We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
To save content items to your account,
please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies.
If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account.
Find out more about saving content to .
To save content items to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org
is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings
on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part
of your Kindle email address below.
Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations.
‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi.
‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Maladaptive daydreaming is a distinct syndrome in which the main symptom is excessive vivid fantasising that causes clinically significant distress and functional impairment in academic, vocational and social domains. Unlike normal daydreaming, maladaptive daydreaming is persistent, compulsive and detrimental to one’s life. It involves detachment from reality in favour of intense emotional engagement with alternative realities and often includes specific features such as psychomotor stereotypies (e.g. pacing in circles, jumping or shaking one’s hands), mouthing dialogues, facial gestures or enacting fantasy events. Comorbidity is common, but existing disorders do not account for the phenomenology of the symptoms. Whereas non-specific therapy is ineffective, targeted treatment seems promising. Thus, we propose that maladaptive daydreaming be considered a formal syndrome in psychiatric taxonomies, positioned within the dissociative disorders category. Maladaptive daydreaming satisfactorily meets criteria for conceptualisation as a psychiatric syndrome, including reliable discrimination from other disorders and solid interrater agreement. It involves significant dissociative aspects, such as disconnection from perception, behaviour and sense of self, and has some commonalities with but is not subsumed under existing dissociative disorders. Formal recognition of maladaptive daydreaming as a dissociative disorder will encourage awareness of a growing problem and spur theoretical, research and clinical developments.
We present a 1000 km transect of phase-sensitive radar measurements of ice thickness, basal reflection strength, basal melting and ice-column deformation across the Ross Ice Shelf (RIS). Measurements were gathered at varying intervals in austral summer between 2015 and 2020, connecting the grounding line with the distant ice shelf front. We identified changing basal reflection strengths revealing a variety of basal conditions influenced by ice flow and by ice–ocean interaction at the ice base. Reflection strength is lower across the central RIS, while strong reflections in the near-front and near-grounding line regions correspond with higher basal melt rates, up to 0.47 ± 0.02 m a−1 in the north. Melting from atmospherically warmed surface water extends 150–170 km south of the RIS front. Melt rates up to 0.29 ± 0.03 m a−1 and 0.15 ± 0.03 m a−1 are observed near the grounding lines of the Whillans and Kamb Ice Stream, respectively. Although troublesome to compare directly, our surface-based observations generally agree with the basal melt pattern provided by satellite-based methods but provide a distinctly smoother pattern. Our work delivers a precise measurement of basal melt rates across the RIS, a rare insight that also provides an early 21st-century baseline.
Objectives: This work was aimed at characterizing the experiences of discrimination, and report initial psychometric properties of a new tool to capture these experiences, among a global sample of people living with dementia.
Methods: Data from 704 people living with dementia who took part in a global survey from 33 different countries and territories were analysed. Psychometric properties were examined, including internal consistency and construct validity.
Results: A total of 83% of participants reported discrimination in one or more areas of life, and this was similar across WHO Regions. The exploratory factor analysis factor loadings and scree plot supported a unidimensional structure for the Discrimination and Stigma Scale Ultra Short for People Living with Dementia (DISCUS-Dementia). The instrument demonstrated excellent internal consistency, with most of the construct validity hypotheses being confirmed and qualitative responses demonstrating face validity.
Conclusions: The DISCUS-Dementia performs well with a global sample of people living with dementia. This scale can be integrated into large-scale studies to understand factors associated with stigma and discrimination. It can also provide an opportunity for a structured Discussion around stigma and discrimination experiences important to people living with dementia, as well as planning psychosocial services and initiatives to reduce stigma and discrimination.
The New Jersey Kids Study (NJKS) is a transdisciplinary statewide initiative to understand influences on child health, development, and disease. We conducted a mixed-methods study of project planning teams to investigate team effectiveness and relationships between team dynamics and quality of deliverables.
