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Strabismus, also known as a squint, is an ocular misalignment. In the UK the prevalence of strabismus in children is 2.1%. There are multiple causes of strabismus in children; some of which can be sinister and are potentially eye or life threatening. Therefore it is essential that strabismus is identified and managed appropriately and in a timely manner. Amblyopia is frequently associated with strabismus, and can be a cause or a complication of strabismus, it needs to be recognized and treated early to prevent a permanent reduction in visual acuity. This article explains how to correctly assess strabismus in children. A detailed history should be taken, and an ocular examination should be performed using the correct techniques and ocular motility tests. The important red flag features of strabismus in children are also outlined in this article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For many observers Australia's approach to the threat of nuclear proliferation under the government of Prime Minister John Howard (1996–2007) was simply the product of its steadfast alignment of Australian foreign policy with that of the United States in the post-9/11 context. The Howard government's enthusiastic support for the 2003 US-led 'coalition of the willing' invasion of Iraq on the basis of Baghdad's alleged possession of 'weapons of mass destruction' (WMD) is taken as the most egregious example of this tendency. Yet this assumption ignores that the potential threat of nuclear proliferation had been an abiding concern for the government since it had entered office. This paper argues that there was an enduring dynamic in Australian foreign and strategic policy of perceiving a direct link between the fate of the prevailing international system and that of Australia's own national security. To this end, the Howard government's perception of the threat of nuclear proliferation was sensitive to trends at the global level, most particularly the strategic posture and preferences of its alliance partner, the United States. The paper demonstrates, however, that this weakened the Howard government's ability to maintain fidelity with what had become Australia's traditional activist diplomacy within the non-proliferation regime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the history of the Oxford, England-based Ashmolean Museum's nineteenth-century French paintings collection, which has been amassed since 1934 largely by gifts and bequests, including a donation by Esther Pissarro in 1950. It mentions that the collection has been cataloged by Jon Whiteley. Although he did not live to see it published, his text was seen to press by his former colleagues.

As precision medicine increases the response rate of treatment, tumors frequently bypass inhibition, and reoccur. In order for treatment to be effective long term, the mechanisms enabling treatment adaptation need to be understood. Here, we report a mouse model that, in the absence of p53 and the presence of oncogenic KrasG12D, develops breast tumors. Upon inactivation of KrasG12D, tumors initially regress and enter remission. Subsequently, the majority of tumors adapt to the withdrawal of KrasG12D expression and return. KrasG12D-independent tumor cells show a strong mesenchymal profile with active RAS-RAF-MEK-ERK (MAPK/ERK) signaling. Both KrasG12D-dependent and KrasG12D-independent tumors display a high level of genomic instability, and KrasG12D-independent tumors harbor numerous amplified genes that can activate the MAPK/ERK signaling pathway. Our study identifies both epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT) and active MAPK/ERK signaling in tumors that adapt to oncogenic KrasG12D withdrawal in a novel Trp53 -/- breast cancer mouse model. To achieve long-lasting responses in the clinic to RAS-fueled cancer, treatment will need to focus in parallel on obstructing tumors from adapting to oncogene inhibition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) is the collective term for a broad range of techniques, strategies and devices which can support children with communication difficulties who may have little or no intelligible speech. This may include manual signs or systems of symbols, words or letters that can be used to construct messages and convey meaning. This review discusses the ways in which AAC systems are categorized and outlines some key principles of assessment and intervention, using the World Health Organization's International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health for Children and Young People as a proposed framework to guide decision-making. The review is aimed at healthcare professionals working with children that may benefit from AAC. It highlights that children who may make use of AAC are a heterogeneous group and it is considered best practice for interventions to be highly individualized, taking into account the motor, sensory, learning and communication needs of each child, as well as their environment, personal preferences and support structures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the nascent deep-sea mining industry, there is currently a high degree of uncertainty about what impacts prolonged metal extraction will have on the receiving environment. There is also concern regarding the transparency and monitoring of operations since the target environment is extremely remote and inaccessible. Polymetallic nodule collection is being pursued, which is distinct from other forms of deep-sea mining in that the resource is distributed in a thin layer atop the seabed, unlike cobalt-rich crusts or massive sulfides, which are concentrated in specific areas. The second distribution of nodules provides opportunities for dynamic mine planning not available for other mineral sources as many constraints normally affecting mining operations like waste stripping or underground development are absent. Also, the highly mobile ship-based collection system that utilizes robotic collectors is easily relocated to other areas in response to emerging data on environmental constraints such as proximity to fragile habitats, sensitive species, or high cumulative impacts. An adaptive management system has been identified as a vital strategy to address scientific uncertainty of ecological impacts of deep-sea mining. The design features dynamic mine planning, scenario modeling, and impact forecasting. Also, operating data will be transparently viewable in a publicly available dashboard. This paper describes an implementation of a threshold-based framework for an effective adaptive management system designed to leverage the unique characteristics inherent to the resource. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Limb-threatening sarcomas invading major vessels present an oncological and reconstructive challenge. Curative resection involves either performing an amputation or an immediate reconstruction of the invaded vessels. We present our 15-year experience of these cases at the North of England Bone and Soft Tissue Tumour Service. A Strengthening the Reporting of Observational studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) compliant retrospective review of our prospective database was performed including patients who required major vessel reconstruction following sarcoma excision from 2003 until 2018. Patient demographic data along with tumour and histological subtypes, treatment modality, complications and outcomes were inquired. Autologous and prosthetic vessel reconstruction approaches were compared. Nineteen patients were identified with the most common tumour locations being the thigh and groin areas. Five cases involved recurrent tumours. Clear resection margins were obtained in 15 cases. Autologous vein grafts were preferred over polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) prosthesis in 17 cases. A pedicled flap or free flap was required to achieve adequate soft tissue cover in six patients, while the rest underwent primary closure. Five patients lost the patency of the reconstructed vessels with one of these requiring an amputation. The estimated disease-specific survival at 5 years was 58%. Limb-preservation surgery in the context of vessel compromise is not only safe, but also a functionally and psychosocially beneficial means of avoiding an amputation. We believe that careful pre-operative planning and discussion in a multidisciplinary setting is key for obtaining positive outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Strabismus, also known as a squint, is an ocular misalignment. In the UK the prevalence of strabismus in children is 2.1%. There are multiple causes of strabismus in children; some of which can be sinister and are potentially eye or life threatening. Therefore it is essential that strabismus is identified and managed appropriately and in a timely manner. Amblyopia is frequently associated with strabismus, and can be a cause or a complication of strabismus, it needs to be recognized and treated early to prevent a permanent reduction in visual acuity. This article explains how to correctly assess strabismus in children. A detailed history should be taken, and an ocular examination should be performed using the correct techniques and ocular motility tests. The important red flag features of strabismus in children are also outlined in this article. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • Individuals of the small marsupial, Antechinus flavipes, use multiple den sites. • Habitat structures used most frequently for dens (large trees, logs) are rare. • A single prescribed burn of low coverage (40–50%) removed 31% of known dens. • The loss of hollows in trees and logs may also affect other hollow-using species. • We recommend retaining patches of long-unburned forest to ensure suitable habitat. Abstract Prescribed burning is used in fire-prone environments worldwide to reduce fuel loads and the severity and spread of future wildfires. Forest habitat structures, such as large trees, dead trees and logs are highly flammable, yet also are essential for animal species that require hollows (cavities) as den sites for shelter and reproduction. We examined the effects of experimental prescribed burns on the use of den sites by a small marsupial, the yellow-footed antechinus Antechinus flavipes , in south-eastern Australia. Specifically, we radio-tracked individual A. flavipes to identify forest habitat structures preferred as den sites and recorded the fate of known den sites following patchy prescribed burns. We found that large living trees and dead trees were used as den sites disproportionately to their relative abundance in the forest. While all marked individuals of A. flavipes survived the immediate impacts of patchy prescribed burns, almost a third (16/52) of den sites identified before burning were lost, including 17% of trees (4/23) and 48% of logs (10/21). The vulnerability of den sites to prescribed burns can be attributed to the decay-dependent effect of fire on both trees and logs, whereby, the amount of damage from fire is related to the structure’s pre-fire condition (i.e. whether dead or alive, amount of decay). Large trees and large logs are scarce in this dry forest ecosystem and their replacement is likely to take a century or more due to the slow growth rates of trees. The ecological impacts of prescribed burning on habitat structures used by A. flavipes and other hollow-using species can be moderated by: (1) carrying out patchy, rather than complete burns; (2) ensuring the inter-fire interval is sufficient to allow time for replenishment of resources; and (3) planning at a regional scale to maintain an appropriate spatial pattern of post-fire age-classes, including areas retained as long-unburned (e.g. >50 years) in which resources such as deep litter, large logs and dead trees can accumulate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reviews the exhibition "Millet and Modern Art: From Van Gogh to Dali" at the Saint Louis Art Museum, in St. Louis, Missouri from February 16 to May 17, 2020.

