The Effect of Simulated Lunar Dust on the Absorptivity, Emissivity, and Operating Temperature on AZ-93 and Ag/FEP Thermal Control Surfaces

JSC-1AF lunar simulant has been applied to AZ-93 and AgFEP thermal control surfaces on aluminum or composite substrates in a simulated lunar environment. The temperature of these surfaces was monitored as they were heated with a solar simulator and cooled in a 30 K coldbox. Thermal modeling was used to determine the absorptivity ( ) and emissivity ( ) of the thermal control surfaces in both their clean and dusted states. Then, a known amount of power was applied to the samples while in the coldbox and the steady state temperatures measured. It was found that even a submonolayer of simulated lunar dust can significantly degrade the performance of both white paint and second-surface mirror type thermal control surfaces under these conditions. Contrary to earlier studies, dust was found to affect as well as . Dust lowered the emissivity by as much as 16 percent in the case of AZ-93, and raised it by as much as 11 percent in the case of AgFEP. The degradation of thermal control surface by dust as measured by / rose linearly regardless of the thermal control coating or substrate, and extrapolated to degradation by a factor 3 at full coverage by dust. Submonolayer coatings of dust were found to not significantly change the steady state temperature at which a shadowed thermal control surface will radiate

Psychological factors and cardiac repolarization instability during anger in implantable cardioverter defibrillator patients

BACKGROUND: Evidence indicates that emotions such as anger are associated with increased incidence of sudden cardiac death, but the biological mechanisms remain unclear. We tested the hypothesis that, in patients with sudden death vulnerability, anger would be associated with arrhythmic vulnerability, indexed by cardiac repolarization instability. METHODS: Patients with coronary artery disease (CAD) and an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD; n = 41) and healthy controls (n = 26) gave an anger‐inducing speech (anger recall), rated their current (state) anger, and completed measures of trait (chronic) levels of Anger and Hostility. Repolarization instability was measured using QT Variability Index (QTVI) at resting baseline and during anger recall using continuous ECG. RESULTS: ICD patients had significantly higher QTVI at baseline and during anger recall compared with controls, indicating greater arrhythmic vulnerability overall. QTVI increased from baseline to anger recall to a similar extent in both groups. In ICD patients but not controls, during anger recall, self‐rated anger was related to QTVI (r = .44, p = .007). Trait (chronic) Anger Expression (r = .26, p = .04), Anger Control (r = −.26, p = .04), and Hostility (r = .25, p = .05) were each associated with the change in QTVI from baseline to anger recall (ΔQTVI). Moderation analyses evaluated whether psychological trait associations with ΔQTVI were specific to the ICD group. Results indicated that Hostility scores predicted ΔQTVI from baseline to anger recall in ICD patients (β = 0.07, p = .01), but not in controls. CONCLUSIONS: Anger increases repolarization lability, but in patients with CAD and arrhythmic vulnerability, chronic and acute anger interact to trigger cardiac repolarization lability associated with susceptibility to malignant arrhythmias

Grouping practices in the primary school: what influences change?

During the 1990s, there was considerable emphasis on promoting particular kinds of pupil grouping as a means of raising educational standards. This survey of 2000 primary schools explored the extent to which schools had changed their grouping practices in responses to this, the nature of the changes made and the reasons for those changes. Forty eight percent of responding schools reported that they had made no change. Twenty two percent reported changes because of the literacy hour, 2% because of the numeracy hour, 7% because of a combination of these and 21% for other reasons. Important influences on decisions about the types of grouping adopted were related to pupil learning and differentiation, teaching, the implementation of the national literacy strategy, practical issues and school self-evaluation

Degradation of Spacesuit Fabrics in Low Earth Orbit

Six samples of pristine and dust-abraded outer layer spacesuit fabrics were included in the Materials International Space Station Experiment-7, in which they were exposed to the wake-side low Earth orbit environment on the International Space Station (ISS) for 18 months in order to determine whether abrasion by lunar dust increases radiation degradation. The fabric samples were characterized using optical microscopy, optical spectroscopy, field emission scanning electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy, and tensile testing before and after exposure on the ISS. Comparison of pre- and post-flight characterizations showed that the environment darkened and reddened all six fabrics, increasing their integrated solar absorptance by 7 to 38 percent. There was a decrease in the ultimate tensile strength and elongation to failure of lunar dust abraded Apollo spacesuit fibers by a factor of four and an increase in the elastic modulus by a factor of two

Which older people decline participation in a primary care trial of physical activity and why: insights from a mixed methods approach

