bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Birth Characteristics and Subsequent Risks of Maternal Cardiovascular Disease
Authors: Bonamy Anna-Karin Edstedt , Parikh Nisha I. , Cnattingius Sven , Ludvigsson Jonas F. , Ingelsson Erik
Published: November 2011

Background—

Prior studies showing an inverse relationship between low birth weight in offspring and maternal risks of cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are limited by lack of information on gestational age and/or insufficient adjustment for confounders.

Methods and Results—

In a nationwide Swedish study, we included information on 923 686 women and their first singleton births between 1983 and 2005. Cox proportional hazards models were used to study associations between gestational length, fetal growth, and maternal incident hospitalization or death from CVD (coronary heart disease, cerebrovascular events, and heart failure). Multivariable adjusted models accounted for birth year, income, education, country of birth, smoking, diabetes mellitus, hypertension, and preeclampsia. The risk of maternal CVD increased with decreasing gestational age whereas the risk increase related to fetal growth appeared to be restricted to very small-for-gestational-age (SGA) infants. Compared with mothers of non-SGA infants born at term, the hazard ratio of CVD ranged from 1.39 (95% confidence interval 1.22–1.58) to 2.57 (95% confidence interval 1.97–3.34) among mothers to moderately and very preterm infants, respectively. There was a significant interaction between preterm birth and fetal growth with respect to mothers' risk of CVD (
P
<0.001). Among mothers to very SGA infants, the hazard ratio of CVD ranged from 1.38 (95% confidence interval 1.15–1.65) to 3.40 (95% confidence interval 2.26–5.11) in mothers to term and very preterm infants, respectively.

Conclusions—

Delivery of a preterm or SGA infant is associated with later life maternal hospitalization or death from CVD even after accounting for socioeconomic factors, smoking, and pregnancy-related complications.
Premotor Cortex Is Sensitive to Auditory–Visual Congruence for Biological Motion
Authors: Wuerger Sophie M. , Parkes Laura , Lewis Penelope A. , Crocker-Buque Alex , Rutschmann Roland , Meyer Georg F.
Published: November 2011

The auditory and visual perception systems have developed special processing strategies for ecologically valid motion stimuli, utilizing some of the statistical properties of the real world. A well-known example is the perception of biological motion, for example, the perception of a human walker. The aim of the current study was to identify the cortical network involved in the integration of auditory and visual biological motion signals. We first determined the cortical regions of auditory and visual coactivation (Experiment 1); a conjunction analysis based on unimodal brain activations identified four regions: middle temporal area, inferior parietal lobule, ventral premotor cortex, and cerebellum. The brain activations arising from bimodal motion stimuli (Experiment 2) were then analyzed within these regions of coactivation. Auditory footsteps were presented concurrently with either an intact visual point-light walker (biological motion) or a scrambled point-light walker; auditory and visual motion in depth (walking direction) could either be congruent or incongruent. Our main finding is that motion incongruency (across modalities) increases the activity in the ventral premotor cortex, but only if the visual point-light walker is intact. Our results extend our current knowledge by providing new evidence consistent with the idea that the premotor area assimilates information across the auditory and visual modalities by comparing the incoming sensory input with an internal representation.
Panopticon of Death: Institutional design of Bereavement
Authors: Lebel Udi
Published: November 2011

Individual behaviors, such as loss-coping and “grief work” are affected in organizational contexts. In everything pertaining to coping with trauma in general, and loss more particularly, the individual is “trapped” within a political psychology that enforces the habitus and expectations of institutional dominance on the ostensibly intimate and private response. Regimes have perceived bereavement over battlefield deaths as a form of social capital that can be mobilized to enhance national loyalty and political support. Employing both existential/hermeneutic and institutional analysis, this study examines three diachronic models of bereavement – hegemonic, political and civil – and their political ramifications in the Israeli context. Drawing on changing parental conceptual orientations towards fallen sons and their role as cultural and ideological agents in public sphere, the article traces the movement of bereavement from its capture by the hegemonic state institutions to its creations under the domination of others institutions: political and civic and ultimate use in critiquing the political and military echelon. The article indicates the powerful impact of the social institutional-organizational context on the intimate-psychological context of coping with loss, by illustrating this phenomenon in the Israeli society.
Social representations of the wolf
Authors: Figari Helene , Skogen Ketil
Published: November 2011

