Spectroscopy from 2 to 200 keV

The astrophysical processes responsible for line and continuum emission in the spectra range 2 keV to 200 keV are examined from the viewpoint of designing a spectrometer which would operate in this regime. Phenomena considered include fluorescent line radiation in X-ray binaries, magnetically shifted iron lines and cyclotron emission from neutron star surfaces, line emission from cosmically abundant elements in thermal plasmas, and nuclear deexcitation lines in fresh nucleosynthetically produced matter. An instrument consisting of a approximately 10 sq cm array of planar germanium detectors surrounded by a large sodium-iodide anticoincidence shield is described and projected background rates and sensitivities are considered. A sample observing program for a two-day shuttle-based mission is included as an example of the wide range of scientific questions which could be addressed by such an instrument

Understanding Minority Patients’ Beliefs About Hypertension to Reduce Gaps in Communication Between Patients and Clinicians

The authors’ objective was to gain a better understanding of minority patients’ beliefs about hypertension and to use this understanding to develop a model to explain gaps in communication between patients and clinicians. Eighty-eight hypertensive black and Latino adults from 4 inner-city primary care clinics participated in focus groups to elucidate views on hypertension. Participants believed that hypertension was a serious illness in need of treatment. Participants’ diverged from the medical model in their beliefs about the time-course of hypertension (believed hypertension was intermittent); causes of hypertension (believed stress, racism, pollution, and poverty were the important causes); symptoms of hypertension (believed hypertension was primarily present when symptomatic); and treatments for hypertension (preferred alternative treatments that reduced stress over prescription medications). Participants distrusted clinicians who prioritized medications that did not directly address their understanding of the causes or symptoms of hypertension. Patients’ models of understanding chronic asymptomatic illnesses such as hypertension challenge the legitimacy of lifelong, pill-centered treatment. Listening to patients’ beliefs about hypertension may increase trust, improve communication, and encourage better self-management of hypertension

The Role of Canids in Ritual and Domestic Contexts: New Ancient DNA Insights from Complex Hunter-Gatherer Sites in Prehistoric Central California

This study explores the interrelationship between the genus Canis and hunter–gatherers through a case study of prehistoric Native Americans in the San Francisco Bay-Sacramento Delta area. A distinctive aspect of the region\u27s prehistoric record is the interment of canids, variously classified as coyotes, dogs, and wolves. Since these species are difficult to distinguish based solely on morphology, ancient DNA analysis was employed to distinguish species. The DNA study results, the first on canids from archaeological sites in California, are entirely represented by domesticated dogs (including both interments and disarticulated samples from midden deposits). These results, buttressed by stable isotope analyses, provide new insight into the complex interrelationship between humans and canids in both ritual and prosaic contexts, and reveal a more prominent role for dogs than previously envisioned

Inequality and Procedural Justice in Social Dilemmas

This study investigates the influence of resource inequality and the fairness of the allocation procedure of unequal resources on cooperative behavior in social dilemmas. We propose a simple formal behavioral model that incorporates conflicting selfish and social motivations. This model allows us to predict how inequality influences cooperative behavior. Allocation of resources is manipulated by three treatments that vary in terms of procedural justice: allocating resources randomly, based on merit, and based on ascription. As predicted, procedural justice influences cooperation significantly. Moreover, gender is found to be an important factor interacting with the association between procedural justice and cooperative behavior.

Can illness beliefs, from the common-sense model, prospectively predict adherence to self-management behaviours?: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Objective: To determine whether people’s beliefs about their illness, conceptualised by the common sense model (CSM), can prospectively predict adherence to self-management behaviours (including, attendance, medication, diet and exercise) in adults with acute and chronic physical illnesses. Design and Main Outcome Measures: Electronic databases were searched in September 2014, for papers specifying the use of the ‘CSM’ in relation to ‘self-management’, ‘rehabilitation’ and ‘adherence’ in the context of physical illness. Six hundred abstracts emerged. Data from 52 relevant studies were extracted. Twenty-one studies were meta-analysed, using correlation coefficients in random effects models. The remainder were descriptively synthesised. Results: The effect sizes for individual illness belief domains and adherence to self-management behaviours ranged from .04 to .13, indicating very weak, predictive relationships. Further analysis revealed that predictive relationships did not differ by the: type of self-management behaviour; acute or chronic illness; or duration of follow-up. Conclusion: Individual illness belief domains, outlined by the CSM, did not predict adherence to self-management behaviours in adults with physical illnesses. Prospective relationships, controlling for past behaviour, also did not emerge. Other factors, including patients’ treatment beliefs and inter-relationships between individual illness beliefs domains, may have influenced potential associations with adherence to self-management behaviours

Characterizing Polytobacco Use Trajectories and Their Associations With Substance Use and Mental Health Across Mid-Adolescence.

Background:Polytobacco product use is suspected to be common, dynamic across time, and increase risk for adverse behavioral outcomes. We statistically modeled characteristic types of polytobacco use trajectories during mid-adolescence and tested their prospective association with substance use and mental health problems. Methods:Adolescents (N = 3393) in Los Angeles, CA, were surveyed semiannually from 9th to 11th grade. Past 6-month combustible cigarette, e-cigarette, or hookah use (yes/no) over four assessments were analyzed using parallel growth mixture modeling to identify a parsimonious set of polytobacco use trajectories. A tobacco product use trajectory group was used to predict substance use and mental health at the fifth assessment. Results:Three profiles were identified: (1) tobacco nonusers (N = 2291, 67.5%) with the lowest use prevalence (<3%) of all products across all timepoints; (2) polyproduct users (N = 920, 27.1%) with moderate use prevalence of each product (8-35%) that escalated for combustible cigarettes but decreased for e-cigarettes and hookah across time; and (3) chronic polyproduct users (N = 182, 5.4%) with high prevalence of each product use (38-86%) that escalated for combustible cigarettes and e-cigarettes. Nonusers, polyproduct users, and chronic polyproduct users reported successively higher alcohol, marijuana, and illicit drug use and ADHD at the final follow-up, respectively. Both tobacco using groups (vs. nonusers) reported greater odds of depression and anxiety at the final follow-up but did not differ from each other. Conclusions:Adolescent polytobacco use may involve a common moderate risk trajectory and a less common high-risk chronic trajectory. Both trajectories predict substance use and mental health symptomology. Implications:Variation in use and co-use of combustible cigarette, e-cigarette, and hookah use in mid-adolescence can be parsimoniously characterized by a small set common trajectory profiles in which polyproduct use are predominant patterns of tobacco product use, which predict adverse behavioral outcomes. Prevention and policy addressing polytobacco use (relative to single product use) may be optimal tobacco control strategies for youth, which may in turn prevent other forms of substance use and mental health problems

Participation in physical play and leisure : developing a theory- and evidence-based intervention for children with motor impairments

Peer reviewedPublisher PD

The experience of living with knee osteoarthritis: exploring illness and treatment beliefs through thematic analysis

Purpose: Knee osteoarthritis (OA) is a major cause of disability in older adults. However, there is limited research on the daily experience of living with knee OA. We aimed to offer insight into the beliefs of patients with knee OA about their illness and treatment. Method: Twenty-four semi-structured interviews were conducted with 17 women and 7 men with physician-diagnosed knee OA, aged between 48 and 84 years (mean 1/4 62, SD 1/4 7). The audio-taped interviews lasted from 30 min to 1 h, and were transcribed verbatim. The data were subjected to thematic analysis. The transcripts were independently coded by two researchers to increase reliability of coding. Results: Six themes were developed and two of these are examined in further detail: (i) Illness representation and (ii) Beliefs about the medical and surgical control of pain. Illness representation comprised beliefs about people’s understanding of OA and their pain experience, as well as expectations about the course of illness. The second theme presented experiences of limited pain relief and concerns about the use of drugs and surgery. Conclusion: Exploring illness representations and beliefs about medical and surgical control of pain may provide the basis for initiating psychological interventions for people with knee OA

Processes of Change in an Asthma Self-Care Intervention

The final version of this paper has been published in Qualitative Health Research, Vol. 23 (10), October 2013 by SAGE Publications Ltd, All rights reserved. © It is available at: http://qhr.sagepub.com/content/23/10/1419.longIn this article, we present a qualitative exploration of the psychological and communication processes that occur within an intervention to improve self-care for people with asthma. In the context of a primary-care-based trial of the intervention, we collected data at three time points for 21 patients, comprising 2 audiotaped consultations (nurse and patient together) and individual semistructured interviews 3 months after the second consultation. Using framework analysis, we identified both psychological processes (illness understanding, affective response to asthma, and reasoned motivation) and patientGÇôprovider interactions (active patient involvement and individual tailoring). We use these findings to extend and refine the pre-existing theoretical model of behavior change underpinning the intervention, in particular with relation to patientGÇôprovider interaction processes. We conclude that it is important for developers and providers of asthma self-care interventions to attend to the style of delivery as well as the behavior change techniques involved

Requirement of Cognate CD4+ T-Cell Recognition for the Regulation of Allospecific CTL by Human CD4+CD127−CD25+FOXP3+ Cells Generated in MLR

Although immunoregulation of alloreactive human CTLs has been described, the direct influence of CD4+ Tregs on CD8+ cytotoxicity and the interactive mechanisms have not been well clarified. Therefore, human CD4+CD127−CD25+FOXP3+ Tregs were generated in MLR, immunoselected and their allospecific regulatory functions and associated mechanisms were then tested using modified 51Chromium release assays (Micro-CML), MLRs and CFSE-based multi-fluorochrome flow cytometry proliferation assays. It was observed that increased numbers of CD4+CD127−CD25+FOXP3+ cells were generated after a 7 day MLR. After immunoselection for CD4+CD127−CD25+ cells, they were designated as MLR-Tregs. When added as third component modulators, MLR-Tregs inhibited the alloreactive proliferation of autologous PBMC in a concentration dependent manner. The inhibition was quasi-antigen specific, in that the inhibition was non-specific at higher MLR-Treg modulator doses, but non-specificity disappeared with lower numbers at which specific inhibition was still significant. When tested in micro-CML assays CTL inhibition occurred with PBMC and purified CD8+ responders. However, antigen specificity of CTL inhibition was observed only with unpurified PBMC responders and not with purified CD8+ responders or even with CD8+ responders plus Non-T “APC”. However, allospecificity of CTL regulation was restored when autologous purified CD4+ T cells were added to the CD8+ responders. Proliferation of CD8+ cells was suppressed by MLR-Tregs in the presence or absence of IL-2. Inhibition by MLR-Tregs was mediated through down-regulation of intracellular perforin, granzyme B and membrane-bound CD25 molecules on the responding CD8+ cells. Therefore, it was concluded that human CD4+CD127−CD25+FOXP3+ MLR-Tregs down-regulate alloreactive cytotoxic responses. Regulatory allospecificity, however, requires the presence of cognate responding CD4+ T cells. CD8+ CTL regulatory mechanisms include impaired proliferation, reduced expression of cytolytic molecules and CD25+ activation epitopes