Understanding and developing procedures for video-based assessment in medical education

Introduction Novel uses of video aim to enhance assessment in health-professionals education. Whilst these uses presume equivalence between video and live scoring, some research suggests that poorly understood variations could challenge validity. We aimed to understand examiners’ and students’ interaction with video whilst developing procedures to promote its optimal use. Methods Using design-based research we developed theory and procedures for video use in assessment, iteratively adapting conditions across simulated OSCE stations. We explored examiners’ and students’ perceptions using think-aloud, interviews and focus group. Data were analysed using constructivist grounded-theory methods. Results Video-based assessment produced detachment and reduced volitional control for examiners. Examiners ability to make valid video-based judgements was mediated by the interaction of station content and specifically selected filming parameters. Examiners displayed several judgemental tendencies which helped them manage videos’ limitations but could also bias judgements in some circumstances. Students rarely found carefully-placed cameras intrusive and considered filming acceptable if adequately justified. Discussion Successful use of video-based assessment relies on balancing the need to ensure station-specific information adequacy; avoiding disruptive intrusion; and the degree of justification provided by video’s educational purpose. Video has the potential to enhance assessment validity and students’ learning when an appropriate balance is achieved

Body mass and hibernation microclimate may predict bat susceptibility to white-nose syndrome

Publishe

Gravel pits support waterbird diversity in an urban landscape

We assessed the benefit of 11 gravel pits for the settlement of waterbird communities in an urbanized area lacking natural wetlands. Gravel pits captured 57% of the regional species pool of aquatic birds. We identified 39 species, among which five were regionally rare. We used the Self Organizing Map algorithm to calculate the probabilities of presence of species, and to bring out habitat conditions that predict assemblage patterns. The age of the pits did not correlate with assemblage composition and species richness. There was a positive influence of macrophyte cover on waterbird species richness. Larger pits did not support more species, but species richness increased with connectivity. As alternative wetland habitats, gravel pits are attractive to waterbirds, when they act as stepping stones that ensure connectivity between larger natural and/or artificial wetlands separated in space

Detection of viral respiratory pathogens in mild and severe acute respiratory infections in Singapore.

To investigate the performance of laboratory methods and clinical case definitions in detecting the viral pathogens for acute respiratory infections (ARIs) from a prospective community cohort and hospital inpatients, nasopharyngeal swabs from cohort members reporting ARIs (community-ARI) and inpatients admitted with ARIs (inpatient-ARI) were tested by Singleplex Real Time-Polymerase Chain Reaction (SRT-PCR), multiplex RT-PCR (MRT-PCR) and pathogen-chip system (PathChip) between April 2012 and December 2013. Community-ARI and inpatient-ARI was also combined with mild and severe cases of influenza from a historical prospective study as mild-ARI and severe-ARI respectively to evaluate the performance of clinical case definitions. We analysed 130 community-ARI and 140 inpatient-ARI episodes (5 inpatient-ARI excluded because multiple pathogens were detected), involving 138 and 207 samples respectively. Detection by PCR declined with days post-onset for influenza virus; decrease was faster for community-ARI than for inpatient-ARI. No such patterns were observed for non-influenza respiratory virus infections. PathChip added substantially to viruses detected for community-ARI only. Clinical case definitions discriminated influenza from other mild-ARI but performed poorly for severe-ARI and for older participants. Rational strategies for diagnosis and surveillance of influenza and other respiratory virus must acknowledge the differences between ARIs presenting in community and hospital settings

Osmoregulators proline and glycine betaine counteract salinity stress in canola

Salt inundation leads to increased salinization of arable land in many arid and semi-arid regions. Until genetic solutions are found farmers and growers must either abandon salt-affected fields or use agronomic treatments that alleviate salt stress symptoms. Here, field experiments were carried out to study the effect of the osmoregulators proline at 200 mg L-1 and glycine betaine at 400 mg L-1 in counteracting the harmful effect of soil salinity stress on canola plants grown in Egypt. We assessed growth characteristics, yield and biochemical constituents. Results show first that all growth characters decreased with increasing salinity stress but applied osmoregulators alleviated these negative effects. Second, salinity stress decreased photosynthetic pigments, K and P contents, whilst increasing proline, soluble sugars, ascorbic acid, Na and Cl contents. Third, application of osmoregulators without salt stress increased photosynthetic pigments, proline, soluble sugars, N, K and P contents whilst decreasing Na and Cl contents. It is concluded that the exogenously applied osmoregulators glycine betaine and proline can fully or partially counteract the harmful effect of salinity stress on growth and yield of canola.© INRA and Springer-Verlag, France 2012

Treatment Outcome of Alcoholics with and without Cocaine Disorders

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/65587/1/j.1530-0277.1994.tb00939.x.pd

Living on the edge: utilising lidar data to assess the importance of vegetation structure for avian diversity in fragmented woodlands and their edges

