In his 2019 essay, Arthur Kleinman laments that medicine has become ever-competent at managing illness, yet caring for those who are ill is increasingly out of practice. He opines that the language of ‘the soul’ is helpful to those practicing medicine, as it provides an important counterbalance to medicine’s technical rationality that avoids the existential and spiritual domains of human life. His accusation that medicine has become soulless merits considering, yet we believe his is the wrong description of contemporary medicine. Where medicine is disciplined by technological and informational rationalities that risk coercing attention away from corporealities and toward an impersonal, digital order, the resulting practices expose medicine to becoming not soulless but excarnated. Here we engage Kleinman in conversation with Franco Berardi, Charles Taylor, and others to ask: Have we left behind the body for senseless purposes? Perhaps medicine is not proving itself to be soulless, but rather senseless, bodyless – the any-occupation of excarnated souls. If so, the dissension of excarnation and the recovery of touching purpose seems to us to be an apparent need within the contemporary and increasingly digitally managed and informationally ordered medical milieu.

Autoimmune encephalitis is increasingly recognized as a neurologic cause of acute mental status changes with similar prevalence to infectious encephalitis. Despite rising awareness, approaches to diagnosis remain inconsistent and evidence for optimal treatment is limited. The following Canadian guidelines represent a consensus and evidence (where available) based approach to both the diagnosis and treatment of adult patients with autoimmune encephalitis. The guidelines were developed using a modified RAND process and included input from specialists in autoimmune neurology, neuropsychiatry and infectious diseases. These guidelines are targeted at front line clinicians and were created to provide a pragmatic and practical approach to managing such patients in the acute setting.

Partisanship in American politics is inextricably linked with social identities, and sentiments toward party-aligned groups affect political orientations. However, out-group animosity may operate differently depending on the party or elite. We investigate the extent to which citizens’ animus toward (Democratically aligned) minority groups drove political support for Donald Trump, whose incendiary rhetoric regarding such groups is unique in modern presidential politics. Leveraging panel data beginning before Trump’s candidacy, we find that animus toward Democratic-linked groups in 2011 predicts future support for Trump regardless of party identity. This animus does not predict future support for other Republican or Democratic politicians or either party. Nor do we find that animus toward Republican groups predicts support for Democratic elites. Trump’s support is thus uniquely tied to animus toward minority groups. Our findings provide insights into the social divisions underlying American politics and the role of elite rhetoric in translating animus into political support.

Implementation of clinically useful research discoveries in the academic environment is challenged by limited funding for early phase proof-of-concept studies and inadequate expertise in product development and commercialization. To address these limitations, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) established the National Centers for Accelerated Innovations (NCAI) program in 2013. Three centers competed successfully for awards through this mechanism. Here, we present the experience of one such center, the Boston Biomedical Innovation Center (B-BIC), and demonstrate its remarkable success at the translation of innovations to clinical application and commercialization, as well as skills development and education.

We report on the successful demonstration of a 150 J nanosecond pulsed cryogenic gas cooled, diode-pumped multi-slab Yb:YAG laser operating at 1 Hz. To the best of our knowledge, this is the highest energy ever recorded for a diode-pumped laser system.

Climate change and an increase in endangered species, are examples of technological advances negatively impacting the environment. As technology demands increase, an earnest effort to reduce the environmental impact of processing and manufacturing related activities is critical. From a business perspective, minimizing or removing toxic process chemicals is a high impact area that can increase work environment safety and decrease waste management costs. This work presents processing considerations when transitioning to greener alternative polymer resist solvents, for applications in nanomanufacturing with sustainability considerations. Within government contracting, process modifications that change product form, fit, or function require qualification and at minimum justification. This work presents the conversion from a chlorobenzene to anisole based solvent using a 495 kMW polymetheyl methacrylate polymer resin, without impacting form fit or function of the intended device. Resist conversion is of interest as the difference in the substituents of the two solvents, impact the effective toxicity of the polymer resists. Specifically, the oral median lethal dose (LD50) in rats for chlorobenzene is 1110 mg/kg, while anisole is 3700 mg/kg. Therefore, developing a process utilizing anisole and replacing chlorobenzene addresses safety concerns and contributes to green initiatives worldwide. Within this work electron beam lithography fabricated transistor components consisting of a double layered source, and gate were converted from a chlorobenzene to anisole based process; while maintaining process of record specifications. The purpose of this work is to provide a starting platform for individuals seeking to convert from a chlorobenzene solvent to an anisole based resist for sub-micron lithography steps.

