Is philosophy of education a historical mistake? Connecting philosophy and education differently

In this article, I suggest that the question whether the proper place for philosophy of education is in the domain of philosophy or the domain of education cannot be resolved as long as we think of the connection between philosophy and education in terms of the idea of 'philosophy of education'. To substantiate this point, I look into the history of the idea of 'philosophy of education', both as a general idea and with regard to the way in which it became institutionalised in universities in the English-speaking world. I contrast this with the way in which the academic study of education developed in German-speaking countries in order to highlight that 'philosophy of education' is not the only way in which philosophy and education can be connected. Being aware that the connection between philosophy and education can be made differently not only provides a way out of the discussion about the proper identity and location of philosophy of education, but also hints at forms of philosophically informed scholarship that are more firmly based with the academic field of education rather than that they remain a halfway house in between philosophy and education

HP1 reshapes nucleosome core to promote phase separation of heterochromatin

Heterochromatin affects genome function at many levels. It enables heritable gene repression, maintains chromosome integrity and provides mechanical rigidity to the nucleus1,2. These diverse functions are proposed to arise in part from compaction of the underlying chromatin2. A major type of heterochromatin contains at its core the complex formed between HP1 proteins and chromatin that is methylated on histone H3, lysine 9 (H3K9me). HP1 is proposed to use oligomerization to compact chromatin into phase-separated condensates3-6. Yet, how HP1-mediated phase separation relates to chromatin compaction remains unclear. Here we show that chromatin compaction by the Schizosaccharomyces pombe HP1 protein Swi6 results in phase-separated liquid condensates. Unexpectedly, we find that Swi6 substantially increases the accessibility and dynamics of buried histone residues within a nucleosome. Restraining these dynamics impairs compaction of chromatin into liquid droplets by Swi6. Our results indicate that Swi6 couples its oligomerization to the phase separation of chromatin by a counterintuitive mechanism, namely the dynamic exposure of buried nucleosomal regions. We propose that such reshaping of the octamer core by Swi6 increases opportunities for multivalent interactions between nucleosomes, thereby promoting phase separation. This mechanism may more generally drive chromatin organization beyond heterochromatin

Surgical Management of Fistulating Perianal Crohn's Disease - A UK Survey.

AIM: Around one-third of patients with Crohn's disease are affected by Crohn's fistula-in-ano (pCD). It typically follows a chronic course and patients undergo long-term medical and surgical therapy. We set out to describe current surgical practice in the management of pCD in the UK. METHODS: A survey of surgical management of pCD was designed by an expert group of colorectal surgeons and gastroenterologists. This assessed acute, elective, multidisciplinary and definitive surgical management. A pilot of the questionnaire was undertaken at the Digestive Disease Federation 2015 meeting. The survey was refined and distributed nationally through the trainee collaborative networks. RESULTS: National rollout obtained responses from 133 surgeons of 179 approached (response rate 74.3%). At first operation, 32% surgeons would always consider drainage of sepsis and 31.1% would place a draining seton. At first elective operation, 66.6% would routinely insert of draining seton, and 84.4% would avoid cutting seton. The IBD multidisciplinary team was available to 87.6% respondents, although only 25.1% routinely discussed pCD patients. Anti-TNF-α therapy was routinely considered by 64.2%, although 44.2% left medical management to gastroenterology. Common definitive procedures were removal of seton only (70.7%), fistulotomy (57.1%), advancement flap (38.9%), fistula plug (36.4%) and ligation of intersphincteric track (LIFT) procedure (31.8%). Indications for diverting stoma or proctectomy were intractable sepsis, incontinence, and poor quality of life. DISCUSSION: This survey has demonstrated areas of common practice, but has also highlighted divergent practice including choices of definitive surgery and multimodal management. Practical guidelines are required to support colorectal surgeons in the UK. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved

Interferon-alpha induced changes in NODDI predispose to the development of fatigue

Interferon-alpha (IFN-α) is an important mediator of antiviral immune responses. It is also used clinically in the treatment of hepatitis-C infection. Though effective, IFN-α-based therapies can often impair mood, motivation and cognition, which when severe can appear indistinguishable from major depression. In susceptible patients, fatigue and motivational impairment emerge early and have been linked to changes in basal ganglia (striatal) metabolism, neurochemistry and microstructural integrity. Here we use neurite orientation dispersion and density imaging (NODDI) modeling of multi-shell diffusion MRI to investigate whether changes in orientation dispersion index (ODI) or neurite density index (NDI) can predict the later emergence of IFN-α-induced fatigue. Eighteen patients initiating IFN-α based treatment for hepatitis-C underwent diffusion MRI and blood sampling at baseline and 4 hours after their first IFN-α injection. They were then followed up with regular psychological assessments for 12 weeks of treatment. IFN-α injection stimulated an acute inflammatory cytokine response and evoked acute fatigue that peaked between 4 and 12 weeks of treatment. Within the brain, IFN-α induced an acute increase in NDI in patients that experienced a simultaneous increase in IFN-α-induced fatigue but not patients that did not. Acute changes in striatal microstructure additionally predicted the continued development of fatigue but not mood symptoms 4 and 8 weeks later into treatment. Our findings highlight the value of NODDI as a potential in vivo biomarker of the central effects of peripheral inflammation. We highlight the exquisite sensitivity of the striatum to IFN-α and further implicate striatal perturbation in IFN-α-induced fatigue