Restoring species to their former range has become a major goal in official environmental policy. Under strict protection, the expansion of a new wolf population has been taking place on the Scandinavian Peninsula since the late 1980s, leading to much controvery in rural areas. Most research on conflicts concerning wolves has taken antagonistic attitudes as a point of departure. In this article we question such an approach. Taking social representations as our framework for analysis, our aim has been to find out how wolves are perceived and whether an analysis of such cultural meanings could contribute to a better understanding of the conflicts accompanying wolf recovery. Focus group interviews in two areas in Eastern Norway suggest that it is not antagonistic interpretations of the carnivores’ nature that fuel the conflicts over wolves, but different views as to whether they belong in the areas where they are now found. Yet, at the same time, it is against the undisputed background of the wolf’s perceived character that the negotiations over their belonging to Norwegian nature make sense. We so argue that the theory of social representations provides a comprehensive framework for studying the complex relationship between consensus and diverging opinions, and between culturally embedded representations and conflict, that appears to lie at the heart of such issues.
Highbrow culture in Finland: Knowledge, taste and participation
Authors: Purhonen Semi , Gronow Jukka , Rahkonen Keijo
Published: November 2011

This article explores the social distribution of involvement in highbrow culture in light of three issues being discussed in cultural sociology. One is that highbrow cultural orientation is an indicator of cultural capital or of social status. A second, the ‘meltdown scenario’, suggests that not only the popularity of highbrow activities, but also their distinctiveness, has decreased among younger cohorts in comparison to older cohorts. A third deals with the ‘feminization’ of highbrow culture. These issues are empirically addressed in contemporary Finland using nationally representative survey data. Highbrow culture is measured in three dimensions of cultural practices – knowledge, taste and participation – covering four different fields: music, literature, cinema and the visual arts. The results support all three arguments: First, education and occupational class are important social determinants of involvement in highbrow culture in Finland. Second, younger age cohorts show less interest in highbrow culture than do older Finns. Third, women tend to be more involved in highbrow culture than men. The results indicate considerable stability across the measures of highbrow culture and cultural fields. Social determinants of knowledge and cinema, however, are different from those in other dimensions and fields.
The Religion and State-Minorities dataset
Authors: Akbaba Yasemin , Fox Jonathan
Published: November 2011

This article presents the Religion and State-Minorities (RASM) dataset addressing its design, collection, and utility. RASM codes religious discrimination by governments against all 566 minorities in 175 countries which make a minimum population cutoff. It includes 24 specific types of religious discrimination coded yearly from 1990 to 2002. Religious discrimination measures the absence of the human right of religious freedom which includes limits on religious practices such as worship as well as limits on religious institutions such as churches and mosques which are not placed on the majority group. Thus the dataset focuses on the restriction of religious group rights. Most similar datasets, including those that focus on human rights in general, include a single discrimination score for a country. RASM is the first to contain an accounting of religious discrimination against all relevant religious minorities on an individual basis while avoiding some methodological problems of previous similar data collections. In order to demonstrate the utility of the dataset, we examine the relationship between religious identity and religious discrimination. We find that both majority and minority identities matter in predicting the treatment of religious minorities. This demonstration that codings for individual minorities add to our understanding of the correlates of religious discrimination is illustrative of the potential uses of this dataset. It also indicates that this type of data can be useful in other types of studies where dyads based on religious identity are relevant, such as studies of ethnic conflict and civil war.
The diffusion of racist violence in the Netherlands: Discourse and distance
Authors: Braun Robert
Published: November 2011

This article illuminates the unanticipated but intense waves of xenophobia that have swept through Western Europe over the last decade. The author makes use of a unique dataset and diffusion models to simultaneously investigate the geographical and temporal development of waves of racist violence in the Netherlands during the turbulent period 2001–03, when the country lost its reputation as a multicultural paradise. The results provide evidence for the fact that previous riots enhance the legitimacy of violence elsewhere, especially if they are visible in the mass media, resonate with public debates on immigration and take place in nearby regions. Opposing previous research on mobilization, the analysis suggests that proxies for ethnic competition, deprivation and political opportunity structures are not significantly related to the outbreak of violence; only population size adequately predicts where violence starts. Together these findings suggest that waves of xenophobia develop in two steps: they start in large cities and subsequently spread to nearby places through geographically clustered networks and to more distant counties once they become visible and resonate in the mass media, turning violence from local deviance into a supra-local phenomenon. This process sheds light on how scales of protest shift and explains why seemingly tolerant regions can suddenly become xenophobic hotbeds.
The economic costs of the German participation in the Afghanistan war
Authors: Brück Tilman , Groot Olaf J de , Schneider Friedrich
Published: November 2011

