Concern about weight gain associated with quitting smoking: Prevalence and association with outcome in a sample of young female smokers.

This study investigated the relationship between weight gain concern and outcomes of a large-scale smoking cessation study among 506 young female smokers attending Planned Parenthood clinics. Results of this prospective study did not support the clinical importance of weight gain concerns. Using an index of weight concern that was predictive in previous research, baseline weight concern was unrelated to smoking cessation efforts, whether participants made a quit attempt, reduced the number of cigarettes they smoked, or reported a change in self-efficacy for stopping smoking. Both the overall level of concern expressed in this sample of predominantly White young women and the lack of relationship between weight gain concern and smoking cessation outcomes suggest that weight gain concern may not be a critical factor for cessation programs targeting similar female smokers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perfectionism and depression: Longitudinal assessment of a specific vulnerability hypothesis.

The authors tested whether perfectionism dimensions interact with specific stress to predict depression over time. A sample of 103 current and former patients completed measures of perfectionism and depression at Time 1 and measures of stress and depression 4 months later. After controlling for Time 1 depression, self-oriented perfectionism interacted only with achievement stress to predict Time 2 depression. Socially prescribed perfectionism did not interact with achievement or social stress to predict Time 2 depression, but it did predict Time 2 depression as a main effect. The results provide support for the contention that perfectionism dimensions are involved in vulnerability to depression over time. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A scenario analysis of investment options for the Cuban power sector using the MARKAL model

The Cuban power sector faces a need for extensive investment in new generating capacity, under a large number of uncertainties regarding future conditions, including: rate of demand growth, fluctuations in fuel prices, access to imported fuel, and access to investment capital for construction of new power plants and development of fuel import infrastructure. To identify cost effective investment strategies under these uncertainties, a supply and power sector MARKAL model was assembled, following an extensive review of available data on the Cuban power system and resource potentials. Two scenarios were assessed, a business-as-usual (BAU) scenario assuming continued moderate electricity load growth and domestic fuel production growth, and a high growth (HI) scenario assuming rapid electricity demand growth, rapid increase in domestic fuel production, and a transition to market pricing of electricity. Within these two scenarios sets, sensitivity analyses were conducted on a number of variables. The implications of least-cost investment strategies for new capacity builds, investment spending requirements, electricity prices, fuel expenditures, and carbon dioxide emissions for each scenario were assessed. Natural gas was found to be the cost effective fuel for new generation across both scenarios and most sensitivity cases, suggesting that access to natural gas, through increased domestic production and LNG import, is a clear priority for further analysis in the Cuban context.     

Hydrogel‐mediated formation of living cartilage template for endochondral initiation

The use of hydrogel in cartilage tissue engineering is especially popular due to its high hydrophilic property which is similar to native cartilage matrix. Alginate hydrogel was used as a transient scaffold material to facilitate chondrocyte proliferation into a three‐dimensional scaffold‐free living hyaline cartilaginous graft (LhCG). As LhCG is purely cell‐based and has a marked resemblance to native hyaline cartilage, it served as an excellent in vitro platform for studying the endochondral ossification pathway. Due to the complexity of events involved throughout endochondral ossification, this study only focuses on early stages of the process where it involves chondrocyte hypertrophy and blood vessel invasion. Human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs) were selected as the target cells for possible endothelialization in the LhCG template. They were seeded onto the LhCG construct and subjected to vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) treatment. Results suggested that VEGF is indeed a potent driving force for initiation of the endochondral pathway. It alone is sufficient to induce hypertrophy in chondrocytes and the corresponding expression of osteogenic genes with or without the presence of HUVECs in the LhCG template. On the other hand, the effect of HUVECs in the LhCG system was less evident. It is hypothesized that this is attributed to the preservation of anti‐angiogenic properties in primary chondrocytes from the LhCG construct, inhibiting HUVECs from endothelialization in the LhCG+HUVEC construct. Based on the outcome from this study, it is recommended that hypertrophy in chondrocytes should be induced prior to endothelial cell introduction so that the microenvironment will be altered to favor angiogenesis within the cartilaginous template. © 2013 Society of Chemical Industry     

Imprisonment: A Major Gateway to Homelessness

This paper presents and discusses the results of a survey of inmates in a representative sample of prisons in Norway. The main conclusion of the study is that imprisonment creates homelessness. While this study and those of others find that approximately one-third of inmates are homeless or live in a precarious housing situation prior to imprisonment, the survey also found that two-thirds were homeless on release. Although the literature on and studies of homelessness and imprisonment are sparse, studies from other countries support this close link between imprisonment and homelessness. There are several reasons why imprisonment should be one of the primary routes into homelessness and the cause of people remaining in precarious housing. The paper also discusses connections between imprisonment, homelessness and social exclusion.     

Correlating indoor and outdoor temperature and humidity in a sample of buildings in tropical climates

The incidence of several respiratory viral infections has been shown to be related to climate. Because humans spend most of their time indoors, measures of indoor climate, rather than outdoor climate, may be better predictors of disease incidence and transmission. Therefore, understanding the relationship between indoor and outdoor climate will help illuminate their influence on the seasonality of diseases caused by respiratory viruses. Indoor-outdoor relationships between temperature and humidity have been documented in temperate regions, but little information is available for tropical regions, where seasonal patterns of respiratory viral diseases differ. We have examined indoor-outdoor correlations of temperature, relative humidity (RH), and absolute humidity (AH) over a 1-year period in each of seven tropical cities. Across all cities, the average monthly indoor temperature was 25 ± 3°C (mean ± standard deviation) with a range of 20–30°C. The average monthly indoor RH was 66 ± 9% with a range of 50–78%, and the average monthly indoor AH was 15 ± 3 g/m³ with a range of 10–23 g/m³. Indoor AH and RH were linearly correlated with outdoor AH when the air conditioning (AC) was off, suggesting that outdoor AH may be a good proxy of indoor humidity in the absence of AC. All indoor measurements were more strongly correlated with outdoor measurements as distance from the equator increased. Such correlations were weaker during the wet season, especially when AC was in operation. These correlations will provide insight for assessing the seasonality of respiratory viral infections using outdoor climate data, which is more widely available than indoor data, even though transmission of these diseases mainly occurs indoors.     

Synthetically programmable nanoparticle superlattices using a hollow three-dimensional spacer approach

Crystalline nanoparticle arrays and superlattices with well-defined geometries can be synthesized by using appropriate electrostatic, hydrogen-bonding or biological recognition interactions. Although superlattices with many distinct geometries can be produced using these approaches, the library of achievable lattices could be increased by developing a strategy that allows some of the nanoparticles within a binary lattice to be replaced with 'spacer' entities that are constructed to mimic the behaviour of the nanoparticles they replace, even though they do not contain an inorganic core. The inclusion of these spacer entities within a known binary superlattice would effectively delete one set of nanoparticles without affecting the positions of the other set. Here, we show how hollow DNA nanostructures can be used as 'three-dimensional spacers' within nanoparticle superlattices assembled through programmable DNA interactions. We show that this strategy can be used to form superlattices with five distinct symmetries, including one that has never before been observed in any crystalline material.