Spread and establishment of Aedes albopictus in southern Switzerland between 2003 and 2014 : an analysis of oviposition data and weather conditions

The Asian tiger mosquito, Aedes albopictus, is a highly invasive mosquito species of public health importance. In the wake of its arrival in neighbouring Italy the authorities of the canton of Ticino in southern Switzerland initiated a surveillance programme in 2000 that is still on-going. Here we explored the unique data set, compiled from 2003 to 2014, to analyse the local dynamic of introduction and establishment of Ae. albopictus, its relative density in relation to precipitation and temperature, and its potential distribution at the passage from southern to northern Europe.; The presence of Ae. albopictus was recorded by ovitraps placed across Ticino. In addition to presence-absence, the relationship between relative egg densities and year, month, temperature and precipitation was analysed by a generalised linear mixed model.; Since its first detection in 2003 at Ticino's border with Italy Ae. albopictus has continuously spread north across the lower valleys, mainly along the trans-European motorway, E35. Detailed local analysis showed that industrial areas were colonised by the mosquito before residential areas and that, afterwards, the mosquito was more present in residential than in industrial areas. Ae. albopictus appeared sporadically and then became more present in the same places the following years, suggesting gradual establishment of locally reproducing populations that manage to overwinter. This trend continues as witnessed by both a growing area being infested and increasing egg counts in the ovitraps. There was a clear South-North gradient with more traps being repeatedly positive in the South and fewer eggs laid during periods of intensive precipitation. In the North, the mosquito appeared repeatedly through the years, but never managed to establish, probably because of unfavourable weather conditions and low road traffic.; Given the present results we assume that additional areas may still become infested. While the current study provides good estimates of relative egg densities and shows the local and regional dynamics of Ae. albopictus invasion, additional parameters ought to be measured to make an objective risk assessment for epidemic disease transmission. The likelihood of Ae. albopictus to further spread and increase in densities calls for continued surveillance

The Monster Under the Bed: The Imaginary Circuit Split and the Nightmares Created in the Special Needs Doctrine\u27s Application to Child Abuse

Kessler Wilkerson was only two years old on the morning of October 16, 1976. At approximately 10:30 a.m., neighbors heard loud noises emanating from inside the Wilkerson trailer, alongside the sound of Kessler\u27s crying and his father\u27s screams. Two hours later, the now-quiet father delivered his two-year-old son to the emergency medical technicians. Despite their attempts to resuscitate the boy en route to the hospital, Kessler was pronounced dead on arrival. Discoveries in the hours and days that followed made Kessler\u27s death even worse. Kessler\u27s autopsy revealed multiple bruises all over the child\u27s body and.., significant bleeding and a deep laceration of the liver, which resulted in his death. Testimony after the fact revealed that Kessler\u27s father Kenneth Wilkerson repeatedly kicked him, whipped him with a belt, and tied up Kessler in order to bring him up to be a man. What makes Kessler\u27s death so tragic was that it came at the hands of his father\u27s repeated beatings witnessed by others who did not know abuse when they saw it, and who never bothered to report the abuse. By the time anyone paid attention, it was too late. Kessler was too young to call out for help, leaving the state unaware of the abuse and unable to intervene. Unfortunately, tragic results can also ensue from an investigation of a child abuse allegation. Jochebed Good was just seven years old on the night of April 24, 1987. Armed with an anonymous tip, state social services caseworker W.N. Hooper and a female police officer drove to the Good household to investigate allegations of child abuse. At 10 p.m., Jochebed\u27s mother Sandra answered a very loud pounding\u27 at the door. Sandra, feeling compelled to do so, reluctantly allowed Hooper and the officer into her home. After talking with Sandra Good, Hooper allegedly chased a frightened Jochebed around the house. Hooper proceeded to order the policewoman to conduct a strip search of Jochebed under his supervision, despite a lack of any evidence suggesting abuse. Finding no evidence of marks, injury, or abuse, Hooper and the officer left Jochebed and her mother shocked and shaken, deeply upset and worried. Jochebed, a child who showed no signs of abuse, was forced to endure the frightening and humiliating experience of an invasive strip search on the basis of an anonymous call and an agency afraid of another child falling through the cracks. The investigation of the Goods and the death of Kessler only begin to shed light on the nightmare created by the pervasive problem of child abuse in the United States

