bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Mineral Extraction and Political Ruptures in Zimbabwe
Authors: Spiegel Samuel J.
Published: August 2020

Strategies for controlling mineral wealth continue to profoundly shape modern political affairs in Zimbabwe, building on colonial-era legacies. Minerals symbolize diverse social, economic, and political struggles. The imagined capacity of minerals to generate economic and social transformation has often been at the heart of debates over mining. Simultaneously, debates on ‘resource curses’ have pointed to the dynamics of elite political capture and the use of minerals to secure political survival. Challenging ‘governance failure’ frames, this chapter discusses some of the ways in which state power was reconfigured in response to the rising importance of minerals in the 2000s, and how narratives of ‘illegality,’ ‘empowerment’, and the ‘resource curse’ were used controversially to justify policy turns and new systems for controlling mineral wealth. Examining articulations of continuities and strategic ruptures with the past, the chapter discusses contested consequences and interpretations around injustices experienced in mining areas and society more broadly.
The Impact of Voter Exit on Party Survival: Evidence from Zimbabwe
Authors: Dendere Chipo
Published: August 2020

Can voter emigration sustain hegemonic undemocratic regimes at a time when elections and democratization are on the rise around the globe? In this chapter I show a link between the mobility of young, middle class, educated urbanites and the survival of ruling parties faced with growing international and local pressures. In additional to benefiting from traditional methods of centralizing power incumbent regimes can sustain their rule when opposition supporters are forced to emigrate because of deteriorating economic or political conditions. My findings suggest that the exit of voters both weakened the opposition movement and relieved political pressures on the incumbent party.
Politicians and Bureaucrats in Executive Government
Authors: Bach Tobias , Wegrich Kai
Published: August 2020

Political executives depend on bureaucrats in the formulation and implementation of public policy. This raises fundamental questions about the balancing of bureaucratic autonomy and political control. The chapter primarily focuses on the relationship between political executives and public officials tasked with policy development (‘policy bureaucrats’). It provides an overview of the main scholarly debates: the recruitment and replacement of public officials; sources of bureaucratic power; and interactions between policy bureaucrats and political executives. We also provide an overview of the main theories on politico-administrative relations, including political economy and Public Service Bargain (PSB) perspectives. The chapter then highlights key developments in current research, including comparative analyses, the study of ministerial advisers, and the politicization of regulatory agencies. We conclude with a research agenda on the impact of increasingly complex problems and political polarization on role understandings and patterns of decision-making, as well as on the motivations and effects of politicization.
Political Executives and the Mediatization of Politics
Authors: Campus Donatella
Published: August 2020

The chapter intends to discuss how the media logic influences the sphere of the political executive. Drawing from the research perspective of the mediatization of politics the chapter will focus on two aspects: how the press portrays governments and governmental leaders and how political executives adapt to the media logic through a proactive process of self-mediatization. It will offer a review of the theoretical and empirical contributions that may highlight the characteristics and the scope of the mediatization process and will address some issues that might lead to future research developments, including the impact of internet and the increasing role of entertainment media in the political field.
Regional and Ethnic Minorities
Authors: Ruedin Didier
Published: August 2020

While members of regional and ethnic minorities can reach the highest echelons of power, in most contexts they remain politically marginalized and under-represented in formal politics. The heterogeneity of regional and ethnic minority groups creates a challenge for the study of representation if one wants to avoid the traps of essentialism and unrealistic assumptions. The inclusion of regional and ethnic minorities in legislatures and government can increase trust, alleviate conflict, and provide substantive representation. Much evidence shows that, on average, representatives of regional and ethnic minorities work in the name of their respective groups, especially in ‘low-cost’ activities like asking parliamentary questions. Such substantive representation should be the guiding principle, but the relationship between descriptive and substantive representation seems moderated by the context in which legislators operate.
Parliamentarians and Party Groups
Authors: Hazan Reuven Y. , Itzkovitch-Malka Reut
Published: August 2020

Parliamentary democracies show little variance in party unity because the vast majority of parliamentarians vote in near perfect unity with their party on recorded votes. Legislative scholars are thus presented with a paradox: in those systems where party unity is most needed, it is the hardest to study. The focus of this chapter is on the elected representatives of the party, the party’s Members of Parliament (the parliamentary party group ). This chapter addresses the importance of party unity in parliamentary democracies, as well as the conceptual confusion surrounding party unity. It presents a new model for assessing party unity that begins to solve the puzzle of how to explore party unity when near perfect unity is recorded in parliamentary voting, and delineates the recent developments in research on party unity. It concludes by proposing an agenda for future research.
Feeling Represented
Authors: Holmberg Sören
Published: August 2020

Institutional learning works. Citizens in older and more mature democracies feel represented to a larger extent than people in new and emerging democracies. And as normatively expected, feelings of being represented are reasonably well spread across different social and political groups. Electoral system design turns out not to be consequential. Majoritarian, proportional or mixed electoral systems do about equally well when it comes to how well people feel they are being represented by a party or a party leader. The results are based on data from The Comparative Study of Electoral System’s (CSES) project covering forty-six countries and eighty-six elections between 2001 and 2011.
Development Policy
Authors: Kjær Anne Mette
Published: August 2020

