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With the surprise onset of the COVID-19 pandemic coinciding with the beginning of the 2020 schoolyear, many, if not most,universities were compelled to hold classes online instead of in person. This necessitated a major re-working of curriculum to support an online learning format. This article presents insights into the challenges and successes encountered in transforming a face-to-face content and language integrated learning (CLIL) English and culture course into a manageable online version. Some of the challenges included managing student engagement, executing testing on a digital platform, dealing with a lack of normally realized student collaboration, and a shortage of teacher-student face-to-face interaction. Although it was a difficult semester for both students and teachers, we recognized some positive outcomes. Students often appeared more comfortable presenting from their own homes. Furthermore, teacher collaboration and task sharing were high, which enabled the vast majority of the curriculum to be successfully delivered. In addition to details related to creating an online course on Google Classroom, there are also insights regarding utilizing parts of the online course in a standard face-to-face classroom situation. Given the current climate of uncertainty related to public health, a forward-looking approach might be advised to include coursework converted to an online format in an attempt to futureproof curriculum against potential eventualities., COVID-19パンデミックの突然の始まりは、2020年度の学年初めと一致したため、多くの大学が対面授業からオンライン授業への変更を余儀なくされた。このため、オンライン学習形式をサポートするために、カリキュラムを大幅に作り直す必要があった。この論文では、対面式の言語統合学習英語(CLIL)クラスを管理可能なオンラインバージョンに変換する際に直面した課題と、成功への洞察をまとめている。課題の一部には、学生関与の管理、デジタルプラットフォームでのテストの実行、通常実現される学生間コラボレーション欠如への対処、教師と学生の直接のやり取りの不足などが含まれる。学生にも教師にも、難しい学期であったが、いくつかの肯定的な良い結果も認めることができた。学生は自分の家からのプレゼンテーションのほうがより快適であるように見受けられることも多く、教師とのコラボレーションとタスクの共有が高く、カリキュラムの大部分が高いレベルで正常に機能した。また、Google Classroomでのオンラインコースの作成に関連する詳細に加えて、標準の対面授業でオンラインコースの一部を利用することに関する考察も含めた。公衆衛生における現在の不確実な状況を考慮し、将来を見据えたアプローチの一つとしては、潜在的な不測の事態に対するカリキュラムの将来性を確保するために、オンライン形式に変換されたコースワークを含めることが望ましいと考えられる。

VI Expanding Ocean Frontiers Conference, 5-7 July 2021, Barcelona, Spain.-- 25 pages

Supplemental material, sj-pdf-1-epx-10.1177_08959048211006833 for Measuring Middle School Achievement Trajectories for College Readiness by Angela Johnson, Megan Kuhfeld and Gregory King in Educational Policy

Supplemental material, sj-pdf-1-epx-10.1177_08959048211006833 for Measuring Middle School Achievement Trajectories for College Readiness by Angela Johnson, Megan Kuhfeld and Gregory King in Educational Policy

In their Letter, Elmendorf and Ettinger (1) question the dominant role of photoperiod in driving secondary growth resumption (hereafter referred to as xylem formation onset) of the Northern Hemisphere conifers, recently reported by Huang et al. (2). Their opinions are grounded on the following three aspects, including 1) the seasonality of the photoperiod, 2) the dependence of the predictor variables (e.g., photoperiod, forcing, and chilling) on the response variable (the date of onset of xylem formation, day of the year [DOY]), and 3) the limited value of the obtained models for interannual forecasting. We think they bring up an interesting issue that deserves further discussion and clarification.

7th International Conference on Meteorology and Climatology of the Mediterranean (MetMed), 4-6 March 2019, Palma

ISSI-BJ/ISSI Joint Workshop on Tropical and Subtropical Cyclones with Improved Satellite Observations, May 2018, Beijing, China

Surgical procedures always involve an element of risk and even a minor error can lead to serious complications. Recent data suggests that over 200 million surgeries are performed annually worldwide and about 3 to 22% of these surgeries involve some sort of complications. Surgical errors can be caused by both technical errors and cognitive errors which may happen to even an experienced surgeon. However, resident surgeons are more prone to surgical errors as they start their surgical career with less experience and skills. In order to reduce errors and accelerate the learning experience of surgeons, we propose a method that can identify, model and prevent surgical errors by using biomechanical motion analysis and a high-fidelity 3-D surgery simulator., submitted to the 42nd Annual Meeting of the American Society of Biomechanics held at Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN, USA (ASB 2018).