This article is available through the Brunel Open Access Publishing Fund. Copyright 2014 Rogers et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.Background: Physical activity is of vital importance to older peoples’ health. Physical activity intervention studies with older people often have low recruitment, yet little is known about non-participants. Methods: Patients aged 60–74 years from three UK general practices were invited to participate in a nurse-supported pedometer-based walking intervention. Demographic characteristics of 298 participants and 690 non-participants were compared. Health status and physical activity of 298 participants and 183 non-participants who completed a survey were compared using age, sex adjusted odds ratios (OR) (95% confidence intervals). 15 non-participants were interviewed to explore perceived barriers to participation. Results: Recruitment was 30% (298/988). Participants were more likely than non-participants to be female (54% v 47%; p = 0.04) and to live in affluent postcodes (73% v 62% in top quintile; p < 0.001). Participants were more likely than non-participants who completed the survey to have an occupational pension OR 2.06 (1.35-3.13), a limiting longstanding illness OR 1.72 (1.05-2.79) and less likely to report being active OR 0.55 (0.33-0.93) or walking fast OR 0.56 (0.37-0.84). Interviewees supported general practice-based physical activity studies, particularly walking, but barriers to participation included: already sufficiently active, reluctance to walk alone or at night, physical symptoms, depression, time constraints, trial equipment and duration. Conclusion: Gender and deprivation differences suggest some selection bias. However, trial participants reported more health problems and lower activity than non-participants who completed the survey, suggesting appropriate trial selection in a general practice population. Non-participant interviewees indicated that shorter interventions, addressing physical symptoms and promoting confidence in pursuing physical activity, might increase trial recruitment and uptake of practice-based physical activity endeavours.The National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) under its Research for Patient Benefit Programme (Grant Reference Number PB-PG-0909-20055)

Tropical forcing of increased Southern Ocean climate variability revealed by a 140-year subantarctic temperate reconstruction

Occupying 14% of the world’s surface, the Southern Ocean plays a fundamental role in global climate, ocean circulation, carbon cycling and Antarctic ice-sheet stability. Unfortunately, high interannual variability and a dearth of instrumental observations before the 1950s limits our understanding of how marine-atmosphere-ice domains interact on multi-decadal timescales and the impact of anthropogenic forcing. Here we integrate climate-sensitive tree growth with ocean and atmospheric observations on southwest Pacific subantarctic islands that lie at the boundary of polar and subtropical climates (52–54˚S). Our annually-resolved temperature reconstruction captures regional change since the 1870s and demonstrates a significant increase in variability from the mid-twentieth century, a phenomenon predating the observational record. Climate reanalysis and modelling shows a parallel change in tropical Pacific sea surface temperatures that generate an atmospheric Rossby wave train which propagates across a large part of the Southern Hemisphere during the austral spring and summer

Time From Symptom Onset to Treatment and Outcomes after Thrombolytic Therapy

OBJECTIVES: This study sought to examine the relations among patient characteristics, time to thrombolysis and outcomes in the international GUSTO-I trial. BACKGROUND: Studies have shown better left ventricular function and decreased infarct size as well as increased survival with earlier thrombolysis, but the relative benefits of various thrombolytic agents with earlier administration are uncertain. METHODS: We evaluated the relations of baseline characteristics to three prospectively defined time variables: symptom onset to treatment, symptom onset to hospital arrival (presentation delay) and hospital arrival to treatment (treatment delay). We also examined the relations of delays to clinical outcomes and to the relative 30-day mortality benefit with accelerated tissue-type plasminogen activator (t-PA) versus streptokinase. RESULTS: Female, elderly, diabetic and hypertensive patients had longer delays at all stages. Previous infarction or bypass surgery was an additional risk factor for treatment delay. Early thrombolysis was associated with lower overall mortality rate ( 4 h, 9.0%), but no additional relative benefit resulted from earlier treatment with accelerated t-PA versus streptokinase (p = 0.38). Longer presentation and treatment delays were both associated with increased mortality rate (presentation delay 4 h, 8.6%; treatment delay 90 min, 8.1%). As time to treatment increased, the incidence of recurrent ischemia or reinfarction decreased, but the rates of shock, heart failure and stroke increased. CONCLUSIONS: Earlier treatment resulted in better outcomes, regardless of thrombolytic strategy. Elderly, female and diabetic patients were treated later, adding to their already substantial risk

A View of Tropical Cyclones from Above: The Tropical Cyclone Intensity Experiment

