bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Evidence‐based postoperative pain management after laparoscopic colorectal surgery
Authors: Joshi G. P. , Bonnet F. , Kehlet H. ,   on behalf of the PROSPECT collaboration
Published: May 2012

Aim  The aim of this systematic review was to evaluate the available literature on the management of pain after laparoscopic colorectal surgery.

Method  Randomized studies, published in English between January 1995 and July 2011, assessing analgesic and anaesthetic interventions in adults undergoing laparoscopic colorectal surgery, and reporting pain scores, were retrieved from the Embase and MEDLINE databases. The efficacy and adverse effects of the analgesic techniques was assessed. The recommendations were based on procedure‐specific evidence from a systematic review and supplementary transferable evidence from other relevant procedures.

Results  Of the 170 randomized studies identified, 12 studies were included. Overall, all approaches including ketorolac, methylprednisolone, intraperitoneal instillation of ropivacaine, intravenous lidocaine infusion, intrathecal morphine and epidural analgesia improved pain relief, reduced opioid requirements and improved bowel function. However, there were significant differences in the study designs and the variables evaluated, precluding quantitative analysis. The L’Abbé plots of the data from the epidural analgesia studies included in this review indicate that the pain scores in the nonepidural groups, although higher than those in the epidural groups, were within an acceptable level (i.e. < 4/10).

Conclusion  Infiltration of surgical incisions with local anaesthetic at the end of surgery, systemic steroids, conventional nonsteroidal anti‐inflammatory drugs or cyclooxygenase‐2‐selective inhibitors in combination with paracetamol with opioid used as rescue are recommended. Intravenous lidocaine infusion is recommended, but not as the first line of therapy. However, neuraxial blocks (i.e. epidural analgesia and spinal morphine) are not necessary based on high risk:benefit ratio.
Congenital ocular and adnexal disorders in reptiles
Authors: Sabater Mikel , Pérez Marisa
Published: May 2012

Ocular and adnexal congenital disorders are those that manifest at birth and could involve single or multiple tissues. Several abnormalities have been reported in literature affecting reptilian ocular and/or adnexal tissues. The objectives of this review are: (i) review those disorders previously reported in reptile literature; (ii) present new cases; (iii) provide a basic classification of them according to the moment of occurrence and (iv) indirectly, encourage the clinician dealing with these cases to go further in their diagnosis. The authors consider that categorizing ocular and adnexal congenital disorders could help the clinician to deal with them. The categorization of these disorders required an intense review of cases previously reported in literature and allows the authors suspect that some of them could not have been accurately diagnosed according to the definitions of the anomalies and/or not accurately described. The authors consider that ocular and adnexal congenital disorders could have been underestimated in reptiles and further studies could be helpful to promote the description of new disorders and to expand the knowledge about those previously reported. The review will first describe abnormalities reported during organogenesis (describing possible etiopathogenesis, cases reported, an approach to their diagnosis and recommended therapeutic options).Then a mention of the ocular disorders occurring after organogenesis is made. These disorders are divided when possible in those affecting all or most part of the globe and those affecting only specific tissues (surface ectoderm, neurocrest and mesenchyma and neuroectoderm).
Organ‐preserving surgery for penile cancer: description of techniques and surgical outcomes
Authors: Veeratterapillay Rajan , Sahadevan K. , Aluru Pavan , Asterling Susan , Rao G.S. , Greene Damian
Published: May 2012

Study Type – Therapy (case series)

Level of Evidence 4

What's known on the subject? and What does the study add?

Organ‐preserving surgeries for penile cancer have been described to reduce the morbidity associated with traditional operations. Patients derive better functional outcomes from penile‐preserving surgery, although local recurrence rates can be higher.

Excellent results can be obtained at large‐volume centres. With close follow‐up, local recurrences can be identified and treated promptly (often with further local excision).

OBJECTIVE

To describe the outcomes of organ‐preserving surgery for penile cancer at a UK tertiary referral centre.

PATIENTS AND METHODS

Patients at Sunderland Hospital (UK) between 2001 and 2008 who had squamous cell tumours limited to the glans penis underwent penile‐preserving surgery including total glansectomy and glanuloplasty, partial glansectomy, glans relining and distal penectomy with glans reconstruction.

Recurrence rates, cosmetic and functional outcomes were recorded.

RESULTS

In all, 65 patients were identified with a median follow‐up of 40 months. Local recurrence was present in four patients (6%) despite 72% having intermediate or poorly differentiated tumours and 30% with T2 disease.

Complications included partial graft loss (1.5%), graft contractures (4.5%) and meatal stenosis (7.5%).

In all, 5% were deemed to have poor cosmetic outcome and 85% described good erections at 1 year after surgery.

