Nineteen of the 40 female respondents mentioned that transition t

Nineteen of the 40 female respondents mentioned that transition to another method should occur “when LAM ends” or “when any of the three LAM criteria no longer apply.” Others provided incomplete responses Selleckchem ZVADFMK including only one or two criteria. Among husbands, most mentioned only that women should take another method by 6 months, and did not cite either of the other cues. Among mothers/mothers-in-law,

most also only remembered that women should transition at 6 months, and did not cite the other two cues. Approximately one third of postpartum women interviewed (32.5%) were currently using a modern contraceptive method. Of the 40 women interviewed, 6 reported using oral pills, 4 used injectables, 2 used implants, and 1 reported regularly using condoms. Fourteen of the 40 women reported previously using LAM, and half of those women (n = 7) had since transitioned Everolimus to another modern method. No respondents were eligible for LAM at the time of the interview (all were beyond six months postpartum). The 40 postpartum women interviewed for this assessment were categorized along the SBC continuum (based on the criteria outlined in Section 2) as seen in Fig. 2. Over half of the women were classified as “intending,” approximately one third are either “practicing” or “advocating,” and a smaller proportion

fall earlier in the continuum at the “knowledgeable” and “approving” phases. Many respondents expressed having learned new information about PPFP through Asma’s Story and the leaflet. The vast majority of female respondents reported improved understanding about fecundity and FP.

Women’s knowledge of optimal pregnancy spacing and timing of return to fecundity also was reported by many to have improved after hearing Asma’s Story. However, few respondents remained at the knowledgeable phase—most had moved further through the continuum. For the two women who did remain many at this stage, both were knowledgeable about return to fecundity and optimal spacing of pregnancies, but felt that using FP was not consistent with their religious beliefs. At the time of the interview, four of the 40 women were classified as being at the approving phase. Three of these women felt that Asma’s experience was similar to the experience of some women in their community, and over half of all 40 postpartum women interviewed said they know someone personally who had a similar experience to Asma’s. However, women remaining at the approving phase faced barriers preventing them from intending to act. Several expressed that although they personally approved, their husbands’ opposition prevented them from using FP. One respondent at this stage also mentioned wanting more children before starting an FP method. At the time of the interview, more than half of the women (21 of 40) were at the intending phase.

It is not obvious that a given concentration of nutrients is “nat

It is not obvious that a given concentration of nutrients is “natural” in an “unnatural”

climate. Can we really maintain target levels of nitrogen and phosphorus in the BSAP if nature is adjusted towards transforming conditions? If not, there is a need to assess the range of further reductions in order to meet the targets in future and the costs associated with this (see also discussion in Meier et al., 2014a). There is a large concern for the health of the Baltic Sea among people and the willingness to pay for its recovery exceeds the present estimated annual cost to reach the environmental targets (SwAM, 2013). This cost may, however, change with climate change. A possible management strategy would be to try to divide the pressure of, e.g. eutrophication in one natural component (including climate variability) and one anthropogenic component (point sources and non-point sources) and opt to minimize check details the anthropogenic component. Overcoming existing problems such as eutrophication

may, however, become more urgent in the light of expected difficulties resulting from climate change, OSI-744 manufacturer implying that efforts to implement the BSAP and other existing targets should be intensified. Given the slow response of the system to external load reductions it may be sensible to speed up the recovery of the system with in situ measures, such as geo-engineering, since the natural recovery will take decades to accomplish due to the slow turnover of water and nutrients. Regardless of the strategy it seems that more research is needed to understand both the consequences of climate change and the actions needed to prevent ecological degradation or how to most efficiently adapt to unavoidable changes due to overriding global influences on the regional scale. IPCC (2013) note that there is a substantial uncertainty in observing Suplatast tosilate changes due to climate change due to that the present observation

record of the sea is still short, especially for the biogeochemical parameters. Long monitoring series, which covers both the vertical and horizontal extent of the sea, will help to identify trends and variability. In this context it is also crucial to continue, and further develop existing regional environmental monitoring programs, to make sure that important areas and parameters of change are covered. One important step for instance is to get a better observational record of the inorganic carbon system parameters (pH, pCO2, TA, dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC)), preferably with a minimum of two of these parameters. Another is to make sure that areas of possible deoxygenation are covered and resolved. There is also a need for a monitoring of biodiversity that can answer questions regarding the rate of disappearing or invasive species as well as any evidence of conservation success or failures.

