bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Law
Authors: Lippert Sandra
Published: December 2020

The chapter gives a brief diachronic survey of ancient Egyptian law, covering the period from the Old Kingdom to the Third Intermediate (c.2686–664 bc). The article provides discussion of what we know about ancient Egyptian law during the pharaonic period, including legal regulations and practices that can be assembled from various textual sources; types and uses of legal documents; and the composition and workings of law courts. [Note that coverage of Egyptian law from the Twenty-sixth Dynasty to the Roman period (c.664 bc–ad 394) is provided in another OHO article—Lippert 2016, for details of which, see the bibliography.]
Funerary beliefs and practices
Authors: Abbas Eltayeb
Published: December 2020

This article provides an overview of the primary texts and images relating to funerary beliefs and practices in ancient Egypt. Following death, the individual was subject to a series of rituals performed by priests. Evidence concerning death and funerary rituals is contained in texts and images on tomb walls, coffins and papyri. The main focus here, however, is on the textual record, including the Pyramid Texts, Coffin Texts, and the Book of the Dead, including discussion of the importance of the Osiris myth in all of these, given that the latter appears to have had a significant impact on almost every aspect of Egyptian rituals surrounding death and burial.
Lexicography
Authors: Stauder-Porchet Julie
Published: December 2020

The history of Egyptian lexicography is marked by the early twentieth-century Wörterbuch der ägyptischen Sprache (Wb). The decades after the appearance of the Wb saw the publication of many specialized dictionaries of language phases and corpuses. Ancient Egyptian lexicography is conditioned by sampling issues and the discontinuous nature of the artefactual record, by cultural distance, and by the nature of the writing systems of Egyptian. Current studies in Egyptian lexicography develop a variety of approaches, ranging from the more philological to the more linguistic. Since the publication of the Wb, many new texts have been published and many new words and meanings have been attested, while the lemmatization of the Wb (i.e. the process of grouping together the inflected forms of a word so that they can be analysed as a single item, identified by the word’s lemma, or dictionary form) appears in need of partial revision. The debate as to whether to produce a new comprehensive dictionary or a general text database based on the lexicon has been decided in favour of the latter in the 1990s. While digital textual databases based on the lexicon are being built, several voices call for a new dictionary, observing that a thesaurus does not replace a lexicographer’s work.
Grammar
Authors: Uljas Sami
Published: December 2020

The present article provides a historical survey of grammatical thinking and theorizing on the Egyptian language. The roots of this lie in efforts made by the Egyptians themselves, beginning from rather modest efforts in distant antiquity but growing into a stream of works at the time when Egyptian was heading towards extinction. Nevertheless, grammatical study of Egyptian was properly established subsequent to the opening of the language to a western scholarly audience, starting with Coptic and then moving on to earlier stages thereof after the decipherment of the hieroglyphic and related scripts. Over the past two centuries Egyptian-Coptic linguistics has seen a steady increase in analytical sophistication as well as successive waves of ‘revolutions’ in which new paradigms and models have been introduced. Today grammatical analysis of the language is a well-established part of Egyptology, with connections to a wide range of other branches of humanities and social sciences.
Literary texts
Authors: Manley Bill
Published: December 2020

Egyptian literary texts from the pharaonic period form a small corpus with no exclusive definition, principally made up of three broad genres: firstly ‘instructions’ or philosophy ascribed to named authors; secondly reports of fine speaking as a witness to truth; and finally, narratives of travel abroad. The problems of understanding this corpus are analogous to those of understanding funerary art-works, and indeed literary texts may well resemble the latter in terms of their use as well as in their narrative structures and meaning. The chapter concludes with discussion concerning the likely origins and functions of these texts, particularly with regard to the physical and cultural contexts of the original documents.
Letters
Authors: Sweeney Deborah
Published: December 2020

This article provides a chronological survey of ancient Egyptian letters from the Old Kingdom to the Coptic period, including discussions of writing materials, literary and model letters, the social setting of correspondence, and special cases such as letters to the gods and to the dead. Letters have often been studied for their content as sources for ancient Egyptian social history and historical events, or as a source for the Egyptian language. Socio-linguistic analysis enhances existing research by providing new insights into the correspondents’ communicative strategies, while computer technology now enables us to recover erased and faded texts.
Coptic texts
Authors: Wilfong Terry
Published: December 2020

The term Coptic describes both a written and a spoken stage of the Egyptian language. This was the final written stage of the ancient Egyptian language, when the traditional Egyptian writing system, based on predominantly phonographic and logographic signs, was replaced by an alphabetic script. The article delineates the emergence of Coptic in the Roman period, and its subsequent development over several centuries and through various religious contexts, beginning with indigenous Egyptian religion and ending with Christianity and other religions contemporary with it. It also discusses the increasing use of Coptic texts for the study of such general topics as law and social and economic history.
Museum collections
Authors: Price Campbell
Published: December 2020

