The Recovery of Human Remains in Weapon-Contaminated Settings: Towards Guidance for the Mine Action Community

Mine action and forensic services are critical elements in the response to humanitarian needs during and after armed conflict. Mine action operators will work to identify, mark, and eventually clear areas contaminated with landmines and explosive remnants of war (ERW). Forensic specialists and other related experts will be operational in the search for missing persons and the management of the dead by locating, recovering, and helping to identify human remains, while ensuring maximum protection, dignity of the deceased, and attention to their families.[1] These professions can often intersect in situations where human remains and explosive hazards are both present

Analysis of wheat SAGE tags reveals evidence for widespread antisense transcription

BACKGROUND: Serial Analysis of Gene Expression (SAGE) is a powerful tool for genome-wide transcription studies. Unlike microarrays, it has the ability to detect novel forms of RNA such as alternatively spliced and antisense transcripts, without the need for prior knowledge of their existence. One limitation of using SAGE on an organism with a complex genome and lacking detailed sequence information, such as the hexaploid bread wheat Triticum aestivum, is accurate annotation of the tags generated. Without accurate annotation it is impossible to fully understand the dynamic processes involved in such complex polyploid organisms. Hence we have developed and utilised novel procedures to characterise, in detail, SAGE tags generated from the whole grain transcriptome of hexaploid wheat. RESULTS: Examination of 71,930 Long SAGE tags generated from six libraries derived from two wheat genotypes grown under two different conditions suggested that SAGE is a reliable and reproducible technique for use in studying the hexaploid wheat transcriptome. However, our results also showed that in poorly annotated and/or poorly sequenced genomes, such as hexaploid wheat, considerably more information can be extracted from SAGE data by carrying out a systematic analysis of both perfect and "fuzzy" (partially matched) tags. This detailed analysis of the SAGE data shows first that while there is evidence of alternative polyadenylation this appears to occur exclusively within the 3' untranslated regions. Secondly, we found no strong evidence for widespread alternative splicing in the developing wheat grain transcriptome. However, analysis of our SAGE data shows that antisense transcripts are probably widespread within the transcriptome and appear to be derived from numerous locations within the genome. Examination of antisense transcripts showing sequence similarity to the Puroindoline a and Puroindoline b genes suggests that such antisense transcripts might have a role in the regulation of gene expression. CONCLUSION: Our results indicate that the detailed analysis of transcriptome data, such as SAGE tags, is essential to understand fully the factors that regulate gene expression and that such analysis of the wheat grain transcriptome reveals that antisense transcripts maybe widespread and hence probably play a significant role in the regulation of gene expression during grain development

Radical pedagogies: Reimagining research & curriculum at the intersection of lis history, archives, and cultural heritage

Abstract (498 words): As the profession evolves, and seeks to thrive during unprecedented times, a number of gaps in service are becoming more apparent to educators, practitioners, and information seekers. Beyond existing services and the path to virtualize so many as possible, we must revisit our curriculum to ensure we are addressing the gaps including service, social justice, and equity, diversity, and inclusion. Equity, diversity, and inclusion are a critical purpose libraries, archives, and museums provide to society and the lives of our users. So where does equity, diversity, and inclusion/social justice fit? Within the library and information science curriculum, of course. The conversation will focus on the direct impact we can have with those who are and will be hands on the ground. To have a direct impact on services, the profession must commit to representation of the society in which we seek to uplift. Representation in all areas of LIS research and curriculum is essential towards the common goal of equity, diversity, and inclusion in services rendered. School of Library and Information Science programs can increase representation by developing cultural heritage programs. Cultural heritage programs come in a variety of forms including, but not limited to, archival studies, historic preservation, and museum studies. Reimagining the historical perspective in the curriculum of archives and cultural heritage programs will be a key to shifting services for inclusiveness and representation. Such programs can stand alone as a Master’s degree or well-equipped concentration with a curriculum for core archival knowledge and complementary knowledges. As discussed by the Society of American Archivists, “A graduate program in archival studies should provide students with a solid foundation in archival science. The curriculum should focus on archival theory, methodology, and practice and should be augmented by instruction in economics, history, information studies, law, management, and technology as they relate to archival work.” The programs should also address the need for cultural preservation and reflection for archivists of Black, Indigenous, and Persons of Color (BIPOC) heritage. Curriculum and research must reimagine pedagogical approaches concerning history, archives and cultural heritage studies. As educators, practitioners and researchers in history, archival studies, and cultural heritage, we consistently seek to highlight the purpose, value, and importance of archives in society. The discussion leads a platform to highlight existing programs, innovative pedagogy, and new approaches to standardizing curriculum. Panelists are experienced practitioners, educators, and researchers with experience in history, archives, records management, historic preservation, and museum studies. They have worked at a variety of levels to reimagine the pedagogical approach in LIS research and curriculum. The panel will feature brief statements from panelists and encourage conversation, through moderator led questions and answers. The session will address process, accomplishments, barriers, innovations and challenges within dimensions of LIS history, Archives, and cultural heritage. Discussion themes include the following: • Critical and Radical Pedagogies • Black, Indigenous, and Persons of Color (BIPOC) history & heritage • Existing and past programs/courses • New approaches to curriculum and research (History, Archives, & Cultural Heritage) • Race, gender, social justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion ALISE RESEARCH TAXONOMY TOPICS Archives; Pedagogy; Social justice; Curriculum; Research AUTHOR KEYWORDS History; Cultural Heritage; Pedagog

Plasmodium falciparum variant erythrocyte surface antigens: a pilot study of antibody acquisition in recurrent natural infections.

