Becoming information centric: The emergence of new cognitive infrastructures in education policy

New cognitive infrastructures are emerging as digital platforms and artificial intelligence enable new forms of automated thinking that shape human decision-making. This paper (a) offers a new theoretical perspective on automated thinking in education policy and (b) illustrates how automated thinking is emerging in one specific policy context. We report on a case study of a policy analysis unit (‘The Centre’) in an Australian state education department that has been implementing a BI strategy since 2013. The Centre is now focused on using BI to support complex decision making and improve learning outcomes, and their strategy describes this focus as becoming ‘information centric’.The theoretical framework for our analysis draws on infrastructure studies and philosophy of technology, particularly Luciana Parisi’s recent work on automated thinking. We analyse technical documentation and semi-structured interview data to describe the enactment of a BI strategy in The Centre, with a focus on how new approaches to data analytics are shaping decision-making. Our analysis shows that The Centre is developing a cognitive infrastructure that is already creating new conditions for education policy making, and we conclude with a call for research designs that enable pragmatic exploration of what these infrastructures can do

Analysis by siRNA_profile program displays novel thermodynamic characteristics of highly functional siRNA molecules

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Objective</p> <p>Here we report the improved results of a new siRNA design program and analysis tool called <b><it>siRNA_profile </it></b>that reveals an additional criterion for bioinformatic search of highly functional siRNA sequences.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We retrospectively analysed over 2400 siRNA sequences from 34 genes and with known efficacies to categorize factors that differentiate highly, moderately and non-functional siRNA sequences in more detail. We tested the biological relevance of <b><it>siRNA_profile </it></b>in CHO cells stably expressing human TRACP.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The highly functional siRNA molecules exhibited lower overall stabilities than non-functional siRNAs after taking into consideration all the nucleotides from 5'-terminus to the 3'-terminus along the siRNA molecule, in addition to the 5'-section of the antisense strand and the region between 9–14 nucleotides as previously has been acknowledged. Comparison of the <b><it>siRNA_profile </it></b>program to five other programs resulted in a wide range of selected siRNA sequences with diverse gene silencing capacities, even when the target was only 197 nucleotides long. Six siRNA design programs selected 24 different siRNA sequences, and only 6 of them were selected by two or more programs. The other 18 sequences were individually selected by these six programs.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Low general stability of dsRNA plays a significant role in the RNAi pathway and is a recommended criterion to consider, in addition to 5'-instability, internal instability, nucleotide preferences and target mRNA position, when designing highly efficient siRNAs.</p

Anticipating education: governing habits, memories and policy-futures

The use of data to govern education is increasingly supported by the use of knowledge-based technologies, including algorithms, artificial intelligence (AI), and tracking technologies (Fenwick, et al., 2014). New forms of datafication and automation enable governments and other powerful stakeholders to draw from the past to construct images of educational futures in order to steer the present (Hartong, 2019). This paper examines the competing conceptions of time and temporality that AI posits for policy and practice when used to anticipate educational futures. We argue that most educational futures are already delineated, and machinic expressions of time are the chronologies, habits, and memories that the educated subject inhabits rather than produces. If resetting educational habits and memories can be an alternative to algorithmic anticipations of education then we believe, paradoxically, that machines may help to reset them by accelerating them

Automated Essay Scoring in Australian Schools: Key Issues and Recommendations White Paper

This white paper outlines critical issues associated with the use of Automated Essay Scoring (AES) technology in the Australian education system. The key insights presented in this paper emerged from a collaborative, multi-stakeholder workshop held in July 2022 that explored an automated essay-scoring trial and generated future possibilities aligned with participant interests and expertise. Drawing on the workshop and our expert understanding of the wider landscape, we propose recommendations that can be adopted by various stakeholders, schools, and educational systems

Automated Essay Scoring in Australian Schools: Collective Policymaking - Policy Brief

This policy brief outlines critical issues associated with policy and the use of Automated Essay Scoring (AES) technology in the Australian education system. The brief outlines recommends multi-scalar policy development informed by educators, policymakers, and representatives from educational technology companies engaging in cooperative learning and action

Towards an ecology of participation: Process philosophy and co-creation of higher education curricula

This article brings together the authors' previous work on co-created curricula (Bovill et al., 2011; Bovill, 2013a; Bovill, 2014) and on partnership and ethics (Taylor and Robinson, 2014; Taylor, 2015), to develop the concept of co-created curricula as an ecology of participation. In doing so, it deploys Alfred North Whitehead’s process philosophy to formulate a new way of considering co-creation in the curriculum and co-creation of the curriculum in higher education. Two empirical examples are used to illuminate what such an approach offers. From this, we outline three dimensions of an ecology of participation: a process of becoming which recasts subjectivity; acting well in relation which enacts concern; and an orientation to harmony in which difference in equality is valued. The contribution of the article is twofold: first, the concept of an ecology of participation takes forward current thinking on higher education curricula and partnership ethics; second, its use of process philosophy provides a new lens to consider co-creation in the curriculum and co-creation of the curriculum

