8383 research outputs found
Sort by
Responding to Adverse Childhood Experiences: An evidence review of interventions to prevent and address adversity across the life course.
Get PDFAdverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are stressful events during childhood that can have a
profound impact on an individual’s present and future health (Section 1.3). Growing up in the
face of such adversities is recognised as an important public health concern in Wales and
internationally (Welsh Government, 2017a; World Health Organization [WHO], 2014). Actions to
prevent and mitigate ACEs and their associated harms are essential to improve population
health for present and future generations (Bethell et al., 2017; Pachter et al., 2017).
In Wales, many sectors are working to identify and respond to adversity in order to improve
outcomes for those who have experienced ACEs. Whilst a number of evidence-based
interventions target specific types of adversity (e.g. domestic violence), we know that ACEs are
strongly correlated (e.g. individuals exposed to adversity are often exposed to more than one
type; Hughes et al., 2017). Thus, complex adversity requires a response which extends across
sectors including health, social care, policing, education, community and others, and across the
life course from early childhood through to adulthood.
To support innovation in addressing ACEs we have undertaken a review of evidence on
common approaches to prevent ACEs and/or mitigate their negative impacts. Over 100
interventions were identified and collated across four common approaches: supporting
parenting; building relationships and resilience; early identification of adversity; and,
responding to trauma and specific ACEs (Chapter 3). Whilst the interventions vary in type, the
review identified cross-cutting themes, which could be used to inform a whole system approach
(spanning individual, family and community levels) to tackle ACEs across the life course,
supporting the development of an ACE-informed approach (Chapter 4). The report concludes by
highlighting current gaps in the evidence and suggests key areas for further work to tackle ACEs
for our future generations (Chapter 5).
The report is not an exhaustive systematic evidence review of the interventions for specific ACE
types, nor does it advocate any specific intervention, rather it seeks to present a summary of
the research evidence and information on common approaches across the prevention of ACEs
and mitigation of their impact. We hope the report will be a useful resource for service
planners, practitioners and commissioners to support innovation and development towards an
ACE-free future
What passive euthanasia is
Get PDFFrom Springer Nature via Jisc Publications RouterHistory: received 2020-02-06, accepted 2020-05-04, registration 2020-05-05, pub-electronic 2020-05-14, online 2020-05-14, collection 2020-12Publication status: PublishedAbstract: Background: Euthanasia can be thought of as being either active or passive; but the precise definition of “passive euthanasia” is not always clear. Though all passive euthanasia involves the withholding of life-sustaining treatment, there would appear to be some disagreement about whether all such withholding should be seen as passive euthanasia. Main text: At the core of the disagreement is the question of the importance of an intention to bring about death: must one intend to bring about the death of the patient in order for withholding treatment to count as passive euthanasia, as some sources would indicate, or does withholding in which death is merely foreseen belong to that category? We may expect that this unclarity would be important in medical practice, in law, and in policy. The idea that withholding life-sustaining treatment is passive euthanasia is traced to James Rachels’s arguments, which lend themselves to the claim that passive euthanasia does not require intention to end life. Yet the argument here is that Rachels’s arguments are flawed, and we have good reasons to think that intention is important in understanding the moral nature of actions. As such, we should reject any understanding of passive euthanasia that does not pay attention to intent. Short conclusion: James Rachels’s work on active and passive euthanasia has been immensely influential; but this is an influence that we ought to resist
The Anniversary Politics of 17 June 1953 since 1990
Get PDFThis is the peer reviewed version of the following article: Millington, R. (2020). The Anniversary Politics of 17 June 1953 since 1990. German Life and Letters, 73(3), 401-419, which has been published in final form at https://doi.org/10.1111/glal.12274. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Use of Self-Archived Versions.This article analyses the politics of anniversaries through examination of the role that the anniversary of the East German uprising of 17 June 1953 has played in German politics since 1990. Prior to reunification, West Germany commemorated the date as the ‘Tag der deutschen Einheit’. This annual public holiday was a chance for politicians to express their views on the possibility of German unification and to lambast the East German regime. After 3 October became the ‘Tag der Deutschen Einheit’ in 1990, German politicians all but ignored the anniversary of 17 June until political commemoration of the date enjoyed a revival in 2003.
