The anthropology of public health

Copyright © 2005 Cambridge University PressThe Journal of Biosocial Science regularly publishes papers addressing the social and cultural aspects of disease, sickness and well-being. Most of these papers attempt to understand the prevalence and distribution of disease and sickness within and between populations as well as local responses to biomedical interventions and public health policy more generally. They fall broadly within the remit of human ecology; and they embrace a ‘factorial’ model of disease in which social and cultural factors are deemed to be just one of a number of factors to be considered alongside a range of other factors. These include biological features of the infecting organism; nutritional factors; environmental factors; psychological factors; and genetic factors influencing susceptibility to disease at an individual and population level

Covert Aspects of Surveillance and the Ethical Issues They Raise

This chapter focusses on the ethical issues raised by different types of surveillance and the varied ways in which surveillance can be covert. Three case studies are presented which highlight different types of surveillance and different ethical concerns. The first case concerns the use of undercover police to infiltrate political activist groups over a 40-year period in the UK. The second case study examines a joint operation by US and Australian law enforcement agencies: the FBI’s operation Trojan Shield and the AFP’s Operation Ironside. This involved distributing encrypted phone handsets to serious criminal organisations which included a ‘backdoor’ secretly sending encrypted copies of all messages to law enforcement. The third case study analyses the use of emotional artificial intelligence systems in educational digital learning platforms for children where technology companies collect, store and use intrusive personal data in an opaque manner. The authors discuss similarities and differences in the ethical questions raised by these cases, for example, the involvement of the state versus private corporations, the kinds of information gathered and how it is used

Chromatic transit light curves of disintegrating rocky planets

Context. Kepler observations have revealed a class of short period exoplanets, of which Kepler-1520 b is the prototype, which have comet-like dust tails thought to be the result of small, rocky planets losing mass. The shape and chromaticity of the transits constrain the properties of the dust particles originating from the planet's surface, offering a unique opportunity to probe the composition and geophysics of rocky exoplanets. Aims. We aim to approximate the average Kepler long-cadence light curve of Kepler-1520 b and investigate how the optical thickness and transit cross-section of a general dust tail can affect the observed wavelength dependence and depth of transit light curves. Methods. We developed a new 3D model that ejects sublimating particles from the planet surface to build up a dust tail, assuming it to be optically thin, and used 3D radiative transfer computations that fully treat scattering using the distribution of hollow spheres (DHS) method, to generate transit light curves between 0.45 and 2.5 $\mu$m. Results. We show that the transit depth is wavelength independent for optically thick tails, potentially explaining why only some observations indicate a wavelength dependence. From the 3D nature of our simulated tails, we show that their transit cross-sections are related to the component of particle ejection velocity perpendicular to the planet's orbital plane and use this to derive a minimum ejection velocity of 1.2 kms$^{-1}$. To fit the average transit depth of Kepler-1520 b of 0.87%, we require a high dust mas-loss rate of 7 $-$ 80 M$_\oplus$ Gyr$^{-1}$ which implies planet lifetimes that may be inconsistent with the observed sample. Therefore, these mass-loss rates should be considered to be upper limits.Comment: 22 pages, 22 figures, accepted for publication in A&