This chapter analyses Danish development policy with an emphasis on changes since the 1990s. It focuses on how it changed from one of continuity and consensus around generous aid to help reduce poverty in the least developed countries to a more politicized era with aid cuts and a move away from the poverty focus. These changes can best be explained by an interplay of factors, most significantly the changed international environment after the 9/11 terror attacks, a shift in the composition of Parliament with reduced importance of the small pro-aid parties in the middle of the political spectrum, and a less coherent policy community of common interests. The centre-right government reframed development aid as coming at the cost of services at home and questioned the Social Democratic value of seeing aid as redistributing from rich to poor globally. A new consensus around a more modest aid budget, some of which is not spent in the poorest countries, may have emerged.
Environment, Energy, and Climate Policy
Authors: Birch Sørensen Peter
Published: August 2020

This chapter traces the evolution of Danish environmental, energy, and climate policy from the early 1970s until the late 2010s. Reacting to growing pollution during the 1960s, Parliament passed the ambitious Environmental Protection Act of 1973. This led to significant improvements in the regulation of pollution from industry and in wastewater treatment during the 1970s, but water pollution remained a problem, in part because of increasingly intensive use of agricultural land. From 1987 onwards, several action plans for the aquatic environment were launched, but meeting EU standards for water quality will require further efforts, as will the protection of habitats and biodiversity. For almost two decades following the first OPEC oil price shock, energy security was the overriding goal of energy policy. Aided by extensive regulation, oil was replaced by other sources of energy, and large increases in energy efficiency were achieved, partly via combined heat and power plants. From around 1990, reduction of greenhouse gas emissions took precedence, and in large part, fossil fuels have been replaced by wind power and biomass in the production of electricity and heating. Nevertheless, climate policy must face up to several new challenges if Denmark is to remain a green frontrunner nation.
Danish European Union Policies
Authors: Dagnis Jensen Mads , Nedergaard Peter
Published: August 2020

This chapter examines Denmark’s different positions on European Union policies which vary in terms of the degree to which sovereignty has been transferred to the EU. Specifically, it traces trade policy (very high transfer), agricultural policy (high transfer), internal market (moderate transfer), and opt-outs (low transfer) diachronically to illuminate the extent to which positions have changed over time and the underlying factors behind these changes. While the level of politicization varies between the policy areas, and party political differences play a role, the general picture that emerges is interest based. According to this approach, Denmark is positive towards giving up sovereignty regarding policies it benefits from economically, while it is more reluctant towards policies involving the transfer of sovereignty and money that are not offset by net economic benefits. In this chapter, this is demonstrated through an analysis stretching back to the decades before Danish membership to the European Union. Denmark also seems to change policy positions when the economic benefits for the country changes, as seen in the case of the Common Agricultural Policy.
The Political Economy of Special Economic Zones
Authors: Neveling Patrick
Published: August 2020

This chapter describes and analyses economic development planning in special economic zones (SEZs) since the end of World War II. The focus is on changing ideas about zone set-ups and the industrial ventures targeted for relocations to the zones. Using material from several years of global ethnographic and archival research in dozens of zones and national and international archives, the chapter reviews SEZ set-ups from the world’s first SEZ in late 1940s Puerto Rico via the Shannon Zone in Ireland in late 1950s and 1960s Asian SEZs to the 1970s’ consolidation of the concept that culminated in the opening of the first zones in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The changing geopolitical economy from the Cold War to the neoliberal world order, related changes in economic development policies, and the social and economic realities of super-exploitative and sexist labour regimes in SEZs are the main variables considered in the analysis.
Agglomeration of European Industries
Authors: Landesmann Michael A. , Schröder Joris M.
Published: August 2020

This chapter analyses the agglomeration of industrial activity across European regions over the past two decades. This period was characterized by the development of potent cross-border regional production networks in manufacturing in Central Europe that include both the more advanced regions of Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Northern Italy, Sweden, and those of the new EU member states of Central and Eastern Europe. These developments were accompanied by serious deindustrialization processes in other parts of Europe which in turn had important macroeconomic implications in the form of sustained external imbalances. The chapter explores the geographic agglomeration of industrial activity in Europe, but also that of ‘advanced tradable services’ in which the more advanced regions of Europe can counter balance the loss of manufacturing. It also gives evidence of cross-border (vertical and functional) specialization patterns that characterize regional production networks.
Gender, Industrialization, and Industrial Hubs
Authors: Tregenna Fiona , İzdeş Özge
Published: August 2020

Industrial hubs are a key component of open-economy industrialization and have the potential to influence gendered patterns in industrial development as well as contributing to structural transformation. In most countries, the majority of the workforce in hubs is female—employment is highly feminized. An extensive literature documents the experiences of women workers in hubs, drawing attention to low wages and poor working conditions in export processing zones (EPZs) in particular. This chapter considers the effects of hubs on women and on gender equality. We propose a conceptual framework for analysing these effects, both direct/static and indirect/dynamic, through the channels of employment, wages, working conditions, rights and benefits, empowerment, and social effects. The negative experiences of women workers in many hubs derive in part from the typical concentration of women’s employment in low-wage, low-skill, low value-added hubs, rather than in forward-looking hubs that build on dynamic comparative advantage with decent labour standards.
Towards a New Generation of Special Economic Zones
Authors: Zhan James X. , Casella Bruno , Bolwijn Richard
Published: August 2020

