Don't sell social science short

The News of the Week article that reports on Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) questioning the need to fund social science research at the National Science Foundation is alarming and shortsighted ("Senate panel chair asks why NSF funds social sciences," 12 May, p. 829). Social science research is at the fundamental core of basic research and has much to contribute to the economic viability of the United States. Twenty years of direct and jointly funded social and ecosystem science research at Colorado State University's Natural Resource Ecology Laboratory has produced deep insights into environmental and societal impacts of political upheaval, land use, and climate change in parts of Africa, Asia, and the Americas. Beyond greatly advancing our understanding of the coupled human-environmental system, the partnership of social and ecosystem science has brought scientists and decision-makers together to begin to develop solutions to difficult problems.

Response of tall buildings with symmetric setbacks under blast loading

This study explores three-dimensional nonlineardynamic responses of typical tall buildings with and without setbacks under blast loading. These 20 storey reinforced concrete buildings have been designed for normal (dead, live and wind)loads. The influence of the setbacks on the lateral load response due to blasts in terms of peak deflections, accelerations, inter-storey drift and bending moments at critical locations (including hinge formation) were investigated. Structural response predictions were performed with a commercially available three-dimensional finite element analysis programme using non-linear direct integration time history analyses. Results obtained for buildings with different setbacks were compared and conclusions made. The comparisons revealed that buildings have setbacks that protect the tower part above the setback level from blast loading show considerably better response in terms of peak displacement and interstorey drift, when compared to buildings without setbacks. Rotational accelerations were found to depend on the periods of the rotational modes. Abrupt changes in moments and shears are experienced near the levels of the setbacks. Typical twenty storey tall buildings with shear walls and frames that are designed for only normaln loads perform reasonably well, without catastrophic collapse, when subjected to a blast that is equivalent to 500 kg TNT at a standoff distance of 10 m.

The RNA world in plants: Post-transcriptional control III

Post-transcriptional control of gene expression has gone from a curiosity involving a few special genes to a highly diverse and widespread set of processes that is truly pervasive in plant gene expression. Thus, Plant Cell readers interested in almost any aspect of plant gene expression in response to any environmental influence, or in development, are advised to read on. In May 2001, what has become the de facto third biennial Symposium on Post-Transcriptional Control of Gene Expression in Plants was held in Ames, Iowa. The meeting was hosted by the new Plant Sciences Institute of Iowa State University with additional funding from the National Science Foundation and the United States Department of Agriculture. In 1997, the annual University of California-Riverside Plant Physiology Symposium was devoted to this topic. This provided a wake-up call to the plant world, summarized in this journal (Gallie and Bailey-Serres, 1997), that not all gene expression is controlled at the level of transcription. This was expanded upon at a European Molecular Biology Organization Workshop in Leysin, Switzerland, in 1999 (Bailey-Serres et al., 1999). The 3-day meeting in Ames brought together a strong and diverse contingent of plant biologists from four continents. The participants represented an unusually heterogeneous group of disciplines ranging from virology to stress response to computational biology. The research approaches and techniques represented were similarly diverse. Here we discuss a sample of the many fascinating aspects of post-transcriptional control that were presented at this meeting; we apologize to those whose work is not described here.

Assessment of body composition of Sri Lankan Australian children using ethnic specific equations

Since ethnic differences exist in body composition, assessment methods need to be validated prior to use in different populations. This study attempts to validate the use of Sri Lankan based body composition assessment tools on a group of 5 - 15 year old Australian children of Sri Lankan origin. The study was conducted at the Body Composition Laboratory of the Children’s Nutrition Research Centre at the Royal Children’s Hospital, Brisbane, Australia. Height (Ht), weight (Wt), segmental length (Lsegment name) and skinfold thickness (SFT) were measured. The whole body and segmental bio impedance analysis (BIA) were also measured. The body composition determined by the deuterium dilution technique (criterion method) was compared with the assessments done using prediction equations developed on Sri Lankan children. 27 boys and 15 girls were studied. All predictions of body composition parameters, except percentage fat mass (FM) assessed by the SFT-FM equation in girls gave statistically significant correlations with the criterion method. They had a low mean bias and most were not influenced by the measured parameter. Although living in a different socioeconomic state, the equations developed on children of the same ethnic background gives a better predictive value of body composition. This highlights the ethnic influence on body composition.

Segmental bioelectrical impedance in the assessment of body composition of Sri Lankan children

Abstract: Over the years bioelectrical impedance assay (BIA) has gained popularity in the assessment of body composition. However, equations for the prediction of whole body composition use whole body BIA. This study attempts to evaluate the usefulness of segmental BIA in the assessment of whole body composition. A cross sectional descriptive study was conducted at the Professorial Paediatric Unit of Lady Ridgeway Hospital, Colombo, involving 259 (M/F:144/115) 5 to 15 year old healthy children. The height, weight, total and segmental BIA were measured and impedance indices and specific resistivity for the whole body and segments were calculated. Segmental BIA indices showed a significant association with whole body composition measures assessed by total body water (TBW) using the isotope dilution method (D2O). Impedance index was better related to TBW and fat free mass (FFM), while specific resistivity was better related to the fat mass of the body. Regression equations with different combinations of variables showed high predictability of whole body composition. Results of this study showed that segmental BIA can be used as an alternative approach to predict the whole body composition in Sri Lankan children.