Cumulative Impact of Environmental Pollution and Population Vulnerability on Pediatric Asthma Hospitalizations: A Multilevel Analysis of CalEnviroScreen.

The CalEnviroScreen created by the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment, Sacramento, USA, is a place-based dataset developed to measure environmental and social indicators that are theorized to have cumulative health impacts on populations. The objective of this study was to examine the extent to which the composite scores of the CalEnviroScreen tool are associated with pediatric asthma hospitalization. This was a retrospective analysis of California hospital discharge data from 2010 to 2012. Children who were hospitalized for asthma-related conditions, were aged 0-14 years, and resided in California were included in analysis. Rates of hospitalization for asthma-related conditions among children residing in California were calculated. Poisson multilevel modeling was used to account for individual- and neighborhood-level risk factors. Every unit increase in the CalEnviroScreen Score was associated with an increase of 1.6% above the mean rate of pediatric asthma hospitalizations (rate ratio (RR) = 1.016, 95% confidence interval (CI) = 1.014-1.018). Every unit increase in racial/ethnic segregation and diesel particulate matter was associated with an increase of 1.1% and 0.2% above the mean rate of pediatric asthma, respectively (RR = 1.011, 95% CI = 1.010-1.013; RR = 1.002, 95% CI = 1.001-1.004). The CalEnviroScreen is a unique tool that combines socioecological factors and environmental indicators to identify vulnerable communities with major health disparities, including pediatric asthma hospital use. Future research should identify mediating factors that contribute to community-level health disparities

Information transfer and nontrivial collective behavior in chaotic coupled map networks

The emergence of nontrivial collective behavior in networks of coupled chaotic maps is investigated by means of a nonlinear mutual prediction method. The resulting prediction error is used to measure the amount of information that a local unit possesses about the collective dynamics. Applications to locally and globally coupled map systems are considered. The prediction error exhibits phase transitions at critical values of the coupling for the onset of ordered collective behavior in these networks. This information measure may be used as an order parameter for the characterization of complex behavior in extended chaotic systems.Comment: 4 pp.,4 figs., Accepted in Phys. Rev. E, Rapid Communications (2002

The Luminous Convolution Model as an alternative to dark matter in spiral galaxies

The Luminous Convolution Model (LCM) demonstrates that it is possible to predict the rotation curves of spiral galaxies directly from estimates of the luminous matter. We consider two frame-dependent effects on the light observed from other galaxies: relative velocity and relative curvature. With one free parameter, we predict the rotation curves of twenty-three (23) galaxies represented in forty-two (42) data sets. Relative curvature effects rely upon knowledge of both the gravitational potential from luminous mass of the emitting galaxy and the receiving galaxy, and so each emitter galaxy is compared to four (4) different Milky Way luminous mass models. On average in this sample, the LCM is more successful than either dark matter or modified gravity models in fitting the observed rotation curve data. Implications of LCM constraints on populations synthesis modeling are discussed in this paper. This paper substantially expands the results in arXiv:1309.7370.Comment: Implications of LCM constraints on populations synthesis modeling are discussed in this paper. This paper substantially expands the results in arxiv:1309.737

Optimization of diarylazines as anti-HIV agents with dramatically

Non-nucleoside inhibitors of HIV-1 reverse transcriptase are reported that have ca. 100-fold greater solubility than the structurally related drugs etravirine and rilpivirine, while retaining high anti-viral activity. The solubility enhancements come from strategic placement of a morpholinylalkoxy substituent in the entrance channel of the NNRTI binding site. Compound 4d shows low-nanomolar activity similar to etravirine towards wild-type HIV-1 and key viral variants.Fil: Bollini, Mariela. University of Yale; Estados Unidos. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; ArgentinaFil: Cisneros, José A.. University of Yale; Estados UnidosFil: Spasov, Krasimir A.. University of Yale; Estados UnidosFil: Anderson, Karen S.. University of Yale; Estados UnidosFil: Jorgensen, William L.. University of Yale; Estados Unido