Special economic zones (SEZs) are widely used across most developing and many developed economies. According to UNCTAD’s new SEZ database, there are nearly 5,400 zones across 147 economies as of 2019, up from about 4,000 five years ago. Although the performance of many zones remains below expectations, the rate of establishment of new zones is accelerating, and more than 500 new SEZs are already in the pipeline. In building new zones and revitalizing existing ones, policymakers and zone developers face new challenges in the context of a rapidly evolving global competitive landscape and the sustainable development imperative. This chapter provides an overview of the universe of SEZs and discusses their economic, social, and environmental impact—proposing an SEZ Sustainable Development Profit and Loss Statement. It highlights three key emerging challenges, points to five routes to modernizing SEZs, and outlines a pioneering idea of SDG model zones.
Innovative Firms and High-tech Industrial Hubs in China
Authors: Li Yin
Published: August 2020

China’s spectacular economic transformation over the last four decades builds on the development and accumulation of a broad array of productive capabilities across industrial sectors. The depth and breadth of Chinese capabilities is a result of the growth of innovative firms and specialization of high-tech industrial hubs in which firms are embedded. This chapter discusses how the interaction between innovative firms and high-tech hubs shapes the development of specific configurations of capabilities locally, and how complementary capabilities from regions across China allow the country as a whole to excel in innovation. This theoretical argument is illustrated through case studies of co-evolution between firms and regions in China’s three prominent innovation centres in the information and communications technology (ICT) industry: Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen.
Industrial Hubs, Industrial Policy, and Economic Development in Mexico
Authors: Carrillo Jorge , de Los Santos Saúl
Published: August 2020

The chapter presents an analysis of the three main models of industrial hubs in Mexico based on empirical evidence derived from previous research. The cases are highly competitive and global, but their locally embedded characteristics are quite singular. Nuevo León, Mexico’s most robust innovation ecosystem with over 100 years of industrial trajectory, is mainly based on large local companies and has managed to consolidate in the period of import-substitution industrialization and successfully adapt to the export model. Baja California, with fifty years of FDI export in the maquila industry has managed a productive restructuring process. Querétaro has recently applied a top-down strategy to achieve a productive reconversion from the primary sector and metal mechanics to the aeronautical industry. Linkages between industry and academia have given a high level of competitiveness to the region. The chapter discusses regions, sectors, and public policies before concluding with relevant development policy recommendations.
Chinese Economic and Trade Cooperation Zones in Africa
Authors: Xiaoyang Tang
Published: August 2020

This chapter examines the genesis and development trajectories of Chinese cooperation zones in Africa since 2006, focusing on their impacts on the broad structural transformation of host countries. In spite of the ambitious plans and high expectations, all the China–Africa cooperation zones faced serious delays and challenges in the fields of infrastructure construction, skill transfer, linkage to local enterprises, sector upgrading, policy influence, and the urbanization process. This chapter argues that the challenges mainly originated from the diverging targets of Chinese developers and African authorities. Unlike in China, the commercial interests of the zone developers in Africa are not appropriately aligned with the local authorities’ broad interest in transformation. To overcome the obstacles, both Chinese and African partners have sought to modify their collaboration patterns. Ethiopia, together with several other countries, has taken particular initiatives to develop its industrial zones after observing practice in cooperation zones.
Local Ecosystems and Social Conditions of Innovative Enterprise
Authors: Andreoni Antonio , Lazonick William
Published: August 2020

This chapter integrates the theory and history of localized economic development by summarizing the experiences of three iconic industrial districts: a) the Lancashire cotton textile district which in the last half of the nineteenth century enabled Britain to become the ‘workshop of the world’; b) the globally competitive towns and cities specializing in a variety of light industries, especially in the Emilia Romagna regional district, that, as the ‘Third Italy’, brought economic modernity to that nation in the decades after World War II; and 3) the area in California south of San Francisco, centred on Stanford University, that, as ‘Silicon Valley’, made the United States the world leader in the microelectronics and Internet revolutions of the last decades of the twentieth century. Using the ‘social conditions of innovative enterprise’ as a common conceptual approach, the chapter highlights key lessons from history of the nexus between firms and their local ecosystems.
Lucretius
Authors: Gale Monica R.
Published: August 2020

