Evaluation of \u3ci\u3ePaederus Littorarius\u3c/i\u3e (Coleoptera: Staphylinidae) as an Egg Predator of \u3ci\u3eChrysoteuchia Topiaria\u3c/i\u3e (Lepidoptera: Pyralidae in Wisconsin Cranberry Bogs

A preliminary study was conducted to determine if the rove beetle, Paederus littorarius Grav., would exhibit a feeding preference for the eggs of the pyralid moth, Chrysoteuchia topiaria Zeller, a pest in Wisconsin cran­berry bogs. Individuals were offered a choice of C. topiaria eggs or Drosophila sp. adults for four days. Total number of prey items eaten was converted to weight using a multiplier based on the mean weight of 20 individuals of each prey item, respectively. A significant preference for Drosophila adults was observed in the preference trial; however as many as 24 C. topiaria eggs in addition to Drosophila offerings were consumed by P. littorarius individuals within a 24 h period. Additionally, laboratory and field observations suggests P. littorarius is a polyphagous predator

Charge and Thermoelectric Transport in Semicrystalline Conjugated Polymers and Single-Walled Carbon Nanotube Networks

Due to their flexibility, solution-processability and continuously improving electronic performance, conjugated polymer semiconductors and single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) networks are promising candidates for wearable electronics, flexible optoelectronic devices and thermoelectric generators. In the past two decades the development of high-mobility donor-acceptor copolymers outperforming amorphous silicon, employed in commercial display technologies, and the ability to tune the diameter distribution in SWCNT networks via selective dispersion with conjugated polymers and other sorting methods have been major breakthroughs for these material systems. This thesis provides an improved understanding of their charge and thermoelectric transport. In particular, the charge density and temperature dependence of their field-effect mobility and gated Seebeck coefficient are investigated. When a temperature difference is applied to a conducting system, a thermal voltage builds up as a response. The Seebeck coefficient is the ratio of the thermal voltage to the temperature difference and characterizes the entropy transported by a carrier divided by its charge. Consequently, it offers insights into the transport energetics and the density of states (DoS). It can be used to identify the prevailing transport mechanisms, such as phonon-assisted hopping between localized states or scattering-limited transport through delocalized states, scattering mechanisms and carrier-carrier interactions as well as the extent of charge carrier trapping. Firstly, it is demonstrated that charge transport in semicrystalline high-mobility copolymers is incompatible with disorder-based transport models that were developed for preceding, more disordered polymers. Instead the charge density and temperature dependence of the field-effect mobility and gated Seebeck coefficient of the semicrystalline n-type polymer P(NDI2OD-T2) with varying degrees of crystallinity provides direct evidence for low-disorder, narrow-band conduction. The inclusion of short-range electron-electron interactions and the consideration of a spatially inhomogeneous DoS allow to explain both the measured mobility and Seebeck coefficient. These findings outline the extension of crystalline domains as a mean for improved thermoelectric conversion efficiencies. Subsequently, the charge density and temperature-dependent field-effect mobility and gated Seebeck coefficient of polymer-sorted monochiral small diameter (6,5) (0.76 nm) and mixed large diameter SWCNT (1.17-1.55 nm) networks with different network densities and length distributions are reported. It is shown that charge and thermoelectric transport in SWCNT networks can be modelled by the Boltzmann transport formalism incorporating transport in heterogeneous media and fluctuation-induced tunneling. The charge density and temperature dependence of the Seebeck coefficient can be simulated via the consideration of the diameter-dependent one-dimensional DoS of the SWCNTs composing the network. Due to the carrier relaxation time being anti-proportional to energy, the simulations further point towards a more two-dimensional character of scattering, as opposed to one-dimensional acoustic and optical phonon scattering in single SWCNTs, as well as the potential necessity to consider scattering at SWCNT junctions. Trap-free, narrow DoS distribution, large diameter SWCNT networks, allowing low tunnel barriers and a large thermally accessible DoS, are proposed for both electronic and thermoelectric applications. Finally, the thermoelectric performance of the molecularly doped semicrystalline polymer PBTTT is presented in the high charge density limit, which is relevant for applications in thermoelectric generators. Using the recently reported ion-exchange doping routine charge densities on the order of one carrier per monomer repeat unit can be obtained, allowing to attain a highly conductive system. Ongoing investigations of the impact of polymer alignment on charge and thermoelectric transport in this regime are presented.EPSRC studentshi

Effectiveness of MBSR and MBCT in Reducing Clinical Symptoms in Adolescents

Like adults, many adolescents live with mental health diagnoses and struggle to manage their symptoms. If adolescents do not find effective strategies to manage their symptoms, they may have a profound effect on their quality of life. While mindfulness has been practiced around the globe for thousands of years, it is an emerging method of practice in the mental health field. Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) was developed as a treatment for adults. Mindfulness base cogitative therapy (MBCT) is an intervention adapted from MBSR. The purpose of this systemic review is to explore the effectiveness of MBSR and MBCT in reducing clinical symptoms in adolescents. The results of this review suggest that MBSR and MBCT may be effective in reducing some clinical symptoms in adolescents. MBSR and MBCT are skill-based interventions, that if effective, teach participants skills to manage their symptoms. This is imperative for work with adolescents as it empowers their independence; compared to medication-based treatments that may lead adolescents to believe they require medication to successfully manage their symptoms. This review found that MBSR and MBCT might also be effective when paired with treatment as usual (TAU). Further research that includes both a control and a treatment groups is recommended

