Roma youth and adults are in need of programs that reduce health disparities and their increased mortality risk. Reducing exposure to risk factors such as smoking, obesity, and poor living conditions may be a target for interventions. More intervention studies and rigorous evaluations are needed.

Objectives We assess whether posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) varies in prevalence, diagnostic criteria endorsement, and type and frequency of traumatic events (PTEs) among a nationally representative U.S. sample of 5071 non-Latino whites, 3264 Latinos, 2178 Asians, 4249 African Americans, and 1476 Afro-Caribbeans. Methods PTSD and other psychiatric disorders were evaluated using the World Mental Health-Composite International Diagnostic Interview (WMH-CIDI) in a national household sample that oversampled ethnic/racial minorities (n=16,238) but was weighted to produce results representative of the general population. Results Asians have lower prevalence rates of probable lifetime PTSD while African Americans have higher rates as compared to non-Latino whites, even after adjusting for type and number of exposures to traumatic events, and for sociodemographic, clinical and social support factors. Afro-Caribbeans and Latinos seem to demonstrate similar risk to non-Latino whites, adjusting for these same covariates. Higher rates of probable PTSD exhibited by African Americans and lower rates for Asians, as compared to non-Latino whites, do not appear related to differential symptom endorsement, differences in risk or protective factors or differences in types and frequencies of PTEs across groups. Conclusions There appears to be marked differences in conditional risk of probable PTSD across ethnic/racial groups. Questions remain about what explains risk of probable PTSD. Several factors that might account for these differences are discussed as well as the clinical implications of our findings. Uncertainty of the PTSD diagnostic assessment for Latinos and Asians requires further evaluation.

Earth's surface topography is a direct physical expression of our planet's dynamics. Most is isostatic, controlled by thickness and density variations within the crust and lithosphere, but a significant proportion arises from forces exerted by underlying mantle convection. This dynamic topography directly connects the evolution of surface environments to Earth's deep interior, but predictions from mantle flow simulations are often inconsistent with inferences from the geological record, with little consensus about its spatial pattern, wavelength and amplitude. Here, we demonstrate that previous comparisons between predictive models and observational constraints have been biased by subjective choices. Using measurements of residual topography beneath the oceans, and a hierarchical Bayesian approach to performing spherical harmonic analyses, we generate a robust estimate of Earth's oceanic residual topography power spectrum. This indicates power of 0.5 ± 0.35 km 2 and peak amplitudes of ∼0.8 ± 0.1 km at long-wavelength (∼10 4 km), decreasing by roughly one order of magnitude at shorter wavelengths (∼10 3 km). We show that geodynamical simulations can only be reconciled with observational constraints if they incorporate lithospheric structure and its impact on mantle flow. This demonstrates that both deep (long-) and shallow (shorter-wavelength) processes are crucial, and implies that dynamic topography is intimately connected to the structure and evolution of Earth's lithosphere. Between Earth's crust and core lies the mantle, a 2,900 km-thick layer of hot rock that constitutes greater than 80% of Earth's volume. Carrying heat to the surface, the convecting mantle is the 'engine' that drives our dynamic planet: it is directly or indirectly responsible for almost all large-scale tectonic and geological activity [1]. As the mantle flows, it transmits normal stresses to the lithosphere-Earth's rigid outermost shell-that are balanced by gravitational stresses arising through topographic deflections of Earth's surface [2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]. This so-called dynamic topography is transient, varying both spatially and temporally in response to underlying mantle flow. As a result, it is more challenging to isolate than isostatic topography. The relative importance of dynamic versus isostatic topography varies according to setting: for example, the elevation of the Himalaya is principally isostatic, due to the presence of Earth's thickest continental crust; but the broad excess elevation of the stable South African craton has been