Peanut Allergen Threshold Study (PATS): validation of eliciting doses using a novel single-dose challenge protocol

Background: The eliciting dose (ED) for a peanut allergic reaction in 5% of the peanut allergic population, the ED05, is 1.5 mg of peanut protein. This ED05 was derived from oral food challenges (OFC) that use graded, incremental doses administered at fixed time intervals. Individual patients’ threshold doses were used to generate population dose-distribution curves using probability distributions from which the ED05 was then determined. It is important to clinically validate that this dose is predictive of the allergenic response in a further unselected group of peanut-allergic individuals. Methods/Aims: This is a multi-centre study involving three national level referral and teaching centres. (Cork University Hospital, Ireland, Royal Children’s Hospital Melbourne, Australia and Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, U.S.A.) The study is now in process and will continue to run until all centres have recruited 125 participates in each respective centre. A total of 375 participants, aged 1–18 years will be recruited during routine Allergy appointments in the centres. The aim is to assess the precision of the predicted ED05 using a single dose (6 mg peanut = 1.5 mg of peanut protein) in the form of a cookie. Validated Food Allergy related Quality of Life Questionnaires-(FAQLQ) will be self-administered prior to OFC and 1 month after challenge to assess the impact of a single dose OFC on FAQL. Serological and cell based in vitro studies will be performed. Conclusion: The validation of the ED05 threshold for allergic reactions in peanut allergic subjects has potential value for public health measures. The single dose OFC, based upon the statistical dose-distribution analysis of past challenge trials, promises an efficient approach to identify the most highly sensitive patients within any given food-allergic population.

Form-focused instruction in Irish-medium immersion education: a critical examination of teachers' perspectives and practices. A small-scale qualitative case study

It has been suggested that the less than optimal levels of students’ immersion language “persist in part because immersion teachers lack systematic approaches for integrating language into their content instruction” (Tedick, Christian and Fortune, 2011, p.7). I argue that our current lack of knowledge regarding what immersion teachers think, know and believe and what immersion teachers’ actual ‘lived’ experiences are in relation to form-focused instruction (FFI) prevents us from fully understanding the key issues at the core of experiential immersion pedagogy and form-focused integration. FFI refers to “any planned or incidental instructional activity that is intended to induce language learners to pay attention to linguistic form” (Ellis, 2001b, p.1). The central aim of this research study is to critically examine the perspectives and practices of Irish-medium immersion (IMI) teachers in relation to FFI. The study ‘taps’ into the lived experiences of three IMI teachers in three different IMI school contexts and explores FFI from a classroom-based, teacher-informed perspective. Philosophical underpinnings of the interpretive paradigm and critical hermeneutical principles inform and guide the study. A multi-case study approach was adopted and data was gathered through classroom observation, video-stimulated recall and semistructured interviews. Findings revealed that the journey of ‘becoming’ an IMI teacher is shaped by a vast array of intricate variables. IMI teacher identity, implicit theories, stated beliefs, educational biographies and experiences, IMI school cultures and contexts as well as teacher knowledge and competence impacted on IMI teachers’ FFI perspectives and practices. An IMI content teacher identity reflected the teachers’ priorities as shaped by pedagogical challenges and their educational backgrounds. While research participants had clearly defined instructional beliefs and goals, their roadmap of how to actually accomplish these goals was far from clear. IMI teachers described the multitude of choices and pedagogical dilemmas they faced in integrating FFI into experiential pedagogy. Significant gaps in IMI teachers’ declarative knowledge about and competence in the immersion language were also reported. This research study increases our understanding of the complexity of the processes underlying and shaping FFI pedagogy in IMI education. Innovative FFI opportunities for professional development across the continuum of teacher education are outlined, a comprehensive evaluation of IMI is called for and areas for further research are delineated.

Operational retrieval of trace gases concentrations from IASI spectra

info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Operational retrieval of trace gases concentrations from IASI spectra

info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Bound on quantum computation time: Quantum error correction in a critical environment

We obtain an upper bound on the time available for quantum computation for a given quantum computer and decohering environment with quantum error correction implemented. First, we derive an explicit quantum evolution operator for the logical qubits and show that it has the same form as that for the physical qubits but with a reduced coupling strength to the environment. Using this evolution operator, we find the trace distance between the real and ideal states of the logical qubits in two cases. For a super-Ohmic bath, the trace distance saturates, while for Ohmic or sub-Ohmic baths, there is a finite time before the trace distance exceeds a value set by the user. © 2010 The American Physical Society.

