Strong and weak lifespan extension: What is most feasible and likely?

Recent advances in biomedical science indicate that it may eventually be possible to intervene in the biological process of human ageing. This paper overviews the current state of the science of lifespan extension and promising future directions. It is uncertain whether 'strong' lifespan extension - the extension of human life beyond the maximum 122 years so far observed - will become a reality. It is more likely that cumulative effects of numerous scientific and biomedical advances in the treatment of common disease will produce 'weak' lifespan extension - the extension of average life expectancy. The practical application of molecular, genetic and nanomaterials research may also lead to advances in life expectancy. It is not too early to begin to consider the policy implications of either form of lifespan extension.

Successful use of recombinant factor VII in massive hemoptysis due to community-acquired pneumonia

Recombinant activated factor VII (rFVIIa) is a powerful hemostatic agent developed for use in hemophilia. It has been used increasingly in life-threatening hemorrhage in a variety of other settings in which conventional medical or surgical therapy is unsuccessful. This report describes the successful use of rFVIIa for pulmonary hemorrhage due to a focal bleeding source in a regional hospital where bronchial artery embolization or surgery were not available. rFVIIa may be a useful temporizing measure in the unstable patient with pulmonary hemorrhage without coagulopathic bleeding when conventional treatment. is not immediately available.

CONVICÇÕES DE SAÚDE DE PAIS DE CRIANÇAS PORTADORAS DE DIABETES MELLITUS TIPO 1

O Diabetes Mellitus tipo 1 geralmente ocorre na infância ou adolescência e repercute de forma dramática na vida dos pais. A família é fundamental no tratamento do paciente: representa o alicerce que influenciará na aceitação ou não da enfermidade por parte do portador. Por isso, os objetivos deste estudo foram descrever as convicções de saúde de pais de crianças portadoras de diabetes mellitus tipo 1 e compreender mudanças comportamentais e psíquicas que possam influenciar na conduta em relação ao tratamento. Investigou-se 13 pessoas, pais de crianças de 11 meses a 10 anos portadoras de Diabetes Mellitus Tipo 1, por intermédio de uma entrevista para levantamento e descrição de fatores de convicção de saúde. Os dados foram avaliados com base em um modelo de “convicção de saúde”. Esse modelo avaliou: impacto do diagnóstico, suscetibilidade, severidade, benefícios, barreiras, eficácia própria e expectativa de futuro de cada um dos pais. Os resultados mostraram que os pais experimentam dificuldades, medos e inseguranças, pela doença do filho. Ao relatarem as situações vividas desde o diagnóstico até o momento atual, em todas as etapas, os pais revelam intenso sofrimento. Eles são constantemente invadidos por medo de perda tanto no presente como no futuro em função das complicações da doença. A partir desses resultados recomenda-se que os pais recebam atendimento de uma equipe multidisciplinar com conhecimento específico e com a finalidade de informar sobre a doença e aplacar os medos e inseguranças que criam obstáculos para a adesão ao tratamento. Espera-se com este tipo de atendimento melhorar e a qualidade de vida do paciente e de sua família.

Motherhood on ice? A media framing analysis of older mothers in the UK news

Changing gender roles and increased sexual and economic freedom have created opportunities for women to give birth relatively late in life. However, stigma and misplaced fears about physical capacity are often reported as sources of anxiety among older, and in vitro fertilisation-induced mothers. In this study, we apply a specially adapted method for analysing news media content to a week's selection of material in the British media following the dissemination of research at an international medical conference. Our findings suggest, despite some positive commentaries, that much negative discourse is circulated by the media about older mothers, from implied claims of selfishness (older mothers as 'delaying' conception) to violations of the 'natural order'. These latter claims reflect the long-standing ambivalence by the media generally towards scientific advancement, but they also reveal continuing resistance towards unorthodox lifestyles.