Methods:
Ten theme-based working groups (WGs) (e.g., Neurodevelopment, Nutrition) informed protocol development and submitted final reports. WG members (n = 79, 75%) completed questionnaires including de-identified demographic and professional information and a modified TeamSTEPPS Team Assessment Questionnaire (TAQ). Reviewers independently evaluated final reports using a standardized tool. We analyzed questionnaire results and final report assessments using linear regression and performed constant comparative qualitative analysis to identify central themes.
Results:
WG-level factors associated with greater team effectiveness included proportion of full professors (β = 31.24, 95% CI 27.65–34.82), team size (β = 0.81, 95% CI 0.70–0.92), and percent dedicated research effort (β = 0.11, 95% CI 0.09–0.13); age distribution (β = −2.67, 95% CI –3.00 to –2.38) and diversity of school affiliations (β = –33.32, 95% CI –36.84 to –29.80) were inversely associated with team effectiveness. No factors were associated with final report assessments. Perceptions of overall initiative leadership were associated with expressed enthusiasm for future NJKS participation. Qualitative analyses of final reports yielded four themes related to team science practices: organization and process, collaboration, task delegation, and decision-making patterns.
Conclusions:
We identified several correlates of team effectiveness in a team science initiative's early planning phase. Extra effort may be needed to bridge differences in team members' backgrounds to enhance the effectiveness of diverse teams. This work also highlights leadership as an important component in future investigator engagement.
Between 1903 and 1952, there was a Jesuit and French university in Shanghai called l’Aurore. This article focuses on its medical faculty, which operated from 1912 to 1952. It shows that, in a precarious political and military context, l’Aurore simultaneously benefited from Jesuit missionary activity and the French quest for imperial influence, without fully identifying with either. The faculty was not an official missionary institution, and most of its hundreds of students were not Christians. However, the Jesuit administration kept a record of baptisms among the students and, based on Catholic principles, encouraged opposition to birth control through courses on ‘medical ethics’ and a special oath that medical graduates had to take. Nor was the medical faculty an overtly imperial institution. It was part of a concession and the result of an alliance between Jesuit missionaries and anti-clerical diplomats of the French Third Republic. Yet, the faculty was key to a French policy of imperial influence designed to compete with other imperial, religious, and private foreign powers active in medical education in China. During the years of war between China and Japan (1937–1945), the faculty consolidated its influence by increasing student numbers and building new infrastructure, whereas its Chinese staff assumed a more prominent role, reinforcing the importance of Chinese medicine in teaching and research. Doctors trained at l’Aurore who stayed in China remained active in public health until well into the second half of the twentieth century, even after the medical faculty was abolished by the Communist regime.
Diagnostic criteria for major depressive disorder allow for heterogeneous symptom profiles but genetic analysis of major depressive symptoms has the potential to identify clinical and etiological subtypes. There are several challenges to integrating symptom data from genetically informative cohorts, such as sample size differences between clinical and community cohorts and various patterns of missing data.
Methods
We conducted genome-wide association studies of major depressive symptoms in three cohorts that were enriched for participants with a diagnosis of depression (Psychiatric Genomics Consortium, Australian Genetics of Depression Study, Generation Scotland) and three community cohorts who were not recruited on the basis of diagnosis (Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children, Estonian Biobank, and UK Biobank). We fit a series of confirmatory factor models with factors that accounted for how symptom data was sampled and then compared alternative models with different symptom factors.
Results
The best fitting model had a distinct factor for Appetite/Weight symptoms and an additional measurement factor that accounted for the skip-structure in community cohorts (use of Depression and Anhedonia as gating symptoms).
Conclusion
The results show the importance of assessing the directionality of symptoms (such as hypersomnia versus insomnia) and of accounting for study and measurement design when meta-analyzing genetic association data.
