Pathways for Nutrient Loss to Water; Slurry and Fertilizer Spreading

End of project reportThere are almost 150,000 farms in Ireland and these contribute substantial quantities of N and P to inland and coastal waters. Some of these nutrients are carried from wet soils by overland flow and by leaching from dry soils. Farm practice can reduce the loss from farms by judicious management of nutrients. Improvements are required to diminish export of nutrients without impairing operations on the farm. Literature regarding nutrient loss from agriculture was reviewed in this project and maps were prepared to predict best slurry spreading times around Ireland. Two further maps were prepared to show slurry storage requirement on farms

Optic disc pit maculopathy: a two-year nationwide prospective study.

Purpose To identify the incidence, presenting features, treatment, and clinical course of optic disc pit maculopathy (ODPM) in the United Kingdom (UK). Design A 2-year nationwide prospective population-based study. Subjects All new incident cases of ODPM presenting to UK ophthalmologists using the British Ophthalmic Surveillance Unit monthly reporting system. Methods All reporting ophthalmologists were sent an initial questionnaire requesting data on previous medical and ophthalmic history, presentation details, investigation findings, and management. A further questionnaire was sent at 12 months post diagnosis to ascertain further outcome data. Main Outcome Measures Visual acuity at initial presentation, at 1 year, and after any intervention. Foveal involvement and optical coherence tomography (OCT) findings, including retinal layers affected, and the location and size of the optic disc pit. Management, including observation, vitrectomy, and associated procedures. Results There were 74 confirmed new cases, giving an annual incidence of approximately 1 per 2 million. Complete data were available on 70 patients (70 eyes) at baseline and 68 after 1 year. There were 35 (50%) female patients with a mean age of 35 years (range, 3–82 years). Visual acuity at baseline ranged from 6/5 to hand movements. In 43 patients (61%) subretinal fluid (SRF) was present, whereas 27 (39%) had intraretinal fluid only. The presence of SRF was associated with worse vision and foveal involvement. Of the 53 eyes initially observed with 1-year follow-up, 10 (19%) deteriorated and 9 (16%) improved on OCT; eyes with SRF were more likely to worsen and those without SRF were more likely to improve. Fifteen of the 70 patients (21%) at baseline had primary surgery and a further 10 had deferred surgery within 1 year of presentation; 19 of these 25 eyes (76%) showed anatomic success with a dry fovea at 1 year of follow-up, and 15 (60%) had a greater than 0.1 logMAR improvement in visual acuity. Conclusion The incidence and presenting features of ODPM were defined. Patients with SRF had worse vision and were more likely to deteriorate than patients with intraretinal fluid only. Surgery was anatomically successful in 75% of cases. Patients without SRF tended to remain stable with observation

Imputing the Number of Responders from the Mean and Standard Deviation of CGI-Improvement in Clinical Trials Investigating Medications for Autism Spectrum Disorder

Introduction: Response to treatment, according to Clinical Global Impression-Improvement (CGI-I) scale, is an easily interpretable outcome in clinical trials of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Yet, the CGI-I rating is sometimes reported as a continuous outcome, and converting it to dichotomous would allow meta-analysis to incorporate more evidence. Methods: Clinical trials investigating medications for ASD and presenting both dichotomous and continuous CGI-I data were included. The number of patients with at least much improvement (CGI-I ≤ 2) were imputed from the CGI-I scale, assuming an underlying normal distribution of a latent continuous score using a primary threshold θ = 2.5 instead of θ = 2, which is the original cut-off in the CGI-I scale. The original and imputed values were used to calculate responder rates and odds ratios. The performance of the imputation method was investigated with a concordance correlation coefficient (CCC), linear regression, Bland–Altman plots, and subgroup differences of summary estimates obtained from random-effects meta-analysis. Results: Data from 27 studies, 58 arms, and 1428 participants were used. The imputation method using the primary threshold (θ = 2.5) had good performance for the responder rates (CCC = 0.93 95% confidence intervals [0.86, 0.96]; β of linear regression = 1.04 [0.95, 1.13]; bias and limits of agreements = 4.32% [−8.1%, 16.74%]; no subgroup differences χ(2) = 1.24, p-value = 0.266) and odds ratios (CCC = 0.91 [0.86, 0.96]; β = 0.96 [0.78, 1.14]; bias = 0.09 [−0.87, 1.04]; χ(2) = 0.02, p-value = 0.894). The imputation method had poorer performance when the secondary threshold (θ = 2) was used. Discussion: Assuming a normal distribution of the CGI-I scale, the number of responders could be imputed from the mean and standard deviation and used in meta-analysis. Due to the wide limits of agreement of the imputation method, sensitivity analysis excluding studies with imputed values should be performed

