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PubMed2005

Emission factors and importance of PCDD/Fs, PCBs, PCNs, PAHs and PM10 from the domestic burning of coal and wood in the U.K.

This paper presents emission factors (EFs) derived for a range of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) when coal and wood were subject to controlled burning experiments, designed to simulate domestic burning for space heating. A wide range of POPs were emitted, with emissions from coal being higher than those from wood. Highest EFs were obtained for particulate matter, PM10, (approximately 10 g/kg fuel) and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (approximately 100 mg/ kg fuel for sigmaPAHs). For chlorinated compounds, EFs were highest for polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), with polychlorinated naphthalenes (PCNs), dibenzo-p-dioxins (PCDDs) and dibenzofurans (PCDFs) being less abundant. EFs were on the order of 1000 ng/kg fuel for sigmaPCBs, 100s ng/ kg fuel for sigmaPCNs and 100 ng/kg fuel for sigmaPCDD/Fs. The study confirmed that mono- to trichlorinated dibenzofurans, Cl1,2,3DFs, were strong indicators of low temperature combustion processes, such as the domestic burning of coal and wood. It is concluded that numerous PCB and PCN congeners are routinely formed during the combustion of solid fuels. However, their combined emissions from the domestic burning of coal and wood would contribute only a few percent to annual U.K. emission estimates. Emissions of PAHs and PM10 were major contributors to U.K. national emission inventories. Major emissions were found from the domestic burning for Cl1,2,3DFs, while the contribution of PCDD/F-sigmaTEQ to total U.K. emissions was minor.

Air Pollutants↗

PubMed2002

Domestic transmission routes of pathogens: the problem of in-house contamination of drinking water during storage in developing countries.

Even if drinking water of poor rural communities is obtained from a 'safe' source, it can become contaminated during storage in the house. To investigate the relative importance of this domestic domain contamination, a 5-week intervention study was conducted. Sixty-seven households in Punjab, Pakistan, were provided with new water storage containers (pitchers): 33 received a traditional wide-necked pitcher normally used in the area and the remaining 34 households received a narrow-necked water storage pitcher, preventing direct hand contact with the water. Results showed that the domestic domain contamination with indicator bacteria is important only when the water source is relatively clean, i.e. contains less than 100 Escherichia coli per 100 ml of water. When the number of E. coli in the water source is above this value, interventions to prevent the domestic contamination would have a minor impact on water quality compared with public domain interventions. Although the bacteriological water quality improved, elimination of direct hand contact with the stored water inside the household could not prevent the occasional occurrence of extreme pollution of the drinking water at its source. This shows that extreme contamination values that are often thought to originate within the domestic domain have to be attributed to the public domain transmission, i.e. filling and washing of the water pitchers. This finding has implications for interventions that aim at the elimination of these extreme contaminations.

Bacterial Infections↗

PubMed2002

Hanging, firearm, and non-domestic gas suicides among males: a comparative study.

OBJECTIVE: To identify characteristics that could distinguish males who completed suicide by hanging from males who completed suicide by firearms and non-domestic gas, and to suggest suicide prevention strategies targeted at hanging. METHOD: Using the psychological autopsy design, males who used hanging, firearms and non-domestic gas were compared on a range of variables covering social, psychological, and health related factors and aspects of the suicide incident. The sample consisted of 950 males who completed suicide in Queensland, Australia, between 1994 and 1996. RESULTS: Compared with males who used firearms and non-domestic gas, males who used hanging were significantly younger, less likely to have left a suicide note, and more likely to have been diagnosed with a psychotic disorder. Compared with males who used firearms, males who used hanging were significantly more likely to have made prior suicide attempts and have had no physical illness. Compared with males who used non-domestic gas, males who used hanging were significantly more likely to have lived with others, have had prior legal trouble, and have completed suicide at their residence. CONCLUSIONS: The results are discussed in terms of the availability and socio-cultural acceptability of methods. The authors suggest a possible relationship between impulsive traits and method choice. This proposition requires further investigation using alternative methodologies. Some suicide prevention measures targeting hanging suicides are discussed in light of the results.