Egyptological museum collections are the principal means of interacting physically with pharaonic material culture. Such collections of objects have a partial, often fragmentary, nature and are usually biased in favour of monumental and funerary sources. This chapter delineates the background to the acquisition of objects and the formation of museum collections—notably through the elaborate antiquities trade network rather than through archaeological ‘discovery’. The resulting museum representations of ‘ancient Egypt’ attempt to elide many gaps in the material record to form a coherent (but often simplistic) narrative. Museums attempt to balance conservation, accessibility and research, while utilizing the popular appeal of ‘ancient Egypt’ to engage with a wide audience. Awareness of these factors is important in understanding Egyptology’s reconstruction of pharaonic civilization.
Mathematical texts
Authors: Imhausen Annette
Published: December 2020

Approximately a dozen mathematical papyri have survived from ancient Egypt. Based on their script (but also their stage of the Egyptian language) they fall into two groups—hieratic and demotic texts. These papyri constitute our primary source material to learn about ancient Egyptian mathematics. Because of the procedural style that they were written in, it is assumed that they were used in teaching junior scribes the mathematical techniques they would need for their job; however, the procedural format may also have constituted the way of collecting mathematical knowledge at the time. It is only if this format is taken into account in the (modern) analysis of Egyptian mathematical texts that their sophistication becomes visible, and a deeper understanding of Egyptian mathematics beyond rudimentary similarities to modern equivalents can therefore be achieved.
Egyptian museums and storehouses
Authors: Eissa Maher A. , el-Senussi Ashraf
Published: December 2020

This article will focus on the history and current nature of both Egyptian museums and storehouses. We will present an account of the current situation with regard only to archaeological and historical museums and storehouses in Egypt which are under the Antiquities authorities. Discussion will be made about the challenges facing these museums, and ideas for future approaches. It should be noted that there are some Egyptological collections in some Egyptian museums that are not under the control of the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities such as the Agricultural Museum, which is owned by the Ministry of Agriculture.
Phenomenology
Authors: Høffding Simon
Published: December 2020

This chapter argues that phenomenology can be methodologically enriched by engaging in second-person methods, exemplified by this chapter’s interviews with the Danish String Quartet about “losing oneself” in music. It points to the importance of relinquishing control in order to enter into an intense absorption and “losing oneself.” The chapter criticizes existing accounts of expertise and absorption for getting stuck on the question of whether one can reflect while performing, at the expense of overlooking the sense of relinquishing control or “letting the music play itself.” It elucidates the meaning of this relinquishing by pointing to the importance of bodily habitualities, the sense of agency, and affective intentionality, and concludes how this perspective can account for the conditions of possibility of playing sophisticated music while having “lost oneself.”
The Enlightenment
Authors: McAuley Tomás
Published: December 2020

This chapter traces the history of music and philosophy in the Enlightenment, with a particular focus on English thinkers in the years 1660–1750. It identifies three modes of interaction between musical and philosophical ideas: music as object of philosophy, music as inspiration for philosophy, and music as corroboration for philosophy. The chapter hones in particularly on the significance of the new, “mechanical” approach to philosophy that emerged in the later seventeenth century and on changing explanations of music’s fabled ability to cure the bite of the tarantula. Through all of this, it uncovers how ideas about musical harmony and music’s affective power were intertwined in this period. It also includes two eighteenth-century case studies showing how these ideas played themselves out in the French “high” Enlightenment and in German Idealist philosophy at the close of the Enlightenment. The chapter closes with an examination of the relative merits, in this context, of the terms “Baroque,” “scientific revolution,” and “Enlightenment.”
The Twentieth Century
Authors: Levitz Tamara
Published: December 2020

This chapter seeks to create a coherent narrative of one dominant strand of music and philosophy—phenomenology—in a limited, largely Western geographical space in the years 1900–58. Through this example, it traces the material history of the philosophy of music as it developed as an exclusive and exclusionary profession within the Westernized university in the twentieth century. In particular, it examines how encounters between the fields of aesthetics and phenomenology at international conferences and in so-called little journals generated intellectual paradigm shifts, ending with the symbolic birth of the analytic–continental divide at the 1958 Royaumont Conference. The chapter reveals that significant structural changes in musical-philosophical practice undermine any universal assessment of the century. The fragmented twentieth-century history presented here anticipates another history yet to be written: one that is truly global and acknowledges structural inequality, white supremacy and privilege, and exclusion.
Ontology
Authors: Nussbaum Charles O.
Published: December 2020

The chapter moves through a brief history of ontology and trends in contemporary analytic ontology before investigating common positions in musical ontology such as Platonism (Kivy, Dodd), compliance theory (Goodman, Elgin), continuant theory (Rohrbaugh, Magnus), and performance theory (Davies, Currie). After evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of each of these, it argues for a version of continuant theory as an account of musical ontology that makes sense of musical practices and intuitions while honouring naturalistic philosophical commitments. Moreover, I suggest that the inherently “shaky” nature of undecidable claims within ontology (musical or otherwise) means that ontological approaches should not take fact-stating as their sole objective. Rather, ontological statements may function both descriptively and prescriptively: as such, ontology possesses a key regulative purpose within our theoretical discourse.
Absolute Music
Authors: Collins Sarah
Published: December 2020

