Association between consumption of black tea and iron status in adult Africans in the North West Province: The THUSA study

The association between black tea consumption and iron status was investigated in a sample of African adults participating in the cross-sectional THUSA (Transition and Health during Urbanization of South Africans) study in the North West Province, South Africa. Data were analysed from 1605 apparently healthy adults aged 15-65 years by demographic and FFQ, anthropometric measurements and biochemical analyses. The main outcome measures were Hb and serum ferritin concentrations. No associations were seen between black tea consumption and concentrations of serum ferritin (men P=0.059; women P=0.49) or Hb (men P=0.33; women P=0.49). Logistic regression showed that tea consumption did not significantly increase risk for iron deficiency (men: OR 1.36; 95 % CI 0.99, 1.87; women: OR 0.98; 95 % CI 0.84, 1.13) nor for iron deficiency anaemia (men: OR 1.28: 95 % Cl 0.84, 1.96; women: OR 0.93; 95 % Cl 0.78, 1.11). Prevalence of iron deficiency and iron deficiency anaemia was especially high in women: 21.6 and 14.6 %, respectively. However, the likelihood of iron deficiency and iron deficiency anaemia was not significantly explained by tea consumption in sub-populations which were assumed to be at risk for iron deficiency. Regression of serum ferritin levels on tea consumption in women : 40 years, adults with a daily iron intak

Daris, a low-frequency distributed aperture array for radio astronomy in space

DARIS (Distributed Aperture Array for Radio Astronomy in Space) is a radio astronomy space mission concept aimed at observing the low-frequency radio sky in the range 1-10 MHz. Because of the Earth's ionospheric disturbances and opaqueness, this frequency range can only be observed from space. The astronomical science cases include sensitive extragalactic surveys, radio transients such as Jupiter-like burst and Crab-like pulses, and coronal mass ejection tracking. The focus of the DARIS concept study is on feasibility aspects of a distributed aperture synthesis array in space, consisting of small satellite nodes and a mother-ship. The study selected suitable science cases, antenna concepts, communications, signal processing, orbital design, and mission analysis. With current-day technologies a satellite cluster can be built consisting of at least eight satellite nodes and a mother-ship, which could be launched with a Soyuz rocket from Kourou. Such a satellite cluster would open up the last unexplored frequency range for astronomy

Employment status, job characteristics and work-related health experience of people with a lower limb amputation in the Netherlands

Objectives: To describe the occupational situation of people with lower limb amputations in The Netherlands and to compare the health experience of workings and nonworking amputee patients with a nonimpaired reference population. Design: Cross-sectional study in which patients completed a questionnaire about their job participation. type of job, workplace adjustments to their limb loss, their position in the company, and a general health questionnaire. Setting: Orthopsdic workshops in The Netherlands with a population of lower limb amputees. Patients: Subjects were recruited from orthopedic workshops in the Netherlands. They ranged in age from Is to 60 years (mean, 44.5yr) and had a lower limb amputated at least 2 years (mean, 19.6yr) before this study. Main Outcome measures: A self-report questionnaire, with 1 part concerning patient characteristics and amputation-related factors, and the other concerning job characteristics, vocational handicaps, work adjustments, and working conditions; and a general health questionnaire (RAND-36) to measure health status. Results: Responses were received from 652 of the 687 patients (response: rate, 95%) who were sent the questionnaire. Sixty-foul percent of the respondents were working at the rime of the study (comparable with the employment rate of the general Dutch population), 31 % had work experience but were not presently working, and 5% had no work experience. After their amputations, people shifted to less physically demanding work. The mean delay between the amputation and the return to work was 2.3 years. Many people wished their work was better adjusted to the limitations presented by their disability and they mentioned having problems concerning possibilities fur promotion. Seventy-eight percent of those who stopped working within 2 years after the amputation said that amputation-related factors played a role in their decision. Thirty-four percent said that they might have worked longer if certain adjustments had been made. The health experience of people who were no longer working was significantly worse than that of the working people with amputations. Conclusions: Although amputee patients had a relatively good rate of job participation, they reported problems concerning the long delay between amputation and return to work, problems in finding suitable jobs, fewer possibilities for promotion, and problems in obtaining needed workplace modifications. People who had to stop working because of the amputation showed a worse health experience than working people

Twee jaar ILG: tijd voor de gebieden. Provincies op zoek naar een nieuwe rol in gebiedsprocessen