Adolescent↗

PubMedDate not supplied

The roles of contemporary Mexican American women in domestic health work.

Domestic health work is defined as the day-to-day household activities, which are often invisible, that create the backbone of healthy environments and healthy individuals. This article describes the roles of a sample of contemporary Mexican American women in domestic health work. Using an ethnographic design, 13 moderately to highly acculturated women were interviewed to determine their roles in domestic health work. Women's roles fell into two broad categories: being a parent and caring for the family. The findings from this research highlight the burden and conflict of multiple roles in this sample and provide insight into the processes by which contemporary Mexican American women maintain culturally defined roles that they feel are important. It also addresses the burdens that they feel are culturally unnecessary. This research has significance for nurses working in the context of the community and the household in that it explicates women's roles in domestic health work and points to the need for community-based nurses to be aware of the many voices of Mexican American women.

Adult↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Confronting barriers to universal screening for domestic violence.

Nationally, domestic violence has reached epidemic proportions. Universal screening is a vital means to identify those women who suffer in abusive relationships with intimate partners. Collaborative efforts between a community shelter for abused women and a local medical center's emergency department resulted in the development and implementation of a universal screening process. Barriers encountered by the emergency department nursing staff during the initial phase of screening included lack of information about domestic violence issues as well as about the tool, personal perceptions and feelings about domestic violence, and institutional barriers such as lack of time, space, and privacy in the emergency department. Of these, informational and affective barriers of nursing staff are viewed as the most significant. Discussion includes a call for emphasis on domestic violence in the curricula of nursing programs and those of other health care providers and use of universal screening to identify and assist abused women. Interdisciplinary methods of formal education, in-service training, and continuing education are encouraged to augment existing universal screening, as well as to assist those who have yet to implement such a process.

Adolescent↗

PubMed1998

Investigation of the bottleneck leading to the domestication of maize.

Maize (Zea mays ssp. mays) is genetically diverse, yet it is also morphologically distinct from its wild relatives. These two observations are somewhat contradictory: the first observation is consistent with a large historical population size for maize, but the latter observation is consistent with strong, diversity-limiting selection during maize domestication. In this study, we sampled sequence diversity, coupled with simulations of the coalescent process, to study the dynamics of a population bottleneck during the domestication of maize. To do this, we determined the DNA sequence of a 1,400-bp region of the Adh1 locus from 19 individuals representing maize, its presumed progenitor (Z. mays ssp. parviglumis), and a more distant relative (Zea luxurians). The sequence data were used to guide coalescent simulations of population bottlenecks associated with domestication. Our study confirms high genetic diversity in maize-maize contains 75% of the variation found in its progenitor and is more diverse than its wild relative, Z. luxurians-but it also suggests that sequence diversity in maize can be explained by a bottleneck of short duration and very small size. For example, the breadth of genetic diversity in maize is consistent with a founding population of only 20 individuals when the domestication event is 10 generations in length.

Agriculture↗

PubMedDate not supplied

The dietary significance of adventitious iron, zinc, copper and lead in domestically prepared food.

The uptake of iron, zinc, copper and lead by food cooked under domestic conditions in utensils made of different metals (cast iron, aluminium, plain and tinned copper) was investigated. It was found that the metal content of the food was generally related to the metal in immediate contact with the food during cooking. Daily dietary intake could vary from 11 to 6 mg of iron, 11 to 9 mg of zinc, 2 to 1 mg of copper and 0.4 to 0.1 mg of lead, depending on the cooking utensils used. Dietary intake of the metals was also related to sources and domestic practices regarding water supply. Consistent use of municipal water from a domestic hot water system could contribute a daily intake of 32 mg iron, 29 mg zinc and 12 mg copper. Rainwater stored in a galvanized iron tank could provide 23 mg of zinc per day when used for domestic purposes. The nutritional and toxicological significance of such adventitious sources of metals in the diet are discussed. The need to consider them when investigating the metal intake of individuals is stressed.