“Absolute music” names an idea, an aesthetic concept, a regulative construct, a repertoire, and an aspiration. The term also engages a range of broader claims about aesthetic autonomy, or the possibility of aesthetic experience more generally. This chapter investigates how and why the aspiration towards autonomy has seemed so necessary—and so powerfully subversive—for musical thinkers at certain times in history. It traces the entanglements and misalignments of the various meanings and uses of these ideas, and brings these insights into the remit of contemporary debates about music’s ineffability, and its capacity to facilitate resistance and political agency.
Composition
Authors: Dubiel Joseph
Published: December 2020

The activity of composition is little discussed in philosophy, understandably due to its disunity across musical cultures. In the context of the individually composed concert music that has preoccupied the discipline, composing and the composer are often invoked figuratively as objects of a kind of engagement expected of the listener. This figure has survived a reversal of direction in a prominent line of anti-modern musical critique, in which composers can be faulted for not proceeding in ways that match those to which listeners supposedly are bound. In a music-analytical example drawn from the finale of Ruth Crawford Seeger’s String Quartet, alternatives are offered to these views. Explicit compositional procedures, realizing Crawford’s radical conception of dissonance, are regarded as influential upon, not definitive of, audible traits of what they produce; and the utility of these procedures is seen as including idle, indirect, and even counter-productive elements. Awareness of compositional process, and of the conceptions in which it is embedded, may substantially affect audition and appreciation.
Music Theory and Philosophy
Authors: Rehding Alexander
Published: December 2020

In principle, music theory and philosophy are close allies, both trying to understand the fundamental issues of music. In practice, however, a deep rift has remained ever since the time of Aristotle and Aristoxenus. Rather than present a survey, this chapter focuses on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, when the foundations were laid for our current music-theoretical practice, to examine the sources of tension and attraction between the two discourses, using Schopenhauer’s philosophy and Ernst Kurth’s Wagnerian music theory as a twin case study. Both Schopenhauer’s metaphysics of music and Kurth’s energistic model of tension-relaxation present related views on harmony and melody. When considered in combination, the two go a long way to bridging the age-old disparities between both disciplines.
Consciousness
Authors: Clarke David
Published: December 2020

Our understanding of the numerous and significant problems of consciousness is inseparable from the often incommensurable disciplinary frameworks through which the topic has been approached. Music may offer a range of perspectives on consciousness, some issuing from interdisciplinary alliances (such as with cognitive psychology and neuroscience), others tapping into what is distinctively musical about music and what music shares with comparable aesthetic formations. Philosophically speaking, music might afford valuable complementary perspectives to approaches within the empirical sciences that see consciousness as essentially a computational process (Pinker, Dennett), or as solely an epiphenomenon of neural activity within the brain. This chapter will look to experiences of music that support views of the mind as extended and embodied, and that see consciousness as ecologically bound up with Being-in-the-world, to adopt notions from Gibson and Heidegger respectively. In this way, music studies can make a contribution to the philosophical study of consciousness from epistemological, phenomenological, and ontological standpoints.
Meaning and Autonomy
Authors: Paddison Max
Published: December 2020

This chapter examines the problem of meaning in Western art music, its entwinement with the idea of “autonomy,” and the confusions surrounding the concept of meaning itself. The argument is in three parts. The first takes a philosophical-historical approach to the relation between autonomy and the problem of musical meaning, considering Kant’s reservations regarding instrumental music’s non-conceptuality. The second analyses the concept of musical meaning in the context of the philosophy of language and argues for the priority of meaning as “sense” over meaning as “reference” in the understanding of autonomous music as a mediated “complex of meaning.” The third takes a critical hermeneutic approach to the problem of interpretation in view of each work’s idiosyncratic rationality, its temporality, and its non-conceptuality. In conclusion it argues that hermeneutic interpretation also requires engaged “mimetic understanding” in the process of making sense of the ambiguity and polyvalence of the autonomous musical work.
Mercy
Authors: Nussbaum Martha C.
Published: December 2020

The idea of discovering mercy as an expressive topic in music might initially seem unpromising; nevertheless, this chapter suggests that mercy is not only a possible topic for musical exposition, but also that understanding how composers marshal resources to express mercy gives key insights into how to interpret their works. The chapter begins by distinguishing between “hierarchical” and “egalitarian” conceptions of mercy derived from Graeco-Roman (especially Senecan) and Christian traditions. A close examination of the words and music in pieces ranging from Benjamin Britten’s War Reqiuem to W. A. Mozart’s operas The Marriage of Figaro and La clemenza di Tito then reveals how composers demonstrate emotional insight in expressing mercy through music. In conclusion, I suggest that the gentle intelligence and sensitivity that are among the qualities of mercy expressed in music are desperately needed in order to move beyond contemporary obsessions with anger and revenge.
Galant Music
Authors: Nancy Jean-Luc
Published: December 2020

Philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy advances a provocative thesis: namely, that the term galant be generalized beyond its traditional historical limits to characterize music’s relationship to sense and to freedom more broadly. Nancy uses the notion of musical galanterie, with its connotations of charm, elegance, finesse, and also ornamentation and bravura, to reprise and develop some of the issues he has raised in previous texts about sense and sensation, such as Listening and Corpus. Specifically this idea of music as galanterie allows Nancy to reconfigure music’s distinctive relationship to signification and redefine the nature of its much-vaunted autonomy. Arguing that music is an “art of passage” and the approach of the impossible, the text makes striking use of the metaphorics of touch and tact and the translator’s introduction argues that all of Derrida’s suspicions in On Touching—Jean-Luc Nancy about the limits of Nancy’s deconstruction of touch should also be brought to bear on the problematic at stake here, including on the possibility of traversing unbridgeable idioms.
Subjectivities
Authors: McClary Susan
Published: December 2020

When humanities scholars speak of “subjectivity” today they refer to ways in which societies have constituted or experienced the Self at various moments in history. In applying the concept to music, this entails paying close attention to the contexts, both personal and communal, of musical experiences and, perhaps counter-intuitively, focuses our attention on the music—the music itself. This chapter analyses some of the major debates over musical style throughout history as shifts in culturally construed notions of subjectivity linked to ideas about music and the body. It suggests that when we trace the complex development of subjectivities in the historical West through our knowledge of music we might learn more about why musicking matters, why its practitioners and fans fight for and against innovations in procedures, and even why we gravitate as individuals towards one repertory as opposed to another—in short, how subjectivity shapes musical experience.
Time
Authors: Hasty Christopher
Published: December 2020

This chapter identifies the opposition of succession and duration as a central obstacle to granting a “real” time in which events are always being created. Within music, this opposition reaches into a nexus of categorical oppositions (unity–multiplicity, continuity–discontinuity, internal–external) that make it difficult to imagine the ongoingness of musical experience. Indeed, musical melody has often been proposed, by thinkers such as Whitehead and Čapek, as an experience that calls such oppositions into question. In this chapter, the challenge of musical “melody” (understood as inseparable from rhythm and measure) offers opportunities to think anew about fundamental categories of succession, event, duration, rhythm, metre, and measure. Following an introduction to the theory of “projection,” a musical-speculative engagement with Beethoven’s Op. 132 provides a laboratory for exploring these concepts. The movement from general to particular argues for the renewed relevance of music in understanding duration, succession, and time via an approach that might be called a “speculative phenomenology.”
Meaning and Scepticism
Authors: Boghossian Paul
Published: December 2020

This chapter revisits the classic questions whether absolute music can express extra-musical meaning and whether such meaning should be thought of as playing an important role in our understanding and appreciation of music. It argues that music’s expressive ability plays a central role in our conception of its phenomenology and value—in our perception of music as expressive and in its capacity to move us, both in the understudied generic sense, and in the sense of arousing specific emotions in us. It examines a type of scepticism about music’s expressive ability made influential by Eduard Hanslick and considers to what extent it can be answered. The chapter concludes that, while the extreme scepticism espoused by Hanslick cannot be sustained, his discussion teaches us deep lessons about the expressive indeterminacy involved in music. The chapter illustrates some of the issues it deals with through an analysis of the slow movement of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major and explores the connection between meaning in music and meaning in poetry.
Continental Philosophy of Music
Authors: Norris Christopher
Published: December 2020

This chapter begins by questioning the distinction between “analytic” (anglophone mainstream) and “continental” (mainland European) philosophy. It then traces ideas and movements of thought that have figured prominently in continental philosophy of music. These have their source in German post-Kantian idealism and its descendants, the latter taking different forms in Germany and France. Among them, mostly coming via literary theory, are the musical applications of Marxism, phenomenology, formalism, structuralism, post-structuralism, deconstruction, French feminism, Deleuzean anti-metaphysics, and Alain Badiou’s mathematically based dialectic of being and event. The chapter surveys ongoing debates within the field, as between proponents of musical analysis and those, like deconstructionists or New Musicologists, who challenge their approach on jointly theoretical and ideological grounds, often concerning tonality and/or “organic form.” The chapter goes on to suggest future critical-creative directions for continentally oriented philosophy of music.
Newton’s Laws of Motion
Authors: Smith George E.
Published: December 2020

An obstacle to reading the Principia is presuming that the Laws of Motion attributed to Newton in physics textbooks, and the concept of force in them, are the same as those in the book; they are not. This chapter provides an account of his Laws and his conception of force as his contemporaries would have understood them. It does so first by giving the historical background to them in works by Descartes, Christiaan Huygens, John Wallis, and Christopher Wren; and then by reviewing the history of Newton’s own reformulations of them not just in the sequence of manuscripts leading up to the first edition, but extending even to the second edition. In the Principia the Laws serve as the basis for deriving conclusions about forces governing the motions in our planetary system from the motions of the bodies within it “among themselves.” Crucial to their doing so are their six Corollaries, some of them initially formulated as Laws. The history of their development too is covered in parallel with that of the Laws, emphasizing their crucial role in licensing those inferences regarding forces from the observed motions.
Diversity of dormant and active zooplankton stages: spatial patterns across scales in temperate riverine floodplains
Authors: Chaparro Griselda , Mariani MatÍas , Hein Thomas
Published: December 2020

