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BackgroundRecently, there has been an emphasis on providing good-quality end-of-life care; however, little is known about it and its determinants for patients living at home.AimTo determine what characterises good-quality end-of-life care for patients living at home.Design and settingAn observational study using 5-year data from the National Survey of Bereaved People (Views of Informal Carers — Evaluation of Services [VOICES]) in England.MethodAnalysis was based on data for 63 598 decedents, who were cared for at home in the last 3 months of life. Data were drawn from 110 311 completed mortality follow-back surveys of a stratified sample of 246 763 deaths registered in England between 2011 and 2015. Logistic regression analyses were used to identify independent variables associated with overall quality of end-of-life care and other indicators of end-of-life care quality.ResultsPatients who received good continuity of primary care (adjusted odds ratio [AOR] 2.03; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 2.01 to 2.06) and palliative care support (AOR 1.86; 95% CI = 1.84 to 1.89) experienced better overall quality of end-of-life care than those who did not, as perceived by relatives. Decedents who died from cancer (AOR 1.05; 95% CI = 1.03 to 1.06) or outside of hospital were more likely to receive good end-of-life care, as perceived by relatives. Being older, female (AOR 1.16; 95% CI = 1.15 to 1.17), from areas with least socioeconomic deprivation, and White (AOR 1.09; 95% CI = 1.06 to 1.12) were associated with better overall end-of-life care, as perceived by relatives.ConclusionBetter quality of end-of-life care was associated with good continuity of primary care, specialist palliative care support, and death outside of hospital. Disparities still exist for those from minority ethnic groups and those living in areas of socioeconomic deprivation. Future commissioning and initiatives must consider these variables to provide a more-equitable service.

With the purpose of investigating new polymeric materials as potential flow modifiers for their future application in enhanced oil recovery (EOR), a series of amphiphilic poly(di(ethylene glycol) methyl ether methacrylate

Heat alters biology from molecular to ecological levels, but may also have unknown indirect effects. This includes the concept that animals exposed to abiotic stress can induce stress in naive receivers. Here, we provide a comprehensive picture of the molecular signatures of this process, by integrating multiomic and phenotypic data. In individual zebrafish embryos, repeated heat peaks elicited both a molecular response and a burst of accelerated growth followed by a growth slowdown in concert with reduced responses to novel stimuli. Metabolomes of the media of heat treated vs. untreated embryos revealed candidate stress metabolites including sulfur-containing compounds and lipids. These stress metabolites elicited transcriptomic changes in naive receivers related to immune response, extracellular signaling, glycosaminoglycan/keratan sulfate, and lipid metabolism. Consequently, non-heat-exposed receivers (exposed to stress metabolites only) experienced accelerated catch-up growth in concert with reduced swimming performance. The combination of heat and stress metabolites accelerated development the most, mediated by apelin signaling. Our results prove the concept of indirect heat-induced stress propagation toward naive receivers, inducing phenotypes comparable with those resulting from direct heat exposure, but utilizing distinct molecular pathways. Group-exposing a nonlaboratory zebrafish line, we independently confirm that the glycosaminoglycan biosynthesis-related gene chs1 and the mucus glycoprotein gene prg4a, functionally connected to the candidate stress metabolite classes sugars and phosphocholine, are differentially expressed in receivers. This hints at the production of Schreckstoff-like cues in receivers, leading to further stress propagation within groups, which may have ecological and animal welfare implications for aquatic populations in a changing climate.