2A and 2B) as reported [7] and [12], suggesting specificity of re

2A and 2B) as reported [7] and [12], suggesting specificity of reagent (antibody) and demonstrating a major difference in the levels of BPDE-DNA adducts between exposed and non-exposed animals/tissues. Levels of BPDE-DNA adducts were measured in a similar area of tissue sections (mm2) and

number of cells (∼800 cells/section/animal) in terms of total adduct intensity as well as nuclei containing a percentage of high, medium and low intensity Autophagy inhibitors due to BPDE-DNA adducts. It was observed that with passage of time, mice on the control diet for 24, 72 and 120 h [subgroups BP(+48h), BP(+96h), BP(+144h)] showed a time-related significant decrease in total adduct(s) intensity (levels) in the liver and lungs compared to BP(+24h) and subgroup of preceding time point (Figure 2 and Figure 3). Interestingly, mice that were shifted to 0.05% curcumin diet and killed at 24, 72 and 120 h [subgroups BP(+48h) + C 24 h, BP(+96h) + C check details 72 h, BP(+144h) + C 120 h] showed significantly higher decrease in the levels of adducts (intensity) in the liver and lungs compared to BP(+24h) and respective time-matched controls [subgroups BP(+48h), BP(+96h), BP(+144h)] (Figure 2 and Figure 3). This decrease was also evident when a comparison

of percentage intensity of nuclei containing high, medium and low those levels of adducts was made between curcumin-treated and respective time-matched controls. In the liver, the observed decrease in total adduct intensity in B(a)P [BP(+48h), BP(+96h), BP(+144h)] and B(a)P + curcumin [BP(+48h) + C 24 h, BP(+96h) + C 72 h, BP(+144h) + C 120 h]-treated subgroups

appears to be attributed to the reduction in percentage intensity of nuclei containing high and medium levels of adducts. In the lungs, it was due to decrease in nuclei containing high levels of adducts both in B(a)P [BP(+48h), BP(+96h), BP(+144h)] and B(a)P + curcumin [BP(+48h) + C 24 h, BP(+96h) + C 72 h, BP(+144h) + C 120 h]-treated subgroups (Figs. 2A and 2B). Notably, the percentage intensity of nuclei containing low levels of adducts remained similar in all the subgroups i.e. animals given B(a)P [BP(+24h), BP(+48h), BP(+96h), BP(+144h)] and B(a)P + curcumin [BP(+48h) + C 24 h, BP(+96h) + C 72 h, BP(+144h) + C 120 h]-treated subgroups (Figs. 2A and 2B). Together, results suggest that dietary curcumin led to enhancement of decrease in nuclei containing high and medium levels of adducts in the liver whereas in the lungs a curcumin-mediated enhanced decrease was mainly observed in nuclei containing high levels of adduct(s).

Using the sLORETA, we performed a current density analysis in the

Using the sLORETA, we performed a current density analysis in the 3-D Talairach/MNI space of the scalp-recorded electrical activity (Fuchs et al., 2002). The MNI brain volume was scanned at a spatial resolution BGB324 in vivo of 5 mm, and this produced 6239 cortical gray

matter voxels (Mazziotta et al., 2001). We calculated sLORETA images for prestimulus alpha power in the time frame from 800 to 200 ms prior to stimulus onset. The amplitude and latency of the P1, N1, P2 and N2 components were also evaluated. For the ERP analysis, we performed a baseline correction from 200 ms prestimulus to stimulus onset, and assessed the maximum amplitude and latency of the P1, within the time window from 100 to 200 ms poststimulus, and the minimum amplitude and latency of the N1 within the time window from 150 to 250 ms poststimulus. We also evaluated the maximum amplitude and latency of the P2, within the time window from 200 to 40 ms poststimulus, and the minimum amplitude and latency of the N2 within the time window from 400 to 600 ms poststimulus. All of these time windows were selected on the basis of their grand-averages and individual variances. These measures

were also assessed on the this website same three parietal electrodes P3, Pz and P4. The averaged values across these three electrodes were used for the statistical assessment. All measures were analyzed with a repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA), which included two within-subjects Inositol monophosphatase 1 factors labeled as “illuminance” (bright vs. dark) and “color–temperature”

