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Providence, Editorial, and News in Early Modern Ballads
Get PDFThis article overturns the assumption that early modern ballads include too much godly, moralizing content to be considered part of news culture. It uses a wide range of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century English ballads in print and manuscript to demonstrate that one of the news ballad’s most significant features was the inclusion of providence – the ongoing supernatural workings of God in the material world. Placing these songs in the context of other cheap print genres and drawing on research into the role of religion in everyday life, the article shows that rather than undermining the ballad’s role in news culture, providence defined it. Moreover, the early modern distinction between God’s overall plan and specific examples of his intervention in earthly affairs helps to subdivide the genre into those where providence forms an editorial line and those where providence itself provides the story. This second type has traditionally been seen as godly rather than ‘newsy’. Understanding providence shows that those ballads which have been dismissed as more moralistic than topical in fact shared the most important news people could hear
Modelling brain metabolism with interacting nonautonomous phase oscillators
No full textTraditional brain models have focused primarily on electrical signalling, offering valuable insights but often overlooking the crucial role of metabolism within the neurovascular unit. Existing metabolic models tend to be highly detailed and mass-based, relying on strict conservation laws that limit their applicability to the brain’s thermodynamically open environment. In this study, we present a novel, phenomenological model of neuronal energy metabolism using a network of coupled Kuramoto oscillators. This nonautonomous phase dynamics framework captures complex, time-dependent interactions and allows for multiple synchronization states among metabolic processes. Our model captures key features consistent with healthy neurovascular dynamics, despite not being directly fitted to empirical data from resting-state brains and reveals how disruptions in metabolic synchrony may contribute to dementia-related pathology. By emphasizing the importance of metabolic coordination in the neurovascular unit, this work provides a versatile methodological foundation for future brain modelling efforts
How Can We Make Precision Medicine (PM) Contestable? Provotyping for PM Service Ecosystems
No full textDensity dependence and territorial competitors can modulate parrotfish social foraging and herbivory on coral reefs
Get PDFSocial context can modify the behaviour of animals, influencing how they interact with their environment—potentially cascading to effects on ecosystem functions. However, typical proxies for functions, such as biomass or densities, may not completely capture this behavioural variation. We examined how grouping behaviour of an abundant parrotfish species, Chlorurus sordidus, influences the critical function of herbivory on coral reefs in the Lakshadweep Archipelago and evaluated the role of density dependence and territorial aggression from competitors in driving group formation in the entire herbivorous fish assemblage. Feeding rates increased with group size and decreased with aggressive encounters, with parrotfish in larger groups consuming about 110% more algae per capita than solitary individuals. Group foragers also benefitted marginally from reduced territorial aggression from competing herbivores. The propensities of herbivores to form groups, and their group sizes were positively density dependent, and to a lesser extent, were driven by access to resources defended by territorial competitors. Our study highlights the importance of incorporating behavioural variation in assessments and predictive frameworks of ecosystem functioning. As our results indicate, for social animals, key ecosystem functions are particularly sensitive to animal densities and interspecific interactions, especially when individual function varies with social context
Integrated multi-omics mapping of the causal landscape of gout across the circulating-tissue axis
No full textBackground Gout is a prevalent inflammatory arthropathy driven by monosodium urate crystal deposition, yet the causal relationships between circulating biomarkers and disease susceptibility remain incompletely characterized. Establishing robust causal associations and mapping them to specific effector genes and tissues is essential for identifying mechanistically informed therapeutic targets. Methods We conducted a comprehensive multi-omics Mendelian randomization study integrating a meta-analysis of three large-scale gout genome-wide association studies (N = 1,538,494) with genome-wide data for 233 metabolites, 179 lipid species, and 926 plasma proteins. Findings were replicated in an independent cohort (N = 327,457). Summary-data-based Mendelian randomization and Bayesian colocalization (HyPrColoc) were applied to map causal biomarkers to tissue-specific effector genes using expression quantitative trait loci data from kidney, liver, and whole blood. Candidate genes were experimentally validated in monosodium urate-stimulated THP-1 macrophages. Results We identified 32 metabolites, one lipid species (TAG 54:3), and two protective plasma proteins (ISLR2, ITIH3) with replicated causal associations with gout. Triglyceride-rich very-low-density lipoprotein particles and circulating isoleucine emerged as prominent risk factors. Multi-tissue transcriptomic mapping prioritized PRELID1 (kidney), NIPAL1 (liver), LMAN2 (whole blood), and CAD as high-confidence effector genes with strong colocalization evidence (posterior probability >0.70). Functional validation confirmed concordant transcriptional and translational dysregulation of these genes following inflammatory stimulation. Conclusion This integrative analysis establishes a causal framework linking specific lipoprotein subfractions, amino acid metabolism, and novel effector genes to gout pathogenesis, elucidating the systemic metabolic architecture of the disease and identifying potential therapeutic candidates warranting further preclinical investigation before clinical translation
