Marriage equality & intersectionality

The goal of this study is to understand the extent to which a diverse group of sexual and gender minorities understood the landmark Supreme Court ruling in favor of marriage equality as personally impacting them. Prominent lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) figures have argued that marriage is an oppressive institution and that legalizing same-sex marriage would not benefit the most marginalized members of the community, particularly Black people. Until now, there have been few resources for comparing these claims of scholars and activists with those of members of the communities they claim to represent. Guided by Critical Race Theory and intersectionality, this study centered LGBTQ people of color's lived experiences. A purposive sample of 99 LGBTQ people in Chicago, New York City, and San Francisco were asked whether and how the Supreme Court's decision in Obergefell v. Hodges (2015) personally impacted them. Most participants described an emotional impact. Relatively few criticized marriages as “heteronormative” or unfit for LGBTQ people. Black participants were less likely than participants of other races to criticize marriage as an institution. Moreover, Black and Latinx participants articulated a more expansive, equality-focused understanding of the right to marry than the Court itself articulated. They described the marriage decision as carrying the potential to empower and elevate their identities in various contexts. For these people, the marriage equality movement was centrally about equality rather than marriage

Older adults who have previously fallen due to a trip walk differently than those who have fallen due to a slip

Studying the relationships between centre of mass (COM) and centre of pressure (COP) during walking has been shown to be useful in determining movement stability. The aim of the current study was to compare COM–COP separation measures during walking between groups of older adults with no history of falling, and a history of falling due to tripping or slipping. Any differences between individuals who have fallen due to a slip and those who have fallen due to a trip in measures of dynamic balance could potentially indicate differences in the mechanisms responsible for falls. Forty older adults were allocated into groups based on their self-reported fall history during walking. The non-faller group had not experienced a fall in at least the previous year. Participants who had experienced a fall were split into two groups based on whether a trip or slip resulted in the fall(s). A Vicon system was used to collect full body kinematic trajectories. Two force platforms were used to measure ground reaction forces. The COM was significantly further ahead of the COP at heel strike for the trip (14.3 ± 2.7 cm) and slip (15.3 ± 1.1 cm) groups compared to the non-fallers (12.0 ± 2.7 cm). COM was significantly further behind the COP at foot flat for the slip group (−14.9 ± 3.6 cm) compared to the non-fallers (−10.3 ± 3.9 cm). At mid-swing, the COM of the trip group was ahead of the COP (0.9 ± 1.6 cm), whereas for the slip group the COM was behind the COP (−1.2 ± 2.2 cm). These results show identifiable differences in dynamic balance control of walking between older adults with a history of tripping or slipping and non-fallers

Joining the conspiracy? Negotiating ethics and emotions in researching (around) AIDS in southern Africa

AIDS is an emotive subject, particularly in southern Africa. Among those who have been directly affected by the disease, or who perceive themselves to be personally at risk, talking about AIDS inevitably arouses strong emotions - amongst them fear, distress, loss and anger. Conventionally, human geography research has avoided engagement with such emotions. Although the ideal of the detached observer has been roundly critiqued, the emphasis in methodological literature on 'doing no harm' has led even qualitative researchers to avoid difficult emotional encounters. Nonetheless, research is inevitably shaped by emotions, not least those of the researchers themselves. In this paper, we examine the role of emotions in the research process through our experiences of researching the lives of 'Young AIDS migrants' in Malawi and Lesotho. We explore how the context of the research gave rise to the production of particular emotions, and how, in response, we shaped the research, presenting a research agenda focused more on migration than AIDS. This example reveals a tension between universalised ethics expressed through ethical research guidelines that demand informed consent, and ethics of care, sensitive to emotional context. It also demonstrates how dualistic distinctions between reason and emotion, justice and care, global and local are unhelpful in interpreting the ethics of research practice

Changes in GABA and glutamate concentrations during memory tasks in patients with Parkinson's disease undergoing DBS surgery.

Until now direct neurochemical measurements during memory tasks have not been accomplished in the human basal ganglia. It has been proposed, based on both functional imaging studies and psychometric testing in normal subjects and in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD), that the basal ganglia is responsible for the performance of feedback-contingent implicit memory tasks. To measure neurotransmitters, we used in vivo microdialysis during deep brain stimulation (DBS) surgery. We show in the right subthalamic nucleus (STN) of patients with PD a task-dependent change in the concentrations of glutamate and GABA during an implicit memory task relative to baseline, while no difference was found between declarative memory tasks. The five patients studied had a significant decrease in the percent concentration of GABA and glutamate during the performance of the weather prediction task (WPT). We hypothesize, based on current models of basal ganglia function, that this decrease in the concentration is consistent with expected dysfunction in basal ganglia networks in patients with PD

TWAM: A Certifying Abstract Machine for Logic Programs

Type-preserving (or typed) compilation uses typing derivations to certify correctness properties of compilation. We have designed and implemented a type-preserving compiler for a simply-typed dialect of Prolog we call T-Prolog. The crux of our approach is a new certifying abstract machine which we call the Typed Warren Abstract Machine (TWAM). The TWAM has a dependent type system strong enough to specify the semantics of a logic program in the logical framework LF. We present a soundness metatheorem which constitutes a partial correctness guarantee: well-typed programs implement the logic program specified by their type. This metatheorem justifies our design and implementation of a certifying compiler from T-Prolog to TWAM.Comment: 41 pages, under submission to ACM Transactions on Computational Logi

Quantitative two-dimensional strain mapping of small core-shell FePt@Fe3O4 nanoparticles

We report a facile one-pot chemical synthesis of colloidal FePt@Fe3O4 core–shell nanoparticles (NPs) with an average diameter of 8.7 ± 0.4 nm and determine their compositional morphology, microstructure, two-dimensional strain, and magnetic hysteresis. Using various state-of-the-art analytical transmission electron microscopy (TEM) characterization techniques—including high resolution TEM imaging, TEM tomography, scanning TEM-high angle annular dark field imaging, and scanning TEM-energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy elemental mapping—we gain a comprehensive understanding of the chemical and physical properties of FePt@Fe3O4 NPs. Additional analysis using x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, x-ray diffraction, and superconducting quantum interference device magnetometry distinguishes the oxide phase and determines the magnetic properties. The geometric phase analysis method is effective in revealing interfacial strain at the core–shell interface. This is of fundamental interest for strain engineering of nanoparticles for desirable applications

Conformational effects on the Circular Dichroism of Human Carbonic Anhydrase II: a multilevel computational study

Circular Dichroism (CD) spectroscopy is a powerful method for investigating conformational changes in proteins and therefore has numerous applications in structural and molecular biology. Here a computational investigation of the CD spectrum of the Human Carbonic Anhydrase II (HCAII), with main focus on the near-UV CD spectra of the wild-type enzyme and it seven tryptophan mutant forms, is presented and compared to experimental studies. Multilevel computational methods (Molecular Dynamics, Semiempirical Quantum Mechanics, Time-Dependent Density Functional Theory) were applied in order to gain insight into the mechanisms of interaction between the aromatic chromophores within the protein environment and understand how the conformational flexibility of the protein influences these mechanisms. The analysis suggests that combining CD semi empirical calculations, crystal structures and molecular dynamics (MD) could help in achieving a better agreement between the computed and experimental protein spectra and provide some unique insight into the dynamic nature of the mechanisms of chromophore interactions