Pre-conception care : current practice and methods of provision

This thesis examines the present provisions for pre-conception care and the views of the providers of services. Pre-conception care is seen by some clinicians and health educators as a means of making any necessary changes in life style, corrections to imbalances in the nutritional status of the prospective mother (and father) and the assessment of any medical problems, thus maximizing the likelihood of the normal development of the baby. Pre-conception care may be described as a service to bridge the gap between the family planning clinic and the first ante-natal booking appointment. There were three separate foci for the empirical research - the Foresight organisation (a charity which has pioneered pre-conception care in Britain); the pre-conception care clinic at the West London Hospital, Hammersmith; and the West Midlands Regional Health Authority. The six main sources of data were: twenty five clinicians operating Foresight pre-conception clinics, couples attending pre-conception clinics, committee members of the Foresight organisation, staff of the West London Hospital pre-conception clinic, Hammersmith, District Health Education Officers working in the West Midlands Regional Health Authority and the members of the Ante-Natal Care Action Group, a sub-group of the Regional Health Advisory Group on Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine. A range of research methods were adopted. These were as follows: questionnaires and report forms used in co-operation with the Foresight clinicians, interviews, participant observation discussions and informal meetings and, finally, literature and official documentation. The research findings illustrated that pre-conception care services provided at the predominantly private Foresight clinics were of a rather `ad hoc' nature. The type of provision varied considerably and clearly reflected the views held by its providers. The protocol which had been developed to assist in the standardization of results was not followed by the clinicians. The pre-conception service provided at the West London Hospital shared some similarities in its approach with the Foresight provision; a major difference was that it did not advocate the use of routine hair trace metal analysis. Interviews with District Health Education Officers and with members of the Ante Natal Care Action Group revealed a tentative and cautious approach to pre-conception care generally and to the Foresight approach in particular. The thesis concludes with a consideration of the future of pre-conception care and the prospects for the establishment of a comprehensive pre-conception care service.

The narrative construction va + infinitive in contemporary French:a linguistic phoenix risen from its medieval ashes?

In Old and Middle French (12th-16th centuries), va ["goes"] + inf was used in narrations in the past. A similar usage seems to have reappeared and be spreading today. However, the old construction combined with past Tenses whereas the new one is found only with forms anchored in present and future. We argue that the conTemporary construction derives not from the old one, but from a metanarrative construction. On the basis of its future in Terpretation, va + inf aids the organization of the narration, announcing subsequent events through a hypernymic process. The periphrasis thus approaches a narrative value by projecting the time of events onto that of narration. With the disappearance of all deictic markers, the go-periphrases are no longer hypernyms: they appear on the same temporal line of events as the neighboring situations and are understood as fully completed. © John Benjamins Publishing Company.

A review of research and practice for the industrial networks of the future

Academic researchers have followed closely the interest of companies in establishing industrial networks by studying aspects such as social interaction and contractual relationships. But what patterns underlie the emergence of industrial networks and what support should research provide for practitioners? First, it appears that manufacturing is becoming a commodity rather than a unique capability, which accounts especially for low-technology approaches in downstream parts of the network, for example, in assembly operations. Second, the increased tendency towards specialisation has forced other, upstream, parts of industrial networks to introduce advanced manufacturing technologies for niche markets. Third, the capital market for investments in capacity, and the trade in manufacturing as a commodity, dominates resource allocation to a larger extent than was previously the case. Fourth, there is becoming a continuous move towards more loosely connected entities that comprise manufacturing networks. Finally, in these networks, concepts for supply chain management should address collaboration and information technology that supports decentralised decision-making, in particular to address sustainable and green supply chains. More traditional concepts, such as the keiretsu and chaibol networks of some Asian economies, do not sufficiently support the demands now being placed on networks. Research should address these five fundamental challenges to prepare for the industrial networks of 2020 and beyond. © 2010 Springer-Verlag London.

Electronic purchasing consortia:a procurement direction for the future?

In literature, there has been little empirical research investigation on purchasing consortium issues focusing on a detailed analysis of ICT-based procurement strategies. Based on the exploration of academic literature and a survey on e-Marketplaces / procurement service providers (PSPs) in the automotive and electronics industry sectors, an overall statement is proposed: Effective participation in electronic purchasing consortia can have the potential to enhance competitive advantage. Implementation therefore requires a clear and detailed understanding of the major process structures and drivers at the e-Marketplace / PSP level of analysis.

