Category Archives: New Publications

New Books This Week: Data Integrity, Counterterrorism, The Biology Revolution and More

Friday brings us to the close of the week and the usual recap of what’s fresh and new here at nap.edu. Next week’s post may be a little delayed by the Thanksgiving holiday, but if there’s new stuff, we’ll be sure you know.

Featured New Book

Experimentation and Rapid Prototyping in Support of Counterterrorism (final)

The U.S. military forces currently face a nontraditional threat from insurgents and terrorists who primarily employ improvised explosive devices, and have shown a cycle of adaptation of less than 12 months to responses by U.S. forces to counter these attacks. This constantly evolving threat requires U.S. military forces to adapt and respond more rapidly with modified tactics, technologies, and/or equipment.

In response to this need for new technologies, the Rapid Reaction Technology Office (RRTO) was established in 2006 to develop technologies that can mature in 6 to 18 months for purposes of counterterrorism. Although RRTO appears to be successfully fulfilling its mission, the agency seeks to understand and address barriers to and opportunities for meeting future counterterrorism needs–including the need to accelerate the transition of technologies for counterterrorism with an eye to countering emerging and anticipated threats. This book reviews RRTO approaches and provides a set of recommendations for potential improvements to help meet these needs for rapid technology development.

All New Books This Week

Disposal of Legacy Nerve Agent GA and Lewisite Stocks at Deseret Chemical Depot: Letter Report (final)

Research at the Intersection of the Physical and Life Sciences (prepublication)

Landscapes on the Edge: New Horizons for Research on Earth’s Surface (prepublication)

Crisis Standards of Care: Summary of a Workshop Series (prepublication)

Review of the Bureau of Reclamation’s Corrosion Prevention Standards for Ductile Iron Pipe (final)

Ensuring the Integrity, Accessibility, and Stewardship of Research Data in the Digital Age (final)

Veterans and Agent Orange: Update 2008 (final)

A New Biology for the 21st Century: Ensuring the United States Leads the Coming Biology Revolution (final)

Biographical Memoirs: V. 91

New From NAP: Mathematics Education, US Construction Industry and more

It’s the end of the week, so it’s time to round up the books new to our website this week. Check back here every Friday afternoon to get all the latest, or better yet, subscribe to the New From NAP RSS feed to get the newest books every day.

Featured New Book

Mathematics Learning in Early Childhood: Paths Toward Excellence and Equity (final)

Early childhood mathematics is vitally important for young children’s present and future educational success. Research has demonstrated that virtually all young children have the capability to learn and become competent in mathematics. Furthermore, young children enjoy their early informal experiences with mathematics. Unfortunately, many children’s potential in mathematics is not fully realized, especially those children who are economically disadvantaged. This is due, in part, to a lack of opportunities to learn mathematics in early childhood settings or through everyday experiences in the home and in their communities. Improvements in early childhood mathematics education can provide young children with the foundation for school success.

Relying on a comprehensive review of the research, Mathematics Learning in Early Childhood lays out the critical areas that should be the focus of young children’s early mathematics education, explores the extent to which they are currently being incorporated in early childhood settings, and identifies the changes needed to improve the quality of mathematics experiences for young children. This book serves as a call to action to improve the state of early childhood mathematics. It will be especially useful for policy makers and practitioners-those who work directly with children and their families in shaping the policies that affect the education of young children.

All New Books This Week

2007-2008 Assessment of the Army Research Laboratory (final)

Systems for Research and Evaluation for Translating Genome-Based Discoveries for Health: Workshop Summary (final)

Evaluating Occupational Health and Safety Research Programs: Framework and Next Steps (final)

Advancing the Competitiveness and Efficiency of the U.S. Construction Industry (final)

New Books This Week on NAP

Friday brings us once again to the end of the work week and a roundup of the books that were new to nap.edu this week. Almost all of our books can be read online for free, and many have free PDFs to download, so check under each book’s title in this post for links to read online or if a free PDF is available.