European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) Meteorological Satellite Conference, 2-6 October 2017, Rome, Italy

18 pages, 15 figures, 1 appendix, We investigate mesoscale turbulence (10–1000 km) in the ocean winds over the Kuroshio Extension ( math formulaN– math formulaN, math formulaE– math formulaE) using the QuikSCAT data set (November 1999 to October 2009). We calculate the second (Djj) and third-order structure functions (Djjj) and the spatial variance (Vj) as a function of scale r ( math formula denotes, respectively, the longitudinal (divergent) and transverse (vortical) component). The most interesting results of the analysis follow. Although both math formula and math formula measure the turbulent kinetic energy (TKE), we find that math formula is the more robust measure. The spatial variance density (dVj/dr) has a broad peak near 450 km (close to the midlatitude Rossby radius of deformation). On interannual time scales, TKE correlates well with the El Niño 3.4 index. According to turbulence theory, the kinetic energy cascades downscale (upscale) if math formula (also skewness math formula) is negative (positive). Our results for the Kuroshio Extension are consistent with a downscale cascade (indicating convergence dominates). Furthermore, classical turbulence theory predicts that math formula and independent of r; however, we find SL varies strongly with r, from −4 at small scales to −0.3 at large scales. This nonclassical behavior implies strong-scale interaction, which we attribute to the rapid, and sometimes explosive, growth of storms in the region through baroclinic instability. Finally, we find that ST (a measure of cyclonic/anticyclonic asymmetry) is positive (cyclonic) and also varies strongly with r, from 4 at small scales to 0.5 at large scales. New turbulence models are needed to explain these results, and that will benefit Weather Prediction and climate modeling, This research was supported by the National Key Research and Development Plan (grant 2016YFA0601800), National Science Foundation of China (grant 41606021, 41476022, and 41490643), Open Fund of State Key Laboratory of Satellite Ocean Environment Dynamics (grant QNHX1610), the Startup Foundation for Introducing Talent of NUIST (grant 2014r017, and 2014r072), the National Programme on Global Change and Air-Sea Interaction (grant GASI-03-IPOVAI-05), and the Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions (PAPD)

35 pages, 18 figures, Air-sea fluxes are greatly enhanced by the winds and wind structures generated by Mesoscale Convective Systems (MCSs). In contrast to global numerical weather prediction models, space-borne scatterometers are able to resolve the small-scale wind variability in and near MCSs. Heavy rain events (rain bursts) occurring in MCSs produce strong gusts and large divergence and curl in surface winds. In this report wind fields from the ASCAT-A and ASCAT-B tandem mission, collocated with Meteosat Second Generation rain fields, were used to develop a methodology capable of identifying and quantifying correlations between wind and rain. Categories of wind divergence, wind stress divergence, and rainfall intensity were defined and a spatial neighbourhood spanning a 25km-by-25km block of WVCs was searched to identify coincidences of extreme rain and extreme convergence/divergence.This showed that when there is extreme rain, there is extreme convergence/divergence in the vicinity. The coincidences were tabulated in 3-by-3 and 2-by-2 contingency tables from which cross-correlations were calculated for each time step in the collocation. The resulting response curves for extreme convergence and extreme divergence each had a well-defined peak. The time lag for the convergence peak was 30 minutes, implying that extreme rain generally appears after (lags) extreme convergence. The overall conclusion then is that the temporal scale of moist convection is determined by the slower updraft process. Results for wind divergence and wind stress were qualitatively similar, wind stress divergence showing the stronger response. This is probably due to its focus on high winds. The report also notes that extreme convergence/divergence are concentrated in spatial patches and recommends for further study to relate the spatial features with the statistics, and as a focus for studying the changes in the divergence fields between the ASCAT-A and ASCAT-B passes

