Ten Days in Tarbena: an evolutionary approach to moving through silence and sound to speech

In this article the author draws on their participation in a ten-day training in Action Theater led by its creator Ruth Zaporah in Tarbena, Spain, June 2014. This interdisciplinary improvisation form utilises silent movement, sound and movement, and speech to create improvisatory performance. It is argued here that Zaporah’s established pedagogical form takes improvisers through a process of dealing with language which can be viewed in evolutionary terms. Moving through silent movement and the vocalisation of sounds allows for a focus on sensation which gives rise to a greater awareness of what Zaporah refers to as ‘feeling states’. The content of improvisatory performance depends on staying in touch with feeling states such that it complicates issues to do with feeling and emotion in ways that become particularly challenging when an improviser is compelled to use speech or what Zaporah refers to as ‘physical narrative’. The author draws on Maxine Sheets-Johnstone’s phenomenology to propose that we view Action Theater’s use of speech as ‘post-kinetic’ and thereby prioritise its somatic rather than semantic ground

Words and dance

Editorial/Front matter to special issue of the journal Choreographic Practices on 'Words and Dance'

On ‘A Piece for Two (Lovers)’ - an unrehearsed performance piece

This essay consists of three 15-minute audio files and a written essay. Audio files #1 and #2 are performance scores made by dance artists Antonio de la Fe and Robert Vesty for A Piece For Two (Lovers), a performance of which was realised on February 20, 2015 at Royal Holloway, University of London. # 3 is a conversation between de la Fe and Vesty recorded unrehearsed for this special issue of RiDE. Together, the essay draws attention to the way in which the performance piece theatricalised its inherent precariousness. De la Fe and Vesty have been in a romantic relationship since December 2012 and the piece draws on themes of volatility and strength. The essay then goes on to propose de la Fe’s notion of unrehearsed not just as a mode of making that can be seen as an ‘artrepreneurial’, (to use Jen Harvie’s term), disruption of conventional modes of making artistic work, but as way to simultaneously reclaim and denounce precarity by re-thinking unrehearsal as a vital choreographic process

Artefacts: a multi-voiced collection of paraphernalia, documentation and reflection on the space and words for dancers work-week

Artefacts is a multi-voiced collection of paraphernalia, documentation and reflection relating to a week-long event (July 2015) that revolved around the work of dancers and poets Julyen Hamilton (Spain) and Billie Hanne (Belgium). Hosted by Chisenhale Dance Space, London, and curated by dance-artist Antonio de la Fe and artist/scholar Robert Vesty, the Space and Words for Dancers event consisted of a six-day workshop for 25 dancers led by Hamilton and Hanne that focused on the use of space and words in performance; two solo performances by Hamilton (Play) and Hanne (Deep Brown Sea); an Evening Talk event with Hamilton and Hanne talking in-depth about their work and the making of poetry and dance; as well as an open-to-the-public Discussion Day that used Open Space Technology (OST) as an organizing tool to discuss the question ‘What skills are required of the dancer and poet to produce poetry and dance in performance?’. Artefacts is a collaboration with graphic designer Tomas Di Giovanni and includes Billie’s Outline, a rationale for bringing words and dance together in the workshop, written by Hanne; poetry by Hamilton and Hanne composed especially for this Words and Dance issue of Choreographic Practices; programme notes from Play and Deep Brown Sea; a reflective piece by Antonio de la Fe on the nature of work for the dance artist as performer entitled That You Took the Workshop Doesn’t Mean You Have Done the Work; a photo-essay by resident photographer Maria Andrews; extracts from the transcript of Evening Talk collated around the headings On Poetry and Dance, On Space, On Making Pieces, On Repeating Pieces and On How it Works; and finally, a nod to the discussion day. Overall, the aim of Artefacts is to pull together some coordinates of the different and multifarious strands of activity that went into and came out of the Space and Words for Dancers work-week, which inspired this special Words and Dance edition of Choreographic Practices, but to do so in a way that might begin to perform and applaud the aesthetic quality of the work with space and words

An ancient and conserved function for armadillo-related proteins in the control of spore and seed germination by abscisic acid

Armadillo‐related proteins regulate development throughout eukaryotic kingdoms. In the flowering plant Arabidopsis thaliana, Armadillo‐related ARABIDILLO proteins promote multicellular root branching. ARABIDILLO homologues exist throughout land plants, including early‐diverging species lacking true roots, suggesting that early‐evolving ARABIDILLOs had additional biological roles. Here we investigated, using molecular genetics, the conservation and diversification of ARABIDILLO protein function in plants separated by c. 450 million years of evolution. We demonstrate that ARABIDILLO homologues in the moss Physcomitrella patens regulate a previously undiscovered inhibitory effect of abscisic acid (ABA) on spore germination. Furthermore, we show that A. thaliana ARABIDILLOs function similarly during seed germination. Early‐diverging ARABIDILLO homologues from both P. patens and the lycophyte Selaginella moellendorffii can substitute for ARABIDILLO function during A. thaliana root development and seed germination. We conclude that (1) ABA was co‐opted early in plant evolution to regulate functionally analogous processes in spore‐ and seed‐producing plants and (2) plant ARABIDILLO germination functions were co‐opted early into both gametophyte and sporophyte, with a specific rooting function evolving later in the land plant lineage

The basis for non-canonical ROK family function in the N-acetylmannosamine kinase from the pathogen Staphylococcus aureus

