1,720,956 research outputs found
Dioxin exposure and cancer risk : a 15-year mortality study after the "Seveso accident"
No full textDioxin (2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-para-dioxin, or TCDD) is a powerful carcinogen in experimental animals, whereas the evidence in humans is limited. We examined cancer mortality from 1976 to 1991 among residents of Seveso, Italy, which was highly contaminated after an industrial accident. The area was divided into zones with decreasing exposure to dioxin (A = highest, B = lower, R = lowest). The population of a surrounding noncontaminated area was used as a reference group. Zone A was small (11,516 person-years); in that zone, we saw a moderate increase in mortality from digestive cancer among women [relative risk (RR) = 1.5; 95% confidence interval (CI) = 0.5-3.5]. In zone B, we also saw excesses at digestive sites (83,610 person-years), 10 years after the accident. Women had an increased mortality from stomach cancer (RR = 2.4; 95% CI = 0.8-5.7), and men had increased mortality from rectal cancer (RR = 6.2; 95% CI = 1.7-15.9). Hematologic neoplasms were increased. The highest risks were seen in zone B for leukemia in men (RR = 3.1; 95% CI = 1.3-6.4), multiple myeloma in women (RR = 6.6; 95% CI = 1.8-16.8), and Hodgkin's disease in both genders (RR = 3.3; 95% CI = 0.4-11.9 in men; and RR = 6.5; 95% CI = 0.7-23.5 in women). Soft tissue sarcoma was elevated only among zone R males (256,408 person-years; RR = 2.1; 95% CI = 0.6-5.4). We found no increase for all-cancer mortality or major specific sites (for example, respiratory among males, breast among females). The specific excesses that we observed were not explained by bias or confounding, and their association with dioxin exposure is plausible. The follow-up is continuing
Dioxin exposure and non-malignant health effects : a mortality study
No full textObjective-To investigate, in a population heavily exposed to 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD), the possible unusual occurrence of diseases other than cancer.
Methods-Five year extension of the follow up of the cohort involved in the Seveso accident. Soil measurements identified three exposure zones: (A) highest contamination, (B) substantial, and (R) low but higher than background contamination. Blood TCDD measurements, although limited in number, confirmed zone exposure ranking. The 15 year mortality in the exposed cohort was compared with that of a large population in the surrounding non-contaminated territory. Relative risks (RRs) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CIs) were estimated with Poisson regression techniques.
Results-The already noted increased occurrence of cardiovascular deaths was confirmed, in particular in zone A, among males for chronic ischaemic heart disease (five deaths, RR 3.0, 95% CI 1.2 to 7.3), and among females for hypertensive disease (three deaths, RR 3.6, 95% CI 1.2 to 11.4) and chronic rheumatic heart disease. Novel findings were the increase of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, most notably among males in zone A (four deaths, RR 3.7, 95% CI 1.4 to 9.9) and females in zone B (seven deaths, RR 2.4, 95% CI 1.1 to 5.1); and from diabetes, which was significantly increased in females in zone B (13 deaths, RR 1.9, 95% CI 1.1 to 3.2). In zone R, chronic ischaemic heart disease (males and females), hypertension (females), and diabetes (females) showed less pronounced, although significant excesses.
Conclusions-As well as high TCDD exposure, the accident caused a severe burden of strain in the population. Both these factors might have contributed to the noted increased risks (in particular, circulatory and respiratory). The cardiovascular and immune toxicity of TCDD, as well as its complex interaction with the endocrine system, might be relevant to the explanations of these findings. These results, although not conclusive, concur with previous data in suggesting cardiopulmonary and endocrine effects in humans highly exposed to TCDD
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
koamabayili/VECTRON-author-checklist: VECTRON author checklist
No full textWe have done our best to complete the author checklist relating to the use of animals in the hut study. Note that the objective for the hut study was to evaluate the IRS treatment applications for residual efficacy against Anopheles mosquitoes, including the local An. coluzzii mosquito population. Cows were only used to attract mosquitoes into the huts and no tests were carried out directly on the cows. The author checklist is intended for use with studies where experiments are carried out on animals, which is why we have had such difficulty in completing this for the hut study, as many of the questions do not relate to how the cows were used
Author-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.
No full textAuthor-wise bibliometric analysis based on entropy.</p
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