The works metallurgist: An evaluation of a CAL package on phase diagrams

The Works Metallurgist is used in the Open University course: Materials — Engineering and Science. It is being evaluated as part of a larger study of CAL teaching in Science and Technology at the Open University. With 540 students, the course provides a sufficiently large sample for a range of evaluation methods to be employed in a variety of settings (e.g. home, residential school). The methods used include questionnaires, attitude scales and pre/post achievement tests, observations and interviews. The focus of the evaluation exercise is on the effectiveness of CAL in contributing to student learning. The issue of the educational quality of the program and its instructional features are considered in this paper, in association with the goals of the program

Workplaces, Low pay and the Gender Earnings Gap in Britain : A Co-production with the Low Pay Commission

This study provides a robust assessment of the importance of a number of determinants of the gaps in earnings between the four groups of employees who make up the British workforce; males and females who work full and part-time. The analysis considers the contribution of individual employee characteristics as well as occupation, industry, region and other workplace specific characteristics. The results are compared with previous findings for 2004 (Mumford and Smith, 2009) and with alternative data from the ASHE series for 2004, 2011 and 2015

Owning the thinking: case studies of how pre-service trainee teachers, training to teach in the post-compulsory sector, construct their professional teaching identities within a framework of accountability

The context for this study is that of educational policy: specifically with reference to initial teacher education in the post-compulsory sector. The research addresses a number of issues which have been relatively neglected in implementing this policy: • The extent to which the policy has redefined the epistemology underpinning being a teacher to that of ‘knowledge deliverer’ • The ways in which this epistemological shift has impacted on the role and identities of beginning teachers as individual teachers seek to resolve the relationship between the policy agenda and their constructions of their professional selves as compatible, compromising and/or compliant The methodology adopted is that of the case study within a longitudinal study of those being trained to teach in the post compulsory sector and follows the subjects of the research post-training into employment. Using trainee accounts and other data, the study examines their encounters with and connections to (Wenger, 2000:27) the various ‘learning communities’ contributing to their training. The narratives they provide are used to provide an ‘…insider’s view of the domain’ of a community (Wenger et al., 2002: 31). The findings are substantial. Analysis of trainees’ accounts reveal the extent to which they seek to adhere to community norms as a consequence of assessment and organisational demands at the expense of their own development as critical, autonomous professionals. The extent to which they supress aspects of their own emerging identities raises ethical issues about the role of professional communities in brokering and developing new professional knowledge. The ways in which the various ‘learning communities’ manage knowledge leads to discrepancies in trainees’ experiences of ‘communities of practice’. As a consequence they offer fractured accounts of their teaching identities. The implications of the research are also substantial. The study underlines the importance of giving greater attention to the voice of the trainee teacher in order to understand and assist ‘self- understanding’ (Kelchtermans, 2005). The voice of trainee teacher has been noticeably marginalised by current policies on teacher education. As new models of partnership and collaborative practice evolve in response to an agenda which prioritises school and employer led ITTE provision, it behoves those working with newly qualified teachers to provide the kind of support which will ensure commitment and the basis for future advance in their teaching careers

Explanatory Journeys: Visualising to Understand and Explain Administrative Justice Paths of Redress

Administrative justice concerns the relationships between individuals and the state. It includes redress and complaints on decisions of a child's education, social care, licensing, planning, environment, housing and homelessness. However, if someone has a complaint or an issue, it is challenging for people to understand different possible redress paths and explore what path is suitable for their situation. Explanatory visualisation has the potential to display these paths of redress in a clear way, such that people can see, understand and explore their options. The visualisation challenge is further complicated because information is spread across many documents, laws, guidance and policies and requires judicial interpretation. Consequently, there is not a single database of paths of redress. In this work we present how we have co-designed a system to visualise administrative justice paths of redress. Simultaneously, we classify, collate and organise the underpinning data, from expert workshops, heuristic evaluation and expert critical reflection. We make four contributions: (i) an application design study of the explanatory visualisation tool (Artemus), (ii) coordinated and co-design approach to aggregating the data, (iii) two in-depth case studies in housing and education demonstrating explanatory paths of redress in administrative law, and (iv) reflections on the expert co-design process and expert data gathering and explanatory visualisation for administrative justice and law.Comment: 11 pages with 10 figures, accepted for publication in IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphic

Sporulenes, Heptaprenyl Metabolites from Bacillus subtilis Spores

Sporulene, a C35-terpenoid hydrocarbon with an unusual pentacyclic structure, is produced by Bacillus subtilis during sporulation.Earth and Planetary SciencesMolecular and Cellular Biolog

Deficiency in β1,3-Galactosyltransferase of a Leishmania major Lipophosphoglycan Mutant Adversely Influences the Leishmania-Sand Fly Interaction

To study the function of side chain oligosaccharides of the cell-surface lipophosphoglycan (LPG), mutagenized Leishmania major defective in side chain biosynthesis were negatively selected by agglutination with the monoclonal antibody WIC79.3, which recognizes the galactose-containing side chains of L. major LPG. One such mutant, called Spock, lacked the ability to bind significantly to midguts of the natural L. major vector, Phlebotomus papatasi, and to maintain infection in the sand fly after excretion of the digested bloodmeal. Biochemical characterization of Spock LPG revealed its structural similarity to the LPG of Leishmania donovani, a species whose inability to bind to and maintain infections in P. papatasi midguts has been strongly correlated with the expression of a surface LPG lacking galactose-terminated oligosaccharide side chains. An in vitro galactosyltransferase assay using wild-type or Spock membranes was used to determine that the defect in Spock LPG biosynthesis is a result of defective beta1,3-galactosyltransferase activity as opposed to a modification of LPG, which would prevent it from serving as a competent substrate for galactose addition. The results of these experiments show that Spock lacks the beta1, 3-galactosyltransferase for side chain addition and that the LPG side chains are required for L. major to bind to and to produce transmissible infection in P. papatasi