Assessing and Improving Value in Cancer Care: Workshop Summary (final)

Unlike many other areas in health care, the practice of oncology presents unique challenges that make assessing and improving value especially complex. First, patients and professionals feel a well-justified sense of urgency to treat for cure, and if cure is not possible, to extend life and reduce the burden of disease. Second, treatments are often both life sparing and highly toxic. Third, distinctive payment structures for cancer medicines are intertwined with practice. Fourth, providers often face tremendous pressure to apply the newest technologies to patients who fail to respond to established treatments, even when the evidence supporting those technologies is incomplete or uncertain, and providers may be reluctant to stop toxic treatments and move to palliation, even at the end of life. Finally, the newest and most novel treatments in oncology are among the most costly in medicine.

This volume summarizes the results of a workshop that addressed these issues from multiple perspectives, including those of patients and patient advocates, providers, insurers, health care researchers, federal agencies, and industry. Its broad goal was to describe value in oncology in a complete and nuanced way, to better inform decisions regarding developing, evaluating, prescribing, and paying for cancer therapeutics.

Interacademy Programs Between the United States and Eastern Europe 1967-2009: The Changing Landscape (final)

Improving the Measurement of Late-Life Disability in Population Surveys: Beyond ADLs and IADLs: Summary of a Workshop (final)

Integrative Medicine and the Health of the Public: A Summary of the February 2009 Summit (final)

Spectrum Management for Science in the 21st Century (prepublication)

Nurturing and Sustaining Effective Programs in Science Education for Grades K-8: Building a Village in California: Summary of a Convocation (final)

New Publications Released This Week

It’s Friday, which means we take our weekly look back at the new publications on the NAP website. We’re spotlighting the prepublication of Surrounded By Science: Learning Science in Informal Environments, and just below that is a list of all the publications that have hit the website in the past week.

Feel free to use the icons at the bottom of this post to share it on Facebook, Twitter or other social sharing and bookmarking sites.

Featured Publication

Surrounded by Science: Learning Science in Informal Environments (prepublication)

Practitioners in informal science settings–museums, after-school programs, science and technology centers, media enterprises, aquariums, zoos, and botanical gardens–are interested in finding out what learning looks like, how to measure it, and what they can do to ensure that people of all ages, from different backgrounds and cultures, have a positive learning experience.

Surrounded by Science: Learning Science in Informal Environments, is designed to make that task easier. Based on the National Research Council study, Learning Science in Informal Environments: People, Places, and Pursuits, this book is a tool that provides case studies, illustrative examples, and probing questions for practitioners. In short, this book makes valuable research accessible to those working in informal science: educators, museum professionals, university faculty, youth leaders, media specialists, publishers, broadcast journalists, and many others.

All Publications This Week

Nanotechnology in Food Products: Workshop Summary (final)

A Review of the NIOSH Roadmap for Research on Asbestos Fibers and Other Elongate Mineral Particles (prepublication)

A Transportation Research Program for Mitigating and Adapting to Climate Change and Conserving Energy Special Report 299 (prepublication)

An Assessment of NASA’s National Aviation Operations Monitoring Service (prepublication)

Frontiers in Crystalline Matter: From Discovery to Technology (final)

Technology, Policy, Law, and Ethics Regarding U.S. Acquisition and Use of Cyberattack Capabilities (final)

Reengineering the Survey of Income and Program Participation (final)

New Publications This Week (10/19-10/23)

Some weeks are bigger than others, and this week is one of those big weeks. Two of our publications got a lot of attention—School Meals and Hidden Costs of Energy—so we thought we’d feature both of them.

There are plenty more, though: two publications on childhood obesity, as well as publications covering tobacco use in the military, the Department of Defense’s Fast Track of SBIR, NASA, and state voter registration.

