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Crystal structure prediction is becoming an increasingly valuable tool for assessing polymorphism of crystalline molecular compounds, yet invariably, it overpredicts the number of polymorphs. One of the causes for this overprediction is in neglecting the coalescence of potential energy minima, separated by relatively small energy barriers, into a single basin at finite temperature. Considering this, we demonstrate a method underpinned by the threshold algorithm for clustering potential energy minima into basins, thereby identifying kinetically stable polymorphs and reducing overprediction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Herein, the synthesis of metal–organic tetrahedral cages featuring flexible thio- and selenophosphate-based ligands is described. The cages were prepared by sub-component self-assembly of A＝P(OC6H4NH2-4)3 (A = S, Se) or S＝P(SC6H4NH2-4)3, 2-pyridinecarboxaldehyde, and either Fe[BF4]2 or Co[BF4]2. Preliminary host–guest studies into the ability of the pendant P＝S and P＝Se groups to interact with suitable substrates will be discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adult jumping spiders are known for their extraordinary eyesight and complex, visually guided behaviors, including elaborate communicatory displays, navigational abilities, and prey-specific predatory strategies. Juvenile spiders also exhibit many of these behaviors, yet their visual systems are many times smaller. How do juveniles retain high visually guided performance despite severe size constraints on their visual systems? We investigated developmental changes in eye morphology and visual function in the jumping spider Phidippus audax using morphology, histology, ophthalmoscopy, and optical measurements. We find that juvenile spiders have proportionally larger lenses in relation to their body size than adults. This should alleviate some of the costs of small body size on visual function. However, photoreceptor number in the anterior lateral eyes (ALE) remains constant from early development onward, consistent with a developmental constraint on photoreceptor differentiation. To accommodate these photoreceptors within the diminutive volume of the spiderling cephalothorax, ALE rhabdoms in early life stages are more tightly packed and significantly smaller in diameter and length, properties that expand across development. Lens focal lengths increase as eyes and retinas grow, resulting in a remarkable maintenance of ALE spatial acuity and field-of-view across life stages. However, this maintenance of acuity comes at a sensitivity cost given the small rhabdomal volumes required by space constraints early in life. Taken together, our results indicate that young jumping spiders have eyes already equipped for high acuity vision, but these young spiders may struggle to perform visually demanding behaviors in low-light environments, a notion that warrants further testing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Whilst pursuing the synthetic utility of quinoline‐based tin complexes, Me2Sn(Quin‐NO2)2 (1) and Ph2Sn(Quin‐NO2)2 (2) (Quin‐NO2 = 5‐nitroquinolino‐8‐oate) were synthesized bearing coordinatively inert nitro groups. Conventional reduction methodologies successfully converted 1 to Me2Sn(Quin‐NH2)2 (3) and 2 to Ph2Sn(Quin‐NH2)2 (4) (Quin‐NH2 = 5‐aminoquinolino‐8‐oate). The synthetically useful amine groups proved difficult to exploit in the presence of the central tin atom, however, a complete Schiff base functionalized Sn complex of the dimethyltin pro‐ligand Me2Sn(Quin‐py)2 (6) was successfully synthesized from 5‐[(pyridin‐2‐ylmethylene)amino]quinolin‐8‐ol (HQuin‐py; 5) in good yield via an alternative strategy exploiting the oxophilic tendencies of tin. All species were fully characterized by NMR (including 119Sn NMR spectroscopy), HR‐ESI MS and single‐crystal X‐ray diffraction, and preliminary studies of their supramolecular potential are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Disgorgement is under threat. In Kokesh v. SEC, the Supreme Court held that disgorgement--a routine remedy that allows the SEC to recoup ill-gotten gains from financial wrongdoers--is subject to a 5- year statute of limitations because it functions as a "penalty." This ruling threatens to upend the traditional conception of disgorgement as an ancillary remedy granted by the court's equity power, because there are no penalties at equity. With the possibility that Kokesh's penalty reasoning could be adopted beyond the statute of limitations context, the future of disgorgement in federal court is in doubt. This Note proposes a way forward that allows for disgorgement's continued viability. The SEC should moderate its use of disgorgement for three reasons: because of a trend of suspicion toward strong government enforcement power by the Supreme Court, because it has been improperly used punitively, and because the rise of other statutory schemes has displaced disgorgement's original justification. At the same time, disgorgement should be saved because of the uncertain future of administrative disgorgement proceedings, the intuitive notion of recovering money from wrongdoers, and the much-needed ability to compensate victims. To save disgorgement, the SEC should limit its use only to restoring the status quo of injured investors, thereby ensuring a remedial--not penal--purpose. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Flapping flight is energetically more costly than running, although it is less costly to fly a given body mass a given distance per unit time than it is for a similar mass to run the same distance per unit time. This is mainly because birds can fly faster than they can run. Oxygen transfer and transport are enhanced in migrating birds compared with those in non-migrators: at the gas-exchange regions of the lungs the effective area is greater and the diffusion distance smaller. Also, migrating birds have larger hearts and haemoglobin concentrations in the blood, and capillary density in the flight muscles tends to be higher. Species like bar-headed geese migrate at high altitudes, where the availability of oxygen is reduced and the energy cost of flapping flight increased compared with those at sea level. Physiological adaptations to these conditions include haemoglobin with a higher affinity for oxygen than that in lowland birds, a greater effective ventilation of the gas-exchange surface of the lungs and a greater capillary-to-muscle fibre ratio. Migrating birds use fatty acids as their source of energy, so they have to be transported at a sufficient rate to meet the high demand. Since fatty acids are insoluble in water, birds maintain high concentrations of fatty acid-binding proteins to transport fatty acids across the cell membrane and within the cytoplasm. The concentrations of these proteins, together with that of a key enzyme in the b-oxidation of fatty acids, increase before migration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the concept of data-driven documents (D3) software library developed by software developer Mike Bostock at Stanford University, for presentation of a series of digital maps. The software library allows functions for the visualization of data sets through scalable vector graphics (SVG) and displaying them in web browsers. It also adds the use of D3 software library in updates, animation capabilities and date functions of series digital map.

Political marketing advances by engaging with new and advanced concepts from both of its parent disciplines. One of the most recent fields of brand research—the study of the human brand—is taken into the political marketing arena in this essay. Human branding is an emergent topic in mainstream marketing. The value as a brand of a person who is well-known and subject to explicit marketing communications efforts is being investigated in many fields. The concept has clear prima facie value in political marketing, where the role of a political leader as part of the political marketing offer has been recognized extensively. Politics is also a unique context given the relationship between leaders and parties, each of which has some unique brand associations. The process of exploring the application of human branding in politics also provides a context in which some of the interactions among party and leader, human brand, and organizational brand can be explored and further developed. Among the conclusions are that political party leaders require brand authenticity as an advocate of the party policy platform and brand authority to command the organization and deliver on the policies being advocated. Implications for party and campaign management are outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Ushered by recent developments in various areas of science and technology, modern energy systems are going to be an inevitable part of our societies. Smart grids are one of these modern systems that have attracted many research activities in recent years. Before utilizing the next generation of smart grids, we should have a comprehensive understanding of the interdependent energy networks and processes. Next-generation energy systems networks cannot be effectively designed, analyzed, and controlled in isolation from the social, economic, sensing, and control contexts in which they operate. In this article, we present a novel framework to support charging and storage infrastructure design for electric vehicles. We develop coordinated clustering techniques to work with network models of urban environments to aid in placement of charging stations for an electrical vehicle deployment scenario. Furthermore, we evaluate the network before and after the deployment of charging stations, to recommend the installation of appropriate storage units to overcome the extra load imposed on the network by the charging stations. We demonstrate the multiple factors that can be simultaneously leveraged in our framework to achieve practical urban deployment. Our ultimate goal is to help realize sustainable energy system management in urban electrical infrastructure by modeling and analyzing networks of interactions between electric systems and urban populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Data mined from satellite imagery could serve as an early indicator of socially disruptive events like epidemics, especially in countries with limited surveillance resources. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

