The impact of farming on over-wintering bird populations

Field boundaries and fields in stubble, set-aside, winter wheat and improved grassland in County Kildare were surveyed for birds on 15 occasions between October 2001 and February 2002. A total of 40 species was recorded on all sites during the period of the study. Arable farming that retains stubble throughout the winter supports the greatest species richness and diversity with the lowest being recorded on improved grassland. Individual species showed preference for certain sites. Seed-feeding species, yellowhammer and skylark, preferred stubble while invertebrate-feeding species, fieldfare and meadow pipit preferred grassland. The analysis demonstrated that certain components of habitat were responsible for differences in species present and density

Epidemiological findings and medical, legal, and public health challenges of an investigation of severe soft tissue infections and deaths among injecting drug users: Ireland, 2000.

In May 2000, public health authorities in Dublin, Ireland, identified a cluster of unexplained severe illness among injecting drug users (IDUs). Similar clusters were also reported in Scotland and England. Concurrent investigations were undertaken to identify the aetiology and source of the illnesses. In Dublin, 22 IDUs were identified with injection-site inflammation resulting in hospitalization or death; eight (36%) died. Common clinical findings among patients with severe systemic symptoms included leukaemoid reaction and cardiogenic shock. Seventeen (77%) patients reported injecting heroin intramuscularly in the 2 weeks before illness. Of 11 patients with adequate specimens available for testing, two (18%) were positive by 16S rDNA PCR for Clostridium novyi. Clinical and laboratory findings suggested that histotoxic Clostridia caused a subset of infections in these related clusters. Empiric treatment for infections among IDUs was optimized for anaerobic organisms, and outreach led to increased enrolment in methadone treatment in Dublin. Many unique legal, medical, and public health challenges were encountered during the investigation of this outbreak

Starting to Stop: Young Offenders' Desistance from Crime

This paper explores the complexities of the interplay between structural and agentic changes in 21 young offenders' lives as they start to stop offending. The young people's ability to desist from crime was dependent upon their engagement with a 'hook for change', their development of prosocial relationships and 'knifing off' of elements of their offending past, the extent of their identity change, and their confidence about desistance. Desistance was less likely in the absence of a 'hook' and where offenders were running a 'condemnation script'. The study challenges previous research that argues that desistance from crime in adolescence is unlikely

Adult Spinal Cord Radial Glia Display a Unique Progenitor Phenotype

Radial glia (RG) are primarily embryonic neuroglial progenitors that express Brain Lipid Binding Protein (Blbp a.k.a. Fabp7) and Glial Fibrillary Acidic Protein (Gfap). We used these transcripts to demarcate the distribution of spinal cord radial glia (SCRG) and screen for SCRG gene expression in the Allen Spinal Cord Atlas (ASCA). We reveal that neonatal and adult SCRG are anchored in a non-ventricular niche at the spinal cord (SC) pial boundary, and express a “signature” subset of 122 genes, many of which are shared with “classic” neural stem cells (NSCs) of the subventricular zone (SVZ) and SC central canal (CC). A core expressed gene set shared between SCRG and progenitors of the SVZ and CC is particularly enriched in genes associated with human disease. Visualizing SCRG in a Fabp7-EGFP reporter mouse reveals an extensive population of SCRG that extend processes around the SC boundary and inwardly (through) the SC white matter (WM), whose abundance increases in a gradient from cervical to lumbar SC. Confocal analysis of multiple NSC-enriched proteins reveals that postnatal SCRG are a discrete and heterogeneous potential progenitor population that become activated by multiple SC lesions, and that CC progenitors are also more heterogeneous than previously appreciated. Gene ontology analysis highlights potentially unique regulatory pathways that may be further manipulated in SCRG to enhance repair in the context of injury and SC disease

Making Free Trade Fair

Philosophers have done very little work on what makes trade fair. Perhaps the most extensive discussion is Malgorzata Kurjanska and Mathias Risse’s article, “Fairness in Trade II: export subsidies and the fair trade movement.”2 In their article, Kurjanska and Risse consider the case for trade subsidies and the Fair Trade movement. They suggest that it is not permissible for developed countries to give their producers subsidies because doing so does not strike an appropriate balance between meeting the needs of the global poor and protecting domestic workers (Kurjanska and Risse, 2008: 34). Kurjanska and Risse also argue that the case for Fair Trade hinges, primarily, on whether or not it is part of the best development strategy for poor countries. They do not think Fair Trade is part of the best development strategy and, so, they believe purchasing Fair Trade certified goods is only acceptable because doing so does not constitute a large share of the market in traded goods. This chapter argues that the case against subsidies and Fair Trade Kurjanska and Risse present is much weaker than they make out. To the contrary, it argues that giving some subsidies and purchasing some Fair Trade certified goods may even be necessary to make trade fair. Section 11.2 starts by saying a few words about the normative framework Kurjanska and Risse adopt

