Bending the Elbow During Shoulder Flexion Facilitates Greater Scapular Upward Rotation and a More Favorable Scapular Muscle Activation Pattern

Context: Decreased scapular upward rotation (UR) and diminished activation of the serratus anterior (SA) and lower trapezius (LT) are often observed among patients with subacromial impingement syndrome. Maintaining the elbow fully flexed during shoulder flexion may limit glenohumeral motion due to passive insufficiency of the triceps brachii and therefore facilitate greater scapular UR and increased scapular muscle activation. Objectives: To compare scapular UR, SA, upper trapezius (UT), middle trapezius, and LT activation levels between shoulder flexion with the elbow extended (Flexion-EE) to shoulder flexion with the elbow fully flexed (Flexion-EF). This study hypothesized that Flexion-EF would result in greater scapular UR, greater SA and LT activation, and a lower UT/SA and UT/LT activation ratio compared with Flexion-EE. Design: Cross-sectional study. Setting: A clinical biomechanics laboratory. Participants: Twenty-two healthy individuals. Main Outcome Measures: Scapular UR and electromyography signal of the SA, UT, middle trapezius, and LT, as well as UT/SA and UT/LT activation ratio were measured during Flexion-EE and Flexion-EF. Results: Flexion-EF resulted in greater scapular UR compared with Flexion-EE (P \u3c .001). Flexion-EF resulted in greater SA activation, lower UT activation, and a lower UT/SA activation ratio compared with Flexion-EE (P \u3c .001). Conclusions: Fully flexing the elbow during shoulder flexion leads to increased scapular UR primarily through greater activation of the SA. This exercise may be of value in circumstances involving diminished scapular UR, decreased activation of the SA, and an overly active UT such as among patients with subacromial impingement syndrome

Public/Private Partnerships: A Trojan Horse for Higher Education?

The version of this article archived here is the author's post-print.Partnering with private industry is presented as a sensible solution to some faculties at institutions of higher education during the current economic downturn. The authors discuss the historic context for increased efficiencies and provide descriptions of how two institutions responded to the prospect of "collaborating" with a corporation. In one case, a partnership forged without faculty consent resulted in dramatic changes in curriculum, class size, course delivery, and instructor authority. In a second case, a proposed partnership, championed by the central administration, was shown to be detrimental to program quality, institutional reputation, and faculty autonomy, and was soundly defeated.Ye

The Social Studies Curriculum in Atlanta Public Schools During the Desegregation Era

This historical investigation explores how teachers, students, and education officials viewed the social studies curriculum in the local context of Atlanta, and the broader state of Georgia, during the post-Civil Rights era, when integration was a court-ordered reality in the public schools. During the desegregation era, Atlanta schools were led by Atlanta Public Schools (APS) Superintendent, Dr. Alonzo Crim. Brought to Atlanta as part of a desegregation compromise, Dr. Crim became APS\u27s first African American superintendent. In particular, the authors investigate how national social studies movements, such as Man: A Course of Study (MACOS), inquiry-based learning, co-curriculum activities, and standards movements, adapted to fit this Southeastern locale, at a time when schools were struggling to desegregate. Local curriculum documents written in the 1970s reveal a traditional social studies curriculum. By the 1980s, APS\u27s social studies curriculum guides broadened to include a stronger focus on an enacted community—inside the classroom and around the world. In oral history interviews, however, former teachers, students, and school officials presented contrasting perspectives of how the social studies curriculum played out in the reality of Atlanta\u27s public schools during the desegregation era

From Ideal to Practice and Back Again: Beginning Teachers Teaching for Social Justice

The five authors of this article designed a multicase study to follow recent graduates of an elementary preservice teacher education program into their beginning teaching placements and explore the ways in which they enacted social justice curricula. The authors highlight the stories of three beginning teachers, honoring the plurality of their conceptions of social justice teaching and the resiliency they exhibited in translating social justice ideals into viable pedagogy. They also discuss the struggles the teachers faced when enacting social justice curricula and the tenuous connection they perceived between their conceptions and their practices. The authors emphasize that such struggles are inevitable and end the article with recommendations for ways in which teacher educators can prepare beginning teachers for the uncertain journey of teaching for social justice

Re-imagining human rights photography: Ariella Azoulays intervention

Gormley and Allan focus on several pertinent theoretical contributions made by Ariella Azoulay that invite a radical rethinking of familiar assumptions regarding human rights photography. Having established a conceptual basis, they proceed to analyse several examples of photojournalists attempting to ‘activate’ viewers by inviting them to co-create photographic narratives via methods of hypertext and online archival interaction, and of International Non Governmental Organisations (INGOs) working to create projects which ‘speak’ to viewers by involving the children they seek to represent in the production of photography. It is argued that in taking up Azoulay’s call to rethink public relationships to human rights imagery, these projects represent progressive steps towards addressing the multifarious inequalities at stake. At the same time, however, realising this potential depends on making good the promise of rendering visible the normative ideals of human rights

Bifidobacteria grown on human milk oligosaccharides downregulate the expression of inflammation-related genes in Caco-2 cells

BACKGROUND: Breastfed human infants are predominantly colonized by bifidobacteria that thrive on human milk oligosaccharides (HMO). Two predominant species of bifidobacteria in infant feces are Bifidobacterium breve (B. breve) and Bifidobacterium longum subsp. infantis (B. infantis), both of which include avid HMO-consumer strains. Our laboratory has previously shown that B. infantis, when grown on HMO, increases adhesion to intestinal cells and increases the expression of the anti-inflammatory cytokine interleukin-10. The purpose of the current study was to investigate the effects of carbon source—glucose, lactose, or HMO—on the ability of B. breve and B. infantis to adhere to and affect the transcription of intestinal epithelial cells on a genome-wide basis. RESULTS: HMO-grown B. infantis had higher percent binding to Caco-2 cell monolayers compared to B. infantis grown on glucose or lactose. B. breve had low adhesive ability regardless of carbon source. Despite differential binding ability, both HMO-grown strains significantly differentially affected the Caco-2 transcriptome compared to their glucose or lactose grown controls. HMO-grown B. breve and B. infantis both downregulated genes in Caco-2 cells associated with chemokine activity. CONCLUSION: The choice of carbon source affects the interaction of bifidobacteria with intestinal epithelial cells. HMO-grown bifidobacteria reduce markers of inflammation, compared to glucose or lactose-grown bifidobacteria. In the future, the design of preventative or therapeutic probiotic supplements may need to include appropriately chosen prebiotics. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12866-015-0508-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users