(warm vs. cool). We used the Greenhouse–Geisser correction where appropriate. BKM carried out the experiment, conducted the data analysis and prepared the manuscript. YCJ, EK, and JYP participated in the design of the study and helped to draft the manuscript. All the authors have read and approved the final manuscript. We are thankful to Hongchae Baek, Kyoungri Park and Hyunjung Kim for helping out during the acquisition of data, and to Hyensou Pak and Yeon-Hong Jeong for providing the illumination devices for this experiment. This work was supported by a 2011 research grant from LG electronics (to E.S.K.) and Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea, funded by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (grant number 2012R1A1A1038358 to B.K.M.) and the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning (grant number 2013R1A1A1013207 to J.Y.P.). The authors declare that they have no competing interests. “
“The authors regret they failed to cite the papers outlined below in their original submission. They apologize and acknowledge they should have sought for permission before reproducing figures already included in their previous publication. The authors failed to cite their own related paper: Chen et al. (2013): Chen, X., Chen, L., Chen, J., Hu, W., Gao, H., Xie, B., Wang, X., Yin, Z., Li, S., Wang, X., 2013. ADAM17 regulates self-renewal and differentiation of U87 glioblastoma stem cells. Neurosci. Lett.

The basin is shared by eight countries: Zambia (41 9% of total ar

The basin is shared by eight countries: Zambia (41.9% of total area), Angola (18.2%), Namibia (1.1%), Botswana (1.5%), Zimbabwe (15.9%), Tanzania

(2.2%), Malawi (7.5%), and GDC-0199 solubility dmso Mozambique (11.6%). Typical vegetation types are woodland, grassland, and some agricultural areas, and elevation ranges from sea level to approximately 2500 m above sea level. The source of the Zambezi River is located at Kalene Hills in Zambia and travels roughly 2600 km to the south and east before discharging into the Indian Ocean at the Mozambican coast. Important tributaries from the north are the Kafue River, Luangwa River and Shire River, but there are no significant tributaries from the south. Floodplains and swamps (Barotse Floodplain, Chobe Swamps, Kafue Flats, Kwando Floodplain) are large, seasonally inundated areas of several thousand km2. Lake Niassa – or also known as Lake Malawi – is located in the north-eastern part of the basin and is one of the world’s largest freshwater lakes (570 km long, 30,000 km2 surface area). There are also two large artificial reservoirs for hydropower generation at the Zambezi River (Lake Kariba with 5500 km2 surface area and Lake Cahora Bassa with 2700 km2). Lake Kariba is actually the world’s largest artificial reservoir according to storage capacity

(200,000 hm3, GRanD global data set, Lehner et al., 2011). Mean annual precipitation (MAP) is approximately 1000 mm/a, of which about 8% generates discharge and the remaining 92% is lost via evapotranspiration. The northern parts are wetter (MAP > 1250 mm/a) than the southern Stem Cell Compound Library in vitro parts (MAP < 750 mm/a). During the dry season there is practically no precipitation. The wet season is during the austral summer and lasts from November to March. In most parts MAP is smaller than annual potential evapotranspiration, with a basin-wide average of 1600 mm/a. Mean discharge at the outlet of the basin is estimated to be approximately 3600 m3/s, but discharge L-gulonolactone oxidase shows large seasonal and

intra-annual variations. Seasonality in discharge is strongly controlled by seasonality in precipitation, but in addition also retention in large floodplains and swamps as well as artificial reservoirs affect the seasonal discharge. Zambezi floods travel several months from the headwaters in Zambia and Angola until reaching the lower reaches in Mozambique. In contrast, floods from the Luangwa tributary reach the Zambezi River within a few days, with similar peak flow as the upper Zambezi floods, but overall smaller flood volumes. Even though in this study the whole Zambezi basin was modelled, in the paper we only report on the results for the Zambezi basin upstream of Tete (covering 1,103,400 km2). Thereby, the Shire basin – with its specific hydrology due to the large impact of Lake Niassa – is excluded from the analysis.

