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  • An Ecosystem Services Approach to Assessing the Impacts of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico

    Prepublication Now Available

    As the Gulf of Mexico recovers from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, natural resource managers face the challenge of understanding the impacts of the spill and setting priorities for restoration work. The full value of losses resulting from the spill cannot be captured, however, without consideration of changes in ecosystem services–the benefits delivered to society through natural processes.

    Approach to Assessing the Impacts of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico discusses the benefits and challenges associated with using an ecosystem services approach to damage assessment, describing potential impacts of response technologies, exploring the role of resilience, and offering suggestions for areas of future research.

    [Read the full report]

    Topics: Environment and Environmental Studies

  • UCLA Health System named one of health care’s ‘most wired’ institutions in 2013 survey

    For the first time, the UCLA Health System and its hospitals have been designated among the nation’s “most wired” institutions in recognition of their implementation and use of information technology in their health-care delivery systems.
     
    The annual Health Care’s Most Wired Survey, sponsored by Hospitals and Health Networks magazine, measures a hospital’s level of adoption of information technology (IT) relative to other hospitals and health systems. The survey data is distributed, collected and analyzed by Health Forum, an American Hospital Association company, which develops industry-standard benchmarks for IT adoption.
     
    The UCLA Health System’s award was based on a comprehensive assessment that examined UCLA’s overall IT infrastructure and its use of IT and electronic processes (versus paper) for business and administrative purposes, clinical quality and safety, and clinical integration.
     
    “This award is the result of hard work by many dedicated staff and clinicians and expresses our core belief that quality information leads to improved patient care,” said Virginia McFerran, chief information officer for the UCLA Health System. “Integrating clinical thinking and dialog into information-systems planning is the cornerstone of our IT strategy to provide the best patient experience possible.”
     
    This year marks the 15th anniversary of the Most Wired Survey. In that time, hospitals and health care systems have made great strides in establishing the basic building blocks of robust clinical information systems aimed at improving patient care. This process includes adopting technologies to improve patient documentation, advance clinical-decision support and evidence-based protocols, reduce the likelihood of medication errors, and rapidly restore access to data in the case of a disaster or outage.
     
    “This year’s Most Wired organizations exemplify progress through innovation,” said Rich Umbdenstock, president and CEO of the American Hospital Association, which co-sponsors the survey. “The hospital field can learn from these outstanding organizations ways that IT can help to improve efficiency.”
     
    The Most Wired Survey, conducted this year between January 15 and March 15, asked hospitals and health systems nationwide to answer questions regarding their IT initiatives. Respondents completed 659 surveys, representing 1,713 hospitals, or roughly 30 percent of all hospitals in the U.S.
     
    Among the key findings of this year’s survey:  
    • 69 percent of the Most Wired hospitals and 60 percent of all hospitals surveyed reported that medication orders were entered electronically by physicians — a significant increase from 2004, when the figures were 27 percent for Most Wired hospitals and 12 percent for all hospitals. 
       
    • 71 percent of Most Wired hospitals had an electronic disease registry to identify and manage gaps in care across a population, compared with 51 percent of total survey respondents.
       
    • 66 percent of Most Wired hospitals share patient discharge data with affiliated hospitals, compared with 49 percent of total respondents. In addition, 37 percent of Most Wired hospitals share this data with non-affiliated hospitals, versus 24 percent of total respondents.
    “The concept of health information exchange is absolutely correct. We need to do it and do it in a robust, refined way,” said Russell P. Branzell, president and CEO of the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives. “The answer here is standards, standards, standards. We need to standardize the entire process, which we’ve done in almost every other business sector.”
     
    The 2013 Most Wired Survey also covered some new areas, such as big data analytics and patient-generated data. An emerging practice, big data analytics looks at large amounts of data to uncover patterns and correlations. The survey found that 32 percent of Most Wired hospitals conduct controlled experiments or scenario-planning to make better management decisions and that 41 percent of Most Wired hospitals provide a patient portal or Web-based solution for patient-generated data.  
     
    The cover story in the July issue of Hospitals and Health Networks (H&HN) magazine details the results of the survey and is available at www.hhnmag.com.
     
    The American Hospital Association is a not-for-profit association of health-care provider organizations and individuals committed to the health improvement of their communities. The AHA is the national advocate for its members, which includes nearly 5,000 hospitals, health care systems, networks, other providers of care and 43,000 individual members. Founded in 1898, the AHA provides education for health care leaders and is a source of information on health care issues and trends. For more information, visit the AHA Web site at www.aha.org.
     
    The 2013 Most Wired Survey is conducted in cooperation with McKesson Corp., AT&T, the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives and the American Hospital Association.
     
    The UCLA Health System has for more than half a century provided the best in health care and the latest in medical technology to the people of Los Angeles and the world. Comprising Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center; UCLA Medical Center, Santa Monica; the Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital at UCLA; Mattel Children’s Hospital UCLA; and the UCLA Medical Group, UCLA Health, with its wide-reaching system of primary care and specialty care offices throughout the region, is among the most comprehensive and advanced health care systems in the world. For information about clinical programs or help in choosing a personal physician, call 800-UCLA-MD1 or visit www.uclahealth.org.   
     
    For more news, visit UCLA Newsroom and follow us on Twitter.

  • Note to teens: Just breathe

    In May, the Los Angeles school board voted to ban suspensions of students for “willful defiance” and directed school officials to use alternative disciplinary practices. The decision was controversial, and the question remains: How do you discipline rowdy students and keep them in the classroom while still being fair to other kids who want to learn?
     
