UA3/7/4/1 Press Conference

Transcript of recorded press conference regarding the selection of Kern Alexander as WKU president. Joe Iracane, Kern Alexander and Paul Cook making statements and fielding unidentified reporters\u27 questions.The recording is approximately 19:15 in length and has been digitized as wav and mp3 files which are available upon request

Lovie Joe

https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/mmb-vp/4478/thumbnail.jp

Biocryomorphology:Integrating Microbial Processes with Ice Surface Hydrology, Topography, and Roughness

Published version. Also available at http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/feart.2015.00078</a

Economics of Robust Surveillance on Exotic Animal Diseases: the Case of Bluetongue

Control of emerging animal diseases critically depends on their early detection. However, designing surveillance programs for exotic and emerging diseases is very challenging because of knowledge gaps on the probability of incursion and mechanisms of spread. Using the example of Bluetongue Virus, which is exotic to the UK, we develop a metapopulation epidemic-economic modelling framework that considers the incursion, detection, spread and control of a disease in a livestock production system composed of heterogeneous subpopulations. The model is then embedded in an information gap (info-gap) framework to assess the robustness of surveillance and vaccination policies to unacceptable outbreaks losses and applied to the case of Bluetongue in the UK. The results show that active reporting of suspect clinical signs by farmers is a very robust way to reduce unacceptable outcomes. Vaccination of animals in high risk regions led to robustly protective programs. If vaccines are not available, surveillance targeted to the high risk region is very robust even if the extent of the high risk region is not known and effectiveness of detection is very low. Surveillance programs focusing in all regions with the same intensity are in general not robust unless the dispersal of the vector connecting both regions is very high.compartmental epidemic model, emergent animal disease, Knightian uncertainty, sentinel surveillance system, Livestock Production/Industries,

The effects of business practices, licensing, and intellectual property on development and dissemination of the polymerase chain reaction: case study

INTRODUCTION: Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) was a seminal genomic technology discovered, developed, and patented in an industry setting. Since the first of its core patents expired in March, 2005, we are in a position to view the entire lifespan of the patent, examining how the intellectual property rights have impacted its use in the biomedical community. Given its essential role in the world of molecular biology and its commercial success, the technology can serve as a case study for evaluating the effects of patenting biological research tools on biomedical research. CASE DESCRIPTION: Following its discovery, the technique was subjected to two years of in-house development, during which issues of inventorship and publishing/patenting strategies caused friction between members of the development team. Some have feared that this delay impeded subsequent research and may have been due to trade secrecy or the desire for obtaining lucrative intellectual property rights. However, our analysis of the history indicates that the main reasons for the delay were benign and were primarily due to difficulties in perfecting the PCR technique. Following this initial development period, the technology was made widely available, but was subject to strict licensing terms and patent protection, leading to an extensive litigation history. DISCUSSION AND EVALUATION: PCR has earned approximately $2 billion in royalties for the various rights-holders while also becoming an essential research tool. However, using citation trend analysis, we are able to see that PCR's patented status did not preclude it from being adopted in a similar manner as other non-patented genomic research tools (specifically, pBR322 cloning vector and Maxam-Gilbert sequencing). CONCLUSION: Despite the heavy patent protection and rigid licensing schemes, PCR seems to have disseminated so widely because of the practices of the corporate entities which have controlled these patents, namely through the use of business partnerships and broad corporate licensing, adaptive licensing strategies, and a "rational forbearance" from suing researchers for patent infringement. While far from definitive, our analysis seems to suggest that, at least in the case of PCR, patenting of genomic research tools need not impede their dissemination, if the technology is made available through appropriate business practices

The Implementation of edTPA in Special Education Teacher Training Programs: Putting Teacher Development Over Passing Scores

Since edTPA\u27s nationwide availability in 2013, it has been adopted by almost 900 education preparation programs in over 40 states. A few states, including the authors\u27, have required a passing score for teacher licensure. While the edTPA has been heralded as a means to improve teacher education programs and the teachers those programs produce, it has also faced criticism for detracting from programs’ ability to train its students, as well as the student teachers’ experiences during their preparation in general, and student teaching in particular. The field of special education shares the implementation challenges faced by other areas of teacher licensure, but the unique nature of IEP delivery across various points on the continuum of placements, the frequent mismatch between student teaching placements and environments conducive to high edTPA scores, and the requirement for passing scores in this era of special education teacher shortages have all placed additional stresses on training programs. When the authors\u27 state was an early adopter of a cutoff score for licensure, its training program focused overtly and extensively on helping its students achieve passing scores, arguably at the expense of career preparation. More recently, it found ways to return teacher development to the fore while still maintaining a high edTPA pass rate for its students, thereby helping them get past the hurdle of licensure while being properly prepared for their careers

Type-II topological phase transitions of topological skyrmion phases

We present minimal toy models for topological skyrmion phases of matter, which generically realize type-II topological phase transitions in effectively non-interacting systems, those which occur without closing of the minimum direct bulk energy gap. We study the bulk-boundary correspondence in detail to show that a non-trivial skyrmion number yields a rich bulk-boundary correspondence. We observe gapless edge states, which are robust against disorder, due to non-trivial skyrmion number. Edge states corresponds to bands, which do not traverse the bulk gap, instead yielding gaplessness due to their overlap in energy and exponential localization on opposite edges of the system. These gapless boundary modes can occur for total Chern number zero, and furthermore correspond to rich real-space spin textures with strong polarization of spin along the real-space edge. By introducing toy models generically exhibiting type-II topological phase transitions and characterizing the bulk-boundary correspondence due to non-trivial skyrmion number in these models, we lay the groundwork for understanding consequences of the quantum skyrmion Hall effect.Comment: 6 pages + 4 figures main text, 12 pages + 15 figures supplementary material

An economic reappraisal of the Melamchi water supply project – Kathmandu, Nepal

This paper examines whether the benefits of the Melamchi water supply project in Nepal are likely to exceed its costs, assuming that high-quality municipal water services can be delivered to households and firms in the urbanized part of the Kathmandu Valley. Monte Carlo simulations are used to explore the sensitivity of the net present value and economic internal rate of return calculations to a wide range of assumptions and input parameters.We find that extreme assumptions are not required to generate large differences in economic feasibility; quite plausible differences in the values of some key parameters can lead to large differences in the economic attractiveness of the project. The results reveal that the three most important influences on net present value and economic internal rate of return are: (i) the discount rate and discounting procedure; (ii) the magnitude of monthly benefits for households connected to the new water system; and (iii) the annual growth rate in monthly benefits of connected households after the project comes on line. Our contribution lies in illustrating, with an actual case study in a developing country, the degree to which cost-benefit calculations of large infrastructure projects are influenced by key economic modeling assumptions and input parameters.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio