The effect of visual impairment on quality of life of children aged 3-16 years

Background: It is well known that visual impairment (VI) has a detrimental effect on Quality of Life (QoL) in adults. Little is known about the effects of VI in childhood. Aims: To evaluate the effects of VI on QoL of children. To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study containing a comparison arm for children with VI. Methods: QoL in children with VI (n¼24, age 10.1362.89, 18 male, 6 female) was compared with an age-matched comparison group (n¼24, age 9.8362.81, 18 male, 6 female) using the Low Vision Quality of Life Questionnaire. Factors (distance and near visual acuity and age) that could be used as predictors of QoL were assessed. These were measured with standard clinical tests. Results: Children with VI had significantly lower QoL scores than the comparison group (p<0.001), resulting in a 35.6% reduction in total QoL score. QoL scores in children with VI were correlated with distance and near visual acuity (p<0.05). 38% of the variance could be predicted by these factors and age. Conclusions: Consideration of the effects of this reduced QoL must be made. Further studies are needed to establish the benefit to QoL of different habilitation strategies

The migration of fluid droplets and their interactions in a thermal gradient

When materials are processed in free fall, buoyant forces will be substantially reduced. Thus, the buoyant migration of droplets and bubbles which normally occurs on earth is expected to be overshadowed by migration due to other mechanisms in space processing. In particular, capillary forces on droplets due to the variation of interfacial tension around their periphery will play a significant role in governing their motion in space. While such interfacial tension gradients can be caused by thermal, compositional, and/or electrical gradients in the continuous phase, thermal gradients are convenient to use in controlled experimentation. On earth, due to interference from buoyant effects, it is difficult to study thermocapillary migration in sufficient detail. Also, the effects of a thermal gradient on the interactions among droplets are hard to study on Earth. Thus, an orbital facility for conducting experiments on the migration and interactions of fluid droplets in a continuous phase due to the action of a thermal gradient appears attractive

Sugars of pearl millet [Pennisetum americanum (L.) Leeke] grains

The sugars in the grains of nine pearl millet cultivars were fractionated through a Biogel column. Five different sugars‘(stachyose, raffinose, sucrose, glucose, and fructose) were identified. Sucrose was predominant in all the cultivars. Raffinose content was high as compared to other cereals, and maltose was absen

Interaction effects in thermocapillary bubble migration

Two bubbles migrating along their line of centers under the influence of an imposed thermal gradient are considered in the quasi-static limit. Results are reported for representative values of the governing parameters

New lower bounds for the independence number of sparse graphs and hypergraphs

We obtain new lower bounds for the independence number of $K_r$-free graphs and linear $k$-uniform hypergraphs in terms of the degree sequence. This answers some old questions raised by Caro and Tuza \cite{CT91}. Our proof technique is an extension of a method of Caro and Wei \cite{CA79, WE79}, and we also give a new short proof of the main result of \cite{CT91} using this approach. As byproducts, we also obtain some non-trivial identities involving binomial coefficients