Background: Our prior six-year review (n=2165) revealed 24% of patients undergoing posterior decompression surgeries (laminectomy or discectomy) sought emergency department (ED) care within three months post-surgery. We established an integrated Spine Assessment Clinic (SAC) to enhance patient outcomes and minimize unnecessary ED visits through pre-operative education, targeted QI interventions, and early post-operative follow-up. Methods: We reviewed 13 months of posterior decompression data (n=205) following SAC implementation. These patients received individualized, comprehensive pre-operative education and follow-up phone calls within 7 days post-surgery. ED visits within 90 days post-surgery were tracked using provincial databases and compared to our pre-SAC implementation data. Results: Out of 205 patients, 24 (11.6%) accounted for 34 ED visits within 90 days post-op, showing a significant reduction in ED visits from 24% to 11.6%, and decreased overall ED utilization from 42.1% to 16.6% (when accounting for multiple visits by the same patient). Early interventions including wound monitoring, outpatient bloodwork, and prescription adjustments for pain management, helped mitigate ED visits. Patient satisfaction surveys (n=62) indicated 92% were “highly satisfied” and 100% would recommend the SAC. Conclusions: The SAC reduced ED visits after posterior decompression surgery by over 50%, with pre-operative education, focused QI initiatives, and its individualized, proactive approach.

An important component of post-release monitoring of biological control of invasive plants is the tracking of species interactions. During post-release monitoring following the initial releases of the weevil Ceutorhynchus scrobicollis Nerenscheimer and Wagner (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) on garlic mustard, Alliaria petiolata (Marschall von Bieberstein) Cavara and Grande (Brassicaceae), in Ontario, Canada, we identified the presence of larvae of the tumbling flower beetle, Mordellina ancilla Leconte (Coleoptera: Mordellidae), in garlic mustard stems. This study documents the life history of M. ancilla on garlic mustard to assess for potential interactions between M. ancilla and C. scrobicollis as a biological control agent. Garlic mustard stems were sampled at eight sites across southern Ontario and throughout the course of one year to record the prevalence of this association and to observe its life cycle on the plant. We found M. ancilla to be a widespread stem-borer of late second–year and dead garlic mustard plants across sampling locations. This is the first host record for M. ancilla on garlic mustard. The observed life cycle of M. ancilla indicates that it is unlikely to negatively impact the growth and reproduction of garlic mustard and that it is unlikely to affect the use of C. scrobicollis as a biological control agent.

Objectives/Goals: We describe the prevalence of individuals with household exposure to SARS-CoV-2, who subsequently report symptoms consistent with COVID-19, while having PCR results persistently negative for SARS-CoV-2 (S[+]/P[-]). We assess whether paired serology can assist in identifying the true infection status of such individuals. Methods/Study Population: In a multicenter household transmission study, index patients with SARS-CoV-2 were identified and enrolled together with their household contacts within 1 week of index’s illness onset. For 10 consecutive days, enrolled individuals provided daily symptom diaries and nasal specimens for polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Contacts were categorized into 4 groups based on presence of symptoms (S[+/-]) and PCR positivity (P[+/-]). Acute and convalescent blood specimens from these individuals (30 days apart) were subjected to quantitative serologic analysis for SARS-CoV-2 anti-nucleocapsid, spike, and receptor-binding domain antibodies. The antibody change in S[+]/P[-] individuals was assessed by thresholds derived from receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis of S[+]/P[+] (infected) versusS[-]/P[-] (uninfected). Results/Anticipated Results: Among 1,433 contacts, 67% had ≥1 SARS-CoV-2 PCR[+] result, while 33% remained PCR[-]. Among the latter, 55% (n = 263) reported symptoms for at least 1 day, most commonly congestion (63%), fatigue (63%), headache (62%), cough (59%), and sore throat (50%). A history of both previous infection and vaccination was present in 37% of S[+]/P[-] individuals, 38% of S[-]/P[-], and 21% of S[+]/P[+] (P<0.05). Vaccination alone was present in 37%, 41%, and 52%, respectively. ROC analyses of paired serologic testing of S[+]/P[+] (n = 354) vs. S[-]/P[-] (n = 103) individuals found anti-nucleocapsid data had the highest area under the curve (0.87). Based on the 30-day antibody change, 6.9% of S[+]/P[-] individuals demonstrated an increased convalescent antibody signal, although a similar seroresponse in 7.8% of the S[-]/P[-] group was observed. Discussion/Significance of Impact: Reporting respiratory symptoms was common among household contacts with persistent PCR[-] results. Paired serology analyses found similar seroresponses between S[+]/P[-] and S[-]/P[-] individuals. The symptomatic-but-PCR-negative phenomenon, while frequent, is unlikely attributable to true SARS-CoV-2 infections that go missed by PCR.