This article shows that the ‘genre memory’ (Olick) of a commemoration ensures that continuities in political commemoration of an anniversary persist, even after long periods in which an historical event is not commemorated. Significantly, the analysis demonstrates further that consideration of the drivers of political mnemonic activity in the twenty-first century must now take into account the technology-led ubiquity of the media in motivating politicians to act. Moreover, the article concludes that politicians’ internationalisation of anniversaries has enabled them to find new political capital in dates that may appear to be politically redundant
Self-supervised monocular image depth learning and confidence estimation
Get PDFWe present a novel self-supervised framework for monocular image depth learning and confidence estimation. Our framework reduces the amount of ground truth annotation data required for training Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs), which is often a challenging problem for the fast deployment of CNNs in many computer vision tasks. Our DepthNet adopts a novel fully differential patch-based cost function through the Zero-Mean Normalized Cross Correlation (ZNCC) to take multi-scale patches as matching and learning strategies. This approach greatly increases the accuracy and robustness of the depth learning. Whilst the proposed patch-based cost function naturally provides a 0-to-1 confidence, it is then used to self-supervise the training of a parallel network for confidence map learning and estimation by exploiting the fact that ZNCC is a normalized measure of similarity which can be approximated as the confidence of the depth estimation. Therefore, the proposed corresponding confidence map learning and estimation operate in a self-supervised manner and is a parallel network to the DepthNet. Evaluation on the KITTI depth prediction evaluation dataset and Make3D dataset show that our method outperforms the state-of-the-art results
Terahertz Probing Irreversible Phase Transitions Related to Polar Clusters in Bi0.5Na0.5TiO3-based Ferroelectric
Get PDFElectric-field-induced phase transitions in Bi0.5Na0.5TiO3 (BNT)-based relaxor ferroelectrics are essential to the controlling of their electrical properties and consequently in revolutionizing their dielectric and piezoelectric applications. However, the fundamental understanding of these transitions is a long-standing challenge due to their complex crystal structures. Given the structural inhomogeneity at the nanoscale or sub-nanoscale in these materials, dielectric response characterization based on terahertz (THz) electromagnetic-probe beam-fields, is intrinsically coordinated to lattice dynamics during DC-biased poling cycles. The complex permittivity reveals the field-induced phase transitions to be irreversible. This profoundly counters the claim of reversibility, the conventional support for which, is based upon the peak that is manifest in each of four quadrants of the current-field curves. The mechanism of this irreversibility is solely attributed to polar clusters in the transformed lattices. These represent an extrinsic factor which is quiescent in the THz spectral domain
Effect of surface micro-pits on mode-II fracture toughness of Ti-6Al-4V/PEEK interface
No full textHerein, the delamination issue of TiGr(TC4/PEEK/Cf) laminate is addressed by investigating the influence of TC4(Ti-6Al-4V) surface micro-pits on mode-II interfacial fracture toughness of TC4/PEEK interface through experimental and finite element modeling. The micro-pits unit cell, unit strip and the end notched flexure (ENF) models are established based on the finite element simulations and the effect of micro-pit size parameters is studied in detail. The results of micro-pits unit cell model reveal that the presence of micro-pits can effectively buffer the interfacial stress concentration under mode-II loading conditions. Furthermore, the micro-pits unit strip model, with different micro-pit sizes, is analyzed to obtain the interface parameters, which are converted and used in the ENF model. Both the unit strip and ENF models conclude that the presence of interfacial micro-pits effectively improves the mode-II fracture toughness. It is worth mentioning that the utilization of converted interface parameters in ENF model avoided the limitation of micro-pit size and reduced the workload. Finally, the experimental and computational ENF results exhibited excellent consistency and confirmed the reliability of the proposed finite element models. The current study provides useful guidelines for the design and manufacturing of high-performance TC4/PEEK interfaces for a wide range of applications
Glutamine supplementation reduces markers of intestinal permeability during running in the heat in a dose-dependent manner
Get PDFPurpose To examine the dose–response effects of acute glutamine supplementation on markers of gastrointestinal
(GI) permeability, damage and, secondary, subjective symptoms of GI discomfort in response to running in the heat.
Methods Ten recreationally active males completed a total of four exercise trials; a placebo trial and three glutamine
trials at 0.25, 0.5 and 0.9 g kg−1 of fat-free mass (FFM) consumed 2 h before exercise. Each exercise trial consisted
of a 60-min treadmill run at 70% of ̇VO2max in an environmental chamber set at 30 °C. GI permeability was measured
using ratio of lactulose to rhamnose (L:R) in serum. Plasma glutamine and intestinal fatty acid binding protein
(I-FABP) concentrations were determined pre and post exercise. Subjective GI symptoms were assessed 45 min and 24 h
post-exercise. Results Relative to placebo, L:R was likely lower following 0.25 g kg−1 (mean difference: − 0.023; ± 0.021) and
0.5 g kg−1 (− 0.019; ± 0.019) and very likely following 0.9 g kg− 1 (− 0.034; ± 0.024). GI symptoms were typically low
and there was no effect of supplementation. Discussion Acute oral glutamine consumption attenuates
GI permeability relative to placebo even at lower doses of 0.25 g kg−1, although larger doses may be more effective. It remains unclear if this will lead to reductions in GI symptoms. Athletes competing in the heat may, therefore, benefit
from acute glutamine supplementation prior to exercise in order to maintain gastrointestinal integrity
Brexit: The Golden Chalice of European Demos Formation?
