Innovations in Analyzing Manuscript Images and Using them in Digital Scholarly Publications

Evellum began developing software for the digital analysis and presentation of medieval manuscripts nearly fifteen year ago, when there were very few design and delivery options available to programmers. In the early years, it was not apparent how it would be best to deliver such products nor exactly how they would function and be used, and the question of longevity plagued us. Today there is the TEI to help standardize the mark-up of text and to offer a greater guarantee of longevity than was previously possible, and internet browsers are capable of facilitating the delivery of programmes that integrate text, image and video. Two products designed by Evellum are described here, with comments on the pedagogical issues that have helped determine their shape

Role of Calcitonin Gene-Related Peptide in Bone Repair after Cyclic Fatigue Loading

Calcitonin gene related peptide (CGRP) is a neuropeptide that is abundant in the sensory neurons which innervate bone. The effects of CGRP on isolated bone cells have been widely studied, and CGRP is currently considered to be an osteoanabolic peptide that has effects on both osteoclasts and osteoblasts. However, relatively little is known about the physiological role of CGRP in-vivo in the skeletal responses to bone loading, particularly fatigue loading.We used the rat ulna end-loading model to induce fatigue damage in the ulna unilaterally during cyclic loading. We postulated that CGRP would influence skeletal responses to cyclic fatigue loading. Rats were fatigue loaded and groups of rats were infused systemically with 0.9% saline, CGRP, or the receptor antagonist, CGRP(8-37), for a 10 day study period. Ten days after fatigue loading, bone and serum CGRP concentrations, serum tartrate-resistant acid phosphatase 5b (TRAP5b) concentrations, and fatigue-induced skeletal responses were quantified. We found that cyclic fatigue loading led to increased CGRP concentrations in both loaded and contralateral ulnae. Administration of CGRP(8-37) was associated with increased targeted remodeling in the fatigue-loaded ulna. Administration of CGRP or CGRP(8-37) both increased reparative bone formation over the study period. Plasma concentration of TRAP5b was not significantly influenced by either CGRP or CGRP(8-37) administration.CGRP signaling modulates targeted remodeling of microdamage and reparative new bone formation after bone fatigue, and may be part of a neuronal signaling pathway which has regulatory effects on load-induced repair responses within the skeleton

Total ankle prostheses in rheumatoid arthropathy: Outcome in 52 patients followed for 1–9 years

Background and purpose The first generations of total ankle replacements (TARs) showed a high rate of early failure. In the last decades, much progress has been made in the development of TARs, with the newer generation showing better results. We evaluated TARs implanted with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) or juvenile inflammatory arthritis (JIA) as indication

Effects of antiplatelet therapy on stroke risk by brain imaging features of intracerebral haemorrhage and cerebral small vessel diseases: subgroup analyses of the RESTART randomised, open-label trial

Background Findings from the RESTART trial suggest that starting antiplatelet therapy might reduce the risk of recurrent symptomatic intracerebral haemorrhage compared with avoiding antiplatelet therapy. Brain imaging features of intracerebral haemorrhage and cerebral small vessel diseases (such as cerebral microbleeds) are associated with greater risks of recurrent intracerebral haemorrhage. We did subgroup analyses of the RESTART trial to explore whether these brain imaging features modify the effects of antiplatelet therapy

Geomorphic and stratigraphic evidence for an unusual tsunami or storm a few centuries ago at Anegada, British Virgin Islands

