England’s Exodus: Jewish Readmission and English Identity

This thesis concerns the published writings of the men and women who engaged in the seventeenth-century debate over the readmission of the Jews to England. Historians who have studied this topic, among them David Katz, Cecil Roth, Lucian Wolfe, H.S.Q. Henriques, Peter Toon, and Mordecai Wilensky, have been at a loss to explain why those who ardently argued for Jewish readmission suddenly withdrew their support when Oliver Cromwell called a council to discuss the terms under which readmission would occur. I hope to contribute to this discussion by considering the one issue on which all of the pamphleteers could agree: anti-Catholicism. I argue that support for readmission dissipated so quickly because none of those who wrote in support of it really wanted Jews to become English. Instead, they wanted the English to become Jews. In other words, they appropriated Jewish myths and Jewish identity as the Chosen People in order to explain the Parliamentarian revolution against Church and king and to distinguish English Protestantism from the Catholic Church

Student Perceptions of the Effectiveness of Adaptive Courseware for Learning

Despite the increasing research on the effectiveness of adaptive learning courseware by vendors and academic institutions, there are few published, peer-reviewed studies on adaptive courseware that address the student experience and student perception of this teaching and learning tool. Over the course of two academic years, 2017/2018 and 2018/2019, researchers at the University of Mississippi conducted 16 course-based student focus groups and gathered data from 4 end-of-semester surveys to understand how students are experiencing adaptive courseware and whether or not they find it adds value to their education. Our study found that, although students generally find courseware to be helpful in their learning, they do not agree the courseware is adaptive, and they find the benefits of the courseware to be undermined by poor implementation and frequent overpricing

Comparing Alternative Breast Milk Feeding Questions to U.S. Breastfeeding Surveillance Questions

Background: Most mothers in the United States express their milk, which is then bottle fed to their infants. The National Immunization Survey (NIS), used to report national breastfeeding prevalence, asks about infant breast milk consumption, regardless of whether it is consumed at the mother\u27s breast or from a bottle. The NIS data are often erroneously interpreted, however, to mean prevalence of at-the-breast feeding. We hypothesized that over half of infants classified as breastfed at 3, 6, and 12 months by the NIS questions would also be consuming expressed breast milk. Materials and Methods: A convenience sample of 456 mothers of infants 19?35 months of age recruited through ResearchMatch.org completed an online infant-feeding questionnaire. The questionnaire included both the NIS questions and more-detailed questions about feeding mode, distinguishing between at-the-breast and bottle. Results: Based on responses of our sample to the NIS questions, it could be interpreted that 74%, 64%, and 39% of mother?infant dyads were at-the-breast feeding at 3, 6, and 12 months, respectively. However, at each time point, most infants consumed at least some breast milk from a bottle. As infants got older, the proportion of breast milk consumed from a bottle increased. Conclusions: In this U.S. sample, the predominant breast milk feeding style involves both at-the-breast and expressed breast milk feeding. Future research and national surveillance should consider including separate measures of maternal breast milk expression and infant consumption of expressed breast milk to enable meaningful exploration of maternal and infant outcomes associated with these asynchronous behaviors

Adaptive Courseware Implementation: Investigating Alignment, Course Redesign, and the Student Experience

In this paper, four institutions share student and faculty feedback on the implementation of adaptive courseware through a common case study: biology for undergraduate non-majors. Additionally, each institution has provided a second case study of their choice. Together, researchers at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, CO, Portland State University in Portland, OR, University of Central Florida in Orlando, FL, and the University of Mississippi in Oxford, MS consider student perception of the benefits to the implementation of adaptive courseware, and how the deliberate alignment between adaptive courseware and course organization and structure impacts student experience. This paper highlights the collaboration of four public land grant Universities and includes data from thousands of students across the United States. Our findings indicate that adaptive blended courses with student engagement at the core multiplies opportunities afforded by emerging technologies within blended course design. This paper contributes multi-year data from four institutional approaches to implementing adaptive software to center student engagement

