“Deep Interdisciplinarity” as Critical Pedagogy: Teaching at the Intersections of Urban Communication and Public Place and Space

Interdisciplinary is a word that has been picked up by institutions of higher education, research foundations, and even popular culture as a way to articulate the need to move beyond the traditional disciplinary boundaries within which we categorize knowledge about the world. While disciplinary silos in higher education often reflect structures within which teaching and learning are engaged, we contend that critical pedagogy provides an opportunity for innovative thinking and creativity to emerge via Giroux’s (1981) critical notion of praxis. We discuss how Penny’s (2009) notion of deep interdisciplinarity can serve to guide course development in a way that enables any interdisciplinary course to achieve its inevitably unique goals. Deep interdisciplinarity, we contend, can enrich both critical and interdisciplinary pedagogies in two prominent ways: first, by expanding critical pedagogy’s focus to directly address instructor-instructor interactions as a significant in-class performance of critical reflexivity; and second, by enabling teaching and learning opportunities to reach into the places and spaces of everyday life. Using our own co-taught interdisciplinary class on urban public place and space as a provocative example, we advocate for finding opportunities to transform traditional institutional and disciplinary silos of understanding into unique learning environments situated on the “bridges” between them. Overall, we call for critical pedagogues to rethink their relationship(s) to interdisciplinary knowledge and for instructors in interdisciplinary classrooms to rethink their relationship(s) to critical pedagogy

Using digital social market applications to incentivise active travel: Empirical analysis of a smart city initiative

Information and communication technologies (ICTs), such as mobile communication networks, and behaviour-based approaches for citizen engagement play a key role in making future cities sustainable and tackling persistent problems in high-density urban areas. In the context of Sharing Cities, an EU-funded programme aiming to deliver smart city solutions in areas such as citizen participation and infrastructure improvements of buildings and mobility, a prominent intervention has been the deployment and monitoring of a Digital Social Market (DSM) tool in Milan (Italy). The DSM allows cities to engage with residents and encourage sustainable behaviours by offering non-monetary rewards. This paper aims to evaluate the effectiveness of the DSM approach to promote active travel (cycling and walking) by analysing the data collected through the app as well as through participant surveys. Our model results show that a broader engagement with the DSM app (number of claps to posts, number of posts made, non-monetary rewards earned by participating in non-travel events) is positively correlated with the monitored level of active travel. Lifestyles, attitudes, and social influence also explain the variability in cycling and walking. This highlights the importance of investigating these factors when replicating such initiatives on a large scale

Improving diagnosis for rare diseases: the experience of the Italian undiagnosed Rare diseases network

Background For a number of persons with rare diseases (RDs) a definite diagnosis remains undiscovered with relevant physical, psychological and social consequences. Undiagnosed RDs (URDs) require other than specialised clinical centres, outstanding molecular investigations, common protocols and dedicated actions at national and international levels; thus, many "Undiagnosed RDs programs" have been gradually developed on the grounds of a well-structured multidisciplinary approach. Methods The Italian Undiagnosed Rare Diseases Network (IURDN) was established in 2016 to improve the level of diagnosis of persons with URD living in Italy. Six Italian Centres of Expertise represented the network. The National Centre for Rare Diseases at the Istituto Superiore di Sanita coordinates the whole project. The software PhenoTips was used to collect the information of the clinical cases. Results One hundred and ten cases were analysed between March 2016 and June 2019. The age of onset of the diseases ranged from prenatal age to 51 years. Conditions were predominantly sporadic; almost all patients had multiple organs involvements. A total of 13/71 family cases were characterized by WES; in some families more than one individual was affected, so leading to 20/71 individuals investigated. Disease causing variants were identified in two cases and were associated to previously undescribed phenotypes. In 5 cases, new candidate genes were identified, although confirmatory tests are pending. In three families, investigations were not completed due to the scarce compliance of members and molecular investigations were temporary suspended. Finally, three cases (one familial) remain still unsolved. Twelve undiagnosed clinical cases were then selected to be shared at International level through PhenomeCentral in accordance to the UDNI statement. Conclusions Our results showed a molecular diagnostic yield of 53,8%; this value is comparable to the diagnostic rates reported in other international studies. Cases collected were also pooled with those collected by UDNI International Network. This represents a unique example of global initiative aimed at sharing and validating knowledge and experience in this field. IURDN is a multidisciplinary and useful initiative linking National and International efforts aimed at making timely and appropriate diagnoses in RD patients who still do not have a confirmed diagnosis even after a long time

The improvement of the best practice guidelines for preimplantation genetic diagnosis of cystic fibrosis: toward an international consensus

