An Age-Period-Cohort Database of Inter-Regional Migration in Australia and Britain, 1976-96

Report prepared as part of a collaborative project on "Migration Trends in Australia and Britain: Levels and Trends in an Age-Period-Cohort Framework" funded by the Economic and Social Research Council and the Australian Research Council. This paper describes the way in which parallel databases of inter-regional migration flows for Australia and Britain, classified by five year ages and birth cohorts for four five year periods between 1976 and 1996. The data processing involves estimation of migration data for comparable spatial units, the reduction of the number of those units to a reduced set for ease of analysis, the extraction of migration data from official data files supplied by the Australian Bureau of Statistics and the Office for National Statistics, and the filling of gaps in these files through iterative proportional fitting for some of the British data. The final stage in preparation of the migration databases was to estimate the numbers of transitions (Australia) or movements (Britain) for age-period-cohort spaces. In principle, this last estimation involves a fairly simple interpolation or aggregation of age-time classified migration data, but in practice a great deal of detailed attention is required. A final section specifies the populations at risk to be used for each age-period-cohort observation plan to compute migration intensities

Harmonising Databases for the Cross National Study of Internal Migration: Lessons from Australia and Britain

This project involves the development of a Web interface to origin-destination statistics from the 1991 Census (in a form that will be compatible with planned 2001 outputs). It provides the user with a set of screen-based tools for setting the parameters governing each data extraction (data set, areas, variables) in the form of a query. Traffic light icons are used to signal what the user has set so far and what remains to be done. There are options to extract different types of flow data and to generate output in different formats. The system can now be used to access the interaction flow data contained in the 1991 Special Migration Statistics Sets 1 and 2 and Special Workplace Statistics Set C. WICID has been demonstrated at the Origin-Destination Statistics Roadshows organised by GRO Scotland and held during May/June 2000 and the Census Offices have expressed interest in using the software in the Census Access Project

Relationship between the Hospital Readmission Reduction Program and Readmissions, Postoperative Complications, and Cost

Hospital readmissions have contributed significantly to rising healthcare costs in the United States. To curb rising costs, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services introduced the Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program (HRRP), a penalty-based program designed to decrease healthcare costs. This research aims to determine if the HRRP has successfully reduced healthcare costs and increased quality outcomes associated with total knee arthroplasty (TKA) or total hip arthroplasty (THA) as defined by a reduction in readmission rates, postoperative complications, and overall costs. Although a positive correlation has been shown between outcomes and costs post-HRRP, more research is needed to tease out the impact of HRRP on these findings, given that these indicators were already positively trending before implementation

Recombinant anticoccidial vaccines - a cup half full?

Eimeria species parasites can cause the disease coccidiosis, most notably in chickens. The occurrence of coccidiosis is currently controlled through a combination of good husbandry, chemoprophylaxis and/or live parasite vaccination; however, scalable, cost-effective subunit or recombinant vaccines are required. Many antigens have been proposed for use in novel anticoccidial vaccines, supported by the capacity to reduce disease severity or parasite replication, increase body weight gain in the face of challenge or improve feed conversion under experimental conditions, but none has reached commercial development. Nonetheless, the protection against challenge induced by some antigens has been within the lower range described for the ionophores against susceptible isolates or current live vaccines prior to oocyst recycling. With such levels of efficacy it may be that combinations of anticoccidial antigens already described are sufficient for development as novel multi-valent vaccines, pending identification of optimal delivery systems. Selection of the best antigens to be included in such vaccines can be informed by knowledge defining the natural occurrence of specific antigenic diversity, with relevance to the risk of immediate vaccine breakthrough, and the rate at which parasite genomes can evolve new diversity. For Eimeria, such data are now becoming available for antigens such as apical membrane antigen 1 (AMA1) and immune mapped protein 1 (IMP1) and more are anticipated as high-capacity, high-throughput sequencing technologies become increasingly accessible

LkHα\alpha 330: Evidence for dust clearing through resolved submillimeter imaging

Mid-infrared spectrophotometric observations have revealed a small sub-class of circumstellar disks with spectral energy distributions (SEDs) suggestive of large inner gaps with low dust content. However, such data provide only an indirect and model dependent method of finding central holes. We present here the direct characterization of a 40 AU radius inner gap in the disk around LkHa 330 through 340 GHz (880 micron) dust continuum imaging with the Submillimeter Array (SMA). This large gap is fully resolved by the SMA observations and mostly empty of dust with less than 1.3 x 10^-6 M_solar of solid particles inside of 40 AU. Gas (as traced by accretion markers and CO M-band emission) is still present in the inner disk and the outer edge of the gap rises steeply -- features in better agreement with the underlying cause being gravitational perturbation than a more gradual process such as grain growth. Importantly, the good agreement of the spatially resolved data and spectrophometry-based model lends confidence to current interpretations of SEDs with significant dust emission deficits as arising from disks with inner gaps or holes. Further SED-based searches can therefore be expected to yield numerous additional candidates that can be examined at high spatial resolution.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figures, accepted to ApJ

Phylogenetic and environmental DNA insights into emerging aquatic parasites: implications for risk management.

Species translocation leads to disease emergence in native species of considerable economic importance. Generalist parasites are more likely to be transported, become established and infect new hosts, thus their risk needs to be evaluated. Freshwater systems are particularly at risk from parasite introductions due to the frequency of fish movements, lack of international legislative controls for non-listed pathogens and inherent difficulties with monitoring disease introductions in wild fish populations. Here we used one of the world's most invasive freshwater fish, the topmouth gudgeon, Pseudorasbora parva, to demonstrate the risk posed by an emergent generalist parasite, Sphaerothecum destruens. Pseudorasbora parva has spread to 32 countries from its native range in China through the aquaculture trade and has introduced S. destruens to at least five of these. We systematically investigated the spread of S. destruens through Great Britain and its establishment in native fish communities through a combination of phylogenetic studies of the host and parasite and a novel environmental DNA detection assay. Molecular approaches confirmed that S. destruens is present in 50% of the P. parva communities tested and was also detected in resident native fish communities but in the absence of notable histopathological changes. We identified specific P. parva haplotypes associated with S. destruens and evaluated the risk of disease emergence from this cryptic fish parasite. We provide a framework that can be applied to any aquatic pathogen to enhance detection and help mitigate future disease risks in wild fish populations

A study of CP violation in B±→DK±B±→DK± and B±→Dπ±B±→Dπ± decays with D→KS0K±π∓ final states

A first study of CP violation in the decay modes B± → [K0S K ±π∓]Dh± and B± → [K0S K ∓π±]Dh±, where h labels a K or π meson and D labels a D0 or D0 meson, is performed. The analysis uses the LHCb data set collected in pp collisions, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 3 fb−1. The analysis is sensitive to the CP-violating CKM phase γ through seven observables: one charge asymmetry in each of the four modes and three ratios of the charge-integrated yields. The results are consistent with measurements of γ using other decay modes