11,406 research outputs found
A road to financial stability
This article provides a road map to financial stability. The roadmap is created by analyzing successive
episodes of financial crisis at various points in time and the regulatory-cum-supervisory responses
devised to reduce the chance of future threats to systemic stability. This article provides a glimpse of
historical events that led to the establishment of Basel Committee and then critically evaluates
committee’s efforts to make financial markets more certain and secure. This article also highlights the
efforts of supervisory authorities in creating an effective regulatory framework through the Basel Capital
accords. A critique of the Basel accords is sketched showing how Basel I and Basel II did not help
contain successive episodes of financial crisis. This paper also draws upon Basel III regulations currently
under deliberation and highlights vulnerable areas that may continue to threaten systemic stability even
after the implementation of Basel III
Measuring fitness of Kenyan children with polyparasitic infections using the 20-meter shuttle run test as a morbidity metric.
BACKGROUND: To date, there has been no standardized approach to the assessment of aerobic fitness among children who harbor parasites. In quantifying the disability associated with individual or multiple chronic infections, accurate measures of physical fitness are important metrics. This is because exercise intolerance, as seen with anemia and many other chronic disorders, reflects the body's inability to maintain adequate oxygen supply (VO(2) max) to the motor tissues, which is frequently linked to reduced quality-of-life in terms of physical and job performance. The objective of our study was to examine the associations between polyparasitism, anemia, and reduced fitness in a high risk Kenyan population using novel implementation of the 20-meter shuttle run test (20mSRT), a well-standardized, low-technology physical fitness test.
METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: Four villages in coastal Kenya were surveyed during 2009-2010. Children 5-18 years were tested for infection with Schistosoma haematobium (Sh), malaria, filaria, and geohelminth infections by standard methods. After anthropometric and hemoglobin testing, fitness was assessed with the 20 mSRT. The 20 mSRT proved easy to perform, requiring only minimal staff training. Parasitology revealed high prevalence of single and multiple parasitic infections in all villages, with Sh being the most common (25-62%). Anemia prevalence was 45-58%. Using multiply-adjusted linear modeling that accounted for household clustering, decreased aerobic capacity was significantly associated with anemia, stunting, and wasting, with some gender differences.
CONCLUSIONS/SIGNIFICANCE: The 20 mSRT, which has excellent correlation with VO(2), is a highly feasible fitness test for low-resource settings. Our results indicate impaired fitness is common in areas endemic for parasites, where, at least in part, low fitness scores are likely to result from anemia and stunting associated with chronic infection. The 20 mSRT should be used as a common metric to quantify physical fitness and compare sub-clinical disability across many different disorders and community settings
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Effect of Endovascular Aneurysm Repair on the Volume-Outcome Relationship in Aneurysm Repair
Background— We aim to quantify the relationship between the annual caseload (volume) and outcome from elective endovascular (EVR) or open repair of abdominal aortic aneurysms (AAAs) in England between 2005 and 2007.
Methods and Results— Individual patient data were obtained from the Hospital Episode Statistics. Statistical methods included multiple logistic regression models, mortality control charts, and safety plots to determine the nature of any relationship between volume and outcome. The case-mix between hospitals of different sizes was examined using observed and expected values for in-hospital mortality. Outcome measures included in-hospital mortality and hospital length of stay. Between 2005 and 2007, a total of 57 587 patients were admitted to hospitals in England with a diagnosis of AAA, and 11 574 underwent AAA repair. There were 7313 elective AAA repairs, of which 5668 (78%) were open and 1645 (22%) were EVR. In-hospital mortality rates were 5.63% for all elective AAA repairs with rates of 6.18% for open repair and 3.77% for EVR (odds ratio, 0.676; 95% CI, 0.501 to 0.913; P=0.011). High-volume aneurysm services were associated with significantly lower mortality rates overall (0.991; 0.988 to 0.994; P<0.0001), for open repairs (0.994; 0.991 to 0.998; P=0.0008), and EVR (0.989; 0.982 to 0.995; P=0.0007). Large endovascular units had low mortality rates for open repairs.
Conclusion— A strong relationship existed between the volume of surgery performed and outcome from both open and endovascular aneurysm repairs. These data support the concept that abdominal aortic surgery should be performed in specialized units that meet a minimum volume threshold
The Morphologically Divided Redshift Distribution of Faint Galaxies
We have constructed a morphologically divided redshift distribution of faint
field galaxies using a statistically unbiased sample of 196 galaxies brighter
than I = 21.5 for which detailed morphological information (from the Hubble
Space Telescope) as well as ground-based spectroscopic redshifts are available.