    A team led by Dara Ghahremani, an assistant researcher in the department of psychiatry at UCLA’s Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior conducted a study on the Youth Empowerment Seminar, or YES!, a workshop for adolescents that teaches them to manage stress, regulate their emotions, resolve conflicts and control impulsive behavior. Impulsive behavior, in particular — including acting out in class, engaging in drug or alcohol abuse, and risky sexual behaviors — is something that gets adolescents in trouble.
     
    The YES! program, run by the nonprofit International Association for Human Values, includes yoga-based breathing practices, among other techniques, and the research findings show that a little bit of breathing can go a long way. The scientists report that students who went through the four-week YES! for Schools program felt less impulsive, while students in a control group that didn’t participate in the program showed no change.
     
    The study appears in the July issue of the Journal of Adolescent Health.
     
    “The program helps teens to gain greater control over their actions by giving them tools to respond to challenging situations in constructive and mindful ways, rather than impulsively,” said Ghahremani, who conducted the study at the UCLA Center for Addictive Behaviors and UCLA’s Laboratory for Molecular Neuroimaging. “The program uses a variety of techniques, ranging from a powerful yoga-based breathing program called Sudarshan Kriya to decision-making and leadership skills that are taught via interactive group games. We found it to be a simple yet powerful approach that could potentially reduce impulsive behavior.”
     
    Ghahremani noted that teens are often just as stressed as adults.
     
    “There are home and family issues, academic pressures and, of course, social pressures,” he said. “With the immediacy and wide reach of communication technology, like Facebook, peer pressure and bullying has risen to a whole new level. Without the tools to handle such pressures, teens can often resort to impulsive acts that include violence towards others or themselves.”
     
    Impulsive behavior, or a lack of self-control, in adolescence is a key predictor of risky behavior, Ghahremani said.
     
    “Substance abuse and various mental health problems that begin in adolescence are often very difficult to shake in adulthood — there is a need for interventions that bring impulsive behavior under control in this group,” he said. “Our research is the first scientific study of the YES! program to show that it can significantly reduce impulsive behavior.”
     
    For the study, students between the ages of 14 and 18 from three Los Angeles–area high schools were invited to participate, between spring 2010 and fall 2011. In total, 788 students participated — 524 in the YES! program and 264 in the control group. The program was taught during the students’ physical education courses for four consecutive weeks. Students were asked to fill out questionnaires to rate statements about their impulsive behavior — for example, “I act without thinking” and “I feel self-control most of the time” — directly before and directly after the program. The students who did not go through the program also completed the questionnaires.
     
    The YES! program is composed of three modules focused on healthy body, healthy mind and healthy lifestyle. The healthy body module consists of physical activity that includes yoga stretches, mindful eating processes and interactive discussions about food and nutrition. The healthy mind module includes stress-management and relaxation techniques, including yoga-based breathing practices, yoga postures and meditation to relax the nervous system, bring awareness to the moment and enhance concentration. Group processes promote personal responsibility, respect, honesty and service to others. In the healthy lifestyle module, students learn strategies for handling challenging emotional and social situations, especially peer pressure. Mindful decision-making and leadership skills are taught via interactive games. Students also create a group community-service project, applying their newly learned skills toward that goal.
     
    “There is a need for simple, engaging interventions that bring impulsive behavior under control in adolescents,” said Ghahremani. “This is important to the public because impulsive behavior in adolescents is associated with many mental health problems and, when left unchecked, can result in violent acts, such as those resulting in tragedies recently observed on school campuses.
     
    “The advantage of this program over approaches that center around psychiatric medications is that it develops a sense of responsibility and empowerment in teens, allowing them to clarify and pursue their goals while fostering a sense of connection to their community. Although some medications can help control impulsive behavior, they often come with unpleasant side effects and the risk of medication abuse. Moreover, approaches that rely on them don’t necessarily focus on empowering kids to take control of their lives. “
     
    Non-pharmacologically–based programs like YES! for Schools that increase self-control are important to explore since they offer concrete tools that students can actively apply to their everyday lives with noticeable results, Ghahremani said.
     
    To follow up on results from this study, the National Institute on Drug Abuse has awarded Ghahremani and his colleagues a grant to examine the effects of the YES! program by using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to study the brain circuitry that is important for self-control and emotion regulation. The project also aims to examine how the YES! program can reduce cravings among teen smokers.
     
    Other authors of the study included Eugene Y. Oh, Andrew C. Dean, Kristina Mouzakis, Kristen D. Wilson and senior author Edythe D. London, all of UCLA. Funding for the study was provided by an endowment from the Thomas P. and Katherine K. Pike Chair in Addiction Studies and a gift from the Marjorie M. Greene Trust.
     
    The UCLA Department of Psychiatry is part of the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA, a world-leading interdisciplinary research and education institute devoted to the understanding of complex human behavior — including the genetic, biological, behavioral and sociocultural underpinnings of normal behavior and the causes and consequences of neuropsychiatric disorders. In addition to conducting fundamental research, institute faculty members seek to develop effective strategies for the prevention and treatment of neurological, psychiatric and behavioral disorders, including improving access to mental health services and the shaping of national health policy.
     
    For more news, visit the UCLA Newsroom and follow us on Twitter.