Performance Analysis of Fluid Antenna System under Spatially-Correlated Rician Fading Channels
No full textFluid antenna systems (FAS) are among the most promising technologies for the sixth generation (6G) mobile communication networks. Unlike traditional fixed-position multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems, a FAS possesses position reconfigurability to switch on-demand among N predefined ports over a prescribed space. This paper explores the performance of a single-input single-output (SISO) model with a fixed-position antenna transmitter and a single-antenna FAS receiver, referred to as the Rx-SISO-FAS model, under spatially-correlated Rician fading channels. Our contributions include exact expressions and closed-form bounds for the outage probability of the Rx-SISO-FAS model, as well as exact and closed-form lower bounds for the ergodic rate. Importantly, we also analyze the performance considering both uniform linear array (ULA) and uniform planar array (UPA) configurations for the ports of the FAS. To gain insights, we evaluate the diversity order of the proposed model and our analytical results indicate that with a fixed overall system size, increasing the number of ports, N, significantly decreases the outage performance of FAS under different Rician fading factors. Our numerical results further demonstrate that: i) the Rx-SISO-FAS model can enhance performance under spatially-correlated Rician fading channels over the fixed-position antenna counterpart; ii) the Rician factor negatively impacts performance in the low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) regime; iii) FAS can outperform an L branches maximum ratio combining (MRC) system under Rician fading channels; and iv) when the number of ports is identical, UPA outperforms ULA
Care coordinator delivered method of levels therapy to improve engagement and other outcomes in early psychosis (CAMEO) : A feasibility cluster-randomised controlled trial
No full textThe Method of Levels (MOL) is a theoretically-informed, transdiagnostic cognitive therapy that could improve service user engagement and recovery for individuals with early psychosis. We aimed to assess the feasibility and acceptability of training care coordinators in early intervention in psychosis teams to deliver MOL, and to assess the feasibility of conducting a two-arm parallel-group cluster-randomised controlled trial (C-RCT) with randomisation at the level of teams. Randomisation was in a ratio of 1:2 to either (1: control) treatment as usual (TAU); or (2: intervention) TAU plus support from a care coordinator who has received training in MOL. Clinical and health economic outcomes were collected at baseline, three, and six months. Fourteen early intervention in psychosis teams (117% of target), 31 care coordinators (129% of target), and 49 service users (51% of target) were recruited. Results suggest that some aspects of this study are feasible in their current form (e.g., care coordinator recruitment), other aspects are likely to be feasible with relatively minor adjustments (e.g., service user retention), and some aspects would need substantial changes to make the delivery of an evaluation C-RCT feasible (e.g., service user recruitment; MOL supervision for care coordinators). Progression to an evaluation trial would be justified if plausible solutions can be found to address the feasibility issues identified in this study
Prevalence of white matter hyperintensities and radiological cerebral small vessel disease : an insight from routinely collected data
No full textApproximately 900,000 MRI brain scans are performed annually in the United Kingdom alone, with incidental findings frequently encountered. One of the most prevalent findings is white matter hyperintensities (WMHs). WMHs often indicate cerebral small vessel disease (cSVD) but can also be associated with migraine and demyelination. Prospective population studies have already confirmed a high prevalence of WMHs in elderly patients. In younger patients, or when the radiological burden is low, WMHs are commonly considered non-specific. Routinely collected data represents a valuable resource to facilitate further study. We aimed to describe the prevalence of WMHs in a direct to scan referral population and to understand associations with age, demographics, performance status and referral criteria. We performed a service evaluation of our local two-week wait suspected central nervous system cancer pathway to understand the association between age, demographics, performance status, referral criteria, imaging outcomes and both the prevalence and radiological characteristics of WMHs. Analysis was performed using R version 4.1.3. We identified 1033 patients, referred over a 30-month period. Mean patient age was 51.3±18.3 years with 65% females. As expected, WMHs were present on 89.7% of scans in patients aged over 80, with 98.1% of these consistent with cSVD upon review by an experienced neuroradiologist. We show an important association between WMHs deemed representative of cSVD and both performance status and levels of deprivation. However, WMHs were also present in approximately 1 in 5 patients under 50 years old and were typically deemed non-specific. Our analysis showed prevalence of WMH, its radiological burden and likelihood of WMHs being attributed to cSVD all increased with age. It is therefore feasible to consider that these changes may represent early cSVD. We demonstrate a prevalence of radiological cSVD comparable to the wider literature in elderly patients whilst highlighting the potential underestimation of cSVD in the younger population, in whom further study of WMHs is required. There is potential for routinely collected data to define the prevalence and characteristics of radiological cSVD more accurately whilst facilitating further research
