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Human Populations
Published in Gary S. Moore, Kathleen A. Bell, Living with the Earth, 2018
Gary S. Moore, Kathleen A. Bell
Abortion refers to the medical means of terminating a pregnancy. In the United States this is considered to be a decision that a woman and her physician may make within the first trimester without legal restriction. This right was given under the 1973 Roe versus Wade Supreme Court decision.62 However, individual states were given the right under later court actions to impose restrictions on abortions. Despite these restrictions, about 1.6 million abortions have been legally performed each year in the United States since 1980.60 Nearly 60 million abortions occur annually on a worldwide basis. Three quarters of the world’s population live in countries where it is legal to induce abortion medically. There are different forms of abortion depending on how many weeks pregnant the woman is at the time of the abortion. The number of weeks of pregnancy is determined from the first day of a woman’s last menstrual period. Most pregnancies are terminated in the first trimester when legal and health consequences are minimal. These are usually referred to as therapeutic abortions and are normally accomplished by vacuum aspiration. Abortion can also be safely induced within the first nine weeks of pregnancy by administering the drug RU-486. This steroid blocks the action of progesterone and causes the uterine lining to break down and so expelling the lining and the fetus, which terminates the pregnancy. The drug RU-486 was developed in the late 1970s by a French researcher consulting for Roussel-Uclaf, a French pharmaceutical company. There continues to be fears by many, including antiabortion groups, that RU486 would popularize abortion by making it available within a doctor’s office and therefore remove the need for abortion clinics, which are frequent targets of protestors. Despite many setbacks including halted productions and distribution, RU-486 is now being widely used in France and on September 28, 2000 was approved by the FDA for sale in the United States. The approval of this drug gives women an alternative to surgical abortion for the cost of a standard abortion.63
Silicon-containing apatite fiber scaffolds with enhanced mechanical property express osteoinductivity and high osteoconductivity
Published in Journal of Asian Ceramic Societies, 2019
Y. Yamada, T. Inui, Y. Kinoshita, Y. Shigemitsu, M. Honda, K. Nakano, H. Matsunari, M. Nagaya, H. Nagashima, M. Aizawa
The scaffolds were characterized as follows; The phase composition was determined by X-ray diffractometry (XRD; MiniFlex, Rigaku Co., Japan). The X-ray generator with Cu Kα was operated at 30 kV and 15 mA. Data were collected in the range of 2θ 4.0–50.0° with a step size of 0.04° and a count speed of 4°·min−1. Phase identification was achieved by comparing the diffraction patterns with the International Centre for Diffraction Data standard. Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR; IR Prestige21, Shimadzu Co., Japan) spectra were measured by the KBr tablet method. Spectra were obtained at a 4 cm−1 resolution over the range of 400–4000 cm−1 with a scan speed of 2.5 mm·s−1. The microstructures were observed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM; JSM6390LA, JEOL Ltd., Japan). The porosity and compressive strength of AFS and Si-AFS specimens (4.2 mm diameter) were determined, together with the specific surface area and water absorption. The specific surface area of specimens was determined by the Brunauer-Emmett-Teller method using a surface area analyzer (Flowsorb III 2310, Shimadzu Co.) [17]. Water absorption was measured according to the Japanese Industrial Standard R 2205. Specifically, the water absorption rate was calculated from the amount of water absorbed into the scaffolds by vacuum aspiration divided by the dry mass of the scaffolds (following formula);
Synthesis of large monolayer titania nanosheets through flux method
Published in Journal of Asian Ceramic Societies, 2021
KTLO was synthesized via recrystallization from flux melt [9,12,18]. Stoichiometric mixture batches of powders were mixed using a zirconia mortar and pestle for 15 min each. Potassium molybdate flux (K2MoO4, or MoO3) was mixed in the ratio of 7:3, as the molar ratio of flux by product. Additionally, Li2CO3 was added in excess of 10 % owing to its high volatility. The ground mixture was placed in an alumina crucible and maintained at a temperature of 900–1,200 °C for 10 h, slowly cooled to 900 °C for 50 h, and then cooled under ambient conditions in a furnace for 5 h. The reacted material was washed with DI water and using vacuum aspiration to remove the K2MoO4 flux. After three rounds of washing, the pure KTLO crystals were fully recovered. The as-synthesized KTLO powder was protonated to HTO via an acid exchange reaction. The KTLO powder (4 g) was then immersed and shaken in 200 mL of different acid solutions, varying across acid species, concentrations, and reaction times. Every 24 h, the acid was replaced with fresh solution. After the termination of the reaction, the powder was washed with copious amounts of DI water via decantation of the supernatant water into the remaining acid. The protonated titanate HTO was kept in a humidity-controlled chamber with sedimented powder. Notably, 70 % relative humidity was maintained to conserve the HTO powder, and the powder was dried in ambient air before subsequent measurements and experiments. The synthesized KTLO and HTO powders were formed into pellets at a pressure of 3,500 psi. Subsequently, electrodes were printed using silver paste on both sides of the pellets to facilitate their use as capacitors. Finally, the pellets were dried in an oven at 100 °C for 2 h to strengthen the electrical contacts without humidity.
Recent advances in devices for mechanical thrombectomy
Published in Expert Review of Medical Devices, 2020
Raphaël Blanc, Simon Escalard, Humain Baharvadhat, Jean Philippe Desilles, William Boisseau, Robert Fahed, Hocine Redjem, Gabriele Ciccio, Stanislas Smajda, Benjamin Maier, François Delvoye, Solène Hebert, Mikael Mazighi, Michel Piotin
Yaeger et al. have compared thrombectomy vacuum aspiration systems for maximum aspiration pressures and highest tip force and concluded that catheters with a larger inner diameter could generate higher tip suction forces on aspiration when combined to the most powerful pump [54].