In this article, we estimate the total costs of the German participation in the Afghanistan war, both past and future. This is a hugely complex and uncertain calculation, which depends on several important assumptions. These assumptions pertain to the different cost channels and the shares of these channels that can be attributed to the German participation in the war. By calculating the costs of the German participation, we provide a framework for other researchers to do the same with respect to other countries. The article can function as a roadmap for researchers focusing on this topic. In the end we find that, in the most realistic of several possible scenarios regarding the duration and intensity of the German participation in the war in Afghanistan, the German share of the net present value of the total costs of the war ranges from 26 billion Euro to 47 billion Euro. This large range reflects the uncertainties with which the costs must be estimated. On an annual basis, we estimate that the German participation in the war costs between 2.5 and 3 billion Euro. This contrasts with the official war budget, which is little over 1 billion Euro for 2010, showing that governments may not adequately represent the costs of military action.
Liberal peace and shared resources – A fair-weather phenomenon?
Authors: Kalbhenn Anna
Published: November 2011

The aim of this article is to empirically analyse liberal peace arguments in the context of shared river basins. In particular, it argues that counter to the water war hypothesis, sharing a river need not necessary lead to conflict over the shared resource: relying on liberal arguments, joint democracy is expected to facilitate trust and thus cooperation over transboundary rivers. Furthermore, by mitigating asymmetries, facilitating (implicit) side-payments and issue linkage, both economic and political interlinkages may encourage cooperation over shared rivers. Previous work suggests that these factors might be a ‘fair-weather’ phenomenon, that is, that they play a role only for problems that are easy to solve. In this article, liberal effects are allowed to vary with the difficulty of the underlying problem by separating different issues and geographic situations. Empirically, the article focuses on intergovernmental behaviour using a new dataset on transboundary water events covering all international basins for a period of eleven years (1997–2007). The results show that indeed liberal peace factors matter with respect to intergovernmental interaction over shared river basins and the effect of joint democracy is more prominent under ‘fair-weather’ conditions.
Do Economic Globalization and Industry Growth Destabilize Careers? An Analysis of Career Complexity and Career Patterns Over Time
Authors: Biemann Torsten , Fasang Anette Eva , Grunow Daniela
Published: November 2011

We analyze the impact of economic globalization and industry growth on the complexity of early work careers in Germany. We conceptualize complexity as the absolute number of employer changes, the regularity in the order of job changes, and the variability of the durations spent in different employment states. Results from empirical analyses based on the German Life History Study ( N = 5453) show only a small increase in the complexity of work careers over the last decades, but there was a shift in the prevalence of different career patterns. This suggests that effects of globalization might be counteracted or modified by other social changes that affected work careers in Germany during the last 60 years. In particular, we consider the possible impact of educational expansion, labor market restructuring, and women’s increased employment. We find no evidence that industry-specific economic globalization impacts the complexity of work careers, but we find a U-shaped relationship between industry growth and career complexity. Careers are slightly more complex in industries with high or low industry growth. We conclude that, while there has been a shift in career patterns over time, the impact of globalization on career stability is possibly overestimated.
Cross-Level Dynamics between Changing Organizations and Career Patterns of Reduced-Load Professionals
Authors: Litrico Jean-Baptiste , Lee Mary Dean , Kossek Ellen Ernst
Published: November 2011

Integrating research on careers, flexible work arrangements, and open systems views of organizational change, we investigate how evolution in the broader organizational context interacts with professional career trajectories over time. Interviews were conducted six years apart (1997 and 2003) with 17 major employers in North America and 36 managers and professionals in those firms who were working on a reduced-load basis by choice in 1997. Overall, we found that career patterns are impacted by the dynamic combination of individual-level and contextual factors. Specifically, while changes in core business/client base, internal structure changes, and industry turbulence were associated with higher proportions of returns to full-time work, financial threat was associated with lower levels of return to full-time work. We identified four cross-level dynamics (co-optation, synergy, decoupling, and tug of war) that capture different patterns of interaction between individual work arrangement trajectories and larger trends occurring at the organizational or industry level.
The problem of letting go: The ‘Big Society’, accountable governance and ‘the curse of the decentralizing minister’
Authors: Flinders Matthew , Moon David S.
Published: November 2011

While clear lines of accountability are normally considered a sine qua non of any modern democracy, this article argues that too much accountability can be as problematic as too little. Through the application of a number of analytical ‘hooks’ drawn from the accountability studies literature, it argues that if the coalition government’s rhetorical commitment to a shift from a ‘Big State’ to a ‘Big Society’ is implemented, it may well flounder due to its inability to reconcile the centrifugal forces of devolution and localism with the centripetal forces of political accountability and public expectation. Indeed, without a more aggressive, sophisticated and indeed honest approach to accountability, the ‘Big Society’ is unwittingly likely to forge an even ‘Bigger State’.
Contours and conflicts in scale: Science, knowledge and urban development
Authors: May Tim , Perry Beth
Published: November 2011

