bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Are generic strategies ‘fit for purpose’ in a public service context?
Authors: Hodgkinson Ian R.
Published: March 2012

The environment in which public sector organisations operate is becoming ever more volatile, with such organisations increasingly facing the dual pressures of growing customer expectations coupled with significant budget reductions. This study presents an exploratory research model to uncover significant relationships between generic strategies and the business and social performance of public leisure providers, in an attempt to ascertain if generic strategies are fit for purpose in the public leisure sector. The findings suggest that low cost and price-based strategies are inadequate for service delivery. Rather, a hybrid strategy – which seeks to add value while also having a cost base that permits low prices – is deemed fit for purpose in the public leisure sector, satisfying the dual strategic agenda of public leisure providers. This study provides contributions to the strategic management, public management, and leisure services literatures.
The role of auxiliary assumptions for the validity of manipulations and measures
Authors: Trafimow David
Published: March 2012

Psychologists are rightly concerned with validity of their manipulations and measures but it is far from clear what it means for these to be valid. Psychologists and philosophers who are interested in the issue have proposed several competing definitions. My goal is not to evaluate these definitions or even to review them. Rather, I start from the literature on the falsification of theories and use that literature to illustrate the importance of auxiliary assumptions in theory testing. Subsequent to this illustration, I argue that auxiliary assumptions should play a more central role in how psychologists and philosophers think about validity.
Remembering against the nation-state: Hereros' pursuit of restorative justice
Authors: Morgan Karie L.
Published: March 2012

One hundred years after committing a genocide, the German government offered an apology to Hereros in Namibia, thereby making a significant step towards meeting their demands for restorative justice. In combination with changes to how the genocide was understood in Namibia and in Germany, the occasion of commemorating the genocide – which offered new contexts for remembering – marked a turning point in the way this past was remembered in both countries.
Remembering indigenous dispossession in the national museum: The National Museum of Australia and the Canadian Museum of Civilization
Authors: Nettelbeck Amanda
Published: March 2012

Recent decades have seen the escalation of debate across western democracies that were once sites of the British Empire about how to remember the history of colonialism. This essay will consider how these debates have manifested in relation to the history of indigenous dispossession and its remembrance in Australia and Canada, which not only share many parallels in their stories of settlement but also in their recent efforts to come to terms with historical injustices against indigenous peoples. In examining how these debates have taken shape in the representation of national history in Australia’s and Canada’s recently established national museums, this essay will question the degree to which public historical consciousness in these former settler societies demonstrates a political imperative to remember historical injustices on the one hand, and on the other hand an enduring desire to forget them in favour of a more unifying story of the nation.
Historical memory and present-day oblivion: The Mapuche conflict in post-dictatorial Chile
Authors: Waldman Gilda M.
Published: March 2012

The conflict between the Chilean state and the Mapuche ethnic minority, and the history of dispossession of land, discrimination and marginalization go back to the end of the nineteenth century. The Pinochet military dictatorship made matters worse by giving their land away to big forest and hydroelectric enterprises. The end of the dictatorship produced expectations that these historical injustices would be addressed. While the post-dictatorship governments have implemented social assistance and cultural recognition policies, they have continued the economic policies put in place under the dictatorship and have criminalized social protests by sections of the Mapuche community. Meanwhile, Chilean society more broadly has remained indifferent towards the plight of Mapuche because of the pervasive narratives that depict Mapuche as standing outside the nation. Neither the state nor non-indigenous society has resolved their relationship with the Mapuche minority.
Social memory and state–civil society relations in the Philippines: Forgetting and remembering the Jabidah ‘massacre'
Authors: Curaming Rommel A. , Aljunied Syed Muhd Khairudin
Published: March 2012

This article seeks to explain the recent resurgence in national memories of the Jabidah Massacre – the killing of dozens of Muslim recruits undergoing clandestine training, allegedly in preparation for the infiltration and destabilization of Sabah. We argue that the ways in which the memories of this incident have been forgotten, remembered and appropriated by different groups in the past four decades were determined by the shifting political needs and interests of elite politicians, Moro nationalists and civil society groups.
Redress as American-style justice: Congressional narratives of Japanese American redress at the end of the Cold War
Authors: Kozen Cathleen K.
Published: March 2012

What does the congressional discourse concerning US redress for the internment of Japanese and Japanese Americans during the Second World War reveal about the politics of governmental redress in relation to nation-building and national war memories? Examining US congressional debates on the Japanese American redress bill passed in 1988, this article argues that the narratives of Japanese American internment as an exceptional national tragedy and its redress as an ‘act of greatness for a great nation’ functioned to rescript memories of the incarceration into an inspirational narration of national redemption and an exemplar of American-style justice, in order to recuperate a particular moral, multicultural brand of American exceptionalism at the end of the Cold War.
Exploring clinical wisdom in nursing education
Authors: McKie Andrew , Baguley Fiona , Guthrie Caitrian , Jackson Carol , Kirkpatrick Pamela , Laing Adele , O’Brien Stephen , Taylor Ruth , Wimpenny Peter
Published: March 2012