This chapter explores distinctive features of Lucretius’s presentation of Epicureanism, particularly his use of verse and the interplay between the poem’s overt concern with physics and its underlying ethical message. The De rerum natura—it is argued—seeks constantly to bring out the ethical corollaries of Epicurus’s physical theory (emphasizing, for example, the harmful consequences of belief in vengeful deities; the self-destructive behaviours, on both the individual and the social level, that stem ultimately from the fear of death; and the futility of uncontrolled desire). While adhering closely to the writings of Epicurus himself, and showing little interest either in subsequent developments within the school or in contemporary inter-school polemics, the poem does, arguably, seek in various ways to adapt the arguments of the founder to the purview of its Late Republican audience. The chapter briefly considers the extent to which Lucretius adapted, or redeployed, arguments originally directed at Platonic/Academic targets as weapons against contemporary Stoicism, and notes other areas—particularly religion and human-animal relationships—where the poet can be seen to give his own distinctive slant to Epicurus’s teachings. Lucretius’s justification for his highly unorthodox use of poetic form is examined in detail, and the chapter concludes with the suggestion that the De rerum natura self-consciously pits Epicureanism against Roman aristocratic ideology, both through its highly original analysis of contemporary political competition and social breakdown, and—more subtly—through its employment of “social metaphor” and depiction of atomic interaction as a microcosm of human society.
Horace and Vergil
Authors: Davis Gregson
Published: August 2020

This article focuses on the ethical subtext that permeates the poetry of Horace and Vergil throughout the various genres in which they composed their works. For these major Augustan poets, Epicurean thought provided a common framework for “conversations” (both overt and latent) on issues in contemporary moral philosophy, such as the proper limits to be followed by mortals in the pursuit of pleasures and the fulfillment of desires. A paramount subject in these conversations is the question of the cognitive preconditions for achieving felicity and a tranquil life (eudaimonia, ataraxia).
Atomism
Authors: Konstan David
Published: August 2020

Epicurus maintained that the universe is composed solely of microscopic material entities called “atoms” (Greek for “unsplittable”) and void; atoms have only the properties of shape, size, weight, and resistance, whereas void or space is extended and penetrable. All perceptible qualities, such as sound, color, and even thought, are the result of specific combinations of atoms, which are themselves composed of theoretically indivisible units called minima. Space and time are similarly quantized, and atoms travel at a uniform velocity of one minimum of space per minimum of time. There are infinite atoms in infinitely extended space, but only an incomprehensibly large but not strictly infinite variety of atoms; it is suggested that this quantity is a specific order of magnitude (like the modern “omega number”), and is the inverse of the minimum; in turn, all atoms are composed of an incomprehensibly large number of minima. This conception of point-like but extended minima escapes some of the objections posed to the theory, such as the incommensurability of side and diagonal in a square. The tendency of atoms to fall is a result of the fact that they emerge from collisions in a favored direction, which by definition is down (comparable to the absence of left-right parity in modern physics). The Epicurean swerve is a sideways motion of one minimum, and prevents the perpetual collisions of atoms from resulting in their uniform downward motion.
Humanist Dissemination of Epicureanism
Authors: Palmer Ada
Published: August 2020

Renaissance humanists first studied Lucretius, and the Epicurean content in Cicero and Diogenes Laertius, as part of their broader project to restore political stability to Italy and Europe by reconstructing the philosophical roots of classical Roman virtue. Transformation of the texts over time gradually expanded the study of Epicureanism, from a fifteenth- and early sixteenth-century audience interested primarily in philology and moral philosophy, to a later sixteenth- and seventeenth-century audience more interested in natural philosophy, medicine, and ontology. While many prominent scholars of Epicureanism faced persecution for their beliefs, the charges levied against them were not related to Epicureanism but to diverse heterodoxies of the day, from syncretism to Protestantism. This, and the preponderance of anti-Epicurean writings, reveals that most Renaissance scholars treated Epicurus less as a teacher than as a foe or gadfly, developing fruitful and often radical new ideas in opposition to Epicureanism, or appropriating some Epicurean concepts while rebutting others.
Making Terrorism Thinkable
Authors: Ries Klaus
Published: August 2020

This chapter challenges the widespread assumption that terrorist ideology was invented in the mid-nineteenth century by such figures as Pierre-Joseph Proudhon and Mikhail Bakunin. Instead, the chapter argues, the foundations of terrorism were laid at the end of the eighteenth century by the Enlightenment philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte and his disciples, who in turn exerted a strong influence on later radical thinkers. In showing how the intellectual reverberations of the French Revolution gave rise to anarchist ideology as well as acts of terrorism in Germany, the chapter traces a link between the state terror of the French Revolution and the emergence of insurgent terrorism.
A Randomized Controlled Trial to Compare Analgesia and Functional Improvement After Continuous Neuroablative and Pulsed Neuromodulative Radiofrequency Treatment of the Genicular Nerves in Patients with Knee Osteoarthritis up to One Year After the Intervention
Authors: Santana-Pineda María M , Vanlinthout Luc E , Santana-Ramírez Samuel , Vanneste Thibaut , Van Zundert Jan , Novalbos-Ruiz José Pedro
Published: August 2020

Objectives

To compare the analgesic and functional outcomes of continuous neuroablative radiofrequency (CNARF) and pulsed neuromodulative radiofrequency (PNMRF) treatment of genicular nerves up to 1 year after the intervention and to identify predictors associated with a successful outcome (defined as an at least 50% reduction in the pre-interventional visual analog scale [VAS] rating) after genicular radiofrequency treatment.

Design

A prospective randomized controlled trial.

