Breast feeding and resilience against psychosocial stress

BACKGROUND: Some early life exposures may result in a well controlled stress response, which can reduce stress related anxiety. Breast feeding may be a marker of some relevant exposures. AIMS: To assess whether breast feeding is associated with modification of the relation between parental divorce and anxiety. METHODS: Observational study using longitudinal birth cohort data. Linear regression was used to assess whether breast feeding modifies the association of parental divorce/separation with anxiety using stratification and interaction testing. Data were obtained from the 1970 British Cohort Study, which is following the lives of those born in one week in 1970 and living in Great Britain. This study uses information collected at birth and at ages 5 and 10 years for 8958 subjects. Class teachers answered a question on anxiety among 10 year olds using an analogue scale (range 0–50) that was log transformed to minimise skewness. RESULTS: Among 5672 non‐breast fed subjects, parental divorce/separation was associated with a statistically significantly raised risk of anxiety, with a regression coefficient (95% CI) of 9.4 (6.1 to 12.8). Among the breast fed group this association was much lower: 2.2 (−2.6 to 7.0). Interaction testing confirmed statistically significant effect modification by breast feeding, independent of simultaneous adjustment for multiple potential confounding factors, producing an interaction coefficient of −7.0 (−12.8 to −1.2), indicating a 7% reduction in anxiety after adjustment. CONCLUSIONS: Breast feeding is associated with resilience against the psychosocial stress linked with parental divorce/separation. This could be because breast feeding is a marker of exposures related to maternal characteristics and parent–child interaction

Process for preparing sterile solid propellants Patent

Using ethylene oxide in preparation of sterilized solid rocket propellants and encapsulating material

Regression Equations and Table for Estimating Numbers of Eggs in Jack Pine Budworm (Lepidoptera: Tortricidae) Egg Masses in Michigan

Three simple linear regression equations were developed to estimate the numbers of eggs in spruce budworm, Choristoneura fumiferana, egg masses in Michigan. One equation was developed for each of 2-row, 2- row + , and 3-row egg masses. A table of estimated numbers of eggs per egg mass is given for each of the three row types for egg mass lengths from 1 to 13 mm

Chow's theorem and universal holonomic quantum computation

A theorem from control theory relating the Lie algebra generated by vector fields on a manifold to the controllability of the dynamical system is shown to apply to Holonomic Quantum Computation. Conditions for deriving the holonomy algebra are presented by taking covariant derivatives of the curvature associated to a non-Abelian gauge connection. When applied to the Optical Holonomic Computer, these conditions determine that the holonomy group of the two-qubit interaction model contains $SU(2) \times SU(2)$. In particular, a universal two-qubit logic gate is attainable for this model.Comment: 13 page

Using Ancient Samples in Projection Analysis.

Projection analysis is a tool that extracts information from the joint allele frequency spectrum to better understand the relationship between two populations. In projection analysis, a test genome is compared to a set of genomes from a reference population. The projection's shape depends on the historical relationship of the test genome's population to the reference population. Here, we explore in greater depth the effects on the projection when ancient samples are included in the analysis. First, we conduct a series of simulations in which the ancient sample is directly ancestral to a present-day population (one-population model), or the ancient sample is ancestral to a sister population that diverged before the time of sampling (two-population model). We find that there are characteristic differences between the projections for the one-population and two-population models, which indicate that the projection can be used to determine whether a test genome is directly ancestral to a present-day population or not. Second, we compute projections for several published ancient genomes. We compare two Neanderthals and three ancient human genomes to European, Han Chinese and Yoruba reference panels. We use a previously constructed demographic model and insert these five ancient genomes to assess how well the observed projections are recovered

Plasma physics abstracts, 1 January 1966 through 31 December 1967

Bibliography containing 26 references with abstracts on plasma physics research, 1966-196

At what chain length do unbranched alkanes prefer folded conformations?

Short unbranched alkanes are known to prefer linear conformations, while long unbranched alkanes are folded. It is not known with certainty at what chain length the linear conformation is no longer the global minimum. To clarify this point, we use {\it ab initio} and density functional methods to compute the relative energies of the linear and hairpin alkane conformers for increasing chain lengths. Extensive electronic structure calculations are performed to obtain optimized geometries, harmonic frequencies and accurate single point energies for the selected alkane conformers from octane through octadecane. Benchmark CCSD(T)/cc-pVTZ single point calculations are performed for chains through tetradecane, while approximate methods are required for the longer chains up to octadecane. Using frozen natural orbitals to unambiguously truncate the virtual orbital space, we are able to compute composite CCSD FNO(T) single point energies for all the chain lengths. This approximate composite method has significant computational savings compared to full CCSD(T) while retaining $\sim0.15$ kcal/mol accuracy compared to the benchmark results. More approximate dual-basis resolution-of-the-identity double-hybrid DFT calculations are also performed and shown to have reasonable $0.2-0.4$ kcal/mol errors compared with our benchmark values. After including contributions from temperature dependent internal energy shifts, we find the preference for folded conformations to lie between hexadecane and octadecane, in excellent agreement with recent experiments [L\"{u}ttschwager, N. O.; Wassermann, T. N.; Mata, R. A.; Suhm, M. A. {\it Angew. Chem. Int. Ed.} 2013, 52, 463]

Structure and thermochemistry of K2_2Rb, KRb2_2 and K2_2Rb2_2

The formation and interaction of ultracold polar molecules is a topic of active research. Understanding possible reaction paths and molecular combinations requires accurate studies of the fragment and product energetics. We have calculated accurate gradient optimized ground state structures and zero point corrected atomization energies for the trimers and tetramers formed by the reaction of KRb with KRb and corresponding isolated atoms. The K${}_2$Rb andKRb${}_2$ trimers are found to have global minima at the $C_{2v}$ configurationwith atomization energies of 6065 and 5931 cm${}^{-1}$ while the tetramer is found to have two stable planar structures, of $D_{2h}$ and $C_s$ symmetry, which have atomization energies of 11131 cm${}^{-1}$ an 11133 cm${}^{-1}$, respectively. We have calculated the minimum energy reaction path for the reaction KRb+KRb to K$_2+$Rb$_2$ and found it to be barrierless