Home Literacy Initiatives of Middle School Families During the 2020 Quarantine Period: Transformation in Education?

The coronavirus pandemic changed everything almost overnight for students and their families. The purpose of this qualitative case study, thus, was to investigate the views of families about the sudden change in education for their middle school children, particularly literacy practices, during the pandemic. Drawing upon Bourdieu’s theoretical framework of cultural capital, coupled with socioeconomic status, funds of knowledge, and crisis management, we conducted interviews with 4 parents. Using the in vivo coding data analysis method, we identified some key preliminary findings: all-day-happy-hour, the strange disconnection between teachers and parents, and soft and hard approaches to school-home literacy. Participants revealed very distinctive dispositions to make this “school-home” education work on their own. These parental dispositions and new meaning-making from their children’s education developed into what we referred to as parentagogy, as they determined for themselves the skills they would need and use to help their children succeed in their new roles as parent and educator. This study confirms the importance of parental value in education

Software Citation in HEP: Current State and Recommendations for the Future

In November 2022, the HEP Software Foundation (HSF) and the Institute for Research and Innovation for Software in High-Energy Physics (IRIS-HEP) organized a workshop on the topic of Software Citation and Recognition in HEP. The goal of the workshop was to bring together different types of stakeholders whose roles relate to software citation and the associated credit it provides in order to engage the community in a discussion on: the ways HEP experiments handle citation of software, recognition for software efforts that enable physics results disseminated to the public, and how the scholarly publishing ecosystem supports these activities. Reports were given from the publication board leadership of the ATLAS, CMS, and LHCb experiments and HEP open source software community organizations (ROOT, Scikit-HEP, MCnet), and perspectives were given from publishers (Elsevier, JOSS) and related tool providers (INSPIRE, Zenodo). This paper summarizes key findings and recommendations from the workshop as presented at the 26th International Conference on Computing In High Energy and Nuclear Physics (CHEP 2023).Comment: 7 pages, 2 listings. Contribution to the Proceedings of the 26th International Conference on Computing In High Energy and Nuclear Physics (CHEP 2023

A Candidate Brightest Proto-Cluster Galaxy at z = 3.03

We report the discovery of a very bright (m_R = 22.2) Lyman break galaxy at z = 3.03 that appears to be a massive system in a late stage of merging. Deep imaging reveals multiple peaks in the brightness profile with angular separations of ~0.''8 (~25 h^-1 kpc comoving). In addition, high signal-to-noise ratio rest-frame UV spectroscopy shows evidence for ~5 components based on stellar photospheric and ISM absorption lines with a velocity dispersion of sigma ~460 km s^-1 for the three strongest components. Both the dynamics and high luminosity, as well as our analysis of a LCDM numerical simulation, suggest a very massive system with halo mass M ~ 10^13 M_solar. The simulation finds that all halos at z = 3 of this mass contain sub-halos in agreement with the properties of these observed components and that such systems typically evolve into M ~ 10^14 M_solar halos in groups and clusters by z = 0. This discovery provides a rare opportunity to study the properties and individual components of z ~ 3 systems that are likely to be the progenitors to brightest cluster galaxies.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures, submitted to ApJ Letter

Orbiting Circum-galactic Gas as a Signature of Cosmological Accretion

We use cosmological SPH simulations to study the kinematic signatures of cool gas accretion onto a pair of well-resolved galaxy halos. Cold-flow streams and gas-rich mergers produce a circum-galactic component of cool gas that generally orbits with high angular momentum about the galaxy halo before falling in to build the disk. This signature of cosmological accretion should be observable using background-object absorption line studies as features that are offset from the galaxy's systemic velocity by ~100 km/s. Accreted gas typically co-rotates with the central disk in the form of a warped, extended cold flow disk, such that the observed velocity offset is in the same direction as galaxy rotation, appearing in sight lines that avoid the galactic poles. This prediction provides a means to observationally distinguish accreted gas from outflow gas: the accreted gas will show large one-sided velocity offsets in absorption line studies while radial/bi-conical outflows will not (except possibly in special polar projections). This rotation signature has already been seen in studies of intermediate redshift galaxy-absorber pairs; we suggest that these observations may be among the first to provide indirect observational evidence for cold accretion onto galactic halos. Cold mode halo gas typically has ~3-5 times more specific angular momentum than the dark matter. The associated cold mode disk configurations are likely related to extended HI/XUV disks seen around galaxies in the local universe. The fraction of galaxies with extended cold flow disks and associated offset absorption-line gas should decrease around bright galaxies at low redshift, as cold mode accretion dies out.Comment: 15 pages, 9 figures, edited to match published version. Includes expanded discussion, with primary results unchange

Towards standard setting for patient-reported outcomes in the NHS homeopathic hospitals