2016 European Space Agency (ESA) Living Planet Symposium, 9-13 May 2016, Prague, Czech Republic, Recent work has shown that, in contrast to global numerical weather prediction models, space-borne scatterometers are able to resolve the increased wind variability near convection areas. This unique capability is essential for climate applications, since wind variability directly impacts air-sea fluxes and, as such, air-sea interaction. In the present work westudyocean winds in heavy rain events occurring in Mesoscale Convective Systems (MCSs) in the Tropical Atlantic using ocean winds measured a short time apart at the same latitude and longitude.This is made possible by the ASCAT tandem mission (ASCAT-A and ASCAT-B pass over the tropics with overlapping swaths and a time difference of 50 minutes) and Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) precipitation time series (every 15 minutes) collocated with the ASCAT-A and B collocations.. We show that the ASCAT derived surface divergence and vorticity fields contain small scale structures with large spatial gradients (conveniently characterized using Singularity Analysis) which we interpret as strong updraft and downdraft events.The strength of these events varies in response to the precipitation. Our objective is to quantify this change and to compare with similar results obtained for ECMWF background and 2DVAR analysis winds

2016 European Space Agency (ESA) Living Planet Symposium, 9-13 May 2016, Prague, Czech Republic, This paper reviews several wind quality-sensitive parameters derived from Ku-band scatterometer data. The objective is to assess their sensitivity to wind data quality in order to optimize the quality control (QC) for Ku-band scatterometers. The current scatterometer wind data processor uses the inversion residual or maximum likelihood estimator (MLE) value in QC. A large inconsistency between the measured backscatter set andthe geophysical model function (GMF) results in a largeMLE value, which indicates geophysical conditions other than those modeled by the wind GMF, such as rain,sea ice, highlocal wind variability,orconfused sea state.Therefore, the MLE value provides a good indication of the quality of the retrieved winds. Besides, an image processing technique, known as Singularity Analysis (SA), has been recently proposed as a complementaryQC tool to the current Advanced Scatterometer (ASCAT) MLE-based QC. In general, MLE is a proxy for sub- wind vector cell (WVC) wind variability, where large positive MLEs are usually found near (gust) fronts, squall lines, and convective systems. The SA-derived singularity exponent (SE) is based on spatial derivatives and therefore mostly represents the inter-WVC variability. By using a spatial filter approach similar to the SE derivation, one can also study the inter-WVC variability with the spatially-averaged MLE, which may further improve the wind quality control. A comprehensive wind quality assessment is carried out forthe ongoing Ku-band rotating pencil-beam scatterometers, namely RapidSCAT installed on the International Space Station and HSCAT onboard the Chinese HY-2A satellite. Since ASCAT QC near rain (< 1%) has been investigated recently and the C-band ASCAT sensitivity to rain is limited as compared to that of Ku-band scatterometers, ASCAT winds can be used as reference for tuning the Ku-band QC. Moreover, thanks to the inclined orbit of RapidScat, a large amount of well collocated (in pace and time) ASCAT and RapidSCAT wind data can be used to fine tune the Ku-band scatterometer QC near rain.The RapidSCAT and HSCAT derived wind dataare further collocated with the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) winds, the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission’s Microwave Imager (TRMM TMI) rain data, in order to characterize and validate the proposed quality indicators. Moreover, buoy wind collocations are also used for validating the proposed QC algorithm. A set of MLE and SE thresholds are defined to optimize the QC effectiveness, i.e., to maximize poor-quality wind rejections (particularly contaminated by rain) while preserving fair-quality data

Scatterometer Science Conference 2016, New challenges and opportunities, 2-4 February 2016, Noordwijk,The Netherlands.-- 26 pages

Scatterometer Science Conference 2016, New challenges and opportunities, 2-4 February 2016, Noordwijk,The Netherlands.-- 20 pages

EUMETSAT Meteorological Satellite Conference, 26 to 30 September 2016, Darmstadt, Germany

International Ocean Vector Winds Science Team Meeting (2016 IOVWST), 17-19 May 2016, Sapporo.-- 18 pages