The recent interest in wisdom in professional health care practice is explored in this article. Key features of wisdom are identified via consideration of certain classical, ancient and modern sources. Common themes are discussed in terms of their contribution to ‘clinical wisdom’ itself and this is reviewed against the nature of contemporary nursing education. The distinctive features of wisdom (recognition of contextual factors, the place of the person and timeliness) may enable their significance for practice to be promoted in more coherent ways in nursing education. Wisdom as practical knowledge (phronesis) is offered as a complementary perspective within the educational preparation and practice of students of nursing. Certain limitations within contemporary UK nursing education are identified that may inhibit development of clinical wisdom. These are: the modularization of programmes in higher education institutions, the division of pastoral and academic support and the relationship between theory and practice.
On the crisis of conscience
Authors: Lachter Bruce
Published: March 2012

Objective: This paper examines the crisis of conscience as portrayed in the biblical story of Abraham and Isaac.

Conclusion: The perspective of allegory allows intense emotion to be contained, and placed in a socio-cultural context, which may work against bloodshed.
Culture, context and therapeutic processes: delivering a parent-child intervention in a remote Aboriginal community
Authors: Mares Sarah , Robinson Gary
Published: March 2012

Objective: Little is written about the process of delivering mainstream, evidence-based therapeutic interventions for Aboriginal children and families in remote communities. Patterns of interaction between parents and children and expectations about parenting and professional roles and responsibilities vary across cultural contexts. This can be a challenging experience for professionals accustomed to work in urban settings. Language is only a part of cultural difference, and the outsider in a therapeutic group in an Aboriginal community is outside not only in language but also in access to community relationships and a place within those relationships.

Method: This paper uses examples from Let’s Start, a therapeutic parent-child intervention to describe the impact of distance, culture and relationships in a remote Aboriginal community, on the therapeutic framework, group processes and relationships.

Results: Cultural and contextual factors influence communication, relationships and group processes in a therapeutic group program for children and parents in a remote Aboriginal community. Group leaders from within and from outside the community, are likely to have complementary skills.

Conclusions: Cultural and contextual factors influence communication, relationships and group processes in a therapeutic group program for children and parents in a remote Aboriginal community. Group leaders from within and from outside the community, are likely to have complementary skills. Program adaptation, evaluation and staff training and support need to take these factors into account to ensure cultural accessibility without loss of therapeutic fidelity and efficacy.
An energy-based model for ballistic impact analysis of ceramic-composite armors
Authors: Naik NK , Kumar Santosh , Ratnaveer D , Joshi Makarand , Akella Kiran
Published: March 2012

An analytical model is presented for the ballistic impact behavior of ceramic-composite armors. The model is based on wave theory and energy balance between the kinetic energy of the projectile and the energy absorbed by different mechanisms. The armor analyzed consists of front composite cover layer, ceramic plate, rubber layer and the composite backing plate. The projectile is cylindrical. The major damage and energy-absorbing mechanisms are compression of the target directly below the projectile, compression in the surrounding region around the point of impact, formation of ring cracks and radial cracks in the ceramic leading to tensile failure, shear plugging, pulverization of the ceramic, tension in the yarns, delamination and matrix cracking in the composite, bulge formation on the back face of the composite backing plate and friction between the target and the projectile. Projectile erosion and deformation are also considered. Kinetic energy, velocity and deceleration of the projectile, distance traveled by the projectile and the contact force are presented as a function of time. Ballistic limit velocity, contact duration and damage progression are also given. Further, solution procedure is presented for the study of ballistic impact behavior of ceramic-composite armors. Analytical predictions are validated with the experimental results. Finally, performance of a typical ceramic-composite armor is presented.
A new method for M-integral experimental evaluation
Authors: Zuo Hong , Feng Yu-hong
Published: March 2012

In this article, the experimental measurement method of M-integral is investigated. Through the detailed analysis to the nondestructive evaluation method of J- and M-integrals suggested by King and Herrmann, it is found that the specimen geometry which they selected and the corresponding clamping mode in their test exists a conflict with the stress distribution assumption on the integral contour. The formulas they proposed cannot represent the selected specimen geometry and the related integral contours. To avoid this conflict, a new experimental measurement method and a simper specimen style is proposed in this study. According to the method, the M-integral is nondestructive evaluated experimentally through the new specimen and the new clamping mode.
Exploring the Roots of Culture Using Spatial Autocorrelation
Authors: Dobson Paul , Gelade Garry A.
Published: March 2012