While bar-headed geese are renowned for migration at high altitude over the Himalayas, previous work on captive birds suggested that these geese are unable to maintain rates of oxygen consumption while running in severely hypoxic conditions. To investigate this paradox, we re-examined the running performance and heart rates of bar-headed geese and barnacle geese (a low altitude species) during exercise in hypoxia. Bar-headed geese (n = 7) were able to run at maximum speeds (determined in normoxia) for 15 minutes in severe hypoxia (7% O2; simulating the hypoxia at 8500 m) with mean heart rates of 466±8 beats min−1. Barnacle geese (n = 10), on the other hand, were unable to complete similar trials in severe hypoxia and their mean heart rate (316 beats.min−1) was significantly lower than bar-headed geese. In bar-headed geese, partial pressures of oxygen and carbon dioxide in both arterial and mixed venous blood were significantly lower during hypoxia than normoxia, both at rest and while running. However, measurements of blood lactate in bar-headed geese suggested that anaerobic metabolism was not a major energy source during running in hypoxia. We combined these data with values taken from the literature to estimate (i) oxygen supply, using the Fick equation and (ii) oxygen demand using aerodynamic theory for bar-headed geese flying aerobically, and under their own power, at altitude. This analysis predicts that the maximum altitude at which geese can transport enough oxygen to fly without environmental assistance ranges from 6,800 m to 8,900 m altitude, depending on the parameters used in the model but that such flights should be rare. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is considerable interest in understanding how the energy budget of an endotherm is modulated from a physiological and ecological point of view. In this paper, we used daily (24 h) heart rate (24), as a proxy of daily energy expenditure (DEE) across seasons, to test the effect of locomotion activity and water temperature on the energy budget of a large diving bird. fH24 was monitored continuously in common eiders (Somateria mollissima) during 7 months together with measures of time spent flying and time spent feeding. fH24 varied substantially during the recording period, with numerous increases and decreases that occurred across seasons, although we did not find any relationship between fH24 and the time spent active (feeding and flying). However, inactive heart rate (fH,inactive) decreased as locomotion activity increased, suggesting that common eiders were using some form of compensation when under a high work load. We were also unable to detect a negative relationship between water temperature and resting heart rate, a proxy of resting metabolic rate. This was unexpected, based on the assumption that high thermoregulation costs would be associated with cold waters. We showed instead that a high level of energy expenditure coincided with feather moult and warm waters, which suggests that the observed variable pattern of seasonal DEE was driven by these two factors. Nevertheless, our results indicate that compensation and possibly the timing of moult may be used as mechanisms to reduce seasonal variation in energy expenditure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Advancement in internet, automation and data communication has led to massive growth in global knowledge-base over the past few decades. It has opened the possibility of developing global research laboratories where experiments and measurement systems can be shared in real time. The global magnetoelectric measurement system (GMMS) developed in this paper allows remote measurement of magnetoelectric properties of single phase and composite samples with ultra-high sensitivity, reducing the operation time from 2–3 hours to approximately 15 minutes. A secure website was developed to (i) create the internet-based control of the measurement system, (ii) compile, email and download the experimental results and (iii) video conferencing between the users. The magnetoelectric measurement system includes an electromagnetic coil to generate DC magnetic field up to 1.5 T, a Helmholtz coil, function generator, high power supply, and a translational stage with a 2 DOF gripper which allows measurements from L-T to T-T mode. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bone is continually undergoing cycles of apposition and resorption referred to as adaptive remodelling. We tested the hypothesis that captive moulting Barnacle Geese ( Branta leucopsis) would show adaptive bone mineralisation during the flightless period of their annual flight feather moult, despite having never flown. The three leg bones showed selective changes in mineralisation in terms of mass and mineral content, while the wing bones did not change in mass or mineral content. The tibia/fibula was the only bone to also undergo significant changes in mass, increasing as moult progressed then decreasing significantly towards the end of moult. This was not a response to changing body mass. Instead, we propose that this is a response to the requirement for increased strength brought about by the significant increase in the force producing muscles that attach to the tibia. The femur and tarsometarsus showed the opposite trend, with mineral content decreasing significantly during mid-moult before increasing again at the end. These changes were also independent of changing body mass, suggesting instead that the calcium, or rather calcium derivatives, were mobilised for feather regrowth. This study demonstrates significant and selective adaptive natural changes in