Earh Sciences

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the No. 1 cause of death in patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) and is approximately 3 to 5 times that of non-uremic control subjects. Moreover, higher rates of CVD are seen in patients with moderate and even mild renal dysfunction, particularly if the patient has hypertension or diabetes. Recent studies have indicated that even modest elevations in serum creatinine and urinary albumin excretion are associated with increased CVD risk, not only in persons with diabetes or hypertension but also in the general population. In addition, recent studies have suggested that targeting the kidney and/or kidney specific endpoints (via the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone-kinin system) in the treatment of hypertension, diabetes, and heart failure slows progression of renal disease and reduces the risk of extra-renal micro- and macrovascular complications. We conclude that it is important to screen for renal disease in those with hypertension, diabetes, and other CVD risk factors because it predicts those who are at high risk for major CVD events.

Ethical and legal considerations in pain management typically relate to 2 issues. The first refers to pain management as a human right. The second involves the nature of the patient-physician relationship as it relates to pain management. Although pain physicians often like to think of pain management as a human right, it remains difficult to support this position as a point of law or as a matter of ethics. Medical organizations generally do not define pain management as a specific duty of the physician, apart from the provision of competent medical care. To date, neither law nor ethics creates a duty of care outside of the traditional patient-physician relationship. Absent a universal duty, no universal right exists. Pursuing pain management as a fundamental human right, although laudable, may place the power of the government in the middle of the patient-physician relationship. Despite apparent altruistic motives, attempts to define pain management as a basic human right could hav...

Microarray technology has become highly valuable for identifying complex global changes in gene expression patterns. The assignment of functional information to these complex patterns remains a challenging task in effectively interpreting data and correlating results from across experiments, projects and laboratories. Methods which allow the rapid and robust evaluation of multiple functional hypotheses increase the power of individual researchers to data mine gene expression data more efficiently. We have developed (gene set matrix analysis) GSMA as a useful method for the rapid testing of group-wise up- or down-regulation of gene expression simultaneously for multiple lists of genes (gene sets) against entire distributions of gene expression changes (datasets) for single or multiple experiments. The utility of GSMA lies in its flexibility to rapidly poll gene sets related by known biological function or as designated solely by the end-user against large numbers of datasets simultan...

... of health care delivery, and in the structure of the NHS itself have impacted upon the development of the health professions (cf, for example, Leathard, 1994 pp7-23; Mackay, Soothill & Webb, 1995 pp5-10; Hugman, 1995 pp31-45; Tope, 1996 pp57-71; Biggs, 1993 p151; Shaw ...

Abstract Since its advent the Digital Terrain Model (DTM) has been employed widely in the sciences for the solution of problems requiring a digital model of landforms. In this paper we describe a new use of the DTM in the calculation of highly accurate visual sunrise and sunset times that are required by the observant population in Israel. We have employed ray tracing to determine the effect of atmospheric refraction through a simplified layered atmosphere. A general analytic expression for the atmospheric refraction was determined from these calculations as a function of the observer’s height for two model atmospheres known as the subtropical summer and winter atmospheres. These expressions determine the general magnitude of the refraction as a function of apparent view angle of the observer. We also determined a simplified analytic expression for the effect of atmospheric refraction on the vertical angular profile of the mountainous horizon as calculated from the DTM (atmospheric refraction magnifies the mountainous features of the horizon). These expressions are then used in calculating the apparent vertical angular position of the Sun as a function of time. The time when the upper limb of the Sun first (last) appears to rise (set) over the horizon adjusted for the effect of refraction determines the time of the visible sunrise (sunset). Comparison with observations have shown that the visible sunrise and sunset times can be typically determined to better than 15 s using the 25 m DTM of Israel and eastern Jordan.

Since 2003, four cruises on the icebreaker USCG HEALY have collected high-resolution multibeam sonar mapping data in the Amerasia Basin in support of a potential submission by the U.S. for an extended continental shelf as defined under the United Nations Convention on Law of the Sea Article 76. The latest of these cruises (HEALY0805), completed in early Sept.of 2008, extended

Quaternary reef development and demise have been shown to correspond to worldwide sea-level fluctuations and related environmental changes, yet the mechanisms and rates affecting this relationship are not well resolved. A set of high-resolution seismic reflection and multibeam bathymetric data were interpreted. Six distinct systems of relict fringing reefs embedded within the sedimentary cover of the northern shelf of the Gulf of Elat/Aqaba were identified. The two uppermost relict fringing reefs are also exposed on the sea floor in water depths of ca 20 m and ca 60 m, along the north-western corner of the northern Gulf of Elat/Aqaba and sub-parallel to the current northern coast, respectively. Two other relict fringing reefs are laterally correlated to each of the last two transgressive cycles, and are inferred to have formed during decelerations in sea-level rise during the last two deglaciations. These reefs and the units to which they are laterally correlated portray a repeating stratigraphic pattern of reef development during deposition of seismically homogeneous sediment and an ensuing demise during deposition of heterogeneous sediment. Correlation of the reef stratigraphy with rates of Late Quaternary sea-level rise and a sediment accumulation rate from one shelf core provide age estimations for the seismic stratigraphy. Two phases of fringing reef generation occurred during the last deglaciation (since ca 18 ka); the older reef probably developed between 12·8 ka and 11·5 ka at ca 60 m below present sea-level and the younger reef after 8·4 to 8·0 ka at ca 20 m below present sea-level. These last two phases of reef generation are separated by a lobate seismic unit that is interpreted as fluvial-deltaic deposits that backstepped across the shelf during the Early Holocene transgression. Results suggest that fringing reefs evolved along the northern shelf of the Gulf of Elat/Aqaba only during relative decelerations in sea-level rise, contemporaneous with low input of terrigenous sediment and probably during a period of aridity. At present, no fringing reef grows along the northern coast of the Gulf of Elat/Aqaba, suggesting that these relatively arid periods may have been drier than Recent. The pattern of slowdown in sea-level rise contemporaneous with conditions of increased aridity seems to have repeated during the last two sea-level rises, approximately at the same sea-levels, suggesting a common mechanism of short (millennium-scale) phases of eustatic and climatic alteration during deglaciations.

Two systems of counterclockwise-converging and northeastward-curving left-lateral shears, which belong to a global pattern of spiraling geosutures, have played a major role in shaping the Eastern Mediterranean. The first one, the Pelusium system, composed of the Dead Sea, Pelusium Line, and Qattara-Eratosthenes shears, is primarily responsible for the structure of the eastern Levantine Basin and the Levant. The other one, composed of the Pliny-Sirte and the Antalia shears, forms the divide between the western Levantine and Ionian basins. Several other geosutures, such as the Coastal Fault of Israel, are also found within the Pelusium system, but they are not necessarily shears. Depositional basins were formed along the axes of the lithospheric subslices that are bound by the main shears. The troughs of these basins systematically hug their eastern boundary shears, whereas their basinal fill moderately rises and thins toward the west; excessive sediment accumulation has taken place in these troughs since Paleozoic or even late Precambrian time. The Levantine Basin, with its 15–16 km thick sedimentary sequence, is therefore considered a relict of the Tethys Ocean, which is of an appreciably older age than hitherto considered.