Guarding against Nanotort Liabilities

Recent headlines comparing the health risks of nanotechnology to those of asbestos have appeared in newspapers throughout the country and on the Internet. Governmental agencies and standard-setting organizations have begun considering and actually adopting requirements to protect against such purported risks. The plaintiffs’ bar and potential plaintiffs have surely taken note. There is every reason to believe that the era of mass tort and class actions related to nanotechnology—“nanotorts” for short—is rapidly approaching. This article examines what nanotort claims might look like, the role that regulations and industry practices may play in such lawsuits, potential defenses to those claims, and what nanotech companies can do now to guard against future nanotort liabilities.     

Characterization of human DNA in environmental samples

Environmental samples from indoor surfaces can be confounded by dust, which is composed largely of human skin cells and has been documented to contain roughly tens of micrograms of total DNA per gram of dust. This study complements previous published work by providing estimates of the quantity of amplifiable human DNA found in environmental samples from a typical indoor environment, categorized by the intensity of human traffic and visible quantity of dust. Dust was collected by surface swabbing standard 576 cm² areas in eight locations, and evaluated for total DNA quantity, presence of human DNA (mitochondrial and nuclear loci using conventional PCR), quantity of human nuclear DNA using quantitative PCR, and STR analysis. The total DNA content of 36 dust samples ranged from 9 to 28 ng/cm², and contained 0.2–1.1 pg/cm² of human DNA. Overall, human DNA was detected in 97% of 36 dust samples and 61% of samples yielded allele distributions of varying degrees of complexity when subjected to STR analysis. The implications of this study are twofold. First, the presence of dust in evidence can be a significant contamination source in forensic investigations because the human DNA component is of sufficient quality and quantity to produce allele calls in STR analysis. This can be effectively managed by implementing stringent protocols for collection and analysis of potential biological samples. A second implication is the use of dust as a source of evidence for identification of inhabitants within a defined location. In the latter case, a number of additional studies would be necessary to identify relevant pretreatments for environmental dust samples and to develop the necessary deconvolution techniques to separate the composite genotypes obtained.     

What Gets Measured,Gets Done: Understanding and Addressing Middle‐Class Challenges

Middle‐class families face a range of challenges, including uneven income growth, imposing child care costs, and affordability gaps for higher education. The ideal policies by which policy makers and public administrators can aid the middle class are far from obvious. Policy solutions are likely to mirror our government and population, meaning that they will be decentralized and varied. Achieving a “growing and thriving middle class” requires understanding the composition of the middle class across the country. Benchmarking and measuring the middle‐class condition at the state and substate levels is critical to crafting and adopting effective policy solutions. This Viewpoint essay highlights the Colorado context to demonstrate the measurement of the middle class and tracking of its lived experiences.     

Neighborhood Socioeconomic Deprivation in Early Childhood Mediates Racial Disparities in Blood Pressure in a College Student Sample

The influence of childhood contexts on adult blood pressure is an important yet understudied topic. Using a developmental perspective, this study examines the association between neighborhood socioeconomic disadvantage in early childhood (0–5?yrs), middle childhood (6–12?yrs) and adolescence (13–18?yrs) on subsequent blood pressure in young adulthood. Data were from 263 college students (52% Black; M_age?=?19.21 years) and neighborhood socioeconomic disadvantage was measured using a tract-level Area Deprivation Index. Neighborhood disadvantage in early childhood was significantly associated with diastolic blood pressure and explained 22% of the race difference between Black and White adults. The findings are consistent with the notion that early childhood may be a sensitive period for the effects of neighborhood disadvantage on blood pressure.

     

Physical purity feminism and state medicine in late nineteenth-century england

Abstract

Late nineteenth-century England saw the development of a number of campaigns and social movements which were connected by both a hostility towards the medical profession and by the use of discourses of purity and sanitary reform. This article explores the involvement of women within these movements, analysing their activism as an aspect of social purity feminism. It argues that many of these movements drew on widespread female anxiety regarding male violence – both physical and sexual – towards women. The anti-medical feminists claimed that some pieces of ‘sanitary’ legislation represented a state-sanctioned violation of the bodies of women and children. Finally, this article analyses the use made, by some of these activists, of the discourses of sanitary reform to challenge the gender ordering associated with the reason/nature dualism in Victorian society.