Changing Occupational Roles in Audit Society—The Case of Swedish Student Aid Officials

This article is about occupational change concerning a non-professional group of Street Level Bureaucrats—student aid officials at the Swedish Board for Study Support (SBSS). The aim is to describe and analyze changes in their occupational role—their discretional space and working conditions under the impact of changed ways to manage public service organizations and new information and communication technology. The SBSS is the sole administrator of student financial aid in Sweden. Its officials investigate and take decisions about students’ applications and repayment of loans. This work includes interacting with clients via telephone and computer. These officials have to have a certain amount of discretion to interpret and apply rules and regulations on specific circumstances in individual cases. How are their working conditions affected by organizational and policy changes in the authority? How is their ability to exercise influence and control over their own work performance affected? The analysis highlights how officials suffer from decreased discretion and an increasing routinization in their work. This is a result of a regulatory framework continuously growing in detail together with increasing management control based on new information and communication technology. What remains of discretion is a kind of ‘task’ discretion, the ability to do minor technical manipulations of rules in individual cases. Even today’s top management seems critical of this development. Besides further automatization and reduction of staff an ongoing process of organizational change is therefore also aiming to develop officials’ competence and working conditions toward what may be seen as organizational professionalism, a development of specific occupational skills and a discretion adjusted and subordinated to managerial means and ends. The analysis rests on data from a research project (2011 to 2014) about Institutional Talk. Data sources are qualitative interviews, audio-taped speech sequences, observational field notes, and official documents

Viral meningitis epidemics and a single, recent, recombinant and anthroponotic origin of swine vesicular disease virus

Background and objectives: Swine vesicular disease virus (SVDV) is a close relative of the human Enterovirus B serotype, coxsackievirus B5. As the etiological agent of a significant emergent veterinary disease, several studies have attempted to explain its origin. However, several key questions remain, including the full biological ancestry of the virus, and its geographical and temporal origin. Methodology: We sequenced near-complete genomes of 27 SVDV and 13 coxsackievirus B5 samples, all originally isolated between 1966 and 2006, and analysed these in conjunction with existing sequences and historical information. Results: While analyses incorporating 24 additional near-complete SVDV genomic sequences indicate clear signs of within-SVDV recombination, all 51 SVDV isolates remain monophyletic. This supports a hypothesis of a single anthroponotic transfer origin. Analysis of individual coding and non-coding regions supports that SVDV has a recombinant origin between coxsackievirus B5 and another Enterovirus B serotype, most likely coxsackievirus A9. Extensive Bayesian sequence-based analysis of the time of the most recent common ancestor of all analysed sequences places this within a few years around 1961. Epidemiological evidence points to China as an origin, but there are no available samples to test this conclusively. Conclusions and implications: Historical investigation and the clinical aspects of the involved Enterovirus B serotypes, makes the current results consistent with a hypothesis stating that SVDV originated through co-infection, recombination, and a single anthroponotic event, during large viral meningitis epidemics around 1960/1961 involving the ancestral serotypes. The exact geographical origin of SVDV may remain untestable due to historical aspects

Genetic diversity among pandemic 2009 influenza viruses isolated from a transmission chain

BACKGROUND: Influenza viruses such as swine-origin influenza A(H1N1) virus (A(H1N1)pdm09) generate genetic diversity due to the high error rate of their RNA polymerase, often resulting in mixed genotype populations (intra-host variants) within a single infection. This variation helps influenza to rapidly respond to selection pressures, such as those imposed by the immunological host response and antiviral therapy. We have applied deep sequencing to characterize influenza intra-host variation in a transmission chain consisting of three cases due to oseltamivir-sensitive viruses, and one derived oseltamivir-resistant case. METHODS: Following detection of the A(H1N1)pdm09 infections, we deep-sequenced the complete NA gene from two of the oseltamivir-sensitive virus-infected cases, and all eight gene segments of the viruses causing the remaining two cases. RESULTS: No evidence for the resistance-causing mutation (resulting in NA H275Y substitution) was observed in the oseltamivir-sensitive cases. Furthermore, deep sequencing revealed a subpopulation of oseltamivir-sensitive viruses in the case carrying resistant viruses. We detected higher levels of intra-host variation in the case carrying oseltamivir-resistant viruses than in those infected with oseltamivir-sensitive viruses. CONCLUSIONS: Oseltamivir-resistance was only detected after prophylaxis with oseltamivir, suggesting that the mutation was selected for as a result of antiviral intervention. The persisting oseltamivir-sensitive virus population in the case carrying resistant viruses suggests either that a small proportion survive the treatment, or that the oseltamivir-sensitive virus rapidly re-establishes itself in the virus population after the bottleneck. Moreover, the increased intra-host variation in the oseltamivir-resistant case is consistent with the hypothesis that the population diversity of a RNA virus can increase rapidly following a population bottleneck

Violation of Bell inequality by photon scattering on a two-level emitter

Entanglement, the non-local correlations present in multipartite quantum systems, is a curious feature of quantum mechanics and the fuel of quantum technology. It is therefore a major priority to develop energy-conserving and simple methods for generating high-fidelity entangled states. In the case of light, entanglement can be realized by interactions with matter, although the required nonlinear interaction is typically weak, thereby limiting its applicability. Here, we show how a single two-level emitter deterministically coupled to light in a nanophotonic waveguide is used to realize genuine photonic quantum entanglement for excitation at the single photon level. By virtue of the efficient optical coupling, two-photon interactions are strongly mediated by the emitter realizing a giant nonlinearity that leads to entanglement. We experimentally generate and verify energy-time entanglement by violating a Bell inequality (Clauder-Horne-Shimony-Holt Bell parameter of $S=2.67(16)>2$) in an interferometric measurement of the two-photon scattering response. As an attractive feature of this approach, the two-level emitter acts as a passive scatterer initially prepared in the ground state, i.e., no advanced spin control is required. This experiment is a fundamental advancement that may pave a new route for ultra-low energy-consuming synthesis of photonic entangled states for quantum simulators or metrology.Comment: the manuscript of 6 pages with 3 figures and a Supplementary Material file of 12 pages with 7 figure

Natural products in modern life science

With a realistic threat against biodiversity in rain forests and in the sea, a sustainable use of natural products is becoming more and more important. Basic research directed against different organisms in Nature could reveal unexpected insights into fundamental biological mechanisms but also new pharmaceutical or biotechnological possibilities of more immediate use. Many different strategies have been used prospecting the biodiversity of Earth in the search for novel structure–activity relationships, which has resulted in important discoveries in drug development. However, we believe that the development of multidisciplinary incentives will be necessary for a future successful exploration of Nature. With this aim, one way would be a modernization and renewal of a venerable proven interdisciplinary science, Pharmacognosy, which represents an integrated way of studying biological systems. This has been demonstrated based on an explanatory model where the different parts of the model are explained by our ongoing research. Anti-inflammatory natural products have been discovered based on ethnopharmacological observations, marine sponges in cold water have resulted in substances with ecological impact, combinatory strategy of ecology and chemistry has revealed new insights into the biodiversity of fungi, in depth studies of cyclic peptides (cyclotides) has created new possibilities for engineering of bioactive peptides, development of new strategies using phylogeny and chemography has resulted in new possibilities for navigating chemical and biological space, and using bioinformatic tools for understanding of lateral gene transfer could provide potential drug targets. A multidisciplinary subject like Pharmacognosy, one of several scientific disciplines bridging biology and chemistry with medicine, has a strategic position for studies of complex scientific questions based on observations in Nature. Furthermore, natural product research based on intriguing scientific questions in Nature can be of value to increase the attraction for young students in modern life science