Lithospheric density models reveal evidence for Cenozoic uplift of the Colorado Plateau and Great Plains by lower-crustal hydration

Subduction at plate boundaries can have thermal, chemical, and physical impacts on broad regions of the continental interior, but these interactions are not as readily obvious as deformation near the continental margin. Such cryp-tic alteration has produced surface uplift in the Colorado Plateau and western Great Plains of North America, which have risen&mdash;largely undeformed&mdash;1.6 and 1.3 km, respectively, relative to the eastern Great Plains during the Cenozoic. Accumulation of Cretaceous&ndash;Cenozoic sediments accounts for only 300 m of uplift of the Colorado Plateau and 400 m of the western Great Plains, leav-ing 1.3 km and 0.9 km, respectively, unexplained. To determine the physical causes of this enigmatic epeirogeny, we derived three-dimensional (3-D) litho-spheric density models from seismic velocity, gravity, topography, and heat-flow data. Lower-crustal density decreases systematically westward across the Great Plains, accounting nearly perfectly for the remaining 900 m of uplift of the western Great Plains and the modern east-west topographic gradient. Lower-crustal dedensification beneath the Colorado Plateau accounts for a similar 900 m of uplift. Lower-crustal xenoliths in both regions show progres-sive hydration-induced retrogression of garnet-bearing assemblages with in-creasing modern elevation, and Th-Pb dating of the Colorado Plateau retro-gression gives end-Cretaceous dates (xenoliths from the Great Plains have not yet been dated). We hypothesize that lower-crustal density variations&mdash;and much of the surface relief&mdash;in North America&rsquo;s Proterozoic interior terranes re-flect varying degrees of metasomatic retrogression, such as by fluids exsolved from the Farallon slab. The remaining 400 m of Colorado Plateau uplift is most plausibly due to elevated mantle temperature. We present thermal models that suggest that 25&ndash;70 km of Cenozoic lithospheric thinning can explain the modern elevation and density structure.</p

A Search for HI in E+A Galaxies

We present the results of HI line and radio continuum observations of five nearby E+A galaxies. These galaxies have spectra that are dominated by a young stellar component but lack the emission lines characteristic of significant, on-going star formation. They are selected from a unique sample of 21 E+A's identified by Zabludoff et al.(1996) in their spectroscopic search for E+A galaxies using the Las Campanas Redshift Survey, where over 11,000 nearby galaxies were examined. The five E+A galaxies span a range of environments: three are in the field and two are in clusters. Only one system was detected in HI emission, the field E+A galaxy EA1, with a total flux of 0.30 +/- 0.02 Jy km/s and an HI mass of (3.5 +/- 0.2) 10^9 h^(-2) M_sun. The HI morphology and kinematics of EA 1 suggest a galaxy-galaxy interaction, with a dynamical age of about 6 x 10^8 h^(-1) yr inferred from the HI tail lengths and velocities. This age estimate is consistent with the interpretation drawn from optical spectroscopy that starbursts in E+A galaxies began (and subsequently ended) within the last 10^9 yr. Our HI detection limits are such that if the other E+A's in our sample had the HI properties of EA 1, we would have detected (or marginally detected) them. We conclude that E+A galaxies have a range of HI properties. None of the galaxies were detected in radio continuum emission, with upper limits to the radio power of about 10^21 h^(-2) W/Hz. Our limits exclude the possibility that these E+A's are dust-enshrouded massive starburst galaxies, but are insufficient to exclude modest star formation rates of less than a few h^(-2) M_sun per yr.Comment: 21 Latex pages, including 5 figures and 6 tables. Uses Aastex. To appear in AJ, April 2001; minor changes to text and Figure

Red star-forming and blue passive galaxies in clusters

We explore the relation between colour and specific star formation rate (derived from optical spectra obtained by SDSS DR4) of over 6,000 galaxies (M_r<=-20.5) in and around low redshift (z<0.12) clusters. Even though most red galaxies have little or no ongoing star formation, and most blue galaxies are currently forming stars, there are significant populations of red star-forming (SF) and blue passive galaxies. This paper examines various properties of galaxies belonging to the latter two categories. These properties include morphological parameters, internal extinction, spectral features such as EW(H_delta) and the 4000 ang break, and metallicity. Our analysis shows that the blue passive galaxies have properties very similar to their SF counterparts, except that their large range in EW(H_delta) indicates recent truncation of star formation. The red SF galaxies fall into two broad categories, one of them being massive galaxies in cluster cores dominated by an old stellar population, but with evidence of current star formation in the core. For the remaining red SF galaxies it is evident from various metallicity measures and mean stellar ages, that their colours result from the predominance of a metal-rich stellar population. The implication of the properties of these SF galaxies on environmental studies, like that of the Butcher-Oemler effect, is discussed.Comment: 13 pages, 11 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA