Beyond the Neoliberal Imaginary: Investigating the Role of Critical Pedagogy in Higher Education

Abstract This thesis uses the qualitative case study approach to investigate the lived experience of three faculty members in higher education who identify themselves as critical pedagogues during an era of neoliberal restructuring. This research explores what the possibilities are for enacting critical pedagogies within a neoliberal climate of educational restructuring in higher education. Existing literature struggles to define neoliberalism as a result of globalization; further, present neoliberalization is penetrating all levels of social life and informing what many now accept as everyday thinking. The faculty members selected for this research each speaks to these struggles, while providing rich accounts of how neoliberalism challenges and concerns them; both, philosophically and pedagogically. This research highlights how at the start of the 21st Century a very compelling discourse on higher education is beginning to take place that seeks to inform how universities critically approach education and global education. This discourse reveals the concerns and potential for links in global higher education and future labour opportunities that are being created through the increasing mobility of people, markets, and knowledge. It also emphasizes the dire need for new ways in understanding how we envision higher education and global relations that are increasingly framed by neoliberal globalization. This discussion also brought to light how neoliberal trends have embedded themselves to such a degree in education it has created a mystique that might actually be a crisis of conscience; not politics, not economics. Keywords: Higher education, neoliberalism, critical pedagogy, democracy, cosmopolitanism, global education, social justice and equity

The tomato P69 subtilase family is involved in resistance to bacterial wilt

The intercellular space or apoplast constitutes the main interface in plant–pathogen interactions. Apoplastic subtilisin-like proteases—subtilases—may play an important role in defence and they have been identified as targets of pathogen-secreted effector proteins. Here, we characterise the role of the Solanaceae-specific P69 subtilase family in the interaction between tomato and the vascular bacterial wilt pathogen Ralstonia solanacearum. R. solanacearum infection post-translationally activated several tomato P69s. Among them, P69D was exclusively activated in tomato plants resistant to R. solanacearum. In vitro experiments showed that P69D activation by prodomain removal occurred in an autocatalytic and intramolecular reaction that does not rely on the residue upstream of the processing site. Importantly P69D-deficient tomato plants were more susceptible to bacterial wilt and transient expression of P69B, D and G in Nicotiana benthamiana limited proliferation of R. solanacearum. Our study demonstrates that P69s have conserved features but diverse functions in tomato and that P69D is involved in resistance to R. solanacearum but not to other vascular pathogens like Fusarium oxysporum

Towards an In Vitro Model of Plasmodium Hypnozoites Suitable for Drug Discovery

Contains fulltext : 96475.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)BACKGROUND: Amongst the Plasmodium species in humans, only P. vivax and P. ovale produce latent hepatic stages called hypnozoites, which are responsible for malaria episodes long after a mosquito bite. Relapses contribute to increased morbidity, and complicate malaria elimination programs. A single drug effective against hypnozoites, primaquine, is available, but its deployment is curtailed by its haemolytic potential in glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase deficient persons. Novel compounds are thus urgently needed to replace primaquine. Discovery of compounds active against hypnozoites is restricted to the in vivo P. cynomolgi-rhesus monkey model. Slow growing hepatic parasites reminiscent of hypnozoites had been noted in cultured P. vivax-infected hepatoma cells, but similar forms are also observed in vitro by other species including P. falciparum that do not produce hypnozoites. METHODOLOGY: P. falciparum or P. cynomolgi sporozoites were used to infect human or Macaca fascicularis primary hepatocytes, respectively. The susceptibility of the slow and normally growing hepatic forms obtained in vitro to three antimalarial drugs, one active against hepatic forms including hypnozoites and two only against the growing forms, was measured. RESULTS: The non-dividing slow growing P. cynomolgi hepatic forms, observed in vitro in primary hepatocytes from the natural host Macaca fascicularis, can be distinguished from similar forms seen in P. falciparum-infected human primary hepatocytes by the differential action of selected anti-malarial drugs. Whereas atovaquone and pyrimethamine are active on all the dividing hepatic forms observed, the P. cynomolgi slow growing forms are highly resistant to treatment by these drugs, but remain susceptible to primaquine. CONCLUSION: Resistance of the non-dividing P. cynomolgi forms to atovaquone and pyrimethamine, which do not prevent relapses, strongly suggests that these slow growing forms are hypnozoites. This represents a first step towards the development of a practical medium-throughput in vitro screening assay for novel hypnozoiticidal drugs

Modern and fossil non-pollen palynomorphs from the Basque mountains (western Pyrenees, France): the use of coprophilous fungi to reconstruct pastoral activity

International audienceThis paper presents results from a modern dataset of non-pollen palynomorphs and its application to aca. 2,000 year peat record from the same area in the western Pyrenees (Basque Country, France). The modern dataset is composed of 35 surface samples (moss polsters) from a mountainous pasture-woodland landscape. Airborne fungal spores (ascospores and conidia), found dominant in the dataset, are linked to the degree of landscape openness and grazing pressure. The complete spectrum of 13 selected spore-types of dung-related Ascomycetes is positively linked with grazing pressure. However, different dung affinities between the spore-types have been identified. These are types clearly related to high grazing pressure and types with no or unclear dung indicative value. The modern dataset is used to aid interpretation of the local fossil pollen record as an independent 'proxy' to assess past pastoral dynamics. This study confirms the utility of modern nonpollen palynomorphs from terrestrial ecosystems in the reconstruction of historical local pastoral activities but also shows their limitation. It may be necessary to extend such study to wetland ecosystems and to investigate the spatial dimension of some fungal spores

