Enhancing the campus experience: Helping international students to adapt to North American campus life

This thesis investigates how culture adaption topic can be applied to a design solution by enhancing international students experience on North American campus. Each year more than half a million international students enroll in American colleges and universities. Many will spend several years on a campus working toward their degree. Most of them arrive with clear academic goals, but they may have no clue what their social lives will be like. In that case, a common phenomenon that most of the international students need to get along with is called “Culture Shock”, which involves culture and academic adapting difficulties, limited social contact with host nationals. While some educators and researchers have been studying on this issue and also considered the constructive suggestions, unfortunately, how to solve the culture shock on campus is rarely applied in interaction design area. To become a feasible design solution rather than just a suggestion, the approach to solve culture adjustments must be integrated into campus life. In this thesis, I propose a vision mobile-based campus application to provide international students useful information on the campus from four dimensions of culture difference: cognition, psychology, behavior and phenomenon. It aims to help international students adapt North American campus life and build social network with host nationals. In addition, providing some basic campus living information to the first-time students. Both qualitative data and quantitative data were collected through online questionnaires, interviews, and existing frameworks. Also, I will address the approach of implementing business model design and distributed user needs into the design outcome. In the end, a heuristic evaluation and a usability testing will be addressed to discuss refining the design outcomes. As a result, I would like to see how effectively and widely that culture differences can be implemented into campus in the future. Ideally, it is able to help international students to diminish the “cultural gap” between host nationals. It is my goal the design solution will help them adapt to culture differences, jump out of their comfort zoom, integrate with the diversity of campus life

High quality, patient centred andcoordinated care for Alstrom syndrome: amodel of care for an ultra-rare disease

Background: Patients with rare and ultra-rare diseases make heavy demands on the resources of both health and social services, but these resources are often used inefficiently due to delays in diagnosis, poor and fragmented care. We analysed the national service for an ultra-rare disease, Alstrom syndrome, and compared the outcome and cost of the service to the standard care. Methods: Between the 9th and 26th of March 2014 we undertook a cross-sectional study of the UK Alstrom syndrome patients and their carers. We developed a semi-structured questionnaire to assess our rare patient need, quality of care and costs incurred to patients and their careers. In the UK all Alstrom syndrome patients are seen in two centres, based in Birmingham, and we systematically evaluated the national service and compared the quality and cost of care with patients’ previous standard of care. Results: One quarter of genetically confirmed Alstrom syndrome UK patients were enrolled in this study. Patients that have access to a highly specialised clinical service reported that their care is well organised, personalised, holistic, and that they have a say in their care. All patients reported high level of satisfaction in their care. Patient treatment compliance and clinic attendance was better in multidisciplinary clinic than the usual standard of NHS care. Following a variable costing approach based on personnel and consumables’ cost, our valuation of the clinics was just under £700/patient/annum compared to the standard care of £960/patient/annum. Real savings, however, came in terms of patients’ quality of life. Furthermore there was found to have been a significant reduction in frequency of clinic visits and ordering of investigations since the establishment of the national service. Conclusions: Our study has shown that organised, multidisciplinary “one stop” clinics are patient centred and individually tailored to the patient need with a better outcome and comparable cost compared with the current standard of care for rare disease. Our proposed care model can be adapted to several other rare and ultra-rare diseases

Comprehensive analysis of SSRs and database construction using all complete gene-coding sequences in major horticultural and representative plants

Simple sequence repeats (SSRs) are one of the most important genetic markers and widely exist in most species. Here, we identified 249,822 SSRs from 3,951,919 genes in 112 plants. Then, we conducted a comprehensive analysis of these SSRs and constructed a plant SSR database (PSSRD). Interestingly, more SSRs were found in lower plants than in higher plants, showing that lower plants needed to adapt to early extreme environments. Four specific enriched functional terms in the lower plant Chlamydomonas reinhardtii were detected when it was compared with seven other higher plants. In addition, Guanylate_cyc existed in more genes of lower plants than of higher plants. In our PSSRD, we constructed an interactive plotting function in the chart interface, and users can easily view the detailed information of SSRs. All SSR information, including sequences, primers, and annotations, can be downloaded from our database. Moreover, we developed Web SSR Finder and Batch SSR Finder tools, which can be easily used for identifying SSRs. Our database was developed using PHP, HTML, JavaScript, and MySQL, which are freely available at http://www.pssrd.info/. We conducted an analysis of the Myb gene families and flowering genes as two applications of the PSSRD. Further analysis indicated that whole-genome duplication and whole-genome triplication played a major role in the expansion of the Myb gene families. These SSR markers in our database will greatly facilitate comparative genomics and functional genomics studies in the future

The structuring role of artificial structure on fish assemblages in a dammed river of the Pearl River in China

