Most people with mental illness in low and middle-income countries (LMICs) do not receive biomedical treatment, though many seek care from traditional healers and faith healers. We conducted a qualitative study in Buyende District, Uganda, using framework analysis. Data collection included interviews with 24 traditional healers, 20 faith healers, and 23 biomedical providers, plus 4 focus group discussions. Interviews explored treatment approaches, provider relationships, and collaboration potential until theoretical saturation was reached. Three main themes emerged: (1) Biomedical providers’ perspectives on traditional and faith healers; (2) Traditional and faith healers’ views on biomedical providers; and (3) Collaboration opportunities and barriers. Biomedical providers viewed faith healers positively but traditional healers as potentially harmful. Traditional and faith healers valued biomedical approaches while feeling variably accepted. Interest in collaboration existed across groups but was complicated by power dynamics, economic concerns, and differing mental illness conceptualizations. Traditional healers and faith healers routinely referred patients to biomedical providers, though reciprocal referrals were rare. The study reveals distinct dynamics among providers in rural Uganda, with historical colonial influences continuing to shape relationships and highlighting the need for integrated, contextually appropriate mental healthcare systems.

Conservation aquaculture, defined as cultivating aquatic organisms to manage or replenish natural populations, has been advocated as a strategy to enhance fisheries production and help restore declining populations. Culture is especially compelling for species in steep decline and for which there is established methodology. The queen conch Aliger gigas is an example of a species with widely overexploited populations, with attempts to culture the species commercially ongoing for > 40 years. However, hatchery-releases have shown low survival from post-settlement to near maturity, leading to low conservation aquaculture potential. When this is viewed alongside large-scale fishery extractions, it is apparent that it is not commercially feasible to replace wild harvest nor ecologically feasible to replenish queen conch populations using existing aquaculture approaches. An age-based mortality model estimates the magnitude of culture required to replace a single adult of reproductive age. Extrapolations from catch–weight relationships highlight the scale of facilities and costs required to partially offset the harvest in a typical Caribbean fishery. Estimates of reproduction to achieve replacement suggest a greater yield from properly protecting natural breeding aggregations. Queen conch aquaculture is useful for scientific inquiry, community engagement and education, but not for stock enhancement or population restoration without more practical and cost-efficient options. Therefore, protecting breeding aggregations should be prioritized for the ecological viability of the species, as well as for its economic value for the people and industries that rely upon it.

In November 2023, the Department of Health and Social Care published guidance, entitled ‘Baroness Hollins’ Final Report: My Heart Breaks – Solitary Confinement in Hospital Has no Therapeutic Benefit for People with a Learning Disability and Autistic People’. The report's commendable analysis of the problems and identification of the areas where practice should be improved is unfortunately not matched by many of its recommendations, which appear to be contrary to evidence-based approaches. The concerns are wide-ranging, from the use of the term ‘solitary confinement’ for current long-term segregation (LTS) and seclusion, to presumption that all LTS and seclusion is bad, to holding clinicians (mainly psychiatrists) responsible for events beyond their locus of control. Importantly, there is a no guidance on how to practically deliver the recommendations in an evidence-based manner. This Feature critically appraises the report, to provide a comprehensive summary outlining potential positive impacts, identifying specific concerns and reflecting on best practice going forward.

We use a combination of primary and secondary data to investigate and quantify the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on the California specialty crop sector. We demonstrate that the specialty crop sector was highly resilient during the pandemic and aftermath in terms of output. For many crops, production fell somewhat between 2019 and 2021, but not to an extent that is outside of normal annual variation for fruits and vegetables. However, prices increased dramatically for many commodities. Contrary to conventional wisdom, most input costs did not surge during the pandemic, and some fell. But both the primary and secondary data identify labor and truck transportation as the major issues facing producers and driving up prices. Trade associations played a vital role in disseminating solutions to growers throughout the pandemic.

Fast and efficient identification is critical for reducing the likelihood of weed establishment and for appropriately managing established weeds. Traditional identification tools require either knowledge of technical morphological terminology or time-consuming image matching by the user. In recent years, deep learning computer vision models have become mature enough to enable automatic identification. The major remaining bottlenecks are the availability of a sufficient number of high-quality, reliably identified training images and the user-friendly, mobile operationalization of the technology. Here, we present the first weed identification and reporting app and website for all of Australia. It includes an image classification model covering more than 400 species of weeds and some Australian native relatives, with a focus on emerging biosecurity threats and spreading weeds that can still be eradicated or contained. It links the user to additional information provided by state and territory governments, flags species that are locally reportable or notifiable, and allows the creation of observation records in a central database. State and local weed officers can create notification profiles to be alerted of relevant weed observations in their area. We discuss the background of the WeedScan project, the approach taken in design and software development, the photo library used for training the WeedScan image classifier, the model itself and its accuracy, and technical challenges and how these were overcome.

This contribution departs from an existing model, the Design Framework for Systems-of-Systems Resilience, to explore systems resilience issues across the health, environmental, and economic domains. The reported research activities include 1) a rapid review to collect a set of systems indicators and 2) a design workshop employing causal loop diagramming to map expected causal influences between indicators. Through this exercise, we examine key themes in this research domain and outline directions for further enquiry, while involving members of the design research community in an open dialogue.

