The Schick Reaction and Diphtheria Prophylactic Immunisation With Toxin -Antitoxin Mixture.

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Fatigue Life Methodology for Tapered Composite Flexbeam Laminates

The viability of a method for determining the fatigue life of composite rotor hub flexbeam laminates using delamination fatigue characterization data and a geometric non-linear finite element (FE) analysis was studied. Combined tension and bending loading was applied to nonlinear tapered flexbeam laminates with internal ply drops. These laminates, consisting of coupon specimens cut from a full-size S2/E7T1 glass-epoxy flexbeam were tested in a hydraulic load frame under combined axial-tension and transverse cyclic bending loads. The magnitude of the axial load remained constant and the direction of the load rotated with the specimen as the cyclic bending load was applied. The first delamination damage observed in the specimens occurred at the area around the tip of the outermost ply-drop group. Subsequently, unstable delamination occurred by complete delamination along the length of the specimen. Continued cycling resulted in multiple delaminations. A 2D finite element model of the flexbeam was developed and a geometrically non-linear analysis was performed. The global responses of the model and test specimens agreed very well in terms of the transverse flexbeam tip-displacement and flapping angle. The FE model was used to calculate strain energy release rates (G) for delaminations initiating at the tip of the outer ply-drop area and growing toward the thick or thin regions of the flexbeam, as was observed in the specimens. The delamination growth toward the thick region was primarily mode 2, whereas delamination growth toward the thin region was almost completely mode 1. Material characterization data from cyclic double-cantilevered beam tests was used with the peak calculated G values to generate a curve predicting fatigue failure by unstable delamination as a function of the number of loading cycles. The calculated fatigue lives compared well with the test data

A Systematic Review and Aggregated Analysis on the Impact of Amyloid PET Brain Imaging on the Diagnosis, Diagnostic Confidence, and Management of Patients being Evaluated for Alzheimer's Disease.

BACKGROUND: Amyloid PET (aPET) imaging could improve patient outcomes in clinical practice, but the extent of impact needs quantification. OBJECTIVE: To provide an aggregated quantitative analysis of the value added by aPET in cognitively impaired subjects. METHODS: Systematic literature searches were performed in Embase and Medline until January 2017. 1,531 cases over 12 studies were included (1,142 cases over seven studies in the primary analysis where aPET was the key biomarker; the remaining cases included as defined groups in the secondary analysis). Data was abstracted by consensus among two observers and assessed for bias. Clinical utility was measured by diagnostic change, diagnostic confidence, and patient management before and after aPET. Three groups were further analyzed: control patients for whom feedback of aPET scan results was delayed; aPET Appropriate Use Criteria (AUC+) cases; and patients undergoing additional FDG/CSF testing. RESULTS: For 1,142 cases with only aPET, 31.3% of diagnoses were revised, whereas 3.2% of diagnoses changed in the delayed aPET control group (p < 0.0001). Increased diagnostic confidence following aPET was found for 62.1% of 870 patients. Management changes with aPET were found in 72.2% of 740 cases and in 55.5% of 299 cases in the control group (p < 0.0001). The diagnostic value of aPET in AUC+ patients or when FDG/CSF were additionally available did not substantially differ from the value of aPET alone in the wider population. CONCLUSIONS: Amyloid PET contributed to diagnostic revision in almost a third of cases and demonstrated value in increasing diagnostic confidence and refining management plans

Echo-Mapping of Swift J1753.5-0127

We present two epochs of coordinated X-ray-optical timing observations of the black hole candidate Swift J1753.5-0127 during its 2005 outburst. The first epoch in July occurred at outburst peak. Two consecutive nights of observations using the McDonald Observatory Argos camera with the Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer show a consistent correlation with an immediate response and an extended tail lasting ~5s. The properties of the variability and the correlation are consistent with thermal reprocessing in an accretion disk. The shortness of the lag suggests a short orbital period consistent with that recently claimed. The second epoch in August used the VLT FORS2 HIT mode again in conjunction with RXTE. Again a repeatable correlation is seen between two independent subsets of the data. In this case, though, the cross-correlation function has an unusual structure comprising a dip followed by a double-peak. We suggest that this may be equivalent to the dip plus single peak structure seen by Kanbach et al. (2001) in XTE J1118+480 and attributed there to synchrotron emission; a similar structure was seen during later activity of Swift J1753.5-0127 by Durant et al. (2008).Comment: 7 pages, accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Societ

