Reactive community-based self-administered treatment against residual malaria transmission: study protocol for a randomized controlled trial

Background: Systematic treatment of all individuals living in the same compound of a clinical malaria case may clear asymptomatic infections and possibly reduce malaria transmission, where this is focal. High and sustained coverage is extremely important and requires active community engagement. This study explores a communitybased approach to treating malaria case contacts. Methods/design: This is a cluster-randomized trial to determine whether, in low-transmission areas, treating individuals living in the same compound of a clinical malaria case with dihydroartemisinin-piperaquine can reduce parasite carriage and thus residual malaria transmission. Treatment will be administered through the local health system with the approach of encouraging community participation designed and monitored through formative research. The trial goal is to show that this approach can reduce in intervention villages the prevalence of Plasmodium falciparum infection toward the end of the malaria transmission season. Discussion: Adherence and cooperation of the local communities are critical for the success of mass treatment campaigns aimed at reducing malaria transmission. By exploring community perceptions of the changing trends in malaria burden, existing health systems, and reaction to self-administered treatment, this study will develop and adapt a model for community engagement toward malaria elimination that is cost-effective and fits within the existing health system. Trial registration: Clinical trials.gov, NCT02878200. Registered on 25 August 2016

The quest for the solar g modes

Solar gravity modes (or g modes) -- oscillations of the solar interior for which buoyancy acts as the restoring force -- have the potential to provide unprecedented inference on the structure and dynamics of the solar core, inference that is not possible with the well observed acoustic modes (or p modes). The high amplitude of the g-mode eigenfunctions in the core and the evanesence of the modes in the convection zone make the modes particularly sensitive to the physical and dynamical conditions in the core. Owing to the existence of the convection zone, the g modes have very low amplitudes at photospheric levels, which makes the modes extremely hard to detect. In this paper, we review the current state of play regarding attempts to detect g modes. We review the theory of g modes, including theoretical estimation of the g-mode frequencies, amplitudes and damping rates. Then we go on to discuss the techniques that have been used to try to detect g modes. We review results in the literature, and finish by looking to the future, and the potential advances that can be made -- from both data and data-analysis perspectives -- to give unambiguous detections of individual g modes. The review ends by concluding that, at the time of writing, there is indeed a consensus amongst the authors that there is currently no undisputed detection of solar g modes.Comment: 71 pages, 18 figures, accepted by Astronomy and Astrophysics Revie

CSR and related terms in SME owner-managers' mental models in six European countries: national context matters

As a contribution to the emerging field of corporate social responsibility (CSR) cognition, this article reports on the findings of an exploratory study that compares SME owner–managers’ mental models with regard to CSR and related concepts across six European countries (Belgium, Italy, Norway, France, UK, Spain). Utilising Repertory Grid Technique, we found that the SME owner–managers’ mental models show a few commonalities as well as a number of differences across the different country samples. We interpret those differences by linking individual cognition to macro-environmental variables, such as language, national traditions and dissemination mechanisms. The results of our exploratory study show that nationality matters but that classifications of countries as found in the comparative capitalism literature do not exactly mirror national differences in CSR cognition and that these classifications need further differentiation. The findings from our study raise questions on the universality of cognition of academic management concepts and warn that promotion of responsible business practice should not rely on the use of unmediated US American management terminology

Comparative aspects of cortical neurogenesis in vertebrates

The mammalian neocortex consists of six layers. By contrast, the reptilian and avian cortices have only three, which are believed to be equivalent to layers I, V and VI of mammals. In mammals, the majority of cortical cell proliferation occurs in the ventricular and subventricular zones, but there are a small number of scattered individual divisions throughout the cortex. Neurogenesis in the cortical subventricular zone is believed to contribute to the supragranular layers. To estimate the proportions of different forms of divisions in reptiles and birds, we examined the site of proliferation in embryonic turtle (stages 18–25) and chick (embryonic days 8–15) brains using phospho-histone H3 (a G2 and M phase marker) immunohistochemistry. In turtle, only few scattered abventricular H3-immunoreactive cells were found outside the ventricular zone; the majority of the H3-immunoreactive cells were located in the ventricular zone throughout the entire turtle brain. Ventricular zone cell proliferation peaks at stages 18 and 20, before an increase of abventricular proliferation at stages 23 and 25. In turtle cortex, however, abventricular proliferation at any given stage never exceeded 17.5 ± 2.47% of the total division and the mitotic profiles did not align parallel to the ventricular zone. Phospho-histone H3 immunoreactivity in embryonic chick brains suggests the lack of subventricular zone in the dorsal cortex, but the presence of subventricular zone in the ventral telencephalon. We were able to demonstrate that the avian subventricular zone is present in both pallial and subpallial regions of the ventral telencephalon during embryonic development, and we characterize the spatial and temporal organization of the subventricular zone. Comparative studies suggest that the subventricular zone was involved in the laminar expansion of the cortex to six layers in mammals from the three-layered cortex found in reptiles and birds. Within mammals, the number of neurons in a cortical column appears to be largely constant; nevertheless, there are considerable differences between the germinal zones in mammalian species. It is yet to be determined whether these elaborations of the subventricular zone may have contributed to cell diversity, tangential expansion or gyrus formation of the neocortex and whether it might have been the major driving force behind the evolution of the six-layered neocortex in mammals