bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Helping undocumented children in an emerging Latino community
Authors: Pesantes M. Amalia , Documet Patricia I.
Published: August 2017

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to describe and discuss the limitations of strategies that mothers of undocumented Latino children use in an emerging community to address the health needs of their children.

Design/methodology/approach

In-depth interviews with low-income immigrant mothers of undocumented Latino children (n=10) and social service providers (n=6). Interviews were transcribed, coded using Atlas-ti and analyzed to identify common perspectives on the strategies used to secure healthcare for uninsured undocumented children.

Findings

Mothers of undocumented Latino children struggle to secure healthcare for their children. Based on the principles of familismo and personalismo, they rely on social support networks such as friends, relatives and fellow churchgoers to secure information about available healthcare options. Despite the willingness of social and health service providers to help them access healthcare, options are limited and depend on the actions of individuals rather than organized solutions. Securing care for undocumented children using families, friends and sympathetic individual providers as the source of information and advice leads to fragile unsustainable solutions.

Research limitations/implications

This paper adds to the small yet growing literature of Latinos in emerging communities.

Practical implications

Emerging Latino communities are usually unprepared to welcome Latinos and address its various needs. Undocumented children are a particularly vulnerable group and any sustainable strategy to address their needs would require structural changes in existing health services to ensure that undocumented children’s lives are not affected by poor health.

Originality/value

Healthcare access problems for immigrant children are presented from the perspective of parents and offers a nuanced description of health systems unpreparedness to provide care for vulnerable groups whose immigrant status is poorly understood.
To what extent does need for touch affect online perceived quality?
Authors: San-Martín Sonia , González-Benito Óscar , Martos-Partal Mercedes
Published: August 2017

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to address the potential impact of need for touch (NFT) on perceived product quality and the possible roles of purchasers’ social (subjective norms), personal (buying impulsiveness) and epistemic (e-commerce orientation) factors, as well as the likely interaction effect of the shopping channel.

Design/methodology/approach

The empirical study is based on 540 observations, analysed in a partial least squares structural equation model.

Findings

The link between the NFT and perceived quality tends to be negative, especially for online purchases. E-commerce orientation reduces the need to touch products, but subjective norms and buying impulsiveness have no significant effects.

Research limitations/implications

The NFT scale might be improved by adding more items. Some of the structural model coefficients indicate a low effect size. Finally, the results are limited to Spanish purchasers of the focal product.

Practical implications

Firms should appeal to purchasers’ e-commerce orientation to reduce the negative implications of a need to touch products among consumers shopping online.

Originality/value

The need to touch a product may be an obstacle to online purchases, yet few studies deal with its impact in online, relative to offline, contexts to evaluate product quality. This study also integrates personal, social and epistemic factors.
Development of a scale measuring the psychic income associated with hosting the Olympic Games
Authors: Liu Dongfeng
Published: August 2017

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to develop a scale to measure the legacy of psychic income associated with the Olympic Games.

Design/methodology/approach

Using the 2008 Beijing Games as an example, data were collected from Beijing residents through structured questionnaires. A scale of measuring psychic income (SPI) was developed through conducting a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) based on a sample of 375.

Findings

In the CFA estimation, a seven-factor SPI was identified with 24 pertinent items retained. This seven-factor model displays good fit to the data, construct validity, and reliability.

Originality/value

Despite the importance of psychic income widely recognized in the existing literature, there has been a lack of valid scales to measure major sports events psychic income in general and Olympic psychic income in particular. This paper develops a multidimensional scale from the host community perspective, which can provide academics and local organizers with a reliable and valid tool to assess Olympic psychic income.
Layout optimization of a robotic cell for foundry application by CAD based point cloud modeling – a case study
Authors: Sharma Ankit , Jha A.K. , Halder Arpan
Published: August 2017

Purpose

In an industrial robotic cell, the optimal layout planning problem needs critical analysis, as it indirectly affects the manufacturing time and cost involved in the production process. This paper aims to propose a generic three-step robotic cell layout planning method and aims to enhance the adaptability of robotic manufacturing cell in small-scale industries.

Design/methodology/approach

The method uses the data generated from the point cloud modeling and simulation of the objects (machines and robot) to optimize their positions and orientations in the cell. The simulated annealing algorithm has been used to solve the optimization problem with minimum joint displacement criterion. This approach is critically analyzed and discussed against the data collected from an industrial robotic cell in a foundry shop of a pipe manufacturing industry.

Findings

More than 50 per cent reduction in the net joint movement of the robot has been achieved. Immediate feedback of the results by a three-dimensional view of the optimal cell layout without using any commercial robotic simulation package.

Originality/value

The layout optimization of an industrial robotic cell based on the point cloud modeling of its objects is the novelty of the method.
Integration of fault tree analysis, reliability block diagram and hazard decision tree for industrial robot reliability evaluation
Authors: Fazlollahtabar Hamed , Akhavan Niaki Seyed Taghi
Published: August 2017

Purpose

This paper aims to conduct a comprehensive fault tree analysis (FTA) on the critical components of industrial robots. This analysis is integrated with the reliability block diagram (RBD) approach to investigate the robot system reliability.

