"Slow Science": Building Scientific Concepts in Physics in High School

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bigozzi, Lucia; Tarchi, Christian; Falsini, Paola; Fiorentini, Carlo

2014-01-01

In this study, a progressive-learning approach to physics, based on knowledge-building pedagogy, was compared to a content-centered approach in which explanations, experiments, and discussions are centered on the transmission of knowledge. Forty-six students attending the first year of high school participated in this study over a whole school…

"I Didn't Used to Have Much Friends": Exploring the Friendship Concepts and Capabilities of a Boy with Autism and Severe Learning Disabilities

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Potter, Carol

2015-01-01

Whilst progress has been made in understanding the friendships of children with autism, research on the friendships of children with additional learning disabilities remains extremely limited. In this research, a qualitative case study approach provided a rich description of the friendship concepts and capabilities of Ben, a 10-year-old boy with…

Changing treatment paradigms for the management of inflammatory bowel disease.

PubMed

Im, Jong Pil; Ye, Byong Duk; Kim, You Sun; Kim, Joo Sung

2018-01-01

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a chronic and progressive inf lammatory condition of the gastrointestinal tract causing bowel damage, hospitalizations, surgeries, and disability. Although there has been much progress in the management of IBD with established and evolving therapies, most current approaches have failed to change the natural course. Therefore, the treatment approach and follow-up of patients with IBD have undergone a significant change. Usage of immunosuppressants and/or biologics early during the course of the disease, known as top-down or accelerated step-up approach, was shown to be superior to conventional management in patients who had been recently diagnosed with IBD. This approach can be applied to selected groups based on prognostic factors to control disease activity and prevent progressive disease. Therapeutic targets have been shifted from clinical remission mainly based on symptoms to objective parameters such as endoscopic healing due to the discrepancies observed between symptoms, objectively evaluated inf lammatory activity, and intestinal damage. The concept of treat-to-target in IBD has been supported by population-based cohort studies, post hoc analysis of clinical trials, and meta-analysis, but more evidence is needed to support this concept to be applied to the clinical practice. In addition, individualized approach with tight monitoring of non-invasive biomarker such as C-reactive protein and fecal calprotectin and drug concentration has shown to improve clinical and endoscopic outcomes. An appropriate de-escalation strategy is considered based on patient demographics, disease features, current disease status, and patients' preferences.

Concept Analysis and the Advance of Nursing Knowledge: State of the Science.

PubMed

Rodgers, Beth L; Jacelon, Cynthia S; Knafl, Kathleen A

2018-04-24

Despite an overwhelming increase in the number of concept analyses published since the early 1970s, there are significant limitations to the impact of this work in promoting progress in nursing science. We conducted an extensive review of concept analyses published between 1972 and 2017 to identify patterns in analysis and followed this with exploration of an exemplar related to the concept of normalization to demonstrate the capabilities of analysis for promoting concept development and progress. Scoping review of peer-reviewed literature published in the Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL) in which the terms "concept analysis," "concept clarification," and "concept derivation" appeared in any part of the reference. The original search returned 3,489 articles. This initial pool was refined to a final sample of 958 articles published in 223 journals and addressing 604 concepts. A review of citations of the original analysis of the concept of normalization resulted in 75 articles selected for closer examination of the process of concept development. Review showed a clear pattern of repetition of analysis of the same concept, growth in number of published analyses, preponderance of first authors with master's degrees, and 43 distinct descriptions of methods. Review of the 75 citations to the normalization analysis identified multiple ways concept analysis can inform subsequent research and theory development. Conceptual work needs to move beyond the level of "concept analysis" involving clear linkage to the resolution of problems in the discipline. Conceptual work is an important component of progress in the knowledge base of a discipline, and more effective use of concept development activities are needed to maximize the potential of this important work. It is important to the discipline that we facilitate progress in nursing science on a theoretical and conceptual level as a part of cohesive and systematic development of the discipline. The absence of effective concepts impedes the ability to recognize, discuss, define, and conduct studies important to clinical practice and research. This article reflects the pressing need as well as the potential for concept analysis work to be approached in a way that promotes nursing science and enables conceptually sound research to improve clinical care. © 2018 Sigma Theta Tau International.

Optical testing of progressive ophthalmic glasses based on galvo mirrors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stuerwald, S.; Schmitt, R.

2014-03-01

In production of ophthalmic freeform optics like progressive eyeglasses, the specimens are tested according to a standardized method which is based on the measurement of the vertex power on usually less than 10 points. For a better quality management and thus to ensure more reliable and valid tests, a more comprehensive measurement approach is required. For Shack Hartmann Sensors (SHS) the dynamic range is defined by the number of micro-lenses and the resolution of the imaging sensor. Here, we present an approach for measuring wavefronts with increased dynamic range and lateral resolution by the use of a scanning procedure. Therefore, the proposed innovative setup is based on galvo mirrors that are capable of measuring the vertex power with a lateral resolution below one millimeter since this is sufficient for a functional test of progressive eyeglasses. Expressed in a more abstract way, the concept is based on a selection and thereby encoding of single sub-apertures of the wave front under test. This allows measuring the wave fronts slope consecutively in a scanning procedure. The use of high precision galvo systems allows a lateral resolution below one millimeter as well as a significant fast scanning ability. The measurement concept and performance of this method will be demonstrated for different spherical and freeformed specimens like progressive eye glasses. Furthermore, approaches for calibration of the measurement system will be characterized and the optical design of the detector will be discussed.

The capability approach: a guiding framework to improve population health and the attainment of the Sustainable Developmental Goals.

PubMed

Hirani, Shela Akbar Ali; Richter, Solina

2017-02-21

The world is progressing in terms of communication, innovative technology and cure of various diseases through advanced pharmacological preparations. Unfortunately, populations are still struggling with ill-health, disabilities, poverty, hunger, inequality, gender disparities and conflicts. Several questions come to mind in this regard: why are prosperity, health, peace and progress not evenly distributed and what is the best approach to address the issues associated with population health? The capability approach may offer a possible model. This approach is a blend of 5 key concepts: capabilities, functioning, agency, endowment, and conversion factors. It proposes an innovative approach to examine and enhance the quality of life and wellbeing of individuals. This reflective paper provides an overview of the capability approach, critically analyses population health from the theoretical lens of the capability approach and highlights the relevance of this approach to achieving the Sustainable Developmental Goals.

On how Watson and Crick discovered what Watson and Crick had suggested: the "folk" concept of discovery rediscovered.

PubMed

Charpa, Ulrich

2008-01-01

This article opens with general and historical remarks on philosophy of science's problems with the concept of discovery. Then, drawing upon simple examples of Watson's and Crick's non-philosophical usage, I characterize phrases of the type "x discovers y" semantically. It will subsequently be shown how widespread philosophical discussion on discovery violates the semantic constraints of phrases of the type "x discovers y." Then I provide a philosophical reconstruction of "x discovers y" that is in keeping with the "folk" notion of discovery. The philosophical ingredients of this approach are taken from a certain aspect of action theory and from epistemological reliabilism. The approach draws upon the concept of superior action and connects this concept to progressive research. In contrast to normal actions, superior actions are primarily explained by competencies. This perspective includes reminders of what some nineteenth-century philosopher-scientists had advocated as a competence-oriented view on scientific research. Finally, this approach is applied to the case of Watson's and Crick's discovery.

Enhancing Conceptual Change in Preschool Children's Representations of Light: A Sociocognitive Approach

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ravanis, Konstantinos; Christidou, Vasilia; Hatzinikita, Vassilia

2013-12-01

The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of a sociocognitive teaching strategy on young children's understanding of light. It explores their understanding of the concept of light as an entity that is transmitted independently of the light source and the final receiver. The study was conducted in three phases: pretest, teaching intervention, and post-tests. The sample consisted of 170 preschool children who were assigned to two groups. The children in the first group participated in activities which adopted a sociocognitive approach. In the context of this approach, a familiar metaphor was introduced in order to facilitate children to construct a "precursor model" about light. The children in the second group participated in activities with the same teaching objectives, but adopting an empiricist perspective. Statistical analysis using the Mann-Whitney U test indicated that the cognitive progress of the sociocognitive group was more significant than the progress of the empiricist group. This provides evidence for the effect of the sociocognitive strategy on enhancing children in constructing a "precursor model" for the concept of light.

The diagnosis and management of progressive dysfunction of health care organizations.

PubMed

Chervenak, Frank A; McCullough, Laurence B

2005-04-01

This paper presents an ethically justified approach to the diagnosis and management of progressive dysfunction of health care organizational cultures. We explain the concept of professional integrity in terms of the ethical concept of the cofiduciary responsibility of physicians and health care organizations. We identify the ethical features of a healthy health care organization and the spectrum of progressive dysfunction of organizational cultures from cynical through wonderland and Kafkaesque to postmodern. Physicians should respond to cynical health care organizations by creating moral enclaves of professional integrity for the main purpose of confrontation and reform, to wonderland organizations by strengthening moral enclaves for the main purpose of resisting self-deception, to Kafkaesque organizations by strengthening moral enclaves still further for the main purpose of defending professional integrity (adopting a Machiavellian appearance of virtue as necessary), and to postmodern organizations by creating moral fortresses and, should these fail, quitting.

The Poverty of Constructivism

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Meyer, Derek Louis

2009-01-01

Constructivism claims to be a postepistemology that replaces "traditional" concepts of knowledge. Supporters of constructivism have argued that progress requires that pre-service teachers be weaned off traditional approaches and that they should adopt constructivist views of knowledge. Constructivism appears to be gaining ground rapidly and should…

Paradigms and Problem-Solving: A Literature Review.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Berner, Eta S.

1984-01-01

Thomas Kuhn's conceptions of the influence of paradigms on the progress of science form the framework for analyzing how medical educators have approached research on medical problem solving. A new paradigm emphasizing multiple types of problems with varied solution strategies is proposed. (Author/MLW)

Conceptual information processing: A robust approach to KBS-DBMS integration

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lazzara, Allen V.; Tepfenhart, William; White, Richard C.; Liuzzi, Raymond

1987-01-01

Integrating the respective functionality and architectural features of knowledge base and data base management systems is a topic of considerable interest. Several aspects of this topic and associated issues are addressed. The significance of integration and the problems associated with accomplishing that integration are discussed. The shortcomings of current approaches to integration and the need to fuse the capabilities of both knowledge base and data base management systems motivates the investigation of information processing paradigms. One such paradigm is concept based processing, i.e., processing based on concepts and conceptual relations. An approach to robust knowledge and data base system integration is discussed by addressing progress made in the development of an experimental model for conceptual information processing.

Computational Simulation of Continuous Fiber-Reinforced Ceramic Matrix Composites Behavior

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Murthy, Pappu L. N.; Chamis, Christos C.; Mital, Subodh K.

1996-01-01

This report describes a methodology which predicts the behavior of ceramic matrix composites and has been incorporated in the computational tool CEMCAN (CEramic Matrix Composite ANalyzer). The approach combines micromechanics with a unique fiber substructuring concept. In this new concept, the conventional unit cell (the smallest representative volume element of the composite) of the micromechanics approach is modified by substructuring it into several slices and developing the micromechanics-based equations at the slice level. The methodology also takes into account nonlinear ceramic matrix composite (CMC) behavior due to temperature and the fracture initiation and progression. Important features of the approach and its effectiveness are described by using selected examples. Comparisons of predictions and limited experimental data are also provided.

Blast and Fragment Protective Sandwich Panel Concepts for Stainless Steel Monohull Designs

DTIC Science & Technology

2008-10-21

to draw broader conclusions. 8. Concluding remarks The resistance of metallic sandwich panels to localized spherical impulsive sources has been...hour per response, including the time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources , gathering and maintaining the data needed, and...applications and ship hull blister attachments. Technical Approach The approach used in this research program exploited progress made in metallic

Women's Liberation: Are Men Victims?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Juhasz, Anne McCreary; Aladjem, Sonia

Varied theoretical approaches provide insight into the complexity of the process of role shift for men and women. The concept of role "shift" as opposed to role "change" recognizes the need to consider the progressively complex interactions and processes which occur intraindividually, interindividually, culturally, and historically as individuals…

Self-assembled hierarchically structured organic-inorganic composite systems.

PubMed

Tritschler, Ulrich; Cölfen, Helmut

2016-05-13

Designing bio-inspired, multifunctional organic-inorganic composite materials is one of the most popular current research objectives. Due to the high complexity of biocomposite structures found in nacre and bone, for example, a one-pot scalable and versatile synthesis approach addressing structural key features of biominerals and affording bio-inspired, multifunctional organic-inorganic composites with advanced physical properties is highly challenging. This article reviews recent progress in synthesizing organic-inorganic composite materials via various self-assembly techniques and in this context highlights a recently developed bio-inspired synthesis concept for the fabrication of hierarchically structured, organic-inorganic composite materials. This one-step self-organization concept based on simultaneous liquid crystal formation of anisotropic inorganic nanoparticles and a functional liquid crystalline polymer turned out to be simple, fast, scalable and versatile, leading to various (multi-)functional composite materials, which exhibit hierarchical structuring over several length scales. Consequently, this synthesis approach is relevant for further progress and scientific breakthrough in the research field of bio-inspired and biomimetic materials.

Pharmacokinetic modeling in aquatic animals. 1. Models and concepts

USGS Publications Warehouse

Barron, M.G.; Stehly, Guy R.; Hayton, W.L.

1990-01-01

While clinical and toxicological applications of pharmacokinetics have continued to evolve both conceptually and experimentally, pharmacokinetics modeling in aquatic animals has not progressed accordingly. In this paper we present methods and concepts of pharmacokinetic modeling in aquatic animals using multicompartmental, clearance-based, non-compartmental and physiologically-based pharmacokinetic models. These models should be considered as alternatives to traditional approaches, which assume that the animal acts as a single homogeneous compartment based on apparent monoexponential elimination.

An Operations Concept for Integrated Model-Centric Engineering at JPL

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bayer, Todd J.; Cooney, Lauren A.; Delp, Christopher L.; Dutenhoffer, Chelsea A.; Gostelow, Roli D.; Ingham, Michel D.; Jenkins, J. Steven; Smith, Brian S.

2010-01-01

As JPL's missions grow more complex, the need for improved systems engineering processes is becoming clear. Of significant promise in this regard is the move toward a more integrated and model-centric approach to mission conception, design, implementation and operations. The Integrated Model-Centric Engineering (IMCE) Initiative, now underway at JPL, seeks to lay the groundwork for these improvements. This paper will report progress on three fronts: articulating JPL's need for IMCE; characterizing the enterprise into which IMCE capabilities will be deployed; and constructing an operations concept for a flight project development in an integrated model-centric environment.

Early aggressive intraocular pressure lowering, target intraocular pressure, and a novel concept for glaucoma care.

PubMed

Singh, Kuldev; Shrivastava, Anurag

2008-11-01

Early diagnosis of glaucomatous optic nerve damage offers the potential for early treatment which may prevent vision loss from this neurodegenerative disease. Even in patients who do not begin early treatment, early diagnosis allows for better monitoring of disease at a stage where the stakes are lower relative to later stages of the disease. For these reasons, early diagnosis of glaucomatous optic nerve disease is desirable and opens the door for appropriately aggressive therapy. The target intraocular pressure (IOP) concept is widely employed by glaucoma practitioners. Although there have been no randomized clinical trials or other high-quality studies showing the benefits of setting a target IOP versus not using this approach, there is ample evidence that lowering IOP slows glaucoma progression and, in general, lower is better, regardless of disease stage and baseline IOP level. We propose an alternative approach to managing glaucoma without the use of the target IOP concept and suggest that this market IOP concept should be compared with the target IOP approach in an appropriately powered comparative clinical trial.

Concepts and algorithms in digital photogrammetry

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Schenk, T.

1994-01-01

Despite much progress in digital photogrammetry, there is still a considerable lack of understanding of theories and methods which would allow a substantial increase in the automation of photogrammetric processes. The purpose of this paper is to raise awareness that the automation problem is one that cannot be solved in a bottom-up fashion by a trial-and-error approach. We present a short overview of concepts and algorithms used in digital photogrammetry. This is followed by a more detailed presentation of perceptual organization, a typical middle-level task.

[Obesity, a disease].

PubMed

Basdevant, Arnaud; Ciangura, Cécile

2010-01-01

Obesity has been considered as a disease by the World Health Organisation since 1997. It was previously considered a simple risk factor and a manifestation of consumer society. This recognition was based on several developments, including epidemiological data showing the worldwide spread of the disease; the increasing health expenditure due to the obesity-related increase in type 2 diabetes; and progress in pathophysiological concepts. Obesity is a chronic and progressive disease. Management approaches range from prevention to surgery, and must be adapted to the individual situation.

Towards a New Approach to Mid-Level Qualifications. Research Report

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Moodie, Gavin; Wheelahan, Leesa; Fredman, Nick; Bexley, Emmaline

2015-01-01

The authors look at the roles that vocations, vocational streams and productive capabilities can play in improving links between mid-level qualifications and occupational outcomes. Support for vocational streams and productive capabilities varied by industry but there is the potential to progress these concepts in each of the industries…

Rethinking Chemistry: A Learning Progression on Chemical Thinking

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sevian, Hannah; Talanquer, Vicente

2014-01-01

Dominant educational approaches in chemistry focus on the learning of somewhat isolated concepts and ideas about chemical substances and reactions. Reform efforts often seek to engage students in the generation of knowledge through the investigation of chemical phenomena, with emphasis on the development and application of models to build causal…

Efficient Swath Mapping Laser Altimetry Demonstration Instrument Incubator Program

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Yu, Anthony W.; Krainak, Michael A,; Harding, David J.; Abshire, James B.; Sun, Xiaoli; Cavanaugh, John; Valett, Susan

2010-01-01

In this paper we will discuss our eighteen-month progress of a three-year Instrument Incubator Program (IIP) funded by NASA Earth Science Technology Office (ESTO) on swath mapping laser altimetry system. This paper will discuss the system approach, enabling technologies and instrument concept for the swath mapping laser altimetry.

Magneto-Inertial Fusion

DOE PAGES

Wurden, G. A.; Hsu, S. C.; Intrator, T. P.; ...

2015-11-17

In this community white paper, we describe an approach to achieving fusion which employs a hybrid of elements from the traditional magnetic and inertial fusion concepts, called magneto-inertial fusion (MIF). Furthermore, the status of MIF research in North America at multiple institutions is summarized including recent progress, research opportunities, and future plans.

Connecting Requirements to Architecture and Analysis via Model-Based Systems Engineering

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cole, Bjorn F.; Jenkins, J. Steven

2015-01-01

In traditional systems engineering practice, architecture, concept development, and requirements development are related but still separate activities. Concepts for operation, key technical approaches, and related proofs of concept are developed. These inform the formulation of an architecture at multiple levels, starting with the overall system composition and functionality and progressing into more detail. As this formulation is done, a parallel activity develops a set of English statements that constrain solutions. These requirements are often called "shall statements" since they are formulated to use "shall." The separation of requirements from design is exacerbated by well-meaning tools like the Dynamic Object-Oriented Requirements System (DOORS) that remained separated from engineering design tools. With the Europa Clipper project, efforts are being taken to change the requirements development approach from a separate activity to one intimately embedded in formulation effort. This paper presents a modeling approach and related tooling to generate English requirement statements from constraints embedded in architecture definition.

Using structured games to teach early fraction concepts to students who are deaf or hard of hearing.

PubMed

Markey, Carmel; Power, Des; Booker, George

2003-01-01

The study focused on the development of the concept of fractions in a group of 11- and 12-year-old students who were deaf or hard of hearing. The approach implemented in the study relied extensively on the use of games with very little formal instruction. It emphasized the development of appropriate language to facilitate an understanding of the notion of fractions through the investigation of concrete materials, pictorial representations, and interactions between students and teacher. The progress achieved by means of this approach is reported, and the implications of developing an understanding of fractions (and mathematics generally) among students who are deaf or hard of hearing are noted.

Shadows constructing a relationship between light and color pigments by physical and mathematical perspectives

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yurumezoglu, Kemal; Karabey, Burak; Yigit Koyunkaya, Melike

2017-03-01

Full shadows, partial shadows and multilayer shadows are explained based on the phenomenon of the linear dispersion of light. This paper focuses on progressing the understanding of shadows from physical and mathematical perspectives. A significant relationship between light and color pigments is demonstrated with the help of the concept of sets. This integration of physical and mathematical reasoning not only manages an operational approach to the concept of shadows, it also outputs a model that can be used in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) curricula by providing a concrete and physical example for abstract concept of the empty set.

Principal Approaches to Understanding Occupation and Occupational Science Found in the Chilean Journal of Occupational Therapy (2001–2012)

PubMed Central

Gómez, Silvia; Tapia, María Jesús; Rueda, Laura

2017-01-01

Background The progression of occupational science in Chile is documented in the main scientific publication of the field, the Chilean Journal of Occupational Therapy (RChTO). Objective Identify approaches to understanding and applying occupation and occupational science as elucidated in the RChTO. Methodology A systematic qualitative review of the journal (2001–2012) identified articles elucidating an approach to understanding and application operationally defined as references to specific authors, theories, models/paradigms, definitions, and other fields that support approaches to O/OS. Results The study identified two main approaches. The first considers occupation/occupational science from a practical perspective or as a means to explain human behavior; the second considers occupation/occupational science as an object of study. Each approach is further divided into categories. Conclusion This study provides a novel perspective on regional use of occupational science concepts. These findings contribute to our understanding of this science in context and to recognition of the cultural relevance of these scientific concepts. PMID:29097971

Principal Approaches to Understanding Occupation and Occupational Science Found in the Chilean Journal of Occupational Therapy (2001-2012).

PubMed

Morrison, Rodolfo; Gómez, Silvia; Henny, Enrique; Tapia, María Jesús; Rueda, Laura

2017-01-01

The progression of occupational science in Chile is documented in the main scientific publication of the field, the Chilean Journal of Occupational Therapy (RChTO). Identify approaches to understanding and applying occupation and occupational science as elucidated in the RChTO. A systematic qualitative review of the journal (2001-2012) identified articles elucidating an approach to understanding and application operationally defined as references to specific authors, theories, models/paradigms, definitions, and other fields that support approaches to O/OS. The study identified two main approaches. The first considers occupation/occupational science from a practical perspective or as a means to explain human behavior; the second considers occupation/occupational science as an object of study. Each approach is further divided into categories. This study provides a novel perspective on regional use of occupational science concepts. These findings contribute to our understanding of this science in context and to recognition of the cultural relevance of these scientific concepts.

Refining a Learning Progression of Energy

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Yao, Jian-Xin; Guo, Yu-Ying; Neumann, Knut

2017-01-01

This paper presents a revised learning progression for the energy concept and initial findings on diverse progressions among subgroups of sample students. The revised learning progression describes how students progress towards an understanding of the energy concept along two progress variables identified from previous studies--key ideas about…

Learning to Fly--The Progressive Development of Situation Awareness

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Melander, Helen; Sahlstrom, Fritjof

2009-01-01

The aim of this article is to argue learning as interaction, and how processes of learning a content as constituted in interaction, can be approached analytically and theoretically. Within aviation, the concept of situation awareness (SA) is used to describe a pilot's capability of correctly perceiving and interpreting a situation, and of…

Creating a Learning Environment for Pre-Service Teachers.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Diggs, Laura L.

This paper presents statistics from ongoing research on a unique learning environment developed at the University of Missouri-Columbia College of Education (MU-CoE). MU-CoE has developed a new approach to space devoted to learning, not teaching. This new concept of progressive learning and performance support integrates interactive networked…

From Teacher to Teacher Leader: A Conceptual Model

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hunzicker, Jana

2017-01-01

Conceptions of teacher leadership are trending away from formal titles and positions to embrace a more informal, integrated approach. Moreover, there is growing agreement among scholars that teacher leadership is a stance, or way of thinking and being, rather than a set of behaviors. As a result, understanding how teachers progress from teacher to…

Viewing Violence, Mental Illness and Addiction through a Wise Practices Lens

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wesley-Esquimaux, Cynthia C.; Snowball, Andrew

2010-01-01

The progressive approaches First Nations, Metis, and Inuit communities use to address health and wellness concerns are rarely written about or acknowledged in a positive manner. This paper speaks to a concept introduced through the Canadian Aboriginal Aids Network (CAAN) entitled "wise practices". CAAN saw a "wise practices"…

Potential and Problems of Existing Creativity and Innovation Indices

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hoelscher, Michael; Schubert, Julia

2015-01-01

Creativity and innovation are important inputs in the global knowledge economy. However, while the theoretical concepts and the measurement of creativity on the individual level have made considerable progress during the last decades, so-called sectoral approaches to measuring creativity and innovation on the level of aggregate units are less well…

French: Foreign Language Curriculum Guide, Grades 7-12.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Farmington Public Schools, CT.

This curriculum guide, developed for an ungraded language program at the secondary school level, allows for a steady progression of skills from unit to unit. Based on the audiolingual approach to language instruction, the guide is divided into four sections: (1) concepts to be taught, (2) references to instructional materials, (3) special…

The Importance of "Wasta" in the Career Success of Middle Eastern Managers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Tlaiss, Hayfaa; Kauser, Saleema

2011-01-01

Purpose: Frequently used in fostering the career progression of individuals this paper aims to explore the concept of "wasta" and its significance in the career advancement of individuals in the Middle Eastern region. The paper also seeks to compare "wasta" with networking and mentoring. Design/methodology/approach: The…

Ramping up to the Biology Workbench: A Multi-Stage Approach to Bioinformatics Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Greene, Kathleen; Donovan, Sam

2005-01-01

In the process of designing and field-testing bioinformatics curriculum materials, we have adopted a three-stage, progressive model that emphasizes collaborative scientific inquiry. The elements of the model include: (1) context setting, (2) introduction to concepts, processes, and tools, and (3) development of competent use of technologically…

A Neo-Piagetian Approach to Development During the Formal Operational Period.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Biemiller, Andrew

Cognitive development during each of the major stages identified by Piaget is characterized by abilities to solve progressively more complex tasks (e.g., changes in the object concept during the sensori-motor stage, and in conservation of amount, weight, and volume during the concrete operational stage). Several theorists have suggested that these…

Artificial General Intelligence: Concept, State of the Art, and Future Prospects

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Goertzel, Ben

2014-12-01

In recent years broad community of researchers has emerged, focusing on the original ambitious goals of the AI field - the creation and study of software or hardware systems with general intelligence comparable to, and ultimately perhaps greater than, that of human beings. This paper surveys this diverse community and its progress. Approaches to defining the concept of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) are reviewed including mathematical formalisms, engineering, and biology inspired perspectives. The spectrum of designs for AGI systems includes systems with symbolic, emergentist, hybrid and universalist characteristics. Metrics for general intelligence are evaluated, with a conclusion that, although metrics for assessing the achievement of human-level AGI may be relatively straightforward (e.g. the Turing Test, or a robot that can graduate from elementary school or university), metrics for assessing partial progress remain more controversial and problematic.

Progress of Rugby Hohlraum Experiments on Omega

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Philippe, Franck; Tassin, Veronique; Casner, Alexis; Gauthier, Pascal; Seytor, Patricia; Monteil, Marie-Christine; Park, Hye-Sook; Robey, Harry; Ross, Steven; Amendt, Peter; Girard, Frederic; Villette, Bruno; Reverdin, Charles; Loiseau, Pascal; Caillaud, Tony; Landoas, Olivier; Li, Chi Kang; Petrasso, Richard; Seguin, Fredrick; Rosenberg, Markus

2011-10-01

The rugby hohlraum concept is predicted to enable better coupling and higher gains in the indirect drive approach to ignition. A collaborative experimental program is currently pursued on OMEGA to test this concept in preparation for future megajoule-scale ignition designs. A direct comparison of gas-filled rugby hohlraums with classical cylinders was recently performed, showing a significant (up to ~40%) observed x-ray drive enhancement and neutron yields that are consistently higher in the rugby case. This work extends and confirms our previous findings in empty rugby hohlraums.

Students' Energy Concepts at the Transition Between Primary and Secondary School

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Opitz, Sebastian T.; Harms, Ute; Neumann, Knut; Kowalzik, Kristin; Frank, Arne

2015-10-01

Energy is considered both a core idea and a crosscutting concept in science education. A thorough understanding of the energy concept is thought to help students learn about other (related) concepts within and across science subjects, thereby fostering scientific literacy. This study investigates students' progression in understanding the energy concept in biological contexts at the transition from primary to lower secondary school by employing a quantitative, cross-sectional study in grades 3-6 ( N = 540) using complex multiple-choice items. Based on a model developed in a previous study, energy concepts were assessed along four aspects of energy: (1) forms and sources of energy, (2) transfer and transformation, (3) degradation and dissipation, and (4) energy conservation. Two parallel test forms (A and B) indicated energy concept scores to increase significantly by a factor of 2.3 (A)/1.7 (B) from grade 3 to grade 6. Students were observed to progress in their understanding of all four aspects of the concept and scored highest on items for energy forms. The lowest scores and the smallest gain across grades were found for energy conservation. Based on our results, we argue that despite numerous learning opportunities, students lack a more integrated understanding of energy at this stage, underlining the requirement of a more explicit approach to teaching energy to young learners. Likewise, more interdisciplinary links for energy learning between relevant contexts in each science discipline may enable older students to more efficiently use energy as a tool and crosscutting concept with which to analyze complex content.

Space Station fluid management logistics

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dominick, Sam M.

1990-01-01

Viewgraphs and discussion on space station fluid management logistics are presented. Topics covered include: fluid management logistics - issues for Space Station Freedom evolution; current fluid logistics approach; evolution of Space Station Freedom fluid resupply; launch vehicle evolution; ELV logistics system approach; logistics carrier configuration; expendable fluid/propellant carrier description; fluid carrier design concept; logistics carrier orbital operations; carrier operations at space station; summary/status of orbital fluid transfer techniques; Soviet progress tanker system; and Soviet propellant resupply system observations.

Refining psychiatric genetics: from ‘mouse psychiatry’ to understanding complex human disorders

PubMed Central

LaPorte, Justin L.; Ren-Patterson, Renee F.; Murphy, Dennis L.; Kalueff, Allan V.

2009-01-01

Investigating the pathogenesis of psychiatric disorders is a complicated and rigorous task for psychiatric geneticists, as the disorders often involve combinations of genetic, behavioral, personality, and environmental factors. To nurture further progress in this field, a new set of conceptual tools is needed in addition to the currently accepted approaches. Concepts that consider cross-species trait genetics and the interplay between the domains of disorders, as well as the full spectrum of potential symptoms and their place along the pathogenetic continuum, are particularly important to address these needs. Here, we outline recent concepts and approaches that can help refine the field and enable more precise dissection of the genetic mechanisms contributing to psychiatric disorders. PMID:18690099

Recent progress in continuous and semi-continuous processing of solid oral dosage forms: a review.

PubMed

Teżyk, Michał; Milanowski, Bartłomiej; Ernst, Andrzej; Lulek, Janina

2016-08-01

Continuous processing is an innovative production concept well known and successfully used in other industries for many years. The modern pharmaceutical industry is facing the challenge of transition from a traditional manufacturing approach based on batch-wise production to a continuous manufacturing model. The aim of this article is to present technological progress in manufacturing based on continuous and semi-continuous processing of the solid oral dosage forms. Single unit processes possessing an alternative processing pathway to batch-wise technology or, with some modification, an altered approach that may run continuously, and are thus able to seamlessly switch to continuous manufacturing are briefly presented. Furthermore, the concept of semi-continuous processing is discussed. Subsequently, more sophisticated production systems created by coupling single unit processes and comprising all the steps of production, from powder to final dosage form, were reviewed. Finally, attempts of end-to-end production approach, meaning the linking of continuous synthesis of API from intermediates with the production of final dosage form, are described. There are a growing number of scientific articles showing an increasing interest in changing the approach to the production of pharmaceuticals in recent years. Numerous scientific publications are a source of information on the progress of knowledge and achievements of continuous processing. These works often deal with issues of how to modify or replace the unit processes in order to enable seamlessly switching them into continuous processing. A growing number of research papers concentrate on integrated continuous manufacturing lines in which the production concept of "from powder to tablet" is realized. Four main domains are under investigation: influence of process parameters on intermediates or final dosage forms properties, implementation of process analytical tools, control-managing system responsible for keeping continuous materials flow through the whole manufacturing process and the development of new computational methods to assess or simulate these new manufacturing techniques. The attempt to connect the primary and secondary production steps proves that development of continuously operating lines is possible. A mind-set change is needed to be able to face, and fully assess, the advantages and disadvantages of switching from batch to continuous mode production.

Architecture is Elementary: Visual Thinking through Architectural Concepts.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Winters, Nathan B.

This book presents very basic but important concepts about architecture and outlines some of the most important concepts used by great architects. These concepts are taught at levels of perceptual maturity applicable to adults and children alike and progress from levels one through seven as the concepts become progressively intertwined. The…

Learning by Doing: A Manual for Teaching and Assessing Higher-Order Thinking in Science and Mathematics.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

National Assessment of Educational Progress, Princeton, NJ.

The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), the Nation's Report Card, has developed and pilot-tested a variety of hands-on science and mathematics tasks. These tasks were developed as prototypes for use in future national assessments, but the concepts measured and the innovative approaches used are equally suitable for classroom…

EcoEvo-MAPS: An Ecology and Evolution Assessment for Introductory through Advanced Undergraduates

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Summers, Mindi M.; Couch, Brian A.; Knight, Jennifer K.; Brownell, Sara E.; Crowe, Alison J.; Semsar, Katharine; Wright, Christian D.; Smith, Michelle K.

2018-01-01

A new assessment tool, Ecology and Evolution--Measuring Achievement and Progression in Science or EcoEvo-MAPS, measures student thinking in ecology and evolution during an undergraduate course of study. EcoEvo-MAPS targets foundational concepts in ecology and evolution and uses a novel approach that asks students to evaluate a series of…

Redwood City School District ESEA Title VII Bilingual Project LEARN. 1981-1982 Annual and Longitudinal Report.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Jones, Earl; Jones, Eleanor

The Redwood City School District Elementary Secondary Education Act (ESEA) Title VII Bilingual Education Program offered instruction in English and Spanish through an integrated approach, to take advantage of students' strengths and help them progress as rapidly as possible in concept development while they acquire English proficiency. The limited…

Exam Corrections: A Dual-Purpose Approach

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Libertini, Jessica; Krul, Caitlin; Turner, Erica

2016-01-01

It is common for freshmen students to enter Calculus I with a wide range of levels of preparation and mastery of background material. In addition, many of the students struggle with the adjustment from high school to college. In an effort to help the students to solidify their understanding of concepts as they progress through the course, as well…

Progress and challenges for cost effective kerfless Silicon crystal growth for PV application

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Serra, J. M.; Alves, J. Maia; Vallera, A. M.

2017-06-01

The major barrier for PV penetration is cost. And the single most important cost factor in silicon technology is the wafer (≈35% of the module cost). Although tremendous progress on cell processing has been reported in recent years, a much smaller evolution is seen on what should be the key point to address - the wafer. The ingot-slicing process is reaching its limits as the wafer thickness is reduced in an effort to lower material costs. Kerf losses of ≈50% and an increase in breakage of a high value added material are putting a lower bound to this approach. New ideas are therefore needed for producing wafers in a way to overcome these limitations. In this paper we present three new concepts being developed in our laboratory that have one thing in common: they all are zero kerf loss processes, aiming at significant reductions in material loss. One explores the concept of exfoliation, the other two aim at the growth of silicon directly into ribbons. These were conceived as continuous processes, based on a floating molten zone concept, to avoid impurity contamination during crystallization.

A Human-in-the Loop Exploration of the Dynamic Airspace Configuration Concept

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Homola, Jeffrey; Lee, Paul U.; Prevot, Thomas; Lee, Hwasoo; Kessell, Angela; Brasil, Connie; Smith, Nancy

2010-01-01

An exploratory human-in-the-loop study was conducted to better understand the impact of Dynamic Airspace Configuration (DAC) on air traffic controllers. To do so, a range of three progressively more aggressive algorithmic approaches to sectorizations were chosen. Sectorizations from these algorithms were used to test and quantify the range of impact on the controller and traffic. Results show that traffic count was more equitably distributed between the four test sectors and duration of counts over MAP were progressively lower as the magnitude of boundary change increased. However, taskload and workload were also shown to increase with the increase in aggressiveness and acceptability of the boundary changes decreased. Overall, simulated operations of the DAC concept did not appear to compromise safety. Feedback from the participants highlighted the importance of limiting some aspects of boundary changes such as amount of volume gained or lost and the extent of change relative to the initial airspace design.

Life extending control for rocket engines

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lorenzo, C. F.; Saus, J. R.; Ray, A.; Carpino, M.; Wu, M.-K.

1992-01-01

The concept of life extending control is defined. A brief discussion of current fatigue life prediction methods is given and the need for an alternative life prediction model based on a continuous functional relationship is established. Two approaches to life extending control are considered: (1) the implicit approach which uses cyclic fatigue life prediction as a basis for control design; and (2) the continuous life prediction approach which requires a continuous damage law. Progress on an initial formulation of a continuous (in time) fatigue model is presented. Finally, nonlinear programming is used to develop initial results for life extension for a simplified rocket engine (model).

Rethinking Clinical Workflow.

PubMed

Schlesinger, Joseph J; Burdick, Kendall; Baum, Sarah; Bellomy, Melissa; Mueller, Dorothee; MacDonald, Alistair; Chern, Alex; Chrouser, Kristin; Burger, Christie

2018-03-01

The concept of clinical workflow borrows from management and leadership principles outside of medicine. The only way to rethink clinical workflow is to understand the neuroscience principles that underlie attention and vigilance. With any implementation to improve practice, there are human factors that can promote or impede progress. Modulating the environment and working as a team to take care of patients is paramount. Clinicians must continually rethink clinical workflow, evaluate progress, and understand that other industries have something to offer. Then, novel approaches can be implemented to take the best care of patients. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

East Meets West--Two Different Approaches to Progress and the Use of the Earth's Resources.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Peterson, Burnell

This unit focuses on differing attitudes toward the environment and the philosophies from which those attitudes developed. After finishing this unit, students will: (1) gain an understanding of the concept of "world view"; (2) trace the historical events that created the Western world view; (3) explain the relationship between world view and the…

Towards a Learning Progression of Energy

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Neumann, Knut; Viering, Tobias; Boone, William J.; Fischer, Hans E.

2013-01-01

This article presents an empirical study on an initial learning progression of energy, a concept of central importance to the understanding of science. Learning progressions have been suggested as one vehicle to support the systematic and successful teaching of core science concepts. Ideally, a learning progression will provide teachers with a…

Validating Proposed Learning Progressions on Force and Motion Using the Force Concept Inventory: Findings from Singapore Secondary Schools

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fulmer, Gavin W.

2015-01-01

This study examines the validity of 2 proposed learning progressions on the force concept when tested using items from the Force Concept Inventory (FCI). This is the first study to compare students' performance with respect to learning progressions both for force and motion and for Newton's third law in parallel. It is also among the first studies…

Mapping of Students’ Learning Progression Based on Mental Model in Magnetic Induction Concepts

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hamid, R.; Pabunga, D. B.

2017-09-01

The progress of student learning in a learning process has not been fully optimally observed by the teacher. The concept being taught is judged only at the end of learning as a product of thinking, and does not assess the mental processes that occur in students’ thinking. Facilitating students’ thinking through new phenomena can reveal students’ variation in thinking as a mental model of a concept, so that students who are assimilative and or accommodative can be identified in achieving their equilibrium of thought as well as an indicator of progressiveness in the students’ thinking stages. This research data is obtained from the written documents and interviews of students who were learned about the concept of magnetic induction through Constructivist Teaching Sequences (CTS) models. The results of this study indicate that facilitating the students’ thinking processes on the concept of magnetic induction contributes to increasing the number of students thinking within the "progressive change" category, and it can be said that the progress of student learning is more progressive after their mental models were facilitated through a new phenomena by teacher.

How Do Undergraduate Students Conceptualize Acid-Base Chemistry? Measurement of a Concept Progression

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Romine, William L.; Todd, Amber N.; Clark, Travis B.

2016-01-01

We developed and validated a new instrument, called "Measuring Concept progressions in Acid-Base chemistry" (MCAB) and used it to better understand the progression of undergraduate students' understandings about acid-base chemistry. Items were developed based on an existing learning progression for acid-base chemistry. We used the Rasch…

A systems approach to animal communication

PubMed Central

Barron, Andrew B.; Balakrishnan, Christopher N.; Hauber, Mark E.; Hoke, Kim L.

2016-01-01

Why animal communication displays are so complex and how they have evolved are active foci of research with a long and rich history. Progress towards an evolutionary analysis of signal complexity, however, has been constrained by a lack of hypotheses to explain similarities and/or differences in signalling systems across taxa. To address this, we advocate incorporating a systems approach into studies of animal communication—an approach that includes comprehensive experimental designs and data collection in combination with the implementation of systems concepts and tools. A systems approach evaluates overall display architecture, including how components interact to alter function, and how function varies in different states of the system. We provide a brief overview of the current state of the field, including a focus on select studies that highlight the dynamic nature of animal signalling. We then introduce core concepts from systems biology (redundancy, degeneracy, pluripotentiality, and modularity) and discuss their relationships with system properties (e.g. robustness, flexibility, evolvability). We translate systems concepts into an animal communication framework and accentuate their utility through a case study. Finally, we demonstrate how consideration of the system-level organization of animal communication poses new practical research questions that will aid our understanding of how and why animal displays are so complex. PMID:26936240

A systems approach to animal communication.

PubMed

Hebets, Eileen A; Barron, Andrew B; Balakrishnan, Christopher N; Hauber, Mark E; Mason, Paul H; Hoke, Kim L

2016-03-16

Why animal communication displays are so complex and how they have evolved are active foci of research with a long and rich history. Progress towards an evolutionary analysis of signal complexity, however, has been constrained by a lack of hypotheses to explain similarities and/or differences in signalling systems across taxa. To address this, we advocate incorporating a systems approach into studies of animal communication--an approach that includes comprehensive experimental designs and data collection in combination with the implementation of systems concepts and tools. A systems approach evaluates overall display architecture, including how components interact to alter function, and how function varies in different states of the system. We provide a brief overview of the current state of the field, including a focus on select studies that highlight the dynamic nature of animal signalling. We then introduce core concepts from systems biology (redundancy, degeneracy, pluripotentiality, and modularity) and discuss their relationships with system properties (e.g. robustness, flexibility, evolvability). We translate systems concepts into an animal communication framework and accentuate their utility through a case study. Finally, we demonstrate how consideration of the system-level organization of animal communication poses new practical research questions that will aid our understanding of how and why animal displays are so complex. © 2016 The Author(s).

Veritas filia temporis: The origins of the idea of scientific progress.

PubMed

Špelda, Daniel

2016-10-01

The article provides insight into the epistemological and anthropological aspect of the origination of the idea of scientific progress. It focuses on the relationship between individual's limited lifetime and the immensity of nature. The basic assumption is that the idea of scientific progress offers a solution of the epistemological problem stemming from the finding that there is no (teleological) coincidence between human cognitive abilities and the extent of nature. In order to facilitate the understanding of the origin of the idea of scientific progress, I propose distinction between the descriptive and prescriptive concepts of progress. While the descriptive notion of progress expresses the cumulative character of scientific knowledge and the superiority of the present over preceding generations, the prescriptive concept pertains to progressivist epistemology directing scientific research at the future development of knowledge. This article claims that the prevalent concept in Antiquity was the descriptive concept of scientific progress. The prescriptive notion had developed only in ancient astronomy. Early modern science was faced with similar issues as ancient astronomy - mainly the empirical finding related to the inexhaustible character of nature. Consequently to the introduction of the idea of progress, the progress of sciences became a purpose in itself - hence becoming infinite.

[Approaching the family: presenting a new definition of family and care].

PubMed

Wernet, Monika; Angelo, Margareth

2003-03-01

Identifying the need to comprehend how nurses 'move' to the family, with the intention of caring for them, the present study obtained twelve biographical narratives of pediatric nurses. The theoretical approach adopted was the Symbolic Interactionism and the methodological one was the Interpretative Interactionism. The analysis of the data allowed the reconstruction of a story which showed that through modifying the concept of caring and family is the process that approximate the pediatric nurses progressively to the family, to a being with them, reaching the freedom to act.

Diagnostic devices for isothermal nucleic acid amplification.

PubMed

Chang, Chia-Chen; Chen, Chien-Cheng; Wei, Shih-Chung; Lu, Hui-Hsin; Liang, Yang-Hung; Lin, Chii-Wann

2012-01-01

Since the development of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technique, genomic information has been retrievable from lesser amounts of DNA than previously possible. PCR-based amplifications require high-precision instruments to perform temperature cycling reactions; further, they are cumbersome for routine clinical use. However, the use of isothermal approaches can eliminate many complications associated with thermocycling. The application of diagnostic devices for isothermal DNA amplification has recently been studied extensively. In this paper, we describe the basic concepts of several isothermal amplification approaches and review recent progress in diagnostic device development.

Diagnostic Devices for Isothermal Nucleic Acid Amplification

PubMed Central

Chang, Chia-Chen; Chen, Chien-Cheng; Wei, Shih-Chung; Lu, Hui-Hsin; Liang, Yang-Hung; Lin, Chii-Wann

2012-01-01

Since the development of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) technique, genomic information has been retrievable from lesser amounts of DNA than previously possible. PCR-based amplifications require high-precision instruments to perform temperature cycling reactions; further, they are cumbersome for routine clinical use. However, the use of isothermal approaches can eliminate many complications associated with thermocycling. The application of diagnostic devices for isothermal DNA amplification has recently been studied extensively. In this paper, we describe the basic concepts of several isothermal amplification approaches and review recent progress in diagnostic device development. PMID:22969402

Evolutionary space platform concept study. Volume 2, part A: SASP special emphasis trade studies

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1982-01-01

Efforts are in progress to define an approach to provide a simple and cost effective solution to the problem of long duration space flight. This approach involves a Space Platform in low Earth orbit, which can be tended by the Space Shuttle and which will provide, for extended periods of time, stability, utilities and access for a variety of replaceable payloads. The feasibility of an evolutionary space system which would cost effectively support unmanned payloads in groups, using a Space Platform which provides centralized basic subsystems is addressed.

Conceptual Foundations of Systems Biology Explaining Complex Cardiac Diseases.

PubMed

Louridas, George E; Lourida, Katerina G

2017-02-21

Systems biology is an important concept that connects molecular biology and genomics with computing science, mathematics and engineering. An endeavor is made in this paper to associate basic conceptual ideas of systems biology with clinical medicine. Complex cardiac diseases are clinical phenotypes generated by integration of genetic, molecular and environmental factors. Basic concepts of systems biology like network construction, modular thinking, biological constraints (downward biological direction) and emergence (upward biological direction) could be applied to clinical medicine. Especially, in the field of cardiology, these concepts can be used to explain complex clinical cardiac phenotypes like chronic heart failure and coronary artery disease. Cardiac diseases are biological complex entities which like other biological phenomena can be explained by a systems biology approach. The above powerful biological tools of systems biology can explain robustness growth and stability during disease process from modulation to phenotype. The purpose of the present review paper is to implement systems biology strategy and incorporate some conceptual issues raised by this approach into the clinical field of complex cardiac diseases. Cardiac disease process and progression can be addressed by the holistic realistic approach of systems biology in order to define in better terms earlier diagnosis and more effective therapy.

Mathematics--An Approach for Slow Learners. Section 2--The Beginnings of Number. Notes for Teachers of Mathematics, Volume 6.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Leeds Education Authority (England). Mathematics Curriculum Study Group.

This is one of a series of monographs developed by teachers in elementary schools near Leeds, England. This document focuses on early instruction of number concepts. It is considered essential that these ideas be presented first in concrete form. The working group attempted to provide a detailed progression in the developmental stages leading to…

Curriculum Design and Management in the Digital Media U: Applying the Corporate University Concept to a Business Sub-Sector

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Selby, Les; Russell, David

2005-01-01

Purpose: To report on the progress of Digital Media U, a tailor-made portal, learning environment and management system. Design/methodology/approach: Discusses the design of the learning content domains, acquisition of the content and the systems for managing the curriculum in the future, including the application of a new model of accreditation.…

At the Garden Gate: Community Building through Food--Revisiting the Critique of "Food, Folk and Fun" in Multicultural Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Richardson, Troy A.

2011-01-01

This essay takes up a re-evaluation of the ossified view of food events that have circulated in the canonical texts of multicultural education. While agreeing with the critique by progressive multiculturalists against a "touristic" approach to diversity, the author argues that such a conception of food-centered events in schools has obscured how…

Current progress of immunoinformatics approach harnessed for cellular- and antibody-dependent vaccine design.

PubMed

Kazi, Ada; Chuah, Candy; Majeed, Abu Bakar Abdul; Leow, Chiuan Herng; Lim, Boon Huat; Leow, Chiuan Yee

2018-03-12

Immunoinformatics plays a pivotal role in vaccine design, immunodiagnostic development, and antibody production. In the past, antibody design and vaccine development depended exclusively on immunological experiments which are relatively expensive and time-consuming. However, recent advances in the field of immunological bioinformatics have provided feasible tools which can be used to lessen the time and cost required for vaccine and antibody development. This approach allows the selection of immunogenic regions from the pathogen genomes. The ideal regions could be developed as potential vaccine candidates to trigger protective immune responses in the hosts. At present, epitope-based vaccines are attractive concepts which have been successfully trailed to develop vaccines which target rapidly mutating pathogens. In this article, we provide an overview of the current progress of immunoinformatics and their applications in the vaccine design, immune system modeling and therapeutics.

Resource Prospector Mission Animation (June 2018)

NASA Image and Video Library

2018-05-30

Expanding human presence beyond low-Earth orbit will require the maximum possible use of local materials, so-called in-situ resources (ISRU). The Moon presents a unique destination to conduct robotic investigations that advance ISRU capabilities, as well as providing significant exploration and science value. This video animation shows one mission concept under study by NASA called Resource Prospector (RP), an ISRU prospecting and technology demonstration mission. RP would scan the surface and sub-surface terrain, and demonstrate extraction of hydrogen and oxygen from lunar regolith to validate one possible ISRU approach. As NASA plans a series of progressive robotic missions to the lunar surface, the agency is considering a variety of approaches to evolve progressively larger landers leading to an eventual human lander capability. Part of this expanded lunar campaign includes early flight of select instruments from Resource Prospector to the Moon.

Hybrid antibiotics - clinical progress and novel designs.

PubMed

Parkes, Alastair L; Yule, Ian A

2016-07-01

There is a growing need for new antibacterial agents, but success in development of antibiotics in recent years has been limited. This has led researchers to investigate novel approaches to finding compounds that are effective against multi-drug resistant bacteria, and that delay onset of resistance. One such strategy has been to link antibiotics to produce hybrids designed to overcome resistance mechanisms. The concept of dual-acting hybrid antibiotics was introduced and reviewed in this journal in 2010. In the present review the authors sought to discover how clinical candidates described had progressed, and to examine how the field has developed. In three sections the authors cover the clinical progress of hybrid antibiotics, novel agents produced from hybridisation of two or more small-molecule antibiotics, and novel agents produced from hybridisation of antibiotics with small-molecules that have complementary activity. Many key questions regarding dual-acting hybrid antibiotics remain to be answered, and the proposed benefits of this approach are yet to be demonstrated. While Cadazolid in particular continues to progress in the clinic, suggesting that there is promise in hybridisation through covalent linkage, it may be that properties other than antibacterial activity are key when choosing a partner molecule.

Network-based Approaches in Pharmacology.

PubMed

Boezio, Baptiste; Audouze, Karine; Ducrot, Pierre; Taboureau, Olivier

2017-10-01

In drug discovery, network-based approaches are expected to spotlight our understanding of drug action across multiple layers of information. On one hand, network pharmacology considers the drug response in the context of a cellular or phenotypic network. On the other hand, a chemical-based network is a promising alternative for characterizing the chemical space. Both can provide complementary support for the development of rational drug design and better knowledge of the mechanisms underlying the multiple actions of drugs. Recent progress in both concepts is discussed here. In addition, a network-based approach using drug-target-therapy data is introduced as an example. © 2017 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Setting a research agenda for progressive multiple sclerosis: the International Collaborative on Progressive MS.

PubMed

Fox, Robert J; Thompson, Alan; Baker, David; Baneke, Peer; Brown, Doug; Browne, Paul; Chandraratna, Dhia; Ciccarelli, Olga; Coetzee, Timothy; Comi, Giancarlo; Feinstein, Anthony; Kapoor, Raj; Lee, Karen; Salvetti, Marco; Sharrock, Kersten; Toosy, Ahmed; Zaratin, Paola; Zuidwijk, Kim

2012-11-01

Despite significant progress in the development of therapies for relapsing MS, progressive MS remains comparatively disappointing. Our objective, in this paper, is to review the current challenges in developing therapies for progressive MS and identify key priority areas for research. A collaborative was convened by volunteer and staff leaders from several MS societies with the mission to expedite the development of effective disease-modifying and symptom management therapies for progressive forms of multiple sclerosis. Through a series of scientific and strategic planning meetings, the collaborative identified and developed new perspectives on five key priority areas for research: experimental models, identification and validation of targets and repurposing opportunities, proof-of-concept clinical trial strategies, clinical outcome measures, and symptom management and rehabilitation. Our conclusions, tackling the impediments in developing therapies for progressive MS will require an integrated, multi-disciplinary approach to enable effective translation of research into therapies for progressive MS. Engagement of the MS research community through an international effort is needed to address and fund these research priorities with the ultimate goal of expediting the development of disease-modifying and symptom-relief treatments for progressive MS.

