Mercury Bioaccumulation in Wood Frogs Developing in Seasonal Pools

Seasonal woodland pools contribute significant biomass to terrestrial ecosystems through production of pool-breeding amphibians. The movement of amphibian metamorphs potentially transports toxins bioaccumulated during larval development in the natal pool into the surrounding terrestrial environment. We documented total mercury (THg) in seasonal woodland pool water, sediment, litter, and Lithobates sylvaticus LeConte (Wood Frog) in Acadia National Park, ME. THg concentrations in pool water varied over the study season, increasing during April-June and remaining high in 2 of 4 pools upon October refill. Water in pools surrounded by softwoods had lower pH, greater dissolved organic carbon, and greater THg concentrations than pools surrounded by hardwoods, with seasonal patterns in sediment THg but not litter THg. THg increased rapidly from near or below detection in 1-2 week old embryos (\u3c 0.2 ng; 0-0.49 ppb wet weight) to 17.1-54.2 ppb in tadpoles within 6 weeks; 7.2-42.0% of THg was methyl Hg in tadpoles near metamorphosis. Metamorphs emigrating from seasonal pools may transfer mercury into terrestrial food webs

Biological embedding of childhood adversity: from physiological mechanisms to clinical implications

Background: Adverse psychosocial exposures in early life, namely experiences such as child maltreatment, caregiver stress or depression, and domestic or community violence, have been associated in epidemiological studies with increased lifetime risk of adverse outcomes, including diabetes, heart disease, cancers, and psychiatric illnesses. Additional work has shed light on the potential molecular mechanisms by which early adversity becomes “biologically embedded” in altered physiology across body systems. This review surveys evidence on such mechanisms and calls on researchers, clinicians, policymakers, and other practitioners to act upon evidence. Observations Childhood psychosocial adversity has wide-ranging effects on neural, endocrine, immune, and metabolic physiology. Molecular mechanisms broadly implicate disruption of central neural networks, neuroendocrine stress dysregulation, and chronic inflammation, among other changes. Physiological disruption predisposes individuals to common diseases across the life course. Conclusions: Reviewed evidence has important implications for clinical practice, biomedical research, and work across other sectors relevant to public health and child wellbeing. Warranted changes include increased clinical screening for exposures among children and adults, scale-up of effective interventions, policy advocacy, and ongoing research to develop new evidence-based response strategies

Associations between polygenic risk for psychiatric disorders and substance involvement

Despite evidence of substantial comorbidity between psychiatric disorders and substance involvement, the extent to which common genetic factors contribute to their co-occurrence remains understudied. In the current study, we tested for associations between polygenic risk for psychiatric disorders and substance involvement (i.e., ranging from ever-use to severe dependence) among 2573 non-Hispanic European-American participants from the Study of Addiction: Genetics and Environment. Polygenic risk scores (PRS) for cross-disorder psychopathology (CROSS) were generated based on the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium’s Cross-Disorder meta-analysis and then tested for associations with a factor representing general liability to alcohol, cannabis, cocaine, nicotine, and opioid involvement (GENSUB). Follow-up analyses evaluated specific associations between each of the 5 psychiatric disorders which comprised CROSS—attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), autism spectrum disorder (AUT), bipolar disorder (BIP), major depressive disorder (MDD), and schizophrenia (SCZ)—and involvement with each component substance included in GENSUB. CROSS PRS explained 1.10% of variance in GENSUB in our sample (p<0.001). After correction for multiple testing in our follow-up analyses of polygenic risk for each individual disorder predicting involvement with each component substance, associations remained between: A) MDD PRS and non-problem cannabis use, B) MDD PRS and severe cocaine dependence, C) SCZ PRS and non-problem cannabis use and severe cannabis dependence, and D) SCZ PRS and severe cocaine dependence. These results suggest that shared covariance from common genetic variation contributes to psychiatric and substance involvement comorbidity

Competency-based medical education in two Sub-Saharan African medical schools.