Heat alters biology from molecular to ecological levels, but may also have unknown indirect effects. This includes the novel concept that animals exposed to abiotic stress can induce stress in naive receivers. Here, we provide a comprehensive picture of the molecular signatures of this process, by integrating multi-omic and phenotypic data. In individual zebrafish embryos, repeated heat peaks elicited both a molecular response and a burst of accelerated growth followed by a growth slow-down in concert with reduced responses to novel stimuli. Metabolomes of the media of heat treated vs. untreated embryos revealed candidate stress metabolites including sulphur-containing compounds and lipids. These stress metabolites elicited transcriptomic changes in naive receivers related to immune response, extracellular signalling, glycosaminoglycan/keratan sulphate, and lipid metabolism. Consequently, non heat-exposed receivers (exposed to stress metabolites only) experienced accelerated catch-up growth in concert with reduced swimming performance. The combination of heat and stress metabolites accelerated development the most, mediated by apelin signalling. Our results prove the concept of indirect heat-induced stress propagation towards naive receivers, inducing phenotypes comparable to those resulting from direct heat exposure, but utilising distinct molecular pathways. Group-exposing a non-laboratory zebrafish line, we independently confirm that the glycosaminoglycan biosynthesis-related gene chs1, and the mucus glycoprotein gene prg4a, functionally connected to the candidate stress metabolite classes sugars and phosphocholine, are differentially expressed in receivers. This hints at production of Schreckstoff-like cues in receivers, leading to further stress propagation within groups, which may have ecological and animal welfare implications for aquatic populations in a changing climate.Significance StatementAquatic animals utilise chemicals to mediate adaptive behaviours. For instance, predated fish release chemical cues that elicit antipredatory responses in naive receivers. But whether abiotic factors such as heat likewise alter chemical communication has received little focus. Here, we uncover a novel dimension of chemical communication — heat-stressed donors can induce stress in naive receivers. We show that heat activates molecular stress responses, leading to the release of distinct stress metabolite classes into the environment. These stress metabolites alter the transcriptome of receivers, resulting in faster development and hypoactivity. Heat combined with stress metabolites had the largest effect, highlighting that abiotic stress, experienced both directly and indirectly, can alter chemical communication and affect embryonic development.Graphical AbstractHighlightsWe elucidate the mechanism for a novel dimension of the heat stress response — chemical communication from heat-stressed donors that induces stress in naive receivers — constituting a positive feedback loopRepeated heat stress induces a cellular and cortisol stress response and alters the phenotype of zebrafish embryosHeat-stressed embryos release stress metabolites enriched in lipids and sulphur-containing organo-oxygen compoundsIn combination, heat and stress metabolites induced 47% distinct differentially expressed genes, with many related to organ developmentThese stress metabolites alter the transcriptome and induce both faster development and hypoactivity in naive receivers, a similar response to that of heat stress itself

Purpose: Cancer patients in Zimbabwe typically access health services with advanced disease, limiting treatment choices and lessening the likelihood of positive treatment outcomes. We outline experiences of patients with advanced cancer prior to interaction with palliative care services to identify targets for future intervention development to enhance care delivery in Zimbabwe. Patient and methods: Participants were purposively sampled adult patients with advanced cancer. We adopted a thematic approach to guide a qualitative secondary data analysis exploring factors influencing support sought by participants, external factors influencing decision making across the disease trajectory, and the process for seeking and accessing palliative care. Results: Participants reported fragmented and uncoordinated care, from initial symptom experience and throughout disease progression. A recurring notion of disjuncture was present through participants’ experiences of gaps, breaks and discontinuity across the disease trajectory. Each step had a beginning and end without clear routes for transition with movement between steps a result of happenstance or informal encounters. Conclusion: Targets for intervention development at the patient and family level exist that may reduce the disjuncture currently experienced between need and care provision. A holistic response that incorporates engagement with policy actors is critical to addressing prominent financial constraints for patients.

The ability to tune the behavior of temperature-responsive polymers and self-assembled nanostructures has attracted significant interest in recent years, particularly in regard to their use in biotechnological applications. Herein, well-defined poly(2-(diethylamino)ethyl methacrylate) (PDEAEMA)-based core-shell particles were prepared by RAFT-mediated emulsion polymerization, which displayed a lower-critical solution temperature (LCST) phase transition in aqueous media. The tertiary amine groups of PDEAEMA units were then utilized as functional handles to modify the core-forming block chemistry via a postpolymerization betainization approach for tuning both the cloud-point temperature (TCP) and flocculation temperature (TCFT) of these particles. In particular, four different sulfonate salts were explored aiming to investigate the effect of the carbon chain length and the presence of hydroxyl functionalities alongside the carbon spacer on the particle's thermoresponsiveness. In all cases, it was possible to regulate both TCP and TCFT of these nanoparticles upon varying the degree of betainization. Although TCP was found to be dependent on the type of betainization reagent utilized, it only significantly increased for particles betainized using sodium 3-chloro-2-hydroxy-1-propanesulfonate, while varying the aliphatic chain length of the sulfobetaine only provided limited temperature variation. In comparison, the onset of flocculation for betainized particles varied over a much broader temperature range when varying the degree of betainization with no real correlation identified between TCFT and the sulfobetaine structure. Moreover, experimental results were shown to partially correlate to computational oligomer hydrophobicity calculations. Overall, the innovative postpolymerization betainization approach utilizing various sulfonate salts reported herein provides a straightforward methodology for modifying the thermoresponsive behavior of soft polymeric particles with potential applications in drug delivery, sensing, and oil/lubricant viscosity modification.