Setting a research agenda for progressive multiple sclerosis: The International Collaborative on Progressive MS

PubMed Central

Thompson, Alan; Baker, David; Baneke, Peer; Brown, Doug; Browne, Paul; Chandraratna, Dhia; Ciccarelli, Olga; Coetzee, Timothy; Comi, Giancarlo; Feinstein, Anthony; Kapoor, Raj; Lee, Karen; Salvetti, Marco; Sharrock, Kersten; Toosy, Ahmed; Zaratin, Paola; Zuidwijk, Kim

2012-01-01

Despite significant progress in the development of therapies for relapsing MS, progressive MS remains comparatively disappointing. Our objective, in this paper, is to review the current challenges in developing therapies for progressive MS and identify key priority areas for research. A collaborative was convened by volunteer and staff leaders from several MS societies with the mission to expedite the development of effective disease-modifying and symptom management therapies for progressive forms of multiple sclerosis. Through a series of scientific and strategic planning meetings, the collaborative identified and developed new perspectives on five key priority areas for research: experimental models, identification and validation of targets and repurposing opportunities, proof-of-concept clinical trial strategies, clinical outcome measures, and symptom management and rehabilitation. Our conclusions, tackling the impediments in developing therapies for progressive MS will require an integrated, multi-disciplinary approach to enable effective translation of research into therapies for progressive MS. Engagement of the MS research community through an international effort is needed to address and fund these research priorities with the ultimate goal of expediting the development of disease-modifying and symptom-relief treatments for progressive MS. PMID:22917690

Examining the progression and consistency of thermal concepts: a cross-age study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Adadan, Emine; Yavuzkaya, Merve Nur

2018-03-01

This cross-sectional study examined how the progression and consistency of students' understanding of thermal concepts in everyday contexts changes across the grade levels. A total of 656 Turkish students from Grade 8 (age 13-14), Grade 10 (age 15-16), and the first year of college (age 19-20) participated in the study. The data were analysed using statistical procedures (descriptive and inferential). Findings indicated a substantial progression in the students' scientific understanding of thermal concepts across grade levels. In addition, the students' alternative conceptions about thermal concepts generally decreased in frequency across grade levels, but certain alternative conceptions were observed in every grade level to a similar extent. Even though the number of students who consistently used scientific ideas increased across grade levels, the number of students who consistently used non-scientific ideas decreased across grade levels. However, the number of students who used scientific and non-scientific ideas inconsistently generally increased as they progressed in the science curriculum. These findings can be associated with either fragmentation or alternative conceptions that result from the gradual enrichment processes students experience when they try to integrate scientific concepts into their conceptual frameworks.

[Psychiatry and interdisciplinary research. Value of a systems approach].

PubMed

Marchais, P; Randrup, A

1986-02-01

Interdisciplinary research is particularly difficult, because of the different frames of reference used in the individual disciplines. Psychiatry by itself show already the complexity of the current methodological situation. A fundamental epistemological problem is posed by the unity and uniqueness of the patient as opposed to the multiple-faceted traits and experiences presented to the observer. The authors show the utility of the systems concept for solution of these difficulties. They depict the characteristics of "the systemal method", the way it is employed and its many applications in the clinic as well as in pharmacology, neurochemistry, neurophysiology and ethology. The systemal approach allows comparison and integration of data and results from various disciplines by means of the concepts "homology" and "isomorphism", and may thus contribute to progress in the study of biological psychiatry. It also makes it possible to regard the organism as an ensemble of sub-systems in interaction with its environment. Finally, because of its logicomathematical foundation, the systemal approach lends itself readily to application of computer techniques.

Progress in understanding harmful algal blooms (HABs): Paradigm shifts and new technologies for research, monitoring and management

PubMed Central

Cembella, Allan D.; Hallegraeff, Gustaaf M.

2017-01-01

The public health, tourism, fisheries and ecosystem impacts from harmful algal blooms (HABs) have all increased over the last few decades. This has led to heightened scientific and regulatory attention, and the development of many new technologies and approaches for research and management. This in turn, is leading to significant paradigm shifts with regard to, e.g., our interpretation of the phytoplankton species concept (strain variation), the dogma of their apparent cosmopolitanism, the role of bacteria and zooplankton grazing in HABs, and our approaches to investigating the ecological and genetic basis for the production of toxins and allelochemicals. Increasingly, eutrophication and climate change are viewed and managed as multifactorial environmental stressors that will further challenge managers of coastal resources and those responsible for protecting human health. Here we review HAB science with an eye towards new concepts and approaches, emphasizing, where possible, the unexpected yet promising new directions that research has taken in this diverse field. PMID:22457972

Progress in Understanding Harmful Algal Blooms: Paradigm Shifts and New Technologies for Research, Monitoring, and Management

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Anderson, Donald M.; Cembella, Allan D.; Hallegraeff, Gustaaf M.

2012-01-01

The public health, tourism, fisheries, and ecosystem impacts from harmful algal blooms (HABs) have all increased over the past few decades. This has led to heightened scientific and regulatory attention, and the development of many new technologies and approaches for research and management. This, in turn, is leading to significant paradigm shifts with regard to, e.g., our interpretation of the phytoplankton species concept (strain variation), the dogma of their apparent cosmopolitanism, the role of bacteria and zooplankton grazing in HABs, and our approaches to investigating the ecological and genetic basis for the production of toxins and allelochemicals. Increasingly, eutrophication and climate change are viewed and managed as multifactorial environmental stressors that will further challenge managers of coastal resources and those responsible for protecting human health. Here we review HAB science with an eye toward new concepts and approaches, emphasizing, where possible, the unexpected yet promising new directions that research has taken in this diverse field.

Progress Toward Attractive Stellarators

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Neilson, G H; Brown, T G; Gates, D A

The quasi-axisymmetric stellarator (QAS) concept offers a promising path to a more compact stellarator reactor, closer in linear dimensions to tokamak reactors than previous stellarator designs. Concept improvements are needed, however, to make it more maintainable and more compatible with high plant availability. Using the ARIES-CS design as a starting point, compact stellarator designs with improved maintenance characteristics have been developed. While the ARIES-CS features a through-the-port maintenance scheme, we have investigated configuration changes to enable a sector-maintenance approach, as envisioned for example in ARIES AT. Three approaches are reported. The first is to make tradeoffs within the QAS designmore » space, giving greater emphasis to maintainability criteria. The second approach is to improve the optimization tools to more accurately and efficiently target the physics properties of importance. The third is to employ a hybrid coil topology, so that the plasma shaping functions of the main coils are shared more optimally, either with passive conductors made of high-temperature superconductor or with local compensation coils, allowing the main coils to become simpler. Optimization tools are being improved to test these approaches.« less

From monocausality to systems thinking: a complementary and alternative conceptual approach for better understanding the development and prevention of sports injury.

PubMed

Hulme, Adam; Finch, Caroline F

The science of sports injury control, including both its cause and prevention, has largely been informed by a biomedical and mechanistic model of health. Traditional scientific practice in sports injury research has routinely involved collapsing the broader socioecological landscape down in order to analyse individual-level determinants of injury - whether biomechanical and/or behavioural. This approach has made key gains for sports injury prevention research and should be further encouraged and allowed to evolve naturally. However, the public health, Applied Human Factors and Ergonomics, and injury epidemiological literature more broadly, has accepted the value of a socioecological paradigm for better understanding disease and injury processes, and sports injury research will fall further behind unless it does the same. A complementary and alternative conceptual approach towards injury control known as systems thinking that builds on socioecological science, both methodologically and analytically, is readily available and fast developing in other research areas. This review outlines the historical progression of causal concepts in the field of epidemiology over the course of the modern scientific era. From here, causal concepts in injury epidemiology, and models of aetiology as found in the context of sports injury research are presented. The paper finishes by proposing a new research agenda that considers the potential for a systems thinking approach to further enhance sports injury aetiological understanding. A complementary systems paradigm, however, will require that sports injury epidemiologists bring their knowledge and skillsets forwards in an attempt to use, adapt, and even refine existing systems-based approaches. Alongside the natural development of conventional scientific methodologies and analyses in sports injury research, progressing forwards to a systems paradigm is now required.

Students' Progression in Understanding the Matter Concept

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hadenfeldt, Jan Christoph; Neumann, Knut; Bernholt, Sascha; Liu, Xiufeng; Parchmann, Ilka

2016-01-01

This study presents our attempt to elicit students' progression in understanding the matter concept. Past work has identified the big ideas about matter students need to understand, the many everyday understandings students hold about these ideas, and levels of understanding through which students progress in developing understanding of the big…

Refining a learning progression of energy

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yao, Jian-Xin; Guo, Yu-Ying; Neumann, Knut

2017-11-01

This paper presents a revised learning progression for the energy concept and initial findings on diverse progressions among subgroups of sample students. The revised learning progression describes how students progress towards an understanding of the energy concept along two progress variables identified from previous studies - key ideas about energy and levels of conceptual development. To assess students understanding with respect to the revised learning progression, we created a specific instrument, the Energy Concept Progression Assessment (ECPA) based on previous work on assessing students' understanding of energy. After iteratively refining the instrument in two pilot studies, the ECPA was administered to a total of 4550 students (Grades 8-12) from schools in two districts in a major city in Mainland China. Rasch analysis was used to examine the validity of the revised learning progression and explore factors explaining different progressions. Our results confirm the validity of the four conceptual development levels. In addition, we found that although following a similar progression pattern, students' progression rate was significantly influenced by environmental factors such as school type. In the discussion of our findings, we address the non-linear and complex nature of students' progression in understanding energy. We conclude with illuminating our research's implication for curriculum design and energy teaching.

Transformation from student to occupational therapist: Using the Delphi technique to identify the threshold concepts of occupational therapy.

PubMed

Nicola-Richmond, Kelli M; Pépin, Geneviève; Larkin, Helen

2016-04-01

Understanding and facilitating the transformation from occupational therapy student to practitioner is central to the development of competent and work-ready graduates. However, the pivotal concepts and capabilities that need to be taught and learnt in occupational therapy are not necessarily explicit. The threshold concepts theory of teaching and learning proposes that every discipline has a set of transformational concepts that students must acquire in order to progress. As students acquire the threshold concepts, they develop a transformed way of understanding content related to their course of study which contributes to their developing expertise. The aim of this study was to identify the threshold concepts of occupational therapy. The Delphi technique, a data collection method that aims to demonstrate consensus in relation to important questions, was used with three groups comprising final year occupational therapy students (n = 11), occupational therapy clinicians (n = 21) and academics teaching occupational therapy (n = 10) in Victoria, Australia. Participants reached consensus regarding 10 threshold concepts for the occupational therapy discipline. These are: understanding and applying the models and theories of occupational therapy; occupation; evidence-based practice; clinical reasoning; discipline specific skills and knowledge; practising in context; a client-centred approach; the occupational therapist role; reflective practice and; a holistic approach. The threshold concepts identified provide valuable information for the discipline. They can potentially inform the development of competencies for occupational therapy and provide guidance for teaching and learning activities to facilitate the transformation to competent practitioner. © 2015 Occupational Therapy Australia.

From pattern to process: The strategy of the Earth Observing System: Volume 2: EOS Science Steering Committee report

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1987-01-01

The Earth Observing System (EOS) represents a new approach to the study of the Earth. It consists of remotely sensed and correlative in situ observations designed to address important, interrelated global-scale processes. There is an urgent need to study the Earth as a complete, integrated system in order to understand and predict changes caused by human activities and natural processes. The EOS approach is based on an information system concept and designed to provide a long-term study of the Earth using a variety of measurement methods from both operational and research satellite payloads and continuing ground-based Earth science studies. The EOS concept builds on the foundation of the earlier, single-discipline space missions designed for relatively short observation periods. Continued progress in our understanding of the Earth as a system will come from EOS observations spanning several decades using a variety of contemporaneous measurements.

The discipline of ergonomics in Cuba within the occupational health framework: background and trends.

PubMed

Torres, Yaniel; Rodríguez, Yordán; Viña, Silvio

2013-01-01

The concept of ergonomics was introduced in Cuba at the beginning of the 1970s. More than 40 years later, the prevailing approach to workers' health is still generally reactive rather than proactive, despite the commitment of the government to the subject. A factor influencing this issue is, generally, lack of recognition of the benefits of establishing ergonomic principles within most occupational activities. Recent progress to move occupational health practice toward a more preventive approach has been conducted, frequently with international support. The introduction of a set of Cuban standards proposing the necessity of ergonomic evaluations is an example of this progress. The main challenge for Cuban ergonomists is to transfer knowledge to occupational health practitioners in order to be in concordance with basic standards and regulations regarding ergonomics. The article offers a short description of the history of ergonomics and an overview of ergonomics practice in Cuba.

Atom Interferometry for Detection of Gravitational Waves: Progress and Prospects

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hogan, Jason

2015-04-01

Gravitational wave astronomy promises to provide a new window into the universe, collecting information about astrophysical systems and cosmology that is difficult or impossible to acquire by other methods. Detector designs based on atom interferometry offer a number of advantages over traditional approaches, including access to conventionally inaccessible frequency ranges and substantially reduced antenna baselines. Atomic physics techniques also make it possible to build a gravitational wave detector with a single linear baseline, potentially offering advantages in cost and design flexibility. In support of these proposals, recent progress in long baseline atom interferometry has enabled observation of matter wave interference with atomic wavepacket separations exceeding 10 cm and interferometer durations of more than 2 seconds. These results are obtained in a 10-meter drop tower incorporating large momentum transfer atom optics. This approach can provide ground-based proof-of-concept demonstrations of many of the technical requirements of both terrestrial and satellite gravitational wave detectors.

[Medical ethics, a counter-weight to the logics of the Perruche decree].

PubMed

François, Irène; Moutel, Grégoire; Bertrandon, Richard; Herve, Christian

2002-07-27

FROM A CONTRACTUAL LOGIC TO A PROBABILISTIC APPROACH: Since 1936, reflections on the relationship between the physician and the patient have progressed within the context of a contractual legal concept. Its contents have been based more on jurisprudence than on the physicians' reflections with regard to their practice. Associated with this contractual logic, some confusion exists between a lesion, a medical concept, and a handicap, which is the social consequence of one's status of health. This has been reinforced by the scientific progress made in medicine, which privileges a probabilistic approach based on scientific data, rather than the uncertainty, inscribed in the dialogue and singularity of the encounter. REGARDING THE PERRUCHE DECREE: We analyzed the reports submitted to the court of cessation regarding the Perruche affair, together with the first chapter of the law concerning the rights of the patients and the quality of health system, by studying the extent to which this decision was inscribed or not in the continuity of past legal decisions, and whether the characteristics described above were present. In this decree, the predominating contractual logic is that the notion of handicap is not analyzed, and the scientific and probabilistic conception of medical practice is involved in the debate. THE NECESSITY FOR REFLECTION: Our discussion insists on the necessity of constructing a reflection on the medical presentation; society cannot accept that this be reduced to the strict respect of the elements of the contract, defined by legal decisions. It should be carefully thought out by health professionals, and in collaboration with human science.

Update on rehabilitation following ACL reconstruction

PubMed Central

Nyland, John; Brand, Emily; Fisher, Brent

2010-01-01

As anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) reconstruction has evolved to less invasive, more anatomical approaches, rehabilitation of the injured athlete has likewise become more progressive and innovative, with a sound understanding of graft and fixation strength and biologic healing-remodeling constraints. This review discusses these innovations including specific considerations before surgery, when planning rehabilitation timetables, and the importance of reestablishing nonimpaired active and passive knee range of motion and biarticular musculotendinous extensibility in positions of function. Concepts of self-efficacy or confidence and reestablishing the “athlete role” are also addressed. Since ACL injury and reinjury are largely related to the influence of structure-form-function on dynamic knee joint stability, the interrelationships between sensorimotor, neuromuscular, and conventional resistance training are also discussed. Although pivot shift “giving way” relates to function loss following ACL injury, anterior translational laxity often does not. Although there is growing evidence that progressive eccentric training may benefit the patient following ACL reconstruction, there is less evidence supporting the use of functional ACL knee braces. Of considerable importance is selecting and achieving a criteria-based progression to sports-specific training, reestablishing osseous homeostasis and improved bone density, blending open and closed kinetic chain exercises at the appropriate time period, and appreciating the influence of the trunk, upper extremities, and sports equipment use on knee loads. We believe that knee dysfunction and functional recovery should be considered from a local, regional, and global perspective. These concepts are consolidated into our approach to prepare patients for return to play including field testing and maintenance training. PMID:24198553

Racing of the biological pacemaker.

PubMed

Yu, Han-Gang

2009-01-01

Over the past decade, rapid progress in the molecular studies of cardiac ion channels and stem cells biology has led to efforts to create a biological pacemaker to supplement the widely-used electronic pacemaker. We will review the main concepts of cardiac pacemaker activities in different heart regions and the approaches to design a working biological pacemaker. We will focus on how to use the gene- and cell-based approaches to meet the requirements of a working biological pacemaker. Possible future development and precautions for creation of an effective biological pacemaker superior to the electronic counterpart are also discussed along with recent patents.

Astrobiology Learning Progressions: Linking Astrobiology Concepts with the 3D Learning Paradigm of NGSS

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Scalice, D.; Davis, H. B.; Leach, D.; Chambers, N.

2016-12-01

The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) introduce a Framework for teaching and learning with three interconnected "dimensions:" Disciplinary Core Ideas (DCI's), Cross-cutting Concepts (CCC's), and Science and Engineering Practices (SEP's). This "3D" Framework outlines progressions of learning from K-12 based on the DCI's, detailing which parts of a concept should be taught at each grade band. We used these discipline-based progressions to synthesize interdisciplinary progressions for core concepts in astrobiology, such as the origins of life, what makes a world habitable, biosignatures, and searching for life on other worlds. The final product is an organizing tool for lesson plans, learning media, and other educational materials in astrobiology, as well as a fundamental resource in astrobiology education that serves both educators and scientists as they plan and carry out their programs for learners.

A Bag of Concepts Approach for Biomedical Document Classification Using Wikipedia Knowledge.

PubMed

Mouriño-García, Marcos A; Pérez-Rodríguez, Roberto; Anido-Rifón, Luis E

2017-01-01

The ability to efficiently review the existing literature is essential for the rapid progress of research. This paper describes a classifier of text documents, represented as vectors in spaces of Wikipedia concepts, and analyses its suitability for classification of Spanish biomedical documents when only English documents are available for training. We propose the cross-language concept matching (CLCM) technique, which relies on Wikipedia interlanguage links to convert concept vectors from the Spanish to the English space. The performance of the classifier is compared to several baselines: a classifier based on machine translation, a classifier that represents documents after performing Explicit Semantic Analysis (ESA), and a classifier that uses a domain-specific semantic an- notator (MetaMap). The corpus used for the experiments (Cross-Language UVigoMED) was purpose-built for this study, and it is composed of 12,832 English and 2,184 Spanish MEDLINE abstracts. The performance of our approach is superior to any other state-of-the art classifier in the benchmark, with performance increases up to: 124% over classical machine translation, 332% over MetaMap, and 60 times over the classifier based on ESA. The results have statistical significance, showing p-values < 0.0001. Using knowledge mined from Wikipedia to represent documents as vectors in a space of Wikipedia concepts and translating vectors between language-specific concept spaces, a cross-language classifier can be built, and it performs better than several state-of-the-art classifiers. Schattauer GmbH.

A Bag of Concepts Approach for Biomedical Document Classification Using Wikipedia Knowledge*. Spanish-English Cross-language Case Study.

PubMed

Mouriño-García, Marcos A; Pérez-Rodríguez, Roberto; Anido-Rifón, Luis E

2017-10-26

The ability to efficiently review the existing literature is essential for the rapid progress of research. This paper describes a classifier of text documents, represented as vectors in spaces of Wikipedia concepts, and analyses its suitability for classification of Spanish biomedical documents when only English documents are available for training. We propose the cross-language concept matching (CLCM) technique, which relies on Wikipedia interlanguage links to convert concept vectors from the Spanish to the English space. The performance of the classifier is compared to several baselines: a classifier based on machine translation, a classifier that represents documents after performing Explicit Semantic Analysis (ESA), and a classifier that uses a domain-specific semantic annotator (MetaMap). The corpus used for the experiments (Cross-Language UVigoMED) was purpose-built for this study, and it is composed of 12,832 English and 2,184 Spanish MEDLINE abstracts. The performance of our approach is superior to any other state-of-the art classifier in the benchmark, with performance increases up to: 124% over classical machine translation, 332% over MetaMap, and 60 times over the classifier based on ESA. The results have statistical significance, showing p-values < 0.0001. Using knowledge mined from Wikipedia to represent documents as vectors in a space of Wikipedia concepts and translating vectors between language-specific concept spaces, a cross-language classifier can be built, and it performs better than several state-of-the-art classifiers.

The fundamental role of mechanical properties in the progression of cancer disease and inflammation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mierke, Claudia Tanja

2014-07-01

The role of mechanical properties in cancer disease and inflammation is still underinvestigated and even ignored in many oncological and immunological reviews. In particular, eight classical hallmarks of cancer have been proposed, but they still ignore the mechanics behind the processes that facilitate cancer progression. To define the malignant transformation of neoplasms and finally reveal the functional pathway that enables cancer cells to promote cancer progression, these classical hallmarks of cancer require the inclusion of specific mechanical properties of cancer cells and their microenvironment such as the extracellular matrix as well as embedded cells such as fibroblasts, macrophages or endothelial cells. Thus, this review will present current cancer research from a biophysical point of view and will therefore focus on novel physical aspects and biophysical methods to investigate the aggressiveness of cancer cells and the process of inflammation. As cancer or immune cells are embedded in a certain microenvironment such as the extracellular matrix, the mechanical properties of this microenvironment cannot be neglected, and alterations of the microenvironment may have an impact on the mechanical properties of the cancer or immune cells. Here, it is highlighted how biophysical approaches, both experimental and theoretical, have an impact on the classical hallmarks of cancer and inflammation. It is even pointed out how these biophysical approaches contribute to the understanding of the regulation of cancer disease and inflammatory responses after tissue injury through physical microenvironmental property sensing mechanisms. The recognized physical signals are transduced into biochemical signaling events that guide cellular responses, such as malignant tumor progression, after the transition of cancer cells from an epithelial to a mesenchymal phenotype or an inflammatory response due to tissue injury. Moreover, cell adaptation to mechanical alterations, in particular the understanding of mechano-coupling and mechano-regulating functions in cell invasion, appears as an important step in cancer progression and inflammatory response to injuries. This may lead to novel insights into cancer disease and inflammatory diseases and will overcome classical views on cancer and inflammation. In addition, this review will discuss how the physics of cancer and inflammation can help to reveal whether cancer cells will invade connective tissue and metastasize or how leukocytes extravasate and migrate through the tissue. In this review, the physical concepts of cancer progression, including the tissue basement membrane a cancer cell is crossing, its invasion and transendothelial migration as well as the basic physical concepts of inflammatory processes and the cellular responses to the mechanical stress of the microenvironment such as external forces and matrix stiffness, are presented and discussed. In conclusion, this review will finally show how physical measurements can improve classical approaches that investigate cancer and inflammatory diseases, and how these physical insights can be integrated into classical tumor biological approaches.

Review of controlled fusion research using laser heating.

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hertzberg, A.

1973-01-01

Development of methods for generating high laser pulse energy has stimulated research leading to new ideas for practical controlled thermonuclear fusion machines. A review is presented of some important efforts in progress, and two different approaches have been selected as examples for discussion. One involves the concept of very short pulse lasers with power output tailored, in time, to obtain a nearly isentropic compression of a deuterium-tritium pellet to very high densities and temperatures. A second approach utilizing long wavelength, long pulse, efficient gas lasers to heat a column of plasma contained in a solenoidal field is also discussed. The working requirements of the laser and various magnetic field geometries of this approach are described.

Students' perception of an integrated approach of teaching entire sequence of medicinal chemistry, pharmacology, and pharmacotherapeutics courses in PharmD curriculum.

PubMed

Islam, Mohammed A; Schweiger, Teresa A

2015-04-01

To develop an integrated approach of teaching medicinal chemistry, pharmacology, and pharmacotherapeutics and to evaluate students' perceptions of integration as they progress through the PharmD curriculum. Instructors from each discipline jointly mapped the course contents and sequenced the course delivery based on organ systems/disease states. Medicinal chemistry and pharmacology contents were integrated and aligned with respective pharmacotherapeutics contents to deliver throughout second and third year of the curriculum. In addition to classroom lectures, active learning strategies such as recitation, case studies, online-discussion boards, open book quizzes, and writing patient progress notes were incorporated to enhance student learning. Student learning was assessed by examination scores, patient progress notes, and writing assignments. The impact of course integration was evaluated by a Web-based survey. One hundred and sixty-nine students completed the survey. Students exhibited positive attitude toward the integrated approach of teaching medicinal chemistry, pharmacology, and therapeutics. The P3 and P4 students better appreciated the benefits of integration compared to P2 students (P < .05). Students perceived the course integration as an effective way of learning. This study supports course improvement and the viability of expanding the concept of integration to other courses in the curriculum. © The Author(s) 2014.

Numerical propulsion system simulation: An interdisciplinary approach

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nichols, Lester D.; Chamis, Christos C.

1991-01-01

The tremendous progress being made in computational engineering and the rapid growth in computing power that is resulting from parallel processing now make it feasible to consider the use of computer simulations to gain insights into the complex interactions in aerospace propulsion systems and to evaluate new concepts early in the design process before a commitment to hardware is made. Described here is a NASA initiative to develop a Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS) capability.

Numerical propulsion system simulation - An interdisciplinary approach

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nichols, Lester D.; Chamis, Christos C.

1991-01-01

The tremendous progress being made in computational engineering and the rapid growth in computing power that is resulting from parallel processing now make it feasible to consider the use of computer simulations to gain insights into the complex interactions in aerospace propulsion systems and to evaluate new concepts early in the design process before a commitment to hardware is made. Described here is a NASA initiative to develop a Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS) capability.

Englisch Klasse 7: 1. Bericht Uber die audio-linguale Konzeption, 2. The Nature of the Curriculum for the Eighties and Onwards (Grade 7 English: 1. A Report on the Audiolingual Concept).

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Freudenstein, Reinhold; Habel, Hans-Gunther

This report consists of two papers devoted to the learning of English in the comprehensive high schools of Hessia, West Germany. The first paper discusses a study which suggests replacement of traditional methods by an audiolingual approach. A catalog of learning goals supplants outdated curriculums, thereby ensuring a stepwise progression of…

From concepts to clinical reality: an essay on the benchmarking of biomedical terminologies.

PubMed

Smith, Barry

2006-06-01

It is only by fixing on agreed meanings of terms in biomedical terminologies that we will be in a position to achieve that accumulation and integration of knowledge that is indispensable to progress at the frontiers of biomedicine. Standardly, the goal of fixing meanings is seen as being realized through the alignment of terms on what are called 'concepts.' Part I addresses three versions of the concept-based approach--by Cimino, by Wüster, and by Campbell and associates--and surveys some of the problems to which they give rise, all of which have to do with a failure to anchor the terms in terminologies to corresponding referents in reality. Part II outlines a new, realist solution to this anchorage problem, which sees terminology construction as being motivated by the goal of alignment not on concepts but on the universals (kinds, types) in reality and thereby also on the corresponding instances (individuals, tokens). We outline the realist approach and show how on its basis we can provide a benchmark of correctness for terminologies which will at the same time allow a new type of integration of terminologies and electronic health records. We conclude by outlining ways in which the framework thus defined might be exploited for purposes of diagnostic decision-support.

Developing a Domain Theory Defining and Exemplifying a Learning Theory of Progressive Attainments

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bunderson, C. Victor

2011-01-01

This article defines the concept of Domain Theory, or, when educational measurement is the goal, one might call it a "Learning Theory of Progressive Attainments in X Domain". The concept of Domain Theory is first shown to be rooted in validity theory, then the concept of domain theory is expanded to amplify its necessary but long neglected…

Building Capacity in Understanding Foundational Biology Concepts: A K-12 Learning Progression in Genetics Informed by Research on Children's Thinking and Learning

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Elmesky, Rowhea

2013-01-01

This article describes the substance, structure, and rationale of a learning progression in genetics spanning kindergarten through twelfth grade (K-12). The learning progression is designed to build a foundation towards understanding protein structure and activity and should be viewed as one possible pathway to understanding concepts of genetics…

Approaches to detection of geochemical stress in vegetation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Horler, D. N. H.; Barber, J.; Darch, J. P.; Ferns, D. C.; Barringer, A. R.

Work has been carried out to elucidate fundamental relationships between spectral properties of plants and geochemical stress, and a programme of field and laboratory work is in progress. The most significant results and conclusions at this stage are described and attention is focused on the new concepts for stress detection which have been generated. The applications of the research are relevant to the understanding of current remotely sensed data as well as relating to ideas for new instrumentation.

Approaches to detection of geochemical stress in vegetation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Horler, D. N. H.; Barber, J.; Darch, J. P.; Ferns, D. C.; Barringer, A. R.

1983-01-01

Work has been carried out to elucidate fundamental relationships between spectral properties of plants and geochemical stress, and a programme of field and laboratory work is in progress. The most significant results and conclusions at this stage are described and attention is focused on the new concepts for stress detection which have been generated. The applications of the research are relevant to the understanding of current remotely sensed data as well as relating to ideas for new instrumentation.

User interface issues in supporting human-computer integrated scheduling

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cooper, Lynne P.; Biefeld, Eric W.

1991-01-01

Explored here is the user interface problems encountered with the Operations Missions Planner (OMP) project at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). OMP uses a unique iterative approach to planning that places additional requirements on the user interface, particularly to support system development and maintenance. These requirements are necessary to support the concepts of heuristically controlled search, in-progress assessment, and iterative refinement of the schedule. The techniques used to address the OMP interface needs are given.

Progress and challenges in the application of artificial intelligence to computational fluid dynamics

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Andrews, Alison E.

1987-01-01

An approach to analyzing CFD knowledge-based systems is proposed which is based, in part, on the concept of knowledge-level analysis. Consideration is given to the expert cooling fan design system, the PAN AIR knowledge system, grid adaptation, and expert zonal grid generation. These AI/CFD systems demonstrate that current AI technology can be successfully applied to well-formulated problems that are solved by means of classification or selection of preenumerated solutions.

Chaos, patterns, coherent structures, and turbulence: Reflections on nonlinear science.

PubMed

Ecke, Robert E

2015-09-01

The paradigms of nonlinear science were succinctly articulated over 25 years ago as deterministic chaos, pattern formation, coherent structures, and adaptation/evolution/learning. For chaos, the main unifying concept was universal routes to chaos in general nonlinear dynamical systems, built upon a framework of bifurcation theory. Pattern formation focused on spatially extended nonlinear systems, taking advantage of symmetry properties to develop highly quantitative amplitude equations of the Ginzburg-Landau type to describe early nonlinear phenomena in the vicinity of critical points. Solitons, mathematically precise localized nonlinear wave states, were generalized to a larger and less precise class of coherent structures such as, for example, concentrated regions of vorticity from laboratory wake flows to the Jovian Great Red Spot. The combination of these three ideas was hoped to provide the tools and concepts for the understanding and characterization of the strongly nonlinear problem of fluid turbulence. Although this early promise has been largely unfulfilled, steady progress has been made using the approaches of nonlinear science. I provide a series of examples of bifurcations and chaos, of one-dimensional and two-dimensional pattern formation, and of turbulence to illustrate both the progress and limitations of the nonlinear science approach. As experimental and computational methods continue to improve, the promise of nonlinear science to elucidate fluid turbulence continues to advance in a steady manner, indicative of the grand challenge nature of strongly nonlinear multi-scale dynamical systems.

On the monitoring and implications of growing damages caused by manufacturing defects in composite structures

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Schagerl, M.; Viechtbauer, C.; Hörrmann, S.

2015-07-01

Damage tolerance is a classical safety concept for the design of aircraft structures. Basically, this approach considers possible damages in the structure, predicts the damage growth under applied loading conditions and predicts the following decrease of the structural strength. As a fundamental result the damage tolerance approach yields the maximum inspection interval, which is the time a damage grows from a detectable to a critical level. The above formulation of the damage tolerance safety concept targets on metallic structures where the damage is typically a simple fatigue crack. Fiber-reinforced polymers show a much more complex damage behavior, such as delaminationsin laminated composites. Moreover, progressive damage in composites is often initiated by manufacturing defects. The complex manufacturing processes for composite structures almost certainly yield parts with defects, e.g. pores in the matrix or undulations of fibers. From such defects growing damages may start after a certain time of operation. The demand to simplify or even avoid the inspection of composite structures has therefore led to a comeback of the traditional safe-life safety concept. The aim of the so-called safe-life flaw tolerance concept is a structure that is capable of carrying the static loads during operation, despite significant damages and after a representative fatigue load spectrum. A structure with this property does not need to be inspected, respectively monitored at all during its service life. However, its load carrying capability is thereby not fully utilized. This article presents the possible refinement of the state-of-the-art safe-life flaw tolerance concept for composite structures towards a damage tolerance approach considering also the influence of manufacturing defects on damage initiation and growth. Based on fundamental physical relations and experimental observations the challenges when developing damage growth and residual strength curves are discussed.

Implementing China's circular economy concept at the regional level: a review of progress in Dalian, China.

PubMed

Geng, Yong; Zhu, Qinghua; Doberstein, Brent; Fujita, Tsuyoshi

2009-02-01

The circular economy (CE) concept was introduced in China to address environmental degradation and resource scarcity associated with rapid economic development. Chosen as a demonstration city, Dalian has implemented the CE strategy as a means of conserving water, materials, energy and land. This paper outlines some of the regional CE initiatives that have been successful to date in Dalian, including those focusing on conserving energy and water resources and others focusing on reduced industrial emissions. The paper details the approach used in implementing the CE concept in Dalian, tracing the foci and goals of the program, and the sectoral approach used to implement a CE. Although Dalian municipality has achieved many successes in implementing a CE, our paper identifies several challenges that, until recently, have held back complete implementation. These include: the lack of incentives for older industries to 'green' their operations, the lack of financial support to expand the CE concept, and a broad-based need for heightened public awareness and participation in CE initiatives. Our paper then identifies several responses by Dalian municipality to overcome these challenges, including pricing and tax reforms that serve as conservation incentives, the provision of financial support for CE promotion through budget reorganization, and the organization of CE training programs. Our paper concludes that, although CE initiatives have been successful in Dalian, more is possible and more is needed before Dalian can be designated a true 'eco-city'. The approach used by Dalian can provide guidance for other Chinese cities, although it is recognized that each city must tailor its own approach for differing contexts and conditions.

Challenging empowerment: AIDS-affected South African children and the need for a multi-level relational approach.

PubMed

Ansell, Nicola

2014-01-01

Critics of empowerment have highlighted the concept's mutability, focus on individual transformation, one-dimensionality and challenges of operationalisation. Relating these critiques to children's empowerment raises new challenges. Drawing on scholarship on children's subjecthood and exercise of power, alongside empirical research with children affected by AIDS, I argue that empowerment envisaged as individual self-transformation and increased capacity to act independently offers little basis for progressive change. Rather it is essential to adopt a relational approach that recognises the need to transform power relationships at multiple levels. This analysis has implications for our wider understanding of empowerment in the 21st century.

Biomedical and development paradigms in AIDS prevention.

PubMed Central

Wolffers, I.

2000-01-01

In the fight against the HIV/AIDS pandemic different approaches can be distinguished, reflecting professional backgrounds, world views and political interests. One important distinction is between the biomedical and the development paradigms. The biomedical paradigm is characterized by individualization and the concept of "risk". This again is related to the concept of the market where health is a product of services and progress a series of new discoveries that can be marketed. The development paradigm is characterized by participation of the different stakeholders and by community work. The concept "vulnerability" is important in the development paradigm and emphasis is placed on efforts to decrease this vulnerability in a variety of sustainable ways. Biomedical technology is definitely one of the tools in these efforts. In the beginning of the pandemic the biomedical approach was important for the discovery of the virus and understanding its epidemiology. Later, stakeholders became involved. In the light of absence of treatment or vaccines, the development paradigm became more important and the two approaches were more in balance. However, since the reports about effective treatment of AIDS and hope of development of vaccines, the biomedical paradigm has become a leading principle in many HIV/AIDS prevention programmes. There is a need for a better balance between the two paradigms. Especially in developing countries, where it is not realistic to think that sustainable biomedical interventions can be organized on a short-term basis, it would be counterproductive to base our efforts to deal with HIV/AIDS exclusively on the biomedical approach. PMID:10743300

The vaccines consistency approach project: an EPAA initiative.

PubMed

De Mattia, F; Hendriksen, C; Buchheit, K H; Chapsal, J M; Halder, M; Lambrigts, D; Redhead, K; Rommel, E; Scharton-Kersten, T; Sesardic, T; Viviani, L; Ragan, I

2015-01-01

The consistency approach for release testing of established vaccines promotes the use of in vitro, analytical, non-animal based systems allowing the monitoring of quality parameters during the whole production process. By using highly sensitive non-animal methods, the consistency approach has the potential to improve the quality of testing and to foster the 3Rs (replacement, refinement and reduction of animal use) for quality control of established vaccines. This concept offers an alternative to the current quality control strategy which often requires large numbers of laboratory animals. In order to facilitate the introduction of the consistency approach for established human and veterinary vaccine quality control, the European Partnership for Alternatives to Animal Testing (EPAA) initiated a project, the "Vaccines Consistency Approach Project", aiming at developing and validating the consistency approach with stakeholders from academia, regulators, OMCLs, EDQM, European Commission and industry. This report summarises progress since the project's inception.

Amelogenesis imperfecta: review of diagnostic findings and treatment concepts.

PubMed

Sabandal, Martin M I; Schäfer, Edgar

2016-09-01

Mineralization defects like amelogenesis imperfecta are often of hereditary origin. This article reviews the diagnostic findings and summarizes the suggested treatment approaches. Currently, there are no defined therapy recommendations available for patients suffering from amelogenesis imperfecta. The mentioned therapies are more or less equal but no comprehensive therapy recommendation is evident. When treating patients suffering from amelogenesis imperfecta, a comprehensive therapy of almost every dental discipline has to be considered. The earlier the diagnosis of amelogenesis imperfecta is confirmed, the better the outcome is. Optimal treatment approaches consist of early diagnosis and treatment approach and frequent dental recall appointments to prevent progressive occlusal wear or early destruction by caries. Full-mouth prosthetic treatment seems to be the best treatment option.

[Surgical intensive care medicine. Current therapy concepts for septic diseases].

PubMed

Niederbichler, A D; Ipaktchi, K; Jokuszies, A; Hirsch, T; Altintas, M A; Handschin, A E; Busch, K H; Gellert, M; Steinau, H-U; Vogt, P M; Steinsträsser, L

2009-10-01

The clinical appearance of septic disorders is characterized by an enormous dynamic. The sepsis-induced dysbalance of the immune system necessitates immediate and aggressive therapeutic interventions to prevent further damage progression of the disease to septic shock and multiple organ failure. This includes supportive therapy to normalize and maintain organ and tissue perfusion as well as the identification of the infection focus. In cases where an infectious focus is identified, surgical source control frequently is a key element of the treatment strategy besides pharmacologic and supportive measures. The integrative approach of the management of septic patients requires rapid communication between the involved medical disciplines and the nursing personnel. Therefore, this article outlines current therapeutic concepts of septic diseases as well as central nursing aspects.

Compact time- and space-integrating SAR processor: design and development status

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Haney, Michael W.; Levy, James J.; Christensen, Marc P.; Michael, Robert R., Jr.; Mock, Michael M.

1994-06-01

Progress toward a flight demonstration of the acousto-optic time- and space- integrating real-time SAR image formation processor program is reported. The concept overcomes the size and power consumption limitations of electronic approaches by using compact, rugged, and low-power analog optical signal processing techniques for the most computationally taxing portions of the SAR imaging problem. Flexibility and performance are maintained by the use of digital electronics for the critical low-complexity filter generation and output image processing functions. The results reported include tests of a laboratory version of the concept, a description of the compact optical design that will be implemented, and an overview of the electronic interface and controller modules of the flight-test system.

An Examination of an Early Intervention Reading Program Focusing on the Progress Monitoring of Literacy Skills and the Reading Self-Concepts of Struggling Readers

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Samuelson, Teresa C.

2010-01-01

The purpose of this study was to examine progress monitoring, reading self-concept, and the literacy skills of first and second grade struggling readers. Progress monitoring is an instructional process used by teachers to assess students' academic performance on a regular basis, typically weekly or monthly. When based on the skill level of the…

A Computational Approach for Model Update of an LS-DYNA Energy Absorbing Cell

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Horta, Lucas G.; Jackson, Karen E.; Kellas, Sotiris

2008-01-01

NASA and its contractors are working on structural concepts for absorbing impact energy of aerospace vehicles. Recently, concepts in the form of multi-cell honeycomb-like structures designed to crush under load have been investigated for both space and aeronautics applications. Efforts to understand these concepts are progressing from tests of individual cells to tests of systems with hundreds of cells. Because of fabrication irregularities, geometry irregularities, and material properties uncertainties, the problem of reconciling analytical models, in particular LS-DYNA models, with experimental data is a challenge. A first look at the correlation results between single cell load/deflection data with LS-DYNA predictions showed problems which prompted additional work in this area. This paper describes a computational approach that uses analysis of variance, deterministic sampling techniques, response surface modeling, and genetic optimization to reconcile test with analysis results. Analysis of variance provides a screening technique for selection of critical parameters used when reconciling test with analysis. In this study, complete ignorance of the parameter distribution is assumed and, therefore, the value of any parameter within the range that is computed using the optimization procedure is considered to be equally likely. Mean values from tests are matched against LS-DYNA solutions by minimizing the square error using a genetic optimization. The paper presents the computational methodology along with results obtained using this approach.

Using UMLS to construct a generalized hierarchical concept-based dictionary of brain functions for information extraction from the fMRI literature.

PubMed

Hsiao, Mei-Yu; Chen, Chien-Chung; Chen, Jyh-Horng

2009-10-01

With a rapid progress in the field, a great many fMRI studies are published every year, to the extent that it is now becoming difficult for researchers to keep up with the literature, since reading papers is extremely time-consuming and labor-intensive. Thus, automatic information extraction has become an important issue. In this study, we used the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS) to construct a hierarchical concept-based dictionary of brain functions. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first generalized dictionary of this kind. We also developed an information extraction system for recognizing, mapping and classifying terms relevant to human brain study. The precision and recall of our system was on a par with that of human experts in term recognition, term mapping and term classification. Our approach presented in this paper presents an alternative to the more laborious, manual entry approach to information extraction.

Glucose-responsive insulin by molecular and physical design

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bakh, Naveed A.; Cortinas, Abel B.; Weiss, Michael A.; Langer, Robert S.; Anderson, Daniel G.; Gu, Zhen; Dutta, Sanjoy; Strano, Michael S.

2017-10-01

The concept of a glucose-responsive insulin (GRI) has been a recent objective of diabetes technology. The idea behind the GRI is to create a therapeutic that modulates its potency, concentration or dosing relative to a patient's dynamic glucose concentration, thereby approximating aspects of a normally functioning pancreas. From the perspective of the medicinal chemist, the GRI is also important as a generalized model of a potentially new generation of therapeutics that adjust potency in response to a critical therapeutic marker. The aim of this Perspective is to highlight emerging concepts, including mathematical modelling and the molecular engineering of insulin itself and its potency, towards a viable GRI. We briefly outline some of the most important recent progress toward this goal and also provide a forward-looking viewpoint, which asks if there are new approaches that could spur innovation in this area as well as to encourage synthetic chemists and chemical engineers to address the challenges and promises offered by this therapeutic approach.

Glucose-responsive insulin by molecular and physical design.

PubMed

Bakh, Naveed A; Cortinas, Abel B; Weiss, Michael A; Langer, Robert S; Anderson, Daniel G; Gu, Zhen; Dutta, Sanjoy; Strano, Michael S

2017-09-22

The concept of a glucose-responsive insulin (GRI) has been a recent objective of diabetes technology. The idea behind the GRI is to create a therapeutic that modulates its potency, concentration or dosing relative to a patient's dynamic glucose concentration, thereby approximating aspects of a normally functioning pancreas. From the perspective of the medicinal chemist, the GRI is also important as a generalized model of a potentially new generation of therapeutics that adjust potency in response to a critical therapeutic marker. The aim of this Perspective is to highlight emerging concepts, including mathematical modelling and the molecular engineering of insulin itself and its potency, towards a viable GRI. We briefly outline some of the most important recent progress toward this goal and also provide a forward-looking viewpoint, which asks if there are new approaches that could spur innovation in this area as well as to encourage synthetic chemists and chemical engineers to address the challenges and promises offered by this therapeutic approach.

Improving science and mathematics education with computational modelling in interactive engagement environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Neves, Rui Gomes; Teodoro, Vítor Duarte

2012-09-01

A teaching approach aiming at an epistemologically balanced integration of computational modelling in science and mathematics education is presented. The approach is based on interactive engagement learning activities built around computational modelling experiments that span the range of different kinds of modelling from explorative to expressive modelling. The activities are designed to make a progressive introduction to scientific computation without requiring prior development of a working knowledge of programming, generate and foster the resolution of cognitive conflicts in the understanding of scientific and mathematical concepts and promote performative competency in the manipulation of different and complementary representations of mathematical models. The activities are supported by interactive PDF documents which explain the fundamental concepts, methods and reasoning processes using text, images and embedded movies, and include free space for multimedia enriched student modelling reports and teacher feedback. To illustrate, an example from physics implemented in the Modellus environment and tested in undergraduate university general physics and biophysics courses is discussed.

Status and path to a final EUVL reticle-handling solution

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

He, Long; Orvek, Kevin; Seidel, Phil; Wurm, Stefan; Underwood, Jon; Betancourt, Ernie

2007-03-01

In extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUVL), the lack of a suitable material to build conventional pellicles calls for industry standardization of new techniques for protection and handling throughout the reticle's lifetime. This includes reticle shipping, robotic handling, in-fab transport, storage, and uses in atmospheric environments for metrology and vacuum environments for EUV exposure. In this paper, we review the status of the industry-wide progress in developing EUVL reticle-handling solutions. We show the industry's leading reticle carrier approaches for particle-free protection, such as improvements in conventional single carrier designs and new EUVL-specific carrier concepts, including variations on a removable pellicle. Our test indicates dual pod approach of the removable pellicle led to nearly particle-free use during a simulated life cycle, at ~50nm inspection sensitivity. We will provide an assessment of the remaining technical challenges facing EUVL reticle-handling technology. Finally, we will review the progress of the SEMI EUVL Reticle-handling Task Force in its efforts to standardize a final EUV reticle protection and handling solution.

SAMSS: An in-progress review of the Spacecraft Assembly, Maintenance, and Servicing Study

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Burt, William W.

1987-01-01

The Spacecraft Assembly, Maintenance, and Servicing Study (SAMSS) is an effort to define and verify the most cost effective approach to spacecraft servicing, as a alternative to replacement, in the 1990's and beyond. The intent of the study is to assess the servicing of satellites in all orbit regimes. Elements of a space servicing infrastructure are developed and cost estimates are generated. Readiness is assessed and proof of concept demonstrations are identified. Cryogenic fuel resupply is discussed.

Revascularization to preserve renal function in patients with atherosclerotic renovascular disease.

PubMed

Novick, A C; Textor, S C; Bodie, B; Khauli, R B

1984-08-01

There are a significant number of patients with advanced atherosclerotic renovascular disease whose blood pressure is well controlled with medical therapy but in whom such vascular disease poses a grave risk to overall renal function. This article reviews current concepts regarding screening, evaluation, and selection of patients with this disease for revascularization to preserve renal function. The underlying rationale for this approach is an increasing awareness that, in selected patients, atherosclerotic renovascular disease represents a surgically correctable cause of progressive renal failure.

The complexity of teaching density in middle school

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hashweh, Maher Z.

2016-01-01

Background: Density is difficult to learn and teach in middle schools. This study, hypothesizing that the density concept develops as part of a conceptual system, used a conceptual change approach to teaching density. The approach emphasized the use of multiple strategies to teach the density concept and the associated concepts in the conceptual system. Purpose: This study assessed post-instructional understanding of different aspects of density in a sample of seventh grade students, examined the effectiveness of the multi-dimensional approach in teaching density, investigated the relations between prior student characteristics and their post-instructional understanding, and investigated if the concept of density develops as part of a conceptual system. Program description: In the first part of the study, student understanding of density was assessed in regular classrooms. In the second part, the investigator and a science teacher co-taught the density unit over a two-week period emphasizing relations between density, mass, volume, part-whole relations, and a scientific particulate conception of matter. A conceptual change approach was used which emphasized multiple representations of knowledge and the use of analogies. Sample: The sample in regular classes consisted of 1645 seventh graders in 51 schools in the West Bank, Palestine. The intervention group consisted of 29 students in one school. Design and methods: The post-instructional understanding of density in 51 regularly taught classrooms was assessed in the first part of the study using a pencil-and paper test. In the second part, a pre-test was used with the intervention group. Students in both parts of the study took the same post-test. Descriptive statistics were calculated to describe student performance. Comparison between pre-test and post-test performance of students in the intervention group was conducted using t-test and ANOVA. Correlations between pre-test sub-scores and post-test scores for students in the intervention class also were calculated. X2 was used to test for co-development of the density concept and other concepts using the different items of the post-test for all groups. Results: Student understanding of density was found poor after instruction, while the intervention had a moderate effect on understanding. Students who started with a basic understanding of some aspects of density gained more from the intervention. The density concept co-developed with the concept of volume and a particulate conception of matter. Conclusions: Teaching density as part of a conceptual system helps promote understanding of the concept. This requires the continuous development and refinement of a learning progression of density, volume, and the particulate nature of matter on the one hand, and an in-depth treatment while teaching the concept on the other hand.

Innovators, Networks, and Structures: Towards a Prosopography of Progressivism.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cunningham, Peter

2001-01-01

Responds to the progressive education concepts analyses of Herbert Kliebard and Sol Cohen. Offers the methodology concept of propography, or collective biography, to explain interests perceived as a homogenous progressive movement in education. Demonstrates the promise of prosopography as a methodology to bring agendas of less well-known…

Students' Energy Understanding Across Biology, Chemistry, and Physics Contexts

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Opitz, S. T.; Neumann, K.; Bernholt, S.; Harms, U.

2017-07-01

Energy is considered both as a disciplinary core idea and as a concept cutting across science disciplines. Most previous approaches studied progressing energy understanding in specific disciplinary contexts, while disregarding the relation of understanding across them. Hence, this study provides a systematic analysis of cross-disciplinary energy learning. On the basis of a cross-sectional study with n = 742 students from grades 6, 8, and 10, we analyze students' progression in understanding energy across biology, chemistry, and physics contexts. The study is guided by three hypothetical scenarios that describe how the connection between energy understanding in the three disciplinary contexts changes across grade levels. These scenarios are compared using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). The results suggest that, from grade 6 to grade 10, energy understanding in the three disciplinary contexts is highly interrelated, thus indicating a parallel progression of energy understanding in the three disciplinary contexts. In our study, students from grade 6 onwards appeared to have few problems to apply one energy understanding across the three disciplinary contexts. These findings were unexpected, as previous research concluded that students likely face difficulties in connecting energy learning across disciplinary boundaries. Potential reasons for these results and the characteristics of the observed cross-disciplinary energy understanding are discussed in the light of earlier findings and implications for future research, and the teaching of energy as a core idea and a crosscutting concept are addressed.

Enhancing clinical concept extraction with distributional semantics

PubMed Central

Cohen, Trevor; Wu, Stephen; Gonzalez, Graciela

2011-01-01

Extracting concepts (such as drugs, symptoms, and diagnoses) from clinical narratives constitutes a basic enabling technology to unlock the knowledge within and support more advanced reasoning applications such as diagnosis explanation, disease progression modeling, and intelligent analysis of the effectiveness of treatment. The recent release of annotated training sets of de-identified clinical narratives has contributed to the development and refinement of concept extraction methods. However, as the annotation process is labor-intensive, training data are necessarily limited in the concepts and concept patterns covered, which impacts the performance of supervised machine learning applications trained with these data. This paper proposes an approach to minimize this limitation by combining supervised machine learning with empirical learning of semantic relatedness from the distribution of the relevant words in additional unannotated text. The approach uses a sequential discriminative classifier (Conditional Random Fields) to extract the mentions of medical problems, treatments and tests from clinical narratives. It takes advantage of all Medline abstracts indexed as being of the publication type “clinical trials” to estimate the relatedness between words in the i2b2/VA training and testing corpora. In addition to the traditional features such as dictionary matching, pattern matching and part-of-speech tags, we also used as a feature words that appear in similar contexts to the word in question (that is, words that have a similar vector representation measured with the commonly used cosine metric, where vector representations are derived using methods of distributional semantics). To the best of our knowledge, this is the first effort exploring the use of distributional semantics, the semantics derived empirically from unannotated text often using vector space models, for a sequence classification task such as concept extraction. Therefore, we first experimented with different sliding window models and found the model with parameters that led to best performance in a preliminary sequence labeling task. The evaluation of this approach, performed against the i2b2/VA concept extraction corpus, showed that incorporating features based on the distribution of words across a large unannotated corpus significantly aids concept extraction. Compared to a supervised-only approach as a baseline, the micro-averaged f-measure for exact match increased from 80.3% to 82.3% and the micro-averaged f-measure based on inexact match increased from 89.7% to 91.3%. These improvements are highly significant according to the bootstrap resampling method and also considering the performance of other systems. Thus, distributional semantic features significantly improve the performance of concept extraction from clinical narratives by taking advantage of word distribution information obtained from unannotated data. PMID:22085698

A Bayesian generative model for learning semantic hierarchies

PubMed Central

Mittelman, Roni; Sun, Min; Kuipers, Benjamin; Savarese, Silvio

2014-01-01

Building fine-grained visual recognition systems that are capable of recognizing tens of thousands of categories, has received much attention in recent years. The well known semantic hierarchical structure of categories and concepts, has been shown to provide a key prior which allows for optimal predictions. The hierarchical organization of various domains and concepts has been subject to extensive research, and led to the development of the WordNet domains hierarchy (Fellbaum, 1998), which was also used to organize the images in the ImageNet (Deng et al., 2009) dataset, in which the category count approaches the human capacity. Still, for the human visual system, the form of the hierarchy must be discovered with minimal use of supervision or innate knowledge. In this work, we propose a new Bayesian generative model for learning such domain hierarchies, based on semantic input. Our model is motivated by the super-subordinate organization of domain labels and concepts that characterizes WordNet, and accounts for several important challenges: maintaining context information when progressing deeper into the hierarchy, learning a coherent semantic concept for each node, and modeling uncertainty in the perception process. PMID:24904452

An Integrative Research Framework to Unravel the Interplay of Natural Hazards and Vulnerabilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Di Baldassarre, Giuliano; Nohrstedt, Daniel; Mârd, Johanna; Burchardt, Steffi; Albin, Cecilia; Bondesson, Sara; Breinl, Korbinian; Deegan, Frances M.; Fuentes, Diana; Lopez, Marc Girons; Granberg, Mikael; Nyberg, Lars; Nyman, Monika Rydstedt; Rhodes, Emma; Troll, Valentin; Young, Stephanie; Walch, Colin; Parker, Charles F.