Emerging data infrastructures and the new topologies of education policy

© The Author(s) 2018. This paper examines how datafication is creating new topologies of education policy. Specifically, we analyse how the creation of data infrastructures that enable the generation, communication and representation of digital data are changing relations of power, including both centralised and dispersed forms, and space in education. The paper uses conceptual resources from cultural topology and infrastructure studies to provide a framework for analysing spatial relations between educational data, discourses, policies and practices in new governance configurations. The paper outlines a case study of an emergent data infrastructure in Australian schooling, the National Schools Interoperability Program, to provide empirical evidence of the movement, connection and enactment of digital data across policy spaces. Key aspects of this case include the ways that data infrastructure is: (i) enabling new private and public connections across policy topologies; (ii) creating a new role for technical standards in education policy and (iii) changing the topological spaces of education governance

A monoclonal antibody raised against bacterially expressed MPV17 sequences shows peroxisomal, endosomal and lysosomal localisation in U2OS cells

Recessive mutations in the MPV17 gene cause mitochondrial DNA depletion syndrome, a fatal infantile genetic liver disease in humans. Loss of function in mice leads to glomerulosclerosis and sensineural deafness accompanied with mitochondrial DNA depletion. Mutations in the yeast homolog Sym1, and in the zebra fish homolog tra cause interesting, but not obviously related phenotypes, although the human gene can complement the yeast Sym1 mutation. The MPV17 protein is a hydrophobic membrane protein of 176 amino acids and unknown function. Initially localised in murine peroxisomes, it was later reported to be a mitochondrial inner membrane protein in humans and in yeast. To resolve this contradiction we tested two new mouse monoclonal antibodies directed against the human MPV17 protein in Western blots and immunohistochemistry on human U2OS cells. One of these monoclonal antibodies showed specific reactivity to a protein of 20 kD absent in MPV17 negative mouse cells. Immunofluorescence studies revealed colocalisation with peroxisomal, endosomal and lysosomal markers, but not with mitochondria. This data reveal a novel connection between a possible peroxisomal/endosomal/lysosomal function and mitochondrial DNA depletion

ИССЛЕДОВАНИЕ ДИНАМИКИ ТЕРРИТОРИАЛЬНОГО РАСПРОСТРАНЕНИЯ И ЭКОЛОГИИ РЕДКИХ МЛЕКОПИТАЮЩИХ ТАЕЖНОЙ ЕВРАЗИИ (НА ПРИМЕРЕ ЛЕТЯГИ PTEROMYS VOLANS, RODENTIA, PTEROMYIDAE) in English INVESTIGATION OF THE DYNAMICS OF REGIONAL DISTRIBUTION AND ECOLOGY OF RARE MAMMALS TAIGA EURASIA (FOR EXAMPLE Letyago PTEROMYS VOLANS, RODENTIA, PTEROMYIDAE)

This study of the spatial distribution and ecology of the flying squirrel during the turn of the 20th century provides a description of new methods and techniques for detecting and accounting flying squirrels in the forest zone of Eurasia. The flying squirrel population area covers the territory of 61 regions of Russia, including Kamchatsky Krai and Chukotka Autonomous District. The number of flying squirrels in Karelia especially to the east – in the Arkhangelsk region and Western Siberia – significantly exceeds that of Finland, but considerable spatial variability in the number is obvious through all the regions: there are areas where this animal is quite abundant, or inhabits all the territory rather evenly, and there are areas where it is completely absent in vast territories even with seemingly favourable conditions. The flying squirrel is quite difficult to study and the reasons of its absence in obviously favourable areas are still to be explained. Some reasons are: the specificity of favourable landscape, forest coverage pattern, trophic relationships with predators and genetic aspect. A number of hypotheses are supposed to be tested in the nearest future. Key words: accounting, flying squirrel, forest zone, home range, spatial distribution.Peer reviewe

Channel-Forming Activities in the Glycosomal Fraction from the Bloodstream Form of Trypanosoma brucei

Background: Glycosomes are a specialized form of peroxisomes (microbodies) present in unicellular eukaryotes that belong to the Kinetoplastea order, such as Trypanosoma and Leishmania species, parasitic protists causing severe diseases of livestock and humans in subtropical and tropical countries. The organelles harbour most enzymes of the glycolytic pathway that is responsible for substrate-level ATP production in the cell. Glycolysis is essential for bloodstream-form Trypanosoma brucei and enzymes comprising this pathway have been validated as drug targets. Glycosomes are surrounded by a single membrane. How glycolytic metabolites are transported across the glycosomal membrane is unclear. Methods/Principal Findings: We hypothesized that glycosomal membrane, similarly to membranes of yeast and mammalian peroxisomes, contains channel-forming proteins involved in the selective transfer of metabolites. To verify this prediction, we isolated a glycosomal fraction from bloodstream-form T.brucei and reconstituted solubilized membrane proteins into planar lipid bilayers. The electrophysiological characteristics of the channels were studied using multiple channel recording and single channel analysis. Three main channel-forming activities were detected with current amplitudes 70–80 pA, 20–25 pA, and 8–11 pA, respectively (holding potential +10 mV and 3.0 M KCl as an electrolyte). All channels were in fully open state in a range of voltages 6150 mV and showed no sub-conductance transitions. The channel with current amplitude 20–25 pA is anion-selective (P K+/P Cl2,0.31), while the other two types of channels are slightl