We report findings from a pilot data collection study within a programme of quality assurance, improvement and development across all five homeopathic hospitals in the UK National Health Service (NHS).<p></p> <b>Aims</b> (1) To pilot the collection of clinical data in the homeopathic hospital outpatient setting, recording patient-reported outcome since first appointment; (2) to sample the range of medical complaints that secondary-care doctors treat using homeopathy, and thus identify the nature and complexity of complaints most frequently treated nationally; (3) to present a cross section of outcome scores by appointment number, including that for the most frequently treated medical complaints; (4) to explore approaches to standard setting for homeopathic practice outcome in patients treated at the homeopathic hospitals.<p></p> <b>Methods</b> A total of 51 medical practitioners took part in data collection over a 4-week period. Consecutive patient appointments were recorded under the headings: (1) date of first appointment in the current series; (2) appointment number; (3) age of patient; (4) sex of patient; (5) main medical complaint being treated; (6) whether other main medical complaint(s); (7) patient-reported change in health, using Outcome Related to Impact on Daily Living (ORIDL) and its derivative, the ORIDL Profile Score (ORIDL-PS; range, –4 to +4, where a score ≤−2 or ≥+2 indicates an effect on the quality of a patient's daily life); (8) receipt of other complementary medicine for their main medical complaint.<p></p> <b>Results</b> The distribution of patient age was bimodal: main peak, 49 years; secondary peak, 6 years. Male:female ratio was 1:3.5. Data were recorded on a total of 1797 individual patients: 195 first appointments, 1602 follow-ups (FUs). Size of clinical service and proportion of patients who attended more than six visits varied between hospitals. A total of 235 different medical complaints were reported. The 30 most commonly treated complaints were (in decreasing order of frequency): eczema; chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS); menopausal disorder; osteoarthritis; depression; breast cancer; rheumatoid arthritis; asthma; anxiety; irritable bowel syndrome; multiple sclerosis; psoriasis; allergy (unspecified); fibromyalgia; migraine; premenstrual syndrome; chronic rhinitis; headache; vitiligo; seasonal allergic rhinitis; chronic intractable pain; insomnia; ulcerative colitis; acne; psoriatic arthropathy; urticaria; ovarian cancer; attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD); epilepsy; sinusitis. The proportion of patients with important co-morbidity was higher in those seen after visit 6 (56.9%) compared with those seen up to and including that point (40.7%; P < 0.001). The proportion of FU patients reporting ORIDL-PS ≥ +2 (improvement affecting daily living) increased overall with appointment number: 34.5% of patients at visit 2 and 59.3% of patients at visit 6, for example. Amongst the four most frequently treated complaints, the proportion of patients that reported ORIDL-PS ≥ +2 at visit numbers greater than 6 varied between 59.3% (CFS) and 73.3% (menopausal disorder).<p></p> <b>Conclusions</b> We have successfully piloted a process of national clinical data collection using patient-reported outcome in homeopathic hospital outpatients, identifying a wide range and complexity of medical complaints treated in that setting. After a series of homeopathy appointments, a high proportion of patients, often representing “effectiveness gaps” for conventional medical treatment, reported improvement in health affecting their daily living. These pilot findings are informing our developing programme of standard setting for homeopathic care in the hospital outpatient context

Associations between immigrant status and pharmacological treatments for diabetes in U.S. adults

Objectives: Although treatment disparities in diabetes have been documented along racial/ethnic lines, it is unclear if immigrant groups in the United States experience similar treatment disparities. Our objective was to determine whether immigrant status is associated with differences in pharmacological treatment of diabetes in a nationally representative sample of adults with diabetes. We were specifically interested in differences in treatment with oral hypoglycemic agents (OHA) and insulin. Method: Respondents were 2,260 adults from National Health and Nutritional Examination Survey (NHANES) 2003–2012 with a self-reported diabetes diagnosis. Immigrant status was indicated by birth within (U.S.-born) or outside (foreign-born) the 50 U.S. States or Washington, DC. Multinomial logistic regression analyses examined associations between immigrant status and (a) treatment with OHAs only and (b) treatment with insulin only or insulin and OHA combination therapy, using no treatment as the reference group. Results: Adjusting for demographics, diabetes severity and duration, cardiovascular disease (CVD), and CVD risk factors, being foreign-born versus U.S.-born was not associated with treatment with OHAs only (odds ratio [OR] = 1.59; 95% confidence interval [CI] [0.97, 2.60]). However, being foreign-born was associated with decreased odds (OR = 0.53; 95% CI [0.28, 0.99]) of treatment with insulin. Conclusions: Pharmacological treatment of diabetes differs along immigrant status lines. To understand these findings, studies capturing the processes underlying treatment differences in diabetes among immigrants are needed. Findings raise the possibility that integrating information about a patient’s immigrant status, in addition to racial/ethnic identity, may be an important component of culturally sensitive diabetes care

Geochemical and Strontium Isotope Characterization of Produced Waters from Marcellus Shale Natural Gas Extraction

