Adoption of early-planted soybean requires investigating optimal residual herbicide programs to ensure effective season-long weed control and crop safety. Experiments were conducted at three locations in Indiana in 2024 and repeated in 2025 to evaluate the interaction of soybean planting dates (early, early-mid, mid-late, and late) and soil residual herbicide programs [full rate, reduced rate (2/3 of full rate), and no residual] on soybean stand, yield, and weed control. Early planting resulted in slightly more soybean injury (5 to 10%) from residual herbicides than later planting dates, but did not translate into yield loss. Soybean stand was typically lower at early planting dates (13 to 23%), but this did not reduce soybean yield, except in SEPAC 2024. In that site-year, drastically lower temperatures after planting caused a 35% stand reduction in early-planted soybean compared with late planting, resulting in a 15% yield reduction. Early planting dates resulted in at least up to 21% higher canopy coverage early in the season compared with later planting dates. Early planting resulted in a 2.5-, 1.9-, and 2.4-fold increase in common lambsquarters, giant ragweed, and waterhemp density at POST compared with late planting, respectively, which resulted in greater selection pressure for herbicide-resistant weed biotypes with postemergence herbicides. An early planting date resulted in a greater yield than for mid-late and late planting dates at all site-years, except in SEPAC 2024. The inclusion of residual herbicides at any soybean planting date, at either full or reduced rates, did not cause yield reductions compared with programs without residual herbicides.

The Chalbi Desert, located in eastern Africa, is a significant but overlooked archive of the Pleistocene and Holocene periods that could add insight into investigations on human evolution. We revisited southeastern Chalbi Desert landforms between the towns of Kargi and Maikona to improve the chronostratigraphy and provide paleoenvironmental context. Direct U-series and electron spin resonance dating of various fossil teeth recovered from a deflated dune (Qzs) landform at the Farre locality return a mean age of ∼545 ka, which is compatible with biostratigraphic inferences. While this numerical age result should probably be regarded as mostly indicative given the existing uncertainty on the environmental dose rate evaluation, the data set available nevertheless strongly suggests a Middle Pleistocene age for at least some of the fauna. Sedimentology, luminescence, and 14C dating further suggest that this Qzs landform and its contents were modified by alluvial fan development and weathering during denudation in a proximal fan setting through the late Pleistocene into the Holocene. The Qzs landform currently experiences aeolian additions, erosion, and salt-affected soil development in an arid climate. Pedogenic carbonate isotope geochemistry suggests that deflated sand dunes were covered by woody grasslands during Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 4 and 3 pluvials, consistent with nearby fan progradation constrained at >35 ka. The desert experienced increased hydrologic activity during late Pleistocene and African humid period pluvials, as evidenced by additional optically stimulated luminescence and 14C dating from fan, dune, and playa contexts. The last significant pluvial episode ended after 4.4 ± 0.3 cal ka BP, which coincides with the final regression of nearby Lake Turkana. This study extends the chronology of Quaternary sediments in the Chalbi Desert to the Middle Pleistocene and offers paleoenvironmental insights into the conditions experienced by Middle Stone Age tool users in the region.

Over the past decade, several multi-institutional research consortia have formed within the North American pediatric surgical community. In this article, we describe our experience with the creation and implementation of the Eastern Pediatric Surgery Network, a large and comprehensive research consortium designed to produce a wide array of high-quality clinical studies within our subspecialty. In 2020, a vision statement and rules of governance were established at thirteen academic pediatric surgery divisions in the eastern United States. The research consortium was organized based on four major pillars, namely legal ownership of aggregate data, horizontal leadership structure, mandatory participation in adopted studies, and a broad research portfolio that encompasses the full breath of the specialty. Over the past five years, the number of research projects has dramatically expanded over time and includes participation from 24 different medical centers. Despite a lack of dedicated sponsored extramural support for most projects, there have been 28 abstracts presented at national conferences and 12 manuscripts published in peer-reviewed journals. It is our hope that sharing our experience with creating this organization can help to inform others interested in establishing the academic infrastructure to engage in multi-institutional, evidence-based clinical research in other medical specialties and beyond.

Many people experiencing mental ill health are trapped in cycles of worsening social exclusion. Individual Placement and Support (IPS) is being implemented to support those with mental ill health into employment. However, this intervention does not address the many challenges faced by those who are more vulnerable and is less effective for those with more severe clinical presentations. Although National Health Service (NHS) guidance suggests broader support is needed, there is little clarity over what this should look like. We discuss one model, drawing on years of experience facilitating user-led services at Lambeth Vocational Services, implementing a genuinely person-centred, trust-based approach to facilitate social inclusion.

Residual blood specimens collected at health facilities may be a source of samples for serosurveys of adults, a population often neglected in community-based serosurveys. Anonymized residual blood specimens were collected from individuals 15 – 49 years of age attending two sub-district hospitals in Palghar District, Maharashtra, from November 2018 to March 2019. Specimens also were collected from women 15 – 49 years of age enrolled in a cross-sectional, community-based serosurvey representative at the district level that was conducted 2 – 7 months after the residual specimen collection. Specimens were tested for IgG antibodies to measles and rubella viruses. Measles and rubella seroprevalence estimates using facility-based specimens were 99% and 92%, respectively, with men having significantly lower rubella seropositivity than women. Age-specific measles and rubella seroprevalence estimates were similar between the two specimen sources. Although measles seropositivity was slightly higher among adults attending the facilities, both facility and community measles seroprevalence estimates were 95% or higher. The similarity in measles and rubella seroprevalence estimates between the community-based and facility serosurveys highlights the potential value of residual specimens to approximate community seroprevalence.

