The Proliferative Response of Equine Chondrocytes to Bovine Lymph Node Proteins \u3ci\u3e In Vitro \u3c/i\u3e

Osteoarthritis is a leading cause of chronic lameness in horses. Many treatment options for osteoarthritis have limited effectiveness and are expensive. Treatments that stimulate cartilage development may promote cartilage healing. Bovine supramammary lymph nodes are available at no cost and contain bioactive growth factors that could promote cartilage healing. The purpose of this study was to measure the proliferative response of equine chondrocytes to bovine lymph node proteins. Chondrocytes were harvested from adult horses. Lymph node extract (LNE) was prepared by mixing freeze-dried lymph node powder with PBS. Experiments compared BGS and LNE on equal and unequal protein bases. Additional experiments investigated LNE fractions, and the proliferative response to IGF-I and TGF-. DNA accumulation was measured using the CyQUANT DNA assay. LNE stimulated chondrocyte proliferation to an equal or greater degree than BGS, suggesting LNE could promote cartilage healing and potentially form the basis for new osteoarthritis therapies

Queer Provisionality: Mapping the Generative Failures of the \u3ci\u3eTransborder Immigrant Tool\u3c/i\u3e

Alison Reed investigates the border- and boundary-crossing performance of Electronic Disturbance Theater 2.0’sTransBorder Immigrant Tool (TBT), an incomplete cell phone program that offers GPS, guidance, and poetry to those attempting to cross into the United States across the Mexico/US border. Reed suggests a provocation-based performance of “queer provisionality,” revealing the aesthetics of oppressive power structures by juxtaposing them to social utopias. Interrogating the national neoliberal project of both US liberalism and US conservatism, Reed’s essay is also a transcription of the performances launched around TBT, the social and political machinery set into motion by Electronic Disturbance Theater’s failed utopian project

Can a Poem Stop a Jail from Being Built? \u3ci\u3eOn Fugitive Counter-Ethics as Prison Pedagogy\u3c/i\u3e

(First paragraph) In 2016, we began facilitating a reading group at the Norfolk City Jail. Once a week during the semester, we met with six to eight men who qualified for program privileges and thus were given the option by jail staff to participate in the reading group. Each week we gathered to discuss the day\u27s reading in what passed for a classroom inside the jail: a noisy corridor that connected two cellblocks. Against one wall there were four white picnic tables, bolted down to the floor, stacked one after the other. Though those accommodations were better suited for cafeteria-style dining than collective study, we did our best to position our bodies so as to bend sharp angles into a passable circle

Flower Iridescence Increases Object Detection in the Insect Visual System without Compromising Object Identity.

Iridescence is a form of structural coloration, produced by a range of structures, in which hue is dependent on viewing angle [1-4]. One of these structures, the diffraction grating, is found both in animals (for example, beetles [2]) and in plants (on the petals of some animal pollinated flowers [5]). The behavioral impacts of floral iridescence and its potential ecological significance are unknown [6-9]. Animal-pollinated flowers are described as "sensory billboards" [10], with many floral features contributing to a conspicuous display that filters prospective pollinators. Yet floral iridescence is more subtle to the human eye than that of many animal displays because the floral diffraction grating is not perfectly regular [5-9]. This presents a puzzle: if the function of petals is to attract pollinators, then flowers might be expected to optimize iridescence to increase showiness. On the other hand, pollinators memorize floral colors as consistent advertisements of reward quality, and iridescence might corrupt flower color identity. Here we tested the trade-off between flower detectability and recognition, requiring bumblebees (Bombus terrestris) to identify artificial flowers that varied in pigmentation and degree of iridescence. We find that iridescence does increase target detectability but that "perfect" iridescence (produced by an artificial diffraction grating) corrupts target identity and bees make many mistakes. However, "imperfect" floral iridescence does not lead to mistaken target identity, while still benefitting flower detectability. We hypothesize that similar trade-offs might be found in the many naturally "imperfect" iridescence-producing structures found in animal-animal, as well as other plant-animal, interactions.We thank Divykriti Chopra, Matthew Dorling, Lucy Sandbach and James Philpott for assistance with experiments, and Edwige Moyroud for helpful discussions. We thank James Foster for assistance with measurement of flight arena light level measurements. HW is supported by ERC Starting Grant 260920. AR was supported by a BBSRC doctoral training grant studentship. LC is supported by a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award and ERC Advanced Grant 339347.This is the author accepted manuscript. It is currently embargoed pending publication

Speeding up to keep up : exploring the use of AI in the research process

Despite growing interest (UKRI 2021) the role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in research as an enabler of new methods, processes, management and evaluation is still relatively under-explored (Cyranoki 2019; Royal Society 2018). This empirical paper explores (n=25) expert interviews on the potential impact of AI on research practice and culture. Our interviewees identify positive and negative consequences for research and researchers with respect to collective and individual use. AI is perceived as helpful with respect to information gathering and other narrow tasks, and in support of impact and interdisciplinarity. However, using AI as a way of ‘speeding up - to keep up’ with bureaucratic and metricised processes, may proliferate negative aspects of academic culture. The expansion of AI in research should assist and not replace human creativity. Research into the future role of AI needs to go further to address these challenges, and ask fundamental questions about how AI might assist in providing new tools able to question the values and principles driving institutions and research processes. We argue that to do this explicit research on the role of AI in research should be carried out considering the effects for research and researcher creativity. Anticipatory approaches and engagement of diverse and critical voices at policy level and across disciplines should also be considered