Background Pharmacists are important members of multidisciplinary teams but, despite surveys of provision, the role of the hospice pharmacist is not well described. Objective To explore the role of the hospice pharmacist and identify barriers and facilitators to the role. Setting Hospices offering in-patient services caring for adults towards the end of life in one geographical area of northern England. Method Pharmacists providing services to hospices were invited to take part in qualitative semi-structured interviews asking about experience, patient contact, team working and barriers and facilitators to the role. These were recorded verbatim and data were analysed thematically using framework analysis. Main outcome measure The hospice pharmacist’s perceptions of their role and barriers and facilitators to it. Results Fifteen pharmacists took part. Two themes and ten subthemes were identified focused on tasks and communication. Practise was varied and time limited the quantity and depth of services carried out but was often spent navigating complex drug supply routes. Participants found methods of communication suited to the hours they spent in the hospice although communication of data was a barrier to effective clinical service provision. Participants identified the need for appropriate training and standards of practice for hospice pharmacists would enable better use of their skills. Conclusion Barriers to the role of hospice pharmacist include time, access to role specific training, access to clinical information and complex medicines supply chains. The role would benefit from definition to ensure that hospices are able to use hospice pharmacists to their greatest potential.

Emma Chapman reviews First Dawn: From the Big Bang to Our Future in Space by Roberto Battiston (translated by Bonnie McClellan-Broussard)

Accurate simulations of the 21-cm signal from the Epoch of Reionization require the generation of maps at specific frequencies given the values of astrophysical and cosmological parameters. The peculiar velocities of the hydrogen atoms producing the 21-cm radiation result in a shift in the observed frequency of the 21-cm radiation and changes the amplitude of the signal itself. This is not an effect we can remove but instead needs to be accurately modelled to ensure we infer the correct physical parameters from an observation. We describe the full calculation of the distortion of the 21-cm signal, and propose a new code that integrates the 21-cm intensity along the line of sight for each individual light cone pixel to fully capture the intensity contributions from multiple redshifts. This algorithm naturally deals with the typical divergences found in standard approaches, allowing for large optical depths and 21-cm absorption events at high redshifts. We find the new method results in up to a 60% decrease in power on the largest scales on the sky, and an increase of over 80% on the smallest scales on the sky. We find that the new implementation of the light cone results in a longer tail of bright temperatures in the brightness temperature distribution, as a result of the successful circumventing of a previous cap that had to be implemented to avoid a divergence in the brightness temperature. We conclude that this full treatment of the evolution of the light cone pixel can be an important effect., Accepted by MNRAS

This study explores the ways in which feelings of “maternal ambivalence” affect women. Through semistructured interviews, four women spoke about their experiences that led to ambivalent feelings about their motherhood. The data gathered from these interviews were analyzed using Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis. This research found that these women experienced a loss of independence, relationships, and confidence when they became mothers. Together, these losses felt like a loss of “self” which led to many unexpected and unwanted feelings. They were shocked and confused when they experienced feelings of resentment towards themselves, others, and their children. They also experienced unexpected feelings of boredom and anxiety in relation to mothering. However, with time and perspective, these women experienced a reemergence of “self” through their ability to begin to balance parts of “self” and accept their ambivalent feelings towards motherhood.

Emma Chapman reviews Bright Galaxies, Dark Matter, and Beyond: the Life of Astronomer Vera Rubin by Ashley Jean Yeager.