Background Relatively little has been written on Medical Education in Sub-Saharan Africa, although there are over 170 medical schools in the region. A number of initiatives have been started to support medical education in the region to improve quality and quantity of medical graduates. These initiatives have led to curricular changes in the region, one of which is the introduction of Competency-Based Medical Education (CBME). Institutional reviews This paper presents two medical schools, Makerere University College of Health Sciences and College of Medicine, University of Ibadan, which successfully implemented CBME. The processes of curriculum revision are described and common themes are highlighted. Both schools used similar processes in developing their CBME curricula, with early and significant stakeholder involvement. Competencies were determined taking into consideration each country’s health and education systems. Final competency domains were similar between the two schools. Both schools established medical education departments to support their new curricula. New teaching methodologies and assessment methods were needed to support CBME, requiring investments in faculty training. Both schools received external funding to support CBME development and implementation. Conclusion CBME has emerged as an important change in medical education in Sub-Saharan Africa with schools adopting it as an approach to transformative medical education. Makerere University and the University of Ibadan have successfully adopted CBME and show that CBME can be implemented even for the low-resourced countries in Africa, supported by external investments to address the human resources gap

Century-scale wood nitrogen isotope trajectories from an oak savanna with variable fire frequencies

Fire frequency exerts a fundamental control on productivity and nutrient cycling in savanna ecosystems. Individual fires often increase short-Term nitrogen (N) availability to plants, but repeated burning causes ecosystem N losses and can ultimately decrease soil organic matter and N availability. However, these effects remain poorly understood due to limited long-Term biogeochemical data. Here, we evaluate how fire frequency and changing vegetation composition influenced wood stable N isotopes (15N) across space and time at one of the longest running prescribed burn experiments in the world (established in 1964). We developed multiple 15N records across a burn frequency gradient from precisely dated Quercus macrocarpa tree rings in an oak savanna at Cedar Creek Ecosystem Science Reserve, Minnesota, USA. Sixteen trees were sampled across four treatment stands that varied with respect to the temporal onset of burning and burn frequency but were consistent in overstory species representation, soil characteristics, and topography. Burn frequency ranged from an unburned control stand to a high-fire-frequency stand that had burned in 4 of every 5 years during the past 55 years. Because N stocks and net N mineralization rates are currently lowest in frequently burned stands, we hypothesized that wood 15N trajectories would decline through time in all burned stands, but at a rate proportional to the fire frequency. We found that wood 15N records within each stand were remarkably coherent in their mean state and trend through time. A gradual decline in wood 15N occurred in the mid-20th century in the no-, low-, and medium-fire stands, whereas there was no trend in the highfire stand. The decline in the three stands did not systematically coincide with the onset of prescribed burning. Thus, we found limited evidence for variation in wood 15N that could be attributed directly to long-Term fire frequency in this prescribed burn experiment in temperate oak savanna. Our wood 15N results may instead reflect decadal-scale changes in vegetation composition and abundance due to early-to mid-20th-century fire suppression

Heart Development, Coronary Vascularization and Ventricular Maturation in a Giant Danio (Devario malabaricus)

Giant danios (genus Devario), like zebrafish, are teleosts belonging to the danioninae subfamily of cyprinids. Adult giant danios are used in a variety of investigations aimed at understanding cellular and physiological processes, including heart regeneration. Despite their importance, little is known about development and growth in giant danios, or their cardiac and coronary vessels development. To address this scarcity of knowledge, we performed a systematic study of a giant danio (Devario malabaricus), focusing on its cardiac development, from the segmentation period to ten months post-fertilization. Using light and scanning electron microscopy, we documented that its cardiovascular development and maturation proceed along well defined dynamic and conserved morphogenic patterns. The overall size and cardiovascular expansion of this species was significantly impacted by environmental parameters such as rearing densities. The coronary vasculature began to emerge in the late larval stage. More importantly, we documented two possible loci of initiation of the coronary vasculature in this species, and compared the emergence of the coronaries to that of zebrafish and gourami. This is the first comprehensive study of the cardiac growth in a Devario species, and our findings serve as an important reference for further investigations of cardiac biology using this species

LabKey Server NAb: A tool for analyzing, visualizing and sharing results from neutralizing antibody assays

