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Sources of error in the estimation of aboveground biomass carbon stocks in mangrove ecosystems
Get PDFPhotonic Hook Initiated Using an Air–Liquid Interface
Get PDFIn this paper, we demonstrate a novel photonic hook being initiated using an air–liquid interface (ALI). This bent light focus is produced by immersing a dielectric micro-cylinder partially at the edge of a thin liquid film whose thickness is smaller than the diameter of the micro-cylinder. Unlike the well-known properties of normal near-field focuses, this photonic hook propagates horizontally in the liquid along the ALI at specific depths and does not require the material processing of microscopic particles or the modulation of light irradiation for initiation. A morphological analysis indicates that the contrast in the refractive indexes of the ALI causes this phenomenon at the shadow end of the micro-cylinder with a transverse dimension smaller than the diffraction limit. Compared to previously discovered photonic hooks, the unique setup of this photonic hook can generate a force field that enables optical trapping in the region slightly beneath the ALI, and the related optical pressures have been simulated
The social value and financial benefits of providing preventive and timely counselling to people with sight loss in Wales, UK
Get PDFBackgroundAlmost 2 million people in the UK live with sight loss, and this number is predicted to double by 2050. There is increasing recognition of the need to provide counselling services to people living with sight loss.AimThe aim of this research was to assess whether there is an unmet need for counselling services for people living with sight loss in North Wales and to estimate the social value and budget impact of the potential roll-out of counselling services to this population.MethodBetween December 2020 and May 2021, a telephone survey was completed by 192 people living with sight loss in North Wales, UK. The survey instrument was a 19-item questionnaire, which included the Short Warwick–Edinburgh Mental Well-being Scale (SWEMWBS). Using data from the SWEMWBS and published statistics, a social return on investment (SROI) and budget impact analysis were conducted.ResultsMost respondents (84%, n = 161) had never been offered counselling in relation to sight loss. Thirty-nine per cent (n = 74) stated that they would use a new counselling service if it were available. Fifty-one per cent (n = 97) indicated that counselling could be especially beneficial for people who have recently been registered or diagnosed with sight loss (the timely window). Of those who completed the SWEMWBS, approximately 25% reported low mental well-being or probable depression. Social return on investment analysis estimated that providing counselling services for people with sight loss in North Wales could generate a social value of £3.42 for every £1 invested.ConclusionTimely counselling may improve an individual's ability to cope with sight loss and improve their quality of life over time
Determining the top research priorities in UK prehospital critical care: a modified Delphi study
Get PDFBackground: Prehospital critical care is a rapidly evolving field. There is a paucity of evidence relating to its practice, with limited progress in answering those research questions identified over a decade ago. It is vital that evidence gaps are identified and addressed. This study aimed to define the current research priorities in UK prehospital critical care. Methods: This modified national Delphi study was coordinated by the Pre-HOspital Trainee Operated research Network and conducted in four rounds between October 2021 and April 2022. Rounds 1 and 2 were conducted online with clinicians involved in prehospital critical care delivery and non-clinical prehospital researchers. Rounds 3 and 4 were completed online by a subject matter expert (SME) panel. Results: In round 1, 78 participants submitted 394 research questions relating to prehospital critical care delivery in the UK. These were refined and categorised into 192 questions, which were scored for importance in round 2. Fifty questions were discussed and scored by the SME panel in round 3. Round 4 created a ranked top 20 list. The top research priority was ‘Which cardiac arrest patients should critical care teams be dispatched to; how do we identify these patients during the emergency call?’. Other priorities included dispatch optimisation, out-of-hospital medical cardiac arrest management, optimising resuscitation in haemorrhagic shock, improving traumatic brain injury outcomes and optimising management of traumatic cardiac arrest. Conclusions: This modified Delphi study identified 20 research priorities where efforts should be concentrated to develop collaborative prehospital critical care research within the UK over the next 5 years
The Effects of Welfare Reform and Area Level Deprivation on Mental Health and Well-being in the UK
Get PDFExamining the relationship between paired associate learning and reading ability in adults and children
Get PDFA study on the executive functioning skills of Greek-English bilingual children - a nearest neighbour approach