To facilitate and sustain community-engaged research (CEnR) conducted by academic-community partnerships (ACPs), a Clinical Translational Science Award (CTSA)-funded Community Engagement Core (CEC) and Community Partner Council (CPC) co-created two innovative microgrant programs. The Community Health Grant (CHG) and the Partnership Development Grant (PDG) programs are designed to specifically fund ACPs conducting pilot programs aimed at improving health outcomes. Collectively, these programs have engaged 94 community partner organizations while impacting over 55,000 individuals and leveraging $1.2 million to fund over $10 million through other grants and awards. A cross-sectional survey of 57 CHG awardees demonstrated high overall satisfaction with the programs and indicated that participation addressed barriers to CEnR, such as building trust in research and improving partnership and program sustainability. The goal of this paper is to (1) describe the rationale and development of the CHG and PDG programs; (2) their feasibility, impact, and sustainability; and (3) lessons learned and best practices. Institutions seeking to implement similar programs should focus on integrating community partners throughout the design and review processes and prioritizing projects that align with specific, measurable goals.

Young people with childhood adversity (CA) were at increased risk to experience mental health problems during the COVID-19 pandemic. Pre-pandemic research identified high-quality friendship support as a protective factor that can buffer against the emergence of mental health problems in young people with CA. This longitudinal study investigated friendship buffering effects on mental health symptoms before and at three timepoints during the pandemic in 102 young people (aged 16–26) with low to moderate CA. Multilevel analyses revealed a continuous increase in depression symptoms following the outbreak. Friendship quality was perceived as elevated during lockdowns and returned to pre-pandemic baseline levels during reopening. A stress-sensitizing effect of CA on social functioning was evident, as social thinning occurred following the outbreak. Bivariate latent change score modeling revealed that before and during the pandemic, young people with greater friendship quality self-reported lower depression symptoms and vice versa. Furthermore, sequential mediation analysis showed that high-quality friendships before the pandemic buffered depression symptoms during the pandemic through reducing perceived stress. These findings highlight the importance of fostering stable and supportive friendships in young people with CA and suggest that through reducing stress perceptions high-quality friendships can mitigate mental health problems during times of multidimensional stress.

The global population and status of Snowy Owls Bubo scandiacus are particularly challenging to assess because individuals are irruptive and nomadic, and the breeding range is restricted to the remote circumpolar Arctic tundra. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) uplisted the Snowy Owl to “Vulnerable” in 2017 because the suggested population estimates appeared considerably lower than historical estimates, and it recommended actions to clarify the population size, structure, and trends. Here we present a broad review and status assessment, an effort led by the International Snowy Owl Working Group (ISOWG) and researchers from around the world, to estimate population trends and the current global status of the Snowy Owl. We use long-term breeding data, genetic studies, satellite-GPS tracking, and survival estimates to assess current population trends at several monitoring sites in the Arctic and we review the ecology and threats throughout the Snowy Owl range. An assessment of the available data suggests that current estimates of a worldwide population of 14,000–28,000 breeding adults are plausible. Our assessment of population trends at five long-term monitoring sites suggests that breeding populations of Snowy Owls in the Arctic have decreased by more than 30% over the past three generations and the species should continue to be categorised as Vulnerable under the IUCN Red List Criterion A2. We offer research recommendations to improve our understanding of Snowy Owl biology and future population assessments in a changing world.

