Introducing and embedding innovation practices in a UK medical engineering degree course

Exposing medical engineering students to innovation and entrepreneurial practices and training them in concepts and models encountered in industry in a simulated start-up company environment allowed students to explore whether this career route was of interest to them and is expected to enhance the employability of all participants. A module, MedTech BEST (Business and Entrepreneurial Skills Training), was developed to focus on the needs of the medical technology industry sector and piloted at the University of Leeds in 2016/2017. Students acquired the skills and knowledge to be able to pitch a hypothetical medical device product together with its supporting business case, developed over the course of the module, to a panel of experienced judges

Situated Practice:Gardening as a Response to Ownership and Ground in Girona

The ground is both the surface occupied by urban development and a physical media – soil – in which plants grow. Since housing density is a mechanism by which to maximise a site’s financial yield, construction covers the real ground. Consequently, the soil is provided to residents in containers on terraces or balconies. However, the properties of natural ground and simulated ground are different, affecting gardening activity and the kind of material and spatial outcomes resulting from it, the synthesis of which is called “the viridic” by the author. Gardening has health benefits for people. Correspondingly, because different soil conditions affect gardening, this benefit’s qualities are also inflected by access to and type of soil. Using Yin’s “theory building” case study model, two gardens by a landscape architect in Girona are discussed: one on a terrace in containers; the other on the natural ground in a public reserve nearby. Comparing and contrasting these gardens allows for the consideration of the relationship between soil and gardening technique. In addition, the process of abstraction of the ground implicit in site development may also be considered, as well as the implications of such a process on the way in which residents cultivate their gardens and the limitations of private gardens in contributing to local microclimatic and environmental qualities. The paper concludes by refining the model of the viridic based on soil and how soil mediates the relationship of the viridic to urban development. &nbsp

Excavating the Archive: Heritage-making Practices in Cornwall’s Clay Country.

In 1999 English China Clays (the then principal china clay producer in Cornwall and west Devon) was acquired by the multinational industrial minerals company Imerys. Shortly after, a group of concerned clay workers and local historians came together in a salvage mission to recover historical documents which had been deemed expendable during the business takeover. Together they ransacked offices and emptied filing cabinets collecting historic documentation about the industry. In the eighteen years that have followed, the china clay industry and its associated landscape have undergone immense change and transformation. Meanwhile, that small band of individuals has grown into the China Clay History Society (CCHS). CCHS is now in the process of formalising their salvaged collection, with curatorial expertise from the Wheal Martyn Museum (of which the CCHS is a component part). In this thesis, the CCHS archive and its associated community relationships are examined in relation to experiences of past loss, present instability, and the hope of future renewal. Over an extended period of participant observation working alongside the caretakers of the archive, I explored the different practices of collecting, sorting, and valuing which are making and remaking china clay heritage in mid-Cornwall. Drawing on heritage studies and past studies of collecting, as well as professional museum and archival scholarship, this thesis emphasises the role that practice and material relationships play in the assembling of heritage (Macdonald 2009). Two distinct modes of ordering (Law 1994; 2004) – ‘Passion’ and ‘Purpose’ – are identified as central to this research, which aims to show how different practices of collecting and valuing have profound implications for the ways china clay heritage may be performed in the future.Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC

Electrospun bioresorbable tissue repair scaffolds: From laboratory to clinic

The healing of soft tissue wounds and injury sites is a complex process requiring the participation of many different cells, tissues, proteins and tissue components in a coordinated manner. We describe the development of regenerative, electrospun, bioresorbable advanced material tissue scaffolds providing three dimensional (3D) structure for cells involved in the repair of soft tissue injuries. One product, EktoTherix™ provides a micron-scale 3D architecture to enhance the recruitment of reparative cells onto this temporary support and in this way the body's capacity to repair itself is utilised. EktoTherix and other electrospun tissue scaffolds have been translated from early stage laboratory work through manufacturing process development and clinical investigation

A review of the Madagascan snake genera Pseudoxyrhopus, Pararhadinaea, and Heteroliodon (Squamata: Colubridae)

http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/56426/1/MP182.pd

Systematic revision of the genus Paroedura Gnther (Reptilia: Squamata: Gekkonidae), with the description of five new species

http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/56432/1/MP189.pd

A new species of Mabuya Fitzinger (Squamata: Scincidae: Lygosominae) from northern Madagascar

http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/57164/1/OP728.pd

Observations and re-description of Zonosaurus boettgeri Steindachner 1891 and description of a second new species of long-tailed Zonosaurus from western Madagascar

http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/57175/1/OP739.pd

Extinction vulnerability of tropical montane endemism from warming and upslope displacement: a preliminary appraisal for the highest massif in Madagascar

One of the predicted biological responses to climate warming is the upslope displacement of species distributions. In the tropics, because montane assemblages frequently include local endemics that are distributed close to summits, these species may be especially vulnerable to experiencing complete habitat loss from warming. However, there is currently a dearth of information available for tropical regions. Here, we present a preliminary appraisal of this extinction threat using the herpetological assemblage of the Tsaratanana Massif in northern Madagascar (the island's highest massif), which is rich with montane endemism. We present meteorological evidence (individual and combined regional weather station data and reanalysis forecast data) for recent warming in Madagascar, and show that this trend is consistent with recent climate model simulations. Using standard moist adiabatic lapse rates, these observed meteorological warming trends in northern Madagascar predict upslope species displacement of 17–74 m per decade between 1993 and 2003. Over this same period, we also report preliminary data supporting a trend for upslope distribution movements, based on two surveys we completed at Tsaratanana. For 30 species, representing five families of reptiles and amphibians, we found overall mean shifts in elevational midpoint of 19–51 m upslope (mean lower elevation limit 29–114 m; mean upper elevation limit −8 to 53 m). We also found upslope trends in mean and median elevational observations in seven and six of nine species analysed. Phenological differences between these surveys do not appear to be substantial, but these upslope shifts are consistent with the predictions based on meteorological warming. An elevational range displacement analysis projects complete habitat loss for three species below the 2 °C ‘dangerous’ warming threshold. One of these species is not contracting its distribution, but the other two were not resampled in 2003. A preliminary review of the other massifs in Madagascar indicates potential similar vulnerability to habitat loss and upslope extinction. Consequently, we urgently recommend additional elevational surveys for these and other tropical montane assemblages, which should also include, when possible, the monitoring of local meteorological conditions and habitat change.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/74789/1/j.1365-2486.2008.01596.x.pd