Observations of the 1992 U.S. Pelagic Pair Trawl Fishery in the Northwest Atlantic

Pelagic pair trawling for tuna, Thunnus spp., and swordfish, Xiphias gladius, was introduced in U.S. Northwest Atlantic waters in 1991. During autumn (October-November) of 1992 under the authority oft he Federal Atlantic Swordfish Regulations, the National Marine Fisheries Service placed observers aboard pelagic pair trawl vessels to document the catch, bycatch, discard, and gear used in this new fishery. The fishery is conducted primarily at night along shelf-edge waters from June to November. In late 1991, revised regulations restricted swordfish to bycatch in this fishery resulting in pelagic pair trawl vessels targeting tuna throughout 1992. Analyses of 1992 data indicate that albacore, T. alalunga, was the predominant species caught, although yellowfin tuna, T. albaeares, and bigeye tuna, T. obesus, were the preferred target species. Bycatch also included swordfish, large sharks, pelagic rays and other pelagic fishes, other tunas, and marine mammals

Developing a mobile audiometric sound booth application for Apple IOS devices

Hearing loss in Australian children, particularly those in rural and remote areas, is a growing health concern. Resultant deafness has significant impact on the educational and social development of such children. Whilst telehealth had provided other benefits for rural and remote areas, the absence of suitable testing equipment and associated healthcare specialists has meant that there is a gap in this area of child health that could be addressed using a mobile solution. This paper discusses the research and development of a mobile application for testing and diagnosis of hearing loss in children. It is unique in its ability to be able to function in uncontrolled test environments, and conforms to current hearing assessment standards. The application also produces an audiogram that can be immediately electronically transferred to the relevant healthcare provider. The application is specifically designed for young children to use and is designed to be used in collaboration with healthcare specialist audiologists and paediatricians. The prototype is currently undergoing testing at the Telethon Speech and Hearing institute, Perth, Western Australia. The results are expected to deliver crucial quantitative data to determine the accuracy of the application, as well as qualitative data from healthcare professionals and consumers

The oral microbiome and adverse pregnancy outcomes.

Significant evidence supports an association between periodontal pathogenic bacteria and preterm birth and preeclampsia. The virulence properties assigned to specific oral pathogenic bacteria, for example, Fusobacterium nucleatum, Porphyromonas gingivalis, Filifactor alocis, Campylobacter rectus, and others, render them as potential collaborators in adverse outcomes of pregnancy. Several pathways have been suggested for this association: 1) hematogenous spread (bacteremia) of periodontal pathogens; 2) hematogenous spread of multiple mediators of inflammation that are generated by the host and/or fetal immune response to pathogenic bacteria; and 3) the possibility of oral microbial pathogen transmission, with subsequent colonization, in the vaginal microbiome resulting from sexual practices. As periodontal disease is, for the most part, preventable, the medical and dental public health communities can address intervention strategies to control oral inflammatory disease, lessen the systemic inflammatory burden, and ultimately reduce the potential for adverse pregnancy outcomes. This article reviews the oral, vaginal, and placental microbiomes, considers their potential impact on preterm labor, and the future research needed to confirm or refute this relationship

A study on information induced medication errors

The electronic health record (eHR) system has recently been considered one of the biggest advancements in healthcare services. A personally controlled electronic health record (PCEHR) system is proposed by the Australian government to make the health system more agile, secure, and sustainable. Although the PCEHR system claims the electronic health records can be controlled by the patients, healthcare professionals and database/system operators may assist in disclosing the patients’ eHRs for retaliation or other ill purposes. As the conventional methods for preserving the privacy of eHRs solely trust the system operators, these data are vulnerable to be exploited by the authorised personnel in an immoral/unethical way. Furthermore, issues such as the sheer number of eHRs, their sensitive nature, flexible access, and efficient user revocation have remained the most important challenges towards fine-grained, cryptographically enforced data access control. In this paper we propose a patient centric cloud-based PCEHR framework, which employs a homomorphic encryption technique in storing the eHRs. The proposed system ensures the control of both access and privacy of eHRs stored in the cloud database

