Research impact evaluation, a wider context: Findings from a research impact pilot

In the face of increasing pressure to demonstrate the socio-economic impact of funded research, whether it is funded directly by research councils or indirectly by governmental research block grants, institutions have to tackle the complexity of understanding, tracking, collecting, and analysing the impact of all their research activities. This paper attempts to encapsulate the wider context of research impact by delineating a broad definition of what might be classified as impact. It also suggests a number of different dimensions that can help in the development of a systematic research impact assessment framework. The paper then proceeds to indicate how boundaries and criteria around the definition of impact and these dimensions can be used to refine the impact assessment framework in order to focus on the objectives of the assessor. A pilot project, run at Brunel University, was used to test the validity of the approach and possible consequences. A tool specifically developed for the pilot, the Brunel Research Impact Device for Evaluation (BRIDE), is used for the analysis of research impact collected during the pilot. The paper reports on the findings of the analysis produced by BRIDE and confirms how a number of areas might be greatly affected by the boundaries set on definition and dimensions of research impact. The pilot project shows that useful information on impacts can be generated and it also provides a way to identify areas of work from each unit of assessment for which it would be worth developing narrative case studies. The pilot project has illustrated that it is feasible to make progress in terms of assessing impact, but that there are many difficulties to be addressed before impact assessment can be incorporated into a system of assessing the impact from the university sector as a whole. The paper concludes with an institutional perspective of the value of the approach and highlights possible applications. It also confirms the intention to expand the pilot and introduce new lines of investigation

Maintaining the safety and quality of beef carcass meat

Contamination of animal carcasses during slaughtering procedures is undesirable, but unavoidable in the conversion of live animals to meat for consumption. Internal muscle tissues are essentially sterile, and most initial contamination of red meat carcasses is contributed by the hide during removal (Elmonssalami and Wassef, 1971; Gill and Penny, 1979; Gill et al., 1976). The exposed surface of the hide and the hair accumulate dust, dirt and faecal material, and this is the primary source of bacterial contamination during slaughter (Ayres, 1955; Shotts et al., 1961). The factors that affect the extent of this contamination are reviewed by Patterson (1969) and Grau et al. (1968). Much of the microflora transferred to the tissue surfaces, while aesthetically undesirable, is nonpathogenic; however, pathogens such as Salmonella, Campylobacter and pathogenic Escherichia coli can be present

Inclusive by design: transformative services and sport-event accessibility

© 2016 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This paper examines the service dimensions required to be inclusive of people with access needs within a major-sport event context. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities seeks to counter disability discrimination and enable citizenship rights of people with disabilities, including access to goods and services, across all dimensions of social participation including major-sport events (e.g. Olympic and Paralympic Games, world cups in football, cricket and rugby union). Providing for people with disability and access needs is also an emerging tourism focus with initiatives addressing accessible tourism included in the World Tourism Organizations mission and recent strategic destination plans. To enhance the understanding of service delivery for an accessible tourism market in a major-sport event context, a case study of the Vancouver Fan Zone for the FIFA Womens World Cup Canada, 2015 TM is analyzed through the lens of transformative services. From this analysis future research directions are identified to benefit those with access needs who wish to participate in major-sport events

Integral closure of rings of integer-valued polynomials on algebras

Let $D$ be an integrally closed domain with quotient field $K$. Let $A$ be a torsion-free $D$-algebra that is finitely generated as a $D$-module. For every $a$ in $A$ we consider its minimal polynomial $\mu_a(X)\in D[X]$, i.e. the monic polynomial of least degree such that $\mu_a(a)=0$. The ring ${\rm Int}_K(A)$ consists of polynomials in $K[X]$ that send elements of $A$ back to $A$ under evaluation. If $D$ has finite residue rings, we show that the integral closure of ${\rm Int}_K(A)$ is the ring of polynomials in $K[X]$ which map the roots in an algebraic closure of $K$ of all the $\mu_a(X)$, $a\in A$, into elements that are integral over $D$. The result is obtained by identifying $A$ with a $D$-subalgebra of the matrix algebra $M_n(K)$ for some $n$ and then considering polynomials which map a matrix to a matrix integral over $D$. We also obtain information about polynomially dense subsets of these rings of polynomials.Comment: Keywords: Integer-valued polynomial, matrix, triangular matrix, integral closure, pullback, polynomially dense set. accepted for publication in the volume "Commutative rings, integer-valued polynomials and polynomial functions", M. Fontana, S. Frisch and S. Glaz (editors), Springer 201

Nets, relations and linking diagrams

In recent work, the author and others have studied compositional algebras of Petri nets. Here we consider mathematical aspects of the pure linking algebras that underly them. We characterise composition of nets without places as the composition of spans over appropriate categories of relations, and study the underlying algebraic structures.Comment: 15 pages, Proceedings of 5th Conference on Algebra and Coalgebra in Computer Science (CALCO), Warsaw, Poland, 3-6 September 201

Multiple roles for FGF-3 during cranial nerve development in the chicken

FGF-3 has been implicated in the development of the hindbrain and otocyst in vertebrate embryos. Since the chicken embryo offers a favourable system in which to study the development of these structures, we have isolated and characterised cDNAs for chicken Fgf-3 and determined its pattern of expression in chick embryos from stage 3 (primitive streak) to stage 25 (early organogenesis). Within the developing cranial neural tube, Fgf-3 exhibits dynamic spatial and temporal expression. During extension of the head process, RNA is detected in the midline of the developing neural plate. In neurulating embryos, transcripts are observed initially in rhombomeres 4 and 5 of the hindbrain and later, in rhombomere 6. During hindbrain development, expression is lost from these rhombomeres, but becomes restricted to rhombomere boundaries, providing an intracellular marker which distinguishes a population of cells within boundary regions. Fgf-3 expression is elevated in ventral and medial boundary regions and is greatly reduced in dorsal parts. Studies of regenerating rhombomere boundaries show that Fgf-3 expression is induced in reforming boundaries when even-numbered rhombomere tissue is grafted next to odd, but not when like is juxtaposed to like. Fgf-3 disappears from boundary regions just prior to the loss of the morphological boundaries suggesting a boundary-associated function. Other sites of expression have also been identified. At early stages of development Fgf-3 is expressed in the epiblast and mesendoderm of the primitive streak, in mesoderm lateral to the streak and in Hensen's node. In older embryos transcripts are detected in the endoderm of the pharyngeal pouches, the ectoderm of the second and third pharyngeal arches and the stomodeum. Expression was also detected in the segmental plate and in the posterior half of the three most-recently generated somites

Mixed-mode oscillations and interspike interval statistics in the stochastic FitzHugh-Nagumo model

We study the stochastic FitzHugh-Nagumo equations, modelling the dynamics of neuronal action potentials, in parameter regimes characterised by mixed-mode oscillations. The interspike time interval is related to the random number of small-amplitude oscillations separating consecutive spikes. We prove that this number has an asymptotically geometric distribution, whose parameter is related to the principal eigenvalue of a substochastic Markov chain. We provide rigorous bounds on this eigenvalue in the small-noise regime, and derive an approximation of its dependence on the system's parameters for a large range of noise intensities. This yields a precise description of the probability distribution of observed mixed-mode patterns and interspike intervals.Comment: 36 page