"More than fruits and vegetables ": Community garden experiences from the Global North to foster green development of informal areas in Sao Paulo, Brazil

Urban gardening contributes to society in various ways such as by enhancing communities, ensuring food security, improving health, providing places for recreation as well as by raising environmental awareness. Although urban gardening initiatives have been spreading, the challenge remains to include vulnerable communities, especially in developing countries, which face manifold infrastructural, environmental and social pressures, thereby helping achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 11 (Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable) and foster urban inclusiveness. The study evaluated the performance of urban community gardens in order to verify their potential for implementation in the slums of Sao Paulo, Brazil. Significant assets and drawbacks were analyzed from existing studies and categorized into social, spatial, economic and environmental factors. Additionally, qualitative interviews on societal and motivational issues were conducted with contributors to a community garden in Dresden, Germany. The results highlight the potential of urban gardening to counteract spatial pressures in informal areas by creating green spaces, improving food quality, raising environmental awareness and, in general, ensuring a higher quality of life. On the other hand, some obstacles remain to be overcome, such as soil pollution, the high probability of further contamination as well as a lack of basic infrastructure. A top-down implementation of urban gardens within slums is considered feasible if the projects are designed in partnership with the community, and a long-term adaptive management model is applied. Under these conditions, urban gardening will make a significant contribution to ‘inclusive urbanism'

Building Sustainable Antiracist Coalition: Developing a Research Team for Studying Diverse Language and Literacy Practices at the University

In the face of so many current challenges, teachers may feel overwhelmed at the thought of engaging in antiracist work, or they may be discouraged by seemingly slow progress. This article presents present a narrative of building and maintaining an antiracist research coalition across departments at our university. By grounding our work in the important work of key black scholars, we describe our process of naming whiteness, inviting collaboration, grappling with definitions, and even identifying a few small victories along the way. Members of our group contribute their voices and perspectives from across the past two years of developing our antiracist research coalition. We hope that as we tell our story, fellow teachers and scholars are encouraged that building a sustainable research group that focuses on a local context is possible, and that even the smallest-seeming progress is forward-motion

Flow-induced glycocalyx formation and cell alignment of HUVECs compared to iPSC-derived ECs for tissue engineering applications

The relevance of cellular in vitro models highly depends on their ability to mimic the physiological environment of the respective tissue or cell niche. Static culture conditions are often unsuitable, especially for endothelial models, since they completely neglect the physiological surface shear stress and corresponding reactions of endothelial cells (ECs) such as alignment in the direction of flow. Furthermore, formation and maturation of the glycocalyx, the essential polysaccharide layer covering all endothelial surfaces and regulating diverse processes, is highly dependent on applied fluid flow. This fragile but utterly important macromolecular layer is hard to analyze, its importance is often underestimated and accordingly neglected in many endothelial models. Therefore, we exposed human umbilical vein ECs (HUVECs) and human induced pluripotent stem cell-derived ECs (iPSC-ECs) as two relevant EC models in a side-by-side comparison to static and physiological dynamic (6.6 dyn cm−2) culture conditions. Both cell types demonstrated an elongation and alignment along the flow direction, some distinct changes in glycocalyx composition on the surface regarding the main glycosaminoglycan components heparan sulfate, chondroitin sulfate or hyaluronic acid as well as an increased and thereby improved glycocalyx thickness and functionality when cultured under homogeneous fluid flow. Thus, we were able to demonstrate the maturity of the employed iPSC-EC model regarding its ability to sense fluid flow along with the general importance of physiological shear stress for glycocalyx formation. Additionally, we investigated EC monolayer integrity with and without application of surface shear stress, revealing a comparable existence of tight junctions for all conditions and a reorganization of the cytoskeleton upon dynamic culture leading to an increased formation of focal adhesions. We then fabricated cell sheets of EC monolayers after static and dynamic culture via non-enzymatic detachment using thermoresponsive polymer coatings as culture substrates. In a first proof-of-concept we were able to transfer an aligned iPSC-EC sheet to a 3D-printed scaffold thereby making a step in the direction of vascular modelling. We envision these results to be a valuable contribution to improvements of in vitro endothelial models and vascular engineering in the future

Symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder among first aid providers

