Spontaneous eye movements during passive spoken language comprehension reflect grammatical processing

Language is tightly connected to sensory and motor systems. Recent research using eye- tracking typically relies on constrained visual contexts, viewing a small array of objects on a computer screen. Some critiques of embodiment ask if people simply match their simulations to the pictures being presented. This study compared the comprehension of verbs with two different grammatical forms: the past progressive form (e.g., was walking), which emphasizes the ongoing nature of actions, and the simple past (e.g., walked), which emphasizes the end-state of an action. The results showed that the distribution and timing of eye movements mirrors the underlying conceptual structure of this linguistic difference in the absence of any visual stimuli. Thus, eye movement data suggest that visual inputs are unnecessary to solicit perceptual simulations

Giving Voice to Australia’s Professional Tour Guides: Perspectives of their Social Identity

Professional tour guides (PTGs) play an instrumental role in Australia’s tourism industry, however, there is little understanding of their perspectives regarding their challenges, expectations, belonging, and recognition. Anecdotal evidence suggests that they lack a voice and feel neglected within the tourism industry. This study adopted an interpretivist approach to capture the voices and perspectives of 19 Australian PTGs, through focus group discussions and one-on-one interviews. This qualitative study was seen through the lens of Tajfel’s Social Identity Theory (1974). A key finding is that the tour guides’ strong sense of belonging is the motivating factor to address the lack of recognition, unmet expectations, as well as numerous challenges framed around Australia’s unregulated tour guiding industry. Belonging is the attribute that motivates them to engage and strive for better recognition

Physical Constraints and Functional Characteristics of Transcription Factor-DNA Interaction

We study theoretical ``design principles'' for transcription factor-DNA interaction in bacteria, focusing particularly on the statistical interaction of the transcription factors (TF's) with the genomic background (i.e., the genome without the target sites). We introduce and motivate the concept of `programmability', i.e. the ability to set the threshold concentration for TF binding over a wide range merely by mutating the binding sequence of a target site. This functional demand, together with physical constraints arising from the thermodynamics and kinetics of TF-DNA interaction, leads us to a narrow range of ``optimal'' interaction parameters. We find that this parameter set agrees well with experimental data for the interaction parameters of a few exemplary prokaryotic TF's. This indicates that TF-DNA interaction is indeed programmable. We suggest further experiments to test whether this is a general feature for a large class of TF's.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figures; revised version as published in PNA

Nutrient contamination from an agricultural non-point source and its mitigation: A case study of EKU Meadowbrook Farm, Madison County, Kentucky

Non-point sources are now responsible for most nutrient contamination in surface water and groundwater, leading to eutrophication and decreased water quality. Because of fertilizer use and animal husbandry, agricultural areas are prime sources for nutrient contamination. Consequently, it is advisable to mitigate entry of nutrients into watersheds from agricultural runoff and groundwater flow. Eastern Kentucky University (EKU) Meadowbrook Farm (Madison County, Kentucky) seeks to decrease its export of nutrients to Muddy Creek, which is tributary of the Kentucky River. To demonstrate the efficacy of any sequestration strategies, nutrient export must be measured both before and after sequestration efforts are implemented. Over the past two field seasons, we have investigated the sources and behavior of dissolved nutrients (phosphate, PO43-; ammonium, NH4+; nitrate, NO3-) and other dissolved ions, and their transport via hydrologic pathways at the Farm. Here, we present our findings in three parts: (1) background nutrient concentration in surface water and groundwater during fair-weather times and identification of likely nutrient sources (Borowski et al.); (2) details of cation and nutrient drainage from the Farm during rain events (Buskirk et al.); and (3) quantification of nutrient export from a representative sub-watershed on the Farm during a major rainfall event (Winter et al.). Meadowbrook Farm is a working farm raising crops (mainly corn and soybeans), and rearing dairy and beef cattle and other livestock. Livestock produce manure that is eventually applied to pasture and croplands; supplemental fertilizer is also used. These are the primary sources for excess nutrients that leave the Farm via overland and groundwater flow. We sampled water from several different water sources and measured their nutrient content. Water types include that from drainage tiles, springs (groundwater), and surface water within intermittent streams on the Farm, other adjacent streams, and Muddy Creek. Water samples were passed through a 0.4 mm syringe filter and then preserved at a pH of 2 with sulfuric acid (H2SO4). Nutrient concentration, expressed in terms of phosphorus (P) and nitrogen (N) content, was measured colorimetrically using an UV-VIS spectrophotometer and the ascorbic acid (orthophosphate; P-PO43-), sodium hypochlorite (ammonium, N-NH4+), and cadmium reduction (nitrate, N-NO3-) methods. Nitrate is the nutrient contaminant with highest median concentration (~1.1 mg/L N-NO3) in surface waters; median concentration for ammonium and phosphate are ~0.3 mg/L N-NH4+ and ~0.03 mg/L P-PO43-, respectively. Relative to national data, Farm groundwater is enriched in all nutrients with median concentrations of ~0.04 mg/L N-NH4+, ~7.3 mg/L N-NO3, and ~0.04 mg/L P-PO43-. Enrichment in ammonium is more significant compared to that of nitrate and phosphate. These data provide fair-weather, background estimates for comparison to nutrient export that occur during rain events

Global Health Perspectives in Physical Therapy Education: A Qualitative Report on a Service Learning Experience in Guatemala

