Teachers’ experiences in a UK international school : the challenges of adaptation

This research is a qualitative case study which explores teachers’ past and present experiences and beliefs in a multilingual, UK International School: ‘Dombey School’. This school employs teachers from eight nationalities and enrols students from more. Two research questions guided this study: In what ways (if any) are teachers’ experiences in such a multilingual school distinctive? Is there any evidence that the multilingual – multicultural identity of such a school offers particular advantages or disadvantages to teachers in terms of work or professional development? Semi-structured interviews with forty-seven secondary cycle teachers shed light on their educational and teaching backgrounds and explore their experiences in a school dedicated to the promotion of multilingual and multicultural education. Fieldnotes, memos, classroom observation and documents were also used as data in the study. This research explores teachers’ cultural differences and their impact on teachers’ work, relationships and adaptation to the school. It also highlights some of the professional challenges faced by teachers in a culturally diverse context which draws them towards linguistic and cultural ghettoes. Teachers’ behaviours in the school are explained in terms of Hofstede’s four dimensional model (1986) and the analysis also draws on other work by Hofstede as well as that of Triandis. My findings discuss teachers’ values and attitudes in the school taking into account the individuality and the particular characteristics of the existent school culture. This thesis points to the need for cross-cultural teacher training programmes and an induction phase in schools of this sort in order to help teachers acquire skills which will help them respect and appreciate cultural differences, prepare them to teach in a school of cultural and linguistic diversity and lead to their successful integration into the school culture. The conclusion highlights the neglect of teachers’ needs compared to the importance given to students in this type of education

Facial affect "in the wild": a survey and a new database

Well-established databases and benchmarks have been developed in the past 20 years for automatic facial behaviour analysis. Nevertheless, for some important problems regarding analysis of facial behaviour, such as (a) estimation of affect in a continuous dimensional space (e.g., valence and arousal) in videos displaying spontaneous facial behaviour and (b) detection of the activated facial muscles (i.e., facial action unit detection), to the best of our knowledge, well-established in-the-wild databases and benchmarks do not exist. That is, the majority of the publicly available corpora for the above tasks contain samples that have been captured in controlled recording conditions and/or captured under a very specific milieu. Arguably, in order to make further progress in automatic understanding of facial behaviour, datasets that have been captured in in the-wild and in various milieus have to be developed. In this paper, we survey the progress that has been recently made on understanding facial behaviour in-the-wild, the datasets that have been developed so far and the methodologies that have been developed, paying particular attention to deep learning techniques for the task. Finally, we make a significant step further and propose a new comprehensive benchmark for training methodologies, as well as assessing the performance of facial affect/behaviour analysis/ understanding in-the-wild. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time that such a benchmark for valence and arousal "in-the-wild" is presente

Targeted gene expression study of Salmonella enterica during biofilm formation on rocket leaves

In the present study, the ability of Salmonella Typhimurium to form biofilm community on rocket leaves and rocket extract at 10 C and 20 C was investigated. This goal was achieved with the study of expression of genes associated with biofilm formation and other functional roles. The obtained results showed that Salmonella growth was inhibited when cultured in rocket extract (liquid and solid state) and when grew directly to rocket leaves. The observed inhibition might be attributed to nutrient starvation to the specific growth media because of plant leaves's variability, cell physiology and antimicrobial compounds of rocket. In addition, gene expression study using Real-Time PCR showed that biofilm was formatted on solid media, while the entrance and adhesion of the microorganism within the plant held more strongly through the stomata of the plant leaves. Furthermore, genes associated with managing stress situations were overexpressed at 20 C. From these results, it is indicated that further studies are needed to better determine the survival and/or growth of the pathogen as “real” biofilm cells on plants. In addition, the study on development and gene expression of biofilm cells is necessary in order to eliminate the specific pathogen and reduce the food-borne diseases it causes

Blood Transfusion After Myocardial Infarction: Friend, Foe or Double-Edged Sword?