Increasing attention is being focused upon the roles of cities in knowledge-based development in the context of debates around the relationships between science, technology and innovation and economic growth. The article argues that underlying assumptions and expectations of knowledge, space and place are important in understanding the content and form of responses within different places. The example of the English Science Cities is drawn upon to highlight issues over dominant knowledge-based discourses and the potential for alternative responses to be formulated. Pressures for knowledge-based success are mediated through national contexts, informed by existing paradigms and assumptions, and their effects are varied according to governance structures. Without proper political consideration of the dynamics between knowledge, science and place, more inclusive and sustainable initiatives for knowledge-based growth will not be forthcoming.
Prospects for local economic development in the north of England under the coalition
Authors: Ward Michael
Published: November 2011

Britain's coalition government, elected in 2010, is making radical changes to the institutions for local economic development in England, scrapping New Labour's Regional Development Agencies and setting up weak, non-statutory Local Enterprise Partnerships. However, sharp regional differences remain between the North and the South, and the new arrangements are unlikely to achieve the coalition's avowed aim of rebalancing the economy.
Localism, social capital and the ‘Big Society’
Authors: Westwood Andy
Published: November 2011

This article explores the rationale for and interconnections between the coalition government's objectives for the ‘Big Society’, ‘localism’ and a ‘rebalanced economy’. It explores the overlaps between the three key policy objectives and highlights how the boundaries between them should be increasingly blurred, with each contributing to and reinforcing the others. In particular, it looks at the prospects for achieving each objective in a weak economic period, particularly in more deprived local areas. It also explores the links between the idea of the ‘Big Society’ and social capital literature, and argues that both are jeopardized by poor understanding and the reducing and changing role of the local and central state.
Localism and local government finance
Authors: Curtis Mike
Published: November 2011

This article surveys a number of key elements of the government's localism agenda, particularly as it relates to local government finance. It concludes that this is a genuine attempt to free up local authorities to innovate and control their own resources, but that the toxic climate and emphasis on central guidance may undermine it.
What is localism, and what implications do different models have for managing the local economy?
Authors: Hildreth Paul
Published: November 2011

This article considers what emerging localism might mean for managing local economies. It develops a simple framework to explore localism in the context of roles and relationships between the centre, local government and communities. It develops three models: ‘conditional localism’, ‘representative localism’ and ‘community localism’. It also identifies some basic characteristics that enable comparisons between each model to be made. Finally, it uses this framework to consider what implications the coalition government's localism rhetoric and legislation might have for management of the local economy.
On Kittler applied: A technical memoir of a specific configuration in the 1990s
Authors: Krajewski Markus
Published: November 2011

This ‘technical memoir’ shares insider knowledge of a specific scholarly and scientific situation in the second half of the 1990s: how a group of students and researchers at Humboldt-University Berlin, together with their teacher, media historian Friedrich Kittler, combined historical questions with computer science. The discussions and projects developed in this circle constituted a scholarly practice which would be called today digital humanities.
Kittler’s optic: Visual theory between hardware, strategy and style
Authors: Fliethmann Axel
Published: November 2011

The article situates Kittler’s view on the question of visual technology within his general media theory and critically examines Kittler’s optical paradigm with regard to questions of (visual) technology, discourse, strategy and style. Focus is given to the link between visual technology and the Renaissance period.
Privacy and the public/private dichotomy
Authors: Dawes Simon
Published: November 2011

This essay reviews Helen Nissenbaum’s Privacy in Context (2010), focusing in particular on her dismissal of the public/private dichotomy. Taking issue with the problem she constructs of ‘privacy in public’, her unitary reading of the dichotomy and ‘socializing’ of the value of privacy, or what she calls ‘contextual integrity’, and her treatment of technology in the abstract, the essay then goes on to argue that the framework she proposes is incapable of addressing the contemporary incursion of market logic into every other aspect of social and political life in the digital economy, and therefore of protecting privacy at all. The essay concludes with an insistence on the need to approach contextual privacy problems from a political economic perspective and with a political conception of privacy, and for that to be founded upon a protean appreciation of the public/private dichotomy.
Alexandre Brierre de Boismont and the origins of the Spanish psychiatric profession
Authors: Novella Enric J , Huertas Rafael
Published: November 2011

This article examines the influence of the French alienist Alexandre Brierre de Boismont in the first development of the Spanish psychiatric profession during the third quarter of the 19th century. As an outstanding figure of French psychological medicine, Brierre enjoyed great scientific prestige among Spanish doctors, but he also took an active part in promoting and legitimizing the cause of alienism in Spain. For instance, he was involved in projects for the reform or creation of new mental hospitals, supported the admission of some Spanish colleagues into the Société Médico-Psychologique and made a decisive contribution to the social recognition of the professional and medico-legal expertise of alienists in Spain. His case is thus an excellent example of the important role played by international relations and the scientific and professional networks of European alienism in spreading the discourses and practices of the emerging psychological medicine.
‘Him Biđ Sona Sel’: psychiatry in the Anglo-Saxon Leechbooks
Authors: Pell Christopher
Published: November 2011