bone mass and mineralization that have not been previously demonstrated. That they should also occur in captive birds which show a decrease in locomotion during the wing moult period, suggests a high endogenous capacity for these changes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Up to half the world''s population of bar-headed geese (Anser indicus) migrate between central Asia and India and fly between 5000m and 9000m above sea level as they cross the Himalayas. The partial pressures of oxygen at these altitudes are, respectively, about 50% and 30% those at sea level. Flapping flight is energetically expensive, so how are bar-headed geese able to migrate at such altitudes? The haemoglobin of bar-headed geese has a greater affinity for oxygen than those of lowland birds, and birds are able to hyperventilate to a greater extent than mammals during severe hypoxia. Together, these mean that the concentration of oxygen in the arterial blood at a given altitude is greater in bar-headed geese than in lowland birds and mammals. The low partial pressure of CO2 in arterial blood (hypocapnia) that accompanies hyperventilation does not cause reduction of cerebral blood flow in birds as it does in mammals, thus there is greater oxygen delivery to the brain in hypoxic birds, including bar-headed geese, than in mammals. Captive bar headed geese could not maintain elevated aerobic metabolism during exercise at a simulated altitude of 8500m and their cardiac stroke volume was much lower than that during exercise at sea level. This suggests that if some individuals of this species of geese do really manage to fly over Mt Everest, they may only do so if they receive assistance from vertical air movements, for example from lee waves downwind from the mountains. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The article reports on the need to implement timeliness rules for the filing of bid protests at the U.S. Court of Federal Claims (CPFC). It discusses the policy implications for the protest system of having two parallel flora and explores the development of this phenomena since the passage of the Administrative Dispute Resolution Act (ADRA) of 1996. It analyzes the impact of the ADRA and suggests that the Congress should amend the ADRA to impose timeliness rules.

Political Marketing shares significant common ground with Public Sector Marketing, but this is not reflected in the current literature. These subdisciplines are developing in mutual isolation, thereby limiting their relevance and theoretical potential. The political marketing research literature highlights election campaigns and communications processes, even though marketing for most politicians involves being associated with actual public service delivery. The public sector marketing literature is both fragmented and heavily influenced by New Public Management which explicitly seeks to disconnect administration from politics, even though public sector managers are essential to political processes and not constrained only to the implementation of policy. The separation of these developing fields is influenced in part by the distinctive US experience of politics and administration; but that experience is untypical of other contexts and thus inclined to skew understanding and theory development. The welfare effects of marketing activity in the politics and public administration contexts are profound; an approach supportive of subdiscipline integration and development is critical. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This review discusses the advancements in our understanding of the physiology and behaviour of avian diving that have been underpinned by optimal foraging theory and the testing of optimal models. To maximise their foraging efficiency during foraging periods, diving birds must balance numerous factors that are directly or indirectly related to the replenishment of the oxygen stores and the removal of excess carbon dioxide. These include (1) the time spent underwater (which diminishes the oxygen supply, increases carbon dioxide levels and may even include a build up of lactate due to anaerobic metabolism), (2) the time spent at the surface recovering from the previous dive and preparing for the next (including reloading their oxygen supply, decreasing their carbon dioxide levels and possibly also metabolising lactate) and (3) the trade-off between maximising oxygen reserves for consumption underwater by taking in more air to the respiratory system, and minimising the energy costs of positive buoyancy caused by this air, to maximise the time available underwater to forage. Due to its importance in avian diving, replenishment of the oxygen stores has become integral to models of optimal diving, which predict the time budgeting of animals foraging underwater. While many of these models have been examined qualitatively, such tests of predictive trends appear fallible and only quantifiable support affords strong evidence of their predictive value. This review describes how the quantification of certain optimal diving models, using tufted ducks, indeed demonstrates some predictive success. This suggests that replenishment of the oxygen stores and removal of excess carbon dioxide have significant influences on the duration of the surface period between dives. Nevertheless, present models are too simplistic to be robust predictors of diving behaviour for individual animals and it is proposed that they require refinement through the incorporation of other variables that also influence diving behaviour such as, perhaps, prey density and predator avoidance. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: The original definition of aerobic dive limit (ADL) was the dive duration after which there is an increase in post-dive concentration of lactate in the blood of Weddell seals freely diving in the field. The only other species in which such measurements have been made is the emperor penguin. For all other species, aerobic dive limit has been calculated (cADL) by dividing usable oxygen stores with an estimation of the rate of oxygen consumption during diving. Unfortunately, cADL is often referred to as the aerobic dive limit, implying that it is equivalent to that determined from the measurement of post-dive blood lactate concentration. However, this is not so, as at cADL all of the usable oxygen would have been consumed, whereas Weddell seals and emperor penguins can dive for at least 2–3 times longer than their ADL. Thus, at ADL, there is still some usable oxygen remaining in the stores. It is suggested that to avoid continued confusion between these two terms, the former is called diving lactate threshold (DLT), as it is somewhat analogous to the lactate threshold in exercising terrestrial vertebrates. Possible explanations of how some species routinely dive beyond their cADL are also discussed. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The oxygen store/usage hypothesis suggests that larger animals are able to dive for longer and hence deeper because oxygen storage scales isometrically with body mass, whereas oxygen usage scales allometrically with an exponent <1 (typically 0.67-0.75). Previous tests of the allometry of diving tend to reject this hypothesis, but they are based on restricted data sets or invalid statistical analyses (which assume that every species provides independent information). Here we apply information-theoretic statistical methods that are phylogenetically informed to a large data set on diving variables for birds and mammals to describe the allometry of diving. Body mass is strongly related to all dive variables except dive : pause ratio. We demonstrate that many diving variables covary strongly with body mass and that they have allometric exponents close to 0.33. Thus, our results fail to falsify the oxygen store/usage hypothesis. The allometric relationships for most diving variables are statistically indistinguishable for birds and mammals, but birds tend to dive deeper than mammals of equivalent mass. The allometric relationships for all diving variables except mean dive duration are also statistically indistinguishable for all major taxonomic groups of divers within birds and mammals, with the exception of the procellariiforms, which, strictly speaking, are not true divers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We measured the effects of exposure to hypoxia (15% and 11% oxygen) and hypercapnia (up to 4.5% carbon dioxide) on rates of respiratory gas exchange both between and during dives in tufted ducks, Aythya fuligula, to investigate to what extent these may explain changes in diving behaviour. As found in previous studies, the ducks decreased dive duration (td) and increased surface duration when diving from a hypoxic or hypercapnic gas mix. In the hype rcapnic conditions, oxygen consumption during the dive cycle was not affected. Oxygen uptake between dives was reduced by only 17% when breathing a hypoxic gas mix of 11 % oxygen. However, estimates of the rate of oxygen metabolism during the foraging periods of dives decreased nearly threefold in 11 % oxygen. Given that tufted ducks normally dive well within their aerobic dive limits and that they significantly reduced their td during hypoxia, it is not at all clear why they make this physiological adjustment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ducks, fur seals, Weddell seals and probably most cetaceans seem to be able to dive and remain aerobic for durations that are consistent with their elevated stores of usable oxygen and their metabolic rate while diving being similar to that when they are resting at the surface of the water. Ducks, in fact, have a high metabolic rate while diving, mainly because of their large positive buoyancy, but other species have relatively low buoyancy, are better streamlined and use lift-based rather than drag-based propulsion. However, species such as the larger penguins, grey seals and elephant seals seem to achieve the impossible by performing a substantial proportion of their dives for periods longer than would be expected on the above assumptions, and yet remaining aerobic. The logical conclusion is that during such dives these species reduce their metabolic rate below the resting level (hypometabolism) and, in some of them, there is a regional reduction in body temperature (hypothermia) which may contribute to the reduction in metabolic rate. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The metabolic rate of moulting macaroni penguins Eudyptes chrysolophus was investigated using three techniques in order to test two hypotheses concerning the energetic cost of the moult fast in penguins. First, that energy expenditure during the moult is greater than that while penguins are onshore during the breeding season. Second, techniques that do not measure energy expenditure throughout the moult fast do not accurately determine the true cost of the moult. Mass loss calculations, measurement of the rate of oxygen consumption and estimation of the rate of oxygen consumption from heart rate in the field were used with captive and free-ranging penguins. Comparison of the results from these techniques suggest that metabolic rate is higher in the field than in a respirometer due to an increase in thermoregulatory costs. Furthermore the average metabolic rate of female penguins during the moult at 5.04±0.85 W kg−1 was not significantly different from that of female penguins on-shore during the breeding season at 6.27±0.38 W kg−1. Metabolic rate in the field changed during the moult fast as feather loss and increased vascularisation of the skin caused increased heat production, illustrating the importance of determining energy expenditure from animals in the field throughout the whole of the moult fast. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite important changes in print media and broadcasting, politicians in Ireland are acutely conscious of the critical role of local reputation, even for those holding high office at national level. The nature and scale of the political system, with Proportional Representation and multi-seat constituencies, means that political incumbents and candidates must engage in a permanent campaign of establishing and maintaining the reputation for service delivery at local levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The application of marketing models in political and public sector contexts is examined. The assumptions in marketing of positive outcomes of (i) rapid responses to consumer concerns, (i0 the extension of choice and customisation in product development, and (iii) the application of market research techniques are considered in turn. This analysis suggests that in the political context, responding rapidly to public opinion is not necessarily a sound reaction; extending choice and customisation of products may not best serve public welfare, and applying market research techniques may not provide for the best system for policy decisions. The features of liberal representative democracy, particularly the role of deliberation, informed assent and accountability, have been neglected. Speed of response has been emphasised to the cost of democratic filters and checks on public opinion; enhanced choice, enabled by mass customisation, presents problems of social fragmentation; and the application of market research is no substitute for political discourse and engagement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Determines the relationship between heart rate and oxygen consumption in marine iguanas in the Galapagos Islands at two different temperatures. Body temperature in the early morning and early afternoon; Body temperature at pre- and post-exercise; Propensity for short bursts of locomotion; Standard of error estimate.

Deals with a study which compared the energetic costs of swimming at the surface and underwater among aquatic tufted ducks and penguin species. Aerobic and anaerobic metabolism during locomotion; Rate of oxygen consumption during swimming and diving; Energy cost of swimming in penguins.

Focuses on a study that measured the fatty acid binding protein (FABP) in samples taken from the cardiac, pectoralis and semimembranosus muscles of a long-distance avian migrant, the barnacle goose at various development stages. Isolation and characterization of FABP from goose heart; FABP content of goose muscle samples during development; Muscle total protein content.

Suggests that the experience of flight activity may be of critical importance in achieving maximal expression of fatty acid binding protein in the pectoralis muscles of postfledgling and mature geese immediately before migration. Use of oxidated fatty acids as fuel for migratory flights; Transportation of fatty acid to mitochondria of active muscles.

Focuses on the physiological responses and control of diving birds and mammals. Methods for determining the metabolic rate of diving animals; Information on the animals' oxygen stores; Diving behavior of the animals; Cardiorespiratory relationships during diving; Cardiorespiratory responses to surfacing; Control of cardiorespiratory responses.

Presents a study which measured the differential thoracic air sacs in five diving tufted ducks, Aythya fuligula. Materials and methods; Data collection and analysis; Results and discussion.

Monitors maximum catabolic enzyme activities of locomotory muscles from the goslings of the wild migratory barnacle goose during growth and development and compare these to values obtained from premigratory geese. Activity of mitochondrial enzymes; Activity of glycolytic enzymes; Estimated maximum flux through catabolic pathways.

Information about the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL) annual conference on Law librarianship is presented. Topics include comments from Associate Director for Collection and Bibliographic Services at Northwestern University School of Law Eric Parker and the terminology Techniques for Electronic Resource Management also known as TERMS which was discussed at the conference. Innovative things happening in areas of librarianship are also discussed.