Combined mechanical and pharmacological interventions constitute the cornerstone of therapy for patients with ST-segment elevation acute myocardial infarction (AMI). These increasingly complex interventions offer morbidity and mortality advantage but are associated frequently with bleeding complications. Major bleeding is probably the most important non-cardiac complication in patients undergoing coronary artery intervention. Prior studies have identified anemia as a strong independent predictor of mortality and adverse cardiac events in this patient population. Limited data are available to guide transfusion decisions in patients with coronary artery disease and anemia either at baseline or after a complication of an angioplasty procedure.The CADILLAC study sought to determine the relationship between red blood cell transfusion and clinical outcomes in patients undergoing primary percutaneous coronary intervention for AMI. Out of 2,060 randomized patients, 82 (3.98%) received red blood cell transfusion during index hospitalization. Transfusion was independently associated with baseline anemia, older age, multivessel disease, and female gender. Patients transfused, versus patients not transfused, had significantly higher rates of one year mortality (23.9% vs. 3.4%), disabling stoke (2.5% vs. 0.5%), reinfarction (7.0% vs. 2.2%) and composite major adverse cardiac events (41.0% vs.16.6%). After multivariable adjustment for potential confounders, red blood cell transfusion was independently associated with mortality at 30 days and one year (hazard ratio 4.71 and 3.16 respectively, both p=0.0005). The authors concluded that red blood cell transfusion after primary angioplasty in the setting of an AMI may be harmful or alternatively transfusion could be a marker of markedly increased risk, with further randomized studies needed to determine the optimal threshold for red blood cell transfusion in this patient population setting

Teachers’ experiences in a UK international school : the challenges of adaptation

This research is a qualitative case study which explores teachers’ past and present experiences and beliefs in a multilingual, UK International School: ‘Dombey School’. This school employs teachers from eight nationalities and enrols students from more. Two research questions guided this study: In what ways (if any) are teachers’ experiences in such a multilingual school distinctive? Is there any evidence that the multilingual – multicultural identity of such a school offers particular advantages or disadvantages to teachers in terms of work or professional development? Semi-structured interviews with forty-seven secondary cycle teachers shed light on their educational and teaching backgrounds and explore their experiences in a school dedicated to the promotion of multilingual and multicultural education. Fieldnotes, memos, classroom observation and documents were also used as data in the study. This research explores teachers’ cultural differences and their impact on teachers’ work, relationships and adaptation to the school. It also highlights some of the professional challenges faced by teachers in a culturally diverse context which draws them towards linguistic and cultural ghettoes. Teachers’ behaviours in the school are explained in terms of Hofstede’s four dimensional model (1986) and the analysis also draws on other work by Hofstede as well as that of Triandis. My findings discuss teachers’ values and attitudes in the school taking into account the individuality and the particular characteristics of the existent school culture. This thesis points to the need for cross-cultural teacher training programmes and an induction phase in schools of this sort in order to help teachers acquire skills which will help them respect and appreciate cultural differences, prepare them to teach in a school of cultural and linguistic diversity and lead to their successful integration into the school culture. The conclusion highlights the neglect of teachers’ needs compared to the importance given to students in this type of education.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo

Acrometastasis due to lung adenocarcinoma

We are presenting a case of acrometastasis in a male patient with lung adenocarcinoma. Acrometastases accumulate for 0.1%of all metastatic bone lesions and can be the first manifestation of cancer in approximately 10% of cases. The main clinicalmanifestations are tenderness, intermittent pain, functional impairment, erythema, heat and swelling of the affected part. Lungcancer is the main primary malignancy which causes acrometastases. Although the lesions can be recognized in x-rays or CTscans, the gold standard for the diagnosis is MRI scan in which the full extension of the tumor can be evaluated.The diagnosisis usually confirmed by fine-needle biopsy of the affected bone. In the presence of acrometastases, prognosis is very poor andpalliative treatment is usually recommended. This case shows that patients at risk for lung cancer should be screened intensivelywhen they develop persistent digital symptoms

STAT3 controls COL1A2 enhancer activation cooperatively with JunB, regulates type I collagen synthesis post-transcriptionally and is essential for lung myofibroblast differentiation

Fibroblast differentiation is key cellular process that underlies the process of fibrosis, a deadly complication of fibrotic diseases like Scleroderma (SSc). This transition coincides with the overproduction of Collagen type I (COL1) and other extracellular matrix proteins. High level expression of the collagen type 1α2 subunit (COL1A2), requires the engagement of a far upstream enhancer, whose activation is strongly dependent on the AP1 factor JunB. We now report that STAT3 also binds the COL1A2 enhancer and is essential for RNA polymerase recruitment, without affecting JunB binding. STAT3 is required for the increased COL1A2 expression observed in myofibroblasts.We also report that TGFβ partially activates STAT3 and show that inhibiting STAT3 potently blocks TGFβ signalling, matrix remodelling and TGFβ-induced myofibroblast differentiation. Activation of STAT3 with IL6 trans-signalling alone however only increased COL1A2 protein expression, leaving COL1A2 mRNA levels unchanged. Our results suggest that activated STAT3 is not the limiting factor for collagen enhancer activation in human lung fibroblasts. Yet, a certain threshold level of STAT3 38 activity is essential to support activation of the COL1A2 enhancer and TGFβ signalling in fibroblasts. We propose that STAT3 operates at the post-transcriptional as well as the transcriptional level