Design/methodology/approach

For practical implementation, a particular autonomous guided vehicle (AGV) system was first modeled. Then, FTA was adopted to model the causes of failures, enabling the probability of success to be determined. In addition, RBD was used to simplify the complex system of the AGV for reliability evaluation purpose.

Findings

Hazard decision tree (HDT) was configured to compute the hazards of each component and the whole AGV robot system. Through this research, a promising technical approach was established, allowing decision-makers to identify the critical components of AGVs along with their crucial hazard phases at the design stage.

Originality/value

As complex systems have become global and essential in today’s society, their reliable design and determination of their availability have turned into very important tasks for managers and engineers. Industrial robots are examples of these complex systems that are being increasingly used for intelligent transportation, production and distribution of materials in warehouses and automated production lines.
The vibratory alignment of the parts in robotic assembly
Authors: Baksys Bronius , Baskutiene Jolanta , Baskutis Saulius
Published: August 2017

Purpose

This paper aims to consider the experimental and theoretical investigation of the vibratory alignment of the peg-hole, when the peg is fixed in the remote centre compliance (RCC) device, and the vibrations are provided either to the hole or to the peg.

Design/methodology/approach

The experimental analysis of the circular and rectangular peg-hole vibratory alignment using the attached to the robot arm RCC device, under vibratory excitation of the hole, has been performed. The parameters of the vibratory excitation and the part-to-part pressing force influence on the alignment process have been analysed. The mathematical approach of the vibratory alignment using the passive compliance device with the vibrations provided to the peg has been proposed, and the simulation has been carried out.

Findings

The research has approved the applicability of the RCC device for both of the vibratory alignments of the non-chamfered peg-hole parts either circular or rectangular ones. The compensation of the axial misalignments has been resulted by the directional displacement of the peg supported compliantly. To perform the successful alignment of the parts, it has been necessary to adjust the frequency and the amplitude of the vibrations, the pressing force, the lateral, as well as the angular stiffness of the device.

Research limitations/implications

The experiments on the vibratory alignment of the rectangular peg-hole parts have been carried out considering only the translational misalignment moved into one direction. The non-impact regime of the vibratory alignment has been analysed.

Practical implications

The obtained results can be applied in designing the reliable and efficient devices of the vibratory assembly for the alignment of the non-chamfered peg-hole parts, as well as for chamfered ones, if the axial misalignment exceeds the width of the chamfer. The vibratory technique and passive compliance provide possibility to accomplish the assembly operations using the non-expensive low accuracy robots.

Originality/value

The new method and the mathematical approach of the vibratory assembly using the RCC device can ensure the reliable alignment of the non-chamfered parts, chamfered circular and the rectangular ones, in case the axial misalignment exceeds the assembly clearance, and prevent jamming and wedging.
Comparative study between IFRS and AAOIFI disclosure compliance
Authors: Ajili Hana , Bouri Abdelfettah
Published: August 2017

Purpose

This study measures and compares the level of compliance with the disclosure requirements provided by the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and the Accounting and Auditing Organization for Islamic Financial Institutions (AAOIFI). This study also aims to investigate the factors associated with this compliance in a sample of Islamic banks (IBs) in Gulf Cooperation Council member states.

Design/methodology/approach

The sample consists of 39 IBs between 2010 and 2014. Among the selected IBs, 23 banks were complying with the AAOIFI standards and 16 banks were complying with the IFRS standards. An unweighted disclosure index was used to measure the level of compliance with IFRS/AAOIFI disclosure requirements.

Findings

It was found that the level of compliance with IFRS is higher than that of compliance with AAOIFI. In addition, the results reveal that compliance with IFRS/AAOIFI disclosure requirements is higher for larger and older IBs. Finally, it was observed that compliance was more noticeable for IBs having a higher leverage and multinational subsidiaries.

Originality value

These findings would be of great help to regulators and policymakers to better understand the accounting disclosure practices of IBs.
Legitimacy of the Summer 2017 GCC crisis and Qatar’s AML framework
Authors: Naheem Mohammed Ahmad
Published: August 2017

Purpose

In June 2017, members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) ended diplomatic ties with Qatar. There is a legitimate concern about the accusation levied on Qatar. This paper aims to analyse the progress Qatar’s financial system has made with respect to its anti-money laundering (AML) and counter-terrorist financing (CFT) regulations, which further serves as the country’s effort to combating the financing of terrorism (CTF). The paper further wishes to advance the discussion by considering the legitimate goals of the aforementioned bodies and their discourse on creating national and international obligations towards reducing terrorist financing through robust AML frameworks.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper analyses Qatar’s legislative and regulatory overhaul following the Financial Action Task Force’s Mutual Evaluation Report. Qatar had distinctively strengthened its approach against Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing. The paper takes an ex ante approach by understanding Qatar’s “strategic deficiencies” before the FATF’s mutual evaluation. Subsequently, the paper studies independent international evaluations of Qatar’s AML/CTF legislation and regulation.