If you’d like faster notification of our new publications, subscribe to the New From NAP RSS feed, or connect with us on Twitter or Facebook for featured books and articles.

Featured Publications

School Meals: Building Blocks for Healthy Children (prepublication)

Ensuring that the foods provided to children in schools are consistent with current dietary recommendations is an important national focus. Various laws and regulations govern the operation of school meal programs. In 1995, Nutrition Standards and Meal Requirements were put in place to ensure that all meals offered would be high in nutritional quality.

School Meals: Building Blocks For Healthy Children reviews and provides recommendations to update the nutrition standard and the meal requirements for the National School Lunch Program and School Breakfast Program. The recommendations reflect new developments in nutrition science, increase the availability of key food groups in the school meal programs, and allow these programs to better meet the nutritional needs of children, foster healthy eating habits, and safeguard children’s health.

School Meals sets standards for menu planning that focus on food groups, calories, saturated fat, and sodium and that incorporate Dietary Guidelines for Americans and the Dietary Reference Intakes. This book will be used as a guide for school food authorities, food producers, policy leaders, state/local government and parents.

Hidden Costs of Energy: Unpriced Consequences of Energy Production and Use (prepublication)

Despite the many benefits of energy, most of which are reflected in energy market prices, the production, distribution, and use of energy causes negative effects. Many of these negative effects are not reflected in energy market prices. When market failures like this occur, there may be a case for government interventions in the form of regulations, taxes, fees, tradable permits or other instruments that will motivate recognition of these external or hidden costs.

Hidden Costs of Energy defines and evaluates key external costs and benefits that are associated with the production, distribution, and use of energy, but not reflected in market prices. In aggregate, the damage estimates presented here are substantial, and reflect damages from air pollution associated with electricity generation, motor vehicle transportation, and heat generation. The book also considers other effects not quantified in dollar amounts, such as damages from climate change, effects of some air pollutants such as mercury, and risks to national security.

While not a comprehensive guide to policy, this analysis indicates that major initiatives to further reduce other emissions, improve energy efficiency, or shift to a cleaner electricity-generating mix could substantially reduce the damages of external effects. A first step in minimizing the adverse consequences of new energy technologies is to better understand these external effects and damages. Hidden Costs of Energy will therefore be a vital informational tool for government policy makers, scientists, and economists in even the earliest stages of research and development on energy technologies.

All Publications This Week

Protecting and Accessing Data from the Survey of Earned Doctorates: A Workshop Summary (prepublication)

Improving State Voter Registration Databases Final Report (prepublication)

Childhood Obesity Prevention in Texas: Workshop Summary (prepublication)

Community Perspectives on Obesity Prevention in Children: Workshop Summary (prepublication)

Revisiting the Department of Defense SBIR Fast Track Initiative (final)

Combating Tobacco Use in Military and Veteran Populations (final)

Fostering Visions for the Future: A Review of the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts (final)

New Publications This Week (10/12-10/16)

Friday brings us to our weekly roundup of all the publications that have been released this week. If you’d like faster notification of our new publications, subscribe to the New From NAP RSS feed or connect with us on Twitter or Facebook.

Featured Publication

Secondhand Smoke Exposure and Cardiovascular Effects: Making Sense of the Evidence (prepublication)

Data suggest that exposure to secondhand smoke can result in heart disease in nonsmoking adults. Recently, progress has been made in reducing involuntary exposure to secondhand smoke through legislation banning smoking in workplaces, restaurants, and other public places. The effect of legislation to ban smoking and its effects on the cardiovascular health of nonsmoking adults, however, remains a question.

Secondhand Smoke Exposure and Cardiovascular Effects reviews available scientific literature to assess the relationship between secondhand smoke exposure and acute coronary events. The authors, experts in secondhand smoke exposure and toxicology, clinical cardiology, epidemiology, and statistics, find that there is about a 25 to 30 percent increase in the risk of coronary heart disease from exposure to secondhand smoke. Their findings agree with the 2006 Surgeon General’s Report conclusion that there are increased risks of coronary heart disease morbidity and mortality among men and women exposed to secondhand smoke. However, the authors note that the evidence for determining the magnitude of the relationship between chronic secondhand smoke exposure and coronary heart disease is not very strong.

