Looking and learning: using participatory video to improve health and safety in the construction industry

Construction health and safety (H&S)is usually managed using a top-down approach of regulating workers' behaviour through the implementation and enforcement of prescriptive rules and procedures. This management approach privileges technical knowledge over knowledge based on workers' tacit and informal ways of knowing about H&S. The aim is to investigate the potential for participatory video to: (1) identify areas in which formal policies and procedures do not reflect as practised by workers; (2) encourage creative thinking and elicit workers' ideas for H&S improvements; and (3) provide an effective mechanism for capturing and sharing tacit H&S knowledge in construction organizations. Interviews were conducted in two case study organizations (CSOs) in the Australian construction industry. The results suggest reflexive participatory video enabled workers and managers to view their work practices from a different perspective. Workers identified new hazards, reflected about the practical difficulties in performing work in accordance with documented procedures and reframed their work practices and developed safer ways of working. Workers described how the participatory video capturing the way they work enabled them to have more meaningful input into H&S decision-making than they had previously experienced. Workers also expressed a strong preference for receiving H&S information in a visual format and commented that video was better suited to communicating H&S 'know how' than written documents. The research is significant in providing initial evidence that participatory video has the potential to improve H&S in construction

The scaling infrared DSE solution as a critical end-point for the family of decoupling ones

Both regular (the zero-momentum ghost dressing function not diverging), also named decoupling, and critical (diverging), also named scaling, Yang-Mills propagators solutions can be obtained by analyzing the low-momentum behaviour of the ghost propagator Dyson-Schwinger equation (DSE) in Landau gauge. The asymptotic expression obtained for the regular or decoupling ghost dressing function up to the order ${\cal O}(q^2)$ fits pretty well the low-momentum ghost propagator obtained through the numerical integration of the coupled gluon and ghost DSE in the PT-BFM scheme. Furthermore, when the size of the coupling renormalized at some scale approaches some critical value, the PT-BFM results seems to tend to the the scaling solution as a limiting case.Comment: Presented in QCSHS09; Madrid (Spain), 30 Aug. 201

Pure Anderson Motives and Abelian \tau-Sheaves

Pure t-motives were introduced by G. Anderson as higher dimensional generalizations of Drinfeld modules, and as the appropriate analogs of abelian varieties in the arithmetic of function fields. In order to construct moduli spaces for pure t-motives the second author has previously introduced the concept of abelian \tau-sheaf. In this article we clarify the relation between pure t-motives and abelian \tau-sheaves. We obtain an equivalence of the respective quasi-isogeny categories. Furthermore, we develop the elementary theory of both structures regarding morphisms, isogenies, Tate modules, and local shtukas. The later are the analogs of p-divisible groups.Comment: final version as it appears in Mathematische Zeitschrif

Prophase-Specific Perinuclear Actin Coordinates Centrosome Separation and Positioning to Ensure Accurate Chromosome Segregation

Centrosome separation in late G2/ early prophase requires precise spatial coordination that is determined by a balance of forces promoting and antagonizing separation. The major effector of centrosome separation is the kinesin Eg5. However, the identity and regulation of Eg5-antagonizing forces is less well characterized. By manipulating candidate components, we find that centrosome separation is reversible and that separated centrosomes congress toward a central position underneath the flat nucleus. This positioning mechanism requires microtubule polymerization, as well as actin polymerization. We identify perinuclear actin structures that form in late G2/early prophase and interact with microtubules emanating from the centrosomes. Disrupting these structures by breaking the interactions of the linker of nucleoskeleton and cytoskeleton (LINC) complex with perinuclear actin filaments abrogates this centrosome positioning mechanism and causes an increase in subsequent chromosome segregation errors. Our results demonstrate how geometrical cues from the cell nucleus coordinate the orientation of the emanating spindle poles before nuclear envelope breakdown

Exploring the use of new school buildings through post-occupancy evaluation and participatory action research

This paper presents the results of the development and testing of an integrated post-occupancy evaluation (POE) approach for teachers, staff, pupils and community members using newly constructed school buildings. It focusses on three cases of UK secondary schools, demonstrating how users can be inspired to engage with the problems of school design and energy use awareness. The cases provided new insights into the engagement of school teachers, staff and young people regarding issues of sustainability, management, functional performance and comfort. The integrative approach adopted in these cases provided a more holistic understanding of these buildings’ performance than could have been achieved by either observational or more traditional questionnaire-based methods. Moreover, the whole-school approach, involving children in POE, provided researchers with highly contextualised information about how a school is used, how to improve the quality of school experiences (both socially and educationally) and how the school community is contributing to the building's energy performance. These POE methods also provided unique opportunities for children to examine the social and cultural factors impeding the adoption of energy-conscious and sustainable behaviours

The interview as narrative ethnography : seeking and shaping connections in qualitative research.

