Participatory politics, environmental journalism and newspaper campaigns

This is an Author's Accepted Manuscript of an article published in Journalism Studies, 13(2), 210 - 225, 2012, copyright Taylor & Francis, available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/1461670X.2011.646398.This article explores the extent to which approaches to participatory politics might offer a more useful alternative to understanding the role of environmental journalism in a society where the old certainties have collapsed, only to be replaced by acute uncertainty. This uncertainty not only generates acute public anxiety about risks, it has also undermined confidence in the validity of long-standing premises about the ideal role of the media in society and journalistic professionalism. The consequence, this article argues, is that aspirations of objective reportage are outdated and ill-equipped to deal with many of the new risk stories environmental journalism covers. It is not a redrawing of boundaries that is needed but a wholesale relocation of our frameworks into approaches better suited to the socio-political conditions and uncertainties of late modernity. The exploration of participatory approaches is an attempt to suggest one way this might be done

Does a standardised dinner meal consumed the evening prior to testing add methodological integrity to an acute meal test study design?

Abstract of an oral paper that was presented at the Dietitians Association of Australia 31st National Conference. Incorporating: 2nd World Forum on Nutrition Research - Translating the Principles of the Mediterranean Diet, 15-17 May 2014, Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Centre, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

Amplicon deep sequencing improves Plasmodium falciparum genotyping in clinical trials of antimalarial drugs

Clinical trials monitoring malaria drug resistance require genotyping of recurrent Plasmodium falciparum parasites to distinguish between treatment failure and new infection occurring during the trial follow up period. Because trial participants usually harbour multi-clonal P. falciparum infections, deep amplicon sequencing (AmpSeq) was employed to improve sensitivity and reliability of minority clone detection. Paired samples from 32 drug trial participants were Illumina deep-sequenced for five molecular markers. Reads were analysed by custom-made software HaplotypR and trial outcomes compared to results from the previous standard genotyping method based on length-polymorphic markers. Diversity of AmpSeq markers in pre-treatment samples was comparable or higher than length-polymorphic markers. AmpSeq was highly reproducible with consistent quantification of co-infecting parasite clones within a host. Outcomes of the three best-performing markers, cpmp, cpp and ama1-D3, agreed in 26/32 (81%) of patients. Discordance between the three markers performed per sample was much lower by AmpSeq (six patients) compared to length-polymorphic markers (eleven patients). Using AmpSeq for discrimination of recrudescence and new infection in antimalarial drug trials provides highly reproducible and robust characterization of clone dynamics during trial follow-up. AmpSeq overcomes limitations inherent to length-polymorphic markers. Regulatory clinical trials of antimalarial drugs will greatly benefit from this unbiased typing method

Cannabis und beginnende Psychose

Cannabis ist neben Nikotin und Alkohol eine der am häufigsten psychotropen Substanzen weltweit. Welche Auswirkungen hat regelmässiger Cannabis-Konsum auf die Wahrscheinlichkeit an einer Psychose zu erkranken? Wie wirkt er sich aus bei Personen mit einer Prädisposition oder bei bereits Erkrankten

A "superstorm": When moral panic and new risk discourses converge in the media

This is an Author's Accepted Manuscript of an article published in Health, Risk and Society, 15(6), 681-698, 2013, copyright Taylor & Francis, available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/13698575.2013.851180.There has been a proliferation of risk discourses in recent decades but studies of these have been polarised, drawing either on moral panic or new risk frameworks to analyse journalistic discourses. This article opens the theoretical possibility that the two may co-exist and converge in the same scare. I do this by bringing together more recent developments in moral panic thesis, with new risk theory and the concept of media logic. I then apply this theoretical approach to an empirical analysis of how and with what consequences moral panic and new risk type discourses converged in the editorials of four newspaper campaigns against GM food policy in Britain in the late 1990s. The article analyses 112 editorials published between January 1998 and December 2000, supplemented with news stories where these were needed for contextual clarity. This analysis shows that not only did this novel food generate intense media and public reactions; these developed in the absence of the type of concrete details journalists usually look for in risk stories. Media logic is important in understanding how journalists were able to engage and hence how a major scare could be constructed around convergent moral panic and new risk type discourses. The result was a media ‘superstorm’ of sustained coverage in which both types of discourse converged in highly emotive mutually reinforcing ways that resonated in a highly sensitised context. The consequence was acute anxiety, social volatility and the potential for the disruption of policy and social change

Effect of subclinical and overt form of rat maternal hypothyroidism on offspring endochondral bone formation

Maternal hypothyroidism in its overt form affects skeletal development of the offspring, but these data are not available for the subclinical form which is becoming very frequent among pregnant women. We hypothesized that the subclinical form of hypothyroidism in rat dams, influences the process of offspring endochondral ossification affecting proliferation and differentiation of chondrocytes, osteoclasts and osteoblasts in pups. Seven-day-old male pups (n=18) derived from control dams and dams treated with a low dose (1.5 mg/L) or high dose (150 mg/L) of propylthiouracil in drinking water during pregnancy and lactation were used. Histomorphometric analysis of pups tibia proximal growth plate, expression of mRNA, immunohistochemical and histochemical visualization of extracellular matrix components was performed. The length of the tibia was reduced in hypothyroid pups. Secretion of type 2 and 10 collagens in the subclinical and overt form were lower while the amount of glycosaminoglycans was higher when compared with controls. Down-regulated tartrate resistant acid phosphatase mRNA indicated altered osteoclasts function while lower expression of dentin matrix acid protein-1 mRNA and reduced synthesis of type 1 collagen accentuated a compromised bone formation in the overt form of hypothyroidism. The subclinical form of maternal hypothyroidism had a negative effect on the differentiation of hypertrophic chondrocytes and calcified cartilage removal in 7-day-old pups. In addition, overt hypothyroidism had a negative effect on the proliferation of chondrocytes and deposition of osteoid. Both forms of hypothyroidism resulted in a decrease of tibia length due to changes in growth plate formation

Molecular Mechanisms of Taste Recognition: Considerations about the Role of Saliva

The gustatory system plays a critical role in determining food preferences and food intake, in addition to nutritive, energy and electrolyte balance. Fine tuning of the gustatory system is also crucial in this respect. The exact mechanisms that fine tune taste sensitivity are as of yet poorly defined, but it is clear that various effects of saliva on taste recognition are also involved. Specifically those metabolic polypeptides present in the saliva that were classically considered to be gut and appetite hormones (i.e., leptin, ghrelin, insulin, neuropeptide Y, peptide YY) were considered to play a pivotal role. Besides these, data clearly indicate the major role of several other salivary proteins, such as salivary carbonic anhydrase (gustin), proline-rich proteins, cystatins, alpha-amylases, histatins, salivary albumin and mucins. Other proteins like glucagon-like peptide-1, salivary immunoglobulin-A, zinc-α-2-glycoprotein, salivary lactoperoxidase, salivary prolactin-inducible protein and salivary molecular chaperone HSP70/HSPAs were also expected to play an important role. Furthermore, factors including salivary flow rate, buffer capacity and ionic composition of saliva should also be considered. In this paper, the current state of research related to the above and the overall emerging field of taste-related salivary research alongside basic principles of taste perception is reviewed