Agrivoltaics shows promise as a practice that can reduce agricultural water use and plant water stress, while also increasing photovoltaic (PV) efficiency due to cooler temperatures of the panels from evapotranspiration below, but little work has investigated this practice at the residential scale. The objectives of this study were to evaluate the potential impact on water use and garden plants that would be found on a typical residential property, and evaluate the impact on solar PV energy production using residential agrivoltaics vs. typical roof-mount residential solar panels. Experimental plots were established to compare lettuce growth and water use between full-sun and a shaded agrivoltaics setup, and to compare temperatures and power production of the PV panels in the agrivoltaics plot vs. a typical roof-mount installation. Results showed significantly less irrigation requirements in the agrivolatic plot vs. the full-sun plot. Weights and leaf counts were significantly lower in the agrivolatic plot, though average leaf lengths were greater than in the full-sun plot. Roof-mount PV panel temperature was significantly higher than the agrivoltaics panel, depending on cloud cover and irradiance, which corresponded to up to a 3.6% decrease in power loss. Results show promise for both water conservation and energy production benefits, but further work is needed to determine optimal conditions that would not affect plant yield, and to verify effects on PV panel production under full load conditions.

Background Racial disparities in pain management have been observed in the USA since the 1990s in settings such as the emergency department and oncology. However, the palliative care context is not well described, and little research has focused outside of the USA or on advanced disease. This review takes a cross-national approach to exploring pain management in advanced disease for people of different racial and ethnic groups. Methods Mixed methods systematic review. The primary outcome measure was differences in receiving pain medication between people from different racial and ethnic groups. Five electronic databases were searched. Two researchers independently assessed quality using JBI checklists, weighted evidence, and extracted data. The quantitative findings on the primary outcome measure were cross-tabulated, and a thematic analysis was undertaken on the mixed methods studies. Themes were formulated into a conceptual/thematic matrix. Patient representatives from UK ethnically diverse groups were consulted. PRISMA 2020 guidelines were followed. Results Eighteen papers were included in the primary outcome analysis. Three papers were rated ‘High’ weight of evidence, and 17/18 (94%) were based in the USA. Ten of the eighteen (56%) found no significant difference in the pain medication received between people of different ethnic groups. Forty-six papers were included in the mixed methods synthesis; 41/46 (89%) were based in the USA. Key themes: Patients from different ethnically diverse groups had concerns about tolerance, addiction and side effects. The evidence also showed: cultural and social doctor-patient communication issues; many patients with unmet pain management needs; differences in pain assessment by racial group, and two studies found racial and ethnic stereotyping. Conclusions There was not enough high quality evidence to draw a conclusion on differences in receiving pain medication for people with advanced disease from different racial and ethnic groups. The mixed methods findings showed commonalities in fears about pain medication side effects, tolerance and addiction across diverse ethnic groups. However, these fears may have different foundations and are differently prioritised according to culture, faith, educational and social factors. There is a need to develop culturally competent pain management to address doctor-patient communication issues and patients’ pain management concerns. Trial registration PROSPERO-CRD42020167890.

We investigate systematic effects in direction dependent gain calibration in the context of the Low-Frequency Array (LOFAR) 21-cm Epoch of Reionization (EoR) experiment. The LOFAR EoR Key Science Project aims to detect the 21-cm signal of neutral hydrogen on interferometric baselines of $50-250 \lambda$. We show that suppression of faint signals can effectively be avoided by calibrating these short baselines using only the longer baselines. However, this approach causes an excess variance on the short baselines due to small gain errors induced by overfitting during calibration. We apply a regularised expectation-maximisation algorithm with consensus optimisation (sagecal-co) to real data with simulated signals to show that overfitting can be largely mitigated by penalising spectrally non-smooth gain solutions during calibration. This reduces the excess power with about a factor 4 in the simulations. Our results agree with earlier theoretical analysis of this bias-variance trade off and support the gain-calibration approach to the LOFAR 21-cm signal data., Comment: This is a pre-copyedited, author-produced PDF of an article accepted for publication in MNRAS following peer review

We compare various foreground removal techniques that are being utilised to remove bright foregrounds in various experiments aiming to detect the redshifted 21cm signal of neutral hydrogen from the Epoch of Reionization. In this work, we test the performance of removal techniques (FastICA, GMCA, and GPR) on 10 nights of LOFAR data and investigate the possibility of recovering the latest upper limit on the 21cm signal. Interestingly, we find that GMCA and FastICA reproduce the most recent 2$\sigma$ upper limit of $\Delta^2_{21}, Comment: 15 pages, 11 figures, accepted by MNRAS on 02 November 2020

