In at the Deep End. Impressions of farming in a year gaining experience: 1952-3; 1978-85

The book describes a wide variety of students’ experiences in their practical year prior to entering University to study BSc Agriculture. Until comparatively recently it was the normal requirement for all such students, whether or not they already had home farming experience, to gain a full year’s experience of practical agriculture – and to write a report thereon. This record of 41 students’ reports of the pre-entry year begins with Paul’s own experience in the early 1950s before 41 reports from 30 or more years ago. The essays provide compelling and fascinating stories, well-articulated with clear acknowledgement for most part of the humanity and the warmth with which each student was treated by farmers and farm workers alike, despite the difference in both age and experience (considerable!). [This summary is an extract from the full overview which is archived here together with the book.]

Estimating age of mature adults from the degeneration of the sternal end of the clavicle

The sternal end of the clavicle has been illustrated to be useful in aging young adults, however, no studies have investigated what age-related changes occur to the sternal end post epiphyseal fusion. In this study, three morphological features (i.e., surface topography, porosity, and osteophyte formation) were examined and scored using 564 clavicles of individuals of European ancestry (n = 318 males; n = 246 females), with known ages of 40+ years, from four documented skeletal collections: Hamann-Todd, Pretoria, St. Bride's, and Coimbra. An ordinal scoring method was developed for each of the three traits. Surface topography showed the strongest correlation with age, and composite scores (formed by summing the three separate trait scores) indicated progressive degeneration of the surface with increasing chronological age. Linear regression analyses were performed on the trait scores to produce pooled-sample age estimation equations. Blind tests of the composite score method and regression formulae on 56 individuals, aged 40+ years, from Christ Church Spitalfields, suggest accuracies of 96.4% for both methods. These preliminary results display the first evidence of the utility of the sternal end of the clavicle in aging older adult individuals. However, in the current format, these criteria should only be applied to individuals already identified as over 40 years in order to refine the age ranges used for advanced age. These findings do suggest the sternal end of the clavicle has potential to aid age estimates beyond the traditional "mature adult" age category (i.e., 46+ years), and provides several suggestions for future research.

The Cold War in retrospect : 25 years after its end

This special issue of Cold War History offers a retrospective on the end of the Cold War, 25 years after its peaceful conclusion. This peaceful conclusion is an achievement that cannot be celebrated enough, and we must continue to build international relations in conflict and co-operation on this awareness of our common humanity and our common human fallibility.

Dating the Thera (Santorin) eruption: evidence versus poor scholarship, and the end of the low chronology

The date of the Late Bronze Age Minoan eruption of the Thera volcano has provoked much debate among archaeologists, not least in a recent issue of Antiquity (‘Bronze Age catastrophe and modern controversy: dating the Santorini eruption’, March 2014). Here, the authors respond to those recent contributions, citing evidence that closes the gap between the conclusions offered by previous typological, stratigraphic and radiometric dating techniques. They reject the need to choose between alternative approaches to the problem and make a case for the synchronisation of eastern Mediterranean and Egyptian chronologies with agreement on a ‘high’ date in the late seventeenth century BC for the Thera eruption.

Latent learning in end stage renal disease (ESRD)

Cognitive functions such as attention and memory are known to be impaired in End Stage Renal Disease (ESRD), but the sites of the neural changes underlying these impairments are uncertain. Patients and controls took part in a latent learning task, which had previously shown a dissociation between patients with Parkinson’s disease and those with medial temporal damage. ESRD patients (n=24) and age and education-matched controls (n=24) were randomly assigned to either an exposed or unexposed condition. In Phase 1 of the task, participants learned that a cue (word) on the back of a schematic head predicted that the subsequently seen face would be smiling. For the exposed (but not unexposed) condition, an additional (irrelevant) colour cue was shown during presentation. In Phase 2, a different association, between colour and facial expression, was learned. Instructions were the same for each phase: participants had to predict whether the subsequently viewed face was going to be happy or sad. No difference in error rate between the groups was found in Phase 1, suggesting that patients and controls learned at a similar rate. However, in Phase 2, a significant interaction was found between group and condition, with exposed controls performing significantly worse than unexposed (therefore demonstrating learned irrelevance). In contrast, exposed patients made a similar number of errors to unexposed in Phase 2. The pattern of results in ESRD was different from that previously found in Parkinson’s disease, suggesting a different neural origin.