This article examines the distribution of some well-established dimensions of national culture within geographic and ecosocial space. Using spatial autocorrelation to quantify the relationships between geographical location, distance from the equator, physical climate, religion, and national development and 38 cultural dimensions, we find a substantial degree of spatial organization; some cultural dimensions are as spatially organized as temperature or rainfall. Overall, we find that culture as measured by aggregated personal values covaries to about the same extent with geographical proximity, national development and religion, and significantly less with the physical climate and distance from the equator. It is also found that there are significant differences in the spatial patterning of GLOBE societal-level values and the personal value measures of previous researchers. GLOBE values are also strongly organized by geographical proximity and religion but unlike personal value measures only weakly organized by level of national development. GLOBE practices are not strongly spatially organized at all suggesting that practice in a nation does not evolve simplistically from national values or vice versa. Religion, a major organizing variable for how people believe things should be in society, has little relationship with how people believe things are. We conclude that the approach taken by the project GLOBE is a valuable contribution to our understanding of national culture and that spatial autocorrelation is an exploratory method of analysis that is underused in cross-cultural research.
A variational formulation for constitutive laws described by bipotentials
Authors: Buliga Marius , de Saxcé Géry , Vallée Claude
Published: March 2012

We propose a rigorous variational formulation and an algorithm for solving the discretisation in time of the evolution problem for an implicit standard material, in terms of bipotentials.
A lightweight virtual machine monitor for Blue Gene/P
Authors: Stoess Jan , Steinberg Udo , Uhlig Volkmar , Kehne Jens , Appavoo Jonathan , Waterland Amos
Published: March 2012

In this paper, we present a lightweight, micro-kernel-based virtual machine monitor (VMM) for the Blue Gene/P supercomputer. Our VMM comprises a small µ-kernel with virtualization capabilities and, atop, a user-level VMM component that manages virtual Blue Gene/P cores, memory, and interconnects; we also support running native applications directly atop the µ-kernel. Our design goal is to enable compatibility to standard operating systems such as Linux on BG/P via virtualization, but to also keep the amount of kernel functionality small enough to facilitate shortening the path to applications and lowering operating system noise.

Our prototype implementation successfully virtualizes a Blue Gene/P version of Linux with support for Ethernet-based communication mapped onto Blue Gene/P’s collective and torus network devices. Our first experiences and experiments show that our VMM still shows a substantial performance hit, and that support for native application environments is a key requirement towards fully exploiting the capabilities of a supercomputer. Altogether, our approach poses an interesting operating system alternative for supercomputers, providing the convenience of a fully featured commodity software stack, while also promising to deliver the scalability and low latency of an HPC operating system.
Metastatic carcinoma in the ulna of a cat secondary to a suspected pulmonary tumour
Authors: Salgüero Raquel , Langley-Hobbs Sorrel , Warland James , Brearley Malcolm
Published: March 2012

A 14-year-old male neutered Burmese cat presented for investigation of right fore limb lameness that was non-responsive to anti-inflammatory drugs and opioids. Thoracic radiography showed multiple pulmonary soft tissue nodules and a larger cavitated mass. Right elbow radiographs revealed marked peri-articular proliferation of new bone and periosteal reaction primarily affecting the ulna. Histopathological examination of an incisional biopsy of the right ulna revealed neoplastic proliferation of epithelial cells; this was confirmed as a poorly differentiated carcinoma with immunohistochemistry. Amputation of the right fore limb was performed at the owner’s request. After surgery, radiographs of the limb showed progression of bone proliferation. Repeat pathological analysis confirmed a metastatic carcinoma. The cat deteriorated 3 days after surgery and was euthanased a week later as a result of severe respiratory distress. This case represents an unusual case of metastasis of a suspected primary lung tumour to the ulna in a Burmese cat.
Ultrasound-guided block of the feline sciatic nerve
Authors: Haro Paulina , Laredo Francisco , Gil Francisco , Belda Eliseo , Ayala María D , Soler Marta , Agut Amalia
Published: March 2012

This study was conducted to validate an ultrasound-guided technique to block the sciatic nerve in cats. An anatomical study was first carried out in four feline cadavers to evaluate the feasibility of the glutea (cranial and caudal), femoris and poplitea ultrasonographical approaches for the sciatic nerve block. The results showed that the femoris approach was optimal because the region was free of vascular and bony structures, and the needle was easily visualised in-plane. Then, the efficacy of the femoris ultrasonographical approach to block the sciatic nerve was tested in six healthy adult experimental cats. A dose of 2 mg/kg lidocaine 2% diluted in saline to a final volume of 1 ml was administered in all cats. The blockade was successful in all cases and the cats recovered uneventfully. This study shows the usefulness of the femoris approach in performing an ultrasound-guided blockade of the sciatic nerve in cats.
Voxelwise analysis of conventional magnetic resonance imaging to predict future disability in early relapsing–remitting multiple sclerosis
Authors: Wybrecht Delphine , Reuter Françoise , Zaaraoui Wafaa , Faivre Anthony , Crespy Lydie , Rico Audrey , Malikova Irina , Confort-Gouny Sylviane , Soulier Elisabeth , Cozzone Patrick J , Pelletier Jean , Ranjeva Jean-Philippe , Audoin Bertrand
Published: March 2012

Background:

The ability of conventional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to predict subsequent physical disability and cognitive deterioration after a clinically isolated syndrome (CIS) is weak.

