Report of the Section of Agencies and Institutions Division of Child Welfare State Department of Social Welfare, 1943

History of child and social welfare in the State of Iowa including legal responsibilities, rules and regulations, inspections and licensing and supervision. it also covers cooperation with state agencies. It also describes in detail the histories, functions and problems of individual welfare homes and schools.

Ecology and evolution of social-organization: insights from fire ants and other highly eusocial insects

Social organisms exhibit conspicuous intraspecific variation in all facets of their social organization. A prominent example of such variation in the highly eusocial Hymenoptera is differences in the number of reproductive queens per colony, Differences in queen number in ants are associated with differences in a host of reproductive and social traits, including queen phenotype and breeding strategy, mode of colony reproduction, and pattern of sex allocation. We examine the causes and consequences of changes in colony queen number and associated traits using the fire ant Solenopsis invicta as a principal model. Ecological constraints on mode of colony founding may act as important selective forces causing the evolution of queen number in this and many other ants, with social organization generally perpetuated across generations by means of the social environment molding appropriate queen phenotypes and reproductive strategies. Shifts in colony queen number have profound effects on genetic structure within nests and may also influence genetic structure at higher levels (aggregations of nests or local demes) because of the association of queen number with particular mating and dispersal habits. Divergence of breeding habits between populations with different social organizations has the potential to promote genetic differentiation between these social variants. Thus, evolution of social organization can be important in generating intrinsic selective regimes that channel subsequent social evolution and in initiating the development of significant population genetic structure, including barriers to gene flow important in cladogenesis.

Brazilian soil science: from its inception to the future, and beyond

The present essay is meant to provide some background on the evolution of the soil science community in Brazil, since its inception, to describe its current situation, and to outline a number of opportunities and challenges facing the discipline in decades to come. The origin of Brazilian agronomy dates back to the beginning of the 19th century as a subdiscipline of botany, and its association with chemistry would later establish it as a science. In the middle of the 19th century, agricultural chemistry was born as a result of this association, leading to the establishment of edaphology, a branch of Soil Science. Another branch of Soil Science, known as pedology, was established as an applied and scientific knowledge in Brazil during the middle of the 20th century. During the same period, the Brazilian Soil Science Society (SBCS) was created, merging the knowledge of both branches and gathering all scientists involved. Twenty years after the SBCS foundation, the creation of Graduate Programs made Brazilian Soil Science enter the modern era, generating crucial knowledge to reach the current levels of agricultural productivity. Part of a community composed of 25 Soil Departments, 15 Graduate Programs and a great number of institutions that promote research and technology transfer, Brazilian soil scientists are responsible for developing solutions for sustainable development, by generating, adapting and transferring technology to the benefit of the country. The knowledge produced by SBCS members has been particularly significant for Brazil to achieve the status of most competitive tropical agriculture in the world. In the future decades, Soil Science will still remain topical in discussions regarding environment care and production of food and fibers, in addition, it will be essential and strategic for certain issues, such as water quality, reducing poverty and development of renewable sources of energy.

Transition to parenthood: The role of social interaction and endogenous networks

Empirical studies indicate that the transition to parenthood is influenced by an individual's peer group. To study the mechanisms creating interdepen- dencies across individuals' transition to parenthood and its timing we apply an agent-based simulation model. We build a one-sex model and provide agents with three different characteristics regarding age, intended education and parity. Agents endogenously form their network based on social closeness. Network members then may influence the agents' transition to higher parity levels. Our numerical simulations indicate that accounting for social inter- actions can explain the shift of first-birth probabilities in Austria over the period 1984 to 2004. Moreover, we apply our model to forecast age-specific fertility rates up to 2016.

Orthopedic implant used as drug delivery system: clinical situation and state of the research.

A partial review is proposed on the existing literature for the research performed in orthopedic implant used as drug delivery system. In the first part, an evaluation is given on the clinical need to deliver a drug in the surrounding of an implant. Secondly, a review of the clinical situation is developed for implants already used as drug delivery system. Experimental works performed for local delivery are reported. In particular, a description is given on the in vitro and in vivo studies where the implant is coated with different proteins or drugs. Finally, a conclusion is proposed on the next step in the development of orthopedic implant as drug delivery system mentioning also the industrial situation.