2018-03-01

Climate change, globalization, urbanization, social isolation, and increased interconnectedness between physical, human, and technological systems pose major challenges to disaster risk reduction (DRR). Subsequently, economic losses caused by natural hazards are increasing in many regions of the world, despite scientific progress, persistent policy action, and international cooperation. We argue that these dramatic figures call for novel scientific approaches and new types of data collection to integrate the two main approaches that still dominate the science underpinning DRR: the hazard paradigm and the vulnerability paradigm. Building from these two approaches, here we propose a research framework that specifies the scope of enquiry, concepts, and general relations among phenomena. We then discuss the essential steps to advance systematic empirical research and evidence-based DRR policy action.

[Charcot and hysteria].

PubMed

Widlöcher, D; Dantchev, N

1994-01-01

Charcot's work on hysteria has always been controversial. All his attitudes, whether on the theory of the ovary, the hysteroepileptic seizure or the use of hypnosis, have always been charicatured, misunderstood and separated from the wider context of his overall approach. Rereading Charcot's works shows that he developed his approach progressively over a period of more than 20 years before coming to his psychological model of hysteria. This model explains the formation of the symptom and the hysterical conversion via a mechanism of being ignorant of the motor representation. This concept has never been disproven and remains the only theory explaining the formation of the hysteria symptom. Based on Charcot's fundamental contribution, Freud and Janet further developed their work on the psychopathology of hysteria.

Personalized medicine in multiple sclerosis.

PubMed

Giovannoni, Gavin

2017-11-01

The therapeutic approach in multiple sclerosis (MS) requires a personalized medicine frame beyond the precision medicine concept, which is not currently implementable due to the lack of robust biomarkers and detailed understanding of MS pathogenesis. Personalized medicine demands a patient-focused approach, with disease taxonomy informed by characterization of pathophysiological processes. Important questions concerning MS taxonomy are: when does MS begin? When does the progressive phase begin? Is MS really two or three diseases? Does a therapeutic window truly exist? Newer evidence points to a disease spectrum and a therapeutic lag of several years for benefits to be observed from disease-modifying therapy. For personalized treatment, it is important to ascertain disease stage and any worsening of focal inflammatory lesions over time.

Time-based analysis of total cost of patient episodes: a case study of hip replacement.

PubMed

Peltokorpi, Antti; Kujala, Jaakko

2006-01-01

Healthcare in the public and private sectors is facing increasing pressure to become more cost-effective. Time-based competition and work-in-progress have been used successfully to measure and improve the efficiency of industrial manufacturing. Seeks to address this issue. Presents a framework for time based management of the total cost of a patient episode and apply it to the six sigma DMAIC-process development approach. The framework is used to analyse hip replacement patient episodes in Päijät-Häme Hospital District in Finland, which has a catchment area of 210,000 inhabitants and performs an average of 230 hip replacements per year. The work-in-progress concept is applicable to healthcare--notably that the DMAIC-process development approach can be used to analyse the total cost of patient episodes. Concludes that a framework, which combines the patient-in-process and the DMAIC development approach, can be used not only to analyse the total cost of patient episode but also to improve patient process efficiency. Presents a framework that combines patient-in-process and DMAIC-process development approaches, which can be used to analyse the total cost of a patient episode in order to improve patient process efficiency.

Explaining Academic Progress via Combining Concepts of Integration Theory and Rational Choice Theory.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Beekhoven, S.; De Jong, U.; Van Hout, H.

2002-01-01

Compared elements of rational choice theory and integration theory on the basis of their power to explain variance in academic progress. Asserts that the concepts should be combined, and the distinction between social and academic integration abandoned. Empirical analysis showed that an extended model, comprising both integration and rational…

Students' Progression of Understanding the Matter Concept from Elementary to High School

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Liu, Xiufeng; Lesniak, Kathleen M.

2005-01-01

Using the US national sample from the Third International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) and the Rasch modeling method, this study identified the conceptual progression sequence of various matter concept aspects, and compared students' latent abilities against the sequence. We found that the four matter aspects, i.e. conservation, physical…

FAA/NASA International Symposium on Advanced Structural Integrity Methods for Airframe Durability and Damage Tolerance

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Harris, Charles E. (Editor)

1994-01-01

International technical experts in durability and damage tolerance of metallic airframe structures were assembled to present and discuss recent research findings and the development of advanced design and analysis methods, structural concepts, and advanced materials. The symposium focused on the dissemination of new knowledge and the peer-review of progress on the development of advanced methodologies. Papers were presented on: structural concepts for enhanced durability, damage tolerance, and maintainability; new metallic alloys and processing technology; fatigue crack initiation and small crack effects; fatigue crack growth models; fracture mechanics failure, criteria for ductile materials; structural mechanics methodology for residual strength and life prediction; development of flight load spectra for design and testing; and advanced approaches to resist corrosion and environmentally assisted fatigue.

Placing Science into Its Human Context: Using Scientific Autobiography to Teach Chemistry

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Carroll, Felix A.; Seeman, Jeffrey I.

2001-12-01

Scientific autobiography and biography can improve chemistry learning by helping students relate otherwise abstract concepts to important events in the lives of fellow human beings. In advanced courses, reading scientific autobiography and biography can help students see how scientific collaboration, advances in instrumentation, and major events in human lives influence the development of chemical ideas over time. In addition, studying many years of an individual's research program can demonstrate the progress of science, the connectivity of research findings, and the validity of experimental results over many decades. This paper describes the use of an autobiography of an eminent chemist in an advanced undergraduate chemistry course. This approach not only enhances the teaching of chemical concepts, but it also provides students with expanded opportunities for cooperative and self-directed learning activities.

A review of causal inference for biomedical informatics

PubMed Central

Kleinberg, Samantha; Hripcsak, George

2011-01-01

Causality is an important concept throughout the health sciences and is particularly vital for informatics work such as finding adverse drug events or risk factors for disease using electronic health records. While philosophers and scientists working for centuries on formalizing what makes something a cause have not reached a consensus, new methods for inference show that we can make progress in this area in many practical cases. This article reviews core concepts in understanding and identifying causality and then reviews current computational methods for inference and explanation, focusing on inference from large-scale observational data. While the problem is not fully solved, we show that graphical models and Granger causality provide useful frameworks for inference and that a more recent approach based on temporal logic addresses some of the limitations of these methods. PMID:21782035

Recombinant and epitope-based vaccines on the road to the market and implications for vaccine design and production.

PubMed

Oyarzún, Patricio; Kobe, Bostjan

2016-03-03

Novel vaccination approaches based on rational design of B- and T-cell epitopes - epitope-based vaccines - are making progress in the clinical trial pipeline. The epitope-focused recombinant protein-based malaria vaccine (termed RTS,S) is a next-generation approach that successfully reached phase-III trials, and will potentially become the first commercial vaccine against a human parasitic disease. Progress made on methods such as recombinant DNA technology, advanced cell-culture techniques, immunoinformatics and rational design of immunogens are driving the development of these novel concepts. Synthetic recombinant proteins comprising both B- and T-cell epitopes can be efficiently produced through modern biotechnology and bioprocessing methods, and can enable the induction of large repertoires of immune specificities. In particular, the inclusion of appropriate CD4+ T-cell epitopes is increasingly considered a key vaccine component to elicit robust immune responses, as suggested by results coming from HIV-1 clinical trials. In silico strategies for vaccine design are under active development to address genetic variation in pathogens and several broadly protective "universal" influenza and HIV-1 vaccines are currently at different stages of clinical trials. Other methods focus on improving population coverage in target populations by rationally considering specificity and prevalence of the HLA proteins, though a proof-of-concept in humans has not been demonstrated yet. Overall, we expect immunoinformatics and bioprocessing methods to become a central part of the next-generation epitope-based vaccine development and production process.

[Scientific reductionism and social control of mind. Part II].

PubMed

Viniegra Velázquez, Leonardo

In the second part of this essay, the progressive subordination of scientific endeavor and knowledge of business and profit is pointed out. For instance, the way facts are prioritized over concepts and ideas in scientific knowledge can translate into technological innovation, central to enterprise competitiveness and key to social mechanisms of control (military, cybernetic, ideological). Overcoming the scientific reductionism approach indicates recognizing the need to define progress in another way, one that infuses scientific knowledge with real liberating and inquisitive power. Power is essential in the search for a more collaborative, inclusive and pluralistic society where respect for human dignity and care for the ecosystem that we live in are prioritized. Copyright © 2014 Hospital Infantil de México Federico Gómez. Publicado por Masson Doyma México S.A. All rights reserved.

Oral feeding readiness assessment in premature infants.

PubMed

Gennattasio, Annmarie; Perri, Elizabeth A; Baranek, Donna; Rohan, Annie

2015-01-01

Oral feeding readiness is a complex concept. More evidence is needed on how to approach beginning oral feedings in premature hospitalized infants. This article provides a review of literature related to oral feeding readiness in the premature infant and strategies for promoting safe and efficient progression to full oral intake. Oral feeding readiness assessment tools, clinical pathways, and feeding advancement protocols have been developed to assist with oral feeding initiation and progression. Recognition and support of oral feeding readiness may decrease length of hospital stay and have a positive impact on reducing healthcare costs. Supporting effective cue-based oral feeding through use of rigorous assessment or evidence-based care guidelines can also optimize the hospital experience for infants and caregivers, which, in turn, can promote attachment and parent satisfaction.

The pathophysiology of post-stroke aphasia: A network approach.

PubMed

Thiel, Alexander; Zumbansen, Anna

2016-06-13

Post-stroke aphasia syndromes as a clinical entity arise from the disruption of brain networks specialized in language production and comprehension due to permanent focal ischemia. This approach to post-stroke aphasia is based on two pathophysiological concepts: 1) Understanding language processing in terms of distributed networks rather than language centers and 2) understanding the molecular pathophysiology of ischemic brain injury as a dynamic process beyond the direct destruction of network centers and their connections. While considerable progress has been made in the past 10 years to develop such models on a systems as well as a molecular level, the influence of these approaches on understanding and treating clinical aphasia syndromes has been limited. In this article, we review current pathophysiological concepts of ischemic brain injury, their relationship to altered information processing in language networks after ischemic stroke and how these mechanisms may be influenced therapeutically to improve treatment of post-stroke aphasia. Understanding the pathophysiological mechanism of post-stroke aphasia on a neurophysiological systems level as well as on the molecular level becomes more and more important for aphasia treatment, as the field moves from standardized therapies towards more targeted individualized treatment strategies comprising behavioural therapies as well as non-invasive brain stimulation (NIBS).

A Concept-Wide Association Study of Clinical Notes to Discover New Predictors of Kidney Failure.

PubMed

Singh, Karandeep; Betensky, Rebecca A; Wright, Adam; Curhan, Gary C; Bates, David W; Waikar, Sushrut S

2016-12-07

Identifying predictors of kidney disease progression is critical toward the development of strategies to prevent kidney failure. Clinical notes provide a unique opportunity for big data approaches to identify novel risk factors for disease. We used natural language processing tools to extract concepts from the preceding year's clinical notes among patients newly referred to a tertiary care center's outpatient nephrology clinics and retrospectively evaluated these concepts as predictors for the subsequent development of ESRD using proportional subdistribution hazards (competing risk) regression. The primary outcome was time to ESRD, accounting for a competing risk of death. We identified predictors from univariate and multivariate (adjusting for Tangri linear predictor) models using a 5% threshold for false discovery rate (q value <0.05). We included all patients seen by an adult outpatient nephrologist between January 1, 2004 and June 18, 2014 and excluded patients seen only by transplant nephrology, with preexisting ESRD, with fewer than five clinical notes, with no follow-up, or with no baseline creatinine values. Among the 4013 patients selected in the final study cohort, we identified 960 concepts in the unadjusted analysis and 885 concepts in the adjusted analysis. Novel predictors identified included high-dose ascorbic acid (adjusted hazard ratio, 5.48; 95% confidence interval, 2.80 to 10.70; q<0.001) and fast food (adjusted hazard ratio, 4.34; 95% confidence interval, 2.55 to 7.40; q<0.001). Novel predictors of human disease may be identified using an unbiased approach to analyze text from the electronic health record. Copyright © 2016 by the American Society of Nephrology.

Adaptive Policies for Reducing Inequalities in the Social Determinants of Health.

PubMed

Carey, Gemma; Crammond, Brad; Malbon, Eleanor; Carey, Nic

2015-09-18

Inequalities in the social determinants of health (SDH), which drive avoidable health disparities between different individuals or groups, is a major concern for a number of international organisations, including the World Health Organization (WHO). Despite this, the pathways to changing inequalities in the SDH remain elusive. The methodologies and concepts within system science are now viewed as important domains of knowledge, ideas and skills for tackling issues of inequality, which are increasingly understood as emergent properties of complex systems. In this paper, we introduce and expand the concept of adaptive policies to reduce inequalities in the distribution of the SDH. The concept of adaptive policy for health equity was developed through reviewing the literature on learning and adaptive policies. Using a series of illustrative examples from education and poverty alleviation, which have their basis in real world policies, we demonstrate how an adaptive policy approach is more suited to the management of the emergent properties of inequalities in the SDH than traditional policy approaches. This is because they are better placed to handle future uncertainties. Our intention is that these examples are illustrative, rather than prescriptive, and serve to create a conversation regarding appropriate adaptive policies for progressing policy action on the SDH. © 2015 by Kerman University of Medical Sciences.

Innateness and the instinct to learn.

PubMed

Marler, Peter

2004-06-01

Concepts of innateness were at the heart of Darwin's approach to behavior and central to the ethological theorizing of Lorenz and, at least to start with, of Tinbergen. Then Tinbergen did an about face, and for some twenty years the term 'innate' became highly suspect. He attributed the change to Lehrman's famous 1953 critique in which he asserted that classifying behaviors as innate tells us nothing about how they develop. Although Lehrman made many valid points, I will argue that this exchange also led to profound misunderstandings that were ultimately damaging to progress in research on the development of behavior. The concept of 'instincts to learn', receiving renewed support from current theorizing among geneticists about phenotypic plasticity, provides a potential resolution of some of the controversies that Lehrman created. Bioacoustical studies, particularly on song learning in birds, serve both to confirm some of Lehrman's anxieties about the term 'innate', but also to make a case that he threw out the genetic baby with the bathwater. The breathtaking progress in molecular and developmental genetics has prepared the way for a fuller understanding of the complexities underlying even the simplest notions of innate behavior, necessary before we can begin to comprehend the ontogeny of behavior.

RLV/X-33 operations overview

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Black, Stephen T.; Eshleman, Wally

1997-01-01

This paper describes the VentureStar™ SSTO RLV and X-33 operations concepts. Applications of advanced technologies, automated ground support systems, advanced aircraft and launch vehicle lessons learned have been integrated to develop a streamlined vehicle and mission processing concept necessary to meet the goals of a commercial SSTO RLV. These concepts will be validated by the X-33 flight test program where financial and technical risk mitigation are required. The X-33 flight test program totally demonstrates the vehicle performance, technology, and efficient ground operations at the lowest possible cost. The Skunk Work's test program approach and test site proximity to the production plant are keys. The X-33 integrated flight and ground test program incrementally expands the knowledge base of the overall system allowing minimum risk progression to the next flight test program milestone. Subsequent X-33 turnaround processing flows will be performed with an aircraft operations philosophy. The differences will be based on research and development, component reliability and flight test requirements.

Bonding in phase change materials: concepts and misconceptions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Jones, R. O.

2018-04-01

Bonding concepts originating in chemistry are surveyed from a condensed matter perspective, beginning around 1850 with ‘valence’ and the word ‘bond’ itself. The analysis of chemical data in the 19th century resulted in astonishing progress in understanding the connectivity and stereochemistry of molecules, almost without input from physicists until the development of quantum mechanics in 1925 and afterwards. The valence bond method popularized by Pauling and the molecular orbital methods of Hund, Mulliken, Bloch, and Hückel play major roles in the subsequent development, as does the central part played by the kinetic energy in covalent bonding (Ruedenberg and others). ‘Metallic’ (free electron) and related approaches, including pseudopotential and density functional theories, have been remarkably successful in understanding structures and bonding in molecules and solids. We discuss these concepts in the context of phase change materials, which involve the rapid and reversible transition between amorphous and crystalline states, and note the confusion that some have caused, in particular ‘resonance’ and ‘resonant bonding’.

Bonding in phase change materials: concepts and misconceptions.

PubMed

Jones, R O

2018-04-18

Bonding concepts originating in chemistry are surveyed from a condensed matter perspective, beginning around 1850 with 'valence' and the word 'bond' itself. The analysis of chemical data in the 19th century resulted in astonishing progress in understanding the connectivity and stereochemistry of molecules, almost without input from physicists until the development of quantum mechanics in 1925 and afterwards. The valence bond method popularized by Pauling and the molecular orbital methods of Hund, Mulliken, Bloch, and Hückel play major roles in the subsequent development, as does the central part played by the kinetic energy in covalent bonding (Ruedenberg and others). 'Metallic' (free electron) and related approaches, including pseudopotential and density functional theories, have been remarkably successful in understanding structures and bonding in molecules and solids. We discuss these concepts in the context of phase change materials, which involve the rapid and reversible transition between amorphous and crystalline states, and note the confusion that some have caused, in particular 'resonance' and 'resonant bonding'.

The leadership continuum: a framework for organizational and individual assessment relative to the advancement of women physicians and scientists.

PubMed

Morahan, Page S; Rosen, Sally E; Richman, Rosalyn C; Gleason, Katharine A

2011-03-01

In the United States, women have attained near gender equity at the entry stages in academic medicine; however, progress has been much slower at senior leadership levels. The paucity of women leaders inhibits the ability of academic medicine to adequately meet the needs of an increasingly diverse body of students, faculty, staff, and patients. Research indicates that until a critical mass of women with sustained success as leaders is achieved, it is unlikely that this deficit will be corrected. To promote the attainment of a critical mass of women leaders, the authors integrate two approaches to advancing women--the concept of a leadership continuum and a framework of practical approaches for moving toward gender equity at all ranks. An institutional guide is presented that can be used to promote dialogue about gender equity, noting areas of success and opportunities for additional improvement as well as an assessment of progress. A corresponding checklist has been developed that women faculty can use as a reflection guide for their career planning and to assess their position and progress along the leadership continuum. Proactive, ongoing use of these frameworks can promote reflective dialogue and provide direction and accountability for institutions working to advance women into leadership positions.

Student Conceptions about Energy Transformations: Progression from General Chemistry to Biochemistry

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wolfson, Adele J.; Rowland, Susan L.; Lawrie, Gwendolyn A.; Wright, Anthony H.

2014-01-01

Students commencing studies in biochemistry must transfer and build on concepts they learned in chemistry and biology classes. It is well established, however, that students have difficulties in transferring critical concepts from general chemistry courses; one key concept is "energy." Most previous work on students' conception of energy…

The development of capability measures in health economics: opportunities, challenges and progress.

PubMed

Coast, Joanna; Kinghorn, Philip; Mitchell, Paul

2015-04-01

Recent years have seen increased engagement amongst health economists with the capability approach developed by Amartya Sen and others. This paper focuses on the capability approach in relation to the evaluative space used for analysis within health economics. It considers the opportunities that the capability approach offers in extending this space, but also the methodological challenges associated with moving from the theoretical concepts to practical empirical applications. The paper then examines three 'families' of measures, Oxford Capability instruments (OxCap), Adult Social Care Outcome Toolkit (ASCOT) and ICEpop CAPability (ICECAP), in terms of the methodological choices made in each case. The paper concludes by discussing some of the broader issues involved in making use of the capability approach in health economics. It also suggests that continued exploration of the impact of different methodological choices will be important in moving forward.

Theoretical Methods of Domain Structures in Ultrathin Ferroelectric Films: A Review

PubMed Central

Liu, Jianyi; Chen, Weijin; Wang, Biao; Zheng, Yue

2014-01-01

This review covers methods and recent developments of the theoretical study of domain structures in ultrathin ferroelectric films. The review begins with an introduction to some basic concepts and theories (e.g., polarization and its modern theory, ferroelectric phase transition, domain formation, and finite size effects, etc.) that are relevant to the study of domain structures in ultrathin ferroelectric films. Basic techniques and recent progress of a variety of important approaches for domain structure simulation, including first-principles calculation, molecular dynamics, Monte Carlo simulation, effective Hamiltonian approach and phase field modeling, as well as multiscale simulation are then elaborated. For each approach, its important features and relative merits over other approaches for modeling domain structures in ultrathin ferroelectric films are discussed. Finally, we review recent theoretical studies on some important issues of domain structures in ultrathin ferroelectric films, with an emphasis on the effects of interfacial electrostatics, boundary conditions and external loads. PMID:28788198

Progress in Organization Development Research.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Roberts, Nancy C.; Porras, Jerry I.

1982-01-01

Describes major areas of progress in organization development (OD): progress in operationalizing the concept of change; progress in improving measurement; and progress in designing statistical procedures used to analyze OD intervention data. Suggests recent research developments point to a more solid base on which to build OD practice and theory.…

The Role of Learning Progressions in Standards-Based Education Reform. Policy Brief. RB-52

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Mosher, Frederic A.

2011-01-01

The concept of "learning progressions" has begun to show up in discussions of education policy and research as a potential answer to the question of how to specify what being "on track" might mean. A number of recent NRC (National Research Council) reports on science education highlight the concept (National Research Council,…

Progression in High School Students' (Aged 16-18) Conceptualizations about Chemical Reactions in Solution.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Boo, Hong-Kwen; Watson, J. R.

2001-01-01

Explores the development over time of students' understandings of the concept of chemical reaction in the context of two familiar reactions in solution. Based on interviews (n=48), results show that students made some progress in their understanding of the concept of chemical reaction but some fundamental misconceptions remained. (Author/MM)

Personality psychology: lexical approaches, assessment methods, and trait concepts reveal only half of the story--why it is time for a paradigm shift.

PubMed

Uher, Jana

2013-03-01

This article develops a comprehensive philosophy-of-science for personality psychology that goes far beyond the scope of the lexical approaches, assessment methods, and trait concepts that currently prevail. One of the field's most important guiding scientific assumptions, the lexical hypothesis, is analysed from meta-theoretical viewpoints to reveal that it explicitly describes two sets of phenomena that must be clearly differentiated: 1) lexical repertoires and the representations that they encode and 2) the kinds of phenomena that are represented. Thus far, personality psychologists largely explored only the former, but have seriously neglected studying the latter. Meta-theoretical analyses of these different kinds of phenomena and their distinct natures, commonalities, differences, and interrelations reveal that personality psychology's focus on lexical approaches, assessment methods, and trait concepts entails a) erroneous meta-theoretical assumptions about what the phenomena being studied actually are, and thus how they can be analysed and interpreted, b) that contemporary personality psychology is largely based on everyday psychological knowledge, and c) a fundamental circularity in the scientific explanations used in trait psychology. These findings seriously challenge the widespread assumptions about the causal and universal status of the phenomena described by prominent personality models. The current state of knowledge about the lexical hypothesis is reviewed, and implications for personality psychology are discussed. Ten desiderata for future research are outlined to overcome the current paradigmatic fixations that are substantially hampering intellectual innovation and progress in the field.

How new concepts become universal scientific approaches: insights from citation network analysis of agent-based complex systems science.

PubMed

Vincenot, Christian E

2018-03-14

Progress in understanding and managing complex systems comprised of decision-making agents, such as cells, organisms, ecosystems or societies, is-like many scientific endeavours-limited by disciplinary boundaries. These boundaries, however, are moving and can actively be made porous or even disappear. To study this process, I advanced an original bibliometric approach based on network analysis to track and understand the development of the model-based science of agent-based complex systems (ACS). I analysed research citations between the two communities devoted to ACS research, namely agent-based (ABM) and individual-based modelling (IBM). Both terms refer to the same approach, yet the former is preferred in engineering and social sciences, while the latter prevails in natural sciences. This situation provided a unique case study for grasping how a new concept evolves distinctly across scientific domains and how to foster convergence into a universal scientific approach. The present analysis based on novel hetero-citation metrics revealed the historical development of ABM and IBM, confirmed their past disjointedness, and detected their progressive merger. The separation between these synonymous disciplines had silently opposed the free flow of knowledge among ACS practitioners and thereby hindered the transfer of methodological advances and the emergence of general systems theories. A surprisingly small number of key publications sparked the ongoing fusion between ABM and IBM research. Beside reviews raising awareness of broad-spectrum issues, generic protocols for model formulation and boundary-transcending inference strategies were critical means of science integration. Accessible broad-spectrum software similarly contributed to this change. From the modelling viewpoint, the discovery of the unification of ABM and IBM demonstrates that a wide variety of systems substantiate the premise of ACS research that microscale behaviours of agents and system-level dynamics are inseparably bound. © 2018 The Author(s).

Synthesizing dimensional and categorical approaches to personality disorders: refining the research agenda for DSM-V Axis II.

PubMed

Krueger, Robert F; Skodol, Andrew E; Livesley, W John; Shrout, Patrick E; Huang, Yueqin

2007-01-01

Personality disorder researchers have long considered the utility of dimensional approaches to diagnosis, signaling the need to consider a dimensional approach for personality disorders in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-V). Nevertheless, a dimensional approach to personality disorders in DSM-V is more likely to succeed if it represents an orderly and logical progression from the categorical system in DSM-IV. With these considerations and opportunities in mind, the authors sought to delineate ways of synthesizing categorical and dimensional approaches to personality disorders that could inform the construction of DSM-V. This discussion resulted in (1) the idea of having a set of core descriptive elements of personality for DSM-V, (2) an approach to rating those elements for specific patients, (3) a way of combining those elements into personality disorder prototypes, and (4) a revised conception of personality disorder as a construct separate from personality traits. Copyright (c) 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Modular standards for emerging avionics technologies

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Radcliffe, B.; Boaz, J.

The present investigation is concerned with modular standards for the integration of new avionics technologies into production aircraft, taking into account also major retrofit programs. It is pointed out that avionics systems are about to undergo drastic changes in the partitioning of functions and judicious sharing of resources. These changes have the potential to significantly improve reliability and maintainability, and to reduce costs. Attention is given to a definition of the modular avionics concept, the existing module program, the development approach, development progress on the modular avionics standard, and the future of avionics installation standards.

Apollo experience report: Flight anomaly resolution

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lobb, J. D.

1975-01-01

The identification of flight anomalies, the determination of their causes, and the approaches taken for corrective action are described. Interrelationships of the broad range of disciplines involved with the complex systems and the team concept employed to ensure timely and accurate resolution of anomalies are discussed. The documentation techniques and the techniques for management of anomaly resolution are included. Examples of specific anomalies are presented in the original form of their progressive documentation. Flight anomaly resolution functioned as a part of the real-time mission support and postflight testing, and results were included in the postflight documentation.

Inflammation and cancer

PubMed Central

Coussens, Lisa M.; Werb, Zena

2009-01-01

Recent data have expanded the concept that inflammation is a critical component of tumour progression. Many cancers arise from sites of infection, chronic irritation and inflammation. It is now becoming clear that the tumour microenvironment, which is largely orchestrated by inflammatory cells, is an indispensable participant in the neoplastic process, fostering proliferation, survival and migration. In addition, tumour cells have co-opted some of the signalling molecules of the innate immune system, such as selectins, chemokines and their receptors for invasion, migration and metastasis. These insights are fostering new anti-inflammatory therapeutic approaches to cancer development. PMID:12490959

Concept mapping to promote meaningful learning, help relate theory to practice and improve learning self-efficacy in Asian mental health nursing students: A mixed-methods pilot study.

PubMed

Bressington, Daniel T; Wong, Wai-Kit; Lam, Kar Kei Claire; Chien, Wai Tong

2018-01-01

Student nurses are provided with a great deal of knowledge within university, but they can find it difficult to relate theory to nursing practice. This study aimed to test the appropriateness and feasibility of assessing Novak's concept mapping as an educational strategy to strengthen the theory-practice link, encourage meaningful learning and enhance learning self-efficacy in nursing students. This pilot study utilised a mixed-methods quasi-experimental design. The study was conducted in a University school of Nursing in Hong Kong. A total of 40 third-year pre-registration Asian mental health nursing students completed the study; 12 in the concept mapping (CM) group and 28 in the usual teaching methods (UTM) group. The impact of concept mapping was evaluated thorough analysis of quantitative changes in students' learning self-efficacy, analysis of the structure and contents of the concept maps (CM group), a quantitative measure of students' opinions about their reflective learning activities and content analysis of qualitative data from reflective written accounts (CM group). There were no significant differences in self-reported learning self-efficacy between the two groups (p=0.38). The concept mapping helped students identify their current level of understanding, but the increased awareness may cause an initial drop in learning self-efficacy. The results highlight that most CM students were able to demonstrate meaningful learning and perceived that concept mapping was a useful reflective learning strategy to help them to link theory and practice. The results provide preliminary evidence that the concept mapping approach can be useful to help mental health nursing students visualise their learning progress and encourage the integration of theoretical knowledge with clinical knowledge. Combining concept mapping data with quantitative measures and qualitative reflective journal data appears to be a useful way of assessing and understanding the effectiveness of concept mapping. Future studies should utilise a larger sample size and consider using the approach as a targeted intervention immediately before and during clinical learning placements. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

History of endonasal skull base surgery.

PubMed

Wang, Amy J; Zaidi, Hasan A; Laws, Edward D

2016-12-01

While the endonasal approach to the skull base continues to advance, this paper invokes its long history. The centuries of medieval neuroanatomy and early neurosurgery enabled the conception of the first transfacial approaches in the late 1800s; Henry Schloffer performed the first transsphenoidal surgery in 1907. Although the procedure was initially met with much interest, Harvey Cushing eventually led the field of neurosurgery to abandon the transsphenoidal approach in the 1920s. The following three generations of neurosurgeons contained several key figures including Norman Dott, Gerard Guiot, and Jules Hardy who were steadfast in preserving the technique as well as in addressing its shortcomings. The endoscopic approach developed simultaneously, and advances in magnifying and fiberoptics further resolved limitations previously inherent to the transsphenoidal approach. At last, in the 1960s, the transsphenoidal approach entered its renaissance. Today, the momentum of its development persists in the endoscopic endonasal approach, which has recently expanded the indications for transsphenoidal surgery across the skull base, far beyond its original jurisdiction of the sella. Continued progress must not take for granted the rich history of the transsphenoidal approach, which was developed over centuries by surgeons around the world. The authors present the evolution of modern endonasal surgery as a dynamic interplay between technology, medicine, and surgery over the past 100 years. Progress can be attributed to courageous surgeons who affirmed their contemporary practices despite gaps in technology or medicine, and to visionary individuals who produced and incorporated new elements into transsphenoidal surgery. And so while the new endoscopic technique brings forth new challenges, its development reaffirms the principles laid down by the pioneers of transsphenoidal surgery.

Progression along the Bipolar Spectrum: A Longitudinal Study of Predictors of Conversion from Bipolar Spectrum Conditions to Bipolar I and II Disorders

PubMed Central

Alloy, Lauren B.; Urošević, Snežana; Abramson, Lyn Y.; Jager-Hyman, Shari; Nusslock, Robin; Whitehouse, Wayne G.; Hogan, Michael

2011-01-01

Little longitudinal research has examined progression to more severe bipolar disorders in individuals with “soft” bipolar spectrum conditions. We examine rates and predictors of progression to bipolar I and II diagnoses in a non-patient sample of college-age participants (n = 201) with high General Behavior Inventory scores and childhood or adolescent onset of “soft” bipolar spectrum disorders followed longitudinally for 4.5 years from the Longitudinal Investigation of Bipolar Spectrum (LIBS) project. Of 57 individuals with initial cyclothymia or bipolar disorder not otherwise specified (BiNOS) diagnoses, 42.1% progressed to a bipolar II diagnosis and 10.5% progressed to a bipolar I diagnosis. Of 144 individuals with initial bipolar II diagnoses, 17.4% progressed to a bipolar I diagnosis. Consistent with hypotheses derived from the clinical literature and the Behavioral Approach System (BAS) model of bipolar disorder, and controlling for relevant variables (length of follow-up, initial depressive and hypomanic symptoms, treatment-seeking, and family history), high BAS sensitivity (especially BAS Fun Seeking) predicted a greater likelihood of progression to bipolar II disorder, whereas early age of onset and high impulsivity predicted a greater likelihood of progression to bipolar I (high BAS sensitivity and Fun-Seeking also predicted progression to bipolar I when family history was not controlled). The interaction of high BAS and high Behavioral Inhibition System (BIS) sensitivities also predicted greater likelihood of progression to bipolar I. We discuss implications of the findings for the bipolar spectrum concept, the BAS model of bipolar disorder, and early intervention efforts. PMID:21668080

Threshold Concepts in Biochemistry

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Loertscher, Jennifer

2011-01-01

Threshold concepts can be identified for any discipline and provide a framework for linking student learning to curricular design. Threshold concepts represent a transformed understanding of a discipline, without which the learner cannot progress and are therefore pivotal in learning in a discipline. Although threshold concepts have been…

Construction of a Precursor Model for the Concept of Rolling Friction in the Thought of Preschool Age Children: A Socio-cognitive Teaching Intervention

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ravanis, Konstantinos; Koliopoulos, Dimitris; Boilevin, Jean-Marie

2008-08-01

The aim of this study was to explore the extent to which the characteristics of two teaching interventions can bring about cognitive progress in preschoolers with regard to the factors rolling friction depends on, when it is applied to an object that is freely rolling on a horizontal surface. The study was conducted in three phases: pre-test, teaching intervention, and post-test. Two teaching strategies were compared: one inspired by Piaget’s theory (Piagetian approach) and one inspired by post-Piagetian and Vygotkian assumptions (socio-cognitive approach). A statistically significant difference was found between the pre-test and post-test, providing evidence that the socio-cognitive approach allows for the creation of a more appropriate teaching framework compared to the Piagetian one.

Concepts in solid tumor evolution.

PubMed

Sidow, Arend; Spies, Noah

2015-04-01

Evolutionary mechanisms in cancer progression give tumors their individuality. Cancer evolution is different from organismal evolution, however, and we discuss where concepts from evolutionary genetics are useful or limited in facilitating an understanding of cancer. Based on these concepts we construct and apply the simplest plausible model of tumor growth and progression. Simulations using this simple model illustrate the importance of stochastic events early in tumorigenesis, highlight the dominance of exponential growth over linear growth and differentiation, and explain the clonal substructure of tumors. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

[In vitro generation of blood red cells from stem cells: a sketch of the future].

PubMed

Mazurier, Christelle; Douay, Luc

2016-01-01

Human adult pluripotent stem cells, stem cells of embryonic origin and induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS) provide cellular sources for new promising regenerative medicine approaches. Because these cells can be patient-specific, they allow considering a personalized medicine appropriate to the diagnosis of each. The generation of cultured red blood cells (cRBC) derived from stem cells is emblematic of personalized medicine. Indeed, these cells have the advantage of being selected according to a blood phenotype of interest and they may provide treatments to patients in situation of impossible transfusion (alloimmunized patients, rare phenotypes). Essential progresses have established proof of concept for this approach, still a concept some years ago. From adult stem cells, all steps of upstream research were successfully achieved, including the demonstration of the feasibility of injection into human. This leads us to believe that Red Blood Cells generated in vitro from stem cells will be the future players of blood transfusion. However, although theoretically ideal, these stem cells raise many biological challenges to overcome, although some tracks are identified. © Société de Biologie, 2016.

Understanding immunology via engineering design: the role of mathematical prototyping.

PubMed

Klinke, David J; Wang, Qing

2012-01-01

A major challenge in immunology is how to translate data into knowledge given the inherent complexity and dynamics of human physiology. Both the physiology and engineering communities have rich histories in applying computational approaches to translate data obtained from complex systems into knowledge of system behavior. However, there are some differences in how disciplines approach problems. By referring to mathematical models as mathematical prototypes, we aim to highlight aspects related to the process (i.e., prototyping) rather than the product (i.e., the model). The objective of this paper is to review how two related engineering concepts, specifically prototyping and "fitness for use," can be applied to overcome the pressing challenge in translating data into improved knowledge of basic immunology that can be used to improve therapies for disease. These concepts are illustrated using two immunology-related examples. The prototypes presented focus on the beta cell mass at the onset of type 1 diabetes and the dynamics of dendritic cells in the lung. This paper is intended to illustrate some of the nuances associated with applying mathematical modeling to improve understanding of the dynamics of disease progression in humans.

The Effects of Prior-knowledge and Online Learning Approaches on Students' Inquiry and Argumentation Abilities

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yang, Wen-Tsung; Lin, Yu-Ren; She, Hsiao-Ching; Huang, Kai-Yi

2015-07-01

This study investigated the effects of students' prior science knowledge and online learning approaches (social and individual) on their learning with regard to three topics: science concepts, inquiry, and argumentation. Two science teachers and 118 students from 4 eighth-grade science classes were invited to participate in this research. Students in each class were divided into three groups according to their level of prior science knowledge; they then took either our social- or individual-based online science learning program. The results show that students in the social online argumentation group performed better in argumentation and online argumentation learning. Qualitative analysis indicated that the students' social interactions benefited the co-construction of sound arguments and the accurate understanding of science concepts. In constructing arguments, students in the individual online argumentation group were limited to knowledge recall and self-reflection. High prior-knowledge students significantly outperformed low prior-knowledge students in all three aspects of science learning. However, the difference in inquiry and argumentation performance between low and high prior-knowledge students decreased with the progression of online learning topics.

Concise Review: Using Stem Cells to Prevent the Progression of Myopia – A Concept

PubMed Central

Janowski, Miroslaw; Bulte, Jeff W.M.; Handa, James T.; Rini, David; Walczak, Piotr

2016-01-01

The prevalence of myopia has increased in modern society due to the educational load of children. This condition is growing rapidly, especially in Asian countries where it has already reached a pandemic level. Typically, the younger the child’s age at the onset of myopia, the more rapidly the condition will progress and the greater the likelihood that it will develop the known sight-threatening complications of high myopia. This rise in incidence of severe myopia has contributed to an increased frequency of eye diseases in adulthood, which often complicate therapeutic procedures. Currently, no treatment is available to prevent myopia progression. Stem cell therapy can potentially address two components of myopia. Regardless of the exact etiology, myopia is always associated with scleral weakness. In this context, a strategy aimed at scleral reinforcement by transplanting connective tissue-supportive mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) is an attractive approach that could yield effective and universal therapy. Sunlight exposure appears to have a protective effect against myopia. It is postulated that this effect is mediated via local ocular production of dopamine. With a variety of dopamine-producing cells already available for the treatment of Parkinson’s disease, stem cells engineered for dopamine production could be utilized for the treatment of myopia. In this review, we further explore these concepts and present evidence from the literature to support the use of stem cell therapy for the treatment of myopia. PMID:25752937

Retinal prostheses: progress toward the next generation implants

PubMed Central

Ghezzi, Diego

2015-01-01

In the last decade, various clinical trials proved the capability of visual prostheses, in particular retinal implants, to restore a useful form of vision. These encouraging results promoted the emerging of several strategies for neuronal stimulation aiming at the restoration of sight. Besides the traditional approach based on electrical stimulation through metal electrodes in the different areas of the visual path (e.g., the visual cortex, the lateral geniculate nucleus, the optic nerve, and the retina), novel concepts for neuronal stimulation have been mostly exploited as building blocks of the next generation of retinal implants. This review is focused on critically discussing recent major advancements in the field of retinal stimulation with particular attention to the findings in the application of novel concepts and materials. Last, the major challenges in the field and their clinical implications will be outlined. PMID:26347602

Minimally invasive technology in the management of breast disease.

PubMed

Hung, W K; Ying, M; Chan, C M; Lam, H S; Mak, K L

2009-01-01

Minimally invasive surgery is gaining popularity around the world because it achieves the same or even superior results when compared to standard surgery but with less morbidity. Minimally invasive breast surgery is a broad concept encompassing new developments in the field of breast surgery that work on this minimally invasive principle. In this regard, breast-conserving surgery and sentinel lymph node biopsy are good illustrations of this concept. There are three major areas of progress in the minimally invasive management of breast disease. First, percutaneous excisional devices are now available that can replace the surgical excision of breast mass lesions. Second, various ablative treatments are capable of destroying breast cancers in situ instead of surgical excision. Third, mammary ductoscopy provides a new approach to the investigation of mammary duct pathology. Clinical experience and potential applications of these new technologies are reviewed.

Experimental investigation on drag and heat flux reduction in supersonic/hypersonic flows: A survey

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Zhen-guo; Sun, Xi-wan; Huang, Wei; Li, Shi-bin; Yan, Li

2016-12-01

The drag and heat reduction problem of hypersonic vehicles has always attracted the attention worldwide, and the experimental test approach is the basis of theoretical analysis and numerical simulation. In the current study, research progress of experimental investigations on drag and heat reduction are summarized by several kinds of mechanism, namely the forward-facing cavity, the opposing jet, the aerospike, the energy deposition and their combinational configurations, and the combinational configurations include the combinational opposing jet and forward-facing cavity concept and the combinational opposing jet and aerospike concept. The geometric models and flow conditions are emphasized, especially for the basic principle for the drag and heat flux reduction of each device. The measurement results of aerodynamic and aerothermodynamic are compared and analyzed as well, which can be a reference for assessing the accuracy of numerical results.

Enhancing the Quality of Financial Advice with Web 2.0 - An Approach Considering Social Capital in the Private Asset Allocation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kundisch, Dennis; Zorzi, Robin

Although theoretically necessary, social capital is not considered within the process of asset allocation for private investors. Both the lack of appropriate practical valuation concepts and the effort of providing and processing the required information as input for a valuation were obstacles to include social capital in this process. However, first theoretical financial models for the evaluation of social capital recently have become available. Moreover, the fast growth of business community websites and the technological progress in Web 2.0 tools that allow and acquire the active involvement of users, facilitate the provision and processing of valuation relevant information. In this paper we focus on the second aspect and propose a social software-based concept that allows for an integration of social capital in the asset allocation process.

Towards Robot-Assisted Echocardiographic Monitoring in Catheterization Laboratories : Usability-Centered Manipulator for Transesophageal Echocardiography.

PubMed

Pahl, Christina; Ebelt, Henning; Sayahkarajy, Mostafa; Supriyanto, Eko; Soesanto, Amiliana

2017-08-15

This paper proposes a robotic Transesophageal Echocardiography (TOE) system concept for Catheterization Laboratories. Cardiovascular disease causes one third of all global mortality. TOE is utilized to assess cardiovascular structures and monitor cardiac function during diagnostic procedures and catheter-based structural interventions. However, the operation of TOE underlies various conditions that may cause a negative impact on performance, the health of the cardiac sonographer and patient safety. These factors have been conflated and evince the potential of robot-assisted TOE. Hence, a careful integration of clinical experience and Systems Engineering methods was used to develop a concept and physical model for TOE manipulation. The motion of different actuators of the fabricated motorized system has been tested. It is concluded that the developed medical system, counteracting conflated disadvantages, represents a progressive approach for cardiac healthcare.

Analysis of Critical Infrastructure Dependencies and Interdependencies

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Petit, Frederic; Verner, Duane; Brannegan, David

2015-06-01

The report begins by defining dependencies and interdependencies and exploring basic concepts of dependencies in order to facilitate a common understanding and consistent analytical approaches. Key concepts covered include; Characteristics of dependencies: upstream dependencies, internal dependencies, and downstream dependencies; Classes of dependencies: physical, cyber, geographic, and logical; and Dimensions of dependencies: operating environment, coupling and response behavior, type of failure, infrastructure characteristics, and state of operations From there, the report proposes a multi-phase roadmap to support dependency and interdependency assessment activities nationwide, identifying a range of data inputs, analysis activities, and potential products for each phase, as well as keymore » steps needed to progress from one phase to the next. The report concludes by outlining a comprehensive, iterative, and scalable framework for analyzing dependencies and interdependencies that stakeholders can integrate into existing risk and resilience assessment efforts.« less

Polycentrism in Global Health Governance Scholarship

PubMed Central

Tosun, Jale

2018-01-01

Drawing on an in-depth analysis of eight global health networks, a recent essay in this journal argued that global health networks face four challenges to their effectiveness: problem definition, positioning, coalition-building, and governance. While sharing the argument of the essay concerned, in this commentary, we argue that these analytical concepts can be used to explicate a concept that has implicitly been used in global health governance scholarship for quite a few years. While already prominent in the discussion of climate change governance, for instance, global health governance scholarship could make progress by looking at global health governance as being polycentric. Concisely, polycentric forms of governance mix scales, mechanisms, and actors. Drawing on the essay, we propose a polycentric approach to the study of global health governance that incorporates coalitionbuilding tactics, internal governance and global political priority as explanatory factors. PMID:29325406

Etiologic Field Effect: Reappraisal of the Field Effect Concept in Cancer Predisposition and Progression

PubMed Central

Lochhead, Paul; Chan, Andrew T; Nishihara, Reiko; Fuchs, Charles S; Beck, Andrew H; Giovannucci, Edward; Ogino, Shuji

2014-01-01

The term “field effect” (also known as field defect, field cancerization, or field carcinogenesis) has been used to describe a field of cellular and molecular alteration, which predisposes to the development of neoplasms within that territory. We explore an expanded, integrative concept, “etiologic field effect”, which asserts that various etiologic factors (the exposome including dietary, lifestyle, environmental, microbial, hormonal, and genetic factors) and their interactions (the interactome) contribute to a tissue microenvironmental milieu that constitutes a “field of susceptibility” to neoplasia initiation, evolution, and progression. Importantly, etiological fields predate the acquisition of molecular aberrations commonly considered to indicate presence of filed effect. Inspired by molecular pathological epidemiology (MPE) research, which examines the influence of etiologic factors on cellular and molecular alterations during disease course, an etiologically-focused approach to field effect can: 1) broaden the horizons of our inquiry into cancer susceptibility and progression at molecular, cellular, and environmental levels, during all stages of tumor evolution; 2) embrace host-environment-tumor interactions (including gene-environment interactions) occurring in the tumor microenvironment; and, 3) help explain intriguing observations, such as shared molecular features between bilateral primary breast carcinomas, and between synchronous colorectal cancers, where similar molecular changes are absent from intervening normal colon. MPE research has identified a number of endogenous and environmental exposures which can influence not only molecular signatures in the genome, epigenome, transcriptome, proteome, metabolome and interactome, but also host immunity and tumor behavior. We anticipate that future technological advances will allow the development of in vivo biosensors capable of detecting and quantifying “etiologic field effect” as abnormal network pathology patterns of cellular and microenvironmental responses to endogenous and exogenous exposures. Through an “etiologic field effect” paradigm, and holistic systems pathology (systems biology) approaches to cancer biology, we can improve personalized prevention and treatment strategies for precision medicine. PMID:24925058

Can nanotechnology improve cancer diagnosis through miRNA detection?

PubMed

Fiammengo, Roberto

2017-01-01

miRNAs are key regulators of gene expression, and alterations in their expression levels correlate with the onset and progression of cancer. Although miRNAs have been proposed as biomarkers for cancer diagnosis, their application in routine clinical praxis is yet to come. Current quantification strategies have limitation, and there is a great interest in developing innovative ones. Since a few years, nanotechnology-based approaches for miRNA quantification are emerging at fast pace but there is urgent need to go beyond the proof-of-concept stage. Nanotechnology will have a strong impact on cancer diagnosis through miRNA detection only if it is demonstrated that the newly developed approaches are indeed working on 'real-world' samples under standardized conditions.

Achieving Balance Through the Art of Eating: Demystifying Eastern Nutrition and Blending it with Western Nutrition.

PubMed

Wongvibulsin, Shannon; Lee, Suzie Seoyang; Hui, Ka-Kit

2012-01-01

Eastern and Western approaches to nutrition are unique and possess both strengths and weaknesses. Blending the best of both techniques will allow for the development of an integrative nutrition system that is more effective than either tradition on its own. The Western view to nutrition is already adopting certain attributes of the Eastern medicine philosophy as exemplified by the progression towards individualized nutrition through methods such as nutrigenetics. Nevertheless, many differences still remain between Eastern and Western nutritional concepts. Becoming fluent in both Western and Eastern methodologies can ensure the extraction of the best from both techniques for the development of a comprehensive, systematic, and holistic nutritional approach to achieve optimal health.

Advances in the high performance polymer electrolyte membranes for fuel cells.

PubMed

Zhang, Hongwei; Shen, Pei Kang

2012-03-21

This critical review tersely and concisely reviews the recent development of the polymer electrolyte membranes and the relationship between their properties and affecting factors like operation temperature. In the first section, the advantages and shortcomings of the corresponding polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells are analyzed. Then, the limitations of Nafion membranes and their alternatives to large-scale commercial applications are discussed. Secondly, the concepts and approaches of the alternative proton exchange membranes for low temperature and high temperature fuel cells are described. The highlights of the current scientific achievements are given for various aspects of approaches. Thirdly, the progress of anion exchange membranes is presented. Finally, the perspectives of future trends on polymer electrolyte membranes for different applications are commented on (400 references).

Achieving Balance Through the Art of Eating: Demystifying Eastern Nutrition and Blending it with Western Nutrition

PubMed Central

Wongvibulsin, Shannon; Lee, Suzie Seoyang; Hui, Ka-Kit

2012-01-01

Eastern and Western approaches to nutrition are unique and possess both strengths and weaknesses. Blending the best of both techniques will allow for the development of an integrative nutrition system that is more effective than either tradition on its own. The Western view to nutrition is already adopting certain attributes of the Eastern medicine philosophy as exemplified by the progression towards individualized nutrition through methods such as nutrigenetics. Nevertheless, many differences still remain between Eastern and Western nutritional concepts. Becoming fluent in both Western and Eastern methodologies can ensure the extraction of the best from both techniques for the development of a comprehensive, systematic, and holistic nutritional approach to achieve optimal health. PMID:24716109

Progressing toward a more culturally competent approach to dental care for African American elders.

PubMed

Slaughter, Ann; Smith, Virginia J; Taylor, Lynne

2004-01-01

This study was conducted to understand perceptions that may influence oral self-care behaviors among elderly African American adults living in an urban community. Four focus groups at two senior centers were recruited, involving a total of 25 participants. Content analysis and ethnographic summaries were used to identify themes, common concepts and language. The results indicated that although the participants recognized the advantages of routine brushing, the importance of keeping teeth clean to prevent gum disease was not widely acknowledged. On the basis of these focus groups, the authors suggest that health promotion approaches for adults who are elderly should be linked to the audience's cultural norms and perceptions regarding the benefits of oral hygiene practices.

MEMS based ion beams for fusion

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Persaud, A.; Seidl, P. A.; Ji, Q.; Waldron, W. L.; Schenkel, T.; Ardanuc, S.; Vinayakumar, K. B.; Schaffer, Z. A.; Lal, A.

2016-10-01

Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) fabrication provides an exciting opportunity to shrink existing accelerator concepts to smaller sizes and to reduce cost by orders of magnitude. We revisit the concept of a Multiple Electrostatic Quadrupole Array Linear Accelerator (MEQALAC) and show how, with current technologies, the concept can be downsized from gap distances of several cm to distances in the sub-mm regime. The basic concept implements acceleration gaps using radio frequency (RF) fields and electrostatic quadrupoles (ESQ) on silicon wafers. First results from proof-of-concept experiments using printed circuit boards to realize the MEQALAC structures are presented. We show results from accelerating structures that were used in an array of nine (3x3) parallel beamlets with He ions at 15 keV. We will also present results from an ESQ focusing lattice using the same beamlet layout showing beam transport and matching. We also will discuss our progress in fabricating MEMS devices in silicon wafers for both the RF and ESQ structures and integration of necessary RF-circuits on-chip. The concept can be scaled up to thousands of beamlets providing high power beams at low cost and can be used to form and compress a plasma for the development of magnetized target fusion approaches. This work was supported by the Office of Science of the US Department of Energy through the ARPA-e ALPHA program under contracts DE-AC0205CH11231 (LBNL).