Adolescents\u27 perceptions of peer sexual harassment in school

In recent years highly publicized lawsuits and costly financial settlements have garnered increasing public attention to the problem of peer sexual harassment in school. Still, the extant literature on peer sexual harassment among secondary school students is extremely limited. The great majority of research has focused primarily on issues of prevalence with little empirical work directed at adolescents\u27 perceptions of sexually harassing behavior from peers. Thus, the purpose of the present study was to examine adolescents\u27 perceptions of peer sexual harassment with the goal of further elucidating the role of key developmental and contextual factors in students\u27 evaluations of social-sexual behavior initiated by peers. One hundred and twenty adolescents ranging in age from 13–18 years were surveyed. Adolescents\u27 ratings of hypothetical sexual harassment scenarios, reported experiences with peer sexual harassment, perceptions of sexual harassment outcomes, and views of reporting options and sanctions for peer sexual harassment was assessed. The extent to which adolescents\u27 responses to these questions differed based on gender, age, gender role identity, harassment type and gender composition of the dyad described in the scenario was examined. Analyses revealed that harassment type, gender composition of the dyad, and gender of the respondent emerged as most influential in adolescents\u27 judgements of behavior as sexually harassing, perceptions of the academic and emotional consequences of sexual harassment, and opinions of appropriate reporting options and sanctions for peer sexual harassment. Significant gender x harassment type interactions were found for questions relating to the potential consequences of peer sexual harassment, with males and females evidencing greater similarity in their views of sexual coercion forms of harassment versus gender harassment. Age and gender role identity were not found to have an impact on adolescents\u27 ratings with minimal differences emerging between these groups. With respect to the frequency of harassment experienced, mean ratings among adolescents evidenced minimal differences, resulting in no significant findings for this dependent variable. The present research yielded several findings that may enhance our current understanding of the variables that influence adolescents\u27 perceptions of sexually harassing behavior. The implications of these results on current conceptualizations of peer sexual harassment in adolescence are discussed

Women’s Early Warning Symptoms of Acute Myocardial Infarction

Background— Data remain sparse on women’s prodromal symptoms before acute myocardial infarction (AMI). This study describes prodromal and AMI symptoms in women.Methods and Results— Participants were 515 women diagnosed with AMI from 5 sites. Using the McSweeney Acute and Prodromal Myocardial Infarction Symptom Survey, we surveyed them 4 to 6 months after discharge, asking about symptoms, comorbidities, and demographic characteristics. Women were predominantly white (93%), high school educated (54.8%), and older (mean age, 66±12), with 95% (n=489) reporting prodromal symptoms. The most frequent prodromal symptoms experienced more than 1 month before AMI were unusual fatigue (70.7%), sleep disturbance (47.8%), and shortness of breath (42.1%). Only 29.7% reported chest discomfort, a hallmark symptom in men. The most frequent acute symptoms were shortness of breath (57.9%), weakness (54.8%), and fatigue (42.9%). Acute chest pain was absent in 43%. Women had more acute (mean, 7.3±4.8; range, 0 to 29) than prodromal (mean, 5.71±4.36; range, 0 to 25) symptoms. The average prodromal score, symptom weighted by frequency and intensity, was 58.5±52.7, whereas the average acute score, symptom weighted by intensity, was 16.5±12.1. These 2 scores were correlated (r=0.61, P\u3c0.001). Women with more prodromal symptoms experienced more acute symptoms. After controlling for risk factors, prodromal scores accounted for 33.2% of acute symptomatology.Conclusions— Most women have prodromal symptoms before AMI. It remains unknown whether prodromal symptoms are predictive of future events

Adaptive Courseware Implementation: Investigating Alignment, Course Redesign, and the Student Experience

In this paper, four institutions share student and faculty feedback on the implementation of adaptive courseware through a common case study: biology for undergraduate non-majors. Additionally, each institution has provided a second case study of their choice. Together, researchers at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, CO, Portland State University in Portland, OR, University of Central Florida in Orlando, FL, and the University of Mississippi in Oxford, MS consider student perception of the benefits to the implementation of adaptive courseware, and how the deliberate alignment between adaptive courseware and course organization and structure impacts student experience. This paper highlights the collaboration of four public land grant Universities and includes data from thousands of students across the United States. Our findings indicate that adaptive blended courses with student engagement at the core multiplies opportunities afforded by emerging technologies within blended course design. This paper contributes multi-year data from four institutional approaches to implementing adaptive software to center student engagement

A Novel Cancer Syndrome Caused by KCNQ1-Deficiency in the Golden Syrian Hamster

BACKGROUND: The golden Syrian hamster is an emerging model organism. To optimize its use, our group has made the first genetically engineered hamsters. One of the first genes that we investigated is KCNQ1 which encodes for the KCNQ1 potassium channel and also has been implicated as a tumor suppressor gene. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We generated KCNQ1 knockout (KO) hamsters by CRISPR/Cas9­-mediated gene targeting and investigated the effects of KCNQ1­-deficiency on tumorigenesis. RESULTS: By 70 days of age seven of the eight homozygous KCNQ1 KOs used in this study began showing signs of distress, and on necropsy six of the seven ill hamsters had visible cancers, including T-cell lymphomas, plasma cell tumors, hemangiosarcomas, and suspect myeloid leukemias. CONCLUSIONS: None of the hamsters in our colony that were wild­-type or heterozygous for KCNQ1 mutations developed cancers indicating that the cancer phenotype is linked to KCNQ1­-deficiency. This study is also the first evidence linking KCNQ1­-deficiency to blood cancers

Aerosol and lobar administration of a recombinant adenovirus to individuals with cystic fibrosis. I. Methods, safety, and clinical implications

Cystic fibrosis (CF), an autosomal recessive disorder resulting from mutations in the cystic fibrosis trans-membrane conductance regulator (CFTR) gene, is the most common lethal genetic illness in the Caucasian population. Gene transfer to airway epithelium, using adenoviruses containing normal CFTR cDNA, leads to transient production of CFTR mRNA and, in some studies, to correction of the airway epithelial ion transport defect caused by dysfunctional CFTR. Inflammatory responses to the adenoviral vector have been reported, particularly at high viral titers. We evaluated the effects of adenovirus-mediated CFTR gene transfer to airway epithelium in 36 subjects with CF (34 individuals, 2 of whom received two separate doses of vector), 20 by lobar instillation and 16 by aerosol administration. Doses ranged from 8 x 10(6) to 2.5 x 10(10) infective units (IU), in 0.5-log increments. After lobar administration of low doses there were occasional reports of cough, low-grade temperature, and myalgias. At the highest lobar dose (2.5 x 10(9) IU) two of three patients had transient myalgias, fever, and increased sputum production with obvious infiltrates on CT scan. After aerosol administration there were no significant systemic symptoms until the 2.5 x 10(10) IU dose, when both patients experienced myalgias and fever that resolved within 24 hr. There were no infiltrates seen on chest CT scans in any of the patients in the aerosol administration group. There were no consistent changes in pulmonary function tests or any significant rise in serum IgG or neutralizing antibodies in patients from either group. Serum, sputum, and nasal cytokines, measured before and after vector administration, showed no correlation with adenoviral dose. Gene transfer to lung cells was inefficient and expression was transient. Cells infected with the vector included mononuclear inflammatory cells as well as cuboidal and columnar epithelial cells. In summary, we found no consistent immune response, no evidence of viral shedding, and no consistent change in pulmonary function in response to adenovirus-mediated CFTR gene transfer. At higher doses there was a mild, nonspecific inflammatory response, as evidenced by fevers and myalgias. Overall, vector administration was tolerated but transfer of CFTR cDNA was inefficient and transgene expression was transient for the doses and method of administration used here

Aerosol and lobar administration of a recombinant adenovirus to individuals with cystic fibrosis. II. Transfection efficiency in airway epithelium

A phase I clinical trial was conducted in which recombinant adenovirus containing the cystic fibrosis trans-membrane regulator (CFTR) (Ad2/CFTR) was administered by bronchoscopic instillation or aerosolization to the lungs of cystic fibrosis (CF) patients. In this paper, we evaluate the efficiency of Ad2/CFTR-mediated transduction of bronchial airway cells. The ability of an Ad2/CFTR vector to transduce airway cells was first evaluated in patients to whom the vector was administered by bronchoscopic instillation. Cells at the administration site were collected 2 days after treatment by bronchoscopic brushing. Ad2-specific CFTR DNA was detected in four of five individuals by PCR, and Ad2-specific CFTR RNA was detected in three of five individuals by RT-PCR. Ad2/CFTR-mediated transduction of airway epithelial cells was then determined in CF individuals receiving this vector by aerosol inhalation. Ad2-specific CFTR DNA was detected in 13 of 13 individuals 2 days after aerosolization, and in 3 of 5 individuals 7 days after aerosolization. Ad2-specific RNA was detected in 4 of 13 individuals on day 2, but was not detected in the 5 individuals tested on day 7. The percentage of airway epithelial cells containing nuclear-localized vector DNA was \u3c or =2.4% as determined by fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH). However, in some cases, a high percentage of nonepithelial mononuclear cells or squamous metaplastic epithelial cells was infected with the adenoviral vector. In conclusion, aerosol administration is a feasible means to distribute adenoviral vectors throughout the conducting airways, but improvements in adenovirus-mediated transduction of airway epithelial cells are necessary before gene therapy for CF will be effective