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Multiple types of assays allow sensitive detection of virus-specific neutralizing antibodies. For example, the extent of antibody neutralization of HIV-1, SIV and SHIV can be measured in the TZM-bl cell line through the degree of luciferase reporter gene expression after infection. In the past, neutralization curves and titers for this standard assay have been calculated using an Excel macro. Updating all instances of such a macro with new techniques can be unwieldy and introduce non-uniformity across multi-lab teams. Using Excel also poses challenges in centrally storing, sharing and associating raw data files and results.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We present LabKey Server's NAb tool for organizing, analyzing and securely sharing data, files and results for neutralizing antibody (NAb) assays, including the luciferase-based TZM-bl NAb assay. The customizable tool supports high-throughput experiments and includes a graphical plate template designer, allowing researchers to quickly adapt calculations to new plate layouts. The tool calculates the percent neutralization for each serum dilution based on luminescence measurements, fits a range of neutralization curves to titration results and uses these curves to estimate the neutralizing antibody titers for benchmark dilutions. Results, curve visualizations and raw data files are stored in a database and shared through a secure, web-based interface. NAb results can be integrated with other data sources based on sample identifiers. It is simple to make results public after publication by updating folder security settings.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Standardized tools for analyzing, archiving and sharing assay results can improve the reproducibility, comparability and reliability of results obtained across many labs. LabKey Server and its NAb tool are freely available as open source software at <url>http://www.labkey.com</url> under the Apache 2.0 license. Many members of the HIV research community can also access the LabKey Server NAb tool without installing the software by using the Atlas Science Portal (<url>https://atlas.scharp.org</url>). Atlas is an installation of LabKey Server.</p

Innovative package for frontline maternal, newborn and child health workers in South Sudan

Improving maternal, newborn, and child health is a leading priority worldwide. It is a particularly urgent issue in South Sudan, which suffers from the world’s worst maternal mortality and among the worst newborn and child mortalities. A leading barrier to improving these health indices is limited frontline health worker capacity. In partnership with the Ministry of Health, the Division of Global Health and Human Rights (Department of Emergency Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, USA) has developed and is currently implementing its novel Maternal, Newborn, and Child Survival (MNCS) Initiative throughout much of South Sudan. The purpose of MNCS is to build frontline health worker capacity through a training package that includes:1. A participatory training course2. Pictorial checklists to guide prevention, care, and referral3. Re-useable medical equipment and commodities.Program implementation began in November 2010 utilizing a training-of-trainers model. To date, 72 local trainers and 632 frontline health workers have completed the training and received their MNCS checklists and commodities. Initial monitoring and evaluation results are encouraging as further evaluation continues. This innovative training package may also serve as a model for building capacity for maternal, newborn, and child health in other resource limited settings beyond South Sudan

Evolution challenges. Integrating research and practice in teaching and learning about evolution

