New method for photoresist stripping

Vacuum dehydration of negatively working photoresist eliminates trace contamination of conventional stripping methods. The semiconductor substrate is coated with photoresist, exposed, developed, cured, and etched, and then placed in a vacuum. Following dehydration, the resist film is removable with ordinary solvents

Integral Glass Encapsulation for Solar Arrays

Work reported was performed during the period from August 1977 to December 1978. The program objective was to continue the development of electrostatic bonding (ESB) as an encapsulation technique for terrestrial cells. Economic analyses shows that this process can be a cost-effective method of producing reliable, long lifetime solar modules. When considered in sufficient volume, both material and equipment costs are competitive with conventional encapsulation systems. In addition, the possibility of integrating cell fabrication into the encapsulation process, as in the case of the preformed cell contacts discussed in this report, offers the potential of significant overall systems cost reduction

Third sector organizations and earthquake recovery planning in Christchurch, New Zealand

On September 4, 2010, an earthquake struck rural Canterbury and the most deadly of over 2,000 aftershocks devastated the Christchurch Central Business District on February 22, 2011 (Ardagh et al. 2012). Questions have arisen regarding population dynamics (Love 2011), marginalized groups, health and social care, and overall recovery efforts. Addressing some of these concerns are various non-profit, non-governmental, and faith based groups, collectively referred to as Third Sector Organizations (TSOs). By providing an alternative to and back-stopping government and private health and social services, TSOs are able to build resiliency following a natural disaster, and are especially able to identify and address unmet needs within their target audiences and maintain a sense of community within their operating areas. The nature of community recovery, also changes the role of TSOs in formal and grassroots efforts over time. In New Zealand, TSOs have shared community health burdens with government and private practices since the 1990s (Larner and Craig 2005) and have championed healthcare policy measures for ethnic minorities (Came 2014). Nevertheless, the earthquakes have presented challenges to TSOs. An inventory of 92 TSOs four months after the earthquakes, 106 one year after, and 454 two years after by Carlton and Vallance (2013) shows that although many TSOs have emerged to address earthquake related issues, other TSOs may have been unable to re-establish themselves outside areas with earthquake damage found to be too severe to inhabit by the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (CERA). Others reported “burn-out” and 52 were inactive or closed because of shifting needs during recovery. This research identifies shared experiences across the third sector in Canterbury to illuminate shifting roles in mid to long-term earthquake recovery

Response to the Letter to the Editor

This paper has attracted interest around the world from the media (both TV and newspapers). In addition, we have received letters, emails and telephone calls. One of our favorites was a voicemail message asking us to return a call to Australia at which point we would learn who really killed JFK. We welcome the opportunity to respond to the letter to the editor from Mr. Fiorentino. Mr. Fiorentino claims that our ``statement relating to the likelihood of a second assassin based on the premise of three or more separate bullets is demonstrably false.'' In response we would like to simply quote from page 327 of Gerald Posner's book Case Closed, one of the most well known works supporting the single assassin theory: ``If Connally was hit by another bullet, it had to be fired from a second shooter, since the Warren Commission's own reconstructions showed that Oswald could not have operated the bolt and refired in 1.4 seconds.'' Mr. Fiorentino also claims that the ``second fatal flaw is the use of a rather uncomplicated formula based on Bayes Theorem.'' Let $E$ denote the evidence and $T$ denote the theory that there were just two bullets (and hence a single shooter). We used Bayes Theorem to hypothetically calculate $P(T|E)$ from $P(E|T)$ and the prior probability $P(T)$. In order to make $P(T|E)$ ten times more likely than $P(\bar{T}|E)$, the ratio of the prior probabilities [i.e., $P(T) / P(\bar{T})$] would have to be greater than 15. Thus, we again conclude that this casts serious doubt on Dr. Guinn's conclusion that the evidence supported just two bullets. Sadly, this is far from the first time that probability has been misunderstood and/or misapplied in a case of public interest. A notable British example is the Clark case. See Nobles and Schiff (2005) for details. Finally, we welcome and, in fact, encourage members of the scientific community to provide alternative analyses of the data.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/07-AOAS154 the Annals of Applied Statistics (http://www.imstat.org/aoas/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

Candida carriage in the alimentary tract of liver transplant candidates

Thirty randomly selected patients with advanced chronic liver disease, which had been evaluated for possible liver transplantation, were sampled endoscopically at 7 alimentary tract locations to assess the frequency and amount of Candida carriage. Eightyone percent (127/156) of the samples obtained contained Candida and 53% (82/156) yielded high counts (> 300 CFU/ml). The most predominant Candida species isolated at each site was Candida albicana, which accounted for 103 (64%) of the 160 fungal isolates. The other Candida species isolated included C tropicalis 30 (19%), C krusei 16 (10%), and C glabrata 11 (7%), Although the number of sites at which yeast was present and the quantities of yeast at each site varied widely among the patients studied, 100% of the patients had Candida in at least one site of the gastrointestinal tract. Eighty-six percent (24/28) of the duodenal aspirates contained Candida and 50% (14/28) of the duodenal samples contained greater than 300 CFU/ml. A positive culture from the stomach was a reliable predictor of the presence of Candida in the duodenum (P=0.0001), but a positive culture at no other site readily predicted the presence of Candida at yet another site. Importantly, there was no correlation between the presence or absence of Candida in either oral or rectal swabs and colonization at other anatomic sites within the gastrointestinal tract, These findings are important in liver transplantation, particularly in those cases in which the bowel has been opened to create a choledochojejunostomy anastomosis. The operative attempts to reduce gastrointestinal fungal carriage using oral antifungal agents may be justified before liver transplantation in an effort to lower the risk of posttransplantation fungal infections, particularly in those patients expected to have a Roux-en-Y choledochojejunostomy biliary reconstruction. © 1994 by Williams and Wilkins

