17 research outputs found

    Existing Guidelines and Certificates for Culturally Sensitive Tourism in Canada

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    Targeting DNA Damage Response and Replication Stress in Pancreatic Cancer

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    Background and aims: Continuing recalcitrance to therapy cements pancreatic cancer (PC) as the most lethal malignancy, which is set to become the second leading cause of cancer death in our society. The study aim was to investigate the association between DNA damage response (DDR), replication stress and novel therapeutic response in PC to develop a biomarker driven therapeutic strategy targeting DDR and replication stress in PC. Methods: We interrogated the transcriptome, genome, proteome and functional characteristics of 61 novel PC patient-derived cell lines to define novel therapeutic strategies targeting DDR and replication stress. Validation was done in patient derived xenografts and human PC organoids. Results: Patient-derived cell lines faithfully recapitulate the epithelial component of pancreatic tumors including previously described molecular subtypes. Biomarkers of DDR deficiency, including a novel signature of homologous recombination deficiency, co-segregates with response to platinum (P < 0.001) and PARP inhibitor therapy (P < 0.001) in vitro and in vivo. We generated a novel signature of replication stress with which predicts response to ATR (P < 0.018) and WEE1 inhibitor (P < 0.029) treatment in both cell lines and human PC organoids. Replication stress was enriched in the squamous subtype of PC (P < 0.001) but not associated with DDR deficiency. Conclusions: Replication stress and DDR deficiency are independent of each other, creating opportunities for therapy in DDR proficient PC, and post-platinum therapy

    Effects of Anacetrapib in Patients with Atherosclerotic Vascular Disease

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    BACKGROUND: Patients with atherosclerotic vascular disease remain at high risk for cardiovascular events despite effective statin-based treatment of low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels. The inhibition of cholesteryl ester transfer protein (CETP) by anacetrapib reduces LDL cholesterol levels and increases high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol levels. However, trials of other CETP inhibitors have shown neutral or adverse effects on cardiovascular outcomes. METHODS: We conducted a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial involving 30,449 adults with atherosclerotic vascular disease who were receiving intensive atorvastatin therapy and who had a mean LDL cholesterol level of 61 mg per deciliter (1.58 mmol per liter), a mean non-HDL cholesterol level of 92 mg per deciliter (2.38 mmol per liter), and a mean HDL cholesterol level of 40 mg per deciliter (1.03 mmol per liter). The patients were assigned to receive either 100 mg of anacetrapib once daily (15,225 patients) or matching placebo (15,224 patients). The primary outcome was the first major coronary event, a composite of coronary death, myocardial infarction, or coronary revascularization. RESULTS: During the median follow-up period of 4.1 years, the primary outcome occurred in significantly fewer patients in the anacetrapib group than in the placebo group (1640 of 15,225 patients [10.8%] vs. 1803 of 15,224 patients [11.8%]; rate ratio, 0.91; 95% confidence interval, 0.85 to 0.97; P=0.004). The relative difference in risk was similar across multiple prespecified subgroups. At the trial midpoint, the mean level of HDL cholesterol was higher by 43 mg per deciliter (1.12 mmol per liter) in the anacetrapib group than in the placebo group (a relative difference of 104%), and the mean level of non-HDL cholesterol was lower by 17 mg per deciliter (0.44 mmol per liter), a relative difference of -18%. There were no significant between-group differences in the risk of death, cancer, or other serious adverse events. CONCLUSIONS: Among patients with atherosclerotic vascular disease who were receiving intensive statin therapy, the use of anacetrapib resulted in a lower incidence of major coronary events than the use of placebo. (Funded by Merck and others; Current Controlled Trials number, ISRCTN48678192 ; ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT01252953 ; and EudraCT number, 2010-023467-18 .)

    The nature experiences of wilderness recreation leaders : throwing a stone

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    Through this descriptive exploratory study, the ways that wilderness recreation leaders experience nature are illuminated, deconstructing the assumed environmental benefits of and practices used in outdoor recreation (Haluza-Delay, 2001). This study also offers a foundation for advancing an environmental ethic among wilderness recreation leaders, participants, and organizations. With the continued degradation of and threats to natural environments, and the rising popularity of outdoor recreation participation, the outdoor recreation professional can be a leader in promoting human reconnections to the Earth (Henderson, 1999). Leaders of outdoor recreation experiences play an important role in encouraging these revived relationships to natural settings and can contribute to the necessary environmental consciousness shift needed within Western society (Hanna, 1995; Jordan, 1996). The purpose of this research was to describe the lived-experience in nature of wilderness recreation leaders. Specifically, a phenomenological method of inquiry was used to describe the meaning of nature, the connections and relationships to nature, and the behaviours and emotions experienced in nature by a group of wilderness canoe trip leaders employed by a residential summer camp. In addition to the implications of this research, achieving this outcome provides a rich descriptive understanding of wilderness leaders' experiences—a basis from which to extend future research endeavours and programmatic practices that promote effective environmental outcomes of outdoor recreation participation. Each of the five study participants was employed in the summer of 2003 by an Ontario residential summer camp organization that sponsors extended wilderness river canoe trips for youth. Two in-depth and semi-structured interviews were performed with each participant, asking them to reflect on the canoe trip that they led for the summer camp organization during 2003. Phenomenological data was analyzed according to Colaizzi's (1978) thematic analysis process. Consistent with van Manen's (1997) emphasis on phenomenological writing, the final result presents the essence of the nature experiences of wilderness recreation leaders in the format of a narrative description. This narrative piece is the culmination of this research effort. Throughout the journey, however, various foundations within the outdoor recreation field, such as minimum impact principles, environmentally responsible behaviours, anthropocentric and ecocentric worldviews, and effective leadership are deconstructed and discussed