European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF/ESA) Workshop: Tropical modelling, observations and assimilation, 7-10 November 2016

Presentación para la ponencia Scatterometer new products en el 2nd Globcurrent User Consultation Meeting, 4-6 November 2015, Brest, France.-- 35 pages, Surface winds derived from earth Observation satellites are increasingly required for use in monitoring and forecasting of the ocean. A drawback of space-borne wind observing systems, such as scatterometers, is that they provide time and space coverage unsuitable for, among others, high-resolution ocean model forcing. As such, blended ocean forcing products combining scatterometer data and numerical weather prediction (NWP) output, are being developed over the past few years. These products, which provide full global coverage at increased temporal resolution (e.g., daily), however, generally only resolve spatial scales closer to NWP-resolved (200km) rather than scatterometer-resolved scales (25 km). Therefore, information on wind-current interaction, on the diurnal wind cycle and on wind variability in moist convection areas is lost in these blended products. Moreover, known systematic NWP model (parameterization) errors are propagated in the blended products at times and locations where no scatterometer winds are available. Direct forcing from ERA-interim or an operational global meteorological model results in even more extensive physical drawbacks, but has the advantage of increased temporal coverage. We propose to maintain this increased temporal coverage in a gridded wind and stress product, but also to maintain most beneficial physical qualities of the scatterometer winds, i.e., 25-km spatial resolution, wind-current interaction, variability due to moist convection, etc., and, at the same time avoid the large-scale NWP parameterization and dynamical errors. In fact, collocations of scatterometer and global NWP winds show these physical differences, where the local mean and variability of these differences are rather constant in time and thus could be added to the ERA-interim time record in order to better represent physical interaction processes and avoid NWP model errors. Correction of either the wind vector biases and wind vector variability is expected to affect ocean forcing. Moreover, the collocation process provides NWP winds, but sampled like a scatterometer and, therefore, provides information on the scatterometer wind sampling error. Prior to merging different scatterometer data sources, a comprehensive characterization of the scatterometer corrections is required. We provide an assessment of the corrections and sampling errors for the tandem scatterometer data set composed by ASCAT-A/B, RapidScat, Oceansat-2 and HY-2A, which, so far offer the most complementary orbits in terms of the diurnal cycle. All comparisons involve the stress-equivalent 10m wind, U10S, which avoids effects of atmospheric stratification and mass density to affect the computed wind differences. U10S may be easily computed from global NWP or moored buoy measurements for comparison to the scatterometer equivalents. U10S, in turn, can be easily related to ocean surface stress

Background and objectiveSmall airway dysfunction is associated with asthma severity and control, but its association with airway inflammation is unknown. The aim was to determine the association between sputum inflammatory cells and the site of small airway dysfunction, measured by multiple breath nitrogen washout in convection-dependent (Scond) and more peripheral diffusion-dependent (Sacin) airways. MethodsFifty-three (20-67 years) subjects with asthma on inhaled corticosteroid (ICS) treatment were characterized by spirometry, Scond, Sacin and induced sputum differential counts. %Predicted values for Scond and Sacin were calculated from published reference equations to adjust for the effects of age. Univariate correlations were assessed using the Spearman test. Multivariate linear regressions were performed to account for potential confounders, including age, gender, disease duration, body mass index and ICS dose. ResultsSacin (%predicted) correlated significantly with neutrophil% (r(s)=0.33, P=0.02), ICS dose (r(s)=-0.28, P=0.04) and age (r(s)=0.27, P=0.05). In multivariate analysis, Sacin related only to neutrophil% (adjusted R-2=0.18, P=0.001). Scond (%predicted) correlated significantly only with eosinophil% (r(s)=0.39, P=0.004). There was a trend for a negative relationship with ICS dose (r(s)=-0.26, P=0.06). In multivariate analysis, Scond related to eosinophil% and ICS dose independently (adjusted R-2=0.12, P=0.02). ConclusionsAcinar and conductive airway dysfunction is associated with different inflammatory profiles in asthmatic airways, independently of the effects of age and disease duration. The association between acinar airway dysfunction and neutrophilic airway inflammation may have implications for asthma treatment. The aim of this cross-sectional study was to determine the association between sputum inflammatory cells and small airway dysfunction in asthma. This is the first report of an association between small airway dysfunction and neutrophilic airway inflammation. The results may have implications for asthma treatment.