Cooking↗

PubMed2006

Improving services for lesbian clients: what do domestic violence agencies need to do?

In her 2004 master's thesis Simpson identified that lesbian victims of domestic violence who are seeking services face systemic, institutional, and individual barriers. For this qualitative study, building on that work, we used in-depth interviews with six staff members who represented both a traditional domestic violence agency and a lesbian social service agency providing domestic violence services. The interviews revealed policy changes that might be made: institutional inclusion, assessment of language and literature, training and supervision, and institutional evaluation and quality assurance. These changes may improve the experiences of lesbian victims who are seeking services from domestic violence agencies. Each change, with specific examples provided, is discussed.

Adult↗

PubMed2004

Birth of African Wildcat cloned kittens born from domestic cats.

In the present study, we used the African Wildcat (Felis silvestris lybica) as a somatic cell donor to evaluate the in vivo developmental competence, after transfer into domestic cat recipients, of cloned embryos produced by the fusion of African Wildcat (AWC) fibroblast cell nuclei with domestic cat cytoplasts. Cloned embryos were produced by fusion of a single AWC somatic cell to in vivo or in vitro enucleated domestic cat cytoplasts. When the two sources of oocytes were compared, fusion rate was higher using in vivo-matured oocytes as recipient cytoplasts, but cleavage rate was higher after reconstruction of in vitro-matured oocytes. To determine the number of reconstructed embryos required per domestic cat recipient to consistently establish pregnancies, AWC cloned embryos were transferred within two groups: recipients (n = 24) receiving < or =25 embryos and recipients (n = 26) receiving > or =30 embryos. Twelve recipients (46.2%) receiving > or =30 embryos were diagnosed to be pregnant, while no pregnancies were established in recipients receiving < or =25 NT embryos. Also, to determine the influence of length of in vitro culture on pregnancy rate, we compared oviductal transfer on day 1 and uterine transfer on day 5, 6, or 7. Pregnancy rates were similar after transfer of embryos on day 1 (6/12; 50.0%), day 5 (4/9; 44.4%), or day 6 (2/5; 40.0%) to synchronous recipients, but the number of fetuses developing after transfer of embryos on day 1 (n = 17), versus day 5 (n = 4) or day 6 (n = 3) was significantly different. Of the 12 pregnant recipients, nine (75%) developed to term and fetal resorption or abortion occurred in the other three (25%) from day 30 to 48 of gestation. Of a total of 17 cloned kittens born, seven were stillborn, eight died within hours of delivery or up to 6 weeks of age, and two are alive and healthy. Perinatal mortality was due to lung immaturity at premature delivery, placental separation and bacterial septicemia. Subsequent DNA analysis of 12 cat-specific microsatellite loci confirmed that all 17 kittens were clones of the AWC donor male. These AWC kittens represent the first wild carnivores to be produced by nuclear transfer.

Animals↗

PubMed2004

Emission of hexanal and carbon monoxide from storage of wood pellets, a potential occupational and domestic health hazard.

