Development and Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the Community Norms of Child Neglect Scale

This article describes the development of the Community Norms of Child Neglect Scale (CNCNS), a new measure of perceptions of child neglect, for use in community samples. The CNCNS differentiates among four subtypes of neglect (failure to provide for basic needs, lack of supervision, emotional neglect, and educational neglect). Scenarios ranging in seriousness for each subtype were presented to a large community sample (N = 3,809). Confirmatory factor analyses indicated that a four-factor model provided a better fit to the data than did a model specifying only one overall neglect factor, suggesting this sample distinguished among the four subtypes of neglect. The authors tested measurement equivalence across individuals who work with children and lay community respondents and across rural and urban respondents, with results indicating a very similar structure across these groups. These initial reliability and validity data suggest that the CNCNS may be of use in comparing perceptions of child neglect among individuals and across communities

Sustaining Care Team Engagement using a Hierarchy of Needs Framework

Cardiology Intensive Care & Cardiovascular Interventional (CICU & R9 West) teams provide superb care to critically ill cardiac patients at Maine Medical Center. Covid Pandemic revealed the importance of physical and mental health wellbeing, as well as care team engagement in order to continue to provide outstanding care to patients. CICU/R9 West Leadership looked for ways to improve team engagement and ensure that care team members’ needs are met and sustained

The gold standard: accurate stellar and planetary parameters for eight Kepler M dwarf systems enabled by parallaxes

We report parallaxes and proper motions from the Hawaii Infrared Parallax Program for eight nearby M dwarf stars with transiting exoplanets discovered by Kepler. We combine our directly measured distances with mass-luminosity and radius–luminosity relationships to significantly improve constraints on the host stars’ properties. Our astrometry enables the identification of wide stellar companions to the planet hosts. Within our limited sample, all the multi-transiting planet hosts (three of three) appear to be single stars, while nearly all (four of five) of the systems with a single detected planet have wide stellar companions. By applying strict priors on average stellar density from our updated radius and mass in our transit fitting analysis, we measure the eccentricity probability distributions for each transiting planet. Planets in single-star systems tend to have smaller eccentricities than those in binaries, although this difference is not significant in our small sample. In the case of Kepler-42bcd, where the eccentricities are known to be ≃0, we demonstrate that such systems can serve as powerful tests of M dwarf evolutionary models by working in L⋆ − ρ⋆ space. The transit-fit density for Kepler- 42bcd is inconsistent with model predictions at 2.1σ (22%), but matches more empirical estimates at 0.2σ (2%), consistent with earlier results showing model radii of M dwarfs are underinflated. Gaia will provide high-precision parallaxes for the entire Kepler M dwarf sample, and TESS will identify more planets transiting nearby, late-type stars, enabling significant improvements in our understanding of the eccentricity distribution of small planets and the parameters of late-type dwarfs.Support for Program number HST-HF2-51364.001-A was provided by NASA through a grant from the Space Telescope Science Institute, which is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Incorporated, under NASA contract NAS5-26555.Some of the data presented in this paper were obtained from the Mikulski Archive for Space Telescopes (MAST). STScI is operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., under NASA contract NAS5-26555. Support for MAST for non-HST data is provided by the NASA Office of Space Science via grant NNX09AF08G and by other grants and contracts. This paper includes data collected by the Kepler mission. Funding for the Kepler mission is provided by the NASA Science Mission directorate. The authors acknowledge the Texas Advanced Computing Center (TACC) at The University of Texas at Austin for providing HPC resources that have contributed to the research results reported within this paper. URL: http://www.tacc.utexas.edu. (HST-HF2-51364.001-A - NASA through Space Telescope Science Institute; NAS5-26555 - NASA; NNX09AF08G - NASA Office of Space Science; NASA Science Mission directorate

KHARON Is an essential cytoskeletal protein involved in the trafficking of flagellar membrane proteins and cell division in African trypanosomes

African trypanosomes and related kinetoplastid parasites selectively traffic specific membrane proteins to the flagellar membrane, but the mechanisms for this trafficking are poorly understood. We show here that KHARON, a protein originally identified in Leishmania parasites, interacts with a putative trypanosome calcium channel and is required for its targeting to the flagellar membrane. KHARON is located at the base of the flagellar axoneme, where it likely mediates targeting of flagellar membrane proteins, but is also on the subpellicular microtubules and the mitotic spindle. Hence, KHARON is probably a multifunctional protein that associates with several components of the trypanosome cytoskeleton. RNA interference-mediated knockdown of KHARON mRNA results in failure of the calcium channel to enter the flagellar membrane, detachment of the flagellum from the cell body, and disruption of mitotic spindles. Furthermore, knockdown of KHARON mRNA induces a lethal failure of cytokinesis in both bloodstream (mammalian host) and procyclic (insect vector) life cycle stages, and KHARON is thus critical for parasite viability

A Prograde, Low-Inclination Orbit for the Very Hot Jupiter WASP-3b

We present new spectroscopic and photometric observations of the transiting exoplanetary system WASP-3. Spectra obtained during two separate transits exhibit the Rossiter-McLaughlin (RM) effect and allow us to estimate the sky-projected angle between the planetary orbital axis and the stellar rotation axis, lambda = 3.3^{+2.5}_{-4.4} degrees. This alignment between the axes suggests that WASP-3b has a low orbital inclination relative to the equatorial plane of its parent star. During our first night of spectroscopic measurements, we observed an unexpected redshift briefly exceeding the expected sum of the orbital and RM velocities by 140 m/s. This anomaly could represent the occultation of material erupting from the stellar photosphere, although it is more likely to be an artifact caused by moonlight scattered into the spectrograph.Comment: 23 pages, 4 figures, Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal, Replacement includes revised citation

Recommendations for validation testing of home pregnancy tests (HPTs) in Europe

Homepregnancy tests (HPTs) available in Europe include accuracy and other performance claims listed on their packaging. Due to the lack of guidance on the standardisation of such products, it is often difficult to replicate these claims when tested on a clinical sample, whether in a laboratory setting or by lay users. The In Vitro Diagnostic Regulation is a set of requirements that mandate comprehensive validation data on human pregnancy tests and other in vitro devices. It is due to replace the current European Directive (98/79/EC) and fully implemented in Europe by 2022. In June 2019, a panel of seven experts convened to discuss the validation studies required to provide the information needed to meet the new regulation for HPTs in Europe and proposed 15 recommendations for best practice. Defining best practice at all stages of validation of these important tests may ensure that tests marketed inEurope are fit for purpose, enabling lay users to be confident of the high quality of the HPT results they obtain. The panelists believe that the recommendations proposed here for the validation of HPTs may constructively contribute to improved standardisation of validation procedures in Europe.Peer reviewe