Real‐time interactive social environments: A review of BT's generic learning platform

Online learning in particular and lifelong learning in general require a learning platform that makes sense both pedagogically and commercially. This paper sets out to describe what we mean by generic, learning and platform. The technical requirements are described, and various trials that test the technical, educational and commercial nature of the platform are described Finally, the future developments planned for the Real‐time Interactive Social Environments (RISE) are discusse

A Comparative Analysis of Hedging in a Corpus of Two Written Legal Discourse Genres

Esta tesis doctoral, que es la culminación de mis estudios de doctorado impartidos por el Departamento de Lingüística Aplicada a la Ciencia y a la Tecnología de la Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, aborda el análisis del uso de la matización (hedging) en el lenguaje legal inglés siguiendo los postulados y principios de la análisis crítica de género (Bhatia, 2004) y empleando las herramientas de análisis de córpora WordSmith Tools versión 6 (Scott, 2014). Como refleja el título, el estudio se centra en la descripción y en el análisis contrastivo de las variedades léxico-sintácticas de los matizadores del discurso (hedges) y las estrategias discursivas que con ellos se llevan a cabo, además de las funciones que éstas desempeñan en un corpus de sentencias del Tribunal Supremo de EE. UU., y de artículos jurídicos de investigación americanos, relacionando, en la medida posible, éstas con los rasgos determinantes de los dos géneros, desde una perspectiva socio-cognitiva. El elemento innovador que ofrece es que, a pesar de los numerosos estudios que se han podido realizar sobre los matizadores del discurso en el inglés general (Lakoff, 1973; Hübler, 1983; Clemen, 1997; Markkanen and Schröder, 1997; Mauranen, 1997; Fetzer 2010; y Finnegan, 2010 entre otros) académico (Crompton, 1997; Meyer, 1997; Skelton, 1997; Martín Butragueňo, 2003) científico (Hyland, 1996a, 1996c, 1998c, 2007; Grabe and Kaplan, 1997; Salager-Meyer, 1997 Varttala, 2001) médico (Prince, 1982; Salager-Meyer, 1994; Skelton, 1997), y, en menor medida el inglés legal (Toska, 2012), no existe ningún tipo de investigación que vincule los distintos usos de la matización a las características genéricas de las comunicaciones profesionales. Dentro del lenguaje legal, la matización confirma su dependencia tanto de las expectativas a macro-nivel de la comunidad de discurso, como de las intenciones a micro-nivel del escritor de la comunicación, variando en función de los propósitos comunicativos del género ya sean éstos educativos, pedagógicos, interpersonales u operativos. El estudio pone de relieve el uso predominante de los verbos modales epistémicos y de los verbos léxicos como matizadores del discurso, estos últimos divididos en cuatro tipos (Hyland 1998c; Palmer 1986, 1990, 2001) especulativos, citativos, deductivos y sensoriales. La realización léxico-sintáctica del matizador puede señalar una de cuatro estrategias discursivas particulares (Namsaraev, 1997; Salager-Meyer, 1994), la indeterminación, la despersonalización, la subjectivisación, o la matización camuflada (camouflage hedging), cuya incidencia y función varia según género. La identificación y cuantificación de los distintos matizadores y estrategias empleados en los diferentes géneros del discurso legal puede tener implicaciones pedagógicos para los estudiantes de derecho no nativos que tienen que demostrar una competencia adecuada en su uso y procesamiento. ABSTRACT This doctoral thesis, which represents the culmination of my doctoral studies undertaken in the Department of Linguistics Applied to Science and Technology of the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, focusses on the analysis of hedging in legal English following the principles of Critical Genre Analysis (Bhatia, 2004), and using WordSmith Tools version 6 (Scott, 2014) corpus analysis tools. As the title suggests, this study centers on the description and contrastive analysis of lexico-grammatical realizations of hedges and the discourse strategies which they can indicate, as well as the functions they can carry out, in a corpus of U.S. Supreme Court opinions and American law review articles. The study relates realization, incidence and function of hedging to the predominant generic characteristics of the two genres from a socio-cognitive perspective. While there have been numerous studies on hedging in general English (Lakoff, 1973; Hübler, 1983; Clemen, 1997; Markkanen and Schröder, 1997; Mauranen, 1997; Fetzer 2010; and Finnegan, 2010 among others) academic English (Crompton, 1997; Meyer, 1997; Skelton, 1997; Martín Butragueňo, 2003) scientific English (Hyland, 1996a, 1996c, 1998c, 2007; Grabe and Kaplan, 1997; Salager-Meyer, 1997 Varttala, 2001) medical English (Prince, 1982; Salager-Meyer, 1994; Skelton, 1997), and, to a lesser degree, legal English (Toska, 2012), this study is innovative in that it links the different realizations and functions of hedging to the generic characteristics of a particular professional communication. Within legal English, hedging has been found to depend on not only the macro-level expectations of the discourse community for a specific genre, but also on the micro-level intentions of the author of a communication, varying according to the educational, pedagogical, interpersonal or operative purposes the genre may have. The study highlights the predominance of epistemic modal verbs and lexical verbs as hedges, dividing the latter into four types (Hyland, 1998c; Palmer, 1986, 1990, 2001): speculative, quotative, deductive and sensorial. Lexical-grammatical realizations of hedges can signal one of four discourse strategies (Namsaraev, 1997; Salager-Meyer, 1994), indetermination, depersonalization, subjectivization and camouflage hedging, as well as fulfill a variety of functions. The identification and quantification of the different hedges and hedging strategies and functions in the two genres may have pedagogical implications for non-native law students who must demonstrate adequate competence in the production and interpretation of hedged discourse

