Medical Fees at Inquests.

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Exploratory topic modeling with distributional semantics

As we continue to collect and store textual data in a multitude of domains, we are regularly confronted with material whose largely unknown thematic structure we want to uncover. With unsupervised, exploratory analysis, no prior knowledge about the content is required and highly open-ended tasks can be supported. In the past few years, probabilistic topic modeling has emerged as a popular approach to this problem. Nevertheless, the representation of the latent topics as aggregations of semi-coherent terms limits their interpretability and level of detail. This paper presents an alternative approach to topic modeling that maps topics as a network for exploration, based on distributional semantics using learned word vectors. From the granular level of terms and their semantic similarity relations global topic structures emerge as clustered regions and gradients of concepts. Moreover, the paper discusses the visual interactive representation of the topic map, which plays an important role in supporting its exploration.Comment: Conference: The Fourteenth International Symposium on Intelligent Data Analysis (IDA 2015

The role of NMR spectroscopy in mapping the conformational landscape of GPCRs.

Over recent years, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy has developed into a powerful mechanistic tool for the investigation of G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs). NMR provides insights which underpin the dynamic nature of these important receptors and reveals experimental evidence for a complex conformational energy landscape that is explored during receptor activation resulting in signalling. NMR studies have highlighted both the dynamic properties of different receptor states as well as the exchange pathways and intermediates formed during activation, extending the static view of GPCRs obtained from other techniques. NMR studies can be undertaken in realistic membrane-like phospholipid environments and an ever-increasing choice of labelling strategies provides comprehensive, receptor-wide information. Combined with other structural methods, NMR is contributing to our understanding of allosteric signal propagation and the interaction of GPCRs with intracellular binding partners (IBP), crucial to explaining cellular signalling.BBSRC BB/K01983 X/

The Micro-political nature of implementing, supporting and coping with organisational change in a professional football club academy

Aim: To investigate the experiences of individuals employed within the academy of a professional football club during a period of organisational change. Key Research Questions: RQ1: How does organisational change impact individual’s day-to-day working practices? RQ2: How do individuals make sense of their actions and behaviours and the actions and behaviours of others during organisational change, and why? RQ3: What impact does organisational change have on the professional working relationships between individuals? Theoretical Background & Literature Review: Investigations into organisational change in sport have only recently received scholarly attention (Welty Peachey & Bruening, 2012). Indeed, professional football, in particular, is dependent on consistent success, with the environment in which employees have to practice characterised by significant change (Wagstaff, Gilmore & Thelwell, 2016). Consequently, investigations into understanding organisational change within professional football appear warranted. From a theoretical perspective, micro-politics has been advocated as a useful framework to understand organisational life within a variety of domains (Gibson & Groom, 2018). Furthermore, previous research (i.e. Munyon et al., 2015) has portrayed the political nature of organisational life and the political skill required by employees to effectively work within and survive in such environments. However, investigations into the micro-political nature of implementing, managing and coping with organisational change in professional football is lacking (Gibson & Groom, 2018). Methodology: Gibson and Groom (2018) have called for in-depth, contextually sensitive methodological approaches to understand organisational change. Such methodological approaches may provide a comparative, relational understanding of interactions within the football environment. In light of the above, an interpretivist approach was adopted to allow for a platform to explore and understand how individuals interpret and make sense of the interrelated, micro-political nature of organisational change in the academy of a professional football club. Data Collection: Following institutional ethical approval, data were collected at the case study site (Alder Football Club) using semi-structured interviews (n=16) with a recently employed Head of Professional Development Phase, a recently promoted Academy Manager, a Head of Foundation Phase, and an Academy Coach, ranging from 60-90 minutes each in length. In addition, ethnographic observational data were collected over three seasons by the primary researcher who was employed as the Under 16’s Academy Coach at Alder Football Club. Ethnographic observational data consisted of field notes, informal and formal meetings, in-house coach development sessions, player assessment evenings, academy training sessions and academy fixtures. Data Analysis: All interview and ethnographic data were subject to a process of thematic analysis using QSR NVIVO 11. A micro-political theoretical framework was used to guide the analysis of all data sets through an iterative process. Specifically, notions of vulnerability, professional self-interests, micro-political literacy (Kelchtermans, 1996, 2005) and social group identity were included in the framework. Findings: Findings highlighted the micro-political nature of changes being made to the image, branding and identity of Alder FC following the appointment of a new Chairman, Board of Directors and 1st Team Manager. Specifically, the creation of a new vision and strategy for Alder FC, aimed at portraying the club’s commitment to developing young players through the academy, evidenced the vulnerable nature of implementing and coping with the changes being made and the micro-political nature of successfully responding to the changes being made. Specifically, issues around increased scrutiny from senior colleagues, both increased and decreased feelings of vulnerability (dependent on the individual’s place within the organisational structure), staff turnover, moral conflict, the construction and destruction of professional working relationships, and the creation of a social group identity designed to support the successful implementation of change became pertinent during the change process at Alder FC. Conclusion: This study is the first to provide novel empirical and theoretical insights into the role that micro-political literacy, micro-political action and employment vulnerability play during periods of organisational change. In considering the applied nature of the findings; individuals tasked with implementing organisational change should consider the role that ‘identity’ plays from an organisational (identity of the football club) and a group (identity of the department i.e. 1st team or academy) perspective. From a departmental perspective, the construction of a social group identity can enhance collaboration, inform decision-making and decrease the potential for conflict amongst employees. However, it must be noted that individual identities of employees must also be congruent with the social group identity of the department. Such findings may be utilised to inform the education and development of practitioners tasked with both implementing and supporting organisational change in professional football