2015 EUMETSAT Meteorological Satellite Conference, 21-25 September 2015, Toulouse.-- 1 page, 4 figures, 1 table, This work was supported in part by the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites Numerical Weather Prediction Satellite Application Facility Associated Scientist project under Reference NWP-AS14-P02 and in part by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (MICINN) National R&D project under Reference AYA2012-39356-C05-03

Presentación para el International Ocean Vector Winds Science Team (2015 IOVWST) Meeting, 19-21 May 2015, Portland, Oregon.-- 20 pages

SOOS/WCRP/ESA Workshop on Southern Ocean air-sea fluxes:Strategies and Requirements for Detecting Physical and Biogeochemical Exchanges:Strategies and Requirements for Detecting Physical and Biogeochemical Exchanges will be held, 21-23 September 2015, Frascati, Italy

Presentación para la ponencia Scatterometer new products en el 2nd Globcurrent User Consultation Meeting, 4-6 November 2015, Brest, France.-- 35 pages Surface winds derived from earth Observation satellites are increasingly required for use in monitoring and forecasting of the ocean. A drawback of space-borne wind observing systems, such as scatterometers, is that they provide time and space coverage unsuitable for, among others, high-resolution ocean model forcing. As such, blended ocean forcing products combining scatterometer data and numerical weather prediction (NWP) output, are being developed over the past few years. These products, which provide full global coverage at increased temporal resolution (e.g., daily), however, generally only resolve spatial scales closer to NWP-resolved (200km) rather than scatterometer-resolved scales (25 km). Therefore, information on wind-current interaction, on the diurnal wind cycle and on wind variability in moist convection areas is lost in these blended products. Moreover, known systematic NWP model (parameterization) errors are propagated in the blended products at times and locations where no scatterometer winds are available. Direct forcing from ERA-interim or an operational global meteorological model results in even more extensive physical drawbacks, but has the advantage of increased temporal coverage. We propose to maintain this increased temporal coverage in a gridded wind and stress product, but also to maintain most beneficial physical qualities of the scatterometer winds, i.e., 25-km spatial resolution, wind-current interaction, variability due to moist convection, etc., and, at the same time avoid the large-scale NWP parameterization and dynamical errors. In fact, collocations of scatterometer and global NWP winds show these physical differences, where the local mean and variability of these differences are rather constant in time and thus could be added to the ERA-interim time record in order to better represent physical interaction processes and avoid NWP model errors. Correction of either the wind vector biases and wind vector variability is expected to affect ocean forcing. Moreover, the collocation process provides NWP winds, but sampled like a scatterometer and, therefore, provides information on the scatterometer wind sampling error. Prior to merging different scatterometer data sources, a comprehensive characterization of the scatterometer corrections is required. We provide an assessment of the corrections and sampling errors for the tandem scatterometer data set composed by ASCAT-A/B, RapidScat, Oceansat-2 and HY-2A, which, so far offer the most complementary orbits in terms of the diurnal cycle. All comparisons involve the stress-equivalent 10m wind, U10S, which avoids effects of atmospheric stratification and mass density to affect the computed wind differences. U10S may be easily computed from global NWP or moored buoy measurements for comparison to the scatterometer equivalents. U10S, in turn, can be easily related to ocean surface stress