© The Author(s), 2010. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Natural Hazards 63 (2012): 51-84, doi:10.1007/s11069-010-9622-6.Waters from the Atlantic Ocean washed southward across parts of Anegada, east-northeast of Puerto Rico, during a singular event a few centuries ago. The overwash, after crossing a fringing coral reef and 1.5 km of shallow subtidal flats, cut dozens of breaches through sandy beach ridges, deposited a sheet of sand and shell capped with lime mud, and created inland fields of cobbles and boulders. Most of the breaches extend tens to hundreds of meters perpendicular to a 2-km stretch of Anegada’s windward shore. Remnants of the breached ridges stand 3 m above modern sea level, and ridges seaward of the breaches rise 2.2–3.0 m high. The overwash probably exceeded those heights when cutting the breaches by overtopping and incision of the beach ridges. Much of the sand-and-shell sheet contains pink bioclastic sand that resembles, in grain size and composition, the sand of the breached ridges. This sand extends as much as 1.5 km to the south of the breached ridges. It tapers southward from a maximum thickness of 40 cm, decreases in estimated mean grain size from medium sand to very fine sand, and contains mud laminae in the south. The sand-and-shell sheet also contains mollusks—cerithid gastropods and the bivalve Anomalocardia—and angular limestone granules and pebbles. The mollusk shells and the lime-mud cap were probably derived from a marine pond that occupied much of Anegada’s interior at the time of overwash. The boulders and cobbles, nearly all composed of limestone, form fields that extend many tens of meters generally southward from limestone outcrops as much as 0.8 km from the nearest shore. Soon after the inferred overwash, the marine pond was replaced by hypersaline ponds that produce microbial mats and evaporite crusts. This environmental change, which has yet to be reversed, required restriction of a former inlet or inlets, the location of which was probably on the island’s south (lee) side. The inferred overwash may have caused restriction directly by washing sand into former inlets, or indirectly by reducing the tidal prism or supplying sand to post-overwash currents and waves. The overwash happened after A.D. 1650 if coeval with radiocarbon-dated leaves in the mud cap, and it probably happened before human settlement in the last decades of the 1700s. A prior overwash event is implied by an inland set of breaches. Hypothetically, the overwash in 1650–1800 resulted from the Antilles tsunami of 1690, the transatlantic Lisbon tsunami of 1755, a local tsunami not previously documented, or a storm whose effects exceeded those of Hurricane Donna, which was probably at category 3 as its eye passed 15 km to Anegada’s south in 1960.The work was supported in part by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission under its project N6480, a tsunami-hazard assessment for the eastern United States

Cognitive Impairment Before Intracerebral Hemorrhage Is Associated With Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy

Background and Purpose—Although the association between cerebral amyloid angiopathy (CAA) and cognitive impairment is increasingly recognized, it is not clear whether this is because of the impact of recurrent intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH) events, disruptions caused by cerebral small vessel damage, or both. We investigated this by considering whether cognitive impairment before ICH was associated with neuroimaging features of CAA on magnetic resonance imaging. Methods—We studied 166 patients with neuroimaging-confirmed ICH recruited to a prospective multicentre observational study. Preexisting cognitive impairment was determined using the Informant Questionnaire on Cognitive Decline in the Elderly (IQCODE). Magnetic resonance imaging markers of cerebral small vessel disease, including CAA, were rated by trained observers according to consensus guidelines. Results—The prevalence of cognitive impairment before ICH was 24.7% (n=41) and, in adjusted analyses, was associated with fulfilling the modified Boston criteria for probable CAA at presentation (odds ratio, 4.01; 95% confidence interval, 1.53–10.51; P=0.005) and a higher composite CAA score (for each point increase, odds ratio, 1.42; 95% confidence interval, 1.03–1.97; P=0.033). We also found independent associations between pre-ICH cognitive decline and the presence of cortical superficial siderosis, strictly lobar microbleeds, and lobar ICH location, but not with other neuroimaging markers, or a composite small vessel disease score. Conclusions—CAA (defined using magnetic resonance imaging markers) is associated with cognitive decline before symptomatic ICH. This provides evidence that small vessel disruption in CAA makes an independent contribution to cognitive impairment, in addition to effects due to brain injury caused directly by ICH

Why Don't We Ask? A Complementary Method for Assessing the Status of Great Apes

Species conservation is difficult. Threats to species are typically high and immediate. Effective solutions for counteracting these threats, however, require synthesis of high quality evidence, appropriately targeted activities, typically costly implementation, and rapid re-evaluation and adaptation. Conservation management can be ineffective if there is insufficient understanding of the complex ecological, political, socio-cultural, and economic factors that underlie conservation threats. When information about these factors is incomplete, conservation managers may be unaware of the most urgent threats or unable to envision all consequences of potential management strategies. Conservation research aims to address the gap between what is known and what knowledge is needed for effective conservation. Such research, however, generally addresses a subset of the factors that underlie conservation threats, producing a limited, simplistic, and often biased view of complex, real world situations. A combination of approaches is required to provide the complete picture necessary to engage in effective conservation. Orangutan conservation (Pongo spp.) offers an example: standard conservation assessments employ survey methods that focus on ecological variables, but do not usually address the socio-cultural factors that underlie threats. Here, we evaluate a complementary survey method based on interviews of nearly 7,000 people in 687 villages in Kalimantan, Indonesia. We address areas of potential methodological weakness in such surveys, including sampling and questionnaire design, respondent biases, statistical analyses, and sensitivity of resultant inferences. We show that interview-based surveys can provide cost-effective and statistically robust methods to better understand poorly known populations of species that are relatively easily identified by local people. Such surveys provide reasonably reliable estimates of relative presence and relative encounter rates of such species, as well as quantifying the main factors that threaten them. We recommend more extensive use of carefully designed and implemented interview surveys, in conjunction with more traditional field methods

Call Cultures in Orang-Utans?

