MULTI-VECTOR DIVERSIFICATION: KAZAKHASTAN´S TRANSNATIONAL FUTURE

The recent election of the Republic of Kazakhstan as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council gives the country an opportunity to participate more directly in shaping regional and global energy, economics, and security. A multi-vector and balanced foreign policy will allow Kazakhstan to strengthen regional security and enhance integration processes with Central Asian states. Kazakhstan can contribute to regional energy security, counterterrorism, nuclear nonproliferation, and other goals. Kazakhstan is among a few countries in the Eurasian region where primary energy production significantly exceeds energy consumption. The country also has striven to reduce regional tensions and terrorism. Meanwhile, non-proliferation has since independence has come to represent the organizing principle of the country’s cooperative foreign policy, one that seeks independence through simultaneous engagement with external power

Déterminer la pondération de la consommation des ressources en chimiothérapie ambulatoire liée à la charge de travail des infirmières

Les programmes de cancérologie ontariens se sont fixés comme objectif de dispenser des soins infirmiers de haute qualité et des traitements sécuritaires à la fois pour les patients et pour le personnel. Dans le domaine de la santé, les contraintes financières inhérentes à la prestation des soins exigent que les mécanismes de financement rendent compte non seulement du coût des médicaments mais encore de facteurs tels que les coûts des ressources humaines en pharmacie et en soins infirmiers. Alors que certaines organisations ont élaboré des systèmes de classification des patients afin de mesurer l’intensité des soins infirmiers et la charge de travail des infirmières, ces systèmes s’appliquent principalement aux clientèles hospitalisées et présentent de nombreux défis tels que la nécessité pour les infirmières de documenter la charge de travail exigée par les soins à des fins de justification. Cet article a pour but de tracer les grandes lignes de la méthodologie et de l’implication des infirmières en vue d’élaborer une pondération de la consommation des ressources basée sur les protocoles pouvant être appliquée aux salles de chimiothérapie ambulatoire. La méthodologie inclut la détermination de la charge de travail reliée au temps dont les infirmières ont besoin pour préparer, conseiller et évaluer les patients et leur fournir l’enseignement requis ainsi que le temps nécessaire pour rassembler les fournitures, accéder aux lignes de perfusion, surveiller, gérer les effets indésirables, gérer les symptômes et documenter les soins. La pondération de la consommation des ressources fournit une meilleure mesure de la complexité des soins exigés par les patients atteints de cancer traités en milieu ambulatoire

InSight Constraints on the Global Character of the Martian Crust

International audienceAnalyses of seismic data from the InSight mission have provided the first in situ constraints on the thickness of the crust of Mars. These crustal thickness constraints are currently limited to beneath the lander that is located in the northern lowlands, and we use gravity and topography data to construct global crustal thickness models that satisfy the seismic data. These models consider a range of possible mantle and core density profiles, a range of crustal densities, a low-density surface layer, and the possibility that the crustal density of the northern lowlands is greater than that of the southern highlands. Using the preferred InSight three-layer seismic model of the crust, the average crustal thickness of the planet is found to lie between 30 and 72 km. Depending on the choice of the upper mantle density, the maximum permissible density of the northern lowlands and southern highlands crust is constrained to be between 2,850 and 3,100 kg m−3. These crustal densities are lower than typical Martian basaltic materials and are consistent with a crust that is on average more felsic than the materials found at the surface. We argue that a substantial portion of the crust of Mars is a primary crust that formed during the initial differentiation of the planet. Various hypotheses for the origin of the observed intracrustal seisimic layers are assessed, with our preferred interpretation including thick volcanic deposits, ejecta from the Utopia basin, porosity closure, and differentiation products of a Borealis impact melt sheet

Combined proteomic and metallomic analyses in Scrobicularia plana clams to assess environmental pollution of estuarine ecosystems

Estuaries are very important ecosystems with great ecological and economic value, but usually highly impacted by anthropogenic pressure. Thus, the assessment of pollution levels in these habitats is critical in order to evaluate their environmental quality. In this work, we combined complementary metallomic and proteomic approaches with the aim to monitor the effects of environmental pollution on Scrobicularia piano clams captured in three estuarine systems from the south coast of Portugal; Arade estuary, Ria Formosa and Guadiana estuary. Multi-elemental profiling of digestive glands was carried out to evaluate the differential pollution levels in the three study areas. Then, proteomic analysis by means of two-dimensional gel electrophoresis and mass spectrometry revealed twenty-one differential proteins, which could be associated with multiple toxicological mechanisms induced in environmentally stressed organisms. Accordingly, it could be concluded that the combination of different omic approaches presents a great potential in environmental research. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

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