Challenges with alternative data sources for disease surveillance include differentiating the signal from the noise, and obtaining information from data constrained settings. For the latter, events such as increases in hospital traffic could serve as early indicators of social disruption resulting from disease. In this study, we evaluate the feasibility of using hospital parking lot traffic data extracted from high-resolution satellite imagery to augment public health disease surveillance in Chile, Argentina and Mexico. We used archived satellite imagery collected from January 2010 to May 2013 and data on the incidence of respiratory virus illnesses from the Pan American Health Organization as a reference. We developed dynamical Elastic Net multivariable linear regression models to estimate the incidence of respiratory virus illnesses using hospital traffic and assessed how to minimize the effects of noise on the models. We noted that predictions based on models fitted using a sample of observations were better. The results were consistent across countries with selected models having reasonably low normalized root-mean-squared errors and high correlations for both the fits and predictions. The observations from this study suggest that if properly procured and combined with other information, this data source could be useful for monitoring disease trends. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A letter to the editor is presented in response to the article "Double lumen central venous catheter for pediatric airway management in laryngeal papillomatosis: caution is warranted," by R. R. Ray, I. M. Sen, and V. Prabhu in the 2014 issue.

Exercise at high altitude is extremely challenging, largely due to hypobaric hypoxia (low oxygen levels brought about by low air pressure). In humans, the maximal rate of oxygen consumption decreases with increasing altitude, supporting progressively poorer performance. Bar-headed geese (Anser indicus) are renowned high altitude migrants and, although they appear to minimize altitude during migration where possible, they must fly over the Tibetan Plateau (mean altitude 4800 m) for much of their annual migration. This requires considerable cardiovascular effort, but no study has assessed the extent to which bar-headed geese may train prior to migration for long distances, or for high altitudes. Using implanted loggers that recorded heart rate, acceleration, pressure, and temperature, we found no evidence of training for migration in bar-headed geese. Geese showed no significant change in summed activity per day or maximal activity per day. There was also no significant change in maximum heart rate per day or minimum resting heart rate, which may be evidence of an increase in cardiac stroke volume if all other variables were to remain the same. We discuss the strategies used by bar-headed geese in the context of training undertaken by human mountaineers when preparing for high altitude, noting the differences between their respective cardiovascular physiology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comments on an article on anesthesia for phaeochromocytoma removal in a five-year-old boy, published in a previous issue of 'Paediatric Anaesthesia.' Additional criteria for adequate alpha blockade.

Great cormorants Phalacrocorax carbo are foot propelled diving birds that seem poorly suited to locomotion on land. They have relatively short legs, which are presumably adapted for the generation of high forces during the power stroke of aquatic locomotion, and walk with a pronounced “clumsy waddle”. We hypothesise (1) that the speed, independent minimum cost of locomotion ( C min, ml O2 m−1) will be high for cormorants during treadmill exercise, and (2) that cormorants will have a relatively limited speed range in comparison to more cursorial birds. We measured the rate of oxygen consumption $$ (\dot{V}_{{\rm O}_{2}}) $$ of cormorants during pedestrian locomotion on a treadmill, and filmed them to determine duty factor (the fraction of stride period that the foot is in contact with the ground), foot contact time ( t c), stride frequency ( f), swing phase duration and stride length. C min was 2.1-fold higher than that predicted by their body mass and phylogenetic position, but was not significantly different from the C min of runners (Galliformes and Struthioniformes). The extrapolated y-intercept of the relationship between $$ \dot{V}_{{\rm O}_{2}} $$ and speed was 1.9-fold higher than that predicted by allometry. Again, cormorants were not significantly different from runners. Contrary to our hypothesis, we therefore conclude that cormorants do not have high pedestrian transport costs. Cormorants were observed to use a grounded gait with two double support phases at all speeds measured, and showed an apparent gait transition between 0.17 and 0.25 m s−1. This transition occurs at a Froude number between 0.016 and 0.037, which is lower than the value of ~0.5 observed for many other species. However, despite the use of a limited speed range, and a gait transition at relatively low speed, we conclude that the pedestrian locomotion of these foot propelled diving birds is otherwise generally similar to that of cursorial birds at comparable relative velocities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many different physiological changes have been observed in wild waterfowl during the flightless stage of