A qualitative study of the relationship of personality type with career management and career choice preference in a group of bioscience postgraduate students and postdoctoral researchers

This study reports on the career management and career choice preferences of a sample of bioscience postgraduate students and postdoctoral researchers according to their personality type as determined using the Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). Correlations can be found but other decision-making processes come into play and are more influential regarding career choice

Measuring, Mapping, Creating: A mixed method approach to sedentary behaviours and work-place design

This paper reports on the formation and success of an innovative interdisciplinary research team formed to tackle a current critical challenge in our social, cultural and built environments. The challenge—that of sedentary behaviour and its relationship to workplace design—is somewhat familiar to researchers in health promotion but is less so to architectural researchers. The research team has been especially choreographed to include a diverse membership with different skills and expertise ranging from highly scientific to highly creative practices. The team consists of experienced researchers from the fields of architecture, health promotion and recreation and includes early career researchers, doctoral and undergraduate students. The mixed methods employed in this study reinforce the value of engaging critical creative practices with scientific analyses. The success of the partnership is demonstrated by being awarded the first ‘Healthway’ grant to an area outside of Health Sciences at Curtin University. In undertaking the research and engaging in interdisciplinary practices it was found that all parties built understandings and capacities in unexpected and enriching ways. Tackling a real world challenge, such as this, through the full spectrum of scientific, critical and creative means results in multifaceted creative solutions and outputs with wide dissemination opportunities

Guiding climate compatible development: User-orientated analysis of planning tools and methodologies

The focus on climate compatible development (CCD) as an aim for development in a changing climate reflects a growing recognition that mitigation, adaptation and development need to be tackled together, not as separate issues. However, given that CCD is an emergent area of work and study, the availability of guidance resources to assist in bringing the three issues together is limited. This report identifies and analyses the currently available tools and methodologies for adaptation, mitigation and development, in an attempt to guide decision makers towards climate compatible development pathways. Three main research questions are addressed in this report: 1. What tools and methodologies that address climate compatible development or its related aspects currently exist? 2. To what extent do these tools currently satisfy user needs in delivering climate compatible development? 3. Where are there gaps, and what is needed in order to plan climate compatible development? Several findings have emerged from the analysis of the tools: - Many tools have been implemented by users on a ‘do it yourself’ basis, even though the tool developers have built a guided process. - In several categories, the tools are very diverse. For example, in their integration across adaptation, mitigation and development, level of stakeholder involvement, costs, and extent of guidance material. - In a number of categories, the tools are similar in having a high frequency of use and low training requirements. - Most tools apply to the early steps of the policy cycle stages, namely problems identification, assessment of options and selection of policies. Fewer tools assist in the policy implementation and evaluation stages.This study was commissioned by the Climate and Development Knowledge Network (CDKN)

Review of offshore CO2 storage monitoring: operational and research experiences of meeting regulatory and technical requirements

Legislation for offshore storage has been developing over the last decade or so and is currently most developed in Europe. Although the large-scale operating sites in Europe were started prior to the regulations coming into force, any planned sites will need to meet these regulatory requirements. Our review of monitoring experiences from both the operating sites and research at experimental injection sites and in areas of natural CO2 seepage suggest that broadly, the technical and regulatory challenges of offshore monitoring can be met. A full report reviewing offshore monitoring including tool capabilities, practicalities and costs is available from IEAGHG (released Q1 2016)

The Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy Reporting Guidelines

The Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy brings together local and regional authorities voluntarily committing to implementing the European Union’s climate and energy objectives on their territory. Signatory local authorities share a vision for making cities decarbonised and resilient, where citizens have access to secure, sustainable and affordable energy. Signatories pledge to reduce CO2 emissions by at least 40% by 2030 and to increase their resilience to the impacts of climate change. The Covenant of Mayors helps local authorities to translate their greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction ambitions into reality, while taking into account the immense diversity on the ground. it provides signatories with a harmonised data compilation and reporting framework which is unique in Europe which assists them to follow a systemic climate and energy planning and monitoring at the local level. The Sustainable Energy and Climate Action Plan (SECAP) template constitutes the standard reporting framework for Covenant Signatories. The SECAP template forms the skeleton of the individual action plans. The SECAP and its monitoring part allow signatories to collect and analyse data in a structured and systematic manner, serve as a basis for good climate and energy management and for tracking progress in implementation. This guide has been developed to assist signatories in understanding the Covenant reporting framework. It seeks to provide signatories with step-by-step guidelines throughout the reporting process. Step I is dedicated to guide signatories through the process of filling in the templates, namely Section I for the SECAP template and Section II for the monitoring template. Step II addresses the upload of documents such as the SECAP, while Step III is focused on the integrated checking system developed for the climate mitigation part of the template and official submission. The guide is enriched with some practical recommendations and concrete examples. Link to the SECAP Template and other technical material: http://www.covenantofmayors.eu/Covenant-technical-materials.html (selectable in URL below).JRC.C.2-Energy Efficiency and Renewable

