Explosives Use in Decommissioning—Guide for Assessment of Risk (EDGAR) : II Determination of Sound Exposure Levels for Open Water Blasts and Severance of Conductors and Piles from below the Seabed

Acknowledgments: The author is grateful for the feedback from the EDGAR Stakeholder Group: Sarah Canning (JNCC); Julie Cook (BEIS); Ewan Edwards (Marine Scotland Science); Phillip Thomp- son (Thornton Tomasetti) and David Lindsay (SPEX). Funding: This research received no external funding. This work was supported by a Knowledge Exchange Award from the University of Aberdeen (Grant number RG13483).Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Explosives Use in Decommissioning—Guide for Assessment of Risk (EDGAR) : I Determination of Sound Pressure Levels for Open Water Blasts and Severance of Conductors and Piles from Below the Seabed

Acknowledgments: The author is grateful for the feedback from the EDGAR Stakeholder Group: Sarah Canning (JNCC), Julie Cook (BEIS), Ewan Edwards (Marine Scotland Science), Phillip Thomp- son (Thornton Tomasetti) and David Lindsay (SPEX). Funding: This research received no external funding. This work was supported by a Knowledge Exchange Award from the University of Aberdeen [Grant number RG13483].Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Mastermind Acts Downstream of Notch to Specify Neuronal Cell Fates in theDrosophilaCentral Nervous System

AbstractIn theDrosophilacentral nervous system, cellular diversity is generated through the asymmetric partitioning of cell fate determinants at cell division. Neural precursors (or neuroblasts) divide in a stem cell lineage to generate a series of ganglion mother cells, each of which divides once to produce a pair of postmitotic neurons or glial cells. An exception to this rule is the MP2 neuroblast, which divides only once to generate two neurons. We screened for genes expressed in the MP2 neuroblast and its progeny as a means of identifying the factors that specify cell fate in the MP2 lineage. We identified a P-element insertion line that expresses the reporter gene, tau-β-galactosidase, in the MP2 precursor and its progeny, the vMP2 and dMP2 neurons. The transposon disrupts the neurogenic gene,mastermind,but does not lead to neural hyperplasia. However, the vMP2 neuron is transformed into its sibling cell, dMP2. By contrast, expression of a dominant activated form of the Notch receptor in the MP2 lineage transforms dMP2 to vMP2. Notch signalling requires Mastermind, suggesting that Mastermind acts downstream of Notch to determine the vMP2 cell fate. We show that Mastermind plays a similar role in the neurons derived from ganglion mother cells 1-1a and 4-2a, where it specifies the pCC and RP2sib fates, respectively. This suggests that Notch signalling through Mastermind plays a wider role in specifying neuronal identity in theDrosophilacentral nervous system

A simple approach to modelling the soil water budget in cool temperate mineral topsoils

Acknowledgements This work was supported by the Rural and Environmental Science and Analytical Services (RESAS) Division of the Scottish Government [grant number RG13483]. RESAS played no further part in the study.Peer reviewedPostprin

Contact-induced apical asymmetry drives the thigmotropic responses of Candida albicans hyphae

Acknowledgements We thank Marco Thiel for assistance with data interpretation, Peter Sudbery for the provision of strains and Jeremy Craven for useful discussions. This work was supported by a BBSRC-DTG to D. D. T., NIH award DK083592 to F. J. B. and P. A. J., and a Royal Society URF UF080611 and MRC NIRG 90671 to A. C. B.Non peer reviewedPublisher PD

Comparing Alcohol Policies Between Countries: Science or Silliness?