Analyzing data from a national deidentified electronic health record-based data set using a matched case–control study design, we found that antibiotic use and severity of illness were independent risk factors for healthcare-associated candidemia in adult patients hospitalized with SARS-CoV-2 infection. Interleukin-6 inhibitor and corticosteroid use were not independent risk factors.

PET imaging is increasingly recognized as an important diagnostic tool to investigate patients with cognitive disturbances of possible neurodegenerative origin. PET with 2-[18F]fluoro-2-deoxy-D-glucose ([18F]FDG), assessing glucose metabolism, provides a measure of neurodegeneration and allows a precise differential diagnosis among the most common neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease, frontotemporal dementia or dementia with Lewy bodies. PET tracers specific for the pathological deposits characteristic of different neurodegenerative processes, namely amyloid and tau deposits typical of Alzheimer’s Disease, allow the visualization of these aggregates in vivo. [18F]FDG and amyloid PET imaging have reached a high level of clinical validity and are since 2022 investigations that can be offered to patients in standard clinical care in most of Canada.

This article will briefly review and summarize the current knowledge on these diagnostic tools, their integration into diagnostic algorithms as well as perspectives for future developments.

In ultra-short laser pulses, small changes in dispersion properties before the final focusing mirror can lead to severe pulse distortions around the focus and therefore to very different pulse properties at the point of laser–matter interaction, yielding unexpected interaction results. The mapping between far- and near-field laser properties intricately depends on the spatial and angular dispersion properties as well as the focal geometry. For a focused Gaussian laser pulse under the influence of angular, spatial and group-delay dispersion, we derive analytical expressions for its pulse-front tilt, duration and width from a fully analytic expression for its electric field in the time–space domain obtained with scalar diffraction theory. This expression is not only valid in and near the focus but also along the entire propagation distance from the focusing mirror to the focus. Expressions relating angular, spatial and group-delay dispersion before focusing at an off-axis parabola, where they are well measurable, to the respective values in the pulse’s focus are obtained by a ray tracing approach. Together, these formulas are used to show in example setups that the pulse-front tilts of lasers with small initial dispersion can become several tens of degrees larger in the vicinity of the focus while being small directly in the focus. The formulas derived here provide the analytical foundation for observations previously made in numerical experiments. By numerically simulating Gaussian pulse propagation and measuring properties of the pulse at distances several Rayleigh lengths off the focus, we verify the analytic expressions.

OBJECTIVES/GOALS: The effect of immunosuppressive metabolites on anti-tumor immunity in human papillomavirus (HPV)-associated vs carcinogen-driven head and neck cancer is unknown. The objective of this study is to define the extent to which metabolites impair this response and identify novel metabolic targets for enhancing anti-tumor immunity. METHODS/STUDY POPULATION: HPV-associated and carcinogen-driven head and neck squamous cell carcinoma specimens were frozen following surgical excision, and tumor sections were cut onto glass slides. Slides were coated in alpha-cyano-4-hydroxy-cinnamic acid (CHCA) matrix and subjected to mass spectrometry imaging using matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization (MALDI) on a Bruker SolariX XR 12T Hybrid QqFT-ICR mass spectrometer run in positive mode. Slides were then stained for immunohistochemistry (IHC) using markers of CD8 T cells, macrophages (CD163), B cells (CD20), and tumor cells (panCK). Mass spectrometry imaging and IHC spatially resolved data will be co-registered and metabolite intensity in regions of interest (cell types) quantified. RESULTS/ANTICIPATED RESULTS: A total of seven HPV-associated (three metastatic lymph nodes and four primary tumors) and six carcinogen-driven (primary tumors) HNSC specimens were subjected to MALDI and IHC. Metabolites significantly enriched in HPV-associated HNSC relative to carcinogen-driven HNSC include 2,3-diphosphoglyceric acid, xanthine, 2,3,5-Trichloromaleylacetate, and indole-3-carboxyaldehyde. Metabolites significantly enriched in carcinogen-driven HNSC relative to HPV-associated HNSC include hesperetin 3'-O-sulfate, hypoxanthine, phosphorylcholine, and L-homocysteine sulfonic acid. In ongoing analyses, we anticipate identifying a relationship between CD8+ T cell enriched vs depleted regions and immunosuppressive metabolites (e.g., kynurenine, adenosine monophosphate). DISCUSSION/SIGNIFICANCE: Defining the extent to which CD8+ T cells interact with the metabolic milieu of the microenvironment will provide a foundation for metabolic Precision Medicine. Strategically targeting metabolic pathways to enhance the anti-tumor immune response will be leveraged for the design and implementation of immune modulatory metabolic therapy.

The draft Mental Health Bill, which amends the Mental Health Act 1983 for England and Wales, proposes protections for people with intellectual disability and/or autism (ID/A) to prevent detention in hospital in the absence of mental illness. This editorial critically appraises the positive impact and unintended consequences of the proposed reforms for people with ID/A.