National evaluation of Diplomas: cohort 1 - the second year

The introduction of Diplomas for 14-19 year olds represented a major innovation in educational opportunity for young people in England. The Diplomas are being offered at three levels and across 14 subjects and have been implemented in three phases (from September 2008, 2009 and 2010). Following the establishment of the Coalition government in May 2010, a number of changes to the implementation and delivery of the Diploma qualification were introduced. The Minister of State for Schools announced that development of new Diplomas in science, humanities and languages, which were due to be introduced from September 2011, would be discontinued. Additionally the Diploma entitlement, whereby all young people within an area would be able to access any of the Diploma subjects, would be removed and that the decision about which Diploma subjects would be available to students would in future be made by schools and colleges. Moreover, it was decided that the Gateway application process whereby consortia (of schools, colleges, training providers, employers and Higher Education Institutes (HEIs)) had previously submitted an application to the Department for Education (DfE) for each Diploma subject they wanted to offer would no longer be required for provision commencing from 2012. Other changes included the freedom for institutions to decide whether or not they wanted to work collaboratively to provide Diploma provision

Online Remote Control of a Wireless Home Automation Network

Embedded systems within home appliances are not usually manufactured to operate in a networked environment; connecting supplementary hardware/software systems through a wireless, PC-controlled medium is necessary to enable full, efficient control of their functions from a remote location. Access to the home’s central PC may be gained via a local web server, giving Internet-based control from almost anywhere in the world. The proposed system constitutes a significant improvement over those discussed in the literature to date, and reviewed here. It enables complex-appliance control in a secure and reliable portable-wireless environment, and was developed using ASP.Net. The system was assessed for Received Signal Strength (RSS) in an environment more radio-hostile than that found in a typical household. The minimum RF level found at a transfer rate of 9.6 kbps was 8 dB above the receiver’s quoted sensitivity of -103 dBm; this fading margin will increase in a normal household environment.</p

The developmental state: dead or alive?

Before the 1980s, the mainstream Western prescription for developing countries to catch up with the West assigned the state a leading role in governing the market. In the 1980s, this shifted to a framework‐providing role in a largely deregulated and maximally open economy. Also in the 1980s, it became apparent that some East Asian capitalist economies were growing so fast that they would become ‘developed’ in the foreseeable future, marking them out as completely exceptional. Mainstream economists explained their success as the result of following the Western prescription, while other scholars attributed this rapid growth to ‘the developmental state’. This essay compares these two explanations of successful economic development, concluding in favour of the latter — with respect to the catch‐up decades. But what happened subsequently? Several scholars who accept the key role of the developmental state in the early period of fast industrialization in East Asia now argue that South Korea, Taiwan and Singapore have transformed from developmental to close‐to‐neoliberal states. This contribution argues that the erstwhile East Asian developmental states have indeed changed, but they have not transformed into neoliberal states. Rather they have adapted and evolved, but still undertake market‐steering, ‘societal mission’ roles well beyond neoliberal limits. The essay also suggests how other developing countries can learn lessons from their experience

Subtribal Relationships in Tribe Tradescantieae (Commelinaceae)Based on Molecular and Morphological Data

Tribe Tradescantieae (Commelinaceae) consists of seven subtribes and 25 genera. Previous attempts to evaluate phylogenetic relationships within the group using morphology or the chloroplast-encoded rbcL have either been highly homoplasious (morphology) or provided only weak support for subtribal relationships due to insufficient variability (rbcL). In this study, phylogenetic analysis of nucleotide sequence data from the chloroplast-encoded ndhF and rbcL genes, as well as 47 morphological and anatomical characters, were used to evaluate relationships within and among the subtribes of Tradescantieae. The addition of ndhF resulted in a more highly resolved phylogeny and greater bootstrap and decay values than were obtained by rbcL alone or rbcL and morphology. The analyses suggest the following: (1) subtribes Coleotrypinae, Cyanotinae, and Tradescantiinae (with the addition of Elasis) are monophyletic; (2) subtribe Thyrsantheminae is polyphyletic; and (3) subtribe Dichorisandrinae is polyphyletic. Members of Dichorisandrinae are united into two clades (Dichorisandra and Siderasis; Cochliostema, Geogenanthus, and Plowmanianthus) whose relationships are more clearly resolved. The position of Old World subtribes Cyanotinae and Coleotrypinae, nested within New World taxa suggested by rbcL studies, are supported by the addition of ndhF data

Disentangling the effects of farmland use, habitat edges, and vegetation structure on ground beetle morphological traits