The forensic saviour : petitions and power in Greco-Roman Egypt

Trabalho de projecto de mestrado em Medicina (Neurologia), apresentado à Faculdade de Medicina da Universidade de CoimbraMovement disorders affect gait, which is one of the most disabling manifestations. Analyzing the brain circuits dependent on the basal ganglia (caudate, putamen, globus pallidus, subthalamic nucleus and substantia nigra), also responsible for organizing movement, we were closer to understand the neurophysiological basis of its operation, taking in account, particularly, the pattern of change of neurotransmitters in each pathology. We considered the Parkinson's and Huntington's diseases as study models, which are characterized by cognitive, behavioral and motor symptoms, as a result of the underlying changes. They were considered in analogy, relating their pathophysiological mechanisms to the circuits of the basal ganglia, which allowed classifying their role in normal gait performance or disease. The evaluation of these diseases goes through different scales and experimental models, which are also intended to objectify and quantify changes in gait, as festination and freezing. This helps in implementing the pharmacological treatment, which appears still insufficient. In addition, there are techniques of physiotherapy and rehabilitation medicine. Therefore, making an updated review of the mechanisms underlying changes in gait in movement disorders, clarifying the role of different neurological structures involved in both the disease and in its absence, was the aim of this workAs doenças do movimento afectam a marcha, sendo uma das manifestações mais incapacitantes. Analisando os circuitos cerebrais dependentes dos gânglios da base (caudado, putamen, globo pálido, substância negra e núcleo subtalâmico), também responsáveis pela organização da locomoção, ficámos mais perto de conhecer as bases neurofisiológicas do seu funcionamento, tendo em conta, nomeadamente, o padrão de alteração de neurotransmissores próprio de cada patologia. Consideraram-se a Doença de Parkinson e a Doença de Huntington como modelos de estudo, sendo caracterizadas por sintomatologia cognitiva, comportamental e motora, fruto das alterações subjacentes. Foram abordadas numa perspectiva de analogia, relacionando os seus mecanismos fisiopatológicos com os circuitos dos gânglios da base, o que permitiu classificar o seu papel no desempenho da marcha normal ou na doença. A avaliação destas doenças passa por diferentes escalas e modelos experimentais, que visam também quantificar e objectivar alterações da marcha como a festinação e o freezing. Este facto auxilia na implementação do tratamento farmacológico, o qual se apresenta ainda insuficiente. Como complemento existem técnicas de fisioterapia e medicina de reabilitação. Foi, por isso, objectivo deste trabalho fazer uma revisão actualizada dos mecanismos subjacentes às alterações da marcha nas doenças do movimento, clarificando o papel das diferentes estruturas neurológicas envolvidas tanto na doença como na ausência del

Prospects for SIMPLE 2000: A large-mass, low-background Superheated Droplet Detector for WIMP searches

SIMPLE 2000 (Superheated Instrument for Massive ParticLE searches) will consist of an array of eight to sixteen large active mass ($\sim15$ g) Superheated Droplet Detectors(SDDs) to be installed in the new underground laboratory of Rustrel-Pays d'Apt. Several factors make of SDDs an attractive approach for the detection of Weakly Interacting Massive Particles (WIMPs), namely their intrinsic insensitivity to minimum ionizing particles, high fluorine content, low cost and operation near ambient pressure and temperature. We comment here on the fabrication, calibration and already-competitive first limits from SIMPLE prototype SDDs, as well as on the expected immediate increase in sensitivity of the program, which aims at an exposure of $>$25 kg-day during the year 2000. The ability of modest-mass fluorine-rich detectors to explore regions of neutralino parameter space beyond the reach of the most ambitious cryogenic projects is pointed out.Comment: 19 pages, 10 figures included. New Journal of Physics, in pres

Dimer Decimation and Intricately Nested Localized-Ballistic Phases of Kicked Harper

Dimer decimation scheme is introduced in order to study the kicked quantum systems exhibiting localization transition. The tight-binding representation of the model is mapped to a vectorized dimer where an asymptotic dissociation of the dimer is shown to correspond to the vanishing of the transmission coefficient thru the system. The method unveils an intricate nesting of extended and localized phases in two-dimensional parameter space. In addition to computing transport characteristics with extremely high precision, the renormalization tools also provide a new method to compute quasienergy spectrum.Comment: There are five postscript figures. Only half of the figure (3) is shown to reduce file size. However, missing part is the mirror image of the part show

Telling donor-conceived children about their conception: Evaluation of the use of the Donor Conception Network children's books

If parents have used donated gametes, it is a personal choice whether they disclose to their children. For those that do, there is, however, little advice on how to tell their children. The Donor Conception Network (DCN) has made a series of books to help parents disclose. This study evaluated parents’ experience of using these books. An online survey with both quantitative and qualitative questions was used. The DCN membership and social media were used to publicize the survey, and 108 responses were analysed. At the time of conception, the parents’ family types were mainly mother and father (56.5%) and solo mothers (36.1%). The method of conception was mainly donor spermatozoa (55.6%) followed by donor egg (38.0%), double donation (8.3%) and one case of surrogacy. Most parents had read the book to their children before 2 years of age (76.9%). Before reading the books, some of the parents had some confidence in telling (43.5%) or were very confident in telling (30.6%). After reading the books, 60.2% reported having much more confidence in telling. Most parents felt their children had no understanding (76.8%) or only some understanding (22.3%) of donor conception before reading the books. After reading the books most parents felt their children's understanding had increased (71.3%). Most parents felt that reading the books had given them more confidence in using donor conception language (90.7%). The use of books to tell children about their conception may be a useful resource for parents wishing to be open with their children