Background Despite increasing evidence of the benefits of early access to palliative care (PC), many patients do not receive PC in a timely manner. A systematic approach in primary care can facilitate early identification of patients with potential PC needs and prompt assessment of their needs. Aim To identify existing screening tools for identification of patients with advanced diseases who are likely to have PC needs in primary health care and evaluate their accuracy. Methods The protocol was registered with Prospero, registration number CRD42019111568. Searches of MEDLINE, Embase, Cochrane and CINAHL, from inception to March 2019. Studies mentioning the use or development of a screening tool to identify patients with advanced diseases and potential PC needs in primary care were eligible for inclusion. A narrative synthesis was conducted. Results From 4,127 unique articles screened, 25 reported the use or development of 10 screening tools. Most tools use prognostication and/or deterioration as a proxy for the identification of people with potential PC needs. The tools are based on a wide range of general and disease-specific indicators. The proportion of patients identified with potential PC needs across studies ranged from 0.49 to and 79%. The accuracy of five tools was assessed in eight studies; these tools differed significantly in their ability to identify patients with potential PC needs with sensitivity ranged 3–94%, and specificity ranged 26–99%. Conclusion The ability of current screening tools to identify patients with advanced diseases who are likely to have PC needs in primary care is limited. Further research is needed to identify standardised screening processes which are based not solely on predicting mortality and deterioration, but also on anticipating the needs whenever they occur and predicting the rate of functional decline in order to trigger holistic assessment to identify and address PC needs at the right time.

We derive constraints on the thermal and ionization states of the intergalactic medium (IGM) at redshift $\approx$ 9.1 using new upper limits on the 21-cm power spectrum measured by the LOFAR radio-telescope and a prior on the ionized fraction at that redshift estimated from recent cosmic microwave background (CMB) observations. We have used results from the reionization simulation code GRIZZLY and a Bayesian inference framework to constrain the parameters which describe the physical state of the IGM. We find that, if the gas heating remains negligible, an IGM with ionized fraction $\gtrsim 0.13$ and a distribution of the ionized regions with a characteristic size $\gtrsim 8 ~h^{-1}$ comoving megaparsec (Mpc) and a full width at the half maximum (FWHM) $\gtrsim 16 ~h^{-1}$ Mpc is ruled out. For an IGM with a uniform spin temperature $T_{\rm S} \gtrsim 3$ K, no constraints on the ionized component can be computed. If the large-scale fluctuations of the signal are driven by spin temperature fluctuations, an IGM with a volume fraction $\lesssim 0.34$ of heated regions with a temperature larger than CMB, average gas temperature 7-160 K and a distribution of the heated regions with characteristic size 3.5-70 $h^{-1}$ Mpc and FWHM of $\lesssim 110$ $h^{-1}$ Mpc is ruled out. These constraints are within the 95 per cent credible intervals. With more stringent future upper limits from LOFAR at multiple redshifts, the constraints will become tighter and will exclude an increasingly large region of the parameter space., 22 pages, 15 Figures, 5 tables, Accepted for publication in MNRAS

A new upper limit on the 21 cm signal power spectrum at a redshift of z ≈ 9.1 is presented, based on 141 h of data obtained with the Low-Frequency Array (LOFAR). The analysis includes significant improvements in spectrally smooth gain-calibration, Gaussian Process Regression (GPR) foreground mitigation and optimally weighted power spectrum inference. Previously seen ‘excess power’ due to spectral structure in the gain solutions has markedly reduced but some excess power still remains with a spectral correlation distinct from thermal noise. This excess has a spectral coherence scale of 0.25–0.45 MHz and is partially correlated between nights, especially in the foreground wedge region. The correlation is stronger between nights covering similar local sidereal times. A best 2-σ upper limit of $\Delta ^2_{21} \lt (73)^2\, \mathrm{mK^2}$ at $k = 0.075\, \mathrm{h\, cMpc^{-1}}$ is found, an improvement by a factor ≈8 in power compared to the previously reported upper limit. The remaining excess power could be due to residual foreground emission from sources or diffuse emission far away from the phase centre, polarization leakage, chromatic calibration errors, ionosphere, or low-level radiofrequency interference. We discuss future improvements to the signal processing chain that can further reduce or even eliminate these causes of excess power.

The EoR foregrounds can be up to three magnitudes greater than the cosmological signal we wish to detect. Multiple methods have been developed in order to extract the cosmological signal, falling roughly into three categories: foreground removal, foreground suppression and foreground avoidance. These main approaches are briefly discussed in this review and consideration taken to the future application of these methods as a multi-layered approach.

Polybetaines exhibit unique properties combining anti-polyelectrolyte and low protein fouling behaviour, as well as biocompatibility. To date, the synthesis of polybetaine particles >50 nm has proved to be extremely challenging with standard emulsion and dispersion techniques being unsuccessful. Here we present the first reported synthesis of micron-sized, discrete cross-linked polybetaine particles, using polymerisation in scCO2 with methanol as a co-solvent. Discrete particles are produced only when the methanol is efficiently removed in situ using scCO2 extraction. A relatively high crosslinking agent initial concentration (10 wt%) was found to result in the most well defined particles, and particle integrity reduced as the crosslinking agent initial concentration was decreased. A monomer loading of between 3.0 × 10−2 mol L−1 and 1.8 × 10−1 mol L−1 resulted in discrete micron sized particles, with significant agglomoration occuring as the monomer loading was increased further. A spherical morphology and extremely low size dispersity was observed by SEM analysis for the optimised particles. The particles were readily re-dispersed in aqueous solution and light scattering measurements confirmed their low size dispersity.

This article examines activism to address staff-to-student sexual misconduct in higher education in the United Kingdom from our perspective as founders and members of the research and lobby organization The 1752 Group. We argue that in order to tackle staff sexual misconduct in higher education, the problem has first to be made visible. We theorize this as “slow activism” and outline the activities that we and others have been engaged in toward this end: conducting research, using complaints processes within institutions, naming the experiences of staff sexual misconduct and/or institutions and perpetrators, and carrying out discipline-led and sector-level initiatives.

The low-frequency radio sky is dominated by the diffuse synchrotron emission of our Galaxy and extragalactic radio sources related to Active Galactic Nuclei and star-forming galaxies. This foreground emission is much brighter than the cosmological 21 cm emission from the Cosmic Dawn and Epoch of Reionization. Studying the physical properties of the foregrounds is therefore of fundamental importance for their mitigation in the cosmological 21 cm experiments. This chapter gives a comprehensive overview of the foregrounds and our current state- of-the-art knowledge about their mitigation.

LOFAR is the LOw-Frequency Radio interferometer ARray located at midlatitude (52°53′N). Here we present results on ionospheric structures derived from 29 LOFAR nighttime observations during the winters of 2012/2013 and 2013/2014. We show that LOFAR is able to determine differential ionospheric total electron content values with an accuracy better than 0.001 total electron content unit = 1016m−2 over distances ranging between 1 and 100 km. For all observations the power law behavior of the phase structure function is confirmed over a long range of baseline lengths, between 1 and 80 km, with a slope that is, in general, larger than the 5/3 expected for pure Kolmogorov turbulence. The measured average slope is 1.89 with a one standard deviation spread of 0.1. The diffractive scale, i.e., the length scale where the phase variance is 1rad2, is shown to be an easily obtained single number that represents the ionospheric quality of a radio interferometric observation. A small diffractive scale is equivalent to high phase variability over the field of view as well as a short time coherence of the signal, which limits calibration and imaging quality. For the studied observations the diffractive scales at 150 MHz vary between 3.5 and 30 km. A diffractive scale above 5 km, pertinent to about 90% of the observations, is considered sufficient for the high dynamic range imaging needed for the LOFAR epoch of reionization project. For most nights the ionospheric irregularities were anisotropic, with the structures being aligned with the Earth magnetic field in about 60% of the observations.

