TOC Summary Line: Healthcare workers in hospitals affected by SARS experience increased psychological stress 1–2 years after the outbreak.

We investigated the contribution of anxiety symptoms to scores on the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) between 36 weeks gestation and 16 weeks postpartum in 150 women. The 3-item anxiety subscale of the EPDS accounted for 47% of the total score in late pregnancy, and 38% of the total score in the postpartum period. Two categories of anxiety were common in the perinatal period: subsyndromal, situational anxiety (in particular during the last weeks of pregnancy); and clinically significant comorbid anxiety, which was experienced by nearly 50% of clinically depressed pregnant and postpartum women. The close relationship between anxiety and depression raises questions about whether symptoms of anxiety might be more common in the perinatal period than in other depressions. A strong role for anxiety symptoms in postpartum depression, and implications for its etiology and treatment, are discussed.

No abstract

Summary1. The British uplands are internationally important for their unique plant and bird communities. They have considerable economic, nature conservation, landscape, aesthetic and tourism-related value and as a result are under a variety of different pressures, most notably from sheep farming, shooting interests, commercial forestry and conservation interests. 2. In order to optimize biodiversity in the uplands, the challenge is to find how to balance the different land-use pressures. One key upland species that is potentially affected by livestock grazing, and is of considerable interest to both foresters and nature conservationists, is the field vole Microtus agrestis. Relaxation of livestock grazing can result in an increase in vole numbers. This in turn could have both positive and negative implications for biodiversity as (i) field voles are a major source of prey for other species and (ii) they are a cause of damage to newly planted trees and potentially damaging in areas of native woodland regeneration. 4.We have demonstrated experimentally for the first time that livestock grazing pressure affects the abundance of field voles (as measured by a vole sign index) in the uplands. In the first year of the experiment, immediate treatment effects were detectable, with a lower abundance of voles in the conventionally grazed treatment compared with those in the ungrazed treatment, and with intermediate vole abundances in the lightly grazed treatments. The significant treatment effects became more apparent in 2004, with a higher abundance of voles in the extensively grazed mixed treatment (i.e. sheep and cattle) than in the extensively grazed treatment that contained only sheep. 5. Synthesis and applications. In order to maximize biodiversity in the uplands, our results suggest that low intensity livestock grazing, used in a novel ways, could be a useful management tool to reduce vole abundance (and hence subsequent tree damage) compared with excluding livestock from young plantations completely. Furthermore, vole abundance would be higher at low grazing intensity compared with conventional stocking rates, thus still providing food for raptors and other vole-eating vertebrates. Indeed, low-intensity sheep and mixed livestock grazing might improve prey availability as a direct consequence of increased heterogeneity in vegetation structure. Our results suggest that it may be possible to maintain the open character of moorland habitats, and benefit key upland species generally, by reducing sheep grazing pressure and introducing low-intensity mixed livestock grazing throughout the uplands.

