Exploring registered nurses’ attitudes towards postgraduate education in Australia: an overview of literature

Background: Nursing education is designed to prepare competent nurses to meet the current and future health care needs of society. Changes to nursing education, especially at post graduate level, will therefore likely be influenced by the on-going developments in healthcare and socio-economic factors. Objective: The main purpose of this study is to develop and validate an instrument that explores the beliefs of Registered Nurses about Postgraduate education in the context of specialist nursing practice in Australia (specialty education). Methods: The Nurses Attitudes Towards Post Graduate Education (NATPGE) instrument was sent to an expert panel to undertake judgment-quantification (content validity testing). Content Validity Index (CVI) based on expert ratings of relevance was used as a method of quantifying content validity for the NATPGE instrument. A convenience sample of 25 Registered Nurses (RN) was selected from four major Queensland tertiary hospitals to assess the face validity of the instrument. A random sample of 100 RN from the Nurses and Midwives e-Cohort Study (NMeS) were invited to participate in a test-retest pilot as part of the process of assessing the reliability of the online NATPGE. To gauge the test-retest reliability, the instrument was administered at two different time points, 3 weeks apart, under similar conditions. Results: The content and face validity was assessed using descriptive statistics. For the test-retest reliability, the NATPGE instrument were analysed on an item by item basis to calculate the intra rater reliability using the weighted kappa (kw) statistic. The NATPGE instrument attained moderate test-retest reliability. 80% of the items on the instrument reached a fair to moderate agreement between the test and retest. Conclusions: There is a need for development of a robust psychometric instrument to explore Registered Nurses’ Attitudes Towards Post Graduate Education (NATPGE)

Improving resistance of austenitic stainless steel to irradiation damage

It is believed that the addition of oversized solute atoms disturbs the process of recombination, agglomeration, and migration of point defects during irradiation process and thereby alters radiation damage, including radiation induced segregation. In this study, austenitic stainless steel (SS) 316 samples with different Ce content (0.00, 0.01, 0.04 and 0.09 wt% Ce) were irradiated using 4.8 MeV protons at 300°C to the total fluence of 9.724×1017 p/cm2. Irradiated samples were characterized using double-loop electrochemical potentiokinetic reactivation (DL-EPR) technique for the extent of RIS due to proton irradiation. It was found that the sample with 0.04 wt% Ce content showed the lowest EPR value, as measured by DL-EPR. It was also noticed that the slip lines were get preferentially attacked vis-à-vis grain boundaries. SS 316 Ce 0.09 wt% sample did not have any slip-lines and attack during the DL-EPR was confined to grain boundaries and few pitlike structures were noticed during AFM examinations

Redefining genomic privacy: trust and empowerment

Fulfilling the promise of the genetic revolution requires the analysis of large datasets containing information from thousands to millions of participants. However, sharing human genomic data requires protecting subjects from potential harm. Current models rely on de-identification techniques in which privacy versus data utility becomes a zero-sum game. Instead, we propose the use of trust-enabling techniques to create a solution in which researchers and participants both win. To do so we introduce three principles that facilitate trust in genetic research and outline one possible framework built upon those principles. Our hope is that such trust-centric frameworks provide a sustainable solution that reconciles genetic privacy with data sharing and facilitates genetic research

Unravelling the structural complexity of glycolipids with cryogenic infrared spectroscopy

Glycolipids are complex glycoconjugates composed of a glycan headgroup and a lipid moiety. Their modular biosynthesis creates a vast amount of diverse and often isomeric structures, which fulfill highly specific biological functions. To date, no gold-standard analytical technique can provide a comprehensive structural elucidation of complex glycolipids, and insufficient tools for isomer distinction can lead to wrong assignments. Herein we use cryogenic gas-phase infrared spectroscopy to systematically investigate different kinds of isomerism in immunologically relevant glycolipids. We show that all structural features, including isomeric glycan headgroups, anomeric configurations and different lipid moieties, can be unambiguously resolved by diagnostic spectroscopic fingerprints in a narrow spectral range. The results allow for the characterization of isomeric glycolipid mixtures and biological applications

Rapid generation of endogenously driven transcriptional reporters in cells through CRISPR/Cas9

