The Dose-Response Effects of Dissociation Training on Measures of Neuromuscular Control during Performance Screening in Male Youth Footballers

AIMS: Movement screens purportedly identify compensatory kinematics that predispose athletes to injury (Kiesel et al., 2011). The efficacy of assessing select competencies and prescribing remedial training based on screen outcomes however remains equivocal. The Foundation Performance Matrix Screen© (FPMS) supposedly profiles injury risk, subsequently directing its independent motor control Dissociation Training (DT) (Mottram and Comerford, 2008). However, there appears to be no research evidencing that DT can improve FPMS score or reduce injury. Therefore this study aimed to investigate the doseresponse of DT on kinematic and kinetic measures of neuromuscular control in male elite academy footballers. METHOD: The dose-response to DT therefore remains to be established. With institutional ethics approval, elite U15/16 and U17/18 male academy footballers comprised group one (n = 6) (G1) and group two (n = 8) (G2) respectively. G1 performed DT 1x week while G2 performed DT 3x week over eight weeks. Centre of pressure (CoP) total, anterior-posterior (X) and medial-lateral (Y) displacements (cm), sway velocity (cm∙s -1) and ellipse area (cm2) were recorded from participants’ non-dominant leg during a single leg stance test (SLST) and Y balance test™ (YBT). Force platform time to stabilisation (TTS), peak vertical ground reaction force (PVGRF) and loading rates were recorded from a 20cm bilateral drop jump landing (DJL). The FPMS and YBT were scored according to respective guidelines. All tests were performed barefoot. Cohen’s d effect size (ES) was calculated from differences in means. RESULTS: Small ES for G1 (ES -0.180; 95% CI, −1.94 - 0.60) and G2 (ES −0.136; 95% CI, −0.12 - 1.62) FPMS scores were observed. Large ES for DJL loading rates (ES -1.89, 95% CI, 0.046 - 0.079) and YBT normalised anterior reach (ES 1.416, 95% CI, 66.30 - 73.29) were observed for G1 compared to G2 where trivial (ES 0.072, 95% CI, 0.067 - 0.095) and moderate effects (ES 1.104, 95% CI, 66.84 - 72.90) respectively, were observed. The magnitude of change for G1 was consistently greater for all DJL and YBT measures. Furthermore, SLST performance for G1 improved for all CoP measures whereas G2 decreased. CONCLUSION: The measures used to assess neuromuscular function indicate eight weeks DT had meaningful effects on neuromuscular control, however, the magnitude of effects were greater for G1 than G2. As SLST, YBT and DJL indicated greater effects and are all proposed to predict injury, they could be a suitable surrogate marker for assessing the effects of DT. These findings also suggest that a lower dose of DT is sufficient provided training is individualised

Postmaterialism as an ideological divide for Australian, British, and Canadian youth elites.

Dept. of History, Philosophy, and Political Science. Paper copy at Leddy Library: Theses & Major Papers - Basement, West Bldg. / Call Number: Thesis1989 .B985. Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 40-07, page: . Thesis (M.A.)--University of Windsor (Canada), 1989

A stable, oligosymptomatic malaria focus in Thailand

Blood from most of the 250 residents of a nonmigratory farming village in south-eastern Thailand was visually examined for malaria parasites monthly for 2 years. Nearly 97% of the population had at least one (median = 5) patent Plasmodium falciparum infection per year; 72% had one due to P. vivax (median = 1). This contrasted with a slide positivity rate of 17% calculated from 12 months of passive case detection before the study began. Children 1-9 years old had the highest mean monthly prevalence (51%) and highest geometric mean density (10/500 white blood cells) of P. falciparum. Fewer than half the expected number of mixed infections were found but these were more common at high densities of P. falciparum. Individuals over 19 years old comprised 52% of the population but accounted for only 18% of P. vivax and 32% of P. falciparum gametocytaemias. Fever rates were marginally higher in those below 10 years old (8%) but occurred with equal frequency in those with patent infections or negative. The spleen rate (89% stage 1) was 24% in those under 15 years old and 7% in those older. No malaria mortality was seen. P. falciparum cases treated for 10 d with quinine + tetracycline (QT) cleared the infection as often as those given one dose of mefloquine + sulfadoxine + pyrimethamine (MSP); both treatments reduced densities in cases not cured. Apparently unsupervised compliance was no better with MSP than with QT. The role played by hyperendemic, cryptic foci in Asian epidemics of malaria may have been underestimate

Interior noise control ground test studies for advanced turboprop aircraft applications

The measurement and analysis procedures are documented, and the results of interior noise control ground tests conducted on a DC-9 aircraft test section are summarized. The objectives of these tests were to study the fuselage response characteristics of treated and untreated aircraft with aft-mount advanced turboprop engines and to analyze the effectiveness of selected noise control treatments in reducing passenger cabin noise on these aircraft. The results of fuselage structural mode surveys, cabin cavity surveys and sound intensity surveys are presented. The performance of various structural and cabin sidewall treatments is assessed, based on measurements of the resulting interior noise levels under simulated advanced turboprop excitation

BrewDog: business growth for punks!