Design of the SPT-SLIM focal plane: A spectroscopic imaging array for the South Pole Telescope

The Summertime Line Intensity Mapper (SLIM) is a mm-wave line-intensity mapping (mm-LIM) experiment for the South Pole Telescope (SPT). The goal of SPT-SLIM is to serve as a technical and scientific pathfinder for the demonstration of the suitability and in-field performance of multi-pixel superconducting filterbank spectrometers for future mm-LIM experiments. Scheduled to deploy in the 2023-24 austral summer, the SPT-SLIM focal plane will include 18 dual-polarisation pixels, each coupled to an R=λ/Δλ=300 thin-film microstrip filterbank spectrometer that spans the 2 mm atmospheric window (120–180 GHz). Each individual spectral channel feeds a microstrip-coupled lumped-element kinetic inductance detector, which provides the highly multiplexed readout for the 10k detectors needed for SPT-SLIM. Here, we present an overview of the preliminary design of key aspects of the SPT-SLIM focal plane array, a description of the detector architecture and predicted performance, and initial test results that will be used to inform the final design of the SPT-SLIM spectrometer array

Conceptual Design of the Modular Detector and Readout System for the CMB-S4 survey experiment

We present the conceptual design of the modular detector and readout system for the Cosmic Microwave Background Stage 4 (CMB-S4) ground-based survey experiment. CMB-S4 will map the cosmic microwave background (CMB) and the millimeter-wave sky to unprecedented sensitivity, using 500,000 superconducting detectors observing from Chile and Antarctica to map over 60 percent of the sky. The fundamental building block of the detector and readout system is a detector module package operated at 100 mK, which is connected to a readout and amplification chain that carries signals out to room temperature. It uses arrays of feedhorn-coupled orthomode transducers (OMT) that collect optical power from the sky onto dc-voltage-biased transition-edge sensor (TES) bolometers. The resulting current signal in the TESs is then amplified by a two-stage cryogenic Superconducting Quantum Interference Device (SQUID) system with a time-division multiplexer to reduce wire count, and matching room-temperature electronics to condition and transmit signals to the data acquisition system. Sensitivity and systematics requirements are being developed for the detector and readout system over a wide range of observing bands (20 to 300 GHz) and optical powers to accomplish CMB-S4's science goals. While the design incorporates the successes of previous generations of CMB instruments, CMB-S4 requires an order of magnitude more detectors than any prior experiment. This requires fabrication of complex superconducting circuits on over 10 square meters of silicon, as well as significant amounts of precision wiring, assembly and cryogenic testing.Comment: 25 pages, 15 figures, presented at and published in the proceedings of SPIE Astronomical Telescopes and Instrumentation 202

Emerging infectious disease implications of invasive mammalian species : the greater white-toothed shrew (Crocidura russula) is associated with a novel serovar of pathogenic Leptospira in Ireland

The greater white-toothed shrew (Crocidura russula) is an invasive mammalian species that was first recorded in Ireland in 2007. It currently occupies an area of approximately 7,600 km2 on the island. C. russula is normally distributed in Northern Africa and Western Europe, and was previously absent from the British Isles. Whilst invasive species can have dramatic and rapid impacts on faunal and floral communities, they may also be carriers of pathogens facilitating disease transmission in potentially naive populations. Pathogenic leptospires are endemic in Ireland and a significant cause of human and animal disease. From 18 trapped C. russula, 3 isolates of Leptospira were cultured. However, typing of these isolates by standard serological reference methods was negative, and suggested an, as yet, unidentified serovar. Sequence analysis of 16S ribosomal RNA and secY indicated that these novel isolates belong to Leptospira alstonii, a unique pathogenic species of which only 7 isolates have been described to date. Earlier isolations were limited geographically to China, Japan and Malaysia, and this leptospiral species had not previously been cultured from mammals. Restriction enzyme analysis (REA) further confirms the novelty of these strains since no similar patterns were observed with a reference database of leptospires. As with other pathogenic Leptospira species, these isolates contain lipL32 and do not grow in the presence of 8-azagunaine; however no evidence of disease was apparent after experimental infection of hamsters. These isolates are genetically related to L. alstonii but have a novel REA pattern; they represent a new serovar which we designate as serovar Room22. This study demonstrates that invasive mammalian species act as bridge vectors of novel zoonotic pathogens such as Leptospira