Classical Greek and Roman writers documented the diagnosis and treatment of psychiatric illness in ancient times. Following the fall of the Western Roman Empire however, we find little writing on the topic in early Medieval Europe. Yet in Britain, medical texts survived and were complemented by local traditions and treatments. This article explores the best-known Anglo-Saxon medical texts, the Leechbooks and Lacnunga, for evidence of psychiatric illness and the treatments employed by physicians in the tenth century. The difficulties encountered when working with sources translated from Old English and speculations about the supernatural aetiology ascribed to these illnesses are detailed. The efficacy of the leechdoms (treatments) described are also investigated for both their placebo and potential pharmacological effects.
Women and melancholy in nineteenth-century German psychiatry
Authors: Hock Lisabeth
Published: November 2011

This study examines depictions of the relationship between women and melancholia in German psychiatric textbooks published between 1803 and 1913. Focusing in particular on how these texts present the female life cycle, nineteenth-century views about female ‘nature’ and gender traits, and women’s familial and professional roles, it reveals how nineteenth-century psychiatrists were caught between the scientific demand for objective clinical observation and the gender norms of the culture to which they belonged. On the one hand, psychiatrists carefully and sensitively describe female melancholia with evidence obtained through the scientific methods of clinical observation, anatomical investigation and self-questioning. On the other hand, language choice contributes to the naturalization of gender difference by assigning cultural meaning to clinical observations.
Aero-mechanical optimization of a contra-rotating open rotor and assessment of its aerodynamic and acoustic characteristics
Authors: Lepot I , Leborgne M , Schnell R , Yin J , Delattre G , Falissard F , Talbotec J
Published: November 2011

Within the frame of the ongoing 7th Framework European Project DREAM, this article presents a synthesis of Cenaero, DLR, and Onera's joint effort to demonstrate the aerodynamic and acoustic optimization potential of a contra-rotating open rotor. Within WP 3.2 led by Snecma, the objective was to maximize the propellers efficiency at top-of-climb conditions and to minimize the noise emission at take-off focusing on interaction noise while fulfilling the thrust and torque split specifications at both operating points. These objectives were successfully met by the development and exploitation of efficient multi-objective three-dimensional Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS)-based surrogate-assisted optimization strategies. In order to assess the aerodynamic and acoustic characteristics of both baseline and optimized geometries, coupled unsteady RANS (URANS) simulation and farfield prediction based on an integral Ffowcs Williams–Hawkings approach were then carried out. The results demonstrate that although the acoustic criterion driving the optimization process did not lead to an improvement of the noise characteristics over the whole directivity range, it may be regarded as a cost-effective way to incorporate noise-related aspects into the design intent.
Social partners and the welfare state: Recalibration, privatization or collectivization of social risks?
Authors: Johnston Alison , Kornelakis Andreas , d’Acri Costanza Rodriguez
Published: November 2011

What has been the extent of welfare state retrenchment? One strand of the comparative political economy literature argues that welfare states have not undergone outright retrenchment, but recalibration. Another strand identifies a shift towards the privatization of risks and increased reliance on the market. Our article seeks to contribute to these debates with an alternative argument: collectivization of social risks. We employ a method of contextualized comparisons, examining three cases of collectivization across diverse contexts: the financing of disability insurance in the Netherlands, training provision for employed and unemployed in Greece, and regulation of atypical contracts in Italy. We conclude by discussing the ensuing political dynamics that the wider relevance of the argument brings to debates in comparative political economy and comparative industrial relations.
Pump using Nematic Liquid Crystalline Flow under Application of Electric Field
Authors: Tsukiji Tetsuhiro , Fuchimoto Ryo
Published: November 2011