Concept Mapping for Critical Thinking: Efficacy, Timing, & Type

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Harris, Charles M.; Zha, Shenghua

2017-01-01

Many college students are not progressing in the development of their critical thinking skills. Concept mapping is a technique for facilitating validation of one's critical thinking by graphically depicting the structure of complex concepts. Each of our three studies of concept mapping involved approximately 240 students enrolled in four sections…

[Integrative concepts in modern forensic psychiatry].

PubMed

Dittmann, V

1996-03-01

Forensic psychiatric diagnosis and treatment should be guided by juridical goals and never be an end in itself. As a whole it is a public service concerning the interests of the perpetrators and the security of the entire population as well. Recent progress in forensic psychiatry is based on integral and comprehensive concepts. In the evaluation of criminal responsibility the new approaches of psychiatric diagnosis like operationalism, application of quantificating instruments and multiaxial diagnostic systems are of considerable importance. The ICD-10 classification of WHO can now be regarded as our reference system. To be acceptable for juridical purposes the evaluation of criminal responsibility has to be based on a systematical analysis of all important factors like actual situation of crime, environment, influence of psychotropic substances, psychosocial stressors, influences of biography and mental disorders. Assessment of prognosis is obligatory by law in many cases. These are juridical decisions, which have to be prepared by the psychiatric experts in the form of risk evaluations considering factors like development of delinquency, analysis of crime, kind of mental disturbance, insight of the perpetrator in his disorder, social competence, selfexamination of the perpetrator of his crime, possible therapies and social circumstances after discharge. Only an integral multiprofessional approach can be regarded as successful in the therapy of forensic high risk patients with paraphilas and aggressive impulse-control disorders. In Switzerland there is still a considerable lack of appropriate institutions for these patients. The vast amount of data accumulated during forensic psychiatric routine should be analysed in multicenter studies with scientific documentation systems to achieve progress in forensic risk calculation and efficiency of therapies.

Applying a Force and Motion Learning Progression over an Extended Time Span Using the Force Concept Inventory

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fulmer, Gavin W.; Liang, Ling L.; Liu, Xiufeng

2014-01-01

This exploratory study applied a proposed force and motion learning progression (LP) to high-school and university students and to content involving both one- and two-dimensional force and motion situations. The Force Concept Inventory (FCI) was adapted, based on a previous content analysis and coding of the questions in the FCI in terms of the…

progressive problemshifts between different research programs in science education: A lakatosian perspective

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Niaz, Mansoor

Given the importance of epistemology and philosophy of science, the Lakatos (1970) methodology is particularly suited to evaluate competing research programs in science education. This article has two objectives: (a) to evaluate critically the interpretations of Gilbert and Swift (1985) and Rowell and Dawson (1989), and (b) to postulate a progressive problemshift between Piaget's epistemic subject and Pascual-Leone's metasubject. Regarding the Gilbert and Swift interpretation, it is concluded that the alternative conceptions movement at its present stage of development cannot explain the previous success of its rival (Piagetian school) nor supersede it by a further display of heuristic power as required by Lakatos. If we accept the Rowell and Dawson thesis it would amount to the postulation of Piagetian and integrated (Piagetian and schema) theories as rival research programs. It appears that the Rowell and Dawson approach would enrich Piagetian theory with descriptive content rather than explanatory constructs, and thus would not lead to a progressive problemshift. It is concluded that Pascual-Leone's theory extends Piaget's negative heuristic by introducing antecedent variables, and at the same time enriches the positive heuristic by introducing metasubjective task analysis, which leads to a progressive problemshift.

Seismic joint analysis for non-destructive testing of asphalt and concrete slabs

USGS Publications Warehouse

Ryden, N.; Park, C.B.

2005-01-01

A seismic approach is used to estimate the thickness and elastic stiffness constants of asphalt or concrete slabs. The overall concept of the approach utilizes the robustness of the multichannel seismic method. A multichannel-equivalent data set is compiled from multiple time series recorded from multiple hammer impacts at progressively different offsets from a fixed receiver. This multichannel simulation with one receiver (MSOR) replaces the true multichannel recording in a cost-effective and convenient manner. A recorded data set is first processed to evaluate the shear wave velocity through a wave field transformation, normally used in the multichannel analysis of surface waves (MASW) method, followed by a Lambwave inversion. Then, the same data set is used to evaluate compression wave velocity from a combined processing of the first-arrival picking and a linear regression. Finally, the amplitude spectra of the time series are used to evaluate the thickness by following the concepts utilized in the Impact Echo (IE) method. Due to the powerful signal extraction capabilities ensured by the multichannel processing schemes used, the entire procedure for all three evaluations can be fully automated and results can be obtained directly in the field. A field data set is used to demonstrate the proposed approach.

Flight Dynamics Mission Support and Quality Assurance Process

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Oh, InHwan

1996-01-01

This paper summarizes the method of the Computer Sciences Corporation Flight Dynamics Operation (FDO) quality assurance approach to support the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Goddard Space Flight Center Flight Dynamics Support Branch. Historically, a strong need has existed for developing systematic quality assurance using methods that account for the unique nature and environment of satellite Flight Dynamics mission support. Over the past few years FDO has developed and implemented proactive quality assurance processes applied to each of the six phases of the Flight Dynamics mission support life cycle: systems and operations concept, system requirements and specifications, software development support, operations planing and training, launch support, and on-orbit mission operations. Rather than performing quality assurance as a final step after work is completed, quality assurance has been built in as work progresses in the form of process assurance. Process assurance activities occur throughout the Flight Dynamics mission support life cycle. The FDO Product Assurance Office developed process checklists for prephase process reviews, mission team orientations, in-progress reviews, and end-of-phase audits. This paper will outline the evolving history of FDO quality assurance approaches, discuss the tailoring of Computer Science Corporations's process assurance cycle procedures, describe some of the quality assurance approaches that have been or are being developed, and present some of the successful results.

Will genomic selection be a practical method for plant breeding?

PubMed

Nakaya, Akihiro; Isobe, Sachiko N

2012-11-01

Genomic selection or genome-wide selection (GS) has been highlighted as a new approach for marker-assisted selection (MAS) in recent years. GS is a form of MAS that selects favourable individuals based on genomic estimated breeding values. Previous studies have suggested the utility of GS, especially for capturing small-effect quantitative trait loci, but GS has not become a popular methodology in the field of plant breeding, possibly because there is insufficient information available on GS for practical use. In this review, GS is discussed from a practical breeding viewpoint. Statistical approaches employed in GS are briefly described, before the recent progress in GS studies is surveyed. GS practices in plant breeding are then reviewed before future prospects are discussed. Statistical concepts used in GS are discussed with genetic models and variance decomposition, heritability, breeding value and linear model. Recent progress in GS studies is reviewed with a focus on empirical studies. For the practice of GS in plant breeding, several specific points are discussed including linkage disequilibrium, feature of populations and genotyped markers and breeding scheme. Currently, GS is not perfect, but it is a potent, attractive and valuable approach for plant breeding. This method will be integrated into many practical breeding programmes in the near future with further advances and the maturing of its theory.

Systems Biology Perspectives on Minimal and Simpler Cells

PubMed Central

Xavier, Joana C.; Patil, Kiran Raosaheb

2014-01-01

SUMMARY The concept of the minimal cell has fascinated scientists for a long time, from both fundamental and applied points of view. This broad concept encompasses extreme reductions of genomes, the last universal common ancestor (LUCA), the creation of semiartificial cells, and the design of protocells and chassis cells. Here we review these different areas of research and identify common and complementary aspects of each one. We focus on systems biology, a discipline that is greatly facilitating the classical top-down and bottom-up approaches toward minimal cells. In addition, we also review the so-called middle-out approach and its contributions to the field with mathematical and computational models. Owing to the advances in genomics technologies, much of the work in this area has been centered on minimal genomes, or rather minimal gene sets, required to sustain life. Nevertheless, a fundamental expansion has been taking place in the last few years wherein the minimal gene set is viewed as a backbone of a more complex system. Complementing genomics, progress is being made in understanding the system-wide properties at the levels of the transcriptome, proteome, and metabolome. Network modeling approaches are enabling the integration of these different omics data sets toward an understanding of the complex molecular pathways connecting genotype to phenotype. We review key concepts central to the mapping and modeling of this complexity, which is at the heart of research on minimal cells. Finally, we discuss the distinction between minimizing the number of cellular components and minimizing cellular complexity, toward an improved understanding and utilization of minimal and simpler cells. PMID:25184563

The Progression of Prospective Primary Teachers' Conceptions of the Methodology of Teaching

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Rivero, Ana; Azcarate, Pilar; Porlan, Rafael; del Pozo, Rosa Martin; Harres, Joao

2011-01-01

This article describes the evolution of prospective primary teachers' conceptions of the methodology of teaching. Three categories were analyzed: the concept of activity, the organization of activities, and the concept of teaching resources. The study was conducted with five teams of prospective teachers, who were participating in teacher…

Students' Energy Concepts at the Transition between Primary and Secondary School

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Opitz, Sebastian T.; Harms, Ute; Neumann, Knut; Kowalzik, Kristin; Frank, Arne

2015-01-01

Energy is considered both a core idea and a crosscutting concept in science education. A thorough understanding of the energy concept is thought to help students learn about other (related) concepts within and across science subjects, thereby fostering scientific literacy. This study investigates students' progression in understanding the energy…

A study on operation efficiency evaluation based on firm's financial index and benchmark selection: take China Unicom as an example

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wu, Zu-guang; Tian, Zhan-jun; Liu, Hui; Huang, Rui; Zhu, Guo-hua

2009-07-01

Being the only listed telecom operators of A share market, China Unicom has always been attracted many institutional investors under the concept of 3G recent years,which itself is a great technical progress expectation.Do the institutional investors or the concept of technical progress have signficant effect on the improving of firm's operating efficiency?Though reviewing the documentary about operating efficiency we find that schoolars study this problem useing the regress analyzing based on traditional production function and data envelopment analysis(DEA) and financial index anayzing and marginal function and capital labor ratio coefficient etc. All the methods mainly based on macrodata. This paper we use the micro-data of company to evaluate the operating efficiency.Using factor analyzing based on financial index and comparing the factor score of three years from 2005 to 2007, we find that China Unicom's operating efficiency is under the averge level of benchmark corporates and has't improved under the concept of 3G from 2005 to 2007.In other words,institutional investor or the conception of technical progress expectation have faint effect on the changes of China Unicom's operating efficiency. Selecting benchmark corporates as post to evaluate the operating efficiency is a characteristic of this method ,which is basicallly sipmly and direct.This method is suit for the operation efficiency evaluation of agriculture listed companies because agriculture listed also face technical progress and marketing concept such as tax-free etc.

Progression in Ethical Reasoning When Addressing Socio-scientific Issues in Biotechnology

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Berne, Birgitta

2014-11-01

This article reports on the outcomes of an intervention in a Swedish school in which the author, a teacher-researcher, sought to develop students' (14-15 years old) ethical reasoning in science through the use of peer discussions about socio-scientific issues. Prior to the student discussions various prompts were used to highlight different aspects of the issues. In addition, students were given time to search for further information themselves. Analysis of students' written arguments, from the beginning of the intervention and afterwards, suggests that many students seem to be moving away from their use of everyday language towards using scientific concepts in their arguments. In addition, they moved from considering cloning and 'designer babies' solely in terms of the present to considering them in terms of the future. Furthermore, the students started to approach the issues in additional ways using not only consequentialism but also the approaches of virtue ethics, and rights and duties. Students' progression in ethical reasoning could be related to the characteristics of the interactions in peer discussions as students who critically and constructively argued with each other's ideas, and challenged each other's claims, made progress in more aspects of ethical reasoning than students merely using cumulative talk. As such, the work provides valuable indications for the importance of introducing peer discussions and debates about SSIs in connection to biotechnology into the teaching of science in schools.

SP-100 system thaw and start-up strategies

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kirpich, A.; Choe, H.

The authors review several strategies that have been considered during calendar year 1990 for SP-100 system start-up and thaw, and provide results of screening analyses. Screening studies have identified three concepts which are capable of thawing the SP-100 system: (1) a heat pipe approach in which reactor-heated heat pipes are routed to equipment enclosed within a thaw cavity; (2) a bleed-tube approach in which perforated tubes routed through ducting and components achieve thaw progressively as the result of successively thawing bleed-holes; and (3) a NaK traceline approach in which reactor-heated NaK is routed along ducting and components and achieves lithium thaw by both radiative and conductive coupling methods. Key issues have been identified in connection with pump start-up, reactor and power converter transient behavior, and hydraulic circuit stability. Pump start-up stability is accomplished by a linked-pump hydraulic arrangement.

Holistic Medicine: Advances and Shortcomings

PubMed Central

Gordon, James S.

1982-01-01

Holistic medicine is an attitudinal approach to health care rather than a particular set of techniques. It addresses the psychological, familial, societal, ethical and spiritual as well as biological dimensions of health and illness. The holistic approach emphasizes the uniqueness of each patient, the mutuality of the doctor-patient relationship, each person's responsibility for his or her own health care and society's responsibility for the promotion of health. As holism has become an increasingly popular concept, it has been distorted by both proponents and critics. Tendencies to equate holism with particular therapeutic modalities, to neglect public health for a one-sided emphasis on individual responsibility and to reject rather than elaborate on the scientific method have hampered the movement's progress. In the future orthodox and alternative approaches and techniques must all be seen as complementary parts of a larger synthesis that will genuinely deserve the name of holism. PMID:7113200

Biomimetic remineralization of dentin

PubMed Central

Niu, Li-na; Zhang, Wei; Pashley, David H.; Breschi, Lorenzo; Mao, Jing; Chen, Ji-hua; Tay, Franklin R.

2013-01-01

Objectives Remineralization of demineralized dentin is important for improving dentin bonding stability and controlling primary and secondary caries. Nevertheless, conventional dentin remineralization strategy is not suitable for remineralizing completely-demineralized dentin within hybrid layers created by etch-and-rinse and moderately aggressive self-etch adhesive systems, or the superficial part of a caries-affected dentin lesion left behind after minimally invasive caries removal. Biomimetic remineralization represents a different approach to this problem by attempting to backfill the demineralized dentin collagen with liquid-like amorphous calcium phosphate nanoprecursor particles that are stabilized by biomimetic analogs of noncollagenous proteins. Methods This paper reviewed the changing concepts in calcium phosphate mineralization of fibrillar collagen, including the recently discovered, non-classical particle-based crystallization concept, formation of polymer-induced liquid- precursors (PILP), experimental collagen models for mineralization, and the need for using phosphate-containing biomimetic analogs for biomimetic mineralization of collagen. Published work on the remineralization of resin-dentin bonds and artificial caries-like lesions by various research groups was then reviewed. Finally, the problems and progress associated with the translation of a scientifically-sound concept into a clinically-applicable approach are discussed. Results and Significance The particle-based biomimetic remineralization strategy based on the PILP process demonstrates great potential in remineralizing faulty hybrid layers or caries-like dentin. Based on this concept, research in the development of more clinically feasible dentin remineralization strategy, such as incorporating poly(anionic) acid-stabilized amorphous calcium phosphate nanoprecursor-containing mesoporous silica nanofillers in dentin adhesives, may provide a promising strategy for increasing of the durability of resin-dentin bonding and remineralizing caries-affected dentin. PMID:23927881

An emergentist vs a linear approach to social change processes: a gender look in contemporary India between modernity and Hindu tradition.

PubMed

Condorelli, Rosalia

2015-01-01

Using Census of India data from 1901 to 2011 and national and international reports on women's condition in India, beginning with sex ratio trends according to regional distribution up to female infanticides and sex-selective abortions and dowry deaths, this study examines the sociological aspects of the gender imbalance in modern contemporary India. Gender inequality persistence in India proves that new values and structures do not necessarily lead to the disappearance of older forms, but they can co-exist with mutual adaptations and reinforcements. Data analysis suggests that these unexpected combinations are not comprehensible in light of a linear concept of social change which is founded, in turn, on a concept of social systems as linear interaction systems that relate to environmental perturbations according to proportional cause and effect relationships. From this perspective, in fact, behavioral attitudes and interaction relationships should be less and less proportionally regulated by traditional values and practices as exposure to modernizing influences increases. And progressive decreases should be found in rates of social indicators of gender inequality like dowry deaths (the inverse should be found in sex ratio trends). However, data does not confirm these trends. This finding leads to emphasize a new theoretical and methodological approach toward social systems study, namely the conception of social systems as complex adaptive systems and the consequential emergentist, nonlinear conception of social change processes. Within the framework of emergentist theory of social change is it possible to understand the lasting strength of the patriarchal tradition and its problematic consequences in the modern contemporary India.

[Education in our time: competency or aptitude? The case for medicine. Part I].

PubMed

Viniegra-Velázquez, Leonardo

This paper begins with a statement: It is necessary to characterize the respective society to be able to understand the education's core. Distinctive features of the present-day world lead us to define it as the ruin of a civilization based on limitless financial gain, where education has a passive quality, responsible of maintaining the status quo as well as preserving the degrading attributes of actual societies: individualism, passivity, competitiveness, consumerism and high vulnerability to control and manipulation. About the dilemma: competency or aptitude, these are not synonyms but concepts pertaining radically different approaches to the practice and understanding of education. Competency represents the actual tendencies of passive education, where knowledge is just about acquiring information. Aptitude refers to participatory education, described in the second part of this essay. The passive education is present in the professional competencies model, specified in terms of curricula, profiles, levels, school activities, evaluation, concept of progress and social consequences. This paradigm does not foster real progress-defined as the primacy of values sustaining spiritual, intellectual and moral development but as an "accomplice" of the civilization's collapse. Copyright © 2017 Hospital Infantil de México Federico Gómez. Publicado por Masson Doyma México S.A. All rights reserved.

Priapism: new concepts in medical and surgical management.

PubMed

Burnett, Arthur L; Bivalacqua, Trinity J

2011-05-01

Advances have recently been made in both medical and surgical management of priapism, and these offer improvements in the level of care afforded such patients. Further developments can be expected based on ongoing progress, particularly in the area of molecular science, which is the primary source for driving novel therapeutic approaches. Continued action to address the health care administrative concerns of those most commonly affected by priapism, specifically individuals with sickle cell disease, is also appropriate. All successes in these arenas ensure that afflicted individuals avoid the health burdens of priapism and preserve sexual function. 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Bio-inspired photon detection using chromophore/nanotube hybrids (Conference Presentation)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Léonard, François

2017-05-01

The human eye is an exquisite optical system with the ability to detect individual photons at room temperature. However, the complexity of this system, optimized over millions of years, has been difficult to reproduce using synthetic techniques. Here we discuss a bio-inspired approach for photon detection based on chromophore/nanotube hybrids, where the chromophore plays a similar role to the retinal molecule in the human eye, and the signal transduction is provided by electronic transport in the carbon nanotube. In this presentation, I will present the concept and discuss our progress in realizing this type of photodetection mechanism.

Soft materials in neuroengineering for hard problems in neuroscience.

PubMed

Jeong, Jae-Woong; Shin, Gunchul; Park, Sung Il; Yu, Ki Jun; Xu, Lizhi; Rogers, John A

2015-04-08

We describe recent advances in soft electronic interface technologies for neuroscience research. Here, low modulus materials and/or compliant mechanical structures enable modes of soft, conformal integration and minimally invasive operation that would be difficult or impossible to achieve using conventional approaches. We begin by summarizing progress in electrodes and associated electronics for signal amplification and multiplexed readout. Examples in large-area, surface conformal electrode arrays and flexible, multifunctional depth-penetrating probes illustrate the power of these concepts. A concluding section highlights areas of opportunity in the further development and application of these technologies. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Heterotrophic cultivation of microalgae for production of biodiesel.

PubMed

Mohamed, Mohd Shamzi; Wei, Lai Zee; Ariff, Arbakariya B

2011-08-01

High cell density cultivation of microalgae via heterotrophic growth mechanism could effectively address the issues of low productivity and operational constraints presently affecting the solar driven biodiesel production. This paper reviews the progress made so far in the development of commercial-scale heterotrophic microalgae cultivation processes. The review also discusses on patentable concepts and innovations disclosed in the past four years with regards to new approaches to microalgal cultivation technique, improvisation on the process flow designs to economically produced biodiesel and genetic manipulation to confer desirable traits leading to much valued high lipid-bearing microalgae strains.

Syntactic Metals: A Survey of Current Technology

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Erikson, Ray

2003-01-01

Syntactic metals are a relatively new development in materials science. Several approaches to synthesizing these materials have been tried, and the handful of researchers in this field are beginning to make progress in defining useful compositions and processes. Syntactic metals can provide materials with dramatically improved specific strength and stiffness over their parent alloys, while retaining the isotropy that makes ordinary metals preferable to fiber-reinforced laminated composites in many applications. This paper reviews syntactic material concepts in general, the current state of the art (including the author's own work in syntactic aluminum), and the direction of future developments.

Recent advances in parametric neuroreceptor mapping with dynamic PET: basic concepts and graphical analyses.

PubMed

Seo, Seongho; Kim, Su Jin; Lee, Dong Soo; Lee, Jae Sung

2014-10-01

Tracer kinetic modeling in dynamic positron emission tomography (PET) has been widely used to investigate the characteristic distribution patterns or dysfunctions of neuroreceptors in brain diseases. Its practical goal has progressed from regional data quantification to parametric mapping that produces images of kinetic-model parameters by fully exploiting the spatiotemporal information in dynamic PET data. Graphical analysis (GA) is a major parametric mapping technique that is independent on any compartmental model configuration, robust to noise, and computationally efficient. In this paper, we provide an overview of recent advances in the parametric mapping of neuroreceptor binding based on GA methods. The associated basic concepts in tracer kinetic modeling are presented, including commonly-used compartment models and major parameters of interest. Technical details of GA approaches for reversible and irreversible radioligands are described, considering both plasma input and reference tissue input models. Their statistical properties are discussed in view of parametric imaging.

Visionaries or dreamers? The story of infant oral health.

PubMed

Nowak, Arthur J; Quiñonez, Rocio B

2011-01-01

To review the early history of the promotion of oral health for infants and toddlers, the impact of the AAPD guideline on infant oral health care and ways to maximize health outcomes. Review of the literature. Concepts on primary prevention and early intervention were reported as early as the 19th century. Progress to positively impact the oral health of children has been made. Nevertheless, the advice of early scholars and clinicians that oral care and prevention must begin early with the caregivers and the emergence of the infant's first tooth have not been fully embraced by the profession. A historical perspective on oral health care for infants and toddlers has been presented. There is a need to move away from the surgical approach of managing oral disease and embrace the concepts of primary care beginning perinatally while more broadly addressing social determinants of health.

Science and Pseudoscience in Medicine: Evidence-Based vs. Evidence-Biased Medicine.

PubMed

Jakovljević, Miro; Ostojić, Ljerka

2016-12-01

The concept of evidence-based medicine (EBM), as the highest standard of health care, came into existence in 1990s to promote a systematic approach to helping clinicians in their practice to be guided by the best available scientific evidence. However, there has been an increasing number of warning reports that in modern research, misrepresented, false and unuseful findings may be the majority or even the vast majority of published research claims In spite of the huge scientific progress, pseudoscience and associated evidence biased medicine represent a serious threat to the concept of the EBM. Effective education in medicine, proper research motivation, sound systems and creative thinking and culture of scientific dialogue may significantly contribute to better science and evidence-based medicine. The seven key words of good science, research and publishing are: integrity, motivation, capacity, understanding, knowledge, experience, and creativity.

Back to the future: revisiting HIV-1 lethal mutagenesis

PubMed Central

Dapp, Michael J.; Patterson, Steven E.; Mansky, Louis M.

2012-01-01

The concept of eliminating HIV-1 infectivity by elevating the viral mutation rate was first proposed over a decade ago, even though the general concept had been conceived earlier for RNA viruses. Lethal mutagenesis was originally viewed as a novel chemotherapeutic approach for treating HIV-1 infection in which use of a viral mutagen would over multiple rounds of replication lead to the lethal accumulation of mutations, rendering the virus population non infectious – known as the slow mutation accumulation model. There have been limitations in obtaining good efficacy data with drug leads, leaving some doubt into clinical translation. More recent studies of the APOBEC3 proteins as well as new progress in the use of nucleoside analogs for inducing lethal mutagenesis have helped to refocus attention on rapid induction of HIV-1 lethal mutagenesis in a single or limited number of replication cycles leading to a rapid mutation accumulation model. PMID:23195922

Nutritional metabolomics: Progress in addressing complexity in diet and health

PubMed Central

Jones, Dean P.; Park, Youngja; Ziegler, Thomas R.

2013-01-01

Nutritional metabolomics is rapidly maturing to use small molecule chemical profiling to support integration of diet and nutrition in complex biosystems research. These developments are critical to facilitate transition of nutritional sciences from population-based to individual-based criteria for nutritional research, assessment and management. This review addresses progress in making these approaches manageable for nutrition research. Important concept developments concerning the exposome, predictive health and complex pathobiology, serve to emphasize the central role of diet and nutrition in integrated biosystems models of health and disease. Improved analytic tools and databases for targeted and non-targeted metabolic profiling, along with bioinformatics, pathway mapping and computational modeling, are now used for nutrition research on diet, metabolism, microbiome and health associations. These new developments enable metabolome-wide association studies (MWAS) and provide a foundation for nutritional metabolomics, along with genomics, epigenomics and health phenotyping, to support integrated models required for personalized diet and nutrition forecasting. PMID:22540256

Microbial genome mining for accelerated natural products discovery: is a renaissance in the making?

PubMed

Bachmann, Brian O; Van Lanen, Steven G; Baltz, Richard H

2014-02-01

Microbial genome mining is a rapidly developing approach to discover new and novel secondary metabolites for drug discovery. Many advances have been made in the past decade to facilitate genome mining, and these are reviewed in this Special Issue of the Journal of Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology. In this Introductory Review, we discuss the concept of genome mining and why it is important for the revitalization of natural product discovery; what microbes show the most promise for focused genome mining; how microbial genomes can be mined; how genome mining can be leveraged with other technologies; how progress on genome mining can be accelerated; and who should fund future progress in this promising field. We direct interested readers to more focused reviews on the individual topics in this Special Issue for more detailed summaries on the current state-of-the-art.

NASA Propulsion Concept Studies and Risk Reduction Activities for Resource Prospector Lander

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Trinh, Huu P.; Williams, Hunter; Burnside, Chris

2015-01-01

The trade study has led to the selection of propulsion concept with the lowest cost and net lowest risk -Government-owned, flight qualified components -Meet mission requirements although the configuration is not optimized. Risk reduction activities have provided an opportunity -Implement design improvements while development with the early-test approach. -Gain knowledge on the operation and identify operation limit -Data to anchor analytical models for future flight designs; The propulsion system cold flow tests series have provided valuable data for future design. -The pressure surge from the system priming and waterhammer within component operation limits. -Enable to optimize the ullage volume to reduce the propellant tank mass; RS-34 hot fire tests have successfully demonstrated of using the engines for the RP mission -No degradation of performance due to extended storage life of the hardware. -Enable to operate the engine for RP flight mission scenarios, outside of the qualification regime. -Provide extended data for the thermal and GNC designs. Significant progress has been made on NASA propulsion concept design and risk reductions for Resource Prospector lander.

H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV) and the Operations Concept for Extravehicular Activity (EVA) Hardware

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chullen, Cinda

2010-01-01

With the retirement of the Space Shuttle fleet imminent in 2011, a new concept of operations will become reality to meet the transportation challenges of the International Space Station (ISS). The planning associated with the retirement of the Space Shuttle has been underway since the announcement in 2004. Since then, several companies and government entities have had to look for innovative low-cost commercial orbital transportation systems to continue to achieve the objectives of ISS delivery requirements. Several options have been assessed and appear ready to meet the large and demanding delivery requirements of the ISS. Options that have been identified that can facilitate the challenge include the Russian Federal Space Agency's Soyuz and Progress spacecraft, European Space Agency's Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's (JAXA's) H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV) and the Boeing Delta IV Heavy (DIV-H). The newest of these options is the JAXA's HTV. This paper focuses on the HTV, mission architecture and operations concept for Extra-Vehicular Activities (EVA) hardware, the associated launch system, and details of the launch operations approach.

GOClonto: an ontological clustering approach for conceptualizing PubMed abstracts.

PubMed

Zheng, Hai-Tao; Borchert, Charles; Kim, Hong-Gee

2010-02-01

Concurrent with progress in biomedical sciences, an overwhelming of textual knowledge is accumulating in the biomedical literature. PubMed is the most comprehensive database collecting and managing biomedical literature. To help researchers easily understand collections of PubMed abstracts, numerous clustering methods have been proposed to group similar abstracts based on their shared features. However, most of these methods do not explore the semantic relationships among groupings of documents, which could help better illuminate the groupings of PubMed abstracts. To address this issue, we proposed an ontological clustering method called GOClonto for conceptualizing PubMed abstracts. GOClonto uses latent semantic analysis (LSA) and gene ontology (GO) to identify key gene-related concepts and their relationships as well as allocate PubMed abstracts based on these key gene-related concepts. Based on two PubMed abstract collections, the experimental results show that GOClonto is able to identify key gene-related concepts and outperforms the STC (suffix tree clustering) algorithm, the Lingo algorithm, the Fuzzy Ants algorithm, and the clustering based TRS (tolerance rough set) algorithm. Moreover, the two ontologies generated by GOClonto show significant informative conceptual structures.

H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV) and the Operations Concept for Extravehicular Activity (EVA) Hardware

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chullen, Cinda; Blome, Elizabeth; Tetsuya, Sakashita

2011-01-01

With the retirement of the Space Shuttle fleet imminent in 2011, a new operations concept will become reality to meet the transportation challenges of the International Space Station (ISS). The planning associated with the retirement of the Space Shuttle has been underway since the announcement in 2004. Since then, several companies and government entities have had to look for innovative low-cost commercial orbital transportation systems to continue to achieve the objectives of ISS delivery requirements. Several options have been assessed and appear ready to meet the large and demanding delivery requirements of the ISS. Options that have been identified that can facilitate the challenge include the Russian Federal Space Agency's Soyuz and Progress spacecraft, European Space Agency's Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV), and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's (JAXA s) H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV). The newest of these options is the JAXA's HTV. This paper focuses on the HTV, mission architecture and operations concept for Extra-Vehicular Activities (EVA) hardware, the associated launch system, and details of the launch operations approach.

Advanced Design Heat PumpRadiator for EVA Suits

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Izenson, Michael G.; Chen, Weibo; Passow, Christian; Phillips, Scott; Trevino, Luis

2009-01-01

Absorption cooling using a LiCl/water heat pump can enable lightweight and effective thermal control for EVA suits without venting water to the environment. The key components in the system are an absorber/radiator that rejects heat to space and a flexible evaporation cooling garment that absorbs heat from the crew member. This paper describes progress in the design, development, and testing of the absorber/radiator and evaporation cooling garment. New design concepts and fabrication approaches will significantly reduce the mass of the absorber/radiator. We have also identified materials and demonstrated fabrication approaches for production of a flexible evaporation cooling garment. Data from tests of the absorber/radiator s modular components have validated the design models and allowed predictions of the size and weight of a complete system.

Fatigue in Parkinson's disease: concepts and clinical approach.

PubMed

Nassif, Daniel V; Pereira, João S

2018-03-01

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a progressive neurological disorder characterized by a large number of motor and non-motor features. Fatigue is one of the most common and most disabling symptoms among patients with PD, and it has a significant impact on their quality of life. Although fatigue has been recognized for a long time, its pathophysiology remains poorly understood, and there is no evidence to support any therapeutic approach in PD patients. Expert consensus on case definition and diagnostic criteria for PD-related fatigue have been recently published, and although they still need to be adequately validated, they provide a great step forward in the study of fatigue. The goal of this article is to provide relevant information for the identification and management of patients with fatigue. © 2018 Japanese Psychogeriatric Society.

Optimal use of novel agents in chronic lymphocytic leukemia.

PubMed

Smith, Mitchell R; Weiss, Robert F

2018-05-07

Novel agents are changing therapy for patients with CLL, but their optimal use remains unclear. We model the clinical situation in which CLL responds to therapy, but resistant clones, generally carrying del17p, progress and lead to relapse. Sub-clones of varying growth rates and treatment sensitivity affect predicted therapy outcomes. We explore effects of different approaches to starting novel agent in relation to bendamustine-rituximab induction therapy: at initiation of therapy, at the end of chemo-immunotherapy, at molecular relapse, or at clinical detection of relapse. The outcomes differ depending on the underlying clonal architecture, raising the concept that personalized approaches based on clinical evaluation of each patient's clonal architecture might optimize outcomes while minimizing toxicity and cost. Copyright © 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Expanding the Envelope of UAS Certification: What it Takes to Type Certify a UAS for Precision Agricultural Spraying

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Maddalon, J. M.; Hayhurst, K. J.; Neogi, N. A.; Verstynen, H. A.; Clothier, R. A.

2016-01-01

One of the key challenges to the development of a commercial Unmanned Air-craft System (UAS) market is the lack of explicit consideration of UAS in the current regulatory framework. Despite recent progress, additional steps are needed to enable broad UAS types and operational models. This paper discusses recent research that examines how a risk-based approach for safety might change the process and substance of airworthiness requirements for UAS. The project proposed risk-centric airworthiness requirements for a midsize un-manned rotorcraft used for agricultural spraying and also identified factors that may contribute to distinguishing safety risk among different UAS types and operational concepts. Lessons learned regarding how a risk-based approach can expand the envelope of UAS certification are discussed.

Toward precision medicine in primary biliary cholangitis.

PubMed

Carbone, Marco; Ronca, Vincenzo; Bruno, Savino; Invernizzi, Pietro; Mells, George F

2016-08-01

Primary biliary cholangitis is a chronic, cholestatic liver disease characterized by a heterogeneous presentation, symptomatology, disease progression and response to therapy. In contrast, clinical management and treatment of PBC is homogeneous with a 'one size fits all' approach. The evolving research landscape, with the emergence of the -omics field and the availability of large patient cohorts are creating a unique opportunity of translational epidemiology. Furthermore, several novel disease and symptom-modifying agents for PBC are currently in development. The time is therefore ripe for precision medicine in PBC. In this manuscript we describe the concept of precision medicine; review current approaches to risk-stratification in PBC, and speculate how precision medicine in PBC might develop in the near future. Copyright © 2016 Editrice Gastroenterologica Italiana S.r.l. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A process for developing and revising a learning progression on sea level rise using learners' explanations

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McDonald, Robert Christopher

The purpose of this study was to explore the process of developing a learning progression (LP) on constructing explanations about sea level rise. I used a learning progressions theoretical framework informed by the situated cognition learning theory. During this exploration, I explicitly described my decision-making process as I developed and revised a hypothetical learning progression. Correspondingly, my research question was: What is a process by which a hypothetical learning progression on sea level rise is developed into an empirical learning progression using learners' explanations? To answer this question, I used a qualitative descriptive single case study with multiple embedded cases (Yin, 2014) that employed analytic induction (Denzin, 1970) to analyze data collected on middle school learners (grades 6-8). Data sources included written artifacts, classroom observations, and semi-structured interviews. Additionally, I kept a researcher journal to track my thinking about the learning progression throughout the research study. Using analytic induction to analyze collected data, I developed eight analytic concepts: participant explanation structures varied widely, global warming and ice melt cause sea level rise, participants held alternative conceptions about sea level rise, participants learned about thermal expansion as a fundamental aspect of sea level rise, participants learned to incorporate authentic scientific data, participants' mental models of the ocean varied widely, sea ice melt contributes to sea level rise, and participants held vague and alternative conceptions about how pollution impacts the ocean. I started with a hypothetical learning progression, gathered empirical data via various sources (especially semi-structured interviews), revised the hypothetical learning progression in response to those data, and ended with an empirical learning progression comprising six levels of learner thinking. As a result of developing an empirically based LP, I was able to compare two learning progressions on the same topic. By comparing my learning progression with the LP in Breslyn, McGinnis, McDonald, and Hestness (2016), I was able to confirm portions of the two learning progressions and explore different possible pathways for learners to achieve progress towards upper anchors of the LPs through targeted instruction. Implications for future LP research, curriculum, instruction, assessment, and policy related to learning progressions are presented.

Effects of Instruction on Chinese College Students' Use of Thematic Progression in English Essays

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wei, Jing

2017-01-01

Thematic progression (TP) patterns used in English leaner essays provide clues as to how they organize information and develop important concepts in their essays. This quasi-experimental research proved that instruction in TP produced positive effects on Chinese college students' use of linear progressions, constant progressions and new Themes.…

Comparing American and Chinese Students' Learning Progression on Carbon Cycling in Socio-Ecological Systems

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chen, J.; Anderson, C. W.

2015-01-01

Previous studies identified a learning progression on the concept of carbon cycling that was typically followed by American students when they progress from elementary to high school. This study examines the validity of this previously identified learning progression for a different group of learners--Chinese students. The results indicate that…

Stress and headache chronification.

PubMed

Houle, Timothy; Nash, Justin M

2008-01-01

In this special section, the concept of stress has been linked to the chronification of headache and is considered to be one of several likely mechanisms for the progression of an otherwise episodic disorder to a chronic daily phenomenon. The present review discusses the concept of stress and describes the mechanisms through which stress could influence headache progression. The hypothesized mechanisms include stress serving as a unique trigger for individual attacks, as a nociceptive activator, and as a moderator of other mechanisms. Finally, the techniques used in the screening and management of stress are mentioned in the context of employing strategies for the primary, secondary, or tertiary prevention of headache progression.

A Proposal for a Research-based Constructivist Physics-and-Pedagogy Course

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zirbel, Esther

2006-12-01

This poster proposes a research-based science-and-pedagogy course that will combine the learning of fundamental physics concepts with methods of how to teach these concepts. Entitled “Understanding the Cosmos: From Antiquity to the Modern Day,” the course will explore how people learn science concepts through the ages, and from childhood through adulthood. This course will use the historical-constructivist approach to illustrate how our understanding of scientific phenomena advanced as we progressed from simple 2-dimensional thinking (starting with the flat Earth concept) to 3-D thinking (learning about the structure of the solar system) to 4-D thinking (understanding space-time and theories about the Big Bang). While transitioning from Impetus to Aristotelian to Newtonian to Einsteinian thinking, students will learn the essence of scientific thinking and inquiry. The overall goal of this course is to excite students in the process of scientific discovery, help them develop scientific reasoning skills, and provide them with fulfilling experiences of truly understanding science concepts. This will be done by employing active engagement techniques (e.g., peer tutoring, Socratic dialogue, and think/pair/share methods) and by challenging students to articulate their thoughts clearly and persuasively. This course could be of value for anybody wanting to enter the teaching profession or simply for anybody who would like to deepen their science understanding.

Deep remission: a new concept?

PubMed

Colombel, Jean-Frédéric; Louis, Edouard; Peyrin-Biroulet, Laurent; Sandborn, William J; Panaccione, Remo

2012-01-01

Crohn's disease (CD) is a chronic inflammatory disorder characterized by periods of clinical remission alternating with periods of relapse defined by recurrent clinical symptoms. Persistent inflammation is believed to lead to progressive bowel damage over time, which manifests with the development of strictures, fistulae and abscesses. These disease complications frequently lead to a need for surgical resection, which in turn leads to disability. So CD can be characterized as a chronic, progressive, destructive and disabling disease. In rheumatoid arthritis, treatment paradigms have evolved beyond partial symptom control alone toward the induction and maintenance of sustained biological remission, also known as a 'treat to target' strategy, with the goal of improving long-term disease outcomes. In CD, there is currently no accepted, well-defined, comprehensive treatment goal that entails the treatment of both clinical symptoms and biologic inflammation. It is important that such a treatment concept begins to evolve for CD. A treatment strategy that delays or halts the progression of CD to increasing damage and disability is a priority. As a starting point, a working definition of sustained deep remission (that includes long-term biological remission and symptom control) with defined patient outcomes (including no disease progression) has been proposed. The concept of sustained deep remission represents a goal for CD management that may still evolve. It is not clear if the concept also applies to ulcerative colitis. Clinical trials are needed to evaluate whether treatment algorithms that tailor therapy to achieve deep remission in patients with CD can prevent disease progression and disability. Copyright © 2012 S. Karger AG, Basel.

Understanding Immunology via Engineering Design: The Role of Mathematical Prototyping

PubMed Central

Klinke, David J.; Wang, Qing

2012-01-01

A major challenge in immunology is how to translate data into knowledge given the inherent complexity and dynamics of human physiology. Both the physiology and engineering communities have rich histories in applying computational approaches to translate data obtained from complex systems into knowledge of system behavior. However, there are some differences in how disciplines approach problems. By referring to mathematical models as mathematical prototypes, we aim to highlight aspects related to the process (i.e., prototyping) rather than the product (i.e., the model). The objective of this paper is to review how two related engineering concepts, specifically prototyping and “fitness for use,” can be applied to overcome the pressing challenge in translating data into improved knowledge of basic immunology that can be used to improve therapies for disease. These concepts are illustrated using two immunology-related examples. The prototypes presented focus on the beta cell mass at the onset of type 1 diabetes and the dynamics of dendritic cells in the lung. This paper is intended to illustrate some of the nuances associated with applying mathematical modeling to improve understanding of the dynamics of disease progression in humans. PMID:22973412

Tricuspid Regurgitation – Medical Management and Evolving Interventional Concepts

PubMed Central

Beckhoff, Frederik; Alushi, Brunilda; Jung, Christian; Navarese, Eliano; Franz, Marcus; Kretzschmar, Daniel; Wernly, Bernhard; Lichtenauer, Michael; Lauten, Alexander

2018-01-01

Severe tricuspid regurgitation (TR) is a complex condition of the right ventricle (RV) and tricuspid valve apparatus and is frequently associated with symptomatic heart failure and a significant morbidity and mortality. In these patients, left heart pathologies lead to chronic pressure overload of the RV, eventually causing progressive RV dilatation and functional TR. Therefore, TR cannot be considered as isolated heart valve disease pathology but has to be understood and treated as one component of a complex structural RV pathology and is frequently also a marker of an advanced stage of cardiac disease. In these patients, medical therapy restricted to diuretics and heart failure medication is frequently ineffective. Also, severe TR in the setting of advanced heart failure constitutes a high risk for cardiac surgery. Neither one of these treatment options has demonstrated a beneficial effect on long-term prognosis. The recent innovations in transcatheter technology led to efforts to develop interventional approaches to severe TR. Multiple innovative treatment concepts are currently under preclinical and clinical investigation to replace or repair TV function. However, up to date none of these approaches is established and there is still a lack of clinical data to support the efficacy of transcatheter TR treatment. PMID:29892601

Advantages of Structure-Based Drug Design Approaches in Neurological Disorders

PubMed Central

Aarthy, Murali; Panwar, Umesh; Selvaraj, Chandrabose; Singh, Sanjeev Kumar

2017-01-01

Objective: The purpose of the review is to portray the theoretical concept on neurological disorders from research data. Background: The freak changes in chemical response of nerve impulse causes neurological disorders. The research evidence of the effort done in the older history suggests that the biological drug targets and their effective feature with responsive drugs could be valuable in promoting the future development of health statistics structure for improved treatment for curing the nervous disorders. Methods: In this review, we summarized the most iterative theoretical concept of structure based drug design approaches in various neurological disorders to unfathomable understanding of reported information for future drug design and development. Results: On the premise of reported information we analyzed the model of theoretical drug designing process for understanding the mechanism and pathology of the neurological diseases which covers the development of potentially effective inhibitors against the biological drug targets. Finally, it also suggests the management and implementation of the current treatment in improving the human health system behaviors. Conclusion: With the survey of reported information we concluded the development strategies of diagnosis and treatment against neurological diseases which leads to supportive progress in the drug discovery. PMID:28042767

Towards the concept of disease-modifier in post-stroke or vascular cognitive impairment: a consensus report.

PubMed

Bordet, Régis; Ihl, Ralf; Korczyn, Amos D; Lanza, Giuseppe; Jansa, Jelka; Hoerr, Robert; Guekht, Alla

2017-05-24

Vascular cognitive impairment (VCI) is a complex spectrum encompassing post-stroke cognitive impairment (PSCI) and small vessel disease-related cognitive impairment. Despite the growing health, social, and economic burden of VCI, to date, no specific treatment is available, prompting the introduction of the concept of a disease modifier. Within this clinical spectrum, VCI and PSCI remain advancing conditions as neurodegenerative diseases with progression of both vascular and degenerative lesions accounting for cognitive decline. Disease-modifying strategies should integrate both pharmacological and non-pharmacological multimodal approaches, with pleiotropic effects targeting (1) endothelial and brain-blood barrier dysfunction; (2) neuronal death and axonal loss; (3) cerebral plasticity and compensatory mechanisms; and (4) degenerative-related protein misfolding. Moreover, pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatment in PSCI or VCI requires valid study designs clearly stating the definition of basic methodological issues, such as the instruments that should be used to measure eventual changes, the biomarker-based stratification of participants to be investigated, and statistical tests, as well as the inclusion and exclusion criteria that should be applied. A consensus emerged to propose the development of a disease-modifying strategy in VCI and PSCI based on pleiotropic pharmacological and non-pharmacological approaches.

The ecosystem approach to fisheries: management at the dynamic interface between biodiversity conservation and sustainable use.

PubMed

Jennings, Simon; Smith, Anthony D M; Fulton, Elizabeth A; Smith, David C

2014-08-01

The emergence of an ecosystem approach to fisheries (EAF) was characterized by the adoption of objectives for maintaining ecosystem health alongside those for fisheries. The EAF was expected to meet some aspirations for biodiversity conservation, but health was principally linked to sustainable use rather than lower levels of human impact. Consequently, while policies including EAF concepts identified objectives for fisheries management and biodiversity conservation, the wording often reflected unresolved societal and political debates about objectives and gave imprecise guidance on addressing inevitable trade-offs. Despite scientific progress in making trade-offs and consequences explicit, there remain substantial differences in interpretations of acceptable impact, responses to uncertainty and risk, and the use of management measures by groups accountable for fisheries management and biodiversity conservation. Within and among nations and regions, these differences are influenced by the contribution of fisheries, aquaculture, farming, and trade to food security, consumers' options, and other social, economic, and environmental factors. Notwithstanding, mutual understanding of the motivations and norms of fisheries management and biodiversity conservation groups is increasing, and interactions between these groups have likely supported more progress toward meeting their stated objectives than would have otherwise been achievable. © 2014 New York Academy of Sciences.

Applying the collective impact approach to address non-native species: A case study of the Great Lakes Phragmites Collaborative

USGS Publications Warehouse

Braun, H. B.; Kowalski, Kurt P.; Hollins, K.

2016-01-01

To address the invasion of non-native Phragmites in the Great Lakes, researchers at the U.S. Geological Survey—Great Lakes Science Center partnered with the Great Lakes Commission in 2012 to establish the Great Lakes Phragmites Collaborative (GLPC). The GLPC is a regional-scale partnership established to improve collaboration among stakeholders and increase the effectiveness of non-native Phragmites management and research. Rather than forming a traditional partnership with a narrowly defined goal, the GLPC follows the principles of collective impact to engage stakeholders, guide progress, and align resources to address this complex, regional challenge. In this paper, the concept and tenets of collective impact are described, the GLPC is offered as a model for other natural resource-focused collective impact efforts, and steps for establishing collaboratives are presented. Capitalizing on the interactive collective impact approach, the GLPC is moving toward a broadly accepted common agenda around which agencies and individuals will be able to better align their actions and generate measureable progress in the regional campaign to protect healthy, diverse ecosystems from damage caused by non-native Phragmites.

An Overview of Current Approaches Toward the Treatment and Prevention of West Nile Virus Infection.

PubMed

Acharya, Dhiraj; Bai, Fengwei

2016-01-01

The persistence of West Nile virus (WNV) infections throughout the USA since its inception in 1999 and its continuous spread throughout the globe calls for an urgent need of effective treatments and prevention measures. Although the licensing of several WNV vaccines for veterinary use provides a proof of concept, similar efforts on the development of an effective vaccine for humans remain still unsuccessful. Increased understanding of biology and pathogenesis of WNV together with recent technological advancements have raised hope that an effective WNV vaccine may be available in the near future. In addition, rapid progress in the structural and functional characterization of WNV and other flaviviral proteins have provided a solid base for the design and development of several classes of inhibitors as potential WNV therapeutics. Moreover, the therapeutic monoclonal antibodies demonstrate an excellent efficacy against WNV in animal models and represent a promising class of WNV therapeutics. However, there are some challenges as to the design and development of a safe and efficient WNV vaccine or therapeutic. In this chapter, we discuss the current approaches, progress, and challenges toward the development of WNV vaccines, therapeutic antibodies, and antiviral drugs.

The ascent to competence conceptual framework: an outcome of a study of belongingness.

PubMed

Levett-Jones, Tracy; Lathlean, Judith

2009-10-01

This paper presents qualitative findings from a study that explored nursing students' experience of belongingness when undertaking clinical placements. The aim is to locate the professional and practical implications of the research within an Ascent to Competence conceptual framework. The need to belong exerts a powerful influence on cognitive processes, emotional patterns, behavioural responses, health and well-being and failure to satisfy this need can have devastating consequences. The literature suggests that diminished belongingness may impede students' motivation for learning and influence the degree to which they are willing to conform rather than adopt a questioning approach to clinical practice. A mixed methods, cross national, multi-site case study approach was adopted with third-year preregistration nursing students from three universities (two in Australia and one in England) participating; 362 in the quantitative phase and 18 in the qualitative phase. Qualitative findings demonstrated that, although the primary purpose of clinical education is to facilitate students' progress towards the attainment of competence, the realisation of this goal is impacted by a wide range of individual, interpersonal, contextual and organisational factors which can be conceptualised hierarchically. By this structuring it is possible to see how belongingness is a crucial precursor to students' learning and success. The framework demonstrates that students progress to a stage where attainment of competence is possible only after their previous needs for safety and security, belongingness, healthy self-concept and learning have been met. The future of the nursing profession depends upon the development of confident, competent professionals with a healthy self-concept and a commitment to patient-centred care and self-directed learning. This paper demonstrates that the realisation of this goal is strongly influenced by the extent to which students' clinical placement experiences promote and enhance their sense of belonging.

Terrestrial Planet Finder Interferometer: Architecture, Mission Design, and Technology Development

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Henry, Curt

2004-01-01

This slide presentation represents an overview progress report about the system design and technology development of two interferometer concepts studied for the Terrestrial Planet Finder (TPF) project. The two concepts are a structurally-connected interferometer (SCI) intended to fulfill minimum TPF science goals and a formation-flying interferometer (FFI) intended to fulfill full science goals. Described are major trades, analyses, and technology experiments completed. Near term plans are also described. This paper covers progress since August 2003

Behavioral Genetic Toolkits: Toward the Evolutionary Origins of Complex Phenotypes.

PubMed

Rittschof, C C; Robinson, G E

2016-01-01

The discovery of toolkit genes, which are highly conserved genes that consistently regulate the development of similar morphological phenotypes across diverse species, is one of the most well-known observations in the field of evolutionary developmental biology. Surprisingly, this phenomenon is also relevant for a wide array of behavioral phenotypes, despite the fact that these phenotypes are highly complex and regulated by many genes operating in diverse tissues. In this chapter, we review the use of the toolkit concept in the context of behavior, noting the challenges of comparing behaviors and genes across diverse species, but emphasizing the successes in identifying genetic toolkits for behavior; these successes are largely attributable to the creative research approaches fueled by advances in behavioral genomics. We have two general goals: (1) to acknowledge the groundbreaking progress in this field, which offers new approaches to the difficult but exciting challenge of understanding the evolutionary genetic basis of behaviors, some of the most complex phenotypes known, and (2) to provide a theoretical framework that encompasses the scope of behavioral genetic toolkit studies in order to clearly articulate the research questions relevant to the toolkit concept. We emphasize areas for growth and highlight the emerging approaches that are being used to drive the field forward. Behavioral genetic toolkit research has elevated the use of integrative and comparative approaches in the study of behavior, with potentially broad implications for evolutionary biologists and behavioral ecologists alike. © 2016 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Medical treatment of lower urinary tract symptoms/benign prostatic hyperplasia: anything new in 2015.

PubMed

Schauer, Ingrid; Madersbacher, Stephan

2015-01-01

The purpose of this study is to provide an update on recent developments regarding the medical management of male lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS). Silodosin improves storage/voiding symptoms and nocturia and is effective within the framework of a trial without a catheter. 5α-reductase inhibitors (5ARIs) are not associated with male breast cancer development. Alcohol consumption seems to increase the risk of high-grade prostate cancer under 5ARIs. The combination of α-blocker and 5ARIs remains a well established concept for benign prostatic hyperplasia/LUTS patients with an enhanced risk of disease progression. Tadalafil 5 mg/day monotherapy is a valid option particularly for men with LUTS and erectile dysfunction; the combination of Tadalafil 5 mg/day with a 5ARI is an interesting approach. The fixed-dose combination of α-blocker and antimuscarinic provides advantages regarding storage symptom improvement. This approach is currently primarily recommended as an add-on strategy. Mirabegron opens new horizons in the management of male LUTS and has no negative (but also no positive) urodynamic effects. Several encouraging novel approaches are currently in the experimental phase and might enhance our therapeutic armamentarium in the near future. The recent literature refines our knowledge on current therapeutic options and provides further evidence for an individualized, risk-adapted approach for male LUTS mainly depending on symptoms status, comorbidities (i.e. erectile dysfunction) and risk of disease progression.