BACKGROUND: Several studies suggested great ape cultures, arguing that human cumulative culture presumably evolved from such a foundation. These focused on conspicuous behaviours, and showed rich geographic variation, which could not be attributed to known ecological or genetic differences. Although geographic variation within call types (accents) has previously been reported for orang-utans and other primate species, we examine geographic variation in the presence/absence of discrete call types (dialects). Because orang-utans have been shown to have geographic variation that is not completely explicable by genetic or ecological factors we hypothesized that this will be similar in the call domain and predict that discrete call type variation between populations will be found. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We examined long-term behavioural data from five orang-utan populations and collected fecal samples for genetic analyses. We show that there is geographic variation in the presence of discrete types of calls. In exactly the same behavioural context (nest building and infant retrieval), individuals in different wild populations customarily emit either qualitatively different calls or calls in some but not in others. By comparing patterns in call-type and genetic similarity, we suggest that the observed variation is not likely to be explained by genetic or ecological differences. CONCLUSION/SIGNIFICANCE: These results are consistent with the potential presence of 'call cultures' and suggest that wild orang-utans possess the ability to invent arbitrary calls, which spread through social learning. These findings differ substantially from those that have been reported for primates before. First, the results reported here are on dialect and not on accent. Second, this study presents cases of production learning whereas most primate studies on vocal learning were cases of contextual learning. We conclude with speculating on how these findings might assist in bridging the gap between vocal communication in non-human primates and human speech

PALB2, CHEK2 and ATM rare variants and cancer risk: data from COGS

Background: The rarity of mutations in PALB2, CHEK2 and ATM make it difficult to estimate precisely associated cancer risks. Population-based family studies have provided evidence that at least some of these mutations are associated with breast cancer risk as high as those associated with rare BRCA2 mutations. We aimed to estimate the relative risks associated with specific rare variants in PALB2, CHEK2 and ATM via a multicentre case-control study.Methods: We genotyped 10 rare mutations using the custom iCOGS array: PALB2 c.1592delT, c.2816T&gt;G and c.3113G&gt;A, CHEK2c.349A&gt;G, c.538C&gt;T, c.715G&gt;A, c.1036C&gt;T, c.1312G&gt;T, and c.1343T&gt;G and ATM c.7271T&gt;G. We assessed associations with breast cancer risk (42 671 cases and 42 164 controls), as well as prostate (22 301 cases and 22 320 controls) and ovarian (14 542 cases and 23 491 controls) cancer risk, for each variant.Results: For European women, strong evidence of association with breast cancer risk was observed for PALB2 c.1592delT OR 3.44 (95% CI 1.39 to 8.52, p=7.1×10−5), PALB2 c.3113G&gt;A OR 4.21 (95% CI 1.84 to 9.60, p=6.9×10−8) and ATM c.7271T&gt;G OR 11.0 (95% CI 1.42 to 85.7, p=0.0012). We also found evidence of association with breast cancer risk for three variants in CHEK2, c.349A&gt;G OR 2.26 (95% CI 1.29 to 3.95), c.1036C&gt;T OR 5.06 (95% CI 1.09 to 23.5) and c.538C&gt;T OR 1.33 (95% CI 1.05 to 1.67) (p≤0.017). Evidence for prostate cancer risk was observed for CHEK2 c.1343T&gt;G OR 3.03 (95% CI 1.53 to 6.03, p=0.0006) for African men and CHEK2 c.1312G&gt;T OR 2.21 (95% CI 1.06 to 4.63, p=0.030) for European men. No evidence of association with ovarian cancer was found for any of these variants.Conclusions: This report adds to accumulating evidence that at least some variants in these genes are associated with an increased risk of breast cancer that is clinically important.</p

The Physics of the B Factories

This work is on the Physics of the B Factories. Part A of this book contains a brief description of the SLAC and KEK B Factories as well as their detectors, BaBar and Belle, and data taking related issues. Part B discusses tools and methods used by the experiments in order to obtain results. The results themselves can be found in Part C