Writing themselves in: a national report on the sexuality, health and well-being of same-sex attracted young people

This 1998 report is about young people who are attracted to their own sex. The need for accurate baseline figures about young people of non-heterosexual orientation has developed as part of a general concern about the spread of the HIV virus into the adolescent population and a specific concern around these young people’s emotional well-being. In the past three years, Australian adolescent research conducted by the National Centre in HIV Social Research, La Trobe University, has revealed that a significant minority of young people are not unequivocally heterosexual, with numbers ranging between 8 and 11% in recent research. Research which specifically targets this population has, until now, been conducted retrospectively and/or with people who identify as gay or lesbian recruited through gay and lesbian youth groups or the gay press. As researchers we know little about young people at pre-identity or pre-disclosure stages because their need for anonymity means they cannot be contacted through the usual channels. The young people represented in this project were accessed through an advertising campaign in National magazines, via radio and the Internet. A survey was available on a website and from the Centre for the Study of Sexually Transmissible Diseases. Surveys were also inserted in the gay and street press. These surveys sought information regarding sexual feelings and experiences as well as sexual and drug-taking practices in regard to STDs (including HIV) and related diseases. The source and adequacy of sexual health information for this group and their levels of support and experiences of abuse and discrimination were also elicited. The survey also charted young people’s perceptions of their quality of life and emotional well-being. In addition, participants were also asked to write stories about their experiences, including when they first knew about their sexual feelings, their relationships with family and friends, and their hopes for the future. &nbsp

Mars rover sample return: An exobiology science scenario

A mission designed to collect and return samples from Mars will provide information regarding its composition, history, and evolution. At the same time, a sample return mission generates a technical challenge. Sophisticated, semi-autonomous, robotic spacecraft systems must be developed in order to carry out complex operations at the surface of a very distant planet. An interdisciplinary effort was conducted to consider how much a Mars mission can be realistically structured to maximize the planetary science return. The focus was to concentrate on a particular set of scientific objectives (exobiology), to determine the instrumentation and analyses required to search for biological signatures, and to evaluate what analyses and decision making can be effectively performed by the rover in order to minimize the overhead of constant communication between Mars and the Earth. Investigations were also begun in the area of machine vision to determine whether layered sedimentary structures can be recognized autonomously, and preliminary results are encouraging

Synthesis of the salts of weakly coordinating stibate ions : & Students' perceptions of two- and three- dimensional animations depicting an oxidation-reduction reaction /

Adviser: Michael Sanger.SYTHESIS OF SALTS OF WEAKLY COORDINATING STIBATE IONS. Weakly coordinating anions have many important applications including olefin polymerization co-catalysis. In an attempt to make tristibic acid, distibic acid and tetrastibic acid were made. Cesium, barium, nickel(II), and diethylammonium salts of tetrastibic acid were also synthesized. Tetrastibic acid and the ammonium salts were concluded to be stable. Elemental analyses showed that neither tristibic acid nor tristibic acid were stable under the reaction conditions employed.STUDENTS' PERCEPTIONS OF TWO- AND THREE-DIMENSIONAL ANIMATIONS DEPICTING AN OXIDATION-REDUCATION REACTION. Electrochemistry is a difficult subject for many students to comprehend. In order to improve teaching in this area of chemistry, semi-structured clinical interviews on second-semester introductory chemistry students were conducted in which students' were asked to explain the particulate behavior of the chemicals in an oxidation-reduction reaction. The interviews included questions after students viewed the chemical demonstration and two computer animations depicting the particulate nature of the same chemical reaction. Misinterpretations of the two animations were identified and described in detail. The simpler 2-D animation was beneficial in helping students understand the oxidation-reduction reaction and write the balanced chemical equation. However, the 3-D animation did not appear to be detrimental to student understanding. Suggestions, taken from the students' comments in the interviews, for improving the animations and for teaching electrochemistry were discussed.D.A

RepSeq-A database of amino acid repeats present in lower eukaryotic pathogens

BACKGROUND Amino acid repeat-containing proteins have a broad range of functions and their identification is of relevance to many experimental biologists. In human-infective protozoan parasites (such as the Kinetoplastid and Plasmodium species), they are implicated in immune evasion and have been shown to influence virulence and pathogenicity. RepSeq http://repseq.gugbe.com is a new database of amino acid repeat-containing proteins found in lower eukaryotic pathogens. The RepSeq database is accessed via a web-based application which also provides links to related online tools and databases for further analyses. RESULTS The RepSeq algorithm typically identifies more than 98% of repeat-containing proteins and is capable of identifying both perfect and mismatch repeats. The proportion of proteins that contain repeat elements varies greatly between different families and even species (3 - 35% of the total protein content). The most common motif type is the Sequence Repeat Region (SRR) - a repeated motif containing multiple different amino acid types. Proteins containing Single Amino Acid Repeats (SAARs) and Di-Peptide Repeats (DPRs) typically account for 0.5 - 1.0% of the total protein number. Notable exceptions are P. falciparum and D. discoideum, in which 33.67% and 34.28% respectively of the predicted proteomes consist of repeat-containing proteins. These numbers are due to large insertions of low complexity single and multi-codon repeat regions. CONCLUSION The RepSeq database provides a repository for repeat-containing proteins found in parasitic protozoa. The database allows for both individual and cross-species proteome analyses and also allows users to upload sequences of interest for analysis by the RepSeq algorithm. Identification of repeat-containing proteins provides researchers with a defined subset of proteins which can be analysed by expression profiling and functional characterisation, thereby facilitating study of pathogenicity and virulence factors in the parasitic protozoa. While primarily designed for kinetoplastid work, the RepSeq algorithm and database retain full functionality when used to analyse other species

