A Contemporary View of Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) Biology and Strain-Specific Di erences

Respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) is a human respiratory pathogen which remains a leading viral cause of hospitalizations and mortality among infants in their first year of life. Here, we review the biology of RSV, the primary laboratory isolates or strains which have been used to best characterize the virus since its discovery in 1956, and discuss the implications for genetic and functional variations between the established laboratory strains and the recently identified clinical isolates

On the supranational spell of PISA in policy

BACKGROUND: PISA results appear to have a large impact upon government policy. The phenomenon is growing, with more countries taking part in PISA testing and politicians pointing to PISA results as reasons for their reforms. PURPOSE: The aims of this research were to depict the policy reactions to PISA across a number of jurisdictions, to see whether they exhibited similar patterns and whether the same reforms were evident. SOURCES OF EVIDENCE: We investigated policy and media reactions to the 2009 and 2012 PISA results in six cases: Canada, China (Shanghai), England, France, Norway and Switzerland. Cases were selected to contrast high-performing jurisdictions (Canada, China) with average performers (England, France, Norway and Switzerland). Countries that had already been well reported on in the literature were excluded (Finland, Germany). DESIGN AND METHODS: Policy documents, media reports and academic articles in English, French, Mandarin and Norwegian relating to each of the cases were critically evaluated. RESULTS: A policy reaction of ‘scandalisation’ was evident in four of the six cases; a technique used to motivate change. Five of the six cases showed ‘standards-based reforms’ and two had reforms in line with the ‘ideal-governance’ model. However, these are categorisations: the actual reforms had significant differences across countries. There are chronological problems with the notion that PISA results were causal with regard to policy in some instances. Countries with similar PISA results responded with different policies, reflecting their differing cultural and historical education system trajectories. CONCLUSIONS: The connection between PISA results and policy is not always obvious. The supranational spell of PISA in policy is in the way that PISA results are used as a magic wand in political rhetoric, as though they conjure particular policy choices. This serves as a distraction from the ideological basis for reforms. The same PISA results could motivate a range of different policy solutions

Double marking revisited

In 2002, the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (QCA) published the report of an independent panel of experts into maintaining standards at Advanced Level (A-Level). One of its recommendations was for: ‘limited experimental double marking of scripts in subjects such as English to determine whether the strategy would signi-ficantly reduce errors of measurement’ (p. 24). This recommendation provided the impetus for this paper which reviews the all but forgotten literature on double marking and considers its relevance now

Teachers' classroom feedback: still trying to get it right

This article examines feedback traditionally given by teachers in schools. Such feedback tends to focus on children's acquisition and retrieval of externally prescribed knowledge which is then assessed against mandated tests. It suggests that, from a sociocultural learning perspective, feedback directed towards such objectives may limit children's social development. In this article, I draw on observation and interview data gathered from a group of 27 9- to 10-year olds in a UK primary school. These data illustrate the children's perceived need to conform to, rather than negotiate, the teacher's feedback comments. They highlight the children's sense that the teacher's feedback relates to school learning but not to their own interests. The article also includes alternative examples of feedback which draw on children's own inquiries and which relate to the social contexts within which, and for whom, they act. It concludes by suggesting that instead of looking for the right answer to the question of what makes teachers' feedback effective in our current classrooms, a more productive question might be how a negotiation can be opened up among teachers and learners themselves, about how teachers' feedback could support children's learning most appropriately

Low Temperature Combustion Optimization and Cycle-by-Cycle Variability Through Injection Optimization and Gas-to-Liquid Fuel-Blend Ratio