CONCLUSION

Penile‐preserving surgery can achieve good penile cancer control with minimal morbidity and reduced psychosexual side‐effects.
HOW HEALTH INSURANCE AFFECTS HEALTH CARE DEMAND—A STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS OF BEHAVIORAL MORAL HAZARD AND ADVERSE SELECTION
Authors: DONG YINGYING
Published: May 2012

Individuals with health insurance use more health care. One reason is that health care is cheaper for the insured. Additionally, having insurance can encourage unhealthy behavior via moral hazard. Previous work studying the effect of health insurance on medical utilization has mostly ignored behavioral changes due to having health insurance, and how that in turn affects medical utilization. This paper investigates the structural causal relationships among health insurance status, health behavior, and medical utilization theoretically and empirically, and separates price effects from behavioral moral hazard effects. Also distinguished are the extensive versus intensive margins of insurance effects on behavior. (JEL C51, I12, D12)
UNION POWER, COLLECTIVE BARGAINING, AND OPTIMAL MONETARY POLICY
Authors: FAIA ESTER , ROSSI LORENZA
Published: May 2012

We study Ramsey policies and optimal monetary policy rules in a dynamic New Keynesian model with unionized labor markets. Collective wage bargaining and unions' monopoly power amplify inefficient employment fluctuations. The optimal monetary policy must trade off between stabilizing inflation and reducing inefficient unemployment fluctuations induced by unions' monopoly power. In this context the monetary authority uses inflation as a tax on union rents and as a mean for indirect redistribution. Results are robust to the introduction of imperfect insurance on income shocks. The optimal monetary policy rule targets unemployment alongside inflation. (JEL E0, E4, E5, E6)
Measuring uncertainty in fisheries stock assessment: the delta method, bootstrap, and MCMC
Authors: Magnusson Arni , Punt André E , Hilborn Ray
Published: May 2012

Fisheries management depends on reliable quantification of uncertainty for decision‐making. We evaluate which uncertainty method can be expected to perform best for fisheries stock assessment. The method should generate confidence intervals that are neither too narrow nor too wide, in order to cover the true value of estimated quantities with a probability matching the claimed confidence level. This simulation study compares the performance of the delta method, the bootstrap, and Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC). A statistical catch‐at‐age model is fitted to 1000 simulated datasets, with varying recruitment and observation noise. Six reference points are estimated, and confidence intervals are constructed across a range of significance levels. Overall, the delta method and MCMC performed considerably better than the bootstrap, and MCMC was the most reliable method in terms of worst‐case performance, for our relatively data‐rich scenario and catch‐at‐age model, which was not subject to substantial model misspecification. All three methods generated too narrow confidence intervals, underestimating the true uncertainty. Bias correction improved the bootstrap performance, but not enough to match the performance of the delta method and MCMC. We recommend using MCMC as the default method for quantifying uncertainty in fisheries stock assessment, although the delta method is the fastest to apply, and the bootstrap is useful to diagnose estimator bias.
Firm behaviour under uncertainty: a simple parametric model
Authors: Shankar Sriram
Published: May 2012

In this paper, we model production technology in a state‐contingent framework. We assume that all the firms use the same stochastic technology, but they may have different risk attitudes and information sets, and ex post they may operate in different production environments. Firms maximise ex ante their preference function subject to a stochastic technology constraint; in other words, they are assumed to act rationally, thereby leaving no room for either technical or allocative inefficiency. We provide a simple parametric functional form to represent the state‐contingent technology. Using simple numerical examples, we illustrate how optimal input–output choices are dramatically affected when firms have different preferences and information sets. Thus, we show that the observed disparateness of production choices among different firms can actually be attributed to the stochastic nature of the decision environment.
Pursuing National Interests: The 1992 British Presidency of the UN Security Council and the Soviet Permanent Seat
Authors: Blavoukos Spyros , Bourantonis Dimitris
Published: May 2012

The UNSC presidency functions under the twin assumptions of neutrality and impartiality. However, chairing multilateral negotiations in institutionalised bargaining fora always offers substantial opportunities to the country in office to pursue its own national interests. An important constraint for the presidency is the very short duration of the period in office, which does not allow chairs to capitalise on the existing informational asymmetries and use them to their own advantage. Can this institutional constraint be overcome? We address this issue by examining the British one-month presidency in January 1992. In a highly turbulent period, with mounting pressures for the UNSC to become more representative, the presidency secured the transition from the Soviet to the Russian UNSC seat without opening the Pandora's box of UNSC reform, in line with British preferences.
The Think Tanks behind ‘Cameronism’
Authors: Pautz Hartwig
Published: May 2012

Think tanks are omnipresent in the British media as sources of expertise for journalists and politicians; they themselves claim that their ideas form the basis of new policies and that they have influenced the thinking of leading decision-makers. This article aims to shed light on whether think tanks have played a role in the modernisation of the Conservative party under David Cameron between 2005 and 2010. The institutions focused on here are Policy Exchange, Reform, Centre for Social Justice, ResPublica, Politeia and Civitas. If these think tanks influenced the Conservatives' modernisation, which important impulses did they give and how? The article also addresses the more general question of why think tanks are worth academic scrutiny.
Muslim Integration into Western Cultures: Between Origins and Destinations
Authors: Norris Pippa , Inglehart Ronald F.
Published: May 2012

