Genome-wide patterns of polymorphism in an inbred line of the African malaria mosquito Anopheles gambiae.

Anopheles gambiae is a major mosquito vector of malaria in Africa. Although increased use of insecticide-based vector control tools has decreased malaria transmission, elimination is likely to require novel genetic control strategies. It can be argued that the absence of an A. gambiae inbred line has slowed progress toward genetic vector control. In order to empower genetic studies and enable precise and reproducible experimentation, we set out to create an inbred line of this species. We found that amenability to inbreeding varied between populations of A. gambiae. After full-sib inbreeding for ten generations, we genotyped 112 individuals--56 saved prior to inbreeding and 56 collected after inbreeding--at a genome-wide panel of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). Although inbreeding dramatically reduced diversity across much of the genome, we discovered numerous, discrete genomic blocks that maintained high heterozygosity. For one large genomic region, we were able to definitively show that high diversity is due to the persistent polymorphism of a chromosomal inversion. Inbred lines in other eukaryotes often exhibit a qualitatively similar retention of polymorphism when typed at a small number of markers. Our whole-genome SNP data provide the first strong, empirical evidence supporting associative overdominance as the mechanism maintaining higher than expected diversity in inbred lines. Although creation of A. gambiae lines devoid of nearly all polymorphism may not be feasible, our results provide critical insights into how more fully isogenic lines can be created

Forward Thinking

Forward thinking is a multi-faceted concept. Forward thinking does not entail predicting the future but rather anticipating what is next for an organization through the use of strategies, visions, and reflection. Words to describe forward thinking are possibility thinking, anticipation, tactical decision making, and envisioning. Forward thinking applies to many areas of leadership. Within education, administrators particularly benefit from forward thinking strategies. Administrators can maximize his or her school’s forward thinking potential through strategies, reflection, and time management. Since the most successful strategies are built backwards, administrators must begin with the end result in mind; student achievement. Reflection allows administrators to look into the past to see deeper into the future by analyzing current trends and patterns to anticipate forward movement within his or her school. Time management is an administrator’s final step in maximizing his or her forward thinking potential. Designating time within an administrator’s schedule for deep reflection promotes a state of continuous awareness toward the future movement of his or her school

Forward Thinking

Abstract is available to download

Entrepreneurial learning in practice: The impact of knowledge transfer

The aim of this research is to provide perspectives on how entrepreneurial practitioners, specifically owners of high-tech small firms (HTSFs), engage with knowledge transfer and learn. The authors draw on extant research and report on the views and observations of the principals in two case study companies in the HTSF sector with regard to growing their ventures and developing learning while part of a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) programme. Entrepreneurial learning is an area of significant interest due to the growth of entrepreneurship and the varied ways in which learning can take place. There are many different interventions that can be used to transfer knowledge and develop learning, but there is limited, if any, consensus on their respective effectiveness. The researchers used an ethnographic approach in two companies over an 18-month period. The study concludes that the KTP intervention facilitates an opportunity for learning through disruption, with the key barrier to any new learning being established practice. Interestingly, the findings suggest that entrepreneurial learning is greatly facilitated by ‘on-the-job’ learning

Abiotic and Biotic Limitations to Nodulation by Leguminous Cover Crops in South Texas

Many farms use leguminous cover crops as a nutrient management strategy to reduce their need for nitrogen fertilizer. When they are effective, leguminous cover crops are a valuable tool for sustainable nutrient management. However, the symbiotic partnership between legumes and nitrogen fixing rhizobia is vulnerable to several abiotic and biotic stressors that reduce nitrogen fixation efficiency in real world contexts. Sometimes, despite inoculation with rhizobial strains, this symbiosis fails to form. Such failure was observed in a 14-acre winter cover crop trial in the Rio Grande Valley (RGV) of Texas when three legume species produced no signs of nodulation or nitrogen fixation. This study examined the role of nitrogen, phosphorus, moisture, micronutrients, and native microbial communities in the nodulation of cowpea (Vigna unguiculata L. Walp) and assessed arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi as an intervention to improve nodulation. Results from two controlled studies confirm moisture and native microbial communities as major factors in nodulation success. Micronutrients showed mixed impacts on nodulation depending on plant stress conditions. Nitrogen and phosphorus deficiencies, however, were not likely causes, nor was mycorrhizal inoculation an effective intervention to improve nodulation. Inoculation method also had a major impact on nodulation rates. Continued research on improved inoculation practices and other ways to maximize nitrogen fixation efficiency will be required to increase successful on-farm implementation

Case study insights to the impact of knowledge transfer in high-tech small firms on entrepreneurial practitioner learning