Abstract and Keywords Scientists frequently attribute public misunderstanding of evolution to religious or political influences. Ineffective undergraduate teaching has also contributed. Faculty often ignored strong pedagogical evidence. Five research conclusions are discussed: The traditional lecture approach is inadequate. Active learning is much more effective. Fundamental reasoning difficulties limit students&apos; understanding. Simple steps help overcome these. Misconceptions typically persist unless directly addressed with a conceptual-change approach. Evolution is a complex set of ideas that cannot be adequately understood without advanced critical thinking. This is infrequently mastered without intentionally designed learning tasks. Understanding evolution is typically insufficient for its acceptance. But acceptance as valid for real-world decisions is important. This requires helping students consider social and affective factors related to evolution. Keywords: misconceptions, conceptual-change, intentional design, evolution acceptance Scientists frequently attribute the public misunderstanding of evolution largely to conservative religious influences or dubious political motivations. Indeed, Mazur (2004 found Christian religiosity to be the strongest correlate of &quot;disbelief&quot; in evolution with low educational attainment and political conservatism also important. How science is taught in undergraduate education is a powerful additional factor that usually has been ignored in analyses of Why Don&apos;t Undergraduates Really &quot;Get&quot; Evolution? What Can ... http://www.oxfordscholarship.com.ezproxy.lib.indiana.edu/vie... of 27 6/25/13 5:37 PM public misunderstanding of evolution. Rejection and misunderstanding of evolution are not simply the results of some facets of American culture. Rather, they are also the predictable results of traditional, didactic teaching strategies. Postsecondary science teaching often ignores strong evidence on ways to make instruction much more effective (e.g., The first part of this chapter focuses on four broadly applicable results of research on teaching undergraduate science. The latter part turns to strategies that take account of factors that apply more strongly to evolution than to much of the rest of science. Key Result 1: Active Learning Is More Effective Active learning substantially increases achievement when compared with traditional pedagogy in undergraduate science, a conclusion featured in a review in Science The inadequacy of the traditional lecture approach in undergraduate science has been demonstrated most extensively in physics, where active methods roughly doubled average normalized pretest to posttest gains in learning, an effect approximating a two standard deviation difference Thus, one answer to the question &quot;What can faculty do to increase the proportion of students who &apos;get&apos; evolution?&quot; is to switch further toward structured active learning in lieu of more didactic pedagogies. The implications of this conclusion can be both distressing and elating. This conclusion can be distressing because time already spent on improving lectures would often have been spent much more effectively on improving pedagogy. The conclusion can be elating because changes can be fairly easy and can have large effects. Unfortunately, faculty often have reservations about adopting active learning. These reservations include loss of content coverage, possible loss of control over the class, and possible failure of the activities. Tanner (2009) addressed a number of these. Similarly, several dysfunctional illusions that falsely suggest a lack of rigor for more effective pedagogies probably have slowed their adoption However one chooses to label these reasoning abilities, scores on reasoning tests have often been shown to predict achievement in undergraduate science courses and, sometimes, in precollege science (e.g., These findings have profound implications for understanding and teaching molecular aspects of biology generally, and of evolution specifically, as shown by studies of undergraduate chemistry. For example, Herron (1975) listed startling differences between core ideas in chemistry that the concrete students can and cannot understand without altered pedagogy. These students will be a large fraction of any first-year class. (p.314) Scores on reasoning tests were also related to the acceptance of evolution. Students who scored lower on tests of basic reasoning were less likely to accept evolution on the pretest and were more likely to continue to reject evolution on the posttest than individuals who performed better on the reasoning assessment A major advance for understanding how differences in reasoning play out in learning biology was recently provided by 1. Descriptive predictions could be mastered by most students whatever their scores on reasoning tests. 2. Tasks requiring understanding and testing hypotheses involving perceptible causal agents (e.g., light, moisture) were usually mastered only by students with higher reasoning scores. 3. Tasks using hypotheses involving causal agents that cannot be as directly perceived (e.g., genetic versus environmental causation, chemical communication) were usually mastered only by students with even higher reasoning abilities. Much greater pedagogical support is needed for tasks requiring the use of causal hypotheses, especially those using inferred causal agents. These distinctions are fundamental to students&apos; difficulties in understanding evolution and to the development of effective ways to help them master it. Unfortunately, the underlying reasoning patterns are not changed easily with conventional teaching. Other researchers have made additional suggestions for fostering more complex reasoning. For example, a nice example of the use of hands-on modeling to support more complex thinking in a large molecular biology class was provided by In summary, the answer to the question &quot;What can faculty do to increase the proportion of students who &apos;get&apos; evolution?&quot; from this second perspective is that faculty often need to pay more attention to students&apos; basic reasoning and to teach in ways that better support (rather than just require) scientific understanding and reasoning. Without such support many students cannot understand what is being taught even when they are trying quite hard to do so. Although these problems and many of the solutions have been clear for decades, they have not been widely adopted. &quot;Because we [as faculty] are at the point that concrete experience … is superfluous, we tend to forget that it was not always so [for us] and in our rush to &apos;cover the material,&apos; we omit the very kind of experiences that can make our subject meaningful to beginning students&quot; (Herron, 1978, p. 167). Many faculty will be skeptical (as I was) that well-performing students are deficient in understanding the basic concepts that should underlie their successes in class. It may be hard to accept that even &quot;facility in solving standard quantitative problems is not an adequate criterion for functional understanding&quot; (Thornton, 1999). In order to see the limitations of current