We are Here and We are Many: Using a Telepresence Robot for Shared Exploration and Learning (and Fun)

Mobile remote presence bots (MRP) have emerged as a potential way of addressing the 'tyranny of distance' when having to attend meetings at far away locations. In this contribution we report on how we used an MRP to share with two cohorts of postgraduate students at a regional university the formal ‘conferencing’ and the informal ‘mingling’ that takes place at quality academic conferences and that many would consider essential for effective networking and knowledge sharing. Simultaneously, students were able to experience and explore what it meant to be ‘different’ in a room full of people interacting in ‘regular’ ways, observing the conference attendees reacting to the MRP aka 'ipad on a stick' in ways from genuine interest to forced indifference

An allosteric gating model recapitulates the biophysical properties of IK,L expressed in mouse vestibular Type I hair cells

Type I and Type II hair cells are the sensory receptors of the mammalian vestibular epithelia. Type I hair cells are characterized by their basolateral membrane being enveloped in a single large afferent nerve terminal, named calyx, and by the expression of a low-voltage-activated outward rectifying K(+) current, IK,L . The biophysical properties and molecular profile of IK,L are still largely unknown. By using the patch-clamp whole-cell technique, we examined the voltage- and time-dependent properties of IK,L in Type I hair cells of the mouse semicircular canal. We found that the biophysical properties of IK,L were affected by an unstable K(+) equilibrium potential (Veq K(+) ). Both the outward and inward K(+) currents shifted Veq K(+) consistent with K(+) accumulation or depletion, respectively, in the extracellular space, which we attributed to a residual calyx attached to the basolateral membrane of the hair cells. We therefore optimized the hair cell dissociation protocol in order to isolate mature Type I hair cells without their calyx. In these cells, the uncontaminated IK,L showed a half-activation at -79.6 mV and a steep voltage dependence (2.8 mV). IK,L also showed complex activation and deactivation kinetics, which we faithfully reproduced by an allosteric channel gating scheme where the channel is able to open from all (five) closed states. The "early" open states substantially contribute to IK,L activation at negative voltages. This study provides the first complete description of the "native" biophysical properties of IK,L in adult mouse vestibular Type I hair cells. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved

Something’s missing from my education: Using a cross sectional survey to examine the needs and interest of Canadian medical students relating to their roles as teachers and educators

Background: Current theory in medical education emphasizes engaging learners as educators while tailoring teaching to their learning needs. However, little is known about learners’ perceptions of their proposed roles as teachers and educators.Methods: Canadian medical students were invited to complete an English language online questionnaire structured to include: teaching experience, participation and/or awareness of teacher development at their school and awareness and/or interest in further training in medical education. The survey was developed by the Canadian Association for Medical Education (CAME) Membership Subcommittee, and distributed via the Canadian Federation of Medical Students (CFMS) email list and the CAME twitter account in March 2014.Results: Of the 169 undergraduate medical student respondents, 36% (n=61) reported a lack of prior teaching experience and 45% (n=73) were unsure if their school provided teaching instruction. Overall, 91% (n=150) indicated that they planned to incorporate teaching or medical education into their future careers.Conclusion: While the majority of medical student respondents are expecting or planning to teach, most report not having access to adequate training through medical school. Further effort is necessary to support medical students as teachers to prepare them for increased teaching responsibilities as residents and to expose them to potential careers in medical education.

Neutralizing Antibody-Resistant Hepatitis C Virus Cell-to-Cell Transmission

Hepatitis C virus (HCV) can initiate infection by cell-free particle and cell-cell contact-dependent transmission. In this study we use a novel infectious coculture system to examine these alternative modes of infection. Cell-to-cell transmission is relatively resistant to anti-HCV glycoprotein monoclonal anti- bodies and polyclonal immunoglobulin isolated from infected individuals, providing an effective strategy for escaping host humoral immune responses. Chimeric viruses expressing the structural proteins rep- resenting the seven major HCV genotypes demonstrate neutralizing antibody-resistant cell-to-cell trans- mission. HCV entry is a multistep process involving numerous receptors. In this study we demonstrate that, in contrast to earlier reports, CD81 and the tight-junction components claudin-1 and occludin are all essential for both cell-free and cell-to-cell viral transmission. However, scavenger receptor BI (SR-BI) has a more prominent role in cell-to-cell transmission of the virus, with SR-BI-specific antibodies and small-molecule inhibitors showing preferential inhibition of this infection route. These observations highlight the importance of targeting host cell receptors, in particular SR-BI, to control viral infection and spread in the liver

BAT AGN spectroscopic survey - XV: the high frequency radio cores of ultra-hard X-ray selected AGN

We have conducted 22 GHz radio imaging at 1 arcsec resolution of 100 low-redshift AGN selected at 14–195 keV by the Swift-BAT. We find a radio core detection fraction of 96 per cent, much higher than lower frequency radio surveys. Of the 96 radio-detected AGN, 55 have compact morphologies, 30 have morphologies consistent with nuclear star formation, and 11 have sub-kpc to kpc-scale jets. We find that the total radio power does not distinguish between nuclear star formation and jets as the origin of the radio emission. For 87 objects, we use optical spectroscopy to test whether AGN physical parameters are distinct between radio morphological types. We find that X-ray luminosities tend to be higher if the 22 GHz morphology is jet-like, but find no significant difference in other physical parameters. We find that the relationship between the X-ray and core radio luminosities is consistent with the L_R/L_X ∼ 10⁻⁵ of coronally active stars. We further find that the canonical fundamental planes of black hole activity systematically overpredict our radio luminosities, particularly for objects with star formation morphologies