Pollen productivity estimates of key European plant taxa for quantitative reconstruction of past vegetation: a review

International audienceInformation on the spatial distribution of past vegetation on local, regional and global scales is increasingly used within climate modelling, nature conservancy and archaeology. It is possible to obtain such information from fossil pollen records in lakes and bogs using the landscape reconstruction algorithm (LRA) and its two models, REVEALS and LOVE. These models assume that reliable pollen productivity estimates (PPEs) are available for the plant taxa involved in the quantitative reconstruc -tions of past vegetation, and that PPEs are constant through time. This paper presents and discusses the PPEs for 15 tree and 18 herb taxa obtained in nine study areas of Europe. Observed differences in PPEs between regions may be explained by methodological issues and environmental variables, of which climate and related factors such as reproduction strategies and growth forms appear to be the most important. An evaluation of the PPEs at hand so far suggests that they can be used in modelling applications and quantitative reconstructions of pastvegetation, provided that consideration of past environmental variability within the region is used to inform selection of PPEs, and bearing in mind that PPEs might have changed through time as a response to climate change. Application of a range of possible PPEs will allow a better evaluation of the results

Pollen signals of ground flora in managed woodlands

This paper explores the vegetation signals contained in the non-arboreal pollen and spore (NAPS) components of pollen assemblages from Tauber traps placed in woodlands subject to rotational cutting (coppicing) in lowland England. Sets of three Tauber traps were placed in compartments of different ages at multiple locations within each woodland for 1 year, and pollen assemblages recorded along with a vegetation survey using a modified pin-frame method in an area of 10 m radius around each trap array. Cluster analysis suggests that, as expected, the ground layer vegetation broadly reflects the different environmental conditions in the three woods, with the main subdivisions within woods apparently driven by changes in ground cover between the early and late stages of the coppice cycle. Non-arboreal pollen and spores (NAPS) assemblages group according to woodland of origin, with subdivisions which relate to pollen abundance but lack a simple relationship with years since cutting. Indices of Association between NAPS records and plant presence in the area around each array were calculated using presence–absence data for multiple distances of vegetation survey. All values tend towards an asymptote, which is interpreted as implying an effective source area for the single taxon presence–absence indicator values of ground flora taxa in coppiced woodlands on the order of a 10 m radius. Only four taxa, Poaceae, Ranunculus acris-type, Cyperaceae, and Scilla-type, have an Index of Association (A) greater than 0.5, implying that the presence of pollen can be interpreted in terms of the local presence of the relevant plant taxon with some confidence. Estimates of Pollen Productivity relative to Poaceae are presented for five taxa: Apiaceae, Asteraceae (Cardueae), Cyperaceae, Mercurialis perennis, and Scilla-type. Years since cutting does affect the ground vegetation and NAPS assemblage trapped in these woods, but that the effect is more clearly seen at an assemblage level in the vegetation than in the pollen assemblages. The interpretative significance of NAPS taxa does not seem to be in providing information about the local conditions around the sampling point, but in reflecting the ground flora of the wider woodland

Approaches to quantitative reconstruction of woody vegetation in managed woodlands from pollen records

There has been increasing interest in developing quantitative methods for reconstructing the dynamics of cultural landscapes over the last 15 years. This paper adds to this literature by using various approaches to reconstruct the vegetation of two woodlands subject to rotational coppicing (the periodic cutting of broadleaved trees and shrubs for wood products). Pollen deposition at ground level was determined at both sites using ‘Tauber’ traps placed near to the centre of 14 compartments of differing age in the coppice rotation. For the main woody taxa, Relative Pollen Productivity (RPP) estimates were derived using linear regression for pollen influx data and Extended R-value analysis for percentage data. The vegetation around three ponds was reconstructed by applying four methods (inverting the two RPP estimate approaches, the modern analogue technique and correction for pollen productivity using the linear regression estimated RPP values) to pollen data obtained from the uppermost sample of sediment from the ponds. To determine whether these methods gave better estimates of the vegetation composition than the original pollen proportions, the results were compared with the surveyed vegetation around each pond using the Bray–Curtis Index. Linear regression of pollen influx produced RPP values which are comparable with previous European studies, whilst for some taxa the Extended R-value analysis produced estimates which are orders of magnitude different both from values derived from the linear regression and previous work. No single approach performed equally well at reconstructing the vegetation around the ponds, and at two of the three locations the uncorrected pollen proportions were most similar to the surveyed vegetation.We conclude that applying quantitative reconstruction methods to individual small sites is, currently, not likely to be useful in complex cultural landscapes. In the context of coppiced woodland, deficiencies in our understanding of pollen taphonomy and the impact of the practice on pollen production first need to be rectified, and we identify strategies to address this situation

Erratum: SC83288 is a clinical development candidate for the treatment of severe malaria

No abstract available

Erratum: SC83288 is a clinical development candidate for the treatment of severe malaria

No abstract available