The Durness Group of NW Scotland records deposition on the Laurentian margin from the basal Miaolingian (Cambrian, 509 Ma) to the Dapingian–Darriwilian boundary interval (Middle Ordovician, 470.3–468.9 Ma). The 930 m thick succession of peritidal and subtidal carbonates was deposited on the Scottish promontory, a nearly 120° deflection in the Palaeozoic continental margin between the Appalachian and Greenland sectors. These sediments were deposited as part of the Great American Carbonate Bank, a non-uniformitarian, continent-scale carbonate platform developed on the peneplaned craton. Measurement and description of a bed-by-bed composite section through the Durness Group provide a high-resolution reference framework that integrates conodont biostratigraphy, chemostratigraphy and sequence stratigraphy, including correlation with the Sauk megasequence and its subdivisions. The Sauk II–Sauk III sequence boundary marks the base of the group. The top of the group is faulted against rocks of the Moine thrust zone, generated by the Scandian orogeny, but sedimentation was probably terminated by the earlier Grampian arc–continent collision at 470–469 Ma. The highly mature quartz arenites of the underlying Ardvreck Group (Cambrian Series 2) indicate that there was no source-to-sink depositional continuity from the Hebridean foreland to the Dalradian Supergroup, which has coeval clastic sedimentary rocks of contrasting composition.

Current literature offers limited mass estimation methodologies and their application in the conceptual or preliminary design stages of moderate to high aspect ratio wings with electric, hydrogen or distributed propulsions. This study presents the development and application of a quasi-analytical wing mass estimation method to address this limitation. The proposed method is distinguished from the existing mass estimation methods by its expanded realistic load cases, sensitivity to several design parameters, improved accuracy with short computational time and capabilities for future applications. To achieve these features, new geometric models are introduced; 483 load cases including symmetric manoeuvre, rolling, and combined cases are covered following airworthiness requirements; the structural elements are idealised and sized with strength and buckling criteria; existing methods are evaluated and integrated cautiously for secondary structures and non-optimum masses. A computation time of 0.1s is accomplished for one load case. The developed method achieved the highest accuracy with an average error of -2.2% and a standard error of 1.8% for wing mass estimates compared with six existing methods, benchmarked against thirteen wings of different aircraft categories. The effects of engine numbers with dual- to 16-engine setups and the dry wing concepts on the wing mass are investigated. The optimised number of engines and their locations decreased the wing mass of the high aspect ratio wing significantly. In contrast, the dry wing design increased the wing masses of all baseline aircraft. The future applications and improvements of the presented method in novel configurations and multidisciplinary designed optimisation studies are explained.

We present the Pilot Survey Phase 2 data release for the Wide-field ASKAP L-band Legacy All-sky Blind surveY (WALLABY), carried-out using the Australian SKA Pathfinder (ASKAP). We present 1760 H i detections (with a default spatial resolution of 30′′) from three pilot fields including the NGC 5044 and NGC 4808 groups as well as the Vela field, covering a total of $\sim 180$ deg$^2$ of the sky and spanning a redshift up to $z \simeq 0.09$. This release also includes kinematic models for over 126 spatially resolved galaxies. The observed median rms noise in the image cubes is 1.7 mJy per 30′′ beam and 18.5 kHz channel. This corresponds to a 5$\sigma$ H i column density sensitivity of $\sim 9.1\times10^{19}(1 + z)^4$ cm$^{-2}$ per 30′′ beam and $\sim 20$ km s$^{-1}$ channel and a 5$\sigma$ H i mass sensitivity of $\sim 5.5\times10^8 (D/100$ Mpc)$^{2}$ M$_{\odot}$ for point sources. Furthermore, we also present for the first time 12′′ high-resolution images (“cut-outs”) and catalogues for a sub-sample of 80 sources from the Pilot Survey Phase 2 fields. While we are able to recover sources with lower signal-to-noise ratio compared to sources in the Public Data Release 1, we do note that some data quality issues still persist, notably, flux discrepancies that are linked to the impact of side lobes associated with the dirty beams due to inadequate deconvolution. However, in spite of these limitations, the WALLABY Pilot Survey Phase 2 has already produced roughly a third of the number of HIPASS sources, making this the largest spatially resolved H i sample from a single survey to date.