No full textIn all its chaos, divisiveness and uncertainty, Brexit has not only raised considerable constitutional questions for the United Kingdom (UK) but has also led to the European Union (EU) reflecting on its self, its direction and how it comprehends and defines its existence both internally and on the global platform. One branch of speculative discussion on what a post-Brexit EU will look like is consideration of the role that the English language will play in the EU’s institutions once the EU loses the Member State that houses the demos for whom that language is associated. Whilst much of this discussion has necessarily focused on whether a different language could become the unofficial lingua franca of the EU institutions in terms of the practicalities of its day-to-day workings, the future role and use of the English language as a democratic legitimacy tool has barely been remarked upon
Computer Modelling for Nutritionists
No full textThis book is about computational modelling of nutrient focused biological systems. The book is aimed at students, researchers, and those with an interest in learning how to build a computational model. The book is the product of many years of teaching computational modelling to undergraduates, postgraduates, and researchers with limited, or no background in computational modelling. What I learned from these experiences is those new to modelling are invariably apprehensive about it, and approach it with a degree of trepidation, or even scepticism. However, from tentative initial steps, they quickly realize that modelling is not as challenging, or as academically intimidating as they initially perceive it; and after gaining familiarity with the essential components of model building they rapidly become cognisant, that it offers an alternative lens to view a biological system, and learn new insights about its underlying dynamic behaviour.
In this book I provide a practical introduction to modelling, for those who are interested in exploring the dynamics of nutrient based systems. My rationale for undertaking this project is based on my experience of interacting with nutritionists in recent years. As a result of many fruitful discussions I identified a growing need for a book of this nature, which is specifically tailored to nutritionists. My aims are to provide the reader with a solid grounding in computational modelling, and how it dovetails within the burgeoning field of systems biology. For the reader this will involve learning how a model is assembled, what software tools are available for model building, what the different paradigms are for simulating a model, and how to analyse and interpret the output from in silico simulations. The only expectation I make of you, as a reader, is that you are enthusiastic about learning how to use new software tools. In exchange for your engagement I will provide you with ample practical exercises, which will help to consolidate your learning, and will make your computational modelling journey a rewarding and enjoyable experience
Maximal punching performance in amateur boxing: An examination of biomechanical and physical performance-related characteristics
Get PDFPunches in boxing are intricate actions requiring the coordinated and synergistic
recruitment of leg, trunk and arm musculature. Maximal punches can have a marked
impact on the outcomes of boxing contests. Currently, there is an absence of research
appraising the biomechanics and physical performance-related qualities associated
with boxing punches, and as such, there are no practical guidelines pertaining to
resistance training and its impact upon these important characteristics. In this respect,
coaches and boxers are reliant consequently upon non-scientific approaches to
training and contest preparation. Thus, the purpose of this thesis was to quantify the
biomechanics and physical performance-related qualities associated with maximal
punching techniques common to amateur boxing, and investigate the extent to which
resistance training enhances such features.
Study 1 quantified the three-dimensional kinetics and kinematics of maximal
punches common to boxing competition to identify the differences between punch
types (straights, hooks, and uppercuts), whilst Study 2 investigated the movement
variability of these measures across punch types. These studies revealed significant
differences for the majority of kinetic and kinematic variables between punch types.
High within-subject, between-subject, and biological variability were recorded for the
same variables across punch types, independent of the amount of boxing experience.
These findings confirm that kinetic and kinematic characteristics vary from punch to
punch, with boxers appearing to manipulate kinematic variables in order to achieve a
consistent intensity and end-product. Study 3 quantified the relationships between
physical performance-related traits and kinetic and kinematic qualities of maximal
punches, and revealed moderate-to-large associations with muscular strength and
power. From this, Study 4 appraised the extent to which strength and contrast
resistance training enhanced maximal punch biomechanics and physical
performance-related qualities. The findings highlighted that contrast training was
superior among male amateur boxers over a six-week intervention, though strength
training alone also brought about improvements.
This current research has advanced our understanding of maximal punching
and the influence of resistance training on a variety of its determinants. Nonetheless,
future research is required to identify if the same findings can be generalised to higher
standards of boxing and whether alternative strength and conditioning strategies are
equally, or more effective
Data sources:
Access Repository Dashboard
Do you manage ChesterRep? Access insider analytics, issue reports and manage access to outputs from your repository in the CORE Repository Dashboard!