Climate-driven change in the North Atlantic and Arctic Ocean can greatly reduce the circulation of the North Sea

We demonstrate for the first time a direct oceanic link between climate‐driven change in the North Atlantic and Arctic oceans and the circulation of the northwest European shelf‐seas. Downscaled scenarios show a shutdown of the exchange between the Atlantic and the North Sea, and a substantial decrease in the circulation of the North Sea in the second half of the 21st Century. The northern North Sea inflow decreases from 1.2‐1.3Sv (1Sv=106 m3s‐1) to 0.0‐0.6Sv with Atlantic water largely bypassing the North Sea. This is traced to changes in oceanic haline stratification and gyre structure, and to a newly identified circulation‐salinity feedback. The scenario presented here is of a novel potential future state for the North Sea, with wide‐ranging environmental management and societal impacts. Specifically, the sea would become more estuarine and susceptible to anthropogenic influence with an enhanced risk of coastal eutrophication

Association of acute myeloid leukemias most immature phenotype with risk groups and outcomes

The precise phenotype and biology of acute myeloid leukemia stem cells remain controversial, in part because the “gold standard” immunodeficient mouse engraftment assay fails in a significant fraction of patients and identifies multiple cell-types in others. We sought to analyze the clinical utility of a novel assay for putative leukemia stem cells in a large prospective cohort. The leukemic clone’s most primitive hematopoietic cellular phenotype was prospectively identified in 109 newly-diagnosed acute myeloid leukemia patients, and analyzed against clinical risk groups and outcomes. Most (80/109) patients harbored CD34+CD38− leukemia cells. The CD34+CD38− leukemia cells in 47 of the 80 patients displayed intermediate aldehyde dehydrogenase expression, while normal CD34+CD38− hematopoietic stem cells expressed high levels of aldehyde dehydrogenase. In the other 33/80 patients, the CD34+CD38− leukemia cells exhibited high aldehyde dehydrogenase activity, and most (28/33, 85%) harbored poor-risk cytogenetics or FMS-like tyrosine kinase 3 internal tandem translocations. No CD34+ leukemia cells could be detected in 28/109 patients, including 14/21 patients with nucleophosmin-1 mutations and 6/7 acute promyelocytic leukemia patients. The patients with CD34+CD38− leukemia cells with high aldehyde dehydrogenase activity manifested a significantly lower complete remission rate, as well as poorer event-free and overall survivals. The leukemic clone’s most immature phenotype was heterogeneous with respect to CD34, CD38, and ALDH expression, but correlated with acute myeloid leukemia risk groups and outcomes. The strong clinical correlations suggest that the most immature phenotype detectable in the leukemia might serve as a biomarker for “clinically-relevant” leukemia stem cells. ClinicalTrials.gov: {"type":"clinical-trial","attrs":{"text":"NCT01349972","term_id":"NCT01349972"}}NCT01349972

Differentiation and Transplantation of Embryonic Stem Cell-Derived Cone Photoreceptors into a Mouse Model of End-Stage Retinal Degeneration

The loss of cone photoreceptors that mediate daylight vision represents a leading cause of blindness, for which cell replacement by transplantation offers a promising treatment strategy. Here, we characterize cone differentiation in retinas derived from mouse embryonic stem cells (mESCs). Similar to in vivo development, a temporal pattern of progenitor marker expression is followed by the differentiation of early thyroid hormone receptor β2-positive precursors and, subsequently, photoreceptors exhibiting cone-specific phototransduction-related proteins. We establish that stage-specific inhibition of the Notch pathway increases cone cell differentiation, while retinoic acid signaling regulates cone maturation, comparable with their actions in vivo. MESC-derived cones can be isolated in large numbers and transplanted into adult mouse eyes, showing capacity to survive and mature in the subretinal space of Aipl1−/− mice, a model of end-stage retinal degeneration. Together, this work identifies a robust, renewable cell source for cone replacement by purified cell suspension transplantation