To what extent do migrants carry their culture with them, and to what extent do they acquire the culture of their new home? The answer not only has important political implications; it also helps us understand the extent to which basic cultural values are enduring or malleable, and whether cultural values are traits of individuals or are attributes of a given society. The first part of this article considers theories about the impact of growing social diversity in Western nations. We classify two categories of society: Origins (defined as Islamic Countries of Origin for Muslim migrants, including twenty nations with plurality Muslim populations) and Destinations (defined as Western Countries of Destination for Muslim migrants, including 22 OECD member states with Protestant or Roman Catholic majority populations). Using this framework, we demonstrate that, on average, the basic social values of Muslim migrants fall roughly midway between those prevailing in their country of origin and their country of destination. We conclude that Muslim migrants do not move to Western countries with rigidly fixed attitudes; instead, they gradually absorb much of the host culture, as assimilation theories suggest.
The Difference between an Analytical Framework and a Theoretical Claim: A Reply to Martin Carstensen
Authors: Stanley Liam
Published: May 2012

Martin Carstensen's recent article is a novel attempt to contribute a theory of incremental ideational change to the relevant discourse and institutionalist literatures. Noticing a potentially problematic twin focus on stable ideas and punctuated equilibrium, Carstensen outlines an alternative framework capable of capturing the true dynamism of political ideas. However, his article and analysis are based on the problematic assumption that analytical frameworks, such as historical institutionalism, make theoretical claims about politics, when instead their purpose is to create an underpinning prism for the construction of explanations. By ignoring this important yet subtle distinction, I claim, Carstensen creates a set of criteria for adjudicating the value of analytical frameworks that is both unfair and potentially inappropriate.
‘Dancing the image’: materiality and spirituality in Andean religious ‘images’
Authors: TASSI NICO
Published: May 2012

In the Christian tradition, representing the divine has often been considered both an impossible and yet necessary endeavour rooted in the human need in certain moments of weakness to visualize God. In this article, based on research findings from fieldwork carried out with urban indigenous groups in La Paz, Bolivia, I suggest that the articulation of local and Catholic representational traditions and practices has produced an understanding of the religious image not so much as an object of detached contemplation or a reference to a religious symbol but rather as an energized element which physically shapes the relationship and exchange between the material and the spiritual world. I suggest that through a study of Andean religious images we may be able to produce an alternative ontological perspective on the relationship between the spiritual, material, and living worlds.

Dans la tradition chrétienne, la représentation du divin est souvent considérée comme une gageure impossible et pourtant nécessaire, motivée par la nécessité humaine de visualiser Dieu dans les moments de faiblesse. À partir des matériaux de terrain obtenus auprès de groupes autochtones urbains à La Paz, en Bolivie, l'auteur suggère ici que l'articulation des traditions et pratiques de représentation locales et catholiques a conduit à concevoir l'image religieuse moins comme un objet de contemplation détachée ou une référence à un symbole religieux que comme un élément chargé d'énergie, qui donne physiquement forme à la relation et aux échanges entre le monde matériel et le monde spirituel. L'article suggère qu'à travers l'étude des images religieuses andines, on pourrait élaborer un autre point de vue ontologique sur la relation entre les mondes spirituel, matériel et vivant.
Pastoral intensification in West Africa: implications for sustainability
Authors: MORITZ MARK
Published: May 2012

African pastoral systems have been under pressure from steady population growth and an expansion of agriculture into grazing lands. This neo‐Malthusian predicament has been considered the beginning of the end for African pastoralism. The article describes how peri‐urban FulBe pastoralists in the Far North Region of Cameroon have adapted to population pressures on grazing lands by pursuing a combination of extensive and intensive pastoral strategies in which they entrust part of their herd to mobile pastoralists, while using industrially produced cottonseed cakes to feed cattle kept in the village. The reliance on cottonseed cakes has resulted in a more capital‐intensive production system. This article considers whether pastoral intensification, in which animal productivity is increased through capital inputs, offers an alternative Boserupian model for African pastoralists.

La croissance démographique et l'empiètement de l'agriculture sur les pâturages exercent une forte pression sur les systèmes pastoraux africains. Certains ont vu dans ce problème néomalthusien le début de la fin pour le pastoralisme en Afrique. L'auteur décrit comment les pasteurs FulBe périurbains de la région du Nord‐Cameroun se sont adaptés à la pression démographique sur les pâturages en combinant des stratégies pastorales extensives et intensives, confiant une partie de leur cheptel à des pasteurs itinérants tout en utilisant des tourteaux de coton industriels pour nourrir le bétail resté au village. La dépendance envers les tourteaux de coton a donné naissance à un système de production plus capitalistique. Le présent article examine l'éventualité que l'intensification du pastoralisme, visant à accroître la productivité animale par des entrées de capital, puisse constituer un modèle boserupien alternatif pour les pasteurs africains.
Cultural anthropology and the question of knowledge*
Authors: FABIAN JOHANNES
Published: May 2012

Although it helps to be aware of what philosophers think about knowledge, anthropologists can neither simply relegate their epistemological problems to, nor find solutions in, philosophy. In anthropology, knowing what and how we know is a practical, not just a theoretical, problem, one we face in all phases of our work, from field research to writing (and teaching). Historical recollections of debates since the 1960s are followed by consideration of two aspects of the knowledge question in our discipline: ‘Knowledge of what?’ and ‘Whose knowledge?’ Guided by reflections on knowledge and survival, the article ends by addressing the question of ethnographic evidence in the context of a current project.