Findings

The paper finds Qatar in significant compliance to the recommendations of the various international bodies, including the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), Basel AML Index, IMF’s financial sector reviews, United Nations and independent reports on AML progress from regulatory bodies around the world. None of these organizations present obligatory rules but have set and determined and international standard for AML/CTF laws.

Originality/value

The primary aim is to draw parallels between Qatar’s regulatory AML and CTF efforts through the country’s compliance with international initiatives, such as the FATF guidelines, Basel AML Index, IMF’s financial sector reviews, United Nations and independent reports on AML progress from regulatory bodies around the world.
Implications of forfeiting property in money laundering cases in Malaysia
Authors: Hamin Zaiton , Omar Normah , Abdul Hakim Muhammad Muaz
Published: August 2017

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to examine the broad concept of forfeiture, its legal positions in the UK and Malaysia, and to highlight the implications of such forfeiture systems and legislations.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper uses a doctrinal legal analysis and secondary data, which analyses primary sources, the POCA (2002) and the AMLATFA 2001, and secondary sources including case law, articles in academic journals, books and online databases.

Findings

The authors contend that the civil forfeiture system and law have far-reaching implications, affecting not only law enforcement agencies, but also on property owners, the courts and bona fide third parties. Also, civil forfeiture law as contained in AMLATFA 2001 represents one of the most serious encroachments on private property rights. Not only that, such a legal rule has made property, and not the owner, guilty until proven innocent.

Originality/value

This paper could be a useful source of information for practitioners, academicians and students. It could also be a beneficial guide for policymakers for any possible future amendments to the law.
Characterization of H5N6 highly pathogenic avian influenza viruses isolated from wild and captive birds in the winter season of 2016–2017 in Northern Japan
Authors: Hiono Takahiro , Okamatsu Masatoshi , Matsuno Keita , Haga Atsushi , Iwata Ritsuko , Nguyen Lam Thanh , Suzuki Mizuho , Kikutani Yuto , Kida Hiroshi , Onuma Manabu , Sakoda Yoshihiro
Published: August 2017

On 15 November 2016, a black swan that had died in a zoo in Akita prefecture, northern Japan, was strongly suspected to have highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI); an HPAI virus (HPAIV) belonging to the H5N6 subtype was isolated from specimens taken from the bird. After the initial report, 230 cases of HPAI caused by H5N6 viruses from wild birds, captive birds, and domestic poultry farms were reported throughout the country during the winter season. In the present study, 66 H5N6 HPAIVs isolated from northern Japan were further characterized. Phylogenetic analysis of the hemagglutinin gene showed that the H5N6 viruses isolated in northern Japan clustered into Group C of Clade 2.3.4.4 together with other isolates collected in Japan, Korea and Taiwan during the winter season of 2016–2017. The antigenicity of the Japanese H5N6 isolate differed slightly from that of HPAIVs isolated previously in Japan and China. The virus exhibited high pathogenicity and a high replication capacity in chickens, whereas virus growth was slightly lower in ducks compared with that of an H5N8 HPAIV isolate collected in Japan in 2014. Comprehensive analyses of Japanese isolates, including those from central, western, and southern Japan, as well as rapid publication of this information are essential for facilitating greater control of HPAIVs.
Soil fertility and species traits, but not diversity, drive productivity and biomass stocks in a Guyanese tropical rainforest
Authors: van der Sande Masha T. , Arets Eric J. M. M. , Peña‐Claros Marielos , Hoosbeek Marcel R. , Cáceres‐Siani Yasmani , van der Hout Peter , Poorter Lourens
Published: August 2017

Tropical forests store and sequester large amounts of carbon in above‐ and below‐ground plant biomass and soil organic matter (SOM), but how these are driven by abiotic and biotic factors remains poorly understood.

Here, we test the effects of abiotic factors (light variation, caused by logging disturbance, and soil fertility) and biotic factors (species richness and functional trait composition) on biomass stocks (above‐ground biomass, fine root biomass), SOM and productivity in a relatively monodominant Guyanese tropical rainforest. This forest grows on nutrient‐poor soils and has few species that contribute most to total abundance. We, therefore, expected strong effects of soil fertility and species’ traits that determine resource acquisition and conservation, but not of diversity. We evaluated 6 years of data for 30 0.4‐ha plots and tested hypotheses using structural equation models.

Disturbance increased productivity but decreased above‐ground biomass stocks. Soil phosphorus (P) enhanced above‐ground biomass and productivity, whereas soil nitrogen reduced fine root biomass. In contrast to expectations, trait values representing acquisitive strategies (e.g. high leaf nutrient concentration) increased biomass stocks, possibly because they indicate higher nutrient absorption and thus higher biomass build‐up. However, under harsh conditions where biomass increase is slow, acquisitive trait values may increase respiration and vulnerability to hazards and therefore increase biomass loss. As expected, species richness did not affect productivity.