Objectives:

We aimed to investigate whether conventional MRI changes over 1 year could predict cognitive and physical disability 5 years later in CIS. We performed analyses using a global approach (T2 lesion load, number of T2 lesions), but also a topographic approach.

Methods:

This study included 38 patients with a CIS. At inclusion, 10 out of 38 patients fulfilled the 2010 revised McDonald’s criteria for the diagnosis of multiple sclerosis. Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS) evaluation was performed at baseline, year 1 and year 5, and cognitive evaluation at baseline and year 5. T2-weighted MRI was performed at baseline and year 1. We used voxelwise analysis to analyse the predictive value of lesions location for subsequent disability.

Results:

Using the global approach, no correlation was found between MRI and clinical data. The occurrence or growth of new lesions in the brainstem was correlated with EDSS changes over the 5 years of follow-up. The occurrence or growth of new lesions in cerebellum, thalami, corpus callosum and frontal lobes over 1 year was correlated with cognitive impairment at 5 years.

Conclusion:

The assessment of lesion location at the first stage of multiple sclerosis may be of value to predict future clinical disability.
Animating the Anatomical Specimen: Regional Dissection and the Incorporation of Photography in J.C.B. Grant’s An Atlas of Anatomy
Authors: Sawchuk Kim
Published: March 2012

In 1943 Dr J.C.B. Grant, of the University of Toronto, published the first anatomical atlas ever fully produced in North America, An Atlas of Anatomy. Within the history of biomedical teaching, the publication of this textbook is remarkable for at least two reasons, both connected to the themes of animation and automation. The visual narrative of the anatomical body found in Grant’s Atlas encapsulated a paradigmatic shift in gross anatomy from a systemic approach (dividing the body into its systems) to a regional anatomy (dividing the body into areas containing interlocking systems). The contextually contingent reasons for this shift in medical training are represented in the production of this textbook. What is crucial is that anatomy is thus conceived as directly applicable to surgical practice, which intervenes on the bodies of the living, rather than the dead. The second important dimension of Grant’s Atlas was his rigorous, yet invisible, incorporation of photography into the practice of medical illustration. Grant’s Atlas systematically deployed hand-drawn tracings of photographic images in the production of his bestselling textbook to affirm an indexical connection to a ‘real body’. At the same time, this use of photography is erased within the visuals, which rely instead on hand-drawn illustrations (line-drawings and carbon-dusting) to produce this particular pedagogy of the anatomical body. The production of ‘textbook anatomy’ is thus articulated to changes in technical modes of representation (photography) and to the new techniques in print-technologies from the late 19th until the mid 20th century.
Animation and Automation – The Liveliness and Labours of Bodies and Machines
Authors: Stacey Jackie , Suchman Lucy
Published: March 2012

Written as the introduction to a special issue of Body & Society on the topic of animation and automation, this article considers the interrelation of those two terms through readings of relevant work in film studies and science and technology studies (STS), inflected through recent scholarship on the body. Drawing upon historical and contemporary examples, we trace how movement is taken as a sign of life, while living bodies are translated through the mechanisms of artifice. Whereas film studies has drawn upon work ranging from production history to semiotics and psychoanalysis to conceptualize the ways in which the appearance of life on the cinema screen materializes subjectivities beyond it, STS has developed a corpus of theoretical and empirical scholarship that works to refigure material-semiotic entanglements of subjects and objects. In approaching animation and automation through insights developed within these two fields we hope to bring them into closer dialogue with each other and with studies of the body, given the convergence of their shared concerns with affective materializations of life. More specifically, an interest in the moving capacities of animation, and in what gets rendered invisible in discourses of automation, is central to debates regarding the interdependencies of bodies and machines. Animation is always in the end a relational effect, it seems, while automation implies the continuing presence of hidden labour and care.
The Hands of the Animator: Rotoscopic Projection, Condensation, and Repetition Automatism in the Fleischer Apparatus
Authors: Cartwright Lisa
Published: March 2012