S'il est utile de savoir ce que les philosophes pensent de la connaissance, les anthropologues ne peuvent pas se contenter de déléguer à la philosophie pour leurs problèmes épistémologiques, ni d'y chercher des solutions. En anthropologie, le problème de savoir ce que l'on sait et comment on le sait n'est pas seulement théorique mais pratique ; nous le rencontrons à chaque phase de notre travail, des recherches sur le terrain à l'écriture et à l'enseignement. L'auteur fait suivre ici les rappels historiques des débats qui ont eu lieu depuis les années 1960 d'une analyse de deux aspects de la question des connaissances dans notre discipline : « connaissance de quoi ? » et « connaissance de qui ? » Guidé par une réflexion sur le savoir et la survie, l'article s'achève par l'examen de la question des preuves ethnographiques dans le contexte d'un projet en cours.
Non-Response Biases in Surveys of Schoolchildren: The Case of the English Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) samples
Authors: Micklewright John , Schnepf Sylke V. , Skinner Chris
Published: May 2012

We analyse response patterns to an important survey of schoolchildren, exploiting rich auxiliary information on respondents’ and non-respondents’ cognitive ability that is correlated both with response and the learning achievement that the survey aims to measure. The survey is the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), which sets response thresholds in an attempt to control the quality of data. We analyse the case of England for 2000, when response rates were deemed sufficiently high by the organizers of the survey to publish the results, and 2003, when response rates were a little lower and deemed of sufficient concern for the results not to be published. We construct weights that account for the pattern of non-response by using two methods: propensity scores and the generalized regression estimator. There is clear evidence of biases, but there is no indication that the slightly higher response rates in 2000 were associated with higher quality data. This underlines the danger of using response rate thresholds as a guide to quality of data.
An Examination of the Quality and Utility of Interviewer Observations in the National Survey of Family Growth
Authors: West Brady T.
Published: May 2012

Survey agencies have started to use interviewer observations collected on all sample units to adjust survey estimates for non-response. Ideally, these observations should be related to both response indicators and key survey variables. However, these observations are typically judgements that are made by the interviewers, making them potentially prone to measurement error. Presenting analyses of data from the National Survey of Family Growth in the USA, this study examines the quality and utility of these interviewer observations and considers the implications of measurement errors in these observations for the effectiveness of non-response adjustments.
Epidemics in Semi-Isolated Communities: Statistical Perspectives on Acute Childhood Diseases in English Public Boarding Schools, 1930–1939
Authors: Smallman-Raynor Matthew , Cliff Andrew D.
Published: May 2012

The work of the Medical Research Council School Epidemics Committee—established in 1929 to undertake a study of ‘droplet infections’ in the ‘semi-isolated’ populations of England’s public schools—represents a little-known chapter in the historical development of applied medical statistics. Drawing on documents in the National Archives, London, we trace the original scheme for the Committee to Miss Ethel Newbold (1882–1933), a Fellow and Council member of the Royal Statistical Society and the first woman to be awarded the Society’s Guy Medal (1928, in silver). Using the Committee’s surviving records, databases of disease incidence are constructed for a multicentre cohort of 27 boarding schools, 1930–1939. Exploratory analysis of the data is illustrated by applying non-metric multi-dimensional scaling and Poisson regression to the themes of disease comorbidity and frequency of outbreak. Prompted by the emerging epidemiological concepts of pathogen–pathogen interaction and syndemicity, the multi-dimensional scaling analysis highlights the apparent epidemiological independence of common acute childhood infections (including chickenpox, measles, mumps, rubella, scarlet fever and whooping cough) in the disease system. Poisson regression reveals a complex pattern of controls on the frequency of school epidemics that vary by disease. The results that are obtained underscore the continuing relevance of the historical disease records of semi-isolated institutions, such as boarding schools, to an epidemiological understanding of common acute childhood infections and other ailments.
ARE EMOTIONS A KIND OF PRACTICE (AND IS THAT WHAT MAKES THEM HAVE A HISTORY)? A BOURDIEUIAN APPROACH TO UNDERSTANDING EMOTION
Authors: SCHEER MONIQUE
Published: May 2012

The term “emotional practices” is gaining currency in the historical study of emotions. This essay discusses the theoretical and methodological implications of this concept. A definition of emotion informed by practice theory promises to bridge persistent dichotomies with which historians of emotion grapple, such as body and mind, structure and agency, as well as expression and experience. Practice theory emphasizes the importance of habituation and social context and is thus consistent with, and could enrich, psychological models of situated, distributed, and embodied cognition and their approaches to the study of emotion.