This case study tells an atypical entrepreneurship story about two men and a dog. It explores the rapid growth of the phenomenon that is BrewDog plc - a company situated in the remote north-east of Scotland. What makes this case special is that the business, set up in 2007 by two university graduates in their early twenties with limited experience of the brewing industry, is now trading as a plc. From the outset they deliberately chose a strategy that flew in the face of accepted orthodoxy in the brewing industry. To industry experts, it made little sense because the remote Aberdeenshire town of Fraserburgh, with its peripheral location, would surely be the last place any rational individual would seek to start a new brewery. The story of how James Watt and Martin Dickie did so is uplifting and inspirational

Telescope to Observe Planetary Systems (TOPS): a high throughput 1.2-m visible telescope with a small inner working angle

The Telescope to Observe Planetary Systems (TOPS) is a proposed space mission to image in the visible (0.4-0.9 micron) planetary systems of nearby stars simultaneously in 16 spectral bands (resolution R~20). For the ~10 most favorable stars, it will have the sensitivity to discover 2 R_E rocky planets within habitable zones and characterize their surfaces or atmospheres through spectrophotometry. Many more massive planets and debris discs will be imaged and characterized for the first time. With a 1.2m visible telescope, the proposed mission achieves its power by exploiting the most efficient and robust coronagraphic and wavefront control techniques. The Phase-Induced Amplitude Apodization (PIAA) coronagraph used by TOPS allows planet detection at 2 lambda/d with nearly 100% throughput and preserves the telescope angular resolution. An efficient focal plane wavefront sensing scheme accurately measures wavefront aberrations which are fed back to the telescope active primary mirror. Fine wavefront control is also performed independently in each of 4 spectral channels, resulting in a system that is robust to wavefront chromaticity.Comment: 12 pages, SPIE conference proceeding, May 2006, Orlando, Florid

Neutrophil extracellular trap inhibition increases inflammation, bacteraemia and mortality in murine necrotizing enterocolitis

Necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC) is a devastating gastrointestinal disease affecting primarily premature infants. The disease is characterized by intestinal inflammation and leucocyte infiltration, often progressing to necrosis, perforation, systemic inflammatory response and death. Neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs), denoting nuclear DNA, histone and antimicrobial protein release, have been suggested to play a role in NEC. This study aimed to determine the role of NETs in NEC and explore the effect of chloramidine, a NET inhibitor, on a murine NEC-like intestinal injury model. Blood and intestinal tissues were collected from infants diagnosed with ≥ Stage II NEC, and levels of nucleosomes and NETs, respectively, were compared with those of case-matched controls. In mice, NEC was induced with dithizone/Klebsiella, and mice in the treatment group received 40 mg/kg chloramidine. Bacterial load, intestinal histology, plasma myeloperoxidase and cytokine levels, and immunofluorescent staining were compared with controls. Nucleosomes were significantly elevated in both human and mouse NEC plasma, whereas NET staining was only present in NEC tissue in both species. Chloramidine treatment increased systemic inflammation, bacterial load, organ injury and mortality in murine NEC. Taken together, our findings suggest that NETs are critical in the innate immune defence during NEC in preventing systemic bacteraemia

Braveheart, a Long Noncoding RNA Required for Cardiovascular Lineage Commitment

Long noncoding RNAs (lncRNAs) are often expressed in a development-specific manner, yet little is known about their roles in lineage commitment. Here, we identified Braveheart (Bvht), a heart-associated lncRNA in mouse. Using multiple embryonic stem cell (ESC) differentiation strategies, we show that Bvht is required for progression of nascent mesoderm toward a cardiac fate. We find that Bvht is necessary for activation of a core cardiovascular gene network and functions upstream of mesoderm posterior 1 (MesP1), a master regulator of a common multipotent cardiovascular progenitor. We also show that Bvht interacts with SUZ12, a component of polycomb-repressive complex 2 (PRC2), during cardiomyocyte differentiation, suggesting that Bvht mediates epigenetic regulation of cardiac commitment. Finally, we demonstrate a role for Bvht in maintaining cardiac fate in neonatal cardiomyocytes. Together, our work provides evidence for a long noncoding RNA with critical roles in the establishment of the cardiovascular lineage during mammalian development.Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation (DRG 2032-09)Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation (DFS 04-12)European Molecular Biology Organization (Long-term Fellowship)National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. Bench to Bassinet Program (U01HL098179)National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. Bench to Bassinet Program (U01HL098188)Smith Family FoundationPew Charitable Trusts. Program in the Biomedical Science

Sensorimotor priors in non-stationary environments

In the course of its interaction with the world, the human nervous system must constantly estimate various variables in the surrounding environment. Past research indicates that environmental variables may be represented as probabilistic distributions of a priori information (priors). Priors for environmental variables that do not change much over time have been widely studied. Little is known however, about how priors develop in environments with non-stationary statistics. We examine whether humans change their reliance on the prior based on recent changes in environmental variance. Through experimentation, we obtain an online estimate of the human sensorimotor prior (prediction) and then compare it to similar online predictions made by various non-adaptive and adaptive models. Simulations show that models that rapidly adapt to non-stationary components in the environments predict the stimuli better than models that do not take the changing statistics of the environment into consideration. We found that adaptive models best predict participants' responses in most cases. However, we find no support for the idea that this is a consequence of increased reliance on recent experience just after the occurrence of a systematic change in the environment