Micro mercury trapped ion clock prototypes with 10[Formula: see text] frequency stability in 1-liter packages.

Modern communication and navigation systems are increasingly relying on atomic clocks. As timing precision requirements increase, demands for lower SWaP (size, weight, and power) clocks rise. However, it has been challenging to break through the general trade-off trend between the clock stability performance and SWaP.

Understanding the role of the scrub nurse during robotic surgery.

In the operating theatre, the scrub nurse has a wide range of roles, including responsibility for organising and ensuring that the correct instrumentation is available to the surgeon in the operating field, while maintaining stringent adherence to the principles of asepsis. Robotic techniques have revolutionised many procedures, providing surgeons with improved tissue access and tool control compared with open or laparoscopic techniques. However, adopting this technology has created additional challenges in the scrub nurse's role in areas such as team dynamics and the need to gather and disseminate vital patient information.

Population dynamics and resource availability drive seasonal shifts in the consumptive and competitive impacts of introduced house mice () on an island ecosystem.

Background: House mice () are widespread and invasive on many islands where they can have both direct and indirect impacts on native ecological communities. Given their opportunistic, omnivorous nature the consumptive and competitive impacts of house mice on islands have the potential to vary over time in concert with resource availability and mouse population dynamics.

Methods: We examined the ecological niche of invasive house mice on Southeast Farallon Island, California, USA using a combination of mouse trapping, food resource surveys, and stable isotope analysis to better understand their trophic interactions with native flora and fauna.

Drought-Induced Civil Conflict Among the Ancient Maya.

The influence of climate change on civil conflict and societal instability in the premodern world is a subject of much debate, in part because of the limited temporal or disciplinary scope of case studies. We present a transdisciplinary case study that combines archeological, historical, and paleoclimate datasets to explore the dynamic, shifting relationships among climate change, civil conflict, and political collapse at Mayapan, the largest Postclassic Maya capital of the Yucatán Peninsula in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries CE. Multiple data sources indicate that civil conflict increased significantly and generalized linear modeling correlates strife in the city with drought conditions between 1400 and 1450 cal.

Surgical care practitioners: an audit across the surgical specialties.

Introduction: The Royal College of Surgeons of England (RCS), when devising their curriculum for surgical care practitioners (SCPs), aimed to provide a level of training to produce a practitioner able to work across the surgical patient's journey, providing care to, arguably, an advanced level. This audit planned to examine the reality of this.

Method: SCPs from a closed group, on the Facebook social media platform were invited to complete an online questionnaire about their role as an SCP.

Discovery of novel fish papillomaviruses: From the Antarctic to the commercial fish market.

Fish papillomaviruses form a newly discovered group broadly recognized as the Secondpapillomavirinae subfamily. This study expands the documented genomes of the fish papillomaviruses from six to 16, including one from the Antarctic emerald notothen, seven from commercial market fishes, one from data mining of sea bream sequence data, and one from a western gull cloacal swab that is likely diet derived. The genomes of secondpapillomaviruses are ∼6 kilobasepairs (kb), which is substantially smaller than the ∼8 kb of terrestrial vertebrate papillomaviruses.

Workforce issues: the blurring of boundaries in surgical care.

and discuss the need for clear boundaries for those nurses practising at an advanced level in surgical specialties.

The role of the surgical care practitioner during the COVID-19 pandemic: An audit of experiences.

Introduction: The Surgical Care Practitioner is a medical associate profession role, working to an advanced level, undertaken by registered nurses, operating department practitioners or physiotherapists, on completion of a Royal College of Surgeons accredited course. The COVID-19 pandemic has led to all heath care professionals needing to adapt to help support the health care system as it tackles its effect.

Aim: Audit of roles undertaken by Surgical Care Practitioners during the COVID-19 pandemic in the context of Royal College of Surgeons (2014) Curriculum to review the utilisation of this medical associate profession role.

Geolocator tagging links distributions in the non-breeding season to population genetic structure in a sentinel North Pacific seabird.