It is suggested here that practices not only generate emotions, but that emotions themselves can be viewed as a practical engagement with the world. Conceiving of emotions as practices means understanding them as emerging from bodily dispositions conditioned by a social context, which always has cultural and historical specificity. Emotion‐as‐practice is bound up with and dependent on “emotional practices,” defined here as practices involving the self (as body and mind), language, material artifacts, the environment, and other people. Drawing on Pierre Bourdieu's concept of habitus, the essay emphasizes that the body is not a static, timeless, universal foundation that produces ahistorical emotional arousal, but is itself socially situated, adaptive, trained, plastic, and thus historical. Four kinds of emotional practices that make use of the capacities of a body trained by specific social settings and power relations are sketched out—mobilizing, naming, communicating, and regulating emotion—as are consequences for method in historical research.
THINKING AFTER HITLER: THE NEW INTELLECTUAL HISTORY OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY1
Authors: Biess Frank
Published: May 2012

This review essay seeks to direct attention to intellectual history as a new and flourishing subfield in the historiography of post‐1945 Germany. The essay probes and critically interrogates some of the basic arguments of Dirk Moses' prize‐winning monograph German Intellectuals and the Nazi Past. It does so by engaging with a series of German‐language monographs on key intellectuals of the postwar period (Alexander Mitscherlich, Jürgen Habermas, Herbert Marcuse) or groups of intellectuals that have appeared during the last few years. The essay also includes two books that focus on intellectual transfers from and to the United States and hence transcend the purely national framework. The essay highlights some broader themes such as West German intellectuals' confrontation with the Nazi past and with the memory of Germany's failed experiment with democracy during the interwar Weimar Republic. It also discusses the significance of the West German student movement in the 1960s for West German intellectual history. The essay concludes with some broader reflections on writing intellectual history of the postwar period, and it points to some avenues for further research. It underlines the significance of intellectual debates—and hence of intellectual history—for charting and explaining the process of postwar democratization and liberalization in the Federal Republic of Germany.
WHAT CONDITION OUR CONDITION IS IN
Authors: Trüper Henning
Published: May 2012

In Humanism in Intercultural Perspective, editors Jörn Rüsen and Henner Laass outline their project of renewing the foundations of the notion of “humanism.” They collect a large variety of contributions they hope will be conducive to this aim. Yet the architecture of the project leaves open a long list of conceptual problems, concerning in particular: the integration of cultural diversity into humanism; the relationship between humanism and the political; the way in which normativity is incorporated into humanism; and the question as to the place of historicity in the human condition. An extended discussion of Elisio Macamo's, Dipesh Chakrabarty's, and Friedrich Wilhelm Graf's contributions to the volume serves to further elucidate these problems and to explore ways in which they might possibly be solved.
NEITHER/NOR
Authors: Peden Knox
Published: May 2012

An Atheism that is Not Humanist Emerges in French Thought examines the advent of antihumanism as a cultural figure out of a network of intellectual crises in interwar and postwar France and ties this advent to the more general consequences of secularization in the modern age. Bracketing political judgments, and eschewing dialectical methods, Stefanos Geroulanos shows how the critique of humanism that emerged from disparate quarters of French intellectual life resulted in a series of negative positions that rendered the human void of any conceptual content and thereby unsuitable as a basis for future political action or philosophical investigation. In addition to basing his analysis on two rigorously sketched concepts of his own design, “antifoundational realism” and “negative anthropology,” Geroulanos deploys a striking use of conceptual irony to show how the critical efforts of his protagonists often led to theoretical cul‐de‐sacs and a heightened measure of existential despondency. The treatment of the emergence of antihumanism as a local phenomenon among a segment of French intellectuals nevertheless encounters problems when it abandons the terrain of historical argument for an engagement with broader metaphysical concerns. By participating in the discourse of its subjects, An Atheism that is Not Humanist finds its way into cul‐de‐sacs of its own, in which, for example, the ostensibly political bearing of efforts to transcend mere politics for broader considerations of the “theo‐political crisis of modernity” remains unclear. Finally, by accepting the terms of the phenomenological diagnosis of metaphysical crisis in the interwar years, the book compromises certain of its genealogical aspirations, especially with regard to the legacy of Third Republic idealism and the specific qualities of post‐phenomenological structuralism.
MODELING IN HISTORICAL RESEARCH PRACTICE AND METHODOLOGY: CONTRIBUTIONS FROM POLAND1
Authors: Norkus Zenonas
Published: May 2012

This selection of texts (mostly translations from Polish) should interest those who study analytical philosophy of history, methodology of history, and historical sociology. It contains contributions by Polish historians and philosophers since 1931, with pride of place given to the work of the Poznań school in the philosophy of science and humanities. With Jerzy Kmita, Leszek Nowak, and Jerzy Topolski as its leaders, it emerged in late 1960s as a synthesis of Marxism and the Polish brand of logical positivism known as the Lwow‐Warsaw school. Most papers discuss or exemplify various forms of idealization in historical research. Although the papers demonstrate the usefulness of modeling in historical sociology and nonnarrative history, the collection as a whole does not provide realistic examples to substantiate the Poznań school's stronger claim of the decomposability of historical narratives into separate strips related to hierarchically ordered “essential factors.”
Dermal dendrocytes FXIIIA+ phagocytizing extruded mast cell granules in drug‐induced acute urticaria
Authors: Criado P.R. , Jardim Criado R.F. , Sotto M.N. , Pagliari C. , Takakura C.H. , Vasconcellos C.
Published: May 2012

Background  Few authors have been attempting between mast cells and dermal dendrocytes interactions on urticaria.

