Divorce and the Welfare of the Child in Japan

Current Japanese legal institutions are ill-equipped to resolve the complicated issues surrounding visitation, custody, and divorce. Japanese views toward family and society have changed greatly since the post-World War II family law was enacted in the 1950s, but the law has not evolved accordingly. This is especially clear in the methods used to determine custody and visitation, as well as the kyōgi rikon, or divorce by mutual consent system. Policy makers and activists are both working to resolve this problem, but their ongoing struggle has yet to produce any tangible results. This comment argues that the Japanese legal system must be reformed to allow for joint custody and to create a presumption for reasonable visitation, and the kyōgi rikon system must be changed to grant greater protections to all parties, including requiring a detailed parenting plan to provide for the children’s welfare and continued relationship with both parents

Divorce and the Best Interest of the Child: Disputes over Visitation and the Japanese Family Courts

The following is a translation of an article written by Professor Takao Tanase for the December 2009 edition of Jiyū to Seigi, a Japanese legal periodical. Divorce and familial breakdown has become a major problem in modern Japanese society, yet the law does not provide any meaningful protection for the noncustodial parent. Professor Tanase analyzes this issue from a comparative and theoretical perspective, looking at the current Japanese visitation laws in place today, while contrasting those with the system in the United States. He also looks at how those laws affect actual families, and how the courts have implemented and enforced visitation agreements and orders. This article concludes that not only are the rights of the noncustodial parent insufficient to maintain a meaningful relation with their children following divorce, but that they hardly exist at all

Variable Step Random Walks and Self-Similar Distributions

We study a scenario under which variable step random walks give anomalous statistics. We begin by analyzing the Martingale Central Limit Theorem to find a sufficient condition for the limit distribution to be non-Gaussian. We note that the theorem implies that the scaling index $\zeta$ is 1/2. For corresponding continuous time processes, it is shown that the probability density function $W(x;t)$ satisfies the Fokker-Planck equation. Possible forms for the diffusion coefficient are given, and related to $W(x,t)$. Finally, we show how a time-series can be used to distinguish between these variable diffusion processes and L\'evy dynamics.Comment: 13pages, 2 figure

A large-scale experiment finds no evidence that a seismic survey impacts a demersal fish fauna

Seismic surveys are used to locate oil and gas reserves below the seabed and can be a major source of noise in marine environments. Their effects on commercial fisheries are a subject of debate, with experimental studies often producing results that are difficult to interpret. We overcame these issues in a large-scale experiment that quantified the impacts of exposure to a commercial seismic source on an assemblage of tropical demersal fishes targeted by commercial fisheries on the North West Shelf of Western Australia. We show that there were no short-term (days) or long-term (months) effects of exposure on the composition, abundance, size structure, behavior, or movement of this fauna. These multiple lines of evidence suggest that seismic surveys have little impact on demersal fishes in this environment

Adolescent Substance Use Following a Deadly U.S. Tornado Outbreak: A Population-Based Study of 2,000 Families

Despite conceptual links between disaster exposure and substance use, few studies have examined prevalence and risk factors for adolescent substance use and abuse in large, population-based samples affected by a recent natural disaster. We addressed this gap using a novel address-based sampling methodology to interview adolescents and parents who were affected by the 4th deadliest tornado outbreak in U.S. history. Postdisaster interviews were conducted with 2,000 adolescent–parent dyads living within a 5-mile radius of the spring 2011 U.S. tornadoes. In addition to descriptive analyses to estimate prevalence, hierarchical linear and logistic regression analyses were used to examine a range of protective and risk factors for substance use and abuse. Approximately 3% reported substance abuse since the tornado. Greater number of prior traumatic events and older age emerged as consistent risk factors across tobacco and alcohol use and substance abuse since the tornado. Tornado incident characteristics, namely, greater loss of services and resources after the tornado and posttraumatic stress disorder since the tornado, were associated with greater alcohol consumption. Service loss increased risk for binge drinking, whereas, for substance abuse, posttraumatic stress disorder increased risk and parent presence during the tornado decreased risk. Greater family tornado exposure was associated with a greater number of cigarettes smoked in female but not male teen participants. Both trauma and non-trauma-related factors are relevant to postdisaster substance abuse among adolescents. Future research should examine the role of broader ecological systems in heightening or curtailing substance use risk for adolescents following disaster exposure