NASA’s all-sky survey mission, the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), is specifically engineered to detect exoplanets that transit bright stars. Thus far, TESS has successfully identified approximately 400 transiting exoplanets, in addition to roughly 6 000 candidate exoplanets pending confirmation. In this study, we present the results of our ongoing project, the Validation of Transiting Exoplanets using Statistical Tools (VaTEST). Our dedicated effort is focused on the confirmation and characterisation of new exoplanets through the application of statistical validation tools. Through a combination of ground-based telescope data, high-resolution imaging, and the utilisation of the statistical validation tool known as TRICERATOPS, we have successfully discovered eight potential super-Earths. These planets bear the designations: TOI-238b (1.61$^{+0.09} _{-0.10}$ R$_\oplus$), TOI-771b (1.42$^{+0.11} _{-0.09}$ R$_\oplus$), TOI-871b (1.66$^{+0.11} _{-0.11}$ R$_\oplus$), TOI-1467b (1.83$^{+0.16} _{-0.15}$ R$_\oplus$), TOI-1739b (1.69$^{+0.10} _{-0.08}$ R$_\oplus$), TOI-2068b (1.82$^{+0.16} _{-0.15}$ R$_\oplus$), TOI-4559b (1.42$^{+0.13} _{-0.11}$ R$_\oplus$), and TOI-5799b (1.62$^{+0.19} _{-0.13}$ R$_\oplus$). Among all these planets, six of them fall within the region known as ‘keystone planets’, which makes them particularly interesting for study. Based on the location of TOI-771b and TOI-4559b below the radius valley we characterised them as likely super-Earths, though radial velocity mass measurements for these planets will provide more details about their characterisation. It is noteworthy that planets within the size range investigated herein are absent from our own solar system, making their study crucial for gaining insights into the evolutionary stages between Earth and Neptune.
In recent decades, populist parties and leaders have obtained great political success. Since populism plays on voter dissatisfaction with the political elite, we might expect that dissatisfaction with the welfare state should also play a role. In this study, we suggest measures to assess welfare state performance (WSP), and we examine how assessment of WSP helps to explain support for the populist political parties – both rightwing and leftwing. Our findings are based on the sixth round of European Social Survey data that has a special module on democracy, which includes questions that enables us to measure WSP. This article shows that WSP is a significant predictor in explaining support for populist parties, but the dynamics differ between how WSP influences support for leftwing populist (LWP) and rightwing populist (RWP) parties.
The UK Soft Drinks Industry Levy (SDIL) (announced in March 2016; implemented in April 2018) aims to incentivise reformulation of soft drinks to reduce added sugar levels. The SDIL has been applauded as a policy success, and it has survived calls from parliamentarians for it to be repealed. We aimed to explore parliamentary reaction to the SDIL following its announcement until two years post-implementation in order to understand how health policy can become established and resilient to opposition.
Design:
Searches of Hansard for parliamentary debate transcripts that discussed the SDIL retrieved 186 transcripts, with 160 included after screening. Five stages of Applied Thematic Analysis were conducted: familiarisation and creation of initial codebooks; independent second coding; codebook finalisation through team consensus; final coding of the dataset to the complete codebook; and theme finalisation through team consensus.
Setting:
The United Kingdom Parliament
Participants:
N/A
Results:
Between the announcement (16/03/2016) – royal assent (26/04/2017), two themes were identified 1: SDIL welcomed cross-party 2: SDIL a good start but not enough. Between royal assent – implementation (5/04/2018), one theme was identified 3: The SDIL worked – what next? The final theme identified from implementation until 16/03/2020 was 4: Moving on from the SDIL.
Conclusions:
After the announcement, the SDIL had cross-party support and was recognised to have encouraged reformulation prior to implementation. Lessons for governments indicate that the combination of cross-party support and a policy’s documented success in achieving its aim can help cement the resilience of it to opposition and threats of repeal.