approaches and the effects of changes we need more sophisticated ways of writing in-class and exam assessments About the Index Search across all sources Show related links Why Don&apos;t Undergraduates Really &quot;Get&quot; Evolution? What Can ... http://www.oxfordscholarship.com.ezproxy.lib.indiana.edu/vie... of 27 6/25/13 5:37 PM macroevolution is central to an understanding of the strength of the evidence showing that evolution has occurred (Padian, 2010). Further, macroevolution &quot;is perhaps the primary stumbling block&quot; for students, teachers, and other adults who have difficulty accepting evolution (M. U. Smith, 2010b, p. 541). The switch in students&apos; understanding from misconceptions or alternative conceptions to scientifically valid views is termed conceptual change (for evolution: Banet &amp; Ayuso, 2003; Various approaches to teaching evolution have attempted to produce major conceptual change and understanding generally. M. U. Smith (2010b) provided a concise (p.317) overview. Six examples merit special discussion. Although these mostly address microevolution, they could be modified for topics in macroevolution. 1. An Exemplary Conceptual Change Approach. Banet and Ayuso About the Index Search across all sources Show related links Why Don&apos;t Undergraduates Really &quot;Get&quot; Evolution? What Can ... http://www.oxfordscholarship.com.ezproxy.lib.indiana.edu/vie... of 27 6/25/13 5:37 PM Roscoe, this volume). 5. Participatory Action Research. In a multiyear study, Grant (2008) examined the misconceptions his first-year biology students held about natural selection. &quot;Many students who presented evidence on pre-tests that they harbored substantial misconceptions in fact remained highly resistant to instruction, and often defended their misconceptions using course appropriate terminology, but incorrectly, on the course final exam. In other words, many had hijacked course content in service of their misconceptions&quot; (Grant, 2008, p. 15). He iteratively designed ways to address these in a large class setting. Key changes included repeatedly presenting summaries of in-class surveys of prior knowledge and misconceptions. He also asked students to discuss with their neighbors what evidence and arguments would be needed to foster the replacement of these misconceptions with expert knowledge. He termed this &quot;participatory action research.&quot; It required substantial reductions in content and rearrangements of topics. There were large increases over previous years in the grades on the final examination questions on evolution: On a key question assessing natural selection, good answers (8 to10 of 10 points) increased from about 3% of students (2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)(2005) to 54% (2006)(2007), and very low scores (0-2 points) were eliminated. This approach has considerable promise for improving undergraduate science learning generally. Whole Course Transformation. In what is essentially a deep conceptual change approach, BioQUEST has emphasized computer-facilitated, case-based learning with a focus on problem-posing, problem-solving, and peer persuasion, often addressing topics in evolution In summary, the answer to the question &quot;What can faculty do to increase the proportion of students who &apos;get&apos; evolution?&quot; from this third perspective is that faculty often need to give even more attention to students&apos; persistent misunderstandings and to teach in ways that better support conceptual change (rather than falsely assuming that telling students the right idea or showing them the data will be sufficient to elicit change). Without explicit, active support for conceptual change, most students will retain their initial misunderstandings. (p.319) Key Result 4: Complex Thinking Is Requisite for Understanding Evolution Many of the difficulties we encounter in getting students to understand evolution are well explained by differences in their approaches to knowledge, specifically to how they expect to understand new topics. These approaches range from &quot;just tell me what to memorize&quot; to expecting us to help them understand the applications, implications, and trade-offs in various contexts. These different approaches are usefully understood as differences in adult cognitive development. There is a substantial body of research on cognitive development in college and its implications for learning and teaching. This approach began with Perry&apos;s (1970) study of &quot;intellectual and ethical development&quot; in undergraduates. Perry&apos;s work has been cited by hundreds of subsequent studies (partially reviewed by Cognitive development beyond that typically found in undergraduates is a prerequisite for an adequate understanding of evolution. Sinatra, Southerland, McConaughy, and Demastes About the Index Search across all sources Show related links Why Don&apos;t Undergraduates Really &quot;Get&quot; Evolution? What Can ... http://www.oxfordscholarship.com.ezproxy.lib.indiana.edu/vie... 6 of 27 6/25/13 5:37 PM they termed absolutism, relativism, and evaluativism. Perry&apos;s terms for these three approaches (dualism, multiplicity, and relativism) have been widely used, although some studies have used alternative terminologies. A simplified summary of these major cognitive differences will make clearer the implications for teaching evolution. (p.320) Absolutism (Perry&apos;s Dualism) About two-thirds of first-year students and half of sophomores had absolutism as their core approach Relativism (Perry&apos;s Multiplicity) When students first encounter meaningful uncertainty in a new area they typically have no idea how it might be resolved. In the face of uncertainty all opinions seem to be equally valid-any answer that one prefers on whatever grounds is fine. Personal experience, personally interpreted, has the preeminent role. This is the approach most of us usually use in picking a flavor of ice cream, but it is a terrible approach to critical thinking About one-third of first-year students and perhaps 80% of seniors were &quot;transitional&quot;: they regarded knowledge in some areas as absolute and knowledge in others as uncertain and, hence, arbitrary Burgoyne and Downey (2011) have suggested that we ask students to see absolutism and relativism as two misconceptions: Contextual Knowing (Bendixen and Rule&apos;s Evaluativism; Perry&apos;s Relativism) The approach where students have learned to make context-framed, criteria-based comparisons has also been termed contextual relativism (e.g., Knefelkamp, 1999) (p.321) and contextual knowing As students become more cognitively sophisticated, they (like many older adults) typically use a mosaic of approaches, perhaps treating some topics in dualism/absolutism and some in multiplicity even while struggling to master contextual knowing in others Beyond Contextual Knowing The limitations of simple contextual knowing are evident when we consider complex problems. The core difficulty is that students who have learned to operate within a series of individual disciplines often have no coherent way to deal with differences that arise when a variety of disciplines apply to a complex problem. They consequently see any choice among combinations of disciplinary For example, even a local environmental issue, such as the appropriateness of a nuclear power plant, requires a consideration of trade-offs across multiple perspectives including science, waste disposal, environmental economics, politics, and environmental racism, to name just a few To deal with such issues constructively, students must learn to consider the benefits and negative consequences illuminated by each perspective. As students learn to make such analyses they begin thinking in a way that Perry termed &quot;Commitment [within contextual relativism]&quot; and Baxter Magolda termed &quot;self-authorship.