We conclude that light availability (through disturbance) and soil fertility—especially P—strongly limit forest biomass productivity and stocks in this Guyanese forest. Low P availability may cause strong environmental filtering, which in turn results in a small set of dominant species. As a result, community trait composition but not species richness determines productivity and stocks of biomass and SOM in tropical forest on poor soils.

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Sexual selection on male body size, genital length and heterozygosity: Consistency across habitats and social settings
Authors: Head Megan L. , Kahn Andrew T. , Henshaw Jonathan M. , Keogh J. Scott , Jennions Michael D.
Published: August 2017

Spatial and temporal variation in environmental factors and the social setting can help to maintain genetic variation in sexually selected traits if it affects the strength of directional selection. A key social parameter which affects the intensity of, and sometimes predicts the response to, mating competition is the operational sex ratio (OSR; ratio of receptive males to females).

How the OSR affects selection for specific male traits is poorly understood. It is also unclear how sexual selection is affected by interactions between the OSR and environmental factors, such as habitat complexity, that alter key male–female interactions such as mate encounter rates.

Here, we experimentally manipulated the OSR and habitat complexity and quantified sexual selection on male mosquitofish (Gambusia holbrooki) by directly measuring male reproductive success (i.e. paternity).

We show that despite a more equitable sharing of paternity (i.e. higher levels of multiple paternity) under a male‐biased OSR, selection on focal male traits was unaffected by the OSR or habitat complexity. Instead, sexual selection consistently, and significantly, favoured smaller bodied males, males with higher genome wide heterozygosity (based on >3,000 SNP markers) and males with a relatively long gonopodium (intromittent organ).

Our results show that sexual selection on male body size, relative genital size and heterozygosity in this system is consistent across environments that vary in ecological parameters that are expected to influence mate encounter rates.
Wildlife disease ecology from the individual to the population: Insights from a long‐term study of a naturally infected European badger population
Authors: McDonald Jenni L. , Robertson Andrew , Silk Matthew J.
Published: August 2017

Long‐term individual‐based datasets on host–pathogen systems are a rare and valuable resource for understanding the infectious disease dynamics in wildlife. A study of European badgers (Meles meles) naturally infected with bovine tuberculosis (bTB) at Woodchester Park in Gloucestershire (UK) has produced a unique dataset, facilitating investigation of a diverse range of epidemiological and ecological questions with implications for disease management.

Since the 1970s, this badger population has been monitored with a systematic mark–recapture regime yielding a dataset of >15,000 captures of >3,000 individuals, providing detailed individual life‐history, morphometric, genetic, reproductive and disease data.

The annual prevalence ofbTBin the Woodchester Park badger population exhibits no straightforward relationship with population density, and both the incidence and prevalence ofMycobacterium bovisshow marked variation in space. The study has revealed phenotypic traits that are critical for understanding the social structure of badger populations along with mechanisms vital for understanding disease spread at different spatial resolutions.

Woodchester‐based studies have provided key insights into how host ecology can influence infection at different spatial and temporal scales. Specifically, it has revealed heterogeneity in epidemiological parameters; intrinsic and extrinsic factors affecting population dynamics; provided insights into senescence and individual life histories; and revealed consistent individual variation in foraging patterns, refuge use and social interactions.

An improved understanding of ecological and epidemiological processes is imperative for effective disease management. Woodchester Park research has provided information of direct relevance tobTBmanagement, and a better appreciation of the role of individual heterogeneity in disease transmission can contribute further in this regard.

The Woodchester Park study system now offers a rare opportunity to seek a dynamic understanding of how individual‐, group‐ and population‐level processes interact. The wealth of existing data makes it possible to take a more integrative approach to examining how the consequences of individual heterogeneity scale to determine population‐level pathogen dynamics and help advance our understanding of the ecological drivers of host–pathogen systems.
Mammal‐induced trophic cascades in invertebrate food webs are modulated by grazing intensity in subalpine grassland
Authors: Vandegehuchte Martijn L. , Schütz Martin , de Schaetzen Frederic , Risch Anita C.
Published: August 2017

Even though mammalian herbivores can exert strong indirect effects on other animals by altering the vegetation, the study of trophic cascades retains a focus on apex predators and their top‐down forces. Bottom‐up trophic interaction chains induced by mammalian herbivores, particularly in invertebrate food webs, remain largely unexplored.

We tested whether effects of mammalian herbivores on the vegetation ricochet back up several trophic levels of the invertebrate food web. We further tested two alternative hypotheses: the strength of herbivore‐induced indirect interactions either increases with plant productivity because of a concurrent higher grazing intensity, or it decreases because of a higher plant tolerance to grazing.

