The Effect of Sanitizing Treatments on Respirator Filtration Performance

The potential for alcoholic vapors emitted by common sanitizing treatments to deteriorate the (electrostatic) filtration performance of disposable respirator masks has been investigated. Reports in the literature and some standard test methods provide a confusing and ambiguous picture concerning the relevance of this effect. Four different types of exposure were investigated in this study to clarify the effect of alcoholic vapor emissions on respirator masks. These included exposure to saturated vapors, use of hand sanitizers, cleaning of table surfaces and sanitization of masks by spraying them with alcohol-containing solutions. Methods employed were designed to be as real-world oriented as possible while remaining reproducible. Filtration performance and deterioration effects on exposure to the different treatments were determined on three different types of certified commercial respirator masks—a P2 and two KN95 masks. This study provides substantial evidence that disposable respirator masks with an accepted performance rating are seriously compromised from an exposure to saturated alcoholic vapors, can tolerate a one-off spray treatment with an alcoholic solution and retain their attested protection under the influence of alcoholic vapors from the use of hand sanitizer or spray sanitizer. Considering the range of vastly different outcomes obtained from the four treatments investigated, it seems prudent to assess in each case the specific effects of alcoholic solution treatments and vapors on respirator masks before use.

Gender preference gaps and voting for redistribution

There is substantial evidence that women tend to support different policies and political candidates than men. Many studies also document gender differences in a variety of important preference dimensions, such as risk-taking, competition and pro-sociality. However, the degree to which differential voting by men and women is related to these gaps in more basic preferences requires an improved understanding. We conduct an experiment in which individuals in small laboratory “societies” repeatedly vote for redistribution policies and engage in production. We find that women vote for more egalitarian redistribution and that this difference persists with experience and in environments with varying degrees of risk. This gender voting gap is accounted for partly by both gender gaps in preferences and by expectations regarding economic circumstances. However, including both these controls in a regression analysis indicates that the latter is the primary driving force. We also observe policy differences between male- and female-controlled groups, though these are substantially smaller than the mean individual differences—a natural consequence of the aggregation of individual preferences into collective outcomes.

Examining the cohesiveness and nestedness entrepreneurial ecosystems: evidence from British FinTechs

It is not clear if entrepreneurial ecosystems are cohesive wholes within a region that support high-growth entrepreneurship across a variety of sectors or if ecosystems are made up of several, nested sectoral-specific sub-ecosystems. This debate speaks to larger disagreements about what entrepreneurial ecosystems are and how they work. This paper addresses this research gap by using a novel methodology based on career history data of founders and top management teams of high-growth FinTech ventures. This method is used to classify the backgrounds of 1,570 individuals in 380 British FinTech firms based on their prior job histories and employers into categories such as technology or finance. The paper finds substantial evidence of nestedness in the ecosystems, but rather than FinTech ecosystems being specialized finance or technology clusters, more generic forms of managerial know-how remain crucial to firm innovation and growth. This suggests that even very advanced ecosystems remain nested, with few cross-over points between different communities.

Premature rejection in science: The case of the Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis

The progress of science has sometimes been unjustifiably delayed by the premature rejection of a hypothesis for which substantial evidence existed and which later achieved consensus. Continental drift, meteorite impact cratering, and anthropogenic global warming are examples from the first half of the twentieth century. This article presents evidence that the Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis (YDIH) is a twenty-first century case. The hypothesis proposes that the airburst or impact of a comet ∼12,850 years ago caused the ensuing ∼1200-year-long Younger Dryas (YD) cool period and contributed to the extinction of the Pleistocene megafauna in the Western Hemisphere and the disappearance of the Clovis Paleo-Indian culture. Soon after publication, a few scientists reported that they were unable to replicate the critical evidence and the scientific community at large came to reject the hypothesis. By today, however, many independent studies have reproduced that evidence at dozens of YD sites. This article examines why scientists so readily accepted the early false claims of irreproducibility and what lessons the premature rejection of the YDIH holds for science.

Immune Characteristics of IgA Nephropathy With Minimal Change Disease

Background: IgA nephropathy (IgAN) has a high degree of heterogeneity in clinical and pathological features. Among all subsets of IgAN, the pathogenesis of IgAN with minimal change disease (MCD-IgAN) remained controversial.Methods: We analyzed the clinical and pathological characteristics of MCD-IgAN patients in a retrospective cohort. Patients diagnosed with IgAN, excluding MCD-IgAN, were randomly selected as controls. Levels of plasma galactose-deficient IgA1 (GdIgA1), IgG autoantibodies against GdIgA1, GdIgA1 deposition in the glomerulus, and inflammatory reactivity of circulating poly-IgA1 complexes to cultured mesangial cells were evaluated.Results: Patients with MCD-IgAN had significantly higher levels of proteinuria and estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR), lower levels of albumin and urine blood cells, and milder histological lesions by a light microscope compared to IgAN patients, which bears a resemblance to MCD. Lower levels of GdIgA1 (3.41 ± 1.68 vs. 4.92 ± 2.30 μg/ml, p = 0.009) and IgG antiglycan autoantibodies (23.25 ± 22.59 vs. 76.58 ± 71.22 IU/ml, p < 0.001) were found in MCD-IgAN patients than those in IgAN controls. Meanwhile, weaker fluorescence intensities of both IgA and GdIgA1 were observed in the glomerulus of MCD-IgAN patients compared to those in IgAN patients. Furthermore, poly-IgA1 complexes from MCD-IgAN patients induced weaker inflammatory effects on cultured mesangial cells than those from IgAN patients in vitro.Conclusion: The results demonstrated that MCD-IgAN cases represent a dual glomerulopathy, namely, mild IgAN with superimposed MCD, which furthermore provides substantial evidence for the corticosteroids therapy in MCD-IgAN patients as the guidelines recommended.