On the Origin and Evolution of Life in the Galaxy

A simple stochastic model for evolution, based upon the need to pass a sequence of n critical steps (Carter 1983, Watson 2008) is applied to both terrestrial and extraterrestrial origins of life. In the former case, the time at which humans have emerged during the habitable period of the Earth suggests a value of n = 4. Progressively adding earlier evolutionary transitions (Maynard Smith and Szathmary, 1995) gives an optimum fit when n = 5, implying either that their initial transitions are not critical or that habitability began around 6 Ga ago. The origin of life on Mars or elsewhere within the Solar System is excluded by the latter case and the simple anthropic argument is that extraterrestrial life is scarce in the Universe because it does not have time to evolve. Alternatively, the timescale can be extended if the migration of basic progenotic material to Earth is possible. If extra transitions are included in the model to allow for Earth migration, then the start of habitability needs to be even earlier than 6 Ga ago. Our present understanding of Galactic habitability and dynamics does not exclude this possibility. We conclude that Galactic punctuated equilibrium (Cirkovic et al. 2009), proposed as a way round the anthropic problem, is not the only way of making life more common in the Galaxy.Comment: See http://www.astrobiologysociety.org/index.ph

Effects of a Large Fishing Closure on Benthic Communitites in the Western Gulf of Maine: Recovery from the Effects of Gillnets and Otter Trawls

The recovery of benthic communities inside the western Gulf of Maine fishing closure area was evaluated by comparing invertebrate assemblages at sites inside and outside of the closure four to six years after the closure was established. The major restriction imposed by the closure was a year-round prohibition of bottom gillnets and otter trawls. A total of 163 seafloor sites (~half inside and half outside the closure) within a 515-km2 study area were sampled with some combination of Shipek grab, Wildco box corer, or underwater video. Bottom types ranged from mud (silt and clay) to boulders, and the effects of the closure on univariate measures (total density, biomass, taxonomic richness) of benthos varied widely among sediment types. For sites with predominantly mud sediments, there were mixed effects on inside and outside infauna and no effect on epifauna. For sites with mainly sand sediments, there were higher density, biomass, and taxonomic richness for infauna inside the closure, but no significant effects on epifauna. For sites dominated by gravel (which included boulders in some areas), there were no effects on infauna but strong effects on epifaunal density and taxonomic richness. For fishing gear, the data indicated that infauna recovered in sand from the impacts of otter trawls operated inside the closure but that they did not recover in mud, and that epifauna recovered on gravel bottoms from the impact of gillnets used inside the closure. The magnitudes of impact and recovery, however, cannot be inferred directly from our data because of a confounding factor of different fishing intensities outside the closure for a direct comparison of preclosure and postclosure data. The overall negative impact of trawls is likely underestimated by our data, whereas the negative impact of gillnets is likely overestimated

