Stainless steel square honeycomb core sandwich and solid monolithic beams have been subjected to high-pressure, short-duration impulses using a shock simulation technique involving high-speed impact ...of Al foam projectiles. The experiments have been designed to achieve two objectives: (i) to demonstrate the benefits of sandwich construction, and (ii) to assess the fidelity of dynamic finite element calculations in simulating the structural response. The results affirm that, when subjected to impulse levels representative of those associated with nearby explosions, the sandwich beams exhibit smaller displacements than the solid beams at equivalent weight. The benefit is especially large at lower impulses where the effective dynamic strength of the honeycomb core prevents crushing. The measurements and finite element simulations having greatest relevance to the shock resistance are found to correspond closely, particularly the displacements and the core crushing strains. One implication is that the dynamic finite element model has the requisite fidelity at impulse levels of interest.
Canine parvovirus (CPV) and feline panleukopaenia virus (FPLV) are two closely related viruses, which are known to cause severe disease in younger unvaccinated animals. As well as causing disease in ...their respective hosts, CPV has recently acquired the feline host range, allowing it to infect both cats and dogs. As well as causing disease in dogs, there is evidence that under some circumstances CPV may also cause disease in cats.
This study has investigated the prevalence of parvoviruses in the faeces of clinically healthy cats and dogs in two rescue shelters. Canine parvovirus was demonstrated in 32.5% (13/50) of faecal samples in a cross sectional study of 50 cats from a feline only shelter, and 33.9% (61/180) of faecal samples in a longitudinal study of 74 cats at a mixed canine and feline shelter. Virus was isolated in cell cultures of both canine and feline origin from all PCR-positive samples suggesting they contained viable, infectious virus. In contrast to the high CPV prevalence in cats, no FPLV was found, and none of 122 faecal samples from dogs, or 160 samples collected from the kennel environment, tested positive for parvovirus by PCR. Sequence analysis of major capsid VP2 gene from all positive samples, as well as the non-structural gene from 18 randomly selected positive samples, showed that all positive cats were shedding CPV2a or 2b, rather than FPLV. Longitudinally sampling in one shelter showed that all cats appeared to shed the same virus sequence type at each date they were positive (up to six weeks), despite a lack of clinical signs. Fifty percent of the sequences obtained here were shown to be similar to those recently obtained in a study of sick dogs in the UK (Clegg et al., 2011).
These results suggest that in some circumstances, clinically normal cats may be able to shed CPV for prolonged periods of time, and raises the possibility that such cats may be important reservoirs for the maintenance of infection in both the cat and the dog population.
Calicivirus Infection in Cats Hofmann-Lehmann, Regina; Hosie, Margaret J; Hartmann, Katrin ...
Viruses,
04/2022, Letnik:
14, Številka:
5
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Feline calicivirus (FCV) is a common pathogen in domestic cats that is highly contagious, resistant to many disinfectants and demonstrates a high genetic variability. FCV infection can lead to ...serious or even fatal diseases. In this review, the European Advisory Board on Cat Diseases (ABCD), a scientifically independent board of experts in feline medicine from 11 European countries, presents the current knowledge of FCV infection and fills gaps with expert opinions. FCV infections are particularly problematic in multicat environments. FCV-infected cats often show painful erosions in the mouth and mild upper respiratory disease and, particularly in kittens, even fatal pneumonia. However, infection can be associated with chronic gingivostomatitis. Rarely, highly virulent FCV variants can induce severe systemic disease with epizootic spread and high mortality. FCV can best be detected by reverse-transcriptase PCR. However, a negative result does not rule out FCV infection and healthy cats can test positive. All cats should be vaccinated against FCV (core vaccine); however, vaccination protects cats from disease but not from infection. Considering the high variability of FCV, changing to different vaccine strain(s) may be of benefit if disease occurs in fully vaccinated cats. Infection-induced immunity is not life-long and does not protect against all strains; therefore, vaccination of cats that have recovered from caliciviral disease is recommended.
