The status and function of minstrels in England between 1350 and 1400

Scholarly interest in minstrels and their literature began in the eighteenth century.I have studied the most important works on this subject from that period up to the present day, and have concluded that although much material has been collected, it needs more discriminating classification and reconsideration within a fairly strict limit of time and place. I have therefore concentrated upon minstrels in England in the years between 1350 and 1400. The progress of scholarship has made available a number of records such as Household Accounts which contain many references to minstrels but which have not yet been systematically drawn on for evidence. I have confined my work to printed records, and have studied three account books in order to gather as much information as possible about the payment, functions,and status of minstrels in England in the second half of the fourteenth century. I have also examined the principal literary texts of this period for what authors say about minstrels. The fourteenth century metrical romances form an indigenous literary group which has been thought to possess a special relationship to minstrels. In an attempt to clarify this relationship, I have studied twenty representative romances for indications of audience level, authorship, and method of delivery. Other work relating to minstrels has been presented in Appendices. These include an appendix on the Tutbury Minstrels Court and Bull-running, the relationship between heralds and. minstrels, the musical instruments connected with minstrelsy, and a series of passages from the metrical romances indicating techniques relating to oral delivery

Long-term sensorimotor adaptation in the ocular following system of primates

The sudden movement of a wide-field image leads to a reflexive eye tracking response referred to as short-latency ocular following. If the image motion occurs soon after a saccade the initial speed of the ocular following is enhanced, a phenomenon known as post-saccadic enhancement. We show in macaque monkeys that repeated exposure to the same stimulus regime over a period of months leads to progressive increases in the initial speeds of ocular following. The improvement in tracking speed occurs for ocular following with and without a prior saccade. As a result of the improvement in ocular following speeds, the influence of post-saccadic enhancement wanes with increasing levels of training. The improvement in ocular following speed following repeated exposure to the same oculomotor task represents a novel form of sensori-motor learning in the context of a reflexive movement

Уменьшение бремени бронхиальной астмы: улучшение качества жизни пациентов

As a serious chronic illness, asthma imposes a significant burden on society in terms of cost to patients, their families and the healthcare and social security system. More specifically, the burden on patients is characterised by impact on lifestyle and well-being, as well as on livelihood. Instruments are available that describe and measure the impact of asthma and its treatment on patients’ health-related quality of life, and a number of these have translated and adapted for use in Russia. Use of these will contribute to improvement in care of asthma patients in Russia in the future.Поскольку бронхиальная астма является хроническим заболеванием, связанные в ней расходы ложатся тяжелым бременем на общество, пациентов, их семьи, а также на систему здравоохранения и социального/медицинского страхования. В частности, влияние бронхиальной астмы на пациентов характеризуется нарушением их образа жизни и благополучия. Существуют специальные анкеты и опросники, которые позволяют оценить влияние бронхиальной астмы и методов ее лечения на качество жизни больных. Многие из них переведены и адаптированы для использования в России. Применение этих анкет и опросников может оказать помощь в улучшении качества оказания медицинской помощи больным бронхиальной астмой в России

Radiation tails and boundary conditions for black hole evolutions

In numerical computations of Einstein's equations for black hole spacetimes, it will be necessary to use approximate boundary conditions at a finite distance from the holes. We point out here that ``tails,'' the inverse power-law decrease of late-time fields, cannot be expected for such computations. We present computational demonstrations and discussions of features of late-time behavior in an evolution with a boundary condition.Comment: submitted to Phys. Rev.

An investigation into the effects of, and interaction between, heel height and shoe upper stiffness on plantar pressure and comfort

High heeled shoes remain popular, nevertheless it is not clear what influence manipulating characteristics of this footwear has on their functioning. It is accepted that shoe features other than heel height can affect plantar pressures. However, few investigations have compared such features, and none have compared the influence of modifying upper material stiffness, whilst systematically increasing heel height. A firm understanding of the interactions of footwear properties is essential to ensure that footwear designers can optimise design for the comfort and health of the wearer. This paper investigates a feature that is known to reduce comfort (heel height) and a feature that is easy to change without affecting aesthetics (material stiffness) to better understand the effects of their interaction on plantar pressure and comfort. Sixteen female participants with experience wearing high heels wore a range of shoes with five effective heel heights (35-75 mm) and two upper materials (with different stiffness). In-shoe plantar pressure was recorded and participants completed a comfort questionnaire. Increasing heel height increased plantar pressure under the metatarsal heads, while reducing pressure in the hallux and heel. Higher heel heights also lead to increased discomfort, particularly in the toes where discomfort increased 154.3% from the 35 to 75 mm heels. Upper stiffness did not affect plantar pressure. However, stiffer uppers significantly increased reported discomfort, most notably on top of the foot (108.6%), the back of the heel (87.7%), the overall width (99%), and the overall comfort (100.7%). Significant interaction effects between heel height and upper material existed for comfort questionnaire data. Manipulating heel height alters plantar pressure and comfort, and choice of upper material is paramount to achieving wearer comfort in heels