HIV-1 R5 Macrophage-Tropic Envelope Glycoprotein Trimers Bind CD4 with High Affinity, while the CD4 Binding Site on Non-macrophage-tropic, T-Tropic R5 Envelopes Is Occluded

HIV-1 R5 variants exploit CCR5 as a coreceptor to infect both T cells and macrophages. R5 viruses that are transmitted or derived from immune tissue and peripheral blood are mainly inefficient at mediating infection of macrophages. In contrast, highly macrophage-tropic (mac-tropic) R5 viruses predominate in brain tissue and can be detected in cerebrospinal fluid but are infrequent in immune tissue or blood even in late disease. These mac-tropic R5 variants carry envelope glycoproteins (Envs) adapted to exploit low levels of CD4 on macrophages to induce infection. However, it is unclear whether this adaptation is conferred by an increased affinity of the Env trimer for CD4 or is mediated by postbinding structural rearrangements in the trimer that enhance the exposure of the coreceptor binding site and facilitate events leading to fusion and virus entry. In this study, we investigated CD4 binding to mac-tropic and non-mac-tropic Env trimers and showed that CD4-IgG binds efficiently to mac-tropic R5 Env trimers, while binding to non-mac-tropic trimers was undetectable. Our data indicated that the CD4 binding site (CD4bs) is highly occluded on Env trimers of non-mac-tropic R5 viruses. Such viruses may therefore infect T cells via viral synapses where Env and CD4 become highly concentrated. This environment will enable high-avidity interactions that overcome extremely low Env-CD4 affinities. IMPORTANCE HIV R5 variants bind to CD4 and CCR5 receptors on T cells and macrophages to initiate infection. Transmitted HIV variants infect T cells but not macrophages, and these viral strains persist in immune tissue even in late disease. Here we show that the binding site for CD4 present on HIV\u27s envelope protein is occluded on viruses replicating in immune tissue. This occlusion likely prevents antibody binding to this site and neutralization of the virus, but it makes it difficult for virus-CD4 interactions to occur. Such viruses probably pass from T cell to T cell via cell contacts where CD4 is highly concentrated and allows infection via inefficient envelope-CD4 binding. Our data are highly relevant for vaccines that aim to induce antibodies targeting the CD4 binding site on the envelope protein

Host plant quality, spatial heterogeneity, and the stability of mite predator–prey dynamics

Population dynamics models suggest that both the over-all level of resource productivity and spatial variability in productivity can play important roles in community dynamics. Higher productivity environments are predicted to destabilize consumer–resource dynamics. Conversely, greater heterogeneity in resource productivity is expected to contribute to stability. Yet the importance of these two factors for the dynamics of arthropod communities has been largely overlooked. I manipulated nutrient availability for strawberry plants in a multi-patch experiment, and measured effects of overall plant quality and heterogeneity in plant quality on the stability of interactions between the phytophagous mite Tetranychus urticae and its predator Phytoseiulus persimilis. Plant size, leaf N content and T. urticae population growth increased monotonically with increasing soil nitrogen availability. This gradient in plant quality affected two correlates of mite population stability, population variability over time (i.e., coefficient of variation) and population persistence (i.e., proportion of plant patches colonized). However, the highest level of plant quality did not produce the least stable dynamics, which is inconsistent with the “paradox of enrichment”. Heterogeneity in plant productivity had modest effects on stability, with the only significant difference being less variable T. urticae densities in the heterogeneous compared to the corresponding homogeneous treatment. These results are generally congruent with metapopulation theory and other models for spatially segregated populations, which predict that stability should be governed largely by relative movement rates of predators and prey—rather than patch quality

Role of the B Allele of Influenza A Virus Segment 8 in Setting Mammalian Host Range and Pathogenicity.