The advent of common rail technology alongside powerful control systems capable of delivering multiple accurate fuel charges during a single engine cycle has revolutionized the level of control possible in diesel combustion. This technology has opened a new path enabling low-temperature combustion (LTC) to become a viable combustion strategy. The aim of the research work presented within this paper is the understanding of how various engine parameters of LTC optimize the combustion both in terms of emissions and in terms of fuel efficiency. The work continues with an investigation of in-cylinder pressure and IMEP cycle-by-cycle variation. Attention will be given to how repeatability changes throughout the combustion cycle, identifying which parts within the cycle are least likely to follow the mean trend and why. Experiments were conducted on a single-cylinder 510cc boosted diesel engine. LTC was affected over varying rail pressure and combustion phasing. Single and split injection regimes of varying dwell-times were investigated. All injection conditions were phased across several crank-angles to demonstrate the interaction between emissions and efficiency. These tests were then repeated with blends of 30% and 50% gas-to-liquid (GTL)-diesel blends in order to determine whether there is any change in the trends of repeatability and variance with increasing GTL blend ratio. The experiments were evaluated in terms of emissions, fuel efficiency, and cyclic behavior. Specific attention was given to how the NO x -PM trade-off changes through increased injection complexity and increasing GTL blend ratio. The cyclic behavior was analyzed in terms of in-cylinder pressure standard deviation. This gives a behavior profile of the repeatability of in-cylinder pressure in comparison to the mean. Each condition was then compared to the behavior of equivalent injection conditions in conventional diesel combustion. Short-dwell split injection was shown to be beneficial for LTC, while NO x was shown to be reduced by the substitution of GTL in the fuel. In-cylinder pressure cyclic behavior was also shown to be comparable or superior to conventional combustion in every case examined. GTL improved this further, but not in proportion to its blend ratio

'I would rather die': reasons given by 16-year-olds for not continuing their study of mathematics

Improving participation rates in specialist mathematics after the subject ceases to be compulsory at age 16 is part of government policy in England. This article provides independent and recent support for earlier findings concerning reasons for non- participation, based on free response and closed items in a questionnaire with a sample of over 1500 students in 17 schools, close to the moment of choice. The analysis supports findings that perceived difficulty and lack of confidence are important reasons for students not continuing with mathematics, and that perceived dislike and boredom, and lack of relevance, are also factors. There is a close relationship between reasons for non-participation and predicted grade, and a weaker relation to gender. An analysis of the effects of schools, demonstrates that enjoyment is the main factor differentiating schools with high and low participation indices. Building on discussion of these findings, ways of improving participation are briefly suggested

Wigs, disguises and child's play : solidarity in teacher education

It is generally acknowledged that much contemporary education takes place within a dominant audit culture, in which accountability becomes a powerful driver of educational practices. In this culture both pupils and teachers risk being configured as a means to an assessment and target-driven end: pupils are schooled within a particular paradigm of education. The article discusses some ethical issues raised by such schooling, particularly the tensions arising for teachers, and by implication, teacher educators who prepare and support teachers for work in situations where vocational aims and beliefs may be in in conflict with instrumentalist aims. The article offers De Certeau’s concept of ‘la perruque’ to suggest an opening to playful engagement for human ends in education, as a way of contending with and managing the tensions generated. I use the concept to recover a concept of solidarity for teacher educators and teachers to enable ethical teaching in difficult times

Temporal dynamics and role of benthic habitat for the Mediterranean slipper lobster Scyllarides latus in a National Park

Populations of large large decapods have diminished due to intense fishing pressure and habitat modification along the widely inhabited coast. During the last decade some of the well established marine protected areas (MPAs) in the Western Mediterranean have led to growing densities of one of the most sought after large decapods, the slipper lobster Scyllarides latus (Latreille, 1803). A four year monitoring study was conducted to assess seasonal dynamics and habitat preference of S. latus in the Cabrera Archipelago National Park. Sampling was carried out through underwater visual census on rocky habitats at 0 - 50 m depth. The species may be found in caves, under boulders, and on walls and slopes at depths of up to 35 m, showing a preference for caves at 5 to 20 m depth. These hábitats provide diverse shelter types that are used during the daily period of trophic inactivity. S latus has a marked seasonality with highest densities occurring in late spring, and they disappear almost entirely from rocky coastal habitats in mid-summer. Knowledge of the preferred habitats and spatial pattern of the species is needed for implementing appropriate management schemes to stimulate their recover

My School? Critiquing the abstraction and quantification of education

This paper draws upon and critiques the Australian federal government's website My School as an archetypal example of the current tendency to abstract and quantify educational practice. Arguing in favour of a moral philosophical account of educational practice, the paper reveals how the My School website reduces complex educational practices to simple, supposedly objective, measures of student attainment, reflecting the broader 'audit' society/culture within which it is located. By revealing just how extensively the My School website reduces educational practices to numbers, the paper argues that we are in danger of losing sight of the 'internal' goods of Education which cannot be readily and simply codified, and that the teacher learning encouraged by the site marginalises more active and collective approaches. While having the potential to serve some beneficial diagnostic purposes, the My School website reinforces a view of teachers as passive consumers of information generated beyond their everyday practice