Competing manufacturers in a retail supply chain: On contractual form and coordination

It is common for a retailer to sell products from competing manufacturers. How then should the firms manage their contract negotiations? The supply chain coordination literature focuses either on a single manufacturer selling to a single retailer or one manufacturer selling to many (possibly competing) retailers. We find that some key conclusions from those market structures do not apply in our setting, where multiple manufacturers sell through a single retailer. We allow the manufacturers to compete for the retailer's business using one of three types of contracts: a wholesale-price contract, a quantity-discount contract, or a two-part tariff. It is well known that the latter two, more sophisticated contracts enable the manufacturer to coordinate the supply chain, thereby maximizing the profits available to the firms. More importantly, they allow the manufacturer to extract rents from the retailer, in theory allowing the manufacturer to leave the retailer with only her reservation profit. However, we show that in our market structure these two sophisticated contracts force the manufacturers to compete more aggressively relative to when they only offer wholesale-price contracts, and this may leave them worse off and the retailer substantially better off. In other words, although in a serial supply chain a retailer may have just cause to fear quantity discounts and two-part tariffs, a retailer may actually prefer those contracts when offered by competing manufacturers. We conclude that the properties a contractual form exhibits in a one-manufacturer supply chain may not carry over to the realistic setting in which multiple manufacturers must compete to sell their goods through the same retailer. © 2010 INFORMS.

Developing a simplified consent form for biobanking.

BACKGROUND: Consent forms have lengthened over time and become harder for participants to understand. We sought to demonstrate the feasibility of creating a simplified consent form for biobanking that comprises the minimum information necessary to meet ethical and regulatory requirements. We then gathered preliminary data concerning its content from hypothetical biobank participants. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS: We followed basic principles of plain-language writing and incorporated into a 2-page form (not including the signature page) those elements of information required by federal regulations and recommended by best practice guidelines for biobanking. We then recruited diabetes patients from community-based practices and randomized half (n = 56) to read the 2-page form, first on paper and then a second time on a tablet computer. Participants were encouraged to use "More information" buttons on the electronic version whenever they had questions or desired further information. These buttons led to a series of "Frequently Asked Questions" (FAQs) that contained additional detailed information. Participants were asked to identify specific sentences in the FAQs they thought would be important if they were considering taking part in a biorepository. On average, participants identified 7 FAQ sentences as important (mean 6.6, SD 14.7, range: 0-71). No one sentence was highlighted by a majority of participants; further, 34 (60.7%) participants did not highlight any FAQ sentences. CONCLUSIONS: Our preliminary findings suggest that our 2-page form contains the information that most prospective participants identify as important. Combining simplified forms with supplemental material for those participants who desire more information could help minimize consent form length and complexity, allowing the most substantively material information to be better highlighted and enabling potential participants to read the form and ask questions more effectively.

A Politics of the Unspeakable: The Differend of Israel

Israel's establishment in 1948 in former British-Mandate Palestine as a Jewish country and as a liberal democracy is commonly understood as a form of response to the Holocaust of WWII. Zionist narratives frame Israel's establishment not only as a response to the Holocaust, but also as a return to the Jewish people's original homeland after centuries of wandering in exile. Debates over Israel's policies, particularly with regard to Palestinians and to the country's non-Jewish population, often center on whether Israel's claims to Jewish singularity are at the expense of principles of liberal democracy, international law and universal human rights. In this dissertation, I argue that Israel's emphasis on Jewish singularity can be understood not as a violation of humanism's universalist frameworks, but as a symptom of the violence inherent to these frameworks and to the modern liberal rights-bearing subject on which they are based. Through an analysis of my fieldwork in Israel (2005-2008), I trace the relation between the figures of "Jew" and "Israeli" in terms of their historical genealogies and in contemporary Israeli contexts. Doing so makes legible how European modernity and its concepts of sovereignty, liberalism, the human, and subjectivity are based on a metaphysics of presence that defines the human through a displacement of difference. This displaced difference is manifest in affective expression. This dissertation shows how the figure of the Jew in relation to Israel reveals sexual difference as under erasure by the suppression of alterity in humanism's configuration of man, woman, and animal, and suggests a political subject unable to be sovereign or fully represented in language.