Reciprocity was experienced differently both across and within pe

Reciprocity was experienced differently both across and within peer support dyads, as partners could experience the same peer Talazoparib cell line relationship differently. The negative aspects of these concepts, along with the concept of emotional entanglement, broaden the range of potential negative effects of peer support identified by Dennis [16]. Stakeholder-specific experiences: As noted above, while a number of concepts had meaning for both mentors and mentees, other concepts had pertinence for only one stakeholder category. While the prevalence of mentor-specific concepts may suggest that articles focused on reporting the experiences

of this stakeholder category, a greater number of articles, in fact, examined peer support experiences from mentees’ perspectives Lumacaftor purchase ( Table 1). The broader range of

concepts specific to mentors suggests that a diverse range of factors shaped mentors’ experience of peer support, as in many cases, they were both providers and recipients of support. Concepts with relevance across participant categories may have different meanings for mentors and mentees. While mentees could find meaning by re-evaluating their lives in the context of peer support interventions, the very act of providing peer support might be a way of finding meaning for mentors. Hence, not only were interventions experienced in heterogeneous ways, but mentors and mentees could give meaning to seemingly shared experiences in different ways. Power relations: Mentor- and mentee-specific concepts may assume different and uneven power relations as well. Sharing, a largely egalitarian concept, denoting the exchange of disease-related experiences by mentees with each other, is the only mentee-specific concept. In contrast, the mentor-specific concepts of helping and role satisfaction, are imbued with hierarchy and power. Helping refers to the unidirectional provision of assistance by mentors; role satisfaction

is closely associated with it. While the rationale for peer support Clomifene is based on the assumption that relationships between peers with experiential knowledge of disease are more egalitarian than relationships between patients and professionals, it would seem that peer support itself has the potential to replicate traditional power dynamics. Indeed, peer support interventions themselves establish such hierarchies by training mentors to provide help to mentees. Such training is intended to enhance mentors’ capacity to provide something of value, which it is assumed the receiver lacks. However, the synthesis indicates that initially asymmetrical relationships have the potential to become more symmetrical over time.

Diversity indices have been used both to explain “undisturbed” na

Diversity indices have been used both to explain “undisturbed” natural communities in relation to their environments and also to infer degree of anthropogenic impact on communities (e.g., Wilhm, 1972 and Wilhm and Dorris, 1968). Here we focus on the latter, but it is worth noting that there is a vast literature dealing with the difficulties in inferring environmental causation from diversity index values, even where the data are all from environments without any

obvious anthropogenic disturbance. For example, estuaries are harsh natural environments because of their low and fluctuating salinities and related osmotic problems. Similarly, hypersaline environments such as endorheic ponds and lakes are harsh, but on a geological/evolutionary time scale and a biogeographic spatial scale they are also new and variable – http://www.selleckchem.com/products/ABT-263.html even ephemeral or intermittent. It has been argued that the estuarine fauna are depauperate because estuarine

environments are transitional (between typical ocean salinities and fresh water) and short-lived, and there has not been enough time of stable existence for the evolution of species adapted to those environments. The same would be true of newly emerged volcanic islands and temporary or fluctuating habitats such as the Dead Sea, Great Salt Lake, or Australia’s Lake Ayre. So the point is: Which is it that is limiting species diversity – harsh environment or new and intermittent habitats/environments or both? The importance of change in this regard is generally underestimated. Meloxicam Treefalls in mature forests create “islands” APO866 chemical structure of change and reversion to early succession. Even marine benthic communities at continental shelf depths (e.g., 100 m) respond to storm effects and re-start successional processes. When the fauna of the deep sea were first sampled they were found to be surprisingly diverse, given the darkness,

pressure, lack of photosynthesis, and low rates of organic material descending from the upper layers. Biomass is low (except near volcanic vents) but diversity is high, as measured by richness (number of taxa) or by any diversity index. A debate ensued which has general implications: what does control biotic diversity given that energy-poor deep sea environments support high diversity? The “Stability-Time Hypothesis” was proposed ( Sanders, 1968, Sanders, 1969, Dayton and Hessler, 1972, Grassle and Sanders, 1973 and Abele and Walters, 1979), which essentially said that species diversity increases asymptotically over time as species evolve and adapt to environments. Disturbance in unstable environments sets back the process and reduces diversity. The greater faunal diversity of the Pacific than the Atlantic Ocean has been attributed to the greater geological age of the Pacific.

