484 research outputs found
Management learning at the speed of life:Designing reflective, creative, and collaborative spaces for millenials
This paper introduces the concept of "management learning at the speed of life" as a metaphor to inspire millenials. Millenials may face three major problems in relation to management learning: lack of concentration, lack of engagement, and lack of socialization. Management learning at the speed of life addresses these potential problems through three dimensions: reflective, creative, and collaborative learning. This paper illustrates the benefits of reflective, creative, and collaborative spaces for millenials using practices from leadership and personal development courses that were offered over seven years in Canada, Turkey, and the UK. These courses incorporated the latest technology that brought the course activities up to the speed of life
RhoA and RhoC have distinct roles in migration and invasion by acting through different targets
Although closely related, RhoA and RhoC have distinct molecular targets and functional roles in cell migration and invasion
Next Generation Life Support Project Status
Next Generation Life Support (NGLS) is one of over twenty technology development projects sponsored by NASA's Game Changing Development Program. The NGLS Project develops selected life support technologies needed for humans to live and work productively in space, with focus on technologies for future use in spacecraft cabin and space suit applications. Over the last three years, NGLS had five main project elements: Variable Oxygen Regulator (VOR), Rapid Cycle Amine (RCA) swing bed, High Performance (HP) Extravehicular Activity (EVA) Glove, Alternative Water Processor (AWP) and Series-Bosch Carbon Dioxide Reduction. The RCA swing bed, VOR and HP EVA Glove tasks are directed at key technology needs for the Portable Life Support System (PLSS) and pressure garment for an Advanced Extravehicular Mobility Unit (EMU). Focus is on prototyping and integrated testing in cooperation with the Advanced Exploration Systems (AES) Advanced EVA Project. The HP EVA Glove Element, new this fiscal year, includes the generation of requirements and standards to guide development and evaluation of new glove designs. The AWP and Bosch efforts focus on regenerative technologies to further close spacecraft cabin atmosphere revitalization and water recovery loops and to meet technology maturation milestones defined in NASA's Space Technology Roadmaps. These activities are aimed at increasing affordability, reliability, and vehicle self-sufficiency while decreasing mass and mission cost, supporting a capability-driven architecture for extending human presence beyond low-Earth orbit, along a human path toward Mars. This paper provides a status of current technology development activities with a brief overview of future plans
Prog imperfective drift in ancient Greek? Reconsidering eimi 'be' with present participle
In this paper, I reconsider the diachrony of the Ancient Greek periphrastic construction of eimi 'be' with present participle by means of Bertinetto’s recently proposed model for the development of progressive grams (a process called ‘PROG imperfective drift’). While Bertinetto’s proposal sheds new light on the diachronic development of the construction, at the same time the evidence from Ancient Greek brings to light the need for modification and further refinement of the model (most importantly with regard to the role of what I call the ‘stative’ function, next to the diachronic source(s) of the construction). I furthermore show that eimi with present participle never fully developed a (focalized) progressive function, which can be explained in terms of ‘constructional competition’
A taxonomic and phylogenetic revision of the Penicillium sclerotiorum complex
The morphological concept of Penicillium sclerotiorum (subgenus Aspergilloides) includes strains with monoverticillate, vesiculate conidiophores, and vivid orange to red colony colours, with colourful sclerotia sometimes produced. Multigene phylogenetic analyses with the nuclear ribosomal internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region, cytochrome c oxidase subunit 1 (cox1), β-tubulin (benA), translation elongation factor 1-α (tef1-α), and calmodulin (cmd), reveal that the P. sclerotiorum morphospecies is a complex of seven phylogenetically distinct species, three of which were recently described, namely P. guanacastense, P. mallochii, and P. viticola. Three previously unidentified species are described here as P. cainii, P. jacksonii, and P. johnkrugii. The phylogenetic species are morphologically similar, but differ in combinations of colony characters, sclerotium production, conidiophore stipe roughening and branching, and conidial shape. Ecological characters and differences in geographical distribution further characterise some of the species, but increased sampling is necessary to confirm these differences. The fungal DNA barcode, the ITS, and the animal DNA barcode, cox1, have lower species resolving ability in our phylogenetic analyses, but still allow identification of all the species. Tef1-α and cmd were superior in providing fully resolved, statistically well-supported phylogenetic trees for this species complex, whereas benA resolved all species but had some issues with paraphyly. Penicillium adametzioides and P. multicolor, considered synonyms of P. sclerotiorum by some previous authors, do not belong to the P. sclerotiorum complex
Expression and trans-specific polymorphism of self-incompatibility RNases in Coffea (Rubiaceae)
Self-incompatibility (SI) is widespread in the angiosperms, but identifying the biochemical components of SI mechanisms has proven to be difficult in most lineages. Coffea (coffee; Rubiaceae) is a genus of old-world tropical understory trees in which the vast majority of diploid species utilize a mechanism of gametophytic self-incompatibility (GSI). The S-RNase GSI system was one of the first SI mechanisms to be biochemically characterized, and likely represents the ancestral Eudicot condition as evidenced by its functional characterization in both asterid (Solanaceae, Plantaginaceae) and rosid (Rosaceae) lineages. The S-RNase GSI mechanism employs the activity of class III RNase T2 proteins to terminate the growth of "self" pollen tubes. Here, we investigate the mechanism of Coffea GSI and specifically examine the potential for homology to S-RNase GSI by sequencing class III RNase T2 genes in populations of 14 African and Madagascan Coffea species and the closely related self-compatible species Psilanthus ebracteolatus. Phylogenetic analyses of these sequences aligned to a diverse sample of plant RNase T2 genes show that the Coffea genome contains at least three class III RNase T2 genes. Patterns of tissue-specific gene expression identify one of these RNase T2 genes as the putative Coffea S-RNase gene. We show that populations of SI Coffea are remarkably polymorphic for putative S-RNase alleles, and exhibit a persistent pattern of trans-specific polymorphism characteristic of all S-RNase genes previously isolated from GSI Eudicot lineages. We thus conclude that Coffea GSI is most likely homologous to the classic Eudicot S-RNase system, which was retained since the divergence of the Rubiaceae lineage from an ancient SI Eudicot ancestor, nearly 90 million years ago.United States National Science Foundation [0849186]; Society of Systematic Biologists; American Society of Plant Taxonomists; Duke University Graduate Schoolinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Pharmacological treatment for psychotic depression