&quot; This approach is exceedingly rare among undergraduates except under transformed curricula Applications to Teaching Evolution &quot;Perhaps the most useful developmental theory to be applied to evolution instruction is that of Perry&quot; (M. U. Smith, 2010b, p. 541; also Nelson, 1986, etc.). Classroom applications that strive to foster cognitive development can profitably focus on key aspects of the three transitions between the four main approaches to understanding. (p.322) These are: initially understanding uncertainty, then using comparisons and criteria to address uncertainty (contextual knowing) and, later, using consequences and values to frame arguments and justify choices. Uncertainty in evolution can be invoked, for example, by listing (or having the class list) currently viable alternative hypotheses, listing ones that were historically viable or by asking for deep understanding of experimental designs (Why is this control included? Are any controls missing? What untested hypotheses might have produced the same results?). Once some important uncertainty has been made clear, the alternative hypotheses or design considerations or other factors need to be compared, and possibly resolved, using appropriate criteria. Unless both the alternatives and the criteria are made explicit, most of the critical thinking will be tacit and therefore incomprehensible-and the students&apos; approaches to thinking will be unaffected. For comparisons of historically grounded alternatives in evolution, such as what sequences should have been expected from the fossil record, an appropriate criterion is the result of a fair test. A fair test is a new set of data that could have confirmed any of the alternatives and that is different from (and not tightly tied to) the data sets on which they were proposed. We can ask: What patterns of change in the fossil record might have been expected of the fossil record when the geological column was first put into its modern order in the 1840s, noting that evolution was not really available except to Darwin. Alternatives included: all kinds at the beginning with just extinction, Lyell&apos;s large cycles with great reptiles perhaps returning again (and again), Sedgwick&apos;s extinctions and new recreations, vertebrates first and invertebrates by degeneration, and, of course, evolution starting, as Darwin noted, with one or a few very simple kinds. Students will suggest some of these ideas, if asked. The fossil record itself provides a fair test of these alternatives, as most of them were not based on the ordered sequence of rocks in the newly emerging geological column and as any of the alternative patterns could have been found. A number of other criteria are also important. These include accounting for apparently conflicting scientific data and the availability of causal explanations (e.g., However, even when we understand that one alternative is much more probable than another we may choose not to accept it. It is often appropriate to reject hypotheses that are probably true when there are serious risks to accepting the hypothesis and being wrong. Thus, for many considerations of safety in the face of severe consequences we demand not just that safety be very probable but that it be overwhelmingly probable (basic decision theory, below). This requires moving beyond contextual knowing. For students studying evolution, going beyond contextual knowing would require that students understand the force of the evidence in the context of the nature of science generally; understand and know how to weigh the consequences (p.323) from the applications of evolution, both positive and negative; and understand how to fit evolution into larger cultural contexts. It thus becomes crucial for faculty members who teach evolution to help students address its consequences and applications. Faculty also need to consider whether to address the cultural contexts for evolution and, if so, how to do so effectively. About the Index Search across all sources Show related links Why Don&apos;t Undergraduates Really &quot;Get&quot; Evolution? What Can ... http://www.oxfordscholarship.com.ezproxy.lib.indiana.edu/vie... of 27 6/25/13 5:37 PM If we step back from focusing just on conceptual understanding or scientific reasoning, things become more complicated. Baxter Magolda (e.g., 2004a) noted that students make meaning of their experiences using their own perspectives rather than accepting the instructor&apos;s meaning and perspective. Further, the development of more complex ways of understanding is inextricably intertwined with the development of a different and more complex sense of self and of different and of more complex ways of relating to others. &quot;Interviewees who developed complex ways of knowing [after graduation] often could not live those ways of knowing until they had developed complex ways of seeing themselves and their relations with others&quot; (Baxter Magolda, 2004a, p. 39). Let me stress again the importance of making extensive use of structured active learning and not just because it fosters content mastery. Appropriately structured collaborative and cooperative learning also helps foster increased cognitive sophistication and the other changes that are essential to that cognitive development. I found two techniques to be especially powerful in fostering cognitive development: 1. In teaching evolution to seniors, I developed a worksheet based on Perry&apos;s descriptions of the cognitive tasks required for deep understanding (Nelson, 2010a), and had students complete the worksheet outside of class. Then, I implemented a whole-period discussion of applications of Perry&apos;s principles, a discussion that fostered deep rethinking with peers. 2. In courses ranging from first-year to graduate, I had the students either discuss excerpts from Perry&apos;s (1970) book including his summary of the student&apos;s experience (Nelson, 2010a) or presented and had them discuss and repeatedly refer back to a graphical synopsis of Perry (as in Nelson, 2010b). Using either approach, I repeatedly asked students how a person would respond to the evolution-creation controversy (and to other issues) from the perspective of an absolutist, versus from multiplicity, versus, in turn, from contextual knowing and, later, from self-authorship In summary, the answer to the question &quot;What can faculty do to increase the proportion of students who &apos;get&apos; evolution?&quot; from this fourth perspective is that faculty need to design their courses to foster greater cognitive sophisticati