Context: In agricultural landscapes, small woodland patches can be important wildlife refuges. Their value in maintaining biodiversity may, however, be compromised by isolation, and so knowledge about the role of habitat structure is vital to understand the drivers of diversity. This study examined how avian diversity and abundance were related to habitat structure in four small woods in an agricultural landscape in eastern England. Objectives: The aims were to examine the edge effect on bird diversity and abundance, and the contributory role of vegetation structure. Specifically: what is the role of vegetation structure on edge effects, and which edge structures support the greatest bird diversity? Methods: Annual breeding bird census data for 28 species were combined with airborne lidar data in linear mixed models fitted separately at (i) the whole wood level, and (ii) for the woodland edges only. Results: Despite relatively small woodland areas (4.9–9.4 ha), bird diversity increased significantly towards the edges, being driven in part by vegetation structure. At the whole woods level, diversity was positively associated with increased vegetation above 0.5 m and especially with increasing vegetation density in the understorey layer, which was more abundant at the woodland edges. Diversity along the edges was largely driven by the density of vegetation below 4 m. Conclusions: The results demonstrate that bird diversity was maximised by a diverse vegetation structure across the wood and especially a dense understorey along the edge. These findings can assist bird conservation by guiding habitat management of remaining woodland patches

Local diversity in settlement, demography and subsistence across the southern Indian Neolithic-Iron Age transition: site growth and abandonment at Sanganakallu-Kupgal

The Southern Indian Neolithic-Iron Age transition demonstrates considerable regional variability in settlement location, density, and size. While researchers have shown that the region around the Tungabhadra and Krishna River basins displays significant subsistence and demographic continuity, and intensification, from the Neolithic into the Iron Age ca. 1200 cal. BC, archaeological and chronometric records in the Sanganakallu region point to hilltop village expansion during the Late Neolithic and ‘Megalithic’ transition period (ca. 1400–1200 cal. BC) prior to apparent abandonment ca. 1200 cal. BC, with little evidence for the introduction of iron technology into the region. We suggest that the difference in these settlement histories is a result of differential access to stable water resources during a period of weakening and fluctuating monsoon across a generally arid landscape. Here, we describe well-dated, integrated chronological, archaeobotanical, archaeozoological and archaeological survey datasets from the Sanganakallu-Kupgal site complex that together demonstrate an intensification of settlement, subsistence and craft production on local hilltops prior to almost complete abandonment ca. 1200 cal. BC. Although the southern Deccan region as a whole may have witnessed demographic increase, as well as subsistence and cultural continuity, at this time, this broader pattern of continuity and resilience is punctuated by local examples of abandonment and mobility driven by an increasing practical and political concern with water

Massive stars as thermonuclear reactors and their explosions following core collapse

Nuclear reactions transform atomic nuclei inside stars. This is the process of stellar nucleosynthesis. The basic concepts of determining nuclear reaction rates inside stars are reviewed. How stars manage to burn their fuel so slowly most of the time are also considered. Stellar thermonuclear reactions involving protons in hydrostatic burning are discussed first. Then I discuss triple alpha reactions in the helium burning stage. Carbon and oxygen survive in red giant stars because of the nuclear structure of oxygen and neon. Further nuclear burning of carbon, neon, oxygen and silicon in quiescent conditions are discussed next. In the subsequent core-collapse phase, neutronization due to electron capture from the top of the Fermi sea in a degenerate core takes place. The expected signal of neutrinos from a nearby supernova is calculated. The supernova often explodes inside a dense circumstellar medium, which is established due to the progenitor star losing its outermost envelope in a stellar wind or mass transfer in a binary system. The nature of the circumstellar medium and the ejecta of the supernova and their dynamics are revealed by observations in the optical, IR, radio, and X-ray bands, and I discuss some of these observations and their interpretations.Comment: To be published in " Principles and Perspectives in Cosmochemistry" Lecture Notes on Kodai School on Synthesis of Elements in Stars; ed. by Aruna Goswami & Eswar Reddy, Springer Verlag, 2009. Contains 21 figure

Electron quantum metamaterials in van der Waals heterostructures

In recent decades, scientists have developed the means to engineer synthetic periodic arrays with feature sizes below the wavelength of light. When such features are appropriately structured, electromagnetic radiation can be manipulated in unusual ways, resulting in optical metamaterials whose function is directly controlled through nanoscale structure. Nature, too, has adopted such techniques -- for example in the unique coloring of butterfly wings -- to manipulate photons as they propagate through nanoscale periodic assemblies. In this Perspective, we highlight the intriguing potential of designer sub-electron wavelength (as well as wavelength-scale) structuring of electronic matter, which affords a new range of synthetic quantum metamaterials with unconventional responses. Driven by experimental developments in stacking atomically layered heterostructures -- e.g., mechanical pick-up/transfer assembly -- atomic scale registrations and structures can be readily tuned over distances smaller than characteristic electronic length-scales (such as electron wavelength, screening length, and electron mean free path). Yet electronic metamaterials promise far richer categories of behavior than those found in conventional optical metamaterial technologies. This is because unlike photons that scarcely interact with each other, electrons in subwavelength structured metamaterials are charged, and strongly interact. As a result, an enormous variety of emergent phenomena can be expected, and radically new classes of interacting quantum metamaterials designed