Background Every year, large numbers of individuals are present or provide first aid in situations involving out-of-hospital cardiac arrest, injuries, or suicides. Little is known about the impact of providing first aid or witnessing a first aid situation, but research indicates that many first aid providers (FAP) experience persistent psychological difficulties. Here we aimed to assess the level of psychological impact of being a FAP. Methods In this retrospective study, FAP attending follow-up were asked to complete the International Trauma Questionnaire (ITQ), which is a self-report diagnostic measure of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and complex post-traumatic stress disorder (CPTSD). We recorded endorsement of a symptom or functional impairment (score ≥ 2/4 on at least one of 18 items). Results Of the 102 FAP in this study, 86 (84%) showed endorsement of a symptom or functional impairment. Common symptoms/functional impairments included being super-alert, watchful, or on guard; having powerful mental images; avoiding internal reminders or memories; and being affected in important parts of one’s life. One-third had affected ability to work. Of the FAPs who attended follow-up more than one month after the incident (n = 32), 19% met the criteria for PTSD or CPTSD. Conclusions The majority of FAPs have endorsement of a symptom or functional impairment. Some FAPs fulfil the criteria of PTSD. We suggest that follow-up should be offered by the EMS to all FAPs involved in incidents with an unconscious patient.publishedVersio

Cryogenic Liquid Hydrogen (LH2) system for Refueling an Airplane, and Use for other Mobile or Stationary Applications

Liquid hydrogen (LH2) is used for energy supply for various stationary and mobile applications. Current political and economic developments show the need of storable, decentralized produced, green energy to ensure supply of fuel, heat and power for an adequate price. Hydrogen can be part of the solution for those global problems. Especially LH2 is promising as fuel for mobile applications. It is advantageous because of the high energy density, and therefore is used for space applications since decades. Currently, there are many activities, to transfer the LH2 technology to other applications, e.g. aerospace and trucks

Suitability of the German version of the Manchester Triage System to redirect emergency department patients to general practitioner care: a prospective cohort study

Objectives: To investigate the suitability of the German version of the Manchester Triage System (MTS) as a potential tool to redirect emergency department (ED) patients to general practitioner care. Such tools are currently being discussed in the context of reorganisation of emergency care in Germany. Design: Prospective cohort study. Setting: Single centre University Hospital Emergency Department. Participants: Adult, non-surgical ED patients. Exposure: A non-urgent triage category was defined as a green or blue triage category according to the German version of the MTS. Primary and secondary outcome measures: Surrogate parameters for short-term risk (admission rate, diagnoses, length of hospital stay, admission to the intensive care unit, in-hospital and 30-day mortality) and long-term risk (1-year mortality). Results: A total of 1122 people presenting to the ED participated in the study. Of these, 31.9% (n= 358) received a non-urgent triage category and 68.1% (n= 764) were urgent. Compared with non-urgent ED presentations, those with an urgent triage category were older (median age 60 vs 56 years, p= 0.001), were more likely to require hospital admission (47.8% vs 29.6%) and had higher inhospital mortality (1.6% vs 0.8%). There was no significant difference observed between non-urgent and urgent triage categories for 30-day mortality (1.2% [n= 4] vs 2.2% [n= 15]; p= 0.285) or for 1-year mortality (7.9% [n= 26] vs 10.5% [n= 72]; p= 0.190). Urgency was not a significant predictor of 1-year mortality in univariate (HR= 1.35; 95% CI 0.87 to 2.12; p= 0.185) and multivariate regression analyses (HR= 1.20; 95% CI 0.77 to 1.89; p= 0.420). Conclusions: The results of this study suggest the German MTS is unsuitable to safely identify patients for redirection to non-ED based GP care

Trafficked Proteins—Druggable in Plasmodium falciparum

Malaria is an infectious disease that results in serious health problems in the countries in which it is endemic. Annually this parasitic disease leads to more than half a million deaths; most of these are children in Africa. An effective vaccine is not available, and the treatment of the disease is solely dependent on chemotherapy. However, drug resistance is spreading, and the identification of new drug targets as well as the development of new antimalarials is urgently required. Attention has been drawn to a variety of essential plasmodial proteins, which are targeted to intra- or extracellular destinations, such as the digestive vacuole, the apicoplast, or into the host cell. Interfering with the action or the transport of these proteins will impede proliferation of the parasite. In this mini review, we will shed light on the present discovery of chemotherapeutics and potential drug targets involved in protein trafficking processes in the malaria parasite