Formation of an ordered phase in neutron star matter

In this work, we explore the possible formation of ordered phases in hadronic matter, related to the presence of hyperons at high densities. We analyze a microscopic mechanism which can lead to the crystallization of the hyperonic sector by the confinement of the hyperons on the nodes of a lattice. For this purpose, we introduce a simplified model of the hadronic plasma, in which the nuclear interaction between protons, neutrons and hyperons is mediated by meson fields. We find that, for some reasonable sets of values of the model parameters, such ordered phases are energetically favoured as density increases beyond a threshold value.Comment: 16 pages, 14 figures, submitted to NP

The Asymptotic D- to S-State Ratio for 3-He

This work was supported by the National Science Foundation Grant NSF PHY 81-14339 and by Indiana Universit

Evaluation of the performance of a lateral flow device for quantitative detection of anti-SARS-CoV-2 IgG

Introduction: The AbC-19™ lateral flow immunoassay (LFIA) performance was evaluated on plasma samples from a SARS-CoV-2 vaccination cohort, WHO international standards for anti-SARS-CoV-2 IgG (human), individuals ≥2 weeks from infection of RT-PCR confirmed SARS-CoV-2 genetic variants, as well as microorganism serology. Methods: Pre-vaccination to three weeks post-booster samples were collected from a cohort of 111 patients (including clinically extremely vulnerable patients) from Northern Ireland. All patients received Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccination for the first and second dose, and Pfizer-BioNTech for the third (first booster). WHO international standards, 15 samples from 2 variants of concern (Delta and Omicron) and cross-reactivity with plasma samples from other microorganism infections were also assessed on AbC-19™. Results: All 80 (100%) participants sampled post-booster had high positive IgG responses, compared to 38/95 (40%) participants at 6 months post-first vaccination. WHO standard results correlated with information from corresponding biological data sheets, and antibodies to all genetic variants were detected by LFIA. No cross-reactivity was found with exception of one (of five) Dengue virus samples. Conclusion: These findings suggest BNT162b2 booster vaccination enhanced humoral immunity to SARS-CoV-2 from pre-booster levels, and that this antibody response was detectable by the LFIA. In combination with cross-reactivity, standards and genetic variant results would suggest LFIA may be a cost-effective measure to assess SARS-CoV-2 antibody status

Against `Realism'

We examine the prevalent use of the phrase ``local realism'' in the context of Bell's Theorem and associated experiments, with a focus on the question: what exactly is the ``realism'' in ``local realism'' supposed to mean? Carefully surveying several possible meanings, we argue that all of them are flawed in one way or another as attempts to point out a second premise (in addition to locality) on which the Bell inequalities rest, and (hence) which might be rejected in the face of empirical data violating the inequalities. We thus suggest that this vague and abused phrase ``local realism'' should be banned from future discussions of these issues, and urge physicists to revisit the foundational questions behind Bell's Theorem

Constraints on the ecomorphological convergence of zooplanktivorous butterflyfishes

Whether distantly related organisms evolve similar strategies to meet the demands of a shared ecological niche depends on their evolutionary history and the nature of form–function relationships. In fishes, the visual identification and consumption of microscopic zooplankters, selective zooplanktivory, is a distinct type of foraging often associated with a suite of morphological specializations. Previous work has identified inconsistencies in the trajectory and magnitude of morphological change following transitions to selective zooplanktivory, alluding to the diversity and importance of ancestral effects. Here we investigate whether transitions to selective zooplanktivory have influenced the morphological evolution of marine butterflyfishes (family Chaetodontidae), a group of small-prey specialists well known for several types of high-precision benthivory. Using Bayesian ancestral state estimation, we inferred the recent evolution of zooplanktivory among benthivorous ancestors that hunted small invertebrates and browsed by picking or scraping coral polyps. Traits related to the capture of prey appear to be functionally versatile, with little morphological distinction between species with benthivorous and planktivorous foraging modes. In contrast, multiple traits related to prey detection or swimming performance are evolving toward novel, zooplanktivore-specific optima. Despite a relatively short evolutionary history, general morphological indistinctiveness, and evidence of constraint on the evolution of body size, convergent evolution has closed a near significant amount of the morphological distance between zooplanktivorous species. Overall, our findings describe the extent to which the functional demands associated with selective zooplanktivory have led to generalizable morphological features among butterflyfishes and highlight the importance of ancestral effects in shaping patterns of morphological convergence