Four aspects of self-image close to death at home

Living close to death means an inevitable confrontation with one's own existential limitation. In this article, we argue that everyday life close to death embodies an identity work in progress. We used a narrative approach and a holistic-content reading to analyze 12 interviews conducted with three persons close to death. By illuminating the unique stories and identifying patterns among the participants’ narratives, we found four themes exemplifying important aspects of the identity work related to everyday life close to death. Two of the themes, named “Inside and outside of me” and “Searching for togetherness,” represented the core of the self-image and were framed by the other themes, “My place in space” and “My death and my time.” Our findings elucidate the way the individual stories moved between the past, the present, and the future. This study challenges the idea that everyday life close to impending death primarily means limitations. The findings show that the search for meaning, new knowledge, and community can form a part of a conscious and ongoing identity work close to death

Openness and archaeology's information ecosystem

The rise of the World Wide Web represents one of the most significant transitions in communicationssince the printing press or even since the origins of writing. To Open Access and Open Data advocates,the Web offers great opportunity for expanding the accessibility, scale, diversity, and quality ofarchaeological communications. Nevertheless, Open Access and Open Data face steep adoption barriers.Critics wrongfully see Open Access as a threat to peer review. Others see data transparency as naivelytechnocratic, and lacking in an appreciation of archaeology’s social and professional incentive structure.However, as argued in this paper, the Open Access and Open Data movements do not gloss oversustainability, quality and professional incentive concerns. Rather, these reform movements offer muchneeded and trenchant critiques of the Academy’s many dysfunctions. These dysfunctions, ranging fromthe expectations of tenure and review committees to the structure of the academic publishing industry, golargely unknown and unremarked by most archaeologists. At a time of cutting fiscal austerity, OpenAccess and Open Data offer desperately needed ways to expand research opportunities, reduce costs andexpand the equity and effectiveness of archaeological communication

Reproducibility and normal values of static pupil diameters

Purpose - To provide additional information on normal values of static pupil diameter measurements for binocular infrared pupillometry with PupilX, a commercial pupillometer, and assess the reproducibility of this device's measurements. Methods - The pupil diameters from 91 study participants with normal eyes with an average age of 39.7 years (SD 16.4 years) were measured with PupilX under scotopic (0 lx), mesopic (1 lx), and photopic (16 lx) illumination. To assess the repeatability of the device, each measurement was repeated 5 times. Results - The mean pupil diameters were 6.5 mm (SD 1.3 mm), 5.5 mm (SD 1.2 mm), and 4.03 mm (SD 0.9 mm) under scotopic, mesopic, and photopic illumination. Left and right eyes showed no difference in mean pupil diameters. The mean unsigned anisocoria was 0.26 mm (SD 0.32 mm) under scotopic, 0.26 mm (SD 0.27 mm) under mesopic, and 0.19 mm (SD 0.19 mm) under photopic illumination. The decrease in pupil diameter with age was largest for scotopic (≈0.057 mm/y) and smallest for photopic illumination (≈0.025 mm/y). The repeatability of the pupillometer was better than 0.2 mm. Conclusion - This study provides reference values for age- and light-related pupil diameters measured with the PupilX digital pupillometer in normal subjects