In environments where glucose is limited, some pathogenic bacteria metabolize host-derived sialic acid as a nutrient source. N-Acetylmannosamine kinase (NanK) is the second enzyme of the bacterial sialic acid import and degradation pathway and adds phosphate to N-acetylmannosamine using ATP to prime the molecule for future pathway reactions. Sequence alignments reveal that Gram-positive NanK enzymes belong to the Repressor, ORF, Kinase (ROK) family, but many lack the canonical Zn-binding motif expected for this function, and the sugar-binding EXGH motif is altered to EXGY. As a result, it is unclear how they perform this important reaction. Here, we study the Staphylococcus aureus NanK (SaNanK), which is the first characterization of a Gram-positive NanK. We report the kinetic activity of SaNanK along with the ligand-free, N-acetylmannosamine-bound and substrate analog GlcNAc-bound crystal structures (2.33, 2.20, and 2.20 Å resolution, respectively). These demonstrate, in combination with small-angle X-ray scattering, that SaNanK is a dimer that adopts a closed conformation upon substrate binding. Analysis of the EXGY motif reveals that the tyrosine binds to the N-acetyl group to select for the "boat" conformation of N-acetylmannosamine. Moreover, SaNanK has a stacked arginine pair coordinated by negative residues critical for thermal stability and catalysis. These combined elements serve to constrain the active site and orient the substrate in lieu of Zn binding, representing a significant departure from canonical NanK binding. This characterization provides insight into differences in the ROK family and highlights a novel area for antimicrobial discovery to fight Gram-positive and S. aureus infections

Impact of mutational profiles on response of primary oestrogen receptor-positive breast cancers to oestrogen deprivation

Pre-surgical studies allow study of the relationship between mutations and response of oestrogen receptor-positive (ER+) breast cancer to aromatase inhibitors (AIs) but have been limited to small biopsies. Here in phase I of this study, we perform exome sequencing on baseline, surgical core-cuts and blood from 60 patients (40 AI treated, 20 controls). In poor responders (based on Ki67 change), we find significantly more somatic mutations than good responders. Subclones exclusive to baseline or surgical cores occur in ∼30% of tumours. In phase II, we combine targeted sequencing on another 28 treated patients with phase I. We find six genes frequently mutated: PIK3CA, TP53, CDH1, MLL3, ABCA13 and FLG with 71% concordance between paired cores. TP53 mutations are associated with poor response. We conclude that multiple biopsies are essential for confident mutational profiling of ER+ breast cancer and TP53 mutations are associated with resistance to oestrogen deprivation therapy

Risk mitigating behaviours in people with inflammatory skin and joint disease during the COVID-19 pandemic differ by treatment type:a cross-sectional patient survey

BACKGROUND: Registry data suggest that people with immune-mediated inflammatory diseases (IMIDs) receiving targeted systemic therapies have fewer adverse coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outcomes compared with patients receiving no systemic treatments. OBJECTIVES: We used international patient survey data to explore the hypothesis that greater risk-mitigating behaviour in those receiving targeted therapies may account, at least in part, for this observation. METHODS: Online surveys were completed by individuals with psoriasis (globally) or rheumatic and musculoskeletal diseases (RMDs) (UK only) between 4 May and 7 September 2020. We used multiple logistic regression to assess the association between treatment type and risk-mitigating behaviour, adjusting for clinical and demographic characteristics. We characterized international variation in a mixed-effects model. RESULTS: Of 3720 participants (2869 psoriasis, 851 RMDs) from 74 countries, 2262 (60·8%) reported the most stringent risk-mitigating behaviour (classified here under the umbrella term 'shielding'). A greater proportion of those receiving targeted therapies (biologics and Janus Kinase inhibitors) reported shielding compared with those receiving no systemic therapy [adjusted odds ratio (OR) 1·63, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1·35-1·97]. The association between targeted therapy and shielding was preserved when standard systemic therapy was used as the reference group (OR 1·39, 95% CI 1·23-1·56). Shielding was associated with established risk factors for severe COVID-19 [male sex (OR 1·14, 95% CI 1·05-1·24), obesity (OR 1·37, 95% CI 1·23-1·54), comorbidity burden (OR 1·43, 95% CI 1·15-1·78)], a primary indication of RMDs (OR 1·37, 95% CI 1·27-1·48) and a positive anxiety or depression screen (OR 1·57, 95% CI 1·36-1·80). Modest differences in the proportion shielding were observed across nations. CONCLUSIONS: Greater risk-mitigating behaviour among people with IMIDs receiving targeted therapies may contribute to the reported lower risk of adverse COVID-19 outcomes. The behaviour variation across treatment groups, IMIDs and nations reinforces the need for clear evidence-based patient communication on risk-mitigation strategies and may help inform updated public health guidelines as the pandemic continues

PEATmoss (Physcomitrella Expression Atlas Tool): a unified gene expression atlas for the model plant Physcomitrella patens

Abstract Physcomitrella patens is a bryophyte model plant that is often used to study plant evolution and development. Its resources are of great importance for comparative genomics and evo-devo approaches. However, expression data from Physcomitrella patens were so far generated using different gene annotation versions and three different platforms: CombiMatrix and NimbleGen expression microarrays and RNA sequencing. The currently available P. patens expression data are distributed across three tools with different visualization methods to access the data. Here, we introduce an interactive expression atlas, Physcomitrella Expression Atlas Tool (PEATmoss), that unifies publicly available expression data for P. patens and provides multiple visualization methods to query the data in a single web-based tool. Moreover, PEATmoss includes 35 expression experiments not previously available in any other expression atlas. To facilitate gene expression queries across different gene annotation versions, and to access P. patens annotations and related resources, a lookup database and web tool linked to PEATmoss was implemented. PEATmoss can be accessed at https://peatmoss.online.uni-marburg.d