We progressively excluded large, medium and small herbivorous mammals from replicated plots of 6 m2 in productive, intensively grazed short‐grass vegetation and less productive, less intensively grazed tall‐grass vegetation of subalpine grasslands. We measured vegetation quantity, quality, structure and composition, and determined the abundance of invertebrate herbivores, detritivores, omnivores and predators. We used structural equation modelling to test vegetation‐mediated cascading effects of the different mammalian herbivores across different trophic groups of invertebrates.

In the short‐grass vegetation, mammals caused changes in vegetation quantity and thickness. These changes directly affected detritivorous and predatory invertebrate abundance, yet indirectly affected predatory and omnivorous invertebrates through a bottom‐up trophic cascade via changes in herbivorous invertebrate abundance. In the tall‐grass vegetation, mammal‐induced changes in vegetation quality and composition affected detritivorous invertebrates and in turn omnivorous invertebrates, but these cascading effects were weaker than those in the short‐grass vegetation. Smaller mammals were at least as important as large mammals in structuring the invertebrate food web.

Our results demonstrate that differently sized mammalian herbivores can trigger trophic cascades in the local invertebrate food web. Our findings further support the hypothesis that herbivore‐induced indirect interactions are stronger in more productive systems because of higher foraging intensity, as opposed to the hypothesis that a higher grazing tolerance of plants should dampen herbivore‐induced indirect interactions in productive systems.
Celecoxib inhibits osteoblast differentiation independent of cyclooxygenase activity
Authors: Matsuyama Atsushi , Higashi Sen , Tanizaki Saori , Morotomi Takahiko , Washio Ayako , Ohsumi Tomoko , Kitamura Chiaki , Takeuchi Hiroshi
Published: August 2017

Non‐steroidal anti‐inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) exert their effects primarily by inhibiting the activity of cyclooxygenase (COX), thus suppressing prostaglandin synthesis. Some NSAIDs are known to perform functions other than pain control, such as suppressing tumour cell growth, independent of their COX‐inhibiting activity. To identify NSAIDs with COX‐independent activity, we examined various NSAIDs for their ability to inhibit osteoblastic differentiation using the mouse pre‐osteoblast cell line MC3T3‐E1. Only celecoxib and valdecoxib strongly inhibited osteoblastic differentiation, and this effect was not correlated with COX‐inhibiting activity. Moreover, 2,5‐dimethyl (DM)‐celecoxib, a celecoxib analogue that does not inhibit COX activity, also inhibited osteoblastic differentiation. Celecoxib and DM‐celecoxib inhibited osteoblastic differentiation induced by bone morphogenetic protein (BMP)‐2 in C2C12 mouse myoblast cell line. Although celecoxib suppresses the growth of some tumour cells, the viability and proliferation of MC3T3‐E1 cells were not affected by celecoxib or DM‐celecoxib. Instead, celecoxib and DM‐celecoxib suppressed BMP‐2‐induced phosphorylation of Smad1/5, a major downstream target of BMP receptor. Although it is well known that COX plays important roles in osteoblastic differentiation, these results suggest that some NSAIDs, such as celecoxib, have targets other than COX and regulate phospho‐dependent intracellular signalling, thereby modifying bone remodelling.
Institutions and the Diversity and Prevalence of Multinationals’ Knowledge‐Augmenting Subsidiaries
Authors: Allen Matthew M. C. , Allen Maria L. , Lange Knut
Published: August 2017

Multinational corporations (MNCs) increasingly seek to gain access to, and exploit, locationally specific sources of advanced knowledge and technological capabilities, creating a need to explain (1) the diversity among these facilities and (2) how institutions influence MNCs’ abilities to invest in different subsidiary types. Extending debates on firms’ knowledge‐augmenting activities, the authors integrate institutions into their analytical framework to a greater extent than previous work has done. Moreover, existing contributions providetypologiesof R&D subsidiaries. In contrast, the authors focus on a particular subset of subsidiaries, knowledge‐augmenting ones, and put forward a theory to explain their variety and their prevalence, enabling them to identify previously neglected subsidiary types that have important managerial and policy implications. By downplaying the diversity of these subsidiaries, existing work has not been able to capture the full range of managerial challenges as well as the costs and benefits of different subsidiary types to host countries. The authors, therefore, problematize firms’ abilities to gain access to foreign knowledge‐generating assets, highlight the importance of institutional environments, provide policy recommendations and identify areas for future research.
The gas that fuels the engine: Individuals’ motivations for medicalisation
Authors: Bell Ann V.
Published: August 2017

