Analyzing Science Education in the United Kingdom: Taking a System-Wide Approach

Increasing evidence suggests that individuals develop their understanding of science concepts in and out of school, using varied community resources and networks. Thus in contrast to historic research approaches that focus exclusively on single organizations and/or educational events, the current paper presents exploratory research in which we utilized specific community ecology analytical tools and approaches to describe and analyze the U.K. science education community as a whole. Data suggest that overall the U.K. science education community is highly interconnected, and collaborative within individual sectors and moderately interconnected and collaborative between sectors; schools and to a lesser degree universities were outliers to this pattern. An important conclusion was that management to maximize the effectiveness of science education the U.K. science education community would involve support for continued diversification of the number of science education entities in the system and encouragement of reciprocally collaborative, synergistic relationships. We posit that systemic research enables a broader, more comprehensive view of a system's strengths and weaknesses, offering useful insights into the structure and functioning of science education activities; insights that could help researchers, practitioners, and policy makers improve the overall quality of science education delivery for all

Using zeta-potential measurements to quantify peptide partition to lipid membranes

© The Author(s) 2011. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com.Open Access: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial License which permits any noncommercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited.Many cellular phenomena occur on the biomembranes. There are plenty of molecules (natural or xenobiotics) that interact directly or partially with the cell membrane. Biomolecules, such as several peptides (e.g., antimicrobial peptides) and proteins, exert their effects at the cell membrane level. This feature makes necessary investigating their interactions with lipids to clarify their mechanisms of action and side effects necessary. The determination of molecular lipid/water partition constants (Kp) is frequently used to quantify the extension of the interaction. The determination of this parameter has been achieved by using different methodologies, such as UV-Vis absorption spectrophotometry, fluorescence spectroscopy and ζ-potential measurements. In this work, we derived and tested a mathematical model to determine the Kp from ζ-potential data. The values obtained with this method were compared with those obtained by fluorescence spectroscopy, which is a regular technique used to quantify the interaction of intrinsically fluorescent peptides with selected biomembrane model systems. Two antimicrobial peptides (BP100 and pepR) were evaluated by this new method. The results obtained by this new methodology show that ζ-potential is a powerful technique to quantify peptide/lipid interactions of a wide variety of charged molecules, overcoming some of the limitations inherent to other techniques, such as the need for fluorescent labeling.This work was partially supported by project PTDC/QUI/ 69937/2006 from Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia-Ministério da Ciência, Tecnologia e Ensino Superior (FCT-MCTES, Portugal), and by Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian (Portugal). JMF and MMD also thank FCT-MCTES for grants IMM/BT/37-2010 and SFRH/BD/41750/2007, respectively

Belowground DNA-based techniques: untangling the network of plant root interactions

Contains fulltext : 91591.pdf (publisher's version ) (Closed access)7 p

Changes in undergraduate student alcohol consumption as they progress through university

BACKGROUND: Unhealthy alcohol use amongst university students is a major public health concern. Although previous studies suggest a raised level of consumption amongst the UK student population there is little consistent information available about the pattern of alcohol consumption as they progress through university. The aim of the current research was to describe drinking patterns of UK full-time undergraduate students as they progress through their degree course. METHOD: Data were collected over three years from 5895 undergraduate students who began their studies in either 2000 or 2001. Longitudinal data (i.e. Years 1–3) were available from 225 students. The remaining 5670 students all responded to at least one of the three surveys (Year 1 n = 2843; Year 2 n = 2219; Year 3 n = 1805). Results: Students reported consuming significantly more units of alcohol per week at Year 1 than at Years 2 or 3 of their degree. Male students reported a higher consumption of units of alcohol than their female peers. When alcohol intake was classified using the Royal College of Physicians guidelines [1] there was no difference between male and females students in terms of the percentage exceeding recommended limits. Compared to those who were low level consumers students who reported drinking above low levels at Year 1 had at least 10 times the odds of continuing to consume above low levels at year 3. Students who reported higher levels of drinking were more likely to report that alcohol had a negative impact on their studies, finances and physical health. Consistent with the reduction in units over time students reported lower levels of negative impact during Year 3 when compared to Year 1. CONCLUSION: The current findings suggest that student alcohol consumption declines over their undergraduate studies; however weekly levels of consumption at Year 3 remain high for a substantial number of students. The persistence of high levels of consumption in a large population of students suggests the need for effective preventative and treatment interventions for all year groups

Retinal repair by transplantation of photoreceptor precursors

Photoreceptor loss causes irreversible blindness in many retinal diseases. Repair of such damage by cell transplantation is one of the most feasible types of central nervous system repair; photoreceptor degeneration initially leaves the inner retinal circuitry intact and new photoreceptors need only make single, short synaptic connections to contribute to the retinotopic map. So far, brain- and retina-derived stem cells transplanted into adult retina have shown little evidence of being able to integrate into the outer nuclear layer and differentiate into new photoreceptors(1-4). Furthermore, there has been no demonstration that transplanted cells form functional synaptic connections with other neurons in the recipient retina or restore visual function. This might be because the mature mammalian retina lacks the ability to accept and incorporate stem cells or to promote photoreceptor differentiation. We hypothesized that committed progenitor or precursor cells at later ontogenetic stages might have a higher probability of success upon transplantation. Here we show that donor cells can integrate into the adult or degenerating retina if they are taken from the developing retina at a time coincident with the peak of rod genesis(5). These transplanted cells integrate, differentiate into rod photoreceptors, form synaptic connections and improve visual function. Furthermore, we use genetically tagged postmitotic rod precursors expressing the transcription factor Nrl (ref. 6) ( neural retina leucine zipper) to show that successfully integrated rod photoreceptors are derived only from immature post-mitotic rod precursors and not from proliferating progenitor or stem cells. These findings define the ontogenetic stage of donor cells for successful rod photoreceptor transplantation.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/62596/1/nature05161.pd

