Uncertain futures: people with learning difficulties and their ageing family carers

Overview of research, policy and practices relating to service responses to adults with learning difficulties living at home with older family carers

Introduction to fungal physiology

This chapter describes some basic aspects of fungal cell physiology, focusing primarily on nutrition, growth, metabolism in unicellular yeasts and filamentous fungi, and cell death. It considers the most common growth forms, the filamentous fungi and unicellular yeasts. Fungal growth involves transport and assimilation of nutrients, followed by their integration into cellular components, followed by biomass increase and eventual cell division or septation. The physiology of vegetative reproduction and its control in fungi has been most widely studied in two model eukaryotes, the budding yeast, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, and the fission yeast, Schizosaccharomyces pombe. An understanding of the death of fungal cells is important from a fundamental viewpoint because fungi, especially yeasts, represent valuable model systems for the study of cellular aging and apoptosis (programed cell death). Recycling and redeployment of cellular material also helps drive the apical growth of filamentous fungi and the mycelium explores and extends through the environment

A Virial Core in the Sculptor Dwarf Spheroidal Galaxy

The projected virial theorem is applied to the case of multiple stellar populations in the nearby dwarf spheroidal galaxies. As each population must reside in the same gravitational potential, this provides strong constraints on the nature of the dark matter halo. We derive necessary conditions for two populations with Plummer or exponential surface brightnesses to reside in a cusped Navarro-Frenk-White (NFW) halo. We apply our methods to the Sculptor dwarf spheroidal, and show that there is no NFW halo compatible with the energetics of the two populations. The dark halo must possess a core radius of ~ 120 pc for the virial solutions for the two populations to be consistent. This conclusion remains true, even if the effects of flattening or self-gravity of the stellar populations are included.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, ApJL, submitte

The world turned upside-down : architects as subcontractors in design-and-build contracts

The traditional role of the Architect on UK building projects is well-known and has been the subject of much study and comment. However, recent surveys indicate that design-and-build arrangements now exceed traditional procurement in terms of their share of total UK construction. On such projects, architects and other designers are engaged, not by the employer, but under sub-contract to the main contractor. The question arises as to the effect this has had. This has been approached by considering architects and other design consultants as professional contractors, as opposed to trade contractors - a term adopted to describe the more traditional type of subcontractor. Within these distinctions there are contractual, managerial and cultural implications for the relationships between the parties. To explore this further, representatives of five main contractors were questioned on their relationships with the two types. Clear differences emerged in matters such as contract formation, price-setting, payment and claims; the treatment of selection, work scheduling, and defects / omissions was more complicated. Within trade contractors there is a strong argument for recognising a further category of specialist contractors, who include a design service in their work package. Within the professional contractor category, architects were clearly differentiated from other design team members. The findings are analysed to suggest a theoretical framework with four dimensions that relate to process/product, attitude/motivation, working culture and relative power. The concern is not to be definitive at this stage, but to suggest an agenda for future research into the issues that have emerged

How much of the variation in the mutation rate along the human genome can be explained?

It has been claimed recently that it may be possible to predict the rate of de novo mutation of each site in the human genome with a high degree of accuracy [Michaelson et al. (2012), Cell 151: 143121442]. We show that this claim is unwarranted. By considering the correlation between the rate of de novo mutation and the predictions from the model of Michaelson et al., we show there could be substantial unexplained variance in the mutation rate. We investigate whether the model of Michaelson et al. captures variation at the single nucleotide level that is not due to simple context. We show that the model captures a substantial fraction of this variation at CpG dinucleotides but fails to explain much of the variation at non-CpG sites

Geomorphological considerations for the introduction of boulders and groynes for fisheries enhancement: assessment of River Eden at Carhead

This report seeks to briefly provide geomorphological guidance over the introduction of 'habitat enhancement' features for fisheries improvement which is an expanding area of interest throughout the region. This document is a primary attempt to draw together the salient details from the large quantity of literature published in recent years with reference to boulder introduction and to groyne/deflector placement in NW rivers. Secondly the potential introduction of such features is assessed, with reference to the proposed works at Carhead on the Eden

Participation in Arts and Culture: The Importance of Community Venues

Finds that more people attend arts and cultural events in community venues such as open air spaces, schools, and places of worship, than in conventional arts venues such as concert halls, theaters, museums, and art galleries

Arts Participation: Steps to Stronger Cultural and Community Life

Shows that the more ways people participate in the arts -- and the more often -- the more likely they are to engage in other activities that support community life