To address the fish use patterns of artificial structures mimicking floating macrophytes deployed in a impounded tributary of the Pearl River, China, field experiments were performed from December 2014 to June 2016 using multi-mesh gillnet. The fish assemblages using artificial structures differ in terms of species richness, abundance, body size, diversity indices, and ecological traits from fish assemblages on natural barren habitats of this river. Overall, fish abundance, species richness, Shannon diversity index, and functional richness were higher at the artificial structures than at the control sites, while fish length and functional evenness was greater at the control sites in comparison to artificial structures. The introduction of artificial structures did not result in statistically significant effects on fish biomass as artificial structures attracted more individuals with smaller size. Seasonal changes of chlorophyll-a and transparency may affect the efficiency of artificial structure in harboring fishes. This study revealed that artificial structures, as synthesized habitats, are effective in acting as a “fish attractor” and an alternative tool to provide new habitats for smaller individuals in a dammed river like the Youjiang River which is a structure-less ecosystem

Nuclear FGFR1 promotes pancreatic stellate cell-driven invasion through up-regulation of Neuregulin 1

Pancreatic stellate cells (PSCs) are key to the treatment-refractory desmoplastic phenotype of pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) and have received considerable attention as a stromal target for cancer therapy. This approach demands detailed understanding of their pro- and anti-tumourigenic effects. Interrogating PSC-cancer cell interactions in 3D models, we identified nuclear FGFR1 as critical for PSC-led invasion of cancer cells. ChIP-seq analysis of FGFR1 in PSCs revealed a number of FGFR1 interaction sites within the genome, notably NRG1, which encodes the ERBB ligand Neuregulin. We show that nuclear FGFR1 regulates transcription of NRG1, which in turn acts in autocrine fashion through an ERBB2/4 heterodimer to promote invasion. In support of this, recombinant NRG1 in 3D model systems rescued the loss of invasion incurred by FGFR inhibition. In vivo we demonstrate that, while FGFR inhibition does not affect the growth of pancreatic tumours in mice, local invasion into the pancreas is reduced. Thus, FGFR and NRG1 may present new stromal targets for PDAC therapy

Whole-genome analysis of the recombination and evolution of newly identified NADC30-like porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus strains circulated in Gansu province of China in 2023

Porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (PRRSV) remains one of the major threats to swine industry, resulting in huge economic losses worldwide. Currently, PRRSV has diversified into multiple lineages with characteristics of extensive recombination in China. In this research, three virus strains were isolated and four virus whole genome sequences were generated and analyzed from clinical samples collected in Gansu province of China in 2023. The four virus strains were designated GSTS4-2023, GSLX2-2023, GSFEI2-2023 and GSBY4-2023. Phylogenetic analysis based on ORF5 sequences showed that GSTS4-2023, GSLX2-2023, GSFEI2-2023 and GSBY4-2023 shared 91.7, 91.2, 93.2 and 92.9% homology with NADC30 strain respectively, and belonged to lineage 1 of PRRSV-2. In addition, one amino acid deletion was observed at position 33 in ORF5 of GSTS4-2023, GSLX2-2023 and GSFEI2-2023. Moreover, amino acid alignment of the four strains showed a typical discontinuous 131-amino acid (aa) deletion in NSP2 for NADC30-like virus strains. Recombination analysis revealed that all four strains originated from NADC30 (lineage 1), with their minor parents coming from JXA1-like strains (lineage 8), VR-2332-like strains (lineage5) and QYYZ-like strains (lineage3). Finally, the three isolated virus strains, GSTS4-2023, GSLX2-2023 and GSFEI2-2023 showed relatively low levels of replication in cell culture. Our findings provide important implications for the field epidemiology of PRRSV

A framework for basic administrative metadata in digital libraries

Administrative metadata means the expansion of the metadata research to the administrative level of resource development. Based on the basic administrative sections in the information resource lifecycle (IRL), the framework for basic administrative metadata (FBAM) is helpful in constructing open interoperable platforms for acquisition, processing and services of information resources in digital libraries. It facilitates the seamless communication, the cooperative construction and management, and the sharing of digital resources. The formulation of FBAM follows the principles of modularity and openness that promote interoperability in resource management. It also adopts the structured methodology of information system design, with which the FBAM data model is developed in conformity with and PREMIS. The capabilities of FRAM are driven by a metadata repository with administrative information that is contained in FBAM records.</p

Empirical research of accounting conservatism, corporate governance and stock price collapse risk based on panel data model

This paper selects the panel data of the main board listed companies in Shenzhen and Shanghai from 2011 to 2016 as the research object and constructs the intersection of corporate governance comprehensive index and accounting conservatism and corporate governance index. Based on this, the mixed utility model is used to empirically test the relationship between accounting conservatism, corporate governance, and stock price collapse risk. The results show that: accounting conservatism, corporate governance and stock price collapse risk are negatively correlated, and conservative accounting policies can effectively restrain the occurrence of the stock price collapse, and higher levels of corporate governance can effectively reduce the possibility of the future stock price crash, and accounting conservatism and corporate governance have substitution effects in preventing the risk of the stock price collapse, and higher corporate governance levels can significantly reduce the negative impact of accounting conservatism on future stock price collapse risks. This paper also puts forward some suggestions to reduce the risk of stock price collapse from two aspects of improving accounting conservatism and strengthening corporate governance, which can be used as the reference for the sustainable and stable development of the capital market