There Is No Prime for Time: The Missing Link between Form and Concept of Progressive Aspect in L2 Production

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Gerwien, Johannes; Flecken, Monique

2015-01-01

The acquisition of linguistic structures that require "perspective-taking" at the level of "message generation" is challenging. We investigate use of "progressive aspect" in L2 event encoding, using a sentence priming paradigm. We focus on Dutch, in which use of progressive aspect is optional. The progressive consists…

Identification of Threshold Concepts for Biochemistry

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Loertscher, Jennifer; Green, David; Lewis, Jennifer E.; Lin, Sara; Minderhout, Vicky

2014-01-01

Threshold concepts (TCs) are concepts that, when mastered, represent a transformed understanding of a discipline without which the learner cannot progress. We have undertaken a process involving more than 75 faculty members and 50 undergraduate students to identify a working list of TCs for biochemistry. The process of identifying TCs for…

Developing an Action Concept Inventory

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

McGinness, Lachlan P.; Savage, C. M.

2016-01-01

We report on progress towards the development of an Action Concept Inventory (ACI), a test that measures student understanding of action principles in introductory mechanics and optics. The ACI also covers key concepts of many-paths quantum mechanics, from which classical action physics arises. We used a multistage iterative development cycle for…

Progress toward a cosmic dust collection facility on space station

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mackinnon, Ian D. R. (Editor); Carey, William C. (Editor)

1987-01-01

Scientific and programmatic progress toward the development of a cosmic dust collection facility (CDCF) for the proposed space station is documented. Topics addressed include: trajectory sensor concepts; trajectory accuracy and orbital evolution; CDCF pointing direction; development of capture devices; analytical techniques; programmatic progress; flight opportunities; and facility development.

The reconstruction of revocation againts the rights to vote or to be voted in public post for those who are found guilty in corruption case in Indonesia from a progressive legal perspective

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tinambunan, HSR.; Widodo, H.; Ahmad, GA.

2018-01-01

Revocation of the right to vote and elected in public office for corruption convicted by the court is absolutely necessary, but in view of the limitations amongst them, the judge shall state how long the right is revoked, and provide a detailed reason why the relevant person shall be subject to an additional penalty of revocation, the non-regulation of the criteria of corruption convicts as to which additional crimes of impunity may be imposed and elected in public office in law. The removal of the right to vote and to be elected in public post is coherent with the progressive law conception that promotes the integration of law and the values of justice in society. The progressive step by the judge in the revocation of the right to vote and elected to the corruption convicts is absolutely necessary, with the legal pluralism approach to encourage pro justice and progressive law enforcement. Revision to the Criminal Code and Law no. 31 of 1999, especially regarding the criteria of what corruption convicts who can be sentenced to additional revocation of the right to vote and be elected is a necessity.

Reference condition approach to restoration planning

USGS Publications Warehouse

Nestler, J.M.; Theiling, C.H.; Lubinski, S.J.; Smith, D.L.

2010-01-01

Ecosystem restoration planning requires quantitative rigor to evaluate alternatives, define end states, report progress and perform environmental benefits analysis (EBA). Unfortunately, existing planning frameworks are, at best, semi-quantitative. In this paper, we: (1) describe a quantitative restoration planning approach based on a comprehensive, but simple mathematical framework that can be used to effectively apply knowledge and evaluate alternatives, (2) use the approach to derive a simple but precisely defined lexicon based on the reference condition concept and allied terms and (3) illustrate the approach with an example from the Upper Mississippi River System (UMRS) using hydrologic indicators. The approach supports the development of a scaleable restoration strategy that, in theory, can be expanded to ecosystem characteristics such as hydraulics, geomorphology, habitat and biodiversity. We identify three reference condition types, best achievable condition (A BAC), measured magnitude (MMi which can be determined at one or many times and places) and desired future condition (ADFC) that, when used with the mathematical framework, provide a complete system of accounts useful for goal-oriented system-level management and restoration. Published in 2010 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Systems biology perspectives on minimal and simpler cells.

PubMed

Xavier, Joana C; Patil, Kiran Raosaheb; Rocha, Isabel

2014-09-01

The concept of the minimal cell has fascinated scientists for a long time, from both fundamental and applied points of view. This broad concept encompasses extreme reductions of genomes, the last universal common ancestor (LUCA), the creation of semiartificial cells, and the design of protocells and chassis cells. Here we review these different areas of research and identify common and complementary aspects of each one. We focus on systems biology, a discipline that is greatly facilitating the classical top-down and bottom-up approaches toward minimal cells. In addition, we also review the so-called middle-out approach and its contributions to the field with mathematical and computational models. Owing to the advances in genomics technologies, much of the work in this area has been centered on minimal genomes, or rather minimal gene sets, required to sustain life. Nevertheless, a fundamental expansion has been taking place in the last few years wherein the minimal gene set is viewed as a backbone of a more complex system. Complementing genomics, progress is being made in understanding the system-wide properties at the levels of the transcriptome, proteome, and metabolome. Network modeling approaches are enabling the integration of these different omics data sets toward an understanding of the complex molecular pathways connecting genotype to phenotype. We review key concepts central to the mapping and modeling of this complexity, which is at the heart of research on minimal cells. Finally, we discuss the distinction between minimizing the number of cellular components and minimizing cellular complexity, toward an improved understanding and utilization of minimal and simpler cells. Copyright © 2014, American Society for Microbiology. All Rights Reserved.

Sustainable development: concept, value and practice.

PubMed

Barrow, C J

1995-11-01

The author discusses the concept of sustainable development (SD) and explores the effectiveness of implementation strategies. Approaches to implementing sustainable development include 1) "a stocktaking approach" that involves regional and national environmental audits, resource accounting, and national environmental action plans; and 2) "changes in people's attitudes." Each approach reinforces the other. Eden examined the International Chamber of Commerce reactions to the 1987 Brundtland Report and found that business generally favored SD over no-growth environmentalism. SD occurs as a process with a variety of routes that most often involve technology that improves upon traditional methods or protects from the destructive effects of modernization. SD assures that environmental quality is maintained, and economic and social development enhances resources and the environment. SD allows for the best quality of life for people. SD assures that future generations do not have reduced options. SD prevents or avoids major natural catastrophes. The requirements are corrective treatment of root causes of nonsustainability and a shift away from consumption-oriented life styles. Trade-offs must be made. Politicians and planners must use a longer planning perspective. There must be transition to smaller population numbers. Resource conflicts must be resolved. Pollution must be reduced and resources must not be wasted. Local resources should be used for agriculture, industry, and power generation. There should be a transition to a more equitable sharing of resources. The author identifies 12 other requirements. Progress thus far is disappointing and not demonstrably evident.

Has Progress in Mathematics Slowed Down?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Halmos, Paul R.

1990-01-01

Reported is whether and how mathematics has changed during the 75 years of the Mathematical Association of America's (MAA) existence. The progress of mathematics is organized into 9 concepts, 2 explosions, and 11 developments. (KR)

Will genomic selection be a practical method for plant breeding?

PubMed Central

Nakaya, Akihiro; Isobe, Sachiko N.

2012-01-01

Background Genomic selection or genome-wide selection (GS) has been highlighted as a new approach for marker-assisted selection (MAS) in recent years. GS is a form of MAS that selects favourable individuals based on genomic estimated breeding values. Previous studies have suggested the utility of GS, especially for capturing small-effect quantitative trait loci, but GS has not become a popular methodology in the field of plant breeding, possibly because there is insufficient information available on GS for practical use. Scope In this review, GS is discussed from a practical breeding viewpoint. Statistical approaches employed in GS are briefly described, before the recent progress in GS studies is surveyed. GS practices in plant breeding are then reviewed before future prospects are discussed. Conclusions Statistical concepts used in GS are discussed with genetic models and variance decomposition, heritability, breeding value and linear model. Recent progress in GS studies is reviewed with a focus on empirical studies. For the practice of GS in plant breeding, several specific points are discussed including linkage disequilibrium, feature of populations and genotyped markers and breeding scheme. Currently, GS is not perfect, but it is a potent, attractive and valuable approach for plant breeding. This method will be integrated into many practical breeding programmes in the near future with further advances and the maturing of its theory. PMID:22645117

Managing Approach Plate Information Study (MAPLIST): An Information Requirements Analysis of Approach Chart Use

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ricks, Wendell R.; Jonnson, Jon E.; Barry, John S.

1996-01-01

Adequately presenting all necessary information on an approach chart represents a challenge for cartographers. Since many tasks associated with using approach charts are cognitive (e.g., planning the approach and monitoring its progress), and since the characteristic of a successful interface is one that conforms to the users' mental models, understanding pilots' underlying models of approach chart information would greatly assist cartographers. To provide such information, a new methodology was developed for this study that enhances traditional information requirements analyses by combining psychometric scaling techniques with a simulation task to provide quantifiable links between pilots' cognitive representations of approach information and their use of approach information. Results of this study should augment previous information requirements analyses by identifying what information is acquired, when it is acquired, and what presentation concepts might facilitate its efficient use by better matching the pilots' cognitive model of the information. The primary finding in this study indicated that pilots mentally organize approach chart information into ten primary categories: communications, geography, validation, obstructions, navigation, missed approach, final items, other runways, visibility requirement, and navigation aids. These similarity categories were found to underlie the pilots' information acquisitions, other mental models, and higher level cognitive processes that are used to accomplish their approach and landing tasks.

Childhood obesity: Current and novel approaches.

PubMed

Sabin, Matthew A; Kiess, Wieland

2015-06-01

The prevalence of childhood obesity has increased over the last fifty years by approximately 5% per decade, and approximately a quarter of all children are now either overweight or obese. These children have a significantly increased risk of many future health problems including adult obesity, type 2 diabetes and heart disease. Despite this relentless increase, common-sense approaches aimed at prevention and treatment have failed to solve the problem. Current approaches at prevention have faced major challenges with some progress in implementing smaller scale programs and social marketing, but little action on broad public policy approaches which often appears unpalatable to society or individual governments. Meanwhile, treatment approaches have mainly focused on lifestyle change, and novel approaches are urgently needed. Prevention needs to shift to improving maternal health prior to conception, with more research focussed on the impact of early years in programming offspring to future overweight/obesity. Likewise, treatment paradigms need to move from simply thinking that obesity can be solved by readdressing diet and activity levels. Novel approaches are needed which take into consideration the complex physiology which regulates early childhood growth and the development of obesity in susceptible individuals. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Biomimetic remineralization of dentin.

PubMed

Niu, Li-Na; Zhang, Wei; Pashley, David H; Breschi, Lorenzo; Mao, Jing; Chen, Ji-Hua; Tay, Franklin R

2014-01-01

Remineralization of demineralized dentin is important for improving dentin bonding stability and controlling primary and secondary caries. Nevertheless, conventional dentin remineralization strategy is not suitable for remineralizing completely demineralized dentin within hybrid layers created by etch-and-rinse and moderately aggressive self-etch adhesive systems, or the superficial part of a caries-affected dentin lesion left behind after minimally invasive caries removal. Biomimetic remineralization represents a different approach to this problem by attempting to backfill the demineralized dentin collagen with liquid-like amorphous calcium phosphate nanoprecursor particles that are stabilized by biomimetic analogs of noncollagenous proteins. This paper reviewed the changing concepts in calcium phosphate mineralization of fibrillar collagen, including the recently discovered, non-classical particle-based crystallization concept, formation of polymer-induced liquid-precursors (PILP), experimental collagen models for mineralization, and the need for using phosphate-containing biomimetic analogs for biomimetic mineralization of collagen. Published work on the remineralization of resin-dentin bonds and artificial caries-like lesions by various research groups was then reviewed. Finally, the problems and progress associated with the translation of a scientifically sound concept into a clinically applicable approach are discussed. The particle-based biomimetic remineralization strategy based on the PILP process demonstrates great potential in remineralizing faulty hybrid layers or caries-like dentin. Based on this concept, research in the development of more clinically feasible dentin remineralization strategy, such as incorporating poly(anionic) acid-stabilized amorphous calcium phosphate nanoprecursor-containing mesoporous silica nanofillers in dentin adhesives, may provide a promising strategy for increasing of the durability of resin-dentin bonding and remineralizing caries-affected dentin. Copyright © 2013 Academy of Dental Materials. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A Concept–Wide Association Study of Clinical Notes to Discover New Predictors of Kidney Failure

PubMed Central

Betensky, Rebecca A.; Wright, Adam; Curhan, Gary C.; Bates, David W.; Waikar, Sushrut S.

2016-01-01

Background and objectives Identifying predictors of kidney disease progression is critical toward the development of strategies to prevent kidney failure. Clinical notes provide a unique opportunity for big data approaches to identify novel risk factors for disease. Design, setting, participants, & measurements We used natural language processing tools to extract concepts from the preceding year’s clinical notes among patients newly referred to a tertiary care center’s outpatient nephrology clinics and retrospectively evaluated these concepts as predictors for the subsequent development of ESRD using proportional subdistribution hazards (competing risk) regression. The primary outcome was time to ESRD, accounting for a competing risk of death. We identified predictors from univariate and multivariate (adjusting for Tangri linear predictor) models using a 5% threshold for false discovery rate (q value <0.05). We included all patients seen by an adult outpatient nephrologist between January 1, 2004 and June 18, 2014 and excluded patients seen only by transplant nephrology, with preexisting ESRD, with fewer than five clinical notes, with no follow-up, or with no baseline creatinine values. Results Among the 4013 patients selected in the final study cohort, we identified 960 concepts in the unadjusted analysis and 885 concepts in the adjusted analysis. Novel predictors identified included high–dose ascorbic acid (adjusted hazard ratio, 5.48; 95% confidence interval, 2.80 to 10.70; q<0.001) and fast food (adjusted hazard ratio, 4.34; 95% confidence interval, 2.55 to 7.40; q<0.001). Conclusions Novel predictors of human disease may be identified using an unbiased approach to analyze text from the electronic health record. PMID:27927892

Pre-Service Physics Teachers' Understanding of the Relational Structure of Physics Concepts: Organising Subject Contents for Purposes of Teaching

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Koponen, Ismo; Nousiainen, Maija

2013-01-01

Good conceptual understanding of physics is based on understanding what the key concepts are and how they are related. This kind of understanding is especially important for physics teachers in planning how and in what order to introduce concepts in teaching; connections which tie concepts to each other give direction of progress--there is "flux…

Lessons learned and unlearned in periodontal microbiology

PubMed Central

Teles, Ricardo; Teles, Flavia; Frias-Lopez, Jorge; Paster, Bruce; Haffajee, Anne

2013-01-01

Periodontal diseases are initiated by bacterial species living in polymicrobial biofilms at or below the gingival margin and progress largely as a result of the inflammation initiated by specific subgingival species. In the past few decades, efforts to understand the microbiota of periodontal diseases have led to an exponential increase in information about biofilms associated with periodontal health and disease. In fact, the oral microbiota is one of the best characterized microbiomes that colonize the human body. Despite this increased knowledge, one has to ask if our fundamental concepts of the etiology and pathogenesis of periodontal diseases have really changed. In this chapter we will review how our comprehension of the structure and function of the subgingival microbiota evolved over the years in search of lessons learned and unlearned in periodontal microbiology. More specifically, this review focuses on: 1) how the data obtained through molecular techniques has impacted our knowledge of the etiology of periodontal infections; 2) the potential role of viruses in the etiopathogenesis of periodontal diseases; 3) how concepts of microbial ecology have expanded our understanding of host microbial interactions that might lead to periodontal diseases; 4) the role of inflammation in the pathogenesis of periodontal diseases; and 5) the impact of these evolving concepts on treatment and preventive approaches to periodontal infections. We will conclude by reviewing how novel systems biology approaches promise to unravel new details of the pathogenesis of periodontal diseases and, hopefully, lead to a better understanding of periodontal disease mechanisms. PMID:23574465

"The angel of the house" in the realm of ART: feminist approach to oocyte and spare embryo donation for research.

PubMed

Alichniewicz, Anna; Michalowska, Monika

2014-02-01

The spectacular progress in assisted reproduction technology that has been witnessed for the past thirty years resulted in emerging new ethical dilemmas as well as the revision of some perennial ones. The paper aims at a feminist approach to oocyte and spare embryo donation for research. First, referring to different concepts of autonomy and informed consent, we discuss whether the decision to donate oocyte/embryo can truly be an autonomous choice of a female patient. Secondly, we argue the commonly adopted language of gift is misleading and that calling for altruism could put female patients at risk of exploitation. Finally, we point out that the presence of gender stereotypes in the procreative area casts doubt whether even a more robust notion of informed consent manages to overcome this risk.

Witnessing eigenstates for quantum simulation of Hamiltonian spectra

PubMed Central

Santagati, Raffaele; Wang, Jianwei; Gentile, Antonio A.; Paesani, Stefano; Wiebe, Nathan; McClean, Jarrod R.; Morley-Short, Sam; Shadbolt, Peter J.; Bonneau, Damien; Silverstone, Joshua W.; Tew, David P.; Zhou, Xiaoqi; O’Brien, Jeremy L.; Thompson, Mark G.

2018-01-01

The efficient calculation of Hamiltonian spectra, a problem often intractable on classical machines, can find application in many fields, from physics to chemistry. We introduce the concept of an “eigenstate witness” and, through it, provide a new quantum approach that combines variational methods and phase estimation to approximate eigenvalues for both ground and excited states. This protocol is experimentally verified on a programmable silicon quantum photonic chip, a mass-manufacturable platform, which embeds entangled state generation, arbitrary controlled unitary operations, and projective measurements. Both ground and excited states are experimentally found with fidelities >99%, and their eigenvalues are estimated with 32 bits of precision. We also investigate and discuss the scalability of the approach and study its performance through numerical simulations of more complex Hamiltonians. This result shows promising progress toward quantum chemistry on quantum computers. PMID:29387796

Aging tumour cells to cure cancer: "pro-senescence" therapy for cancer.

PubMed

Calcinotto, Arianna; Alimonti, Andrea

2017-01-19

Robust scientific evidence demonstrates that senes-cence induction in cancer works as a potent weapon to eradicate tumorigenesis. Therapies that enhance senescence not only promote a stable cell growth arrest but also work as a strong stimulus for the acti-vation of the antitumour immune response. However, recent advances suggest that if senescent tumour cells are not cleared from the tumours, they may promote tumour progression and metastasis. In this article, we focus on concepts that are relevant to a pro-senescence therapeutic approach, including caveats, and we propose therapeutic strategies that involve the combined use of pro-senescence therapies with im-munotherapies to promote the clearance of senescent tumour cells. In our opinion, these approaches may avoid potential negative effects of pro-senescence therapies and may also enhance the efficacy of cur-rently available immunotherapies.

Music. Arkansas Public School Course Content Guide.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Arkansas State Dept. of Education, Little Rock.

This document is a guide that maps student progress in a seventh- or eighth-grade general music class. Growth is based on music concepts learned through singing, listening, playing, and reading. Concepts to be learned include melody, rhythm, harmony, form/style, and expressive qualities. Skills to be developed around each concept fall into three…

Social Studies Concepts: An Analysis of the NAEP and States' Standards

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lord, Kathleen M.; Noel, Andrea M.; Slevin, Bridgette

2016-01-01

This study examined the 4th-grade National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) assessments (history, geography, and civics) and 3rd- and 4th-grade social studies standards from nine randomly selected states and organized the content around three global concepts (conflict, movement, discovery) and six specific concepts (war, rebellion,…

Programming for Effective Concept Learning: Where Should the Branches Go and Why?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Driscoll, Marcy P.; And Others

The two studies detailed in this paper investigated the effects of adaptive sequencing of examples and adaptive feedback on concept learning using computer-based instruction. In the first study, two groups of undergraduate students progressed through a set of five behavior management concepts presented in the rational set generator framework.…

Postpartum smoking relapse and becoming a mother.

PubMed

Gaffney, Kathleen F

2006-01-01

To propose an innovative, theoretically-derived conceptual framework for studies of postpartum smoking relapse including concepts of smoking abstinence self-efficacy and becoming a mother. Presentation of an existing research paradigm followed by evidence from intervention research and studies of factors associated with postpartum smoking behavior, leading to a new approach to postpartum smoking relapse. Effectiveness of current interventions to prevent relapse is limited. Variables associated with becoming a mother are missing from studies of postpartum smoking relapse. Context-specific variables that influence a woman's progression through the stages of becoming a mother might include protective or risk factors that should be incorporated into the design of postpartum smoking relapse studies.

Analysis of World Economic Variables Using Multidimensional Scaling

PubMed Central

Machado, J.A. Tenreiro; Mata, Maria Eugénia

2015-01-01

Waves of globalization reflect the historical technical progress and modern economic growth. The dynamics of this process are here approached using the multidimensional scaling (MDS) methodology to analyze the evolution of GDP per capita, international trade openness, life expectancy, and education tertiary enrollment in 14 countries. MDS provides the appropriate theoretical concepts and the exact mathematical tools to describe the joint evolution of these indicators of economic growth, globalization, welfare and human development of the world economy from 1977 up to 2012. The polarization dance of countries enlightens the convergence paths, potential warfare and present-day rivalries in the global geopolitical scene. PMID:25811177

Ethical advertising in dentistry.

PubMed

Graskemper, Joseph P

2009-01-01

Advertising in dentistry has steadily increased since the 1970s to become a leading choice of many dentists to promote their practices. The manner in which advertising progresses within the profession affects all dentists and how patients perceive dentistry as a profession. This paper presents ethical concepts that should be followed when dentists are pursuing practice promotion through advertising. It also raises questions that, hopefully, will increase attention and discussion on dental advertising. The paper concludes that ethical advertising is easily achieved by promoting patient education while not placing the dentist's self-interests ahead of the patient's. With this approach, dentistry may continue to be one of the most trusted professions.

Using expression genetics to study the neurobiology of ethanol and alcoholism.

PubMed

Farris, Sean P; Wolen, Aaron R; Miles, Michael F

2010-01-01

Recent simultaneous progress in human and animal model genetics and the advent of microarray whole genome expression profiling have produced prodigious data sets on genetic loci, potential candidate genes, and differential gene expression related to alcoholism and ethanol behaviors. Validated target genes or gene networks functioning in alcoholism are still of meager proportions. Genetical genomics, which combines genetic analysis of both traditional phenotypes and whole genome expression data, offers a potential methodology for characterizing brain gene networks functioning in alcoholism. This chapter will describe concepts, approaches, and recent findings in the field of genetical genomics as it applies to alcohol research. Copyright 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Progress Check Module; Basic Electricity and Electronics Individualized Learning System. Progress Check Booklet.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bureau of Naval Personnel, Washington, DC.

The Progress Check Booklet is designed to be used by the student working in the programed course to determine if he has mastered the concepts in the course booklets on: electrical current; voltage; resistance; measuring current and voltage in series circuits; relationships of current, voltage, and resistance; parellel circuits; combination…

Measuring Progressions: Assessment Structures Underlying a Learning Progression

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wilson, Mark

2009-01-01

This article describes some of the underlying conceptualizations that have gone into the work of the BEAR Center in the development of learning progressions. The core of all of these developments has been the construct map, which is the first building block in the BEAR Assessment System (BAS). After introducing the concept of a learning…

How Does Student Understanding of a Concept Change Throughout a Unit of Instruction? Support Toward the Theory of Learning Progressions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Dyer, Brian Jay

This study documented the changes in understanding a class of eighth grade high school-level biology students experienced through a biology unit introducing genetics. Learning profiles for 55 students were created using concept maps and interviews as qualitative and quantitative instruments. The study provides additional support to the theory of learning progressions called for by experts in the field. The students' learning profiles were assessed to determine the alignment with a researcher-developed learning profile. The researcher-developed learning profile incorporated the learning progressions published in the Next Generation Science Standards, as well as current research in learning progressions for 5-10th grade students studying genetics. Students were found to obtain understanding of the content in a manner that was nonlinear, even circuitous. This opposes the prevailing interpretation of learning progressions, that knowledge is ascertained in escalating levels of complexity. Learning progressions have implications in teaching sequence, assessment, education research, and policy. Tracking student understanding of other populations of students would augment the body of research and enhance generalizability.

High school chemistry students' learning of the elements, structure, and periodicity of the periodic table: Contributions of inquiry-based activities and exemplary graphics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Roddy, Knight Phares, Jr.

The main research question of this study was: How do selected high school chemistry students' understandings of the elements, structure, and periodicity of the Periodic Table change as they participate in a unit study consisting of inquiry-based activities emphasizing construction of innovative science graphics? The research question was answered using a multiple case study/mixed model design which employed elements of both qualitative and quantitative methodologies during data collection and analyses. The unit study was conducted over a six-week period with 11th -grade students enrolled in a chemistry class. A purposive sample of six students from the class was selected to participate in interviews and concept map coconstruction (Wandersee & Abrams, 1993) periodically across the study. The progress of the selected students of the case study was compared to the progress of the class as a whole. The students of the case study were also compared to a group of high school chemistry students at a comparative school. The results show that the students from both schools left traditional instruction on the periodic table (lecture and textbook activities) with a very limited understanding of the topic. It also revealed that the inquiry-based, visual approach of the unit study helped students make significant conceptual progress in their understanding of the periodic table. The pictorial periodic table (which features photographs of the elements), used in conjunction with the graphic technique of data mapping, enhanced students understanding of the patterns of the physical properties of the elements on the periodic table. The graphic technique of compound mapping helped students learn reactivity patterns between types and groups of elements on the periodic table. The recreation of the periodic table with element cards created from the pictorial periodic table helped students progress in their understanding of periodicity and its key concepts. The Periodic Table Literacy Rubric (PTLR) proved to be a valuable tool for assessing students' conceptual progress, and helped to identify a critical juncture in the learning of periodicity. In addition, the PTLR rubric's historical-conceptual design demonstrates how the history of science can be used to inform today's science teaching.

Operationalisation of the construct of access to dental care: a position paper and proposed conceptual definitions.

PubMed

Harris, R V

2013-06-01

'Access' is a term readily used in a political and policy context, but one which has not leant itself to measurement of progress towards policy goals or comparisons between health systems. Like 'quality', 'access' is a multi-dimensional construct, but currently often remains a vague and abstract concept which is difficult to translate into something specific, concrete and therefore measureable. The paper describes previous work and identifies a need for a greater consensus and conceptual clarity in the selection of metrics for dental access. The construct of dental access is described as involving the concepts of 1: opportunity for access; 2, realised access (utilisation); 3, equity and 4, outcomes. Proposed conceptual definitions are given and a case made for measuring 'initial utilisation' separately from 'continued utilisation', reflecting modern approaches which distinguish 'entry access' (gaining entry to the dental care system), from the process of gaining access to higher levels of care. Using a distinction between 'entry access' and 'effective access' allows a choice of whether to restrict measurement to mainly supply side considerations, or alternatively to extend the measurement to include whether there is equity in the proportion of patients who are able obtain effective needed interventions. A development of conceptual definitions of dental access could facilitate measurement of progress towards policy goals and operationalisation of the construct.

How Should Energy Be Defined Throughout Schooling?

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bächtold, Manuel

2017-02-01

The question of how to teach energy has been renewed by recent studies focusing on the learning and teaching progressions for this concept. In this context, one question has been, for the most part, overlooked: how should energy be defined throughout schooling? This paper addresses this question in three steps. We first identify and discuss two main approaches in physics concerning the definition of energy, one claiming there is no satisfactory definition and taking conservation as a fundamental property, and the other based on Rankine's definition of energy as the capacity of a system to produce changes. We then present a study concerning how energy is actually defined throughout schooling in the case of France by analyzing national programs, physics textbooks, and the answers of teachers to a questionnaire. This study brings to light a consistency problem in the way energy is defined across school years: in primary school, an adapted version of Rankine's definition is introduced and conservation is ignored; in high school, conservation is introduced and Rankine's definition is ignored. Finally, we address this consistency problem by discussing possible teaching progressions. We argue in favor of the use of Rankine's definition throughout schooling: at primary school, it is a possible substitute to students' erroneous conceptions; at secondary school, it might help students become aware of the unifying role of energy and thereby overcome the compartmentalization problem.

Advanced technology commercial fuselage structure

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ilcewicz, L. B.; Smith, P. J.; Walker, T. H.; Johnson, R. W.

1991-01-01

Boeing's program for Advanced Technology Composite Aircraft Structure (ATCAS) has focused on the manufacturing and performance issues associated with a wide body commercial transport fuselage. The primary goal of ATCAS is to demonstrate cost and weight savings over a 1995 aluminum benchmark. A 31 foot section of fuselage directly behind the wing to body intersection was selected for study purposes. This paper summarizes ATCAS contract plans and review progress to date. The six year ATCAS program will study technical issues for crown, side, and keel areas of the fuselage. All structural details in these areas will be included in design studies that incorporate a design build team (DBT) approach. Manufacturing technologies will be developed for concepts deemed by the DBT to have the greatest potential for cost and weight savings. Assembly issues for large, stiff, quadrant panels will receive special attention. Supporting technologies and mechanical tests will concentrate on the major issues identified for fuselage. These include damage tolerance, pressure containment, splices, load redistribution, post-buckled structure, and durability/life. Progress to date includes DBT selection of baseline fuselage concepts; cost and weight comparisons for crown panel designs; initial panel fabrication for manufacturing and structural mechanics research; and toughened material studies related to keel panels. Initial ATCAS studies have shown that NASA's Advanced Composite Technology program goals for cost and weight savings are attainable for composite fuselage.

Progress on DCLL Blanket Concept

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Wong, Clement; Abdou, M.; Katoh, Yutai

2013-09-01

Under the US Fusion Nuclear Science and Technology Development program, we have selected the Dual Coolant Lead Lithium concept (DCLL) as a reference blanket, which has the potential to be a high performance DEMO blanket design with a projected thermal efficiency of >40%. Reduced activation ferritic/martensitic (RAF/M) steel is used as the structural material. The self-cooled breeder PbLi is circulated for power conversion and for tritium breeding. A SiC-based flow channel insert (FCI) is used as a means for magnetohydrodynamic pressure drop reduction from the circulating liquid PbLi and as a thermal insulator to separate the high-temperature PbLi (~700°C) frommore » the helium-cooled RAF/M steel structure. We are making progress on related R&D needs to address critical Fusion Nuclear Science and Facility (FNSF) and DEMO blanket development issues. When performing the function as the Interface Coordinator for the DCLL blanket concept, we had been developing the mechanical design and performing neutronics, structural and thermal hydraulics analyses of the DCLL TBM module. We had estimated the necessary ancillary equipment that will be needed at the ITER site and a detailed safety impact report has been prepared. This provided additional understanding of the DCLL blanket concept in preparation for the FNSF and DEMO. This paper will be a summary report on the progress of the DCLL TBM design and R&Ds for the DCLL blanket concept.« less

Progress in video immersion using Panospheric imaging

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bogner, Stephen L.; Southwell, David T.; Penzes, Steven G.; Brosinsky, Chris A.; Anderson, Ron; Hanna, Doug M.

1998-09-01

Having demonstrated significant technical and marketplace advantages over other modalities for video immersion, PanosphericTM Imaging (PI) continues to evolve rapidly. This paper reports on progress achieved since AeroSense 97. The first practical field deployment of the technology occurred in June-August 1997 during the NASA-CMU 'Atacama Desert Trek' activity, where the Nomad mobile robot was teleoperated via immersive PanosphericTM imagery from a distance of several thousand kilometers. Research using teleoperated vehicles at DRES has also verified the exceptional utility of the PI technology for achieving high levels of situational awareness, operator confidence, and mission effectiveness. Important performance enhancements have been achieved with the completion of the 4th Generation PI DSP-based array processor system. The system is now able to provide dynamic full video-rate generation of spatial and computational transformations, resulting in a programmable and fully interactive immersive video telepresence. A new multi- CCD camera architecture has been created to exploit the bandwidth of this processor, yielding a well-matched PI system with greatly improved resolution. While the initial commercial application for this technology is expected to be video tele- conferencing, it also appears to have excellent potential for application in the 'Immersive Cockpit' concept. Additional progress is reported in the areas of Long Wave Infrared PI Imaging, Stereo PI concepts, PI based Video-Servoing concepts, PI based Video Navigation concepts, and Foveation concepts (to merge localized high-resolution views with immersive views).

Error, contradiction and reversal in science and medicine.

PubMed

Coccheri, Sergio

2017-06-01

Error and contradictions are not "per se" detrimental in science and medicine. Going back to the history of philosophy, Sir Francis Bacon stated that "truth emerges more readily from error than from confusion", and recently Popper introduced the concept of an approximate temporary truth that constitutes the engine of scientific progress. In biomedical research and in clinical practice we assisted during the last decades to many overturnings or reversals of concepts and practices. This phenomenon may discourage patients from accepting ordinary medical care and may favour the choice of alternative medicine. The media often enhance the disappointment for these discrepancies. In this note I recommend to transfer to patients the concept of a confirmed and dependable knowledge at the present time. However, physicians should tolerate uncertainty and accept the idea that medical concepts and applications are subjected to continuous progression, change and displacement. Copyright © 2017 European Federation of Internal Medicine. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Technical Progress of the New Worlds Observer Mission

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lo, Amy; Noecker, C.; Cash, W.; NWO Study Team

2009-01-01

We report on the technical progress of the New Worlds Observer (NWO) mission concept. NWO is a two spacecraft mission that is capable of detecting and characterizing extra-solar, terrestrial planets and planetary systems. NWO consists of an external starshade and an UV-optical space telescope, flying in tandem. The starshade is a petal-shaped, opaque screen that creates an extremely dark shadow large enough to shade the telescope aperture from the target star. The NWO team has been addressing the top technology challenges of the concept, and report here our progress. We will present the current mission configuration best suited to address Terrestrial Planet Finding requirements, and highlight the technological breakthroughs that we have achieved this year. In particular, we will report on progress made in precision deployables for the large starshade, and the trajectory & alignment control system for NWO. We will also briefly highlight advances in understanding the starshade optical performance.

Tracing the foundations of a conceptual framework for a patient safety ontology.

PubMed

Runciman, William B; Baker, G Ross; Michel, Philippe; Dovey, Susan; Lilford, Richard J; Jensen, Natasja; Flin, Rhona; Weeks, William B; Lewalle, Pierre; Larizgoitia, Itziar; Bates, David

2010-12-01

In work for the World Alliance for Patient Safety on research methods and measures and on defining key concepts for an International Patient Safety Classification (ICPS), it became apparent that there was a need to try to understand how the meaning of patient safety and underlying concepts relate to the existing safety and quality frameworks commonly used in healthcare. To unfold the concept of patient safety and how it relates to safety and quality frameworks commonly used in healthcare and to trace the evolution of the ICPS framework as a basis of the electronic capture of the component elements of patient safety. The ICPS conceptual framework for patient safety has its origins in existing frameworks and an international consultation process. Although its 10 classes and their semantic relationships may be used as a reference model for different disciplines, it must remain dynamic in the ever-changing world of healthcare. By expanding the ICPS by examining data from all available sources, and ensuring rigorous compliance with the latest principles of informatics, a deeper interdisciplinary approach will progressively be developed to address the complex, refractory problem of reducing healthcare-associated harm.

The helical ventricular myocardial band of Torrent-Guasp.

PubMed

Kocica, Mladen J; Corno, Antonio F; Lackovic, Vesna; Kanjuh, Vladimir I

2007-01-01

We live in an era of substantial progress in understanding myocardial structure and function at genetic, molecular, and microscopic levels. Yet, ventricular myocardium has proven remarkably resistant to macroscopic analyses of functional anatomy. Pronounced and practically indefinite global and local structural anisotropy of its fibers and other ventricular wall constituents produces electrical and mechanical properties that are nonlinear, anisotropic, time varying, and spatially inhomogeneous. The helical ventricular myocardial band of Torrent-Guasp is a revolutionary new concept in understanding global, 3-dimensional, functional architecture of the ventricular myocardium. This concept defines the principal, cumulative vectors, integrating the tissue architecture (ie, form) and net forces developed (ie, function) within the ventricular mass. The primary purpose of this review is to emphasize the importance of this concept, in the light of collaborative efforts to establish an integrative approach, defining ventricular form and function by linking across multiple scales of biological organization, as explained in the ongoing Physiome project. Because one of the most important scientific missions in this century is integration of basic research with clinical medicine, we believe that this knowledge is not of merely academic importance, but is also the essential prerequisite in clinical evaluation and treatment of different heart diseases.

Pathophysiology and Mechanisms of Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease.

PubMed

Haas, Joel T; Francque, Sven; Staels, Bart

2016-01-01

Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) encompasses a spectrum of liver disorders characterized by abnormal hepatic fat accumulation, inflammation, and hepatocyte dysfunction. Importantly, it is also closely linked to obesity and the metabolic syndrome. NAFLD predisposes susceptible individuals to cirrhosis, hepatocellular carcinoma, and cardiovascular disease. Although the precise signals remain poorly understood, NAFLD pathogenesis likely involves actions of the different hepatic cell types and multiple extrahepatic signals. The complexity of this disease has been a major impediment to the development of appropriate metrics of its progression and effective therapies. Recent clinical data place increasing importance on identifying fibrosis, as it is a strong indicator of hepatic disease-related mortality. Preclinical modeling of the fibrotic process remains challenging, particularly in the contexts of obesity and the metabolic syndrome. Future studies are needed to define the molecular pathways determining the natural progression of NAFLD, including key determinants of fibrosis and disease-related outcomes. This review covers the evolving concepts of NAFLD from both human and animal studies. We discuss recent clinical and diagnostic methods assessing NAFLD diagnosis, progression, and outcomes; compare the features of genetic and dietary animal models of NAFLD; and highlight pharmacological approaches for disease treatment.

Castration-resistant prostate cancer: targeted therapies.

PubMed

Leo, S; Accettura, C; Lorusso, V

2011-01-01

Castration-resistant prostate cancer (CRPC) refers to patients who no longer respond to surgical or medical castration. Standard treatment options are limited. To review the concepts and rationale behind targeted agents currently in late-stage clinical testing for patients with CRPC. Novel targeted therapies in clinical trials were identified from registries. The Medline database was searched for all relevant reports published from 1996 to October 2009. Bibliographies of the retrieved articles and major international meeting abstracts were hand-searched to identify additional studies. Advances in our understanding of the molecular mechanisms underlying prostate cancer (PCa) progression have translated into a variety of treatment approaches. Agents targeting androgen receptor activation and local steroidogenesis, angiogenesis, immunotherapy, apoptosis, chaperone proteins, the insulin-like growth factor (IGF) pathway, RANK ligand, endothelin receptors, and the Src family kinases are entering or have recently completed accrual to phase III trials for patients with CRPC. There has been an increase in the understanding of the mechanisms of progression of CRPC. A number of new agents targeting mechanisms of PCa progression with early promising results are in clinical trials and have the potential to provide novel treatment options for CRPC in the near future. Copyright © 2011 S. Karger AG, Basel.

Progress in pharmacogenetics: consortiums and new strategies.

PubMed

Maroñas, Olalla; Latorre, Ana; Dopazo, Joaquín; Pirmohamed, Munir; Rodríguez-Antona, Cristina; Siest, Gérard; Carracedo, Ángel; LLerena, Adrián

2016-03-01

Pharmacogenetics (PGx), as a field dedicated to achieving the goal of personalized medicine (PM), is devoted to the study of genes involved in inter-individual response to drugs. Due to its nature, PGx requires access to large samples; therefore, in order to progress, the formation of collaborative consortia seems to be crucial. Some examples of this collective effort are the European Society of Pharmacogenomics and personalized Therapy and the Ibero-American network of Pharmacogenetics. As an emerging field, one of the major challenges that PGx faces is translating their discoveries from research bench to bedside. The development of genomic high-throughput technologies is generating a revolution and offers the possibility of producing vast amounts of genome-wide single nucleotide polymorphisms for each patient. Moreover, there is a need of identifying and replicating associations of new biomarkers, and, in addition, a greater effort must be invested in developing regulatory organizations to accomplish a correct standardization. In this review, we outline the current progress in PGx using examples to highlight both the importance of polymorphisms and the research strategies for their detection. These concepts need to be applied together with a proper dissemination of knowledge to improve clinician and patient understanding, in a multidisciplinary team-based approach.

Data Sharing to Improve Close Approach Monitoring and Safety of Flight

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chan, Joseph; DalBello, Richard; Hope, Dean; Wauthier, Pascal; Douglas, Tim; Inghram, Travis

2009-03-01

Individual satellite operators have done a good job of developing the internal protocols and procedures to ensure the safe operation of their fleets. However, data sharing among operators for close approach monitoring is conducted in an ad-hoc manner during relocations, and there is currently no standardized agreement among operators on the content, format, and distribution protocol for data sharing. Crowding in geostationary orbit, participation by new commercial actors, government interest in satellite constellations, and highly maneuverable spacecraft all suggest that satellite operators will need to begin a dialogue on standard communication protocols and procedure to improve situation awareness. We will give an overview of the current best practices among different operators for close approach monitoring and discuss the concept of an active data center to improve data sharing, conjunction monitoring, and avoidance among satellite operators. We will also report on the progress and lessons learned from a Data Center prototype conducted by several operators over a one year period.

Seeing the Solar System through Two Perspectives. Part 2 of a Series Focusing on Learning Progressions

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Tretter, Thomas R.; Thornburgh, William R.; Duckwall, Mark

2016-01-01

Supporting elementary student understandings of ideas related to Earth's Place in the Universe (ESS1) can be challenging, especially given the large time and distance scales involved with many of the concepts. However, with effective use of crosscutting concepts and science and engineering practices, important concepts within this content domain…

Discourse, Complexity, Normativity: Tracing the Elaboration of Foucault's Materialist Concept of Discourse

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Olssen, Mark

2014-01-01

In this article, I want to suggest that it is through the elaboration of the concept of discourse that the differences between Foucault and thinkers like Habermas, Hegel and Marx can best be understood. Foucault progressively develops a conception of discourse as a purely historical category that resists all reference to transcendental principles…

Inseparability of science history and discovery

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Herndon, J. M.

2010-04-01

Science is very much a logical progression through time. Progressing along a logical path of discovery is rather like following a path through the wilderness. Occasionally the path splits, presenting a choice; the correct logical interpretation leads to further progress, the wrong choice leads to confusion. By considering deeply the relevant science history, one might begin to recognize past faltering in the logical progression of observations and ideas and, perhaps then, to discover new, more precise understanding. The following specific examples of science faltering are described from a historical perspective: (1) Composition of the Earth's inner core; (2) Giant planet internal energy production; (3) Physical impossibility of Earth-core convection and Earth-mantle convection, and; (4) Thermonuclear ignition of stars. For each example, a revised logical progression is described, leading, respectively, to: (1) Understanding the endo-Earth's composition; (2) The concept of nuclear georeactor origin of geo- and planetary magnetic fields; (3) The invalidation and replacement of plate tectonics; and, (4) Understanding the basis for the observed distribution of luminous stars in galaxies. These revised logical progressions clearly show the inseparability of science history and discovery. A different and more fundamental approach to making scientific discoveries than the frequently discussed variants of the scientific method is this: An individual ponders and through tedious efforts arranges seemingly unrelated observations into a logical sequence in the mind so that causal relationships become evident and new understanding emerges, showing the path for new observations, for new experiments, for new theoretical considerations, and for new discoveries. Science history is rich in "seemingly unrelated observations" just waiting to be logically and causally related to reveal new discoveries.

The Emergence of a Learning Progression in Middle School Chemistry

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Johnson, Philip; Tymms, Peter

2011-01-01

Previously, a small scale, interview-based, 3-year longitudinal study (ages 11-14) in one school had suggested a learning progression related to the concept of a substance. This article presents the results of a large-scale, cross-sectional study which used Rasch modeling to test the hypothesis of the learning progression. Data were collected from…

Developing a Learning Progression for Three-Dimensional Learning of the Patterns of Evolution

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wyner, Yael; Doherty, Jennifer H.

2017-01-01

This paper examines how students make progress toward three-dimensional (3D) understanding of the patterns of evolution. Specifically, it proposes a learning progression that explains how scientific practices, crosscutting concepts, and disciplinary core ideas come together in naming and grouping, length of change over time, and the role of common…

Results and Implications of a 12-Year Longitudinal Study of Science Concept Learning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Novak, Joseph D.

2005-03-01

This paper describes the methods and outcomes of a 12-year longitudinal study into the effects of an early intervention program, while reflecting back on changes that have occurred in approaches to research, learning and instruction since the preliminary inception stages of the study in the mid 1960s. We began the study to challenge the prevailing consensus at the time that primary school children were either preoperational or concrete operational in their cognitive development and they could not learn abstract concepts. Our early research, based on Ausubelian theory, suggested otherwise. The paper describes the development and implementation of a Grade 1-2 audio tutorial science instructional sequence, and the subsequent tracing over 12 years, of the children's conceptual understandings in science compared to a matched control group. During the study the concept map was developed as a new tool to trace children's conceptual development. We found that students in the instruction group far outperformed their non-instructed counterparts, and this difference increased as they progressed through middle and high school. The data clearly support the earlier introduction of science instruction on basic science concepts, such as the particulate nature of matter, energy and energy transformations. The data suggest that national curriculum standards for science grossly underestimate the learning capabilities of primary-grade children. The study has helped to lay a foundation for guided instruction using computers and concept mapping that may help both teachers and students become more proficient in understanding science.

Progression In The Concepts Of Cognitive Sense Wireless Networks - An Analysis Report

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ajay, V. P.; Nesasudha, M.

2017-10-01

This paper illustrates the conception of networks, their primary goals (from day one to the present), the changes it had to endure to get to its present form and the developments which are in progress and in store for further standardization. The analysis gives more importance to the specifics of the Cognitive Radio Networks, which makes use of the dynamic spectrum access procedures, framed for better utilization of our available spectrum resources. The main conceptual difficulties and current research trends are also discussed in terms of real time implementation.

Cryotank Skin/Stringer Bondline Analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nguyen, Bao

1999-01-01

The need for light weight structure for advanced launch systems have presented great challenges and led to the usage of composites materials in a variety of structural assemblies where joining of two or more components is imperative. Although joints can be mechanically bolted, adhesive bonding has always been a very desirable method for joining the composite components, particularly for the cryotank systems, to achieve maximum structural efficiency. This paper presents the analytical approach resulted from the conceptual development of the DC-Y composite cryotank, conducted under the NASA/Boeing NRA 8-12 Partnership, to support the continued progress of SSTO (Single-Stage-To-Orbit) concepts. One of the critical areas of design was identified as the bonded interface between the skin (tank wall) and stringer. The approach to analyze this critical area will be illustrated through the steps which were used to evaluate the structural integrity of the bondline. Detailed finite element models were developed and numerous coupon test data were also gathered as part of the approach. Future plan is to incorporate this approach as a building block in analyzing bondline for the cryotank systems of RLVs (Reusable Launch Vehicles).

[From the cell theory to the neuron theory].

PubMed

Tixier-Vidal, Andrée

2010-01-01

The relationship between the cell theory formulated by Schwann (1839) and by Virchow (1855) on the one hand, and, on the other hand, the neuron theory, as formulated by Waldeyer (1891) and by Cajal (1906), are discussed from a historical point of view. Both of them are the result of technical and conceptuel progress. Both of them had to fight against the dominant dogma before being accepted. The cell theory opposed the school of Bichat, the vitalist philosophy and the positivist philosophy of Auguste Comte. The neuron theory, which is clearly based on the cell theory, was mostly concerned with the mode of interneuronal communication; it opposed the concept of contiguity to Golgi's concept of continuity. At present, the cell theory remains central in every field of Biology. By contrast, the neuron theory, which until the middle of the XXth century opened the study of the nervous system to a necessary reductionnist approach, is no longer central to recent developments of neurosciences. © Société de Biologie, 2011.

Automatic Suppression of Intense Monochromatic Light in Electro-Optical Sensors

PubMed Central

Ritt, Gunnar; Eberle, Bernd

2012-01-01

Electro-optical imaging sensors are widely distributed and used for many different tasks. Due to technical improvements, their pixel size has been steadily decreasing, resulting in a reduced saturation capacity. As a consequence, this progress makes them susceptible to intense point light sources. Developments in laser technology have led to very compact and powerful laser sources of any wavelength in the visible and near infrared spectral region, offered as laser pointers. The manifold of wavelengths makes it difficult to encounter sensor saturation over the complete operating waveband by conventional measures like absorption or interference filters. We present a concept for electro-optical sensors to suppress overexposure in the visible spectral region. The key element of the concept is a spatial light modulator in combination with wavelength multiplexing. This approach allows spectral filtering within a localized area in the field of view of the sensor. The system offers the possibility of automatic reduction of overexposure by monochromatic laser radiation. PMID:23202039

Neuronal network disintegration: common pathways linking neurodegenerative diseases.

PubMed

Ahmed, Rebekah M; Devenney, Emma M; Irish, Muireann; Ittner, Arne; Naismith, Sharon; Ittner, Lars M; Rohrer, Jonathan D; Halliday, Glenda M; Eisen, Andrew; Hodges, John R; Kiernan, Matthew C

2016-11-01

Neurodegeneration refers to a heterogeneous group of brain disorders that progressively evolve. It has been increasingly appreciated that many neurodegenerative conditions overlap at multiple levels and therefore traditional clinicopathological correlation approaches to better classify a disease have met with limited success. Neuronal network disintegration is fundamental to neurodegeneration, and concepts based around such a concept may better explain the overlap between their clinical and pathological phenotypes. In this Review, promoters of overlap in neurodegeneration incorporating behavioural, cognitive, metabolic, motor, and extrapyramidal presentations will be critically appraised. In addition, evidence that may support the existence of large-scale networks that might be contributing to phenotypic differentiation will be considered across a neurodegenerative spectrum. Disintegration of neuronal networks through different pathological processes, such as prion-like spread, may provide a better paradigm of disease and thereby facilitate the identification of novel therapies for neurodegeneration. Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://www.bmj.com/company/products-services/rights-and-licensing/.

Gross national happiness as a framework for health impact assessment

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Pennock, Michael, E-mail: michael.pennock@viha.c; Ura, Karma

The incorporation of population health concepts and health determinants into Health Impact Assessments has created a number of challenges. The need for intersectoral collaboration has increased; the meaning of 'health' has become less clear; and the distinctions between health impacts, environmental impacts, social impacts and economic impacts have become increasingly blurred. The Bhutanese concept of Gross National Happiness may address these issues by providing an over-arching evidence-based framework which incorporates health, social, environmental and economic contributors as well as a number of other key contributors to wellbeing such as culture and governance. It has the potential to foster intersectoral collaborationmore » by incorporating a more limited definition of health which places the health sector as one of a number of contributors to wellbeing. It also allows for the examination of the opportunity costs of health investments on wellbeing, is consistent with whole-of-government approaches to public policy and emerging models of social progress.« less

EcoEvo-MAPS: An Ecology and Evolution Assessment for Introductory through Advanced Undergraduates.

PubMed

Summers, Mindi M; Couch, Brian A; Knight, Jennifer K; Brownell, Sara E; Crowe, Alison J; Semsar, Katharine; Wright, Christian D; Smith, Michelle K

2018-06-01

A new assessment tool, Ecology and Evolution-Measuring Achievement and Progression in Science or EcoEvo-MAPS, measures student thinking in ecology and evolution during an undergraduate course of study. EcoEvo-MAPS targets foundational concepts in ecology and evolution and uses a novel approach that asks students to evaluate a series of predictions, conclusions, or interpretations as likely or unlikely to be true given a specific scenario. We collected evidence of validity and reliability for EcoEvo-MAPS through an iterative process of faculty review, student interviews, and analyses of assessment data from more than 3000 students at 34 associate's-, bachelor's-, master's-, and doctoral-granting institutions. The 63 likely/unlikely statements range in difficulty and target student understanding of key concepts aligned with the Vision and Change report. This assessment provides departments with a tool to measure student thinking at different time points in the curriculum and provides data that can be used to inform curricular and instructional modifications.

Synthetic biology for CO2 fixation.

PubMed

Gong, Fuyu; Cai, Zhen; Li, Yin

2016-11-01

Recycling of carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) into fuels and chemicals is a potential approach to reduce CO 2 emission and fossil-fuel consumption. Autotrophic microbes can utilize energy from light, hydrogen, or sulfur to assimilate atmospheric CO 2 into organic compounds at ambient temperature and pressure. This provides a feasible way for biological production of fuels and chemicals from CO 2 under normal conditions. Recently great progress has been made in this research area, and dozens of CO 2 -derived fuels and chemicals have been reported to be synthesized by autotrophic microbes. This is accompanied by investigations into natural CO 2 -fixation pathways and the rapid development of new technologies in synthetic biology. This review first summarizes the six natural CO 2 -fixation pathways reported to date, followed by an overview of recent progress in the design and engineering of CO 2 -fixation pathways as well as energy supply patterns using the concept and tools of synthetic biology. Finally, we will discuss future prospects in biological fixation of CO 2 .

Annual Report: Photovoltaic Subcontract Program FY 1990

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Summers, K. A.

1991-03-01

This report summarizes the progress of the Photovoltaic (PV) Subcontract Program of the Solar Energy Research Institute (SERI) from October 1, 1989 through September 30, 1990. The PV Subcontract Program is responsible for managing the subcontracted portion of SERI's PV Advanced Research and Development Project. In fiscal year 1990, this included more than 54 subcontracts with a total annualized funding of approximately $11.9 million. Approximately two-thirds of the subcontracts were with universities at a total funding of nearly $3.3 million. The six technical sections of the report cover the main areas of the subcontract program: the Amorphous Silicon Research Project,more » Polycrystalline Thin Films, Crystalline Silicon Materials Research, High-Efficiency Concepts, the New Ideas Program, and the University Participation Program. Technical summaries of each of the subcontracted programs provide a discussion of approaches, major accomplishments in FY 1990, and future research directions. Another section introduces the PVMaT project and reports on its progress.« less

Gene doping.