Nerve excitability changes in critical illness polyneuropathy

Patients in intensive care units frequently suffer muscle weakness and atrophy due to critical illness polyneuropathy (CIP), an axonal neuropathy associated with systemic inflammatory response syndrome and multiple organ failure. CIP is a frequent and serious complication of intensive care that delays weaning from mechanical ventilation and increases mortality. The pathogenesis of CIP is not well understood and no specific therapy is available. The aim of this project was to use nerve excitability testing to investigate the changes in axonal membrane properties occurring in CIP. Ten patients (aged 37-76 years; 7 males, 3 females) were studied with electrophysiologically proven CIP. The median nerve was stimulated at the wrist and compound action potentials were recorded from abductor pollicis brevis muscle. Strength-duration time constant, threshold electrotonus, current-threshold relationship and recovery cycle (refractoriness, superexcitability and late subexcitability) were recorded using a recently described protocol. In eight patients a follow-up investigation was performed. All patients underwent clinical examination and laboratory investigations. Compared with age-matched normal controls (20 subjects; aged 38-79 years; 7 males, 13 females), CIP patients exhibited reduced superexcitability at 7 ms, from −22.3 ± 1.6% to −7.6 ± 3.1% (mean ± SE, P ≈ 0.0001) and increased accommodation to depolarizing (P < 0.01) and hyperpolarizing currents (P < 0.01), indicating membrane depolarization. Superexcitability was reduced both in patients with renal failure and without renal failure. In the former, superexcitability correlated with serum potassium (R = 0.88), and late subexcitability was also reduced (as also occurs owing to hyperkalaemia in patients with chronic renal failure). In patients without renal failure, late subexcitability was normal, and the signs of membrane depolarization correlated with raised serum bicarbonate and base excess, indicating compensated respiratory acidosis. It is inferred that motor axons in these CIP patients are depolarized, in part because of raised extracellular potassium, and in part because of hypoperfusion. The chronic membrane depolarization may contribute to the development of neuropath

Peacock Bundles: Bundle Coloring for Graphs with Globality-Locality Trade-off

Bundling of graph edges (node-to-node connections) is a common technique to enhance visibility of overall trends in the edge structure of a large graph layout, and a large variety of bundling algorithms have been proposed. However, with strong bundling, it becomes hard to identify origins and destinations of individual edges. We propose a solution: we optimize edge coloring to differentiate bundled edges. We quantify strength of bundling in a flexible pairwise fashion between edges, and among bundled edges, we quantify how dissimilar their colors should be by dissimilarity of their origins and destinations. We solve the resulting nonlinear optimization, which is also interpretable as a novel dimensionality reduction task. In large graphs the necessary compromise is whether to differentiate colors sharply between locally occurring strongly bundled edges ("local bundles"), or also between the weakly bundled edges occurring globally over the graph ("global bundles"); we allow a user-set global-local tradeoff. We call the technique "peacock bundles". Experiments show the coloring clearly enhances comprehensibility of graph layouts with edge bundling.Comment: Appears in the Proceedings of the 24th International Symposium on Graph Drawing and Network Visualization (GD 2016

