“‘Not In Canada’: The Non-Ebola Panic And Media Misrepresentation Of The Black Community”

This paper investigates the case of a non-Ebola panic in Hamilton, Ontario in 2001. Using in-depth interviews of journalists, hospital staff, members of the Congolese-Black community and content analysis of coverage by four Canadian newspapers, this study shows that the media problematized the case by cross-articulating a health scare of Ebola with immigration, crime and “race”. Utilizing extant “late modernity” literature and its attendant anxiety over risks, the study shows how a “scapegoat” was created, feasted upon by the media and aroused the collective conscience of mainstream Canadian society. Consequently, the voice of the community was misrepresented and underrepresented in the media. This study explicates the human material effects of media coverage on members of the community. Through interviews with key dramatis personae in the event, this study qualitatively teases out how weak ties to major institutions of society can lead to a drowning out of minority standpoints regardless of its authenticity and factuality

Strengthening Cross-border Law Enforcement Cooperation: the Prüm Network of Information Exchange

The Prüm network was established to provide mechanisms and the infrastructure to achieve a closer cooperation between the EU member states in combating terrorism, organised crime and illegal immigration through the cross border exchange of DNA profiles, fingerprints and vehicle registration data. While Prüm offers clear benefits for cross-border policing, it continues to present challenges of a technical and scientific nature as well as legal, ethical and socioeconomic concerns. This article reviews these challenges as well as the existing safeguards. It argues that, in order to achieve Prüm benefits and maximise its potential, it is important to enhance the necessary dialogue and cooperation between member states so as to confront the above concerns and address challenges posed by Prüm through balanced measures

A NEW BIOACTIVE THIOPHENOLIC GLYCOSIDE FROM THE LEAF OF MASSULARIA ACUMINATA (G. DON BULLOCK) EX HOYLE (RUBIACEAE)

Background: Massularia acuminata is a small tree or shrub of tropical rainforest. The leaves are used in Nigerian ethno-medicine for the treatment of microbial infections and pharmacological report suggested the leaf extract as possessing antioxidant activity. This study was therefore carried out to determine the most antioxidant and antimicrobial active fraction(s) of Massularia acuminata leaf and the constituent(s) responsible for the activities. Matherials and Methods: The leaf of Massularia acuminata was investigated for in vitro antioxidant and antimicrobial activities, using a 2,2- diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) radical scavenging assay and agar dilution method respectively. Results: The ethyl acetate fraction demonstrated the best activities among the partitioned fractions tested. Bioassay guided purification of the most active ethyl acetate fraction led to isolation of a new thiophenolic glycoside, characterized as 4-(3´,3´-dihydroxy-1-mercaptopropyl)phenyl glycosylpyranoside. Conclusion: The isolated compound from the leaf of Massularia acuminata demonstrated antioxidant and antimicrobial activities and may be responsible for the activities of leaf extract and its ethyl acetate fraction, hence this may justify its ethnomedicinal use

Damage function for historic paper. Part II: Wear and tear

Background: As a result of use of library and archival documents, defined as reading with handling in the context of general access, mechanical degradation (wear and tear) accumulates. In contrast to chemical degradation of paper, the accumulation of wear and tear is less well studied. Previous work explored the threshold of mechanical degradation at which a paper document is no longer considered to be fit for the purpose of use by a reader, while in this paper we explore the rate of accumulation of such damage in the context of object handling. Results: The degree of polymerisation (DP) of historic paper of European origin from mid-19th–mid-20th Century was shown to affect the rate of accumulation of wear and tear. While at DP > 800, this accumulation no longer depends on the number of handlings (the process is random), a wear-out function could be developed for documents with DP between 300 and 800. For objects with DP < 300, one large missing piece (i.e. such that contains text) developed on average with each instance of handling, which is why we propose this DP value as a threshold value for safe handling. Conclusions: The developed model of accumulation of large missing pieces per number of handlings of a document depending on DP, enables us to calculate the time required for an object to become unfit for use by readers in the context of general access. In the context of the average frequency of document use at The UK National Archives (Kew), this period is 60 years for the category of papers with DP 300, and 450 years for papers with DP 500. At higher DP values, this period of time increases beyond the long-term planning horizon of 500 years, leading to the conclusion that for such papers, accumulation of wear and tear is not a significant collection management concern

Active wetting of epithelial tissues

Development, regeneration and cancer involve drastic transitions in tissue morphology. In analogy with the behavior of inert fluids, some of these transitions have been interpreted as wetting transitions. The validity and scope of this analogy are unclear, however, because the active cellular forces that drive tissue wetting have been neither measured nor theoretically accounted for. Here we show that the transition between 2D epithelial monolayers and 3D spheroidal aggregates can be understood as an active wetting transition whose physics differs fundamentally from that of passive wetting phenomena. By combining an active polar fluid model with measurements of physical forces as a function of tissue size, contractility, cell-cell and cell-substrate adhesion, and substrate stiffness, we show that the wetting transition results from the competition between traction forces and contractile intercellular stresses. This competition defines a new intrinsic lengthscale that gives rise to a critical size for the wetting transition in tissues, a striking feature that has no counterpart in classical wetting. Finally, we show that active shape fluctuations are dynamically amplified during tissue dewetting. Overall, we conclude that tissue spreading constitutes a prominent example of active wetting --- a novel physical scenario that may explain morphological transitions during tissue morphogenesis and tumor progression

Climate change adaptation options in farming communities of selected Nigerian ecological zones

This chapter examines the impacts of climate change on three tropical crops and assesses the climate change adaptation options adopted by rural farmers in the region. The study was conducted among farming communities settled in three major ecological zones in Nigeria. Over 37 years of data on rainfall and temperature were analyzed to examine climate change impacts on three major crops: rice, maize, and cassava. Farmers' adaptive capacity was assessed with a survey. Climatic data, crop yields, and survey data were analyzed using both descriptive and inferential statistics. The relation between rainfall/temperature and crop yields was examined using the Pearson correlation coefficient. Results show a high variation in the annual rainfall and temperature during the study period. The major findings from this research is that crops in different ecological zones respond differently to climate variation. The result revealed that there is a very strong relationship between precipitation and the yield of rice and cassava at p <0.05 level of significance. The results further showed low level of adaption among the rural farmers. The study concludes that rainfall and temperature variability has a significant impact on crop yield in the study area, but that the adaptive capacity of most farmers to these impacts is low. There is a need for enhancing the adaptation options available to farmers in the region, which should be the focus of government policies

Colonialism and contemporary African migration

Scholars of international migration have paid scant attention to the phenomenon of bifurcated social identity of African migrants and their efforts to reinvent or re- and deconstruct a certain image of self in their everyday life. This article aims to offer a more nuanced approach to studying the phenomenon of Africans’ involvement in voluntary migration to the West. Drawing on Goffman’s idea of “dramaturgy,” the article enunciates ways that African immigrants and migrants manage their impression and represent themselves to their peers and social groups in home societies. Using selected cases of African immigrants and migrants in the West, the article enunciates, first, how African migrants (re) present their myriad of experiences to their peers and social groups in home societies as well as the effect of those representations on prospective migrants and, second, why African migrants construe themselves in a particular way to their peers and social groups in home societies. A speculative application of phenomenology to existing qualitative data on African immigration and migration is offered to explicate the lifeworld of African migrants in their oscillation between ancestral and current societies and their seemingly insatiable desire for Euro-American countries