  • Toward Quality Measures for Population Health and the Leading Health Indicators

    Prepublication Now Available

    The Institute of Medicine (IOM) Committee on Quality Measures for the Healthy People Leading Health Indicators was charged by the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health to identify measures of quality for the 12 Leading Health Indicator (LHI) topics and 26 Leading Health Indicators in Healthy People 2020 (HP2020), the current version of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) 10-year agenda for improving the nation’s health.

    The scope of work for this project is to use the nine aims for improvement of quality in public health (population-centered, equitable, proactive, health promoting, risk reducing, vigilant, transparent, effective, and efficient) as a framework to identify quality measures for the Healthy People Leading Health Indicators (LHIs). The committee reviewed existing literature on the 12 LHI topics and the 26 Leading Health Indicators. Quality measures for the LHIs that are aligned with the nine aims for improvement of quality in public health will be identified. When appropriate, alignments with the six Priority Areas for Improvement of Quality in Public Health will be noted in the Committee’s report. Toward Quality Measures for Population Health and the Leading Health Indicators also address data reporting and analytical capacities that must be available to capture the measures and for demonstrating the value of the measures to improving population health.

    Toward Quality Measures for Population Health and the Leading Health Indicators provides recommendations for how the measures can be used across sectors of the public health and health care systems. The six priority areas (also known as drivers) are population health metrics and information technology; evidence-based practices, research, and evaluation; systems thinking; sustainability and stewardship; policy; and workforce and education.

    [Read the full report]

    Topics: Health and Medicine

  • Chinese inflation – unreported retail

    China’s inflation print for June at 2.7 percent, a four-month high, was higher than forecast, but part of the picture could be obfuscated by a lack of accounting for the ever-growing online retail sector.

    Gross domestic product figures have been consistently revised down this year from 8 percent to around 7.4 percent by July, with significant doubt over the reliability of official data. Some analysts forecast the more likely GDP print is around 5 percent, given the lack of punishment for falsifying local data and incentives for better growth figures for regional prints.

    With an increasing share of shopping carried out online through websites such as Taobao, Tmall and Paipai, there is an increasing argument for online retail numbers -which had lifted one metric of inflation  closer to 7 percent in April –  to be included in the headline CPI. That metric is the retail sector’s internet shopping price index (iSPI).

    This includes (based on the compilation of Taobao sales data) food, tobacco, liquor, clothing, household equipment and maintenance services, health care and personal products, transport and communications, entertainment and educational products and services including residential and office supplies. If inflation were calculated on this basis, it could be more accurately computed at 3.15 percent today.

    On the connection between the iSPI and the CPI numbers, analysts at ICBC have said:

    Network retail price index (iSPI)…  should generally reflect changes in the general price of the domestic online retail channels, which is ultimately the formation of a national network of retail price index and even the formation of the first stepping stone in the CPI process of covering the online retail channels.

    Take a look at this chart for a closer look at the level where inflation could be more accurately estimated. In recent months, the gap between the internet shopping index and official CPI data has started to converge, to around 3.65 percent today from as wide as 11.9 percent in May last year.

    Online retail holds opportunities for the investor too. According to McKinsey & Company research in March,  the online marketplace ecosystem in China accounts for 90 percent of transactions, though covers only 70 percent of investment. The current level of online market activity breaks down on a GDP per capita basis.

     

  • Nationwide Response Issues After an Improvised Nuclear Device Attack: Medical and Public Health Considerations for Neighboring Jurisdictions: Workshop Summary

    Prepublication Now Available

    Our nation faces the distinct possibility of a catastrophic terrorist attack using an improvised nuclear device (IND), according to international and U.S. intelligence. Detonation of an IND in a major U.S. city would result in tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of victims and would overwhelm public health, emergency response, and health care systems, not to mention creating unprecedented social and economic challenges. While preparing for an IND may seem futile at first glance, thousands of lives can be saved by informed planning and decision making prior to and following an attack.

    In 2009, the Institute of Medicine published the proceedings of a workshop assessing the health and medical preparedness for responding to an IND detonation. Since that time, multiple federal and other publications have added layers of detail to this conceptual framework, resulting in a significant body of literature and guidance. However, there has been only limited planning effort at the local level as much of the federal guidance has not been translated into action for states, cities and counties. According to an informal survey of community preparedness by the National Association of City and County Health Officials (NACCHO), planning for a radiation incident ranked lowest in priority among other hazards by 2,800 local health departments.

    The focus of Nationwide Response Issues After an Improvised Nuclear Device Attack: Medical and Public Health Considerations for Neighboring Jurisdictions: Workshop Summary is on key response requirements faced by public health and health care systems in response to an IND detonation, especially those planning needs of outlying state and local jurisdictions from the detonation site. The specific meeting objectives were as follows:

    – Understand the differences between types of radiation incidents and implications of an IND attack on outlying communities.

    -Highlight current planning efforts at the federal, state, and local level as well as challenges to the implementation of operational plans.

    -Examine gaps in planning efforts and possible challenges and solutions.

    -Identify considerations for public health reception centers: how public health and health care interface with functions and staffing and how radiological assessments and triage be handled.

    -Discuss the possibilities and benefits of integration of disaster transport systems.

    -Explore roles of regional health care coalitions in coordination of health care response.

    [Read the full report]

    Topics: Health and Medicine | Conflict and Security Issues

  • News story: Prime Minister’s video message for Ramadan 2013

    Prime Minister’s video message for Ramadan 2013

    Full transcript

    I’d like to send my sincere greetings to everyone observing the Holy month of Ramadan.

    This is a month which demonstrates the true spirit of Islam.