The nature of impairments of memory in patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD)

Possible impairments of memory in end-stage renal disease (ESRD) were investigated in two experiments. In Experiment 1, in which stimulus words were presented visually, participants were tested on conceptual or perceptual memory tasks, with retrieval being either explicit or implicit. Compared with healthy controls, ESRD patients were impaired when memory required conceptual but not when it required perceptual processing, regardless of whether retrieval was explicit or implicit. An impairment of conceptual implicit memory (priming) in the ESRD group represented a previously unreported deficit compared to healthy aging. There were no significant differences between pre- and immediate post-dialysis memory performance in ESRD patients on any of the tasks. In Experiment 2, in which presentation was auditory, patients again performed worse than controls on an explicit conceptual memory task. We conclude that the type of processing required by the task (conceptual vs. perceptual) is more important than the type of retrieval (explicit vs. implicit) in memory failures in ESRD patients, perhaps because temporal brain regions are more susceptible to the effects of the illness than are posterior regions.

Microphase separation induced in the melt of Pluronic copolymers by blending with a hydrogen bonding urea–urethane end-capped supramolecular polymer

Blending with a hydrogen-bonding supramolecular polymer is shown to be a successful novel strategy to induce microphase-separation in the melt of a Pluronic polyether block copolymer. The supramolecular polymer is a polybutadiene derivative with urea–urethane end caps. Microphase separation is analysed using small-angle X-ray scattering and its influence on the macroscopic rheological properties is analysed. FTIR spectroscopy provides a detailed picture of the inter-molecular interactions between the polymer chains that induces conformational changes leading to microphase separation.

The Earls of Kildare and their books at the end of the Middle Ages

The two surviving inventories of the library of the Fitzgerald Earls of Kildare bear witness to a particularly large and diverse collection of books in the Earls' castle at Maynooth, Co. Kildare. Between them, the lists record well over one hundred separate items in four languages: Latin, French, English and Irish. This paper traces the history of the library and analyses the Fitzgeralds' particular interests as book collectors and as readers. It provides the first full published set of suggested identifications and bibliographical details for the books at Maynooth. It also includes a fresh transcription of the library lists and a discussion of the manuscript context in which they are preserved. Sources like the Kildare library lists provide valuable evidence for the potential circulation of a wide range of non-native manuscripts and prints in late-medieval Ireland.

Self-assembly of telechelic tyrosine end-capped PEO and poly(alanine) polymers in aqueous solution

The self-assembly in aqueous solution of three novel telechelic conjugates comprising a central hydrophilic polymer and short (trimeric or pentameric) tyrosine end-caps has been investigated. Two of the conjugates have a central poly(oxyethylene) (polyethylene oxide, PEO) central block with different molar masses. The other conjugate has a central poly(l-alanine) (PAla) sequence in a purely amino-acid based conjugate. All three conjugates self-assemble into β-sheet based fibrillar structures, although the fibrillar morphology revealed by cryogenic-TEM is distinct for the three polymers—in particular the Tyr5-PEO6k-Tyr5 forms a population of short straight fibrils in contrast to the more diffuse fibril aggregates observed for Tyr5-PEO2k-Tyr5 and Tyr3-PAla-Tyr3. Hydrogel formation was not observed for these samples (in contrast to prior work on related systems) up to quite high concentrations, showing that it is possible to prepare solutions of peptide–polymer-peptide conjugates with hydrophobic end-caps without conformational constraints associated with hydrogelation. The Tyr5-PEO6k-Tyr5 shows significant PEO crystallization upon drying in contrast to the Tyr5-PEO2k-Tyr5 conjugate. Our findings point to the remarkable ability of short hydrophobic peptide end groups to modulate the self-assembly properties of polymers in solution in model peptide-capped “associative polymers”. Retention of fluidity at high conjugate concentration may be valuable in potential future applications of these conjugates as bioresponsive or biocompatible materials, for example exploiting the enzyme-responsiveness of the tyrosine end-groups

