The Rhetoric of Disfigurement in First World War Britain

During the First World War, the horror of facial mutilation was evoked in journalism, poems, memoirs and fiction; but in Britain it was almost never represented visually outside the professional contexts of clinical medicine and medical history. This article asks why, and offers an account of British visual culture in which visual anxiety and aversion are of central importance. By comparing the rhetoric of disfigurement to the parallel treatment of amputees, an asymmetrical picture emerges in which the ‘worst loss of all’—the loss of one's face—is perceived as a loss of humanity. The only hope was surgery or, if that failed, prosthetic repair: innovations that were often wildly exaggerated in the popular press. Francis Derwent Wood was one of several sculptors whose technical skill and artistic ‘wizardry’ played a part in the improvised reconstruction of identity and humanity

Monitoring Breast Cancer Response to Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy Using Ultrasound Strain Elastography

© 2019 The Authors Strain elastography was used to monitor response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy (NAC) in 92 patients with biopsy-proven, locally advanced breast cancer. Strain elastography data were collected before, during, and after NAC. Relative changes in tumor strain ratio (SR) were calculated over time, and responder status was classified according to tumor size changes. Statistical analyses determined the significance of changes in SR over time and between response groups. Machine learning techniques, such as a naïve Bayes classifier, were used to evaluate the performance of the SR as a marker for Miller-Payne pathological endpoints. With pathological complete response (pCR) as an endpoint, a significant difference (P < .01) in the SR was observed between response groups as early as 2 weeks into NAC. Naïve Bayes classifiers predicted pCR with a sensitivity of 84%, specificity of 85%, and area under the curve of 81% at the preoperative scan. This study demonstrates that strain elastography may be predictive of NAC response in locally advanced breast cancer as early as 2 weeks into treatment, with high sensitivity and specificity, granting it the potential to be used for active monitoring of tumor response to chemotherapy

Regional Gray Matter Correlates of Perceived Emotional Intelligence

Coping with stressful life events requires a degree of skill in the ability to attend to, comprehend, label, communicate and regulate emotions. Individuals vary in the extent to which these skills are developed, with the term ‘alexithymia’ often applied in the clinical and personality literature to those individuals most compromised in these skills. Although a frontal lobe model of alexithymia is emerging, it is unclear whether such a model satisfactorily reflects brain-related patterns associated with perceived emotional intelligence at the facet level. To determine whether these trait meta-mood facets (ability to attend to, have clarity of and repair emotions) have unique gray matter volume correlates, a voxel-based morphometry study was conducted in 30 healthy adults using the Trait Meta Mood Scale while co-varying for potentially confounding sociodemographic variables. Poorer Attention to Emotion was associated with lower gray matter volume in clusters distributed primarily throughout the frontal lobe, with peak correlation in the left medial frontal gyrus. Poorer Mood Repair was related to lower gray matter volume in three clusters in frontal and inferior parietal areas, with peak correlation in the left anterior cingulate. No significant volumetric correlations emerged for the Clarity of Emotion facet. We discuss the localization of these areas in the context of cortical circuits known to be involved in processes of self-reflection and cognitive control

The carbon cycle in Mexico: past, present and future of C stocks and fluxes

PublishedThe Supplement related to this article is available online at doi:10.5194/bg-13-223-2016-supplement.We modeled the carbon (C) cycle in Mexico with a process-based approach. We used different available products (satellite data, field measurements, models and flux towers) to estimate C stocks and fluxes in the country at three different time frames: present (defined as the period 2000–2005), the past century (1901–2000) and the remainder of this century (2010–2100). Our estimate of the gross primary productivity (GPP) for the country was 2137 ± 1023 TgC yr−1 and a total C stock of 34 506 ± 7483 TgC, with 20 347 ± 4622 TgC in vegetation and 14 159 ± 3861 in the soil. Contrary to other current estimates for recent decades, our results showed that Mexico was a C sink over the period 1990–2009 (+31 TgC yr−1) and that C accumulation over the last century amounted to 1210 ± 1040 TgC. We attributed this sink to the CO2 fertilization effect on GPP, which led to an increase of 3408 ± 1060 TgC, while both climate and land use reduced the country C stocks by −458 ± 1001 and −1740 ± 878 TgC, respectively. Under different future scenarios, the C sink will likely continue over the 21st century, with decreasing C uptake as the climate forcing becomes more extreme. Our work provides valuable insights on relevant driving processes of the C cycle such as the role of drought in drylands (e.g., grasslands and shrublands) and the impact of climate change on the mean residence time of soil C in tropical ecosystems.The lead author (G. Murray-Tortarolo) thanks CONACYT-CECTI, the University of Exeter and Secretaría de Educación Pública (SEP) for their funding of this project. The authors extend their thanks to Carlos Ortiz Solorio and to the Colegio de Posgraduados for the field soil data and to the Alianza Redd+ Mexico for the field biomass data. This project would not have been possible without the valuable data from the CMIP5 models. A. Arneth, G. Murray-Tortarolo, A. Wiltshire and S. Sitch acknowledge the support of the European Commission-funded project LULCC4C (grant no. 603542). A. Wiltshire was partsupported by the Joint UK DECC/Defra Met Office Hadley Centre Climate Programme (GA01101)