Residual blood specimens provide a sample repository that could be analyzed to estimate and track changes in seroprevalence with fewer resources than household-based surveys. We conducted parallel facility and community-based cross-sectional serological surveys in two districts in India, Kanpur Nagar District, Uttar Pradesh, and Palghar District, Maharashtra, before and after a measles-rubella supplemental immunization activity (MR-SIA) from 2018 to 2019. Anonymized residual specimens from children 9 months to younger than 15 years of age were collected from public and private diagnostic laboratories and public hospitals and tested for IgG antibodies to measles and rubella viruses. Significant increases in seroprevalence were observed following the MR SIA using the facility-based specimens. Younger children whose specimens were tested at a public facility in Kanpur Nagar District had significantly lower rubella seroprevalence prior to the SIA compared to those attending a private hospital, but this difference was not observed following the SIA. Similar increases in rubella seroprevalence were observed in facility-based and community-based serosurveys following the MR SIA, but trends in measles seroprevalence were inconsistent between the two specimen sources. Despite challenges with representativeness and limited metadata, residual specimens can be useful in estimating seroprevalence and assessing trends through facility-based sentinel surveillance.

I exploit the leveraged exchange-traded funds’ (ETFs’) primary market to measure aggregate, uninformed, gambling-like demand, that is, speculation sentiment. The leveraged ETFs’ primary market is a novel setting that provides observable arbitrage activity attributed to correcting mispricing between ETFs’ shares and their underlying assets. The arbitrage activity proxies for the magnitude and direction of speculative demand shocks and I use them to form the Speculation Sentiment Index. The measure negatively relates to contemporaneous market returns (e.g., it is bullish in down markets) and negatively predicts returns. The results are consistent with speculation sentiment causing market-wide price distortions that later reverse.

Ethnohistoric accounts indicate that the people of Australia's Channel Country engaged in activities rarely recorded elsewhere on the continent, including food storage, aquaculture and possible cultivation, yet there has been little archaeological fieldwork to verify these accounts. Here, the authors report on a collaborative research project initiated by the Mithaka people addressing this lack of archaeological investigation. The results show that Mithaka Country has a substantial and diverse archaeological record, including numerous large stone quarries, multiple ritual structures and substantial dwellings. Our archaeological research revealed unknown aspects, such as the scale of Mithaka quarrying, which could stimulate re-evaluation of Aboriginal socio-economic systems in parts of ancient Australia.

An example illustrates (a) that the use of indefinite inner products can illuminate Probabilistic Wiener–Hopf Theory in symmetrizable cases, and (b) that half-winding probabilities should be thought of as branching measures for Ray processes. The paper's wide variety of techniques could make it instructive for research students.

Protein SRP54 is an essential component of eukaryotic signal recognition particle (SRP). The methionine-rich M-domain (SRP54M or 54M) interacts with the SRP RNA and is also involved in the binding to signal peptides of secretory proteins during their targeting to cellular membranes. To gain insight into the molecular details of SRP-mediated protein targeting, we studied the human 54M polypeptide. The recombinant human protein was expressed successfully in Escherichia coli and was purified to homogeneity. Our studies determined the sites that were susceptible to limited proteolysis, with the goal to design smaller functional mutant derivatives that lacked nonessential amino acid residues from both termini. Of the four polypeptides produced by V8 protease or chymotrypsin, 54MM-2 was the shortest (120 residues; Mr = 13,584.8), but still contained the conserved amino acids suggested to associate with the signal peptide or the SRP RNA. 54MM-2 was cloned, expressed, purified to homogeneity, and was shown to bind human SRP RNA in the presence of protein SRP19, indicating that it was functional. Highly reproducible conditions for the crystallization of 54MM-2 were established. Examination of the crystals by X-ray diffraction showed an orthorhombic unit cell of dimensions a = 29.127 Å, b = 63.693 Å, and c = 129.601 Å, in space group P212121, with reflections extending to at least 2.0 Å.

A program of surveys and test excavations has located 53 prehistoric open midden sites in the Bahamas and procured a large artifact sample from them. Sites in the central Bahamas, concentrated in the eastern islands of the area, are characterized by the shell-tempered Palmetto Series pottery. While sharing specific modes with Antillean cultures, it is an indigenous development, originating in the Caicos where the earliest sites have only ceramics imported from the Antilles. Distribution of sites and ceramic analyses suggest a movement of Antillean Arawaks to the Caicos to secure salt. An indigenous cultural tradition developed there by shortly after 1000 A.D. and spread rapidly to the central Bahamas. Factors affecting the limits of cultural expansion were the temperature and rainfall requirements of bitter manioc agriculture, which eliminated the northern Bahamas, and perhaps, in part, a time factor affecting expansion to the west.