The overall objective of the guideline is to provide up‐to‐date, evidence‐based recommendations for the management of delusional infestation (DI) in adults.
Linked Comment: I. Coulson. Br J Dermatol ...2022; 187:457.
The advance of the onset of the Indian monsoon is here explained in terms of a balance between the low‐level monsoon flow and an overrunning intrusion of mid‐tropospheric dry air. The monsoon ...advances, over a period of about 6 weeks, from the south of the country to the northwest. Given that the low‐level monsoon winds are westerly or southwesterly, and the mid‐level winds northwesterly, the monsoon onset propagates upwind relative to mid‐level flow, and perpendicular to the low‐level flow, and is not directly caused by moisture flux toward the northwest. Lacking a conceptual model for the advance means that it has been hard to understand and correct known biases in weather and climate prediction models.
The mid‐level northwesterlies form a wedge of dry air that is deep in the far northwest of India and over‐runs the monsoon flow. The dry layer is moistened from below by shallow cumulus and congestus clouds, so that the profile becomes much closer to moist adiabatic, and the dry layer is much shallower in the vertical, toward the southeast of India. The profiles associated with this dry air show how the most favourable environment for deep convection occurs in the south, and onset occurs here first.
As the onset advances across India, the advection of moisture from the Arabian Sea becomes stronger, and the mid‐level dry air is increasingly moistened from below. This increased moistening makes the wedge of dry air shallower throughout its horizontal extent, and forces the northern limit of moist convection to move toward the northwest. Wetting of the land surface by rainfall will further reinforce the north‐westward progression, by sustaining the supply of boundary‐layer moisture and shallow cumulus. The local advance of the monsoon onset is coincident with weakening of the mid‐level northwesterlies, and therefore weakened mid‐level dry advection.
We provide an expansive analysis of polar bear (Ursus maritimus) circumpolar genetic variation during the last two decades of decline in their sea-ice habitat. We sought to evaluate whether their ...genetic diversity and structure have changed over this period of habitat decline, how their current genetic patterns compare with past patterns, and how genetic demography changed with ancient fluctuations in climate. Characterizing their circumpolar genetic structure using microsatellite data, we defined four clusters that largely correspond to current ecological and oceanographic factors: Eastern Polar Basin, Western Polar Basin, Canadian Archipelago and Southern Canada. We document evidence for recent (ca. last 1-3 generations) directional gene flow from Southern Canada and the Eastern Polar Basin towards the Canadian Archipelago, an area hypothesized to be a future refugium for polar bears as climate-induced habitat decline continues. Our data provide empirical evidence in support of this hypothesis. The direction of current gene flow differs from earlier patterns of gene flow in the Holocene. From analyses of mitochondrial DNA, the Canadian Archipelago cluster and the Barents Sea subpopulation within the Eastern Polar Basin cluster did not show signals of population expansion, suggesting these areas may have served also as past interglacial refugia. Mismatch analyses of mitochondrial DNA data from polar and the paraphyletic brown bear (U. arctos) uncovered offset signals in timing of population expansion between the two species, that are attributed to differential demographic responses to past climate cycling. Mitogenomic structure of polar bears was shallow and developed recently, in contrast to the multiple clades of brown bears. We found no genetic signatures of recent hybridization between the species in our large, circumpolar sample, suggesting that recently observed hybrids represent localized events. Documenting changes in subpopulation connectivity will allow polar nations to proactively adjust conservation actions to continuing decline in sea-ice habitat.
Some of the highest summer monsoon rainfall in South Asia falls on the windward slopes of the Western Ghats mountains on India's west coast and offshore over the eastern Arabian Sea. Understanding of ...the processes determining the spatial distribution and temporal variability of this region remains incomplete. In this paper, new Interaction of Convective Organization and Monsoon Precipitation, Atmosphere, Surface and Sea (INCOMPASS) aircraft and ground‐based measurements of the summer monsoon over the Western Ghats and upstream of them are presented and placed within the context of remote‐sensing observations and reanalysis. The transition from widespread rainfall over the eastern Arabian Sea to rainfall over the Western Ghats is documented in high spatial and temporal resolution. Heavy rainfall offshore during the campaign was associated primarily with mid‐tropospheric humidity, secondarily with sea surface temperature, and only weakly with orographic blocking. A mid‐tropospheric dry intrusion suppressed deep convection offshore in the latter half of the campaign, allowing the build‐up of low‐level humidity in the onshore flow and enhancing rainfall over the mountains. Rainfall on the lee side of the Western Ghats occurred during the latter half of the campaign in association with enhanced mesoscale easterly upslope flow. Diurnal cycles in rainfall offshore (maximum in the morning) and on the mountains (maximum in the afternoon) were observed. Considerable zonal and temporal variability was seen in the offshore boundary layer, suggesting the presence of convective downdraughts and cold pools. Persistent drying of the subcloud mixed layer several hundred kilometres off the coast was observed, suggesting strong mixing between the boundary layer and the free troposphere. These observations provide quantitative targets to test models and suggest hypotheses on the physical mechanisms determining the distribution and variability in rainfall in the Western Ghats region.
Over a 10‐day period the switch from heavy rainfall over the eastern Arabian Sea, and relatively dry conditions over the west coast of South India, was observed in conjunction with the passage of an active phase of the Boreal Summer Intraseasonal Oscillation. This was followed by a mid‐tropospheric dry intrusion over the Arabian Sea which suppressed offshore convection, allowing the build‐up of boundary‐layer humidity which contributed to an enhancement of rainfall over the coast. This change in mid‐tropospheric humidity was much more strongly associated with the strength of offshore convection than was orographic blocking.