Setting

The Pain Department of the Jerez de la Frontera University Hospital, Cadíz, Spain, from January 2018 until May 2019.

Subjects

Patients with grade 3–4 gonarthritis suffering from knee pain, with a VAS score ≥5 for >6 months.

Methods

Eligible participants were randomly assigned to receive either CNARF or PNMRF of the superior medial, superior lateral, and inferior medial genicular nerves. The VAS and Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Osteoarthritis (WOMAC) scores were assessed before and at 1, 6, and 12 months after treatment. Medication use was quantified before and at 6 months after the intervention. Potential characteristics associated with the efficacy of radiofrequency intervention were explored by using multivariable statistical models.

Results

A total of 188 participants were included. The magnitude and duration of beneficial effect and reduction in analgesic use were significantly greater in the CNARF group. Success at 6 months after radiofrequency treatment decreased with grade 4 gonarthritis; higher pre-interventional VAS score; and concomitant depression, anxiety disorder, and diabetes mellitus.

Conclusions

Therapeutic efficacy and reduction in analgesic consumption were superior after CNARF. Treatment success at 6 months after radiofrequency intervention decreased with more severe gonarthritis; higher pre-interventional pain intensity; and concomitant depression, anxiety disorder, and diabetes mellitus.
Accurate and efficient structure-based computational mutagenesis for modeling fluorescence levels of Aequorea victoria green fluorescent protein mutants
Authors: Masso Majid
Published: August 2020

A computational mutagenesis technique was used to characterize the structural effects associated with over 46 000 single and multiple amino acid variants of Aequorea victoria green fluorescent protein (GFP), whose functional effects (fluorescence levels) were recently measured by experimental researchers. For each GFP mutant, the approach generated a single score reflecting the overall change in sequence-structure compatibility relative to native GFP, as well as a vector of environmental perturbation (EP) scores characterizing the impact at all GFP residue positions. A significant GFP structure–function relationship (P < 0.0001) was elucidated by comparing the sequence-structure compatibility scores with the functional data. Next, the computed vectors for GFP mutants were used to train predictive models of fluorescence by implementing random forest (RF) classification and tree regression machine learning algorithms. Classification performance reached 0.93 for sensitivity, 0.91 for precision and 0.90 for balanced accuracy, and regression models led to Pearson’s correlation as high as r = 0.83 between experimental and predicted GFP mutant fluorescence. An RF model trained on a subset of over 1000 experimental single residue GFP mutants with measured fluorescence was used for predicting the 3300 remaining unstudied single residue mutants, with results complementing known GFP biochemical and biophysical properties. In addition, models trained on the subset of experimental GFP mutants harboring multiple residue replacements successfully predicted fluorescence of the single residue GFP mutants. The models developed for this study were accurate and efficient, and their predictions outperformed those of several related state-of-the-art methods.
Short Character Sums and the Pólya–Vinogradov Inequality
Authors: Mangerel Alexander P
Published: August 2020

We show in a quantitative way that any odd primitive character χ modulo q of fixed order g ≥ 2 satisfies the property that if the Pólya–Vinogradov inequality for χ can be improved to $$\begin{equation*} \max_{1 \leq t \leq q} \left|\sum_{n \leq t} \chi(n)\right| = o_{q \rightarrow \infty}(\sqrt{q}\log q) \end{equation*}$$ then for any ɛ > 0 one may exhibit cancellation in partial sums of χ on the interval [1, t] whenever $t \gt q^{\varepsilon}$, i.e., $$\begin{equation*} \sum_{n \leq t} \chi(n) = o_{q \rightarrow \infty}(t)\ \text{for all } t \gt q^{\varepsilon}. \end{equation*}$$

We also prove a converse implication, to the effect that if all odd primitive characters of fixed order dividing g exhibit cancellation in short sums then the Pólya–Vinogradov inequality can be improved for all odd primitive characters of order g. Some applications are also discussed.
Phylogenomics of Piranhas and Pacus (Serrasalmidae) Uncovers How Dietary Convergence and Parallelism Obfuscate Traditional Morphological Taxonomy
Authors: Kolmann M A , Hughes L C , Hernandez L P , Arcila D , Betancur-R R , Sabaj M H , López-Fernández H , Ortí G
Published: August 2020