We show that the exposure to war-related violence increases the quantity of children temporarily, with permanent negative consequences for the quality of the current and previous cohorts. Our empirical evidence is based on Nepal, which experienced a 10 year long civil conflict of varying intensity. We exploit that villages affected by the conflict had the same trend in fertility as non-affected villages prior to the onset of conflict and employ a difference-in-differences estimator. We find that women in affected villages increased their fertility during the conflict by 19%, while child height-for-age declined by 10%. Supporting evidence suggests that the temporary fertility increase was the main pathway leading to reduced child height, as opposed to direct impacts of the conflict.
We identify a set of essential recent advances in climate change research with high policy relevance, across natural and social sciences: (1) looming inevitability and implications of overshooting the 1.5°C warming limit, (2) urgent need for a rapid and managed fossil fuel phase-out, (3) challenges for scaling carbon dioxide removal, (4) uncertainties regarding the future contribution of natural carbon sinks, (5) intertwinedness of the crises of biodiversity loss and climate change, (6) compound events, (7) mountain glacier loss, (8) human immobility in the face of climate risks, (9) adaptation justice, and (10) just transitions in food systems.
Technical summary
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Assessment Reports provides the scientific foundation for international climate negotiations and constitutes an unmatched resource for researchers. However, the assessment cycles take multiple years. As a contribution to cross- and interdisciplinary understanding of climate change across diverse research communities, we have streamlined an annual process to identify and synthesize significant research advances. We collected input from experts on various fields using an online questionnaire and prioritized a set of 10 key research insights with high policy relevance. This year, we focus on: (1) the looming overshoot of the 1.5°C warming limit, (2) the urgency of fossil fuel phase-out, (3) challenges to scale-up carbon dioxide removal, (4) uncertainties regarding future natural carbon sinks, (5) the need for joint governance of biodiversity loss and climate change, (6) advances in understanding compound events, (7) accelerated mountain glacier loss, (8) human immobility amidst climate risks, (9) adaptation justice, and (10) just transitions in food systems. We present a succinct account of these insights, reflect on their policy implications, and offer an integrated set of policy-relevant messages. This science synthesis and science communication effort is also the basis for a policy report contributing to elevate climate science every year in time for the United Nations Climate Change Conference.
Social media summary
We highlight recent and policy-relevant advances in climate change research – with input from more than 200 experts.
The recent World Health Organization (WHO) blueprint for dementia research and Lancet Commission on ending stigma and discrimination in mental health has identified a gap around dementia-related measures of stigma and discrimination that can be used in different cultural, language and regional contexts.
Aims
We aimed to characterise experiences of discrimination, and report initial psychometric properties of a new tool to capture these experiences, among a global sample of people living with dementia.
Method
We analysed data from 704 people living with dementia who took part in a global survey from 33 different countries and territories. Psychometric properties were examined, including internal consistency and construct validity.
Results
A total of 83% of participants reported discrimination in one or more areas of life, and this was similar across WHO Regions. The exploratory factor analysis factor loadings and scree plot supported a unidimensional structure for the Discrimination and Stigma Scale Ultra Short for People Living with Dementia (DISCUS-Dementia). The instrument demonstrated excellent internal consistency, with most of the construct validity hypotheses being confirmed and qualitative responses demonstrating face validity.