In dynamic systems, many species use dormancy as a strategy to survive harsh periods and disperse through time, a fundamental aspect scarcely explored in metacommunities studies. We compared spatial patterns of resting egg bank and active zooplankton diversity across scales (rotifers and cladocerans), explored relationships between diversity and environmental and spatial factors and compared their species composition in riverine floodplains of the Danube River. The egg bank was similarly or even more heterogeneous than the active communities, and signals of community homogenization detected for active communities were not observed for the egg bank. The strong relationships detected between rotifers egg bank diversity and local hydrological parameters suggest that floods would not weaken diversity–environment relationships, as observed for the active communities. These results imply that spatial patterns of resting and active stages are affected by different processes and that the egg bank would not contribute to the homogenizing tendencies observed for the active communities. Our study contributes to a more thorough understanding of zooplankton metacommunities in riverine floodplains and shows the need to further investigate the spatial and temporal patterns of the egg banks within the framework of metacommunities.
Do Infant Motor Skills Mediate the Association Between Positional Plagiocephaly/Brachycephaly and Cognition in School-Aged Children?
Authors: Collett Brent R , Wallace Erin R , Ola Cindy , Kartin Deborah , Cunningham Michael L , Speltz Matthew L
Published: December 2020

Objective

Positional plagiocephaly/brachycephaly (PPB) is associated with lower cognitive scores in school-aged children. This study tested the hypothesis that infant motor skills mediate this association.

Methods

Children with a history of PPB (cases, n = 187) and without PPB (controls, n = 149) were followed from infancy through approximately 9 years of age. Infant motor skills were assessed using the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development, 3rd edition (Bayley-3), and cognition was assessed using the Differential Ability Scales, 2nd edition (DAS-2). The Bayley-3 motor composite was examined as a mediator of the association between PPB and DAS-2 general cognitive ability (GCA) scores. In secondary analyses, mediation models were examined for the DAS-2 verbal ability, nonverbal ability, and working memory scores; models using the Bayley-3 fine versus gross motor scores also were examined.

Results

Cases scored lower than controls on the DAS-GCA (β = −4.6; 95% CI = −7.2 to −2.0), with an indirect (mediated) effect of β = −1.5 (95% CI = −2.6 to −0.4) and direct effect of β = −3.1 (95% CI = −5.7 to −0.5). Infant motor skills accounted for approximately 33% of the case–control difference in DAS-2 GCA scores. Results were similar for other DAS-2 outcomes. Evidence of mediation was greater for Bayley-3 gross motor versus fine motor scores.

Conclusion

Infant motor skills partially mediate the association between PPB and cognition in school-aged children. Monitoring motor development and providing intervention as needed may help offset associated developmental concerns for children with PPB.

Impact

To our knowledge, this study is the first longitudinal investigation of the development of children with and without PPB from infancy through the early school years and the first to examine motor skills as a mediator of cognitive outcomes in this population. The findings highlight the importance of early motor skills for other developmental outcomes.

Lay Summary

Infants’ motor skills are related to the development of PPB and its association with later cognition. If your child has PPB, physical therapists may have an important role in assessing and providing treatment to promote motor development.
Effects of Trigger Point Dry Needling for Nontraumatic Shoulder Pain of Musculoskeletal Origin: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis
Authors: Navarro-Santana Marcos J , Gómez-Chiguano Guido F , Cleland Joshua A , Arias-Buría Jose L , Fernández-de-las-Peñas César , Plaza-Manzano Gustavo
Published: December 2020

Objective

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of trigger point (TrP) dry needling alone or as an adjunct to other interventions on pain intensity and related disability in nontraumatic shoulder pain.

Methods

Ten databases were searched from inception to January 2020 for randomized clinical trials in which at least 1 group received TrP dry needling for shoulder pain of musculoskeletal origin with outcomes collected on pain intensity and related disability. Data extraction including participant and therapist details, interventions, blinding strategy, blinding assessment outcomes, and results were extracted by 2 reviewers. The risk of bias (Cochrane Risk of Bias, Cochrane Guidelines), methodological quality (Physiotherapy Evidence Database score), and evidence level (Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation approach) were assessed. The search identified 551 publications with 6 trials eligible for inclusion.

Results

There was moderate-quality evidence that TrP dry needling reduces shoulder pain intensity with a small effect (mean difference = −0.49 points, 95% CI = −0.84 to −0.13; standardized mean difference = −0.25, 95% CI = −0.42 to −0.09) and low-quality evidence that TrP dry needling improves related disability with a large effect (mean difference = −9.99 points, 95% CI −15.97 to −4.01; standardized mean difference = −1.14, 95% CI −1.81 to −0.47) compared with a comparison group. The effects on pain were only found at short term. The Cochrane Risk of Bias was generally low, but the heterogenicity of the results downgraded the evidence level.

