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Background High prevalence rates of psychological distress in medical training and later professional life indicate a need for prevention. Different types of intervention were shown to have good effects, but little is known about the relative efficacy of different types of stress management interventions, and methodological limitations have been reported. In order to overcome some of these limitations, the present study aimed at evaluating the effect of a specifically developed mindfulness-based stress prevention training for medical students (MediMind) on measures of distress, coping and psychological morbidity. Methods We report on a prospective randomized controlled trial with three study conditions: experimental treatment (MediMind), standard treatment (Autogenic Training) and a control group without treatment. The sample consisted of medical or dental students in the second or eighth semester. They completed self-report questionnaires at baseline, after the training and at one year follow-up. Distress (Trier Inventory for the Assessment of Chronic Stress, TICS) was assessed as the primary outcome and coping (Brief COPE) as a co-primary outcome. Effects on the psychological morbidity (Brief Symptom Inventory, BSI) as a secondary outcome were expected one year after the trainings. Results Initially, N  = 183 students were randomly allocated to the study groups. At one year follow-up N  = 80 could be included into the per-protocol analysis: MediMind ( n =31), Autogenic Training ( n  = 32) and control group ( n  = 17). A selective drop-out for students who suffered more often from psychological symptoms was detected ( p  = .020). MANCOVA’s on TICS and Brief COPE revealed no significant interaction effects. On the BSI, a significant overall interaction effect became apparent ( p  = .002, η2partial = .382), but post hoc analyses were not significant. Means of the Global Severity Index (BSI) indicated that MediMind may contribute to a decrease in psychological morbidity. Conclusion Due to the high and selective dropout rates, the results cannot be generalized and further research is necessary. Since the participation rate of the trainings was high, a need for further prevention programs is indicated. The study gives important suggestions on further implementation and evaluation of stress prevention in medical schools. Trial registration This trial is recorded at German Clinical Trials Register under the number DRKS00005354 (08.11.2013).

An up-to-date global QCD analysis of high energy lepton-hadron and hadron-hadron interactions is performed to better determine the gluon and quark parton distributions in the nucleon. Improved experimental data on inclusive jet production, in conjunction with precise deep inelastic scattering data, place good constraints on the gluon over a wide range of x; while new data on asymmetries in Drell-Yan processes contribute to better determine the d/u ratio. Comparisons with results of other recent global analyses are made, and the differences are described. Open issues and the general problem of determining the uncertainties of parton distributions are discussed.

Studies in rodents observed that the effects of stress on memory are modulated by gonadal hormones. In animals and humans, stress and cortisol treatment impairs memory retrieval. To investigate if the acute impairing effect of cortisol on memory retrieval in women is influenced by endogenous or exogenous gonadal steroids. Three groups of women were studied: women during mensis (n=13), women in the luteal phase (n=14), and women using oral contraceptives (OCs; n=20). In a double-blind crossover fashion, they received cortisol (30 mg) or placebo 1 h prior to memory retrieval testing. Overall cortisol led to a significant impairment of memory retrieval. Further exploratory analysis using t tests showed that both groups of naturally cycling women were significantly impaired (p<0.05), while no effect was apparent in the OC users (p=0.29). The current results could suggest that OC use is associated with a reduced sensitivity of the brain to acute cortisol elevations. In contrast, menstrual-cycle-associated changes in estradiol and progesterone concentrations appear to have no strong influence on this acute cortisol effect. The underlying neurobiological mechanisms of these behavioral findings remain to be elucidated.

Telomerase activity, which has fundamental roles in development and carcinogenesis, strongly depends on the expression of human telomerase reverse transcriptase (hTERT), its catalytic subunit. In this report, we show that the basic helix-loop-helix factor, TAL1 (T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia 1), is a negative regulator of the hTERT promoter. Indeed, TAL1 overexpression leads to a decrease in hTERT mRNA abundance and hence to reduced telomerase activity. Conversely, suppression of TAL1 by RNA interference in Jurkat cells increases hTERT expression. Analysis by chromatin immunoprecipitation assays showed that TAL1 binds to the hTERT proximal promoter and recruits HDAC1. Considering the relationship recently established between TAL1 and the human T-cell leukemia virus type 1 (HTLV-1) Tax protein, which was confirmed in T lymphocyte clones derived from adult T-cell leukemia patients, we analyzed the effect of TAL1 with respect to the earlier characterized effects of Tax and HBZ (HTLV-1 basic leucine zipper) on hTERT expression. TAL1 was observed to reinforce the negative effect of Tax, whereas hTERT transactivation by the HBZ–JunD complex was repressed by TAL1 overexpression. Moreover, HBZ was found to induce proteasome-mediated degradation of TAL1. These observations support a model in which Tax and TAL1 by repressing hTERT would initially favor genomic instability, whereas expression of factors such as HBZ allows at a later stage an increase in hTERT production and consequently in telomerase activity.