Regional Gray Matter Correlates of Perceived Emotional Intelligence

Coping with stressful life events requires a degree of skill in the ability to attend to, comprehend, label, communicate and regulate emotions. Individuals vary in the extent to which these skills are developed, with the term ‘alexithymia’ often applied in the clinical and personality literature to those individuals most compromised in these skills. Although a frontal lobe model of alexithymia is emerging, it is unclear whether such a model satisfactorily reflects brain-related patterns associated with perceived emotional intelligence at the facet level. To determine whether these trait meta-mood facets (ability to attend to, have clarity of and repair emotions) have unique gray matter volume correlates, a voxel-based morphometry study was conducted in 30 healthy adults using the Trait Meta Mood Scale while co-varying for potentially confounding sociodemographic variables. Poorer Attention to Emotion was associated with lower gray matter volume in clusters distributed primarily throughout the frontal lobe, with peak correlation in the left medial frontal gyrus. Poorer Mood Repair was related to lower gray matter volume in three clusters in frontal and inferior parietal areas, with peak correlation in the left anterior cingulate. No significant volumetric correlations emerged for the Clarity of Emotion facet. We discuss the localization of these areas in the context of cortical circuits known to be involved in processes of self-reflection and cognitive control

Apathy Is Associated With Ventral Striatum Volume in Schizophrenia Spectrum Disorder

Apathy is prevalent in schizophrenia, but its etiology has received little investigation. The ventral striatum (VS), a key brain region involved in motivated behavior, has been implicated in studies of apathy. We therefore evaluated whether apathy is associated with volume of the VS on MRI in 23 patients with schizophrenia using voxel-based morphometry. Results indicated that greater self-reported apathy severity was associated with smaller volume of the right VS even when controlling for age, gender, depression, and total gray matter volume. The finding suggests that apathy is related to abnormality of brain circuitry subserving motivated behavior in patients with schizophrenia

Role of CO2, climate and land use in regulating the seasonal amplitude increase of carbon fluxes in terrestrial ecosystems: A multimodel analysis

© Author(s) 2016.We examined the net terrestrial carbon flux to the atmosphere (FTA) simulated by nine models from the TRENDY dynamic global vegetation model project for its seasonal cycle and amplitude trend during 1961-2012. While some models exhibit similar phase and amplitude compared to atmospheric inversions, with spring drawdown and autumn rebound, others tend to rebound early in summer. The model ensemble mean underestimates the magnitude of the seasonal cycle by 40g% compared to atmospheric inversions. Global FTA amplitude increase (19g±g8g%) and its decadal variability from the model ensemble are generally consistent with constraints from surface atmosphere observations. However, models disagree on attribution of this long-term amplitude increase, with factorial experiments attributing 83g±g56g%, ĝ'3g±g74 and 20g±g30g% to rising CO2, climate change and land use/cover change, respectively. Seven out of the nine models suggest that CO2 fertilization is the strongest control - with the notable exception of VEGAS, which attributes approximately equally to the three factors. Generally, all models display an enhanced seasonality over the boreal region in response to high-latitude warming, but a negative climate contribution from part of the Northern Hemisphere temperate region, and the net result is a divergence over climate change effect. Six of the nine models show that land use/cover change amplifies the seasonal cycle of global FTA: some are due to forest regrowth, while others are caused by crop expansion or agricultural intensification, as revealed by their divergent spatial patterns. We also discovered a moderate cross-model correlation between FTA amplitude increase and increase in land carbon sink (R2 Combining double low line g0.61). Our results suggest that models can show similar results in some benchmarks with different underlying mechanisms; therefore, the spatial traits of CO2 fertilization, climate change and land use/cover changes are crucial in determining the right mechanisms in seasonal carbon cycle change as well as mean sink change.This study was funded by NOAA, NASA and NSF. This study was partly supported by a Laboratory Directed Research and Development project by Pacific Northwest National Laboratory that is being managed by Battelle Memorial Institute for the US Department of Energy. We thank the TRENDY coordinators and participating modeling teams, NOAA ESRL and Jena/CarbonTracker inversion teams