We tested the hypothesis that segregation in wintering areas is associated with population differentiation in a sentinel North Pacific seabird, the rhinoceros auklet (Cerorhinca monocerata). We collected tissue samples for genetic analyses on five breeding colonies in the western Pacific Ocean (Japan) and on 13 colonies in the eastern Pacific Ocean (California to Alaska), and deployed light-level geolocator tags on 12 eastern Pacific colonies to delineate wintering areas. Geolocator tags were deployed previously on one colony in Japan.

Killer whales redistribute white shark foraging pressure on seals.

Predatory behavior and top-down effects in marine ecosystems are well-described, however, intraguild interactions among co-occurring marine top predators remain less understood, but can have far reaching ecological implications. Killer whales and white sharks are prominent upper trophic level predators with highly-overlapping niches, yet their ecological interactions and subsequent effects have remained obscure. Using long-term electronic tagging and survey data we reveal rare and cryptic interactions between these predators at a shared foraging site, Southeast Farallon Island (SEFI).

Microbial Ecology of the Western Gull (Larus occidentalis).

Avian species host diverse communities of microorganisms which have important roles in the life of birds, including increased metabolism, protection from disease, and immune system development. Along with high human populations and a diversity of human uses of coastal zones, anthropogenic food sources are becoming increasingly available to some species, including gulls. Anthropogenic associations increase the likelihood of encountering foreign or pathogenic bacteria.

Genome Sequence of a Gyrovirus Associated with Ashy Storm-Petrel.

Ashy storm-petrels (order Procellariiformes) are seabirds that are found along the coast of California to Baja Mexico. A novel gyrovirus was identified from a cloacal swab of an ashy storm-petrel, which is the second gyrovirus to be identified in sea birds, the first being found in the related northern fulmar.

Increased reproductive investment associated with greater survival and longevity in Cassin's auklets.

Individuals increase lifetime reproductive output through a trade-off between investment in future survival and immediate reproductive success. This pattern may be obscured in certain higher quality individuals that possess greater reproductive potential. The Cassin's auklet () is a long-lived species where some individuals exhibit greater reproductive ability through a behaviour called double brooding.

Population-level plasticity in foraging behavior of western gulls ().

Background: Plasticity in foraging behavior among individuals, or across populations may reduce competition. As a generalist carnivore, western gulls () consume a wide range of marine and terrestrial foods. However, the foraging patterns and habitat selection (ocean or land) of western gulls is not well understood, despite their ubiquity in coastal California.

Life span and reproductive cost explain interspecific variation in the optimal onset of reproduction.

Fitness can be profoundly influenced by the age at first reproduction (AFR), but to date the AFR-fitness relationship only has been investigated intraspecifically. Here, we investigated the relationship between AFR and average lifetime reproductive success (LRS) across 34 bird species. We assessed differences in the deviation of the Optimal AFR (i.

Shifting Effects of Ocean Conditions on Survival and Breeding Probability of a Long-Lived Seabird.

With a rapidly changing climate, there is an increasing need to predict how species will respond to changes in the physical environment. One approach is to use historic data to estimate the past influence of environmental variation on important demographic parameters and then use these relationships to project the abundance of a population or species under future climate scenarios. However, as novel climate conditions emerge, novel species responses may also appear.

As the egg turns: monitoring egg attendance behavior in wild birds using novel data logging technology.

Egg turning is unique to birds and critical for embryonic development in most avian species. Technology that can measure changes in egg orientation and temperature at fine temporal scales (1 Hz) was neither readily available nor small enough to fit into artificial eggs until recently. Here we show the utility of novel miniature data loggers equipped with 3-axis (i.

Timing is everything: flexible phenology and shifting selection in a colonial seabird.

1. In order to reproduce successfully in a temporally varying environment, iteroparous animals must exhibit considerable behavioural flexibility across their lifetimes. By adjusting timing of breeding each year, parents can ensure optimal overlap between the energy intensive period of offspring production and the seasonal peak in favourable environmental conditions, thereby increasing their chances of successfully rearing young.

Helminth community of scaled quail (Callipepla squamata) from western Texas.

Forty-eight scaled quail (Callipepla squamata) were collected during August 2002 at Elephant Mountain Wildlife Management Area in Brewster County, Texas, and examined for helminths. Eight species of helminths were found (5 nematodes and 3 cestodes), representing 2,811 individuals. Of these species, Gongylonema sp.