We report the discovery of a hot Jupiter on a 3.28-day orbit around a 1.08
M
⊙
G0 star that is the secondary component in a loose binary system. Based on follow-up radial velocity observations of ...TOI-858 B with CORALIE on the Swiss 1.2 m telescope and CHIRON on the 1.5 m telescope at the Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory (CTIO), we measured the planet mass to be 1.10
−0.07
+0.08
M
J
. Two transits were further observed with CORALIE to determine the alignment of TOI-858 B b with respect to its host star. Analysis of the Rossiter-McLaughlin signal from the planet shows that the sky-projected obliquity is
λ
= 99.3
−3.7
+3.8°
. Numerical simulations show that the neighbour star TOI-858 A is too distant to have trapped the planet in a Kozai–Lidov resonance, suggesting a different dynamical evolution or a primordial origin to explain this misalignment. The 1.15
M
⊙
primary F9 star of the system (TYC 8501-01597-1, at
ρ
~11″) was also observed with CORALIE in order to provide upper limits for the presence of aplanetary companion orbiting that star.
Primary care is likely to see the highest number of Lyme disease patients. Despite this, there is limited published data regarding Lyme disease patients accessing primary care in the UK. We aim to ...describe trends in the incidence of a new diagnosis, and demographics of patients identified in a primary care electronic health database.
A descriptive epidemiological study of Lyme disease coded patients in UK primary care. 3725 patients coded for Lyme disease during 1998-2016 were identified within The Health Improvement Network (THIN). Incidence rates and the demographics of cases identified were described. Poisson regression was used to analyse socio-demographic characteristics of the cases.
There was an increase in annual crude incidence rates, peaking in 2015 at 5.47 (95% CI 4.85-6.14) cases per 100,000 population per year. Multivariable analysis showed there were significant differences in the ages of those affected, incidence of a new diagnosis rose as deprivation levels improved, and that there was a higher incidence of cases living in rural areas compared to urban areas. There was no significant difference between sexes for the UK. Cases were significantly more likely to identify with being white compared to the national population.
An increasing incidence of patients newly coded with Lyme disease related Read codes was identified using data from a UK national primary care database. By comparing these incidence figures with national laboratory-confirmed surveillance data, a multiplication factor of 2.35 (95%CI 1.81-2.88) can be calculated in order to estimate the annual number of cases seen in primary care. The significant socio-demographic variables associated with a Lyme disease diagnosis likely reflect a complex interplay of socio-economic issues, which needs to be further explored. Future work is needed to examine the treatment and management of patients within this database.
The Portsmouth Dental Academy delivers an interprofessional education to dental students on outreach placement from King's College London Dental Institute.
To establish what the dental students' ...attitudes to the placement are and how these correlate to the perceptions of the staff who work with them.
Using Delphi consensus procedures, a simple, closed, two-question questionnaire was developed. The questionnaire was completed by the students and then, to triangulate the results, was subsequently applied to staff who teach and assist them on clinic.
To the question: Why do you think the experience that is commonly termed the 'Portsmouth experience' is so successful 'in the eyes of the students'?, the students ranked first the response: 'Students gain experience in primary dental care clinical practice under the current NHS contract - UDAs and KPIs'. To the second question: What do you think the students most enjoyed about working in Portsmouth?, the students ranked first: 'A sense of independence - being made to make their own decisions'.
The students' major perception of the 'Portsmouth experience' centres around the placement being a realistic preparation for their future practising career. This is combined with a strong sense of belonging when studying and working at the Academy.
Sterile neutrinos are a minimal extension of the standard model of particle physics. A promising model-independent way to search for sterile neutrinos is via high-precision β-spectroscopy. The ...Karlsruhe tritium neutrino (KATRIN) experiment, equipped with a novel multi-pixel silicon drift detector focal plane array and read-out system, named the TRISTAN detector, has the potential to supersede the sensitivity of previous laboratory-based searches. In this work we present the characterization of the first silicon drift detector prototypes with electrons and we investigate the impact of uncertainties of the detector's response to electrons on the final sterile neutrino sensitivity.