This article is concerned with the affective relationship among bodies and film technologies in the process of building and using filmmaking instruments, taking as its object the early Rotoscope, a device patented by the legendary American animator Max Fleischer that entailed the projection of live-action film for use as a template in the drawing of animated figures, to which the live-action trace was thought to impart life-like, normative patterns of movement. Drawing from media archaeology, psychoanalytic theories of repetition, projection, and condensation, and object relations theory, this article offers an interpretation of some of the kinds of psychic interactions offered in animated film through traces of the Rotoscope’s production history found in the device’s patent drawings, its patent embodiments, and its published family legend. It is proposed that the device was the locus of a collective fraternal performance, serving as a shared ground for an array of condensations and displacements and enactments of repetition compulsion among the multiple bodies engaged in the production of the device, as well as among the multiple animated and live-action film bodies that crossed its production screens and patent pages. One objective of this article is to shift the interpretive and analytic focus in film studies from the filmstrip and the projected screen image to the relationship between bodies and technologies in the experience of making films, and making the filmic apparatus. A secondary objective of this article is to suggest that the approach to bodily movement embedded in the design of the Rotoscope was hardly normative. The device offered a means to stretch and distort both norms and stereotypes of human expression through movement. The rotoscoped body sometimes performed in ways that pushed the limits of viewer expectations about how a given body will, or should, move, in space or across the screen.
Anxiety and depression are independent predictors of quality of life of patients with chronic musculoskeletal pain
Authors: Orenius Tage , Koskela Taru , Koho Petteri , Pohjolainen Timo , Kautiainen Hannu , Haanpää Maija , Hurri Heikki
Published: March 2012

We examined the relative impact of baseline anxiety, depression and fear of movement on health related quality of life at 12-month follow-up after a multidisciplinary pain management programme. One hundred and eleven patients who had chronic musculoskeletal pain (mean age 45 years, 65% women) attended during 2003–2005 a multidisciplinary three-phase pain management programme with a total time frame of six to seven months, totalling 19 days. The Beck Anxiety Inventory was used to rate anxiety, the Beck Depression Inventory depression, the Tampa Scale of Kinesiophobia fear of movement. The generic 15D questionnaire was used to assess health related quality of life. Baseline data were collected at admission, follow-up data at 12 months. Mean health related quality of life increased significantly from baseline to 12-month follow-up. Anxiety at baseline predicted significant negative change in the health related quality of life, depression predicted significant positive change in the health related quality of life. Fear of movement did not predict any significant change in the health related quality of life. We concluded that patients with chronic musculoskeletal pain and mild to moderate depression benefit from a multidisciplinary pain management programme in contrast to anxious patients. The findings imply further research with bigger sample sizes, other than HRQoL outcome measures as well as with other groups of patients.
Translation, representation and the Deaf ‘voice’
Authors: Stone Christopher , West Donna
Published: March 2012

In this article, we introduce a complex world of working with qualitative data in multiple languages, modalities and media. We share some of the theoretical considerations that influenced our decisions about when to translate, what and how. We also report some of the multiple possibilities available to the researcher when analysing data in a visual language – in this case, British Sign Language – sharing considerations in choosing one method over another in differing circumstances. Through these discussions we draw attention to how translation issues are both similar and different from working solely with spoken language audio recordings. We then offer suggestions on the reporting and dissemination of results when more than one language is involved and when translation is at the heart of the research. While grounded in empirical Deaf Studies research, the methodological, cultural and theoretical issues raised here concerning translation, representation and ‘voice’ are applicable across social science disciplines, and particularly where minority communities and unwritten languages are at the heart of research activities.
Reflections on using life history to investigate women teachers’ aspirations and career decisions
Authors: Smith Joan M
Published: March 2012

Drawing on a study about women secondary school teachers’ perceptions of the factors affecting their career decisions, I consider in this article some of the issues I faced as a researcher in using life history interviews, as well as the strengths afforded by this approach for research with a social justice agenda. I argue that researcher involvement and bias are inevitable aspects of life history research, and that these need to be managed to the benefit rather than the detriment of the study. I describe some of the strategies I used to code, organize and interpret the data. Life history offers a number of strengths: it offers scope for exploring subjective realities; it allows narrators to reflect as they speak, which for some can be a transformative experience; and it affords rich insights into the reasons behind the decisions people make that would not be possible via more structured approaches.
Parents reading with their toddlers: The role of personalization in book engagement
Authors: Kucirkova Natalia , Messer David , Whitelock Denise
Published: March 2012

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of personalized books on parents’ and children’s engagement during shared book reading. Seven native English parents and their children aged between 12 and 33 months were observed at home when sharing a book made specifically for the child (i.e. a personalized book), a comparable book with no personalized content, and a favourite book of the child. The interactions were videotaped and later coded to provide information about the frequency of behaviours that indicated engagement with the books. Statistical analyses revealed that children and parents showed significantly higher overall frequencies of smiles and laughs with the personalized books in comparison to the non-personalized books, and showed higher frequency of vocal activity with the personalized as opposed to the child’s favourite book. In addition, there was a significantly higher rate of children’s smiles and laughs with the personalized than with the non-personalized book. It appeared that most of the children’s positive affect with the personalized books was in response to the content of those books, while the parents’ smiles occurred mostly in response to a smile or laugh from the child. These findings are among the first to suggest that personalized features of books result in specific distinct responses in parents and children during shared book reading.
What the Berenstain Bears can tell us about school readiness: Maternal story grammar style and preschool narrative recall
Authors: Harris Yvette R. , Schroeder Valarie M.
Published: March 2012

Forty middle-class American mothers and their preschool children were observed in a narrative activity which involved telling a story using the Berenstain Bears Play Set as a stimulus. The goal of the study was to examine the presence of story grammar elements in both maternal and preschool narratives. In addition, the study sought to explore the types of narrative eliciting strategies mothers employ to assist their children in recalling a story. Mothers were also queried about the school readiness and narrative activity that are available in their home environments. The results of the study indicate that there are distinct maternal story grammar styles and narrative eliciting styles which are at some level related to the preschoolers’ recall of stories and those styles enable preschoolers’ to practice school readiness skills. The findings also suggest that preschoolers’ in our study live in narrative rich environments, where mothers embed school readiness activities in narrative-like games. Suggestions for providing parents with strategies to increase their use of narratives as learning tools are discussed.
White lighting for residential applications
Authors: Rea MS , Freyssinier JP
Published: March 2012

The lighting industry relies on colour-rendering index (CRI) and correlated colour temperature (CCT) to communicate the colour properties of light sources. While advances have been made in recent years to develop new metrics for colour rendering, not much attention has been given to the validity or utility of CCT for communicating the appearance of illumination. Recently, it was shown that a wide range of chromaticities can appear ‘white’ or with minimal perceived ‘tint’. Importantly, these chromaticities do not follow the line of blackbody radiation, the reference for CCT. The present study builds on this previous research to determine whether ‘white’ illumination is preferred in simulated residential applications. Results presented here support the hypothesis that people prefer ‘white’ or minimally ‘tinted’ sources of illumination.
Nonpharmacological interventions for managing respiratory symptoms in lung cancer
Authors: Yorke Janelle , Brettle Alison , Molassiotis Alex
Published: March 2012

Patients with lung cancer experience significant symptom burden, particularly symptoms of a respiratory nature. Such symptom burden can be distressing for patients and negatively impact their functional status and quality of life. The aim of this review is to evaluate studies of nonpharmacological and noninvasive interventions for the management of respiratory symptoms experienced by patients with lung cancer. In total, 13 studies met the inclusion criteria for this review and included 1383 participants of which 1296 were lung cancer patients. The most frequently assessed and reported symptom was breathlessness ( n = 9 studies). Cough and haemoptysis were reported in one study. A variety of outcome measurement tools were used and a broad range of intervention strategies evaluated. Lack of consistency between studies impinged on the ability to combine studies. It is not possible to draw any firm conclusion as to the effectiveness of nonpharmacological interventions for the management of respiratory symptoms in lung cancer. Nonpharmacological interventions may well have an important role to play in the management of some of the respiratory symptoms (or combinations of respiratory symptoms), but more work of higher quality is necessary in the future.
Reflexive Management Learning
Authors: Cotter Richard J. , Cullen John G.
Published: March 2012

The scale and reach of the recent global financial has created a fresh wave of interest in exploring more sustainable forms of management. A central thrust behind this trend in the practice of management development and education has been the accentuation of reflexivity. There are many variations in how reflexivity is understood, and this article aims to explore the various philosophical roots and contemporary understandings of reflexive management learning (which we refer to in this article as RML). Rather than assuming that RML is “one thing,” we attempt to integrate disparate understandings of it in classical and contemporary theory and propose a conceptual typology of the various forms of RML as it is studied and practiced. We conclude by reviewing some of the problematic aspects of RML and signpost further avenues of research in the field.
Goals Can Be Threatened to Extinction
Authors: Hutchison Keith A. , Smith Jessi L. , Ferris Amber
Published: March 2012

Consensus is building that stereotype threat interferes with working memory, but how so? Grounded in the dual-process framework of Kane and Engle, the authors examined the extent to which stereotype threat interferes with one’s ability to maintain task goals in working memory and one’s ability to choose between conflicting responses. One hundred eighty-seven Montana State University (MSU) men were first given the Operation Span task (OSPAN) to assess working memory capacity, then engaged in the Stroop task under mostly incongruent or mostly congruent conditions. The Stroop task was presented as a measure of verbal processing skills (stereotype threat condition) or not (control condition). Stroop errors and reaction times were assessed. Results suggest that for people lower in working memory capacity, stereotype threat primarily interferes with internally maintaining task goals across trials. Implications for such stereotype threat-based distraction effects on performance in educational and workplace environments are discussed.
Accurate multiple sequence alignment of transmembrane proteins with PSI-Coffee
Authors: Chang Jia-Ming , Di Tommaso Paolo , Taly Jean-François , Notredame Cedric
Published: March 2012