PubMed

Azzazy, Hassan M E

2010-01-01

Gene doping abuses the legitimate approach of gene therapy. While gene therapy aims to correct genetic disorders by introducing a foreign gene to replace an existing faulty one or by manipulating existing gene(s) to achieve a therapeutic benefit, gene doping employs the same concepts to bestow performance advantages on athletes over their competitors. Recent developments in genetic engineering have contributed significantly to the progress of gene therapy research and currently numerous clinical trials are underway. Some athletes and their staff are probably watching this progress closely. Any gene that plays a role in muscle development, oxygen delivery to tissues, neuromuscular coordination, or even pain control is considered a candidate for gene dopers. Unfortunately, detecting gene doping is technically very difficult because the transgenic proteins expressed by the introduced genes are similar to their endogenous counterparts. Researchers today are racing the clock because assuring the continued integrity of sports competition depends on their ability to develop effective detection strategies in preparation for the 2012 Olympics, which may mark the appearance of genetically modified athletes.

Progress in the Visualization and Mining of Chemical and Target Spaces.

PubMed

Medina-Franco, José L; Aguayo-Ortiz, Rodrigo

2013-12-01

Chemogenomics is a growing field that aims to integrate the chemical and target spaces. As part of a multi-disciplinary effort to achieve this goal, computational methods initially developed to visualize the chemical space of compound collections and mine single-target structure-activity relationships, are being adapted to visualize and mine complex relationships in chemogenomics data sets. Similarly, the growing evidence that clinical effects are many times due to the interaction of single or multiple drugs with multiple targets, is encouraging the development of novel methodologies that are integrated in multi-target drug discovery endeavors. Herein we review advances in the development and application of approaches to generate visual representations of chemical space with particular emphasis on methods that aim to explore and uncover relationships between chemical and target spaces. Also, progress in the data mining of the structure-activity relationships of sets of compounds screened across multiple targets are discussed in light of the concept of activity landscape modeling. Copyright © 2013 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

On process optimization considering LCA methodology.

PubMed

Pieragostini, Carla; Mussati, Miguel C; Aguirre, Pío

2012-04-15

The goal of this work is to research the state-of-the-art in process optimization techniques and tools based on LCA, focused in the process engineering field. A collection of methods, approaches, applications, specific software packages, and insights regarding experiences and progress made in applying the LCA methodology coupled to optimization frameworks is provided, and general trends are identified. The "cradle-to-gate" concept to define the system boundaries is the most used approach in practice, instead of the "cradle-to-grave" approach. Normally, the relationship between inventory data and impact category indicators is linearly expressed by the characterization factors; then, synergic effects of the contaminants are neglected. Among the LCIA methods, the eco-indicator 99, which is based on the endpoint category and the panel method, is the most used in practice. A single environmental impact function, resulting from the aggregation of environmental impacts, is formulated as the environmental objective in most analyzed cases. SimaPro is the most used software for LCA applications in literature analyzed. The multi-objective optimization is the most used approach for dealing with this kind of problems, where the ε-constraint method for generating the Pareto set is the most applied technique. However, a renewed interest in formulating a single economic objective function in optimization frameworks can be observed, favored by the development of life cycle cost software and progress made in assessing costs of environmental externalities. Finally, a trend to deal with multi-period scenarios into integrated LCA-optimization frameworks can be distinguished providing more accurate results upon data availability. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Turbat, A.; Deschanels, H.; Sperandio, M.

The leak before break (LBB) concept was not used at the design level for SUPERPHENIX (SPX), but different studies have been performed or are in progress concerning different components : Main Vessel (MV), pipings. These studies were undertaken to improve the defense in depth, an approach used in all French reactors. In a first study, the LBB approach has been applied to the MV of SPX plant to verify the absence of risk as regards the core supporting function and to help in the definition of in-service inspection (ISI) program. Defining a reference semi-elliptic defect located in the welds ofmore » the structure, it is verified that the crack growth is limited and that the end-of-life defect is smaller than the critical one. Then it is shown that the hoop welds (those which are the most important for safety) located between the roof and the triple point verify the leak-before-break criteria. However, generally speaking, the low level of membrane primary stresses which is favorable for the integrity of the vessel makes the application of the leak-before-break concept more difficult due to small crack opening areas. Finally, the extension of the methodology to the secondary pipings of SPX incorporating recent European works of DCRC is briefly presented.« less

Neurological dysfunction, psychic conflict, and psychotherapy.

PubMed

Wolf, M

2000-01-01

Clinical experience of psychotherapists is getting more and more circumscribed by the boundaries of theoretical references. The Freudian "psychic treatment" for neurosis got its impetus from the friendship between Sigmund Freud and Ludwig Binswanger, the phenomenological psychiatrist. This relationship laid the foundation for the references of psychoanalytic psychotherapy in Europe. Then, the Freudian conception of actual neurosis led to a psychosomatic approach. Later, the study of narcissistic neurosis opened up to borderline patients. Today, scientific and medical progress greatly influence psychopathological research and the way we look at our patients and their requests. These changes come from the patients' sayings and their expectancy of well-being. At the same time psychotherapists have to take a new look at their theoretical references. On the one hand, a dynamic concept for psychotherapy is necessary for integrating the phenomenologic approach into psychoanalysis, and providing the understanding of situations emerging in neurological dysfunction. On the other hand, psychotherapists pay more attention to the different actors contributing to a pathology (Who is suffering? What about the life-partner or the relatives?). These changes lead to a new look into the processes of identification as well as the notion of identity. This article discusses these influences on psychotherapy and clinical research showing how clinical situations get ahead of theoretical references.

Linking ecosystem characteristics to final ecosystem services for public policy.

PubMed

Wong, Christina P; Jiang, Bo; Kinzig, Ann P; Lee, Kai N; Ouyang, Zhiyun

2015-01-01

Governments worldwide are recognising ecosystem services as an approach to address sustainability challenges. Decision-makers need credible and legitimate measurements of ecosystem services to evaluate decisions for trade-offs to make wise choices. Managers lack these measurements because of a data gap linking ecosystem characteristics to final ecosystem services. The dominant method to address the data gap is benefit transfer using ecological data from one location to estimate ecosystem services at other locations with similar land cover. However, benefit transfer is only valid once the data gap is adequately resolved. Disciplinary frames separating ecology from economics and policy have resulted in confusion on concepts and methods preventing progress on the data gap. In this study, we present a 10-step approach to unify concepts, methods and data from the disparate disciplines to offer guidance on overcoming the data gap. We suggest: (1) estimate ecosystem characteristics using biophysical models, (2) identify final ecosystem services using endpoints and (3) connect them using ecological production functions to quantify biophysical trade-offs. The guidance is strategic for public policy because analysts need to be: (1) realistic when setting priorities, (2) attentive to timelines to acquire relevant data, given resources and (3) responsive to the needs of decision-makers. © 2014 The Authors. Ecology Letters published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd and CNRS.

Quantifying resilience

USGS Publications Warehouse

Allen, Craig R.; Angeler, David G.

2016-01-01

Several frameworks to operationalize resilience have been proposed. A decade ago, a special feature focused on quantifying resilience was published in the journal Ecosystems (Carpenter, Westley & Turner 2005). The approach there was towards identifying surrogates of resilience, but few of the papers proposed quantifiable metrics. Consequently, many ecological resilience frameworks remain vague and difficult to quantify, a problem that this special feature aims to address. However, considerable progress has been made during the last decade (e.g. Pope, Allen & Angeler 2014). Although some argue that resilience is best kept as an unquantifiable, vague concept (Quinlan et al. 2016), to be useful for managers, there must be concrete guidance regarding how and what to manage and how to measure success (Garmestani, Allen & Benson 2013; Spears et al. 2015). Ideas such as ‘resilience thinking’ have utility in helping stakeholders conceptualize their systems, but provide little guidance on how to make resilience useful for ecosystem management, other than suggesting an ambiguous, Goldilocks approach of being just right (e.g. diverse, but not too diverse; connected, but not too connected). Here, we clarify some prominent resilience terms and concepts, introduce and synthesize the papers in this special feature on quantifying resilience and identify core unanswered questions related to resilience.

Linking ecosystem characteristics to final ecosystem services for public policy

PubMed Central

Wong, Christina P; Jiang, Bo; Kinzig, Ann P; Lee, Kai N; Ouyang, Zhiyun

2015-01-01

Governments worldwide are recognising ecosystem services as an approach to address sustainability challenges. Decision-makers need credible and legitimate measurements of ecosystem services to evaluate decisions for trade-offs to make wise choices. Managers lack these measurements because of a data gap linking ecosystem characteristics to final ecosystem services. The dominant method to address the data gap is benefit transfer using ecological data from one location to estimate ecosystem services at other locations with similar land cover. However, benefit transfer is only valid once the data gap is adequately resolved. Disciplinary frames separating ecology from economics and policy have resulted in confusion on concepts and methods preventing progress on the data gap. In this study, we present a 10-step approach to unify concepts, methods and data from the disparate disciplines to offer guidance on overcoming the data gap. We suggest: (1) estimate ecosystem characteristics using biophysical models, (2) identify final ecosystem services using endpoints and (3) connect them using ecological production functions to quantify biophysical trade-offs. The guidance is strategic for public policy because analysts need to be: (1) realistic when setting priorities, (2) attentive to timelines to acquire relevant data, given resources and (3) responsive to the needs of decision-makers. PMID:25394857

Childhood glaucoma surgery in the 21st Century

PubMed Central

Papadopoulos, M; Edmunds, B; Fenerty, C; Khaw, P T

2014-01-01

Most children with glaucoma will require surgery in their lifetime, often in their childhood years. The surgical management of childhood glaucoma is however challenging, largely because of its greater potential for failure and complications as compared with surgery in adults. The available surgical repertoire for childhood glaucoma has remained relatively unchanged for many years with most progress owing to modifications to existing surgery. Although the surgical approach to childhood glaucoma varies around the world, angle surgery remains the preferred initial surgery for primary congenital glaucoma and a major advance has been the concept of incising the whole of the angle (circumferential trabeculotomy). Simple modifications to the trabeculectomy technique have been shown to considerably minimise complications. Glaucoma drainage devices maintain a vital role for certain types of glaucoma including those refractory to other surgery. Cyclodestruction continues to have a role mainly for patients following failed drainage/filtering surgery. Although the prognosis for childhood glaucoma has improved significantly since the introduction of angle surgery, there is still considerable progress to be made to ensure a sighted lifetime for children with glaucoma all over the world. Collaborative approaches to researching and delivering this care are required, and this paper highlights the need for more high-quality prospective surgical trials in the management of the childhood glaucoma. PMID:24924446

From "cracking the orthographic code" to "playing with language": toward a usage-based foundation of the reading process.

PubMed

Wallot, Sebastian

2014-01-01

The empirical study of reading dates back more than 125 years. But despite this long tradition, the scientific understanding of reading has made rather heterogeneous progress: many factors that influence the process of text reading have been uncovered, but theoretical explanations remain fragmented; no general theory pulls together the diverse findings. A handful of scholars have noted that properties thought to be at the core of the reading process do not actually generalize across different languages or from situations single-word reading to connected text reading. Such observations cast doubt on many of the traditional conceptions about reading. In this article, I suggest that the observed heterogeneity in the research is due to misguided conceptions about the reading process. Particularly problematic are the unrefined notions about meaning which undergird many reading theories: most psychological theories of reading implicitly assume a kind of elemental token semantics, where words serve as stable units of meaning in a text. This conception of meaning creates major conceptual problems. As an alternative, I argue that reading shoud be rather understood as a form of language use, which circumvents many of the conceptual problems and connects reading to a wider range of linguistic communication. Finally, drawing from Wittgenstein, the concept of "language games" is outlined as an approach to language use that can be operationalized scientifically to provide a new foundation for reading research.

Vital nodes identification in complex networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lü, Linyuan; Chen, Duanbing; Ren, Xiao-Long; Zhang, Qian-Ming; Zhang, Yi-Cheng; Zhou, Tao

2016-09-01

Real networks exhibit heterogeneous nature with nodes playing far different roles in structure and function. To identify vital nodes is thus very significant, allowing us to control the outbreak of epidemics, to conduct advertisements for e-commercial products, to predict popular scientific publications, and so on. The vital nodes identification attracts increasing attentions from both computer science and physical societies, with algorithms ranging from simply counting the immediate neighbors to complicated machine learning and message passing approaches. In this review, we clarify the concepts and metrics, classify the problems and methods, as well as review the important progresses and describe the state of the art. Furthermore, we provide extensive empirical analyses to compare well-known methods on disparate real networks, and highlight the future directions. In spite of the emphasis on physics-rooted approaches, the unification of the language and comparison with cross-domain methods would trigger interdisciplinary solutions in the near future.

Disparate stakeholder management: the case of elk and bison feeding in southern Greater Yellowstone

USGS Publications Warehouse

Koontz, Lynne; Hoag, Dana; DeLong, Don

2012-01-01

For resource decisions to make the most possible progress toward achieving agency mandates, managers must work with stakeholders and may need to at least partially accommodate some of their key underlying interests. To accommodate stakeholder interests, while also substantively working toward fulfilling legal mandates, managers must understand the sociopolitical factors that influence the decision-making process. We coin the phrase disparate stakeholder management (DSM) to describe situations with disparate stakeholders and disparate management solutions. A DSM approach (DSMA) requires decision makers to combine concepts from many sciences, thus releasing them from disciplinary bonds that often constrain innovation and effectiveness. We combined three distinct approaches to develop a DSMA that assisted in developing a comprehensive range of elk and bison management alternatives in the Southern Greater Yellowstone Area. The DSMA illustrated the extent of compromise between meeting legal agency mandates and accommodating the preferences of certain stakeholder groups.

Moral enhancement, gnosticism, and some philosophical paradoxes.

PubMed

Barilan, Y M

2015-01-01

This article examines the concept of moral enhancement from two different perspectives. The first is a bottom-up approach, which aims at identifying fundamental moral traits and subcapacities as targets for enhancement. The second perspective, a top-down approach, is holistic and in line with virtue ethics. Both perspectives lead to the observation that alterations of material and social conditions are the most reliable means to improve prosocial behavior overall. Moral enhancement as a preventive measure invokes Gnostic narratives on the allegedly fallen status of human nature, its search for salvation, and the dependence of the laity on heteronomous salvific interventions. The allure of the preventive kind of enhancement is attributable to its religious hues. Owing to the absence of clarity regarding moral enhancement and of metrics to evaluate its progress, humanity is at risk of prioritizing unclear and unsubstantiated measures of preventive diminishment at the expense of celebrating human capacities and joys.

Creating a culture of professional development: a milestone pathway tool for registered nurses.

PubMed

Cooper, Elizabeth

2009-11-01

The nursing shortage continues to be a significant threat to health care. Creating a culture of professional development in health care institutions is one way to combat this shortage. Professional development refers to a constant commitment to maintain one's knowledge and skill base. Increasing professional development opportunities in the health care setting has been shown to affect nurse retention and satisfaction. Several approaches have been developed to increase professional development among nurses. However, for the most part, these are "one size fits all" approaches that direct nurses to progress in lock step fashion in skill and knowledge acquisition within a specialty. This article introduces a milestone pathway tool for registered nurses designed to enhance professional development that is unique to the individual nurse and the specific nursing unit. This tool provides a unit-specific concept map, a milestone pathway template, and a personal professional development plan. Copyright 2009, SLACK Incorporated.

Content Validity and Inter-Rater Reliability of the Halliwick-Concept-Based Instrument "Swimming with Independent Measure"

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Srsen, Katja Groleger; Vidmar, Gaj; Pikl, Masa; Vrecar, Irena; Burja, Cirila; Krusec, Klavdija

2012-01-01

The Halliwick concept is widely used in different settings to promote joyful movement in water and swimming. To assess the swimming skills and progression of an individual swimmer, a valid and reliable measure should be used. The Halliwick-concept-based Swimming with Independent Measure (SWIM) was introduced for this purpose. We aimed to determine…

Development and Validation of a Learning Progression for Change of Seasons, Solar and Lunar Eclipses, and Moon Phases

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Testa, Italo; Galano, Silvia; Leccia, Silvio; Puddu, Emanuella

2015-01-01

In this paper, we report about the development and validation of a learning progression about the Celestial Motion big idea. Existing curricula, research studies on alternative conceptions about these phenomena, and students' answers to an open questionnaire were the starting point to develop initial learning progressions about change of seasons,…

In-vehicle signing concepts: An analytical precursor to an in-vehicle information system

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Spelt, P.F.; Tufano, D.R.; Knee, H.E.

The purpose of the project described in this report is to develop alternative In-Vehicle Signing (IVS) system concepts based on allocation of the functions associated with driving a road vehicle. In the driving milieu, tasks can be assigned to one of three agents, the driver, the vehicle or the infrastructure. Assignment of tasks is based on a philosophy of function allocation which can emphasize any of several philosophical approaches. In this project, function allocations were made according to the current practice in vehicle design and signage as well as a human-centered strategy. Several IVS system concepts are presented based onmore » differing functional allocation outcomes. A design space for IVS systems is described, and a technical analysis of a map-based and sever beacon-based IVS systems are presented. Because of problems associated with both map-based and beacon-based concepts, a hybrid IVS concept was proposed. The hybrid system uses on-board map-based databases to serve those areas in which signage can be anticipated to be relatively static, such as large metropolitan areas where few if any new roads will be built. For areas where sign density is low, and/or where population growth causes changes in traffic flow, beacon-based concepts function best. For this situation, changes need only occur in the central database from which sign information is transmitted. This report presents system concepts which enable progress from the IVS system concept-independent functional requirements to a more specific set of system concepts which facilitate analysis and selection of hardware and software to perform the functions of IVS. As such, this phase of the project represents a major step toward the design and development of a prototype WS system. Once such a system is developed, a program of testing, evaluation, an revision will be undertaken. Ultimately, such a system can become part of the road vehicle of the future.« less

New concepts in the management of diffuse low-grade glioma: Proposal of a multistage and individualized therapeutic approach.

PubMed

Duffau, Hugues; Taillandier, Luc

2015-03-01

Diffuse low-grade glioma grows, migrates along white matter tracts, and progresses to high-grade glioma. Rather than a "wait and see" policy, an aggressive attitude is now recommended, with early surgery as the first therapy. Intraoperative mapping, with maximal resection according to functional boundaries, is associated with a longer overall survival (OS) while minimizing morbidity. However, most studies have investigated the role of only one specific treatment (surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy) without taking a global view of managing the cumulative time while preserving quality of life (QoL) versus time to anaplastic transformation. Our aim is to switch towards a more holistic concept based upon the anticipation of a personalized and long-term multistage therapeutic approach, with online adaptation of the strategy over the years using feedback from clinical, radiological, and histomolecular monitoring. This dynamic strategy challenges the traditional approach by proposing earlier therapy, by repeating treatments, and by reversing the classical order of therapies (eg, neoadjuvant chemotherapy when maximal resection is impossible, no early radiotherapy) to improve OS and QoL. New individualized management strategies should deal with the interactions between the course of this chronic disease, reaction brain remapping, and oncofunctional modulation elicited by serial treatments. This philosophy supports a personalized, functional, and preventive neuro-oncology. © The Author(s) 2014. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Society for Neuro-Oncology. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oup.com.

Investment feasibility tracking: the importance of measuring and tracking the success level of the project during commercialization phase

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Saputra, Y. A.; Setyaningtyas, V. E. D.; Latiffianti, E.; Wijaya, S. H.; Ladamay, O. S. A.

2018-04-01

Measuring project success level is a challenging activity. This area of works has attracted many researchers to look deeper into the method of measurement, success factor identification, risk management, and many others relevant topics. However, the project management scope is limited until the project handover stage. After a project handover, the control of a project management changes from Project Management Team to the project owner/commercialization team. From an investor’s point of view, the success of a project delivery needs to be followed by the success of commercialization phase. This paper aims to present an approach on how we track and measure the progress and success level of a project investment in the commercialization phase. This is an interesting topic which probably often being forgotten in many practical case. Our proposed concept modify Freeman and Beale concept by estimating the variance between the Planned Net Present Value / Annual Worth (as it is in the Feasibility Study Document) and the Actual Net Present Value / Annual Worth (until the point time of evaluation). The gap will lead us to the next analysis and give us some important information, especially exposing whether our project investment performs better than the planning or underperformed. Some corrective actions can be suggested based on the provided information. Practical cases to exercise the concept is also provided and discussed; one case in a property sector in the middle of commercialization phase, and another case in a Power Plant investment approaching the end of commercialization phase.

Pharmacovigilance from social media: mining adverse drug reaction mentions using sequence labeling with word embedding cluster features.

PubMed

Nikfarjam, Azadeh; Sarker, Abeed; O'Connor, Karen; Ginn, Rachel; Gonzalez, Graciela

2015-05-01

Social media is becoming increasingly popular as a platform for sharing personal health-related information. This information can be utilized for public health monitoring tasks, particularly for pharmacovigilance, via the use of natural language processing (NLP) techniques. However, the language in social media is highly informal, and user-expressed medical concepts are often nontechnical, descriptive, and challenging to extract. There has been limited progress in addressing these challenges, and thus far, advanced machine learning-based NLP techniques have been underutilized. Our objective is to design a machine learning-based approach to extract mentions of adverse drug reactions (ADRs) from highly informal text in social media. We introduce ADRMine, a machine learning-based concept extraction system that uses conditional random fields (CRFs). ADRMine utilizes a variety of features, including a novel feature for modeling words' semantic similarities. The similarities are modeled by clustering words based on unsupervised, pretrained word representation vectors (embeddings) generated from unlabeled user posts in social media using a deep learning technique. ADRMine outperforms several strong baseline systems in the ADR extraction task by achieving an F-measure of 0.82. Feature analysis demonstrates that the proposed word cluster features significantly improve extraction performance. It is possible to extract complex medical concepts, with relatively high performance, from informal, user-generated content. Our approach is particularly scalable, suitable for social media mining, as it relies on large volumes of unlabeled data, thus diminishing the need for large, annotated training data sets. © The Author 2015. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Medical Informatics Association.

Variation in Student Reflections on their Conceptions of and Approaches to Learning Biochemistry in a First-year Health Sciences' Service Subject

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Minasian-Batmanian, Laura C.; Lingard, Jennifer; Prosser, Michael

2006-12-01

Many factors affect students’ learning approaches, including topic conceptions and prior study. This research, undertaken after a first-semester compulsory subject, explores students’ conceptions of biochemistry and how they approached their studies. Students (n=151) completed an open-ended survey analysed phenomenographically. Those with cohesive conceptions were found to be more likely to adopt deeper approaches to study than those with fragmented conceptions, a result unaffected by various demographic parameters. Compared with earlier research, a semester of study increased the percentage of students with a cohesive view, with no concomitant change in learning approaches, suggesting that cohesive conceptions are a necessary but not sufficient criterion for deep learning outcomes. Compared with results for a science major subject, more of the students with cohesive conceptions used surface approaches. This may reflect a regression to safe surface approaches when faced with an unfamiliar topic or high total workload driving a strategic approach to learning. It could also reflect a perception that this material is only a tool for later application. The present findings indicate the crucial importance, when university studies begin, of enabling students to build an overarching conception of the topic’s place in professional practice. This concept building should be applied across the entire curriculum to emphasize application and integration of material (key graduate attributes). Improved conceptions may provide crucial motivation for students to achieve deeper learning, especially in these foundation service subjects. These essential changes to the learning context may also better prepare students for increasing self-directed/life-long learning.

The Impact of Aphasia Camp Participation on Quality of Life: A Primary Progressive Aphasia Perspective.

PubMed

Kim, Esther S; Figeys, Mathieu; Hubbard, H Isabel; Wilson, Carlee

2018-07-01

Individuals with primary progressive aphasia (PPA) and their caregivers are at risk for decreased quality of life (QoL) due to their progressive condition. Aphasia camps are an intervention that can improve QoL, yet individuals with PPA are underrepresented at aphasia camps relative to those with poststroke aphasia. The purpose of this exploratory case study was to examine the effect of participation in aphasia camp on the QoL of a couple impacted by PPA. The Living with Aphasia: Framework for Outcome Measurement (A-FROM) was used to guide a semistructured interview with an individual with PPA and her spouse, both of whom had attended the Alberta Aphasia Camp for 4 years. Conventional content analysis with an inductive approach was used to analyze results. Concepts that emerged from the interview were organized into pre-camp, during, and post-camp categories. Aspects of camp that had an effect on post-camp QoL for this couple with PPA included expanding social connections and introduction to new activities. Personal characteristics exhibited by the couple had an impact on their experience of aphasia camp and how they incorporated their experiences into their everyday lives post-camp. Aphasia camps are a participation-based service approach that can benefit people with aphasia regardless of etiology. A consideration of personal factors of potential campers with PPA, and the provision of PPA-specific resources, is recommended for programs such as aphasia camps that incorporate participants with mixed etiologies. Thieme Medical Publishers 333 Seventh Avenue, New York, NY 10001, USA.

Relational Analysis of College Chemistry-Major Students' Conceptions of and Approaches to Learning Chemistry

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Li, Wei-Ting; Liang, Jyh-Chong; Tsai, Chin-Chung

2013-01-01

The purpose of this research was to examine the relationships between conceptions of learning and approaches to learning in chemistry. Two questionnaires, conceptions of learning chemistry (COLC) and approaches to learning chemistry (ALC), were developed to identify 369 college chemistry-major students' (220 males and 149 females) conceptions of…

[How I treat: from specialized pharmacology to drug therapy: a plea for an optimal educational program for rational therapeutics, from decision making to drug prescription].

PubMed

Scheen, A J

2000-09-01

Clinical pharmacology and therapeutics are two complementary disciplines which should lead the medical student, through an optimized training, to a rational prescription of drugs, ultimate and important step of the medical approach. Such a learning should occur progressively throughout the medical education, focusing, first, on the therapeutic reasoning ("why?") and, second, on the practical application leading to the prescription ("how?"). The medical student should learn the difficult task of integrating disease, drug and patient, in order to optimize the benefit/risk ratio, while being informed about new concepts such as "Evidence-Based Medicine" and pharmacoeconomics.

What should we mean by empirical validation in hypnotherapy: evidence-based practice in clinical hypnosis.

PubMed

Alladin, Assen; Sabatini, Linda; Amundson, Jon K

2007-04-01

This paper briefly surveys the trend of and controversy surrounding empirical validation in psychotherapy. Empirical validation of hypnotherapy has paralleled the practice of validation in psychotherapy and the professionalization of clinical psychology, in general. This evolution in determining what counts as evidence for bona fide clinical practice has gone from theory-driven clinical approaches in the 1960s and 1970s through critical attempts at categorization of empirically supported therapies in the 1990s on to the concept of evidence-based practice in 2006. Implications of this progression in professional psychology are discussed in the light of hypnosis's current quest for validation and empirical accreditation.

Precision diagnostics: moving towards protein biomarker signatures of clinical utility in cancer.

PubMed

Borrebaeck, Carl A K

2017-03-01

Interest in precision diagnostics has been fuelled by the concept that early detection of cancer would benefit patients; that is, if detected early, more tumours should be resectable and treatment more efficacious. Serum contains massive amounts of potentially diagnostic information, and affinity proteomics has risen as an accurate approach to decipher this, to generate actionable information that should result in more precise and evidence-based options to manage cancer. To achieve this, we need to move from single to multiplex biomarkers, a so-called signature, that can provide significantly increased diagnostic accuracy. This Opinion article focuses on the progress being made in identifying protein biomarker signatures of clinical utility, using blood-based proteomics.

Assembly and testing of a 1.8 by 3.7 meter Fresnel lens solar concentrator

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Robertson, J. E.

1977-01-01

A project was initiated to establish a technical data base on line focusing acrylic Fresnel lenses for use in a solar collector system that could generate temperatures in the range of 200 C to 370 C. The effort was originally directed toward electric power generation in the 100 to 10,000 kWe range using a distributed collector approach. However, as the program progressed, it centered on the development of a concentrator/collector subsystem concept that could meet the general requirement of thermal delivery within the 200 C to 370 C range. The expanded list of possible applications includes commercial heating/cooling and industrial process heat as well as electric power generation.

Proficiency in science: assessment challenges and opportunities.

PubMed

Pellegrino, James W

2013-04-19

Proficiency in science is being defined through performance expectations that intertwine science practices, cross-cutting concepts, and core content knowledge. These descriptions of what it means to know and do science pose challenges for assessment design and use, whether at the classroom instructional level or the system level for monitoring the progress of science education. There are systematic ways to approach assessment development that can address design challenges, as well as examples of the application of such principles in science assessment. This Review considers challenges and opportunities that exist for design and use of assessments that can support science teaching and learning consistent with a contemporary view of what it means to be proficient in science.

Review of light-ion driver development for inertial fusion energy

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bluhm, H.; Hoppé, P.

2001-05-01

The concept of a light ion beam driver for Inertial Fusion Energy (IFE) is based on multi-terawatt, multi-megavolt pulsed power generators, two-stage ion acceleration and charge neutralised transport. In this paper we discuss the present status for each of these components and identify the main issues for research. Only modest extrapolations from presently available technologies seem necessary for the high voltage pulse generator. The greatest challenge of this approach is the accelerator, which will consist of two stages, the injector and the post-accelerator. Large progress has been made in understanding the physical phenomena occurring in the injector gap. This progress has become possible by new sophisticated diagnostics that allowed detailed temporally and spatially resolved measurements of field and particle densities in the acceleration gap and by relativistic fully electromagnetic PIC-simulation tools, that stimulated analytic models. The conclusions drawn from these studies, namely limiting the ion current density to small enhancements to reduce the beam divergence need still to be verified experimentally. Systematic experimental research on post-acceleration at high power and voltage must aim at a complete understanding of instabilities coupling from the injector to the post-accelerator and at limiting voltages and barriers for the extraction of unwanted ions from plasmas at the injection side. Ultimately the light ion approach requires rep-rateable large area ion sources with ion masses greater than 1 and particle energies around 30 MeV. Although different cleaning protocols were able to reduce the amount of parasitic ions in the Li beam from a LiF field emission source the achievements are still insufficient. A field of common interest between light and heavy ion beam driven fusion is beam transport from the accelerator to the target. Supposedly the most favourable concept for both approaches is self-pinched transport. Experimental evidence for self-pinched transport has recently been achieved in an experiment at NRL. Further experiments are needed to determine the dynamics and magnitude of net current formation, the efficiency of transport and the effect of bunching.

Selecting concepts for a concept-based curriculum: application of a benchmark approach.

PubMed

Giddens, Jean Foret; Wright, Mary; Gray, Irene

2012-09-01

In response to a transformational movement in nursing education, faculty across the country are considering changes to curricula and approaches to teaching. As a result, an emerging trend in many nursing programs is the adoption of a concept-based curriculum. As part of the curriculum development process, the selection of concepts, competencies, and exemplars on which to build courses and base content is needed. This article presents a benchmark approach used to validate and finalize concept selection among educators developing a concept-based curriculum for a statewide nursing consortium. These findings are intended to inform other nurse educators who are currently involved with or are considering this curriculum approach. Copyright 2012, SLACK Incorporated.

Differences in Achievement Motivation and Academic and Social Self-Concept in Gifted Students of Higher Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sierra, María Dolores Valadez; Cuervo, Angel Alberto Valdés; Amezaga, Teodoro Rafael Wendlandt; Sánchez, Ana Carolina Reyes; Guzmán, Rogelio Zambrano; Agraz, Juan Pedro Navarro

2015-01-01

The purpose of this study is to identify groups of gifted university students that differ in their self-concept and achievement motivation. For this, 80 students who achieved scores of the 95th percentile or higher in the Raven's Progressive Matrices test were selected. Two groups were identified in terms of their social self-concept and the…

Using Laboratory Activities Enhanced with Concept Cartoons to Support Progression in Students' Understanding of Acid-Base Concepts

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ozmen, Haluk; Demircioglu, Gokhan; Burhan, Yasemin; Naseriazar, Akbar; Demircioglu, Hulya

2012-01-01

The aim of this study is to examine the effectiveness of an intervention based on a series of laboratory activities enhanced with concept cartoons. The purpose of the intervention was to enhance students' understanding of acid-base chemistry for eight grade students' from two classes in a Turkish primary school. A pretest-posttest non-equivalent…

Space reactor power 1986 - A year of choices and transition

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wiley, R. L.; Verga, R. L.; Schnyer, A. D.; Sholtis, J. A., Jr.; Wahlquist, E. J.

1986-01-01

Both the SP-100 and Multimegawatt programs have made significant progress over the last year and that progress is the focus of this paper. In the SP-100 program the thermoelectric energy conversion concept powered by a compact, high-temperature, lithium-cooled, uranium-nitride-fueled fast spectrum reactor was selected for engineering development and ground demonstration testing at an electrical power level of 300 kilowatts. In the Multimegawatt program, activities moved from the planning phase into one of technology development and assessment with attendant preliminary definition and evaluation of power concepts against requirements of the Strategic Defense Initiative.

Terrestrial Planet Finder Interferometer: Architecture, Mission Design and Technology Development

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Henry, Curt; Lay, Oliver; Aung, MiMi; Gunter, Steven M.; Dubovitsky, Serge; Blackwood, Gary

2004-01-01

This overview paper is a progress report about the system design and technology development of two interferometer concepts studied for the Terrestrial Planet Finder (TPF) project. The two concepts are a structurally-connected interferometer (SCI) intended to fulfill minimum TPF science goals and a formation-flying interferometer (FFI) intended to fulfill full science goals. Described are major trades, analyses, and technology experiments completed. Near term plans are also described. This paper covers progress since August 2003 and serves as an update to a paper presented at that month's SPIE conference, 'Techniques and Instrumentation for Detection of Exoplanets.

Some questions and answers about the Satellite Power System (SPS)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1980-01-01

Progress in the evaluation of the concept of obtaining significant amount of electrical energy from space through the Satellite Power System is reported. The Concept Development and Evaluation Program plan is described including: systems definition, environmental assessment, societal assessment, and comparative assessment.

Operationalizing Ecosystem Services Indicators for Policy and Decision-Making

EPA Science Inventory

The ecosystem services concept has gained popularity as a means of linking ecosystem goods and services to human well-being. Despite its popularity as a concept, there is much progress needed in operationalizing ecosystem services indicators before they are useful for policy and...

Taming theory with thought experiments: Understanding and scientific progress.

PubMed

Stuart, Michael T

2016-08-01

I claim that one way thought experiments contribute to scientific progress is by increasing scientific understanding. Understanding does not have a currently accepted characterization in the philosophical literature, but I argue that we already have ways to test for it. For instance, current pedagogical practice often requires that students demonstrate being in either or both of the following two states: 1) Having grasped the meaning of some relevant theory, concept, law or model, 2) Being able to apply that theory, concept, law or model fruitfully to new instances. Three thought experiments are presented which have been important historically in helping us pass these tests, and two others that cause us to fail. Then I use this operationalization of understanding to clarify the relationships between scientific thought experiments, the understanding they produce, and the progress they enable. I conclude that while no specific instance of understanding (thus conceived) is necessary for scientific progress, understanding in general is. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Applying a Force and Motion Learning Progression over an Extended Time Span using the Force Concept Inventory

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fulmer, Gavin W.; Liang, Ling L.; Liu, Xiufeng

2014-11-01

This exploratory study applied a proposed force and motion learning progression (LP) to high-school and university students and to content involving both one- and two-dimensional force and motion situations. The Force Concept Inventory (FCI) was adapted, based on a previous content analysis and coding of the questions in the FCI in terms of the level descriptors of the LP. Using a Rasch measurement model and latent class analysis, students' responses were tested for fit with the proposed LP. Results indicated that the recoded FCI response options are generally consistent with a progression of difficulties as proposed in the LP, and that the students could be organized into different groups with progressively different levels of ability. However, reliability for the ability estimates was only moderate and response options at lower levels of the LP were not well differentiated. Implications for the assessments with LPs and revisions for both the FCI and the force and motion LP are also discussed.

Overcoming Barriers to Implementation of Evidence-Based Practice Concepts in Athletic Training Education: Perceptions of Select Educators

PubMed Central

Manspeaker, Sarah; Van Lunen, Bonnie

2011-01-01

Context: The need to include evidence-based practice (EBP) concepts in entry-level athletic training education is evident as the profession transitions toward using evidence to inform clinical decision making. Objective: To evaluate athletic training educators' experience with implementation of EBP concepts in Commission on Accreditation of Athletic Training Education (CAATE)-accredited entry-level athletic training education programs in reference to educational barriers and strategies for overcoming these barriers. Design: Qualitative interviews of emergent design with grounded theory. Setting: Undergraduate CAATE-accredited athletic training education programs. Patients or Other Participants: Eleven educators (3 men, 8 women). The average number of years teaching was 14.73 ± 7.06. Data Collection and Analysis: Interviews were conducted to evaluate perceived barriers and strategies for overcoming these barriers to implementation of evidence-based concepts in the curriculum. Interviews were explored qualitatively through open and axial coding. Established themes and categories were triangulated and member checked to determine trustworthiness. Results: Educators identified 3 categories of need for EBP instruction: respect for the athletic training profession, use of EBP as part of the decision-making toolbox, and third-party reimbursement. Barriers to incorporating EBP concepts included time, role strain, knowledge, and the gap between clinical and educational practices. Suggested strategies for surmounting barriers included identifying a starting point for inclusion and approaching inclusion from a faculty perspective. Conclusions: Educators must transition toward instruction of EBP, regardless of barriers present in their academic programs, in order to maintain progress with other health professions' clinical practices and educational standards. Because today's students are tomorrow's clinicians, we need to include EBP concepts in entry-level education to promote critical thinking, inspire potential research interest, and further develop the available body of knowledge in our growing clinical practice. PMID:22488139

Overcoming barriers to implementation of evidence-based practice concepts in athletic training education: perceptions of select educators.

PubMed

Manspeaker, Sarah; Van Lunen, Bonnie

2011-01-01

The need to include evidence-based practice (EBP) concepts in entry-level athletic training education is evident as the profession transitions toward using evidence to inform clinical decision making. To evaluate athletic training educators' experience with implementation of EBP concepts in Commission on Accreditation of Athletic Training Education (CAATE)-accredited entry-level athletic training education programs in reference to educational barriers and strategies for overcoming these barriers. Qualitative interviews of emergent design with grounded theory. Undergraduate CAATE-accredited athletic training education programs. Eleven educators (3 men, 8 women). The average number of years teaching was 14.73 ± 7.06. Interviews were conducted to evaluate perceived barriers and strategies for overcoming these barriers to implementation of evidence-based concepts in the curriculum. Interviews were explored qualitatively through open and axial coding. Established themes and categories were triangulated and member checked to determine trustworthiness. Educators identified 3 categories of need for EBP instruction: respect for the athletic training profession, use of EBP as part of the decision-making toolbox, and third-party reimbursement. Barriers to incorporating EBP concepts included time, role strain, knowledge, and the gap between clinical and educational practices. Suggested strategies for surmounting barriers included identifying a starting point for inclusion and approaching inclusion from a faculty perspective. Educators must transition toward instruction of EBP, regardless of barriers present in their academic programs, in order to maintain progress with other health professions' clinical practices and educational standards. Because today's students are tomorrow's clinicians, we need to include EBP concepts in entry-level education to promote critical thinking, inspire potential research interest, and further develop the available body of knowledge in our growing clinical practice.

Progress Made in Lunar In-Situ Resource Utilization Under NASA's Exploration Technology and Development Program

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sanders, Gerald B.; Larson, William E.

2012-01-01

Incorporation of In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU) and the production of mission critical consumables for 9 propulsion, power, and life support into mission architectures can greatly reduce the mass, cost, and risk of missions 10 leading to a sustainable and affordable approach to human exploration beyond Earth. ISRU and its products can 11 also greatly affect how other exploration systems are developed, including determining which technologies are 12 important or enabling. While the concept of lunar ISRU has existed for over 40 years, the technologies and systems 13 had not progressed much past simple laboratory proof-of-concept tests. With the release of the Vision for Space 14 Exploration in 2004 with the goal of harnessing the Moon.s resources, NASA initiated the ISRU Project in the 15 Exploration Technology Development Program (ETDP) to develop the technologies and systems needed to meet 16 this goal. In the five years of work in the ISRU Project, significant advancements and accomplishments occurred in 17 several important areas of lunar ISRU. Also, two analog field tests held in Hawaii in 2008 and 2010 demonstrated 18 all the steps in ISRU capabilities required along with the integration of ISRU products and hardware with 19 propulsion, power, and cryogenic storage systems. This paper will review the scope of the ISRU Project in the 20 ETDP, ISRU incorporation and development strategies utilized by the ISRU Project, and ISRU development and 21 test accomplishments over the five years of funded project activity.

Relationship of Topology, Multiscale Phase Synchronization, and State Transitions in Human Brain Networks

PubMed Central

Kim, Minkyung; Kim, Seunghwan; Mashour, George A.; Lee, UnCheol

2017-01-01

How the brain reconstitutes consciousness and cognition after a major perturbation like general anesthesia is an important question with significant neuroscientific and clinical implications. Recent empirical studies in animals and humans suggest that the recovery of consciousness after anesthesia is not random but ordered. Emergence patterns have been classified as progressive and abrupt transitions from anesthesia to consciousness, with associated differences in duration and electroencephalogram (EEG) properties. We hypothesized that the progressive and abrupt emergence patterns from the unconscious state are associated with, respectively, continuous and discontinuous synchronization transitions in functional brain networks. The discontinuous transition is explainable with the concept of explosive synchronization, which has been studied almost exclusively in network science. We used the Kuramato model, a simple oscillatory network model, to simulate progressive and abrupt transitions in anatomical human brain networks acquired from diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) of 82 brain regions. To facilitate explosive synchronization, distinct frequencies for hub nodes with a large frequency disassortativity (i.e., higher frequency nodes linking with lower frequency nodes, or vice versa) were applied to the brain network. In this simulation study, we demonstrated that both progressive and abrupt transitions follow distinct synchronization processes at the individual node, cluster, and global network levels. The characteristic synchronization patterns of brain regions that are “progressive and earlier” or “abrupt but delayed” account for previously reported behavioral responses of gradual and abrupt emergence from the unconscious state. The characteristic network synchronization processes observed at different scales provide new insights into how regional brain functions are reconstituted during progressive and abrupt emergence from the unconscious state. This theoretical approach also offers a principled explanation of how the brain reconstitutes consciousness and cognitive functions after physiologic (sleep), pharmacologic (anesthesia), and pathologic (coma) perturbations. PMID:28713258

Relationship of Topology, Multiscale Phase Synchronization, and State Transitions in Human Brain Networks.

PubMed

Kim, Minkyung; Kim, Seunghwan; Mashour, George A; Lee, UnCheol

2017-01-01

How the brain reconstitutes consciousness and cognition after a major perturbation like general anesthesia is an important question with significant neuroscientific and clinical implications. Recent empirical studies in animals and humans suggest that the recovery of consciousness after anesthesia is not random but ordered. Emergence patterns have been classified as progressive and abrupt transitions from anesthesia to consciousness, with associated differences in duration and electroencephalogram (EEG) properties. We hypothesized that the progressive and abrupt emergence patterns from the unconscious state are associated with, respectively, continuous and discontinuous synchronization transitions in functional brain networks. The discontinuous transition is explainable with the concept of explosive synchronization, which has been studied almost exclusively in network science. We used the Kuramato model, a simple oscillatory network model, to simulate progressive and abrupt transitions in anatomical human brain networks acquired from diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) of 82 brain regions. To facilitate explosive synchronization, distinct frequencies for hub nodes with a large frequency disassortativity (i.e., higher frequency nodes linking with lower frequency nodes, or vice versa) were applied to the brain network. In this simulation study, we demonstrated that both progressive and abrupt transitions follow distinct synchronization processes at the individual node, cluster, and global network levels. The characteristic synchronization patterns of brain regions that are "progressive and earlier" or "abrupt but delayed" account for previously reported behavioral responses of gradual and abrupt emergence from the unconscious state. The characteristic network synchronization processes observed at different scales provide new insights into how regional brain functions are reconstituted during progressive and abrupt emergence from the unconscious state. This theoretical approach also offers a principled explanation of how the brain reconstitutes consciousness and cognitive functions after physiologic (sleep), pharmacologic (anesthesia), and pathologic (coma) perturbations.

Reconstructing Student Conceptions of Climate Change; An Inquiry Approach

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McClelland, J. Collin

No other environmental issue today has as much potential to alter life on Earth as does global climate change. Scientific evidence continues to grow; indicating that climate change is occurring now, and that change is a result of human activities (National Research Council [NRC], 2010). The need for climate literacy in society has become increasingly urgent. Unfortunately, understanding the concepts necessary for climate literacy remains a challenge for most individuals. A growing research base has identified a number of common misconceptions people have about climate literacy concepts (Leiserowitz, Smith, & Marlon 2011; Shepardson, Niyogi, Choi, & Charusombat, 2009). However, few have explored this understanding in high school students. This sequential mixed methods study explored the changing conceptions of global climate change in 90 sophomore biology students through the course of their participation in an eight-week inquiry-based global climate change unit. The study also explored changes in students' attitudes over the course of the study unit, contemplating possible relationships between students' conceptual understanding of and attitudes toward global climate change. Phase I of the mixed methods study included quantitative analysis of pre-post content knowledge and attitude assessment data. Content knowledge gains were statistically significant and over 25% of students in the study shifted from an expressed belief of denial or uncertainty about global warming to one of belief in it. Phase II used an inductive approach to explore student attitudes and conceptions. Conceptually, very few students grew to a scientifically accurate understanding of the greenhouse effect or the relationship between global warming and climate change. However, they generally made progress in their conceptual understanding by adding more specific detail to explain their understanding. Phase III employed a case study approach with eight purposefully selected student cases, identifying five common conceptual and five common attitudebased themes. Findings suggest similar misconceptions revealed in prior research also occurred in this study group. Some examples include; connecting global warming to the hole in the ozone layer, and falsely linking unrelated environmental issues like littering to climate change. Data about students' conceptual understanding of energy may also have implications for education research curriculum development. Similar to Driver & While no statistical relationship between students' attitudes about global climate change and overall conceptual understanding emerged, some data suggested that climate change skeptics may perceive the concept of evidence differently than non-skeptics. One-way ANOVA data comparing skeptics with other students on evidence-based assessment items was significant. This study offers insights to teachers of potential barriers students face when trying to conceptualize global climate change concepts. More importantly it reinforces the idea that students generally find value in learning about global climate change in the classroom.

Narrating Neoliberalism: Alternative Education Teachers' Conceptions of Their Changing Roles

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Golden, Noah Asher

2018-01-01

The signifier "alternative" in education has largely shifted from progressive or humanizing pedagogies to deficit framings requiring alternate graduation criteria. This development is part of broader neoliberal educational reform efforts that disrupt longstanding conceptions of teachers' roles. This study serves to investigate long-term…

"Paideia," Progress, Puzzlement

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hrachovec, Herbert

2018-01-01

Platonic "paideia" is a mainstream concept in traditional philosophy and humanistic circles generally. It is closely connected with social progress brought about by the dynamics of enlightenment and self-fulfillment, symbolized by the allegory of the cave. The main contention of this paper is that the philosophical grammar of this simile…

[Understanding new progress in prosthodontics from the perspective of updates in the glossary of prosthodontic terms].

PubMed

Jiang, T

2017-12-09

Glossary of Prosthodontic Terms is a standardized vocabulary with international influence. Its ninth edition was published in J Prosthet Dent in 2017, 12 years after the last edition. During this period, great development has taken place in the dental prosthetics due to dental implant and digital dentistry as well as application of new materials and technologies. The research results of dental adhesion, aesthetic dentistry, orofacial function, and tissue regeneration has been fully applied in dental clinic. This paper attempts to capture and accurately understand the changes of some important, especially controversial academic concepts through the comparison of the seventh, eighth and ninth edition of vocabulary. Four parts including new terms, obsolete terms, terms with updated concept, and terms with the continuity of concept are used to show the important progress of prosthodontics.

[Locus of control and self-concept in interpersonal conflict resolution approaches].

PubMed

Hisli Sahin, Nesrin; Basim, H Nejat; Cetin, Fatih

2009-01-01

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between self-concept and locus of control in interpersonal conflict resolution approaches and to determine the predictors of conflict resolution approach choices. The study included 345 students aged between 18 and 28 years that were studying at universities in Ankara. Data were collected using the Interpersonal Conflict Resolution Approaches Scale to measure conflict resolution approaches, the Social Comparison Scale to measure self-concept, and the Internal-External Locus of Control Scale to measure locus of control. It was observed that confrontation approach to interpersonal conflict was predicted by self-concept (beta = 0.396, P < 0.001) Moreover, self-concept was related to self-disclosure (beta = 0.180, P < 0.01) and emotional expression (beta = 0.196, P < 0.001) approaches. Locus of control played a role in the choice of all resolution approaches. In addition to these findings, it was observed that females used self-disclosure (beta = -0.163, P < 0.01) and emotional expression (beta = -0.219, P < 0.001), while males used approach (beta = 0.395, P < 0.001) and public behavior (beta = 0.270, P < 0.001) approaches in the resolution processes. Self-concept and locus of control were related to the behaviors adopted in the interpersonal conflict resolution process. Individuals with a positive self-concept and an internal locus of control adopted solutions to interpersonal conflict resolution that were more effective and constructive.

Potency testing of veterinary vaccines: the way from in vivo to in vitro.

PubMed

Romberg, Judith; Lang, Stefan; Balks, Elisabeth; Kamphuis, Elisabeth; Duchow, Karin; Loos, Daniela; Rau, Henriette; Motitschke, Andreas; Jungbäck, Carmen

2012-01-01

Current quality control of inactivated animal vaccines still focuses on the potency of final products in a batch-wise manner. Animal welfare concerns as well as scientific considerations have led to the '3Rs-concept' that comprises the refinement of animal procedures, the reduction of animal numbers, and the replacement of animal models. Although the 3Rs-concept has been widely accepted as a fundamental principle, the number of approved alternatives for in vivo tests is still limited. To promote further progress, the international scientific workshop 'Potency Testing of Veterinary Vaccines: The Way from in vivo to in vitro' was held at the Paul-Ehrlich-Institut in Langen, Germany, on 01-03 December 2010. More than 130 participants from industry, academia and regulatory authorities discussed the current state of the 3Rs-concept, examples of its successful implementation as well as still existing hurdles. Special emphasis was laid on the 'consistency approach' that aims to ensure relevant quality attributes of vaccine batches by in vitro analyses during production rather than by in vivo potency tests on the final product. This report provides an overview of the insights gained, including the recommendations produced at the end of the workshop. Copyright © 2011. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.

A Textbook for a First Course in Computational Fluid Dynamics

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Zingg, D. W.; Pulliam, T. H.; Nixon, David (Technical Monitor)

1999-01-01

This paper describes and discusses the textbook, Fundamentals of Computational Fluid Dynamics by Lomax, Pulliam, and Zingg, which is intended for a graduate level first course in computational fluid dynamics. This textbook emphasizes fundamental concepts in developing, analyzing, and understanding numerical methods for the partial differential equations governing the physics of fluid flow. Its underlying philosophy is that the theory of linear algebra and the attendant eigenanalysis of linear systems provides a mathematical framework to describe and unify most numerical methods in common use in the field of fluid dynamics. Two linear model equations, the linear convection and diffusion equations, are used to illustrate concepts throughout. Emphasis is on the semi-discrete approach, in which the governing partial differential equations (PDE's) are reduced to systems of ordinary differential equations (ODE's) through a discretization of the spatial derivatives. The ordinary differential equations are then reduced to ordinary difference equations (O(Delta)E's) using a time-marching method. This methodology, using the progression from PDE through ODE's to O(Delta)E's, together with the use of the eigensystems of tridiagonal matrices and the theory of O(Delta)E's, gives the book its distinctiveness and provides a sound basis for a deep understanding of fundamental concepts in computational fluid dynamics.

Project Icarus: Analysis of Plasma jet driven Magneto-Inertial Fusion as potential primary propulsion driver for the Icarus probe

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stanic, M.; Cassibry, J. T.; Adams, R. B.

2013-05-01

Hopes of sending probes to another star other than the Sun are currently limited by the maturity of advanced propulsion technologies. One of the few candidate propulsion systems for providing interstellar flight capabilities is nuclear fusion. In the past many fusion propulsion concepts have been proposed and some of them have even been explored in detail, Project Daedalus for example. However, as scientific progress in this field has advanced, new fusion concepts have emerged that merit evaluation as potential drivers for interstellar missions. Plasma jet driven Magneto-Inertial Fusion (PJMIF) is one of those concepts. PJMIF involves a salvo of converging plasma jets that form a uniform liner, which compresses a magnetized target to fusion conditions. It is an Inertial Confinement Fusion (ICF)-Magnetic Confinement Fusion (MCF) hybrid approach that has the potential for a multitude of benefits over both ICF and MCF, such as lower system mass and significantly lower cost. This paper concentrates on a thermodynamic assessment of basic performance parameters necessary for utilization of PJMIF as a candidate propulsion system for the Project Icarus mission. These parameters include: specific impulse, thrust, exhaust velocity, mass of the engine system, mass of the fuel required etc. This is a submission of the Project Icarus Study Group.

A qualitative study of parents' experiences using family support services: applying the concept of surface and depth.

