Workplace discrimination for persons with hearing loss: Before and after the 2008 ADA Amendments Act.

Background: Individuals with hearing loss experience unique barriers to employment frequently documented in the areas of communication and education. The purpose of this article is to contribute to extend this inquiry to the uniqueness of workplace discrimination involving persons with hearing loss.

Objective: This study investigated differences in allegations of workplace discrimination filed by persons with hearing loss ("Hearing") compared to those filed by persons with other physical or neurological disabilities (General Disability, or "GENDIS") before and after the enactment of the 2008 Americans with Disabilities Act Amendments Act (2008 Amendments).

Examination of Summer Campers' Physical Activity Interest and Behavior.

This study has provided insight into the complex relationship between situational interest, the social environment, competence, and behavior. This quasi-experiential design included a pre-test questionnaire, intervention activity of throwing and catching a football, and post-test questionnaire administered to forty children aged 7-13 enrolled in a summer camp. The results of this study supported a theoretical approach that hypothesized that competence positively influences situational interest.

Comparing the Efficacy and Safety of Treating Chronic Hepatitis B Infection during Pregnancy with Lamivudine, Telbivudine, and Tenofovir: A Meta-analysis.

The perinatal transmission of hepatitis B virus (HBV) remains an important global health problem. Here, a systematic review and meta-analysis were conducted to evaluate the evidence regarding the efficacy and maternal/fetal safety of treating pregnant women with lamivudine, telbivudine (LdT), and tenofovir (TDF). A PubMed and Scopus search resulted in 1,076 records, which were reduced to 36, containing 7,717 pregnant women with chronic HBV infection and 7467 infants meeting the inclusion criteria.

Adolescent food insecurity: the special case of Marshallese youth in north-west Arkansas, USA.

Objective: Food insecurity is not randomly dispersed throughout the population; rather, there are a number of risk and protective factors shaping both the prevalence and severity of food insecurity across households and sociodemographic populations. The present study examines some of these factors and the role that race and ethnicity among adolescent individuals in north-west Arkansas might play, paying specific attention to a subgroup of Pacific Islanders: the Marshallese.

Design: The study uses cross-sectional survey data collected from a self-administered questionnaire of 10th-12th grade students.

Image Captioning with Bidirectional Semantic Attention-Based Guiding of Long Short-Term Memory.

Automatically describing contents of an image using natural language has drawn much attention because it not only integrates computer vision and natural language processing but also has practical applications. Using an end-to-end approach, we propose a bidirectional semantic attention-based guiding of long short-term memory (Bag-LSTM) model for image captioning. The proposed model consciously refines image features from previously generated text.

Single-nucleotide polymorphisms associated with pemphigus vulgaris: Potent markers for better treatment and personalized medicine.

Pemphigus vulgaris (PV) is a rare autoimmune blistering disorder, which could affect both skin and mucosal surfaces. There is increasing evidence that genetics plays a critical role in PV development, severity and prognosis. Single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) are the most common type of genetic variation among people and have been widely evaluated in most diseases.

Local edge-enhanced active contour for accurate skin lesion border detection.

Background: Dermoscopy is one of the common and effective imaging techniques in diagnosis of skin cancer, especially for pigmented lesions. Accurate skin lesion border detection is the key to extract important dermoscopic features of the skin lesion. In current clinical settings, border delineation is performed manually by dermatologists.

Enzymatic analysis of glucuronidation of synthetic cannabinoid 1-naphthyl 1-(4-fluorobenzyl)-1H-indole-3-carboxylate (FDU-PB-22).

Recently, there has been a rise in abuse of synthetic cannabinoids (SCBs). The consumption of SCBs results in various effects and can induce toxic reactions, including paranoia, seizures, tachycardia and even death. 1-Naphthyl 1-(4-fluorobenzyl)-1H-indole-3-carboxylate (FDU-PB-22) is a third generation SCB whose metabolic pathway has not been fully characterized.

Correction to: MISC: missing imputation for single-cell RNA sequencing data.

It was highlighted that the original article [1] contained a typesetting error in the last name of Allon Canaan. This was incorrectly captured as Allon Canaann in the original article which has since been updated.

MISC: missing imputation for single-cell RNA sequencing data.

Background: Single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) technology provides an effective way to study cell heterogeneity. However, due to the low capture efficiency and stochastic gene expression, scRNA-seq data often contains a high percentage of missing values. It has been showed that the missing rate can reach approximately 30% even after noise reduction.

Measuring word retrieval in narrative discourse: core lexicon in aphasia.

Background: Discourse analysis procedures are time consuming and impractical in a clinical setting. Critical to clinicians are simple and informative discourse measures that require minimal time and labour to complete. Many studies, however, have overlooked difficulties that clinicians face.

Correlates of Illicit Drug Use Among Indigenous Peoples in Canada: A Test of Social Support Theory.

Relying on a national stratified random sample of Indigenous peoples aged 19 years old and above in Canada, this study investigates the correlates of illicit drug use among Indigenous peoples, paying special attention to the association between social support measures and illegal drug use. Results from multivariate logistical regression show that measures of social support, such as residential mobility, strength of ties within communities, and lack of timely counseling, are statistically significant correlates of illicit drug use. Those identifying as Christian are significantly less likely to use illegal drugs.

Fine-scale variation in microclimate across an urban landscape shapes variation in mosquito population dynamics and the potential of Aedes albopictus to transmit arboviral disease.

Most statistical and mechanistic models used to predict mosquito-borne disease transmission incorporate climate drivers of disease transmission by utilizing environmental data collected at geographic scales that are potentially coarser than what mosquito populations may actually experience. Temperature and relative humidity can vary greatly between indoor and outdoor environments, and can be influenced strongly by variation in landscape features. In the Aedes albopictus system, we conducted a proof-of-concept study in the vicinity of the University of Georgia to explore the effects of fine-scale microclimate variation on mosquito life history and vectorial capacity (VC).