It is well established that the drivers of medicalisation have shifted alongside changes in the institution of medicine. The process of medicalisation is no longer incited by macro processes of institutional prestige or control; rather, individual patients/consumers are pushing the process forward. The present study complicates this neat transition and examines the relationship between structure and agency using the case of assisted reproductive technology (ART), specifically the medicalisation of lesbian reproduction in the US. I explore individuals’ influence on and motivations towards medicalisation through 24 in‐depth interviews with women in same‐sex relationships who had ever attempted to become pregnant. In centring on their experiences, I find that while individual consumers may now propel medicalisation forward, oftentimes consumers’ motivations for doing so reside in the prestige and control of medicine. In other words, consumers now seek medicalisation precisely because of the process's previous institutional drivers. In exploring what fuels the engine of medicalisation, the findings reveal its nuance and complexity.
Re‐making the global economy of knowledge: do new fields of research change the structure of North–South relations?
Authors: Connell Raewyn , Pearse Rebecca , Collyer Fran , Maia João , Morrell Robert
Published: August 2017

How is global‐North predominance in the making of organized knowledge affected by the rise of new domains of research? This question is examined empirically in three interdisciplinary areas – climate change, HIV‐AIDS, and gender studies – through interviews with 70 researchers in Southern‐tier countries Brazil, South Africa and Australia. The study found that the centrality of the North was reinstituted as these domains came into existence, through resource inequalities, workforce mechanisms, and intellectual framing. Yet there are tensions in the global economy of knowledge, around workforce formation, hierarchies of disciplines, neoliberal management strategies, and mismatches with social need. Intellectual workers in the Southern tier have built significant research centres, workforces and some distinctive knowledge projects. These create wider possibilities of change in the global structure of organized knowledge production.
Social space and cultural class divisions: the forms of capital and contemporary lifestyle differentiation
Authors: Flemmen Magne , Jarness Vegard , Rosenlund Lennart
Published: August 2017

In this article, we address whether and how contemporary social classes are marked by distinct lifestyles. We assess the model of the social space, a novel approach to class analysis pioneered by Bourdieu's Distinction. Although pivotal in Bourdieu's work, this model is too often overlooked in later research, making its contemporary relevance difficult to assess. We redress this by using the social space as a framework through which to study the cultural manifestation of class divisions in lifestyle differences in contemporary Norwegian society. Through a Multiple Correspondence Analysis (MCA) of unusually rich survey data, we reveal a structure strikingly similar to the model in Distinction, with a primary dimension of the volume of capital, and a secondary dimension of the composition of capital. While avoiding the substantialist fallacy of predefined notions of ‘highbrow’ and ‘lowbrow’ tastes, we explore how 168 lifestyle items map onto this social space. This reveals distinct classed lifestyles according to both dimensions of the social space. The lifestyles of the upper classes are distinctly demanding in terms of resources. Among those rich in economic capital, this manifests itself in a lifestyle which involves a quest for excitement, and which is bodily oriented and expensive. For their counterparts rich in cultural capital, a more ascetic and intellectually oriented lifestyle manifests itself, demanding of resources in the sense of requiring symbolic mastery, combining a taste for canonized, legitimate culture with more cosmopolitan and ‘popular’ items. In contrast to many studies’ descriptions of the lower classes as ‘disengaged’ and ‘inactive’, we find evidence of distinct tastes on their part. Our analysis thus affirms the validity of Bourdieu's model of social class and the contention that classes tend to take the form of status groups. We challenge dominant positions in cultural stratification research, while questioning the aptness of the metaphor of the ‘omnivore’, as well as recent analyses of ‘emerging cultural capital’.
The Difficult Task of Diagnosing Prostate Cancer Metastases on Dry Bone
Authors: Castoldi Elisa , Cappella Annalisa , Gibelli Daniele , Sforza Chiarella , Cattaneo Cristina
Published: August 2017

The interpretation of pathology on skeletal remains is mandatory for implementing the biological profile and for disease recognition. Prostate cancer is one of the most common tumors, with a high preference for the skeleton as a primary site of metastasis. Its diagnosis on bone is however still ambiguous, due to its “osteoblastic” and resorptive manifestation. This study investigates distribution and appearance of prostate cancer metastases on dry bone on six known cases (selected from the Milano Cemetery Skeletal Collection) and one healthy individual. A macroscopic inspection was performed highlighting the abnormalities observed, describing location, shape, dimension, and aspect. A great amount of proliferative and mixed lesions was noticed, but also cases of pure lytic lesions were displayed. The multiple appearances of the manifestations observed display the difficulty in correctly identifying such a pathology, but also the potential and advantages provided by investigating a study sample with known antemortem history.
Lessons learnt from incidents involving the airway and breathing reported from Australasian emergency departments
Authors: Crock Carmel , Hansen Kim , Fogg Toby , Cahill Angela , Deakin Anita , Runciman William B
Published: August 2017

Objective

To review incident reports relating to problems encountered during the ED management of patients with ‘airway or breathing’ problems, with the aim of finding and highlighting common themes within these rare events, and making recommendations to further improve patient safety in the areas in which deficiencies have been identified.

Methods

Thematic analysis of 36 incidents reported from Australasian EDs, which were related to problems with airway and breathing.