PubMed

Whittaker, Karen A; Cox, Pat; Thomas, Nigel; Cocker, Karen

2014-09-01

United Kingdom policy and practice endorses family support for child well-being. Achieving such support requires multi-agency approaches that consider all aspects of parents' and children's lives and which offer practical, social and emotional help. The potential for services to make a positive impact on parents and their families will depend in part on the level and nature of engagement. In this paper, a case is made for the application of the two-part surface and depth concept for understanding how practitioners engage with families and how they might improve the chances of supporting sustainable differences for parents and families. To illustrate, qualitative data from a review of family centre support provided by a north of England local authority are presented. The review was commissioned to explore why families often need to re-engage with intensive support services. Data were drawn from interviews with parents (n = 18, recruited following a survey of all those registered with the service during April-May 2009) and discussions with family centre support workers (n = 4), and following thematic analysis, three dominant themes emerged--resources available, staff approach and real life--which were appraised in the light of the surface and depth concept. Much of the work with parents effectively dealt with pressing needs. This felt gratifying for both parent and worker and supported immediate service engagement. However, each noted that the more complex issues in parents' lives went unchallenged and thus the sustainability of progress in terms of parenting practice was questionable. A strengths focused approach by staff that understood needs in the context of parents' real-life circumstances was important to parent engagement. Thus, longer term benefits from family support require practitioners to work with parents to problem solve immediate issues while also digging deeper to acknowledge and seek to resolve the more complex challenges parents face in their real lives. © 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Investigating the interrelationships among conceptions of, approaches to, and self-efficacy in learning science

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zheng, Lanqin; Dong, Yan; Huang, Ronghuai; Chang, Chun-Yen; Bhagat, Kaushal Kumar

2018-01-01

The purpose of this study was to examine the relations between primary school students' conceptions of, approaches to, and self-efficacy in learning science in Mainland China. A total of 1049 primary school students from Mainland China participated in this study. Three instruments were adapted to measure students' conceptions of learning science, approaches to learning science, and self-efficacy. The exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis were adopted to validate three instruments. The path analysis was employed to understand the relationships between conceptions of learning science, approaches to learning science, and self-efficacy. The findings indicated that students' lower level conceptions of learning science positively influenced their surface approaches in learning science. Higher level conceptions of learning science had a positive influence on deep approaches and a negative influence on surface approaches to learning science. Furthermore, self-efficacy was also a hierarchical construct and can be divided into the lower level and higher level. Only students' deep approaches to learning science had a positive influence on their lower and higher level of self-efficacy in learning science. The results were discussed in the context of the implications for teachers and future studies.

Developing Coherent Conceptual Storylines: Two Elementary Challenges

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hanuscin, Deborah; Lipsitz, Kelsey; Cisterna-Alburquerque, Dante; Arnone, Kathryn A.; van Garderen, Delinda; de Araujo, Zandra; Lee, Eun Ju

2016-01-01

The "conceptual storyline" of a lesson refers to the flow and sequencing of learning activities such that science concepts align and progress in ways that are instructionally meaningful to student learning of the concepts. Research demonstrates that when teachers apply lesson design strategies to create a coherent science content…

Commentary--Enlarging Concepts, Refining Methods, Improving Interventions

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Palacios, Jesús

2015-01-01

As illustrated by the articles in this special issue, the research into ethnic identity in adoption is making significant progress. At the same time, it faces new challenges in the definition of concepts, the use of appropriate methods of study, and the consideration of implications for professional interventions. This commentary offers additional…

Institutional Advancement: A Marketing Perspective. Part I: A Proposal.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Moriarty, Daniel F.

Strategies are proposed for the implementation of the marketing concept at Triton College. The report begins by describing the establishment and goals of the Marketing Task Force and goes on to define "institutional advancement," as a positive, progressive response to community educational needs, and "the marketing concept," as suggesting an…

Landscape assessment for tourism

Treesearch

Clare A. Gunn

1979-01-01

Increased development of landscapes for tourism now creates problems of integrating the many parts. Accomplishments at the site scale have not been matched with equal progress at the regional scale. This concept, and its example of application, shows promise of assisting regions in assessing their potential of landscapes before development. With such a concept, not...

Evolution of Management Thought in the Medieval Times.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sharma, C. L.

The medieval times witnessed progress toward the growth of larger and more complex organizations and the application of increasingly sophisticated management techniques. Feudalism contributed the concept of decentralization. The concepts evolved by the Catholic Church can scarcely be improved on and are very much pertinent to the management of…

Progress Monitoring in Middle School Mathematics: Options and Issues

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Foegen, Anne

2008-01-01

This study investigated the technical features of six potential progress-monitoring measures in mathematics appropriate for use at the middle school level, including two commercially available measures for sixth-grade mathematics, two measures used in previous middle school studies, and two new measures of numeracy concepts. Five hundred…

Significant Ideas and Progressive Change

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Morgan, Gwen; Mitchell, Anne

2012-01-01

Ideas are not one-time "Eureka" moments, but are parts of concepts progressing forward. Sometimes years pass before ideas are implemented. They then resurface, connect with other ideas, and move policies ahead. Meanwhile, the idea remains alive in the field, influencing decisions and goals. Ideas build on one another when implemented. The field of…

Construction and reconstruction concept in mathematics instruction

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mumu, Jeinne; Charitas Indra Prahmana, Rully; Tanujaya, Benidiktus

2017-12-01

The purpose of this paper is to describe two learning activities undertaken by lecturers, so that students can understand a mathematical concept. The mathematical concept studied in this research is the Vector Space in Linear Algebra instruction. Classroom Action Research used as a research method with pre-service mathematics teacher at University of Papua as the research subject. Student participants are divided into two parallel classes, 24 students in regular class, and remedial class consist of 18 students. Both approaches, construct and reconstruction concept, are implemented on both classes. The result shows that concept construction can only be done in regular class while in remedial class, learning with concept construction approach is not able to increase students' understanding on the concept taught. Understanding the concept of a student in a remedial class can only be carried out using the concept reconstruction approach.

Status of Progress Made Toward Preliminary Design Concepts for the Inventory in Select Media for DOE-Managed HLW/SNF

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Matteo, Edward N.; Hardin, Ernest L.; Hadgu, Teklu

As the title suggests, this report provides a summary of the status and progress for the Preliminary Design Concepts Work Package. Described herein are design concepts and thermal analysis for crystalline and salt host media. The report concludes that thermal management of defense waste, including the relatively small subset of high thermal output waste packages, is readily achievable. Another important conclusion pertains to engineering feasibility, and design concepts presented herein are based upon established and existing elements and/or designs. The multipack configuration options for the crystalline host media pose the greatest engineering challenges, as these designs involve large, heavy wastemore » packages that pose specific challenges with respect to handling and emplacement. Defense-related Spent Nuclear Fuel (DSNF) presents issues for post-closure criticality control, and a key recommendation made herein relates to the need for special packaging design that includes neutron-absorbing material for the DSNF. Lastly, this report finds that the preliminary design options discussed are tenable for operational and post-closure safety, owing to the fact that these concepts have been derived from other published and well-studied repository designs.« less

Interaction of learning approach with concept integration and achievement in a large guided inquiry organic class

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mewhinney, Christina

A study was conducted to investigate the relationship of students' concept integration and achievement with time spent within a topic and across related topics in a large first semester guided inquiry organic chemistry class. Achievement was based on evidence of algorithmic problem solving; and concept integration was based on demonstrated performance explaining, applying, and relating concepts to each other. Twelve individual assessments were made of both variables over three related topics---acid/base, nucleophilic substitution and electrophilic addition reactions. Measurements included written, free response and ordered multiple answer questions using a classroom response system. Results demonstrated that students can solve problems without conceptual understanding. A second study was conducted to compare the students' learning approach at the beginning and end of the course. Students were scored on their preferences for a deep, strategic, or surface approach to learning based on their responses to a pre and post survey. Results suggest that students significantly decreased their preference for a surface approach during the semester. Analysis of the data collected was performed to determine the relationship between students' learning approach and their concept integration and achievement in this class. Results show a correlation between a deep approach and concept integration and a strong negative correlation between a surface approach and concept integration.

Analyzing data flows of WLCG jobs at batch job level

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kuehn, Eileen; Fischer, Max; Giffels, Manuel; Jung, Christopher; Petzold, Andreas

2015-05-01

With the introduction of federated data access to the workflows of WLCG, it is becoming increasingly important for data centers to understand specific data flows regarding storage element accesses, firewall configurations, as well as the scheduling of batch jobs themselves. As existing batch system monitoring and related system monitoring tools do not support measurements at batch job level, a new tool has been developed and put into operation at the GridKa Tier 1 center for monitoring continuous data streams and characteristics of WLCG jobs and pilots. Long term measurements and data collection are in progress. These measurements already have been proven to be useful analyzing misbehaviors and various issues. Therefore we aim for an automated, realtime approach for anomaly detection. As a requirement, prototypes for standard workflows have to be examined. Based on measurements of several months, different features of HEP jobs are evaluated regarding their effectiveness for data mining approaches to identify these common workflows. The paper will introduce the actual measurement approach and statistics as well as the general concept and first results classifying different HEP job workflows derived from the measurements at GridKa.

Reference Mission Version 3.0 Addendum to the Human Exploration of Mars: The Reference Mission of the NASA Mars Exploration Study Team. Addendum; 3.0

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Drake, Bret G. (Editor)

1998-01-01

This Addendum to the Mars Reference Mission was developed as a companion document to the NASA Special Publication 6107, "Human Exploration of Mars: The Reference Mission of the NASA Mars Exploration Study Team." It summarizes changes and updates to the Mars Reference Missions that were developed by the Exploration Office since the final draft of SP 6107 was printed in early 1999. The Reference Mission is a tool used by the exploration community to compare and evaluate approaches to mission and system concepts that could be used for human missions to Mars. It is intended to identify and clarify system drivers, significant sources of cost, performance, risk, and schedule variation. Several alternative scenarios, employing different technical approaches to solving mission and technology challenges, are discussed in this Addendum. Comparing alternative approaches provides the basis for continual improvement to technology investment plan and a general understanding of future human missions to Mars. The Addendum represents a snapshot of work in progress in support of planning for future human exploration missions through May 1998.

Introducing evidence-based dentistry to dental students using histology.

PubMed

Lallier, Thomas E

2014-03-01

The expansion of evidence-based dentistry (EBD) is essential to the continued growth and development of the dental profession. Expanding EBD requires increased emphasis on critical thinking skills during dental education, as noted in the American Dental Education Association's Competencies for the New General Dentist. In order to achieve this goal, educational exercises must be introduced to increase the use of critical thinking skills early in the dental curriculum, with continued reinforcement as students progress through subsequent years. Described in this article is one approach to increasing student exposure to critical thinking during the early basic science curriculum-specifically, within the confines of a traditional histology course. A method of utilizing the medical and dental research literature to reinforce and enliven the concepts taught in histology is described, along with an approach for using peer-to-peer presentations to demonstrate the tools needed to critically evaluate research studies and their presentation in published articles. This approach, which could be applied to any basic science course, will result in a stronger foundation on which students can build their EBD and critical thinking skills.

Investigation of virtual reality concept based on system analysis of conceptual series

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Romanova, A.; Shuklin, D. A.; Kalinkina, M. E.; Gotskaya, I. B.; Ponomarev, Y. E.

2018-05-01

The paper covers approaches to the definition of virtual reality from the point of view of the humanitarian sciences and technology. Each approach analyzing problems of concept perception of methods interpreted by representatives of philosophy, psychology and sociology is singled out. Terminological analysis of the basic concepts is carried out and their refinement is constructed in the process of comparing the concepts of virtuality and virtual reality. Using the analysis of selected sources, a number of singularity characteristics of the given concept are singled out and its definition is specified. Results consist in combining the interpretation of all approaches to determine the concept of virtual reality. Due to the use of a comprehensive approach to the definition of the investigated concept, which allows us to consider the object of research as a set of elements that are subject to study with the help of a corresponding set of methods, one can conclude that the concept under study is complex and multifaceted. The authors noted that virtual reality technologies have a flexible concept depending on the field of application.

Exploring Sun-Earth Connections: A Physical Science Program for (K-8)Teachers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Michels, D. J.; Pickert, S. M.; Thompson, J. L.; Montrose, C. J.

2003-12-01

An experimental, inquiry-based physical science curriculum for undergraduate, pre-service K-8 teachers is under development at the Catholic University of America in collaboration with the Solar Physics Branch of the Naval Research Laboratory and NASA's Sun-Earth Connection missions. This is a progress report. The current, stunningly successful exploratory phase in Sun-Earth Connection (SEC) physics, sparked by SOHO, Yohkoh, TRACE, and other International Solar Terrestrial Physics (ISTP) and Living With a Star (LWS) programs, has provided dynamic, visually intuitive data that can be used for teaching basic physical concepts such as the properties of gravitational and electromagnetic fields which are manifest in beautiful imagery of the astrophysical plasmas of the solar atmosphere and Earth's auroras. Through a team approach capitalizing on the combined expertise of the Catholic University's departments of Education and Physics and of NRL solar researchers deeply involved in SEC missions we have laid out a program that will teach non-science-major undergraduates a very limited number of physical science concepts but in such a way as to develop for each one both a formal understanding and an intuitive grasp that will instill confidence, spark interest and scientific curiosity and, ideally, inspire a habit of lifetime inquiry and professional growth. A three-semester sequence is planned. The first semester will be required of incoming Education freshmen. The second and third semesters will be of such a level as to satisfy the one-year science requirement for non-science majors in the College of Arts and Sciences. The approach as adopted will integrate physics content and educational methods, with each concept introduced through inquiry-based, hands-on investigation using methods and materials directly applicable to K-8 teaching situations (Exploration Phase). The topic is further developed through discussion, demonstration and lecture, introducing such mathematical formulations as are necessary to express the concept clearly (Invention Phase). To further clarify the concept, exercises will be carried out using Web-accessible SEC mission data to develop facility in use of the mathematical formulations, stimulate a sense of participation in ongoing research, and expand on ways to introduce future pupils to the excitement of real-world exploration (Expansion Phase).

Innovative mid-infrared detector concepts

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Höfling, Sven; Pfenning, Andreas; Weih, Robert; Ratajczak, Albert; Hartmann, Fabian; Knebl, Georg; Kamp, Martin; Worschech, Lukas

2016-09-01

Gas sensing is a key technology with applications in various industrial, medical and environmental areas. Optical detection mechanisms allow for a highly selective, contactless and fast detection. For this purpose, rotational-vibrational absorption bands within the mid infrared (MIR) spectral region are exploited and probed with appropriate light sources. During the past years, the development of novel laser concepts such as interband cascade lasers (ICLs) and quantum cascade lasers (QCLs) has driven a continuous optimization of MIR laser sources. On the other hand side, there has been relatively little progress on detectors in this wavelength range. Here, we study two novel and promising GaSb-based detector concepts: Interband cascade detectors (ICD) and resonant tunneling diode (RTD) photodetectors. ICDs are a promising approach towards highly sensitive room temperature detection of MIR radiation. They make use of the cascading scheme that is enabled by the broken gap alignment of the two binaries GaSb and InAs. The interband transition in GaSb/InAs-superlattices (SL) allows for normal incidence detection. The cut-off wavelength, which determines the low energy detection limit, can be engineered via the SL period. RTD photodetectors act as low noise and high speed amplifiers of small optically generated electrical signals. In contrast to avalanche photodiodes, where the gain originates from multiplication due to impact ionization, in RTD photodetectors a large tunneling current is modulated via Coulomb interaction by the presence of photogenerated minority charge carriers. For both detector concepts, first devices operational at room temperature have been realized.

The potential of net zero energy buildings (NZEBs) concept at design stage for healthcare buildings towards sustainable development

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hazli Abdellah, Roy; Asrul Nasid Masrom, Md; Chen, Goh Kai; Mohamed, Sulzakimin; Omar, Roshartini

2017-11-01

The focus on net-zero energy buildings (NZEBs) has been widely analysed and discussed particularly when European Union Parliament are progressively moving towards regulation that promotes the improvement of energy efficiency (EE). Additionally, it also to reduce energy consumption through the recast of the EU Directive on Energy Performance of Buildings (EPBD) in which all new buildings to be “nearly Zero-Energy” Buildings by 2020. Broadly, there is a growing trend to explore the feasibility of net zero energy in healthcare sector as the level energy consumption for healthcare sector is found significantly high. Besides that, healthcare buildings energy consumption also exceeds of many other nondomestic building types, and this shortcoming is still undetermined yet especially for developing countries. This paper aims to review the potential of NZEBs in healthcare buildings by considering its concept in design features. Data are gathered through a comprehensive energy management literature review from previous studies. The review is vital to encourage construction players to increase their awareness, practices, and implementation of NZEBs in healthcare buildings. It suggests that NZEBs concept has a potential to be adapted in healthcare buildings through emphasizing of passive approach as well as the utilization of energy efficiency systems and renewable energy systems in buildings. This paper will provide a basis knowledge for construction key players mainly architects to promote NZEBs concept at design stage for healthcare buildings development.

From “cracking the orthographic code” to “playing with language”: toward a usage-based foundation of the reading process

PubMed Central

Wallot, Sebastian

2014-01-01

The empirical study of reading dates back more than 125 years. But despite this long tradition, the scientific understanding of reading has made rather heterogeneous progress: many factors that influence the process of text reading have been uncovered, but theoretical explanations remain fragmented; no general theory pulls together the diverse findings. A handful of scholars have noted that properties thought to be at the core of the reading process do not actually generalize across different languages or from situations single-word reading to connected text reading. Such observations cast doubt on many of the traditional conceptions about reading. In this article, I suggest that the observed heterogeneity in the research is due to misguided conceptions about the reading process. Particularly problematic are the unrefined notions about meaning which undergird many reading theories: most psychological theories of reading implicitly assume a kind of elemental token semantics, where words serve as stable units of meaning in a text. This conception of meaning creates major conceptual problems. As an alternative, I argue that reading shoud be rather understood as a form of language use, which circumvents many of the conceptual problems and connects reading to a wider range of linguistic communication. Finally, drawing from Wittgenstein, the concept of “language games” is outlined as an approach to language use that can be operationalized scientifically to provide a new foundation for reading research. PMID:25202285

Automatic control of a primary electric thrust subsystem

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Macie, T. W.; Macmedan, M. L.

1975-01-01

A concept for automatic control of the thrust subsystem has been developed by JPL and participating NASA Centers. This paper reports on progress in implementing the concept at JPL. Control of the Thrust Subsystem (TSS) is performed by the spacecraft computer command subsystem, and telemetry data is extracted by the spacecraft flight data subsystem. The Data and Control Interface Unit, an element of the TSS, provides the interface with the individual elements of the TSS. The control philosophy and implementation guidelines are presented. Control requirements are listed, and the control mechanism, including the serial digital data intercommunication system, is outlined. The paper summarizes progress to Fall 1974.

Enhancing introductory hydrology curriculum by integrating perspectives from multi-disciplinary graduate fields of study

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Arnold, T. E.; Henson, W.; Reijo, C. J.; Laing, J.; Weinkam, G.

2015-12-01

A cross-disciplinary hydrology course was developed that combined field and classroom based techniques to educate undergraduate level students on issues related to water resources in Florida, USA. Six instructors from separate departments brought a different perspective, research experience, and view on water quality and quantity issues. The course progressed by examining hydrologic processes at different spatio-temporal scales beginning with the geologic scale (the formation of aquifers) and ending with present-day water management and policy concerns. We were challenged to introduce students from various academic backgrounds and levels to the core concepts of hydrology and water chemistry. Additionally, the instructors faced the task of making our research fit together seamlessly, such that one topic would naturally progress to the next topic. We ensured that students' knowledge progressed enough so they could address complex management issues through critical thinking and application of basic field techniques. It is our objective to share the experiences and challenges in developing an interdisciplinary course that: 1) introduced new research ideas and concepts from six separate fields, 2) enhanced lecture concepts by hands-on, field-based activities, and 3) would keep students from science and non-science backgrounds engaged and challenged but not overwhelmed.

Omics/systems biology and cancer cachexia.

PubMed

Gallagher, Iain J; Jacobi, Carsten; Tardif, Nicolas; Rooyackers, Olav; Fearon, Kenneth

2016-06-01

Cancer cachexia is a complex syndrome generated by interaction between the host and tumour cells with a background of treatment effects and toxicity. The complexity of the physiological pathways likely involved in cancer cachexia necessitates a holistic view of the relevant biology. Emergent properties are characteristic of complex systems with the result that the end result is more than the sum of its parts. Recognition of the importance of emergent properties in biology led to the concept of systems biology wherein a holistic approach is taken to the biology at hand. Systems biology approaches will therefore play an important role in work to uncover key mechanisms with therapeutic potential in cancer cachexia. The 'omics' technologies provide a global view of biological systems. Genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, lipidomics and metabolomics approaches all have application in the study of cancer cachexia to generate systems level models of the behaviour of this syndrome. The current work reviews recent applications of these technologies to muscle atrophy in general and cancer cachexia in particular with a view to progress towards integration of these approaches to better understand the pathology and potential treatment pathways in cancer cachexia. Copyright © 2016. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Contrasting Conceptions of Intelligence and their Educational Implications. Technical Report No. 14.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sternberg, Robert J.

The componential conception of intelligence is summarized and contrasted with the psychometric conception. A brief history of concepts of intelligence is presented, beginning with Galton's anthropometric approach and Binet's more educationally relevant approach. Spearman's, and later Thurstone's, contributions to factor analysis promoted a…

A Learning Progression for Elementary Students' Functional Thinking

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Stephens, Ana C.; Fonger, Nicole; Strachota, Susanne; Isler, Isil; Blanton, Maria; Knuth, Eric; Murphy Gardiner, Angela

2017-01-01

In this article we advance characterizations of and supports for elementary students' progress in generalizing and representing functional relationships as part of a comprehensive approach to early algebra. Our learning progressions approach to early algebra research involves the coordination of a curricular framework and progression, an…

Disease progression and neuroscience.

PubMed

Holford, Nick

2013-06-01

The concepts of disease progression are discussed in the context of neurological disorders. The importance of understanding the time course of the response to inactive (placebo) treatment is discussed. Disease progression and response to placebo treatment both need to be considered before drug effects can be reliably identified. Criteria for distinguishing between symptomatic and disease modifying drug effects are proposed and used to interpret the results of clinical trials in pain, depression, schizophrenia, stroke, Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease.

Animal models for bone tissue engineering and modelling disease

PubMed Central

Griffin, Michelle

2018-01-01

ABSTRACT Tissue engineering and its clinical application, regenerative medicine, are instructing multiple approaches to aid in replacing bone loss after defects caused by trauma or cancer. In such cases, bone formation can be guided by engineered biodegradable and nonbiodegradable scaffolds with clearly defined architectural and mechanical properties informed by evidence-based research. With the ever-increasing expansion of bone tissue engineering and the pioneering research conducted to date, preclinical models are becoming a necessity to allow the engineered products to be translated to the clinic. In addition to creating smart bone scaffolds to mitigate bone loss, the field of tissue engineering and regenerative medicine is exploring methods to treat primary and secondary bone malignancies by creating models that mimic the clinical disease manifestation. This Review gives an overview of the preclinical testing in animal models used to evaluate bone regeneration concepts. Immunosuppressed rodent models have shown to be successful in mimicking bone malignancy via the implantation of human-derived cancer cells, whereas large animal models, including pigs, sheep and goats, are being used to provide an insight into bone formation and the effectiveness of scaffolds in induced tibial or femoral defects, providing clinically relevant similarity to human cases. Despite the recent progress, the successful translation of bone regeneration concepts from the bench to the bedside is rooted in the efforts of different research groups to standardise and validate the preclinical models for bone tissue engineering approaches. PMID:29685995

Illusion or delusion--Lean management in the health sector.

PubMed

McIntosh, Bryan; Sheppy, Bruce; Cohen, Ivan

2014-01-01

There has been considerable interest in the implementation of practices imported from manufacturing into healthcare as a solution to rising healthcare spending and disappointing patient safety indicators. One approach that has attracted particular interest is Lean management and the purpose of this paper is to engage with this topic. Secondary research. Despite widespread enthusiasm about the potential of Lean management processes, evidence about its contribution to higher organisational performance remains inconsistent. This paper engages with the major Lean concepts of operations management and human resource management, including just-in-time, total quality management, total productive maintenance and does not engage in-depth with concepts related to employee empowerment, and training This paper contributes to the organisational management literature in healthcare by showing that although Lean management seems to have the potential to improve organisational performance it is far from a panacea against under performing hospitals. It informs policy making by suggesting that a progressive managerial philosophy has a stronger impact on healthcare performance than the adoption of practices from any particular managerial approach. This paper provides a critical evaluation of the impact of Lean practices in informing healthcare policy. The paper contributes to the organisational management literature in healthcare by showing that even though Lean management in healthcare appears to have the potential to improve organisational performance; there remain problems with its application.

Two sides of a coin: ecological and chronobiological perspectives of timing in the wild.

PubMed

Helm, Barbara; Visser, Marcel E; Schwartz, William; Kronfeld-Schor, Noga; Gerkema, Menno; Piersma, Theunis; Bloch, Guy

2017-11-19

Most processes within organisms, and most interactions between organisms and their environment, have distinct time profiles. The temporal coordination of such processes is crucial across levels of biological organization, but disciplines differ widely in their approaches to study timing. Such differences are accentuated between ecologists, who are centrally concerned with a holistic view of an organism in relation to its external environment, and chronobiologists, who emphasize internal timekeeping within an organism and the mechanisms of its adjustment to the environment. We argue that ecological and chronobiological perspectives are complementary, and that studies at the intersection will enable both fields to jointly overcome obstacles that currently hinder progress. However, to achieve this integration, we first have to cross some conceptual barriers, clarifying prohibitively inaccessible terminologies. We critically assess main assumptions and concepts in either field, as well as their common interests. Both approaches intersect in their need to understand the extent and regulation of temporal plasticity, and in the concept of 'chronotype', i.e. the characteristic temporal properties of individuals which are the targets of natural and sexual selection. We then highlight promising developments, point out open questions, acknowledge difficulties and propose directions for further integration of ecological and chronobiological perspectives through Wild Clock research.This article is part of the themed issue 'Wild Clocks: integrating chronobiology and ecology to understand timekeeping in free-living animals'. © 2017 The Author(s).

Lessons from HIV-1 vaccine efficacy trials.

PubMed

Excler, Jean-Louis; Michael, Nelson L

2016-11-01

Only four HIV-1 vaccine concepts have been tested in six efficacy trials with no product licensed to date. Several scientific and programmatic lessons can be learned from these studies generating new hypotheses and guiding future steps. RV144 [ALVAC-HIV (canarypox vector) and AIDSVAX B/E (bivalent gp120 HIV-1 subtype B and CRF01_AE)] remains the only efficacy trial that demonstrated a modest vaccine efficacy, which led to the identification of immune correlates of risk. Progress on subtype-specific, ALVAC (canarypox vector) and gp120 vaccine prime-boost approaches has been slow, but we are finally close to the launch of an efficacy study in Africa in 2016. The quest of a globally effective HIV-1 vaccine has led to the development of new approaches. Efficacy studies of combinations of Adenovirus type 26 (Ad26)/Modified Vaccinia Ankara (MVA)/gp140 vaccines with mosaic designs will enter efficacy studies mid-2017 and cytomegalovirus (CMV)-vectored vaccines begin Phase I studies at the same time. Future HIV-1 vaccine efficacy trials face practical challenges as effective nonvaccine prevention programs are projected to decrease HIV-1 incidence. An HIV-1 vaccine is urgently needed. Increased industry involvement, mobilization of resources, expansion of a robust pipeline of new concepts, and robust preclinical challenge studies will be essential to accelerate efficacy testing of next generation HIV-1 vaccine candidates.

Evaluation of a patient with suspected chronic demyelinating polyneuropathy.

PubMed

Jani-Acsadi, Agnes; Lewis, Richard A

2013-01-01

Demyelinating neuropathies are typically characterized by physiological slowing of conduction velocity and pathologically by segmental loss of myelin and in some instances, evidence of remyelination. Clinically, patients with demyelinating neuropathy can be seen with inherited disorders (Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease) or acquired disorders, typically immune-mediated or inflammatory. The acquired disorders can be either acute or subacute as seen in the acute inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (AIDP) form of Guillain-Barré syndrome or chronic progressive or relapsing disorders such as chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy. It is important to develop a logical approach to diagnosing these disorders. This requires an understanding of the clinical, genetic, physiological, and pathological features of these neuropathies. Clinically, important features to consider are the temporal progression, degree of symmetry, and involvement of proximal as well as distal muscles. Genetically, recognizing the different inheritance patterns and age of onset allow for a coordinated approach to determining a specific genotype. Physiologically, besides nerve conduction slowing, other physiological hallmarks of demyelination include temporal dispersion of compound motor action potentials (CMAP) on proximal stimulation, conduction block, and distal CMAP duration prolongation with certain patterns of involvement pointing to specific disorders. This chapter focuses on these various aspects of the evaluation of patients with chronic acquired demyelinating neuropathies to develop a comprehensive and thoughtful diagnostic concept. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

A WEB based approach in biomedical engineering design education.

PubMed

Enderle, J D; Browne, A F; Hallowell, M B

1997-01-01

As part of the accreditation process for university engineering programs, students are required to complete a minimum number of design credits in their course of study, typically at the senior level. Many call this the capstone course. Engineering design is a course or series of courses that bring together concepts and principles that students learn in their field of study--it involves the integration and extension of material learned in their major toward a specific project. Most often, the student is exposed to system-wide analysis, critique and evaluation for the first time. Design is an iterative, decision making process in which the student optimally applies previously learned material to meet a stated objective. At the University of Connecticut, students work in teams of 3-4 members and work on externally sponsored projects. To facilitate working with sponsors, a WEB based approach is used for reporting the progress on projects. Students are responsible for creating their own WEB sites that support both html and pdf formats. Students provide the following deliverables: weekly progress reports, project statement, specifications, project proposal, interim report, and final report. A senior design homepage also provides links to data books and other resources for use by students. We are also planning distance learning experiences between two campuses so students can work on projects that involve the use of video conferencing.

Pathological Bases for a Robust Application of Cancer Molecular Classification

PubMed Central

Diaz-Cano, Salvador J.

2015-01-01

Any robust classification system depends on its purpose and must refer to accepted standards, its strength relying on predictive values and a careful consideration of known factors that can affect its reliability. In this context, a molecular classification of human cancer must refer to the current gold standard (histological classification) and try to improve it with key prognosticators for metastatic potential, staging and grading. Although organ-specific examples have been published based on proteomics, transcriptomics and genomics evaluations, the most popular approach uses gene expression analysis as a direct correlate of cellular differentiation, which represents the key feature of the histological classification. RNA is a labile molecule that varies significantly according with the preservation protocol, its transcription reflect the adaptation of the tumor cells to the microenvironment, it can be passed through mechanisms of intercellular transference of genetic information (exosomes), and it is exposed to epigenetic modifications. More robust classifications should be based on stable molecules, at the genetic level represented by DNA to improve reliability, and its analysis must deal with the concept of intratumoral heterogeneity, which is at the origin of tumor progression and is the byproduct of the selection process during the clonal expansion and progression of neoplasms. The simultaneous analysis of multiple DNA targets and next generation sequencing offer the best practical approach for an analytical genomic classification of tumors. PMID:25898411

The Conception Approach to the Traffic Control in Czech Cities - Examples from Prague

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tichý, Tomáš; Krajčír, Dušan

Modern and economic development of contemporary towns is without question highly dependent upon traffic infrastructure progress. Automobile transport intensity is dramatically rising in large towns and other Czech and European cities. At the same time number of traffic congestions and accidents is increasing, standing times are becoming longer and ecological stress is also escalated. To solve this situation seems to be the most effective solution to design intelligent traffic light intersection control system, variable message signs, preference of public transportation, road line traffic control and next telematics subsystems. This control system and subsystems should improve permeability of traffic road network with a respect for all demands on recent trends of traffic development in towns and regions.

Genetic literacy and competency.

PubMed

Kaye, Celia; Korf, Bruce

2013-12-01

Since the sequencing of the human genome was completed, progress toward understanding the genetic contributions to both rare and common disorders has accelerated dramatically. That understanding will lead to new approaches to diagnosis and management, which will be incorporated into day-to-day medical practice. Moreover, the mindset with regard to genetic contributions to health and disease has shifted from 1 gene at a time to genome wide. However, most practicing pediatricians, and even many still in training, are likely to be unfamiliar with the concepts of genetics and genomics and their applications in medical practice. This article addresses the issues of genetic and genomic literacy and competencies for pediatricians and other primary care providers, as they prepare to work with their patients in the emerging world of genomic medicine.

Utilization of microparticles in next-generation assays for microflow cytometers.

PubMed

Kim, Jason S; Ligler, Frances S

2010-11-01

Micron-sized particles have primarily been used in microfabricated flow cytometers for calibration purposes and proof-of-concept experiments. With increasing frequency, microparticles are serving as a platform for assays measured in these small analytical devices. Light scattering has been used to measure the agglomeration of antibody-coated particles in the presence of an antigen. Impedance detection is another technology being integrated into microflow cytometers for microparticle-based assays. Fluorescence is the most popular detection method in flow cytometry, enabling highly sensitive multiplexed assays. Finally, magnetic particles have also been used to measure antigen levels using a magnetophoretic micro-device. We review the progress of microparticle-based assays in microflow cytometry in terms of the advantages and limitations of each approach.

Dynamic complexity: plant receptor complexes at the plasma membrane.

PubMed

Burkart, Rebecca C; Stahl, Yvonne

2017-12-01

Plant receptor complexes at the cell surface perceive many different external and internal signalling molecules and relay these signals into the cell to regulate development, growth and immunity. Recent progress in the analyses of receptor complexes using different live cell imaging approaches have shown that receptor complex formation and composition are dynamic and take place at specific microdomains at the plasma membrane. In this review we focus on three prominent examples of Arabidopsis thaliana receptor complexes and how their dynamic spatio-temporal distribution at the PM has been studied recently. We will elaborate on the newly emerging concept of plasma membrane microdomains as potential hubs for specific receptor complex assembly and signalling outputs. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Dragonfly: Investigating the Surface Composition of Titan

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Brinckerhoff, W. B.; Lawrence, D. J.; Barnes, J. W.; Lorenz, R. D.; Horst, S. M.; Zacny, K.; Freissinet, C.; Parsons, A. M.; Turtle, E. P.; Trainer, M. G.;

New Concepts on Pathogenesis and Diagnosis of Liver Fibrosis; A Review Article

PubMed Central

Ebrahimi, Hedyeh; Naderian, Mohammadreza; Sohrabpour, Amir Ali

2016-01-01

Liver fibrosis is a potentially reversible response to hepatic insults, triggered by different chronic diseases most importantly viral hepatitis, alcoholic, and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. In the course of the chronic liver disease, hepatic fibrogenesis may develop, which is attributed to various types of cells, molecules, and pathways. Activated hepatic stellate cell (HSC), the primary source of extracellular matrix (ECM), is fundamental in pathophysiology of fibrogenesis, and thus is the most attractable target for reversing liver fibrosis. Although, liver biopsy has long been considered as the gold standard for diagnosis and staging of hepatic fibrosis, assessing progression and regression by biopsy is hampered by its limitations. We provide recent views on noninvasive approaches including serum biomarkers and radiologic techniques. PMID:27698966

Automated distribution system management for multichannel space power systems

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Fleck, G. W.; Decker, D. K.; Graves, J.

1983-01-01

A NASA sponsored study of space power distribution system technology is in progress to develop an autonomously managed power system (AMPS) for large space power platforms. The multichannel, multikilowatt, utility-type power subsystem proposed presents new survivability requirements and increased subsystem complexity. The computer controls under development for the power management system must optimize the power subsystem performance and minimize the life cycle cost of the platform. A distribution system management philosophy has been formulated which incorporates these constraints. Its implementation using a TI9900 microprocessor and FORTH as the programming language is presented. The approach offers a novel solution to the perplexing problem of determining the optimal combination of loads which should be connected to each power channel for a versatile electrical distribution concept.

Promoting Innovative Thinking

PubMed Central

2015-01-01

Innovation is the engine of scientific progress, yet we do not train public health students to think creatively. I present the key concepts within an evidence-based method currently taught at the University of Texas. Habitual thought patterns involve deeply held framed expectations. Finding alternatives generates originality. Because frame breaking is difficult, a series of innovation heuristics and tools are offered including enhancing observation, using analogies, changing point of view, juggling opposites, broadening perspective, reversal, reorganization and combination, and getting the most from groups. Gaining cognitive attributes such as nonjudgment, willingness to question, mindfulness, and plasticity is also emphasized. Students completing the class demonstrate substantial increases on a standardized test of idea fluency and originality, more joyful attitudes toward science, and more pluralistic approaches. PMID:25706005

Glioblastoma: new therapeutic strategies to address cellular and genomic complexity

PubMed Central

Cai, Xue; Sughrue, Michael E.

2018-01-01

Glioblastoma (GBM) is the most invasive and devastating primary brain tumor with a median overall survival rate about 18 months with aggressive multimodality therapy. Its unique characteristics of heterogeneity, invasion, clonal populations maintaining stem cell-like cells and recurrence, have limited responses to a variety of therapeutic approaches, and have made GBM the most difficult brain cancer to treat. A great effort and progress has been made to reveal promising molecular mechanisms to target therapeutically. Especially with the emerging of new technologies, the mechanisms underlying the pathology of GBM are becoming more clear. The purpose of this review is to summarize the current knowledge of molecular mechanisms of GBM and highlight the novel strategies and concepts for the treatment of GBM. PMID:29507709

The implementation and use of Ada on distributed systems with high reliability requirements

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Knight, J. C.; Gregory, S. T.; Urquhart, J. I. A.

1985-01-01

The use and implementation of Ada in distributed environments in which reliability is the primary concern were investigated. In particular, the concept that a distributed system may be programmed entirely in Ada so that the individual tasks of the system are unconcerned with which processors they are executing on, and that failures may occur in the software or underlying hardware was examined. Progress is discussed for the following areas: continued development and testing of the fault-tolerant Ada testbed; development of suggested changes to Ada so that it might more easily cope with the failure of interest; and design of new approaches to fault-tolerant software in real-time systems, and integration of these ideas into Ada.

Automation literature: A brief review and analysis

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Smith, D.; Dieterly, D. L.

1980-01-01

Current thought and research positions which may allow for an improved capability to understand the impact of introducing automation to an existing system are established. The orientation was toward the type of studies which may provide some general insight into automation; specifically, the impact of automation in human performance and the resulting system performance. While an extensive number of articles were reviewed, only those that addressed the issue of automation and human performance were selected to be discussed. The literature is organized along two dimensions: time, Pre-1970, Post-1970; and type of approach, Engineering or Behavioral Science. The conclusions reached are not definitive, but do provide the initial stepping stones in an attempt to begin to bridge the concept of automation in a systematic progression.

Neuroendocrine–immune disequilibrium and endometriosis: an interdisciplinary approach

PubMed Central

Tariverdian, Nadja; Theoharides, Theoharis C.; Siedentopf, Friederike; Gutiérrez, Gabriela; Jeschke, Udo; Rabinovich, Gabriel A.; Blois, Sandra M.

2007-01-01

Endometriosis, a chronic disease characterized by endometrial tissue located outside the uterine cavity, affects one fourth of young women and is associated with chronic pelvic pain and infertility. However, an in-depth understanding of the pathophysiology and effective treatment strategies of endometriosis is still largely elusive. Inadequate immune and neuroendocrine responses are significantly involved in the pathophysiology of endometriosis, and key findings are summarized in the present review. We discuss here the role of different immune mechanisms particularly adhesion molecules, protein–glycan interactions, and pro-angiogenic mediators in the development and progression of the disease. Finally, we introduce the concept of endometrial dissemination as result of a neuroendocrine-immune disequilibrium in response to high levels of perceived stress caused by cardinal clinical symptoms of endometriosis. PMID:17621704

Assessment of microbiology students' progress with an audience response system.

PubMed

Chaudhry, M Ahmad

2011-01-01

The development of new approaches to teaching of large lecture courses is needed. Today's classroom has a wide range of students including high-achieving motivated learners, students struggling to understand basic concepts, and learning-challenged students. Many of these students can be lost in large classes under the shadow of the high-achieving extroverted students who dominate classroom question-and-answer sessions. Measuring a student's understanding and achievement of content standards becomes difficult until an assessment has been done. To close this gap, an audience response system was introduced in an introductory Principles of Microbiology course. This technology specifically addressed the goal of individualizing instruction to the needs of the students. The evaluation of this project indicated an overall positive impact on student learning.

[Charles Darwin and the problem of evolutionary progress].

PubMed

Iordanskiĭ, N N

2010-01-01

According to Ch. Darwin's evolutionary theory, evolutionary progress (interpreted as morpho-physiological progress or arogenesis in recent terminology) is one of logical results of natural selection. At the same time, natural selection does not hold any factors especially promoting evolutionary progress. Darwin emphasized that the pattern of evolutionary changes depends on organism nature more than on the pattern of environment changes. Arogenesis specificity is determined by organization of rigorous biological systems - integral organisms. Onward progressive development is determined by fundamental features of living organisms: metabolism and homeostasis. The concept of social Darwinism differs fundamentally from Darwin's ideas about the most important role of social instincts in progress of mankind. Competition and selection play secondary role in socio-cultural progress of human society.

Neuroinflammation in pulmonary hypertension: concept, facts, and relevance.

PubMed

Hilzendeger, Aline M; Shenoy, Vinayak; Raizada, Mohan K; Katovich, Michael J

2014-09-01

Pulmonary hypertension (PH) is a progressive lung disease characterized by elevated pressure in the lung vasculature, resulting in right-sided heart failure and premature death. The pathogenesis of PH is complex and multifactorial, involving a dysregulated autonomic nervous system and immune response. Inflammatory mechanisms have been linked to the development and progression of PH; however, these are usually restricted to systemic and/or local lung tissue. Inflammation within the CNS, often referred to as neuroinflammation involves activation of the microglia, the innate immune cells that are found specifically in the brain and spinal cord. Microglial activation results in the release of several cytokines and chemokines that trigger neuroinflammation, and has been implicated in the pathogenesis of several disease conditions such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, hypertension, atherosclerosis, and metabolic disorders. In this review, we introduce the concept of neuroinflammation in the context of PH, and discuss possible strategies that could be developed for PH therapy based on this concept.

The development of scientific thinking in elementary school: a comprehensive inventory.

PubMed

Koerber, Susanne; Mayer, Daniela; Osterhaus, Christopher; Schwippert, Knut; Sodian, Beate

2015-01-01

The development of scientific thinking was assessed in 1,581 second, third, and fourth graders (8-, 9-, 10-year-olds) based on a conceptual model that posits developmental progression from naïve to more advanced conceptions. Using a 66-item scale, five components of scientific thinking were addressed, including experimental design, data interpretation, and understanding the nature of science. Unidimensional and multidimensional item response theory analyses supported the instrument's reliability and validity and suggested that the multiple components of scientific thinking form a unitary construct, independent of verbal or reasoning skills. A partial credit model gave evidence for a hierarchical developmental progression. Across each grade transition, advanced conceptions increased while naïve conceptions decreased. Independent effects of intelligence, schooling, and parental education on scientific thinking are discussed. © 2014 The Authors. Child Development © 2014 Society for Research in Child Development, Inc.

Deep Borehole Disposal Safety Analysis.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Freeze, Geoffrey A.; Stein, Emily; Price, Laura L.

This report presents a preliminary safety analysis for the deep borehole disposal (DBD) concept, using a safety case framework. A safety case is an integrated collection of qualitative and quantitative arguments, evidence, and analyses that substantiate the safety, and the level of confidence in the safety, of a geologic repository. This safety case framework for DBD follows the outline of the elements of a safety case, and identifies the types of information that will be required to satisfy these elements. At this very preliminary phase of development, the DBD safety case focuses on the generic feasibility of the DBD concept.more » It is based on potential system designs, waste forms, engineering, and geologic conditions; however, no specific site or regulatory framework exists. It will progress to a site-specific safety case as the DBD concept advances into a site-specific phase, progressing through consent-based site selection and site investigation and characterization.« less

User interfaces in space science instrumentation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

McCalden, Alec John

This thesis examines user interaction with instrumentation in the specific context of space science. It gathers together existing practice in machine interfaces with a look at potential future usage and recommends a new approach to space science projects with the intention of maximising their science return. It first takes a historical perspective on user interfaces and ways of defining and measuring the science return of a space instrument. Choices of research methodology are considered. Implementation details such as the concepts of usability, mental models, affordance and presentation of information are described, and examples of existing interfaces in space science are given. A set of parameters for use in analysing and synthesizing a user interface is derived by using a set of case studies of diverse failures and from previous work. A general space science user analysis is made by looking at typical practice, and an interview plus persona technique is used to group users with interface designs. An examination is made of designs in the field of astronomical instrumentation interfaces, showing the evolution of current concepts and including ideas capable of sustaining progress in the future. The parameters developed earlier are then tested against several established interfaces in the space science context to give a degree of confidence in their use. The concept of a simulator that is used to guide the development of an instrument over the whole lifecycle is described, and the idea is proposed that better instrumentation would result from more efficient use of the resources available. The previous ideas in this thesis are then brought together to describe a proposed new approach to a typical development programme, with an emphasis on user interaction. The conclusion shows that there is significant room for improvement in the science return from space instrumentation by attention to the user interface.

The trilayer approach of teaching physiology, pathophysiology, and pharmacology concepts in a first-year pharmacy course: the TLAT model.

PubMed

Islam, Mohammed A; Sabnis, Gauri; Farris, Fred

2017-09-01

This paper describes the development, implementation, and students' perceptions of a new trilayer approach of teaching (TLAT). The TLAT model involved blending lecture, in-class group activities, and out-of-class assignments on selected content areas and was implemented initially in a first-year integrated pharmacy course. Course contents were either delivered by traditional lectures or by the TLAT. A survey instrument was distributed by SurveyMonkey to determine students' perceptions of the TLAT model. Descriptive statistics were used for data analysis. Students' performance in a total of 225 examination and quiz questions was analyzed to evaluate whether the TLAT model improved students' learning. Students' ( n = 98) performance scores for TLAT-based and lecture-based questions were 83.3 ± 10.2 and 79.5 ± 14.0, respectively ( P < 0.05). Ninety-three percent of students believed that in-class group activities enhanced conceptual understanding of course materials, helped them take responsibility of their own learning, and enhanced their overall learning experiences. More than 80% of respondents felt that solving cases and developing concept maps helped them sharpen creative and critical thinking skills. In addition, 90% of the respondents indicated that the homework throughout the semester helped them stay up to date and focused with the progress of the course. The use of the TLAT model led to an improvement in student learning of complex concepts. Moreover, the results suggest that this model improves students' self-reliance and attitudes toward learning. Our findings should serve as an impetus for inclusion of diverse active learning strategies in pharmacy education. Copyright © 2017 the American Physiological Society.

neoPASCAL: A Cubesat-based approach to validate Mars GCMs using a network of landed sensors

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Moores, John; Podmore, Hugh; Lee, Regina S. K.; Haberle, Robert

2017-10-01

Beginning in the 1990s, concepts for a network of 15-20 small (12.8 kg) landers to measure surface pressure across Mars were proposed (Merrihew et al., 1996). Such distributed measurements were seen as particularly valuable as they held the promise of validating Mars Global Circulation Models (GCMs), for which the diurnal and seasonal variations in surface pressure may be diagnostically related to atmospheric parameters (Haberle et al., 1996). MicroMET, later renamed PASCAL, was a Discovery contender, however, the total mass required for the 20 landers and a support orbiter presented a challenge compared to the delivered science.In the 20 years since this concept originated, miniaturization of spacecraft systems, sensors and components has made substantial progress. Several small planetary science spacecraft based on the CubeSat design approach will launch in the next few years. Yet, only one meteorological station (REMS) currently operates on the surface of Mars. Meanwhile, the output from atmospheric models have become ever more critical for understanding key Martian geological processes including volatile transport, identifying the extent and persistence of surface brines, understanding the sources and sinks of methane and investigating the past climate of Mars, to name only a few areas.As such, it is time to reconsider the PASCAL concept. We find that modern equipment opens up payload space in the original 12.8 kg entry-vehicles from 23 g to nearly 1 kg, sufficient for adding small imagers, spectrometers and other additional or alternate payloads to examine atmosphere and surface over a wide geographic range of settings. If, instead, we seek the minimum solution for spacecraft mass, we find that a pressure-sensing vehicle would mass < 250 g at entry making these spacecraft appealing secondary payloads for future Mars missions.

Dependence as a unifying construct in defining Alzheimer’s disease severity

PubMed Central

McLaughlin, Trent; Feldman, Howard; Fillit, Howard; Sano, Mary; Schmitt, Frederick; Aisen, Paul; Leibman, Christopher; Mucha, Lisa; Ryan, J. Michael; Sullivan, Sean D.; Spackman, D. Eldon; Neumann, Peter J.; Cohen, Joshua; Stern, Yaakov

2012-01-01

This article reviews measures of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) progression in relation to patient dependence and offers a unifying conceptual framework for dependence in AD. Clinicians typically characterize AD by symptomatic impairments in three domains: cognition, function, and behavior. From a patient’s perspective, changes in these domains, individually and in concert, ultimately lead to increased dependence and loss of autonomy. Examples of dependence in AD range from a need for reminders (early AD) to requiring safety supervision and assistance with basic functions (late AD). Published literature has focused on the clinical domains as somewhat separate constructs and has given limited attention to the concept of patient dependence as a descriptor of AD progression. This article presents the concept of dependence on others for care needs as a potential method for translating the effect of changes in cognition, function, and behavior into a more holistic, transparent description of AD progression. PMID:21044778

Dependence as a unifying construct in defining Alzheimer's disease severity.

PubMed

McLaughlin, Trent; Feldman, Howard; Fillit, Howard; Sano, Mary; Schmitt, Frederick; Aisen, Paul; Leibman, Christopher; Mucha, Lisa; Ryan, J Michael; Sullivan, Sean D; Spackman, D Eldon; Neumann, Peter J; Cohen, Joshua; Stern, Yaakov

2010-11-01

This article reviews measures of Alzheimer's disease (AD) progression in relation to patient dependence and offers a unifying conceptual framework for dependence in AD. Clinicians typically characterize AD by symptomatic impairments in three domains: cognition, function, and behavior. From a patient's perspective, changes in these domains, individually and in concert, ultimately lead to increased dependence and loss of autonomy. Examples of dependence in AD range from a need for reminders (early AD) to requiring safety supervision and assistance with basic functions (late AD). Published literature has focused on the clinical domains as somewhat separate constructs and has given limited attention to the concept of patient dependence as a descriptor of AD progression. This article presents the concept of dependence on others for care needs as a potential method for translating the effect of changes in cognition, function, and behavior into a more holistic, transparent description of AD progression. Copyright © 2010. Published by Elsevier Inc.

Hitting the right target: taxonomic challenges for, and of, plant invasions

PubMed Central

Pyšek, Petr; Hulme, Philip E.; Meyerson, Laura A.; Smith, Gideon F.; Boatwright, James S.; Crouch, Neil R.; Figueiredo, Estrela; Foxcroft, Llewellyn C.; Jarošík, Vojtěch; Richardson, David M.; Suda, Jan; Wilson, John R. U.

2013-01-01

This paper explores how a lack of taxonomic expertise, and by implication a dearth of taxonomic products such as identification tools, has hindered progress in understanding and managing biological invasions. It also explores how the taxonomic endeavour could benefit from studies of invasive species. We review the literature on the current situation in taxonomy with a focus on the challenges of identifying alien plant species and explore how this has affected the study of biological invasions. Biosecurity strategies, legislation dealing with invasive species, quarantine, weed surveillance and monitoring all depend on accurate and rapid identification of non-native taxa. However, such identification can be challenging because the taxonomic skill base in most countries is diffuse and lacks critical mass. Taxonomic resources are essential for the effective management of invasive plants and incorrect identifications can impede ecological studies. On the other hand, biological invasions have provided important tests of basic theories about species concepts. Better integration of classical alpha taxonomy and modern genetic taxonomic approaches will improve the accuracy of species identification and further refine taxonomic classification at the level of populations and genotypes in the field and laboratory. Modern taxonomy therefore needs to integrate both classical and new concepts and approaches. In particular, differing points of view between the proponents of morphological and molecular approaches should be negotiated because a narrow taxonomic perspective is harmful; the rigour of taxonomic decision-making clearly increases if insights from a variety of different complementary disciplines are combined and confronted. Taxonomy plays a critical role in the study of plant invasions and in turn benefits from the insights gained from these studies.

Materials R&D-student internships

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Thompson, R.B.; Jiles, D.C.; Chumbley, L.S.

1995-05-01

This program has as an objective the conduct of programmatic research for the Advanced Industrial Concepts Materials Program while training minority graduate students in the process. Well-known demographics indicate that minorities will constitute an increasing fraction of our future work force. Consequently, efforts have been initiated to increase the fraction of minorities and women who choose technical career paths. Included are a wide ranging set of programs beginning with pre-school education, progressing through efforts to retain students in technical paths in grades K-12 and undergraduate education, and ending with encouraging graduate education. The Materials R & D - Student Internshipsmore » is a unique approach in the latter category. Here, we have focused on a particular area of applied materials research, the Advanced Industrial Concepts Materials Program. Our goal, then, is to educate minority graduate students in the context of this program. The Ames Laboratory was selected as a site for this pilot project since it is a DOE national laboratory, located on the campus of a major research university, which includes in its research interests programs with a strong technological flavor.« less

Vulvar field resection: novel approach to the surgical treatment of vulvar cancer based on ontogenetic anatomy.

