Can Common Pool Resource Theory Catalyze Stakeholder-Driven Solutions to the Freshwater Salinization Syndrome?

Freshwater salinity is rising across many regions of the United States as well as globally, a phenomenon called the freshwater salinization syndrome (FSS). The FSS mobilizes organic carbon, nutrients, heavy metals, and other contaminants sequestered in soils and freshwater sediments, alters the structures and functions of soils, streams, and riparian ecosystems, threatens drinking water supplies, and undermines progress toward many of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. There is an urgent need to leverage the current understanding of salinization's causes and consequences─in partnership with engineers, social scientists, policymakers, and other stakeholders─into locally tailored approaches for balancing our nation's salt budget. In this feature, we propose that the FSS can be understood as a common pool resource problem and explore Nobel Laureate Elinor Ostrom's social-ecological systems framework as an approach for identifying the conditions under which local actors may work collectively to manage the FSS in the absence of top-down regulatory controls. We adopt as a case study rising sodium concentrations in the Occoquan Reservoir, a critical water supply for up to one million residents in Northern Virginia (USA), to illustrate emerging impacts, underlying causes, possible solutions, and critical research needs.

The Unmet Data Visualization Needs of Decision Makers Within Organizations.

When an organization chooses one course of action over alternatives, this task typically falls on a decision maker with relevant knowledge, experience, and understanding of context. Decision makers rely on data analysis, which is either delegated to analysts, or done on their own. Often the decision maker combines data, likely uncertain or incomplete, with non-formalized knowledge within a multi-objective problem space, weighing the recommendations of analysts within broader contexts and goals. As most past research in visual analytics has focused on understanding the needs and challenges of data analysts, less is known about the tasks and challenges of organizational decision makers, and how visualization support tools might help. Here we characterize the decision maker as a domain expert, review relevant literature in management theories, and report the results of an empirical survey and interviews with people who make organizational decisions. We identify challenges and opportunities for novel visualization tools, including trade-off overviews, scenario-based analysis, interrogation tools, flexible data input and collaboration support. Our findings stress the need to expand visualization design beyond data analysis into tools for information management.

A storm event-based approach to TMDL development.

It is vitally important to define the critical condition for a receiving water body in the total maximum daily load (TMDL) development process. One of the major disadvantages of using a continuous simulation approach is that there is no guarantee that the most critical condition will be covered within the subjectively selected representative hydrologic period, which is usually several years depending on the availability of data. Another limitation of the continuous simulation approach, compared to a design storm approach, is the lack of an estimate of the risk involved. Because of the above limitations, a storm event-based critical flow-storm (CFS) approach was previously developed to explicitly address the critical condition as a combination of a prescribed stream flow and a storm event of certain magnitude, both having a certain frequency of occurrence and when combined, would create a critical condition. The CFS approach was tested successfully in a TMDL study for Muddy Creek in Virginia. The present paper reports results of a comparative study on the applicability of the CFS approach in Taiwan. The Dy-yu creek watershed in northern Taiwan differs significantly from Muddy Creek in terms of climate, hydrology, terrain, and other characteristics. Results show that the critical condition for different watersheds might be also different, and that the CFS approach could clearly define that critical condition and should be considered as an alternative method for TMDL development to a continuous simulation approach.

Technological advances in the study of HLA-DRA promoter regulation: extending the functions of CIITA, Oct-1, Rb, and RFX.

Several advances were established in examining the interaction of transcriptional factors with the HLA-DRA promoter. First, hydrodynamic injection was used to demonstrate the activation of the promoter by class II transactivator in a live mouse. Second, the Oct-1 DNA-binding site in the HLA-DRA promoter is a negative element in many cells, but here we show that Oct-1 activates the promoter independently of the Oct-1-binding site. Third, the retinoblastoma (Rb) protein is required for the induction of the endogenous HLA-DRA gene, due to a poorly understood, pleiotropic effect on the Oct-1 and YY1 repressive functions at the HLA-DRA promoter. There has never been an indication that direct promoter activation, by Rb, is possible. Here, we report that the first HLA-DRA intron has an Rb-responsive element, as indicated by a transient transfection/promoter reporter assay. Finally, RFX activates a methylated version of an HLA-DRA promoter reporter construct, consistent with the role of RFX in rescuing the expression of the methylated, endogenous HLA-DRA gene. Here, we report that this RFX function is not limited to a specific RFX-binding sequence or to the HLA-DRA promoter. These advances provide bases for novel investigations into the function of the major histocompatibility class II promoter.

Fluoxetine versus placebo in posttraumatic stress disorder.