Extraction of natural gas by hydraulic fracturing of the Middle Devonian Marcellus Shale, a major gas-bearing unit in the Appalachian Basin, results in significant quantities of produced water containing high total dissolved solids (TDS). We carried out a strontium (Sr) isotope investigation to determine the utility of Sr isotopes in identifying and quantifying the interaction of Marcellus Formation produced waters with other waters in the Appalachian Basin in the event of an accidental release, and to provide information about the source of the dissolved solids. Strontium isotopic ratios of Marcellus produced waters collected over a geographic range of ∼375 km from southwestern to northeastern Pennsylvania define a relatively narrow set of values (εSr SW = +13.8 to +41.6, where εSr SW is the deviation of the 87Sr/86Sr ratio from that of seawater in parts per 104); this isotopic range falls above that of Middle Devonian seawater, and is distinct from most western Pennsylvania acid mine drainage and Upper Devonian Venango Group oil and gas brines. The uniformity of the isotope ratios suggests a basin-wide source of dissolved solids with a component that is more radiogenic than seawater. Mixing models indicate that Sr isotope ratios can be used to sensitively differentiate between Marcellus Formation produced water and other potential sources of TDS into ground or surface waters

Dosing regimen of meropenem for adults with severe burns : a population pharmacokinetic study with Monte Carlo simulations

Objectives To develop a population model to describe the pharmacokinetics (PK) of intravenous meropenem in adult patients with severe burns and investigate potential relationships between dosage regimens and antimicrobial efficacy.Patients and methods A dose of 1 g every 8 h was administered to adult patients with total body surface area burns of ≥15%. Doses for subsequent courses were determined using results from the initial course and the patient's clinical condition. Five plasma meropenem concentrations were typically measured over the dosage interval on one to four occasions. An open, two-compartment PK model was fitted to the meropenem concentrations using NONMEM and the effect of covariates on meropenem PK was investigated. Monte Carlo simulations investigated dosage regimens to achieve a target T>MIC for ≥40%, ≥60% or ≥80% of the dose interval.Results Data comprised 113 meropenem concentration measurements from 20 dosage intervals in 12 patients. The parameters were CL (L/h) = 0.196 L/h/kg × [1 − 0.023 × (age − 46)] × [1 − 0.049 × (albumin − 15)], V1 = 0.273 L/kg × [1 − 0.049 × (albumin − 15)], Q = 0.199 L/h/kg and V2 = 0.309 L/kg × [1 – 0.049 × (albumin − 15)]. For a target of ≥80% T>MIC, the breakpoint was 8 mg/L for doses of 1 g every 4 h and 2 g every 8 h given over 3 h, but only 4 mg/L if given over 5 min.Conclusions Although 1 g 8 hourly should be effective against Escherichia coli and CoNS, higher doses, ideally with a longer infusion time, would be more appropriate for empirical therapy, mixed infections and bacteria with MIC values ≥4 mg/L

Differential expression, function and response to inflammatory stimuli of 11β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase type 1 in human fibroblasts: a mechanism for tissue-specific regulation of inflammation

Stromal cells such as fibroblasts play an important role in defining tissue-specific responses during the resolution of inflammation. We hypothesized that this involves tissue-specific regulation of glucocorticoids, mediated via differential regulation of the enzyme 11β-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenase type 1 (11β-HSD1). Expression, activity and function of 11β-HSD1 was assessed in matched fibroblasts derived from various tissues (synovium, bone marrow and skin) obtained from patients with rheumatoid arthritis or osteoarthritis. 11β-HSD1 was expressed in fibroblasts from all tissues but mRNA levels and enzyme activity were higher in synovial fibroblasts (2-fold and 13-fold higher mRNA levels in dermal and synovial fibroblasts, respectively, relative to bone marrow). Expression and activity of the enzyme increased in all fibroblasts following treatment with tumour necrosis factor-α or IL-1β (bone marrow: 8-fold and 37-fold, respectively, compared to vehicle; dermal fibroblasts: 4-fold and 14-fold; synovial fibroblasts: 7-fold and 31-fold; all P < 0.01 compared with vehicle). Treatment with IL-4 or interferon-γ was without effect, and there was no difference in 11β-HSD1 expression between fibroblasts (from any site) obtained from patients with rheumatoid arthritis or osteoarthritis. In the presence of 100 nmol/l cortisone, IL-6 production – a characteristic feature of synovial derived fibroblasts – was significantly reduced in synovial but not dermal or bone marrow fibroblasts. This was prevented by co-treatment with an 11β-HSD inhibitor, emphasizing the potential for autocrine activation of glucocorticoids in synovial fibroblasts. These data indicate that differences in fibroblast-derived glucocorticoid production (via the enzyme 11β-HSD1) between cells from distinct anatomical locations may play a key role in the predeliction of certain tissues to develop persistent inflammation