Theoretical development and social capital measurement

Chapter 4, by Sarah Hean and colleagues, highlights the importance of theory development in making the concept useful to the practice of public health. The authors present an innovative way of thinking about the different facets of social capital, describe the development of a survey instrument that attempts to make explicit the inputs and outputs of social capital and describe how these can be operationalised in a practice setting. The survey tool takes account of the dynamic nature of social capital and offers a useful way of evaluating community projects

A review of energy law education in the UK

This article focuses on reviewing energy law education in the UK. For such a fast-growing discipline it is important to reflect on the features that give cohesiveness to its curriculum development: how it is taught; who is teaching it and where it is being taught; and what content is given to the curriculum offered? Is it, for example, national in focus or international, or both? A recent review on the state of energy law education in the US demonstrates the scale and ambition of energy law education in that country. This article complements that exercise by providing a review of energy law education in the UK as at 2016. By comparing and contrasting the two approaches, we can glean some distinctive features of the UK approach. More research is needed on energy law education but from this article it is clear that energy law has taken a foothold in legal education in the UK

A framework for socio-technical innovation: the case of a human-powered shredder

Abstract: Please refer to full text to view abstrac

LOW BACK PAIN IN ADOLESCENT FEMALE ROWERS AND THE ASSOCIATED FACTORS

There were two aims of the current study; firstly, to determine the incidence of low back pain in adolescent female rowers and secondly, to determine the differences between LBP and no-LBP groups for a range of physical tests and psycho-social variables. The point prevalence of LBP was 47.5% for rowers and 15.5% for controls indicating that LBP is common in this group of rowers. When no-LBP and LBP groups were compared for the data collected in this study, LBP subjects showed significantly decreased lower limb endurance and back muscle endurance and sitting with more erect postures. Although this study cannot determine causation, it has the potential to direct interventions to decrease the incidence of LBP in this group

Adeno-Associated Virus (AAV)-Mediated Gene Therapy for Disorders of Inherited and Non-Inherited Origin

Gene therapy is a novel promising approach for treating a spectrum of inherited and non-inherited disorders by delivering therapeutic genes to specific organs or tissues. Of the viral vectors that have been used to date to deliver the genes of interest, the adeno-associated viral (AAV) vector appears to be the most safe and effective vehicle and has the ability to maintain long-term gene and protein expression following a single injection of the vector. Gene therapy studies using AAV vector have shown significant progress not only in animal models but also in human gene therapy with no known pathogenicity. While success has been achieved in gene therapy using AAV vector to deliver the target genes for inherited disorders, however, clinical trials are yet to begin to see whether gene therapy has promise for treatment of non-inherited diseases. This chapter describes AAV biology, viral structure, and cell entry mechanisms, with special emphasis on AAV tissue tropism achieved by manipulating different serotypes and capsid engineering. This chapter also discusses successful application of the AAV vector for non-inherited disorders in animal models with particular reference to liver fibrosis, outlining advantages, disadvantages, and future challenges that this therapy may face

GENDER DIFFERENCES IN MOTOR CONTROL OF THE TRUNK DURING PROLONGED ERGOMETER ROWING

The aim of the study was to compare the temporal kinematics of a stroke, spino-pelvic kinematics, trunk and quadriceps muscle activation in prolonged ergometer rowing between males and female rowers. Twelve adolescent rowers performed a 20 minute rowing ergometer trial at a high self perceived rate of exertion. Spino-pelvic kinematics, muscle activity and temporal kinematics data were compared in the 1st, 10th and 20th minute. The results from this study indicate there is a difference in temporal kinematics of a rowing stroke between adolescent males and females. Furthermore, males row with a more flexed thoracic spine and a posteriorly rotated sacrum compared to females at the catch and the finish positions