Effectiveness of MBSR and MBCT in Reducing Clinical Symptoms in Adolescents

Like adults, many adolescents live with mental health diagnoses and struggle to manage their symptoms. If adolescents do not find effective strategies to manage their symptoms, they may have a profound effect on their quality of life. While mindfulness has been practiced around the globe for thousands of years, it is an emerging method of practice in the mental health field. Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR) was developed as a treatment for adults. Mindfulness base cogitative therapy (MBCT) is an intervention adapted from MBSR. The purpose of this systemic review is to explore the effectiveness of MBSR and MBCT in reducing clinical symptoms in adolescents. The results of this review suggest that MBSR and MBCT may be effective in reducing some clinical symptoms in adolescents. MBSR and MBCT are skill-based interventions, that if effective, teach participants skills to manage their symptoms. This is imperative for work with adolescents as it empowers their independence; compared to medication-based treatments that may lead adolescents to believe they require medication to successfully manage their symptoms. This review found that MBSR and MBCT might also be effective when paired with treatment as usual (TAU). Further research that includes both a control and a treatment groups is recommended

Finding the Winning Combination: How Blending Organ Procurement Systems Used Internationally Can Reduce the Organ Shortage

The shortage in transplantable organs worldwide not only leads to unnecessary death, but also to grave human rights abuses through illegal methods of procuring organs. The shortage leads some desperate to find an organ through any possible means, including purchasing an organ on the black market. The system for procuring organs in the United States is based on altruism, where potential donors have to opt in to the system in order for their organs to be donated. This creates issues at the time of death for medical professionals or the next of kin to decide whether their patient or loved one had decided to donate. This Note explores organ procurement systems used internationally and details the benefits and drawbacks of each. The Author proposes that a blend of some of the systems used internationally could reduce the illegal and immoral methods of organ procurement. The Author argues that the United States needs to implement a national registration system that tracks the willingness of all individuals to donate and is available to hospitals nation-wide through a database. In addition, the Author suggests that non-monetary incentives, including a paired organ exchange and giving priority to those who are themselves listed as donors, will also help decrease the shortage of organs

To recognize the tyranny of distance: A spatial reading of Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt

Distance—physical, material distance—is an obviously spatial concept, but one rarely engaged by legal or feminist geographers. We take up this oversight in relation to the 2016 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt, which adjudicated the constitutionality of a Texas law that imposed new regulations on abortion providers. Because half of the state’s abortion providers were unable to meet these regulations and thus closed, the distance that many Texas women had to travel for abortion services increased dramatically. In part because of these increases, the Supreme Court ultimately determined that the Texas laws imposed an unconstitutional “undue burden.” Bringing together case law and ethnographic data, this article traces the process by which distance is made legally “legible” in the context of reproductive injustice. In so doing, it confronts more uneasy realities of distance, including the discursive dismissal of social and literal immobility and isolation; contradictory readings of “emptiness”; and the material spatiality of distance through the nonplace-ness of rural areas. Together, these factors illuminate a more significant distance, namely the epistemic and social distance that exists between the legal performance of distance in litigation and the embodied traversal of distance by a woman seeking an abortion in Texas. Prioritizing rural distance as material, legal and gendered, our work engages and augments the nascent field of feminist legal geographies. It likewise challenges legal geographers’ insistence on urban space by uncovering the ways in which even the relative “emptiness” of distance is intimately consequential. Finally, this paper makes connections between the exercise of the abortion right and the exercise of other rights that implicate distance, most notably the right to vote. Just as abortion regulations have often had the effect of requiring women to travel farther for abortion services, voter ID laws have the effect of requiring voters to travel to a public agency in order to secure the requisite identity document. Other voting regulations and state and local voting practices may similarly impose spatial burdens on voters. We thus assert that what Whole Woman’s Health reveals about making distance legally cognizable finds ready legal application in other contexts

ACE! How the Waste Management Phoenix Open Rose from the Ash Heap to become a Sponsorship Exemplar

Waste Management leverages the PGA TOUR’s so-called “People’s Open” in a manner that is unparalleled in the sport industry. The Waste Management Phoenix Open (WMPO) is not only a zero-waste event but also utilizes activation tactics that maximize this value proposition for consumers through sponsored activities that engage fans of all ages, backgrounds, and motivations. After an extensive analysis of the event and what makes it distinct, we propose a framework that we term ACE (Activation optimization, Cohesive value propositions, and Experientially focused programs), which can serve as a three-pronged test that event/property owners and sponsors alike can use to achieve desired results

The diversity of odonata and their endophytic ovipositions from the upper oligocene fossillagerstätte of rott (Rhineland, Germany)

A commented list of fossil Odonata from the Oligocene outcrop of Rott is given, together with descriptions of new traces of oviposition in plant tissues, very similar to ichnotaxa already known from the early Eocene Laguna del Hunco floras of Patagonia. The joint presences of odonatan larvae and traces of oviposition demonstrate the autochthony of these insects in the palaeolake of Rott, confirming the existence of a diverse and abundant aquatic entomofauna, a situation strikingly different to that in the contemporaneous Oligocene palaeolake of Céreste (France).Fil: Petrulevicius, Julian Fernando. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - La Plata; Argentina. Universidad Nacional de La Plata. Facultad de Ciencias Naturales y Museo. División Paleozoología Invertebrados; ArgentinaFil: Wappler, Torsten. Universitat Bonn; AlemaniaFil: Nel, André. Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle; FranciaFil: Rust, Jes. Universitat Bonn; Alemani