OBJECTIVES: The objective of the present study was to investigate and describe the emissions of volatile compounds, particularly hexanal and carbon monoxide, from large- and small-scale storage of wood pellets. METHODS: Air sampling was performed with Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and adsorbent sampling in pellet warehouses, domestic storage rooms, lumber kiln dryers and experimental set-ups. Literature studies were included to describe the formation of hexanal and carbon monoxide and the toxicology of hexanal. RESULTS: A arithmetic mean aldehyde level of 111 +/- 32 mg/m(3) was found in one warehouse, with a peak reading of 156 mg/m(3) [correction]. A maximum aldehyde reading of 457 mg/m(3) was recorded at the surface of a pellet pile. Hexanal (70-80% w/w) and pentanal (10-15% w/w) dominated, but acetone (83 +/- 24 mg/m(3)), methanol (18 +/- 7 mg/m(3)) and carbon monoxide (56 +/- 4 mg/m(3)) were also found. The emissions in a domestic storage room varied with the ambient temperature and peaked after 2 months storage in the midst of the warm season. Aldehyde levels of 98 +/- 4 mg/m(3) and carbon monoxide levels of 123 +/- 10 mg/m(3) were recorded inside such storage rooms. Elevated levels of hexanal (0.084 mg/m(3)) were recorded inside domestic housing and 6 mg/m(3) in a room adjacent to a poorly sealed storage area. Experimental laboratory studies confirmed the findings of the field studies. A field study of the emissions from industrial lumber drying also showed the formation of aldehydes and carbon monoxide. CONCLUSIONS: High levels of hexanal and carbon monoxide were strongly associated with storage of wood pellets and may constitute an occupational and domestic health hazard. The results from lumber drying show that the emissions of hexanal and carbon monoxide are not limited to wood pellets but are caused by general degradation processes of wood, facilitated by drying at elevated temperature. Emission of carbon monoxide from wood materials at low temperatures (<100 degrees C) has not previously been reported in the literature. We postulate that carbon monoxide is formed due to autoxidative degradation of fats and fatty acids. A toxicological literature survey showed that the available scientific information on hexanal is insufficient to determine the potential risks to health. However, the data presented in this paper seem sufficient to undertake preventive measures to reduce exposure to hexanal.

Air Pollutants↗

PubMed2005

Does usage of domestic heating influence internal environmental conditions and health?

BACKGROUND: Housing conditions are recognised as an important determinant of health. In the UK, interventions to improve domestic heating are in place with the expectation that they will improve health. As a component of evaluating such policies, this study assesses whether specific health outcomes are significantly associated with the extent and duration of domestic heating use, either directly or via a possible mediating effect of internal environmental conditions. METHODS: Baseline data from a prospective controlled study evaluating the health effects of a publicly-funded programme of heating improvements in Scotland were used to assess associations among heating use, internal conditions, and three specific health outcomes. RESULTS: There were significant associations (P < 0.01) between measures of heating use and the presence of environmental problems in the home, such as mould and condensation. The presence of such problems was, in turn, found to be significantly predictive of two health outcomes derived from the SF-36 (P < 0.01) and of adult wheezing (P < 0.05). The direction of significant associations was highly consistent: greater levels of heating were associated with reduced likelihood of environmental problems, and the presence of environmental problems was linked to poorer health status. Heating use was not directly associated with the health outcomes considered. CONCLUSIONS: The study findings are consistent with a conceptual model in which health may be influenced by usage patterns of domestic heating, via the mediating effect of poor internal environmental conditions. Since these findings are based on cross-sectional data, interpretation must be carried out cautiously. However, if confirmed by planned future work they have important implications for policy initiatives relating to domestic heating and fuel poverty.

Adult↗

PubMed2000

Variation and selection at the CAULIFLOWER floral homeotic gene accompanying the evolution of domesticated Brassica oleracea.

The evolution of plant morphologies during domestication events provides clues to the origin of crop species and the evolutionary genetics of structural diversification. The CAULIFLOWER gene, a floral regulatory locus, has been implicated in the cauliflower phenotype in both Arabidopsis thaliana and Brassica oleracea. Molecular population genetic analysis indicates that alleles carrying a nonsense mutation in exon 5 of the B. oleracea CAULIFLOWER (BoCAL) gene are segregating in both wild and domesticated B. oleracea subspecies. Alleles carrying this nonsense mutation are nearly fixed in B. oleracea ssp. botrytis (domestic cauliflower) and B. oleracea ssp. italica (broccoli), both of which show evolutionary modifications of inflorescence structures. Tests for selection indicate that the pattern of variation at this locus is consistent with positive selection at BoCAL in these two subspecies. This nonsense polymorphism, however, is also present in both B. oleracea ssp. acephala (kale) and B. oleracea ssp. oleracea (wild cabbage). These results indicate that specific alleles of BoCAL were selected by early farmers during the domestication of modified inflorescence structures in B. oleracea.

