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PubMed2002

'It is a different war to fight here in Sweden'--the impact of involuntary migration on the health of refugee families in transition.

Involuntary migration and adaptation to a new cultural environment is known to be a stress factor. The aim of the study was to explore the impact of involuntary migration on the family health in order to identify specific health care issues related to refugee families in transition living in Sweden. Data was collected through interviews with 16 members of 10 different refugee families from Balkan countries, Kurdistan and Africa for which permission was obtained from the chairman of the local ethnic organizations in a municipality in the southern part of Sweden. In interpreting the material, analysis was made using a contextual approach with reference to phenomenography. The analysis resulted in four qualitatively different descriptive categories characterizing the health of the families: a distressed family living under prolonged tension; a contented family who leads a satisfactory life; a frustrated family who cannot lead a fully satisfactory life and a dejected family who feels deserted. Stressors seeking asylum, facing unemployment and changed roles, interacted negatively within the family. A friendly and understanding attitude from the host country was the main factor in promoting the health of the refugee families. Nursing interventions should therefore assist the families accordingly in order to promote the stability of the family system.

Adult↗

PubMed2001

Integrating particle image velocimetry and laser Doppler velocimetry measurements of the regurgitant flow field past mechanical heart valves.

This study investigates the transient regurgitant flow downstream of a prosthetic heart valve using both laser Doppler velocimetry (LDV) and particle image velocimetry (PIV). Until now, LDV has been the more commonly used tool in investigating the flow characteristics associated with mechanical heart valves. The LDV technique allows point-by-point velocity measurements and provides enough information about the temporal variations in the flow. The main drawback of this technique is the time consuming nature of the data acquisition process in order to assess an entire flow field area. The PIV technique, on the other hand, allows measurement of the entire flow field in space in a plane at a given instant. In this study, PIV with spatial resolution of 0 (1 mm) and LDV with a temporal resolution of 0 (1 ms) were used to measure the regurgitant flow proximal to the Björk-Shiley monostrut (BSM) valve in the mitral position. With PIV, the ability to measure 2 velocity components over an entire plane simultaneously provides a very different insight into the flow field compared to a more traditional point-to-point technique like LDV. In this study, a picture of the effects of occluder motion on the fluid flow in the atrial chamber is interpreted using an integration of PIV and LDV measurements. Specifically, fluid velocities in excess of 3.0 m/s were recorded in the pressure-driven jet during valve closure, and a 1.5 m/s sustained regurgitant jet was observed on the minor orifice side. Additionally, the effects of the impact and subsequent rebound of the occluder on the flow also were clearly recorded in spatial and temporal detail by the PIV and LDV measurements, respectively. The PIV results provide a visually intuitive way of interpreting the flow while the LDV data explore the temporal variations and trends in detail. This analysis is an integrated flow description of the effects of valve closure and leakage on the pulsatile regurgitation flow field past a tilting-disc mechanical heart valve (MHV). It further reinforces the hypothesis that the planar flow visualization techniques, when integrated with traditional point-to point techniques, provide significantly more insight into the complex pulsatile flow past MHVs.

Blood Flow Velocity↗

PubMed2006

Tracer diffusion in hard sphere fluids from molecular to hydrodynamic regimes.

Molecular dynamics is employed to investigate tracer diffusion in hard sphere fluids. Reduced densities (rho*=rhosigma(3), sigma is the diameter of bath fluid particles) ranging from 0.02 to 0.52 and tracers ranging in diameter from 0.125sigma to 16sigma are considered. Finite-size effects are found to pose a significant problem and can lead to seriously underestimated tracer diffusion constants even in systems that are very large by simulation standards. It is shown that this can be overcome by applying a simple extrapolation formula that is linear in the reciprocal cell length L(-1), allowing us to obtain infinite-volume estimates of the diffusion constant for all tracer sizes. For higher densities, the range of tracer diameters considered spans diffusion behavior from molecular to hydrodynamic regimes. In the hydrodynamic limit our extrapolated results are clearly consistent with the theoretically expected slip boundary conditions, whereas the underestimated values obtained without extrapolation could easily be interpreted as approaching the stick limit. It is shown that simply adding the Enskog and hydrodynamic contributions gives a reasonable qualitative description of the diffusion behavior but tends to overestimate the diffusion constant. We propose another expression that fits the simulation results for all densities and tracer diameters.

Journal Article↗

PubMed1981

Elimination of cannibalistic denaturation by enzyme immobilization or inhibition.