Objective  To describe the extruded mast cell granules and dermal dendrocytes in drug‐induced acute urticaria.

Methods  Seven patients with drug‐induced acute urticaria were enrolled in the study. We token skin biopsies of urticaria lesion and perilesional skin. The 14 fragments collected were processed to immunogold electron microscopy using single stains to tryptase and FXIIIa, besides double immunogold labeling with both.

Results  Some sections demonstrated mast cells in degranulation process, both in anaphylactic and piecemeal degranulation types. After double immunogold staining, 10 nm (FXIIIa) and 15 nm (Tryptase) gold particles were present together over the granules in mast cells indicating that tryptase and FXIIIa are each localized within the granules of these cells. Interestingly, we found a strong evidence of than the exocytosed mast cell granules contents both FXIIIa and tryptase immunolabeled are phagocytized by dermal dendrocytes.

Conclusions  The current observations provide morphological evidence that the exocytosis‐phagocytosis mechanisms of mast cell granules represents one pathophysiological example of mast cells‐dermal dendrocytes interactions in urticaria.
Individual quality and nuptial throat colour in male European green lizards
Authors: Molnár O. , Bajer K. , Török J. , Herczeg G.
Published: May 2012

Nuptial traits signalling individual quality are common in numerous animal taxa, and play a significant role in sexual selection. Detecting female mate choice based on visual cues is notoriously hard in lizards. Previously, we found that female European green lizards (Lacerta viridis) preferred to associate with males with high ultraviolet (UV) throat reflectance. Here, we investigated if different components of nuptial throat colour of male European green lizards were correlated to other fitness‐related traits, and thus could signal male quality. We found that (1) high UV chroma correlates positively with directional asymmetry and shows a negative trend with body condition; (2) blue chroma is not related to any individual traits; and (3) total throat brightness correlates positively with body size and relative head size, and negatively with ectoparasite load. Our results suggest that having high throat UV reflectance is costly for male European green lizards, so probably only high‐quality individuals can afford it, while total brightness of the throat colour signals age, relative head size and health status. Hence, throat colour in male European green lizards is a multiple honest signal.
Homes for hermits: temporal, spatial and structural dynamics as transportable homes are incorporated into a population
Authors: Laidre M. E.
Published: May 2012

Understanding the process by which limiting resources are incorporated into populations is a major goal of ecology. While many studies have examined this dynamic process using essential resources like homes, few of these studies have involved homes that can be transported by their occupants. This study introduced over a thousand transportable homes into a population of terrestrial hermit crabs Coenobita compressus, animals that carry their homes with them wherever they travel. These new homes were tracked between years to test key predictions about the temporal dynamics the homes would generate, and the spatial and structural changes the homes would undergo as they were used by the population. When moving into new homes, crabs dropped off their old homes directly at the exchange site, and the number of such traded‐in homes peaked rapidly in time. Traded‐in homes were under half the diameter of new homes, a difference apparently magnified by social formations involving vacancy chains. After crabs moved into new homes, they carried the homes away from the exchange site. The following year, these homes were displaced a distance four orders of magnitude times their diameter, thus penetrating extensively through the population. Between years, crabs also remodeled the internal architecture of the homes, creating homes that were more spacious and less of a burden to carry. These results suggest that transportable homes generate novel ecological dynamics along temporal, spatial and structural dimensions, which are a direct consequence of their transportability.
Evidence for the efficacy of statins in animal stroke models: a meta‐analysis
Authors: García‐Bonilla Lidia , Campos Mireia , Giralt Dolors , Salat David , Chacón Pilar , Hernández‐Guillamon Mar , Rosell Anna , Montaner Joan
Published: May 2012

J. Neurochem. (2012) 122, 233–243.

Protective effects of statins have been well documented for stroke therapy. Here, we used a systematic review and meta‐analysis to assess these evidences. We identified 190 studies using statin treatment in stroke animal models by electronic searching. From those, only studies describing ischemic occlusive stroke and reporting data on infarct volume and/or neurological outcome were included in the analysis (41 publications, 1882 animals). The global estimate effect was assessed by Weighted Mean Difference meta‐analysis. Statins reduced infarct volume by 25.12% (20.66%–29.58%, P < 0.001) and consistently, induced an improvement on neurological outcome (20.36% (14.17%–26.56%), P < 0.001). Stratified analysis showed that simvastatin had the greatest effect on infarct volume reduction (38.18%) and neurological improvement (22.94%), whereas bigger infarct reduction was observed giving the statin as a pre‐treatment (33.5%) compared with post‐treatment (16.02%). The use of pentobarbital sodium, the timing of statin administration, the statement of conflict of interest and the type of statin studied were found to be independent factors in the meta‐regression, indicating their influence on the results of studies examining statin treatment. In conclusion, this meta‐analysis provides further evidences of the efficacy of statins, supporting their potential use for human stroke therapy.
Domain‐dependent effects of DAT inhibition in the rat dorsal striatum
Authors: Mitch Taylor I. , Jaquins‐Gerstl Andrea , Sesack Susan R. , Michael Adrian C.
Published: May 2012

