Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) for Positron Emission Particle Tracking (PEPT) and Turbulence Modeling Validation

A Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) experiment is designed and data collected with intention to validate Positron Emission Particle Tracking (PEPT) methods. The PIV data are collected in a narrow rectangular channel for flow Reynolds number near 20,000. The narrow channel and attendant pump, header tanks and flow instrumentation are portable and designed to allow identical tests in a Concord Microsystems MicroPET P4 pre-clinical PET scanner at the pre-clinical Imaging Suite at the UT Hospital. The PIV data are instantaneous velocity field data, allowing statistics on the flow turbulence to be collected in the Eulerian frame. The PEPT method measures activated particle trajectories in time, corresponding to a Lagrangian measurement. The relationship between the PIV data collected herein, and the anticipated PEPT data is explored to provide a path for validating the performance of the PEPT method for flow measurement. The utility of the PEPT method extends to opaque fluids and flow in complex and opaque flow boundaries. These flow conditions are impossible or technically difficult for optical PIV methods to address. The PEPT method also provides full 4 dimensional particle trajectory data, with temporal and spatial resolution competitive with the most advanced optical PIV methods

Thinking About ... Core Funding

Thinking about... core funding draws on learning from their own and others' research and interviews with key informants from seven charitable foundations providing core funding to shed light on why, when and how to use core funding. Their particular focus is social welfarevoluntary organisations, many of which are local. This part of the voluntary sector relies mainly on two types of income – grants from statutory bodies and fundraising from trusts and foundations. This makes their dependence on core funding from trusts and foundations, and full costrecovery, even more critical

Women in education and training for the Scottish wood chain

The paper introduces a new project at Napier University in Edinburgh into the issues surrounding entry, progression and retention of female students for courses relating to the growing, processing and utilisation of timber for use in the built environment. Major issues surrounding the recruitmentand retention of women in employment and education in the Scottish forest and timber industries are highlighted. The paper concludes by outlining some recommendations on how best to proactively tackle gender segregation in careers choice initiatives and course promotion to maximise the pool of potential future students

Women in education and training for the Scottish wood chain

The paper introduces a new project at Napier University in Edinburgh into the issues surrounding entry, progression and retention of female students for courses relating to the growing, processing and utilisation of timber for use in the built environment. Major issues surrounding the recruitmentand retention of women in employment and education in the Scottish forest and timber industries are highlighted. The paper concludes by outlining some recommendations on how best to proactively tackle gender segregation in careers choice initiatives and course promotion to maximise the pool of potential future students

Microtubules Regulate Migratory Polarity through Rho/ROCK Signaling in T Cells

Background: Migrating leukocytes normally have a polarized morphology with an actin-rich lamellipodium at the front and a uropod at the rear. Microtubules (MTs) are required for persistent migration and chemotaxis, but how they affect cell polarity is not known.Methodology/Principal Findings: Here we report that T cells treated with nocodazole to disrupt MTs are unable to form a stable uropod or lamellipodium, and instead often move by membrane blebbing with reduced migratory persistence. However, uropod-localized receptors and ezrin/radixin/moesin proteins still cluster in nocodazole-treated cells, indicating that MTs are required specifically for uropod stability. Nocodazole stimulates RhoA activity, and inhibition of the RhoA target ROCK allows nocodazole-treated cells to re-establish lamellipodia and uropods and persistent migratory polarity. ROCK inhibition decreases nocodazole-induced membrane blebbing and stabilizes MTs. The myosin inhibitor blebbistatin also stabilizes MTs, indicating that RhoA/ROCK act through myosin II to destabilize MTs.Conclusions/Significance: Our results indicate that RhoA/ROCK signaling normally contributes to migration by affecting both actomyosin contractility and MT stability. We propose that regulation of MT stability and RhoA/ROCK activity is a mechanism to alter T-cell migratory behavior from lamellipodium-based persistent migration to bleb-based migration with frequent turning

“Catch 22”: biosecurity awareness, interpretation and practice amongst poultry catchers

Campylobacter contamination of chicken on sale in the UK remains at high levels and has a substantial public health impact. This has prompted the application of many interventions in the supply chain, including enhanced biosecurity measures on-farm. Catching and thinning are acknowledged as threats to the maintenance of good biosecurity, yet the people employed to undertake this critical work (i.e. ‘catchers’) are a rarely studied group. This study uses a mixed methods approach to investigate catchers’ (n = 53) understanding of the biosecurity threats posed by the catching and thinning, and the barriers to good biosecurity practice. It interrogated the role of training in both the awareness and practice of good biosecurity. Awareness of lapses in biosecurity was assessed using a Watch-&-Click hazard awareness survey (n = 53). Qualitative interviews (n = 49 catchers, 5 farm managers) explored the understanding, experience and practice of catching and biosecurity. All of the catchers who took part in the Watch-&-Click study identified at least one of the biosecurity threats with 40% detecting all of the hazards. Those who had undergone training were significantly more likely to identify specific biosecurity threats and have a higher awareness score overall (48% compared to 9%, p = 0.03). Crucially, the individual and group interviews revealed the tensions between the high levels of biosecurity awareness evident from the survey and the reality of the routine practice of catching and thinning. Time pressures and a lack of equipment rather than a lack of knowledge appear a more fundamental cause of catcher-related biosecurity lapses. Our results reveal that catchers find themselves in a ‘catch-22′ situation in which mutually conflicting circumstances prevent simultaneous completion of their job and compliance with biosecurity standards

Secondary Structure and Glycosylation of Mucus Glycoproteins by Raman Spectroscopies

The major structural components of protective mucus hydrogels on mucosal surfaces are the secreted polymeric gel-forming mucins. The very high molecular weight and extensive O-glycosylation of gel-forming mucins, which are key to their viscoelastic properties, create problems when studying mucins using conventional biochemical/structural techniques. Thus, key structural information, such as the secondary structure of the various mucin subdomains, and glycosylation patterns along individual molecules, remains to be elucidated. Here, we utilized Raman spectroscopy, Raman optical activity (ROA), circular dichroism (CD), and tip-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (TERS) to study the structure of the secreted polymeric gel-forming mucin MUC5B. ROA indicated that the protein backbone of MUC5B is dominated by unordered conformation, which was found to originate from the heavily glycosylated central mucin domain by isolation of MUC5B O-glycan-rich regions. In sharp contrast, recombinant proteins of the N-terminal region of MUC5B (D1-D2-D′-D3 domains, NT5B), C-terminal region of MUC5B (D4-B-C-CK domains, CT5B) and the Cys-domain (within the central mucin domain of MUC5B) were found to be dominated by the β-sheet. Using these findings, we employed TERS, which combines the chemical specificity of Raman spectroscopy with the spatial resolution of atomic force microscopy to study the secondary structure along 90 nm of an individual MUC5B molecule. Interestingly, the molecule was found to contain a large amount of α-helix/unordered structures and many signatures of glycosylation, pointing to a highly O-glycosylated region on the mucin