The cannibalistic denaturation of alpha-chymotrypsin (EC 3.4.21.1) around neutral pH can be eliminated by immobilization (insolubilization) of the enzyme or by inhibition by specific reversible inhibitors, but the high-pH denaturation cannot be. The denaturation of the immobilized enzyme at high pH follows first-order kinetics, just as the denaturation of the soluble enzyme does. These results lend credence to the description of the denaturation of chymotrypsin as cannibalistic around neutrality and due to a hydroxide ion reaction at high pH; this interpretation followed from kinetic arguments given in the previous article [Wu, H.-L., Wastell, A. & Bender, M. L. (1981) Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 78, 4116-4117]. Elimination of denaturation around neutrality by immobilization may be the reason why membrane-bound enzymes are so common in vivo.

Journal Article↗

PubMed1993

A biomechanical analysis of the last stride, touch-down and take-off characteristics of the women's long jump.

This study was concerned with the measurement of a selection of performance variables from competitors in the women's long jump final of the World Student Games held in Sheffield, UK in July 1991. Several performances of each of six finalists were recorded on cine-film at 100 Hz. Resulting planar kinematic data were obtained for the last stride, touch-down and take-off. For the analysis, the point of maximum knee flexion was established and this was used to represent the point at which the compression phase had ended. A variety of variables describing the position, velocity and angular changes are presented as descriptive data. In addition, these were used to compute energies on the basis of a whole body model. The data were interpreted on the basis of a technique model of long jumping established from the literature. It was confirmed that take-off velocity was a function of touch-down velocity, and that there was an increase in vertical velocity at the expense of a reduction of horizontal velocity. An attempt was made to identify the mechanisms acting during the touch-down to take-off phase which were responsible for generating vertical velocity. It was concluded that there was evidence for mechanical, biomechanical and muscular mechanisms. The former relates to the generation of vertical velocity by the body riding over the base of support; the second is the elastic re-utilization of energy; and the third is the contribution by concentric muscular contraction.

Biomechanical Phenomena↗

PubMed1978

Nile blue fluorescence signals from cut single muscle fibers under voltage or current clamp conditions.

A method is presented for recording extrinsic optical signals from segments of single skeletal muscle fibers under current or voltage clamp conditions. Such segments, which are cut from intact fibers, are maintained in a relaxed state, while exhbiting otherwise normal physiological properties, including healthy delayed rectifier currents. Extrinsic fluorescence changes are demonstrated, using the permeant potentiometric probe, Nile Blue A. These changes vary nonlinearly with the controlled surface membrane potential, in a manner which suggests that they arise from potential changes in the sarcoplasmic reticulum. According to this interpretation, a simple model based on the gating charge movement implicated in excitation-contraction coupling, provides a self-consistent description of the voltage dependence of the signal that requires no additional parameters.

Action Potentials↗

PubMed2003

AIDSVAX results: an answer, or just more questions?

Some time within the next few weeks, VaxGen is expected to announce the results of the Phase III trials of its first vaccine candidate based on a bivalent HIV envelope gp120, AIDSVAX B/B. Interpretation of these results will probably not be straightforward and will likely lead to many more unanswered questions. Following is a description of some of the key issues involved.

AIDS Vaccines↗

PubMed2003

Extended self-similarity in the two-dimensional metal-insulator transition.

We show that extended self-similarity, a scaling phenomenon first observed in classical turbulent flows, holds for a two-dimensional metal-insulator transition that belongs to the universality class of random Dirac fermions. Deviations from multifractality, which in turbulence are due to the dominance of diffusive processes at small scales, appear in the condensed-matter context as a large-scale, finite-size effect related to the imposition of an infrared cutoff in the field theory formulation. We propose a phenomenological interpretation of extended self-similarity in the metal-insulator transition within the framework of the random beta-model description of multifractal sets. As a natural step, our discussion is bridged to the analysis of strange attractors, where crossovers between multifractal and nonmultifractal regimes are found and extended self-similarity turns out to be verified as well.

Journal Article↗

PubMed2004

Real-time analysis of the telegrapher's equation for tunneling processes.

Based on a close analogy with an RLC circuit, a model for interpreting delay times in forbidden regimes (tunneling) is formulated, avoiding the analytical continuation into imaginary time. In this way, a reasonable description of experimental data, which were previously reported for a waveguide propagation below the cutoff frequency at approximately 9.5 GHz, is obtained.

Journal Article↗

PubMed2004

Comprehensive four-quark interpretation of Ds(2317), Ds(2457), and Ds(2632).