2014 American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting, 15-19 december 2014, San Francisco, Recent work shows that, in contrast to global numerical weather prediction models, space-borne scatterometers are able to resolve the increased wind variability near convection areas. This unique capability is essential for climate applications, since wind variability directly impacts air-sea fluxes and, as such, air-sea interaction. Although scatterometer-derived wind quality is known to be degraded by rain contamination effects (notably for Ku-band systems), recent results show that for C-band scatterometers, such as the Advanced Scatterometers (ASCAT-A and ASCAT-B) onboard the Metop satellite series, the wind quality degradation under rain conditions is mainly due to the increased sub-cell wind variability. Moreover, ASCAT winds are of comparable quality to buoy winds while they provide a substantially larger coverage. Since convective systems rapidly evolve in time, ASCAT A and B acquisitions (overlapping in the tropics with only 50 minutes difference) provide a unique opportunity to carry out in-depth analyses of the dynamics associated to rain events. In this study, Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) rain rate time series (every 15 minutes) around the Metop-A and B satellite overpasses are used to evaluate both the presence of rain and the maturity stage of the convective systems. Also, several wind-variability sensitive parameters derived from ASCAT data, such as the inversion residual, the measurement noise (Kp) and the singularity exponents (an estimation of the wind decorrelation between an observation cell and its neighboring cells), are used to assess both the quality of the derived winds and the potential presence of gust fronts. Moreover, divergence and curl fields are derived from ASCAT A and B winds to provide insight on the wind convergence/divergence and vorticity processes associated with convection and related downdrafts/downbursts. Although much affected by rain, a similar analysis will also be carried out for Ku-band scatterometers, such as Oceansat-2 and the upcoming Rapidscat (if calibrated data are available in time). Intercomparison of C-band and Ku-band winds under rain conditions will certainly provide new insights on how to improve scatterometer processing to better resolve rain-induced dynamics

There have been various studies of the easy-to-V construction in English. Many of these studies have found that this complex structure is a prime candidate for late acquisition by both native speakers of English and those learning English as a second language. This study is derived from Yamaoka's (1988) study of Japanese EFL learners and Kim's (1998) study of Korean EFL learners. This paper attempts to discern whether native speakers of Korean and native speakers of Japanese have different grammaticality judgements of the easy-to-V structure.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) involves a complex interaction of structural and functional abnormalities. The two have long been studied in isolation. However, advanced imaging techniques allow us to simultaneously assess pathological processes and their physiological consequences. This review gives a comprehensive account of the various advanced imaging modalities used to study COPD, including computed tomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and the nuclear medicine techniques positron emission tomography (PET) and single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT). Some more recent developments in imaging technology, including micro-CT, synchrotron imaging, optical coherence tomography (OCT) and electrical impedance tomography (EIT), are also described. The authors identify the pathophysiological insights gained from these techniques, and speculate on the future role of advanced imaging in both clinical and research settings.

Presentación para Earth Observation for Ocean-Atmosphere Interactions Science 2014, Responding to the new scientific challenges of SOLAS, 28-31 October 2014, Frascati, Italy.-- 26 pages

2014 American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting, 15-19 december 2014, San Francisco, Kinetic energy variance as a function of spatial scale for wind fields is commonly estimated either using second-order structure functions (in the spatial domain) or by spectral analysis (in the frequency domain). It will be demonstrated that neither spectra nor second-order structure functions offer a good representation of the variance as a function of scale. These difficulties can be circumvented by using a statistical quantity called spatial variance. It combines the advantages of spectral analysis and spatial statistics. In particular, when applied to observations, spatial variances have a clear interpretation and are tolerant for missing data. They can be related to second-order structure functions, both for discrete and continuous data. For data sets without missing points the relation is statistically exact. Spatial variances can also be Fourier transformed to yield a relation with spectra. The flexibility of spatial variances is used to study various sampling strategies, and to compare them with second-order structure functions and spectral variances. It is shown that the spectral sampling strategy is not seriously biased to calm conditions for scatterometer ocean surface vector winds, and that one-fifth of the second-order structure function value is a good proxy for the cumulative variance

Presentación para Earth Observation for Ocean-Atmosphere Interactions Science 2014, Responding to the new scientific challenges of SOLAS, 28-31 October 2014, Frascati, Italy.-- 25 pages

