The influence of MRI scan position on patients with oropharyngeal cancer undergoing radical radiotherapy

<p>Background: The purpose of this study was to demonstrate how magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) patient position protocols influence registration quality in patients with oropharyngeal cancer undergoing radical radiotherapy and the consequences for gross tumour volume (GTV) definition and radiotherapy planning.</p> <p>Methods and materials: Twenty-two oropharyngeal patients underwent a computed tomography (CT), a diagnostic MRI (MRID) and an MRI in the radiotherapy position within an immobilization mask (MRIRT). Clinicians delineated the GTV on the CT viewing the MRID separately (GTVC); on the CT registered to MRID (GTVD) and on the CT registered to MRIRT (GTVRT). Planning target volumes (PTVs) were denoted similarly. Registration quality was assessed by measuring disparity between structures in the three set-ups. Volumetric modulated arc therapy (VMAT) radiotherapy planning was performed for PTVC, PTVD and PTVRT. To determine the dose received by the reference PTVRT, we optimized for PTVC and PTVD while calculating the dose to PTVRT. Statistical significance was determined using the two-tailed Mann–Whitney or two-tailed paired student t-tests.</p> <p>Results: A significant improvement in registration accuracy was found between CT and MRIRT versus the MRID measuring distances from the centre of structures (geometric mean error of 2.2 mm versus 6.6 mm). The mean GTVC (44.1 cm3) was significantly larger than GTVD (33.7 cm3, p value = 0.027) or GTVRT (30.5 cm3, p value = 0.014). When optimizing the VMAT plans for PTVC and investigating the mean dose to PTVRT neither the dose to 99% (58.8%) nor 95% of the PTV (84.7%) were found to meet the required clinical dose constraints of 90% and 95% respectively. Similarly, when optimizing for PTVD the mean dose to PTVRT did not meet clinical dose constraints for 99% (14.9%) nor 95% of the PTV (66.2%). Only by optimizing for PTVRT were all clinical dose constraints achieved.</p> <p>Conclusions: When oropharyngeal patients MRI scans are performed in the radiotherapy position there are significant improvements in CT-MR image registration, target definition and PTV dose coverage.</p&gt

The Early Career Framework – A Guide for School Leaders and Induction Leads

This guide has been developed from findings from the Early Career Teacher Support pilot evaluation (Hardman et al., 2020), funded by the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF). It is one of three guides intended to summarise the key messages from the evaluation and provide strategic and practical suggestions that can inform planning to support the development of Early Career Teachers (ECTs) in schools. The guidance is applicable to all school contexts and is not specific to particular programmes of support. The Early Career Framework (ECF) has been introduced in some parts of England from September 2020 and will be rolled out nationally in September 2021 along with guidance to support participating Early Career Teachers and mentors. Stemming from the Recruitment and Retention Strategy (DfE, 2019) the ECF seeks to ensure that all teachers in England receive high quality support in the first two years of their career. During 2019-20 the Centre for Teachers and Teaching Research at UCL Institute of Education undertook an evaluation of three pilot programmes which were designed to test different ways of supporting Early Career Teachers and their mentors. We worked with the Chartered College of Teaching, Ambition Institute and The Education Endowment Foundation as well as 98 schools (both primary and secondary) to evaluate the impact of these pilot programmes. Following the pilot which we evaluated, the DfE selected four suppliers to develop freely available resources for schools to use. This included a separate team from UCL Institute of Education. We shared our initial findings with these suppliers to inform their materials. From 2021 there will be six suppliers, including UCL Institute of Education, offering programmes based on one of these four initial programmes. Schools now have three options around how they implement the ECF. The guidance in this document is relevant to all three options

The Early Career Framework – A Guide for Implementation

This guide has been developed from findings from the Early Career Teacher Support pilot evaluation (Hardman et al., 2020), funded by the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF). It is one of three guides intended to summarise the key messages from the evaluation and provide strategic and practical suggestions that can inform planning to support the development of Early Career Teachers (ECTs) in schools. The guidance is applicable to all school contexts and is not specific to particular programmes of support. The Early Career Framework (ECF) has been introduced in some parts of England from September 2020 and will be rolled out nationally in September 2021 along with guidance to support participating Early Career Teachers and mentors. Stemming from the Recruitment and Retention Strategy (DfE, 2019) the ECF seeks to ensure that all teachers in England receive high quality support in the first two years of their career. During 2019-20 the Centre for Teachers and Teaching Research at UCL Institute of Education undertook an evaluation of three pilot programmes which were designed to test different ways of supporting Early Career Teachers and their mentors. We worked with the Chartered College of Teaching, Ambition Institute and The Education Endowment Foundation as well as 98 schools (both primary and secondary) to evaluate the impact of these pilot programmes. Following the pilot which we evaluated, the DfE selected four suppliers to develop freely available resources for schools to use. This included a separate team from UCL Institute of Education. We shared our initial findings with these suppliers to inform their materials. From 2021 there will be six suppliers, including UCL Institute of Education, offering programmes based on one of these four initial programmes. Schools now have three options around how they implement the ECF. The guidance in this document is relevant to all three options