Results

In all, 51 problems were identified among the 36 incidents related to airway and/or breathing. Fourteen involved clinical decision‐making, 11 equipment, nine communication, seven intubation, five surgical access and five pneumothorax. Eight incidents involved children and there were nine deaths within hours or days.

Conclusions

Recommendations for improving preparedness of ED staff and facilities have been made for each of the problem areas identified with respect to clinical practice, equipment, communication and clinical process. Analysis of incidents from the Australasian Emergency Medicine Events Register allows clusters of like‐events to be identified and characterised, providing the possibility of getting a better idea of how problems present and progress, with some information about contributing factors, characteristics and context. This will pave the way for earlier and better detection of life‐threatening problems and the development and reinforcement of preventive and corrective strategies.
Disentangling the role of management, vegetation structure, and plant quality for Orthoptera in lowland meadows
Authors: Schirmel Jens , Gerlach Rebekka , Buhk Constanze
Published: August 2017

Seminatural grasslands provide habitats for various species and are important for biodiversity conservation. The understanding of the diverse responses of species and traits to different grassland management methods is therefore urgently needed. We disentangled the role of grassland management (fertilization and irrigation), vegetation structure (biomass, sward height) and plant quality (protein and fiber content) for Orthoptera communities in lowland hay meadows in Germany. We found vegetation structure to be the most important environmental category in explaining community structure of Orthoptera (species richness, total individuals, functional diversity and species composition). Intensively used meadows (fertilized, irrigated, high plant biomass) were characterized by assemblages with few species, low functional diversity, and low conservation value. Thereby, the relatively moderate fertilizer inputs in our study system of up to ∼75 kg N/ha/year reduced functional diversity of Orthoptera, while this negative effect of fertilization was not detectable when solely considering taxonomic aspects. We found strong support for a prominent role of plant quality in shaping Orthoptera communities and especially the trait composition. Our findings demonstrate the usefulness of considering both taxonomic and functional components (functional diversity) in biodiversity research and we suggest a stronger involvement of plant quality measures in Orthoptera studies.
Assembly and RNA‐free annotation of highly heterozygous genomes: The case of the thick‐billed murre (Uria lomvia)
Authors: Tigano Anna , Sackton Timothy B. , Friesen Vicki L.
Published: August 2017

Thanks to a dramatic reduction in sequencing costs followed by a rapid development of bioinformatics tools, genome assembly and annotation have become accessible to many researchers in recent years. Among tetrapods, birds have genomes that display many features that facilitate their assembly and annotation, such as small genome size, low number of repeats and highly conserved genomic structure. However, we found that high genomic heterozygosity could have a great impact on the quality of the genome assembly of the thick‐billed murre (Uria lomvia), an arctic colonial seabird. In this study, we tested the performance of three genome assemblers, ray/sscape, soapdenovo2 and platanus, in assembling the highly heterozygous genome of the thick‐billed murre. Our results show that platanus, an assembler specifically designed for heterozygous genomes, outperforms the other two approaches and produces a highly contiguous (N50 = 15.8 Mb) and complete genome assembly (93% presence of genes from the Benchmarking Universal Single Copy Ortholog [BUSCO] gene set). Additionally, we annotated the thick‐billed murre genome using a homology‐based approach that takes advantage of the genomic resources available for birds and other taxa. Our study will be useful for those researchers who are approaching assembly and annotation of highly heterozygous genomes, or genomes of species of conservation concern, and/or who have limited financial resources.
A novel post hoc method for detecting index switching finds no evidence for increased switching on the Illumina HiSeq X
Authors: Owens Gregory L. , Todesco Marco , Drummond Emily B. M. , Yeaman Sam , Rieseberg Loren H.
Published: August 2017

High‐throughput sequencing using the Illumina HiSeq platform is a pervasive and critical molecular ecology resource, and has provided the data underlying many recent advances. A recent study has suggested that “index switching,” where reads are misattributed to the wrong sample, may be higher in new versions of the HiSeq platform. This has the potential to invalidate both published and in‐progress work across the field. Here, we test for evidence of index switching in an exemplar whole‐genome shotgun data set sequenced on both the Illumina HiSeq 2500, which should not have the problem, and the Illumina HiSeq X, which may. We leverage unbalanced heterozygotes, which may be produced by index switching, and ask whether the undersequenced allele is more likely to be found in other samples in the same lane than expected based on the allele frequency. Although we validate the sensitivity of this method using simulations, we find that neither the HiSeq 2500 nor the HiSeq X has evidence of index switching. This suggests that, thankfully, index switching may not be a ubiquitous problem in HiSeq X sequence data. Lastly, we provide scripts for applying our method so that index switching can be tested for in other data sets.
Quantifying and modelling decay in forecast proficiency indicates the limits of transferability in land‐cover classification
Authors: Gavish Yoni , O'Connell Jerome , Benton Tim G.
Published: August 2017

The ability to provide reliable projections for the current and future distribution of land‐cover is fundamental if we wish to protect and manage our diminishing natural resources. Two inter‐related revolutions make map productions feasible at unprecedented resolutions—the availability of high‐resolution remotely sensed data and the development of machine‐learning algorithms. However, ground‐truthed data needed for training models is in most cases spatially and temporally clustered. Therefore, map production requires extrapolation of models from one place to another and the uncertainty cost of such extrapolation is rarely explored. In other words, the focus has mainly been on projections, and less on quantifying their reliability.