Base Sequence↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Genetics of qualitative traits in domesticated chia (Salvia hispanica L.).

In Salvia hispanica L., several changes in qualitative characters, including seed coat color, stem pigmentation, and shattering, have evolved with cultivation and domestication. Three F(2) segregating generations from crosses between wild and domesticated parents were scored for three qualitative traits. A single recessive gene, designated scc, was found to govern the white seed characteristic. A single dominant gene, designated SSP, was found to control striated stem pigmentation. A complete dominance of open calyx over closed calyx was observed in F(1) generations and small numbers of plants with closed calyxes were observed in F(2) generations, not conforming to Mendelian ratios. For this non-shattering trait, a complementation test was conducted between two lines representative of geographically and morphologically divergent domesticated varieties. Complementary gene action was not observed in any F(1) plants, and all F(2) plants were homogeneous with respect to the trait, suggesting the same genetic control for non-shattering among domesticated varieties. An analysis of limited data for linkage of SSP and scc indicated that the two loci segregate independently.

Genes, Dominant↗

PubMed1997

Metric differences between silvatic and domestic Triatoma infestans (Heteroptera: Reduviidae) in Bolivia.

One hundred and fifty-seven specimens of Bolivian Triatoma infestans (Klug 1834), including 44 from the silvatic focus at Cochabamba (Bolivia), were compared using morphometric characters of the head capsule. From these specimens, 10 silvatic and 28 domestic adults were also compared using additional morphometric characters of the membranous part of the hemelytra. Nonparametric univariate comparisons between specimens from silvatic and domestic ecotopes indicated the importance of the postocular region as a possible diagnostic character for nymphs and adults from the different ecotopes, and they detected wing differences in males. Populations became more distinct entities when head or wing characters were considered jointly in canonical variate analysis. Regardless of whether size variation was considered, canonical variate analysis generally showed greater significance for wing than for head features. These morphological differences between silvatic and domestic bugs, particularly unrelated to size differences, are interpreted to indicate incipient separation between silvatic and domestic populations that had not been detected by previous isoenzyme analyses, and suggest a reinterpretation of the epidemiological significance of silvatic populations of T. infestans in Bolivia.

Analysis of Variance↗

PubMed2007

Multilocus analysis of nucleotide variation of Oryza sativa and its wild relatives: severe bottleneck during domestication of rice.

Varying degrees of reduction of genetic diversity in crops relative to their wild progenitors occurred during the process of domestication. Such information, however, has not been available for the Asian cultivated rice (Oryza sativa) despite its importance as a staple food and a model organism. To reveal levels and patterns of nucleotide diversity and to elucidate the genetic relationship and demographic history of O. sativa and its close relatives (Oryza rufipogon and Oryza nivara), we investigated nucleotide diversity data from 10 unlinked nuclear loci in species-wide samples of these species. The results indicated that O. rufipogon and O. nivara possessed comparable levels of nucleotide variation ((sil) = 0.0077 approximately 0.0095) compared with the relatives of other crops. In contrast, nucleotide diversity of O. sativa was as low as (sil) = 0.0024 and even lower ((sil) = 0.0021 for indica and 0.0011 for japonica), if we consider the 2 subspecies separately. Overall, only 20-10% of the diversity in the wild species was retained in 2 subspecies of the cultivated rice (indica and japonica), respectively. Because statistic tests did not reject the assumption of neutrality for all 10 loci, we further used coalescent to simulate bottlenecks under various lengths and population sizes to better understand the domestication process. Consistent with the dramatic reduction in nucleotide diversity, we detected a severe domestication bottleneck and demonstrated that the sequence diversity currently found in the rice genome could be explained by a founding population of 1,500 individuals if the initial domestication event occurred over a 3,000-year period. Phylogenetic analyses revealed close genetic relationships and ambiguous species boundary of O. rufipogon and O. nivara, providing additional evidence to treat them as 2 ecotypes of a single species. Lowest linkage disequilibrium (LD) was found in the perennial O. rufipogon where the r(2) value dropped to a negligible level within 400 bp, and the highest in the japonica rice where LD extended to the entirely sequenced region ( approximately 900 bp), implying that LD mapping by genome scans may not be feasible in wild rice due to the high density of markers needed.