The recently observed new member of the charm-strange family D(s)(2632), which has a surprisingly narrow width, is challenging our theory. D(s)(2317) and D(s)(2457), which were observed earlier, have similar behaviors and receive various theoretical explanations. Some authors use the heavy hadron chiral effective theory to evaluate heavy-light quark systems and obtain a reasonable evaluation on the masses of D(s)(2317) and D(s)(2457). An alternative picture is to interpret them as four-quark or molecular states. In this work, we are following the latter and propose a unitive description for all three new members, D(s)(2632), D(s)(2317), and D(s)(2457), and, at least, so far our picture is consistent with the data.

Journal Article↗

PubMed2005

The meaning for elders of receiving family care.

AIMS: This paper reports a study undertaken to broaden nurse clinicians', policy-makers', and researchers' understandings of what it means to elders to receive family care. BACKGROUND: The number of older people receiving assistance at home will increase tremendously in coming decades in proportion to the rapidly increasing aged population. Seventy to 80% of the care received by elders is provided by family members. As more elders with fewer family carers are predicted, nursing's insight into the family care phenomenon becomes even more important. The literature contains reports of specific aspects of family care. Most results include reports of elders dreading giving up their independence in the context of Euro-American United States society's highly valued cultural norm of independence. No studies have explored elders' views of the meaning of receiving family care. METHODS: Hermeneutic interpretive phenomenology was chosen, and a sample of nine elders (five women and four men) was interviewed. Participants were asked for descriptions of their day-to-day experiences of receiving family care in two to five interviews, and were observed interacting with their family carers in naturalistic settings. FINDINGS: Elders living at home were found to incorporate help from family members comfortably into their lives. They viewed themselves as autonomous and able to maintain balance between autonomy and dependence on loved ones. CONCLUSIONS: Receiving family care may have positive meaning for elders, especially when the care is provided within the context of positive relationships with family carers. These findings are in contrast to previous reports. If validated in further research, they could be used to inform practice and policy in health care systems involved in collaborating with families to develop care arrangements for community-living elders.

Activities of Daily Living↗

PubMed1986

Maternal control of co-vocalization and inter-speaker silences in mother-infant vocal engagements.

Co-vocalizations and inter-speaker silences were used to investigate the vocal engagements of six mother-infant dyads. Observed records of vocal behaviours were compared with records in which the vocal behaviours were randomized. The results indicated that there were significantly fewer co-vocalizations in observed than in randomized records; that the durations of inter-speaker silences following infant vocalization were significantly shorter in observed than in randomized records; and that the durations of inter-speaker silences following maternal vocalization were significantly longer in observed than in randomized records. These findings were interpreted as being consistent with the view that mothers attempt to engage their infants in turn-taking encounters, and that descriptions of such engagements in terms of conversational metaphors may be misleading in this regard.

Female↗

PubMed1987

Determining pathway structure-property relationships through experimentation and analytical frameworks.

A brief description of the information content of the experimental methods that are becoming increasingly useful for probing intracellular processes, a framework for interpreting observations, and an example that combines framework results and 13C NMR observations have been presented. Results in terms of structural criterion have been obtained that suggest that it may be possible to develop a glossary of structure-function heuristics. From the engineering point of view, such general work may also provide keys to system/subsystem modeling due to having some classic and nonclassic network properties mapped in advance. However, we note that approaches based solely on kinetics ignore physiochemical processes. A number of potential processes were mentioned earlier. Investigations of the importance of such processes, though, have been limited due to the dominance of in vitro enzyme kinetic and regulation work. Nonetheless, interesting proposals have been advanced by a limited number of workers, such as the suggestion that membrane-bound and soluble populations of enzymes with high and low activity, respectively, exist in eukaryotes (e.g., aldolase22) and the balanced attained between the two populations is an important regulatory mechanism. In an effort to contribute to the evaluation of physiochemical processes, our formalism was recently used to explore the logic of enzyme turnover number-enzyme amount distributions from the standpoint of minimizing excess enzymatic capacity (i.e., minimizing excess energy expenditure for protein biosynthesis) and the use of limited cytoplasmic solvation capacity (i.e., concentrated cytoplasm is water-limited; hence, maintaining the solubility of all constituents is difficult).

Biochemistry↗

PubMed2003

Symptom reflections of women with cardiac disease and advanced practice nurses: a descriptive study.

