Constructing digital literary texts: A case study of six year 5 children

Children’s lives have changed due to the increased access to, and focus on, information technology in contemporary western cultures. These new technologies enable children to access new forms of content, and they provide them with opportunities to contribute their own digital texts. Despite this, there have been few studies conducted that explore the literacy practices children require to construct digital texts, and fewer that have focused on the construction of digital literary texts, a significant expectation in Australian Curriculum English policy documents. This inquiry examines the literacy practices of six Year 5 children during the construction of their own digital literary texts. It draws on two events – the children’s deconstruction of two digital literary texts, and the subsequent construction of their own digital literary texts. It explores the literacy practices associated with the children’s experiences, writing practices and resource selections. Ethnographic principles and collective case study were used in this qualitative inquiry. Data were collected from six Year 5 children and their classroom teacher in a primary school in New South Wales, Australia. The data were collected over a six-week period from interviews, observations, work samples and artefacts. Two complementary theoretical frames inform this qualitative inquiry; literacy as social practice and new literacies. Together these theoretical orientations recognise how literacy can be mediated by digital technologies and how, as a consequence, new social literacy practices may be needed. The findings of this inquiry show how the previous literacy experiences of the participants invited particular forms of literate practices. Further how digital literary text construction often demands new and dynamic literacy practices that vary according to circumstances and the context of an evolving digital environment

Extra-curricular education for sustainable development interventions in higher education

Universities are seen to have a central role in the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD), partly through their teaching and research activities. However, the critique of Higher Education's (HE) contribution to sustainable development thus far points to the limitations of a discipline driven, curriculum content and solely student focused response. Within this context, extra-curricular interventions, for example, running awareness campaigns, creating groups and organising events, appear to have potential to advance ESD in HE. However, there has been little investigation or published work in this area. Ideas of non formal and informal education; constructivist theories of learning; concepts of free choice, tacit and social learning, and the notions of whole systems thinking and sustainable education all point to roles for interventions in the extra-curricular sphere. This thesis explores the use of extra-curricular interventions in HE through an empirical investigation in the UK. A 2006 postal survey of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) records the extent and type of interventions in use and opinions about their utility. A case study, developed through action research, reports the use and impact of extra-curricular ESD-related interventions at one HEI over an academic year (2006-07). In this case study, regular contact with a group of staff and students over the year is used to map changes in their thoughts and actions relating to sustainable development, and to record the influences attributed to these changes. Importantly, extra-curricular ESD-related interventions are found to be commonly used in UK HE, and to have a prominent position in ESD work despite their limited visibility in the literature. Their utility is confirmed as they are seen to provide experiences that contribute to student and staff learning, as well as institutional change. The evidence collected supports their roles as: disciplinary bridge', community bridge; socialisation scaffold, and social learning arena. They appear to have a useful developmental role in mobilising and motivating members of the campus community. As peripheral activities, however, extra-curricular interventions may be prone to erratic implementation through being under-resourced. They can extend participation in BSD although will not reach everyone. They are best viewed as a complementary part of BSD and linked to a process of curricular and pedagogic renewal. In addition to confirming the extent, utility and limitations of extra-curricular ESD practice, the research contributes a model to map understandings of sustainable development. This model points to a core environmental understanding to which extra layers and strands of thinking can be added. It also confirms the importance of non formal and informal influences in shaping people's conceptions of sustainable development.University of Cheste

Letter from M. B. Lipscombe to P. Colson

Letter from M. B. Lipscombe to P. Colson. The one-page handwritten note is on Jacksonville, Sewing Machine Company letterhead and is dated 5 July 1911

Application of air injectors to biomass combustion systems. Conveyance of rice husks and other particulate biomass materials (NRI Bulletin 52)

This bulletin describes work carried out by the Process and Storage Engineering Department of the Natural Resources Institute on the conveyance of particulate biomass materials by means of low pressure air injectors for applications in small-scale to medium-scale combustion systems. Experimental data on the injector entrainment ratios for particulate-laden gases are compared with values calculated from theory. Procedures are given for an injector design optimized for minimum fan-power and fan-pressure requirements. lt is concluded that the theoretical procedures developed for injector design and performance prediction for clean gases can also be applied, with simple modifications, to the dilute-phase entrainment of particulate materials in the injectors. This publication is primarily intended for use by engineers in the design of injector systems for application in small-scale to medium-scale particulate biomass combustion systems

Copper cable theft: revisiting the price–theft hypothesis

Objectives: To test the commonly espoused but little examined hypothesis that fluctuations in the price of metal are associated with changes in the volume of metal theft. Specifically, we analyze the relationship between the price of copper and the number of police recorded 'live’ copper cable thefts from the British railway network (2006 to 2012)

Report on a visit to Sri Lanka to evaluate performance of traditional furnace/heat exchanger systems used in the tea industry: 10 to 29 November 1992

Under a project entitled "Fuel efficient wood-fired furnace systems" NRI has developed a fuel efficient wood fired furnace/heat exchanger system suitable for application in developing countries. To gauge its effectiveness in both economic and technical terms a comparative study of a typical system used in the Sri Lankan tea industry was carried out. This was coupled to a detailed energy audit of a tea processing factory in order to assess the relative importance of process heat within the entire manufacturing operation. This exercise was carried out in close collaboration with Browns Engineering, a long established Sri Lankan company which sells and maintains tea furnace/dryer equipment both to the Sri Lankan industry and for export. On the evidence of detailed trial results at one factory, observations in other factories, and discussion with equipment suppliers; there are clearly significant energy savings that could be achieved in the industry. Servicing of existing furnace equipment and furnace operator training should be given high priority. Production scheduling within the new factory groupings·also offers scope for reduced specific energy consumption. It was also established from the assignment that there exists a desire to upgrade furnace equipment in the tea industry. The NRI unit is competitively priced and offers significantly improved wood fuel utilization. Changes in the industry and the plans of new management groups to improve efficiency and update manufacturing techniques makes this an opportune time for introduction of the NRI design. A simple payback financial analysis shows that there are financial benefits in replacing old and inefficient units. A suitable venue for field testing and techno-economic evaluation of performance under prolonged operation has been identified

