Effects of parental separation and divorce on very young children.

Data from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care were analyzed to explore effects of marital separation on children in the first 3 years of life. The sample included 73 never-married mothers and 97 separated mothers; a comparison group of 170 was conditionally randomly selected from the 2-parent families. Children in 2-parent families performed better than children in 1-parent families on assessments of cognitive and social abilities, problem behavior, attachment security, and behavior with mother. However, controlling for mothers' education and family income reduced these differences, and associations with separated-intact marital status were nonsignificant (the effect size was .01). Thus, children's psychological development was not affected by parental separation per se; it was related to mothers' income, education, ethnicity, childrearing beliefs, depressive symptoms, and behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Serial processing in reading aloud: Reply to Zorzi (2000).

K. Rastle and M. Coltheart (1999; see also M. Coltheart & K. Rastle, 1994) reported data demonstrating that the cost of irregularity in reading aloud low-frequency exception words is modulated by the position of the irregularity in the word. They argued that these data implicated a serial process and falsified all models of reading aloud that operate solely in parallel, a conclusion that M. Zorzi (2000) challenged by successfully simulating the position of irregularity effect with such a model. Zorzi (2000) further claimed that a reanalysis of K. Rastle and A Coltheart's (1999) data demonstrates sensitivity to grapheme-phoneme consistency (which he claimed was confounded across the position of irregularity manipulation) rather than the use of a serial process. Here, the authors argue that M. Zorzi's (2000) reanalyses were inappropriate and reassert that K. Rastle and A Coltheart's (1999) findings are evidence for serial processing. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Microstrip ring resonator using quarter-wave couplers

A microstrip ring resonator that uses quarter-wave coupled lines for input and output coupling is presented. The ring exhibits a double resonance due to an asymmetry in the topology of the structure. When the asymmetry is removed a single resonant peak is observed. The insertion loss of the ring is 6 dB and its quality factor is 64     

Diet preference in rats (Rattus norvegicus) as a function of odor exposure, odor concentration, and conspecific presence.

The relative contributions of social and stimulus factors in development of rat dietary preferences were examined. Investigation of odor-alone effects revealed that weak odors resulted in preference for familiar-odor diets, but only at longer exposure times. Shorter exposure to strong odors also produced differences in diet preference. When odor and conspecific presence were manipulated simultaneously, odors produced no diet preference at low intensities, whereas high-intensity odors did so regardless of conspecific presence. Medium-intensity odor concentrations produced differences only with conspecifics present, indicating social enhancement of stimuli that are ineffective in isolation. These results suggest the separate influence of social and stimulus factors on dietary preferences and explain contradictions in previous studies. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dehydration anorexia in decerebrate rats.

Hypertonic saline (HS) administered intraperitoneal/ly (ip) reduced the intake of sucrose solution infused intraorally in tube-fed decerebrate rats, as it did in control animals. Similarly, either ip or intravenous HS markedly decreased the intake of laboratory chow by neurologically intact control rats. These observations complement recent findings that lesions of putative osmoreceptors in the ventral diencephalon, which eliminate thirst and blunt pituitary secretion of vasopressin and oxytocin in response to HS in rats, have no apparent effect on the HS-induced inhibition of food intake. Taken together they support previous studies indicating an important role for the caudal brainstem in the central control of food intake and suggest that such brainstem control may also include the inhibition of food intake induced by acute hyperosmolality. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perceived stress and caregiver burden after brain injury: A theoretical integration.

Presents a theoretical integration of the literature examining burden among caregivers of brain-injured persons. An examination of various conceptualizations of caregiver burden suggests that the most parsimonious definition for burden is that of perceived stress, or the perception that the caregiving situation exceeds the caregiver's resources with which to cope. Using traditional stress theory as a framework, relationships are suggested between variables identified in the brain injury literature. Particularly, perceived stress might be expected to mediate the effects of other variables identified in the literature. Viewing caregiver burden as a complex process involving a number of variables should aid the understanding of burden and suggest areas for future research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A fuzzy expert system application to the evaluation of ceramic- and paper-quality kaolin

This paper describes the results obtained from the application of a fuzzy expert system to the zonification of a deposit in terms of kaolin of a quality suitable for the paper and ceramic industries. In the first stage of the study, mineralogical, chemical and paper quality indices were characterized for samples taken from a kaolin deposit located in Galicia in NW Spain. In the second part of the study the expert system was trained and adjusted on the basis of analytical data, and its reliability in classifying samples in different quality groups was tested.Data analysis and the design and training of a fuzzy-logic expert system furnish the tool not only with general information inherent to kaolin mining but also with an input in the form of the local characteristics of the studied deposit. This method enables mining experts to identify the areas of a deposit containing kaolin that meets the criteria necessary for enrichment and subsequent use in the ceramic or paper industry. This kind of tool is not only indispensable in planning extraction tasks, but also permits technical and financial risk to be minimized. The model is innovative in that it automatically classified kaolin quality in terms of saleability, thereby emulating the logical reasoning processes of the human expert.     

In Vitro and In Silico Analysis of New n-Butyl and Isobutyl Quinoxaline-7-carboxylate 1,4-di-N-oxide Derivatives against Trypanosoma cruzi as Trypanothione Reductase Inhibitors

American trypanosomiasis is a worldwide health problem that requires attention due to ineffective treatment options. We evaluated n-butyl and isobutyl quinoxaline-7-carboxylate 1,4-di-N-oxide derivatives against trypomastigotes of the Trypanosoma cruzi strains NINOA and INC-5. An in silico analysis of the interactions of 1,4-di-N-oxide on the active site of trypanothione reductase (TR) and an enzyme inhibition study was carried out. The n-butyl series compound identified as T-150 had the best trypanocidal activity against T. cruzi trypomastigotes, with a 13% TR inhibition at 44 μM. The derivative T-147 behaved as a mixed inhibitor with Ki and Ki’ inhibition constants of 11.4 and 60.8 µM, respectively. This finding is comparable to the TR inhibitor mepacrine (Ki = 19 µM).