Postpartum Fatigue in the Active Duty Military Woman

Up to 16,000 military women annually experience the birth of a child. Barring complications, regulations require a return to work 42 days postpartum, making them susceptible to the effects of postpartum fatigue. The purpose of this descriptive, longitudinal study of 109 military women was to describe fatigue levels across the first 6–8 weeks postpartum; to describe the relationship among selected psychological, physiological, and situational variables of fatigue; and to examine the relationship between predictor variables, fatigue levels, and performance after childbirth. The majority of the sample were married or partnered enlisted women in the U.S. Navy with a mean age of 25 (±5) years. Descriptive statistics, repeated measures ANOVA, correlation, and regression were used to analyze the data. Women were found to be moderately fatigued across time and there was no change in fatigue levels from 2 to 6–8 weeks postpartum. Study variables of type of delivery, lactogenesis, depression, anxiety, maternal sleep, and infant temperament correlated with fatigue during hospitalization and at 2 weeks postpartum. Depression, anxiety, maternal sleep, and performance correlated with fatigue at 6–8 weeks postpartum. Regression analyses indicated that maternal anxiety during hospitalization and at 2 weeks postpartum explained 6% and 20% of the variance in fatigue at 6–8 weeks postpartum. Over half of the women had not regained full functional status when they returned to work and 40% still displayed symptoms of postpartum depression and anxiety. Future research is needed to examine issues surrounding depression and anxiety of military women, including exploration of its causes in both the prenatal and postpartum periods. Designing interventions to reduce fatigue symptoms among military postpartum women may result in improved parenting, decreased healthcare costs, workplace accidents, increased job satisfaction, breastfeeding rates, and physical readiness. Reducing fatigue in this population has the potential benefit of a significant cost-savings to the United States government as well as an improved quality of life for military families

Promiscuous Substrate-Binding explains the Enzymatic stereo and Regiocontrolled Synthesis of Enantiopure Hydroxy Ketones and Diols

Financial support from the Spanish Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación (MICINN, Project CTQ2007-61126) and the Spanish Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores y de Cooperación (Programa de Cooperación Interuniversitaria, PCI Iberoamérica MAEC-AECID, Project A/8856/07) is gratefully acknowledged

Some Exactly Solvable Models And Their Asymptotics

In this thesis, we present three projects studying exactly solvable models in the KPZ universality class and one project studying a generalization of the SIR model from epidemiology. The first chapter gives an overview of the results and how they fit into the study of KPZ universality when applicable. Each of the following 4 chapters corresponds to a published or submitted article. In the first project, we study an oriented first passage percolation model for the evolution of a river delta. We show that at any fixed positive time, the width of a river delta of length L approaches a constant times L²/³ with Tracy-Widom GUE fluctuations of order L⁴/⁹. This result can be rephrased in terms of a particle system generalizing pushTASEP. We introduce an exactly solvable particle system on the integer half line and show that after running the system for only finite time the particle positions have Tracy-Widom fluctuations. In the second project, we study n-point sticky Brownian motions: a family of n diffusions that evolve as independent Brownian motions when they are apart, and interact locally so that the set of coincidence times has positive Lebesgue measure with positive probability. These diffusions can also be seen as n random motions in a random environment whose distribution is given by so-called stochastic flows of kernels. For a specific type of sticky interaction, we prove exact formulas characterizing the stochastic flow and show that in the large deviations regime, the random fluctuations of these stochastic flows are Tracy-Widom GUE distributed. An equivalent formulation of this result states that the extremal particle among n sticky Brownian motions has Tracy-Widom distributed fluctuations in the large n and large time limit. These results are proved by viewing sticky Brownian motions as a diffusive limit of the exactly solvable beta random walk in random environment. In the third project, we study a class of probability distributions on the six-vertex model, which originates from the higher spin vertex model. For these random six-vertex models we show that the behavior near their base is asymptotically described by the GUE-corners process. In the fourth project, we study a model for the spread of an epidemic. This model generalizes the classical SIR model to account for inhomogeneity in the infectiousness and susceptibility of individuals in the population. A first statement of this model is given in terms of infinitely many coupled differential equations. We show that solving these equations can be reduced to solving a one dimensional first order ODE, which is easy to solve numerically. We use the explicit form of this ODE to characterize the total number of people who are ever infected before the epidemic dies out. This model is not related to the KPZ universality class