BACKGROUND: Evidence is limited regarding the most effective pharmacological treatment for psychotic depression: combination of an antidepressant plus an antipsychotic, monotherapy with an antidepressant or monotherapy with an antipsychotic. This is an update of a review first published in 2005 and last updated in 2009.OBJECTIVES: 1. To compare the clinical efficacy of pharmacological treatments for patients with an acute psychotic depression: antidepressant monotherapy, antipsychotic monotherapy and the combination of an antidepressant plus an antipsychotic, compared with each other and/or with placebo.2. To assess whether differences in response to treatment in the current episode are related to non-response to prior treatment.SEARCH METHODS: A search of the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials and the Cochrane Depression, Anxiety and Neurosis Group Register (CCDANCTR) was carried out (to 12 April 2013). These registers include reports of randomised controlled trials from the following bibliographic databases: EMBASE (1970-), MEDLINE (1950-) and PsycINFO (1960-). Reference lists of all studies and related reviews were screened and key authors contacted.SELECTION CRITERIA: All randomised controlled trials (RCTs) that included participants with acute major depression with psychotic features, as well as RCTs consisting of participants with acute major depression with or without psychotic features, that reported separately on the subgroup of participants with psychotic features.DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: Two review authors independently extracted data and assessed risk of bias in the included studies, according to the criteria of the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions. Data were entered into RevMan 5.1. We used intention-to-treat data. For dichotomous efficacy outcomes, the risk ratio (RR) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) was calculated. For continuously distributed outcomes, it was not possible to extract data from the RCTs. Regarding the primary outcome of harm, only overall dropout rates were available for all studies.MAIN RESULTS: The search identified 3659 abstracts, but only 12 RCTs with a total of 929 participants could be included in the review. Because of clinical heterogeneity, few meta-analyses were possible. The main outcome was reduction of severity (response) of depression, not of psychosis.We found no evidence for the efficacy of monotherapy with an antidepressant or an antipsychotic.However, evidence suggests that the combination of an antidepressant plus an antipsychotic is more effective than antidepressant monotherapy (three RCTs; RR 1.49, 95% CI 1.12 to 1.98, P = 0.006), more effective than antipsychotic monotherapy (four RCTs; RR 1.83, 95% CI 1.40 to 2.38, P = 0.00001) and more effective than placebo (two identical RCTs; RR 1.86, 95% CI 1.23 to 2.82, P = 0.003).Risk of bias is considerable: there were differences between studies with regard to diagnosis, uncertainties around randomisation and allocation concealment, differences in treatment interventions (pharmacological differences between the various antidepressants and antipsychotics) and different outcome criteria.AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS: Psychotic depression is heavily understudied, limiting confidence in the conclusions drawn. Some evidence indicates that combination therapy with an antidepressant plus an antipsychotic is more effective than either treatment alone or placebo. Evidence is limited for treatment with an antidepressant alone or with an antipsychotic alone.</p
aGEM: an integrative system for analyzing spatial-temporal gene-expression information
Motivation: The work presented here describes the ‘anatomical Gene-Expression Mapping (aGEM)’ Platform, a development conceived to integrate phenotypic information with the spatial and temporal distributions of genes expressed in the mouse. The aGEM Platform has been built by extending the Distributed Annotation System (DAS) protocol, which was originally designed to share genome annotations over the WWW. DAS is a client-server system in which a single client integrates information from multiple distributed servers
The interaction of Wnt-11 and signalling cascades in prostate cancer
Prostate cancer (PCa) is the second most common cancer among the male population. Conventional therapies target androgen signalling, which drives tumour growth; however, they provide limited survival benefits for patients. It is essential, therefore, to develop a more specific biomarker than the current gold standard, PSA testing. The Wnt signalling pathway induces expression of target genes through cell surface receptors. A non-canonical member of this family, Wnt-11, is evolutionarily highly conserved and is normally expressed by various cells in the developing embryo, as well as in the heart, liver and skeletal muscle of adult humans. We comprehensively review several cell signalling pathways to explain how they interact with Wnt-11, demonstrating its use as a potential biomarker for PCa. Several studies have shown that the expression of Wnt-11 is associated with gastric, renal and colorectal adenocarcinomas and PCa. Moreover, Wnt-11 affects extracellular matrix composition and cytoskeletal rearrangement, and it is required for proliferation and/or survival during cell differentiation. It was found that PCa cell lines express high levels of Wnt-11, which allows differentiation of the epithelial prostate tumour cells to neuron-like (NE) cells. The NE cells produce additional factors that can cause regression after treatment. Accumulating evidence shows that Wnt-11 could be a potential biomarker in diagnosing PCa. Many studies have shown both non-canonical and canonical Wnts interact with several signalling cascades such as PKC, JNK, NF-κB, Rho, PKA and PI3K. In particular, evidence demonstrates Wnt-11 is involved in the progression of PCa, thus it could have the potential to become both a specific disease marker and an important therapeutic target
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