Contexts and typologies in the analysis of welfare state legitimacy : a social psychological approach to political opinion formation

This dissertation analyses public opinion towards the welfare state across 29 European countries. Based on an interdisciplinary approach combining social psychological, sociological, and public opinion approaches to political opinion formation, it investigates how social position and shared beliefs shape perceived legitimacy of welfare institutions, and how social contexts impact on the processes of opinion formation. Drawing on social representations theory, as well as socialization and self-interest approaches, the dissertation analyses the role of social position in lay support for institutional solidarity. Normative beliefs-defined as preferred views regarding the organisation of social relations-mediate the effect of social position on welfare support. In addition, drawing on public opinion literature, the dissertation analyses opinion formation as a function of country-level structural (e.g., level of social spending, unemployment) and ideological factors (e.g., level of meritocracy). The dissertation comprises two theoretical and four empirical chapters. Three of the empirical chapters use data from the European Social Survey 2008. Using multilevel and typological approaches, the dissertation contributes to welfare attitude literature by showing that normative beliefs, such as distrust or egalitarianism, function as underlying mechanisms that link social position to policy attitudes (Chapter 3), and that characteristics of the national contexts influence the processes of political opinion formation (Chapters 3 and 4). Chapter 5 proposes and predicts a typology of the relationship between attitudes towards solidarity and attitudes towards control, reflecting the two central domains of government intervention. Finally, Chapter 6 examines welfare support in the realm of action and social protest, using data from a survey on Spanish Indigados activists. The findings of this dissertation inform contemporary debates about welfare state legitimacy and retrenchment. - Cette thèse avait pour but d'analyser l'opinion publique envers l'Etat social dans 29 pays européens. Basée sur une approche interdisciplinaire qui combine des perspectives psycho-sociales, sociologiques et d'opinion publique sur la formation d'opinion politique, la thèse étudie comment la position sociale et les croyances partagées façonnent la légitimité perçue des institutions de l'Etat social, et comment les contextes sociaux influencent les processus de formation d'opinion. Basée sur la théorie des représentations sociales, ainsi qu'une approche de socialisation et d'intérêt propre, cette thèse analyse le rôle des positions sociales dans le soutien envers la solidarité institutionnelle. Les croyances normatives-définies comme les visions préférées de l'organisation des rapports sociaux-médiatisent l'effet de la position sociale sur le soutien pour l'Etat social. De plus, s'inspirant de la littérature sur l'opinion publique, la thèse analyse la formation d'opinion en fonction des facteurs structurels (ex. le taux de dépenses sociales, le chômage) et idéologiques (ex. le degré de méritocratie). Cette thèse est composée de deux chapitres théoriques et quatre chapitres empiriques. Trois chapitres empiriques utilisent des données provenant de l'enquête European Social Survey 2008. Appliquant des approches multi-niveux et typoloqiques, la thèse contribue à la littérature sur les attitudes envers l'Etat social en montrant que les croyances normatives, telles que la méfiance ou l'égalitarisme, fonctionnent comme des mécanismes sous-jacents qui relient la position sociale aux attitudes politiques (Chapitre 3), et que les caractéristiques des contextes nationaux influencent les processus de formation d'opinion politique (Chapitres 3 et 4). Le chapitre 5 propose et prédit une typologie sur le rapport entre les attitudes envers la solidarité et celles envers le contrôle, renvoyant à deux domaines centraux de régulation étatique. Enfin, le chapitre 6 examine le soutien à l'Etat social dans le domaine de l'action protestataire, utilisant des données d'une enquête menée auprès des militants espagnols du mouvement des Indignés. Les résultats de cette thèse apportent des éléments qui éclairent les débats contemporains sur la légitimité de l'Etat social et son démantèlement.

How Much Does It Cost? Optimization of Costs in Sequence Analysis of Social Science Data

One major methodological problem in analysis of sequence data is the determination of costs from which distances between sequences are derived. Although this problem is currently not optimally dealt with in the social sciences, it has some similarity with problems that have been solved in bioinformatics for three decades. In this article, the authors propose an optimization of substitution and deletion/insertion costs based on computational methods. The authors provide an empirical way of determining costs for cases, frequent in the social sciences, in which theory does not clearly promote one cost scheme over another. Using three distinct data sets, the authors tested the distances and cluster solutions produced by the new cost scheme in comparison with solutions based on cost schemes associated with other research strategies. The proposed method performs well compared with other cost-setting strategies, while it alleviates the justification problem of cost schemes.

The influence of social structure on brood survival and development in a socially polymorphic ant: insights from a cross-fostering experiment.

Animal societies vary in the number of breeders per group, which affects many socially and ecologically relevant traits. In several social insect species, including our study species Formica selysi, the presence of either one or multiple reproducing females per colony is generally associated with differences in a suite of traits such as the body size of individuals. However, the proximate mechanisms and ontogenetic processes generating such differences between social structures are poorly known. Here, we cross-fostered eggs originating from single-queen (= monogynous) or multiple-queen (= polygynous) colonies into experimental groups of workers from each social structure to investigate whether differences in offspring survival, development time and body size are shaped by the genotype and/or prefoster maternal effects present in the eggs, or by the social origin of the rearing workers. Eggs produced by polygynous queens were more likely to survive to adulthood than eggs from monogynous queens, regardless of the social origin of the rearing workers. However, brood from monogynous queens grew faster than brood from polygynous queens. The social origin of the rearing workers influenced the probability of brood survival, with workers from monogynous colonies rearing more brood to adulthood than workers from polygynous colonies. The social origin of eggs or rearing workers had no significant effect on the head size of the resulting workers in our standardized laboratory conditions. Overall, the social backgrounds of the parents and of the rearing workers appear to shape distinct survival and developmental traits of ant brood.

Influence of magnetic field strength and image registration strategy on voxel-based morphometry in a study of Alzheimer's disease.

Multi-centre data repositories like the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) offer a unique research platform, but pose questions concerning comparability of results when using a range of imaging protocols and data processing algorithms. The variability is mainly due to the non-quantitative character of the widely used structural T1-weighted magnetic resonance (MR) images. Although the stability of the main effect of Alzheimer's disease (AD) on brain structure across platforms and field strength has been addressed in previous studies using multi-site MR images, there are only sparse empirically-based recommendations for processing and analysis of pooled multi-centre structural MR data acquired at different magnetic field strengths (MFS). Aiming to minimise potential systematic bias when using ADNI data we investigate the specific contributions of spatial registration strategies and the impact of MFS on voxel-based morphometry in AD. We perform a whole-brain analysis within the framework of Statistical Parametric Mapping, testing for main effects of various diffeomorphic spatial registration strategies, of MFS and their interaction with disease status. Beyond the confirmation of medial temporal lobe volume loss in AD, we detect a significant impact of spatial registration strategy on estimation of AD related atrophy. Additionally, we report a significant effect of MFS on the assessment of brain anatomy (i) in the cerebellum, (ii) the precentral gyrus and (iii) the thalamus bilaterally, showing no interaction with the disease status. We provide empirical evidence in support of pooling data in multi-centre VBM studies irrespective of disease status or MFS.

From protein sequences to 3D-structures and beyond: the example of the UniProt knowledgebase.

With the dramatic increase in the volume of experimental results in every domain of life sciences, assembling pertinent data and combining information from different fields has become a challenge. Information is dispersed over numerous specialized databases and is presented in many different formats. Rapid access to experiment-based information about well-characterized proteins helps predict the function of uncharacterized proteins identified by large-scale sequencing. In this context, universal knowledgebases play essential roles in providing access to data from complementary types of experiments and serving as hubs with cross-references to many specialized databases. This review outlines how the value of experimental data is optimized by combining high-quality protein sequences with complementary experimental results, including information derived from protein 3D-structures, using as an example the UniProt knowledgebase (UniProtKB) and the tools and links provided on its website ( http://www.uniprot.org/ ). It also evokes precautions that are necessary for successful predictions and extrapolations.