Consensus Statement on Concussion in Sportâ The 4th International Conference on Concussion in Sport Held in Zurich, November 2012

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/147044/1/pmr2255.pd

Host Immune Responses to a Viral Immune Modulating Protein: Immunogenicity of Viral Interleukin-10 in Rhesus Cytomegalovirus-Infected Rhesus Macaques

, consistent with a central role for rhcmvIL-10 during acute virus-host interactions. Since cmvIL-10 and rhcmvIL-10 are extremely divergent from the cIL-10 of their respective hosts, vaccine-mediated neutralization of their function could inhibit establishment of viral persistence without inhibition of cIL-10.As a prelude to evaluating cmvIL-10-based vaccines in humans, the rhesus macaque model of HCMV was used to interrogate peripheral and mucosal immune responses to rhcmvIL-10 in RhCMV-infected animals. ELISA were used to detect rhcmvIL-10-binding antibodies in plasma and saliva, and an IL-12-based bioassay was used to quantify plasma antibodies that neutralized rhcmvIL-10 function. rhcmvIL-10 is highly immunogenic during RhCMV infection, stimulating high avidity rhcmvIL-10-binding antibodies in the plasma of all infected animals. Most infected animals also exhibited plasma antibodies that partially neutralized rhcmvIL-10 function but did not cross-neutralize the function of rhesus cIL-10. Notably, minimally detectable rhcmvIL-10-binding antibodies were detected in saliva.This study demonstrates that rhcmvIL-10, as a surrogate for cmvIL-10, is a viable vaccine candidate because (1) it is highly immunogenic during natural RhCMV infection, and (2) neutralizing antibodies to rhcmvIL-10 do not cross-react with rhesus cIL-10. Exceedingly low rhcmvIL-10 antibodies in saliva further suggest that the oral mucosa, which is critical in RhCMV natural history, is associated with suboptimal anti-rhcmvIL-10 antibody responses

A randomised controlled trial comparing the effectiveness of Tai Chi alongside usual care with usual care alone on the postural balance of community-dwelling people with dementia: Protocol for The TACIT Trial (TAi ChI for people with dementia).

Background: Falls are a public health issue for the older adult population and more so for people with dementia (PWD). Compared with their cognitively intact peers, PWD are at higher risk of falls and injurious falls. This randomised controlled trial aims to test the clinical and cost effectiveness of Tai Chi to improve postural balance among community-dwelling PWD and to assess the feasibility of conducting a larger definitive trial to reduce the incidence of falls among PWD. Methods: A 3-centre parallel group randomised controlled trial with embedded process evaluation. One hundred and fifty community-dwelling dyads of a person with dementia and their informal carer will be recruited and assessed at baseline and at six-month follow-up. Dyads will be randomised in a 1:1 ratio to either usual care or usual care plus a Tai Chi intervention for 20 weeks. The Tai Chi intervention will consist of weekly classes (45 minutes’ Tai Chi plus up to 45 minutes for informal discussion, with up to 10 dyads per class) and home-based exercises (20 minutes per day to be facilitated by the carer). Home practice of Tai Chi will be supported by the use of behaviour change techniques with the Tai Chi instructor at a home visit in week 3-4 of the intervention (action planning, coping planning, self-monitoring, and alarm clock reminder) and at the end of each class (feedback on home practice). The primary outcome is dynamic balance measured using the Timed Up and Go test, coinciding with the end of the 20-week intervention phase for participants in the Tai Chi arm. Secondary outcomes for PWD include functional balance, static balance, fear of falling, global cognitive functioning, visual-spatial cognitive functioning, quality of life, and falls. Secondary outcomes for carers include dynamic balance, static balance, quality of life, costs, and carer burden. Discussion: This trial is the first in the UK to test the effectiveness of Tai Chi to improve balance among PWD. The trial will inform a future study that will be the first in the world to use Tai Chi in a trial to prevent falls among PWD. Trial registration: NCT02864056

A New Curriculum and a New Learning Space: An Opportunity for Real Change in an Irish Context