Background

Transmembrane proteins (TMPs) constitute about 20~30% of all protein coding genes. The relative lack of experimental structure has so far made it hard to develop specific alignment methods and the current state of the art (PRALINE™) only manages to recapitulate 50% of the positions in the reference alignments available from the BAliBASE2-ref7.

Methods

We show how homology extension can be adapted and combined with a consistency based approach in order to significantly improve the multiple sequence alignment of alpha-helical TMPs. TM-Coffee is a special mode of PSI-Coffee able to efficiently align TMPs, while using a reduced reference database for homology extension.

Results

Our benchmarking on BAliBASE2-ref7 alpha-helical TMPs shows a significant improvement over the most accurate methods such as MSAProbs, Kalign, PROMALS, MAFFT, ProbCons and PRALINE™. We also estimated the influence of the database used for homology extension and show that highly non-redundant UniRef databases can be used to obtain similar results at a significantly reduced computational cost over full protein databases. TM-Coffee is part of the T-Coffee package, a web server is also available from http://tcoffee.crg.cat/tmcoffee and a freeware open source code can be downloaded from http://www.tcoffee.org/Packages/Stable/Latest.
Design of a multi-signature ensemble classifier predicting neuroblastoma patients' outcome
Authors: Cornero Andrea , Acquaviva Massimo , Fardin Paolo , Versteeg Rogier , Schramm Alexander , Eva Alessandra , Bosco Maria Carla , Blengio Fabiola , Barzaghi Sara , Varesio Luigi
Published: March 2012

Background

Neuroblastoma is the most common pediatric solid tumor of the sympathetic nervous system. Development of improved predictive tools for patients stratification is a crucial requirement for neuroblastoma therapy. Several studies utilized gene expression-based signatures to stratify neuroblastoma patients and demonstrated a clear advantage of adding genomic analysis to risk assessment. There is little overlapping among signatures and merging their prognostic potential would be advantageous. Here, we describe a new strategy to merge published neuroblastoma related gene signatures into a single, highly accurate, Multi-Signature Ensemble (MuSE)-classifier of neuroblastoma (NB) patients outcome.

Methods

Gene expression profiles of 182 neuroblastoma tumors, subdivided into three independent datasets, were used in the various phases of development and validation of neuroblastoma NB-MuSE-classifier. Thirty three signatures were evaluated for patients' outcome prediction using 22 classification algorithms each and generating 726 classifiers and prediction results. The best-performing algorithm for each signature was selected, validated on an independent dataset and the 20 signatures performing with an accuracy > = 80% were retained.

Results

We combined the 20 predictions associated to the corresponding signatures through the selection of the best performing algorithm into a single outcome predictor. The best performance was obtained by the Decision Table algorithm that produced the NB-MuSE-classifier characterized by an external validation accuracy of 94%. Kaplan-Meier curves and log-rank test demonstrated that patients with good and poor outcome prediction by the NB-MuSE-classifier have a significantly different survival (p < 0.0001). Survival curves constructed on subgroups of patients divided on the bases of known prognostic marker suggested an excellent stratification of localized and stage 4s tumors but more data are needed to prove this point.

Conclusions

The NB-MuSE-classifier is based on an ensemble approach that merges twenty heterogeneous, neuroblastoma-related gene signatures to blend their discriminating power, rather than numeric values, into a single, highly accurate patients' outcome predictor. The novelty of our approach derives from the way to integrate the gene expression signatures, by optimally associating them with a single paradigm ultimately integrated into a single classifier. This model can be exported to other types of cancer and to diseases for which dedicated databases exist.
An ICT infrastructure to integrate clinical and molecular data in oncology research
Authors: Segagni Daniele , Tibollo Valentina , Dagliati Arianna , Zambelli Alberto , Priori Silvia G , Bellazzi Riccardo
Published: March 2012

Background

The ONCO-i2b2 platform is a bioinformatics tool designed to integrate clinical and research data and support translational research in oncology. It is implemented by the University of Pavia and the IRCCS Fondazione Maugeri hospital (FSM), and grounded on the software developed by the Informatics for Integrating Biology and the Bedside (i2b2) research center. I2b2 has delivered an open source suite based on a data warehouse, which is efficiently interrogated to find sets of interesting patients through a query tool interface.