Using the concept of “forecast horizon”, we suggest that the predictability of land‐cover classification models should be quantitatively explored as a continuum against distances measured along multiple dimensions—space, time, environmental and spectral. Focusing on ten agricultural sites from England and using models specifically designed to predict multivariate decay‐curves, we ask: how does a model's predictive performance decay with distance? More specifically, we explored if we could predict the proficiency (kappa statistics) of a model trained in one site when making predictions in another site based on the spatial, temporal, spectral and environmental distances between sites.

We found that model proficiency decays with distance between sites in each dimension. More importantly, we found for the first time, that it is possible to predict the performance a model transferred to or from a novel site will have, based on its distances from known sites. The spectral distance variables were the most important when predicting model transferability.

Exploring model transferability as a continuum may have multiple usages including predicting uncertainty values in space and time, prioritisation of strategies for ground‐truth data collection, and optimising model characteristics for defined tasks.
Single‐tube library preparation for degraded DNA
Authors: Carøe Christian , Gopalakrishnan Shyam , Vinner Lasse , Mak Sarah S. T. , Sinding Mikkel Holger S. , Samaniego José A. , Wales Nathan , Sicheritz‐Pontén Thomas , Gilbert M. Thomas P.
Published: August 2017

In recent years, massive parallel sequencing has revolutionised the study of degraded DNA, thus enabling the field of ancient DNA to evolve into that of paleogenomics. Despite these advances, the recovery and sequencing of degraded DNA remains challenging due to limitations in the manipulation of chemically damaged and highly fragmented DNA molecules. In particular, the enzymatic reactions and DNA purification steps during library preparation can result in DNA template loss and sequencing biases, affecting downstream analyses. The development of library preparation methods that circumvent these obstacles and enable higher throughput are therefore of interest to researchers working with degraded DNA.

In this study, we compare four Illumina library preparation protocols, including two “single‐tube” methods developed for this study with the explicit aim of improving data quality and reducing preparation time and expenses. The methods are tested on grey wolf (Canis lupus) museum specimens.

We found single‐tube protocols increase library complexity, yield more reads that map uniquely to the reference genome, reduce processing time, and may decrease laboratory costs by 90%.

Given the advantages of single‐tube library preparations, we anticipate these methods will be of considerable interest to the growing field of paleogenomics and other applications investigating degraded DNA.
Modelling unbiased dispersal kernels over continuous space by accounting for spatial heterogeneity in marking and observation efforts
Authors: Chadœuf Joël , Millon Alexandre , Bourrioux Jean‐Luc , Printemps Thierry , van Hecke Benoît , Lecoustre Vincent , Bretagnolle Vincent
Published: August 2017

Although a key demographic trait determining the spatial dynamics of wild populations, dispersal is notoriously difficult to estimate in the field. Indeed, dispersal distances obtained from the monitoring of marked individuals typically lead to biased estimations of dispersal kernels as a consequence of (i) restricted spatial scale of the study areas compared to species potential dispersal and (ii) heterogeneity in marking and observation efforts and therefore in detection probability across space.

Here, we propose a novel method to circumvent these issues that does not require data on observation effort per se, to correct for the variability in detection of marked individuals across space. Observed dispersal events were weighted by the distribution of departure points and an eroded spatial window approach was applied so as to deal with border effect. We conducted a set of simulations which indicated that our method was successful in correcting the effect of spatially heterogeneous detectability and produce unbiased dispersal kernels.

We applied this method to a real dataset on the Montagu's harrier (>5,000 chicks tagged), providingc. 6,000 resightings collected in entire France by a network of 1,200 volunteers within a citizen‐science programme. The median dispersal distance observed was 32 km (range: 0.1–627 km). Once corrected for spatial heterogeneity in marking and observation efforts and border effect, the modelled dispersal kernel indicated a median dispersal distance of 78–123 km depending on the spatial scale considered (constrained within French borders or not, respectively).

Synthesis and applications: The current rise of citizen‐science programmes is likely to stretch our estimate of the ecologically relevant spatial scale at which dispersal takes place for many taxa. Our method is particularly suited for such large‐scale data that typically suffer from high spatial heterogeneity in marking and observation efforts and offers the possibility to derive unbiased dispersal kernels, a key component for modelling population dynamics and species distribution in a context of environmental change. Currently, our method assumes homogeneity in both habitat and dispersal behaviour across individuals. We discuss, however, how to relax these hypotheses to further investigate the effect of, e.g. local conspecific density or habitat quality on dispersal propensity.