Patients with chronic lung disease (CLD) have an increased risk for severe coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) and poor outcomes. Here, we analyze the transcriptomes of 611,398 single cells isolated ...from healthy and CLD lungs to identify molecular characteristics of lung cells that may account for worse COVID-19 outcomes in patients with chronic lung diseases. We observe a similar cellular distribution and relative expression of SARS-CoV-2 entry factors in control and CLD lungs. CLD AT2 cells express higher levels of genes linked directly to the efficiency of viral replication and the innate immune response. Additionally, we identify basal differences in inflammatory gene expression programs that highlight how CLD alters the inflammatory microenvironment encountered upon viral exposure to the peripheral lung. Our study indicates that CLD is accompanied by changes in cell-type-specific gene expression programs that prime the lung epithelium for and influence the innate and adaptive immune responses to SARS-CoV-2 infection.
Fullerene dyads bridged with perfluorinated linking groups have been synthesized through a modified arc‐discharge procedure. The addition of Teflon inside an arc‐discharge reactor leads to the ...formation of dyads, consisting of two C60 fullerenes bridged by CF2 groups. The incorporation of bridging groups containing electronegative atoms lead to different energy levels and to new features in the photoluminescence spectrum. A suppression of the singlet oxygen photosensitization indicated that the radiative decay from singlet‐to‐singlet state is favoured against the intersystem crossing singlet‐to‐triplet transition.
Double the fun: Fullerene dyads bridged with perfluorinated linking groups have been synthesized through a modified arc‐discharge procedure by incorporating Teflon inside the reactor. The incorporation of bridging groups containing electronegative atoms lead to different energy levels and to new features in the photoluminescence spectrum.
The increasing frequency and duration of severe fire events in Australia further necessitate accurate and timely forecasting to mitigate their consequences. This study evaluated the performance of ...two distinct approaches to forecasting extreme fire danger at two- to three-week lead times for the period 2003 to 2017: the official Australian climate simulation dynamical model and a statistical model based on climate drivers. We employed linear logistic regression to develop the statistical model, assessing the influence of individual climate drivers using single linear regression. The performance of both models was evaluated through case studies of three significant extreme fire events in Australia: the Canberra (2003), Black Saturday (2009), and Pinery (2015) fires. The results revealed that ACCESS-S2 generally underestimated the spatial extent of all three extreme FBI events, but with accuracy scores ranging from 0.66 to 0.86 across the case studies. Conversely, the statistical model tended to overpredict the area affected by extreme FBI, with high false alarm ratios between 0.44 and 0.66. However, the statistical model demonstrated higher probability of detection scores, ranging from 0.57 to 0.87 compared with 0.03 to 0.57 for the dynamic model. These findings highlight the complementary strengths and limitations of both forecasting approaches. Integrating dynamical and statistical models with transparent communication of their uncertainties could potentially improve accuracy and reduce false alarms. This can be achieved through hybrid forecasting, combined with visual inspection and comparison between the statistical and dynamical forecasts. Hybrid forecasting also has the potential to increase forecast lead times to up to several months, ultimately aiding in decision-making and resource allocation for fire management.
Purpose
To create an algorithm able to accurately detect IVC filters on radiographs without human assistance, capable of being used to screen radiographs to identify patients needing IVC filter ...retrieval.
Methods
A primary dataset of 5225 images, 30% of which included IVC filters, was assembled and annotated. 85% of the data was used to train a Cascade R-CNN (Region Based Convolutional Neural Network) object detection network incorporating a pre-trained ResNet-50 backbone. The remaining 15% of the data, independently annotated by three radiologists, was used as a test set to assess performance. The algorithm was also assessed on an independently constructed 1424-image dataset, drawn from a different institution than the primary dataset.
Results
On the primary test set, the algorithm achieved a sensitivity of 96.2% (95% CI 92.7–98.1%) and a specificity of 98.9% (95% CI 97.4–99.5%). Results were similar on the external test set: sensitivity 97.9% (95% CI 96.2–98.9%), specificity 99.6 (95% CI 98.9–99.9%).
Conclusion
Fully automated detection of IVC filters on radiographs with high sensitivity and excellent specificity required for an automated screening system can be achieved using object detection neural networks. Further work will develop a system for identifying patients for IVC filter retrieval based on this algorithm.
Graphical abstract
Parental investment theory predicts that observed levels of parental care afforded to offspring are set by the benefits (to offspring quality and survival) relative to the costs (to parental survival ...or future reproduction). Although difficult to document in mammals, there is often substantial individual variation in the amount of parental care within species. We measured the impact of individual variation in maternal care (“attentiveness” towards offspring or maternal motivation) on offspring growth and survival in a wild population of North American red squirrels (Tamiasciurus hudsonicus). We used latency to return to pups following a nest intrusion as a measure of maternal attentiveness to pups. We found this behavior to be repeatable within individuals suggesting this behavior is a personality trait or a “maternal style.” In this population, postnatal growth rate is important for pup overwinter survival. Pups from large litters grew faster if they had a highly attentive mother, indicating that maternal care can mitigate the trade-off between litter size and offspring growth and potentially improve survival of pups. Additionally, more attentive mothers had slightly higher lifetime reproductive success than less attentive mothers. These results highlight important fitness effects of having a highly attentive mother and show that maternal care can alter a fundamental life history trade-off between offspring quantity and quality.
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