15,043 research outputs found
Access courses as a site of engagement: a research project
This research project was funded by the Greater Manchester Strategic Alliance and Aimhigher Research Network North West. A database of Access students was held at the University of Salford that included students from 1998-2006. The names of the students were gathered by the Access Unit from their Enrichment Programme over the period. Ethical approval for the research was sought from the IRIS Director and advice on the Data Protection Act sought from the manager responsible within the university. The database contained information on name, age, address, telephone contact, gender, ethnicity, college and Access course attended. There were approximately 6000 entries on the database.
“Access to higher education courses offer a route into higher education (HE) for those who do not have the educational qualifications which are usually required for entry. These courses provide the underpinning knowledge and skills needed for university-level study, and lead to the award of the Access to HE qualification, which is of an equivalent standard to Level 3 qualifications, such as A levels.” UCAS website.
Individuals can study a range of courses in different subject areas such as health, science or humanities. Access courses can be studied over one year as a full time course or over two-three years as a part time course. The starting point for the study is the view that to enrol on an Access to HE course means that a major decision or turning point in an adult’s life has taken place and that the individual wants to change direction. This change of direction is important and suggests that individuals may have missed an opportunity earlier in their lives or do not wish to continue in the same employment situation or in the case of many women who are carers their circumstances have changed. The engagement in learning is an agentic act on the part of the individual that may be prompted by others in the immediate family or friends. However, a necessary aspect of this engagement is the provision of Access courses as a means to enter higher education or change employment
To what extent does the self-consistent mean-field exist?
A non-convergent difficulty near level-repulsive region is discussed within
the self-consistent mean-field theory. It is shown by numerical and analytic
studies that the mean-field is not realized in the many-fermion system when
quantum fluctuations coming from two-body residual interaction and quadrupole
deformation are larger than an energy difference between two avoided crossing
orbits. An analytic condition indicating a limitation of the mean-field concept
is derived for the first time
SIRT1 Activity Is Linked to Its Brain Region-Specific Phosphorylation and Is Impaired in Huntington’s Disease Mice
Huntingtons disease (HD) is a neurodegenerative disorder for which there are no disease-modifying treatments. SIRT1 is a NAD+-dependent protein deacetylase that is implicated in maintaining neuronal health during development, differentiation and ageing. Previous studies suggested that the modulation of SIRT1 activity is neuroprotective in HD mouse models, however, the mechanisms controlling SIRT1 activity are unknown. We have identified a striatum-specific phosphorylation-dependent regulatory mechanism of SIRT1 induction under normal physiological conditions, which is impaired in HD. We demonstrate that SIRT1 activity is down-regulated in the brains of two complementary HD mouse models, which correlated with altered SIRT1 phosphorylation levels. This SIRT1 impairment could not be rescued by the ablation of DBC1, a negative regulator of SIRT1, but was linked to changes in the sub-cellular distribution of AMPK-α1, a positive regulator of SIRT1 function. This work provides insights into the regulation of SIRT1 activity with the potential for the development of novel therapeutic strategies
Severity of experimental escherichia-coli mastitis in ketonemic and nonketonemic dairy-cows.
