Construals as a complement to intelligent tutoring systems in medical education

This is a preliminary version of a report prepared by Meurig and Will Beynon in conjunction with a poster paper "Mediating Intelligence through Observation, Dependency and Agency in Making Construals of Malaria" at the 11th International Conference on Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS 2012) and a paper "Construals to Support Exploratory and Collaborative Learning in Medicine" at the associated workshop on Intelligent Support for Exploratory Environments (ISEE 2012). A final version of the report will be published at a later stage after feedback from presentations at these events has been taken into account, and the experimental versions of the JS-EDEN interpreter used in making construals have been developed to a more mature and stable form

A united statement of the global chiropractic research community against the pseudoscientific claim that chiropractic care boosts immunity.

BACKGROUND: In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the International Chiropractors Association (ICA) posted reports claiming that chiropractic care can impact the immune system. These claims clash with recommendations from the World Health Organization and World Federation of Chiropractic. We discuss the scientific validity of the claims made in these ICA reports. MAIN BODY: We reviewed the two reports posted by the ICA on their website on March 20 and March 28, 2020. We explored the method used to develop the claim that chiropractic adjustments impact the immune system and discuss the scientific merit of that claim. We provide a response to the ICA reports and explain why this claim lacks scientific credibility and is dangerous to the public. More than 150 researchers from 11 countries reviewed and endorsed our response. CONCLUSION: In their reports, the ICA provided no valid clinical scientific evidence that chiropractic care can impact the immune system. We call on regulatory authorities and professional leaders to take robust political and regulatory action against those claiming that chiropractic adjustments have a clinical impact on the immune system

Beyond ΛCDM:problems, solutions, and the road ahead

97 pages, 8 figuresInternational audienceDespite its continued observational successes, there is a persistent (and growing) interest in extending cosmology beyond the standard model, $\Lambda$CDM. This is motivated by a range of apparently serious theoretical issues, involving such questions as the cosmological constant problem, the particle nature of dark matter, the validity of general relativity on large scales, the existence of anomalies in the CMB and on small scales, and the predictivity and testability of the inflationary paradigm. In this paper, we summarize the current status of $\Lambda$CDM as a physical theory, and review investigations into possible alternatives along a number of different lines, with a particular focus on highlighting the most promising directions. While the fundamental problems are proving reluctant to yield, the study of alternative cosmologies has led to considerable progress, with much more to come if hopes about forthcoming high-precision observations and new theoretical ideas are fulfilled

Mediating intelligence through observation, dependency and agency in making construals of malaria

Achieving co-adaptation in building an Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) involves integrating machine and human perspectives on ‘knowledge’ and ‘intelligence’. We address this integration by using Empirical Modelling (EM) principles to make construals: interactive environments in which human agents acting as model-builders can explore the observation, dependency and agency that underpins their understanding of the subject domain. This approach is well-suited to domains such as medicine where reasoning draws both on scientific knowledge and evolving human experience and judgement. We illustrate this by developing construals of malaria using a web-based variant of the principal EM tool that enables many agents to participate in the process of adaptation

Construals to support exploratory and collaborative learning in medicine

Research into learning environments naturally emphasises the posi-tive merits and benefits of technologies upon which their very existence de-pends. As learning environments mature, it becomes ever more important to ex-amine the full impact of the underlying technologies critically. We argue that exploratory and collaborative learning is not well-served by the predominantly symbolic protocol-driven basis for communication that computing technology promotes. To address this issue, we apply Empirical Modelling (EM) principles to make construals: interactive environments that can be co-constructed bycol-laborating human agents so as to reflect their fluid understanding and develop-ing knowledge of a subject domain. This approach is particularly well-suited to the medical domain, where reasoning draws on scientific knowledge and evolv-ing human experience and judgement, and learning is not based on theory alone. We illustrate this via a proof-of-concept collaborative case study in which we draw on our technical and medical expertise to develop construals of malaria. To this end, we exploit a web-enabled variant of the principal EM tool that enables many agents to participate in exploratory learning activity

High-resolution differentiation of transmissible spongiform encephalopathy strains by quantitative N-terminal amino acid profiling (N-TAAP) of PK-digested abnormal prion protein

New forms of transmissible spongiform encephalopathy (TSE) continue to be identified, and consequently sensitive differential diagnosis is increasingly important both for the management of disease in humans and livestock and in providing confidence in the safety of the food chain. TSE diseases are associated with accumulation of protease-resistant prion protein (PrPSc) and detection of this marker protein is central to diagnosis. Proteolysis by proteinase K (PK) generates protease-resistant products (PrPres) with partially variable N-termini. The conformation(s) of PrPSc and thus the points of PK cleavage are thought to be dependent on the strain of prion disease. Western blot (WB) analysis of PrPres gives characteristic migration patterns that can be used to diagnose TSEs, but the relatively low resolution of this technique limits its ability to differentiate certain disease strains. Mass spectrometry (MS) has the capability to resolve these various PK cleavage sites to the level of individual amino acid residues. In the present study multiple selected reaction monitoring (mSRM) was used to detect and quantify PrPres N-terminal tryptic peptides by MS and thus to define the N-terminal amino acid profiles (N-TAAPs) of PrPres characteristic for various TSEs in sheep. The fragmentation behaviour of the N-terminal tryptic peptides was studied to allow selection of the transitions specific for each peptide. Different PrPres preparation methods were evaluated and the most effective approach applied to differentiate the N-TAAPs corresponding to various sheep TSE isolates. Marked differences were identified between the N-TAAPs of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) and classical scrapie, and between classical scrapie and the experimental strains SSBP/1 and CH1641, thereby validating this approach as a means of TSE-strain specific diagnosis