Physical interpretation of gauge invariant perturbations of spherically symmetric space-times

By calculating the Newman-Penrose Weyl tensor components of a perturbed spherically symmetric space-time with respect to invariantly defined classes of null tetrads, we give a physical interpretation, in terms of gravitational radiation, of odd parity gauge invariant metric perturbations. We point out how these gauge invariants may be used in setting boundary and/or initial conditions in perturbation theory.Comment: 6 pages. To appear in PR

On Becoming a DNP user: Some Reflections on the Developing Use of a Computer

This paper considers the development of a tool to support the presentation of the material forming an ethnographic report. The paper focuses on the way in which use of the system has evolved to offer appropriate facilities. The use of viewpoints to present material from a number of studies is described. The paper concludes by reflecting on the need to consider the way in ethnographers have become users of the tool

Surprises in the Orbital Magnetic Moment and g-Factor of the Dynamic Jahn-Teller Ion C_{60}^-

We calculate the magnetic susceptibility and g-factor of the isolated C_{60}^- ion at zero temperature, with a proper treatment of the dynamical Jahn-Teller effect, and of the associated orbital angular momentum, Ham-reduced gyromagnetic ratio, and molecular spin-orbit coupling. A number of surprises emerge. First, the predicted molecular spin-orbit splitting is two orders of magnitude smaller than in the bare carbon atom, due to the large radius of curvature of the molecule. Second, this reduced spin-orbit splitting is comparable to Zeeman energies, for instance, in X-band EPR at 3.39KGauss, and a field dependence of the g-factor is predicted. Third, the orbital gyromagnetic factor is strongly reduced by vibron coupling, and so therefore are the effective weak-field g-factors of all low-lying states. In particular, the ground-state doublet of C_{60}^- is predicted to show a negative g-factor of \sim -0.1.Comment: 19 pages RevTex, 2 postscript figures include

The acquisition of Sign Language: The impact of phonetic complexity on phonology

Research into the effect of phonetic complexity on phonological acquisition has a long history in spoken languages. This paper considers the effect of phonetics on phonological development in a signed language. We report on an experiment in which nonword-repetition methodology was adapted so as to examine in a systematic way how phonetic complexity in two phonological parameters of signed languages — handshape and movement — affects the perception and articulation of signs. Ninety-one Deaf children aged 3–11 acquiring British Sign Language (BSL) and 46 hearing nonsigners aged 6–11 repeated a set of 40 nonsense signs. For Deaf children, repetition accuracy improved with age, correlated with wider BSL abilities, and was lowest for signs that were phonetically complex. Repetition accuracy was correlated with fine motor skills for the youngest children. Despite their lower repetition accuracy, the hearing group were similarly affected by phonetic complexity, suggesting that common visual and motoric factors are at play when processing linguistic information in the visuo-gestural modality

A risk factor analysis of outcomes after unrelated cord blood transplantation for children with Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome

Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome is a severe X-linked recessive immune deficiency disorder. A scoring system of Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome severity (0.5-5) distinguishes 2 phenotypes: X-linked thrombocytopenia and classic Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome. Hematopoietic cell transplantation is curative for Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome, however the use of unrelated umbilical cord blood transplantation has seldom been described. We analyzed umbilical cord blood transplantation outcomes for 90 patients. Median age at umbilical cord blood transplantation was 1.5 years. Patients were classified according to clinical scores (2 (23%), 3 (30%), 4 (23%) and 5 (19%)). Most patients received HLA mismatched umbilical cord blood transplantation and myeloablative conditioning with anti-thymocyte globulin. Cumulative incidence of neutrophil recovery at day-60 was 89% and day-100 acute graft-versus-host disease grade II-IV was 38%; use of methotrexate for graft-versus- host disease prophylaxis delayed engraftment (p=0.02), but decreased acute graft-versus-host disease (p=0.03). At 5-year, overall survival and event-free survival were 75% and 70%, respectively. Estimated 5 year- event-free survival was 83%, 73% and 55% for patients with clinical score 2, 4-5 and 3, respectively. In multivariate analysis, age<2years at umbilical cord blood transplantation and clinical phenotype X-linked thrombocytopenia were associated with improved event-free survival. Overall survival tended to be improved after 2007 (p=0.09). In conclusion, umbilical cord blood transplantation is a good alternative option for young children with Wiskott-Aldrich syndrome lacking an HLA identical stem cell donor