IPO Firms’ Voluntary Compliance with SOX 404 as Evidence on the Value Relevance of Internal Control Quality

Newly public firms are not required to comply with SOX 404 for their initial public offerings. This provides a unique setting in which to investigate the benefits of voluntary disclosure with SOX 404 and the value of information revealed as a consequence of compliance.  We investigate whether voluntary compliance with SOX 404, either fully or partially, impacts the perceived risk of firms conducting IPOs on the first day of trading (reflected in underpricing) or following the IPO. Our results indicate that neither full compliance with SOX 404 at the time of the IPO, nor a managerial discussion of internal controls prior to the IPO, result in lower underpricing or higher post-IPO performance. This suggests that the costs incurred through the SOX 404 compliance process may be unnecessary. Indirectly, our results provide additional evidence that some of the requirements of SOX extract costs from shareholders without supporting better quality information

IPO Firms\u27 Voluntary Compliance With SOX 404 As Evidence On The Value Relevance Of Internal Control Quality

Newly public firms are not required to comply with SOX 404 for their initial public offerings. This provides a unique setting in which to investigate the benefits of voluntary disclosure with SOX 404 and the value of information revealed as a consequence of compliance. We investigate whether voluntary compliance with SOX 404, either fully or partially, impacts the perceived risk of firms conducting IPOs on the first day of trading (reflected in underpricing) or following the IPO. Our results indicate that neither full compliance with SOX 404 at the time of the IPO, nor a managerial discussion of internal controls prior to the IPO, result in lower underpricing or higher post-IPO performance. This suggests that the costs incurred through the SOX 404 compliance process may be unnecessary. Indirectly, our results provide additional evidence that some of the requirements of SOX extract costs from shareholders without supporting better quality information

A Phase 3 Trial of 2 Years of Androgen Suppression and Radiation Therapy With or Without Adjuvant Chemotherapy for High-Risk Prostate Cancer: Final Results of Radiation Therapy Oncology Group Phase 3 Randomized Trial NRG Oncology RTOG 9902.

PURPOSE: Long-term (LT) androgen suppression (AS) with radiation therapy (RT) is a standard treatment of high-risk, localized prostate cancer (PCa). Radiation Therapy Oncology Group 9902 was a randomized trial testing the hypothesis that adjuvant combination chemotherapy (CT) with paclitaxel, estramustine, and oral etoposide plus LT AS plus RT would improve overall survival (OS). METHODS AND MATERIALS: Patients with high-risk PCa (prostate-specific antigen 20-100 ng/mL and Gleason score [GS] ≥ 7 or clinical stage ≥ T2 and GS ≥ 8) were randomized to RT and AS (AS + RT) alone or with adjuvant CT (AS + RT + CT). CT was given as four 21-day cycles, delivered beginning 28 days after 70.2 Gy of RT. AS was given as luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone for 24 months, beginning 2 months before RT plus an oral antiandrogen for 4 months before and during RT. The study was designed based on a 6% improvement in OS from 79% to 85% at 5 years, with 90% power and a 2-sided alpha of 0.05. RESULTS: A total of 397 patients (380 eligible) were randomized. The patients had high-risk PCa, 68% with GS 8 to 10 and 34% T3 to T4 tumors, and median prostate-specific antigen of 22.6 ng/mL. The median follow-up period was 9.2 years. The trial closed early because of excess thromboembolic toxicity in the CT arm. The 10-year results for all randomized patients revealed no significant difference between the AS + RT and AS + RT + CT arms in OS (65% vs 63%; P=.81), biochemical failure (58% vs 54%; P=.82), local progression (11% vs 7%; P=.09), distant metastases (16% vs 14%; P=.42), or disease-free survival (22% vs 26%; P=.61). CONCLUSIONS: NRG Oncology RTOG 9902 showed no significant differences in OS, biochemical failure, local progression, distant metastases, or disease-free survival with the addition of adjuvant CT to LT AS + RT. The trial results provide valuable data regarding the natural history of high-risk PCa treated with LT AS + RT and have implications for the feasibility of clinical trial accrual and tolerability using CT for PCa