Artificial Metalloenzymes: Challenges and Opportunities

Artificial metalloenzymes (ArMs) result from the incorporation of an abiotic metal cofactor within a protein scaffold. From the earliest techniques of transition metals adsorbed on silk fibers, the field of ArMs has expanded dramatically over the past 60 years to encompass a range of reaction classes and inspired approaches: Assembly of the ArMs has taken multiple forms with both covalent and supramolecular anchoring strategies, while the scaffolds have been intuitively selected and evolved, repurposed, or designed in silico. Herein, we discuss some of the most prominent recent examples of ArMs to highlight the challenges and opportunities presented by the field

Empathy maps in communication skills training

Funding: This research was funded by Excellent Medical Education Joint ASME/GMC Award 2018 Undergraduate category.Background : Empathy is a cornerstone of patient‐centred care. However, empathy levels among health care professionals and medical students are currently suboptimal. An empathy map is a tool which aids in understanding another person’s perspective. Empathy maps have up until now not been used in a medical education setting. Objective : To assess the attitudes towards, applicability and usefulness of empathy maps as part of medical student’s communication skills training. Methods : Empathy map training was introduced to first‐year medical student communication skills training at two UK‐based medical schools. Twenty‐eight participants in total agreed to be interviewed about their experiences using the empathy map, including sixteen students and twelve patient partners who assisted with communication skills training. Results : Medical students and patient partners perceive value in empathy map training. Medical students stated that the empathy map training impacted on their views of empathy and patient‐centredness by highlighting the importance of patient‐centred care. Medical students and patient partners enjoyed the experience of completing the empathy map and had suggestions for how it could be improved in the future. Conclusions : Empathy maps could provide a cost‐effective way to encourage empathic and patient‐centred care in medical education. Furthermore, there is no reason why empathy maps would not aid in any caring profession. Further research is needed to confirm that empathy maps do increase empathy.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

The LIM protein Ajuba influences p130Cas localization and Rac1 activity during cell migration

Cell migration requires extension of lamellipodia that are stabilized by formation of adhesive complexes at the leading edge. Both processes are regulated by signaling proteins recruited to nascent adhesive sites that lead to activation of Rho GTPases. The Ajuba/Zyxin family of LIM proteins are components of cellular adhesive complexes. We show that cells from Ajuba null mice are inhibited in their migration, without associated abnormality in adhesion to extracellular matrix proteins, cell spreading, or integrin activation. Lamellipodia production, or function, is defective and there is a selective reduction in the level and tyrosine phosphorylation of FAK, p130Cas, Crk, and Dock180 at nascent focal complexes. In response to migratory cues Rac activation is blunted in Ajuba null cells, as detected biochemically and by FRET analysis. Ajuba associates with the focal adhesion-targeting domain of p130Cas, and rescue experiments suggest that Ajuba acts upstream of p130Cas to localize p130Cas to nascent adhesive sites in migrating cells thereby leading to the activation of Rac

Computational modelling of movement-related beta-oscillatory dynamics in human motor cortex

Oscillatory activity in the beta range, in human primary motor cortex (M1), shows interesting dynamics that are tied to behaviour and change systematically in disease. To investigate the pathophysiology underlying these changes, we must first understand how changes in beta activity are caused in healthy subjects. We therefore adapted a canonical (repeatable) microcircuit model used in dynamic causal modelling (DCM) previously used to model induced responses in visual cortex. We adapted this model to accommodate cytoarchitectural differences between visual and motor cortex. Using biologically plausible connections, we used Bayesian model selection to identify the best model of measured MEG data from 11 young healthy participants, performing a simple handgrip task. We found that the canonical M1 model had substantially more model evidence than the generic canonical microcircuit model when explaining measured MEG data. The canonical M1 model reproduced measured dynamics in humans at rest, in a manner consistent with equivalent studies performed in mice. Furthermore, the changes in excitability (self-inhibition) necessary to explain beta suppression during handgrip were consistent with the attenuation of sensory precision implied by predictive coding. These results establish the face validity of a model that can be used to explore the laminar interactions that underlie beta-oscillatory dynamics in humans in vivo. Our canonical M1 model may be useful for characterising the synaptic mechanisms that mediate pathophysiological beta dynamics associated with movement disorders, such as stroke or Parkinson's disease