Different types of soluble fermentable dietary fibre decrease food intake, body weight gain and adiposity in young adult male rats

We thank Donna Wallace and the Rowett Animal House staff for the daily care of experimental rats, body weight and food intake measurements and MRI scanning, Vivien Buchan and Donna Henderson of the Rowett Analytical Department for proximate analyses and SCFA GC, and Andrew Chappell for conducting the beta-glucan analysis. This research was funded by the Scottish Government’s Rural and Environment Science and Analytical Services Division.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Tailoring the surface charge of dextran-based polymer coated SPIONs for modulated stem cell uptake and MRI contrast

Tracking stem cells in vivo using non-invasive techniques is critical to evaluate the efficacy and safety of stem cell therapies. Superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs) enable cells to be tracked using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), but to obtain detectable signal cells need to be labelled with a sufficient amount of iron oxide. For the majority of SPIONs, this can only be obtained with the use of transfection agents, which can adversely affect cell health. Here, we have synthesised a library of dextran-based polymer coated SPIONs with varying surface charge from −1.5 mV to +18.2 mV via a co-precipitation approach and investigated their ability to be directly internalised by stem cells without the need for transfection agents. The SPIONs were colloidally stable in physiological solutions. The crystalline phase of the particles was confirmed with powder X-ray diffraction and their magnetic properties were characterised using SQUID magnetometry and magnetic resonance. Increased surface charge led to six-fold increase in uptake of particles into stem cells and higher MRI contrast, with negligible change in cell viability. Cell tracking velocimetry was shown to be a more accurate method for predicting MRI contrast of stem cells compared to measuring iron oxide uptake through conventional bulk iron quantification

Reflection

This symposium has been unquestionably the greatest honor of my life. I am deeply grateful to all who planned it, particularly Katherine Franke and Suzanne Goldberg; to each of the remarkable speakers; and to the ever-supportive institutional community of Columbia University. Anything I say beyond that much risks sounding like a bad speech at the Oscars, without benefit of a recuperatively fetching gown. But I am appreciative beyond words for the work invested in shepherding this event into being. It feels as though a truckload of fairy dust had been dumped on me, and suddenly, suddenly . . . little academic wings have sprouted from my shoulders

A broad distribution of the alternative oxidase in microsporidian parasites

Microsporidia are a group of obligate intracellular parasitic eukaryotes that were considered to be amitochondriate until the recent discovery of highly reduced mitochondrial organelles called mitosomes. Analysis of the complete genome of Encephalitozoon cuniculi revealed a highly reduced set of proteins in the organelle, mostly related to the assembly of ironsulphur clusters. Oxidative phosphorylation and the Krebs cycle proteins were absent, in keeping with the notion that the microsporidia and their mitosomes are anaerobic, as is the case for other mitosome bearing eukaryotes, such as Giardia. Here we provide evidence opening the possibility that mitosomes in a number of microsporidian lineages are not completely anaerobic. Specifically, we have identified and characterized a gene encoding the alternative oxidase (AOX), a typically mitochondrial terminal oxidase in eukaryotes, in the genomes of several distantly related microsporidian species, even though this gene is absent from the complete genome of E. cuniculi. In order to confirm that these genes encode functional proteins, AOX genes from both A. locustae and T. hominis were over-expressed in E. coli and AOX activity measured spectrophotometrically using ubiquinol-1 (UQ-1) as substrate. Both A. locustae and T. hominis AOX proteins reduced UQ-1 in a cyanide and antimycin-resistant manner that was sensitive to ascofuranone, a potent inhibitor of the trypanosomal AOX. The physiological role of AOX microsporidia may be to reoxidise reducing equivalents produced by glycolysis, in a manner comparable to that observed in trypanosome