The Amazon and neighboring South American river basins harbor the world’s most diverse assemblages of freshwater fishes. One of the most prominent South American fish families is the Serrasalmidae (pacus and piranhas), found in nearly every continental basin. Serrasalmids are keystone ecological taxa, being some of the top riverine predators as well as the primary seed dispersers in the flooded forest. Despite their widespread occurrence and notable ecologies, serrasalmid evolutionary history and systematics are controversial. For example, the sister taxon to serrasalmids is contentious, the relationships of major clades within the family are inconsistent across different methodologies, and half of the extant serrasalmid genera are suggested to be non-monophyletic. We analyzed exon capture to reexamine the evolutionary relationships among 63 (of 99) species across all 16 serrasalmid genera and their nearest outgroups, including multiple individuals per species to account for cryptic lineages. To reconstruct the timeline of serrasalmid diversification, we time-calibrated this phylogeny using two different fossil-calibration schemes to account for uncertainty in taxonomy with respect to fossil teeth. Finally, we analyzed diet evolution across the family and comment on associated changes in dentition, highlighting the ecomorphological diversity within serrasalmids. We document widespread non-monophyly of genera within Myleinae, as well as between Serrasalmus and Pristobrycon, and propose that reliance on traits like teeth to distinguish among genera is confounded by ecological homoplasy, especially among herbivorous and omnivorous taxa. We clarify the relationships among all serrasalmid genera, propose new subfamily affiliations, and support hemiodontids as the sister taxon to Serrasalmidae. [Characiformes; exon capture; ichthyochory; molecular time-calibration; piscivory.]
Three New Fungal Leaf Spot Diseases of Spinach in the United States and the Evaluation of Fungicide Efficacy for Disease Management
Authors: Liu Bo , Stein Larry , Cochran Kimberly , du Toit Lindsey J. , Feng Chunda , Correll James C.
Published: August 2020

Leaf spot diseases of spinach, caused by Colletotrichum spinaciae, has become a major production constraint in several production areas, including Texas, in recent years. Leaf spot symptoms were observed in several fields in Texas in 2016 and 2017, with typical anthracnose-like symptoms and leaves with small, circular, and sunken lesions that appeared similar to injury from windblown sand. The lesions were plated on potato dextrose agar, from which fungal cultures were recovered. The fungi were identified based on morphology and sequence analysis of the introns of glutamate synthetase and glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase (for isolates determined to be Colletotrichum spp.) and the internal transcribed spacer ribosomal DNA (for isolates determined to be Myrothecium spp.). Based on foliar symptoms, fungal colony and spore morphology, pathogenicity tests of fungal isolates on the spinach cultivar ‘Viroflay’, and DNA sequence analysis of the isolates, the symptoms on spinach leaves for two sets of samples were caused by Colletotrichum coccodes and Colletotrichum truncatum, and leaf spots resembling damage from windblown sand were caused by Myrothecium verrucaria. This is the first report of spinach leaf spot diseases caused by C. coccodes, C. truncatum, and M. verrucaria in the United States. C. coccodes and C. truncatum caused severe symptoms on the spinach cultivar ‘Viroflay’, whereas M. verrucaria caused symptoms of intermediate severity. Fungicide efficacy tests demonstrated that chlorothalonil, mancozeb, pyraclostrobin, fluxapyroxad + pyraclostrobin, and penthiopyrad were completely effective at preventing leaf spots caused by any of these pathogens when applied 24 h before inoculation of ‘Viroflay’ plants in greenhouse trials.
Lesbian Women Undergoing Assisted Reproduction
Authors: Kim Ashley S. , Sax Megan R. , Pavolvic Zoran J. , Jabara Sami I. , DeCherney Alan H.
Published: August 2020

The use of assisted reproduction among women in relationships with other women has increased in the United States over the past decade as a result of increased legal access and social acceptance. Despite this shift, limited studies currently exist to guide optimal fertility care for this growing patient population of women seeking assisted reproduction. In this Commentary, assisted reproduction will be meant to include ovulation induction, intrauterine insemination (IUI), and in vitro fertilization (IVF). Conflicting studies suggest that self-identified lesbian women may demonstrate an increased prevalence of polycystic ovarian syndrome. Most available studies find that a woman's sexual orientation does not affect the outcome of fertility treatment. Self-identified lesbian women undergoing donor sperm IUI and IVF have similar pregnancy and live-birth rates as heterosexual women. Better evidence regarding patient demographics and comorbidities, underlying etiologies of subfertility, and assisted reproductive outcomes among women building families with other women is needed to optimize care.
Implementing Couple’s Human Immunodeficiency Virus Testing and Counseling in the Antenatal Care Setting
Authors: Momplaisir Florence , Finley Emily , Wolf Sandra , Aaron Erika , Inoyo Itoro , Bennett David , Seyedroudbari Sara , Groves Allison
Published: August 2020

OBJECTIVE:

To describe a pilot implementation of couple’s human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) testing and counseling in an antenatal care clinic in the United States.

METHODS:

We used a cross-sectional study design. Couples were recruited from an antenatal care clinic of a large, urban, tertiary medical center, and were eligible if both partners agreed to receive HIV test results together and reported no coercion to participate in testing and counseling and no intimate partner violence. We assessed relationship characteristics, HIV risk-related behaviors and concordance of couples' sexual agreement (ie, mutual agreement about sexual risk behaviors that are permissible within or outside of their relationship). Acceptability of couple’s HIV testing and counseling (ie, format, quality of the sessions, ability to meet their needs) was assessed after completing the session. Barriers and facilitators to couple’s HIV testing and counseling were assessed at the individual-level among decliners and participants and at the clinic-level among members of the care team.

