Objectives: Explore digital technology use among recreational runners in Wales and assess attitudes toward a proposed digital intervention for running-related injury (RRI) prevention and self-management.
Design: Exploratory survey.
Setting: Online questionnaire, closed questions distributed to runners over a 7 week period.
The National Environmental Health Association strives to provide up-to-date and relevant information on environmental health and to build partnerships in the profession. In pursuit of these goals, we feature this column on environmental health services from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in every issue of the . In these columns, authors from CDC's Water, Food, and Environmental Health Services Branch, as well as guest authors, will share tools, resources, and guidance for environmental health practitioners.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFMobile genetic elements (MGEs) like plasmids, viruses, and transposable elements can provide fitness benefits to their hosts for survival in the presence of environmental stressors. Heavy metal resistance genes (HMRGs) are frequently observed on MGEs, suggesting that MGEs may be an important driver of adaptive evolution in environments contaminated with heavy metals. Here, we report the meta-mobilome of the heavy metal-contaminated regions of the Oak Ridge Reservation subsurface.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe sources and sinks of nitrous oxide, as control emissions to the atmosphere, are generally poorly constrained for most environmental systems. Initial depth-resolved analysis of nitrous oxide flux from observation wells and the proximal surface within a nitrate contaminated aquifer system revealed high subsurface production but little escape from the surface. To better understand the environmental controls of production and emission at this site, we used a combination of isotopic, geochemical, and molecular analyses to show that chemodenitrification and bacterial denitrification are major sources of nitrous oxide in this subsurface, where low DO, low pH, and high nitrate are correlated with significant nitrous oxide production.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFUnderstanding drivers of disease vectors' population dynamics is a pressing challenge. For short-lived organisms like mosquitoes, landscape-scale models must account for their highly local and rapid life cycles. Aedes aegypti, a vector of multiple emerging diseases, has become abundant in desert population centers where water from precipitation could be a limiting factor.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAedes aegypti is the primary vector of dengue virus and threatens 3.9 billion people living in many tropical and subtropical countries. Prevention and reduction of dengue and other Aedes-borne viruses, including Zika and chikungunya, requires control of mosquito populations.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEnvironmental contamination constrains microbial communities impacting diversity and total metabolic activity. The former S-3 Ponds contamination site at Oak Ridge Reservation (ORR), TN, has elevated concentrations of nitric acid and multiple metals from decades of processing nuclear material. To determine the nature of the metal contamination in the sediment, a three-step sequential chemical extraction (BCR) was performed on sediment segments from a core located upgradient (EB271, non-contaminated) and one downgradient (EB106, contaminated) of the S-3 Ponds.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThroughout the COVID-19 pandemic, the American College Health Association (ACHA) has partnered with CommunicateHealth (CH) to develop COVID-19 mitigation resources for colleges and universities. In 2021, the CH team conducted a series of applied research activities to gain a nuanced understanding of factors that shape perceptions of risk and drive vaccine hesitancy among campus audiences-especially college students who are emerging adults (approximately ages 18 to 22). Based on our findings, CH and ACHA identified key traits of vaccine-hesitant college students and implications for future vaccine communication campaigns.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDengue transmission is determined by a complex set of interactions between the environment, mosquitoes, dengue viruses, and humans. Emergence in new geographic areas can be unpredictable, with some regions having established mosquito populations for decades without locally acquired transmission. Key factors such as mosquito longevity, temperature-driven extrinsic incubation period (EIP), and vector-human contact can strongly influence the potential for disease transmission.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: One in four American adults reports having at least one disability. The COVID-19 pandemic has disproportionately impacted people with disabilities and widened already-existing health disparities and inequities. For many people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD), these disparities are compounded by literacy limitations that make it challenging to access, understand, and act upon critical COVID-19 prevention information.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNonpathogenic bacteria likely play important roles in the biology and vector competence of ticks and other arthropods. Coxiella, a gram-negative gammaproteobacterium, is one of the most commonly reported maternally inherited endosymbionts in ticks and has been associated with over 40 tick species. Species-specific Coxiella-like endosymbionts (CLEs) have been reported in the brown dog tick, Rhipicephalus sanguineus sensu lato (Acari: Ixodidae), throughout the world, while recent research suggests low Coxiella diversity among tick species.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFGiven that older (L.) mosquitoes typically pose the greatest risk of pathogen transmission, the capacity to age grade wild mosquito populations would be a valuable tool in monitoring the potential risk of arboviral transmission. Here, we compared the effectiveness of near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) to age grade field-collected with two alternative techniques-parity analysis and transcript abundance of the age-associated gene .
