Canadian Civil Justice: Relief in Small and Simple Matters in an Age of Efficiency

Canada is in the midst of an access to justice crisis. The rising costs and complexity of legal services in Canada have surpassed the need for these services. This article briefly explores some obstacles to civil justice as well as some of the court-based programmes and initiatives in place across Canada to address this growing access to justice gap. In par- ticular, this article explains the Canadian civil justice system and canvasses the procedures and programmes in place to make the justice system more efficient and improve access to justice in small and simple matters. Although this article does look briefly at the impact of the global financial crisis on access to justice efforts in Canada, we do not provide empirical data of our own on this point. Further, we conclude that there is not enough existing data to draw correlations between austerity measures in response to the global crisis and the challenges facing Canadian civil justice. More evidence-based research would be helpful to understand current access to justice challenges and to make decisions on how best to move forward with meaningful innovation and policy reform. However, there is reason for optimism in Canada: innovative ideas and a national action plan provide reason to believe that the country can simplify, expedite, and increase access to civil justice in meaningful ways over the coming years

Powering sub-Saharan Africa’s urban revolution: An energy transitions approach

This paper develops a geographic understanding of urban energy transitions in subSaharan African towns and cities. In doing so this paper seeks to critically reflect on the value and limits of urban transitions analysis as a framework for understanding energy networks beyond the largely integrated systems across the Global North. We explore how these potentials and deficits can be addressed by examining promising developments across a series of debates in urban studies that can help sensitise this approach to energyscapes in the African context. By reviewing urban transi- tions analysis through these debates the paper offers four important contributions to expand existing ways of understanding energy transition. These include the particular urbanisation dynamics of African towns ands cities, the need to locate the urban across energy regimes, the agencies of various intermediaries and urban actors and the contested politics inherent in the governing of energy networks. In the conclusion we reflect on the specific directions that have emerged from the paper in relation to our contributions, offering a geographically informed framework that allows us to better examine the challenges and specificities of transition across these rapidly growing urban regions

Length of carotid stenosis predicts peri-procedural stroke or death and restenosis in patients randomized to endovascular treatment or endarterectomy.

BACKGROUND: The anatomy of carotid stenosis may influence the outcome of endovascular treatment or carotid endarterectomy. Whether anatomy favors one treatment over the other in terms of safety or efficacy has not been investigated in randomized trials. METHODS: In 414 patients with mostly symptomatic carotid stenosis randomized to endovascular treatment (angioplasty or stenting; n = 213) or carotid endarterectomy (n = 211) in the Carotid and Vertebral Artery Transluminal Angioplasty Study (CAVATAS), the degree and length of stenosis and plaque surface irregularity were assessed on baseline intraarterial angiography. Outcome measures were stroke or death occurring between randomization and 30 days after treatment, and ipsilateral stroke and restenosis ≥50% during follow-up. RESULTS: Carotid stenosis longer than 0.65 times the common carotid artery diameter was associated with increased risk of peri-procedural stroke or death after both endovascular treatment [odds ratio 2.79 (1.17-6.65), P = 0.02] and carotid endarterectomy [2.43 (1.03-5.73), P = 0.04], and with increased long-term risk of restenosis in endovascular treatment [hazard ratio 1.68 (1.12-2.53), P = 0.01]. The excess in restenosis after endovascular treatment compared with carotid endarterectomy was significantly greater in patients with long stenosis than with short stenosis at baseline (interaction P = 0.003). Results remained significant after multivariate adjustment. No associations were found for degree of stenosis and plaque surface. CONCLUSIONS: Increasing stenosis length is an independent risk factor for peri-procedural stroke or death in endovascular treatment and carotid endarterectomy, without favoring one treatment over the other. However, the excess restenosis rate after endovascular treatment compared with carotid endarterectomy increases with longer stenosis at baseline. Stenosis length merits further investigation in carotid revascularisation trials

Complex Evolutionary History of the Aeromonas veronii Group Revealed by Host Interaction and DNA Sequence Data

Aeromonas veronii biovar sobria, Aeromonas veronii biovar veronii, and Aeromonas allosaccharophila are a closely related group of organisms, the Aeromonas veronii Group, that inhabit a wide range of host animals as a symbiont or pathogen. In this study, the ability of various strains to colonize the medicinal leech as a model for beneficial symbiosis and to kill wax worm larvae as a model for virulence was determined. Isolates cultured from the leech out-competed other strains in the leech model, while most strains were virulent in the wax worms. Three housekeeping genes, recA, dnaJ and gyrB, the gene encoding chitinase, chiA, and four loci associated with the type three secretion system, ascV, ascFG, aexT, and aexU were sequenced. The phylogenetic reconstruction failed to produce one consensus tree that was compatible with most of the individual genes. The Approximately Unbiased test and the Genetic Algorithm for Recombination Detection both provided further support for differing evolutionary histories among this group of genes. Two contrasting tests detected recombination within aexU, ascFG, ascV, dnaJ, and gyrB but not in aexT or chiA. Quartet decomposition analysis indicated a complex recent evolutionary history for these strains with a high frequency of horizontal gene transfer between several but not among all strains. In this study we demonstrate that at least for some strains, horizontal gene transfer occurs at a sufficient frequency to blur the signal from vertically inherited genes, despite strains being adapted to distinct niches. Simply increasing the number of genes included in the analysis is unlikely to overcome this challenge in organisms that occupy multiple niches and can exchange DNA between strains specialized to different niches. Instead, the detection of genes critical in the adaptation to specific niches may help to reveal the physiological specialization of these strains