COMPOSITIONS FEATURING THE PIANO IN FANTASY FORM: 1820-1920

The Fantasy form offered a composer the freedom to create a work without concerns for fitting into the current stylistic and traditional structures. The flowering of the form seems to be concentrated from 1820-1920 since the composer started to use it as a way to convey a personal idea or to portray a special spirit. This dissertation is comprised of three recitals with fantasies in different genres and styles. Through performing these diverse fantasies, I have been inspired to connect with the imagery and spirit of the compositions in order to capture the unique sentiments of each piece. Also, in order to keep the audience absorbed in the music that is without structure, I have focused on expanding my technical abilities to vary color, sonority, and phrasing. Program one (April 26,2004) includes Fantasie, Op. 17 and Piano Concerto, Op. 54 (assisted by Ya-Hsin Wu) by R. Schumann. Program two (December 10, 2004) includes Three Fantastic Dances, Op. 5 by D. Shostakovitch, Fantasy "Sonataecossaise ", Op. 28 by F. Mendelssohn, Sonata No.2 "Sonata-Fantasy", Op. 19 by A. Scriabin and Fantasie for Piano and Violin, D 934 by F. Schubert with violinist, TaoChang Yu. The last program (November 1, 2005) includes Fantasia baetica by E. de Falla, Morceaux de Fantaisie, Op. 3 by S. Rachrnaninoff, Fantaisie, Op. 49, Impromptu No. 4 '%h.ntasy-hpromptu", Op. 66 and Polonaise-Fantaisie, Op. 61 by F. Chopin.

Four-decade responses of soil trace elements to an aggrading old-field forest: B, Mn, Zn, Cu, and Fe.

In the ancient and acidic Ultisol soils of the Southern Piedmont, USA, we studied changes in trace element biogeochemistry over four decades, a period during which formerly cultivated cotton fields were planted with pine seedlings that grew into mature forest stands. In 16 permanent plots, we estimated 40-year accumulations of trace elements in forest biomass and O horizons (between 1957 and 1997), and changes in bioavailable soil fractions indexed by extractions of 0.05 mol/L HCl and 0.2 mol/L acid ammonium oxalate (AAO). Element accumulations in 40-year tree biomass plus O horizons totaled 0.9, 2.9, 4.8, 49.6, and 501.3 kg/ha for Cu, B, Zn, Mn, and Fe, respectively. In response to this forest development, samples of the upper 0.6-m of mineral soil archived in 1962 and 1997 followed one of three patterns. (1) Extractable B and Mn were significantly depleted, by -4.1 and -57.7 kg/ha with AAO, depletions comparable to accumulations in biomass plus O horizons, 2.9 and 49.6 kg/ha, respectively. Tree uptake of B and Mn from mineral soil greatly outpaced resupplies from atmospheric deposition, mineral weathering, and deep-root uptake. (2) Extractable Zn and Cu changed little during forest growth, indicating that nutrient resupplies kept pace with accumulations by the aggrading forest. (3) Oxalate-extractable Fe increased substantially during forest growth, by 275.8 kg/ha, about 10-fold more than accumulations in tree biomass (28.7 kg/ha). The large increases in AAO-extractable Fe in surficial 0.35-m mineral soils were accompanied by substantial accretions of Fe in the forest's O horizon, by 473 kg/ha, amounts that dwarfed inputs via litterfall and canopy throughfall, indicating that forest Fe cycling is qualitatively different from that of other macro- and micronutrients. Bioturbation of surficial forest soil layers cannot account for these fractions and transformations of Fe, and we hypothesize that the secondary forest's large inputs of organic additions over four decades has fundamentally altered soil Fe oxides, potentially altering the bioavailability and retention of macro- and micronutrients, contaminants, and organic matter itself. The wide range of responses among the ecosystem's trace elements illustrates the great dynamics of the soil system over time scales of decades.

Beta-adrenergic receptor kinase: identification of a novel protein kinase that phosphorylates the agonist-occupied form of the receptor.

Agonist-promoted desensitization of adenylate cyclase is intimately associated with phosphorylation of the beta-adrenergic receptor in mammalian, avian, and amphibian cells. However, the nature of the protein kinase(s) involved in receptor phosphorylation remains largely unknown. We report here the identification and partial purification of a protein kinase capable of phosphorylating the agonist-occupied form of the purified beta-adrenergic receptor. The enzyme is prepared from a supernatant fraction from high-speed centrifugation of lysed kin- cells, a mutant of S49 lymphoma cells that lacks a functional cAMP-dependent protein kinase. The beta-agonist isoproterenol induces a 5- to 10-fold increase in receptor phosphorylation by this kinase, which is blocked by the antagonist alprenolol. Fractionation of the kin- supernatant on molecular-sieve HPLC and DEAE-Sephacel results in a 50- to 100-fold purified beta-adrenergic receptor kinase preparation that is largely devoid of other protein kinase activities. The kinase activity is insensitive to cAMP, cGMP, cAMP-dependent kinase inhibitor, Ca2+-calmodulin, Ca2+-phospholipid, and phorbol esters and does not phosphorylate general kinase substrates such as casein and histones. Phosphate appears to be incorporated solely into serine residues. The existence of this novel cAMP-independent kinase, which preferentially phosphorylates the agonist-occupied form of the beta-adrenergic receptor, suggests a mechanism that may explain the homologous or agonist-specific form of adenylate cyclase desensitization. It also suggests a general mechanism for regulation of receptor function in which only the agonist-occupied or "active" form of the receptor is a substrate for enzymes inducing covalent modification.

Induced pluripotent stem cell-derived cardiac progenitors differentiate to cardiomyocytes and form biosynthetic tissues.

The mammalian heart has little capacity to regenerate, and following injury the myocardium is replaced by non-contractile scar tissue. Consequently, increased wall stress and workload on the remaining myocardium leads to chamber dilation, dysfunction, and heart failure. Cell-based therapy with an autologous, epigenetically reprogrammed, and cardiac-committed progenitor cell source could potentially reverse this process by replacing the damaged myocardium with functional tissue. However, it is unclear whether cardiac progenitor cell-derived cardiomyocytes are capable of attaining levels of structural and functional maturity comparable to that of terminally-fated cardiomyocytes. Here, we first describe the derivation of mouse induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells, which once differentiated allow for the enrichment of Nkx2-5(+) cardiac progenitors, and the cardiomyocyte-specific expression of the red fluorescent protein. We show that the cardiac progenitors are multipotent and capable of differentiating into endothelial cells, smooth muscle cells and cardiomyocytes. Moreover, cardiac progenitor selection corresponds to cKit(+) cell enrichment, while cardiomyocyte cell-lineage commitment is concomitant with dual expression of either cKit/Flk1 or cKit/Sca-1. We proceed to show that the cardiac progenitor-derived cardiomyocytes are capable of forming electrically and mechanically coupled large-scale 2D cell cultures with mature electrophysiological properties. Finally, we examine the cell progenitors' ability to form electromechanically coherent macroscopic tissues, using a physiologically relevant 3D culture model and demonstrate that following long-term culture the cardiomyocytes align, and form robust electromechanical connections throughout the volume of the biosynthetic tissue construct. We conclude that the iPS cell-derived cardiac progenitors are a robust cell source for tissue engineering applications and a 3D culture platform for pharmacological screening and drug development studies.

The abstraction of form in semantic categories.

Undergraduates were asked to generate a name for a hypothetical new exemplar of a category. They produced names that had the same numbers of syllables, the same endings, and the same types of word stems as existing exemplars of that category. In addition, novel exemplars, each consisting of a nonsense syllable root and a prototypical ending, were accurately assigned to categories. The data demonstrate the abstraction and use of surface properties of words.

Tracing Neoclassical Influences in selected solo and chamber music for the clarinet

The musical period of Neoclassicism began in the 1920's, between the first and second world wars. It was initiated by French composers and eventually spread to other countries. One of the most important themes to emerge from the movement was to escape from the formless, rather emotional music of the Romantic era and instead, emphasize balance, order, objectivity and clarity in musical form. Many popular clarinet repertoires are enjoyed by performers and listeners because the music is enjoyable to play and easy to listen to. In particular, classically influenced clarinet music is quite interesting because it features musical elements from both the past and contemporary musical styles. For instance, some composers have integrated preexisting, more traditional styles of composition with lighter styles of modern culture such as popular music and Jazz. It is difficult to discover purely neoclassical clarinet repertoires even though many composers created their pieces during the neoclassical era. What we most commonly find are both neoclassical and non-neoclassical influences in compositions from that time period. Thus, I aim to trace the influence of neoclassicism in selected clarinet repertoires that exist today. It is my hope that increased awareness and knowledge about accessible clarinet music may encourage the general public to develop a deeper interest in a wider sphere of clarinet music, beyond what is considered popular today. The works performed and discussed in this dissertation are the following: (Recital I) Duo Concertante by Darius Milhaud; Sonata by Leonard Bernstein; Sonata for Two Clarinets by Francis Poulenc; Duos for Flute and Clarinet, Op. 34 by Robert Muczynski; Dance Preludes by Witold Lutoslawski, (Recital II) Sonatine by Arthur Honegger; Time pieces by Robert Muczynski; Suite for Clarinet, Violin and Piano by Darius Milhaud; Sonate for Clarinet, Flute and Piano by Maurice Emmanuel; Tarantelle for Flute, Clarinet and Piano, Op. 6 by Camille Saint-Saëns, (Recital III) Sonatina by Joseph Horovitz; Suite from L'histoire du Soldat for Clarinet, Violin and Piano by Igor Stravinsky; Contrasts for Clarinet, Violin and Piano by Béla Bartók The recitals that took place on December 1, 2012 and on April 25, 2013 were performed in the Ulrich Recital Hall of the Clarice Performing Arts Center in College Park, Maryland. The recital that took place on November 2, 2013 was performed at the Gildenhorn Recital Hall of the same performing arts center.

Quantitative laboratory spectroscopy of atmospheric trace gases

info:eu-repo/semantics/published