In this paper we review the design and development of a 100 J, 10 Hz nanosecond pulsed laser, codenamed DiPOLE100X, being built at the Central Laser Facility (CLF). This 1 kW average power diode-pumped solid-state laser (DPSSL) is based on a master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) design, which includes two cryogenic gas cooled amplifier stages based on DiPOLE multi-slab ceramic Yb:YAG amplifier technology developed at the CLF. The laser will produce pulses between 2 and 15 ns in duration with precise, arbitrarily selectable shapes, at pulse repetition rates up to 10 Hz, allowing real-time shape optimization for compression experiments. Once completed, the laser will be delivered to the European X-ray Free Electron Laser (XFEL) facility in Germany as a UK-funded contribution in kind, where it will be used to study extreme states of matter at the High Energy Density (HED) instrument.

In September 1989, speaking to the Republican Strike Committee of the Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic (MSSR), Erkin Nurzhanovich Auel'bekov, assistant chairman of the All-Union Soviet of Nationalities, asked a question of great importance to Soviet citizens in the increasingly fragile union: “Is there such a thing as a Soviet narod (people), or is this just an empty fiction?” For Auel'bekov and the assembled strike committee, the answer was not in doubt. “Certainly for all of us here,” he continued, “there is such a narod. There is a passport, there are Soviet people (sovetskie liudi) and, moreover, there is justification for thinking that this is the most important achievement of the past seventy years of Soviet power.” Soviet patriots, they agreed, needed to protect this narod from the process of “nationalization” that threatened the Soviet Union and its constituent people both locally in Moldova and more broadly in the union in general. The protection of this achievement in Soviet nation building became the mission of an “internationalist' ” movement as it moved from a strike campaign to stop language laws in 1989 to an election campaign in 1990. The political strike of 1989 had achieved none of its immediate goals and as internationalist activists moved into the second phase of the conflict over the future of Moldova they invoked imperiled Soviet achievements as they first attempted to take the Moldovan government through the ballot box, and failing at that, to take the eastern region of Transnistria out of Moldova.

The Australian Government (AG) employs Indigenous Engagement Officers (IEO) in many of the remote Aboriginal communities of the Northern Territory (NT). IEOs are respected community members who apply their deep understanding of local tradition, language and politics in providing expert cultural advice to government. Competing priorities of workplace and cultural obligation make the IEO role stressful and dichotomous in nature. The workplace experiences and perceptions of IEOs remain largely unexplored and there is scant understanding of the significant crosscultural issues associated with the role. IEOs typically confront ongoing workplace stress and are unable to perform at full capacity. This qualitative study explores participant meaning regarding workplace and community roles to inform the AG in development of culturally appropriate training and support for IEOs. The study captures detailed information from six IEOs through an interpretive process sensitive to phenomenological experience. Personal meanings associated with the workplace are assembled through individual interviews and focus group sessions. Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis methodology is applied to the resulting idiographic dataset in exposing a range of superordinate themes including desire for recognition and feelings of abandonment. Findings reveal the need to incorporate correct cultural protocols in the workplace and give preference for Aboriginal learning styles in professional development activities. There is urgent need for a range of workplace supports for IEOs in future capacity-building strategies.

Experiments were conducted in the greenhouse and the field to determine if a seaweed extract and its component alginates could enhance the activity of sethoxydim on barley (five- to six-leaf stage). In greenhouse trials, sethoxydim with 0.5% oil concentrate was applied at 0.05, 0.1, and 0.15 kg ai/ha; in field trials, sethoxydim with 0.5% oil concentrate was applied at 0.1, 0.2, and 0.3 kg/ha. In both sets of trials the seaweed extract was applied at a rate of 1 and 2 L/ha, and the alginates were applied at 250 and 500 g/ha. When either the seaweed extract, or the calcium ammonium salt of alginic acid was used as an adjuvant a significant increase in sethoxydim activity was usually observed. At the highest rates of these adjuvants, sethoxydim (0.2 kg/ha) activity increased from 59% control (1321 g/m2 fresh weight) with only oil concentrate, to 87% control (224 g/m2 fresh weight) with seaweed extract, or 89% control (184 g/m2 fresh weight) with the calcium ammonium salt of alginic acid. Sodium salts of alginic acid, both low and medium viscosity, were much less effective.