PubMed

Höckel, Michael; Schmidt, Katja; Bornmann, Karoline; Horn, Lars-Christian; Dornhöfer, Nadja

2010-10-01

Current local treatment of vulvar cancer is wide tumor excision and radical vulvectomy based on functional anatomy established from the adult and on the view of radial progressive tumor permeation. Standard surgery is associated with a considerable local failure rate and severe disturbance of the patients' body image. Vulvar field resection (VFR) is based on ontogenetic anatomy and on the concept of local tumor spread within permissive compartments. VFR combined with anatomical reconstruction (AR) is proposed as a new surgical approach to the treatment of vulvar cancer. A prospective trial was launched to test the compartment theory for vulvar cancer and to assess safety and effectiveness of the new therapy. In 54 consecutive patients 46 tumors were locally confined to the tissue compartment differentiated from the vulvar anlage. The 8 tumors having transgressed into adjacent tissue compartments of different embryonic origins exhibited signs of advanced malignant progression. 38 patients with vulvar cancer, stages T1-3 were treated with VFR and AR. The perioperative complication rate was low. At 19 (3-50) months follow-up no patient failed locally. 33 patients estimated their body image as undisturbed. Vulvar cancer permeates within ontogenetic tissue compartments and surgical treatment with VFR and AR appears to be safe and effective. Patients should benefit from the new approach as local tumor control is high and the preserved tissue can be successfully used for restoration of vulvar form and function. Confirmatory trials with more patients and longer follow-up are suggested. Copyright © 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Clinical Implications of ESR1 Mutations in Hormone Receptor-Positive Advanced Breast Cancer

PubMed Central

Reinert, Tomas; Saad, Everardo D.; Barrios, Carlos H.; Bines, José

2017-01-01

Hormone receptor-positive breast cancer is the most frequent breast cancer subtype. Endocrine therapy (ET) targeting the estrogen receptor (ER) pathway represents the main initial therapeutic approach. The major strategies include estrogen deprivation and the use of selective estrogen modulators or degraders, which show efficacy in the management of metastatic and early-stage disease. However, clinical resistance associated with progression of disease remains a significant therapeutic challenge. Mutations of the ESR1 gene, which encodes the ER, have been increasingly recognized as an important mechanism of ET resistance, with a prevalence that ranges from 11 to 39%. The majority of these mutations are located within the ligand-binding domain and result in an estrogen-independent constitutive activation of the ER and, therefore, resistance to estrogen deprivation therapy such as aromatase inhibition. ESR1 mutations, most often detected from liquid biopsies, have been consistently associated with a worse outcome and are being currently evaluated as a potential biomarker to guide therapeutic decisions. At the same time, targeted therapy directed to ESR1-mutated clones is an appealing concept with preclinical and clinical work in progress. PMID:28361033

Sex and gender differences in therapy of type 2 diabetes.

PubMed

Kautzky-Willer, Alexandra; Harreiter, Jürgen

2017-09-01

Clinical guidelines for the management of type 2 diabetes recommend individual therapy considering age, duration of disease, presence of complication and risk of hypoglycaemia. However, at present, the patient's sex has no impact on clinical decisions. Yet, there is mounting data pointing at biological and psychosocial differences between men and women with great impact on progression of disease and complications. Moreover, choices and preferences of therapeutic strategies as well as adherence to lifestyle and pharmacological interventions differ in both sexes. In addition, drug therapy may have sex-specific side effects. Therefore, there is need of more research on biological differences and of evidence-based individualised targeted sex-sensitive therapeutic concepts. Clinical guidelines must consider relevant sex-differences. Development and implementation of sex-specific programs may help to improve adherence to therapy and to reduce progression of disease and development of complications. A more gender-sensitive clinical approach may improve quality of life and increase health and life expectancy in men and women with type 2 diabetes. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Detecting and correcting the bias of unmeasured factors using perturbation analysis: a data-mining approach.

PubMed

Lee, Wen-Chung

2014-02-05

The randomized controlled study is the gold-standard research method in biomedicine. In contrast, the validity of a (nonrandomized) observational study is often questioned because of unknown/unmeasured factors, which may have confounding and/or effect-modifying potential. In this paper, the author proposes a perturbation test to detect the bias of unmeasured factors and a perturbation adjustment to correct for such bias. The proposed method circumvents the problem of measuring unknowns by collecting the perturbations of unmeasured factors instead. Specifically, a perturbation is a variable that is readily available (or can be measured easily) and is potentially associated, though perhaps only very weakly, with unmeasured factors. The author conducted extensive computer simulations to provide a proof of concept. Computer simulations show that, as the number of perturbation variables increases from data mining, the power of the perturbation test increased progressively, up to nearly 100%. In addition, after the perturbation adjustment, the bias decreased progressively, down to nearly 0%. The data-mining perturbation analysis described here is recommended for use in detecting and correcting the bias of unmeasured factors in observational studies.

Results from flamelet and non-flamelet models for supersonic combustion

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ladeinde, Foluso; Li, Wenhai

2017-11-01

Air-breathing propulsion systems (scramjets) have been identified as a viable alternative to rocket engines for improved efficiency. A scramjet engine, which operates at flight Mach numbers around 7 or above, is characterized by the existence of supersonic flow conditions in the combustor. In a dual-mode scramjet, this phenomenon is possible because of the relatively low value of the equivalence ratio and high stagnation temperature, which, together, inhibits thermal choking downstream of transverse injectors. The flamelet method has been our choice for turbulence-combustion interaction modeling and we have extended the basic approach in several dimensions, with a focus on the way the pressure and progress variable are modeled. Improved results have been obtained. We have also examined non-flamelet models, including laminar chemistry (QL), eddy dissipation concept (EDC), and partially-stirred reactor (PaSR). The pressure/progress variable-corrected simulations give better results compared with the original model, with reaction rates that are lower than those from EDC and PaSR. In general, QL tends to over-predict the reaction rate for the supersonic combustion problems investigated in our work.

A brief histone in time: understanding the combinatorial functions of histone PTMs in the nucleosome context.

PubMed

Ng, Marlee K; Cheung, Peter

2016-02-01

It has been over 50 years since Allfrey et al. proposed that histone acetylation regulates RNA synthesis, and the study of histone modifications has progressed at an extraordinary pace for the past two decades. In this review, we provide a perspective on some key events and advances in our understanding of histone modifications. We also highlight reagents and tools from past to present that facilitated progress in this research field. Using histone H3 phosphorylation as an underlying thread, we review the rationale that led to the proposal of the histone code hypothesis, as well as examples that illustrate the concepts of combinatorial histone modifications and cross-talk pathways. We further highlight the importance of investigating these mechanisms in the context of nucleosomes rather than just at the histone level and present current and developing approaches for such studies. Overall, research on histone modifications has yielded great mechanistic insights into the regulation of genomic functions, and extending these studies using nucleosomes will further elucidate the complexity of these pathways in a more physiologically relevant context.

Food Reformulation, Responsive Regulation, and “Regulatory Scaffolding”: Strengthening Performance of Salt Reduction Programs in Australia and the United Kingdom

PubMed Central

Magnusson, Roger; Reeve, Belinda

2015-01-01

Strategies to reduce excess salt consumption play an important role in preventing cardiovascular disease, which is the largest contributor to global mortality from non-communicable diseases. In many countries, voluntary food reformulation programs seek to reduce salt levels across selected product categories, guided by aspirational targets to be achieved progressively over time. This paper evaluates the industry-led salt reduction programs that operate in the United Kingdom and Australia. Drawing on theoretical concepts from the field of regulatory studies, we propose a step-wise or “responsive” approach that introduces regulatory “scaffolds” to progressively increase levels of government oversight and control in response to industry inaction or under-performance. Our model makes full use of the food industry’s willingness to reduce salt levels in products to meet reformulation targets, but recognizes that governments remain accountable for addressing major diet-related health risks. Creative regulatory strategies can assist governments to fulfill their public health obligations, including in circumstances where there are political barriers to direct, statutory regulation of the food industry. PMID:26133973

Antiviral therapy: current concepts and practices.

PubMed Central

Bean, B

1992-01-01

Drugs capable of inhibiting viruses in vitro were described in the 1950s, but real progress was not made until the 1970s, when agents capable of inhibiting virus-specific enzymes were first identified. The last decade has seen rapid progress in both our understanding of antiviral therapy and the number of antiviral agents on the market. Amantadine and ribavirin are available for treatment of viral respiratory infections. Vidarabine, acyclovir, ganciclovir, and foscarnet are used for systemic treatment of herpesvirus infections, while ophthalmic preparations of idoxuridine, trifluorothymidine, and vidarabine are available for herpes keratitis. For treatment of human immunodeficiency virus infections, zidovudine and didanosine are used. Immunomodulators, such as interferons and colony-stimulating factors, and immunoglobulins are being used increasingly for viral illnesses. While resistance to antiviral drugs has been seen, especially among AIDS patients, it has not become widespread and is being intensely studied. Increasingly, combinations of agents are being used: to achieve synergistic inhibition of viruses, to delay or prevent resistance, and to decrease dosages of toxic drugs. New approaches, such as liposomes carrying antiviral drugs and computer-aided drug design, are exciting and promising prospects for the future. PMID:1576586

A Learning Progressions Approach to Early Algebra Research and Practice

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fonger, Nicole L.; Stephens, Ana; Blanton, Maria; Knuth, Eric

2015-01-01

We detail a learning progressions approach to early algebra research and how existing work around learning progressions and trajectories in mathematics and science education has informed our development of a four-component theoretical framework consisting of: a curricular progression of learning goals across big algebraic ideas; an instructional…

How Existing Business Management Concepts Become School Leadership Fashions

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Peck, Craig; Reitzug, Ulrich C.

2012-01-01

Purpose: This article examines the history of three management concepts that originated in the business sector and progressed to the K-12 education sector. Framework: We propose a new conceptual model intended to help illuminate how ideas and strategies originally created for business leadership gain influence in the realm of K-12 school…

An Exploration into the Teaching of Cosmopolitan Ideals: The Case of "Global Citizenship"

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Watson, Sam

2013-01-01

This article examines why we should continue to teach based upon cosmopolitan ideals, despite the shortfalls of global citizenship as a concept. The author first defines and critically engages with both cosmopolitanism and global citizenship, before identifying where these concepts originate from and tracking their progression throughout time. The…

The Conceptual Complexity of Vocabulary in Elementary-Grades Core Science Program Textbooks

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fitzgerald, W. Jill; Elmore, Jeff; Kung, Melody; Stenner, A. Jackson

2017-01-01

The researchers explored the conceptual complexity of vocabulary in contemporary elementary-grades core science program textbooks to address two research questions: (1) Can a progression of concepts' complexity level be described across grades? (2) Was there gradual developmental growth of the most complex concepts' networks of associated concepts…

Evaluating Self-Concept and Ego Development within Erikson's Psychosocial Framework: A Formulation.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hamachek, Don E.

1988-01-01

Suggests criteria developed within context of Erikson's first five psychosocial stages that may help in evaluating self-concept and ego development. To assess strengths and weaknesses in self's growth as it progresses through the stages, five behavioral expressions tables are presented, each illustrating possible behaviors and implicit attitudes…

Aviation Safety Program: Weather Accident Prevention (WxAP) Development of WxAP System Architecture And Concepts of Operation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Grantier, David

2003-01-01

This paper presents viewgraphs on the development of the Weather Accident Prevention (WxAP) System architecture and Concept of Operation (CONOPS) activities. The topics include: 1) Background Information on System Architecture/CONOPS Activity; 2) Activity Work in Progress; and 3) Anticipated By-Products.

Students' Conceptions of Learning in the Context of an Accounting Degree

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Abhayawansa, Subhash; Bowden, Mark; Pillay, Soma

2017-01-01

Students' conceptions of learning (CoL) play an important role in the learning process leading to the development of generic skills. This paper investigates whether CoL of accounting students can be developed by incorporating high-level cognitive skills progressively within the accounting curriculum. First, the study explored, using…

Development of an Empirically-Based Conditional Learning Progression for Climate Change

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Breslyn, Wayne; Drewes, Andrea; McGinnis, J. Randy; Hestness, Emily; Mouza, Chrystalla

2017-01-01

Climate change encompasses a broad and complex set of concepts that is often challenging for students and educators. Using a learning progressions (LPs) knowledge system, we developed a LP that described student learning of climate change. In this exploratory study, we present findings from written assessments of climate change (n = 294) and…

Social Possible Selves, Self-Regulation, and Social Goal Progress in Older Adulthood

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ko, Han-Jung; Mejía, Shannon; Hooker, Karen

2014-01-01

Lifespan development involves setting and pursuing self-guided goals. This study examines how in the social domain, possible selves, a future-oriented self-concept, and self-regulation, including self-regulatory beliefs and intraindividual variability in self-regulatory behavior, relate to differences in overall daily social goal progress. An…

Women's Doctoral Student Experiences and Degree Progress in Education versus Engineering

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Masterman, Ann Katherine

2014-01-01

This study's purpose was to compare the lived experiences of doctoral women studying Education, a prototypically female field, with women studying Engineering, a prototypically male field to illustrate the phenomenon of doctoral degree progress in the two fields. Using critical feminist theory and Valian's (1999) concept of gender schemas, this…

Are We Making "PROGRESS"? A Critical Literacies Framework to Engage Pre-Service Teachers for Social Justice

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Matteson, Holly C.; Boyd, Ashley S.

2017-01-01

In this article, authors describe an original framework aimed to acquaint pre-service English teachers with concepts related to social justice to facilitate their critical literacies related to eight components: positionality, race, orientation, gender, relationships, environment, social class, and stereotypes (PROGRESS). Authors then illustrate…

An Educational Historical Narrative Study of Visualization in the Progressive Art Pedagogy of Lowenfeld

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cromarty, Edward

2017-01-01

This study utilizes an educational historical narrative research method to understand the unique viewpoint of Lowenfeld toward visualization as a holistic concept in progressive art education. Employing a social constructivist framework, it explores the problem that the emphasis in education on the surface elements of standardized subject-based…

The Inter-Temporal Aspect of Well-Being and Societal Progress

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sicherl, Pavle

2007-01-01

The perceptions on well-being and societal progress are influenced also by the quantitative indicators and measures used in the measurement, presentation and semantics of discussing these issues. The article presents a novel generic statistical measure S-time-distance, with clear interpretability that delivers a broader concept to look at data, to…

A Learning Progression for Energy in Socio-Ecological Systems

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Jin, Hui; Anderson, Charles W.

2012-01-01

This article reports on our work of developing a learning progression focusing on K-12 students' performances of using energy concept in their accounts of carbon-transforming processes in socio-ecological systems. Carbon-transforming processes--the ecological carbon cycle and the combustion of biomass and fossil fuels--provide all of the energy…

Patterns of Reasoning about Ecological Systemic Reasoning for Early Elementary Students

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Hokayem, H.

2016-01-01

Systems and system models are recognized as a crosscutting concept in the newly released framework for K-12 science education (NRC [National Research Council], 2012). In previous work, I developed a learning progression for systemic reasoning in ecology at the elementary level. The learning progression captured five levels of students' reasoning…

An Analysis of the Role of ATC in the AILS Concept

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Waller, Marvin C.; Doyle, Thomas M.; McGee, Frank G.

2000-01-01

Airborne information for lateral spacing (AILS) is a concept for making approaches to closely spaced parallel runways in instrument meteorological conditions (IMC). Under the concept, each equipped aircraft will assume responsibility for accurately managing its flight path along the approach course and maintaining separation from aircraft on the parallel approach. This document presents the results of an analysis of the AILS concept from an Air Traffic Control (ATC) perspective. The process has been examined in a step by step manner to determine ATC system support necessary to safely conduct closely spaced parallel approaches using the AILS concept. The analysis resulted in recognizing a number of issues related to integrating the process into the airspace system and proposes operating procedures.

Optimal speech motor control and token-to-token variability: a Bayesian modeling approach.

PubMed

Patri, Jean-François; Diard, Julien; Perrier, Pascal

2015-12-01

The remarkable capacity of the speech motor system to adapt to various speech conditions is due to an excess of degrees of freedom, which enables producing similar acoustical properties with different sets of control strategies. To explain how the central nervous system selects one of the possible strategies, a common approach, in line with optimal motor control theories, is to model speech motor planning as the solution of an optimality problem based on cost functions. Despite the success of this approach, one of its drawbacks is the intrinsic contradiction between the concept of optimality and the observed experimental intra-speaker token-to-token variability. The present paper proposes an alternative approach by formulating feedforward optimal control in a probabilistic Bayesian modeling framework. This is illustrated by controlling a biomechanical model of the vocal tract for speech production and by comparing it with an existing optimal control model (GEPPETO). The essential elements of this optimal control model are presented first. From them the Bayesian model is constructed in a progressive way. Performance of the Bayesian model is evaluated based on computer simulations and compared to the optimal control model. This approach is shown to be appropriate for solving the speech planning problem while accounting for variability in a principled way.

Life extending control: A concept paper

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Lorenzo, Carl F.; Merrill, Walter C.

1991-01-01

The concept of Life Extending Control is defined. Life is defined in terms of mechanical fatigue life. A brief description is given of the current approach to life prediction using a local, cyclic, stress-strain approach for a critical system component. An alternative approach to life prediction based on a continuous functional relationship to component performance is proposed.Base on cyclic life prediction an approach to Life Extending Control, called the Life Management Approach is proposed. A second approach, also based on cyclic life prediction, called the Implicit Approach, is presented. Assuming the existence of the alternative functional life prediction approach, two additional concepts for Life Extending Control are presented.

The Relationship between Conceptions of Teaching and Approaches to Teaching

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lam, Bick-Har; Kember, David

2006-01-01

The relationship between conceptions of teaching and approaches to teaching was explored in a study of 18 secondary school art teachers in Hong Kong. Conceptions of teaching approaches were fitted to a four-category model. Each of the categories was distinguished by reference to six relevant dimensions. As is the case in higher education,…

Conquest or Reconquest? Students' Conceptions of Nation Embedded in a Historical Narrative

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lopez, Cesar; Carretero, Mario; Rodriguez-Moneo, Maria

2015-01-01

This article focuses on university students' understanding of the concept of nation. First an analysis of this concept from a historiographical point of view is presented. This allows for distinguishing between different conceptions of the nation related to 3 main approaches: the romantic, the modernist, and the ethnosymbolic approaches. Based on…

Best practices for learning video concept detectors from social media examples (Author’s Manuscript)

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-05-23

Best practices for learning video concept detectors from social media examples Svetlana Kordumova & Xirong Li & Cees G. M. Snoek Received: 25...September 2013 /Revised: 3 April 2014 /Accepted: 25 April 2014 # Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014 Abstract Learning video concept detectors from...While the potential has been recognized by many, and progress on the topic has been impressive, we argue that key questions crucial to know how to learn

Control of Future Air Traffic Systems via Complexity Bound Management

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Alexandrov, Natalia

2013-01-01

The complexity of the present system for managing air traffic has led to "discreteness" in approaches to creating new concepts: new concepts are created as point designs, based on experience, expertise, and creativity of the proposer. Discrete point designs may be highly successful but they are difficult to substantiate in the face of equally strong substantiation of competing concepts, as well as the state of the art in concept evaluation via simulations. Hybrid concepts may present a compromise - the golden middle. Yet a hybrid of sometimes in principle incompatible concepts forms another point design that faces the challenge of substantiation and validation. We are faced with the need to re-design the air transportation system ab initio. This is a daunting task, especially considering the problem of transitioning from the present system to any fundamentally new system. However, design from scratch is also an opportunity to reconsider approaches to new concept development. In this position paper we propose an approach, Optimized Parametric Functional Design, for systematic development of concepts for management and control of airspace systems, based on optimization formulations in terms of required system functions and states. This reasoning framework, realizable in the context of ab initio system design, offers an approach to deriving substantiated airspace management and control concepts. With growing computational power, we hope that the approach will also yield a methodology for actual dynamic control of airspace

Should the Concept of Network-Centric Warfare Form a Central Pillar of the Australian Army’s Transformation, as Articulated in the Hardened and Networked Army Concept?

DTIC Science & Technology

2007-05-08

of this transformation, the Australian Army aims to gain advantage through the concept of a ‘network- enabled’ Army. This approach is only a slight...43 NETWORK ENABLED VERSUS NETWORK CENTRIC— A DIFFERENT APPROACH ?... 45 Introduction...advantage through the concept of a ‘network- enabled’ Army. This approach is only a slight modification of that proposed in the Australian Department of

Implementing Toxicity Testing in the 21st Century (TT21C): Making safety decisions using toxicity pathways, and progress in a prototype risk assessment.

PubMed

Adeleye, Yeyejide; Andersen, Melvin; Clewell, Rebecca; Davies, Michael; Dent, Matthew; Edwards, Sue; Fowler, Paul; Malcomber, Sophie; Nicol, Beate; Scott, Andrew; Scott, Sharon; Sun, Bin; Westmoreland, Carl; White, Andrew; Zhang, Qiang; Carmichael, Paul L

2015-06-05

Risk assessment methodologies in toxicology have remained largely unchanged for decades. The default approach uses high dose animal studies, together with human exposure estimates, and conservative assessment (uncertainty) factors or linear extrapolations to determine whether a specific chemical exposure is 'safe' or 'unsafe'. Although some incremental changes have appeared over the years, results from all new approaches are still judged against this process of extrapolating high-dose effects in animals to low-dose exposures in humans. The US National Research Council blueprint for change, entitled Toxicity Testing in the 21st Century: A Vision and Strategy called for a transformation of toxicity testing from a system based on high-dose studies in laboratory animals to one founded primarily on in vitro methods that evaluate changes in normal cellular signalling pathways using human-relevant cells or tissues. More recently, this concept of pathways-based approaches to risk assessment has been expanded by the description of 'Adverse Outcome Pathways' (AOPs). The question, however, has been how to translate this AOP/TT21C vision into the practical tools that will be useful to those expected to make safety decisions. We have sought to provide a practical example of how the TT21C vision can be implemented to facilitate a safety assessment for a commercial chemical without the use of animal testing. To this end, the key elements of the TT21C vision have been broken down to a set of actions that can be brought together to achieve such a safety assessment. Such components of a pathways-based risk assessment have been widely discussed, however to-date, no worked examples of the entire risk assessment process exist. In order to begin to test the process, we have taken the approach of examining a prototype toxicity pathway (DNA damage responses mediated by the p53 network) and constructing a strategy for the development of a pathway based risk assessment for a specific chemical in a case study mode. This contribution represents a 'work-in-progress' and is meant to both highlight concepts that are well-developed and identify aspects of the overall process which require additional development. To guide our understanding of what a pathways-based risk assessment could look like in practice, we chose to work on a case study chemical (quercetin) with a defined human exposure and to bring a multidisciplinary team of chemists, biologists, modellers and risk assessors to work together towards a safety assessment. Our goal was to see if the in vitro dose response for quercetin could be sufficiently understood to construct a TT21C risk assessment without recourse to rodent carcinogenicity study data. The data presented include high throughput pathway biomarkers (p-H2AX, p-ATM, p-ATR, p-Chk2, p53, p-p53, MDM2 and Wip1) and markers of cell-cycle, apoptosis and micronuclei formation, plus gene transcription in HT1080 cells. Eighteen point dose response curves were generated using flow cytometry and imaging to determine the concentrations that resulted in significant perturbation. NOELs and BMDs were compared to the output from biokinetic modelling and the potential for in vitro to in vivo extrapolation explored. A first tier risk assessment was performed comparing the total quercetin concentration in the in vitro systems with the predicted total quercetin concentration in plasma and tissues. The shortcomings of this approach and recommendations for improvement are described. This paper therefore describes the current progress in an ongoing research effort aimed at providing a pathways-based, proof-of-concept in vitro-only safety assessment for a consumer use product. Copyright © 2014 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ireland Ltd.. All rights reserved.

A concept for performance management for Federal science programs

USGS Publications Warehouse

Whalen, Kevin G.

2017-11-06

The demonstration of clear linkages between planning, funding, outcomes, and performance management has created unique challenges for U.S. Federal science programs. An approach is presented here that characterizes science program strategic objectives by one of five “activity types”: (1) knowledge discovery, (2) knowledge development and delivery, (3) science support, (4) inventory and monitoring, and (5) knowledge synthesis and assessment. The activity types relate to performance measurement tools for tracking outcomes of research funded under the objective. The result is a multi-time scale, integrated performance measure that tracks individual performance metrics synthetically while also measuring progress toward long-term outcomes. Tracking performance on individual metrics provides explicit linkages to root causes of potentially suboptimal performance and captures both internal and external program drivers, such as customer relations and science support for managers. Functionally connecting strategic planning objectives with performance measurement tools is a practical approach for publicly funded science agencies that links planning, outcomes, and performance management—an enterprise that has created unique challenges for public-sector research and development programs.

Current state of hematopoietic cell transplantation in CLL as smart therapies emerge.

PubMed

Kharfan-Dabaja, Mohamed A; El-Asmar, Jessica; Awan, Farrukh T; Hamadani, Mehdi; Ayala, Ernesto

2016-03-01

Novel therapies targeting various kinases downstream of the B-cell receptor have emerged along with monoclonal antibodies and BCL-2 antagonists, and are changing the therapeutic landscape of chronic lymphocytic leukemia. However, cure remains unattainable unless eligible patients are offered an allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplant. Access to allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation has expanded considerably with availability of reduced intensity conditioning regimens which is capable offering durable remissions even in poor-risk disease. Encouraging data from ibrutinib and venetoclax in Del17p is challenging the notion of disease eradication as the ultimate therapeutic goal to a new concept of merely disease control. By favoring the non-transplant approach, patients should be aware that there are no established salvage therapies, yet, to rescue disease progression after ibrutinib. When disease eradication is the desirable approach, a reduced intensity conditioning allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplant is the preferred choice at this time. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Identifying Falls Risk Screenings Not Documented with Administrative Codes Using Natural Language Processing

PubMed Central

Zhu, Vivienne J; Walker, Tina D; Warren, Robert W; Jenny, Peggy B; Meystre, Stephane; Lenert, Leslie A

2017-01-01

Quality reporting that relies on coded administrative data alone may not completely and accurately depict providers’ performance. To assess this concern with a test case, we developed and evaluated a natural language processing (NLP) approach to identify falls risk screenings documented in clinical notes of patients without coded falls risk screening data. Extracting information from 1,558 clinical notes (mainly progress notes) from 144 eligible patients, we generated a lexicon of 38 keywords relevant to falls risk screening, 26 terms for pre-negation, and 35 terms for post-negation. The NLP algorithm identified 62 (out of the 144) patients who falls risk screening documented only in clinical notes and not coded. Manual review confirmed 59 patients as true positives and 77 patients as true negatives. Our NLP approach scored 0.92 for precision, 0.95 for recall, and 0.93 for F-measure. These results support the concept of utilizing NLP to enhance healthcare quality reporting. PMID:29854264

Targeting ADAM17 inhibits human colorectal adenocarcinoma progression and tumor-initiating cell frequency.

PubMed

Dosch, Joseph; Ziemke, Elizabeth; Wan, Shanshan; Luker, Kathryn; Welling, Theodore; Hardiman, Karin; Fearon, Eric; Thomas, Suneetha; Flynn, Matthew; Rios-Doria, Jonathan; Hollingsworth, Robert; Herbst, Ronald; Hurt, Elaine; Sebolt-Leopold, Judith

2017-09-12

ADAM17 (a disintegrin and metalloproteinase 17)/TACE (TNFα converting enzyme) has emerged as a potential therapeutic target in colorectal cancer (CRC) and other cancers, due in part to its role in regulating various tumor cell surface proteins and growth factors and cytokines in the tumor microenvironment. The emergence of MEDI3622, a highly potent and specific antibody-based ADAM17 inhibitor, has allowed testing of the concept that targeting ADAM17 may be an important new therapeutic approach for CRC patients. We demonstrate that MEDI3622 is highly efficacious on tumor growth in multiple human CRC PDX models, resulting in improved survival of animals bearing tumor xenografts. MEDI3622 was further found to impact Notch pathway activity and tumor-initiating cells. The promising preclinical activity seen here supports further clinical investigation of this treatment approach to improve therapeutic outcome for patients diagnosed with metastatic CRC, including patients with KRAS-mutant tumors for whom other therapeutic options are currently limited.

Compact time- and space-integrating SAR processor: performance analysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Haney, Michael W.; Levy, James J.; Michael, Robert R., Jr.; Christensen, Marc P.

1995-06-01

Progress made during the previous 12 months toward the fabrication and test of a flight demonstration prototype of the acousto-optic time- and space-integrating real-time SAR image formation processor is reported. Compact, rugged, and low-power analog optical signal processing techniques are used for the most computationally taxing portions of the SAR imaging problem to overcome the size and power consumption limitations of electronic approaches. Flexibility and performance are maintained by the use of digital electronics for the critical low-complexity filter generation and output image processing functions. The results reported for this year include tests of a laboratory version of the RAPID SAR concept on phase history data generated from real SAR high-resolution imagery; a description of the new compact 2D acousto-optic scanner that has a 2D space bandwidth product approaching 106 sports, specified and procured for NEOS Technologies during the last year; and a design and layout of the optical module portion of the flight-worthy prototype.

Mechanisms-based viscoplasticity: Theoretical approach and experimental validation for steel 304L

PubMed Central

Zubelewicz, Aleksander; Oliferuk, Wiera

2016-01-01

We propose a mechanisms-based viscoplasticity approach for metals and alloys. First, we derive a stochastic model for thermally-activated motion of dislocations and, then, introduce power-law flow rules. The overall plastic deformation includes local plastic slip events taken with an appropriate weight assigned to each angle of the plane misorientation from the direction of maximum shear stress. As deformation progresses, the material experiences successive reorganizations of the slip systems. The microstructural evolution causes that a portion of energy expended on plastic deformation is dissipated and the rest is stored in the defect structures. We show that the reorganizations are stable in a homogeneously deformed material. The concept is tested for steel 304L, where we reproduce experimentally obtained stress-strain responses, we construct the Frost-Ashby deformation map and predict the rate of the energy storage. The storage is assessed in terms of synchronized measurements of temperature and displacement distributions on the specimen surface during tensile loading. PMID:27026209

Mines Systems Safety Improvement Using an Integrated Event Tree and Fault Tree Analysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kumar, Ranjan; Ghosh, Achyuta Krishna

2017-04-01

Mines systems such as ventilation system, strata support system, flame proof safety equipment, are exposed to dynamic operational conditions such as stress, humidity, dust, temperature, etc., and safety improvement of such systems can be done preferably during planning and design stage. However, the existing safety analysis methods do not handle the accident initiation and progression of mine systems explicitly. To bridge this gap, this paper presents an integrated Event Tree (ET) and Fault Tree (FT) approach for safety analysis and improvement of mine systems design. This approach includes ET and FT modeling coupled with redundancy allocation technique. In this method, a concept of top hazard probability is introduced for identifying system failure probability and redundancy is allocated to the system either at component or system level. A case study on mine methane explosion safety with two initiating events is performed. The results demonstrate that the presented method can reveal the accident scenarios and improve the safety of complex mine systems simultaneously.

Theory in rural health.

PubMed

Farmer, Jane; Munoz, Sarah-Anne; Threlkeld, Guinever

2012-08-01

This paper offers theories to explain persistent rural health challenges and describes their application to rural health and research. Review of theories from several disciplines. Key issues in rural health are poorer health status and access to health care, staff shortages, relationship-based health provision and the role of health services in community sustainability. These could be fruitfully addressed by applying theory and findings around social determinants of health, economic sociology, the role of culture and capitals approaches to measuring assets. In particular, the concept of rural health might be a barrier to progressing knowledge; and relational approaches, common in geography, offer a more useful conceptual framework for studying health and place. To move beyond its current stage, rural health needs to look to other disciplines' theories and ideas; particularly, it needs a more contemporary understanding of what place means so that health status and service provision can be improved by more thoughtful research. © 2012 The Authors. Australian Journal of Rural Health © National Rural Health Alliance Inc.

Earth & Space Science in the Next Generation Science Standards: Promise, Challenge, and Future Actions. (Invited)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pyle, E. J.

2013-12-01

The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) are a step forward in ensuring that future generations of students become scientifically literate. The NGSS document builds from the National Science Education Standards (1996) and the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) science framework of 2005. Design teams for the Curriculum Framework for K-12 Science Education were to outline the essential content necessary for students' science literacy, considering the foundational knowledge and the structure of each discipline in the context of learning progressions. Once draft standards were developed, two issues emerged from their review: (a) the continual need to prune 'cherished ideas' within the content, such that only essential ideas were represented, and (b) the potential for prior conceptions of Science & Engineering Practices (SEP) and cross-cutting concepts (CCC) to limit overly constrain performance expectations. With the release of the NGSS, several challenges are emerging for geoscience education. First, the traditional emphasis of Earth science in middle school has been augmented by new standards for high school that require major syntheses of concepts. Second, the integration of SEPs into performance expectations places an increased burden on teachers and curriculum developers to organize instruction around the nature of inquiry in the geosciences. Third, work is needed to define CCCs in Earth contexts, such that the unique structure of the geosciences is best represented. To ensure that the Earth & Space Science standards are implemented through grade 12, two supporting structures must be developed. In the past, many curricular materials claimed that they adhered to the NSES, but in some cases this match was a simple word match or checklist that bore only superficial resemblance to the standards. The structure of the performance expectations is of sufficient sophistication to ensure that adherence to the standards more than a casual exercise. Claims of match must be supported not just by disciplinary core ideas, but also by SEPs and CCCs. Such a structured approach to Earth science instruction also requires specialized approaches to teacher preparation and professional development. Many teachers of Earth science are underprepared, and an examination of how Earth science teachers are prepared and supported to use to new curricular materials is also warranted. This presentation will (a) compare the structure of the NGSS and NSES for Earth & Space Science, (b) discuss the review of the NGSS drafts with respect to the intent of the Curriculum Framework, (c) provide definition to the particular challenges to instruction offered by the NGSS beyond prior instructional experience, and (d) define and reinforce concepts of what it means for curricula, instructional materials, and teacher preparation and professional development to be considered 'aligned' with the NGSS.

Health financing for universal coverage and health system performance: concepts and implications for policy

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Abstract Unless the concept is clearly understood, “universal coverage” (or universal health coverage, UHC) can be used to justify practically any health financing reform or scheme. This paper unpacks the definition of health financing for universal coverage as used in the World Health Organization’s World health report 2010 to show how UHC embodies specific health system goals and intermediate objectives and, broadly, how health financing reforms can influence these. All countries seek to improve equity in the use of health services, service quality and financial protection for their populations. Hence, the pursuit of UHC is relevant to every country. Health financing policy is an integral part of efforts to move towards UHC, but for health financing policy to be aligned with the pursuit of UHC, health system reforms need to be aimed explicitly at improving coverage and the intermediate objectives linked to it, namely, efficiency, equity in health resource distribution and transparency and accountability. The unit of analysis for goals and objectives must be the population and health system as a whole. What matters is not how a particular financing scheme affects its individual members, but rather, how it influences progress towards UHC at the population level. Concern only with specific schemes is incompatible with a universal coverage approach and may even undermine UHC, particularly in terms of equity. Conversely, if a scheme is fully oriented towards system-level goals and objectives, it can further progress towards UHC. Policy and policy analysis need to shift from the scheme to the system level. PMID:23940408

Measuring subjective well-being for policy purposes: The example of well-being indicators in the WHO "Health 2020" framework.

PubMed

Vik, Mari Hagtvedt; Carlquist, Erik

2018-03-01

This article discusses the rationale for measuring national well-being, and examines the use of subjectively oriented well-being measures in the context of public policy. Recent years have witnessed growing attention towards the concept and measurement of well-being, both within academic disciplines, intergovernmental organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO) as well as in many governments across Europe, including the Nordic countries. Economic indicators have commonly been regarded as proxies of societal progress of nations, but indicators of well-being have increasingly been applied in order to complement or replace these measures. Well-being indicators of the WHO "Health 2020" framework are critically examined with particular attention given to the subjective aspects of well-being. Literature discussing the rationale for subjective indicators is reviewed. As a background, central theoretical and measurement perspectives on well-being are outlined, including hedonic, eudaimonic and objective list approaches. The WHO refers to well-being in definitions of health and mental health, but has primarily reported on disease. The "Health 2020" framework marked a shift in this concern. One of the main targets of "Health 2020" concerns well-being, involving six core indicators. Only one indicator refers to well-being as subjective experience. Literature supports more extensive use of subjective indicators in combination with objective measures. Although consensus on definitions and instruments is lacking, subjective and objective measures of national well-being may jointly contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of societal progress, as well as a broader conception of health. Further research is required, particularly with regard to eudaimonic indicators.

Health financing for universal coverage and health system performance: concepts and implications for policy.

PubMed

Kutzin, Joseph

2013-08-01

Unless the concept is clearly understood, "universal coverage" (or universal health coverage, UHC) can be used to justify practically any health financing reform or scheme. This paper unpacks the definition of health financing for universal coverage as used in the World Health Organization's World health report 2010 to show how UHC embodies specific health system goals and intermediate objectives and, broadly, how health financing reforms can influence these. All countries seek to improve equity in the use of health services, service quality and financial protection for their populations. Hence, the pursuit of UHC is relevant to every country. Health financing policy is an integral part of efforts to move towards UHC, but for health financing policy to be aligned with the pursuit of UHC, health system reforms need to be aimed explicitly at improving coverage and the intermediate objectives linked to it, namely, efficiency, equity in health resource distribution and transparency and accountability. The unit of analysis for goals and objectives must be the population and health system as a whole. What matters is not how a particular financing scheme affects its individual members, but rather, how it influences progress towards UHC at the population level. Concern only with specific schemes is incompatible with a universal coverage approach and may even undermine UHC, particularly in terms of equity. Conversely, if a scheme is fully oriented towards system-level goals and objectives, it can further progress towards UHC. Policy and policy analysis need to shift from the scheme to the system level.

Addressing unwarranted clinical variation: A rapid review of current evidence.

PubMed

Harrison, Reema; Manias, Elizabeth; Mears, Stephen; Heslop, David; Hinchcliff, Reece; Hay, Liz

2018-05-15

Unwarranted clinical variation (UCV) can be described as variation that can only be explained by differences in health system performance. There is a lack of clarity regarding how to define and identify UCV and, once identified, to determine whether it is sufficiently problematic to warrant action. As such, the implementation of systemic approaches to reducing UCV is challenging. A review of approaches to understand, identify, and address UCV was undertaken to determine how conceptual and theoretical frameworks currently attempt to define UCV, the approaches used to identify UCV, and the evidence of their effectiveness. Rapid evidence assessment (REA) methodology was used. A range of text words, synonyms, and subject headings were developed for the major concepts of unwarranted clinical variation, standards (and deviation from these standards), and health care environment. Two electronic databases (Medline and Pubmed) were searched from January 2006 to April 2017, in addition to hand searching of relevant journals, reference lists, and grey literature. Results were merged using reference-management software (Endnote) and duplicates removed. Inclusion criteria were independently applied to potentially relevant articles by 3 reviewers. Findings were presented in a narrative synthesis to highlight key concepts addressed in the published literature. A total of 48 relevant publications were included in the review; 21 articles were identified as eligible from the database search, 4 from hand searching published work and 23 from the grey literature. The search process highlighted the voluminous literature reporting clinical variation internationally; yet, there is a dearth of evidence regarding systematic approaches to identifying or addressing UCV. Wennberg's classification framework is commonly cited in relation to classifying variation, but no single approach is agreed upon to systematically explore and address UCV. The instances of UCV that warrant investigation and action are largely determined at a systems level currently, and stakeholder engagement in this process is limited. Lack of consensus on an evidence-based definition for UCV remains a substantial barrier to progress in this field. © 2018 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

The allocation of valenced concepts onto 3D space.

PubMed

Marmolejo-Ramos, Fernando; Tirado, Carlos; Arshamian, Edward; Vélez, Jorge Iván; Arshamian, Artin

2018-06-01

The valence-space metaphor research area investigates the metaphorical mapping of valenced concepts onto space. Research findings from this area indicate that positive, neutral, and negative concepts are associated with upward, midward, and downward locations, respectively, in the vertical plane. The same research area has also indicated that such concepts seem to have no preferential location on the horizontal plane. The approach-avoidance effect consists in decreasing the distance between positive stimuli and the body (i.e. approach) and increasing the distance between negative stimuli and the body (i.e. avoid). Thus, the valence-space metaphor accounts for the mapping of valenced concepts onto the vertical and horizontal planes, and the approach-avoidance effect accounts for the mapping of valenced concepts onto the "depth" plane. By using a cube conceived for the study of allocation of valenced concepts onto 3D space, we show in three studies that positive concepts are placed in upward locations and near the participants' body, negative concepts are placed in downward locations and far from the participants' body, and neutral concepts are placed in between these concepts in both planes.

Building an Economical and Sustainable Lunar Infrastructure to Enable Lunar Industrialization

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Zuniga, Allison F.; Turner, Mark; Rasky, Daniel; Loucks, Mike; Carrico, John; Policastri, Daniel

2017-01-01

A new concept study was initiated to examine the architecture needed to gradually develop an economical, evolvable and sustainable lunar infrastructure using a public/private partnerships approach. This approach would establish partnership agreements between NASA and industry teams to develop a lunar infrastructure system that would be mutually beneficial. This approach would also require NASA and its industry partners to share costs in the development phase and then transfer operation of these infrastructure services back to its industry owners in the execution phase. These infrastructure services may include but are not limited to the following: lunar cargo transportation, power stations, communication towers and satellites, autonomous rover operations, landing pads and resource extraction operations. The public/private partnerships approach used in this study leveraged best practices from NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program which introduced an innovative and economical approach for partnering with industry to develop commercial cargo services to the International Space Station. This program was planned together with the ISS Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contracts which was responsible for initiating commercial cargo delivery services to the ISS for the first time. The public/private partnerships approach undertaken in the COTS program proved to be very successful in dramatically reducing development costs for these ISS cargo delivery services as well as substantially reducing operational costs. To continue on this successful path towards installing economical infrastructure services for LEO and beyond, this new study, named Lunar COTS (Commercial Operations and Transport Services), was conducted to examine extending the NASA COTS model to cis-lunar space and the lunar surface. The goals of the Lunar COTS concept are to: 1) develop and demonstrate affordable and commercial cis-lunar and surface capabilities, such as lunar cargo delivery and surface power generation, in partnership with industry; 2) incentivize industry to establish economical and sustainable lunar infrastructure services to support NASA missions and initiate lunar commerce; and 3) encourage creation of new space markets for economic growth and benefit. A phased-development approach was also studied to allow for incremental development and demonstration of capabilities needed to build a lunar infrastructure. This paper will describe the Lunar COTS concept goals, objectives and approach for building an economical and sustainable lunar infrastructure. It will also describe the technical challenges and advantages of developing and operating each infrastructure element. It will also describe the potential benefits and progress that can be accomplished in the initial phase of this Lunar COTS approach. Finally, the paper will also look forward to the potential of a robust lunar industrialization environment and its potential effect on the next 50 years of space exploration.

The Assessment of Taiwanese College Students' Conceptions of and Approaches to Learning Computer Science and Their Relationships

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Liang, Jyh-Chong; Su, Yi-Ching; Tsai, Chin-Chung

2015-01-01

The aim of this study was to explore Taiwanese college students' conceptions of and approaches to learning computer science and then explore the relationships between the two. Two surveys, Conceptions of Learning Computer Science (COLCS) and Approaches to Learning Computer Science (ALCS), were administered to 421 college students majoring in…

Undergraduate Students' Conceptions of and Approaches to Learning in Biology: A Study of Their Structural Models and Gender Differences

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chiou, Guo-Li; Liang, Jyh-Chong; Tsai, Chin-Chung

2012-01-01

This study reports the findings of a study which examined the relationship between conceptions of learning and approaches to learning in biology. This study, which used structural equation modelling, also sorted to identify gender differences in the relationship. Two questionnaires, the Conceptions of Learning Biology (COLB) and the Approaches to…

Proof-of-Concept Part-Task Trainer to Enhance Situation Awareness for Instrument Approach Procedures in Aviation Domain

DTIC Science & Technology

2017-06-01

able.  If the autopilot is engaged on the INAV controlling solution side and the  CDI source is changed to set up for the approach , the NAV mode...release. Distribution is unlimited. PROOF-OF-CONCEPT PART-TASK TRAINER TO ENHANCE SITUATION AWARENESS FOR INSTRUMENT APPROACH PROCEDURES IN AVIATION...CONCEPT PART-TASK TRAINER TO ENHANCE SITUATION AWARENESS FOR INSTRUMENT APPROACH PROCEDURES IN AVIATION DOMAIN 5. FUNDING NUMBERS 6. AUTHOR(S

Concept Car Design and Ability Training

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lv, Jiefeng; Lu, Hairong

The concept design as a symbol of creative design thinking, reflecting on the future design of exploratory and prospective, as a vehicle to explore the notion of future car design, design inspiration and creativity is not only a bold display, more through demonstrate the concept, reflects the company's technological strength and technological progress, and thus enhance their brand image. Present Chinese automobile design also has a very big disparity with world level, through cultivating students' concept design ability, to establish native design features and self-reliant brand image is practical and effective ways, also be necessary and pressing.

The Progression of Prospective Primary Teachers' Conceptions of the Methodology of Teaching

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rivero, Ana; Azcárate, Pilar; Porlán, Rafael; Martín Del Pozo, Rosa; Harres, Joao

2011-11-01

This article describes the evolution of prospective primary teachers' conceptions of the methodology of teaching. Three categories were analyzed: the concept of activity, the organization of activities, and the concept of teaching resources. The study was conducted with five teams of prospective teachers, who were participating in teacher education courses of a constructivist orientation. The results showed very different itineraries in the processes of change, and the presence of two major obstacles—the belief that teaching is the direct cause of learning, and epistemological absolutism. The study allows us to deduce some implications for initial teacher education.

Presenters in Focus: Updating Your Toolkit for Monitoring Progress of Younger Struggling Readers--Q&A with Nathan Clemens

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Clemens, Nathan

2017-01-01

Using a data-driven approach to effectively monitor progress remains an important staple for school psychologists. However, progress monitoring approaches vary significantly based on the age and development of the student, requiring a nuanced and unique approach, particularly for young emerging readers. In this Presenters in Focus Q&A,…

Implementation of Concept Mapping to Novices: Reasons for Errors, a Matter of Technique or Content?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Conradty, Catherine; Bogner, Franz X.

2010-01-01

Concept mapping is discussed as a means to promote meaningful learning and in particular progress in reading comprehension skills. Its increasing implementation necessitates the acquisition of adequate knowledge about frequent errors in order to make available an effective introduction to the new learning method. To analyse causes of errors, 283…

Freedom and the Growth of an Ethical Dimension in Journalism.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Merrill, John C.

To examine what freedom is and how it, in its many manifestations, may best be used to thrust journalism into more productive, progressive, and moral directions, this paper surveys the concepts of freedom and press freedom in Western thought from the eighteenth century to the present. After surveying the evolution of the concept of freedom,…

The Development of an Assessment Tool: Student Knowledge of the Concept of Place Value

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Major, Karen

2012-01-01

The importance of student understanding of the concept of place value cannot be underestimated. Place value is a "gate keeper" in developing mathematical understanding. The purpose of this study was to examine and develop a teacher-made test of place value knowledge. The questions were developed using the progressions from the Number…

How Students Learn from Multiple Contexts and Definitions: Proper Time as a Coordination Class

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Levrini, Olivia; diSessa, Andrea A.

2008-01-01

This article provides an empirical analysis of a single classroom episode in which students reveal difficulties with the concept of proper time in special relativity but slowly make progress in improving their understanding. The theoretical framework used is "coordination class theory," which is an evolving model of concepts and conceptual change.…

What Form of Mathematics Are Assessments Assessing? The Case of Multiplication and Division in Fourth Grade NAEP Items

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kosko Karl W.; Singh, Rashmi

2018-01-01

Multiplicative reasoning is a key concept in elementary school mathematics. Item statistics reported by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) assessment provide the best current indicator for how well elementary students across the U.S. understand this, and other concepts. However, beyond expert reviews and statistical analysis,…

Basic Measurement and Related Careers: Level C.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ohio State Univ., Columbus. Center for Vocational and Technical Education.

The teaching guide, part of a series of four, consists of learning experiences for use at the levels of grades 3 and 4 in mathematics. It focuses on the basic concepts of measurement and developing measurement skills in the early grades. It progresses to the concept of measurement by comparison and to developing basic volume measurement skills.…

Identifying Threshold Concepts for Information Literacy: A Delphi Study

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Townsend, Lori; Hofer, Amy R.; Hanick, Silvia Lin; Brunetti, Korey

2016-01-01

This study used the Delphi method to engage expert practitioners on the topic of threshold concepts--core ideas and processes in a discipline that students need to grasp in order to progress in their learning, but that are often unspoken or unrecognized by expert practitioners--for information literacy. A panel of experts considered two questions:…

Recognizing Engaged Scholarship in Faculty Reward Structures: Challenges and Progress

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cavallaro, Claire C.

2016-01-01

The concept of community engagement as a primary function of higher education and the roots of this movement can be traced back to the 1980s with the founding of the Campus Compact in 1985 (Glass & Fitzgerald, 2010). The concept has been endorsed by several higher education organizations, including the American Association of State Colleges…

The Development of Children's Ideas on Animal Classification, Form and Function; Is School Experience Becoming Increasingly Impoverished?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Braund, Martin

This paper begins with a review of previous research into children's classification schema, specifically with regard to the concept of vertebrate/invertebrate, before citing the details of more recent findings with primary aged children. This research explores the concept of vertebrate/invertebrate and how ideas progress across primary and…

[Discursive thought and intuition in medical research].

PubMed

Labhart, A

1981-02-01

The history of diabetes and the progress of the sciences demonstrates that original creative investigation requires in addition to logic thinking intuition which originates from the unconscious. The concept of intuition is of great importance in philosophy, religion and psychology. Luck and serendipity have similar meaning as the concepts of kairos, tyche and techne of the Greek.

Evaluating and comparing Singaporean and Taiwanese eighth graders' conceptions of science assessment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lin, Tzung-Jin; Tan, Aik-Ling; Lee, Min-Hsien; Tsai, Chin-Chung

2017-10-01

Background: Researchers have indicated that assessment practices and methods should support learners' construction of meaningful understanding of knowledge. Understanding students' conceptions of assessment will enable us to construct more realistic, valid and fair assessments. Learners' conceptualization of assessment would be imperative to serve as an essential reference to evaluate their learning progress.

From Students to Consumers: Reflections on the Marketisation of Portuguese Higher Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cardoso, Sonia; Carvalho, Teresa; Santiago, Rui

2011-01-01

A progressive attempt to replace traditional public administration values and concepts by others that are closer to private management can be observed in the replacement of the service user concept by that of consumer or client. This redefinition's more implicit or explicit intent is to increase consumers'/clients' status, their capacity to choose…

Learning in Structured Connectionist Networks

DTIC Science & Technology

1988-04-01

the structure is too rigid and learning too difficult for cognitive modeling. Two algorithms for learning simple, feature-based concept descriptions...and learning too difficult for cognitive model- ing. Two algorithms for learning simple, feature-based concept descriptions were also implemented. The...Term Goals Recent progress in connectionist research has been encouraging; networks have success- fully modeled human performance for various cognitive

An Analysis of Human Resource Officers in Support of MPT&E Enterprise Management: A Succession Management Plan for Human Capital Managers

DTIC Science & Technology

2007-09-01

creating incentives to motivate and cultivate an atmosphere of constant progress. This is often referred to as “ kaizen ,” the Japanese concept of...improvement, mainly to jumpstart the moribund Japanese industrial system. Eventually, this gave rise to the kaizen revolution and the concept was quickly

A Progression in First-Grade Children's Thinking about Variable and Variable Notation in Functional Relationships

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Blanton, Maria; Brizuela, Bárbara M.; Gardiner, Angela Murphy; Sawrey, Katie; Newman-Owens, Ashley

2017-01-01

Recent research suggests that children in elementary grades have some facility with variable and variable notation in ways that warrant closer attention. We report here on an empirically developed progression in first-grade children's thinking about these concepts in functional relationships. Using learning trajectories research as a framework for…

Progress Report for March, 1964; Cambridge Conference on School Mathematics; Feasibility Study No. 33.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lomon, Earle

This report gives information regarding the mathematical classroom activities for the first six grades at Estabrook School from March 1964 to June 1965. A brief progress report is given regarding the instruction provided to teach such concepts as addition and subtraction, symmetry transformations of squares, open sentences and graphing,…

"Escuela Nueva" in Spain: Origins and Implications in Teacher Professional Development for the 21st Century

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Jorrin Abellan, Ivan M.; Villagra Sobrino, Sara L.; Garcia Sastre, Sara

2013-01-01

During the Spanish Second Republican government (April 1931-July 1939), there was an institutional initiative in the country called "Misiones Pedagogicas", deeply based in the early Deweyan conception of Progressive Education. The aim of this project was bringing access to culture, entertainment and some sort of progress to rural areas…

Progress Revisited: The Quality of (Work)Life of Women Teachers.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Canadian Teachers' Federation, Ottawa (Ontario).

This study explores the elusive concept of "Quality of Life" of women teachers in Canada. It is clear that both gender and profession mediate quality of life and overlap in ways researchers are just beginning to understand. The experiences of men have been the yardstick against which women's progress in the teaching profession has been…

Annual Technical Progress Report for Emergency School Assistance Program, Title 45, 1970-71.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lindsey, Randall B.

This paper presents a technical progress report of two programs conducted with funds provided under the Emergency School Assistance Program. One, the Mobile Learning Unit, said to have been designed to measure changes in fourth and fifth grade students' self-concept in a reorganized desegregated school environment, focuses on whether a positive…

Fundamental Research in Engineering Education. Identifying and Repairing Student Misconceptions in Thermal and Transport Science: Concept Inventories and Schema Training Studies

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Miller, Ronald L.; Streveler, Ruth A.; Yang, Dazhi; Roman, Aidsa I. Santiago

2011-01-01

This paper summarizes progress on two related lines of chemical engineering education research: 1) identifying persistent student misconceptions in thermal and transport science (fluid mechanics, heat transfer, and thermodynamics); and, 2) developing a method to help students repair these misconceptions. Progress on developing the Thermal and…