The purpose of this descriptive study was to explore the experiences of women with cardiac disease in regard to cardiac risk factors, symptoms, and symptom interpretation. Interviews with a convenience sample of 21 African American and Caucasian female patients, aged 40-81 years with cardiac diagnoses, were taped and transcribed. Three advanced practice nurses with experience in cardiovascular nursing were interviewed individually for background. Analyses of symptoms indicated that women experienced a range of prodromal symptoms other than chest pain prior to hospitalization such as: edema, shortness of breath, lightheadedness, dry cough, and exhaustion. Atypical symptoms delayed recognition of a cardiac problem for some women. The lack of symptom consistency underscores the need for thorough assessment and screening of women at risk for cardiac problems. Advanced practice nurses are aware of current cardiac disease research in women but they must continue to be vigilant for atypical symptoms.

Adaptation, Psychological↗

PubMed1999

Metabolism and genetics of Helicobacter pylori: the genome era.

The publication of the complete sequence of Helicobacter pylori 26695 in 1997 and more recently that of strain J99 has provided new insight into the biology of this organism. In this review, we attempt to analyze and interpret the information provided by sequence annotations and to compare these data with those provided by experimental analyses. After a brief description of the general features of the genomes of the two sequenced strains, the principal metabolic pathways are analyzed. In particular, the enzymes encoded by H. pylori involved in fermentative and oxidative metabolism, lipopolysaccharide biosynthesis, nucleotide biosynthesis, aerobic and anaerobic respiration, and iron and nitrogen assimilation are described, and the areas of controversy between the experimental data and those provided by the sequence annotation are discussed. The role of urease, particularly in pH homeostasis, and other specialized mechanisms developed by the bacterium to maintain its internal pH are also considered. The replicational, transcriptional, and translational apparatuses are reviewed, as is the regulatory network. The numerous findings on the metabolism of the bacteria and the paucity of gene expression regulation systems are indicative of the high level of adaptation to the human gastric environment. Arguments in favor of the diversity of H. pylori and molecular data reflecting possible mechanisms involved in this diversity are presented. Finally, we compare the numerous experimental data on the colonization factors and those provided from the genome sequence annotation, in particular for genes involved in motility and adherence of the bacterium to the gastric tissue.

Gene Expression Regulation, Bacterial↗

PubMed2000

High-throughput screening in drug metabolism and pharmacokinetic support of drug discovery.

The application of rapid methods currently used for screening discovery drug candidates for metabolism and pharmacokinetic characteristics is discussed. General considerations are given for screening in this context, including the criteria for good screens, the use of counterscreens, the proper sequencing of screens, ambiguity in the interpretation of results, strategies for false positives and negatives, and the special difficulties encountered in drug metabolism and pharmacokinetic screening. Detailed descriptions of the present status of screening are provided for absorption potential, blood-brain barrier penetration, inhibition and induction of cytochrome P450, pharmacokinetics, biotransformation, and computer modeling. Although none of the systems currently employed for drug metabolism and pharmacokinetic screening can be considered truly high-throughput, several of them are rapid enough to be a practical part of the screening paradigm for modern, fast-moving discovery programs.

Absorption↗

PubMed1980

Mechanism of the reaction of thrombin with fibrin in a bovine system.

The application of the Freundlich equation suggested by Seegers et al. for the description of thrombin (EC 3.4.21.5) adsorption by fibrin is inadequate in the (i) an exception has to be assumed for the interpretation of the thrombin adsorption by fibrin at higher concentrations of thrombin, and (ii) no comprehensive reaction mechanism between thrombin and fibrin is further indicated by this suggestion. Existing data are shown to suggest an interpretation which (i) may provide an explanation for the existing data without irregularity and (ii) may have implications for the mechanism of thrombin equilibrium-binding to fibrin.

Animals↗

PubMed2003

The analyst's desire and the problem of narcissistic resistances.

The ways in which the analyst's desire for particular experiences with patients is inevitable and often leads to narcissistically based resistances are considered. Five propositions are examined: (1) that the analyst cannot help but have desires and want them recognized by the analysand; (2) that these desires frequently underwrite the analyst's theoretical beliefs and technical interventions; (3) that narcissistic desires and their influence are ubiquitous among practicing analysts; (4) that the patient is often on the lookout for the analyst's various agendas; and (5) that the patient often hopes the analyst will put his or her desire aside and listen so the patient can further his or her own interests. Lacan's concept of the "dual relation" is central to this discussion. The neo-Kleinian position on narcissistic resistances is explored, as is the idea of the "analytic third" as a potential solution to the problem they pose. An extended case description illustrates the main points.

Adult↗