End-of-life practices in seven Brazilian pediatric intensive care units

Objective: To evaluate the incidence of life support limitation and medical practices in the last 48 hrs of life of children in seven Brazilian pediatric intensive care units (PICUs). Design. Cross-sectional multicenter retrospective study based on medical chart review. Setting: Seven PICUs belonging to university and tertiary hospitals located in three Brazilian regions: two in Porto Alegre (southern region), two in Sao Paulo (southeastern region), and three in Salvador (northeastern region). Patients. Medical records of all children who died in seven PICUs from January 2003 to December 2004. Deaths in the first 24 hrs of admission to the PICU and brain death were excluded. Interventions: Two pediatric intensive care residents from each PICU were trained to fill out a standard protocol (K = 0.9) to record demographic data and all medical management provided in the last 48 hrs of life (inotropes, sedatives, mechanical ventilation, full resuscitation maneuvers or not). Student`s t-test, analysis of variance, chi-square test, and relative risk were used for comparison of data. Measurements and Main Results. Five hundred and sixty-one deaths were identified; 97 records were excluded (61 because of brain death and 36 due to <24 hrs in the PICU). Thirty-six medical charts could not be found. Cardiopulmonary resuscitation was performed in 242 children (57%) with a significant difference between the southeastern and northeastern regions (p =.0003). Older age (p = .025) and longer PICU stay (p = .001) were associated with do-not-resuscitate orders. In just 52.5% of the patients with life support limitation, the decision was clearly recorded in the medical chart. No ventilatory support was provided in 14 cases. Inotropic drug infusions were maintained or increased in 66% of patients with do-not-resuscitate orders. Conclusions. The incidence of life support limitation has increased among Brazilian PICUs but with significant regional differences. Do-not-resuscitate orders are still the most common practice, with scarce initiatives for withdrawing or withholding life support measures.

HISTOLOGIC EVALUATION OF END-TO-SIDE NEURORRHAPHY. EXPERIMENTAL STUDY IN RATS

Objective: The aim of this study was to histologically compare the axonal sprouting after end-to-side neurorrhaphy with or without epineurotomy. Methods: twenty male Wistar rats were used, divided into two groups of 10 rats each. A 1.0cm segment of the tibial nerve E was dried and sutured on the opposite side, where it was sutured into the sciatic nerve D. In Group I, the suture was made directly in the epineurium and in Group II, epineurotomy was performed. After 4 weeks, histological evaluation was carried out of the transposed segment and the sciatic nerve distal to the suture. Results: the results showed a small number of remyelinated fibers, varying from 7 to 51 fibers in Group I and from 10 to 91 fibers in Group II. The Mann-Whitney U test was used, with p=0.311, showing there is no statistically significant difference between the two groups. There was no positive relation between the number of remyelinated fibers in the graft and in the suture site distal to the sciatic lesion. Conclusion: lateral-ending neurorrhaphy, with or without epineural window, does not promote efficient remyelinization. Level of Evidence: Level II, prospective comparative study.

Intrachain Energy Migration to Weak Charge-Transfer State in Polyfluorene End-Capped with Naphthalimide Derivative

Polyfluorene end-capped with N-(2-benzothiazole)-1 8-naphthalimide (PF-BNI) is a highly fluorescent material with fluorescence emission modulated by solvent polarity Its low energy excited state is assigned as a mixed configuration state between the singlet S(1) of the fluorene backbone (F) with the charge transfer (CI) of the end group BNI The triexponential fluorescence decays of PF-BNI were associated with fast energy migration to form an intrachain charge-transfer (ICCT) state polyfluorene backbone decay and ICCT deactivation Time-resolved fluorescence anisotropy exhibited biexponential relaxation with a fast component of 12-16 ps in addition to a slow one in the range 0 8-1 4 ns depending on the solvent showing that depolarization occurs from two different processes energy migration to form the ICCT state and slow rotational diffusion motion of end segments at a longer time Results from femtosecond transient absorption measurements agreed with anisotropy decay and showed a decay component of about 16 ps at 605 nm in PF BNI ascribed to the conversion of S(1) to the ICCT excited state From the ratio of asymptotic and initial amplitudes of the transient absorption measurement the efficiency of intrachain ICCT formation is estimated in 0 5 which means that on average, half of the excited state formed in a BNI-(F)(n)-BNI chain with n = 32 is converted to its low energy intrachain charge-transfer (ICCT) state

Motor Winding Students at Work

This photo shows a classroom of students working on motors. Photograph is black and white.