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Aging in place has become a popular social policy worldwide. This paper argues that well-being is an important outcome of aging in place, upon which older people develop autonomy and environmental proactivity. The temporal dimension of aging in place highlights development of place attachment, which includes place identity and place dependence. The study explores how older people, who live inhigh-density urban environments, make sense of well-being and place attachment by articulating their daily lives. Community dwelling older people aged 65 and above, who came from neighborhoods with high aging population and residential density but high and low median household incomes, were invited for focus group discussions. Multifaceted meanings of well-being include various dimensions that cover individual-collective and material-spiritual (psychological) construct. Meanings of place attachment include values of, bonding ties to, and memories about places. Three pathways are identified linking place attachment and multifaceted well-being. The study finds that social welfare and material richness are not the only determinants of well-being. Fulfillment of higher psychological needs, such as positive evaluation of life and self-actualization, should be emphasized by which older people can make the most of their life in old age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background/purpose: Typhoon Morakot in August 2009 caused significant damages and health and socio-economic impacts in Taiwan. Therefore, we evaluated the mental health status of adult and patients who lived in the affected area after the disaster.Methods: An observational, prospective population-based study was conducted. Adults living in the affected area were selected as the affected population in the National Health Insurance Database from January 2008 to December 2011. Prevalence and incidence of stress-associated illnesses, such as insomnia, anxiety, depressive, adjustment and mood disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in the psychiatry department were analysed after the disaster.Results: A total of 897,689 adult patients were studied. Of the affected population without pre-existing chronic mental health illness, the monthly visits for stress-associated illnesses, such as insomnia, anxiety, depressive disorders and PTSD increased about twice after the disaster in elderly and non-elderly groups. Comparing to the non-elderly group, the elderly group has more increased in the incidence of insomnia (356% vs. 318% increase) and depressive disorders (308% vs. 245%) but was affected to a lesser extent increase in the anxiety (269% vs. 307%), PTSD, episodic mood disorders (82% vs. 158%), and adjustment reaction (160% vs. 202%).Conclusion: The mental health statuses of patients who experienced a major natural disaster deteriorated in the elderly population after the disaster. However, we still need pay more attentions on the elderly of the affected population to decrease the risk for insomnia and depressive disorders after the disaster. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Urbanisation and population ageing are two critical trends identified in the New Urban Agenda. Understanding the relationship between environment-related experiences and well-being is conducive to achieving an age-friendly urbanism. We argue that place, as a location, a material form and an expression of value, is an essential component of this relationship. Physical and social environments shape socio-spatial experiences and hence one's well-being, bearing significant implications for the current policy movement of ageing in place. Environment comprises contexts whereby older people develop sentimental and emotive links to the place they live. Such links give rise to residential satisfaction and place attachment, the psychological experiences that highlight the importance of place in ageing. The article calls for research and planning practices to shed light on policies concerning age-friendly urbanism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Resilience, which has rapidly become an area of interest in multiple disciplines, is regarded as being key in disaster mitigation and adaptation. The objective-indicator framework is a common way to evaluate resilience, but limited attention has been paid to measuring the risk perceptions and adaptation behaviors of individuals. In addition, due to limitations related to predicting potential earthquake events, past studies have placed more emphasis on predisaster discussions. Fortunately, this paper explores the changes in risk perceptions and adaptation behaviors in different socioeconomic groups through a comparative analysis between pre- and postearthquake disasters and through one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) with a post hoc test applied to examine the changes in risk perceptions and adaptation behaviors. The results show that people tend to have greater risk perceptions of future earthquakes but are less willing to retrofit their houses after a serious disaster. Females show greater fear and worry accompanied by a higher willingness to retrofit their houses compared to males. In addition, people with a higher education level and a better occupation might be more willing than others to adopt adaptation behaviors. The results can serve as a reference to provide risk communication, risk education, and diverse disaster adaptation options. Although limitations exist, the results of comparative analysis between the predisaster and postdisaster conditions could serve as a reference for adequate strategies and government decisions on the prioritization of risk management policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Resilience has rapidly arisen in multiple disciplines and has been regarded as the key in disaster mitigation and adaptation. Objective indicator framework is a common way evaluating resilience while limited attention on measuring subjective resilience. In fact, subjective resilience might further explain how people respond to the uncertainty of disaster risks. Due to the limitation on predicting potential earthquake events, past studies put more efforts on discussing pre-disaster. Luckily, this paper could explore the change of risk perception and adaptation behavior in types of socio-economic groups through a comparative analysis between pre- and post- earthquake disaster, and one-way analysis of variance with Post Hoc test is applied to examining the change of risk perception and adaptation behavior. The results show that female might be much willing on house retrofit due to the fear and the worrisome. However, the elders might be less aware on earthquake than the young. Education indeed affects people's risk perception and adaptive behavior. As a whole, the results could be referred to areas clustered of male, female, elder population, and lower education population by providing risk communication, risk education, and diverse disaster adaptation options. Although limitation exists, the results of comparative analysis between pre-disaster and post-disaster conditions could be referred to adequate strategies and decide the priority of risk management policies by governments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rabies is a neglected zoonotic disease that is preventable in humans by appropriate post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP). However, current PEP relies on polyclonal immune globulin products purified from pooled human (HRIG) or equine (ERIG) plasma that are either in chronic shortage or in association with safety concerns. Here, we present the development of an antibody cocktail, SYN023, made of two novel monoclonal antibodies (MAb) CTB011 and CTB012 that could serve as safer and more cost-effective alternatives to the current RIG products. Both CTB011 and CTB012 are humanized MAbs that bind to non-overlapping epitopes on the rabies virus (RABV) glycoprotein (G) with sub-nanomolar affinities. Sequence analysis revealed that many of the critical residues in binding are highly conserved across different species of lyssaviruses. When combined at a 1:1 ratio, CTB011/CTB012 exhibited neutralization capabilities equivalent or superior to HRIG against 10 North American street RABV isolates in vitro and 15 prevalent Chinese RABV strains in animal models. Finally, SYN023, at a dosage of 0.03 mg/kg, was able to offer the same degree of protection as standard HRIG administration (20 IU/kg) in Syrian hamsters challenged with a highly virulent bat (Tadarida brasiliensis) RABV variant. Taken together, the high-potency and broad-spectrum neutralization demonstrated by SYN023 make it an effective candidate for human rabies PEP consideration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A low-cost terahertz transmitter is proposed by using system-on-package (SoP) heterogeneous system integration. A signal source in 40-nm CMOS is integrated with an antenna array on a Benzocyclobutene carrier through a broadband low-loss terahertz interconnect. The signal source adopting triple-push oscillator topology is able to produce a differential output without any additional balun circuit. Hence, the power consumption and the chip area can be reduced. The antenna array containing 50 patch antennas is differentially excited to give simulated directivity, efficiency, and antenna gain as high as 22.6 dB, 88%, and 22 dBi, respectively, at 335 GHz. The terahertz interconnect employs a resonator coupling technique to provide low-loss and broadband performance while occupying a small area. Measured results show that the proposed terahertz transmitter can work at 338.4 GHz with equivalent isotropically radiated power (EIRP) of 8.0 dBm while consuming only 37.5 mW from a 1-V supply. The measured half-power beam-width can be as narrow as 15.5°. The EIRP can be further raised to 9.5 dBm as the supply V DD is increased to 1.3 V. The CMOS chip only occupies an area as small as 0.028 mm2. All of the design efforts enable the proposed terahertz transmitter to feature in small form factor, low power dissipation, low cost, and high performance. To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the most compact, lowest power, lowest cost, and high-performance SoP-based terahertz transmitter reported thus far. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]