This article is concerning a small pump for liquid crystal, which is called liquid crystal pump in this article. The mechanism of the induced flow of liquid crystal by application of electric fields on the liquid crystal is used to generate the rotational flow in the present pump. Liquid crystal pump has a channel to change rotational flow into one-way flow from inlet to outlet of the pump. Rotational electric fields are used in the present study. In our researches, a previous pump was cylindrical type with a long length in the axial direction. On the other hand, this article presents plate-type pumps with planar electrode, so it is short in the axial direction. The rotational electric fields are generated by circle-electrode structure fabricated on planar surface, which are applied three-phase alternating currents. Using integrated electrode plate, connection of pumps with plate type is easier than cylindrical one. The pressure–flow rate characteristics of the pump were measured. In addition, the relation between non-dimensional flow rate and pressure of the pump were obtained. In order to obtain a high pressure and high flow rate, various shapes of electrode and channel were investigated and the measured results were compared with each other. Besides connecting pumps with integrated circle electrode plate were designed to get the required pressure and flow rate. The structure of liquid crystal pump is simple and the size can be decreased by further researches. So this pump has the advantage of small source of actuator by changing electric power into fluid power. Furthermore, our pump has a good possibility of the cooling system’s source because this pump makes no noise and no mechanical vibration.
Cardiovascular predictors for long-term mortality after EVAR for AAA
Authors: Ohrlander Tomas , Dencker Magnus , Dias Nuno V , Gottsäter Anders , Acosta Stefan
Published: November 2011

The aim of this study was to assess cardiovascular predictors for all-cause long-term mortality in patients undergoing standard endovascular aneurysm repair (EVAR) for infrarenal abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA). Consecutive patients treated with EVAR (Zenith® stent grafts; Cook) between May 1998 and February 2006 were prospectively enrolled in a computerized database, together with retrospectively collected data on medication, and electrocardiographic and echocardiographic variables. Mortality was assessed on 1 December 2010. The median follow-up time was 68 months and the median age was 74 years (range 53–89) for the 304 patients. Mortality at the end of follow-up was 54.3% (165/304). The proportion of deaths caused by vascular diseases was 61% (101/165). In the univariate analysis, low preoperative ejection fraction (EF) ( p = 0.004), absence of statin medication ( p = 0.007), and medication with diuretics ( p = 0.028) or digitalis ( p = 0.016) were associated with an increased long-term mortality rate. Myocardial ischemia on electrocardiogram (ECG) (hazard ratio (HR) 1.6 [95% CI 1.1–2.4]) and anemia (HR 1.5 [95% CI 1.0–2.1]) were found to be independent predictors for long-term mortality after Cox regression analysis. There was a trend that chronic kidney disease, stage ≥ 3 (HR 1.5 [95% CI 1.0–2.2]), and age 80 years and above (HR 1.5 [95% CI 1.0–2.4]) were independently associated with long-term mortality. In conclusion, ischemia on ECG and anemia were independently related to an increased long-term mortality rate after EVAR, and these predictive factors seem to be most important for critical assessment in the preoperative medical work-up.
Transitions, local culture and human dignity
Authors: Wierenga Ani
Published: November 2011

Rural towns are made up of people who want to be here, people who need to be here and people who want to get out. This article focuses on the narratives of working-class young men who want to stay in their home town. For these individuals, rapid social change is presenting one complex series of challenges, while contemporary social policies are presenting yet another. I argue that entrenched ways of thinking about social problems are compounded by ‘silos’ within research traditions. In the context of this study, when research enquiries about young people’s transitions are informed by their narratives about identity, their explanations of cultural practices and resources and an understanding of the role of cultures of trust, shifts in understanding become possible. Acknowledging the ways in which these distinct areas of study are integrally related brings new sociological insights, methodological possibilities, alongside implications for policy and practice.
Schizoid subjectivities?
Authors: Renold Emma , Ringrose Jessica
Published: November 2011

Drawing on three case studies from two UK ethnographic research projects in urban and rural working-class communities, this article explores young teen girls’ negotiation of increasingly sex-saturated societies and cultures. Our analysis complicates contemporary debates around the ‘sexualization’ moral panic by troubling developmental and classed accounts of age-appropriate (hetero)sexuality. We explore how girls are regulated by, yet rework and resist expectations to perform as agentic sexual subjects across a range of spaces (e.g. streets, schools, homes, cyberspace). To conceptualize the blurring of generational and sexual binaries present in our data, we develop Deleuzian notions of ‘becomings’, ‘assemblages’ and ‘schizoid subjectivities’. These concepts help us to map the anti-linear transitions and contradictory performances of young femininity as always in-movement; where girls negotiate discourses of sexual knowingness and innocence, often simultaneously, yet always within a wider context of socio-cultural gendered/classed regulations.
The educated citizen: Cultural and gender capital in the schooling of Latin American children in Japan
Authors: Castro-Vázquez Genaro
Published: November 2011