Conclusion

Moderate- to low-quality evidence suggests positive effects of TrP dry needling for pain intensity (small effect) and pain-related disability (large effect) in nontraumatic shoulder pain of musculoskeletal origin, mostly at short term. Future clinical trials investigating long-term effects are needed.

Impact

Dry needling is commonly used for the management of musculoskeletal pain. This is the first meta-analysis to examine the effects of dry needling on nontraumatic shoulder pain.
Urinary Incontinence in People Referred for Pulmonary Rehabilitation: An Undisclosed Issue but a Real Problem
Authors: Bocquet Léna , Gravier Francis-Edouard , Smondack Pauline , Prieur Guillaume , Combret Yann , Muir Jean-François , Cuvelier Antoine , Boujibar Fairuz , Medrinal Clément , Bonnevie Tristan
Published: December 2020

Pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) is an evidence-based intervention to manage symptoms related to chronic obstructive respiratory diseases (CORD). Paradoxically, few people with CORD actually engage in PR, and of those, up to one-third do not complete the program. Additionally, some of those who complete the program do not achieve worthwhile benefits. Therefore, the main challenge for the next decades is to offer PR to as many people (that would potentially benefit from it) as possible. This raises questions about factors influencing participation, completion, and responsiveness to PR programs. Among these factors, urinary incontinence (UI) is highly prevalent among people with CORD (much more than in the general population) and may worsen during PR exercise sessions. Paradoxically, UI is poorly explored in routine and scarcely assessed in research, and none of the actual guidelines about PR mention it. However, its potential influence on engagement, completion, and response to PR is of real concern. Therefore, the aim of this perspective is to describe the mechanisms of UI, particularly in the context of CORD, as well as to highlight its prevalence among people with CORD, their burden, and how it could affect a PR approach based on sustained and regular physical activity.
The Impact of Regional and National Leaders in Subnational Elections in Spain: Evidence from Andalusian Regional Elections
Authors: Ortega Carmen , Recuero Fátima , Trujillo José Manuel , Oñate Pablo
Published: December 2020

Democracies have experienced two trends in the last decades: the growing personalization of politics and the increasing relevance of regions in the political process. This article addresses these trends by posing two questions: Do political leaders influence the vote in regional elections? Do regional party leaders have a larger impact on voter preferences than their national counterparts in regional elections? To answer these questions, we analyzed five regional elections held in Andalusia between 2004 and 2018. The results show that both national and regional leaders matter in regional elections. However, the effect of national and regional leaders is “conditioned” by the characteristics of the leaders themselves, their respective parties, and citizens’ party attachments. Additionally, there is no clear evidence that the type of relationship between national and regional leaders of the same party—cohesion-like or confrontation-like—and the electoral context variables may affect the voting decision in multi-level government systems.
Shareholder Perks and Firm Value
Authors: Karpoff Jonathan M , Schonlau Robert , Suzuki Katsushi
Published: December 2020

Shareholder perks are in-kind gifts or purchase discounts that disproportionately reward small shareholders. Data from Japanese firms indicate that firms initiating perk programs attract individual retail shareholders and experience increases in share values. We find support for three channels by which perks increase firm value: an increase in share liquidity, a decrease in the equity cost of capital, and signaling to investors. A fourth channel, by which perks help to market the firm’s products to consumers, receives mixed support. We do not find evidence that perk programs work to entrench managers.
Changes in the pharmacological management of rheumatoid arthritis over two decades
Authors: Crossfield Samantha S R , Buch Maya H , Baxter Paul , Kingsbury Sarah R , Pujades-Rodriguez Mar , Conaghan Philip G
Published: December 2020

Objectives

To assess whether modern management of RA has reduced the prescription of oral corticosteroids and NSAIDs and to evaluate use of pharmacological prophylaxis strategies.

Methods

Using the Clinical Practice Research Datalink, we explored long-term (≥3/12 months; ≥6/12 in sub-analyses) DMARD, corticosteroid and NSAID prescribing (annually, in the year post-diagnosis and across the patient’s life course to 15 years post-diagnosis), annual proportion with co-prescribing for prophylaxis of associated bone (corticosteroids, women only) and gastrointestinal (NSAIDs) comorbidity.

Results

Reported incidence of RA was 5.98 (0.37) per 10 000 person-years and prevalence was 0.91% (0.014) in 2017. In 71 411 RA patients, long-term DMARD prescribing initially rose post-diagnosis from 41.6% in 1998 to 67.9% in 2009. Corticosteroid prescribing changed little, overall [22.2% in 1998, 19.1% in 2016; incident risk ratio (IRR) 0.92, 95% CI: 0.82, 1.03] and across the life course from the first to fifteenth year (22.2% to 16.9%). NSAID prescribing declined from 57.7% in 1998, and significantly so from 2008, to 27.1% in 2016 (IRR 0.50, 95% CI: 0.44, 0.56). This continued across the life course (41.2% to 28.4%). Bone prophylaxis increased to 68.1% in 2008 before declining to 56.4% in 2017; gastrointestinal prophylaxis increased from 11.5% in 1998 to 62.6% in 2017. Sub-analyses showed consistent patterns.