The paper sets out to examine the characteristics of support for innovation processes in Non-Wood Forest Products (NWFP). The typical enterprises and start-ups which emerge in this sector tend to be small-scale and family owned. We claim that there is a large unused potential for NWFP to support rural development and increase incomes of land owners and rural enterprises. In this article, we study what makes selected and so far successful product innovations in NWFPs special and subsequently what were the factors that supported their development and marketing? These questions we study at hand of four empirical innovative case studies in four European rural areas. We come to the conclusion that the entrepreneurs show some common features in the ways they started their business. However, they have applied individual strategies for the realisation of their own ideas. In line with recommendations from recent literature on creating innovations, all of them have used some “external” support, but at very different levels: They range from monetary support and consultation of effective support organisations to personal non-monetary exchange-relationships in social networks within a communal area. Our results contribute to an understanding of entrepreneurial behaviour as a very individual and context-specific undertaking on the one hand and as a “universal” activity with common features and attributes on the other.

A novel fluorescent monomer was synthesized to probe the state of CO2-responsive cross-linked polymeric particles. The fluorescent emission of this aminobromomaleimide-bearing monomer, being sensitive to protic environments, can provide information on the core hydrophilicity of the particles and therefore indicates the swollen state and size of the particles. The particles’ core, synthesized from DEAEMA (N,N-diethylaminoethyl methacrylate), is responsive to CO2 through protonation of the tertiary amines of DEAEMA. The response is reversible and the fluorescence emission can be recovered by simply bubbling nitrogen into the particle solution. Alternate purges of CO2 and N2 into the particles’ solution allow several ON/OFF fluorescence emission cycles and simultaneous particle swelling/shrinking cycles.\ud \ud

In 1951, three separate research groups established radio astronomy as a contender to the dominance of optical astronomy. Using the interstellar 21-cm line, they provided a method to look deeper into our own Galaxy and back in time to the birth of all galaxies.

Detection of the 21-cm signal coming from the epoch of reionization (EoR) is challenging especially because, even after removing the foregrounds, the residual Stokes I maps contain leakage from polarized emission that can mimic the signal. Here, we discuss the instrumental polarization of Low Frequency Array (LOFAR) and present realistic simulations of the leakages between Stokes parameters. From the LOFAR observations of polarized emission in the 3C196 field, we have quantified the level of polarization leakage caused by the nominal model beam of LOFAR, and compared it with the EoR signal using power spectrum analysis. We found that at 134-166 MHz, within the central 4° of the field the (Q, U) → I leakage power is lower than the EoR signal at k < 0.3 Mpc-1. The leakage was found to be localized around a Faraday depth of 0, and the rms of the leakage as a fraction of the rms of the polarized emission was shown to vary between 0.2 and 0.3 per cent, both of which could be utilized in the removal of leakage. Moreover, we could define an `EoR window' in terms of the polarization leakage in the cylindrical power spectrum above the point spread function (PSF)-induced wedge and below k∥ ̃ 0.5 Mpc-1, and the window extended up to k∥ ̃ 1 Mpc-1 at all k⊥ when 70 per cent of the leakage had been removed. These LOFAR results show that even a modest polarimetric calibration over a field of view of ≲ 4° in the future arrays like Square Kilometre Array will ensure that the polarization leakage remains well below the expected EoR signal at the scales of 0.02-1 Mpc-1.

We present the first limits on the Epoch of Reionization (EoR) 21-cm HI power spectra, in the redshift range $z=7.9-10.6$, using the Low-Frequency Array (LOFAR) High-Band Antenna (HBA). In total 13\,h of data were used from observations centred on the North Celestial Pole (NCP). After subtraction of the sky model and the noise bias, we detect a non-zero $\Delta^2_{\rm I} = (56 \pm 13 {\rm mK})^2$ (1-$\sigma$) excess variance and a best 2-$\sigma$ upper limit of $\Delta^2_{\rm 21} < (79.6 {\rm mK})^2$ at $k=0.053$$h$cMpc$^{-1}$ in the range $z=$9.6-10.6. The excess variance decreases when optimizing the smoothness of the direction- and frequency-dependent gain calibration, and with increasing the completeness of the sky model. It is likely caused by (i) residual side-lobe noise on calibration baselines, (ii) leverage due to non-linear effects, (iii) noise and ionosphere-induced gain errors, or a combination thereof. Further analyses of the excess variance will be discussed in forthcoming publications., Comment: 17 pages, 8 figures, accepted by ApJ

Herein we report the first example of the controlled synthesis of linear and hyperbranched copolymers of 2-methylene-1,3-dioxepane (MDO) with functional vinyl monomers to deliver a range of functional, degradable polymers by reversible deactivation radical polymerization. The copolymerization was able to be tuned to vary the incorporation of degradable segments to create degradable materials with predictable molar mass, low dispersity values while also featuring side-chain functionality. The formation of nanoparticles by the addition of divinyladipate to form degradable hyperbranched copolymers was proven by DLS and TEM analyses.