Engaging youth in post-disaster research: Lessons learned from a creative methods approach

Children and youth often demonstrate resilience and capacity in the face of disasters. Yet, they are typically not given the opportunities to engage in youth-driven research and lack access to official channels through which to contribute their perspectives to policy and practice during the recovery process. To begin to fill this void in research and action, this multi-site research project engaged youth from disaster-affected communities in Canada and the United States. This article presents a flexible youth-centric workshop methodology that uses participatory and arts-based methods to elicit and explore youth’s disaster and recovery experiences. The opportunities and challenges associated with initiating and maintaining partnerships, reciprocity and youth-adult power differentials using arts-based methods, and sustaining engagement in post-disaster settings, are discussed. Ultimately, this work contributes to further understanding of the methods being used to conduct research for, with, and about youth.Keywords: youth, disaster recovery, engagement, resilience, arts-based methods, participatory researc

Diclazuril Protects against Maternal Gastrointestinal Syndrome and Congenital Toxoplasmosis

BACKGROUND: Toxoplasmosis is a common cause of foodborne, gastrointestinal and congenital syndrome with particularly severe or unknown health consequences. There is no safe and effective preventive or therapeutic modality against congenital toxoplasmosis or to eliminate the persistent chronic infection. HYPOTHESIS: Diclazuril to be safe in pregnancy and effective against gastrointestinal toxoplasmosis. METHODS: CD1 programmed pregnant mice were divided into groups and administered a diet containing diclazuril, or sham control. Treatments were initiated on Day 5 of pregnancy and continued until Day 16 when dams were euthanatized. On Day 8 of pregnancy dams were infected intraperitoneally with escalating doses of tachyzoites (0, 100, 300, 600) from Type II strain. Dams were monitored daily for distress, pain, and abortion and samples collected at the end of the experiments. RESULTS: Infected dams developed moderate to severe Toxoplasma related complications in tachyzoites dose dependent manner. Animals became anemic and showed hydrothorax, and ascities. Diclazuril effectively protected dams from ascities and anemia (p \u3c 0.05). Infected dams showed splenomegaly, with massive infiltration of epithelioid cells compared with the protective effect of diclazuril in treated animals. Infected dams exhibited severe hepatitis (score 0 to 4 scale = 3.5 ± 0.01) with influx of inflammatory and plasma cells, dysplastic hepatocytes, multinucleated giant cell transformation and hepatic cells necrosis. Diclazuril treatment significantly protected dams from hepatitis, also in tachyzoites dose (100, 300, 600) dependent manner (respectively infected-treated versus infected controls, p \u3c 0.001, p \u3c 0.01 and p \u3c 0.05). Colonic tissues were significantly shortened in length, with infiltration of lymphocytes, and macrophages and microabscess formations in the cryptic structures, with significant improvement in diclazuril treated animals. Additionally, the number of fetuses, fetal length and fetal weight were preserved in diclazuril treated dams. CONCLUSIONS: This is the first report describing of diclazuril safety in pregnancy as well as efficacy against mild to moderate hepato-gastrointestinal syndrome in dams and fetal toxoplasmosis (Special issue, Treatment of Liver Diseases )

Atovaquone Ameliorate Gastrointestinal Toxoplasmosis Complications in a Pregnancy Model

Background: Toxoplasma is an important source of foodborne hospitalization with no safe and effective therapy against chronic or congenital Toxopalsmosis. Atovaquone is a drug of choice but not approved for use in congenital Toxoplasmosis. We hypothesized atovaquone to be safe and effective against feto-maternal Toxoplasmosis. Material/Methods: Programmed pregnant mice were i.p. infected with 50–2400 Tachyzoites from Type II strain (clone PTG). Dams were treated daily with atovaquone or sham and monitored for pain, and complications. Results: Dams developed pain related abdominal hypersensitivity (allodynia) to mechanical stimuli in a Tachyzoites dose dependent manner. Infected dams were anemic and exhibited ascities and severe hepatitis (score 3.6±0.01 on scale 0 – normal to 4 – severe) with influx of inflammatory and plasma cells, multinucleated dysplastic hepatocytes and necrosis. In addition, dams expressed mild to severe pancreatitis with mononuclear cell invasion, loss of islets and necrosis. This was consistent with splenomegaly (X3 Fold), and massive infiltration of epithelioid cells and loss of germinal structure. Colon became significantly shortened in length (p \u3c 0.01) with semi-normal content. Pathological manifestation included, shortening of crypts with numerous microabscess formations, infiltration of lymphocytes, and macrophages. The severe clinical complications led to abortion (50%), early birth (25%) or still birth (25%) consistent with the high dose of Tachyzoites inoculation. Atovaquone treatment partially but significantly protected the dams from the severity of hepatitis, splenomegaly, colitis, myocarditis, and pain related responses as well as fetal demise. Conclusions: This is a valuable model for therapeutic evaluation of feto-maternal Toxoplasmosis and gastrointestinal complications. Atovaquone protects dams and their fetuses against some infectious/inflammatory aspects of the disease