Galaxies are classified into 3 rough morphological types according to their
visual appearance (E/S0s, Spirals, Sdm/dE/Irr/Pec's), and redshift
distributions are constructed for each type. The most striking feature is the
abundance of low to moderate redshift Sdm/dE/Irr/Pec's at I < 19.5. This
confirms that the faint end slope of the luminosity function (LF) is steep
(alpha < -1.4) for these objects. We also find that Sdm/dE/Irr/Pec's are fairly
abundant at moderate redshifts, and this can be explained by strong luminosity
evolution. However, the normalization factor (or the number density) of the LF
of Sdm/dE/Irr/Pec's is not much higher than that of the local LF of
Sdm/dE/Irr/Pec's. Furthermore, as we go to fainter magnitudes, the abundance of
moderate to high redshift Irr/Pec's increases considerably. This cannot be
explained by strong luminosity evolution of the dwarf galaxy populations alone:
these Irr/Pec's are probably the progenitors of present day ellipticals and
spiral galaxies which are undergoing rapid star formation or merging with their
neighbors. On the other hand, the redshift distributions of E/S0s and spirals
are fairly consistent those expected from passive luminosity evolution, and are
only in slight disagreement with the non-evolving model.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figures (published in ApJ
Luminosity Functions of Elliptical Galaxies at z < 1.2
The luminosity functions of E/S0 galaxies are constructed in 3 different
redshift bins (0.2 < z < 0.55, 0.55 < z < 0.8, 0.8 < z < 1.2), using the data
from the Hubble Space Telescope Medium Deep Survey (HST MDS) and other HST
surveys. These independent luminosity functions show the brightening in the
luminosity of E/S0s by about 0.5~1.0 magnitude at z~1, and no sign of
significant number evolution.
This is the first direct measurement of the luminosity evolution of E/S0
galaxies, and our results support the hypothesis of a high redshift of
formation (z > 1) for elliptical galaxies, together with weak evolution of the
major merger rate at z < 1.Comment: To be published in ApJ Letters, 4 pages, AAS Latex, 4 figures, and 2
table
Impacts of East Mediterranean megacity emissions on air quality
Megacities are large urban agglomerations with intensive anthropogenic
emissions that have significant impacts on local and regional air quality.
In the present mesoscale modeling study, the impacts of anthropogenic
emissions from the Greater Istanbul Area (GIA) and the Greater Athens Area
(GAA) on the air quality in GIA, GAA and the entire East Mediterranean are
quantified for typical wintertime (December 2008) and summertime (July 2008)
conditions. They are compared to those of the regional anthropogenic and
biogenic emissions that are also calculated. Finally, the efficiency of
potential country-based emissions mitigation in improving air quality is
investigated.
The results show that relative contributions from both cities to surface
ozone (O3) and aerosol levels in the cities' extended areas are
generally higher in winter than in summer. Anthropogenic emissions from GIA
depress surface O3 in the GIA by ~ 60% in winter and
~ 20% in summer while those from GAA reduce the surface
O3 in the GAA by 30% in winter and by 8% in summer. GIA and GAA
anthropogenic emissions contribute to the fine particulate matter
(PM2.5) levels inside the cities themselves by up to 75% in winter
and by 50% (GIA) and ~ 40% (GAA), in summer. GIA
anthropogenic emissions have larger impacts on the domain-mean surface
O3 (up to 1%) and PM2.5 (4%) levels compared to GAA
anthropogenic emissions (3 and ≤2% for
PM2.5) in both seasons. Impacts of regional anthropogenic emissions on
the domain-mean surface pollutant levels (up to 17% for summertime
O3 and 52% for wintertime fine particulate matter, PM2.5) are
much higher than those from Istanbul and Athens together (~ 1% for
O3 and ~ 6% for PM2.5, respectively).
Regional biogenic emissions are found to limit the production of secondary
inorganic aerosol species in summer up to 13% (non-sea-salt sulfate
(nss-SO42−) in rural Athens) due to their impact on oxidant levels
while they have negligible impact in winter.
Finally, the responses to country-based anthropogenic emission mitigation
scenarios inside the studied region show increases in O3 mixing ratios
in the urban areas of GIA and GAA, higher in winter (~ 13%
for GIA and 2% for GAA) than in summer (~ 7% for GIA and
2.5 concentrations decrease
by up to 30% in GIA and by 20% in GAA with the highest improvements
computed for winter. The emission reduction strategy also leads to
domain-wide decreases in most primary pollutants like carbon monoxide (CO)
or nitrogen oxides (NOx) for both seasons. The results show the
importance of long range transport of pollutants for the air quality in the
East Mediterranean. Thus, improvements of air quality in the East
Mediterranean require coordinated efforts inside the region and beyond
Sports/energy drinks consumption among young athletes in Kano, Nigeria
Little is known about the prevalence and motives of sport drinks use among adolescents and young adult athletes who exercise on regular basis in most football and other games pitches. Therefore, the current study was performed to assess information regarding the use of sport drinks among 440 athletes (23.5±4.62 years of age) in Kano Nigeria. Data were collected using a selfadministered, structured and pretested questionnaire. The results indicated that the frequency of sport drinks consumption was higher among male athletes and in those who did not have breakfast on a regular basis, ever smoked cigarettes and drank alcoholic beverages compared with their female counterparts. Athletes who had ‘ever’ tried a sport drink were significantly higher (p<0.05) than those who had ‘never’ tasted the drink. Main reasons for using such drinks for regular users varied across the selected groups of athletes and included obtaining energy and boosting performance while doing sport. Most athletes claimed to be aware of the ingredients of sport drinks or their potential hazardous health effects, and that they could distinguish between sport and energy drinks. This study discovered that energy drinks were consumed by the athletes rather than sport drinks and that sport drinks are still alien to the study community as they are not commonly available in the market. This stands in strong contrast to the assumption that athletes consumed sport drinks. Therefore, increased awareness among the athletes of the discrepancies, ingredients and potential health hazards of both sport and energy drinks should be sustained.Keywords: Sport drinks, consumption, adolescents, young adults, athlete
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