Tropical cyclone (TC) outflow and its relationship to TC intensity change and structure were investigated in the Office of Naval Research Tropical Cyclone Intensity (TCI) field program during 2015 using dropsondes deployed from the innovative new High-Definition Sounding System (HDSS) and remotely sensed observations from the Hurricane Imaging Radiometer (HIRAD), both on board the NASA WB-57 that flew in the lower stratosphere. Three noteworthy hurricanes were intensively observed with unprecedented horizontal resolution: Joaquin in the Atlantic and Marty and Patricia in the eastern North Pacific. Nearly 800 dropsondes were deployed from the WB-57 flight level of ∼60,000 ft (∼18 km), recording atmospheric conditions from the lower stratosphere to the surface, while HIRAD measured the surface winds in a 50-km-wide swath with a horizontal resolution of 2 km. Dropsonde transects with 4–10-km spacing through the inner cores of Hurricanes Patricia, Joaquin, and Marty depict the large horizontal and vertical gradients in winds and thermodynamic properties. An innovative technique utilizing GPS positions of the HDSS reveals the vortex tilt in detail not possible before. In four TCI flights over Joaquin, systematic measurements of a major hurricane’s outflow layer were made at high spatial resolution for the first time. Dropsondes deployed at 4-km intervals as the WB-57 flew over the center of Hurricane Patricia reveal in unprecedented detail the inner-core structure and upper-tropospheric outflow associated with this historic hurricane. Analyses and numerical modeling studies are in progress to understand and predict the complex factors that influenced Joaquin’s and Patricia’s unusual intensity changes

Efficacy of a referral and physical activity program for survivors of prostate cancer [ENGAGE]: Rationale and design for a cluster randomised controlled trial

Background: Despite evidence that physical activity improves the health and well-being of prostate cancer survivors, many men do not engage in sufficient levels of activity. The primary aim of this study (ENGAGE) is to determine the efficacy of a referral and physical activity program among survivors of prostate cancer, in terms of increasing participation in physical activity. Secondary aims are to determine the effects of the physical activity program on psychological well-being, quality of life and objective physical functioning. The influence of individual and environmental mediators on participation in physical activity will also be determined.Methods/Design: This study is a cluster randomised controlled trial. Clinicians of prostate cancer survivors will be randomised into either the intervention or control condition. Clinicians in the intervention condition will refer eligible patients (n = 110) to participate in an exercise program, comprising 12 weeks of supervised exercise sessions and unsupervised physical activity. Clinicians allocated to the control condition will provide usual care to eligible patients (n = 110), which does not involve the recommendation of the physical activity program. Participants will be assessed at baseline, 12 weeks, 6 months, and 12 months on physical activity, quality of life, anxiety, depression, self-efficacy, outcome expectations, goals, and socio-structural factors.Discussion: The findings of this study have implications for clinicians and patients with different cancer types or other chronic health conditions. It will contribute to our understanding on the potential impact of clinicians promoting physical activity to patients and the long term health benefits of participating in physical activity programs.<br /

Psychotropic medication use among nursing home residents in Austria: a cross-sectional study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The use of psychotropic medications and their adverse effects in frail elderly has been debated extensively. However, recent data from European studies show that these drugs are still frequently prescribed in nursing home residents. In Austria, prevalence data are lacking. We aimed to determine the prevalence of psychotropic medication prescription in Austrian nursing homes and to explore characteristics associated with their prescription.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Cross-sectional study and association analysis in forty-eight out of 50 nursing homes with 1844 out of a total of 2005 residents in a defined urban-rural region in Austria. Prescribed medication was retrieved from residents' charts. Psychotropic medications were coded according to the Anatomical Therapeutic Chemical Classification 2005. Cluster-adjusted multiple logistic regression analysis was performed to investigate institutional and residents' characteristics associated with prescription.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Residents' mean age was 81; 73% of residents were female. Mean cluster-adjusted prevalence of residents with at least one psychotropic medication was 74.6% (95% confidence interval, CI, 72.0–77.2). A total of 45.9% (95% CI 42.7–49.1) had at least one prescription of an antipsychotic medication. Two third of all antipsychotic medications were prescribed for bedtime use only. Anxiolytics were prescribed in 22.2% (95% CI 20.0–24.5), hypnotics in 13.3% (95% CI 11.3–15.4), and antidepressants in 36.8% (95% CI 34.1–39.6) of residents. None of the institutional characteristics and only few residents' characteristics were significantly associated with psychotropic medication prescription. Permanent restlessness was positively associated with psychotropic medication prescription (AOR 1.54, 95% CI 1.32–1.79) whereas cognitive impairment was inversely associated (AOR 0.70, 95% CI 0.56–0.88).</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Frequency of psychotropic medication prescription is high in Austrian nursing homes compared to recent published data from other countries. Interventions should aim at reduction and optimisation of prescriptions.</p