Acts of counter-subjectification in qualitative research are always present but are often submerged in accounts that seek to locate the power of subjectification entirely with the researcher. This is particularly so when talking to people about sensitive issues. Based on an interview-based study of infertility and reproductive disruption among British Pakistanis in Northeast England, we explore how we, as researchers, sought and were drawn into various kinds of connections with the study participants; connections that were actively and performatively constructed through time. The three of us that conducted interviews are all female academics with Ph.Ds in anthropology, but thereafter our backgrounds, life stories and experiences diverge in ways that intersected with those of our informants in complex and shifting ways. We describe how these processes shaped the production of narrative accounts and consider some of the associated analytical and ethical implications

The Interaction of a Circular Synthetic Jet with a Cross-Flow Boundary Layer

The interaction of a circular synthetic jet with a laminar cross-flow boundary layer was investigated experimentally in the Matched-Index-of-Refraction flow facility at Idaho National Laboratory. Two orifice orientations were investigated, straight and inclined. For each orifice, phase-averaged and time-averaged PIV measurements were made at L◦/D◦ = 1.0 and 2.0 with ReU◦ = 250 and r = 1.12. Refractive index matching between the working fluid and the model material permitted experimental measurements of the flow field inside the actuator orifice and cavity simultaneously. At L◦/D◦ = 1.0, the vortex ring formed at the orifice during the expulsion portion of the actuator cycle blocks the boundary layer causing the flow to divert over and around the ring. This vortex ring does not escape the near-vicinity of the orifice and is subsequently re-ingested. At the same stroke, inclining the orifice axis 30◦ downstream leads to a jet comprised of a train of vortex rings that penetrates the cross-flow. At L◦/D◦ = 2.0, both the straight and inclined orifices create large discrete vortex rings that penetrate deep into the cross-flow, and consequently do not affect the boundary layer much beyond the near-field of the orifice

Arithmeticity vs. non-linearity for irreducible lattices

We establish an arithmeticity vs. non-linearity alternative for irreducible lattices in suitable product groups, such as for instance products of topologically simple groups. This applies notably to a (large class of) Kac-Moody groups. The alternative relies on a CAT(0) superrigidity theorem, as we follow Margulis' reduction of arithmeticity to superrigidity.Comment: 11 page

Differences in intracellular localisation of ANKH mutants that relate to mechanisms of calcium pyrophosphate deposition disease and craniometaphyseal dysplasia

ANKH mutations are associated with calcium pyrophosphate deposition disease and craniometaphyseal dysplasia. This study investigated the effects of these ANKH mutants on cellular localisation and associated biochemistry. We generated four ANKH overexpression-plasmids containing either calcium pyrophosphate deposition disease or craniometaphyseal dysplasia linked mutations: P5L, E490del and S375del, G389R. They were transfected into CH-8 articular chondrocytes and HEK293 cells. The ANKH mutants dynamic differential localisations were imaged and we investigated the interactions with the autophagy marker LC3. Extracellular inorganic pyrophosphate, mineralization, ENPP1 activity expression of ENPP1, TNAP and PIT-1 were measured. P5L delayed cell membrane localisation but once recruited into the membrane it increased extracellular inorganic pyrophosphate, mineralization, and ENPP1 activity. E490del remained mostly cytoplasmic, forming punctate co-localisations with LC3, increased mineralization, ENPP1 and ENPP1 activity with an initial but unsustained increase in TNAP and PIT-1. S375del trended to decrease extracellular inorganic pyrophosphate, increase mineralization. G389R delayed cell membrane localisation, trended to decrease extracellular inorganic pyrophosphate, increased mineralization and co-localised with LC3. Our results demonstrate a link between pathological localisation of ANKH mutants with different degrees in mineralization. Furthermore, mutant ANKH functions are related to synthesis of defective proteins, inorganic pyrophosphate transport, ENPP1 activity and expression of ENPP1, TNAP and PIT-1

A champion-driven pathway towards quality improvement in the medical management of osteoporotic fractures

The document attached has been archived with permission from the editor of the Medical Journal of Australia. An external link to the publisher’s copy is included.Tim Yu-Ting Lu, Jennifer A Pink, Lauren E Whitten, Catherine L Hill, Robert J Adams and Catherine Gib