Guyana’s paediatric training program: a global health partnership for medical education

Guyana is a low-middle income country on the northern coast of South America between Venezuela and Suriname. Guyana has relatively high child mortality and a notable gap in health care provision. As of 2011, there were no paediatricians in the public sector where approximately 90% of the population seek care. In response to this unmet need, Guyanese diaspora living in Canada, in partnership with Canadian paediatricians and the main teaching hospital, Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC), developed a Master’s program in paediatrics. The postgraduate program was designed with adapted training objectives from the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada and the American Board of Paediatrics. Innovative strategies to overcome the lack of qualified paediatric faculty in Guyana included web-conferencing and a volunteer North American paediatric faculty presence at GPHC with a goal of 1-2 weeks every month. By November 2016, 10 graduates will have passed through a rigorous program of assessment including a two-day final examination with an objective structured clinical examination (OSCE) component.

Inorganic carbon physiology underpins macroalgal responses to elevated CO2

Beneficial effects of CO2 on photosynthetic organisms will be a key driver of ecosystem change under ocean acidification. Predicting the responses of macroalgal species to ocean acidification is complex, but we demonstrate that the response of assemblages to elevated CO2 are correlated with inorganic carbon physiology. We assessed abundance patterns and a proxy for CO2:HCO3- use (\u3b413C values) of macroalgae along a gradient of CO2 at a volcanic seep, and examined how shifts in species abundance at other Mediterranean seeps are related to macroalgal inorganic carbon physiology. Five macroalgal species capable of using both HCO3- and CO2 had greater CO2 use as concentrations increased. These species (and one unable to use HCO3-) increased in abundance with elevated CO2 whereas obligate calcifying species, and non-calcareous macroalgae whose CO2 use did not increase consistently with concentration, declined in abundance. Physiological groupings provide a mechanistic understanding that will aid us in determining which species will benefit from ocean acidification and why

On the acidity and reactivity of HNO in aqueous solution and biological systems

The gas phase and aqueous thermochemistry and reactivity of nitroxyl (nitrosyl hydride, HNO) were elucidated with multiconfigurational self-consistent field and hybrid density functional theory calculations and continuum solvation methods. The pK(a) of HNO is predicted to be 7.2 ± 1.0, considerably different from the value of 4.7 reported from pulse radiolysis experiments. The ground-state triplet nature of NO(−) affects the rates of acid-base chemistry of the HNO/NO(−) couple. HNO is highly reactive toward dimerization and addition of soft nucleophiles but is predicted to undergo negligible hydration (K(eq) = 6.9 × 10(−5)). HNO is predicted to exist as a discrete species in solution and is a viable participant in the chemical biology of nitric oxide and derivatives