Oxidiative lipidomics coming of age:advances in analysis of oxidized phospholipids in physiology and pathology

Significance: Oxidized phospholipids are now well-recognized as markers of biological oxidative stress and bioactive molecules with both pro-inflammatory and anti-inflammatory effects. While analytical methods continue to be developed for studies of generic lipid oxidation, mass spectrometry (MS) has underpinned the advances in knowledge of specific oxidized phospholipids by allowing their identification and characterization, and is responsible for the expansion of oxidative lipidomics. Recent Advances: Studies of oxidized phospholipids in biological samples, both from animal models and clinical samples, have been facilitated by the recent improvements in MS, especially targeted routines that depend on the fragmentation pattern of the parent molecular ion and improved resolution and mass accuracy. MS can be used to identify selectively individual compounds or groups of compounds with common features, which greatly improves the sensitivity and specificity of detection. Application of these methods have enabled important advances in understanding the mechanisms of inflammatory diseases such as atherosclerosis, steatohepatitis, leprosy and cystic fibrosis, and offer potential for developing biomarkers of molecular aspects of the diseases. Critical Issues and Future Directions: The future in this field will depend on development of improved MS technologies, such as ion mobility, novel enrichment methods and databases and software for data analysis, owing to the very large amount of data generated in these experiments. Imaging of oxidized phospholipids in tissue MS is an additional exciting direction emerging that can be expected to advance understanding of physiology and disease.

Developing Financial Expertise Through Mathematics and IT School Curricula

Report published in the Proceedings of the National Conference on "Education and Research in the Information Society", Plovdiv, May, 2014

Graphical Approach to Teaching Compound Interest in High School Math Classes

Report published in the Proceedings of the National Conference on "Education and Research in the Information Society", Plovdiv, May, 2015

Bayesian Prediction of Weibull Distribution Based on Fixed and Random Sample Size

2000 Mathematics Subject Classification: 62E16, 65C05, 65C20.

A családi fészekben élő fiatal felnőttek és fogyasztói döntéseik (In the family nest living young adults and their consumer decisions)

Fiatal felnőttek nagyarányú jelenléte a szülői háztartásokban nemcsak Magyarországon és Európában jellemző, de a fejlett ipari országokban általánosan megfigyelhető jelenség. Az Európai Unióban élő 18–34 év közötti fiatalok 46%-a él együtt legalább egyik szülőjével, a magyar fiatalok esetében hasonló az arány. A fiatalok kitolódó felnőtté válása azt is jelenti, hogy a szülők egyre későbbi időponttól kezdve rendelkeznek szabadabban idejükkel és anyagi forrásaikkal, a fiatal felnőttek döntései pedig részben szüleik részvételével történik. Jelen cikk arra keresi a választ, hogy a szülői fészekben élő vagy a szüleiktől részben függő fiatalok milyen döntési mintákkal rendelkeznek, illetve vásárlási döntéseikben mennyire önállóak. A kérdés vizsgálatát a szülői háztól függő egyetemista fiatalok körében végzett kérdőíves megkérdezés segítségével a szerzők elemezték, és arra is lehetőségük volt, hogy a családtagok által írt rövid esszék segítségével a kérdést több oldalról vizsgálják meg. Eredményeik szerint a szülői háztól függő fiatal felnőttek önálló döntésre képes, sok esetben szakértő fogyasztók, döntéseik önállóságát azonban a termékkategória, a családdal való kapcsolattartás gyakorisága, a családforma és a nemi szerepek is befolyásolják. ____ High ratio of adult children is still living in their parents’ home. This is a significant phenomenon that can be observed in Hungary and throughout Europe, while influences living trends globally. In the EU, 46% of youth between 18-34 years live with at least one of their parents and this same statistic holds true in the case of Hungary. This postponement of adulthood allows parents to enjoy more free time and have higher disposable income from later in life. The young adults, however, in the household make their consumer decisions under parental control. The purpose of this study is to explore the decisionmaking styles of young adults and their independence from their parents in shopping-related decision-making through a literature review and primary study. The survey focused on university students who are dependent on their parental home and short essays were also collected from family members of the target group in order to gain a more complex view on this phenomenon. According to the results the following conclusion can be made: young adults living in their parents’ home are competent consumers with individual decisions, in addition, they are consumer experts within the family in many cases. However, their independent shopping-related decision-making is influenced by product category, frequency of connection to the family home, family form and also sex role orientations.