The terrestrial carbon budget of South and Southeast Asia

This is the final version of the article. Available from IOP Publishing via the DOI in this record.Accomplishing the objective of the current climate policies will require establishing carbon budget and flux estimates in each region and county of the globe by comparing and reconciling multiple estimates including the observations and the results of top-down atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) inversions and bottom-up dynamic global vegetation models. With this in view, this study synthesizes the carbon source/sink due to net ecosystem productivity (NEP), land cover land use change (E LUC), fires and fossil burning (E FIRE) for the South Asia (SA), Southeast Asia (SEA) and South and Southeast Asia (SSEA = SA + SEA) and each country in these regions using the multiple top-down and bottom-up modeling results. The terrestrial net biome productivity (NBP = NEP - E LUC - E FIRE) calculated based on bottom-up models in combination with E FIRE based on GFED4s data show net carbon sinks of 217 ±147, 10 ±55, and 227 ±279 TgC yr-1 for SA, SEA, and SSEA. The top-down models estimated NBP net carbon sinks were 20 ±170, 4 ±90 and 24 ±180 TgC yr-1. In comparison, regional emissions from the combustion of fossil fuels were 495, 275, and 770 TgC yr-1, which are many times higher than the NBP sink estimates, suggesting that the contribution of the fossil fuel emissions to the carbon budget of SSEA results in a significant net carbon source during the 2000s. When considering both NBP and fossil fuel emissions for the individual countries within the regions, Bhutan and Laos were net carbon sinks and rest of the countries were net carbon source during the 2000s. The relative contributions of each of the fluxes (NBP, NEP, E LUC, and E FIRE, fossil fuel emissions) to a nation's net carbon flux varied greatly from country to country, suggesting a heterogeneous dominant carbon fluxes on the country-level throughout SSEA.This research was partly supported by the NASA Land Cover and Land Use Change Program (NNX14AD94G) and the US National Science Foundation (No. NSF-AGS-12-43071)

Regional carbon fluxes from land use and land cover change in Asia, 1980–2009

This is the final version of the article. Available from IOP Publishing via the DOI in this record.We present a synthesis of the land-atmosphere carbon flux from land use and land cover change (LULCC) in Asia using multiple data sources and paying particular attention to deforestation and forest regrowth fluxes. The data sources are quasi-independent and include the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization-Forest Resource Assessment (FAO-FRA 2015; country-level inventory estimates), the Emission Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGARv4.3), the 'Houghton' bookkeeping model that incorporates FAO-FRA data, an ensemble of 8 state-of-the-art Dynamic Global Vegetation Models (DGVM), and 2 recently published independent studies using primarily remote sensing techniques. The estimates are aggregated spatially to Southeast, East, and South Asia and temporally for three decades, 1980–1989, 1990–1999 and 2000–2009. Since 1980, net carbon emissions from LULCC in Asia were responsible for 20%–40% of global LULCC emissions, with emissions from Southeast Asia alone accounting for 15%–25% of global LULCC emissions during the same period. In the 2000s and for all Asia, three estimates (FAO-FRA, DGVM, Houghton) were in agreement of a net source of carbon to the atmosphere, with mean estimates ranging between 0.24 to 0.41 Pg C yr−1, whereas EDGARv4.3 suggested a net carbon sink of −0.17 Pg C yr−1. Three of 4 estimates suggest that LULCC carbon emissions declined by at least 34% in the preceding decade (1990–2000). Spread in the estimates is due to the inclusion of different flux components and their treatments, showing the importance to include emissions from carbon rich peatlands and land management, such as shifting cultivation and wood harvesting, which appear to be consistently underreported.This work was supported by the Asia Pacific Network for Global Change Research (ARCP2013-01CMY-Patra/Canadell). LC was supported by the National Science Foundation East Asia Pacific Summer Institute (EAPSI) Fellowship. KI and PP were supported by the Environment Research and Technology Development Funds (2-1401) from the Ministry of the Environment of Japan. JGC thanks the support from the Australian Climate Change Science Program. AI and EK were supported by ERTDF (S-10) by the Ministry of the Environment, Japan. CK is supported by DOE-BER through BGC-Feedbacks SFA and NGEE-Tropics. AW was supported by the Joint UK DECC/Defra Met Office Hadley Centre Climate Programme (GA01101) and EU FP7 Funding through project LUC4C (603542)