    Inquiring with Hospitable Methodologies

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    In ‘Inquiring with hospitable methodologies,’ Emily Höckert and Bryan Grimwood engage with postcolonial philosophies of hospitality that approach ethical subjectivity as openness to alterity and ‘the other.’ Following especially in the footsteps of Emmanuel Levinas and Jacques Derrida, the chapter explores what research would be or become, and what research would do, if oriented around the metaphor of hospitality. Through slow thinking with proximate relations and the exchange of letters and postcards, they reflect the different ways hosts and guests—both human and non-human—make space for otherness and negotiate the conditions of hospitality in different kinds of homes. The chapter serves as an invitation to engage in proximate relations with other-oriented ethics of generosity and preparedness to be unprepared.In ‘Inquiring with hospitable methodologies,’ Emily Höckert and Bryan Grimwood engage with postcolonial philosophies of hospitality that approach ethical subjectivity as openness to alterity and ‘the other.’ Following especially in the footsteps of Emmanuel Levinas and Jacques Derrida, the chapter explores what research would be or become, and what research would do, if oriented around the metaphor of hospitality. Through slow thinking with proximate relations and the exchange of letters and postcards, they reflect the different ways hosts and guests—both human and non-human—make space for otherness and negotiate the conditions of hospitality in different kinds of homes. The chapter serves as an invitation to engage in proximate relations with other-oriented ethics of generosity and preparedness to be unprepared

    Engaged acclimatization: Towards responsible community-based participatory research in Nunavut

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    In this article, we consider the formation of responsible research relationships with Inuit communities from an "outsider" researcher perspective. Cautious not to prescribe what counts as responsible, we draw on research experiences in several Nunavut communities to introduce and explain "engaged acclimatization." This neologism refers to embodied and relational methodological processes for fostering responsible research partnerships, and is inspired by the significance of preliminary fieldwork in orienting the lead author's doctoral thesis. As a complement to community-based participatory methodologies, engaged acclimatization facilitates endogenous research by enacting ethics as a lived experience, initiating and nurturing relationships as a central component of research, and centring methods on circumstances within participating communities. After we locate engaged acclimatization within resonant literature and details of interrelated research projects, our article sketches out four aspects of engaged acclimatization: crafting relations, learning, immersion, and activism. In our discussion of each, we integrate specific insight

    Staying Proximate

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    The introductory chapter ‘Staying proximate’ welcomes the reader to stay with more-than-human relations in present times of ecological crisis, known as the age of the Anthropocene. The chapter joins feminist, postcolonial, and Indigenous environmental scholars’ call for more nuanced alternatives to the Anthropocenic imaginary, ones that attend to the multiplicity, difference, and uneven distribution of more-than-human responsibilities, vulnerabilities, and sufferings in the world. We seek alternatives to the distancing, generalising, and even apocalyptic imaginaries of the Anthropocene by engaging with mundane beings, relations, and places in the north. By gathering around uncomfortable concerns, we develop modes of proximity as affirmative entry points underlining the commitment to stay with the trouble in caring, sensitive, and thoughtful ways. We suggest openness, affinity, engagement, irritation, middleness, and scopic modes of attuning to and engaging with more-than-human worlds. It is these modes of attuning to our proximate relations that provide a radical standpoint of proximity that intensifies, enriches, and complicates our research inquiries in such times of all-encompassing ecological turmoil.The introductory chapter ‘Staying proximate’ welcomes the reader to stay with more-than-human relations in present times of ecological crisis, known as the age of the Anthropocene. The chapter joins feminist, postcolonial, and Indigenous environmental scholars’ call for more nuanced alternatives to the Anthropocenic imaginary, ones that attend to the multiplicity, difference, and uneven distribution of more-than-human responsibilities, vulnerabilities, and sufferings in the world. We seek alternatives to the distancing, generalising, and even apocalyptic imaginaries of the Anthropocene by engaging with mundane beings, relations, and places in the north. By gathering around uncomfortable concerns, we develop modes of proximity as affirmative entry points underlining the commitment to stay with the trouble in caring, sensitive, and thoughtful ways. We suggest openness, affinity, engagement, irritation, middleness, and scopic modes of attuning to and engaging with more-than-human worlds. It is these modes of attuning to our proximate relations that provide a radical standpoint of proximity that intensifies, enriches, and complicates our research inquiries in such times of all-encompassing ecological turmoil
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