Ticks are an important driver of veterinary health care, causing irritation and sometimes infection to their hosts. We explored epidemiological and geo-referenced data from > 7 million electronic ...health records (EHRs) from cats and dogs collected by the Small Animal Veterinary Surveillance Network (SAVSNET) in Great Britain (GB) between 2014 and 2021 to assess the factors affecting tick attachment in an individual and at a spatiotemporal level.
EHRs in which ticks were mentioned were identified by text mining; domain experts confirmed those with ticks on the animal. Tick presence/absence records were overlaid with a spatiotemporal series of climate, environment, anthropogenic and host distribution factors to produce a spatiotemporal regression matrix. An ensemble machine learning spatiotemporal model was used to fine-tune hyperparameters for Random Forest, Gradient-boosted Trees and Generalized Linear Model regression algorithms, which were then used to produce a final ensemble meta-learner to predict the probability of tick attachment across GB at a monthly interval and averaged long-term through 2014-2021 at a spatial resolution of 1 km. Individual host factors associated with tick attachment were also assessed by conditional logistic regression on a matched case-control dataset.
In total, 11,741 consultations were identified in which a tick was recorded. The frequency of tick records was low (0.16% EHRs), suggesting an underestimation of risk. That said, increased odds for tick attachment in cats and dogs were associated with younger adult ages, longer coat length, crossbreeds and unclassified breeds. In cats, males and entire animals had significantly increased odds of recorded tick attachment. The key variables controlling the spatiotemporal risk for tick attachment were climatic (precipitation and temperature) and vegetation type (Enhanced Vegetation Index). Suitable areas for tick attachment were predicted across GB, especially in forests and grassland areas, mainly during summer, particularly in June.
Our results can inform targeted health messages to owners and veterinary practitioners, identifying those animals, seasons and areas of higher risk for tick attachment and allowing for more tailored prophylaxis to reduce tick burden, inappropriate parasiticide treatment and potentially TBDs in companion animals and humans. Sentinel networks like SAVSNET represent a novel complementary data source to improve our understanding of tick attachment risk for companion animals and as a proxy of risk to humans.
Objective
This study explored, and compared, the attitudes of student groups trained at the University of Portsmouth Dental Academy (UPDA) in 2010/2011 towards dental interprofessional education ...(IPE).
Methods
The study population consisted of fifth‐year student dentists (n = 80) from King's College London Dental Institute, second‐ and third‐year dental hygiene and therapy (n = 38) and first‐year dental nursing (n = 14) students from UPDA. A 19‐item, validated and dentally modified questionnaire, ‘Readiness for Inter‐Professional Learning Scale (RIPLS)’, was administered. RIPLS contains three subscales: teamwork and collaboration, professional identity and roles and responsibilities. Mean (x¯) and standard deviation (SD) of the scores were calculated, following reversal of negative items. All the analyses were carried out using SPSS version 20 and STATA version 11.
Results
An overall response rate of 71% (n = 94) was achieved. In reference to teamwork and collaboration, all groups strongly indicated that IPE can contribute to learning teamwork skills (x¯ = 24.98, SD = 3.5) and improving relationships with team members (x¯ = 12.93, SD = 1.63); however, the scores did not differ between the groups (P = 0.09 and P = 0.16, respectively). Concerning professional identity, student dentists had significantly higher preference for a discipline‐based approach (P = 0.002); were more likely to agree that ‘it is not necessary for undergraduate dental and dental care professional students to learn together’ (P = 0.01); and perceived that ‘clinical problem‐solving skills can only be learnt effectively with other students from their own discipline’ (P = 0.02) than dental hygiene and therapy students. In relation to roles and responsibilities, participants demonstrated a strong sense of their own professional role. Student dentists reported that they had ‘to gain more knowledge and skills’ than dental hygiene and therapy (P = 0.01) and dental nursing (P = 0.01) students. Dental hygiene and therapy students were less likely than student dentists to agree that ‘the role of dental nurses and hygienists was to mainly provide support for dentists’ (P = 0.001).
Conclusion
The findings suggest that IPE was perceived as beneficial in relation to teamwork; however, the study raises issues regarding professional identity and roles. Educators should consider differing perceptions of professional roles and identities when planning and delivering interprofessional programmes.
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