Suchergebnisse

Canadian lawyers make far too little use of the rich body of administrative law which has been developed in the United States. To some extent this is because the very sophistication and complexity of that law makes occasional unorganized forays and serendipitous research intimidating and, all too often, frustrating ventures. The purpose of this review is to introduce the Canadian reader to the latest volume of the leading treatise and to a new one volume textbook. Each, in its own way, may serve as an invaluable guide and introduction to American administrative law. Before going any further it would be well to consider why a working knowledge of American administrative law will be of value to a Canadian lawyer. After all, we have a different system of government and do not "judicialize" all our social, economic and political problems to anything like the same extent. Law and the courts have never played the dominant role here as in the United States. For us the emphasis is on parliamentary sovereignty and ministerial responsibility, not on limited powers and judicial review. How relevant are American solutions to our problems?

Every year, thousands of basic military trainees in each service of the U.S. Armed Forces experience acute respiratory disease. The majority of this disease burden results from infection with human adenoviruses. We designed single- and multiplex assays that detect and discriminate adenovirus types B3, E4, B7, B11, B14, and B21. A total of 116 oropharyngeal swab specimens obtained from patients at the Naval Health Research Center were used to validate the new assays. Type-specific singleplex assays were designed and used independently to successfully identify 94 representative patient specimens. The lower limits of detection for our singleplex real-time PCR assays were calculated to be 50, 500, 500, 50, 50, and 50 genomic copies per reaction for human adenovirus type B3 (HAdV-B3), HAdV-E4, HAdV-B7, HAdV-B11, HAdV-B14, and HAdV-B21, respectively. These were then multiplexed to increase efficiency and tested against singleplex assays using titrated controls. The HAdV-B3/B11 and HAdV-E4/B7 multiplex assays were as sensitive and specific as they were individually. The HAdV-B14/B21 multiplex assay was not as efficient at detecting HAdV-B14 as the singleplex assay. Interestingly, a statistically significant difference was found between the viral loads of HAdV-B14 and those of HAdV-B3, -E4, -B7, and -B21 (P < 0.001). The assays did not cross-react with other adenoviruses, influenza virus, respiratory syncytial virus, or respiratory disease-causing bacteria. These assays have the potential to be useful as clinical diagnostic tools for the detection of HAdV infection in adult populations.

International studies point out that some freshwater policy objectives are not achieved. This study describes that this is in part caused by shortcomings that include: the lack of targeted monitoring schemes to measure impact; a too small range of specific technologies rather than a wider suite of integrated multiple technologies; a too tight focus on sub-sets of stakeholders instead of the involvement of the wider range of end users; and poor trust building and technology explanations to end users. As an example, the New Zealand government is addressing widespread concern over the deterioration of the national freshwater resource by supporting a diverse portfolio of land and riparian management actions. Efforts to assess the effectiveness of these interventions and establish an evidence-based framework for future policies are however limited by the existing regional-scale freshwater monitoring infrastructure. Such hydrometric networks were established largely to assess the broader-scale regional 'state' of the environment and are generally out-of-phase with freshwater improvement actions that are implemented more typically at edge-of-field, farm or sub-catchment scales. Recent and rapid evolution in sensor technologies have created new opportunities to deliver information tuned to the appropriate parameters and frequencies needed to evaluate improvement actions. Despite this, the necessary transformative change in freshwater monitoring has yet to gather pace. In this study we explore barriers and solutions with the objective to better understand what is needed for successful integration of innovative monitoring technologies in a transitional environmental policy setting, using recent New Zealand policy directives as a case study. We use expert surveys and scenario testing to explore barriers to adoption to more robust and comprehensive monitoring required to establish the success, or otherwise, of freshwater improvement actions. This process reveals that rather than further innovations in technology, change in ...