    Muslims in Britain and around the world will sacrifice the day-to-day luxuries that we can take for granted, they will pray for people in need, and they will fast to show devotion to God and recognise those who go hungry in our world.

    

I am very proud to be Prime Minister of a nation in which people can freely practise their beliefs.

    And it should be a source of pride to all Muslims that this month, even those living with extreme hardships will give up the little they have and pray for others.

    Many will be praying for Muslims around the world. Those caught up in conflict, those who are seeking justice and democracy, or those living in the poorest regions on earth, who struggle to get by day to day.

    As Prime Minister I am delighted that the British Government has been able to keep its promise to invest 0.7% of our gross national income on helping the world’s poorest and I am grateful that we have been able to partner with Muslim and other organisations to help those in need overseas.



    Ramadan is a shining example of how humanity can come together in a positive way for a common good, and I pay tribute to all those who take part. 

To Muslims at home and overseas I wish you: Ramadan Kareem!

  • BlackBerry Balance Demo Team Takes to the Streets of Washington, D.C.

    Originally published on the Inside BlackBerry for Business blog

    Armed with BlackBerry Z10 devices and these awesome costumes, our BlackBerry Balance demo team took to the streets to show the people of Washington, D.C. the power and versatility of BlackBerry Balance. Our team members don’t just love BlackBerry Balance — they live it. Sporting half-business, half-casual attire, the demo team exemplifies how BlackBerry allows you to manage your personal and work lives. They even wore special BlackBerry Backpacks with LCD screens for device demonstrations!

    pic_1-w600

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    The Demo Team mingled with the public, surprising pedestrians with their costumes and impressing onlookers with the functionality of the re-invented BlackBerry Z10. Our BlackBerry Balance Demo Team spread out across the city to demonstrate how Balance helps government workers move seamlessly between their work and personal apps.

    One reason BlackBerry 10 is such a great solution for government employees, IT admins, and internal policy makers is the BlackBerry Balance feature, which keeps personal and work data separate. Key features that make BlackBerry 10 the best option for government include:

    Secure separation of government and personal data

    • Privileged information is secure and separate from personal employee information
    • Through BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10, businesses can seamlessly manage and curate a corporate app storefront ó BlackBerry World for Work ó within the BlackBerry Balance Work Space to push and install mandatory apps and publish recommended apps to both corporate and BYOD users

    BlackBerry 10 supports IT policy protection

    • Employees will receive alerts when they take actions that conflict with internal policies
    • BlackBerry Balance is designed to restrict third-party applications, like social media platforms, from accessing government data, and it helps to prevent copy-and-pasting from government assets to personal apps

    Secure data with role-based administration

    • In the event of a potential security breach, admins can remotely wipe all privileged data associated with the government agency and cut off the device from the office’s BlackBerry server. Personal information and apps remain intact.

    We shared demos with hundreds of D.C. workers, encouraging them to jump into the unified experience of the BlackBerry 10 platform. Responses were positive and everyone involved had a lot of fun giving BlackBerry Balance on BlackBerry 10 a try. Our favorite consistent response: “So I don’t have to carry two phones anymore? …Great!”

  • PNNL wins R&D 100 Award for instrument that leads to rapid medical and environmental tests

    An instrument that quickly and more effectively analyzes complex biological and environmental samples was today named one of the past year’s 100 most significant scientific and technological products or advances.

    The innovation was recognized by R&D Magazine in their annual R&D 100 Awards competition and was developed by researchers at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.

    PNNL has now won 90 R&D 100 Awards — sometimes referred to as the “Oscars of Innovation” — since the contest began in 1963.

    “My sincere congratulations to the winners of this year’s R&D 100 Awards,” said Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz. “The scientists and engineers who developed these award-winning technologies at the cutting edge facilities across our national labs are keeping Americans at the forefront of the innovation community and assuring our nation’s economic competitiveness and national security.”

    Identification of small molecules that indicate disease, known as biomarkers, promises to significantly improve human heath through early diagnosis and customized treatment. However, improved research instruments for separation and identification of specific molecules in complex samples are needed to achieve this objective.

    PNNL researchers have recently developed a new instrument that can process such complex samples rapidly and accurately, detecting rare yet important molecules for early diagnosis that cannot be adequately characterized using existing instruments.

    The PNNL-developed instrument effectively merges two complementary analysis techniques — one known as multiplexed ion mobility spectrometry (IMS) and the other as ultrafast quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry — into the Combined Orthogonal Mobility & Mass Evaluation Technology, or CoMet.

    The combination of the two distinct approaches enables CoMet to exhaustively characterize samples, some of which have many different components that vary greatly in abundance. This wide range of quantities commonly trips up less advanced separation methods. The exceptional speed of IMS permits CoMet to analyze large numbers of samples rapidly and inexpensively. This can be crucial in biomedical research, clinical practices, natural product management — where sample analysis is conducted by oil and mining industries — and in environmental studies.

    CoMet has been used in collaborations with Oregon Health Sciences University and the University of Washington to investigate several diseases and with the University of Wisconsin-Madison for environmental studies. The technology was created at EMSL, DOE’s Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory located at PNNL, and integrated into several instruments that are available for use by the scientific community through EMSL’s competitive peer review process. Developed using mass spectrometers from Agilent Technologies of Santa Clara, Calif., CoMet has been licensed by Agilent and commercially introduced at the National ASMS Meeting in June 2013.

