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Objective: This study aimed to identify the types of foods that constitute a vegan diet and establish patterns within the diet. Dietary pattern analysis, a key instrument for exploring the correlation between health and disease, was used to identify patterns within the vegan diet. Design: A modified version of the EPIC-Norfolk FFQ was created and validated to include vegan foods and launched on social media. Setting: UK participants, recruited online. Participants: A convenience sample of 129 vegans voluntarily completed the FFQ. Collected data were converted to reflect weekly consumption to enable factor and cluster analyses. Results: Factor analysis identified four distinct dietary patterns including: (1) convenience (22 %); (2) health conscious (12 %); (3) unhealthy (9 %) and (4) traditional vegan (7 %). Whilst two healthy patterns were defined, the convenience pattern was the most identifiable pattern with a prominence of vegan convenience meals and snacks, vegan sweets and desserts, sauces, condiments and fats. Cluster analysis identified three clusters, cluster 1 'convenience' (26·8 %), cluster 2 'traditional' (22 %) and cluster 3 'health conscious' (51·2 %). Clusters 1 and 2 consisted of an array of ultraprocessed vegan food items. Together, both clusters represent almost half of the participants and yielding similar results to the predominant dietary pattern, strengthens the factor analysis. Conclusions: These novel results highlight the need for further dietary pattern studies with full nutrition and blood metabolite analysis in larger samples of vegans to enhance and ratify these results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Over the last decade, driver distractions, such as cell phone use and texting, have become a significant contributor to roadway crashes. Some states now have legislation that severely restricts or bans driver activities deemed distracting. However, many policies and engineered countermeasures are based on self-reported crash data. This raises the issue of potential bias and when not controlled for in analysis supporting policy decisions, can lead to poor allocation of public resources. This study explores the impact of self-reporting driver distraction on the likelihood estimates of the injury severity category of vehicle crashes. Using a two-step correction technique, the presence of bias is tested, when present corrected, and its impact is interpreted. The findings show that self-reporting bias is present in the national database, a database often used to help evaluate policy and engineering options, self-reporting bias understates the true effect of driver distraction on injury severity, and it is not uniform across injury categories. As a result, the forecast of potential savings of countermeasure policies or in-vehicle devices will be distorted leading to inefficient allocation of public resources. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This article studies the relationship between school district size and bus transportation costs, and estimates the change in such costs when a statewide policy of consolidation is pursued. To explore this relationship, we develop a multiple-objective model and solution procedure that combines a geographic aggregation and bus routing heuristic to generate consolidation scenarios. The heuristic was developed to explicitly consider efficiency, effectiveness, and equity objectives, and can be applied in both urban and rural states. The scenarios will generate average statewide bus transportation costs. As applied to the State of Iowa, within the legislature''s proposed range of consolidation of 500–1000 students, it was found that transportation operational and capital cost increases range from 0.6 to 10.6 percent and 0.7 to 7.7 percent, respectively. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

A multiagent simulation model is used to assess the impact on single-family residential development patterns of plans for size, location, and timing of sewer line extensions, policies for extension timing, and of responses to these plans and policies by landowners and developers. The simulation constructs the sewer network over time in relation to the sewerage provider's plans, to the construction of sewers and housing in previous periods, and to the expectations of landowners and developers regarding plans. In comparing the temporal and spatial patterns produced by the simulation, we found: (1) scenario 3 (early extensions not allowed), which was the historical policy in the study area, most closely replicated the historical development pattern; (2) the location of single-family residential development was not constrained by the capacity of the sewer network, but was constrained by the timing policy of sewer expansion; and (3) the developers could afford to pay for early sewer expansion, when allowed, on the basis of expected revenues from single-family residential development. The model succeeded in incorporating multiagent behaviors of landowners and developers sufficient to compare different sewer-expansion policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Building upon earlier work by Camp, Gibbs, and Masters II, (1988). The Journal of Higher Education 59(6): 652–667 and Wenger and Girard, (2000). Research in Higher Education 41(2):195–207, we present a model for allocating funds for salary increases