Fire is an important disturbance in forest ecosystems globally. Many of the effects of fire on forest processes are mediated through effects on vegetation structure. Understanding how fire properties, fire regimes and environmental variation interact to affect structure is required in the face of predictions of increasing size and severity of fires – “megafires”. Here, we investigated the influence of topographic position, fire severity, and time since last fire on vegetation structure in foothill eucalypt forests, two years after a large wildfire in south-eastern Australia. We found that forest gullies had significantly greater structural complexity than forest slopes; but that fire severity and time since last fire influenced the structure of vegetation in gullies and slopes in similar ways. Two years after wildfire, severely burnt gullies and slopes (tree crowns scorched or consumed) had a reduced canopy cover, but a denser cover of eucalypt saplings up to 4 m tall, than gullies and slopes that had not been burnt. Compared with severe fire, understorey fire had much less influence on the structure of vegetation, with a significant effect only on slopes. There was little effect of the time since last fire prior to 2009 (≤3 years vs. ≥20 years) on subsequent vegetation structure after wildfire in either gullies or slopes. Finally, we found that fire did not homogenise the structure of gullies and slopes: vegetation structure in paired gullies and slopes did not become more similar following understorey or severe fire. Two years after a large wildfire, heterogeneity in the structural complexity of forest vegetation was evident at both the site and landscape scale. At the landscape scale, fire-induced heterogeneity in vegetation structure, arising from spatial variation in fire severity, provides habitat structures of differing quality for plants and animals. At a finer scale, the rapid return of distinct vegetation structure between adjacent gullies and slopes is important for the persistence of species that depend on a complex vegetation structure or require fine-scale heterogeneity in vegetation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prescribed burning to achieve management objectives is a common practice in fire-prone regions worldwide. Structural components of habitat that are combustible and slow to develop are particularly susceptible to change associated with prescribed burning. We used an experimental, 'whole-landscape' approach to investigate the effect of differing patterns of prescribed burning on key habitat components (logs, stumps, dead trees, litter cover, litter depth, and understorey vegetation). Twenty-two landscapes (each ~100 ha) were selected in a dry forest ecosystem in southeast Australia. Experimental burns were conducted in 16 landscapes (stratified by burn extent) while six served as untreated controls. We measured habitat components prior to and after burning. Landscape burn extent ranged from 22% to 89% across the 16 burn treatments. With the exception of dead standing trees (no change), all measures of habitat components declined as a consequence of burning. The degree of loss increased as the extent to which a landscape was burned also increased. Prescribed burning had complex effects on the spatial heterogeneity (beta diversity) of structural components within landscapes. Landscapes that were more heterogeneous pre-fire were homogenized by burning, while those that were more homogenous pre-fire tended to display greater differentiation post-burning. Thus, the notion that patch mosaic burning enhances heterogeneity at the landscape-scale depends on prior conditions. These findings have important management implications. Where prescribed burns must be undertaken, effects on important resources can be moderated via control of burn characteristics (e.g., burn extent). Longer-term impacts of prescribed burning will be strongly influenced by the return interval, given the slow rate at which some structural components accumulate (decades to centuries). Management of habitat structural components is important given the critical role they play in (1) provision of habitat resources for diverse organisms, (2) retention of moisture and nutrients in otherwise dry, low-productivity systems, and (3) carbon storage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues, through a case study of the evolving impact of the Xinjiang and Uyghur issue, that the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) ethnic minorities have been a significant factor in Beijing’s foreign relations throughout its history. Since the end of the Cold War in particular, China’s approach to the Xinjiang and Uyghur issue has played an important role in undergirding domestic stability and shaping its relations with Central Asia. More broadly, the case of Xinjiang and the Uyghur suggests that the nature and scale of the challenge posed by any one ethnic minority in the context of the PRC’s foreign policy has largely been a function of the interplay of five major factors: the historical relationship between the ethnic group and the Chinese state; the geographic concentration of an ethnic minority; the degree of acculturation to the dominant Han society; external great power support; and mobilised diasporas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fire plays an important role in structuring vegetation in fire-prone regions worldwide. Progress has been made towards documenting the effects of individual fire events and fire regimes on vegetation structure; less is known of how different fire history attributes (e.g., time since fire, fire frequency) interact to affect vegetation. Using the temperate eucalypt foothill forests of southeastern Australia as a case study system, we examine two hypotheses about such interactions: (1) post-fire vegetation succession (e.g., time-since-fire effects) is influenced by other fire regime attributes and (2) the severity of the most recent fire overrides the effect of preceding fires on vegetation structure. Empirical data on vegetation structure were collected from 540 sites distributed across central and eastern Victoria, Australia. Linear mixed models were used to examine these hypotheses and determine the relative influence of fire and environmental attributes on vegetation structure. Fire history measures, particularly time since fire, affected several vegetation attributes including ground and canopy strata; others such as low and sub-canopy vegetation were more strongly influenced by environmental characteristics like rainfall. There was little support for the hypothesis that post-fire succession is influenced by fire history attributes other than time since fire; only canopy regeneration was influenced by another variable (fire type, representing severity). Our capacity to detect an overriding effect of the severity of the most recent fire was limited by a consistently weak effect of preceding fires on vegetation structure. Overall, results suggest the primary way that fire affects vegetation structure in foothill forests is via attributes of the most recent fire, both its severity and time since its occurrence; other attributes of fire regimes (e.g., fire interval, frequency) have less influence. The strong effect of environmental drivers, such as rainfall and topography, on many structural features show that foothill forest vegetation is also influenced by factors outside human control. While fire is amenable to human management, results suggest that at broad scales, structural attributes of these forests are relatively resilient to the effects of current fire regimes. Nonetheless, the potential for more frequent severe fires at short intervals, associated with a changing climate and/or fire management, warrant further consideration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Maternal vitamin D deficiency disturbs fetal development and programmes neurodevelopmental complications in offspring, possibly through increased fetal glucocorticoid exposure. We aimed to determine whether prenatal exposure to excess glucocorticoids underlies our rat model of early-life vitamin D deficiency, leading to altered adult behaviours. Vitamin D deficiency reduced the expression of the glucocorticoid-inactivating enzyme Hsd11b2 in the female placenta, but did not alter maternal glucocorticoid levels, feto-placental weights, or placental expression of other glucocorticoid-related genes at mid-gestation. This differs to the phenotype previously observed in vitamin D deficient mice, and highlights important modelling considerations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children with cerebral palsy (CP) can experience a range of significant speech, language and communication difficulties. Those children with little or no intelligible speech can benefit from the provision of augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) systems. AAC approaches include training in the use of manual signs and/or symbol systems, as part of a ‘total communication’ approach, whereby all possible communicative modalities are considered as potentially useful. For children with severe motor impairment where the potential for signing is limited, intervention typically focuses on supporting symbol use through the provision of high-tech and low-tech communication systems. This review describes the categories of AAC systems available to children with CP, and outlines AAC assessment and intervention principles, drawing on the World Health Organisation's International Classification of Function, Disability and Health (ICF-CY). Given the complex health, motor, sensory, learning and communication needs of children with CP, AAC related assessment and intervention requires a multi-disciplinary perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wildfires have major impacts on ecosystems globally. Fire regimes (including fire frequency, intensity, season and type of fire) influence the status of species by altering habitat suitability at the site scale, and by creating heterogeneity at the landscape scale. The relative effects of site and landscape-scale fire attributes on animal species are rarely examined together. Such knowledge is important, given that fire regimes are sensitive to changing land management practices; and that fires are predicted to become larger and more frequent in some regions as a result of climate change. Here, we tested the relative influence of elements of the fire regime (fire severity, fire history) at the site-scale, and the landscape context (extent of surrounding unburnt forest, fire heterogeneity) on the occurrence of native terrestrial mammals after severe wildfire in south-eastern Australia. We conducted surveys by using automatically triggered, infrared cameras at 80 sites in fire-prone eucalypt forests, 2–3 years post-wildfire. Thirteen native mammal species were recorded, eight of which were detected with sufficient frequency for analysis. Most species were widespread (35–90% of sites) and recorded in all fire severity classes. Fire effects at the site-level were more influential than landscape context effects arising from heterogeneity in the fire regime (e.g. extent of surrounding unburnt forest). Fire severity was the most influential of the fire-regime elements investigated, but it affected different species in different ways. This study highlights three main points relevant to conservation of terrestrial mammals after wildfire. First, spatial variation in fire severity associated with wildfire (ranging from unburned to severely burned stands) is an important contributor to the post-fire status of species. Second, post-fire environmental conditions are significant: here, rapid regeneration of vegetation following drought-breaking rains greatly influenced the suitability of post-fire habitats. Third, it is valuable to consider the effects of the fire regime at multiple scales, including both the site (forest stand) and its landscape context. Insights from short-term surveys, such as this, will be enhanced by complementary longitudinal studies, especially where they encompass environmental variation through the post-fire succession. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reviews the painting exhibition "Corot: The Painter and his Models" displaying the works by artist Camille Corot, held at the Musée Marmottan Monet in Paris, France on February 8-July 8, 2018.

The article reviews the exhibition "Unruly Nature: The Landscapes of Théodore Rousseau" at Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek in Copenhagen, Denmark through January 8, 2016.

Highlights: [•] We investigated the importance to birds of unburnt patches within a mega-fire. [•] We compared differences due to severity and time-since-fire prior to the mega-fire. [•] Unburnt patches had high richness, and a distinct composition. [•] Prior fire history was less relevant to avifauna in severely burnt sites. [•] Recent planned burns may contribute to refuge habitat if subsequent fire is avoided. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]