Public health professionals will rely upon Secondhand Smoke Exposure and Cardiovascular Effects for its survey of critical epidemiological studies on the effects of smoking bans and evidence of links between secondhand smoke exposure and cardiovascular events, as well as its findings and recommendations.

All Publications This Week

Science at Sea: Meeting Future Oceanographic Goals with a Robust Academic Research Fleet (prepublication)

Live Variola Virus: Considerations for Continuing Research (final)

Transforming Agricultural Education for a Changing World (final)

Initial National Priorities for Comparative Effectiveness Research (final)

Final Report from the NRC Committee on the Review of the Louisiana Coastal Protection and Restoration (LACPR) Program (final)

This Week’s New Publications (10/5-10/9)

Every Friday, we run down the publications that hit nap.edu in the past week. Every publication is available to read for free online, so follow the links to read them on our site.

Featured Publication

Approaches to Reducing the Use of Forced or Child Labor: Summary of a Workshop on Assessing Practice (final)

Globally, child labor and forced labor are widespread and complex problems. They are conceptually different phenomena, requiring different policy responses, though they may also overlap in practice. The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA) was designed to reduce the use of child and forced labor in the production of goods consumed in the United States. The Act was reauthorized in 2003, 2005, and 2008.

In response to provisions of TVPA, the the Bureau of International Labor Affairs requested that the National Research Council organize a two-day workshop. The workshop, summarized in this volume, discusses methods for identifying and organizing a standard set of practices that will reduce the likelihood that persons will use forced labor or child labor to produce goods, with a focus on business and governmental practices.

All Publications This Week

Experimentation and Rapid Prototyping in Support of Counterterrorism (prepublication)

Review of the Methodology Proposed by the Food Safety and Inspection Service for Follow-up Surveillance of In-Commerce Businesses: A Letter Report (final)

Vital Statistics: Summary of a Workshop (final)

Letter Report to the U.S. Department of Education on the Race to the Top Fund (final)

Biographical Memoirs: V. 90 (final)

Sensing and Supporting Communications Capabilities for Special Operations Forces (final)

Toward a Universal Radio Frequency System for Special Operations Forces (final)

This Week’s New Publications, September 28 – October 2

It was a busy week at the National Academies Press, with a whole lot of reports hitting the site. Check out the list of everything new on nap.edu below the featured publication.

Featured Publication

Depression in Parents, Parenting, and Children: Opportunities to Improve Identification, Treatment, and Prevention (final)

Depression is a widespread condition affecting approximately 7.5 million parents in the U.S. each year and may be putting at least 15 million children at risk for adverse health outcomes. Based on evidentiary studies, major depression in either parent can interfere with parenting quality and increase the risk of children developing mental, behavioral and social problems. Depression in Parents, Parenting, and Children highlights disparities in the prevalence, identification, treatment, and prevention of parental depression among different sociodemographic populations. It also outlines strategies for effective intervention and identifies the need for a more interdisciplinary approach that takes biological, psychological, behavioral, interpersonal, and social contexts into consideration.

A major challenge to the effective management of parental depression is developing a treatment and prevention strategy that can be introduced within a two-generation framework, conducive for parents and their children. Thus far, both the federal and state response to the problem has been fragmented, poorly funded, and lacking proper oversight. This study examines options for widespread implementation of best practices as well as strategies that can be effective in diverse service settings for diverse populations of children and their families.

The delivery of adequate screening and successful detection and treatment of a depressive illness and prevention of its effects on parenting and the health of children is a formidable challenge to modern health care systems. This study offers seven solid recommendations designed to increase awareness about and remove barriers to care for both the depressed adult and prevention of effects in the child. The report will be of particular interest to federal health officers, mental and behavioral health providers in diverse parts of health care delivery systems, health policy staff, state legislators, and the general public.