to faculty lines within an academic unit at a public research university. The model first divides available funds into three separate amounts, based on the unit norms adopted by the faculty of the academic unit. These norms define the relative effort levels to be placed on teaching, scholarship, and service. The model enables individual faculty members to negotiate different effort levels for the respective activities. Within each of these activities, specific weights can be assigned to different types of accomplishments. The result is a flexible approach that allows fair and predictable salary increases to be assigned on the basis of criteria that have been agreed to by the faculty of the academic unit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Whether to allow wider use of longer combination vehicles (LCVs) is the topic of a policy debate in the United States. If allowed to operate in a greater number of states, LCVs would largely be confined to interstate highways and other major facilities. Yet, it often may be necessary for them to travel on two-lane highways en route to shipping points to pick up or discharge freight. A safety issue related to LCVs operating on two-lane highways is the potential risk to occupants of vehicles overtaking LCVs. To help assess the added risk of passing a longer vehicle, we developed a passing model that takes into account different performance levels of overtaking autos, varying levels of aggressiveness of drivers, volume of oncoming traffic, and lengths of vehicles being overtaken. We conclude that with moderate oncoming traffic, the odds of failure to pass a 120ft LCV versus a 65ft standard truck are about 2–6 times greater. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Considerable uncertainty surrounds the relative safety of combination trucks with two or three trailers, compared to those pulling single trailers. This article uses data on conditions present in 5889 fatal crashes involving combination trucks to examine the extent to which these conditions vary for the two configurations. Using two complementary techniques, multiple classification analysis and automatic interaction detector, we evaluate the additive and interactive effects of these conditions. We conclude that multiple-trailer trucks are more likely to be involved in fatal crashes in the following conditions: darkness; snow, slush, or ice on the road surface; involvement of three or more vehicles, indicating at least moderate traffic volume; and higher-speed facilities with 65 to 75 mph limits. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Analysing the climate envelope of plant species has been suggested as a tool to predict the vulnerability of tree species in future urban climates. However, there is little evidence that the climate envelope of a plant species directly relates to the drought and thermal tolerance of that species, at least not at the resolution required to identify or rank species vulnerability. Here, we attempted to predict drought and thermal tolerance of commonly used urban tree species using climate variables derived exclusively from open-source global occurrence data. We quantified three drought and thermal tolerance traits for 43 urban tree species in a common garden experiment: stomatal sensitivity to vapour pressure deficit, leaf water potential at the turgor loss point, and leaf thermal tolerance. We then attempted to predict each tolerance trait from variables derived from the climate envelope of each species, using occurrence data from the Global Biodiversity Information Facility. We found no strong relationships between drought and thermal tolerance traits and climatic variables. Across wide environmental gradients, plant tolerance and climate are inherently linked. But our results suggest that climate envelopes determined from species occurrence data alone may not predict drought or thermal tolerance at the resolution required to select tree species for future urban forests. We should focus on identifying the most relevant strategies and traits required to describe tolerance which in combination with climate envelope analysis should ultimately predict growth and mortality of trees in urban landscapes. We were unable to predict the drought and thermal tolerance of common urban tree species using climate variables based on their global distribution. Unlabelled Image • We need methods of selecting tree species which will thrive in future urban climates. • Climate envelope analysis may help with species selection. • We tried to predict drought and thermal tolerance from species climate envelopes • But we found no strong links between climate envelopes and species tolerance [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Spatial accessibility of dental care is mediated by dentist workforce availability and travel costs. In this study, we generated dental service areas through small area analysis of Medicaid administrative data and claims. Service areas were then used to assess dimensions of spatial accessibility, including dentist-to-population ratios, and examine relationships in geographic variation of routine dental care among Medicaid-enrolled children. Our findings indicate significant geographic differences in accessibility for Hispanic children compared to other children, even after controlling for individual and service area characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]