Ludwig Spohr und Friedrich Rochlitz : ihre Beziehungen nach ungedruckten Briefen

Die hier zum ersten Male gedruckten Briefe stammen aus der Autographen-Sammlung des Herrn Fritz Donebauer in Prag, der mir in der liebenswürdigsten und zuvorkommendsten Weise deren Veröffentlichung gestattet hat. Dafür danke ich ihm im eigenen Namen aufs wärmste, aber ich darf ihm sicher auch im Namen aller derjenigen danken, die vielleicht einmal aus dem interessanten Inhalt dieser Briefe Einzelheiten für Arbeiten über Spohr oder über Rochlitz oder über das Oratorium finden, Details, denen bisher in der in Frage kommenden Literatur keine Beachtung geschenkt werden konnte. Von Spohr kann ich leider nur 5 Briefe an Rochlitz mitteilen, dagegen 32 Briefe Rochlitz' an Spohr. ..

Large vector spaces of block-symmetric strong linearizations of matrix polynomials

Given a matrix polynomial P(lambda) = Sigma(k)(i=0) lambda(i) A(i) of degree k, where A(i) are n x n matrices with entries in a field F, the development of linearizations of P(lambda) that preserve whatever structure P(lambda) might posses has been a very active area of research in the last decade. Most of the structure-preserving linearizations of P(lambda) discovered so far are based on certain modifications of block-symmetric linearizations. The block-symmetric linearizations of P(lambda) available in the literature fall essentially into two classes: linearizations based on the so-called Fiedler pencils with repetition, which form a finite family, and a vector space of dimension k of block-symmetric pencils, called DL(P), such that most of its pencils are linearizations. One drawback of the pencils in DL(P) is that none of them is a linearization when P(lambda) is singular. In this paper we introduce new vector spaces of block,symmetric pencils, most of which are strong linearizations of P(lambda). The dimensions of these spaces are O(n(2)), which, for n >= root k, are much larger than the dimension of DL(P). When k is odd, many of these vector spaces contain linearizations also when P(lambda) is singular. The coefficients of the block-symmetric pencils in these new spaces can be easily constructed as k x k block-matrices whose n x n blocks are of the form 0, +/-alpha I-n, +/-alpha A(i), or arbitrary n x n matrices, where a is an arbitrary nonzero scalar.The research of F. M. Dopico was partially supported by the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad of Spain through grant MTM-2012-3254

Exploring Spacer Arm Structures for Designs of Asymmetric Sulfoxide-Containing MS-Cleavable Cross-Linkers.

Cross-linking mass spectrometry (XL-MS) has become a powerful structural tool for defining protein-protein interactions (PPIs) and elucidating architectures of large protein assemblies. To advance XL-MS studies, we have previously developed a series of sulfoxide-containing MS-cleavable cross-linkers to facilitate the detection and identification of cross-linked peptides using multistage mass spectrometry (MSn). While current sulfoxide-based cross-linkers are effective for in vivo and in vitro XL-MS studies at the systems-level, new reagents are still needed to help expand PPI coverage. To this end, we have designed and synthesized six variable-length derivatives of disuccinimidyl sulfoxide (DSSO) to better understand the effects of spacer arm modulation on MS-cleavability, fragmentation characteristics, and MS identification of cross-linked peptides. In addition, the impact on cross-linking reactivity was evaluated. Moreover, alternative MS2-based workflows were explored to determine their feasibility for analyzing new sulfoxide-containing cross-linked products. Based on the results of synthetic peptides and a model protein, we have further demonstrated the robustness and predictability of sulfoxide chemistry in designing MS-cleavable cross-linkers. Importantly, we have identified a unique asymmetric design that exhibits preferential fragmentation of cross-links over peptide backbones, a desired feature for MSn analysis. This work has established a solid foundation for further development of sulfoxide-containing MS-cleavable cross-linkers with new functionalities

Cyclic Osmate Esters from 1,2- and 1,3-Diols and α-Hydroxy Acids for X-ray Analysis.

We previously demonstrated that osmium tetroxide and TMEDA generate stable crystalline adducts with alkenes that facilitate X-ray analysis and structure assignments. Alternatively, osmate esters can be prepared from diols, potassium osmate, and TMEDA·2TsOH in a nonoxidative condensation reaction. This new approach provides a convenient route to form stable, crystalline osmate(VI) esters for X-ray analysis. Because it is redox neutral, it works with a variety of diol substrates, including 1,3-diols, that cannot be prepared from alkenes. α-Hydroxy acids also form stable osmate esters in reasonable yields and readily crystallize. An alternative ligand screen was performed to assess the improved crystallinity from substituted TMEDA analogues. The enhanced crystallinity of osmate esters and the incorporation of a heavy atom make a reliable determination of structure and absolute configuration routine