Conclusions
Our analyses suggest that the DISCUS-Dementia performs well with a global sample of people living with dementia. This scale can be integrated into large-scale studies to understand factors associated with stigma and discrimination. It can also provide an opportunity for a structured discussion around stigma and discrimination experiences important to people living with dementia, as well as planning psychosocial services and initiatives to reduce stigma and discrimination.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture–Agricultural Research Service (USDA-ARS) has been a leader in weed science research covering topics ranging from the development and use of integrated weed management (IWM) tactics to basic mechanistic studies, including biotic resistance of desirable plant communities and herbicide resistance. ARS weed scientists have worked in agricultural and natural ecosystems, including agronomic and horticultural crops, pastures, forests, wild lands, aquatic habitats, wetlands, and riparian areas. Through strong partnerships with academia, state agencies, private industry, and numerous federal programs, ARS weed scientists have made contributions to discoveries in the newest fields of robotics and genetics, as well as the traditional and fundamental subjects of weed–crop competition and physiology and integration of weed control tactics and practices. Weed science at ARS is often overshadowed by other research topics; thus, few are aware of the long history of ARS weed science and its important contributions. This review is the result of a symposium held at the Weed Science Society of America’s 62nd Annual Meeting in 2022 that included 10 separate presentations in a virtual Weed Science Webinar Series. The overarching themes of management tactics (IWM, biological control, and automation), basic mechanisms (competition, invasive plant genetics, and herbicide resistance), and ecosystem impacts (invasive plant spread, climate change, conservation, and restoration) represent core ARS weed science research that is dynamic and efficacious and has been a significant component of the agency’s national and international efforts. This review highlights current studies and future directions that exemplify the science and collaborative relationships both within and outside ARS. Given the constraints of weeds and invasive plants on all aspects of food, feed, and fiber systems, there is an acknowledged need to face new challenges, including agriculture and natural resources sustainability, economic resilience and reliability, and societal health and well-being.
The surface of the Greenland Ice Sheet is darkening, which accelerates its surface melt. The role of glacier ice algae in reducing surface albedo is widely recognised but not well quantified and the feedbacks between the algae and the weathering crust remain poorly understood. In this letter, we summarise recent advances in the study of the biological darkening of the Greenland Ice Sheet and highlight three key research priorities that are required to better understand and forecast algal-driven melt: (i) identifying the controls on glacier ice algal growth and mortality, (ii) quantifying the spatio-temporal variability in glacier ice algal biomass and processes involved in cell redistribution and (iii) determining the albedo feedbacks between algal biomass and weathering crust characteristics. Addressing these key research priorities will allow us to better understand the supraglacial ice-algal system and to develop an integrated model incorporating the algal and physical controls on ice surface albedo.
Vector-borne parasites are important ecological drivers influencing life-history evolution in birds by increasing host mortality or susceptibility to new diseases. Therefore, understanding why vulnerability to infection varies within a host clade is a crucial task for conservation biology and for understanding macroecological life-history patterns. Here, we studied the relationship of avian life-history traits and climate on the prevalence of Plasmodium and Parahaemoproteus parasites. We sampled 3569 individual birds belonging to 53 species of the family Thraupidae. Individuals were captured from 2007 to 2018 at 92 locations. We created 2 phylogenetic generalized least-squares models with Plasmodium and Parahaemoproteus prevalence as our response variables, and with the following predictor variables: climate PC1, climate PC2, body size, mixed-species flock participation, incubation period, migration, nest height, foraging height, forest cover, and diet. We found that Parahaemoproteus and Plasmodium prevalence was higher in species inhabiting open habitats. Tanager species with longer incubation periods had higher Parahaemoproteus prevalence as well, and we hypothesize that these longer incubation periods overlap with maximum vector abundances, resulting in a higher probability of infection among adult hosts during their incubation period and among chicks. Lastly, we found that Plasmodium prevalence was higher in species without migratory behaviour, with mixed-species flock participation, and with an omnivorous or animal-derived diet. We discuss the consequences of higher infection prevalence in relation to life-history traits in tanagers.
As TeV gamma-ray astronomy progresses into the era of the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA), there is a desire for the capacity to instantaneously follow up on transient phenomena and continuously monitor gamma-ray flux at energies above $10^{12}\,\mathrm{eV}$. To this end, a worldwide network of Imaging Air Cherenkov Telescopes (IACTs) is required to provide triggers for CTA observations and complementary continuous monitoring. An IACT array sited in Australia would contribute significant coverage of the Southern Hemisphere sky. Here, we investigate the suitability of a small IACT array and how different design factors influence its performance. Monte Carlo simulations were produced based on the Small-Sized Telescope (SST) and Medium-Sized Telescope (MST) designs from CTA. Angular resolution improved with larger baseline distances up to 277 m between telescopes, and energy thresholds were lower at 1 000 m altitude than at 0 m. The ${\sim} 300\,\mathrm{GeV}$ energy threshold of MSTs proved more suitable for observing transients than the ${\sim}1.2\,\mathrm{TeV}$ threshold of SSTs. An array of four MSTs at 1 000 m was estimated to give a 5.7$\sigma$ detection of an RS Ophiuchi-like nova eruption from a 4-h observation. We conclude that an array of four MST-class IACTs at an Australian site would ideally complement the capabilities of CTA.
