Effect of Microstructure on the Permeability and Sorption of Wood of Sterculia rhinopetala and Albizia ferruginea

This paper sets to find out the effect of the microstructure of wood on the permeability and sorption of the wood of Sterculia rhinopetala and Albizia ferruginea. Permeability, the way of ingress of water into wood mass, is one of the most variable properties of timber and it further influences nearly all the physical properties of wood. Wood exposed to high humidity conditions or to liquid water during use may be subjected to biological deterioration which makes equilibrium moisture content of wood very important. Equilibrium moisture content is the moisture level where the wood neither gains nor loses moisture since it is at equilibrium with the relative humidity and temperature of the surrounding environment. Sixteen randomly sampled specimens of each of the wood of Sterculia rhinopetala and Albizia ferruginea species (heartwood and sapwood) with dimensions 3 cm x 3 cm x 3 cm were exposed at various relative humidity conditions of 30 %, 45 %, 60 %, 75 % and 90 % in a temperature and humidity-controlled climate chamber. The order of water uptake in terms of percentage volume is arranged from the lowest to the highest. Sterculia rhinopetala heartwood had the lowest uptake per volume with a value of 0.31 %. On the uptake per weight Sterculia rhinopetala heartwood again had the lowest uptake whilst Albizia ferruginea had the highest with a value of 6.77 %. The sapwood of Sterculia rhinopetala had a relatively higher uptake per volume value of 0.53 % and a value of uptake per weight of 0.72 %  compared to the heartwood. The equilibrium moisture content values of Sterculia rhinopetala suggests that it can have minimal dimensional changes when used in both the Southern and the Northern parts of Ghana.

Rapid testing for malaria in settings where microscopy is available and peripheral clinics where only presumptive treatment is available: a randomised controlled trial in Ghana

Objective To test in West Africa the impact of rapid diagnostic tests on the prescription of antimalarials and antibiotics both where microscopy is used for the diagnosis of malaria and in clinical (peripheral) settings that rely on clinical diagnosis

Clinical features and management of individuals admitted to hospital with monkeypox and associated complications across the UK: a retrospective cohort study.

BACKGROUND The scale of the 2022 global mpox (formerly known as monkeypox) outbreak has been unprecedented. In less than 6 months, non-endemic countries have reported more than 67 000 cases of a disease that had previously been rare outside of Africa. Mortality has been reported as rare but hospital admission has been relatively common. We aimed to describe the clinical and laboratory characteristics and outcomes of individuals admitted to hospital with mpox and associated complications, including tecovirimat recipients. METHODS In this cohort study, we undertook retrospective review of electronic clinical records and pathology data for all individuals admitted between May 6, and Aug 3, 2022, to 16 hospitals from the Specialist and High Consequence Infectious Diseases Network for Monkeypox. The hospitals were located in ten cities in England and Northern Ireland. Inclusion criteria were clinical signs consistent with mpox and MPXV DNA detected from at least one clinical sample by PCR testing. Patients admitted solely for isolation purposes were excluded from the study. Key outcomes included admission indication, complications (including pain, secondary infection, and mortality) and use of antibiotic and anti-viral treatments. Routine biochemistry, haematology, microbiology, and virology data were also collected. Outcomes were assessed in all patients with available data. FINDINGS 156 individuals were admitted to hospital with complicated mpox during the study period. 153 (98%) were male and three (2%) were female, with a median age of 35 years (IQR 30-44). Gender data were collected from electronic patient records, which encompassed full formal review of clincian notes. The prespecified options for data collection for gender were male, female, trans, non-binary, or unknown. 105 (71%) of 148 participants with available ethnicity data were of White ethnicity and 47 (30%) of 155 were living with HIV with a median CD4 count of 510 cells per mm (IQR 349-828). Rectal or perianal pain (including proctitis) was the most common indication for hospital admission (44 [28%] of 156). Severe pain was reported in 89 (57%) of 156, and secondary bacterial infection in 82 (58%) of 142 individuals with available data. Median admission duration was 5 days (IQR 2-9). Ten individuals required surgery and two cases of encephalitis were reported. 38 (24%) of the 156 individuals received tecovirimat with early cessation in four cases (two owing to hepatic transaminitis, one to rapid treatment response, and one to patient choice). No deaths occurred during the study period. INTERPRETATION Although life-threatening mpox appears rare in hospitalised populations during the current outbreak, severe mpox and associated complications can occur in immunocompetent individuals. Analgesia and management of superimposed bacterial infection are priorities for patients admitted to hospital

Search for gravitational-lensing signatures in the full third observing run of the LIGO-Virgo network

Gravitational lensing by massive objects along the line of sight to the source causes distortions of gravitational wave-signals; such distortions may reveal information about fundamental physics, cosmology and astrophysics. In this work, we have extended the search for lensing signatures to all binary black hole events from the third observing run of the LIGO--Virgo network. We search for repeated signals from strong lensing by 1) performing targeted searches for subthreshold signals, 2) calculating the degree of overlap amongst the intrinsic parameters and sky location of pairs of signals, 3) comparing the similarities of the spectrograms amongst pairs of signals, and 4) performing dual-signal Bayesian analysis that takes into account selection effects and astrophysical knowledge. We also search for distortions to the gravitational waveform caused by 1) frequency-independent phase shifts in strongly lensed images, and 2) frequency-dependent modulation of the amplitude and phase due to point masses. None of these searches yields significant evidence for lensing. Finally, we use the non-detection of gravitational-wave lensing to constrain the lensing rate based on the latest merger-rate estimates and the fraction of dark matter composed of compact objects