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInt J Environ Res Public Health
April 2022
s.l. (Latreille, 1806), the brown dog tick, is the most widely distributed tick species in the world.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFVertical transmission, or pathogen transfer from female to offspring, can facilitate the persistence of emerging arboviruses, such as Zika virus (ZIKV), through periods of low horizontal transmission or adverse environmental conditions. We aimed at determining the rate of vertical transmission for ZIKV in its principal vector, , and the vector competence of vertically infected progeny. females that consumed a blood meal provisioned with ZIKV were maintained under three temperature conditions (27°C, 30°C, and 33°C) following the infectious blood meal and allowed to complete three reproductive cycles.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe Aedes aegypti mosquito is the primary vector of dengue, yellow fever, chikungunya, and Zika viruses. Infection with the dengue virus alone occurs in an estimated 400 million people each year. Likelihood of infection with a virus transmitted by Ae.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Am Mosq Control Assoc
March 2019
Vector surveillance is an essential component of vector-borne disease prevention, but many communities lack resources to support extensive surveillance. The Great Arizona Mosquito Hunt (GAMH) was a collaborative citizen science project conducted during 2015-17 to enhance surveillance for in Arizona. Citizen science projects engage the public in scientific research in order to further scientific knowledge while improving community understanding of a specific field of science and the scientific process.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAedes aegypti (L.; Diptera: Culicidae) has been established in the southwestern United States for several decades, but relationships between humans and mosquitoes in this arid region are not well-characterized. In August 2012, the outdoor premises of 355 houses within 20 neighborhoods in Tucson, Arizona were surveyed for containers that could provide larval habitat for Ae.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjectives: To elucidate the unique sleep and waking characteristics in progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), a neurodegenerative disease associated with motor deficits and dementia that largely affects the brainstem and thalamic regions.
Methods: A total of 20 PSP and 16 healthy older adult controls participated in this study. The participants underwent an overnight polysomnography and multiple sleep latency test (MSLT) the following day.
Background: Government-administered adulticiding is frequently conducted in response to dengue transmission worldwide. Anecdotal evidence suggests that spraying may create a "false sense of security" for residents. Our objective was to determine if there was an association between residents' reporting outdoor spatial insecticide spraying as way to prevent dengue transmission and both their reported frequency of dengue prevention practices and household entomological indices in Hermosillo, Mexico.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDengue virus, primarily transmitted by the Aedes aegypti (L.) mosquito, has rapidly expanded in geographic extent over the past several decades. In some areas, however, dengue fever has not emerged despite established Ae.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective/background: The brainstem is among the first regions affected in progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP) and is part of the sleep/circadian regulation network. In two small studies, blood pressure and core body temperature circadian patterns were disrupted in PSP; however, it is unclear if circadian activity rhythms are also affected. Our objective was to perform circadian analyses of the rest-activity rhythms in PSP and determine the association with increasing disease severity.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAs the range of dengue virus (DENV) transmission expands, an understanding of community uptake of prevention and control strategies is needed both in geographic areas where the virus has recently been circulating and in areas with the potential for DENV introduction. Personal protective behaviors such as the use of mosquito repellent to limit human-vector contact and the reduction of vector density through elimination of oviposition sites are the primary control methods for Aedes aegypti, the main vector of DENV. Here, we examined personal mosquito control measures taken by individuals in Key West, FL, in 2012, which had experienced a recent outbreak of DENV, and Tucson, AZ, which has a high potential for introduction but has not yet experienced autochthonous transmission.
View Article and Find Full Text PDF