All Publications This Week

Responsible Research with Biological Select Agents and Toxins (prepublication)
An Assessment of the National Institute of Standards and Technology Chemical Science and Technology Laboratory: Fiscal Year 2009 (final forthcoming)
An Assessment of the National Institute of Standards and Technology Information Technology Laboratory: Fiscal Year 2009 (final forthcoming)
An Assessment of the National Institute of Standards and Technology Electronics and Electrical Engineering Laboratory: Fiscal Year 2009 (final forthcoming)
An Assessment of the National Institute of Standards and Technology Center for Nanoscale Science and Technology: Fiscal Year 2009 (final forthcoming)
An Assessment of the National Institute of Standards and Technology Center for Neutron Research: Fiscal Year 2009 (final forthcoming)
Data on Federal Research and Development Investments: A Pathway to Modernization (prepublication)
Global Sources of Local Pollution: An Assessment of Long-Range Transport of Key Air Pollutants to and from the United States (prepublication)
Persistent Forecasting of Disruptive Technologies (prepublication)
Emergency and Continuous Exposure Guidance Levels for Selected Submarine Contaminants: Volume 3 (final)
Acute Exposure Guideline Levels for Selected Airborne Chemicals: Volume 8 (prepublication)
An Assessment of the Small Business Innovation Research Program at the Department of Defense (final)
Avoiding Technology Surprise for Tomorrow’s Warfighter: A Symposium Report (final)

This Week’s New Publications, 9/14-9/18

Here’s a list of our new publications for September 14th through 18th. Click on the title of the publication to go to the book’s catalog page to buy the print version, download the PDF, or read the book for free.

Featured Publication

Conflict of Interest in Medical Research, Education, and Practice (final)

Collaborations of physicians and researchers with industry can provide valuable benefits to society, particularly in the translation of basic scientific discoveries to new therapies and products. Recent reports and news stories have, however, documented disturbing examples of relationships and practices that put at risk the integrity of medical research, the objectivity of professional education, the quality of patient care, the soundness of clinical practice guidelines, and the public’s trust in medicine.

Conflict of Interest in Medical Research, Education, and Practice provides a comprehensive look at conflict of interest in medicine. It offers principles to inform the design of policies to identify, limit, and manage conflicts of interest without damaging constructive collaboration with industry. It calls for both short-term actions and long-term commitments by institutions and individuals, including leaders of academic medical centers, professional societies, patient advocacy groups, government agencies, and drug, device, and pharmaceutical companies. Failure of the medical community to take convincing action on conflicts of interest invites additional legislative or regulatory measures that may be overly broad or unduly burdensome.

Conflict of Interest in Medical Research, Education, and Practice makes several recommendations for strengthening conflict of interest policies and curbing relationships that create risks with little benefit. The book will serve as an invaluable resource for individuals and organizations committed to high ethical standards in all realms of medicine.

All Publications Released This Week

New publications on nap.edu this week

Here’s a list of the publications that have hit nap.edu in the last week, with our weekly featured publication up top and a list of all of our new publications just below that.

Featured New Publication

Engineering in K 12 Education: Understanding the Status and Improving the Prospects (final)

Engineering in K-12 Education reviews the scope and impact of engineering education today and makes several recommendations to address curriculum, policy, and funding issues. The book also analyzes a number of K-12 engineering curricula in depth and discusses what is known from the cognitive sciences about how children learn engineering-related concepts and skills.

Engineering in K-12 Education will serve as a reference for science, technology, engineering, and math educators, policy makers, employers, and others concerned about the development of the country’s technical workforce. The book will also prove useful to educational researchers, cognitive scientists, advocates for greater public understanding of engineering, and those working to boost technological and scientific literacy.