RESULTS:

Dyadic data were collected from 82 individuals (41 couples). Most partners (n=56, 68%) did not have a sexual agreement or had differing expectations about their sexual agreement. Partners with a concordant sexual agreement (n=26) felt more confident working with their partners on condom use when having sex outside of their relationship (P=.008) and were more likely to agree with their partner to get tested regularly for HIV or sexually transmitted infections (P=.015). Acceptability was high, with a rating of 93 or more (out of 100) among all items. Individual-level barriers to couple’s HIV testing and counseling included difficulty bringing the male partner for counseling and a perception by either member of the couple that they were at low-risk for HIV. At the clinic level, need for training, staff turnover, and integration of couple’s HIV testing and counseling in the clinic flow presented as barriers, whereas commitment by the clinic leadership facilitated the couple’s HIV testing and counseling program.

CONCLUSION:

Despite barriers, couple’s HIV testing and counseling can be implemented in antenatal clinics and is a highly acceptable method of HIV testing.
Radical Trachelectomy for the Treatment of Early-Stage Cervical Cancer
Authors: Smith Evan S. , Moon Ashley S. , O'Hanlon Robin , Leitao Mario M. , Sonoda Yukio , Abu-Rustum Nadeem R. , Mueller Jennifer J.
Published: August 2020

OBJECTIVE:

To assess surgical, oncologic, and pregnancy outcomes in patients undergoing radical vaginal, abdominal, or laparoscopic trachelectomy for the treatment of early-stage cervical cancer, using a methodic review of published literature.

DATA SOURCES:

PubMed, EMBASE, and Cochrane Library sources, including ClinicalTrials.gov, were searched from 1990–2019 with terms “cervical cancer” and “(vaginal, abdominal, open, minimally invasive, or laparoscopic) radical trachelectomy.” Grey literature and unpublished data were omitted.

METHODS OF STUDY SELECTION:

After removal of duplicates from a combined EndNote library of results, 490 articles were reviewed using Covidence software. Two reviewers screened titles and abstracts, and then screened full texts. Selection criteria included articles that reported radical trachelectomy with lymph node assessment as primary therapy for cervical carcinoma, with stated follow-up intervals and recurrences.

TABULATION, INTEGRATION, AND RESULTS:

Variables of interest were manually extracted into an electronic database. A total 47 articles that reported on 2,566 women met inclusion criteria. Most tumors were of squamous histology (68.5%), stage IB1 (74.8%), 2 cm or less (69.2%), and without lymphovascular invasion (68.8%). Of planned trachelectomies, 9% were converted intraoperatively to hysterectomy. Separated by route of trachelectomy, 58.1%, 37.2%, and 4.7% were performed using radical vaginal, abdominal, and laparoscopic approaches, respectively. With median follow-up of 48 months (range 2–202 months) across studies, median recurrence rate was 3.3% (range 0–25%); median time to recurrence was 26 months (range 8–44 months). Median 5-year recurrence-free and overall survival were 94.6% (range 88–97.3%) and 97.4% (range 95–99%), respectively. The posttrachelectomy pregnancy rate was 23.9%, with a live-birth rate of 75.1%.

CONCLUSION:

Radical trachelectomy for fertility-preserving treatment of cervical cancer is widely reported in the literature, though publications are mainly limited to case reports and case series. Reported follow-up periods infrequently meet standard oncologic parameters but show encouraging recurrence-free and overall survival rates and pregnancy outcomes. Higher-level evidence needed for meta-analysis is lacking.

SYSTEMATIC REVIEW REGISTRATION:

PROSPERO, CRD42019132443.
Placenta Accreta Spectrum Without Placenta Previa
Authors: Carusi Daniela A. , Fox Karin A. , Lyell Deirdre J. , Perlman Nicola C. , Aalipour Soroush , Einerson Brett D. , Belfort Michael A. , Silver Robert M. , Shamshirsaz Alireza A.
Published: August 2020

OBJECTIVE:

To evaluate placenta accreta spectrum with and without placenta previa with regard to risk factors, antepartum diagnosis, and maternal morbidity.

METHODS:

We conducted a retrospective cohort study of pathology-confirmed placenta accreta spectrum deliveries with hysterectomy from two U.S. referral centers from January 2010–June 2019. Maternal, pregnancy, and delivery characteristics were compared among placenta accreta spectrum cases with (previa PAS group) and without (nonprevia PAS group) placenta previa. Surgical outcomes and a composite of severe maternal morbidities were evaluated, including eight or more blood cell units transfused, reoperation, pulmonary edema, acute kidney injury, thromboembolism, or death. Logistic regression was used with all analyses controlled for delivery location.

RESULTS:

Of 351 deliveries, 106 (30%) had no placenta previa at delivery. When compared with the previa group, nonprevia placenta accreta spectrum was less likely to be identified antepartum (38%, 95% CI 28–48% vs 87%, 82–91%), less likely to receive care from a multidisciplinary team (41%, 31–51% vs 86%, 81–90%), and less likely to have invasive placenta increta or percreta (51% 41–61% vs 80%, 74–84%). The nonprevia group had more operative hysteroscopy (24%, 16–33% vs 6%, 3–9%) or in vitro fertilization (31%, 22–41% vs 9%, 6–13%) and was less likely to have had a prior cesarean delivery (64%, 54–73% vs 93%, 89–96%) compared with the previa group, though the majority in each group had a prior cesarean delivery. Rates of severe maternal morbidity were similar in the two groups, at 19% (nonprevia) and 20% (previa), even after controlling for confounders (adjusted odds ratio for the nonprevia group 0.59, 95% CI 0.30–1.17).

