Occupational Therapy’s Role in Early Language Development of Babies and Young Children

Occupational therapy practitioners in their interactions with babies, young children and their families, can be change-agents who promote rich language environments as a foundation to social interactions, social participation and academic successes. OTPs may be the sole provider working with a family or may reinforce with families the plan of care developed by speech-language pathologists (SLP) or early intervention teachers. The first step for OTPs is deeper knowledge of the importance of early language exposure, social interaction and participation development in young children and approaches that promotes rich language environments

One Measure of Success: A Study of the Lamaze Technique of Preparation for Childbirth

The process of the Psychoprophylactic Method of Childbirth, Lamaze Technique, has been receiving increasing emphasis during tbe past twenty years. Receiving its original trial and utilization in Russia in 1949, it was modified and introduced to western society in 1951 by a French physician, Dr. Fernand Lamaze

Transmission: Premium Television Characters Outside of the Gender Binary

Five fictional characters have emerged on the U.S. premium-pay-cable channels that blur the traditional male-or-female gender divide. The basics of queer theory (sex, gender, orientation, and transgender) and critical/cultural studies (encoding, decoding, and reading a text) are explained as a basis for the analysis of the characters, which seeks to answer the research question: does the premium-pay-cable television format offer truly empathetic non-binary transgender characters that challenge the dominant American ideologies about gender identity and expression? If so, how? If not, why not? Shane McCutcheon from Showtime’s lesbian melodrama The L Word (2004- 2010), Lafayette Reynolds from HBO’s supernatural drama-comedy True Blood (2008- 2014), Roscoe Kaan from Showtime’s corporate drama-comedy House of Lies (2012-), Brienne of Tarth from HBO’s political-fantasy-epic Game of Thrones (2010-) and Job from Cinemax’s pulpy action-thriller Banshee (2013-) are rigorously scrutinized, revealing their surprisingly complex, confident, and transgressive queer power

Heritable Sperm Chromatin Epigenetics: A Break to Remember

Sperm chromatin not only has a unique structure to condense and protect the paternal DNA in transit, but also provides epigenetic information that supports embryonic development. Most of the unique sperm nuclear architecture is formed during the sweeping postmeiotic chromatin remodeling events in spermiogenesis, where the majority of nucleosomes are removed and replaced by protamines. The remaining histones and other chromatin proteins are located in structurally and transcriptionally relevant positions in the genome and carry diverse post-translational modifications relevant to the control of embryonic gene expression. How such postmeiotic chromatin-based programming of sperm epigenetic information proceeds, and how susceptible the process is to modulation by exogenous factors are key questions for understanding the inheritance of acquired epigenetic marks through the male germ line. We propose that transient DNA strand breaks mediated by topoisomerase II beta and the subsequent activation of DNA damage response pathways result in defined post-translational modifications of histones in spermiogenesis. These pathways, likely along with others, may contribute to chromatin remodeling in elongating spermatids, influence chromatin-based intergenerational inheritance of epigenetic information, and may be defective in pathologies of abnormal male gametogenesis and infertility

Metro Habitat Connectivity Toolkit: Bringing Connectivity to an Actionable Scale

Habitat fragmentation is a serious threat to maintaining biodiversity particularly in urbanizing areas. Methods exist to model habitat connectivity, however many of these are applied at large scales and rely on data that may be a decade or older, resulting in inaccuracies when compared to on the ground conditions, particularly in dynamic urban systems that experience rapid change. These issues make taking action to preserve or enhance these connectivity zones difficult, if not impossible. The Metro Regional Habitat Connectivity Toolkit approaches this problem by combining GIS analysis with on the ground assessments at realistic scales for land acquisition, restoration projects and/or barrier mitigation. We employed a surrogate species approach to address connectivity needs in a way that incorporates empirical data. Local information and research was combined with other habitat attributes to focus development of field assessments for habitat quality and barrier permeability. The field assessments allow technicians to verify GIS data, identify barriers and record habitat attributes in a way that is comparable across multiple habitat connectivity zones and for multiple species. Once assessments are concluded the resulting information is used to generate two species specific scores for habitat quality and barrier permeability. These scores identify where on the landscape restoration and/or land acquisitions would provide the most connectivity benefit vs areas where mitigation for barriers such as wildlife passages structures across roads are the priority. This toolkit is in the final stages of development and is currently being testing in pilot areas in the Portland Metro region

Metro Habitat Connectivity Toolkit: Bringing Connectivity to an Actionable Scale

Habitat fragmentation is a serious threat to maintaining biodiversity particularly in urbanizing areas. Methods exist to model habitat connectivity, however many of these are applied at large scales and rely on data that may be a decade or older, resulting in inaccuracies when compared to on the ground conditions, particularly in dynamic urban systems that experience rapid change. These issues make taking action to preserve or enhance these connectivity zones difficult, if not impossible. The Metro Regional Habitat Connectivity Toolkit approaches this problem by combining GIS analysis with on the ground assessments at realistic scales for land acquisition, restoration projects and/or barrier mitigation. We employed a surrogate species approach to address connectivity needs in a way that incorporates empirical data. Local information and research was combined with other habitat attributes to focus development of field assessments for habitat quality and barrier permeability. The field assessments allow technicians to verify GIS data, identify barriers and record habitat attributes in a way that is comparable across multiple habitat connectivity zones and for multiple species. Once assessments are concluded the resulting information is used to generate two species specific scores for habitat quality and barrier permeability. These scores identify where on the landscape restoration and/or land acquisitions would provide the most connectivity benefit vs areas where mitigation for barriers such as wildlife passages structures across roads are the priority. This toolkit is in the final stages of development and is currently being testing in pilot areas in the Portland Metro region