Translating Divergent Environmental Stresses into a Common Proteome Response through Hik33 in a Model Cyanobacterium.

The histidine kinase Hik33 plays important roles in mediating cyanobacterial response to divergent types of abiotic stresses including cold, salt, high light (HL), and osmotic stresses. However, how these functions are regulated by Hik33 remains to be addressed. Using a hik33-deficient strain (Δhik33) of Synechocystis sp.

OOSTT: a Resource for Analyzing the Organizational Structures of Trauma Centers and Trauma Systems.

Organizational structures of healthcare organizations has increasingly become a focus of medical research. In the CAFÉ project we aim to provide a web-service enabling ontology-driven comparison of the organizational characteristics of trauma centers and trauma systems. Trauma remains one of the biggest challenges to healthcare systems worldwide.

Abrupt skin lesion border cutoff measurement for malignancy detection in dermoscopy images.

Background: Automated skin lesion border examination and analysis techniques have become an important field of research for distinguishing malignant pigmented lesions from benign lesions. An abrupt pigment pattern cutoff at the periphery of a skin lesion is one of the most important dermoscopic features for detection of neoplastic behavior. In current clinical setting, the lesion is divided into a virtual pie with eight sections.

Impacts of coal ash on methylmercury production and the methylating microbial community in anaerobic sediment slurries.

Mercury (Hg) associated with coal ash is an environmental concern, particularly if the release of coal ash to the environment is associated with the conversion of inorganic Hg to methylmercury (MeHg), a bioaccumulative form of Hg that is produced by anaerobic microorganisms. In this study, sediment slurry microcosm experiments were performed to understand how spilled coal ash might influence MeHg production in anaerobic sediments of an aquatic ecosystem. Two coal ash types were used: (1) a weathered coal ash; and (2) a freshly collected, unweathered fly ash that was relatively enriched in sulfate and Hg compared to the weathered ash.

Analysis of Protein-protein Interaction Interface between Yeast Mitochondrial Proteins Rim1 and Pif1 Using Chemical Cross-linking Mass Spectrometry.

Defining protein-protein contacts is a challenging problem and cross-linking is a promising solution. Here, we present a case of mitochondrial single strand binding protein Rim1 and helicase Pif1, an interaction first observed in immuno-affinity pull-down from yeast cells using Pif1 bait. We found that only the short succinimidyl-diazirine cross-linker or formaldehyde captured the interaction between recombinant Rim1 and Pif1.

Electrothermal Vaporization Sample Introduction for Spaceflight Water Quality Monitoring via Gas Chromatography-Differential Mobility Spectrometry.

In the history of manned spaceflight, environmental monitoring has relied heavily on archival sampling. However, with the construction of the International Space Station (ISS) and the subsequent extension in mission duration up to one year, an enhanced, real-time method for environmental monitoring is necessary. The station air is currently monitored for trace volatile organic compounds (VOCs) using gas chromatography-differential mobility spectrometry (GC-DMS) via the Air Quality Monitor (AQM), while water is analyzed to measure total organic carbon and biocide concentrations using the Total Organic Carbon Analyzer (TOCA) and the Colorimetric Water Quality Monitoring Kit (CWQMK), respectively.

Large Scale Chemical Cross-linking Mass Spectrometry Perspectives.

The spectacular heterogeneity of a complex protein mixture from biological samples becomes even more difficult to tackle when one's attention is shifted towards different protein complex topologies, transient interactions, or localization of PPIs. Meticulous protein-by-protein affinity pull-downs and yeast-two-hybrid screens are the two approaches currently used to decipher proteome-wide interaction networks. Another method is to employ chemical cross-linking, which gives not only identities of interactors, but could also provide information on the sites of interactions and interaction interfaces.

Overview of biological database mapping services for interoperation between different 'omics' datasets.

Many primary biological databases are dedicated to providing annotation for a specific type of biological molecule such as a clone, transcript, gene or protein, but often with limited cross-references. Therefore, enhanced mapping is required between these databases to facilitate the correlation of independent experimental datasets. For example, molecular biology experiments conducted on samples (DNA, mRNA or protein) often yield more than one type of 'omics' dataset as an object for analysis (eg a sample can have a genomics as well as proteomics expression dataset available for analysis).

Episodes in insect evolution.

This article derives from a society-wide symposium organized by Timothy Bradley and Adriana Briscoe and presented at the 2009 annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology in Boston, Massachusetts. David Grimaldi provided the opening presentation in which he outlined the major evolutionary events in the formation and subsequent diversification of the insect clade. This presentation was followed by speakers who detailed the evolutionary history of specific physiological and/or behavioral traits that have caused insects to be both ecologically successful and fascinating as subjects for biological study.

Physician and patient satisfaction with the new AMS 700 momentary squeeze inflatable penile prosthesis.

Introduction: A single-armed, prospective, multicenter study evaluated the redesigned American Medical Systems (AMS) 700 Momentary Squeeze (MS) pump inflatable penile prosthesis (IPP) with enhanced features for ease of implantation and patient manipulation. The device incorporates design changes to all components: pump, cylinders, rear-tip extenders, and reservoir.

Aim: To assess physician and patient satisfaction with the new AMS 700 MS pump.

Structure and development of Medicago truncatula pod wall and seed coat.

Background And Aims: Medicago truncatula has gained much attention as a genomic model species for legume biology, but little is known about the morphology of its pods and seeds. Structural and developmental characteristics of M. truncatula pod walls and seed coats are presented.