No effect was shown of 3-amino-l,2,4-triazole (amitrole) upon the incorporation of alanine or histidine into soluble protein in bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) hypocotyls grown in darkness. The metabolic derivative of amitrole, β-(3-amino-1,2,4-triazolyl-l-)α-ala-nine (hereinafter referred to as 3-ATAL), also had no effect upon histidine incorporation. Serine incorporation was increased 56% in the presence of amitrole, but this may result from a reduction of endogenous serine pools. No evidence indicates a general disruption of protein synthesis. Activity from amitrole-5-14C was readily incorporated into bean protein, but hydrolysis revealed no 3-ATAL. Most of the activity was recovered as amitrole. Amitrole in the presence of riboflavin and light attacked bovine serum albumin, probably by free radical formation. Hydrolysis of bovine serum albumin revealed mainly amitrole. Apparently, the entry of amitrole into bean protein is by free radical formation.

Surgical experiments were conducted on cultured five-node apical rhizome segments of quackgrass. Removal of scale leaves promoted an initial burst of growth within the axillary buds but did not support the continued growth of buds as effectively as removal of the rhizome apex. Replacement of detached scale leaves over denuded buds temporarily repressed the promotive effect of scale leaf removal. Aqueous extracts of scale leaf material inhibited apical growth in rhizome segments but did not inhibit bud growth. Anatomical sections revealed that removal of scale leaves promoted development of buds: cells enlarged, vascular tissues differentiated, and new nodes began to form within 4 days of the removal of scale leaves. It is suggested that scale leaves contribute to apical dominance by inhibiting the initial development of axillary buds.

This article considers three lithic artefacts (two sidescrapers and a gouge or plane) discovered at Augila Oasis, located in Cyrenaica along the dried riverbed of Wadi Nashoof and once directly in the line of the Western Desert trade and pilgrimage route. The three Augila tools belong to the so-called bifacial tradition, which spread in the eastern Sahara during the mid-Holocene, from c. 6000 to 4800 BC, and find parallels among the mid-Holocene production of the northern edge of the Farafra Oasis and other contexts of the Egyptian Western Desert. The presence of the bifacial tradition in the Lower Nile Valley and in the Libyan littoral could have unfolded through exchange networks during periods of favourable climatic condition in the mid-Holocene.

Nanoparticles have applications in a diverse range of products including medications, detergents, cosmetics, paint, sunscreen and electronics, with an economic worth projected to reach $2.5 trillion dollars in 2015. Research into the effects of manufactured nanomaterials on the environment, however, has failed to keep pace with the high volume of commercial production. Whereas a number of studies have examined the effects of nanoparticles on aquatic species, little work has focused on the way in which benthic marine species encounter, ingest and depurate these materials. The purpose of this study was to examine the ingestion and depuration of titania nanoparticles (anatase) by the blue mussel (Mytilus edulis) and the eastern oyster (Crassostrea virginica) during a spill scenario (an acute exposure to elevated concentrations). Bivalves were exposed to nanoparticles either incorporated into marine snow, an environmentally relevant medium for pollutants, or added directly to seawater at a concentration of 4.5 mg L−1 for 2 h. After feeding, the animals were transferred to filtered seawater and allowed to depurate. Faeces and tissues were collected at 0, 6, 24, 72 and 120 h, post-exposure, and analysed for concentrations of titanium by inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry. Results indicated that the capture and ingestion of titania nanoparticles by both species was not dependent on the method of delivery (incorporated into marine snow or freely suspended). Additionally, greater than 90% of the titania nanoparticles, on average, were eliminated from the tissues after 6 h, and only trace amounts remained after 72 h. These data demonstrate that mussels and oysters readily ingest titania nanoparticles, but rapidly depurate the material within hours of an acute exposure suggesting that little would be transferred to secondary consumers including humans. Further research is required to determine if other species of suspension-feeders handle titania nanoparticles in a manner similar to bivalves.