Alison Ritter discusses the pros and cons of a new metric, called the Alcohol Policy Index, which is designed to allow comparisons between countries of their alcohol policies

Modelling SoilMAT-ters

Geophysical Research Abstracts Vol. 20Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Bioactive oat β-glucan reduces LDL cholesterol in Caucasians and non-Caucasians

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>There is increasing global acceptance that viscous soluble fibers lower serum LDL cholesterol (LDL-C), but most evidence for this comes from studies in Caucasians. To see if oat β-glucan lowers LDL-C in Caucasians and non-Caucasians we conducted a post-hoc analysis of the results of a randomized, controlled, double-blind, multi-center clinical trial whose primary aim was to determine if molecular-weight (MW) influenced the LDL-C-lowering effect of oat β-glucan.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Caucasian and non-Caucasian subjects with LDL-C-C ≥ 3.0 and ≤ 5.0 mmol/L (n = 786 screened, n = 400 ineligible, n = 19 refused, n = 367 randomized, n = 345 completed, n = 1 excluded for missing ethnicity) were randomly assigned to consume cereal containing wheat-fiber (Control, n = 74:13 Caucasian:non-Caucasian) or 3 g high-MW (3H, 2,250,000 g/mol, n = 67:19), 4 g medium-MW (4 M, 850,000 g/mol, n = 50:17), 3 g medium-MW (3M, 530,000 g/mol, n = 54:9) or 4 g low-MW (4 L, 210,000 g/mol, n = 51:12) oat β-glucan daily for 4 weeks. LDL-C after 4 weeks was influenced by baseline LDL-C (p < 0.001) and treatment (p = 0.003), but not ethnicity (p = 0.74). In all subjects, compared to control, 3 H, 4 M and 3 M reduced LDL-C significantly by 4.8 to 6.5%, but 4 L had no effect. Compared to control, the bioactive oat β-glucan treatments (3H, 4M and 3M) reduced LDL-C by a combined mean (95% CI) of 0.18 (0.06, 0.31) mmol/L (4.8%, n = 171, p = 0.004) in Caucasians, a value not significantly different from the 0.37 (0.09, 0.65) mmol/L (10.3%, n = 45, p = 0.008) reduction in non-Caucasians.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>We conclude that oat β-glucan reduces LDL-C in both Caucasians and non-Caucasians; there was insufficient power to determine if the magnitude of LDL-C-lowering differed by ethnicity.</p> <p>Trial Registration</p> <p>ClinicalTrials.gov: <a href="http://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT00981981">NCT00981981</a></p

Excisional treatment in women with cervical adenocarcinoma in situ (AIS): a prospective randomised controlled noninferiority trial to compare AIS persistence/recurrence after loop electrosurgical excision procedure with cold knife cone biopsy: protocol for a pilot study

Introduction: Adenocarcinoma in situ (AIS) of the uterine cervix is the precursor to invasive endocervical adenocarcinoma. An excisional biopsy such as a cold knife cone biopsy (CKC) should be performed to exclude invasive adenocarcinoma. Loop electrosurgical excision procedure (LEEP) is an alternative modality to CKC but is controversial in AIS. There is a perception that there is a greater likelihood of incomplete excision of AIS with LEEP because the depth of excised tissue tends to be smaller and the tissue margins may show thermal artefact which can interfere with pathology assessment. In the USA, guidelines recommend that any treatment modality can be used to excise AIS, provided that the specimen remains intact with interpretable margins. However, there are no high-quality studies comparing LEEP with CKC and well-designed prospective studies are needed. If such a study were to show that LEEP was non-inferior to CKC for the outcomes of post-treatment persistence, recurrence and adenocarcinoma, LEEP could be recommended as an appropriate treatment option for AIS in selected patients. This would benefit women because, unlike CKC, LEEP does not require general anaesthesia and may be associated with reduced morbidity. Methods and analysis: The proposed exploratory study is a parallel group trial with an allocation ratio of 2:1 in favour of the intervention (LEEP: CKC). Participants are women aged ≥18 to ≤45 years diagnosed with AIS on cervical screening and/or colposcopically directed biopsy in Australia and New Zealand, who are to receive excisional treatment in a tertiary level centre. Ethics and dissemination: Ethical approval for the study has been granted by the St John of God Healthcare Human Research Ethics Committee (reference number #1137)