In terms of income, good revenues were obtained when fishing in b

In terms of income, good revenues were obtained when fishing in both seagrass and coral habitats (Fig. 3 and Fig. 4). Biomass extremes varied a lot with a minimum value of 0.18 kg1 fisher−1 day−1 to a maximum of 35.66 kg1 fisher−1 day−1. The median ranged little from 2.75 to 3.68 kg1 fisher−1 day−1, but not the mean 0.66–3.66 kg1 fisher−1 day−1. Income minimum and maximum range was from about 130 to 34,666 TZS1 fisher−1 day−1 (0.11–31.19 USD); with a median range of 2000 to about 3000 TZS1 fisher−1 day−1 (1.80–2.70 USD) and mean range from 1926 to 2762 TZS1 fisher−1 day−1. (1.733–2.48 USD). The highest variability in both biomass and income

RG7420 manufacturer was associated with selleck monoclonal humanized antibody inhibitor rainy seasons when fishing in mangrove areas (Table 3, Supplementary Data; Fig. 3 and Fig. 4). Biomass minimum and maximum were 0.5–24 kg1 fisher−1 day−1 respectively; with a median range from 2.5 to 4 kg1 fisher−1 day−1 and a mean of 2.23–4.15 kg1 fisher−1 day−1. Income median varied from 1000 to 2266 (0.90–2.03

USD) TZS1 fisher−1 day−1, with a minimum of 100 TZS1 fisher−1 day−1 (0.09 USD) and a maximum of 21,900 TZS1 fisher−1 day−1 (19.70 USD), while the mean ranged from 1064 to 2706 TZS1 fisher−1 day−1 (0.95–2.43 USD) (Table 3, Supplementary Data; Fig. 3 and Fig. 4). Variability for this group was highest during rainy seasons. The minimum–maximum biomass range for this group was 1.00–31.91 kg1 fisher−1 day−1; with a median ranging from 3 to 4.75 and a mean of 2.88–4.87 kg1 fisher−1 day−1). The income levels varied from 255 to 27,000 TZS1 fisher−1 day−1 (0.22–24.30 USD); with a median range

of 1695–3633 and a mean of 1685–3473 TZS1 fisher−1 day−1 (1.52–3.26 USD; 1.51–3.12 USD respectively). Variation for both biomass and income was found when fishing in corals in the long rainy season (southeast monsoon) (Table 3, Supplementary Data; Fig. 3 and Fig. 4). The results of the 3-way ANOVA for both biomass and income showed significant values for all the main factors tested and their interactions. However, HSP90 the subsequent 72 pairwise tests showed only four (4) significant values (Table 4, Supplementary Data). The strongest significant values were found for basket trap fishers during the northeast monsoon between coral and seagrass habitats (p < 0.00139) and between coral and mangrove habitats (p < 0.00139). For income, the same pairwise tests were significant; between coral and seagrass habitats (p < 0.00139) and between coral and mangrove habitats (p < 0.00139) ( Table 4, Supplementary Data). All the other 68 values were not significant at all ( Appendix III, Supplementary Information). The results of this study show that seagrasses play an important role for SSF in Chwaka Bay, and we suggest that this finding is likely applicable to other similar tropical coastal systems.

These hypotheses will be demonstrated below In the Southern Ocea

These hypotheses will be demonstrated below. In the Southern Ocean, CM5_piStart Caspase-independent apoptosis is generally too cold around 50°S and too warm south of 60°S in the surface as compared to observations (Fig. 8 top left). The warm surface anomalies do not extend at depth though, where CM5_piStart is generally too cold over

the whole water column (Fig. 9 top left). This surface warm bias remains relatively unchanged in CM5_RETRO. Yet it extends down to almost 1000 m as well as along the oceanic floor (except for weak anomalies of the opposite sign between 50 m and 100 m, suggesting a modification of the thermocline). This is consistent with the forced simulations (compare F5_CMIP5 and F1_CMIP3, Fig. 2). The suite of sensitivity experiments in forced mode suggests that this effect is due to the implementation of the partial steps (F2). Bottom waters along the Antarctic continental shelf are colder in CM5_piStart as compared to CM5_RETRO. This is indicative of an intensified AABW formation, in agreement with forced