Base Sequence↗

PubMed2003

Domestic radon risks may be dominated by bystander effects--but the risks are unlikely to be greater than we thought.

Radon risks derive from exposure of bronchio-epithelial cells to alpha particles. Alpha-particle exposure can result in bystander effects when irradiated cells emit signals resulting in damage to nearby unirradiated bystander cells. Bystander effects can cause downwardly-curving dose-response relations and inverse dose-rate effects. We have extended a quantitative mechanistic model of bystander effects to include protracted exposure, with inverse dose-rate effects attributed to replenishment, during exposure, of a subpopulation of cells which are hypersensitive to bystander signals. In this approach, bystander effects and the inverse dose-rate effect are manifestations of the same basic phenomenon. The model was fitted to dose- and dose-rate dependent radon-exposed miner data; the results suggest that one directly-hit target cell can send bystander signals to about 50 neighboring cells and that, in the case of domestic radon exposures, the risk could be dominated by bystander effects. The analysis concludes that a naive linear extrapolation of radon miner data to low doses, without accounting for dose rate/bystander effects, would result in an underestimation of domestic radon risks by about a factor of approximately 4. However, recent domestic radon risk estimates (BEIR VI) have already applied a phenomenological correction factor of approximately 4 for inverse dose-rate effects, and have thus already implicitly taken into account corrections which we here suggest are due to bystander effects. Thus current domestic radon risk estimates are unlikely to be underestimates as a result of bystander effects.

Air Pollution, Indoor↗

PubMed1998

Genotoxicity from domestic use of organophosphate pesticides.

This report describes the types of chromosome damage in peripheral blood found in patients exposed to domestic application of organophosphate pesticides. These changes serve as a biomarker of cumulative toxic exposure. Susceptible individuals show DNA damage as chromosome alterations. The importance of these findings is that the apparent genotoxic changes occurred from domestic application of two of the commonly used organophosphate pesticides in America and adds one more adverse potential effect from these hazardous chemicals. Peripheral blood from eight patients exposed to the domestic spraying of organophosphate pesticides was cultured and the chromosomes photographed. The types of chromosome alterations seen included chromatid and chromosome breaks, single and double minutes, dicentrics, rings, translocations, exchanges (including sister chromatid), and endoreduplications. Our findings support previous findings that organophosphate pesticides have genotoxic effects even at domestically sprayed levels.

Accidents, Home↗

PubMed1991

Molecular evidence for a role of domestic ducks in the introduction of avian H3 influenza viruses to pigs in southern China, where the A/Hong Kong/68 (H3N2) strain emerged.

The haemagglutinins (HAs) of five H3 influenza A viruses isolated from domestic ducks and one from a goose in southern China were analysed antigenically and genetically. The patterns of reactivity of two of the duck viruses and the goose virus with a panel of monoclonal antibodies to 10 different epitopes on the H3 HA were similar to those of influenza viruses isolated from wild ducks and pigs, as well as those of the earliest human H3 viruses. The other three isolates from domestic ducks were different from each other and from these viruses antigenically. Sequence analysis revealed that the HA genes of the two duck viruses and the goose virus were closely related to those of isolates from wild ducks and pigs; the identities between the deduced amino acid sequence of the HA of one of the isolates from domestic ducks and those of isolates from a wild duck and a pig were 98.7% and 99.5%, respectively. The antigenic and genetic similarity between these H3 HAs suggests that in southern China, the hypothetical influenza epicentre, domestic ducks may have played a role in the introduction of avian influenza viruses to pigs from feral ducks. The findings also support the hypothesis that the pig was a 'mixing vessel', producing a new human pandemic strain, A/Hong Kong/68 (H3N2), by genetic reassortment.

Amino Acid Sequence↗