OBJECTIVES/GOALS: Current approaches to drug development for the aggressive triple negative breast cancer rely on current 2D and 3D in vitro models which have limited capabilities. We have developed a translational microphysiological system that can maintain the human breast microenvironment to capture the complex interaction with the tumor microenvironment. METHODS/STUDY POPULATION: Three different TNBC cell lines were seeded in BC-MPS: MDA-MB-231 parental cell line, MDA-MB-231wiht the gene, LKB1 overexpressed, which is a tumor suppressor, and MDA-MB-231 with the enzyme, ERK5, an enzyme associated with increased metastasis and drug resistance, knocked out. These three TNBC cell lines were cultured in a standard 2D 96-well plate and in BC-MPS. Time-lapse videos were taken to track cellular mobility. RNA-sequencing was performed to compare different expression levels of various cancer related genes of the cell lines cultured in standard 2D and BC-MPS. RESULTS/ANTICIPATED RESULTS: The LKB1 overexpressed MDA-MB-231 and the ERK5-ko MDA-MB-231 cell lines are expected to have decreased mobility compared to the parental cells. The cell lines are expected to have increased expression of cancer related genes when cultured in BC-MPS than when cultured in standard 2D due to the presence of human breast tissue. DISCUSSION/SIGNIFICANCE: BC-MPS is a promising new translational MPS that facilitates studying long term interactions between real human breast tissue and cancer cells. The BC-MPS systems ability to support the growth of established cell lines has been demonstrated. Future studies will focus on developing the model for personalized medicine.
We report on the mobility and orientation of finite-size, neutrally buoyant, prolate ellipsoids (of aspect ratio $\varLambda =4$) in Taylor–Couette flow, using interface-resolved numerical simulations. The set-up consists of a particle-laden flow between a rotating inner and a stationary outer cylinder. The flow regimes explored are the well-known Taylor vortex, wavy vortex and turbulent Taylor vortex flow regimes. We simulate two particle sizes $\ell /d=0.1$ and $\ell /d=0.2$, $\ell$ denoting the particle major axis and $d$ the gap width between the cylinders. The volume fractions are $0.01\,\%$ and $0.07\,\%$, respectively. The particles, which are initially randomly positioned, ultimately display characteristic spatial distributions which can be categorised into four modes. Modes (i) to (iii) are observed in the Taylor vortex flow regime, while mode (iv) encompasses both the wavy vortex and turbulent Taylor vortex flow regimes. Mode (i) corresponds to stable orbits away from the vortex cores. Remarkably, in a narrow $\textit {Ta}$ range, particles get trapped in the Taylor vortex cores (mode (ii)). Mode (iii) is the transition when both modes (i) and (ii) are observed. For mode (iv), particles distribute throughout the domain due to flow instabilities. All four modes show characteristic orientational statistics. The focus of the present study is on mode (ii). We find the particle clustering for this mode to be size-dependent, with two main observations. Firstly, particle agglomeration at the core is much higher for $\ell /d=0.2$ compared with $\ell /d=0.1$. Secondly, the $\textit {Ta}$ range for which clustering is observed depends on the particle size. For this mode (ii) we observe particles to align strongly with the local cylinder tangent. The most pronounced particle alignment is observed for $\ell /d=0.2$ at around $\textit {Ta}=4.2\times 10^5$. This observation is found to closely correspond to a minimum of axial vorticity at the Taylor vortex core ($\textit {Ta}=6\times 10^5$) and we explain why.