Deep proteogenomics; high throughput gene validation by multidimensional liquid chromatography and mass spectrometry of proteins from the fungal wheat pathogen Stagonospora nodorum

BACKGROUND: Stagonospora nodorum, a fungal ascomycete in the class dothideomycetes, is a damaging pathogen of wheat. It is a model for necrotrophic fungi that cause necrotic symptoms via the interaction of multiple effector proteins with cultivar-specific receptors. A draft genome sequence and annotation was published in 2007. A second-pass gene prediction using a training set of 795 fully EST-supported genes predicted a total of 10762 version 2 nuclear-encoded genes, with an additional 5354 less reliable version 1 genes also retained. RESULTS: In this study, we subjected soluble mycelial proteins to proteolysis followed by 2D LC MALDI-MS/MS. Comparison of the detected peptides with the gene models validated 2134 genes. 62% of these genes (1324) were not supported by prior EST evidence. Of the 2134 validated genes, all but 188 were version 2 annotations. Statistical analysis of the validated gene models revealed a preponderance of cytoplasmic and nuclear localised proteins, and proteins with intracellularassociated GO terms. These statistical associations are consistent with the source of the peptides used in the study. Comparison with a 6-frame translation of the S. nodorum genome assembly confirmed 905 existing gene annotations (including 119 not previously confirmed) and provided evidence supporting 144 genes with coding exon frameshift modifications, 604 genes with extensions of coding exons into annotated introns or untranslated regions (UTRs), 3 new gene annotations which were supported by tblastn to NR, and 44 potential new genes residing within un-assembled regions of the genome. CONCLUSION: We conclude that 2D LC MALDI-MS/MS is a powerful, rapid and economical tool to aid in the annotation of fungal genomic assemblies

Spinal morphine but not ziconotide or gabapentin analgesia is affected by alternative splicing of voltage-gated calcium channel CaV2.2 pre-mRNA

Presynaptic voltage-gated calcium CaV2.2 channels play a privileged role in spinal level sensitization following peripheral nerve injury. Direct and indirect inhibitors of CaV2.2 channel activity in spinal dorsal horn are analgesic in chronic pain states. CaV2.2 channels represent a family of splice isoforms that are expressed in different combinations according to cell-type. A pair of mutually exclusive exons in the CaV2.2 encoding Cacna1b gene, e37a and e37b, differentially influence morphine analgesia. In mice that lack exon e37a, which is enriched in nociceptors, the analgesic efficacy of intrathecal morphine against noxious thermal stimuli is reduced. Here we ask if sequences unique to e37a influence: the development of abnormal thermal and mechanical sensitivity associated with peripheral nerve injury; and the actions of two other classes of analgesics that owe part or all of their efficacy to CaV2.2 channel inhibition. We find that: i) the analgesic efficacy of morphine, but not ziconotide or gabapentin, is reduced in mice lacking e37a, ii) the induction and maintenance of behaviors associated with sensitization that accompany peripheral nerve injury, do not require e37a-specific sequence, iii) intrathecal morphine, but not ziconotide or gabapentin analgesia to thermal stimuli is significantly lower in wild-type mice after peripheral nerve injury, iv) the analgesic efficacy of ziconotide and gabapentin to mechanical stimuli is reduced following nerve injury, and iv) intrathecal morphine analgesia to thermal stimuli in mice lacking e37a is not further reduced by peripheral nerve injury. Our findings show that the analgesic action of morphine, but not ziconotide or gabapentin, to thermal stimuli is linked to which Cacna1b exon, e37a or e37b, is selected during alternative pre-mRNA splicing

Identification of Functionally Distinct Isoforms of the N-Type Ca2+ Channel in Rat Sympathetic Ganglia and Brain

AbstractThe N channel is critical for regulating release of neurotransmitter at many synapses, and even subtle differences in its activity would be expected to influence the efficacy of synaptic transmission. Although several splice variants of the N channel are expressed in the mammalian nervous system, their biological importance is presently unclear. Here, we show that variants of the α1B subunit of the N channel are expressed in sympathetic ganglia and that alternative splicing within IIIS3-S4 and IVS3-S4 generate kinetically distinct channels. We further show a striking difference between the expression pattern of the S3-S4 variants in brain and peripheral ganglia and conclude that the brain-dominant form of the N channel gates 2- to 4-fold more rapidly than that predominant in ganglia

Quantum test of the distributions of composite physical measurements [pre-print]

Probability distribution functions and lowest statistical moments of composite measurements representable as products and quotients of independent normal variates are derived, and tested by means of the α and β branching decays of 212Bi. The exact composite distribution functions are non-Gaussian and provide correct uncertainty estimates and confidence intervals in cases where standard error propagation relations are inaccurate. Although nuclear decay processes give rise to Poisson-distributed parent populations, the Gaussian-based composite distributions form nearly perfect envelopes to the discrete distributions of products and ratios of Poisson variates, even for relatively low counts. To our knowledge, this is the first reported experimental test of the statistics of composite measurements by a fundamental quantum process