Many-core applications to online track reconstruction in HEP experiments

Interest in parallel architectures applied to real time selections is growing in High Energy Physics (HEP) experiments. In this paper we describe performance measurements of Graphic Processing Units (GPUs) and Intel Many Integrated Core architecture (MIC) when applied to a typical HEP online task: the selection of events based on the trajectories of charged particles. We use as benchmark a scaled-up version of the algorithm used at CDF experiment at Tevatron for online track reconstruction - the SVT algorithm - as a realistic test-case for low-latency trigger systems using new computing architectures for LHC experiment. We examine the complexity/performance trade-off in porting existing serial algorithms to many-core devices. Measurements of both data processing and data transfer latency are shown, considering different I/O strategies to/from the parallel devices.Comment: Proceedings for the 20th International Conference on Computing in High Energy and Nuclear Physics (CHEP); missing acks adde

Orbital Instabilities in a Triaxial Cusp Potential

This paper constructs an analytic form for a triaxial potential that describes the dynamics of a wide variety of astrophysical systems, including the inner portions of dark matter halos, the central regions of galactic bulges, and young embedded star clusters. Specifically, this potential results from a density profile of the form $\rho (m) \propto m^{-1}$, where the radial coordinate is generalized to triaxial form so that $m^2 = x^2/a^2 + y^2/b^2 + z^2/c^2$. Using the resulting analytic form of the potential, and the corresponding force laws, we construct orbit solutions and show that a robust orbit instability exists in these systems. For orbits initially confined to any of the three principal planes, the motion in the perpendicular direction can be unstable. We discuss the range of parameter space for which these orbits are unstable, find the growth rates and saturation levels of the instability, and develop a set of analytic model equations that elucidate the essential physics of the instability mechanism. This orbit instability has a large number of astrophysical implications and applications, including understanding the formation of dark matter halos, the structure of galactic bulges, the survival of tidal streams, and the early evolution of embedded star clusters.Comment: 50 pages, accepted for publication in Ap

REDUCE-IT USA: Results From the 3146 Patients Randomized in the United States.

BackgroundSome trials have found that patients from the United States derive less benefit than patients enrolled outside the United States. This prespecified REDUCE-IT (Reduction of Cardiovascular Events with Icosapent Ethyl - Intervention Trial) subgroup analysis was conducted to determine the degree of benefit of icosapent ethyl in the United States.MethodsREDUCE-IT randomized 8179 statin-treated patients with qualifying triglycerides ≥135 and <500 mg/dL and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol >40 and ≤100 mg/dL and a history of atherosclerosis or diabetes mellitus to icosapent ethyl 4 g/d or placebo. The primary composite end point was cardiovascular death, nonfatal myocardial infarction, nonfatal stroke, coronary revascularization, or hospitalization for unstable angina. The key secondary composite end point was cardiovascular death, nonfatal myocardial infarction, or nonfatal stroke. A hierarchy was prespecified for examination of individual and composite end points.ResultsA total of 3146 US patients (38.5% of the trial) were randomized and followed for a median of 4.9 years; 32.3% were women and 9.7% were Hispanic. The primary composite end point occurred in 24.7% of placebo-treated patients versus 18.2% of icosapent ethyl-treated patients (hazard ratio [HR], 0.69 [95% CI, 0.59-0.80]; P=0.000001); the key secondary composite end point occurred in 16.6% versus 12.1% (HR, 0.69 [95% CI, 0.57-0.83]; P=0.00008). All prespecified hierarchical end points were meaningfully and significantly reduced, including cardiovascular death (6.7% to 4.7%; HR, 0.66 [95% CI, 0.49-0.90]; P=0.007), myocardial infarction (8.8% to 6.7%; HR, 0.72 [95% CI, 0.56-0.93]; P=0.01), stroke (4.1% to 2.6%; HR, 0.63 [95% CI, 0.43-0.93]; P=0.02), and all-cause mortality (9.8% to 7.2%; HR, 0.70 [95% CI, 0.55-0.90]; P=0.004); for all-cause mortality in the US versus non-US patients, Pinteraction=0.02. Safety and tolerability findings were consistent with the full study cohort.ConclusionsWhereas the non-US subgroup showed significant reductions in the primary and key secondary end points, the US subgroup demonstrated particularly robust risk reductions across a variety of individual and composite end points, including all-cause mortality.Clinical trial registrationURL: https://www.clinicaltrials.gov. Unique identifier: NCT01492361

Dynamic Soil-Foundation-Structure Interaction Analyses of Large Caissons

Large cellular reinforced concrete caissons exist as foundations of major long-span bridges across waterways in many parts of the country. This study was conducted to evaluate the important factors affecting the seismic response of large caissons. The paper presents the results of equivalent linear and non-linear analyses performed for a typical caisson idealized based on the cellular caisson at Pier W3 of the West San Francisco Bay Bridge subject to ground motion with a peak rock acceleration of 0.6 g. This caisson is 38.7 m (127 fi) long by 22.9 m (75 ft) wide submerged in about 32.6 m (107 ft) of water. It is embedded in 33.5 m (110 fi) of soil deposits and is founded on rock. Equivalent linear 3-D and 2-D analyses conducted in the direction of the short axis (longitudinal) were performed using a modified version of computer program SASSI. The results of these 3-D and 2-D analyses are similar. Non-linear analyses were performed for 2-D models using computer program FLAC. The results indicate that side gapping, base lifting, interface sliding, and soil yielding reduce the earth pressure, base bearing stress, caisson shear and bending moment, and caisson motions. However, the frequency characteristics of the responses appear to be relatively unaffected