Marginally outer trapped tubes in de Sitter spacetime.

We prove two results which are relevant for constructing marginally outer trapped tubes (MOTTs) in de Sitter spacetime. The first one (Theorem 1) holds more generally, namely for spacetimes satisfying the null convergence condition and containing a timelike conformal Killing vector with a "temporal function". We show that all marginally outer trapped surfaces (MOTSs) in such a spacetime are unstable.

Duration of death investigations that proceed to inquest in Australia.

Background: Recent government inquiries in several countries have identified the length of time it takes coroners to investigate deaths due to injury and other unnatural causes as a major problem. Delays undermine the integrity of vital statistics and adversely affect the deceased's family and others with interests in coroners' findings. Little is publicly known about the extent, nature and causes of these delays.

Relationship between penalties for road traffic infringements and crash risk in Queensland, Australia: a case-crossover study.

Background: Most countries have detailed lists of traffic rules and elaborate legal regimes for penalizing drivers who break them. Previous research has suggested that drivers tend to drive more safely after receiving penalties for traffic infringements.

Methods: We linked driver-level data on infringements and crashes in Queensland, Australia (1995-2010) with information on the licence histories of all drivers in the state.

Survival of the fittest: retrospective cohort study of the longevity of Olympic medallists in the modern era.

Objective: To determine whether Olympic medallists live longer than the general population.

Design: Retrospective cohort study, with passive follow-up and conditional survival analysis to account for unidentified loss to follow-up.

Setting And Participants: 15 174 Olympic athletes from nine country groups (United States, Germany, Nordic countries, Russia, United Kingdom, France, Italy, Canada, and Australia and New Zealand) who won medals in the Olympic Games held in 1896-2010.

Examining Specialization Among Sex Offenders Released From Prison.

A prevailing cultural stereotype about sex offenders is that they tend to specialize in sexual offending. Many recent policy developments-mainly aimed to restrict the liberties of sex offenders-are rooted in this idea. We examined the correctional and arrest records of a sample of 312 sex offenders released on parole in Colorado to determine the prevalence of sexual specialization among these offenders, and to compare the legal and social characteristics of specialists and versatile sex offenders.

Effectiveness of the 2005 compulsory personal flotation device (PFD) wearing regulations in reducing drowning deaths among recreational boaters in Victoria, Australia.

Objective: To investigate whether the Victorian mandatory personal flotation device wearing regulations that came into effect on 1 December 2005 reduced drowning deaths among recreational boaters in Victoria, Australia.

Design: A retrospective population-based 'before and after' study using Victorian coronial data on drowning deaths of occupants of recreational vessels operating in Victorian waters.

Methods: The annual numbers of deaths in the 5 years after the transition year of the regulations (2005) was compared with the annual numbers of deaths in the 6 years prior to the transition year, using the Mann-Whitney U test.

The role of boards in clinical governance: activities and attitudes among members of public health service boards in Victoria.

Objectives: To determine the nature and extent of governance activities by health service boards in relation to quality and safety of care and to gauge the expertise and perspectives of board members in this area.

Methods: This study used an online and postal survey of the Board Chair, Quality Committee Chair and two randomly selected members from the boards of all 85 health services in Victoria. Seventy percent (233/332) of members surveyed responded and 96% (82/85) of boards had at least one member respond.

Survival of the fittest: retrospective cohort study of the longevity of Olympic medallists in the modern era.

Objective: To determine whether Olympic medallists live longer than the general population.

Design: Retrospective cohort study, with passive follow-up and conditional survival analysis to account for unidentified loss to follow-up.

Setting And Participants: 15,174 Olympic athletes from nine country groups (United States, Germany, Nordic countries, Russia, United Kingdom, France, Italy, Canada, and Australia and New Zealand) who won medals in the Olympic Games held in 1896-2010.

Geographic variation in inquest rates in Australia.

This paper examines the relationship between the remoteness of locations in which deaths occur and coroners' decisions to hold inquests. We analysed 16,242 deaths investigated by coroners in three Australian states over 7.5 yrs.

Factors predicting coroners' decisions to hold discretionary inquests.

Background: Coroners in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and other countries in the Commonwealth hold inquests into deaths in two situations. Mandatory inquests are held when statutory rules dictate they must be; discretionary inquests are held based on the decisions of individual coroners. Little is known as to how and why coroners select particular deaths for discretionary inquests.

An exploratory study of Internet-initiated sexual offenses and the chat room sex offender: has the Internet enabled a new typology of sex offender?

This exploratory study examined 51 participants convicted of an Internet-initiated sex offense in which they attempted to entice an adolescent into a sexual relationship using an Internet chat room. All participants were convicted of a sex offense and subject to an evaluation as a part of sentencing requirements in Colorado. Clinical and behavioral data were obtained from each subject's offense-specific evaluation and chat room transcripts.

Italy as a major Ice Age refuge area for the bat Myotis myotis (Chiroptera: Vespertilionidae) in Europe.

The distribution of biota from the temperate regions changed considerably during the climatic fluctuations of the Quaternary. This is especially true for many bat species that depend on warm roosts to install their nursery colonies. Surveys of genetic variation among European bats have shown that the southern peninsulas (Iberia and the Balkans) harbour endemic diversity, but to date, no such surveys have been conducted in the third potential glacial refuge area, the Apennine peninsula.

Local existence of dynamical and trapping horizons.

Given a spacelike foliation of a spacetime and a marginally outer trapped surface S on some initial leaf, we prove that under a suitable stability condition S is contained in "horizon" i.e., a smooth 3-surface foliated by marginally outer trapped slices which lie in the leaves of the given foliation.

On the Penrose inequality for general horizons.

For asymptotically flat initial data of Einstein's equations satisfying an energy condition, we show that the Penrose inequality holds between the Arnowitt-Deser-Misner mass and the area of an outermost apparent horizon, if the data are suitably restricted. We prove this by generalizing Geroch's proof of monotonicity of the Hawking mass under a smooth inverse mean curvature flow, for data with non-negative Ricci scalar. Unlike Geroch we need not confine ourselves to minimal surfaces as horizons.