Ensuring Public Access to Green Spaces in Urban Densification: The Role of Planning and Property Rights

Implementing densification while ensuring green space accessibility is a crucial planning challenge. The powerful role of private for-profit actors densification projects mean that green spaces are at risk of being co-opted by private interests and transformed into club goods. Using a new-institutionalist approach, we analyse the implementation of densification and urban greening based on two case-studies in Switzerland and the Netherlands. We ask what planning strategies are successful in ensuring public access to green spaces in private-led densification. To counteract club formation, planners need to restrict property rights, actively monitor implementation of planning objectives, and ensure an open physical design

Martha McMillan Biography

https://digitalcommons.cedarville.edu/mcmillan_supplemental_material/1009/thumbnail.jp

Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) Program

In order to enhance student experiential learning, Franklin University\u27s Department of Accounting, Finance and Economics continued its third year efforts in participating in the Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program in 2016, in conjunction with United Way\u27s Tax Time Coalition of Central Ohio and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The VITA program prepares free federal and state tax returns for low to moderate income taxpayers in the central Ohio community. During the 2016 tax season, 14 volunteer undergraduate students, alumni and administrative personnel were trained and received IRS certification to serve the community; the efforts of the volunteers in the Franklin University VITA program have served 187 clients and successfully helped these clients claim $201,807 in refunds; saving them an estimated$37,400 in preparation fees! Student and alumni volunteers not only had the opportunity to contribute back to the community but also earned hands-on experience working with clients by applying what they have learned in the accounting courses. The poster will demonstrate how Franklin VITA volunteers operated the tax clinic efficiently to give back to the local community and provided the unique experiential learning experience for students.https://fuse.franklin.edu/ss2016/1050/thumbnail.jp

Pelvic pain and early IUD discontinuation: a prospective cohort study

Background: The aim of the study is to assess if pelvic pain is a risk factor for intrauterine device (IUD) discontinuation within one year of placement.Methods: This is a prospective cohort study of women who had IUDs inserted at a family planning office for the primary intent of contraception. Baseline pelvic pain characteristics were assessed using a validated pelvic pain questionnaire.  Women were contacted at 1 year to assess IUD continuation.Results: From February 1, 2014 to August 11, 2015 authors enrolled a sample of 179 women.  Of the 179 enrolled,163 participants completed the questionnaire, 98 reported a history of baseline pelvic pain and 65 reported no history of baseline pelvic pain. 20 participants were lost to follow-up. 86 women in the pelvic pain and 57 in the no pelvic pain group were included in the final analysis. Discontinuation rates at one year follow up were 25.6% (22) and 35.1% (20) respectively. There was no significant difference in those with and without pelvic pain discontinuing IUDs at one year (p = 0.22).Conclusions: Baseline generalized pelvic pain may not be a risk factor for IUD discontinuation within one year of placement

The strength of the meridional overturning circulation of the stratosphere.

The distribution of gases such as ozone and water vapour in the stratosphere - which affect surface climate - is influenced by the meridional overturning of mass in the stratosphere, the Brewer-Dobson circulation. However, observation-based estimates of its global strength are difficult to obtain. Here we present two calculations of the mean strength of the meridional overturning of the stratosphere. We analyze satellite data that document the global diabatic circulation between 2007- 2011, and compare these to three re-analysis data sets and to simulations with a state-of-the-art chemistry-climate model. Using measurements of sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) and nitrous oxide, we calculate the global mean diabatic overturning mass flux throughout the stratosphere. In the lower stratosphere, these two estimates agree, and at a potential temperature level of 460 K (about 20 km or 60 hPa in tropics), the global circulation strength is 6.3-7.6 × 109 kg/s. Higher in the atmosphere, only the SF6-based estimate is available, and it diverges from the re-analysis data and simulations. Interpretation of the SF6 data-based estimate is limited because of a mesospheric sink of SF6; however, the reanalyses also differ substantially from each other. We conclude that the uncertainty in the mean meridional overturning circulation strength at upper levels of the stratosphere amounts to at least 100 %

Altered brain morphometry in carpal tunnel syndrome is associated with median nerve pathology☆☆☆

