The Virtual Extension Annual Conference: Addressing Contemporary Professional Development Needs

Extension systems are experimenting with new models for conducting professional development to enhance staff competence and other returns on professional development investments. The ISUEO virtual annual conference provides a successful flipped classroom model of asynchronous and synchronous learning events for conducting an Extension annual conference. The lessons learned and emerging promising practices from our experiment will help Extension systems better meet the professional development needs of today\u27s Extension workers by providing new learning models and technology they can incorporate into their practice

Design and characterization of terahertz CORPS beam forming networks

This work reviews the design and applicability of beam-forming networks based on Coherently Radiating Periodic Structures (CORPS-BFN) at Terahertz (THz) frequency bands. These versatile networks offer two operation modes: a continuous beam steering – feeding an antenna array with a linearly progressive phase distribution – using a reduced number of phase controls; or a multi-beam operation, generating independent, overlapped beams. These networks are built upon the concatenation of power combiners/dividers (PCDs) with isolated outputs. The isolation is provided by monolithically integrated resistors, implemented with Ti/TiO thin films for the first time. In this work, a planar prototype of a (inputs/outputs) microstrip CORPS-BFN for operation in the WR3.4/WM-864 band (220–330 GHz) on a thin 50 m Indium Phosphide (InP) substrate is designed, fabricated, and characterized. The measured S-parameters show a reflection coefficient better than -15 dB and an insertion loss between 1.6 and 3.2 dB in the whole band. In addition, an isolation better than 20 dB between the input ports has been measured. An overall remarkable agreement is observed between the measurements and the simulations. Last, the applications, scalability and efficiency of this type of networks at the targeted band are discussed in detail.This research was funded partially by the FPU Program from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation, grant No. FPU18/00013, and project PID2019-109984RB-C43 (FRONT-MiliRAD); by the Deutsche Forschungs-Gemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under Project 287022738-CRC/TRR 196 MARIE (Projects C02, C05, C06, C07 and S03); by BMBF (smartBeam, 6GEM grant No. EFRE-0400215, grant No.16KISK017 and grant No.16KISK039) and by the NRW/EFRE Terahertz-Integrationszentrum (Open6GHub and THz.NRW). Open Access funding provided by Universidad Pública de Navarra

Prospectus, October 19, 1983

OLDEST PARKLAND GRADUATE REPAYS LOAN; News Digest; Sociologist Stelle changes to archeology; Students fave meal; Donors for Tonia; Financial aid for students; \u27Gold Company\u27 needs basses; PC Happenings; LaRocque quote; Celebrate arts; Stugo forum; Hours increase; New Procedure; Director of Security Davis enjoys his work; Zamary is hard worker; Counseling acts as an advocate; Placement for future; U.S. Marines should be in America: Question: Should U.S. Marines be left in Lebanon?; Richardson teaches dance; Auto shop provides variety of services; Deathtrap finishes Saturday; Lack of teachers--; Parade grand champs--Newton; Highlights of the Illini marching band festival; C.A.A.R. president Soloff explains purpose of club; Can we delay the aging process?; State Police release figures; Classified; Sean Connery returns as 007; Speculation on murder; Album is an empty blank; Movie shows friendship; Brainstorm is a stunning movie; Campus Paperback Bestsellers; New & Recommended; Moore makes romance a comedy; Rockin\u27 the house; WILL has class for fall season; Fast Freddy Contest; Volleyball star ponders future; Results Of October 8 Matches; I.M. News...volleyball; Interested?https://spark.parkland.edu/prospectus_1983/1008/thumbnail.jp

Staged storage and magma convection at Ambrym Volcano, Vanuatu

New mineral-melt thermobarometry and mineral chemistry data are presented for basaltic scoriae erupted from the Mbwelesu crater of Ambrym volcano, Vanuatu, during persistent lava lake activity in 2005 and 2007. These data reveal crystallisation conditions and enable the first detailed attempt at reconstruction of the central magma plumbing system of Ambrym volcano. Pressures and temperatures of magma crystallisation at Ambrym are poorly constrained. This study focuses on characterising the magma conditions underlying the quasipermanent lava lakes at the basaltic central vents, and examines petrological evidence for magma circulation. Mineral-melt equilibria for clinopyroxene, olivine and plagioclase allow estimation of pressures and temperatures of crystallisation, and reveal two major regions of crystallisation, at 24–29 km and 11–18 km depth, in agreement with indications from earthquake data of crustal storage levels at c.25–29 km and 12–21 km depth. Temperature estimates are ~1150–1170 ºC for the deeper region, and ~1110 1140 ºC in the midcrustal region, with lower temperatures of ~1090–1100 ºC for late-stage crystallisation. More primitive plagioclase antecrysts are thought to sample a slightly more mafic melt at sub-Moho depths. Resorption textures combined with effectively constant mafic mineral compositions suggest phenocryst convection in a storage region of consistent magma composition. In addition, basalt erupted at Ambrym has predominantly maintained a constant composition throughout the volcanic succession. This, coupled with recurrent periods of elevated central vent activity on the scale of months, suggest frequent magmatic recharge via steady-state melt generation at Ambrym

ART Suppresses Plasma HIV-1 RNA to a Stable Set Point Predicted by Pretherapy Viremia

Current antiretroviral therapy is effective in suppressing but not eliminating HIV-1 infection. Understanding the source of viral persistence is essential for developing strategies to eradicate HIV-1 infection. We therefore investigated the level of plasma HIV-1 RNA in patients with viremia suppressed to less than 50–75 copies/ml on standard protease inhibitor- or non-nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor-containing antiretroviral therapy using a new, real-time PCR-based assay for HIV-1 RNA with a limit of detection of one copy of HIV-1 RNA. Single copy assay results revealed that >80% of patients on initial antiretroviral therapy for 60 wk had persistent viremia of one copy/ml or more with an overall median of 3.1 copies/ml. The level of viremia correlated with pretherapy plasma HIV-1 RNA but not with the specific treatment regimen. Longitudinal studies revealed no significant decline in the level of viremia between 60 and 110 wk of suppressive antiretroviral therapy. These data suggest that the persistent viremia on current antiretroviral therapy is derived, at least in part, from long-lived cells that are infected prior to initiation of therapy

Discourse and religion in educational practice

Despite the existence of long-held binaries between secular and sacred, private and public spaces, school and religious literacies in many contemporary societies, the significance of religion and its relationship to education and society more broadly has become increasingly topical. Yet, it is only recently that the investigation of the nexus of discourse and religion in educational practice has started to receive some scholarly attention. In this chapter, religion is understood as a cultural practice, historically situated and embedded in specific local and global contexts. This view of religion stresses the social alongside the subjective or experiential dimensions. It explores how through active participation and apprenticeship in culturally appropriate practices and behaviors often mediated intergenerationally and the mobilisation of linguistic and other semiotic resources but also affective, social and material resources, membership in religious communities is constructed and affirmed. The chapter reviews research strands that have explored different aspects of discourse and religion in educational practice as a growing interdisciplinary field. Research strands have examined the place and purpose of religion in general and evangelical Christianity in particular in English Language Teaching (ELT) programmes and the interplay of religion and teaching and learning in a wide range of religious and increasingly secular educational contexts. They provide useful insights for scholars of discourse studies to issues of identity, socialisation, pedagogy and language policy

A next-generation sequencing method for overcoming the multiple gene copy problem in polyploid phylogenetics, applied to Poa grasses

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Polyploidy is important from a phylogenetic perspective because of its immense past impact on evolution and its potential future impact on diversification, survival and adaptation, especially in plants. Molecular population genetics studies of polyploid organisms have been difficult because of problems in sequencing multiple-copy nuclear genes using Sanger sequencing. This paper describes a method for sequencing a barcoded mixture of targeted gene regions using next-generation sequencing methods to overcome these problems.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Using 64 3-bp barcodes, we successfully sequenced three chloroplast and two nuclear gene regions (each of which contained two gene copies with up to two alleles per individual) in a total of 60 individuals across 11 species of Australian <it>Poa </it>grasses. This method had high replicability, a low sequencing error rate (after appropriate quality control) and a low rate of missing data. Eighty-eight percent of the 320 gene/individual combinations produced sequence reads, and >80% of individuals produced sufficient reads to detect all four possible nuclear alleles of the homeologous nuclear loci with 95% probability.</p> <p>We applied this method to a group of sympatric Australian alpine <it>Poa </it>species, which we discovered to share an allopolyploid ancestor with a group of American <it>Poa </it>species. All markers revealed extensive allele sharing among the Australian species and so we recommend that the current taxonomy be re-examined. We also detected hypermutation in the <it>trn</it>H-<it>psb</it>A marker, suggesting it should not be used as a land plant barcode region. Some markers indicated differentiation between Tasmanian and mainland samples. Significant positive spatial genetic structure was detected at <100 km with chloroplast but not nuclear markers, which may be a result of restricted seed flow and long-distance pollen flow in this wind-pollinated group.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Our results demonstrate that 454 sequencing of barcoded amplicon mixtures can be used to reliably sample all alleles of homeologous loci in polyploid species and successfully investigate phylogenetic relationships among species, as well as to investigate phylogeographic hypotheses. This next-generation sequencing method is more affordable than and at least as reliable as bacterial cloning. It could be applied to any experiment involving sequencing of amplicon mixtures.</p