An ethnographic study on a Japanese language tutoring programme for foreign children was conducted from 2003 to 2006. The investigation attempted to shed light on issues of language acquisition among Latin American children who attended three public primary schools in Japan. This article combines extensive participant observation and in-depth group/individual semi-structured interviews with nine education personnel, three Latin American families living in Japan and 30 Japanese mothers. The participants provided their insights on language acquisition and schooling of foreign children at Japanese public schools. The analysis of interviews and observations suggested that ‘the educated citizen’ was a construct that could help explain issues concerning the education of foreign children in Japan. In addition, the educated citizen seemed to have two basic components – cultural and gender capital – entwined in the children’s academic achievement.
Involvement of Roma parents in children’s education in Croatia: A comparative study
Authors: Pahic Tea , Vidovic Vlasta Vizek , Miljevic-Ridicki Renata
Published: November 2011

This article compares Roma and mainstream parents’ involvement in the education of their children, based on Epstein’s six-dimensional model of parent–school partnership. The survey was conducted in Croatia on two sub-samples: 60 Roma parents and 908 mainstream parents. Results suggest that Roma parents show lower interest in participating in volunteer work and school decision making than do mainstream parents, they rate their children’s achievement and school satisfaction lower, and they have lower academic aspirations for their children.
Modelling the effect of oar shaft bending during the rowing stroke
Authors: Sliasas A , Tullis S
Published: November 2011

The behaviour of oar shaft bending during the drive phase is examined using a hydrodynamic-based model of the rowing stroke. By modelling the complex time-varying hydrodynamic load on the blade, the amount of shaft bending during the drive can be calculated. It is shown during the first 45 per cent of the drive that the blade rotation rate is up to 30 per cent slower than the oarlock rotation rate as the oar deflects and energy is stored in the flexible shaft. Through the remainder of the drive the shaft unbends, causing the blade to rotate up to 16 per cent quicker than the oarlock as the stored energy is transferred to the water and to shell propulsion. The effects that this bending has on oar blade and handle forces highlight the importance of accounting for oar shaft flexibility when modelling the rowing stroke.
Addressing Nutrient Density in the Context of the Use of Thickened Liquids in Dysphagia Treatment
Authors: McCallum Shirley
Published: November 2011

Thickening liquids has become a standard of practice for managing children with oropharyngeal dysphagia. A variety of commercial products have been developed from guar gum, xanthan gums, and modified corn starch. Practitioners and families are also trying to thicken liquids with available foods, such as infant rice cereal, yogurt, strained baby foods, and instant potato flakes. Throughout this process little consideration is given to the impact of the use of different thickeners on the nutrient density of human milk, formula, or other beverages. Various fluids were thickened by the author using different products to achieve National Dysphagia Diet nectar-like, or honey-like consistencies. Nutrient analysis of the calorie effect of the thickeners was calculated using the USDA Agriculture Research Service Nutrient database, manufacturer information, and displacement factors to evaluate the effects on calories per ounce of the thickened fluids. Considerations of thickener choice on other nutrients are discussed, including potential for toxicity of nutrient loads with specific thickeners. No one thickener is appropriate for all patients, but the characteristics of the various thickeners need to be understood. The assessment of the individual patient by an interdisciplinary team, including a registered dietitian should determine the patient’s specific needs before recommending a thickener.
Accuracies of genomic breeding values in American Angus beef cattle using K-means clustering for cross-validation
Authors: Saatchi Mahdi , McClure Mathew C , McKay Stephanie D , Rolf Megan M , Kim JaeWoo , Decker Jared E , Taxis Tasia M , Chapple Richard H , Ramey Holly R , Northcutt Sally L , Bauck Stewart , Woodward Brent , Dekkers Jack CM , Fernando Rohan L , Schnabel Robert D , Garrick Dorian J , Taylor Jeremy F
Published: November 2011

Background

Genomic selection is a recently developed technology that is beginning to revolutionize animal breeding. The objective of this study was to estimate marker effects to derive prediction equations for direct genomic values for 16 routinely recorded traits of American Angus beef cattle and quantify corresponding accuracies of prediction.

Methods

Deregressed estimated breeding values were used as observations in a weighted analysis to derive direct genomic values for 3570 sires genotyped using the Illumina BovineSNP50 BeadChip. These bulls were clustered into five groups using K-means clustering on pedigree estimates of additive genetic relationships between animals, with the aim of increasing within-group and decreasing between-group relationships. All five combinations of four groups were used for model training, with cross-validation performed in the group not used in training. Bivariate animal models were used for each trait to estimate the genetic correlation between deregressed estimated breeding values and direct genomic values.

Results

Accuracies of direct genomic values ranged from 0.22 to 0.69 for the studied traits, with an average of 0.44. Predictions were more accurate when animals within the validation group were more closely related to animals in the training set. When training and validation sets were formed by random allocation, the accuracies of direct genomic values ranged from 0.38 to 0.85, with an average of 0.65, reflecting the greater relationship between animals in training and validation. The accuracies of direct genomic values obtained from training on older animals and validating in younger animals were intermediate to the accuracies obtained from K-means clustering and random clustering for most traits. The genetic correlation between deregressed estimated breeding values and direct genomic values ranged from 0.15 to 0.80 for the traits studied.