Land-use change due to agriculture has a major influence on arthropod biodiversity, and may influence species differently depending on their traits. It is unclear how species traits vary across different land uses and their edges, with most studies focussing on single habitat types and overlooking edge effects. We examined variation in morphological traits of carabid beetles (Coleoptera:Carabidae) on both sides of edges between woodlands and four adjoining, but contrasting farmland uses in an agricultural landscape. We asked: (1) how do traits differ between woodlands and different adjoining farmland uses (crop, fallow, restoration planting, and woody debris applied over crop), and do effects depend on increasing distances from the farmland–woodland edge? (2) Does vegetation structure explain observed effects of adjoining farmland use and edge effects on these traits? We found that carabid communities varied in body size and shape, including traits associated with diet, robustness, and visual ability. Smaller sized species were associated with woodlands and larger sized species with farmlands. Farmland use further influenced these associations, where woodlands adjoining plantings supported smaller species, while fallows and crops supported larger species. Vegetation structure significantly influenced body size, flying ability, and body shape, and helped explain the effects of farmland use and distance from edges on body size. We highlight the important role of vegetation structure, farmland use, and edge effects in filtering the morphological traits of carabid assemblages across a highly modified agricultural landscape. Our findings suggest that farmland management can influence body size and dispersal-related traits in farmland and adjacent native vegetation. © 2018, Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature. **Please note that there are multiple authors for this article therefore only the name of the first 5 including Federation University Australia affiliate “Philip Barton” is provided in this record*

Revisiting carbonate chemistry controls on planktic foraminifera Mg / Ca:implications for sea surface temperature and hydrology shifts over the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum and Eocene-Oligocene transition

Much of our knowledge of past ocean temperatures comes from the foraminifera Mg / Ca palaeothermometer. Several nonthermal controls on foraminifera Mg incorporation have been identified, of which vital effects, salinity, and secular variation in seawater Mg / Ca are the most commonly considered. Ocean carbonate chemistry is also known to influence Mg / Ca, yet this is rarely examined as a source of uncertainty, either because (1) precise pH and [CO32−] reconstructions are sparse or (2) it is not clear from existing culture studies how a correction should be applied. We present new culture data of the relationship between carbonate chemistry and Mg / Ca for the surface-dwelling planktic species Globigerinoides ruber and compare our results to data compiled from existing studies. We find a coherent relationship between Mg / Ca and the carbonate system and argue that pH rather than [CO32−] is likely to be the dominant control. Applying these new calibrations to data sets for the Paleocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) and Eocene–Oligocene transition (EOT) enables us to produce a more accurate picture of surface hydrology change for the former and a reassessment of the amount of subtropical precursor cooling for the latter. We show that pH-adjusted Mg / Ca and δ18O data sets for the PETM are within error of no salinity change and that the amount of precursor cooling over the EOT has been previously underestimated by  ∼ 2 °C based on Mg / Ca. Finally, we present new laser-ablation data of EOT-age Turborotalia ampliapertura from St. Stephens Quarry (Alabama), for which a solution inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICPMS) Mg / Ca record is available (Wade et al., 2012). We show that the two data sets are in excellent agreement, demonstrating that fossil solution and laser-ablation data may be directly comparable. Together with an advancing understanding of the effect of Mg / Casw, the coherent picture of the relationship between Mg / Ca and pH that we outline here represents a step towards producing accurate and quantitative palaeotemperatures using this proxy

Periodic upright posture negates the suppression of neuroendocrine response to head down bedrest

Head down bedrest (HDT) decreases plasma neurohormone levels, attaining a nadir within four hours. The present study evaluates the effect of periodic standing or exercises (+G(z)) on this acute suppression of plasma neurohormones. Methods: Nine male subjects (mean plus or minus SE age 37 plus or minus 2 yr; height 182 plus or minus 2 cm; weight 83 plus or minus 3 kg) were admitted to the Human Research Facility on three occasions separated by one month. Subjects were assigned to head down tilt (minus 6 degrees) or 15-minutes of standing or moderate exercise at the end of each hour. Initially during an ambulatory period, subjects were placed in a supine position for 45-min and a control blood sample obtained. The next day following 4 hours of HDT with or without standing or exercise a blood sample was taken 45-min (3 3/4 hours into HDT) after the preceding stand or exercise. Blood was withdrawn and all plasma samples frozen for determination of neurohormone levels within the same assay. Plasma aldosterone, Plasma Renin Activity (PRA) vasopressin (AVP) and cortisol levels were measured by radioimmunoassay. Norepinephrine (NE) and epinephrine (E) levels were measured by electrochemical detection following HPLC. Values were compared by ANOVA, P less than 0.05. Results: Control levels following 45-min supine were not different between treatments. HDT suppressed plasma aldosterone (13.9 plus or minus 3.7 to 6.6 plus or minus 0.7 ng/dl) and NE levels (299 plus or minus 35 to 217 plus or minus 23 pg/dl), E (69 plus or minus 15 to 65 plus or minus 21 pg/ml), and PRA (0.64 plus or minus 0.13 to 0.58 plus or minus 0.17 ngAl/m/hr) were not significantly altered. Standing or exercise negated the decrease in aldosterone and NE levels due to HDT. Conclusions: Periodic upright posture (+G(z)) with or without exercise for 15-min out of each hour negates the acute suppression of aldosterone and NE associated with HDT