BACKGROUND: This study was designed to address the efficacy and tolerability of fluoxetine in patients with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as diagnosed using the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis I Disorders and the Clinician-Administered PTSD Scale (CAPS). The patient population included both civilians and combat veterans. METHOD: This was a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled study conducted in Europe, Israel, and South Africa, primarily in war-torn countries. Patients were predominantly male (81%) and white (91%), with 48% exposed to a combat-related traumatic episode. Patients were randomly assigned to 12 weeks of acute treatment with fluoxetine, 20 to 80 mg/day (N = 226), or placebo (N = 75). The primary efficacy measurement was the mean change from baseline in the Treatment Outcome PTSD rating scale (TOP-8) total score, which was analyzed using a repeated-measures analysis of variance. Secondary assessments included the CAPS, the Davidson Trauma Scale, the Clinical Global Impressions-Severity of Illness scale (CGI-S), the CGI-Improvement scale (CGI-I), the Montgomery-Asberg Depression Rating Scale (MADRS), the Hamilton Rating Scale for Anxiety (HAM-A), and the Hopkins 90-Item Symptom Checklist-Revised. RESULTS: Fluoxetine was associated with a greater improvement from baseline in total TOP-8 score than was placebo. This difference was statistically significant by week 6 of treatment (p < .001) through the end of the acute phase of the study (week 12; p = .006). Compared with placebo, fluoxetine was also associated with significantly greater improvement in CAPS total score as well as intrusive and hyperarousal subscores and in CGI-S, CGI-I, HAM-A, and MADRS scores (p < .05). The presence of dissociative symptoms at baseline appeared to be a predictor of high placebo response. The mean fluoxetine dose at endpoint was 57 mg. There were no clinically significant safety differences. CONCLUSION: Fluoxetine is effective and well tolerated in the treatment of PTSD. Most PTSD patients will respond satisfactorily at doses in the upper normal range for the usual antidepressant doses of fluoxetine.

Population pharmacokinetics of rosuvastatin: implications of renal impairment, race, and dyslipidaemia.

OBJECTIVES: To build the structural model of pharmacokinetics for rosuvastatin and evaluate the impact of demographic characteristics including renal function on its pharmacokinetic parameters. METHODS: A population pharmacokinetic analysis of rosuvastatin in healthy volunteers, subjects with dyslipidaemia, and renal failure patients was performed using non-linear mixed-effects modelling and a two-compartment pharmacokinetic model with simultaneous first- and zero-order absorption. Demographic covariates, dyslipidaemic state and renal function were evaluated for their impact on pharmacokinetic parameters by step-wise additions or deletions using the likelihood ratio test. RESULTS: Typical pharmacokinetic parameters were estimated for a healthy white male subject. For example, apparent oral clearance (CL/F) was estimated to be 257 L/h. Age, smoking status, weight, body surface area, and lean body mass had no significant effect on rosuvastatin pharmacokinetics. The model predicted that CL/F for subjects with creatinine clearance (CLCR) of 30 mL/min (moderate renal impairment) and of 50 mL/min (mild renal impairment) was 17% and 9.7% lower, respectively, relative to subjects with CLCR of 94 mL/min, the data set median value. CL/F was reduced by 71.1% and 43.7% in subjects with dyslipidaemia and in Asian subjects, respectively. CONCLUSIONS: Reduction of CL/F of rosuvastatin is not considered clinically significant for patients with mild-to-moderate renal impairment. Rosuvastatin CL/F was reduced in subjects with dyslipidaemia, but it is important to realise that the safety/efficacy profile of rosuvastatin has been well established in this population. However, the potential for increased exposure in Asian subjects should be considered when initiating rosuvastatin treatment or increasing dose in this population.

Identification of real-time diagnostic measures of visual distraction with an automatic eye-tracking system.

OBJECTIVE: This study was conducted to identify eye glance measures that are diagnostic of visual distraction. BACKGROUND: Visual distraction degrades performance, but real-time diagnostic measures have not been identified. METHOD: In a driving simulator, 14 participants responded to a lead vehicle braking at -2 or -2.7 m/s2 periodically while reading a varying number of words (6-15 words every 13 s) on peripheral displays (with diagonal eccentricities of 24 degrees, 43 degrees, and 75 degrees). RESULTS: As the number of words and display eccentricity increased, total glance duration and reaction time increased and driving performance suffered. CONCLUSION: Correlation coefficients between several glance measures and reaction time or performance variables were reliably high, indicating that these glance measures are diagnostic of visual distraction. It is predicted that for every 25% increase in total glance duration, reaction time is increased by 0.39 s and standard deviation of lane position is increased by 0.06 m. APPLICATION: Potential applications of this research include assessing visual distraction in real time, delivering advisories to distracted drivers to reorient their attention to driving, and using distraction information to adapt forward collision and lane departure warning systems to enhance system effectiveness.

Fluoxetine v. placebo in prevention of relapse in post-traumatic stress disorder.

BACKGROUND: Little is known about the effect of pharmacotherapy in the prevention of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) relapse. AIMS: To assess the efficacy and tolerability of fluoxetine in preventing PTSD relapse. METHOD: This was a double-blind, randomised, placebo-controlled study. Following 12 weeks of acute treatment, patients who responded were rerandomised and continued in a 24-week relapse prevention phase with fluoxetine (n=69) or placebo (n=62). The primary efficacy assessment was the prevention of PTSD relapse, based on the time to relapse. RESULTS: Patients in the fluoxetine/fluoxetine group were less likely to relapse than patients in the fluoxetine/placebo group (P=0.027). There were no clinically significant differences in treatment-emergent adverse events between treatment groups. CONCLUSIONS: Fluoxetine is effective and well tolerated in the prevention of PTSD relapse for up to 6 months.