    The winning PNNL team was led by Battelle Fellow Richard Smith, and included co-developers Gordon Anderson, Erin Baker, Kevin Crowell, William Danielson III, Yehia Ibrahim, Brian LaMarche, Matthew Monroe, Ronald Moore, Randolph Norheim, Daniel Orton, Alexandre Shvartsburg, Gordon Slysz, and Keqi Tang.

    PNNL staff involved in developing and commercializing the innovation will be honored at the annual R&D 100 Awards ceremony in Orlando, Fla., Nov. 7.

  • News story: Andy Murray visits Downing Street

    Andy Murray, the 2013 Wimbledon men’s champion, has arrived at Downing Street.

    He was met at the front door by the Prime Minister, before attending a cross-party reception in the Downing Street garden where he met the Deputy Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition.

    The Prime Minister and Andy Murray outside 10 Downing Street
    The Prime Minister and Andy Murray outside 10 Downing Street
    The Prime Minister leads Andy Murray through Downing Street as staff applaud
    The Prime Minister leads Andy Murray through Downing Street as staff applaud
    Andy Murray with the Prime Minister, Deputy Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition in the Number 10 garden
    Andy Murray with the Prime Minister, Deputy Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition in the Number 10 garden
    The Prime Minister and Andy Murray with the Wimbledon men’s trophy
    The Prime Minister and Andy Murray with the Wimbledon men’s trophy

  • News story: Education reform: a world-class curriculum to drive up standards and fuel aspiration

    This follows a consultation period launched in February.

    The new national curriculum embodies high expectations in every subject and will raise standards for all children. It combines the best elements of what is taught in the world’s most successful school systems, including Hong Kong, Massachusetts, Singapore and Finland, with some of the most impressive practice from schools in England.

    It has been designed to ensure England has the most productive, most creative and best educated young people of any nation. It aims to create a population with the knowledge and skills not just to get a good job and succeed in life, but also to help us compete and win in the global race.

    The Prime Minister said:

    We are determined to give all children in this country the very best education – for their future, and for our country’s future. The new national curriculum is a vital part of that.

    This curriculum marks a new chapter in British education. From advanced fractions to computer coding to some of the greatest works of literature in the English language, this is a curriculum that is rigorous, engaging and tough.

    As a parent this is exactly the kind of thing I want my children to be learning. And as Prime Minister I know this revolution in education is critical for Britain’s prosperity in the decades to come.

    This is a curriculum to inspire a generation – and it will educate the great British engineers, scientists, writers and thinkers of our future.

    Secretary of State for Education Michael Gove said:

    We are introducing a tougher, more rigorous national curriculum. Schools will focus more on essay writing, mathematical modelling and problem solving. For the first time children will be learning to programme computers. It will raise standards across the board – and allow our children to compete in the global race.

    Read the written ministerial statement from the Secretary of State for Education.

  • UCLA brain-pacemaker patient to play guitar in public for first time since live-tweeted surgery

    WHAT: 
    Brad Carter, a Los Angeles man who captured international attention when he strummed his guitar during a live-tweeted UCLA surgery to implant a pacemaker in his brain, will appear at a UCLA press conference to discuss with his surgeon how undergoing the procedure has changed his life. He will also play guitar in public for the first time since the May 23 surgery. 
     
    Carter chose to undergo the surgery to halt what is known as benign essential tremor, a neurological disorder that made his hands shake when he moved them. He was the 500th Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center patient to undergo the deep-brain stimulation procedure, which uses imaging technology to target the exact site in the brain producing abnormal electrical signals. When surgeons implant the pacemaker, they stimulate the region to restore a more normal pattern of brain activity, effectively stopping the tremors.
     
    WHO: 
    The following individuals will be available for interviews:
     
    Brad Carter
    The 39-year-old actor, musician and artist underwent deep-brain stimulation during an awake craniotomy, in which surgeons temporarily lifted a piece of his skull to implant a pacemaker inside his brain.
     
    Dr. Nader Pouratian
    An assistant professor of neurosurgery at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and director of its neurosurgical movement disorders program, Pouratian is a leading expert on surgical therapies for Parkinson’s disease and essential tremor.
     
    WHEN: 
    Wednesday, July 10 (Press check-in at 10:30 a.m.; press conference begins at 11 a.m.)
     
    WHERE:       
    Auditorium of UCLA’s Neuroscience Research Building (map)
    635 Charles E. Young Dr. South, Los Angeles 90095
     
    PARKING:
    Parking for oversized media vans is very limited. Please R.S.V.P. to media contact by 3 p.m. on Tuesday, July 9, to be assigned a space for oversized trucks and to arrange a complimentary parking pass for passenger vehicles. 
     
    MEDIA CONTACT:
    Elaine Schmidt | [email protected] | 310-794-2272

  • News story: 25th anniversary of the Piper Alpha disaster: Prime Minister’s letter

    Dear Malcolm,

    The 25th Anniversary of the Piper Alpha disaster is a fitting moment to mark the skill, bravery and dedicated professionalism of all those who work offshore.

    The oil and gas industry is one of the UK’s greatest industrial success stories. The sector has made – and will continue to make – a significant contribution to our country’s economic prosperity.

    Conditions in the North Sea are some of the harshest anywhere in the world. The work to provide the fuels we all rely on is a triumph of technical ingenuity and committed human endeavour.

    In this testing environment the highest safety standards are paramount. I know how tirelessly the industry works to prevent incidents like Piper Alpha from ever happening again.

    Over the last 25 years the North Sea has embraced continuous improvement in health and safety – an appropriate lasting memorial to those who suffered so terribly a quarter of a century ago.