CRISPR/Cas9 technologies have been employed for genome editing to achieve gene knockouts and knock-ins in somatic cells. Similarly, certain endogenous genes have been tagged with fluorescent proteins. Often, the detection of tagged proteins requires high expression and sophisticated tools such as confocal microscopy and flow cytometry. Therefore, a simple, sensitive and robust transcriptional reporter system driven by endogenous promoter for studies into transcriptional regulation is desirable. We report a CRISPR/Cas9-based methodology for rapidly integrating a firefly luciferase gene in somatic cells under the control of endogenous promoter, using the TGFβ-responsive gene PAI-1. Our strategy employed a polycistronic cassette containing a non-fused GFP protein to ensure the detection of transgene delivery and rapid isolation of positive clones. We demonstrate that firefly luciferase cDNA can be efficiently delivered downstream of the promoter of the TGFβ-responsive gene PAI-1. Using chemical and genetic regulators of TGFβ signalling, we show that it mimics the transcriptional regulation of endogenous PAI-1 expression. Our unique approach has the potential to expedite studies on transcription of any gene in the context of its native chromatin landscape in somatic cells, allowing for robust high-throughput chemical and genetic screens

FEASIBILITY STUDIES FOR THE EXTRACTION OF BOTH LHC BEAMS FROM CERN SPS USING A COMMON KICKER

Abstract The CERN Super Proton Synchrotron has to fulfil the demanding intensity specifications for the High Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) era, with a doubling of the presently achieved operational beam intensity. One of the main problems to be addressed is given by impedance-driven beam instabilities. About 40 % of the total measured SPS impedance is due to the kickers, of which the extraction kickers in two of the SPS straight sections are the largest systems. A potential upgrade is explored which would strongly reduce the number of extraction kickers required in the SPS, by performing non-local extraction. In this scenario LHC Beam 1 would be kicked by the extraction kicker in SPS Long Straight Section 4 (LSS4), normally only used for Beam 2, to be extracted in LSS6. The concept and the expected performance of such a scheme are presented along with detailed simulation results

A comparison between Asian and Australasia backpackers using cultural consensus analysis

This study tests the differences in the shared understanding of the backpacker cultural domain between two groups: backpackers from Australasia and backpackers from Asian countries. A total of 256 backpackers responded to a questionnaire administered in Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok and Krabi Province (Thailand). Cultural consensus analysis (CCA) guided the data analysis, to identify the shared values and the differences in the backpacker culture of the two groups. The findings revealed that while the two groups share some of the backpacker cultural values, some other values are distinctively different from one another. The study provides the first empirical evidence of the differences in backpacking culture between the two groups using CCA. Based on the study findings, we propose some marketing and managerial implications

Improvement in the Accuracy of Back Trajectories Using WRF to Identify Pollen Sources in Southern Iberian Peninsula

Airborne pollen transport at micro-, meso-gamma and meso-beta scales must be studied by atmospheric models, having special relevance in complex terrain. In these cases, the accuracy of these models is mainly determined by the spatial resolution of the underlying meteorological dataset. This work examines how meteorological datasets determine the results obtained from atmospheric transport models used to describe pollen transport in the atmosphere. We investigate the effect of the spatial resolution when computing backward trajectories with the HYSPLIT model. We have used meteorological datasets from the WRF model with 27, 9 and 3 km resolutions and from the GDAS files with 1 ° resolution. This work allows characterizing atmospheric transport of Olea pollen in a region with complex flows. The results show that the complex terrain affects the trajectories and this effect varies with the different meteorological datasets. Overall, the change from GDAS to WRF-ARW inputs improves the analyses with the HYSPLIT model, thereby increasing the understanding the pollen episode. The results indicate that a spatial resolution of at least 9 km is needed to simulate atmospheric flows that are considerable affected by the relief of the landscape. The results suggest that the appropriate meteorological files should be considered when atmospheric models are used to characterize the atmospheric transport of pollen on micro-, meso-gamma and meso-beta scales. Furthermore, at these scales, the results are believed to be generally applicable for related areas such as the description of atmospheric transport of radionuclides or in the definition of nuclear-radioactivity emergency preparedness