Female Labor Force Participation in Argentina, 1980-2003: Gendered Trends and Responses to Crisis

How do the experiences of women in the labor market differ from the experiences of men? Do economic crises affect their labor market decisions differently? Economists have investigated the responses of women to specific moments of crisis in Argentina – the country lends itself well to this analysis, as the last three decades of its history have seen both economic growth and financial collapse. With the crisis literature in mind, I investigate trends in female labor force participation rates in Argentina between 1980-2003, finding that while some evidence supports the “added worker effect” hypothesis, more research must be done to understand the relationships between female labor force participation and male and female unemployment

Evidence for an interaction between the Galactic Center clouds M0.10-0.08 and M0.11-0.11

We present high-resolution (~2-3"; ~0.1 pc) radio observations of the Galactic center cloud M0.10-0.08 using the Very Large Array at K and Ka band (~25 and 36 GHz). The M0.10-0.08 cloud is located in a complex environment near the Galactic center Radio Arc and the adjacent M0.11-0.11 molecular cloud. From our data, M0.10-0.08 appears to be a compact molecular cloud (~3 pc) that contains multiple compact molecular cores (5+; <0.4 pc). In this study we detect a total of 15 molecular transitions in M0.10-0.08 from the following molecules: NH3, HC3N, CH3OH, HC5N, CH3CN, and OCS. We have identified more than sixty 36 GHz CH3OH masers in M0.10-0.08 with brightness temperatures above 400 K and 31 maser candidates with temperatures between 100-400 K. We conduct a kinematic analysis of the gas using NH3 and detect multiple velocity components towards this region of the Galactic center. The bulk of the gas in this region has a velocity of 51.5 km/s (M0.10-0.08) with a lower velocity wing at 37.6 km/s. We also detect a relatively faint velocity component at 10.6 km/s that we attribute to being an extension of the M0.11-0.11 cloud. Analysis of the gas kinematics, combined with past X-ray fluorescence observations, suggests M0.10-0.08 and M0.11-0.11 are located in the same vicinity of the Galactic center and could be physically interacting.Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journa

Pregnancy and lactation, a challenge for the skeleton

In this review we discuss skeletal adaptations to the demanding situation of pregnancy and lactation. Calcium demands are increased during pregnancy and lactation, and this is effectuated by a complex series of hormonal changes. The changes in bone structure at the tissue and whole bone level observed during pregnancy and lactation appear to largely recover over time. The magnitude of the changes observed during lactation may relate to the volume and duration of breastfeeding and return to regular menses. Studies examining long-term consequences of pregnancy and lactation suggest that there are small, site-specific benefits to bone density, and that bone geometry may also be affected. Pregnancy- and lactation-induced osteoporosis (PLO) is a rare disease for which the pathophysiological mechanism is as yet incompletely known; here we discuss and speculate on the possible roles of genetics, oxytocin, sympathetic tone and bone marrow fat. Finally, we discuss fracture healing during pregnancy and lactation and the effects of estrogen on this process

The Optical Green Valley Versus Mid-infrared Canyon in Compact Groups

Compact groups of galaxies provide conditions similar to those experienced by galaxies in the earlier universe. Recent work on compact groups has led to the discovery of a dearth of mid-infrared transition galaxies (MIRTGs) in Infrared Array Camera (3.6-8.0 micrometers) color space as well as at intermediate specific star formation rates. However, we find that in compact groups these MIRTGs have already transitioned to the optical ([gr]) red sequence. We investigate the optical color-magnitude diagram (CMD) of 99 compact groups containing 348 galaxies and compare the optical CMD with mid-infrared (mid-IR) color space for compact group galaxies. Utilizing redshifts available from Sloan Digital Sky Survey, we identified new galaxy members for four groups. By combining optical and mid-IR data, we obtain information on both the dust and the stellar populations in compact group galaxies. We also compare with more isolated galaxies and galaxies in the Coma Cluster, which reveals that, similar to clusters, compact groups are dominated by optically red galaxies. While we find that compact group transition galaxies lie on the optical red sequence, LVL (Local Volume Legacy) + (plus) SINGS (Spitzer Infrared Nearby Galaxies Survey) mid-IR (infrared) transition galaxies span the range of optical colors. The dearth of mid-IR transition galaxies in compact groups may be due to a lack of moderately star-forming low mass galaxies; the relative lack of these galaxies could be due to their relatively small gravitational potential wells. This makes them more susceptible to this dynamic environment, thus causing them to more easily lose gas or be accreted by larger members

Artificial tongues and leaves

The objective with synthetic multifunctional nanoarchitecture is to create large suprastructures with interesting functions. For this purpose, lipid bilayer membranes or conducting surfaces have been used as platforms and rigid-rod molecules as shape-persistent scaffolds. Examples for functions obtained by this approach include pores that can act as multicomponent sensors in complex matrices or rigid-rod π-stack architecture for artificial photosynthesis and photovoltaic

A Census of Early-phase High-mass Star Formation in the Central Molecular Zone

We present new observations of the C-band continuum emission and masers to assess high-mass (>8 ${M}_{\odot }$) star formation at early evolutionary phases in the inner 200 pc of the Central Molecular Zone (CMZ) of the Galaxy. The continuum observation is complete to free–free emission from stars above 10–11 ${M}_{\odot }$ in 91% of the covered area. We identify 104 compact sources in the continuum emission, among which five are confirmed ultracompact H ii regions, 12 are candidates of ultracompact H ii regions, and the remaining 87 sources are mostly massive stars in clusters, field stars, evolved stars, pulsars, extragalactic sources, or of unknown nature that is to be investigated. We detect class ii CH3OH masers at 23 positions, among which six are new detections. We confirm six known H2CO masers in two high-mass star-forming regions and detect two new H2CO masers toward the Sgr C cloud, making it the ninth region in the Galaxy that contains masers of this type. In spite of these detections, we find that current high-mass star formation in the inner CMZ is only taking place in seven isolated clouds. The results suggest that star formation at early evolutionary phases in the CMZ is about 10 times less efficient than expected from the dense gas star formation relation, which is in line with previous studies that focus on more evolved phases of star formation. This means that if there will be any impending, next burst of star formation in the CMZ, it has not yet begun

Allelic Variation Investigation of the Estrogen Receptor Within an Australian Multiple Sclerosis Population

Multiple Sclerosis (MS) is a central nervous system (CNS) chronic inflammatory demyelinating disease leading to various neurological disabilities. The disorder is more prevalent for women with a ratio of 3:2 female to male. Objectives: To investigate variation within the estrogen receptor 1 (ESR1) polymorphism gene in an Australian MS case-control population using two intragenic restriction fragment length polymorphisms; the G594A located in exon 8 detected with the BtgI restriction enzyme and T938C located in intron 1, detected with PvuII. One hundred and ten Australian MS patients were studied, with patients classified clinically as Relapsing Remitting MS (RR-MS), Secondary Progressive MS (SP-MS) or Primary Progressive MS (PP-MS). Also, 110 age, sex and ethnicity matched controls were investigated as a comparative group. No significant difference in the allelic distribution frequency was found between the case and control groups for the ESR1 PvuII (P = 0.50) and Btg1 (P = 0.45) marker. Our results do not support a role for these two ESR1 markers in multiple sclerosis susceptibility, however other markers within ESR1 should not be excluded for potential involvement in the disorder