Comparison of the CDC Backpack aspirator and the Prokopack aspirator for sampling indoor- and outdoor-resting mosquitoes in southern Tanzania.

BACKGROUND\ud \ud Resting mosquitoes can easily be collected using an aspirating device. The most commonly used mechanical aspirator is the CDC Backpack aspirator. Recently, a simple, and low-cost aspirator called the Prokopack has been devised and proved to have comparable performance. The following study evaluates the Prokopack aspirator compared to the CDC backpack aspirator when sampling resting mosquitoes in rural Tanzania.\ud \ud METHODS\ud \ud Mosquitoes were sampled in- and outdoors of 48 typical rural African households using both aspirators. The aspirators were rotated between collectors and households in a randomized, Latin Square design. Outdoor collections were performed using artificial resting places (large barrel and car tyre), underneath the outdoor kitchen (kibanda) roof and from a drop-net. Data were analysed with generalized linear models.\ud \ud RESULTS\ud \ud The number of mosquitoes collected using the CDC Backpack and the Prokopack aspirator were not significantly different both in- and outdoors (indoors p = 0.735; large barrel p = 0.867; car tyre p = 0.418; kibanda p = 0.519). The Prokopack was superior for sampling of drop-nets due to its smaller size. The number mosquitoes collected per technician was more consistent when using the Prokopack aspirator. The Prokopack was more user-friendly: technicians preferred using the it over the CDC backpack aspirator as it weighs considerably less, retains its charge for longer and is easier to manoeuvre.\ud \ud CONCLUSIONS\ud \ud The Prokopack proved in the field to be more advantageous than the CDC Backpack aspirator. It can be self assembled using simple, low-cost and easily attainable materials. This device is a useful tool for researchers or vector-control surveillance programs operating in rural Africa, as it is far simpler and quicker than traditional means of sampling resting mosquitoes. Further longitudinal evaluations of the Prokopack aspirator versus the gold standard pyrethrum spray catch for indoor resting catches are recommended