Food insecurity in university students receiving financial aid.

PURPOSE: To evaluate the adequacy of loans funding and the risk for food insecurity in students living away from home and receiving loans at the University of Alberta. METHODS: A nutritious seven-day menu was developed. The menu was priced for skilled and unskilled shoppers at a grocery store near to campus and a discount-style grocery store further away. RESULTS: The menu was more costly for males, unskilled shoppers and those students who shopped near to campus. The menu cost was as high as $296/month and often exceeded the $196 allocated by the Canada Student Loans Program for food each month. CONCLUSIONS: Based on the findings from this study, students reliant on financial assistance likely have insufficient money for a nutritionally adequate diet and are at risk for food insecurity. Shopping skills and budgeting, while important, would be insufficient to alleviate food insecurity for many students who require financial aid. Increased funding for food in student loans is necessary.     

Identification of e.m. spectrum by known pole sets

A procedure for obtaining the e.m. poles of an object from its frequency-domain transfer function is applied to the scattered fields of three shiplike wire models. The possibility for identifying a particular ship model in the set of three from its pole set is examined.     

Heterologous expression of the Rhodobacter capsulatus BchI, -D, and -H genes that encode magnesium chelatase subunits and characterization of the reconstituted enzyme

Magnesium chelatase inserts Mg2+ into protoporphyrin IX in the chlorophyll and bacteriochlorophyll biosynthetic pathways. In photosynthetic bacteria, the products of three genes, bchI, bchD, and bchH, are required for magnesium chelatase activity. These genes from Rhodobacter capsulatus were cloned separately into expression plasmids pET3a and pET15b. The pET15b constructs produced NH2-terminally His6-tagged proteins. All proteins were highly expressed and were purified to near homogeneity. The BchI and BchH proteins were soluble. BchD proteins were insoluble, inactive inclusion bodies that were renatured by rapid dilution from 6 M urea. The presence of BchI in the solution into which the urea solution of BchD was diluted increased the yield of active BchD. A molar ratio of 1 BchI:1 BchD was sufficient for maximum renaturation of BchD. All of the proteins were active in the magnesium chelatase assay except His-tagged BchI, which was inactive and inhibited in incubations containing non-His-tagged BchI. Expressed BchH proteins contained tightly bound protoporphyrin IX, and they were susceptible to inactivation by light. Maximum magnesium chelatase activity per mol of BchD occurred at a stoichiometry of 4 BchI:1 BchD. The optimum reaction pH was 8.0. The reaction exhibited Michaelis-Menten kinetics with respect to protoporphyrin IX and BchH.     

A FRAMEWORK FOR CLIMATE RISK MANAGEMENT APPLIED TO A UK WATER RESOURCE PROBLEM

Climate risk management is a new and evolving area and many decisions are likely to be affected by climate risks over the long-term. This paper presents a decision-making framework designed for managing climate alongside nonclimate risk factors. The framework describes a process that should help identify and manage these risks. It can be used to help decision-makers answer questions about whether adaptation is required, and, if so, which measures should be implemented. Adaptive management is recommended as a useful approach for dealing with climate and other uncertainties. This paper describes an application of the framework to a water resources case study. Feedback from training workshops based on four different case studies suggests the framework provides at minimum a useful (post-hoc) decision analysis tool. Potential users, who include planners, consultants and policy-makers have been largely positive about the prospective utility of the framework.     

Nutritional quality and price of university food bank hampers.

PURPOSE: Food insecurity appears to be a growing problem for post-secondary students, but little study has been made of the 51 campus-based food banks that exist. In 2003-04, the University of Alberta Campus Food Bank (CFB) distributed hampers intended to supply four days of food to 630 unique clients, of whom 207 (32.8%) were children. The nutritional adequacy of food hampers and cost saving to students were evaluated in the current study. METHODS: Hampers prepared for one adult, and for one adult with one child, were nutritionally evaluated and scored for number of servings according to Canada's Food Guide to Healthy Eating. Two types of hampers were evaluated: those containing only non-perishable items, and those containing non-perishable and perishable items. Hamper contents were priced to establish the cost saving to students. RESULTS: The study revealed that a student with one child would receive up to 58.02 Canadian dollars worth of food in a hamper that contained perishable items. All hampers met the recommended minimum servings for each food group, but were very low in fat and protein from animal sources. CONCLUSIONS: Because students can obtain hampers only twice each month, the CFB is not the solution to food insecurity on campus. Awareness of the issue of post-secondary student food insecurity needs to be raised.     

Alternative methods for determining the electrical conductivity of core samples

Electrode configurations are described that can be used in measuring the electrical conductivity of a core sample and that do not require access to the core end faces. The use of these configurations eliminates the need for machining the core ends for placement of end electrodes. This is because the conductivity in the cases described is relatively insensitive to the length of the sample. We validated the measurement technique by comparing mathematical models with actual measurements that were made perpendicular and paralled to the core axis of granite samples.     

An ethnographic exploration of perceptions of changes in dietary variety in the Kolli Hills,India

The Malayalis Tribe, a Scheduled Tribe of the Kolli Hills in southern India, has experienced a decrease in the variety of foods consumed in the past 20 years. It is important to understand these changes in dietary patterns to inform future interventions to improve dietary diversity. This study aimed to investigate the perceived factors and experiences from participants belonging to different age groups and genders that have affected changes in dietary variety in the Kolli Hills over the past 20 years. An ethnographic approach was used for the study. Data collection methods included semi-structured focus group discussions, informal individual interviews, and participant observations. Inductive thematic analysis was used to analyze themes related to the research questions. Results suggest that dietary diversity has declined and a smaller number of foods are consumed from grain products, fruits, vegetables and meat products. The main reasons for the decrease in dietary variety include an increased reliance on market systems (linked with an increase in cassava cash cropping) to obtain food and a lack of financial resources to purchase a variety of foods for consumption. Intergenerational changes in taste preferences influenced the types of foods consumed in the household. Drudgery associated with preparing traditional millets for consumption made it a less favorable choice in comparison to subsidized rice purchased through Fair Price Shops. The findings from this study are important to understand the changes in dietary patterns from the perspective of community members and will help inform future interventions to improve dietary diversity in the Kolli Hills.     

Individual differences in distraction by pictures in a reading situation.

Determined whether the relative difficulty of the words being read influences the extent to which good, normal, and poor readers' decoding is susceptible to influence by adjunct pictures. 48 3rd graders were required to read easy, moderate, and difficult 1-syllable nouns under each of 3 conditions: a control condition with no pictures, an identifying-picture condition, and an unrelated-picture condition. The reading performance of poor readers as a group was influenced by pictures under all conditions, while that of normal and good readers was much less affected by them. There were, however, marked individual differences among the poor readers in the degree of their susceptibility to distraction. (10 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Bias: A Network Analysis Computer Program Useful to the Reliability Engineer

This paper briefly describes the Bias program1 and its application in reliability analysis. Except in the simplest of networks, the calculation of parameters for reliability analyses is not easily achieved. Because of the easy temperature variation and other features of the network analysis program Bias, it is extremely well suited to at least three commonly used reliability analysis procedures: failure mode and criticality, drift failure, reliability prediction (catastrophic failures).