Inert gas washout tests, performed using the single- or multiple-breath washout technique, were first described over 60 years ago. As measures of ventilation distribution inhomogeneity, they offer complementary information to standard lung function tests, such as spirometry, as well as improved feasibility across wider age ranges and improved sensitivity in the detection of early lung damage. These benefits have led to a resurgence of interest in these techniques from manufacturers, clinicians and researchers, yet detailed guidelines for washout equipment specifications, test performance and analysis are lacking. This manuscript provides recommendations about these aspects, applicable to both the paediatric and adult testing environment, whilst outlining the important principles that are essential for the reader to understand. These recommendations are evidence based, where possible, but in many places represent expert opinion from a working group with a large collective experience in the techniques discussed. Finally, the important issues that remain unanswered are highlighted. By addressing these important issues and directing future research, the hope is to facilitate the incorporation of these promising tests into routine clinical practice.

Excessive frontal plane motion and valgus torques have been linked to knee injuries, particularly in women. Studies have investigated the role of lower extremity musculature, yet few have studied the activation of trunk or "core" musculature on hip and knee kinematics. Therefore, this study evaluated the influence of intentional core engagement on hip and knee kinematics during a single leg squat.Participants (n = 14) performed a single leg squat from a 6 inch step under 2 conditions: core intentionally engaged (CORE) and no intentional core engagement (NOCORE). Participants were also evaluated for core activation ability using Sahrmann's model, and the resulting scores were used to divide participants into low (LOWCORE) and high scoring (HIGHCORE) groups. All trials were captured using 3-D motion analysis, and data were normalized for height and time. Paired t-tests and repeated measures, mixed model MANOVAs were used to assess condition and group differences.The CORE condition, compared to NOCORE, was characterized by smaller right [t(13) = 3.03, p = .01] and left [t(13) = 3.04, p = .01] hip frontal plane displacement and larger knee flexion range of motion [t(13) = 3.08, p = .009]. Subsequent MANOVAs and follow-up analyses revealed that: (1) the CORE condition demonstrated smaller right and left hip medial-lateral displacement in the LOWCORE group (p = .001), but not in the HIGHCORE group; (2) the CORE condition showed larger overall knee flexion range of motion across LOWCORE and HIGHCORE groups (p = .021); and (3) the HIGHCORE group exhibited less knee varus range of motion across CORE and NOCORE conditions (p = .028).Intentional core activation influenced hip and knee kinematics during single leg squats, with greater positive effect noted in the LOWCORE group. These findings may have implications for preventing and rehabilitating knee injuries among women.2B, Cohort laboratory study, mixed model design.

It is demonstrated that textural parameters calculated from functional pulmonary CT data have the potential to provide a robust and objective quantitative characterisation of inhomogeneity in lung function and classification of lung diseases in routine clinical applications. Clear recommendations are made for optimum data preparation and textural parameter selection. A new set of platform-independent software tools are presented that are implemented as plug-ins for ImageJ. The tools allow segmentation and subsequent histogram-based and grey-level co-occurrence matrix based analysis of the regions of interest. The work-flow is optimised for use in a clinical environment for the analysis of transverse Computed Tomography (CT) scans and lung ventilation scans based on SPECT. Consistency tests are made against other texture analysis plug-ins and simulated lung CT data. The same methods are then applied to patient data consisting of a healthy reference group and one patient group each who suffered from asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), and COPD plus lung cancer. The potential for disease classification based on computer analysis is evaluated.

M-I-P-C

Dietary magnesium deficiency in rats has been employed to generate kidney stones in a relatively short period of time. Stones have been observed in situ and examined histochemically. Techniques have been devised for the isolation of the kidney stones and for the demineralization of the stones. The gross morphological character of isolated concretions has been examined microscopically, and the mineral composition determined by X-ray emission analysis. Hydroxyapatite was found to be the mineral component. Decalcification and subsequent dialysis of stones revealed that about 60% of the stone, on a dry weight basis, consists of apatite, and about. 5.8% consists of a nondialyzable organic component termed matrix. A variety of chemical analyses were done on this matrix material. These tests included elemental analysis, amino acid analysis, a variety of carbohydrate assays, fatty acid analysis, a cholesterol determination, phosphate analysis, and measurements of calcium and magnesium content. From these studies, about 60% of the matrix composition has been determined, the majority of which are amino acids and neutral carbohydrate. The origin and function of kidney stone matrix are unknown. Possible answers to these questions have been presented, although insufficient data does not permit any conclusive statement to be made. Knowledge of.the composition of matrix may be useful in determining its origin. Master of Science