The Ccr4-Not Complex Interacts with the mRNA Export Machinery

The Ccr4-Not complex is a key eukaryotic regulator of gene transcription and cytoplasmic mRNA degradation. Whether this complex also affects aspects of post-transcriptional gene regulation, such as mRNA export, remains largely unexplored. Human Caf1 (hCaf1), a Ccr4-Not complex member, interacts with and regulates the arginine methyltransferase PRMT1, whose targets include RNA binding proteins involved in mRNA export. However, the functional significance of this regulation is poorly understood.Here we demonstrate using co-immunoprecipitation approaches that Ccr4-Not subunits interact with Hmt1, the budding yeast ortholog of PRMT1. Furthermore, using genetic and biochemical approaches, we demonstrate that Ccr4-Not physically and functionally interacts with the heterogenous nuclear ribonucleoproteins (hnRNPs) Nab2 and Hrp1, and that the physical association depends on Hmt1 methyltransferase activity. Using mass spectrometry, co-immunoprecipitation and genetic approaches, we also uncover physical and functional interactions between Ccr4-Not subunits and components of the nuclear pore complex (NPC) and we provide evidence that these interactions impact mRNA export.Taken together, our findings suggest that Ccr4-Not has previously unrealized functional connections to the mRNA processing/export pathway that are likely important for its role in gene expression. These results shed further insight into the biological functions of Ccr4-Not and suggest that this complex is involved in all aspects of mRNA biogenesis, from the regulation of transcription to mRNA export and turnover

The Pleistocene cinder cones surrounding Volcán Colima, Mexico re-visited: eruption ages and volumes, oxidation states, and sulfur content

Located at the volcanic front in the western Mexican arc, in the Colima Rift, is the active Volcán Colima, which lies on the southern end of the massive (∼450 km 3 ) Colima-Nevado volcanic complex. Along the margins of this andesitic volcanic complex, is a group of 11 scoria cones and associated lavas, which have been dated by the 40 Ar/ 39 Ar method. Nine scoria cones erupted ∼1.3 km 3 of alkaline magma (basanite, leucite-basanite, minette) between 450 and 60 ka, with >99% between 240 and 60 ka. Two additional cones (both the oldest and calc-alkaline) erupted <0.003 km 3 of basalt (0.5 Ma) and <0.003 km 3 of basaltic andesite (1.2 Ma), respectively. Cone and lava volumes were estimated with the aid of digital elevation models (DEMs). The eruption rate for these scoria cones and their associated lavas over the last 1.2 Myr is ∼1.2 km 3 /Myr, which is more than 400 times smaller than that from the andesitic Colima-Nevado edifice. In addition to these alkaline Colima cones, two other potassic basalts erupted at the volcanic front, but ∼200 km to the ESE (near the historically active Volcán Jorullo), and were dated at 1.06 and 0.10 Ma. These potassic suites reflect the tendency in the west-central Mexican arc for magmas close to the volcanic front to be enriched in K 2 O relative to those farther from the trench.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/47809/1/445_2005_Article_15.pd

Search for stop and higgsino production using diphoton Higgs boson decays

Results are presented of a search for a "natural" supersymmetry scenario with gauge mediated symmetry breaking. It is assumed that only the supersymmetric partners of the top-quark (stop) and the Higgs boson (higgsino) are accessible. Events are examined in which there are two photons forming a Higgs boson candidate, and at least two b-quark jets. In 19.7 inverse femtobarns of proton-proton collision data at sqrt(s) = 8 TeV, recorded in the CMS experiment, no evidence of a signal is found and lower limits at the 95% confidence level are set, excluding the stop mass below 360 to 410 GeV, depending on the higgsino mass