The Early Career Framework – A Guide for Mentors and Early Career Teachers

This guide has been developed from findings from the Early Career Teacher Support pilot evaluation (Hardman et al., 2020), funded by the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF). It is one of three guides intended to summarise the key messages from the evaluation and provide strategic and practical suggestions that can inform planning to support the development of Early Career Teachers (ECTs) in schools. The guidance is applicable to all school contexts and is not specific to particular programmes of support. The Early Career Framework (ECF) has been introduced in some parts of England from September 2020 and will be rolled out nationally in September 2021 along with guidance to support participating Early Career Teachers and mentors. Stemming from the Recruitment and Retention Strategy (DfE, 2019) the ECF seeks to ensure that all teachers in England receive high quality support in the first two years of their career. During 2019-20 the Centre for Teachers and Teaching Research at UCL Institute of Education undertook an evaluation of three pilot programmes which were designed to test different ways of supporting Early Career Teachers and their mentors. We worked with the Chartered College of Teaching, Ambition Institute and The Education Endowment Foundation as well as 98 schools (both primary and secondary) to evaluate the impact of these pilot programmes. Following the pilot which we evaluated, the DfE selected four suppliers to develop freely available resources for schools to use. This included a separate team from UCL Institute of Education. We shared our initial findings with these suppliers to inform their materials. From 2021 there will be six suppliers, including UCL Institute of Education, offering programmes based on one of these four initial programmes. Schools now have three options around how they implement the ECF. The guidance in this document is relevant to all three options

Early Career Teacher Support - Pilot Report, EEF Evaluation

In order to provide timely feedback in the development of policy and programmes around the rollout of the Early Career Framework (DfE, 2019a), three pilot programmes were developed to investigate the promise, feasibility, and scalability of differing models for developing Early Career Teachers (ECTs), mentors, and induction leads. Two programmes were developed by Ambition Institute and a third by the Chartered College of Teaching. All aimed to provide mentors with the resources to deliver instructional coaching sessions to ECTs, coaching that uses expert teachers to deliver recurring, classroom-practice focused sessions, using observation and targeted feedback to develop practice. • Programme A (Ambition Institute) provided face-to-face training, a coaching guide, weekly online resources, and regular online coaching and support sessions to in-school mentors. School induction leads also received face-to-face training, designed to enable them to support mentors. Mentors used the programme to deliver instructional coaching to ECTs, either weekly or fortnightly. • Programme B (Ambition Institute) provided the same training as Programme A to mentors and school induction leads. In addition, this programme also delivered weekly online content and regular online support sessions directly to ECTs. The programme was also used to enable in-school mentors to deliver weekly or fortnightly instructional coaching sessions to ECTs. • Programme C (Chartered College of Teaching) provided online support to mentors, school induction leads, and ECTs. All received a selection of online modules providing weekly content to mentors and ECTs that were used to facilitate either weekly or fortnightly instructional coaching sessions, delivered by mentors to ECTs. The intention was not to undertake a comparative evaluation of these programmes but instead to evaluate the modes of support and delivery within them. Each programme was delivered to teachers teaching a variety of different year groups and subjects spanning primary and secondary education. Schools opted to receive one of these programmes. At the end of the evaluation there was a total of 98 schools across the pilot programmes: 50 primary schools, 45 secondary schools, and three all-through schools. The pilot evaluation was designed to run from June 2019 to July 2020. However, delivery and evaluation were modified due to the COVID-19 outbreak and this report covers the initial set-up period until February 2020. The pilot aimed to examine the evidence of promise, feasibility, and scalability of the programmes using a mixed methods approach using three waves of survey, 20 school case studies, online engagement data, observation of sessions, and evaluation of materials

Bioinspired trailing-edge noise control

Strategies for trailing edge noise control have been inspired by the downy canopy that covers the surface of exposed flight feathers of many owl species. Previous wind tunnel measurements demonstrate that canopies of similar characteristics can reduce pressure fluctuations on the underlying surface by as much as 30dB, and significantly attenuate roughness noise generated by that surface. In the present work, surface treatments are designed to replicate the effects of the canopy in a form suitable for application to an airfoil. These treatments are installed directly upstream of the trailing edge to modify the boundary layer turbulence prior to acoustic scattering by the edge. Over 20 variants of these designs have been tested by performing aeroacoustic wind tunnel measurements on a tripped DU96-W180 airfoil at chord Reynolds numbers of up to 3 million. Compared to the unmodified airfoil, the treatments provided up to 10dB of broadband attenuation of trailing edge noise. The effectiveness of the treatment is not highly dependent on a particular geometry, but there appears to be strong potential for optimization. The surface treatments remain effective over an angle of attack range that extends over 9 degrees from zero lift. Aerodynamic impact of the treatment appears minimal.Office of Naval Research (Grant IDs: N00014-13-1-0244, N00014-14-1-0242, N62909-12-1-7116 (NICOP)), College of Engineering at Virginia Tech, AVEC Incorporate