Mapping the diagnosis axis of an interface terminology to the NANDA International Taxonomy

Background: Nursing terminologies are designed to support nursing practice but, as with any other clinical tool, they should be evaluated. Cross-mapping is a formal method for examining the validity of the existing controlled vocabularies. Objectives: The study aims to assess the inclusiveness and expressiveness of the nursing diagnosis axis of a newly implemented interface terminology by cross-mapping with the NANDA-I taxonomy. Design/Methods: The study applied a descriptive design, using a cross-sectional, bidirectional mapping strategy. The sample included 728 concepts from both vocabularies. Concept cross-mapping was carried out to identify one-to-one, negative, and hierarchical connections. The analysis was conducted using descriptive statistics. Results: Agreement of the raters" mapping achieved 97%. More than 60% of the nursing diagnosis concepts in the NANDA-I taxonomy were mapped to concepts in the diagnosis axis of the new interface terminology; 71.1% were reversely mapped. Conclusions: Main results for outcome measures suggest that the diagnosis axis of this interface terminology meets the validity criterion of cross-mapping when mapped from and to the NANDA-I taxonomy.

Spatial mapping of exciton lifetimes in single ZnO nanowires

We investigate the spatial dependence of the exciton lifetimes in single ZnO nanowires. We have found that the free exciton and bound exciton lifetimes exhibit a maximum at the center of nanowires, while they decrease by 30% towards the tips. This dependence is explained by considering the cavity-like properties of the nanowires in combination with the Purcell effect. We show that the lifetime of the bound-excitons scales with the localization energy to the power of 3/2, which validates the model of Rashba and Gurgenishvili at the nanoscale.

Computational toolbox towards evolutionary domain mapping of membrane proteins

Membrane proteins account for about 20% to 30% of all proteins encoded in a typical genome. They play central roles in multiple cellular processes mediating the interaction of the cell with its surrounding. Over 60% of all drug targets contain a membrane domain. The experimental difficulties of obtaining a crystal structural severely limits our ability or understanding of membrane protein function. Computational evolutionary studies of proteins are crucial for the prediction of 3D structures. In this project, we construct a tool able to quantify the evolutionary positive selective pressure on each residue of membrane proteins through maximum likelihood phylogeny reconstruction. The conservation plot combined with a structural homology model is also a potent tool to predict those residues that have essentials roles in the structure and function of a membrane protein and can be very useful in the design of validation experiments.

Characterization and genetic mapping of eceriferum-ym (cer-ym), a cutin deficient barley mutant with impaired leaf water retention capacity.

The cuticle covers the aerial parts of land plants, where it serves many important functions, including water retention. Here, a recessive cuticle mutant, eceriferum-ym (cer-ym), of Hordeum vulgare L. (barley) showed abnormally glossy spikes, sheaths, and leaves. The cer-ym mutant plant detached from its root system was hypersensitive to desiccation treatment compared with wild type plants, and detached leaves of mutant lost 41.8% of their initial weight after 1 h of dehydration under laboratory conditions, while that of the wild type plants lost only 7.1%. Stomata function was not affected by the mutation, but the mutant leaves showed increased cuticular permeability to water, suggesting a defective leaf cuticle, which was confirmed by toluidine blue staining. The mutant leaves showed a substantial reduction in the amounts of the major cutin monomers and a slight increase in the main wax component, suggesting that the enhanced cuticle permeability was a consequence of cutin deficiency. cer-ym was mapped within a 0.8 cM interval between EST marker AK370363 and AK251484, a pericentromeric region on chromosome 4H. The results indicate that the desiccation sensitivity of cer-ym is caused by a defect in leaf cutin, and that cer-ym is located in a chromosome 4H pericentromeric region.

Electrostimulation mapping of comprehension of auditory and visual words.

In order to spare functional areas during the removal of brain tumours, electrical stimulation mapping was used in 90 patients (77 in the left hemisphere and 13 in the right; 2754 cortical sites tested). Language functions were studied with a special focus on comprehension of auditory and visual words and the semantic system. In addition to naming, patients were asked to perform pointing tasks from auditory and visual stimuli (using sets of 4 different images controlled for familiarity), and also auditory object (sound recognition) and Token test tasks. Ninety-two auditory comprehension interference sites were observed. We found that the process of auditory comprehension involved a few, fine-grained, sub-centimetre cortical territories. Early stages of speech comprehension seem to relate to two posterior regions in the left superior temporal gyrus. Downstream lexical-semantic speech processing and sound analysis involved 2 pathways, along the anterior part of the left superior temporal gyrus, and posteriorly around the supramarginal and middle temporal gyri. Electrostimulation experimentally dissociated perceptual consciousness attached to speech comprehension. The initial word discrimination process can be considered as an "automatic" stage, the attention feedback not being impaired by stimulation as would be the case at the lexical-semantic stage. Multimodal organization of the superior temporal gyrus was also detected since some neurones could be involved in comprehension of visual material and naming. These findings demonstrate a fine graded, sub-centimetre, cortical representation of speech comprehension processing mainly in the left superior temporal gyrus and are in line with those described in dual stream models of language comprehension processing.