J. Neurochem. (2012) 122, 283–294.

The rat dorsal striatum exhibits domain‐dependent kinetics of dopamine release and clearance. The present report describes the domain‐dependent actions of nomifensine (20 mg/kg i.p.), a competitive dopamine uptake inhibitor, on evoked dopamine responses recorded by voltammetry during electrical stimulation of the medial forebrain bundle. In slow domains, nomifensine increases the initial rate of evoked overflow, increases response overshoot, does not affect the slope of the linear segment of the dopamine clearance profile, and slows the non‐linear segment of the clearance profile. In fast domains, nomifensine does not affect the initial rate of overflow, increases the end‐of‐stimulus overshoot, and decreases the slope of the linear segment of the dopamine clearance profile. Collectively, these findings do not concur with existing models of evoked dopamine release that describe the effect of nomifensine as an increase in the effective KM of dopamine uptake. These findings suggest that dopamine clearance after evoked release is affected by both dopamine uptake and a restricted extracellular diffusion process.
The effects of exercise modality on the incidence of plateau at
Authors: Gordon Dan , Mehter Mashihullah , Gernigon Marie , Caddy Oliver , Keiller Don , Barnes Richard
Published: May 2012

The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of exercise modality on the incidence of plateau at . Twelve recreationally active men (age, 21·7 ± 2·3 year; mass, 74·8 ± 6·5 kg; height, 177·6 ± 5·6 cm) completed four incremental tests to volitional exhaustion, of which two were completed on a treadmill (TRE) and two were completed using a cycle ergometer (CYC). The work rate employed for CYC was 1 W·2 s−1 from an initial loading of 100 W with cadence being maintained at 60 rpm. For TRE, the workload (gradient) increased at a rate of 0·5% · 30 s−1while maintaining a constant running speed of 10 kph. Throughout all the trials, was determined on a breath‐by‐breath basis using a precalibrated metabolic cart. The criteria adopted for determination of a plateau was a Δ over the final two consecutive 30‐s sampling periods of ≤50 ml · min−1. Averaging across the two trials per each exercise modality showed a significant difference for plateau incidence between CYC (8%) and TRE (58%) (P = 0·017). This was aligned with a significant difference in the slope of the regression line during the final 60 s of the test, CYC (99·9 ± 49·7 ml · min−1) and TRE (49·6 ± 42·6 ml · min−1) (P = 0·017). Repeat measures ANOVA of these data suggests that plateau incidence rates at differ between treadmill‐ and cycle ergometry‐based exercises. Future studies need to address whether these response rates are replicated in well‐trained athletes.
Epithelium‐dependent modulation of responsiveness of airways from caveolin‐1 knockout mice is mediated through cyclooxygenase‐2 and 5‐lipoxygenase
Authors: Sharma Pawan , Ryu Min H , Basu Sujata , Maltby Sarah A , Yeganeh Behzad , Mutawe Mark M , Mitchell Richard W , Halayko Andrew J
Published: May 2012

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Acute silencing of caveolin‐1 (Cav‐1) modulates receptor‐mediated contraction of airway smooth muscle. Moreover, COX‐2‐ and 5‐lipoxygenase (5‐LO)‐derived prostaglandin and leukotriene biosynthesis can influence smooth muscle reactivity. COX‐2 half‐life can be prolonged through association with Cav‐1. We suggested that lack of Cav‐1 modulated levels of COX‐2 which in turn modulated tracheal contraction, when arachidonic acid signalling was disturbed by inhibition of COX‐2.

EXPERIMENTAL APPROACH Using tracheal rings from Cav‐1 knockout (KO) and wild‐type mice (B6129SF2/J), we measured isometric contractions to methacholine and used PCR, immunoblotting and immunohistology to monitor expression of relevant proteins.

KEY RESULTS Tracheal rings from Cav‐1 KO and wild‐type mice exhibited similar responses, but the COX‐2 inhibitor, indomethacin, increased responses of tracheal rings from Cav‐1 KO mice to methacholine. The phospholipase A2 inhibitor, eicosatetraynoic acid, which inhibits formation of both COX‐2 and 5‐LO metabolites, had no effect on wild‐type or Cav‐1 KO tissues. Indomethacin‐mediated hyperreactivity was ablated by the LTD4 receptor antagonist (montelukast) and 5‐LO inhibitor (zileuton). The potentiating effect of indomethacin on Cav‐1 KO responses to methacholine was blocked by epithelial denudation. Immunoprecipitation showed that COX‐2 binds Cav‐1 in wild‐type lungs. Immunoblotting and qPCR revealed elevated levels of COX‐2 and 5‐LO protein, but not COX‐1, in Cav‐1 KO tracheas, a feature that was prevented by removal of the epithelium.