Objective: Carpal tunnel syndrome (CTS) is a common median nerve entrapment neuropathy characterized by pain, paresthesias, diminished peripheral nerve conduction velocity (NCV) and maladaptive functional brain neuroplasticity. We evaluated structural reorganization in brain gray matter (GM) and white matter (WM) and whether such plasticity is linked to altered median nerve function in CTS. Methods: We performed NCV testing, T1-weighted structural MRI, and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) in 28 CTS and 28 age-matched healthy controls (HC). Voxel-based morphometry (VBM) contrasted regional GM volume for CTS versus HC. Significant clusters were correlated with clinical metrics and served as seeds to define associated WM tracts using DTI data and probabilistic tractography. Within these WM tracts, fractional anisotropy (FA), axial (AD) and radial (RD) diffusivity were evaluated for group differences and correlations with clinical metrics. Results: For CTS subjects, GM volume was significantly reduced in contralesional S1 (hand-area), pulvinar and frontal pole. GM volume in contralesional S1 correlated with median NCV. NCV was also correlated with RD and was negatively correlated with FA within U-fiber cortico-cortical association tracts identified from the contralesional S1 VBM seed. Conclusions: Our study identified clear morphometric changes in the CTS brain. This central morphometric change is likely secondary to peripheral nerve pathology and altered somatosensory afference. Enhanced axonal coherence and myelination within cortico-cortical tracts connecting primary somatosensory and motor areas may accompany peripheral nerve deafferentation. As structural plasticity was correlated with NCV and not symptomatology, the former may be a better determinant of appropriate clinical intervention for CTS, including surgery

NQO1-dependent, tumor-selective radiosensitization of non-small cell lung cancers

Purpose: Development of tumor-specific therapies for the treatment of recalcitrant non-small cell lung cancers (NSCLCs) are urgently needed. Here, we investigated the ability of ß-lapachone (ß-lap, ARQ761 in clinical form) to selectively potentiate the effects of ionizing radiation (IR, 1–3 Gy) in NSCLCs that over-express NAD(P)H:Quinone Oxidoreductase 1 (NQO1). Experimental Design: The mechanism of lethality of low dose IR in combination with sublethal doses of ß-lap were evaluated in NSCLC lines in vitro and validated in subcutaneous and orthotopic xenograph models in vivo. Pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics (PK/PD) studies comparing single versus co-treatments were performed to validate therapeutic efficacy and mechanism of action. Results: ß-Lap administration after IR treatment hyperactivated PARP, greatly lowered NAD+/ATP levels, and increased DSB lesions over time in vitro. Radiosensitization of orthotopic, as well as subcutaneous, NSCLCs occurred with high apparent cures (>70%), even though 1/8 ß-lap doses reach subcutaneous versus orthotopic tumors. No methemoglobinemia or long-term toxicities were noted in any normal tissues, including mouse liver that expresses the highest level of NQO1 (~12 Units) of any normal tissue. PK/PD responses confirm that IR + ß-lap treatments hyperactivate PARP activity, greatly lower NAD+/ATP levels and dramatically inhibit DSB repair in exposed NQO1+ cancer tissue, while low NQO1 levels and high levels of Catalase in associated normal tissue were protective. Conclusion: Our data suggest that combination of sublethal doses of ß-lap and IR is a viable approach to selectively treat NQO1-overexpressing NSCLC and warrant a clinical trial using low-dose IR + ß-lapachone against patients with NQO1+ NSCLCs

The relative ineffectiveness of bibliographic search engines

Author Posting. © American Institute of Biological Sciences, 2005. This article is posted here by permission of American Institute of Biological Sciences for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Bioscience 55 (2005): 688–692, doi:10.1641/0006-3568(2005)055[0688:TRIOBS]2.0.CO;2.The increasing number of scientific publications has made bibliographic search engines essential tools in all disciplines. These software-based devices, however, are far from perfect. Comparisons of software-based bibliographic search engines with complete lists of three authors' publications showed that reference citations were not generally available before 1970, and that the effectiveness of recovery was improving but was quite variable, yielding on average 36 percent of the publications. There was marked year-to-year inconsistency in the recovery of titles. The inconsistency could not be explained by differences in indexing due to journal reputation: there was no evident relationship between search effectiveness and journal impact factor, but the percentage of recovered citations was higher for indexed journals. Search engines are widely used in bibliographic searches performed for evaluating researchers, awarding promotions, or assessing journal performance. Given the ineffectiveness of search engines, their use in making such important personal and institutional decisions needs careful consideration

Stress Granules and RNA Processing Bodies are Novel Autoantibody Targets in Systemic Sclerosis

Autoantibody profiles represent important patient stratification markers in systemic sclerosis (SSc). Here, we performed serum-immunoprecipitations with patient antibodies followed by mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) to obtain an unbiased view of all possible autoantibody targets and their associated molecular complexes recognized by SSc