Cystic fibrosis (CF) is one of the most common indications for preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) for single gene disorders, giving couples the opportunity to conceive unaffected children without having to consider termination of pregnancy. However, there are no available standardized protocols, so that each center has to develop its own diagnostic strategies and procedures. Furthermore, reproductive decisions are complicated by the diversity of disease-causing variants in the CFTR (cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator) gene and the complexity of correlations between genotypes and associated phenotypes, so that attitudes and practices toward the risks for future offspring can vary greatly between countries. On behalf of the EuroGentest Network, eighteen experts in PGD and/or molecular diagnosis of CF from seven countries attended a workshop held in Montpellier, France, on 14 December 2011. Building on the best practice guidelines for amplification-based PGD established by ESHRE (European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology), the goal of this meeting was to formulate specific guidelines for CF-PGD in order to contribute to a better harmonization of practices across Europe. Different topics were covered including variant nomenclature, inclusion criteria, genetic counseling, PGD strategy and reporting of results. The recommendations are summarized here, and updated information on the clinical significance of CFTR variants and associated phenotypes is presented

Patient-specific Bacteroides genome variants in pouchitis

© The Author(s), 2016. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in mBio 7 (2016): e01713-16, doi:10.1128/mBio.01713-16.A 2-year longitudinal microbiome study of 22 patients who underwent colectomy with an ileal pouch anal anastomosis detected significant increases in distinct populations of Bacteroides during 9 of 11 patient visits that coincided with inflammation (pouchitis). Oligotyping and metagenomic short-read annotation identified Bacteroides populations that occurred in early samples, bloomed during inflammation, and reappeared after antibiotic treatment. Targeted cultivation of Bacteroides isolates from the same individual at multiple time points and from several patients detected subtle genomic changes, including the identification of rapidly evolving genomic elements that differentiate isogenic strains of Bacteroides fragilis from the mucosa versus lumen. Each patient harbored Bacteroides spp. that are closely related to commonly occurring clinical isolates, including Bacteroides ovatus, B. thetaiotaomicron, B. vulgatus, and B. fragilis, which contained unique loci in different patients for synthesis of capsular polysaccharides. The presence of unique Bacteroides capsular polysaccharide loci within different hosts and between the lumen and mucosa may represent adaptations to stimulate, suppress, and evade host-specific immune responses at different microsites of the ileal pouch.Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust; Bay and Paul Foundations; Frank R. Lillie Research Innovation Award; Gastrointestinal Research Foundation of Chicag

Primary mediastinal large B-cell lymphoma in HIV: report of two cases

Primary mediastinal large B cell lymphoma (PMLBCL) is a subtype of diffuse large B cell lymphoma arising in the mediastinum with distinctive clinical and morphological features. Though diffuse large B cell lymphoma is one of the most common non-Hodgkin lymphoma associated with AIDS, there are no data available regarding the association of HIV and PMLBCL. We report here two cases of PMLBCL arising in AIDS patients. In both cases, PMLBCL presented in a setting of low CD4 T-cell count as rapidly enlarging mediastinal mass. The morphologic and immunophenotypic findings are characteristic of PMLBCL. One of the two patients, a 25-year-old woman who had localized disease and evidence of Epstein–Barr virus in lymphoma cells, did not respond to chemotherapy and died of disease progression 5 months after diagnosis. The second patient, a 38-year-old male with disseminated disease, responded to therapy and is disease-free after 9 months of follow-up

A multidrug, antiproteinuric approach to alport syndrome : a ten-year cohort study

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Combined ACE inhibitor, angiotensin-receptor-blocker, non-dihydropyridine calcium-channel-blocker, and statin therapy (Remission Clinic) reduced proteinuria and halted progression in non-diabetic nephropathies, but their efficacy in Alport syndrome (AS) nephropathy is unknown. METHODS: From February 2004 to September 2007, we included nine albuminuric AS adults with creatinine clearance >20 ml/min/1.73 m(2) in a single-center, open-label, prospective, off-on-off academic study. After the 1-month wash-out from RAS inhibition (Run-in), patients entered the 4-month, add-on, treatment period with benazepril (10-20 mg/day), valsartan (80-160 mg/day), diltiazem (60-120 mg/day), and fluvastatin (40-80 mg/day) followed by the 1-month wash-out (Recovery). The primary outcome was albuminuria at month 4. After recovery, patients were kept on the Remission Clinic protocol and followed until July 2014 (Extension). RESULTS: The median (IQR) albuminuria progressively declined from 657.7 (292.7-1,089.6) \u3bcg/min at baseline to 71.4 (21.7-504.9) \u3bcg/min at treatment end (p = 0.009) and raised to 404.3 (167.9-446.8) \u3bcg/min after recovery. Albumin and IgG fractional clearances significantly (p 64 0.005) decreased from 66.9 (53.6-80.8) to 9.4 (4.6-26.0) and from 5.1 (3.0-8.4) to 1.1 (0.6-3.2), and then recovered toward baseline. Blood pressure and lipids significantly decreased on treatment, without changes in inulin-measured GFR or para-aminohippuric-measured RPF. After recovery, one patient refused to enter the extension, one with severe renal insufficiency at baseline reached ESRD, and seven retained normal serum creatinine until the end of the study. At the final visit, three were microalbuminuric and one was normoalbuminuric. Treatment was well tolerated. CONCLUSION: The Remission Clinic approach safely ameliorated albuminuria, blood pressure, lipids, and glomerular selectivity in AS patients and halted long-term progression in those without renal insufficiency to start with