BACKGROUND: During intra-erythrocytic replication Plasmodium falciparum escapes the human host immune system by switching expression of variant surface antigens (VSA). Piecemeal acquisition of variant specific antibody responses to these antigens as a result of exposure to multiple re-infections has been proposed to play a role in acquisition of naturally acquired immunity. METHODS: Immunofluorescence was used to explore the dynamics of anti-VSA IgG responses generated by children to (i) primary malaria episodes and (ii) recurrent P. falciparum infections. RESULTS: Consistent with previous studies on anti-VSA responses, sera from each child taken at the time of recovery from their respective primary infection tended to recognize their own secondary parasites poorly. Additionally, compared to patients with reinfections by parasites of new merozoite surface protein 2 (MSP2) genotypes, baseline sera sampled from patients with persistent infections (recrudescence) tended to have higher recognition of heterologous parasites. This is consistent with the prediction that anti-VSA IgG responses may play a role in promoting chronic asymptomatic infections. CONCLUSIONS: This pilot study validates the utility of recurrent natural malaria infections as a functional readout for examining the incremental acquisition of immunity to malaria

Inpaint3D: 3D Scene Content Generation using 2D Inpainting Diffusion

This paper presents a novel approach to inpainting 3D regions of a scene, given masked multi-view images, by distilling a 2D diffusion model into a learned 3D scene representation (e.g. a NeRF). Unlike 3D generative methods that explicitly condition the diffusion model on camera pose or multi-view information, our diffusion model is conditioned only on a single masked 2D image. Nevertheless, we show that this 2D diffusion model can still serve as a generative prior in a 3D multi-view reconstruction problem where we optimize a NeRF using a combination of score distillation sampling and NeRF reconstruction losses. Predicted depth is used as additional supervision to encourage accurate geometry. We compare our approach to 3D inpainting methods that focus on object removal. Because our method can generate content to fill any 3D masked region, we additionally demonstrate 3D object completion, 3D object replacement, and 3D scene completion

What does 'supporting parents' mean? - parents' views

This paper reports on the views of a community sample of 428 parents with primary school-aged children. In a previous study parents had identified that they needed 'support'. This study was designed to try to understand what types of support parents already have and what support they think needs to be available to them. Most parents use informal support of family and friends and have limited awareness of what is available to them in the way of locally based services. They propose services which are already available, like Parentline, but of which they are unaware. There seems to be a need for universal, non-stigmatising services which design their programmes with parents and can refer to more specialised services, e.g. Social Services or Family Centres. These services need to be located in agencies which parents frequent and are comfortable with, such as schools and health settings

Reproduction of contagious bovine pleuropneumonia via aerosol-based challenge with Mycoplasma mycoides subsp. mycoides.

Contagious bovine pleuropneumonia (CBPP) is a respiratory disease caused by Mycoplasma mycoides subsp. mycoides. Infection occurs via Mycoplasma-containing droplets and therefore requires close contact between animals. The current infection models are suboptimal and based on intratracheal installation of mycoplasmas or in-contact infection. This work tested the infection of adult cattle via aerosols containing live mycoplasmas mimicking the infection of cattle in the field. Therefore, we infected six cattle with aerosolized Mycoplasma mycoides subsp. mycoides strain Afadé over seven consecutive days with altogether 109 colony forming units. All animals seroconverted between 11-24 days post infection and five out of six animals showed typical CBPP lesions. One animal did not show any lung lesions at necropsy, while another animal had to be euthanized at 25 days post infection because it reached endpoint criteria. Seroconversion confirmed successful infection and the spectrum of clinical and lesions observed mirrors epidemiological models and the field situation, in which only a fraction of animals suffers from acute clinical disease post infection

Net benefits of smallholder dairy cattle farms in Senegal can be significantly increased through the use of better dairy cattle breeds and improved management practices

Senegal, located in West Africa, is an example of a low-to middle-income country where the govern-ment has prioritized improving livestock production self-sufficiency, with a strong focus on dairy. Among other initiatives, the use of exotic dairy cattle has been promoted, despite no evidence for the potential liveli-hood benefits (or otherwise) to smallholder farmers on adopting the new genetics. The current work fills this evidence gap by performing a farm-level economic study comparing the keeping of different breed and cross-breed types of dairy cattle under different management levels. Data for the study were obtained by monitoring 220 smallholder dairy cattle farms, with a combined cattle population of about 3,000 animals, over an almost 2-yr period. Findings of the study suggest that the most net-beneficial and cost-beneficial dairy cattle enterprise that could be used by the smallholder farmers was to keep crossbred indigenous zebu by exotic Bos taurus animals under management standards that are consid-ered good compared with local standards. This dairy enterprise type was 7.4-fold more net beneficial and had a 1.4-fold more favorable cost-benefit ratio than the traditional system of keeping indigenous zebu animals under poor (low-input) management. Interestingly, the keeping of (near) pure B. taurus dairy cattle resulted in the highest milk yields and thus benefit from milk, but was not the most net beneficial due to the high costs of keeping these animals, particularly in terms of feed. We also found that increasing the managementlevel of any of the breed or cross-breed types under consideration, including the indigenous zebu animals, resulted in an increased net benefit of 2.2-to 2.9-fold. Results of this economic analysis are discussed as part of a broader trade-off analysis, resulting in recommendations to strengthen the Senegal dairy sector. The combined intervention of improved dairy cattle genetics and management is considered a promising intervention to improve livelihoods of the rural poor as well as livestock production self-sufficiency for Senegal; some other system constraints are addressed.Peer reviewe