Disorder-specific functional abnormalities during temporal discounting in youth with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), Autism and comorbid ADHD and Autism

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) are often comorbid and share cognitive abnormalities in temporal foresight. A key question is whether shared cognitive phenotypes are based on common or different underlying pathophysiologies and whether comorbid patients have additive neurofunctional deficits, resemble one of the disorders or have a different pathophysiology. We compared age- and IQ-matched boys with non-comorbid ADHD (18), non-comorbid ASD (15), comorbid ADHD and ASD (13) and healthy controls (18) using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) during a temporal discounting task. Only the ASD and the comorbid groups discounted delayed rewards more steeply. The fMRI data showed both shared and disorder-specific abnormalities in the three groups relative to controls in their brain-behaviour associations. The comorbid group showed both unique and more severe brain-discounting associations than controls and the non-comorbid patient groups in temporal discounting areas of ventromedial and lateral prefrontal cortex, ventral striatum and anterior cingulate, suggesting that comorbidity is neither an endophenocopy of the two pure disorders nor an additive pathology

Economic and employment impacts of offshore wind for Ireland: A value chain analysis

The imminent development of a number of offshore wind farms in the Republic of Ireland presents a sizable opportunity to stimulate the Irish economy through the growth of an indigenous and globally competitive offshore wind supply chain. This study uses a value chain analysis to evaluate the economic and employment potential of the offshore wind sector for Ireland. The analysis is based on the expenditure on products and services required to develop an offshore wind farm, the planned capacity of projects in the pipeline, and the ability of Irish companies to supply the sector. Results suggest that by 2030, 2.5–4.5GW of domestic offshore wind development could create between 11,424 and 20,563 supply chain jobs and generate between €763 m and €1.4bn in gross value added. This is the first study to estimate domestic GVA potential for the sector

Limited evidence exists on the effectiveness of education and training interventions on trial recruitment; a systematic review

Objective: To examine the effectiveness of education and training interventions on recruitment to randomised and non-randomised trials. Study Design and Setting: A systematic review of the effectiveness of education and training interventions for recruiters to trials. The review included randomised and non-randomised controlled trials of any type of education and training intervention for recruiters to trials, within any healthcare field. The primary outcome was recruitment rates, and secondary outcomes were: quality of informed consent, recruiter self-confidence, understanding/knowledge of trial information, numbers of potential trial participants approached, satisfaction with training, retention rates. Results: Of the 19 records reviewed at full text level, six met the inclusion criteria for our review. Due to heterogeneity of outcomes and methods between the included studies, meta-analysis was not possible for the primary outcome. Of the three studies that reported recruitment rates, one favoured the education and training intervention for increased recruitment; the remaining two found no differences between the groups. Of the reported secondary outcomes, quality of informed consent was improved, but no differences between groups in understanding/knowledge of trial information were found. Conclusion: There is limited evidence of effectiveness on the impact of education and training interventions on trial recruitment. Further work on developing a substantial evidence base around the effectiveness of education and training interventions for recruiters to trials is required. Keywords: trial recruitment, educational intervention, training intervention, systematic revie

Synergistic toughening and electrical functionalization of an epoxy using MWCNTs and silane- /plasma-activated basalt fibers

This work studied the effects of adding short basalt fibers (BFs) and multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs), both separately and in combination, on the mechanical properties, fracture toughness, and electrical conductivity of an epoxy polymer. The surfaces of the short BFs were either treated using a silane coupling agent or further functionalized by atmospheric plasma to enhance the adhesion between the BFs and the epoxy. The results of a single fiber fragmentation test demonstrated a significantly improved BF/epoxy adhesion upon applying the plasma treatment to the BFs. This resulted in better mechanical properties and fracture toughness of the composites containing the plasma-activated BFs. The improved BF/epoxy adhesion also affected the hybrid toughening performance of the BFs and MWCNTs. In particular, synergistic toughening effects were observed when the plasma-activated BFs/MWCNTs hybrid modifiers were used, while only additive toughening effects occurred for the silane-sized BFs/MWCNTs hybrid modifiers. This work demonstrated a potential to develop strong, tough, and electrically conductive epoxy composites by adding hybrid BF/MWCNT modifiers.</p