6,027 results match your criteria: "University of Canterbury[Affiliation]"

The Influence of Strength and Skill Parameters on the Evolution of Dysphagia Post Stroke: A Prospective Study.

Dysphagia

December 2024

University of Canterbury Rose Centre for Stroke Recovery and Research, St George's Medical Centre, Level One, Leinster Chambers, 249 Papanui Road, Merivale, Christchurch, 8014, New Zealand.

The role of pathophysiological deficits in the evolution of dysphagia post-stroke is unclear. This observational, longitudinal study aimed to document the evolution and relationship between strength and precision of submental contraction, and swallowing outcomes at six months. Participants were recruited from a tertiary acute hospital after a first acute stroke.

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Replications are important for assessing the reliability of published findings. However, they are costly, and it is infeasible to replicate everything. Accurate, fast, lower-cost alternatives such as eliciting predictions could accelerate assessment for rapid policy implementation in a crisis and help guide a more efficient allocation of scarce replication resources.

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The aim of this narrative review is to summarize evidence relating the importance of nutrient intake from diet and supplementation for paediatric mental health. We begin by reviewing several mechanisms by which nutrients maximize brain health, including enabling metabolic reactions to occur, supporting mitochondrial function, reducing inflammation and assisting with detoxification. Circumstances that may contribute to an individual requiring additional nutrients beyond what are available in the diet, such as consumption of nutritionally depleted food, individual differences in biological need, long-term medication use and gut-brain health needs are then reviewed.

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Background: Tramway Ridge, a geothermal Antarctic Specially Protected Area (elevation 3340 m) located near the summit of Mount Erebus, is home to a unique community composed of cosmopolitan surface-associated micro-organisms and abundant, poorly understood subsurface-associated microorganisms. Here, we use shotgun metagenomics to compare the functional capabilities of this community to those found elsewhere on Earth and to infer in situ diversity and metabolic capabilities of abundant subsurface taxa.

Results: We found that the functional potential in this community is most similar to that found in terrestrial hydrothermal environments (hot springs, sediments) and that the two dominant organisms in the subsurface carry high rates of in situ diversity which was taken as evidence of potential endemicity.

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This research looked at how three different light intensities (1600, 4300, and 7200 lx) affect the biomass development, treatment of fuel synthesis wastewater and the recovery of valuable bioproducts between biofilm and suspended growth in a purple-bacteria enriched photobioreactor. Each condition was run in duplicate using an agricultural shade cloth as the biofilm support media in a continuously mixed batch reactor. The results showed that the highest chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal rate (56.

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Background: Travel restrictions and border controls were used extensively during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the processes for making robust evidence-based risk assessments of source countries to inform border control policies was in many cases very limited.

Methods: Between April 2020 and February 2022, all international arrivals to New Zealand were required to spend 14 days in government-managed quarantine facilities and were tested at least twice.

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Decline of antibodies to major viral and bacterial respiratory pathogens during the COVID-19 pandemic.

J Infect Dis

December 2024

Department of Molecular Medicine and Pathology, Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences, The University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.

Surges in infections caused by respiratory pathogens have been documented in multiple settings after relaxation of pandemic restrictions. Antibodies to major antigens from respiratory syncytial virus and Group A Streptococcus waned significantly in a longitudinal adult cohort throughout the pandemic. This waning may have contributed to the pathogen-surges that followed.

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Staphylococcus aureus is a significant human pathogen causing acute life-threatening, and chronic infections often linked to biofilms. This study conducted a comparative lipidomic analysis of a methicillin-resistant (MRSA) and a methicillin-susceptible (MSSA) S. aureus strain in both planktonic and biofilm cultures using liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy.

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Decreasing responsiveness to repeated visual stimuli (i.e., the inability to sustain attention) in jumping spiders (Salticidae) parallels that found in humans.

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This study evaluates the effectiveness of the Parent-child Brain Camp, a 4-week video-based executive functions (EFs) training program for children ages 5-6, through a randomized controlled trial with a pre- and post-test design with 173 Hong Kong children (intervention ni = 79, 48.7% girls, M = 69.16 months; control n = 94, 56.

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The influence of surface-groundwater interactions on nutrient dynamics in urban in-channel treatment systems.

Environ Monit Assess

December 2024

Department of Civil and Natural Resources Engineering, University of Canterbury, Private Bag 4800, 8140, Christchurch, New Zealand.

In-channel water treatment systems remove excess nutrients through biological, chemical, and physical processes associated with the hyporheic zone. However, the impact of surface and groundwater interactions on these treatment processes is poorly understood. This research aims to assess the influence of varying groundwater conditions (neutral, drainage water, and groundwater seepage) and different bed sediment hydraulic conductivities on nitrogen and phosphorus dynamics in in-channel treatment systems.

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Research on nutraceutical and dietary interventions in psychiatry has grown substantially, but progress is hindered by methodological inconsistencies and limited reporting standards. To address this, the International Society for Nutritional Psychiatry Research presents the first guidelines on clinical trial design, conduct, and reporting for future clinical trials in this area. Recommendations were developed using a Delphi process including eighteen researchers with considerable clinical trial expertise and experience in either methodology, nutraceutical, or dietary interventions in psychiatry.