CONCLUSION:

Placenta accreta spectrum without previa is less likely to be diagnosed antepartum, potentially missing the opportunity for multidisciplinary team management. Despite the absence of placenta previa and less placental invasion, severe maternal morbidity at delivery was not lower. Broader recognition of patients at risk for placenta accreta spectrum may improve early clinical diagnosis and patient outcomes.
Outpatient Foley Catheter for Induction of Labor in Nulliparous Women
Authors: Ausbeck Elizabeth B. , Jauk Victoria C. , Xue Yumo , Files Pamela , Kuper Spencer G. , Subramaniam Akila , Casey Brian M. , Szychowski Jeff M. , Harper Lorie M. , Tita Alan T.
Published: August 2020

OBJECTIVE:

To assess whether outpatient cervical ripening with a transcervical Foley catheter in nulliparous women undergoing elective labor induction shortens the time from admission to delivery.

METHODS:

We performed a randomized controlled trial of patients with singleton pregnancies undergoing elective labor induction at 39 weeks of gestation or more with a modified Bishop score less than 5. Women were randomized 1:1 to outpatient or inpatient transcervical Foley. In the outpatient group, the Foley was inserted the day before admission for scheduled induction; insertion was performed at scheduled admission in the inpatient group. The primary outcome was duration of time from admission to the labor and delivery unit to delivery. With 80% power and a two-sided α of 0.05, a sample size of 126 was estimated to detect at least a 5-hour mean difference in time from admission to delivery between groups from a baseline duration of 19±10 hours.

RESULTS:

From May 2018 to October 2019, 126 women were randomized, 63 in each group. Baseline characteristics were balanced between groups, except that body mass index (31±5.4 vs 34±7.5, P=.01) and group B streptococcus colonization (31% vs 54%, P=.01) were lower in the outpatient group. The time from admission to delivery was shorter in the outpatient group (17.4±7.4 vs 21.7±9.1 hours, P<.01, mean difference 4.3 hours, 95% CI 1.3–7.2). Admissions before scheduled induction were higher in the outpatient group (22% vs 5%, relative risk [RR] 4.7, 95% CI 1.4–15.4, P<.01), as was median modified Bishop score on admission (3 vs 1, P<.01). Cesarean delivery (24% vs 32%, RR 0.8, 95% CI 0.4–1.3, P=.32) and chorioamnionitis (22% vs 13%, RR 1.8, 95% CI 0.8–3.9, P=.16) were not significantly different between groups.

CONCLUSION:

In nulliparous patients undergoing elective labor induction at term, outpatient cervical ripening with a transcervical Foley catheter reduced the time from admission to delivery.

CLINCAL TRIAL REGISTRATION:

ClinicalTrials.gov, NCT03472937.
The Use of Hemostatic Blood Products in Children Following Cardiopulmonary Bypass and Associated Outcomes
Authors: Closson Ryan , Mauer Elizabeth , Stock Arabela , Dayton Jeffrey D. , LaPar Damien J. , Walline Maria C. , Nellis Marianne E.
Published: August 2020

Objectives:

To describe the use of hemostatic transfusions in children following cardiac surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass and the association of hemostatic transfusions postoperatively with clinical outcomes.

Design:

A retrospective cohort study.

Setting:

PICU of a tertiary care center from 2011 to 2017.

Patients:

Children 0–18 years old undergoing cardiac surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass.

Interventions:

None.

Measurements and Main Results:

Four-hundred twenty children underwent cardiac surgery with cardiopulmonary bypass. The median (interquartile range) age was 0.8 years (0.3–5 yr) and 243 (58%) were male. The majority of cases were classified as Risk Adjustment for Congenital Heart Surgery 2 (223, 54%) or Risk Adjustment for Congenital Heart Surgery 3 (124, 30%). Twenty-four percent of children (102/420) received at least one hemostatic transfusion with the most common first product being platelet transfusions (47/102), followed by plasma (44/102), and cryoprecipitate (11/102). The children who received hemostatic transfusions were younger (p = 0.006), had lower body weights (p = 0.004), less likely to be their initial operation with cardiopulmonary bypass (p = 0.003), underwent more complex surgeries (p = 0.001) with longer bypass runs (p < 0.001), and had more use of hypothermic circulatory arrest (p = 0.014). The receipt of hemostatic blood products postoperatively was independently associated with more days of mechanical ventilation (p < 0.001) and longer PICU lengths of stay (p = 0.001) but not with time receiving vasoactive mediations (p = 0.113) or nosocomial infections (p = 0.299).

Conclusions:

Nearly one-quarter of children undergoing cardiac repair with cardiopulmonary bypass receive hemostatic transfusions postoperatively. These blood products are independently associated with worse clinical outcomes. Larger studies should be performed to determine the hemostatic efficacy of these products, as well as to clarify associated morbidities, in order to inform proper blood management.