The interaction between xylem phenology and climate assesses forest growth and productivity and carbon storage across biomes under changing environmental conditions. We tested the hypothesis that patterns of wood formation are maintained unaltered despite the temperature changes across cold ecosystems. Wood microcores were collected weekly or biweekly throughout the growing season for periods varying between 1 and 13 years during 1998–2014 and cut in transverse sections for assessing the onset and ending of the phases of xylem differentiation. The data set represented 1321 trees belonging to 10 conifer species from 39 sites in the Northern Hemisphere and covering an interval of mean annual temperature exceeding 14 K. The phenological events and mean annual temperature of the sites were related linearly, with spring and autumnal events being separated by constant intervals across the range of temperature analysed. At increasing temperature, first enlarging, wall-thickening and mature tracheids appeared earlier, and last enlarging and wall-thickening tracheids occurred later. Overall, the period of wood formation lengthened linearly with the mean annual temperature, from 83.7 days at −2 °C to 178.1 days at 12 °C, at a rate of 6.5 days °C−1. April–May temperatures produced the best models predicting the dates of wood formation. Our findings demonstrated the uniformity of the process of wood formation and the importance of the environmental conditions occurring at the time of growth resumption. Under warming scenarios, the period of wood formation might lengthen synchronously in the cold biomes of the Northern Hemisphere.

Background and Aims Ongoing global warming has been implicated in shifting phenological patterns such as the timing and duration of the growing season across a wide variety of ecosystems. Linear models are routinely used to extrapolate these observed shifts in phenology into the future and to estimate changes in associated ecosystem properties such as net primary productivity. Yet, in nature, linear relationships may be special cases. Biological processes frequently follow more complex, non-linear patterns according to limiting factors that generate shifts and discontinuities, or contain thresholds beyond which responses change abruptly. This study investigates to what extent cambium phenology is associated with xylem growth and differentiation across conifer species of the northern hemisphere. Methods Xylem cell production is compared with the periods of cambial activity and cell differentiation assessed on a weekly time scale on histological sections of cambium and wood tissue collected from the stems of nine species in Canada and Europe over 1–9 years per site from 1998 to 2011. Key Results The dynamics of xylogenesis were surprisingly homogeneous among conifer species, although dispersions from the average were obviously observed. Within the range analysed, the relationships between the phenological timings were linear, with several slopes showing values close to or not statistically different from 1. The relationships between the phenological timings and cell production were distinctly non-linear, and involved an exponential pattern. Conclusions The trees adjust their phenological timings according to linear patterns. Thus, shifts of one phenological phase are associated with synchronous and comparable shifts of the successive phases. However, small increases in the duration of xylogenesis could correspond to a substantial increase in cell production. The findings suggest that the length of the growing season and the resulting amount of growth could respond differently to changes in environmental conditions.

Despite growing interest in predicting plant phenological shifts, advanced spring phenology by global climate change remains debated. Evidence documenting either small or large advancement of spring phenology to rising temperature over the spatio-temporal scales implies a potential existence of a thermal threshold in the responses of forests to global warming. We collected a unique data set of xylem cell-wall-thickening onset dates in 20 coniferous species covering a broad mean annual temperature (MAT) gradient (−3.05 to 22.9°C) across the Northern Hemisphere (latitudes 23°–66° N). Along the MAT gradient, we identified a threshold temperature (using segmented regression) of 4.9 ± 1.1°C, above which the response of xylem phenology to rising temperatures significantly decline. This threshold separates the Northern Hemisphere conifers into cold and warm thermal niches, with MAT and spring forcing being the primary drivers for the onset dates (estimated by linear and Bayesian mixed-effect models), respectively. The identified thermal threshold should be integrated into the Earth-System-Models for a better understanding of spring phenology in response to global warming and an improved prediction of global climate-carbon feedbacks.