Authors: Winter F Wildt-Bailey, SPT; Adriana Sandoval, SPT; Holly J Roberts, PT, DPT, GCS, NCS Global Health Perspectives in Physical Therapy Education: A Qualitative Report on a Service Learning Experience in Guatemala Purpose: Doctor of physical therapy (DPT) students at the University of Puget Sound traveled to Zacapa, Guatemala to deliver physical therapy services for 5 days as part of an elective course introducing students to physical therapy and health care delivery from a global health perspective. Participants journaled about their experiences, responding to prompts provided by the course professor/clinical instructor. The purpose of this research was to explore the impact of the experience by identifying common themes among the journal entries. Methods: Ten student physical therapists (SPT), 9 females, 1 male, mean age 29yrs (range 25-40) at the end of their second year of a three-year DPT program consented to allow their journals to be included in this report. Two SPTs noted recurring themes that emerged in the de-identified journal entries. Results: Five common themes emerged among the journal entries: 1) Cultural Bias: recognizing cultural biases, the impact they have on patient care, and identifying strategies for addressing them; 2) Healthcare Disparities: recognizing disparities in access to healthcare, patient education, and resources between the U.S. and Guatemala; 3) Confidence and Competency: overcoming feelings of inadequacy as novice clinicians and appreciating the extent of knowledge and skill gained through didactic coursework; 4) Identity: reaffirming one\u27s decision to pursue a physical therapy career and that it aligns with one\u27s values and identity; and 5) Skills Development: adapting to working with limited resources, and developing effective communication skills with a language barrier. Conclusions: Reflection is a central tenet of service learning. The personal reflections of DPT students participating in a short-term service learning trip to Guatemala as part of an elective course in global health perspectives revealed the experience allowed students to recognize and address cultural biases, recognize healthcare disparities, build professional confidence and competence, reaffirm professional goals, and develop important skills in communication and healthcare delivery. Clinical Relevance: The results of this qualitative report are consistent with literature examining the benefits of experiential learning in healthcare education. They demonstrate the potential for an international service learning experience to facilitate development of cultural competence, clinical reasoning skills, communication skills, and confidence in one\u27s knowledge and abilities. Keywords: global health, service learning, experiential learning References: Benson JD, Provident I, Szucs KA. An experiential learning lab embedded in a didactic course: outcomes from a pediatric intervention course. Occ Ther Health Care. 2013; 27:46-57. Knecht-Sabres LJ. Experiential learning in occupational therapy: can it enhance readiness for clinical practice? J Exp Educ. 2013; 36:22-36. Paterson C, Chapman J. Enhancing skills of critical reflection to evidence learning in professional practice. Phys Ther Sport. 2013; 14:133-138. Seif G, Coker-Bolt P, Kraft S, Gonsalves W, Simpson K, Johnson E. The development of clinical reasoning and interprofessional behaviors: service-learning at a student-run free clinic. J Interprof Care. 2014; 28(6):559-564. Smith S, Crocker A. Experiential learning in physical therapy education. Adv Med Educ Pract. 2017; 8:427-433. Village D, Clouten N, Millar AL, Geigle A, et al. Comparison of the use of service learning, volunteer, and pro bono activities in physical therapy curricula. J Phys Ther Educ St Louis. 2004;18(1):22-28

Perturbations of nuclear C*-algebras

Kadison and Kastler introduced a natural metric on the collection of all C*-subalgebras of the bounded operators on a separable Hilbert space. They conjectured that sufficiently close algebras are unitarily conjugate. We establish this conjecture when one algebra is separable and nuclear. We also consider one-sided versions of these notions, and we obtain embeddings from certain near inclusions involving separable nuclear C*-algebras. At the end of the paper we demonstrate how our methods lead to improved characterisations of some of the types of algebras that are of current interest in the classification programme.Comment: 45 page

Flower Bats (Glossophaga soricina) and Fruit Bats (Carollia perspicillata) Rely on Spatial Cues over Shapes and Scents When Relocating Food

Natural selection can shape specific cognitive abilities and the extent to which a given species relies on various cues when learning associations between stimuli and rewards. Because the flower bat Glossophaga soricina feeds primarily on nectar, and the locations of nectar-producing flowers remain constant, G. soricina might be predisposed to learn to associate food with locations. Indeed, G. soricina has been observed to rely far more heavily on spatial cues than on shape cues when relocating food, and to learn poorly when shape alone provides a reliable cue to the presence of food.Here we determined whether G. soricina would learn to use scent cues as indicators of the presence of food when such cues were also available. Nectar-producing plants fed upon by G. soricina often produce distinct, intense odors. We therefore expected G. soricina to relocate food sources using scent cues, particularly the flower-produced compound, dimethyl disulfide, which is attractive even to G. soricina with no previous experience of it. We also compared the learning of associations between cues and food sources by G. soricina with that of a related fruit-eating bat, Carollia perspicillata. We found that (1) G. soricina did not learn to associate scent cues, including dimethyl disulfide, with feeding sites when the previously rewarded spatial cues were also available, and (2) both the fruit-eating C. perspicillata and the flower-feeding G. soricina were significantly more reliant on spatial cues than associated sensory cues for relocating food.These findings, taken together with past results, provide evidence of a powerful, experience-independent predilection of both species to rely on spatial cues when attempting to relocate food

Does Practice Make Perfect?

Extensive literature supports the correlation between surgical volume and improved clinical outcome in the management of various cancers. It is this evidence that has catalysed the creation of centres of excellence. However, on closer inspection, many of these studies are poor quality, low weight and use vastly heterogenous end points in assessment of both volume and outcome. We critically appraise the English language literature published over the last ten years pertaining to the volume outcome relationship in the context of cancer care. Future balanced unbiased studies may enable equipoise in planning international cancer management strategies