We describe the one-pot synthesis of temperature-responsive branched polymer nanoparticles. Reversible addition–fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerisation has been utilised to synthesise ultra-high molecular weight sulfobetaine polymers (up to ca. 500 kDa) with good control over molecular weight (Mn) and dispersity (Mw/Mn). The UCST cloud points of these linear polymers were found to increase with both Mn and concentration, and represent one of the few recent descriptions of polymers exhibiting UCST behaviour in aqueous solution. The incorporation of difunctional monomers results in branched polymers which display vastly reduced transition temperatures compared to their linear counterparts. Furthermore, the incorporation of a permanently hydrophilic monomer results in the formation of stable core–shell particles which no longer exhibit a cloud point in water, even at very high concentrations (ca. 50 mg mL−1). The branched polymers are shown to form discrete well-defined nanoparticles in aqueous solution, and these have been characterised by DLS, SLS, TEM and DOSY. Their reversible swelling behaviour in response to temperature is also demonstrated.

The accurate and precise removal of 21-cm foregrounds from Epoch of Reionization (EoR) redshifted 21-cm emission data is essential if we are to gain insight into an unexplored cosmological era. We apply a non-parametric technique, Generalized Morphological Component Analysis (GMCA), to simulated Low Frequency Array (LOFAR)-EoR data and show that it has the ability to clean the foregrounds with high accuracy. We recover the 21-cm 1D, 2D and 3D power spectra with high accuracy across an impressive range of frequencies and scales. We show that GMCA preserves the 21-cm phase information, especially when the smallest spatial scale data is discarded. While it has been shown that LOFAR-EoR image recovery is theoretically possible using image smoothing, we add that wavelet decomposition is an efficient way of recovering 21-cm signal maps to the same or greater order of accuracy with more flexibility. By comparing the GMCA output residual maps (equal to the noise, 21-cm signal and any foreground fitting errors) with the 21-cm maps at one frequency and discarding the smaller wavelet scale information, we find a correlation coefficient of 0.689, compared to 0.588 for the equivalently smoothed image. Considering only the pixels in a central patch covering 50 per cent of the total map area, these coefficients improve to 0.905 and 0.605, respectively, and we conclude that wavelet decomposition is a significantly more powerful method to denoise reconstructed 21-cm maps than smoothing.

Objective: Caffeine has been shown to have effects on certain areas of cognition, but in executive functioning the research is limited and also inconsistent. One reason could be the need for a more sensitive measure to detect the effects of caffeine on executive function. This study used a new non-immersive virtual reality assessment of executive functions known as JEF© (the Jansari Assessment of Executive Function) alongside the ‘classic’ Stroop Colour-Word task to assess the effects of a normal dose of caffeinated coffee on executive function. Method: Using a double-blind, counterbalanced within participants procedure 43 participants were administered either a caffeinated or decaffeinated coffee and completed the ‘JEF©’ and Stroop tasks, as well as a subjective mood scale and blood pressure pre- and post condition on two separate occasions a week apart. JEF© yields measures for eight separate aspects of executive functions, in addition to a total average score. Results: Findings indicate that performance was significantly improved on the planning, creative thinking, event-, time- and action-based prospective memory, as well as total JEF© score following caffeinated coffee relative to the decaffeinated coffee. The caffeinated beverage significantly decreased reaction times on the Stroop task, but there was no effect on Stroop interference. Conclusion: The results provide further support for the effects of a caffeinated beverage on cognitive functioning. In particular, it has demonstrated the ability of JEF© to detect the effects of caffeine across a number of executive functioning constructs, which weren’t shown in the Stroop task, suggesting executive functioning improvements as a result of a ‘typical’ dose of caffeine may only be detected by the use of more real-world, ecologically valid tasks.