Viva voce functions, its dilution, and contribution to the proliferation of predatory universities

Since the Middle Ages, it has been a custom in universities to examine doctoral candidates orally through a “viva voce”. In this way, the doctoral examination consists of two components: a written thesis and a viva voce. Despite justifiable differences between universities around the world, the practice of the viva voce has changed from time to time. In general, the rigour and impact have diminished to such extent that, there is now an emerging practice of not holding a viva at all. In this paper I focus on the impact that the dilution of the viva can or might have on the selected classical functions of the viva. I also explore the possible link between this dilution and the proliferation of predatory universities. Using a qualitative approach, I conclude that the dilution of the viva voce undermines its classical functions and broadly  contributes to the proliferation of predatory universities. I, therefore, recommend African universities that are in the process of establishing doctoral programmes to attach great importance to the viva voce examination

Measurement of the Cross Section Times Branching Ratio of Light Higgs Decays at CLIC

The investigation of the properties of a Higgs boson, especially a test of the predicted linear dependence of the branching ratios on the mass of the final state, is currently one of the most compelling arguments for building a linear collider. We demonstrate that the large Higgs boson production cross section at a 3 TeV CLIC machine allows for a precision measurement of the Higgs branching ratios. The cross section times branching ratio of the decays H \rightarrow b^{-}b, H \rightarrow cc^{-} and H \rightarrow {\mu}{\mu} can be measured with a statistical uncertainty of 0.22%, 3.2% and 15%, respectively.Comment: LCWS 2011 Proceeding

Les Elections à l'Assemblée de la Polynésie Française

The law of 27 February 2004 about the new status of French Polynesia modifies two important points of the electoral rules for appointing the islands’ governing assembly. This law increases the number of constituencies from five to six and has a new method of allocating seats. Most importantly, the law creates a new voting system with a mixture of proportional and first-past-the-post representation. The size of the first-past-the-post representation, one third of the seats, makes this change very important

Death comes suddenly to the unprepared: singing crickets, call fragmentation, and parasitoid flies

Male field crickets are subject to a delicate dilemma because their songs simultaneously attract mates and acoustic predators. It has been suggested that in response, crickets have modified various temporal song parameters to become less attractive to acoustic predators. We investigated whether crickets with chirping (versus trilling) song structures are less likely to attract acoustically orienting parasitoid flies. Experimentally, we evaluated the phonotactic quest of the parasitoid fly Ormia ochracea in response to broadcast cricket calls, presented both simultaneously (choice paradigm) and sequentially (no-choice paradigm). Flight trajectories were recorded in darkness using three-dimensional active infrared video tracking. The flies showed remarkable phonotactic accuracy by landing directly on the loudspeaker. The introduction of acoustic fragmentation that resembles calls of many chirping crickets altered the flies' phonotactic accuracy only slightly. Our results document differential attraction between trilling and chirping cricket songs and quantitatively demonstrate that chirping songs, if presented alone, do not impair the efficiency (temporal investment and landing accuracy) of the flies' phonotactic quest. This study shows that song fragmentation is no safeguard against acoustic parasitism. We conclude that, in general, a cricket may reduce predation only if its neighbors are acoustically more conspicuous, chiefly by amplitud

Substantial variation in species ages among vertebrate clades

Ecological and evolutionary studies traditionally assume that species are comparable units of biodiversity. However, not only this assumption is rarely tested, but also there have been few attempts even to assess variation in most emergent, species-level traits and their corresponding underlying mechanisms. One such trait is species age, here defined as the time since the most recent common ancestor between a given species and its sister lineage. In this study, we demonstrate that different terrestrial vertebrate clades vary considerably in the age of their constituent species. In particular, species ages were youngest in mammals and birds as opposed to squamates and amphibians, although considerable variation was found within those clades as well. Sensitivity analyses showed that these results are unaffected by phylogenetic uncertainty or incomplete taxonomic sampling. Interestingly, there was little geographical correspondence in mean species age across taxa, as well as with temperature and precipitation stability over the past 21,000 years. We discuss candidate mechanisms that might explain differences in species ages among clades, and explore the implications of these findings in relation to recent advances in age-dependent speciation and extinction models of diversification