Knowledge transfer, as the term suggests, is about the exchange of knowledge between associates in a partnership. The ambition of such knowledge transfer is the pursuit and exploitation of new, innovative opportunities and the facilitation of learning. The theatre for such activity is, largely, within high technology small to medium sized firms. The partnership commonly includes those within a business venture, an academic or team of academics from a Higher Education Institute, (HEI), and government agencies. It is essentially about the transfer of tangible and intellectual property, expertise, learning and skills between academia and the non-academic community, particularly the business community. The ‘knowledge’ transferred can be formal and clearly expressed, for example, from published research, informal in terms of individual experiences and tacit as in residing in the individual without being stated and therefore difficult to articulate in direct communication. Transferring knowledge, particularly tacit knowledge, and facilitating learning, is a complex undertaking. The entrepreneurial business venturer, for example, busy with developing an enterprise, may not be fully aware of, or have thought critically about, the wealth of knowledge that resides within him/her as a consequence of years of business experience. The specific challenge to transfer ‘knowledge’ is therefore to capture, organize, create, and distribute such knowledge from one part of an enterprise to another or indeed throughout an enterprise in ways that effect a step-change in the progress of the business venture and to ensure its legacy remains valid for those within the enterprise into the future though the development of appropriate applied learning. The Knowledge Transfer Partnership, (KTP), scheme in the UK, is specifically designed to help those within entrepreneurial firms to acquire the knowledge they need to pursue growth through a greater commitment to, and development of, competencies in innovation practice and opportunity focus. The link between the entrepreneurial business venturer, the academic in the HEI and the graduate, the Associate, recruited by the HEI and lodged within the firm, are the key players in determining the potential of the scheme to facilitate learning that will have a positive impact on the future of the business. The Associate, as an agent for positive, innovative change in the business, brings with him/her new knowledge to be introduced into the business, challenging established practices and processes and supporting innovative step-changes in the business. The placements are temporary but potentially can be a ‘long-interview’. In a recent independent report, (The Knowledge Transfer Partnership programme: an impact review, From: Innovate UK, First published: 13 October 2015), it was noted, for example, that for every £1 of KTP grant invested up to £8 of net extra GVA was generated, that 94% of associates said KTP had had a positive impact on their personal/career development, that over a third said the impact had actually been transformational for their development and career, that 99% of knowledge base organisations would recommend the KTP programme and that 95% of KTP associates would recommend it to other graduates/post graduates. Knowledge transfer is, therefore, clearly both potentially valuable and challenging for those engaged in it. Many high-technology small to medium sized firms emerge as a consequence of the creativity and innovativeness of a founding entrepreneur and his or her team and the early development of such enterprises can often be characterised by organic development and considerable adhocracy. Innovation in terms of new product or process development lie at the core of what founders and their teams do although not always formally recognised and supported. Early practices that are seen to work become established. That key focus of knowledge-transfer is on supporting appropriate and sustainable learning, where the Entrepreneurial Practitioner acquires and learns to implement new knowledge of best practice in business development, where the Associate gains experience of business practice and an opportunity to apply learned theory and where the academic learns the value of their research in an applied context. The focus of this research is on the Entrepreneurial Practitioner’s learning. Cope (2003) suggests however that the entrepreneurship discipline does not currently possess sufficient conceptual frameworks to explain how entrepreneurs learn. He concluded ‘..entrepreneurial learning is not characterised by the notions of stability, consistency or predictability. Rather, evidence suggests that the concepts of metamorphosis, discontinuity and change more appropriately encapsulate the dynamics of this phenomenon’, (p. 26). When it comes to working, learning and innovation, Brown and Duguid (1991) argue that ‘Work practice is generally viewed as conservative and resistant to change, learning is generally viewed as distinct from working and problematic in the face of change and innovation is generally viewed as the disruptive but necessary imposition of change on the other two’, (p40), highlighting the tensions that often accompany the learning process within the developing HTSF. In this exploratory, ethnographic report, two of the authors were each embedded in a high-tech small firm as part of a knowledge transfer partnership, (KTP), and in the research key decision-makers in each firm are observed and interviewed over a two-year period in order to gain insights to practitioner learning over that period. In response to Cope’s suggestion, and reflecting those of Brown and Duguid, the authors’ aim is to provide perspectives on how Entrepreneurial Practitioners, owners of high-tech small firms, (HTSF), and engaged with knowledge transfer, learn

Rape Culture

https://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/feminist_zines/1047/thumbnail.jp

Concept Mapping as a Mechanism for Assessing Science Teachers’ Cross-Disciplinary Field-Based Learning

Two common goals of science teacher professional development (PD) are increased content knowledge (CK) and improved readiness to teach through inquiry. However, PD assessment challenges arise when the context is structured around inquiry-based, participant-driven learning, and when the content crosses scientific disciplines. This study extended the use of concept mapping as an assessment tool for examining changes in the content knowledge of 21 high school science teachers who participated in a field-based environmental science summer institute. The scoring rubric focused on documenting concepts, links, and map organization and scope in an attempt to capture development of cross- disciplinary knowledge in ways that correspond with theories of expertise development. The analysis revealed significant gains from pre-PD to post PD maps in the sophistication of links between concepts and in the number of additional, participant-generated scientifically valid concepts. Relative to the initial maps, post PD maps also manifested more complete clustering of concepts. Findings are discussed in reference to previous studies on teachers’ learning and implications for future research using concept mapping as a means of assessing teacher PD