Curricular change is currently underway in Ireland. A new Junior Cycle Student Award (JCSA) marks a move away from traditional learning and examinations, replacing these with project work, continual assessment, and collaborative styles of learning. Traditionally, teaching and learning has been dominated by teacher-led methodologies. Students sit in straight rows of square individual desks facing a whiteboard and projector at the front of the classroom. The teacher lectures on their subject expertise and the students write notes, with limited peer interaction. However, the foci of the JCSA are team work, discussion, project design, and collaboration and these will change the dynamic of classrooms, and improve the communication skills of pupils. This kind of change presents an excellent opportunity to reconsider classroom spaces and how they are used, with a view to designing new learning spaces to accommodate the curricula innovation. Ireland has for many years used curriculum reform as an accelerant for the adoption of learner-centred pedagogies in teaching and learning (National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, 2011). However, schools have experienced difficulty moving away from past pedagogical cultures to adopt new approaches to teaching and learning. If the traditional learning spaces in schools are not reconfigured to allow for collaborative work is it reasonable to predict that the new approaches of the JCSA are doomed? In Ireland, school designs for State-funded school buildings are contained in a set of guidelines from the Department of Education and Skills (DES). The DES insists that “where it is proposed to construct a new school these guidelines and all associated documents in the suite of Design Guidance should be applied in full” (Technical Guidance Second Level School, DES, 2014). The design philosophy of the DES states that “the different functions of the ‘Design Team’ members shall be integrated, combining ‘Building Services Engineering’, ‘Architectural Design’, ‘Structural Engineering’ and ‘Quantity Surveying’ to create a well-designed, sustainable, cost effective, durable low maintenance building” (DES, 2014). Notably missing in this ‘team’ are the teachers, principals and pupils. This study suggests that teachers and principals have a key role to play in informing good design for learning spaces and they should play a central role in evaluating innovative learning spaces

A New Curriculum and a New Learning Space: An Opportunity for Real Change in an Irish Context

Curricular change is currently underway in Ireland. A new Junior Cycle Student Award (JCSA) marks a move away from traditional learning and examinations, replacing these with project work, continual assessment, and collaborative styles of learning. Traditionally, teaching and learning has been dominated by teacher-led methodologies. Students sit in straight rows of square individual desks facing a whiteboard and projector at the front of the classroom. The teacher lectures on their subject expertise and the students write notes, with limited peer interaction. However, the foci of the JCSA are team work, discussion, project design, and collaboration and these will change the dynamic of classrooms, and improve the communication skills of pupils. This kind of change presents an excellent opportunity to reconsider classroom spaces and how they are used, with a view to designing new learning spaces to accommodate the curricula innovation. Ireland has for many years used curriculum reform as an accelerant for the adoption of learner-centred pedagogies in teaching and learning (National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, 2011). However, schools have experienced difficulty moving away from past pedagogical cultures to adopt new approaches to teaching and learning. If the traditional learning spaces in schools are not reconfigured to allow for collaborative work is it reasonable to predict that the new approaches of the JCSA are doomed? In Ireland, school designs for State-funded school buildings are contained in a set of guidelines from the Department of Education and Skills (DES). The DES insists that “where it is proposed to construct a new school these guidelines and all associated documents in the suite of Design Guidance should be applied in full” (Technical Guidance Second Level School, DES, 2014). The design philosophy of the DES states that “the different functions of the ‘Design Team’ members shall be integrated, combining ‘Building Services Engineering’, ‘Architectural Design’, ‘Structural Engineering’ and ‘Quantity Surveying’ to create a well-designed, sustainable, cost effective, durable low maintenance building” (DES, 2014). Notably missing in this ‘team’ are the teachers, principals and pupils. This study suggests that teachers and principals have a key role to play in informing good design for learning spaces and they should play a central role in evaluating innovative learning spaces

Exact and efficient Bayesian inference for multiple changepoint problems.

We demonstrate how to perform direct simulation from the posterior distribution of a class of multiple changepoint models where the number of changepoints is unknown. The class of models assumes independence between the posterior distribution of the parameters associated with segments of data between successive changepoints. This approach is based on the use of recursions, and is related to work on product partition models. The computational complexity of the approach is quadratic in the number of observations, but an approximate version, which introduces negligible error, and whose computational cost is roughly linear in the number of observations, is also possible. Our approach can be useful, for example within an MCMC algorithm, even when the independence assumptions do not hold. We demonstrate our approach on coal-mining disaster data and on well-log data. Our method can cope with a range of models, and exact simulation from the posterior distribution is possible in a matter of minutes