Get PDFFindings of bilingual participants outperforming their monolingual counterparts in executive functioning tasks have been repeatedly reported in the literature (Bialystok, 2017). However, uncontrolled factors or imperfectly matched samples might affect the reliability of these findings. This study aims to take into account a range of relevant variables in combination with innovative analyses to investigate the performance of one unstudied language group, Greek-English bilingual children in the north of England, compared to monolingual control groups. Our battery of executive function tasks taps into inhibition, updating and shifting. We use k-means nearest neighbour methods to match the groups and factor analysis to determine language proficiency. We find that bilinguals’ accuracy is on a par with their monolingual peers, however, they are faster in inhibition and working memory tasks. Our study provides strong evidence for the presence of a bilingual advantage in these domains, while making important methodological contributions to the field
“Everything Remains the Same”: Julio Camba Travelling Spain
Get PDFIn the first decades of the twentieth century, the Madrid-based Galician journalist Julio Camba (1882–1962) acquired long-lasting fame as a travel writer thanks to his foreign chronicles published in the Spanish press and subsequently compiled in a series of volumes. La rana viajera [The Travelling Frog] (1920), however, gathers some of the pieces he wrote about Spain. This article examines Camba’s domestic travel writing, which not only provides an excellent insight into significant social and political issues at the time (with references to the rise of sub-state nationalisms and political corruption in the country), but also highlights the similarities between the Restoration period and present-day Spain. Using his characteristic humorous style and subverting pre-existing tropes of travel writing, Camba represents Spanish society by combining criticism of Spain’s economic stagnation and national decay with a centralist view of the country. In particular, his scorn towards the Galician, Catalan and Basque languages and his parodic take on Catalonia’s claims for autonomy shed light on the formation of Spanish nationalism in the decades prior to the Civil War. Drawing on studies on state nationalism (Billig 1995) and Spanish nationalism (Taibo 2014, Delgado 2014) this article examines not only Camba’s own views but the response from contemporary scholarship to his texts
Climate change drives rapid warming and increasing heatwaves of lakes
Get PDFClimate change could seriously threaten global lake ecosystems by warming lake surface water and increasing the occurrence of lake heatwaves. Yet, there are great uncertainties in quantifying lake temperature changes globally due to a lack of accurate large-scale model simulations. Here, we integrated satellite observations and a numerical model to improve lake temperature modeling and explore the multifaceted characteristics of trends in surface temperatures and lake heatwave occurrence in Chinese lakes from 1980 to 2100. Our model-data integration approach revealed that the lake surface waters have warmed at a rate of 0.11 °C 10a-1 during the period 1980-2021, being only half of the pure model-based estimate. Moreover, our analysis suggested that an asymmetric seasonal warming rate has led to a reduced temperature seasonality in eastern plain lakes but an amplified one in alpine lakes. The durations of lake heatwaves have also increased at a rate of 7.7 d 10a-1. Under the high-greenhouse-gas-emission scenario, lake surface temperature and lake heatwave duration were projected to increase by 2.2 °C and 197 d at the end of the 21st century, respectively. Such drastic changes would worsen the environmental conditions of lakes subjected to high and increasing anthropogenic pressures, posing great threats to aquatic biodiversity and human health.</p
Atmospheric deposition of microplastics in a rural region of North China Plain
Get PDFMicroplastics (MPs) pollution is becoming one of the most pressing environmental issues globally. MPs in the marine, freshwater and terrestrial environments have been fairly well investigated. However, knowledge of the atmospheric-mediated deposition of MPs within rural environments is limited. Here, we present the results of bulk (dry and wet) atmospheric MPs deposition in a rural region of Quzhou County in the North China Plain (NCP). Samples of MPs in the atmospheric bulk deposition were collected for individual rainfall events over a 12-month period from August 2020 to August 2021. The number and size of MPs from 35 rainfall samples were measured by fluorescence microscopy, while the chemical composition of MPs was identified using micro-Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (μ-FTIR). The results showed that the atmospheric MPs deposition rate in summer (892-75,421 particles/m2/day) was highest compared to 735-9428, 280-4244 and 86-1347 particles/m2/day in spring, autumn, and winter, respectively. Furthermore, the MPs deposition rates in our study were 1-2 orders of magnitude higher than those in other regions, indicating a higher rate of MPs deposition in the rural region of the NCP. MPs with a diameter of 3-50 μm accounted for 75.6 %, 78.4 %, 73.4 % and 66.1 % of total MPs deposition in spring, summer, autumn, and winter, respectively, showing that the majority of MPs in the current study were small in size. Rayon fibers accounted for the largest proportion (32 %) of all MPs, followed by polyethylene terephthalate (12 %) and polyethylene (8 %). This study also found that a significant positive correlation between rainfall volume and MPs deposition rate. In addition, HYSPLIT back-trajectory modelling showed that the farthest source of deposition MPs may have come from Russia.</p