Men’s experiences of state sponsored housing in South Africa: emerging issues and key questions

In South African cities, millions of men and women living informally are being rehoused through the state-directed provision of formal houses to poor beneficiaries. This intervention is reshaping their lives, and innovatively targets beneficiaries with dependents, where over half are women. Aiming to redress the historical context of gendered inequality in housing ownership and house the very poor, these policy and implementation changes necessarily impact on men in terms of their power, resources and employment but in complex ways including positive and negative. The home remains significant for many men’s desires for authority and identity. Using the lens of masculinity, this paper considers the ways in which men are experiencing this housing intervention, revealing a complex mix of outcomes in terms of their sense of identity, their relationships and their financial pressures and income generation. It draws on empirical work in South Africa to illuminate the importance of focusing on men in relation to housing and offers key questions for future research.     

Fruit snacks from raspberries: influence of drying parameters on colour degradation and bioactive potential

Raspberries were dehydrated using air and freeze‐drying with wet and dry sugar infusion pretreatments. Product quality factors such as colour, bioactive compounds, antioxidant capacity and sensorial characteristics were analysed. Special emphasis was placed on the analysis of anthocyanin degradation and its relationship with colour deterioration and with polymeric compounds development and browning. Freeze‐dried raspberries presented a higher retention of bioactive compounds and a lower content of polymeric compounds than air‐dried ones. Dried samples without pretreatment (control) showed the highest retention of total phenolic content (freeze‐dried ≈82% and air‐dried ≈37% retention), but the lowest sensory acceptability. Although sugar infusion pretreatments caused an important loss of bioactive compounds (9–18% of TPC retention), a higher sensorial acceptability was obtained. Pretreatments with bisulphite and acid allowed obtaining the best quality attributes in terms of anthocyanin and polyphenol content, antiradical activity and colour retention. Polyphenol intake through pretreated dried raspberries (115–299 mg gallic ac./100 g intake) would be higher in some cases than that of usually consumed foods as vegetables, cereals and several fresh fruits.     

Myth and reality of the word caller: The relation between teacher nominations and prevalence among elementary school children.

The purpose of the study was to investigate (a) the prevalence of word callers in elementary school, (b) the accuracy of teachers’ word caller nominations, and (c) teachers’ conceptualization of reading fluency and reading comprehension. To this end, 2 cross-sectional studies of second- and third- (N = 868) and of third- and fifth-grade (N = 202) children were conducted. Our findings suggest that word callers occur infrequently in the primary grades but that they are more prevalent in late elementary school. Regardless of grade level, teachers often overnominated children as word callers. Furthermore, a great deal of ambiguity and inconsistency seems to exist regarding teachers’ understanding and use of the term. These findings suggest that the term should be used relatively rarely and that reading educators should be cautious about their identification of word callers in early elementary school. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Strain aging: Cribb/reed-hill’s model applied to the FeMnAlSiC austenitic system

An analysis of the consistency of Cribb/Reed-Hill’s model with strain aging in FeMnAl systems is attractive since it is a model specifically developed for austenitic systems and based on mechanisms whose activation energy is compatible with the energy for vacancy migration. The present work proposed the application of this model to the FeMnAlSiC system, which besides presenting an essentially austenitic structure also shows a high level of carbon in solid solution. Parameters, such as the interaction energies between carbon and vacancy; the interaction energies between the carbonvacancy dipoles and the dislocations; and the concentration of the carbon-vacancy pairs, of free vacancies, and of free carbon, were estimated for the FeMnAlSiC system. Some corrections in the model were also proposed, such as in the calculation of the energy associated with dipole ordering and of the elastic interaction between the vacancy and the dislocation.     

Nitrate probability mapping in the northern aquifer alluvial system of the river Tagus (Portugal) using Disjunctive Kriging

The Water Framework Directive and its daughter directives recognize the urgent need to adopt specific measures against the contamination of water by individual pollutants or a group of pollutants that present a significant risk to the quality of water. Probability maps showing that the nitrate concentrations exceed a legal threshold value in any location of the aquifer are used to assess risk of groundwater quality degradation from intensive agricultural activity in aquifers. In this paper we use Disjunctive Kriging to map the probability that the Nitrates Directive limit (91/676/EEC) is exceeded for the Nitrate Vulnerable Zone of the River Tagus alluvium aquifer.The Tagus alluvial aquifer system belongs to one of the most productive hydrogeological unit of continental Portugal and it is used to irrigate crops. Several groundwater monitoring campaigns were carried out from 2004 to 2006 according to the summer crops cycle.The study reveals more areas on the west bank with higher probabilities of contamination by nitrates (nitrate concentration values above 50 mg/L) than on the east bank.The analysis of synthetic temporal probability map shows the areas where there is an increase of nitrates concentration during the summers.     

Interpretation training influences memory for prior interpretations.

