Characterizing the spatial determinants and prevention of malaria in Kenya

The United Nations' Sustainable Development Goal 3 is to ensure health and well-being for all at all ages with a specific target to end malaria by 2030. Aligned with this goal, the primary objective of this study is to determine the effectiveness of utilizing local spatial variations to uncover the statistical relationships between malaria incidence rate and environmental and behavioral factors across the counties of Kenya. Two data sources are used-Kenya Demographic and Health Surveys of 2000, 2005, 2010, and 2015, and the national Malaria Indicator Survey of 2015. The spatial analysis shows clustering of counties with high malaria incidence rate, or hot spots, in the Lake Victoria region and the east coastal area around Mombasa; there are significant clusters of counties with low incidence rate, or cold spot areas in Nairobi. We apply an analysis technique, geographically weighted regression, that helps to better model how environmental and social determinants are related to malaria incidence rate while accounting for the confounding effects of spatial non-stationarity. Some general patterns persist over the four years of observation. We establish that variables including rainfall, proximity to water, vegetation, and population density, show differential impacts on the incidence of malaria in Kenya. The El-Nino-southern oscillation (ENSO) event in 2015 was significant in driving up malaria in the southern region of Lake Victoria compared with prior time-periods. The applied spatial multivariate clustering analysis indicates the significance of social and behavioral survey responses. This study can help build a better spatially explicit predictive model for malaria in Kenya capturing the role and spatial distribution of environmental, social, behavioral, and other characteristics of the households.Published versio

Decay of Ultralight Axion Condensates

Axion particles can form macroscopic condensates, whose size can be galactic in scale for models with very small axion masses $m\sim10^{-22}$ eV, and which are sometimes referred to under the name of Fuzzy Dark Matter. Many analyses of these condensates are done in the non-interacting limit, due to the weakness of the self-interaction coupling of axions. We investigate here how certain results change upon inclusion of these interactions, finding a decreased maximum mass and a modified mass-radius relationship. Further, these condensates are, in general, unstable to decay through number-changing interactions. We analyze the stability of galaxy-sized condensates of axion-like particles, and sketch the parameter space of stable configurations as a function of a binding energy parameter. We find a strong lower bound on the size of Fuzzy Dark Matter condensates which are stable to decay, with lifetimes longer than the age of the universe.Comment: 24 pages, 2 figures. v2: Added brief discussion of angular momentum; extended Appendix A; typos correcte

Dead Time Compensation for High-Flux Ranging

Dead time effects have been considered a major limitation for fast data acquisition in various time-correlated single photon counting applications, since a commonly adopted approach for dead time mitigation is to operate in the low-flux regime where dead time effects can be ignored. Through the application of lidar ranging, this work explores the empirical distribution of detection times in the presence of dead time and demonstrates that an accurate statistical model can result in reduced ranging error with shorter data acquisition time when operating in the high-flux regime. Specifically, we show that the empirical distribution of detection times converges to the stationary distribution of a Markov chain. Depth estimation can then be performed by passing the empirical distribution through a filter matched to the stationary distribution. Moreover, based on the Markov chain model, we formulate the recovery of arrival distribution from detection distribution as a nonlinear inverse problem and solve it via provably convergent mathematical optimization. By comparing per-detection Fisher information for depth estimation from high- and low-flux detection time distributions, we provide an analytical basis for possible improvement of ranging performance resulting from the presence of dead time. Finally, we demonstrate the effectiveness of our formulation and algorithm via simulations of lidar ranging.Comment: Revision with added estimation results, references, and figures, and modified appendice

Effective Fathering and the Quantity and Quality of Time Spent With Children

Research into fathers\u27 parenting is relatively new. New measures have been developed to assess the style and effectiveness of fathering. Many questions remain about the salient elements of effective fathering. The present study was focused on the quantity and quality of time that fathers spend at home and in contact with their children. The primary research questions were (a) What is the relationship between the quantity of time spent with children and the quality of time spent with children? (b) What is the relationship between effective fathering attributes and the quantity of time spent with children? and(c)What is the relationship between effective fathering attributes and the quality of time spent with children? To the end of addressing these research questions, a sample of fathers responded to questions regarding quality and quantity of time spent with their children. Their responses were compared to their ICAN scores (Roid & Canfield, 1994). No relationship was shown between quantity of time spent with children and qualitative items. Results indicated statistically significant relationships between effective fathering and qualitative attributes. No relationship was demonstrated between effective fathering and time spent with children

Improvement of adhesive toughness measurement

The double cantilever beam (DCB) method for adhesive toughness measurement was improved by incorporating a sufficiently sharp crack made by a wedge-tapping method. A known route to producing cracks via loading–unloading cycles was proved unreliable because the cycles produced plastic deformation in the adhesive where new cracks propagated. Abnormally high toughness values with large standard deviations were obtained with cracks made by embedding a non-sticky insert. Only instantly propagated cracks made by tapping were sufficiently sharp to produce reproducible, accurate tough-ness measurements. However, toughened resin was insensit

The Effect of Acute Hyperglycemia on Muscular Strength, Power and Endurance

International Journal of Exercise Science 10(3): 390-396, 2017. The purpose of this study was to elucidate the impact of acute hyperglycemia on skeletal muscle strength, power, and endurance. Ten male collegiate athletes (age 21.5 ± 1.5 years, height 186 ± 2.03 cm, body mass 108.8 ± 7.6 kg) participated in 2 testing sessions, separated by 7 days and randomized for either high glucose (HG) or control (C) treatment conditions. HG consumed a high glucose drink (2 g glucose/kg body weight) while controls consumed an isocaloric nutrition bar (40% protein, 30% fat, and 30% carbohydrate). Blood glucose (BC) levels for HG and C were tested at 0 (basal) and 30, 60, 90, and 120 minutes (mins) post consumption. At 30 mins post consumption, HG and C muscular strength was assessed by a 1RM bench press (BP) test followed by lower body power at 60 mins via vertical jump test. Muscular endurance was examined with a 3-set-to-failure BP test at 90 mins. HG exhibited significantly greater BC values (

The Antiferroelectric ↔ Ferroelectric Phase Transition in Lead-Containing and Lead-Free Perovskite Ceramics

A comprehensive review on the latest development of the antiferroelectric ferroelectric phase transition is presented. The abrupt volume expansion and sudden development of polarization at the phase transition has been extensively investigated in PbZrO3-based perovskite ceramics. New research developments in these compositions, including the incommensurate domain structure, the auxetic behavior under electric fields in the induced ferroelectric phase, the ferroelastic behavior of the multicell cubic phase, the impact of radial compression, the unexpected electric field-induced ferroelectric-to-antiferroelectric transition, and the phase transition mechanical toughening effect have been summarized. Due to their significance to lead-free piezoelectric ceramics, compounds with antiferroelectric phases, including NaNbO3, AgNbO3, and (Bi1/2Na1/2)TiO3, are also critically reviewed. Focus has been placed on the (Bi1/2Na1/2)TiO3–BaTiO3 solid solution where the electric field-induced ferroelectric phase remains even after the applied field is removed at room temperature. Therefore, the electric field-induced antiferroelectric-to-ferroelectric phase transition is a key to the poling process to develop piezoelectricity in morphotropic phase boundary (MPB) compositions. The competing phase transition and domain switching processes in 0.93(Bi1/2Na1/2)TiO3–0.07BaTiO3 are directly imaged with nanometer resolution using the unique in situ transmission electron microscopy (TEM) technique