Conclusion

Despite modern treatment strategies, corticosteroid prescribing in RA patients remains substantial and persists beyond 6 months once initiated. Rheumatologists need to determine causes and develop strategies to reduce corticosteroid use to minimize adverse event occurrence.
Hippocampal subfield alterations in pediatric patients with post-traumatic stress disorder
Authors: Li Lei , Pan Nanfang , Zhang Lianqing , Lui Su , Huang Xiaoqi , Xu Xin , Wang Song , Lei Du , Li Lingjiang , Kemp Graham J , Gong Qiyong
Published: December 2020

The hippocampus, a key structure with distinct subfield functions, is strongly implicated in the pathophysiology of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); however, few studies of hippocampus subfields in PTSD have focused on pediatric patients. We therefore investigated the hippocampal subfield volume using an automated segmentation method and explored the subfield-centered functional connectivity aberrations related to the anatomical changes, in a homogenous population of traumatized children with and without PTSD. To investigate the potential diagnostic value in individual patients, we used a machine learning approach to identify features with significant discriminative power for diagnosis of PTSD using random forest classifiers. Compared to controls, we found significant mean volume reductions of 8.4% and 9.7% in the right presubiculum and hippocampal tail in patients, respectively. These two subfields’ volumes were the most significant contributors to group discrimination, with a mean classification accuracy of 69% and a specificity of 81%. These anatomical alterations, along with the altered functional connectivity between (pre)subiculum and inferior frontal gyrus, may underlie deficits in fear circuitry leading to dysfunction of fear extinction and episodic memory, causally important in post-traumatic symptoms such as hypervigilance and re-experience. For the first time, we suggest that hippocampal subfield volumes might be useful in discriminating traumatized children with and without PTSD.
The Role of Ascospores and Conidia, in Relation to Weather Variables, in the Epidemiology of Stemphylium Leaf Blight of Onion
Authors: Gossen Bruce D. , Tayviah C. Selasi , McDonald Mary Ruth
Published: December 2020

Stemphylium leaf blight (SLB), caused by Stemphylium vesicarium, is an important foliar disease of onion in northeastern North America. The pathogen produces conidia and ascospores, but the relative contributions of these spore types to epidemics in onion is not known. Determining the abundance of ascospores and conidia during the growing season could contribute to a disease forecasting model. Airborne ascospores and conidia of S. vesicarium were trapped during the growing season of 2015 and 2016 at an onion trial in southern Ontario, Canada, using a Burkard 7-day volumetric sampler. Meteorological data were recorded hourly. Ascospore numbers peaked before the crop was planted and declined rapidly with time and at daily mean air temperatures >15°C. Conidia were present throughout the growing season and appear to be closely related to the development of SLB on onion. Daily spore concentrations were variable, but 59 to 73% of ascospores and approximately 60% of conidia were captured between 0600 and 1200 h. Spore concentrations increased 24 to 72 h after rainfall and precipitation and leaf wetness duration were consistently and positively associated with increases in numbers of conidia and subsequent SLB incidence. The first symptoms of SLB coincided with high numbers of conidia, rainfall, leaf wetness duration ≥8 h, and days with average daily temperature ≥18°C. The number of airborne ascospores was very low by the time SLB symptoms were observed. Ascospores may initiate infection on alternative hosts in early spring, while conidia are the most important inoculum for the epidemic on onions.
Detection of Diverse Maize Chlorotic Mottle Virus Isolates in Maize Seed
Authors: Bernardo Pauline , Frey Timothy S. , Barriball Kelly , Paul Pierce A. , Willie Kristen , Mezzalama Monica , Kimani Esther , Mugambi Cyrus , Wangai Anne , Prasanna Boddupalli M. , Redinbaugh Margaret G.
Published: December 2020

Maize chlorotic mottle virus (MCMV) has driven the emergence of maize lethal necrosis worldwide, where it threatens maize production in areas of East Africa, South America, and Asia. It is thought that MCMV transmission through seed may be important for introduction of the virus in new regions. Identification of infested seed lots is critical for preventing the spread of MCMV through seed. Although methods for detecting MCMV in leaf tissue are available, diagnostic methods for its detection in seed lots are lacking. In this study, ELISA, RT-PCR, and RT-qPCR were adapted for detection of MCMV in maize seed. Purified virions of MCMV isolates from Kansas, Mexico, and Kenya were then used to determine the virus detection thresholds for each diagnostic assay. No substantial differences in response were detected among the isolates in any of the three assays. The RT-PCR and a SYBR Green-based RT-qPCR assays were >3,000 times more sensitive than commercial ELISA for MCMV detection. For ELISA using seed extracts, selection of positive and negative controls was critical, most likely because of relatively high backgrounds. Use of seed soak solutions in ELISA detected MCMV with similar sensitivity to seed extracts, produced minimal background, and required substantially less labor. ELISA and RT-PCR were both effective for detecting MCMV in seed lots from Hawaii and Kenya, with ELISA providing a reliable and inexpensive diagnostic assay that could be implemented routinely in seed testing facilities.

