JUST OPEN A WINDOW: UNDERSTANDING THE VULNERABILITY TO SUMMER HEAT OF A MOUNTAIN COMMUNITY IN THE WESTERN UNITED STATES, MISSOULA, MT

How do we conceptualize vulnerability or resiliency to a natural hazard when it has not historically been understood as such? This study focuses on Missoula, located in mountains of western Montana, which has steadily grown by 1-2% per year to almost 75,000 residents. The formerly temperate quality of its winters and summers has also been changing. Projections from the 2017 Montana Climate Assessment estimate the state will experience a 2-5°F increase in mean annual air temperature over the next two decades, prompting city and county officials to plan for scenarios not formerly in their consideration. Of further concern is the increasing frequency of extensive summer wildfires and accompanying poor air quality that prevents the low cost venting of homes during cooler evenings. This study was facilitated by the American Geophysical Union’s Thriving Earth Exchange (TEX) collaboration between local (City of Missoula, Climate Smart Missoula), state (University of Montana), and national (TEX, University of Notre Dame) stakeholders seeking to create a climate change plan. Areal interpolation from U.S. Census American Community Survey block-group data to the block level, and dasymetric mapping were utilized to account for the unpopulated public lands that occupy substantial portions of many blocks. Socioeconomic variable layers (age, income, education, employment, living alone, multi-unit housing, mobile housing, insurance status, and disability) were combined in a Multi-Criteria Analysis to map sensitivity and exposure variables of land surface temperature and land-cover data to predict the populations most vulnerable to heat (and smoke) risks. The resulting maps will be utilized by Missoula city and county planners to allocate resources for mitigation, such as recommendations for the selection of building materials in new construction, installation of cooling shelters, and enhancement of urban forest. This study was designed to develop a methodology that could be readily replicated by other small communities to implement and update as needed

Partial Regulatory T Cell Depletion Prior to Acute Feline Immunodeficiency Virus Infection Does Not Alter Disease Pathogenesis

Feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV) infection in cats follows a disease course similar to HIV-1, including a short acute phase characterized by high viremia, and a prolonged asymptomatic phase characterized by low viremia and generalized immune dysfunction. CD4+CD25hiFoxP3+ immunosuppressive regulatory T (Treg) cells have been implicated as a possible cause of immune dysfunction during FIV and HIV-1 infection, as they are capable of modulating virus-specific and inflammatory immune responses. Additionally, the immunosuppressive capacity of feline Treg cells has been shown to be increased during FIV infection. We have previously shown that transient in vivo Treg cell depletion during asymptomatic FIV infection reveals FIV-specific immune responses suppressed by Treg cells. In this study, we sought to determine the immunological influence of Treg cells during acute FIV infection. We asked whether Treg cell depletion prior to infection with the highly pathogenic molecular clone FIV-C36 in cats could alter FIV pathogenesis. We report here that partial Treg cell depletion prior to FIV infection does not significantly change provirus, viremia, or CD4+ T cell levels in blood and lymphoid tissues during the acute phase of disease. The effects of anti-CD25 mAb treatment are truncated in cats acutely infected with FIV-C36 as compared to chronically infected cats or FIV-naïve cats, as Treg cell levels were heightened in all treatment groups included in the study within two weeks post-FIV infection. Our findings suggest that the influence of Treg cell suppression during FIV pathogenesis is most prominent after Treg cells are activated in the environment of established FIV infection

Search for dark matter produced in association with bottom or top quarks in √s = 13 TeV pp collisions with the ATLAS detector

A search for weakly interacting massive particle dark matter produced in association with bottom or top quarks is presented. Final states containing third-generation quarks and miss- ing transverse momentum are considered. The analysis uses 36.1 fb−1 of proton–proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS experiment at √s = 13 TeV in 2015 and 2016. No significant excess of events above the estimated backgrounds is observed. The results are in- terpreted in the framework of simplified models of spin-0 dark-matter mediators. For colour- neutral spin-0 mediators produced in association with top quarks and decaying into a pair of dark-matter particles, mediator masses below 50 GeV are excluded assuming a dark-matter candidate mass of 1 GeV and unitary couplings. For scalar and pseudoscalar mediators produced in association with bottom quarks, the search sets limits on the production cross- section of 300 times the predicted rate for mediators with masses between 10 and 50 GeV and assuming a dark-matter mass of 1 GeV and unitary coupling. Constraints on colour- charged scalar simplified models are also presented. Assuming a dark-matter particle mass of 35 GeV, mediator particles with mass below 1.1 TeV are excluded for couplings yielding a dark-matter relic density consistent with measurements