The severity of experimental Escherichia coli mastitis in relation to in vitro chemotaxis of polymorphonuclear leukocytes was investigated in cows during negative energy balance. The negative energy balance was induced by feed restriction. Cows were classified into two groups, ketonemic and nonketonemic, based on the beta-hydroxybutyrate concentration in the peripheral blood at the moment of inoculation. Bacterial growth in the inoculated quarter was used as a parameter to indicate the severity of experimental mastitis. In the nonketonemic cows, experimental mastitis ranged from moderate to severe. Severity of experimental mastitis was negatively related to preinfection chemotactic response of polymorphonuclear leukocytes. In contrast, the course of experimental mastitis in the ketonemic group was relatively severe in all cows, regardless of preinfection chemotactic response
Failure assessment of lightly reinforced floor slabs. I: Experimental investigation
This paper is concerned with the ultimate behavior of lightly reinforced concrete floor slabs under extreme loading conditions. Particular emphasis is given to examining the failure conditions of idealized composite slabs which become lightly reinforced in a fire situation as a result of the early loss of the steel deck. An experimental study is described which focuses on the response of two-way spanning floor slabs with various materials and geometric configurations. The tests enable direct assessment of the influence of a number of key parameters such as the reinforcement type, properties, and ratio on the ultimate response. The results also permit the development of simplified expressions that capture the influence of salient factors such as bond characteristics and reinforcement properties for predicting the ductility of lightly reinforced floor slabs. The companion paper complements the experimental observations with detailed numerical assessments of the ultimate response and proposes analytical models that predict failure of slab members by either reinforcement fracture or compressive crushing of concrete. © 2011 American Society of Civil Engineers
Evolutionary Consequences of Dusty Tori in Active Galactic Nuclei
Deep surveys of {\em Chandra} and {\em HST} (Hubble Space Telescope) show
that active galactic nucleus (AGN) populations are changing with hard X-ray
luminosities. This arises an interesting question whether the dusty torus is
evolving with the central engines. We assemble a sample of 50 radio-quiet PG
quasars to tackle this problem. The covering factors of the dusty tori can be
estimated from the multiwavelength continuum. We find they are strongly
correlated with the hard X-ray luminosity. Interestingly this correlation
agrees with the fraction of type II AGNs discovered by {\em Chandra} and {\em
HST}, implying strong evidence for that the AGN population changing results
from the evolution of the tori. We also find that the frequencies of the dips
around 1m in the continuum correlate with the covering factors in the
present sample, indicating the dip frequencies are adjusted by the covering
factors. In the scenario of fueling black hole from the torus, the covering
factor is a good and the dip frequency is a potential indicator of the torus
evolution.Comment: 4 pages in emulateapj5.sty. Accepted by ApJ Letter
Linking dwarf galaxies to halo building blocks with the most metal-poor star in Sculptor
Current cosmological models indicate that the Milky Way's stellar halo was
assembled from many smaller systems. Based on the apparent absence of the most
metal-poor stars in present-day dwarf galaxies, recent studies claimed that the
true Galactic building blocks must have been vastly different from the
surviving dwarfs. The discovery of an extremely iron-poor star (S1020549) in
the Sculptor dwarf galaxy based on a medium-resolution spectrum cast some doubt
on this conclusion. However, verification of the iron-deficiency and
measurements of additional elements, such as the alpha-element Mg, are
mandatory for demonstrating that the same type of stars produced the metals
found in dwarf galaxies and the Galactic halo. Only then can dwarf galaxy stars
be conclusively linked to early stellar halo assembly. Here we report
high-resolution spectroscopic abundances for 11 elements in S1020549,
confirming the iron abundance of less than 1/4000th that of the Sun, and
showing that the overall abundance pattern mirrors that seen in low-metallicity
halo stars, including the alpha-elements. Such chemical similarity indicates
that the systems destroyed to form the halo billions of years ago were not
fundamentally different from the progenitors of present-day dwarfs, and
suggests that the early chemical enrichment of all galaxies may be nearly
identical.Comment: 16 pages, including 2 figures. Accepted for publication in Nature. It
is embargoed for discussion in the press until formal publication in Natur
Progress Report on Dynamics of Particulate Matter in Fluid Suspensions
This report describes work performed during the period from August 1, 1949 to November, 1950. When the project was started, it was financed for one year with the intention of continuing it for a second year, and the program
was planned accordingly. However, after about
three months of operation, it became necessary
for reasons of economy to reconsider the original
plans, with the result that the funds for the
first year's operation were reduced and plans
for continuing the work beyond the first year
were dropped. In the early summer of 1950,
the U. S. Air Force indicated its interest in
sponsoring the work. In view of this prospect,
the Office of Naval Research (ONR) allotted
funds for an additional three-months' period to
allow time for working out the necessary contractual
arrangements with the Air Force for
continuing the work. These arrangements were
worked out and the studies were continued under
contract with the Office of Air Research, starting
November 1, 1950
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