UNLABELLED: Two alleles of segment 8 (NS) circulate in nonchiropteran influenza A viruses. The A allele is found in avian and mammalian viruses, but the B allele is viewed as being almost exclusively found in avian viruses. This might reflect the fact that one or both of its encoded proteins (NS1 and NEP) are maladapted for replication in mammalian hosts. To test this, a number of clade A and B avian virus-derived NS segments were introduced into human H1N1 and H3N2 viruses. In no case was the peak virus titer substantially reduced following infection of various mammalian cell types. Exemplar reassortant viruses also replicated to similar titers in mice, although mice infected with viruses with the avian virus-derived segment 8s had reduced weight loss compared to that achieved in mice infected with the A/Puerto Rico/8/1934 (H1N1) parent. In vitro, the viruses coped similarly with type I interferons. Temporal proteomics analysis of cellular responses to infection showed that the avian virus-derived NS segments provoked lower levels of expression of interferon-stimulated genes in cells than wild type-derived NS segments. Thus, neither the A nor the B allele of avian virus-derived NS segments necessarily attenuates virus replication in a mammalian host, although the alleles can attenuate disease. Phylogenetic analyses identified 32 independent incursions of an avian virus-derived A allele into mammals, whereas 6 introductions of a B allele were identified. However, A-allele isolates from birds outnumbered B-allele isolates, and the relative rates of Aves-to-Mammalia transmission were not significantly different. We conclude that while the introduction of an avian virus segment 8 into mammals is a relatively rare event, the dogma of the B allele being especially restricted is misleading, with implications in the assessment of the pandemic potential of avian influenza viruses. IMPORTANCE: Influenza A virus (IAV) can adapt to poultry and mammalian species, inflicting a great socioeconomic burden on farming and health care sectors. Host adaptation likely involves multiple viral factors. Here, we investigated the role of IAV segment 8. Segment 8 has evolved into two distinct clades: the A and B alleles. The B-allele genes have previously been suggested to be restricted to avian virus species. We introduced a selection of avian virus A- and B-allele segment 8s into human H1N1 and H3N2 virus backgrounds and found that these reassortant viruses were fully competent in mammalian host systems. We also analyzed the currently available public data on the segment 8 gene distribution and found surprisingly little evidence for specific avian host restriction of the B-clade segment. We conclude that B-allele segment 8 genes are, in fact, capable of supporting infection in mammals and that they should be considered during the assessment of the pandemic risk of zoonotic influenza A viruses.Wellcome Trust (Grant ID: 108070/Z/15/Z), Medical Research Council (Grant ID: MR/K000276/1), Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (Grant IDs: BB/J004324/1, BB/J01446X/1), Division of Intramural Research National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, University Of Edinburgh (Chancellor’s Fellowship)This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from the American Society for Microbiology via http://dx.doi.org/10.1128/JVI.01205-1

Modern microwave methods in solid state inorganic materials chemistry: from fundamentals to manufacturing

No abstract available

COVID-19: Third dose booster vaccine effectiveness against breakthrough coronavirus infection, hospitalisations and death in patients with cancer: A population-based study

Purpose: People living with cancer and haematological malignancies are at increased risk of hospitalisation and death following infection with acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). Coronavirus third dose vaccine boosters are proposed to boost waning immune responses in immunocompromised individuals and increase coronavirus protection; however, their effectiveness has not yet been systematically evaluated. Methods: This study is a population-scale real-world evaluation of the United Kingdom’s third dose vaccine booster programme for cancer patients from 8th December 2020 to 7th December 2021. The cancer cohort comprises individuals from Public Health England’s national cancer dataset, excluding individuals less than 18 years. A test-negative case-control design was used to assess third dose booster vaccine effectiveness. Multivariable logistic regression models were fitted to compare risk in the cancer cohort relative to the general population. Results: The cancer cohort comprised of 2,258,553 tests from 361,098 individuals. Third dose boosters were evaluated by reference to 87,039,743 polymerase chain reaction (PCR) coronavirus tests. Vaccine effectiveness against breakthrough infections, symptomatic infections, coronavirus hospitalisation and death in cancer patients were 59.1%, 62.8%, 80.5% and 94.5% respectively. Lower vaccine effectiveness was associated with a cancer diagnosis within 12 months, lymphoma, recent systemic anti-cancer therapy (SACT) or radiotherapy. Lymphoma patients had low levels of protection from symptomatic disease. In spite of third dose boosters, following multivariable adjustment, individuals with cancer remain at increased risk of coronavirus hospitalisation and death compared to the population control (OR 3.38, 3.01 respectively. p<0.001 for both). Conclusions: Third dose boosters are effective for most individuals with cancer, increasing protection from coronavirus. However, their effectiveness is heterogenous, and lower than the general population. Many patients with cancer will remain at increased risk of coronavirus infections, even after 3 doses. In the case of patients with lymphoma, there is a particularly strong disparity of vaccine effectiveness against breakthrough infection and severe disease. Breakthrough infections will disrupt cancer care and treatment with potentially adverse consequences on survival outcomes. The data support the role of vaccine boosters in preventing severe disease, and further pharmacological intervention to prevent transmission and aid viral clearance to limit disruption of cancer care as the delivery of care continues to evolve during the coronavirus pandemic