Briefing: UK Ministry of Defence Force Protection Engineering Programme

The Defence Science and Technology Laboratory sponsored, QinetiQ-led Force Protection Engineering Research Programme has two main strands, applied and underpinning research. The underpinning strand is led by Blastech Ltd. One focus of this research is into the response of geomaterials to threat loading. The programme on locally won fill is split into four main characterisation strands: high-stress (GPa) static pressure–volume; medium-rate pressure–volume (split Hopkinson bar); high-rate (flyer plate) pressure–volume; and unifying modelling research at the University of Sheffield, which has focused on developing a high-quality dataset for locally won fill in low and medium strain rates. With the test apparatus at Sheffield well-controlled tests can be conducted at both high strain rate and pseudo-static rates up to stress levels of 1 GPa. The University of Cambridge has focused on using one-dimensional shock experiments to examine high-rate pressure–volume relationships. Both establishments are examining the effect of moisture content and starting density on emergent rate effects. Blastech Ltd has been undertaking carefully controlled fragment impact experiments, within the dataspace developed by the Universities of Sheffield and Cambridge. The data from experiments are unified by the QinetiQ-led modelling team, to predict material behaviour and to derive a scalable locally won fill model for use in any situation

Lightning occurrence in Pukaskwa National Park and surrounding area

Pukaskwa National Park has implemented a natural fire regime emulation program. One component of the natural fire regime is the pattern of ignitions, primarily from lightning. There were three ways in which patterns of lightning strikes were investigated: a geographical analysis, a fire weather analysis, and an ignition analysis. The analysis for the first two components was carried out using a kernel analysis, which is a non-parametric probability density estimation technique. In the geographic analysis, probability of lightning strikes was tabulated by characteristics of the landscape- vegetation, topography, ecodistrict, and proximity to Lake Superior. It was shown that there was a strong effect of the proximity to Lake Superior- areas near the lake have a higher probability of lightning strikes than areas inland. The topographic component showed that high points on the landscape were more likely to get struck than the rest of the landscape. Other effects were masked by the effect of proximity to Lake Superior. In the fire weather analysis, probability density surfaces were prepared from the daily weather and from the weather on the day of lightning strikes. Strikes are most frequent at values of the Fine Fuel Moisture Code (FFMC) and Duff Moisture Code (DMC) that are notconducive to the ignition and survival of fire. The exception to this was a storm in June, 1995 which happened at a high value of FFMC and DMC. This storm presumably lit Fire Wawa 41/95. The ignition analysis was carried out as an anecdotal discussion of conditions at the time of ignition of the two fires that were ignited in the three years under study (1994-1996). The conditions surrounding these two ignitions, both in June of 1995, were consistent with other descriptions of fire weather in the Pukaskwa area. Warm and dry weather with a high barometric pressure preceded a lightning storm. The geographic analysis suggested that there might be relatively little reason to modify fire policy based on lightning density within the park. The weather analysis suggested that it is rare to have the right combination of events that might ignite fires- dry fuel and lightning

The M-C-M' cycle and social capital.

Social capital has become a popular term over the past two decades amongst researchers, policy makers and practitioners from varied disciplines. This popularity, however, has resulted in a great deal of confusion over the nature and application of social capital in different contexts. This confusion has made it difficult to identify and measure social capital within the evaluation of specific social and health programmes, one of the aims of which may be to stimulate social capital. This paper identifies a theoretical model that seeks to capture the dynamic nature of social capital to assist in the development of research methods that will facilitate its measurement and exploration within such programmes. The model reported in the paper identifies the key components of social capital and expresses the relationship between those components in a dynamic system based on Marx's description of the process of capital (economic) exchanges expressed in the M-C-M' cycle. The M-C-M' cycle is the transformation of money (M) into commodities (C), and the change of commodities back again into money (M') of altered value. The emphasis within the paper is on the capital element of the concept and its transactional nature with the aim of avoiding the pitfall of attributing social capital in relation to social behaviours in isolation of context and interaction. Importantly, the paper seeks to distinguish the central elements of social capital from some of the antecedent factors and outcomes often attributed to and confused with social capital adding to the problem of providing valid measurement. The model is presented as the basis for the measurement of social capital within a transactional process involving the investment of social resources in a cyclical process, which may result in net gains or losses. This process is described as the R-C-R' cycle following Marx's model of economic capital, with the focus being on the transfer of social resources (R) rather than money (M). R represents an internal resource held by individuals, C the external resource or commodity they obtain from the network and the R' the internal resource of altered value. The possibilities of the model in assisting in the measurement of social capital specifically in assessing formal networks are explored