Methods

Onco-i2b2 integrates data coming from multiple sources and allows the users to jointly query them. I2b2 data are then stored in a data warehouse, where facts are hierarchically structured as ontologies. Onco-i2b2 gathers data from the FSM pathology unit (PU) database and from the hospital biobank and merges them with the clinical information from the hospital information system.

Our main effort was to provide a robust integrated research environment, giving a particular emphasis to the integration process and facing different challenges, consecutively listed: biospecimen samples privacy and anonymization; synchronization of the biobank database with the i2b2 data warehouse through a series of Extract, Transform, Load (ETL) operations; development and integration of a Natural Language Processing (NLP) module, to retrieve coded information, such as SNOMED terms and malignant tumors (TNM) classifications, and clinical tests results from unstructured medical records. Furthermore, we have developed an internal SNOMED ontology rested on the NCBO BioPortal web services.

Results

Onco-i2b2 manages data of more than 6,500 patients with breast cancer diagnosis collected between 2001 and 2011 (over 390 of them have at least one biological sample in the cancer biobank), more than 47,000 visits and 96,000 observations over 960 medical concepts.

Conclusions

Onco-i2b2 is a concrete example of how integrated Information and Communication Technology architecture can be implemented to support translational research. The next steps of our project will involve the extension of its capabilities by implementing new plug-in devoted to bioinformatics data analysis as well as a temporal query module.
Reliable identification at the species level of Brucella isolates with MALDI-TOF-MS
Authors: Lista Florigio , Reubsaet Frans AG , De Santis Riccardo , Parchen Rene R , de Jong Ad L , Kieboom Jasper , van der Laaken Anton L , Voskamp-Visser Ingrid AI , Fillo Silvia , Jansen Hugo-Jan , Van der Plas Jan , Paauw Armand
Published: March 2012

Background

The genus Brucella contains highly infectious species that are classified as biological threat agents. The timely detection and identification of the microorganism involved is essential for an effective response not only to biological warfare attacks but also to natural outbreaks. Matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF-MS) is a rapid method for the analysis of biological samples. The advantages of this method, compared to conventional techniques, are rapidity, cost-effectiveness, accuracy and suitability for the high-throughput identification of bacteria. Discrepancies between taxonomy and genetic relatedness on the species and biovar level complicate the development of detection and identification assays.

Results

In this study, the accurate identification of Brucella species using MALDI-TOF-MS was achieved by constructing a Brucella reference library based on multilocus variable-number tandem repeat analysis (MLVA) data. By comparing MS-spectra from Brucella species against a custom-made MALDI-TOF-MS reference library, MALDI-TOF-MS could be used as a rapid identification method for Brucella species. In this way, 99.3% of the 152 isolates tested were identified at the species level, and B. suis biovar 1 and 2 were identified at the level of their biovar. This result demonstrates that for Brucella, even minimal genomic differences between these serovars translate to specific proteomic differences.

Conclusions

MALDI-TOF-MS can be developed into a fast and reliable identification method for genetically highly related species when potential taxonomic and genetic inconsistencies are taken into consideration during the generation of the reference library.
Pharmacist provision of primary health care: a modified Delphi validation of pharmacists' competencies
Authors: Kennie-Kaulbach Natalie , Farrell Barbara , Ward Natalie , Johnston Sharon , Gubbels Ashley , Eguale Tewodros , Dolovich Lisa , Jorgenson Derek , Waite Nancy , Winslade Nancy
Published: March 2012

Background

Pharmacists have expanded their roles and responsibilities as a result of primary health care reform. There is currently no consensus on the core competencies for pharmacists working in these evolving practices. The aim of this study was to develop and validate competencies for pharmacists' effective performance in these roles, and in so doing, document the perceived contribution of pharmacists providing collaborative primary health care services.

Methods

Using a modified Delphi process including assessing perception of the frequency and criticality of performing tasks, we validated competencies important to primary health care pharmacists practising across Canada.

Results

Ten key informants contributed to competency drafting; thirty-three expert pharmacists replied to a second round survey. The final primary health care pharmacist competencies consisted of 34 elements and 153 sub-elements organized in seven CanMeds-based domains. Highest importance rankings were allocated to the domains of care provider and professional, followed by communicator and collaborator, with the lower importance rankings relatively equally distributed across the manager, advocate and scholar domains.

Conclusions

Expert pharmacists working in primary health care estimated their most important responsibilities to be related to direct patient care. Competencies that underlie and are required for successful fulfillment of these patient care responsibilities, such as those related to communication, collaboration and professionalism were also highly ranked. These ranked competencies can be used to help pharmacists understand their potential roles in these evolving practices, to help other health care professionals learn about pharmacists' contributions to primary health care, to establish standards and performance indicators, and to prioritize supports and education to maximize effectiveness in this role.