Impact of COVID-19 on carers of people with dementia

Objective Unpaid carers for people with dementia play a crucial role in society. Emerging evidence suggests the COVID-19 pandemic has negatively impacted on carers. This study sought to explore the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on carers for community-dwelling people with dementia and compare responses with pre-pandemic data. Methods Data were collected between September 2020 and April 2021 in England and Wales. Carers were identified from the IDEAL cohort and data were collected either through the telephone, video conferencing, or an online questionnaire. Responses from 242 carers were compared against benchmark data from the IDEAL cohort collected pre-pandemic. Analyses were conducted for the full sample of carers and spousal/partner carers only. Results In total 48.8% of carers thought their healthcare needs were negatively affected during the pandemic. Compared with pre-pandemic data carers were more lonely and experienced less life satisfaction. There was little impact on carers’ experience of caregiving, although carers felt trapped in their caregiving role. Carers were more optimistic and had higher social contact with relatives. There were changes in the methods carers used for contacting relatives and friends. Most carers coped very or fairly well during the pandemic. There was little difference in the experiences of spousal/partner carers and the full sample. Conclusions After a long period of providing care under pandemic conditions carers require additional support. This support needs to be focused on alleviating feelings of loneliness and increasing life satisfaction. Services need to consider how to improve access to health care, particularly resuming face-to-face appointments.Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) through grant ES/V004964/1 | National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) through grant ES/L001853/2 | Alzheimer’s Society, grant number 348, AS-PR2-16-00

Defects in the Outer Limiting Membrane Are Associated with Rosette Development in the Nrl−/− Retina

The neural retinal leucine zipper (Nrl) knockout mouse is a widely used model to study cone photoreceptor development, physiology, and molecular biology in the absence of rods. In the Nrl−/− retina, rods are converted into functional cone-like cells. The Nrl−/− retina is characterized by large undulations of the outer nuclear layer (ONL) commonly known as rosettes. Here we explore the mechanism of rosette development in the Nrl−/− retina. We report that rosettes first appear at postnatal day (P)8, and that the structure of nascent rosettes is morphologically distinct from what is seen in the adult retina. The lumen of these nascent rosettes contains a population of aberrant cells protruding into the subretinal space that induce infolding of the ONL. Morphologically adult rosettes do not contain any cell bodies and are first detected at P15. The cells found in nascent rosettes are photoreceptors in origin but lack inner and outer segments. We show that the adherens junctions between photoreceptors and Müller glia which comprise the retinal outer limiting membrane (OLM) are not uniformly formed in the Nrl−/− retina and thus allow protrusion of a population of developing photoreceptors into the subretinal space where their maturation becomes delayed. These data suggest that the rosettes of the Nrl−/− retina arise due to defects in the OLM and delayed maturation of a subset of photoreceptors, and that rods may play an important role in the proper formation of the OLM

A Partial Structural and Functional Rescue of a Retinitis Pigmentosa Model with Compacted DNA Nanoparticles

Previously we have shown that compacted DNA nanoparticles can drive high levels of transgene expression after subretinal injection in the mouse eye. Here we delivered compacted DNA nanoparticles containing a therapeutic gene to the retinas of a mouse model of retinitis pigmentosa. Nanoparticles containing the wild-type retinal degeneration slow (Rds) gene were injected into the subretinal space of rds+/− mice on postnatal day 5. Gene expression was sustained for up to four months at levels up to four times higher than in controls injected with saline or naked DNA. The nanoparticles were taken up into virtually all photoreceptors and mediated significant structural and biochemical rescue of the disease without histological or functional evidence of toxicity. Electroretinogram recordings showed that nanoparticle-mediated gene transfer restored cone function to a near-normal level in contrast to transfer of naked plasmid DNA. Rod function was also improved. These findings demonstrate that compacted DNA nanoparticles represent a viable option for development of gene-based interventions for ocular diseases and obviate major barriers commonly encountered with non-viral based therapies

The Role of Individual Variables, Organizational Variables and Moral Intensity Dimensions in Libyan Management Accountants’ Ethical Decision Making

This study investigates the association of a broad set of variables with the ethical decision making of management accountants in Libya. Adopting a cross-sectional methodology, a questionnaire including four different ethical scenarios was used to gather data from 229 participants. For each scenario, ethical decision making was examined in terms of the recognition, judgment and intention stages of Rest’s model. A significant relationship was found between ethical recognition and ethical judgment and also between ethical judgment and ethical intention, but ethical recognition did not significantly predict ethical intention—thus providing support for Rest’s model. Organizational variables, age and educational level yielded few significant results. The lack of significance for codes of ethics might reflect their relative lack of development in Libya, in which case Libyan companies should pay attention to their content and how they are supported, especially in the light of the under-development of the accounting profession in Libya. Few significant results were also found for gender, but where they were found, males showed more ethical characteristics than females. This unusual result reinforces the dangers of gender stereotyping in business. Personal moral philosophy and moral intensity dimensions were generally found to be significant predictors of the three stages of ethical decision making studied. One implication of this is to give more attention to ethics in accounting education, making the connections between accounting practice and (in Libya) Islam. Overall, this study not only adds to the available empirical evidence on factors affecting ethical decision making, notably examining three stages of Rest’s model, but also offers rare insights into the ethical views of practising management accountants and provides a benchmark for future studies of ethical decision making in Muslim majority countries and other parts of the developing world