simulations, and confirmed by deeper mixed layers (not shown) and meridional streamfunctions (below). Furthermore, along the Antarctic continent, surface water masses are saltier Selleck STA-9090 in CM5_piStart, while they are fresher north of 50°S (Fig. 9 bottom right). Fig 10 shows that these salinity anomalies in the Southern Hemisphere are responsible for an increase of the density gradient across Branched chain aminotransferase the Southern Ocean (80°S–50°S) in CM5_piStart by roughly 15% as compared to CM5_RETRO. This consistent with intensified ACC in CM5_piStart, as described below. Regarding the tropical regions, Fig. 8 (bottom) shows that surface waters are colder by up to 1 °C and saltier by more than 1.5 psu in CM5_piStart as compared to CM5_RETRO in the southern part of the Indonesian Archipelago

(IA). This results from the implementation of tidal mixing, consistent with coupled simulations from Koch-Larrouy et al. (2009). Further north, offshore of southeastern Asia, CM5_piStart displays a strong fresh anomaly compared to observations while this anomaly was much weaker in CM5_RETRO. This difference between the two simulations can be partly tracked down to changes in atmospheric freshwater flux, as shown in Fig. 12, with larger precipitation into the ocean (blue colour) in CM5_piStart along 5°N and weaker along the Equator and 5°S in the Indian Ocean. These changes are the signature of a northward shift of the ITCZ, and induce the SSS anomalies seen in Fig. 8 (bottom right). Note that from Fig. 12, atmospheric freshwater changes are also very strong in the tropical Atlantic, similarly characterised by a northward shift of the mean ITCZ position (around 10°N). Stronger precipitation are also found along 10°S.

These case reports demonstrate the potential of different contras

These case reports demonstrate the potential of different contrast-specific

modalities for the assessment of pathologic brain perfusion using contrast ultrasound imaging. In a small study analyzing local correlations of ultrasound perfusion parameters of bolus kinetics with the occurrence of a perfusion-diffusion mismatch on Stroke MRI (penumbra) thresholds were calculated. Penumbra could be assumed if the relative time delay exceeded 4 s and the relative signal amplitude exceeded 1/3 [21]. These preliminary data should be verified by a prospective study. Besides the high potential of ultrasound perfusion imaging as a fast, semi-invasive bedside method to evaluate supratentorial brain perfusion in acute ischemic stroke patients, there are some drawbacks like the insonation artifacts, which occur in most of the patients and the inability to scan the whole brain. Besides these technical limitations there are potential Anti-diabetic Compound Library Afatinib side effects of the new contrast agents, which restrict the employment of these substances in severe cardiac or pulmonary disease. Prof. Seidel is employed by Asklepios

Kliniken Hamburg GmbH and is professor of Neurology at the University of Luebeck, Germany. He has previously received unrestricted educational grants from Schering, Bracco Imaging SpA, Philips Medical Systems, Boehringer Ingelheim, Solvay, Bayer HealthCare, Biogen idec, Desitin, Merck Serono, Meda, MSD, Novartis Neuroscience, Talecris, UCB, Grunenthal, Lundbeck, Merz, Teva and Sanofi Aventis. He has worked together with Bracco Imaging SpA

and Philips Medical Systems in research projects funded by the European Union. “
“Compared to conventional transcranial Doppler sonography (TCD), transcranial color duplex sonography (TCDS) is able to measure much more accurately on the basis of angle-collected velocities in the intracranial major vessels. Furthermore, TCDS is able to visualize intracranial lesions in stroke [1], severe head Proteasome inhibitor injury [2], and other neurological disorder cases [3]. Utilizing ultrasound contrast agents (UCA), TCDS has been able to evaluate brain tissue perfusion non-invasively, particularly in ischemic stroke patient investigations [4] and [5]. Possibilities of quantitative measurements have been evaluated in an identical way to neuroradiological perfusion imaging, based on the bolus dye-dilution principle. However, quantitative reliability has not yet been established, due to problems of skull- and depth-dependent ultrasound attenuation, shadowing effects, bubble saturation, and low data reproducibility (the latter due to UCA administration methods, transducer fixation, data analysis, etc.) [4] and [5]. Transducer holders or probe fixation devices for conventional TCD monitoring have been introduced into clinical settings [6], [7], [8] and [9]. However, a transducer holder for TCDS has yet to be clinically introduced. We have developed and improved such a transducer holder (Sonopod) (Fig.