Anxiety is associated with memory biases when the initial interpretation of the event is taken into account. This experiment examined whether modification of interpretive bias retroactively affects memory for prior events and their initial interpretation. Before training, participants imagined themselves in emotionally ambiguous scenarios to which they provided endings that often revealed their interpretations. Then they were trained to resolve the ambiguity in other situations in a consistently positive (n = 37) or negative way (n = 38) before they tried to recall the initial scenarios and endings. Results indicated that memory for the endings was imbued with the emotional tone of the training, whereas memory for the scenarios was unaffected. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Composite Dissolving Microneedles for Coordinated Control of Antigen and Adjuvant Delivery Kinetics in Transcutaneous Vaccination

Transcutaneous administration has the potential to improve therapeutics delivery, providing an approach that is safer and more convenient than traditional alternatives, while offering the opportunity for improved therapeutic efficacy through sustained/controlled drug release. To this end, a microneedle materials platform is demonstrated for rapid implantation of controlled‐release polymer depots into the cutaneous tissue. Arrays of microneedles composed of drug‐loaded poly(lactide‐co‐glycolide) (PLGA) microparticles or solid PLGA tips are prepared with a supporting and rapidly water‐soluble poly(acrylic acid) (PAA) matrix. Upon application of microneedle patches to the skin of mice, the microneedles perforate the stratum corneum and epidermis. Penetration of the outer skin layers is followed by rapid dissolution of the PAA binder on contact with the interstitial fluid of the epidermis, implanting the microparticles or solid polymer microneedles in the tissue, which are retained following patch removal. These polymer depots remain in the skin for weeks following application and sustain the release of encapsulated cargos for systemic delivery. To show the utility of this approach the ability of these composite microneedle arrays to deliver a subunit vaccine formulation is demonstrated. In comparison to traditional needle‐based vaccination, microneedle delivery gives improved cellular immunity and equivalent generation of serum antibodies, suggesting the potential of this approach for vaccine delivery. However, the flexibility of this system should allow for improved therapeutic delivery in a variety of diverse contexts.     

Influence of foliar urea on the antioxidant response and fruit color of sweet pepper under limited N supply

BACKGROUND: Foliar fertilizer methods could provide a rapid and efficient response when uptake by plant roots is limited. This work studies the effect of foliar urea sprays (15 g L^?1) at different frequencies on the antioxidant metabolism and fruit quality of sweet pepper fruits under N‐limited nutrient solution (3.5 mmol L^?1 NO₃^?) and fully N‐supplied (12.5 mmol L^?1 NO₃^?) plants. RESULTS: Foliar applications of urea in root N‐limited plants increased the total N concentration in the fruits and no significant differences were found with respect to control fruits (plants fully supplied with N by the roots). Fruit color was significantly affected by the urea sprays, and at the highest frequency (twice a week) the largest overall color difference (ΔE) with respect the non‐sprayed fruits was obtained. Foliar urea increased anthocyanin concentration to control values but flavonoids were only affected at the highest application frequency. N deficiency induced oxidative stress but foliar application of urea altered this response, significantly diminishing catalase and ascorbate peroxidase activity. CONCLUSION: Sweet pepper fruits showed a significant and positive response to foliar fertilization on the studied parameters, compensating to a major extent the reduction of N by the roots. In addition to the environmental issues in reducing N contamination, fully monitored automatically sprayed foliar fertilizer could utilize N more efficiently and at lower cost than applying the full recommended rate of other N fertilizers to the nutrient solution, providing flexibility in correcting N nutrition in the plant, and especially the control of nutrient supply independent of the water supply. Copyright © 2008 Society of Chemical Industry     

The synthesis of a novel 1,8-naphthalimide based PAMAM-type dendron and its potential for light-harvesting

The photophysical characteristics of a PAMAM-type dendron that utilizes a 4-ethoxy-1,8-naphthalimide donor and 4-piperidine-1,8-naphthalimide acceptor in nine organic solvents of different polarities were investigated using absorption and fluorescent spectroscopy. The 1,8-naphthalimide acceptor can be indirectly excited by the donor 1,8-naphthalimide at 372 nm whereby the only emission observed is that due to the acceptor at 517 nm; no acceptor emission at 435 nm was observed. The efficiency of energy transfer was ～98%.     

Spray-drying encapsulation of mangiferin using natural polymers

Microencapsulation processes, such as spray-drying are an alternative to enhance solubility of bioactive materials and a good way to preserve, protect and control the release rate of a substance until it reaches its target in the body. Mangiferin is an active phytochemical present in various plants including Mangifera indica L. This substance is reported to have anti-cancer, antioxidant and other properties, but has a low solubility in aqueous medium. In this work mangiferin was encapsulated with four different natural polymers compositions by using spray-drying techniques. The products were characterized by FTIR, SEM and HPLC–ESI-MS. A calibration curve was constructed by HPLC to determine the efficiency of mangiferin incorporation into each encapsulate. The highest encapsulation efficiency was determined to be for pectins using Polysorbate 80 (Tween 80) as emulsifier. The nature of the polysaccharide as well as the surfactant used has a considerable influence on drug retaining ability during the spray-drying process.