Met het ingaan van het Investeringsbudget Landelijk Gebied (ILG) in 2007, brak een nieuw hoofdstuk aan voor de verhoudingen tussen rijk en provincies in het landelijk gebied. Het ILG is bedoeld om gebiedsgerichte samenwerking te stimuleren en daarmee de rijksdoelen in het natuur- en plattelandsbeleid te realiseren. De verwachtingen zijn torenhoog, vooral voor provincies. In dit artikel bespreken we de gevolgen van het ILG voor de verhoudingen tussen provincies en gebieden. We doen dat aan de hand van twee gebieden: de Krimpenerwaard en Utrecht Midden-Noord

DARIS, a fleet of passive formation flying small satellites for low frequency radio astronomy

DARIS (Distributed Aperture Array for Radio Astronomy In Space) is a mission to conduct radio astronomy in the low frequency region from 1-10MHz. This region has not yet been explored, as the Earth's ionosphere is opaque to those frequencies, and so a space based observatory is the only solution. DARIS will undertake an extragalactic survey of the low frequency sky, and can also detect some transient radio events such as solar or planetary bursts. To achieve these scientific objectives, DARIS comprises a space-based array, forming a very large effective aperture, as required for such a long wavelength survey. Each station in the array (each required to be a small satellite to ensure several nodes can be flown) carries three orthogonal dipole antennas, each 5m in length. The more station nodes in the array, the more sensitive the antenna. The entire fleet remains within a 100km diameter cloud. \ud A very large data volume is generated by each node, as the antennas have to capture all radio signals, after which the data can be correlated to find the astronomical signal in the noise. As the astronomical signals also have a noise-like nature, no compression is possible on the data captured by the nodes. The data volume is too high to transfer directly to Earth, and will need to be correlated in space. Distributed correlation between the nodes is technically challenging, and therefore a mothership acts as the central correlator and then downlinks the correlated data (lower volume) to Earth. \u

Mirror effect induced by the dilaton field on the Hawking radiation

We discuss the string creation in the near-extremal NS1 black string solution. The string creation is described by an effective field equation derived from a fundamental string action coupled to the dilaton field in a conformally invariant manner. In the non-critical string model the dilaton field causes a timelike mirror surface outside the horizon when the size of the black string is comparable to the Planck scale. Since the fundamental strings are reflected by the mirror surface, the negative energy flux does not propagate across the surface. This means that the evaporation stops just before the naked singularity of the extremal black string appears even though the surface gravity is non-zero in the extremal limit.Comment: 15 page

Arterial revascularization with the right gastroepiploic artery and internal mammary arteries in 300 patients

From September 1989 to September 1992, the right gastroepiploic artery in combination with one or both internal mammary arteries was used as a graft in 300 patients who underwent coronary artery bypass grafting. The gastroepiploic artery was the primary choice in preference to the saphenous vein. The study comprised 263 men and 37 women, ranging in age from 31 to 77 years (median age 59 years). Thirty-nine patients (13%) underwent previous bypass procedures with autologous vein grafts. In 17 patients (5.7%) the gastroepiploic artery was used as a single graft. In 150 patients (50%) the gastroepiploic artery in conjunction with one internal mammary artery was used (in 6 patients combined with a vein graft). In 133 patients (44.3%) the gastroepiploic artery was used with both internal mammary arteries. Revascularization in nine patients (3%) was combined with another cardiac procedure; three aortic valve replacements, two mitral valve repairs, and four resections of a left ventricular aneurysm. Ten patients died in the hospital (3.3%; 70% confidence limits 2.3% to 4.8%); two of these patients had an infarction in the area revascularized by the gastroepiploic artery. At late follow-up, 0.5 to 39 months (mean 14 months) after the operation, we found no mortality. One patient with an occluded gastroepiploic artery graft underwent reoperation with the use of the right internal mammary artery. One patient underwent percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty of the right coronary artery after occlusion of the gastroepiploic artery. Elective recatheterization was done in 88 patients 1 to 25 months after operation (mean 10 months). Graft patency in gastroepiploic artery grafts increased steadily from 77% in the first semester of the study to 95% in the fourth semester and then equaled the patency of the internal mammary artery grafts (97%), which was almost constant during the whole period. We conclude that patency of the gastroepiploic artery was initially related to a ''learning curve'' but eventually equaled that of the internal mammary artery grafts. Furthermore, the gastroepiploic artery may well be the graft of choice in conjunction with the internal mammary arteries

Generalized Conformal Quantum Mechanics of D0-brane

We study the generalized conformal quantum mechanics of the probe D0-brane in the near horizon background of the bound state of source D0-branes. We elaborate on the relationship of such model to the M theory in the light cone frame.Comment: 14 pages, RevTeX, revised version with added references to appear in Phys. Rev.