Alright: a distinctive pathway of change from the 18th century to the present day

The origins of the vast majority of the words we use in contemporary English go back as far as Old or Middle English. In contrast, alright and all right in their present-day application appear to be the result of a more recent evolution, as there is no evidence of their use, not even in the two-word form, in the published fiction before the 18th century. Furthermore, there are not in the research literature, at least to my knowledge, any previous linguistic studies on this specific subject matter. The present article is simply an attempt to describe the various processes of diachronic change that brought about the emergence of alright.

Analysis of the combined exposure to noise and ototoxic substances—pilot study

Abstract: Ototoxic substances have been associated to damage of the auditory system, and its effects are potentiated by noise exposure. The present study aims at analyzing auditory changes from combined exposure to noise and organic solvents, through a pilot study in the furniture industry sector. Audiological tests were performed on 44 workers, their levels of exposure to toluene, xylene and ethylbenzene were determined and the levels of noise exposure were evaluated. The results showed that workers are generally exposed to high noise levels and cabin priming filler and varnish sector workers have high levels of exposure to toluene. However, no hearing loss was registered among the workers. Workers exposed simultaneously to noise and ototoxic substances do not have a higher degree of hearing loss than those workers exposed only to noise. Thus, the results of this study did not show that the combined exposure to noise and the organic solvent is associated with hearing disorders.

Assessment of nutritional and metabolic profiles of pea shoots: The new ready-to-eat baby-leaf vegetable

Pea-shoots are a new option as ready-to-eat baby-leaf vegetable. However, data about the nutritional composition and the shelf-life stability of these leaves, especially their phytonutrient composition is scarce. In this work, the macronutrient, micronutrient and phytonutrients profile of minimally processed pea shoots were evaluated at the beginning and at the end of a 10-day storage period. Several physicochemical characteristics (color, pH, total soluble solids, and total titratable acidity) were also monitored. Standard AOAC methods were applied in the nutritional value evaluation, while chromatographic methods with UV–vis and mass detection were used to analyze free forms of vitamins (HPLC-DAD-ESI-MS/MS), carotenoids (HPLC-DAD-APCI-MSn) and flavonoid compounds (HPLC-DAD-ESI-MSn). Atomic absorption spectrometry (HR-CS-AAS) was employed to characterize the mineral content of the leaves. As expected, pea leaves had a high water (91.5%) and low fat (0.3%) and carbohydrate (1.9%) contents, being a good source of dietary fiber (2.1%). Pea shoots showed a high content of vitamins C, E and A, potassium and phosphorous compared to other ready-to-eat green leafy vegetables. The carotenoid profile revealed a high content of β-carotene and lutein, typical from green leafy vegetables. The leaves had a mean flavonoid content of 329 mg/100 g of fresh product, mainly composed by glycosylated quercetin and kaempferol derivatives. Pea shoots kept their fresh appearance during the storage being color maintained throughout the shelf-life. The nutritional composition was in general stable during storage, showing some significant (p < 0.05) variation in certain water-soluble vitamins.

Nonlinear dynamics of the patient’s response to drug effect during general anesthesia

In today’s healthcare paradigm, optimal sedation during anesthesia plays an important role both in patient welfare and in the socio-economic context. For the closed-loop control of general anesthesia, two drugs have proven to have stable, rapid onset times: propofol and remifentanil. These drugs are related to their effect in the bispectral index, a measure of EEG signal. In this paper wavelet time–frequency analysis is used to extract useful information from the clinical signals, since they are time-varying and mark important changes in patient’s response to drug dose. Model based predictive control algorithms are employed to regulate the depth of sedation by manipulating these two drugs. The results of identification from real data and the simulation of the closed loop control performance suggest that the proposed approach can bring an improvement of 9% in overall robustness and may be suitable for clinical practice.

Nonlinear dynamics of the patient’s response to drug effect during general anesthesia

In today’s healthcare paradigm, optimal sedation during anesthesia plays an important role both in patient welfare and in the socio-economic context. For the closed-loop control of general anesthesia, two drugs have proven to have stable, rapid onset times: propofol and remifentanil. These drugs are related to their effect in the bispectral index, a measure of EEG signal. In this paper wavelet time–frequency analysis is used to extract useful information from the clinical signals, since they are time-varying and mark important changes in patient’s response to drug dose. Model based predictive control algorithms are employed to regulate the depth of sedation by manipulating these two drugs. The results of identification from real data and the simulation of the closed loop control performance suggest that the proposed approach can bring an improvement of 9% in overall robustness and may be suitable for clinical practice.