A prospective evaluation of the predictive value of faecal calprotectin in quiescent Crohn’s disease

Background: The faecal calprotectin (FC) test is a non-invasive marker for gastrointestinal inflammation. Aim: To determine whether higher FC levels in individuals with quiescent Crohn’s disease are associated with clinical relapse over the ensuing 12 months.<p></p> Methods: A single centre prospective study was undertaken in Crohn's disease patients in clinical remission attending for routine review. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve for the primary endpoint of clinical relapse by 12 months, based on FC at baseline, was calculated. Kaplan-Meier curves of time to relapse were based on the resulting optimal FC cutoff for predicting relapse.<p></p> Results: Of 97 patients recruited, 92 were either followed up for 12 months without relapsing, or reached the primary endpoint within that period. Of these, 10 (11%) had relapsed by 12 months. The median FC was lower for non-relapsers, 96µg/g (IQR 39-237), than for relapsers, 414µg/g (IQR 259-590), (p=0.005). The area under the ROC curve to predict relapse using FC was 77.4%. An optimal cutoff FC value of 240µg/g to predict relapse of quiescent Crohn’s had sensitivity of 80.0% and specificity of 74.4%. Negative predictive value was 96.8% and positive predictive value was 27.6%. FC≥240μg/g was associated with likelihood of relapse 5.7 (95% CI 1.9-17.3) times higher within 2.3 years than lower values (p=0.002).<p></p> Conclusions: In this prospective dataset, FC appears to be a useful, non-invasive tool to help identify quiescent Crohn’s disease patients at a low risk of relapse over the ensuing 12 months. FC of 240µg/g was the optimal cutoff in this cohort.<p></p&gt

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A trace monitor observes the sequence of actions in a software system, and when it detects that this sequence matches a given pattern, it executes some extra code of its own. Trace monitors are often specified declaratively using patterns based on regular expressions, context free grammars or logical formulae, and then the trace monitor implementation is generated from the specification. Trace monitors are particularly useful for runtime verification, and many variations have been proposed. Despite this intense interest, there have been hardly any systems that implement the idea in its full generality, because it is hard to generate e#cient code from a purely declarative statement of the pattern. This paper identifies and addresses the challenges faced in generating e#cient trace monitors from declarative pattern-based specifications

An open reproducible framework for the study of the iterated prisoner's dilemma

The Axelrod library is an open source Python package that allows for reproducible game theoretic research into the Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma. This area of research began in the 1980s but suffers from a lack of documentation and test code. The goal of the library is to provide such a resource, with facilities for the design of new strategies and interactions between them, as well as conducting tournaments and ecological simulations for populations of strategies. With a growing collection of 139 strategies, the library is a also a platform for an original tournament that, in itself, is of interest to the game theoretic community. This paper describes the Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma, the Axelrod library and its development, and insights gained from some novel research.Comment: 11 pages, Journal of Open Research Software 4.1 (2016

Primary Care Asthma Attack Prediction Models for Adults:A Systematic Review of Reported Methodologies and Outcomes

Prognostic models hold great potential for predicting asthma exacerbations, providing opportunities for early intervention, and are a popular area of current research. However, it is unclear how models should be compared and contrasted, given their differences in both design and performance, particularly with a view to potential implementation in routine practice. This systematic review aimed to identify novel predictive models of asthma attacks in adults, and compare differences in construction related to populations, outcome definitions, prediction time horizons, algorithms, validation, and performance estimation. 25 studies were identified for comparison, with varying definitions of asthma attacks and prediction event time horizons ranging from 15 days to 30 months. The most commonly used algorithm was logistic regression (20/25 studies), however none of the six which tested multiple algorithms identified it as highest performing algorithm. The effect of various study design characteristics on performance was evaluated in order to provide context to the limitations of highly performing models. Models used a variety of constructs, which affected both their performance and their viability for implementation in routine practice. Consultation with stakeholders is necessary to identify priorities for model refinement and to create a benchmark of acceptable performance for implementation in clinical practice

Prevalence and Predictors of Annual Asthma Reviews in Scottish Primary Care Data

Background People with asthma are recommended to have regular reviews in primary care, with assessment of symptoms, adjustment of treatment and self-management processes, and the delivery of a written action plan for emergencies.Aim Our study aimed to investigate the incidence and factors associated with attendance of annual reviews.Design &amp; setting electronic health records for approximately 50 000 Scottish asthma patients, between 2008 and 2016.Method Multivariable logistic regression using linked primary care prescription data and primary care registration demographic data.Results There was a median of 381 days between subsequent reviews. Reviews in the index year were strongly associated with reviews in the following year (odds ratio 1.76 [1.68-1.84]). In contrast, asthma consultations (excluding reviews) in the index year were associated with a lower odds of having a review in the following year (0.48 [0.46-0.51]). Those aged 18-35 in the index year, or with missing address in the practice registration data, were the least likely age group to have an asthma review in the following year.Conclusion Reviewing the delivery of asthma care identifies patients who may be slipping through the gaps by receiving only reactive asthma care rather than the structured, preventative care which can be delivered through annual reviews. Understanding the risk factors for not receiving an annual review can be leveraged to create more effective review invitations, such as explaining the specific content of reviews, introducing new contact methods to improve health equity, and reviewing the algorithm used to determine who is invited.<br/