    We will never forget the 167 who lost their lives on 6th July 1988. And my thoughts as Aberdeen remembers its loss are with their families and loved ones, the survivors and all those involved on that tragic night.

    Yours,

    David Cameron
    Prime Minister

  • Route 312 – China’s Route 66

    The world’s largest car market, China, with a population of 1.3 billion people and an emerging middle class, holds great potential for investors and consumers alike with annual growth rates in the auto sector expected to hold at around 23 percent to 2017, according to Alliance Bernstein Asset Managers.

    Joint ventures (JV), the most popular structure for foreign firms investing in the automobile sector in the world’s largest car market, are set to capitalise on a growing consumer base in a country with 3.3 million kilometres of asphalt. Traversing the so-called ‘mother’ road 312 (China’s route 66) is becoming more of an attainable dream for the Chinese consumer.

    VW has a JV with Changchun-based FAW, Dongfeng with Nissan, GAC with Toyota and  Honda. There are many investment opportunities, though a constantly changing sectoral environment and risks of mechanical recalls can cause sharp fluctuations as in any market, according to Bernstein Research, a subsidiary of Alliance Bernstein holdings.

    China now has some 21,100 dealers nationwide, more than the United States (17,500), Germany (12,900), and the UK (4,700) in absolute numbers. Domestic dealers are overshadowed by international brands in the larger cities. The next step is for the international JV-backed dealers to make regional expansion where domestic dealers are currently concentrated.

    Tassos Stassopoulos at Alliance Bernstein said:

    The place we currently expect companies to generate most value in China is in the SUV and luxury segment. Land Rover is in a sweet spot to cover both and for luxury BMW and Audi. This is all contingent on them not messing up their product cycle, which is hard to predict.

    There are some warnings, however, according to the authors of the Bernstein Research report.

    We believe Chinese car sales growth is set to run at a slower pace going forward and will collide with large increases in production capacity. Direct government financial assistance appears to be playing a role in China’s fast increasing capacity, which will ultimately lower returns. Our framework takes account of technology, R&D competence, growth and cash valuation. We rate Brilliance (HK$13 price target) and Dongfeng (HK$17) outperform. We rate Great Wall (HK$36) and GAC (HK$7) market-perform. We rate Geely (HK$3) underperform.

    Elsewhere in the  BRICs, Russia’s government announced a new subsidy programme in July for Russian citizens wanting to buy a car, helping to boost the likes of Avtovaz. Tata Motors in India has also found SUVs a bright spot, though sales to March were lower than expectations.  In Brazil the world’s fourth largest car market, auto sales hit record levels in May as car makers took advantage of tax breaks for domestically manufactured vehicles.

    If there is still doubt about the market in China, it is clear that it has more dealers in absolute terms and still sells more per dealer than major developed markets.

    China tops the list for sales per dealer

  • An Assessment of the Prospects for Inertial Fusion Energy

    Final Book Now Available

    The potential for using fusion energy to produce commercial electric power was first explored in the 1950s. Harnessing fusion energy offers the prospect of a nearly carbon-free energy source with a virtually unlimited supply of fuel. Unlike nuclear fission plants, appropriately designed fusion power plants would not produce the large amounts of high-level nuclear waste that requires long-term disposal. Due to these prospects, many nations have initiated research and development (R&D) programs aimed at developing fusion as an energy source. Two R&D approaches are being explored: magnetic fusion energy (MFE) and inertial fusion energy (IFE).

    An Assessment of the Prospects for Inertial Fusion Energy describes and assesses the current status of IFE research in the United States; compares the various technical approaches to IFE; and identifies the scientific and engineering challenges associated with developing inertial confinement fusion (ICF) in particular as an energy source. It also provides guidance on an R&D roadmap at the conceptual level for a national program focusing on the design and construction of an inertial fusion energy demonstration plant.

    [Read the full report]

    Topics: Energy and Energy Conservation | Engineering and Technology | Math, Chemistry and Physics

  • News story: NHS 65th anniversary: David Cameron celebrates "this great national treasure"

    To mark the occasion, the Prime Minister said:

    Our National Health Service is one of the most precious institutions we have. We all know it, because all of us have been touched by it. I will never forget the care my son Ivan received and the inspirational people who helped Sam and me through some of the most difficult times. The consultants, the community nurses, the care team – every one of them became part of our lives. When you have experienced support and dedicated professional care like that, you know just how incredibly special the NHS is.

    Read the Prime Minister’s full statement on LinkedIn.

    The Prime Minister and Health Secretary today set out plans to make the NHS a more personal service for vulnerable and elderly patients. Older people with complicated health needs will have a named clinician responsible for them at all times when they are out of hospital, whether they are at home or in a care home. This will mean every element of their treatment is personalised and tailored around their individual needs.

    Today also sees the launch of Genomics England, a new organisation tasked with radically improving our understanding of disease and designing treatments better tailored to individual patients.

    Find out more about these announcements from the Department of Health.

  • News story: Prime Minister champions inward investment at London Array and Battersea Power Station

    The Prime Minister first attended the inauguration of London Array, the world’s largest offshore wind farm located 12 miles off the Kent and Essex coasts in the outer Thames Estuary.

    A ceremony was held to mark the occasion at the Turner Contemporary gallery in Margate, Kent, from where the wind farm’s 175 turbines can be seen.

