Sustainability in supply and value chain management

This chapter presents the case for integrating sustainability principles into supply and value chain management provision at higher education level as an urgent matter for consideration. It draws on the key declarations including Global Action Programme (GAP) of UNESCO that support the incorporation of sustainability values and practices into all aspects of learning to underscore the need for embedding supply and value chain management curriculum with sustainability. The shared experience and insights from scholarly engagement with integrating sustainability principles at three levels in higher education facilitates sustainability knowledge transfer. Grounded in the extant literature, a critical discussion of the integration process including pedagogical practices reveals prospects and challenges to scaling up of sustainable supply and value chain management education

Modification of Aminoacyl tRNA Synthetase in Order to Incorporate An Unnatural Amino Acid

Proteins allow daily processes in the cell to occur. A protein consists of amino acids. There are twenty natural amino acids coded for in the DNA of organisms. The natural amino acids can be modified to form unnatural amino acids (UAAs). UAAs have useful characteristics when inserted into a protein of a cell, like the ability of fluorescence and the ability to undergo unique reactions. For an UAA to be incorporated into a protein, it must be bound to a transport RNA molecule by an enzyme called aminoacyl tRNA synthetase (aaRS). An existing aaRS was modified in E. Coli bacterial cells to incorporate 3-(2-pyridyl)-L-Alanine since it has metal-binding capabilities. Once incorporated, the UAA could act as a sensor for a metal, making it useful to environmental fields. The aaRS was randomly mutated using saturation mutagenesis at sites L32, V65, W108, G158, A159. The cells were run through a positive screen to determine if the mutated aaRS incorporated the UAA into a green fluorescent protein, which glowed if the UAA was inserted. The results of the positive screen showed several mutated aaRSs (2,4,7,8) incorporated 3-(2-pyridyl)-L-Alanine, while other mutants (2,5,6,7,8,9) also/instead incorporated the p-cyanophenylalanine amino acid that the original aaRS was designed to select

Modification of Aminoacyl tRNA Synthetase in Order to Incorporate An Unnatural Amino Acid

Proteins allow daily processes in the cell to occur. A protein consists of amino acids. There are twenty natural amino acids coded for in the DNA of organisms. The natural amino acids can be modified to form unnatural amino acids (UAAs). UAAs have useful characteristics when inserted into a protein of a cell, like the ability of fluorescence and the ability to undergo unique reactions. For an UAA to be incorporated into a protein, it must be bound to a transport RNA molecule by an enzyme called aminoacyl tRNA synthetase (aaRS). An existing aaRS was modified in E. Coli bacterial cells to incorporate 3-(2-pyridyl)-L-Alanine since it has metal-binding capabilities. Once incorporated, the UAA could act as a sensor for a metal, making it useful to environmental fields. The aaRS was randomly mutated using saturation mutagenesis at sites L32, V65, W108, G158, A159. The cells were run through a positive screen to determine if the mutated aaRS incorporated the UAA into a green fluorescent protein, which glowed if the UAA was inserted. The results of the positive screen showed several mutated aaRSs (2,4,7,8) incorporated 3-(2-pyridyl)-L-Alanine, while other mutants (2,5,6,7,8,9) also/instead incorporated the p-cyanophenylalanine amino acid that the original aaRS was designed to select

Research in action: using positive deviance to improve quality of health care

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Despite decades of efforts to improve quality of health care, poor performance persists in many aspects of care. Less than 1% of the enormous national investment in medical research is focused on improving health care delivery. Furthermore, when effective innovations in clinical care are discovered, uptake of these innovations is often delayed and incomplete. In this paper, we build on the established principle of 'positive deviance' to propose an approach to identifying practices that improve health care quality.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We synthesize existing literature on positive deviance, describe major alternative approaches, propose benefits and limitations of a positive deviance approach for research directed toward improving quality of health care, and describe an application of this approach in improving hospital care for patients with acute myocardial infarction.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The positive deviance approach, as adapted for use in health care, presumes that the knowledge about 'what works' is available in existing organizations that demonstrate consistently exceptional performance. Steps in this approach: identify 'positive deviants,' <it>i.e</it>., organizations that consistently demonstrate exceptionally high performance in the area of interest (<it>e.g</it>., proper medication use, timeliness of care); study the organizations in-depth using qualitative methods to generate hypotheses about practices that allow organizations to achieve top performance; test hypotheses statistically in larger, representative samples of organizations; and work in partnership with key stakeholders, including potential adopters, to disseminate the evidence about newly characterized best practices. The approach is particularly appropriate in situations where organizations can be ranked reliably based on valid performance measures, where there is substantial natural variation in performance within an industry, when openness about practices to achieve exceptional performance exists, and where there is an engaged constituency to promote uptake of discovered practices.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The identification and examination of health care organizations that demonstrate positive deviance provides an opportunity to characterize and disseminate strategies for improving quality.</p