CONCLUSION AND IMPLICATIONS The indomethacin‐induced hypercontractility observed in Cav‐1 KO tracheas was linked to increased expression of COX‐2 and 5‐LO, which probably enhanced arachidonic acid shunting and generation of pro‐contractile leukotrienes when COX‐2 was inhibited.
Comparing and Exploring Frontier Myth and Reality in Latin America
Authors: Slatta Richard W.
Published: May 2012

Frontiers around the world have long attracted attention, both scholarly and popular, owing to their exoticism and often ‘larger‐than‐life’ qualities. In Latin America, scholars have deployed a range of concepts to convey the realities and complexities of frontier life. Frontiers have given rise to a wide range of often contradictory myths and images which complicate the search for their true nature. Looking at and comparing conceptual frameworks for interpreting frontiers and the variety of myths they have engendered illuminates our understanding of the interplay between myth and social reality across time and space.
Republican Courts and Beyond: Early U.S. Political Culture
Authors: Moats Sandra
Published: May 2012

The once moribund field of early American political history has enjoyed a much needed revival over the past decade, thanks to the generous borrowing of interdisciplinary and transatlantic approaches from the realms of cultural anthropology, sociology, and European cultural and social history. American historians have embraced the tools of social and cultural analysis to produce the groundbreaking field of early American political culture. Amidst this vibrant political resurrection is an equally vibrant debate between early republic historians over whose political culture to emphasize: the masses or the elites? One approach has been to focus on the political culture of street theater and popular demonstrations, embracing the “history from below” perspective of social history. Other historians have chosen to examine the “republican courts” of America’s governing elite: presidents, first ladies, and other early political leaders, finding parallels with European monarchical rituals. Even if the historians employing these competing approaches struggle to find common ground, a reader who embraces these innovative studies on both sides of the debate will come away with a rich portrait of the early republic’s diverse and dynamic political culture.
Banks and Banking in the Early American Republic
Authors: Murphy Sharon Ann
Published: May 2012

Although the history of banks and banking in the early American republic has received considerable attention from financial and economic historians in recent years, knowledge about this important sector of the economy by the average historian or student is still woefully inadequate and outdated. This essay seeks to remedy that gap by outlining the basic history of banks from the American Revolution through the Bank War. This sketch includes a discussion of the constitutional issues surrounding the First and Second Banks of the United States which culminated in the Supreme Court’s decision in M’Culloch v. Maryland, as well as issues surrounding the Panics of 1819, 1837, and their aftermath. Additionally, this historiographical essay examines the major scholarly works published on early American banks and banking since roughly 1990. While the banking system as a whole proved essential to the successful development of the early American economy, problems such as the discounting of notes, counterfeiting, and rare but well‐publicized cases of irresponsible or fraudulent conduct by banks and bankers emboldened banking critics throughout the period.
Coupled role of deformation and metamorphism in the construction of inverted metamorphic sequences: an example from far‐northwest Nepal
Authors: YAKYMCHUK C. , GODIN L.
Published: May 2012

In the Greater Himalayan sequence of far northwestern Nepal, detailed mapping, thermobarometry, and microstructure analysis are used to test competing models of the construction of Himalayan inverted metamorphism. The inverted Greater Himalayan sequence, which is characterized by an increase in peak metamorphic temperatures up structural section from 580 to 720 °C, is divided into two tectonometamorphic domains. The lower domain contains garnet‐ to kyanite‐zone rocks whose peak metamorphic assemblages suggest a metamorphic field pressure gradient that increases up structural section from 8 to 11 kbar, and which developed during top‐to‐the‐south directed shearing. The upper portion of the Greater Himalayan sequence is composed of kyanite‐ and sillimanite‐zone migmatitic gneisses that contain a metamorphic pressure gradient that decreases up structural section from 10 to 5 kbar. The lower and upper portions of the Greater Himalayan sequence are separated by a metamorphic discontinuity that spatially coincides with the base of the lowest migmatite unit. Temperatures inferred from quartz recrystallization mechanisms and the opening angles of quartz c‐axis fabrics increase up section through the Greater Himalayan sequence from ∼530 to >700 °C and yield similar results to peak metamorphic temperatures determined by thermometry. The observations from the Greater Himalayan sequence in far northwestern Nepal are consistent with numerical predictions of channel‐flow tectonic models, whereby the upper hinterland part evolved as a ductile southward tunnelling mid‐crustal channel and the lower foreland part ductily accreted in a critical‐taper system at the leading edge of the extruding channel. The boundary between the upper and lower portions of the Greater Himalayan sequence is shown to represent a foreland–hinterland transition zone that is used to reconcile the different proposed tectonic styles documented in western Nepal.
Reversing neuropathic deficits
Authors: Zochodne Douglas W.
Published: May 2012

This is a brief review of several novel strategies for therapeutic approaches to axonal damage in peripheral neuropathies. Although not comprehensive, the review addresses the challenges in axonal regrowth, newly identified roadblocks to regeneration and the concept of collateral reinnervation to restore lost neurological function.