The South Pole Telescope third-generation (SPT-3G) receiver was installed during the austral summer of 2016–2017. It is designed to measure the cosmic microwave background across three frequency bands centered at 95, 150, and 220 GHz. The SPT-3G receiver has ten focal plane modules, each with 269 pixels. Each pixel features a broadband sinuous antenna coupled to a niobium microstrip transmission line. In-line filters define the desired band-passes before the signal is coupled to six bolometers with Ti/Au/Ti/Au transition edge sensors (three bands  ×  two polarizations). In total, the SPT-3G receiver is composed of  16,000 detectors, which are read out using a 68 × frequency-domain multiplexing scheme. In this paper, we present the process employed in fabricating the detector arrays.

We have developed a new transition-edge sensor material with critical temperature ( T c ) in the range 100–200 mK. The new material is a solid solution of two superconducting components, Mo x Nb 1− x , co-sputtered from two high-purity single-component targets (Mo and Nb). The T c has a minimum (d T c / d x  = 0) at an intermediate concentration of the components. We have optimized the deposition parameters and composition to provide films with a sharp superconducting transition at ~ 150 mK. We investigated structural features of the films and surface morphology using X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscopy. The XRD measurements indicate that the grown films are polycrystalline, with a preferred orientation along the (110) crystal direction and a clear correlation between superconducting properties and film microstructure.

Frequency-domain multiplexing is a readout technique for transition-edge sensor bolometer arrays used on modern cosmic microwave background experiments, including the SPT-3G receiver. Here, we present design details and performance measurements for a low-parasitic frequency-domain multiplexing readout. Reducing the parasitic impedance of the connections between cryogenic components provides a path to improve both the crosstalk and noise performance of the readout. Reduced crosstalk will in turn allow higher-multiplexing factors. We have demonstrated a factor of two improvement in parasitic resistance compared to SPT-3G hardware. Reduced parasitics also permits operation of lower-resistance bolometers optimized for improved readout noise performance. We demonstrate that a module in the prototype system has comparable readout noise performance to an SPT-3G module when operated with dark TES bolometers in the laboratory.

Background: There is no standard approach for the medical management of Crohn's disease (CD) during pregnancy and there is limited data regarding safety and efficacy of the treatments. Budesonide (Entocort® EC, AstraZeneca) is an enteric coated locally acting glucocorticoid preparation whose pH‐ and time‐dependent coating enables its release into the ileum and ascending colon for the treatment of mild to moderate Crohn's disease. There is no available data on the safety of using oral budesonide in pregnant patients. Methods: We reviewed our Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) center database to identify patients with CD who received treatment with budesonide for induction and/or maintenance of remission during pregnancy and describe the maternal and fetal outcomes in a series of eight mothers and their babies. Results: The mean age of the patients was 27.7 years. All patients had small bowel involvement with their CD. The disease pattern was stricturing in 6 patients, fistulizing in 1 and inflammatory in 1 patient. Budesonide was used at the 6 mg/day dose in 6 patients and 9 mg/day dose in 2 patients. The average treatment duration ranges from 1‐8 months. There were no cases of maternal adrenal suppression, glucose intolerance, ocular side effects, hypertension or fetal congenital abnormalities. Conclusion: Budesonide may be a safe option for treatment of CD during pregnancy. (Inflamm Bowel Dis 2008)

Let KK be the basic closed semi-algebraic set in Rn\\mathbb {R}^n defined by some finite set of polynomials SS and TT, the preordering generated by SS. For KK compact, ff a polynomial in nn variables nonnegative on KK and real ϵ>0\\epsilon >0, we have that f+ϵ∈Tf+\\epsilon \\in T [15]. In particular, the KK-Moment Problem has a positive solution. In the present paper, we study the problem when KK is not compact. For n=1n=1, we show that the KK-Moment Problem has a positive solution if and only if SS is the natural description of KK (see Section 1). For n≥2n\\ge 2, we show that the KK-Moment Problem fails if KK contains a cone of dimension 2. On the other hand, we show that if KK is a cylinder with compact base, then the following property holds: \\[ (‡)∀f∈R[X],f≥0 on K⇒∃q∈T such that ∀ real ϵ>0,f+ϵq∈T.(\\ddagger )\\quad \\quad \\forall f\\in \\mathbb {R}[X], f\\ge 0 \\text { on } K\\Rightarrow \\exists q\\in T \\text { such that }\\forall \\text { real } \\epsilon >0, f+\\epsilon q\\in T.\\quad \\] This property is strictly weaker than the one given in [15], but in turn it implies a positive solution to the KK-Moment Problem. Using results of [9], we provide many (noncompact) examples in hypersurfaces for which (‡\\ddagger) holds. Finally, we provide a list of 8 open problems.