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Background: While the benefits of fathers' engagement in pregnancy are well researched, little is known about first-time expectant fathers' information-seeking practices in Southeast Asia regarding pregnancy. In addition, there is a notable gap in understanding their information-sharing behaviors during the pregnancy journey. This information is important, as cultural norms are prevalent in Southeast Asia, and this might influence their information-sharing behavior, particularly about pregnancy.

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A search is reported for charge-parity violation in decays, using data collected in proton-proton collisions at recorded by the CMS experiment in 2018. The analysis uses a dedicated data set that corresponds to an integrated luminosity of 41.6 , which consists of about 10 billion events containing a pair of b hadrons, nearly all of which decay to charm hadrons.

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Article Synopsis
  • Early childhood is a crucial time for language development, and this study investigates how phoneme awareness and cognitive flexibility evolve in children aged 4 to 5, focusing on early, intermediate, and late language development patterns.
  • The study involved 439 four-year-olds who underwent various assessments, revealing that early language developers showed greater improvement in language and phonological skills, while intermediate and late developers exhibited steeper increases in cognitive flexibility.
  • The results highlight the interconnectedness of phoneme awareness, cognitive functioning, and language skills, suggesting that interventions for children with language delays should focus on enhancing both literacy and executive function skills.
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Article Synopsis
  • Nonstructural carbohydrates (NSC) in leaves relate to photosynthesis and respiration, influencing plant strategies.
  • A study involving 114 species showed that total NSC concentrations varied widely but generally didn't correlate with leaf gas exchange or economic traits.
  • However, species with higher photosynthesis had shorter NSC residence times, indicating that daily carbon gain is mainly exported rather than stored.
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A model-based quantification of nonlinear expiratory resistance in Plethysmographic data of COPD patients.

Comput Methods Programs Biomed

November 2024

Department of Mechanical Engineering, Centre for Bio-Engineering, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand. Electronic address:

Background: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is characterised by airway obstruction with an increase in airway resistance (R) to airflow in the lungs. An extreme case of expiratory airway resistance is expiratory flow limitation, a common feature of severe COPD. Current analyses quantify expiratory R with linear model-based methods, which do not capture non-linearity's noted in COPD literature.

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Why does tinnitus vary with naps? A polysomnographic prospective study exploring the somatosensory hypothesis.

Hear Res

December 2024

Université Paris Cité, VIFASOM ERC 7330, Vigilance Fatigue Sommeil et Santé publique, Paris, France; APHP Hôtel-Dieu, Centre du Sommeil et de la Vigilance, Paris, France.

Background: Tinnitus, defined as the conscious awareness of a noise without any identifiable corresponding external acoustic source, can be modulated by various factors. Among these factors, tinnitus patients commonly report drastic increases of tinnitus loudness following nap sleep. Previous studies have suggested that this clinical pattern could be attributed to a somatosensory modulation of tinnitus.

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Objective: Previous evidence has established that micronutrient capsules can improve emotion regulation in children. This three-phased randomized open-label waitlist-controlled study investigated the safety of a micronutrient powder absorbed by the oral mucosa and its effects on emotion dysregulation in 5-to-10-year-old children. The primary outcome measures were the Revised Clinician-rated Temper and Irritability Scale (CL-ARI) and the Clinical Global Impressions-Improvement Scale (CGI-I).

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Objective: This study sought to understand cleft team clinician experiences of transitioning patients from pediatric to adult cleft care services in New Zealand.

Design: The qualitative study conducted 4 interviews and 4 focus groups with Cleft Team clinicians either in person or over Zoom. Data were analyzed using inductive thematic analysis to identify themes.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study focuses on detecting multijet signatures from proton-proton collisions at a high energy of 13 TeV, analyzing a dataset totaling 128 fb^{-1}.
  • A special data scouting method is utilized to pick out events with low combined momentum in jets.
  • This research is pioneering in its investigation of electroweak particle production in R-parity violating supersymmetric models, particularly examining hadronically decaying mass-degenerate higgsinos, and it broadens the limits on the existence of R-parity violating top squarks and gluinos.
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Search for an eV-Scale Sterile Neutrino Using Improved High-Energy ν_{μ} Event Reconstruction in IceCube.

Phys Rev Lett

November 2024

Department of Physics and Wisconsin IceCube Particle Astrophysics Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, Wisconsin 53706, USA.

Article Synopsis
  • * The study introduces enhanced modeling techniques for neutrino flux and detector response, and it distinguishes between starting (inside) and throughgoing (outside) neutrino interaction events to improve energy resolution.
  • * The findings indicate a best-fit point for the 3+1 model with sin²(2θ_{24})=0.16 and Δm_{41}²=3.5 eV², supporting previous studies while showing consistency with no evidence of sterile neutrinos, as reflected
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Article Synopsis
  • * A study of over 19,000 autistic youth revealed they had higher rates of hospitalization and specialist visits, particularly for mental health medications compared to non-autistic youth.
  • * Autistic youth with intellectual disabilities showed increased physical health service usage but lower mental health service usage, indicating a gap in healthcare meeting the needs of autistic youth that requires further investigation and improvement.
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Understanding the role of climate in the assembly of rainforest tree communities is informative for predicting how future climates will impact species and communities. We surveyed rainforest tree communities across the Australian subtropics (spanning 600 to 2500 mm rainfall year) and measured functional traits on 285 (91%) of all recorded species. We used principal component analysis to create axes approximating species' hydraulic strategies, leaf economics and stature and included these as predictors in joint species distribution models, along with traits describing dispersal ability and leaf phenology.

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