[Formula: see text] Copyright © 2021 The Author(s). This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY 4.0 International license .
Natamycin, a Biofungicide for Managing Major Postharvest Fruit Decays of Citrus
Authors: Chen Daniel , Förster Helga , Adaskaveg James E.
Published: December 2020

The antifungal polyene macrolide natamycin was evaluated as a postharvest biopesticide for citrus fruit. Aqueous spray applications with 1,000 µg/ml were moderately to highly effective against green mold incidence after inoculation but did not reduce sporulation of Penicillium digitatum on infected fruit. Treatments with natamycin were significantly more effective against green mold on grapefruit and lemon than on orange and mandarin, with 92.9, 88.5, 57.5, and 60.9% reductions in decay, respectively, as compared with the control. The biofungicide was compatible with a storage fruit coating but was less effective when applied in a packing coating. However, when either fruit coating was applied following an aqueous natamycin treatment (i.e., staged applications), the incidence of decay was reduced to ≤10.7% as compared with the untreated control (with 81.9%). The incidence of sour rot of lemon and mandarin was also significantly reduced from the untreated control by natamycin (1,000 µg/ml) but propiconazole (540 µg/ml) and propiconazole + natamycin (540 + 500 µg/ml) mixtures generally were significantly more effective than natamycin alone when using a severe inoculation procedure. Experimental and commercial packingline studies demonstrated that natamycin-fludioxonil or natamycin-propiconazole mixtures applied in a storage fruit coating or as an aqueous flooder treatment were highly effective and typically resulted in a >85.0% reduction of green mold and sour rot. Resistance to natamycin has never been documented in filamentous fungi. Thus, the use of natamycin, in contrast to other registered postharvest fungicides for citrus, can be an antiresistance strategy and an effective treatment in mixtures with other fungicides for the management of major postharvest decays of citrus.
Host Gamma-Aminobutyric Acid Metabolic Pathway Is Involved in Resistance Against Rhizoctonia solani
Authors: Rani Mamta , Jha Gopaljee
Published: December 2020

Rhizoctonia solani is a highly destructive necrotrophic fungal pathogen having a diverse host range, including rice and tomato. Previously R. solani infection has been found to cause large-scale readjustment in host primary metabolism and accumulation of various stress-associated metabolites such as gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA) in rice. In this study, we report upregulation of GABA pathway genes during pathogenesis of R. solani in rice and tomato. The exogenous application of GABA provided partial resistance against R. solani infection in both the hosts. Furthermore, by using the virus-induced gene silencing approach, we knocked down the expression of some of the tomato genes involved in GABA biosynthesis (glutamate decarboxylase) and GABA catabolism (GABA-transaminase and succinic semialdehyde dehydrogenase) to study their role in host defense against R. solani infection. The silencing of each of these genes increased disease susceptibility in tomato. Overall the results from gene expression analysis, exogenous chemical application, and gene silencing studies suggest that the GABA pathway plays a positive role in plant defense against necrotrophic pathogen R. solani.
Use of Electronic Health Record Data to Estimate the Probability of Alcohol Withdrawal Syndrome in a National Cohort of Hospitalized Veterans
Authors: Steel Tessa L. , Malte Carol A. , Bradley Katharine A. , Hawkins Eric J.
Published: December 2020

Objectives:

Inpatient alcohol withdrawal syndrome (AWS) is common and early treatment improves outcomes, but no prior study has used electronic health record (EHR) data, available at admission, to predict the probability of inpatient AWS. This study estimated the probability of inpatient AWS using prior-year EHR data, hypothesizing that documented alcohol use disorder (AUD) and AWS would be strongly associated with inpatient AWS while exploring associations with other patient characteristics.

Methods:

The study investigated patients hospitalized ≥24 hours on medical services in the Veterans Health Administration during 2013 using EHR data extracted from the Veterans Health Administration Corporate Data Warehouse. ICD-9-CM diagnosis code, demographic, and healthcare utilization data documented in the year before admission defined prior-year AUD, AWS, and other factors associated with inpatient AWS. The primary outcome, inpatient AWS, was defined by inpatient ICD-9-CM codes.

Results:

The unadjusted probability of AWS was 5.0% (95% CI 4.5%–5.4%) among 209,151 medical inpatients overall, 26.4% (95% CI 24.4%–28.4%) among those with prior-year AUD, and 62.5% (95% CI 35.2%–39.7%) among those with prior-year AWS. Of those with AWS, 86% had documented prior-year AUD and/or AWS. Other patient characteristics associated with increased probability of inpatient AWS (P < 0.001) were: male sex, single relationship status, homelessness, seizure, and cirrhosis.

Conclusions:

Although inpatient providers often use history to predict AWS, this is the first study in hospitalized patients to inform and validate this practice, showing that prior-year diagnosis of AUD and/or AWS in particular, can identify the majority of inpatients who should be monitored for AWS.