Infectious bronchitis virus (IBV) belongs to the genus Coronavirus of the family Coronaviridae in the order Nidovirales (5).Coronaviruses have a single-stranded, nonsegmented, positivesense RNA genome of between 27.4 and 31 kb, that of IBV being 27.6 kb (16). Defective RNAs (D-RNAs) are being used to identify the cis-acting sequences required for coronavirus replication, transcription, and packaging.The 3Ј-most 55 nucleotides (nt) of the virus genome have been shown previously to be sufficient for negative-strand synthesis of mouse hepatitis coronavirus (MHV) D-RNAs (18). However, larger regions of both the 5Ј and 3Ј termini of the D-RNAs were required for synthesis of positive-stranded RNA. The numbers of nucleotides identified as being required at the 5Ј end were approximately 460 for MHV strain JHM, reviewed by Lai and Cavanagh (16), and up to 1,348 for transmissible gastroenteritis virus (TGEV) (13). At the 3Ј terminus, between 436 and 461 nt were required for MHV D-RNAs (14, 17, 32); most or all of the 3Ј untranslated region (UTR) (288 nt), including a pseudoknot, was required for the related bovine coronavirus (BCoV) (35); and 492 nt were required for TGEV (13). Hsue and Masters (12) showed that a sequence located at the 5Ј end of the 3Ј UTR of a D-RNA of MHV was predicted to fold into a stable stem-loop structure and was essential for replication. The BCoV D-RNA pDrep1 required the complete N gene sequence in addition to the 3Ј UTR; deletions within the N gene prevented replication (6).Comparisons of naturally occurring MHV D-RNA sequences accompanied by deletion mutagenesis studies have identified a region considered to be essential for RNA packaging. This is a 61-nt stem-loop structure present in the 1b region of gene 1, the replicase gene (10,22,31). Cologna and Hogue have identified a similar sequence in BCoV, a group II coronavirus like MHV (8). Notwithstanding, MHV-JHM D-RNA DIssE does not have this 61-nt stem-loop but was replicated and packaged, although to a lesser extent than were the D-RNAs with this stem-loop (20). The analogous region is also absent from D-RNA pDrep1 of BCoV, which contains no replicase 1b sequence. This indicated that the packaging signal for the BCoV D-RNA is in one or more of the regions that comprise the D-RNA; the 5Ј UTR, part of the 1a sequence of gene 1, the N gene, or the 3Ј UTR (4). No single region for packaging has been identified in TGEV D-RNAs. Rather, two regions, designated F1 and F2, from the replicase 1b region have been implicated, although neither is absolutely required for packaging (13).The starting point for this work was D-RNA CD-61, derived from a naturally occurring 9.1-kb IBV D-RNA, CD-91 (24), by deletion of 3.0 kb (Fig. 1) (25). We have made an additional 21 deletion mutant D-RNAs, using a chloramphenicol acetyltransferase (CAT) reporter gene to distinguish the processes of replication and packaging. Previously, we relied upon several passages of the rescued D-RNAs to produce sufficient RNA to be detectable by Northern blot analysis. The incorporat...

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of grip width, chest depth, limb lengths, and bar path on the performance of a maximal bench press. Subjects were 24 experienced male weight trainers. Bench press performance was assessed at six different grip widths (G1–G6). Repeated-measures ANOVA with Tukey post hoc comparisons revealed that bench press strength values at the two moderate grip widths (G3 and G4) were significantly greater than either the narrow or wide grip widths. First-order partial correlations showed no significant relationship between strength values and anthropometric variables when adjusted for differences in body weight. Standard two-dimensional cinematographic procedures were used to film a subsample (n = 6) while bench pressing using G1, G3, and G6. The results of the statistical comparisons of bar path indicated that as grip width increased, the horizontal and vertical distance from the bar to the shoulder decreased.

This model demonstrates the importance of considering both biological and psychosocial variables in complex health conditions such as perinatal mood disorders.

A reverse genetics system for the avian coronavirus infectious bronchitis virus (IBV) has been described in which a full-length cDNA, corresponding to the IBV (Beaudette-CK) genome, was inserted into the vaccinia virus genome following in vitro assembly of three contiguous cDNAs [Casais, R., Thiel, V., Siddell, S.G., Cavanagh, D., Britton, P., 2001. Reverse genetics system for the avian coronavirus infectious bronchitis virus. J. Virol. 75, 12359-12369]. The method has subsequently been used to generate a recombinant IBV expressing a chimaeric S gene [Casais, R., Dove, B., Cavanagh, D., Britton, P., 2003. Recombinant avian infectious bronchitis virus expressing a heterologous spike gene demonstrates that the spike protein is a determinant of cell tropism. J. Virol. 77, 9084-9089]. Use of vaccinia virus as a vector for the full-length cDNA of the IBV genome has the advantage that modifications can be made to the IBV cDNA using homologous recombination, a method frequently used to insert and delete sequences from the vaccinia virus genome. We describe the use of homologous recombination as a method for modifying the Beaudette full-length cDNA, within the vaccinia virus genome, without the requirement for in vitro assembly of the IBV cDNA. To demonstrate the feasibility of the method we exchanged the ectodomain of the Beaudette spike gene for the corresponding region from IBV M41 and generated two recombinant infectious bronchitis viruses (rIBVs) expressing the chimaeric S protein, validating the method as an alternative way for generating rIBVs.