wing moult, including a loss of body mass. We aimed to determine whether captive barnacle geese (Branta leucopsis) would show the characteristic decrease in body mass during their wing moult, even though they had unlimited and unrestricted access to food. Fourteen captive geese were weighed at 1-2-week intervals for two complete years. During the flightless period of the moult, body mass decreased by approximately 25% from the pre- moult value. To understand the basis of this change, the rate of oxygen consumption was measured during daytime and nighttime at six points in the second year, and at three points (before, during and after wing moult) behavioural observations were made. Measurements of the rate of oxygen consumption showed an 80% increase above that of the nonmoulting periods of the year. We propose that metabolism was increased during moult because of the cost of feather synthesis. Although food was available, the captive birds chose not to forage and instead increased the proportion of time spent resting. It is likely that this behaviour in response to wing moult is a strategy to avoid predation in the wild. Thus, the innate nature of this behaviour has potential survival value for wild birds of this species. We conclude that the increase in metabolism led to the use of endogenous energy reserves because the birds reduced rather than increased their food intake rates, and as a result, the barnacle geese lost body mass during wing moult. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aquatic birds have access to limited amounts of usable oxygen when they forage (dive) underwater, so the major physiological constraint to their behaviour is the need to periodically visit the water surface to replenish these stores and remove accumulated carbon dioxide. The size of the oxygen stores and the rate at which they are used (Vo2) or carbon dioxide accumulates are the ultimate determinants of the duration that aquatic birds can remain feeding underwater. However, the assumption that the decision to terminate a dive is governed solely by the level of the respiratory stores is not always valid. Quantification of an optimal diving model for tufted ducks (Aythya fuligula) shows that while they dive efficiently by spending a minimum amount of time on the surface to replenish the oxygen used during a dive, they dive with nearly full oxygen stores and surface well before these stores are exhausted. The rates of carbon dioxide production during dives and removal during surface intervals are likely to be at least as important a constraint as oxygen; thus, further developments of optimal diving models should account for their effects. In the field, diving birds will adapt to changing environmental conditions and often maximise the time spent submerged during diving bouts. However, other factors influence the diving depths and durations of aquatic birds, and in some circumstances they are unable to forage sufficiently well to provide food for their offspring. The latest developments in telemetry have demonstrated how diving birds can make physiological decisions based on complex environmental factors. Diving penguins can control their inhaled air volume to match the expected depth, likely prey encounter rate, and buoyancy challenges of the following dive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Models of diving optimality qualitatively predict diving behaviours of aquatic birds and mammals. However, none of them has been empirically tested. We examined the quantitative predictions of optimal diving models by combining cumulative oxygen uptake curves with estimates of power costs during the dives of six tufted ducks, Aythya fuligula. The effects of differing foraging costs on dive duration and rate of oxygen uptake (VO2up) at the surface were measured during bouts of voluntary dives to a food tray. The birds were trained to surface into a respirometer after each dive, so that changes in VO2up over time could be measured. The tray held either just food or closely packed stones on top of the food to make foraging energetically more costly. In contrast to predictions from the Houston & Carbone model, foraging time (tf) increased after dives incorporating higher foraging energy costs but surface time (ts) remained the same. While optimal diving models have assumed that the cumulative oxygen uptake curve is fixed, VO2up increased when the energy cost of the dive increased. The optimal breathing model quantitatively predicted ts in both conditions and oxygen consumption during foraging (m2tf) in the control condition, for the mean of all ducks. This offers evidence that the ducks were diving optimally and supports the fundamentals of optimal diving theory. However, the model did not consistently predictts or m2tf for individual birds. We discuss the limits of optimal foraging models for air-breathing divers caused by individual variation. Copyright 2003 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd on behalf of The Association for the Study of Animal Behaviour. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Investigates the hypothesis that tissue-levels of thyroid hormones are essential for normal locomotor muscle development, using the barnacle goose (Branta leucopsis), to test this hypothesis. Details on the induction of hypothyroidism in goslings; Information on developmental responses to hypothyroidism; Results of the investigation.