    London Array will be able to power the equivalent of around half a million UK households and should help reduce harmful CO2 emissions by more than 900,000 tonnes a year. As well as marking a big step forward for UK renewable energy generation it will help ensure a reliable electricity source for the south east.

    Speaking at the inauguration, Prime Minister David Cameron said:

    This is a great day for Kent and a great day for Britain. London Array has been built by some of the bravest seamen, the most talented engineers and hardest workers. It will bring benefits to Kent for years to come.

    More than 75 organisations and 6,700 individuals were involved in its construction, with up to 1,000 people working on site. The lessons learned are expected to help reduce the cost of future offshore wind farms.

    Inward investment for the project came from Denmark-based DONG Energy, the E.ON Group and Abu Dhabi’s Masdar.

    Later, the PM joined Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak in London for the official groundbreaking ceremony of the 39-acre Battersea Power Station site redevelopment.

    The long-awaited project will transform the area into a vibrant new neighbourhood and see the iconic Grade II* listed power station fully restored and opened to the public, 30 years after it was decommissioned.

    Some 3,500 new homes, shops, restaurants and offices will be built, set in a 6-acre riverside park with the power station at its heart.

    The redevelopment will generate 15,000 new jobs and has attracted inward investment from a Malaysian-led consortium of SP Setia, Sime Darby and EPF, with redevelopment undertaken by the British-based Battersea Power Station Development Company.

  • Politics: the unquantifiable risk that is rising in emerging markets

    Political risks appear to be rising in emerging markets, but how do you measure them?

    Protests in Egypt – leading to the ousting of a second president in as many years–  Turkey and Brazil have caught investors on the hop this year, causing the kind of market volatility that emerging market bulls had been saying were a thing of the past.

    Political risk didn’t go away, so it turned out, it just took a breather, while at the same time spreading to countries like Portugal and Greece.

    Market players often use credit default swaps as a proxy for political risk, as they measure a country’s likelihood of defaulting on its debt. Egypt’s five-year CDS hit record highs earlier this week following mass demonstrations, but they fell on Thursday after the army removed Islamist President Mohamed Mursi, as investors hoped for a more business-friendly environment.

    But investors find CDS a clumsy and risky tool, that can be easily influenced by other factors, like liquidity or the credit quality of your counterparty. Renaissance Capital measures per capita GDP against government type since 1950 to show the similarities between Egypt in 2013 and Turkey in the 1970s, before Turkey’s 1980 military coup, which was followed by democratic elections only three years later:

    A middle class with improving incomes is more likely to demand and get democracy.  For a country with Egypt’s per capita GDP, it is more likely that a country moves from autocracy to democracy, than from democracy to autocracy.

    That move to democracy is likely to keep investors on the sidelines, however, as long as the situation remains uncertain. Renaissance says Africa funds are likely to stick with sub-Saharan Africa and Morocco, and keep clear of Egypt.

    That’s the case for Africa fund manager Alexander Trotter of Fulcrum, who is underweight Egypt because of the political turmoil, despite the country’s attractions as an industrial centre, a so-called “Manchester of the Middle East”:

    We are very bottom up, finding stocks where we think there is value. But at times, politics can dwarf all that.

     

  • Growth, not just size, boosts brain aneurysms’ risk of bursting

    Brain aneurysms of all sizes — even small ones the size of a pea — are up to 12 times more likely to rupture if they are growing, according to a new UCLA study.
     
    Published July 2 in the online edition of the journal Radiology, the discovery counters current guidelines suggesting that small aneurysms pose a low risk for rupture, and it emphasizes the need for regular monitoring and earlier treatment.
     
    “Until now, we believed that large aneurysms presented the highest risk for rupture and that smaller aneurysms may not require monitoring,” said lead author Dr. J. Pablo Villablanca, chief of diagnostic neuroradiology at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. “Our findings show this is not the case and shed light on additional risk factors for rupture in aneurysms of all sizes.”
     
    An aneurysm occurs at a weak spot in an artery that supplies blood to the brain. The artery wall bulges outward, creating a balloon filled with blood. If an aneurysm ruptures, blood leaks into or around the brain, which can cause stroke, paralysis, brain damage or death.
     
    An estimated 6 million people in the U.S., one in 50, live with a brain aneurysm, most with no symptoms. But brain aneurysms rupture in some 30,000 Americans each year. The prognosis is grim: About 40 percent die before reaching the hospital, and another third die within the first 30 days post-rupture. The majority of those who survive are left with permanent brain damage and physical disability.
     
    Villablanca and his colleagues imaged the brain blood vessels of 165 patients with 258 asymptomatic aneurysms using a noninvasive method called computed tomography angiography, or CTA. Patients underwent CTA scans every six or 12 months.
     
    In 38 of the patients, the researchers saw growth in 46 aneurysms — nearly 18 percent of all the aneurysms. Three of the growing aneurysms ruptured; all were smaller than 7 millimeters when the patient enrolled in the study.
     
    “Our study shows that the size of the aneurysm is not as important as we once thought,” Dr. Villablanca said. “Any aneurysm is capable of growth and requires follow-up imaging.”
     
    Compared with the aneurysms that did not increase in size, growing aneurysms were associated with a 12-fold higher risk of rupture. The researchers calculated the risk of rupture for growing aneurysms at 2.4 percent per patient-year, versus 0.2 percent for aneurysms without growth.
     
    “Our data emphasize the importance of long-term follow-up imaging to watch for possible growth in all unruptured aneurysms, including small lesions,” Villablanca said.
     