Conclusions

These results suggest that genomic estimates of genetic merit can be produced in beef cattle at a young age but the recurrent inclusion of genotyped sires in retraining analyses will be necessary to routinely produce for the industry the direct genomic values with the highest accuracy.
The association of DNA damage response and nucleotide level modulation with the antibacterial mechanism of the anti-folate drug Trimethoprim
Authors: Sangurdekar Dipen P , Zhang Zhigang , Khodursky Arkady B
Published: November 2011

Background

Trimethoprim is a widely prescribed antibiotic for a variety of bacterial infections. It belongs to a class of anti-metabolites - antifolates - which includes drugs used against malarial parasites and in cancer therapy. However, spread of bacterial resistance to the drug has severely hampered its clinical use and has necessitated further investigations into its mechanism of action and treatment regimen. Trimethoprim selectively starves bacterial cells for tetrahydrofolate, a vital cofactor necessary for the synthesis of several metabolites. The outcome (bacteriostatic or bactericidal) of such starvation, however, depends on the availability of folate-dependent metabolites in the growth medium. To characterize this dependency, we investigated in detail the regulatory and structural components of Escherichia coli cellular response to trimethoprim in controlled growth and supplementation conditions.

Results

We surveyed transcriptional responses to trimethoprim treatment during bacteriostatic and bactericidal conditions and analyzed associated gene sets/pathways. Concurrent starvation of all folate dependent metabolites caused growth arrest, and this was accompanied by induction of general stress and stringent responses. Three gene sets were significantly associated with the bactericidal effect of TMP in different media including LB: genes of the SOS regulon, genes of the pyrimidine nucleotide biosynthetic pathway and members of the multiple antibiotic resistance (mar) regulon controlled by the MarR repressor. However, the SOS response was identified as the only universal transcriptional signature associated with the loss of viability by direct thymine starvation or by folate stress. We also used genome-wide gene knock-out screen to uncover means of sensitization of bacteria to the drug. We observed that among a number of candidate genes and pathways, the effect of knock-outs in the deoxyribose nucleotide salvage pathway, encoded by the deoCABD operon and under the control of the DeoR repressor, was most informative.

Conclusion

Transcriptional induction of DNA damage response is an essential feature of the bactericidal effect of trimethoprim. Either the observation of the transcriptional response or DNA damage itself, or both, is made possible by thymine starvation when other folate-dependent metabolites are not limited. The effect of DNA damage by the drug takes place prior to its bactericidal effect, at the beginning of the lag stage of the treatment. Mutations in the deoxyribose nucleotide salvage pathway can affect duration of the lag as well as the rate of killing. This information can be used to postulate certain mechanistic differences between direct thymine starvation in thymidylate synthase deficient mutants and thymine starvation by anti-folate inhibitors.
Effectiveness of laxatives in elderly - a cross sectional study in nursing homes
Authors: Fosnes Gunvor S , Lydersen Stian , Farup Per G
Published: November 2011

Background

Laxatives are efficient drugs, but the effectiveness has been questioned. In nursing homes, the prevalence of constipation is high and laxatives are commonly used drugs. The aims of the study were to assess the effectiveness of laxative therapy in an everyday setting in Norwegian nursing homes, study differences between treatment regimens and factors associated with normal bowel function.

Methods

A cross-sectional study. After giving informed consent, residents above 60 years of age using laxatives for functional constipation were included, and their characteristics, medical history, use of drugs and bowel functions were recorded. Normal bowel function was defined as bowel movements from 3 times/week to 3 times/day and stool consistency 3-5 on Bristol Stool Form Scale.

Results

Out of 647 residents in the nursing homes, 197 were included and 116 (59%) had normal bowel function. The treatment effect did not differ significantly between the laxatives, treatment regimens or expected efficacy of the regimens. The treatment was unsatisfactorily adapted to individual needs. In subjects with normal bowel function, 113 (97%) had persistent complaints; 68 (59.5%), 10 (8.0%), 34 (28.6%) and 26 (22.5%) reported straining, manual manoeuvre to facilitate bowel movements, feeling of incomplete bowel movements, and feeling of anorectal obstruction respectively. Good nutritional status, previous or present cancer disease and anxiety/depression were predictors of normal bowel function.

Conclusions

Treatment of constipation in nursing homes was unsatisfactory. Nearly all patients with normal stool frequency and consistence had some persistent complaints. Improved nutrition and individualization of the treatment could improve the outcome.