High incorporation of [3H]inositol into phosphoinositides of human platelets during reversible electropermeabilisation

AbstractA new method for high incorporation of [3H]inositol into human platelets is described. The method involves incorporation of [3H]inositol during reversible electropermeabilisation by high voltage discharge, followed by resealing the cells during incubation at 37°C. Between 10- and 20-fold increase of isotope uptake is achieved compared to control intact cells. Permeabilised resealed platelets maintain good responses to thrombin and collagen. Analysis of the incorporation of the label amongst the phosphoinositides shows 70% to be in PI, 20% in PIP, and 10% in PIP2. Stimulation with thrombin and analysis of the formation of IP1, IP2 and IP3 shows the labelling to occur in a hormone-sensitive pool. These studies indicate that reversible electropermeabilisation can be used to achieve good uptake of non-membrane penetrating substances such as inositol

Islamophobia in the National Health Service: an ethnography of institutional racism in PREVENT's counter‐radicalisation policy

In 2015, the UK government made its counter‐radicalisation policy a statutory duty for all National Health Service (NHS) staff. Staff are now tasked to identify and report individuals they suspect may be vulnerable to radicalisation. Prevent training employs a combination of psychological and ideological frames to convey the meaning of radicalisation to healthcare staff, but studies have shown that the threat of terrorism is racialised as well. The guiding question of our ethnography is: how is counter‐radicalisation training understood and practiced by healthcare professionals? A frame analysis draws upon 2 years of ethnographic fieldwork, which includes participant observation in Prevent training and NHS staff interviews. This article demonstrates how Prevent engages in performative colour‐blindness – the active recognition and dismissal of the race frame which associates racialised Muslims with the threat of terrorism. It concludes with a discussion of institutional racism in the NHS – how racialised policies like Prevent impact the minutia of clinical interactions; how the pretence of a ‘post‐racial’ society obscures institutional racism; how psychologisation is integral to the performance of colour‐blindness; and why it is difficult to address the racism associated with colourblind policies which purport to address the threat of the Far‐Right

The militarisation of English schools: Troops to Teaching and the implications for Initial Teacher Education and race equality

This article considers the implications of the Troops to Teaching (TtT) programme, to be introduced in England in autumn 2013, for Initial Teacher Education (ITE) and race equality. TtT will fast-track ex-armed service members to teach in schools, without necessarily the requirement of a university degree. Employing theories of white supremacy, and Althusser’s (1971) concept of Ideological and Repressive State Apparatus, I argue that this initiative both stems from, and contributes to, a system of social privilege and oppression in education. Despite appearing to be aimed at all young people, the planned TtT initiative is actually aimed at poor and racially subordinated youth. This is likely to further entrench polarisation in a system which already provides two tier educational provision: TtT will be a programme for the inner-city disadvantaged, whilst wealthier, whiter schools will mostly continue to get highly qualified teachers. Moreover, TtT contributes to a wider devaluing of current ITE; ITE itself is rendered virtually irrelevant, as it seems TtT teachers will not be subject specialists, rather will be expected to provide military-style discipline, the skills for which they will be expected to bring with them. More sinister, I argue that TtT is part of the wider militarisation of education. This military-industrial-education complex seeks to contain and police young people who are marginalised along lines of race and class, and contributes to a wider move to increase ideological support for foreign wars - both aims ultimately in the service of neoliberal objectives which will feed social inequalities

Localisation of the [32P]IP3 binding site on human platelet intracellular membranes isolated by high-voltage free-flow electrophoresis

AbstractThis Study reports the localisation of the [32P]IP3 binding site on highly purified membrane fractions prepared using high-voltage free-flow electrophoresis. Binding studies on mixed membranes, carried out at 4°C, revealed a binding site with a Kd = 86 nM and βmax = 5.3 pmol/mg protein. The binding was potently inhibited by heparin. High-voltage free-flow electrophoresis was used to further purify surface and intracellular membranes. The intracellular membranes showed a 5-fold enrichment of binding sites with respect to the parent mixed membranes with the same Kd(80 nM), but the surface membranes showed an absence of binding activity. The results indicate the localisation of the IP3 receptor on highly purified intracellular membranes

Studies of potentially inflammatory phospholipases A2 and the effects of chloroquine-like agents

Studies of potentially inflammatory phospholipases A2 and the effects of chloroquine-like agent

The fractionation of dextran using ethanol

Reviews of molecular weight fractionation based on solubility difference and of gel permeation chromatography theories have been made. Fractional precipitation with ethanol has to be performec at least twice to obtain clinical dextran, which is a poly­glucose, from an aqueous solution of dextran having a broad molecular weight distribution. In the first stage the high molecular weight dextrans precipitate out from the solution as a syrup. In the second stage the lower molecular weight dextrans precipitate out from the remaining supernatant solution, when the ethanol concentration is increased. For the economic optimisation of dextran fractions, a mathematical model has been proposed based on the Boltzmann equation which predicts the weight percentage dextrans in each of the two stages of fractionation, the Boltzmann equation constants C, E and the volume ratios D,F for the two-phase separation. The aims of the project were to test this mathematical model on the laboratory-scale ethanol fractionation of dextran and also to use it to predict actual plant fractionations. In the laboratory-scale ethanol fractionation, the comparison of results on the first siage between the model predictions and experimental values are in very good agree­ment. On the second stage there is an offset present between the two comparable sets of results over the entire experi­mental range of values. The model predicts values that are approximately 10 Wt% higher than the experimental values. A similar pattern to that in the laboratory was found to exist between the two sets of results obtained for the plant fractionations of dextran. The precipitation of dextran molecules on an industrial­scale was also studied and it was found that the current settling times were inadequate. It is shown that a. company producing 100 batches per annum could increase its cash flow by £200,000 per annum by using the model to predict plant fractionations