Taking Youth Voices Seriously: Theatre, Storytelling, and Empowerment with Refugee Youth in Memphis, TN

This project report documents the most recent play-turned-podcast in a multi-year partnership between the Orpheum Theatre Group and the Refugee Empowerment Program in Memphis, TN. Youth from the program have been engaging in From Where I Stand, a theatrical storytelling program that weaves first-person narratives into theatrical performances that are presented for the community. While our third performance entitled, Refugee Portraits, was postponed due to the pandemic, it was given new life in the form of a podcast. This report will explore the process of creating the live theatrical performance, pivoting that performance to a podcast, and reflect on how we can harness the power of storytelling and community-based theatre as a model for youth empowerment and liberatory education

Complex designers and emergent design : reforming the investment treaty system

How do actors undertake institutional design in complex systems? Scholars recognize that many international regimes are becoming increasingly complex. Yet relatively little is known about how actors design or redesign institutions amid this complexity. As participant-observers in the UN negotiations on investment treaty reform, we have watched state officials and other participants grapple with this question for several years. To help explain what we have observed, we conceptualize these participants as complex designers – actors who seek to design and redesign institutions within complex adaptive systems. We then formulate three emergent design principles that seem to guide their approach as they aim to create: flexible structures, balanced content, and adaptive management processes. In a dynamic era marked by unpredictability, division, and complex transnational challenges, we believe these concepts may prove to be increasingly relevant in global governance.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Asymmetric diffusion : World Bank 'best practice' and the spread of arbitration in national investment laws

Globally, 74 countries have domestic investment laws that mention investor-state arbitration and 42 of these laws provide consent to it. That is, they give foreign investors the right to bypass national courts and bring claims directly to arbitration. What explains this variation, and why do any governments include investor-state arbitration in domestic legislation? We argue that governments incorporate arbitration into their domestic laws because doing so was labelled ‘international best practice’ by specialist units at the World Bank. We introduce the concept of asymmetric diffusion, which occurs when a policy is framed as international best practice but only recommended to a subset of states. No developed state consents to arbitration in their domestic law, nor does the World Bank recommend that they do so. Yet we show that governments who receive technical assistance from the World Bank’s Foreign Investment Advisory Service are more likely to include arbitration in their laws. We first use event history analysis and find that receiving World Bank technical assistance is an exceptionally strong predictor of domestic investment laws with arbitration. Then we illustrate our argument with a case study of the Kyrgyz Republic’s 2003 law.PostprintPeer reviewe

Selection and appointment in international adjudication : insights from political science

Stiansen’s work was supported by the Research Council of Norway through its Centres of Excellence funding scheme, project number 223274 (PluriCourts). Financial support for Larsson’s work was provided by the Swedish Research Council, project no. 2018-01693.This article summarizes insights from political science and empirical legal scholarship concerning selection and appointment of adjudicators to permanent international courts (ICs). This scholarship suggests that designers of ICs face challenging trade-offs in balancing judicial independence and accountability, as well as in promoting descriptive representation and necessary qualifications on the bench. The article considers different institutional design features related to appointment procedures: representation, reappointment, screening procedures and procedures for removing judges. Representation is discussed in a series of sections considering full or selective representation, voting rules and geographic and gender quotas and aspirational targets. Throughout, we draw on data on 24 ICs to illustrate the different appointment procedures and institutional features.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Global perspectives and translations of consuming clothing waste in the present

The mass consumption of clothing has resulted in collection charities such as Oxfam exporting unwanted second hand clothing to markets in the Sub-Saharan region. This is a trade that is seen as supporting sustainable solutions to unwanted clothing but offers ‘both opportunity’ and ‘danger’ to local communities (Haggblade, 2007). The research explores the second hand clothing trade in Ghana, which evidences this danger and challenges the notion of opportunity. The second hand clothing market whilst benefitting local communities in Africa has also impacted upon local textile production. From our conversations around these issues, a collaborative project idea emerged entitled ‘Return to Sender’. The project aims to highlight and challenge the effects of the second hand clothing market upon local heritage in Africa. A shared perspective through global design stories can encourage designers to understand the consequences of design but at the time same enable them to have the power to impact and drive change of consumer habits. The current and future perspectives of purchasing clothing and re-use is explored, regarding how this could then influence and change the global second hand clothing markets. This paper also explores the potential of sustainable outcomes through focusing design in the present, rather than the future. In order to understand a global world we need to see the world as it is to solve the problems and in turn prevent problems in the future. We need an approach that is not engrained into a system but something that promotes creativity and openness to change

Quantitative characterization of viscoelastic behavior in tissue-mimicking phantoms and ex vivo animal tissues.

Viscoelasticity of soft tissue is often related to pathology, and therefore, has become an important diagnostic indicator in the clinical assessment of suspect tissue. Surgeons, particularly within head and neck subsites, typically use palpation techniques for intra-operative tumor detection. This detection method, however, is highly subjective and often fails to detect small or deep abnormalities. Vibroacoustography (VA) and similar methods have previously been used to distinguish tissue with high-contrast, but a firm understanding of the main contrast mechanism has yet to be verified. The contributions of tissue mechanical properties in VA images have been difficult to verify given the limited literature on viscoelastic properties of various normal and diseased tissue. This paper aims to investigate viscoelasticity theory and present a detailed description of viscoelastic experimental results obtained in tissue-mimicking phantoms (TMPs) and ex vivo tissues to verify the main contrast mechanism in VA and similar imaging modalities. A spherical-tip micro-indentation technique was employed with the Hertzian model to acquire absolute, quantitative, point measurements of the elastic modulus (E), long term shear modulus (η), and time constant (τ) in homogeneous TMPs and ex vivo tissue in rat liver and porcine liver and gallbladder. Viscoelastic differences observed between porcine liver and gallbladder tissue suggest that imaging modalities which utilize the mechanical properties of tissue as a primary contrast mechanism can potentially be used to quantitatively differentiate between proximate organs in a clinical setting. These results may facilitate more accurate tissue modeling and add information not currently available to the field of systems characterization and biomedical research

Optimized profiles for improved confinement and stability in the DIII-D tokamak

Simultaneous achievement of high energy confinement, {tau}{sub E}, and high plasma beta, {beta}, leads to an economically attractive compact tokamak fusion reactor. High confinement enhancement, H = {tau}{sub E}/{tau}{sub E-ITER89P} = 4, and high normalized beta {beta}{sub N} = {beta}/(I/aB) = 6%-m-T/MA, have been obtained in DIII-D experimental discharges. These improved confinement and/or improved stability limits are observed in several DIII-D high performance operational regimes: VH-mode, high {ell}{sub i} H-mode, second stable core, and high beta poloidal. The authors have identified several important features of the improved performance in these discharges: details of the plasma shape, toroidal rotation or ExB flow profile, q profile and current density profile, and pressure profile. From the improved physics understanding of these enhanced performance regimes, they have developed operational scenarios which maintain the essential features of the improved confinement and which increase the stability limits using localized current profile control. The stability limit is increased by modifying the interior safety factor profile to be nonmonotonic with high central q, while maintaining the edge current density consistent with the improved transport regimes and the high edge bootstrap current. They have calculated high beta equilibria with {beta}{sub N} = 6.5, stable to ideal n = 1 kinks and stable to ideal ballooning modes. The safety factor at the 95% flux surface is 6, the central q value is 3.9 and the minimum in q is 2.6. The current density profile is maintained by the natural profile of the bootstrap current, and a modest amount of electron cyclotron current drive

A Comparison of Two Shallow Water Models with Non-Conforming Adaptive Grids: classical tests

In an effort to study the applicability of adaptive mesh refinement (AMR) techniques to atmospheric models an interpolation-based spectral element shallow water model on a cubed-sphere grid is compared to a block-structured finite volume method in latitude-longitude geometry. Both models utilize a non-conforming adaptation approach which doubles the resolution at fine-coarse mesh interfaces. The underlying AMR libraries are quad-tree based and ensure that neighboring regions can only differ by one refinement level. The models are compared via selected test cases from a standard test suite for the shallow water equations. They include the advection of a cosine bell, a steady-state geostrophic flow, a flow over an idealized mountain and a Rossby-Haurwitz wave. Both static and dynamics adaptations are evaluated which reveal the strengths and weaknesses of the AMR techniques. Overall, the AMR simulations show that both models successfully place static and dynamic adaptations in local regions without requiring a fine grid in the global domain. The adaptive grids reliably track features of interests without visible distortions or noise at mesh interfaces. Simple threshold adaptation criteria for the geopotential height and the relative vorticity are assessed.Comment: 25 pages, 11 figures, preprin

Transmission of mitochondrial DNA following assisted reproduction and nuclear transfer

Review of the articleMitochondria are the organelles responsible for producing the majority of a cell's ATP and also play an essential role in gamete maturation and embryo development. ATP production within the mitochondria is dependent on proteins encoded by both the nuclear and the mitochondrial genomes, therefore co-ordination between the two genomes is vital for cell survival. To assist with this co-ordination, cells normally contain only one type of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) termed homoplasmy. Occasionally, however, two or more types of mtDNA are present termed heteroplasmy. This can result from a combination of mutant and wild-type mtDNA molecules or from a combination of wild-type mtDNA variants. As heteroplasmy can result in mitochondrial disease, various mechanisms exist in the natural fertilization process to ensure the maternal-only transmission of mtDNA and the maintenance of homoplasmy in future generations. However, there is now an increasing use of invasive oocyte reconstruction protocols, which tend to bypass mechanisms for the maintenance of homoplasmy, potentially resulting in the transmission of either form of mtDNA heteroplasmy. Indeed, heteroplasmy caused by combinations of wild-type variants has been reported following cytoplasmic transfer (CT) in the human and following nuclear transfer (NT) in various animal species. Other techniques, such as germinal vesicle transfer and pronuclei transfer, have been proposed as methods of preventing transmission of mitochondrial diseases to future generations. However, resulting embryos and offspring may contain mtDNA heteroplasmy, which itself could result in mitochondrial disease. It is therefore essential that uniparental transmission of mtDNA is ensured before these techniques are used therapeutically

TCR deep sequencing of transgenic RAG-1-deficient mice reveals endogenous TCR recombination: a cause for caution

The utility of T‐cell receptor (TCR) transgenic mice in medical research has been considerable, with applications ranging from basic biology all the way to translational and clinical investigations. Crossing of TCR transgenic mice with either recombination‐activating gene (RAG)‐1 or RAG‐2 knockouts is frequently used to generate mice with a monoclonal T‐cell repertoire. However, low level productive TCR rearrangement has been reported in RAG‐deficient mice expressing transgenic TCRs. Using deep sequencing, we set out to directly examine and quantify the presence of these endogenous TCRs. Our demonstration that functional nontransgenic TCRs are present in nonmanipulated mice has wide reaching ramifications worthy of critical consideration