Do constituents know (or care) about the lawmaking effectiveness of their representatives?

Substantial evidence exists that members of the US Congress vary in their lawmaking effectiveness. Less known, however, is whether constituents are sufficiently informed and inclined to hold their representatives accountable, based on their effectiveness. We conduct two separate survey experiments, informing some constituents about lawmakers' effectiveness and comparing their responses to those with the baseline level of information. We find that voters demonstrate little knowledge of their elected officials' lawmaking effectiveness. When presented with objective and credible information about lawmaking effectiveness, however, respondents express greater approval of more effective lawmakers. Effects are strongest among ideological moderates, but are even pronounced among partisans, who approve of effective representatives of the opposing party, and disapprove of ineffective representatives from their own party.

The reduced embodiment of a second language

Substantial evidence indicates that first language (L1) comprehension involves embodied visual simulations. The present study tested the assumption that a formally learned second language (L2), which is less related to real-life experiences, is processed in a less embodied manner relative to a naturally acquired L1. To this end, bilingual participants completed the same task in their L1 and L2. In the task, they read sentences and decided immediately after each sentence whether a pictured object had been mentioned in the preceding sentence. Responses were significantly faster when the shape of the object in the picture matched rather than mismatched the sentence-implied shape, but only in the L1, and only when the L1 block was performed before the L2 block. These findings suggest that embodied visual simulations are reduced in a formally learned L2 and may be subjected to cross-language influences.

Divided attention impairs detection of simple visual features

Covert spatial attention allows us to prioritize processing at relevant locations. There is substantial evidence that perception is poorer when attention is distributed across multiple locations than when attention is focused on a single location. However, recent work suggests that may not always be the case: divided attention does not appear to impair detection of simple visual features that are represented in primary visual cortex. Here, we re-examined this possibility. In two experiments, observers detected a simple target (a vertical Gabor), and we manipulated whether attention was focused at one location (focal-cue condition) or distributed across two locations (distributed-cue condition). In Experiment 1, targets could appear independently at each location. Thus, observers needed to judge target presence for each location separately in the distributed-cue condition. Under these conditions, we found a robust cost of dividing attention. In this experiment, the cost of dividing attention could reflect either a limit in perceptual processing or a limit in decision making. Therefore, in Experiment 2, we simplified the task to more directly test whether dividing attention impairs perceptual processing of the target. Specifically, only one target could appear on each trial, such that observers made the exact same decision in both conditions (“was a target present?”). Here, we found a marginal cost of dividing attention on performance, that was weaker than the cost in Experiment 1. Together, our results suggest that divided attention does impair detection of simple visual features, but that this cost is primarily due to limits in post-perceptual decision making.

A Personal Biography of a Physiological Misnomer: The Anaerobic Threshold

In 1973 Wasserman, Whipp, Koyal, and Beaver published a groundbreaking study titled “Anaerobic threshold and respiratory gas analysis during exercise”. At that time, respiratory gas analysis and laboratory computers had evolved such that more advanced respiratory exercise physiology studies were possible. The initial publications from this group on the onset of anaerobic metabolism in cardiac patients, the first breath-by-breath VO2 system, the first description of the anaerobic threshold, and then later new methods to detect the anaerobic threshold have been and continue to be highly cited. In fact, their 1973 anaerobic threshold paper is the sixth and their 1986 paper is the second most cited paper ever published in the Journal of Applied Physiology. The anaerobic threshold concept has also generated>5500 publications with the rates increasing over time. The publication of two papers that help to refute the “anaerobic” explanation for this phenomenon had no effect on the rates of citations of the original anaerobic threshold papers or the number of anaerobic threshold papers published since. Thus, despite now substantial evidence refuting the proposed anaerobic mechanisms underlying this phenomenon, these papers continue to be highly influential in the discipline of exercise physiology and, perhaps even more explicitly, clinical exercise physiology.

Embalming, Viewing and the Social Construction of the Corpse: Time for Another Look

Embalming of the dead is more common in the United States than anywhere else in the world. Battles far from home during the Civil War with concern for contagion from dead bodies being shipped home, compelled President Lincoln to direct the troops to use embalming to allow the return of the Union dead to their homes. Viewings were common with war heroes and culminated with the viewing of Lincoln himself. In the 20th century embalming became a tradition despite substantial evidence indicating environmental and occupational hazards related to embalming fluids and carbon dioxide generated from manufacturing steel coffins before placing in concrete burial vaults. Embalming is promoted and considered helpful to the grieving process when families are comforted by a the appearance of a peaceful death. Embalmers are expected to produce an illusion of rest, an image that in some ways disguises death for the benefit of mourners. The dead are carefully displayed in a condition of liminal repose where the 'true' condition is hidden, and death is removed from the actual event. In this paper we highlight the spiritual and cultural complexities of embalming related- issues. We also provide data on the lack of grieving families’ preparedness for the financial burden associated with the death of a loved one and the lack of knowledge of alternative options. We propose an innovative process to empower people facing serious illness, and their families to make shared and informed decisions, especially when death is the expected outcome.