    In a secondary finding, the researchers reported that tobacco smoking and an aneurysm’s initial larger size were independent factors predicting aneurysm growth. These combined risk factors were linked to nearly 80 percent of all aneurysm growth in the study.
     
    “Our findings correlated a higher risk of rupture to the combined factors of smoking, aneurysm growth and larger aneurysm size,” Villablanca said. “Patients who smoke and have growing aneurysms may require earlier treatment, such as brain surgery or endovascular coiling.”
     
    The research was supported by a grant from the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering. 
     
    Villablanca’s co-authors included Dr. Gary Duckwiler, Dr. Reza Jahan, Dr. Satoshi Tateshima, Dr. Neil Martin, Dr. John Frazee, Dr. Nestor Gonzalez, James Sayre and Dr. Fernando Vinuela, all from UCLA.
     
    Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center offers three-dimensional imaging of brain aneurysms to predict which patients may be at higher risk of rupture and require immediate treatment.  
     
    UCLA Radiology is committed to providing outstanding patient care by combining xcellence in clinical imaging, research and educational programs with state-of-the-art technology. The department’s internationally recognized faculty and researchers collaborate with a vast number of departments within the hospital and university, allowing UCLA to rapidly implement new and often revolutionary imaging and therapeutic innovations to benefit patients.
     
    For more news, visit the UCLA Newsroom and follow us on Twitter.

  • UCLA researchers find new clue to cause of human narcolepsy

    In 2000, researchers at the UCLA Center for Sleep Research published findings showing that people suffering from narcolepsy, a disorder characterized by uncontrollable periods of deep sleep, had 90 percent fewer neurons containing the neuropeptide hypocretin in their brains than healthy people. The study was the first to show a possible biological cause of the disorder.
     
    Subsequent work by this group and others demonstrated that hypocretin is an arousing chemical that keeps us awake and elevates both mood and alertness; the death of hypocretin cells, the researchers said, helps explain the sleepiness of narcolepsy. But it has remained unclear what kills these cells. 
     
    Now the same UCLA team reports that an excess of another brain cell type — this one containing histamine — may be the cause of the loss of hypocretin cells in human narcoleptics. 
     
    UCLA professor of psychiatry Jerome Siegel and colleagues report in the current online edition of the journal Annals of Neurology that people with the disorder have nearly 65 percent more brain cells containing the chemical histamine. Their research suggests that this excess of histamine cells causes the loss of hypocretin cells in human narcoleptics.
     
    Narcolepsy is a chronic disorder of the central nervous system characterized by the brain’s inability to control sleep–wake cycles. It causes sudden bouts of sleep and is often accompanied by cataplexy, an abrupt loss of voluntary muscle tone that can cause person to collapse. According to the National Institutes of Health, narcolepsy is thought to affect roughly one in every 3,000 Americans. Currently, there is no cure.
     
    Histamine is a body chemical that works as part of the immune system to kill invading cells. When the immune system goes awry, histamine can act on a person’s eyes, nose, throat, lungs, skin or gastrointestinal tract, causing the symptoms of allergy that many people are familiar with. But histamine is also present in a type of brain cell. 
     
    For the study, researchers examined five narcoleptic brains and seven control brains from human cadavers. Prior to death, all the narcoleptics had been diagnosed by a sleep disorder center as having narcolepsy with cataplexy. These brains were also compared with the brains of three narcoleptic mouse models and to the brains of narcoleptic dogs. 
     
    The researchers found that the humans with narcolepsy had an average of 64 percent more histamine neurons. Interestingly, the team did not see an increased number of these cells in any of the animal models of narcolepsy.
     
    “Humans and animals with narcolepsy share the same symptoms, but we did not see the histamine cell changes we saw in humans in the animal models we examined,” said Siegel, who directs the Center for Sleep Research at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior and is the senior author of the research. “We know that narcolepsy in the animal models is caused by engineered genetic changes that block hypocretin function. However, in humans, we did not know why the hypocretin cells die.
     
    “Our current findings indicate that the increase of histamine cells that we see in human narcolepsy may cause the loss of hypocretin cells,” he said.
     
    The study results may also further our understanding of brain plasticity, Siegel noted. While scientists have known of the existence neurogenesis — the process by which the brain is populated with new neurons — it was thought to function mainly to replace existing cells that had died.
     
    “This paper shows for the first time that neuronal numbers can increase greatly and not just serve as replacement cells,” he said. “In the current example, this appears to be pathological with the destruction of hypocretin, but in other circumstances, it may underlie recovery and learning and open new routes to treatment of a number of neurological disorders.”
     
    Siegel is also the chief of neurobiology research at the Sepulveda Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Mission Hills, Calif. Other authors on the study included co–first authors Joshi John and Thomas C. Thannickal, Ronald McGregor, Lalini Ramanathan and Carly Stone of UCLA; Marcia Cornford of Harbor–UCLA Medical Center; Hiroshi Ohtsu of Japan’s Tohoku University; Seiji Nishino and Noriaki Sakai of Stanford University; and Akhiro Yamanaka of Japan’s Nagoya University.
     
    Funding for the study was provided by the Medical Research Service of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and by National Institutes of Health grants NS14610 and MH064109.
     
    The UCLA Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences is the home within the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA for faculty who are experts in the origins and treatment of disorders of complex human behavior. The department is part of the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA, a world-leading interdisciplinary research and education institute devoted to the understanding of complex human behavior and the causes and consequences of neuropsychiatric disorders.
     
    For more news, visit the UCLA Newsroom and follow us on Twitter.