The effects of exercise in hypoxic and normoxic conditions on endothelin-1 and arterial compliance

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of short-term normoxic and hypoxic exercise on plasma endothelin-1 and nitric oxide levels, and the relationship of arterial compliance and pulmonary artery pressure to endothelin-1. Seven endurance-trained males completed two incremental and two steady-state exercise tests performed at ventilatory threshold in normoxia and hypoxia (fraction of inspired oxygen = 0.14). Plasma endothelin-1was measured throughout steady-state tests. Arterial compliance using applanation tonometry, plasma nitric oxide and pulmonary artery pressure using Doppler echocardiography were measured before and after exercise. Small arterial compliance and pulmonary artery pressure significantly increased following exercise. There were no main effects of condition or time for plasma endothelin-1and nitric oxide levels. There were no significant relationships between plasma endothelin-1 and arterial compliance or pulmonary artery pressure. In conclusion, mechanisms other than the endothelial system may play a role in the exercise-induced changes in small artery compliance in this study population. Moderate hypoxia and a 30-minute steady-state exercise have limited effects on plasma endothelin-1 in endurance-trained males.     

性别表演与反思社会学

布迪厄为后现代女性主义研究者提供了反思社会学和惯习等学术理念和社会学方法,试图通过对朱迪斯．邑特勒的性别表演理论的解读和释疑来发掘布迪厄对女性主义社会学的贡献。     

The quest for visibility of scientific journals in Latin America

This article studies the strategies for visibility of some of the most outstanding publications from Mexico, Venezuela, Brazil, Chile, Argentina, and Colombia, and the relationship between open access and the visibility of these journals. By means of in‐depth interviews with the editors, we explored their indexing and circulation strategies and examined certain organizational and contextual variables that may have helped them to remain in circulation. We also considered whether a combination of electronic publication and open access to the contents of the journals have increased the visibility of science from these developing countries. When these journals were not available electronically, even if they were distributed at no cost, their distribution was necessarily selective, and one could not properly speak of open access; once they were put on the Web, however, they became widely available at no cost to the reader. The editors' views on open access are also explored.     

Cinders in Snow? Indigenous Teacher Identities in Formation

The identity work engaged in by Indigenous teachers1 1. We use the term ‘Indigenous’ here to include Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people working in Australian schools, although most of our informants to date are from Victoria, NSW and Queensland, who do not use the term ‘Indigenous’ when identifying themselves and their communities, preferring ‘Aboriginal’, ‘Koori’ or ‘Murri’.. View all notes in school settings is highlighted in a study of Australian Indigenous teachers. The construction of identity in home and community relationships intersects with and can counteract the take up of a preferred identity in the workplace. In this paper we analyse data from interviews with Indigenous teachers, exploring the interplay between culture and identity. We foreground the binary nature of racial assignment in schools, demonstrate how this offers contradictory constructions of identity for Indigenous teachers, and note the effects of history, culture and location in the process of forming a teaching ‘self’.     

EGO‐TRAP: A Mobile Augmented Reality Tool for Science Learning in a Semi‐formal Setting

Abstract EGO‐TRAP is a cellphone‐facilitated interactive narrative game created at the Experimentarium in Copenhagen. Designed to support scientific literacy among students from upper secondary schools, the project is part of a reform that has increased focus on educational methods and alternative learning resources in Denmark since 2005, and that explores the educational potential of museums and science centers outside formal school settings. EGO‐TRAP can be called a “digital narrative” or Augmented Reality (AR)—a digital extension of a physical setting.     

An Air of Sharing. A Format of Open Interviewing in a Joint Nordic Project

The five Nordic countries and their respective quality assurance agencies ¹ 1. EVA, FINHEEC, NOKUT, HSV, and the Ministry of Education, Science and Culture of Iceland. have convened annually for over a decade to exchange experiences and discuss issues concerning quality assurance in higher education. In recent years this has resulted in a regional network for the quality assurance agencies (NOQA). During this period, methodological issues have increasingly been emphasised within the network’s activities, and the current article presents and discusses a new format of open interviewing in a setting where the quality assurance work of four higher education institutions were analysed. The openness of the process was the key in providing an opportunity for the higher education institutions to learn from each other.     

Conceptions of quality in four different disciplines

Abstract

The paper is based on a book (written by the author and his colleague Markku Lehikoinen) dealing with definitions of quality and views on the applicability of different methods of quality assessment to four different disciplinary fields: physics, biology, sociology and history. The paper focuses on conceptions and definitions of quality voiced by scholars representing the different disciplines. The study involved semi‐structured in depth interviews with 33 experienced scholars. The disciplines under study were chosen to represent diverse disciplinary cultures, with the aim of finding out about the potential impact of (social and cognitive) cultural characteristics of the disciplines on conceptions of quality. The findings show both common views across disciplinary fields and disciplinary differences.     

The impetus for organisational change: An exploration

Abstract

This paper examines the factors that cause universities to undertake academic change, specifically, changes to achieve more effective teaching and learning. Based on an analysis of 30 reform‐oriented US colleges and universities, it suggests that universities respond to diverse environmental pressures, not solely to external mandates. There is evidence, too, that internal forces within universities can be an impetus for change.     

Positive emotions: passionate scholarship and student transformation

This paper challenges the practical and conceptual understanding of the role of emotions in higher education from the twin perspectives of transition and transformation. Focusing on the neglected area of positive emotions, exploratory data reveal a rich, low-level milieu of undergraduate emotional awareness in students chiefly attributed to pedagogic actions, primarily extrinsically orientated, and pervasive throughout the learning experience. The data conceive positive affect as oppositional, principally ephemeral and linked to performative pedagogic endeavours of getting, knowing and doing. A cyclical social dynamic of reciprocity, generating positive feedback loops, is highlighted. Finally we inductively construct a tentative ‘emotion-transition framework’ to assist our understanding of positive emotion as a force for transformational change; our contention is that higher education might proactively craft pedagogic spaces so as to unite the feeling discourse, the thinking discourse (epistemological self) and the wider life-self (ontological) discourse.