Coccolithophore biodiversity controls carbonate export in the Southern Ocean

Southern Ocean waters are projected to undergo profound changes in their physical and chemical properties in the coming decades. Coccolithophore blooms in the Southern Ocean are thought to account for a major fraction of the global marine calcium carbonate (CaCO3) production and export to the deep sea. Therefore, changes in the composition and abundance of Southern Ocean coccolithophore populations are likely to alter the marine carbon cycle, with feedbacks to the rate of global climate change. However, the contribution of coccolithophores to CaCO3 export in the Southern Ocean is uncertain, particularly in the circumpolar subantarctic zone that represents about half of the areal extent of the Southern Ocean and where coccolithophores are most abundant. Here, we present measurements of annual CaCO3 flux and quantitatively partition them amongst coccolithophore species and heterotrophic calcifiers at two sites representative of a large portion of the subantarctic zone. We find that coccolithophores account for a major fraction of the annual CaCO3 export, with the highest contributions in waters with low algal biomass accumulations. Notably, our analysis reveals that although Emiliania huxleyi is an important vector for CaCO3 export to the deep sea, less abundant but larger species account for most of the annual coccolithophore CaCO3 flux. This observation contrasts with the generally accepted notion that high particulate inorganic carbon accumulations during the austral summer in the subantarctic Southern Ocean are mainly caused by E. huxleyi blooms. It appears likely that the climate-induced migration of oceanic fronts will initially result in the poleward expansion of large coccolithophore species increasing CaCO3 production. However, subantarctic coccolithophore populations will eventually diminish as acidification overwhelms those changes. Overall, our analysis emphasizes the need for species-centred studies to improve our ability to project future changes in phytoplankton communities and their influence on marine biogeochemical cycles.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Recruitment and retention of participants in UK surgical trials : survey of key issues reported by trial staff

Source of Funding This research was supported by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Oxford Biomedical Research Centre (BRC) (NIHR-BRC-1215-20008) and by the Medical Research Council (MRC) Network of Hubs for Trials Methodology Research (MR/L004933/1-N66), as part of the wider PIRRIST project. The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the NHS, the NIHR or the Department of Health. The Health Services Research Unit, University of Aberdeen, receives core funding from the Chief Scientist Office of the Scottish Government Health Directorates. The funders had no input into the study design, data collection, analysis, interpretation or manuscript writing. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS We are grateful to all survey respondents and to PIRRIST study collaborators and advisers who helped to promote survey. We thank Caroline Jordan and Liz Woolliams for providing administrative support; Rebecca Harmston for providing valuable advice from a patient perspective; Murat Akkulak at the Royal College of Surgeons for providing the RCS portfolio of surgical trials; Amadea Turk for helping to identify potential participants; and colleagues who kindly piloted and helped to improve the survey including Kerry Avery, Karen Barnett, Helen Bulbeck, Marloes Franssen, Nicola Higgins, Jennifer Hirst, Lynne Maddocks, Peter McCulloch, James Shepperd, Jean Simmonds and Sharon Tonner. Anonymised survey data can be made available on request. Please contact the corresponding author. This study was not preregistered. The authors declare no potential competing interests.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Insight into partial agonism by observing multiple equilibria for ligand-bound and Gs-mimetic nanobody-bound β1-adrenergic receptor.

A complex conformational energy landscape determines G-protein-coupled receptor (GPCR) signalling via intracellular binding partners (IBPs), e.g., Gs and β-arrestin. Using 13C methyl methionine NMR for the β1-adrenergic receptor, we identify ligand efficacy-dependent equilibria between an inactive and pre-active state and, in complex with Gs-mimetic nanobody, between more and less active ternary complexes. Formation of a basal activity complex through ligand-free nanobody-receptor interaction reveals structural differences on the cytoplasmic receptor side compared to the full agonist-bound nanobody-coupled form, suggesting that ligand-induced variations in G-protein interaction underpin partial agonism. Significant differences in receptor dynamics are observed ranging from rigid nanobody-coupled states to extensive μs-to-ms timescale dynamics when bound to a full agonist. We suggest that the mobility of the full agonist-bound form primes the GPCR to couple to IBPs. On formation of the ternary complex, ligand efficacy determines the quality of the interaction between the rigidified receptor and an IBP and consequently the signalling level