Effect of ultraviolet photofunctionalization of dental titanium implants on osseointegration

Objective

The aim of the current study was to evaluate the effect of ultraviolet (UV) photofunctionalization of dental titanium implants with exposure to the oral cavity on osseointegration in an animal model.

Methods

Forty-eight titanium implants (Camlog® Conelog® 4.3 mmx9.0 mm) were placed epicrestally into the edentulous jaws of three minipigs and implant stability was assessed by measuring the implant stability quotient (ISQ). Prior to implantation half of the implants were photofunctionalized with intense UV-light. After three months, the implants were exposed and ISQ was measured again. After six months of implant exposure, the minipigs were sacrificed and the harvested specimens were analyzed using histomorphometric, light, and fluorescence microscopy.

Main results

Forty-two of 48 implants osseointegrated. The overall mean bone-implant contact area (BIC) was (64±22)%. No significant differences were found in BIC or ISQ value (multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA), P>0.05) between implants with and without exposure to UV photofunctionalization.

Conclusions

No significant effects were observed on osseointegration of dental titanium implants nine months after exposure of UV photofunctionalization.

     

What can Interpersonal Process Recall (IPR) offer academic development?

Abstract

Academic development is often seen as a compliance activity, divorced from the teaching context and what teachers are trying to achieve in their classroom. In this case study, we researched Interpersonal Process Recall (IPR) as a reflective, non-judgmental approach to help tutors identify coherence between their teaching intentions and practice. Our results provided evidence that IPR helped tutors reflect on ways to improve their teaching. It also led to unexpected ‘discoveries’ not typically afforded by conventional academic development. We conclude that IPR offers a formative, teacher-focussed and contextual approach that has not been clearly defined in the literature. We offer the IPR model followed in this study for academic developers and researchers alike.     

Improving Students’ Information Problem-Solving Skills on the Web Through Explicit Instruction and the Use of Customized Search Software

Abstract

Research shows that students face a range of difficulties when using the Internet to solve information problems. Using a quasi-experimental design, we tested a strategy to improve Chilean 10th graders’ skills for information problem solving using the Internet (IPS-I). The intervention was based on a workshop in which students learned IPS-I strategies and solved information problems using a customized Internet search software package. Results showed that members of the experimental group changed their search behavior and improved the quality of their products. However, no correlation between the number of search actions and product quality was found. Based on this, we highlight the potential of combining teaching strategies to improve specific search skills and the use of customized search tools with embedded functionalities that foster good search techniques.     

Instructional Quality Features in Videotaped Biology Lessons: Content-Independent Description of Characteristics

Research in Science Education - A number of studies on single instructional quality features have been reported for mathematics and science instruction. For summarizing single instructional quality...     

Mindfulness and discussing “thorny” issues in the classroom

Being in the moment, showing compassion, being non-judgmental, acknowledging deep emotional challenges without getting stuck: these are mindfulness characteristics important to us as teachers, yet not often included in teacher preparation. These concerns become magnified when we focus on difficult knowledge and thorny issues, like topics related to gender and race. Using a sociocultural framework, we address how mindfulness, heuristics, and other contemplative practices can be adopted to create safe, supporting, and healing spaces for such complex, often emotionally painful discussions. Participant narratives are used extensively to provide a voice to those marginalized or hurt. Drawing from these narratives and their experience in discussing thorny issues, we put forth possible solutions and interventions that can create spaces that encourage and support critical discourse through mindful practices. The development of a heuristic for discussing thorny issues whose characteristics can be adopted by interested teachers and educators to help frame and mediate this type of difficult discussion is an outcome of this research.     

Wie schneiden SINUS-Schulen bei PISA ab?

In Reaktion auf die Ergebnisse der TIMS-Studie wurde das BLK-Modellversuchsprogramm SINUS konzipiert und 1998 mit 180 Schulen über fünf Jahre betrieben. Im vorliegenden Beitrag berichten wir über zentrale Ergebnisse der summativen Evaluation des Programms. Ziel des Programms war es, (1) die Professionalisierung der Lehrkr?fte zu unterstützen, (2) die Qualit?t des mathematisch-naturwissenschaftlichen Unterrichts zu verbessern und (3) die Lernprozesse und Lernergebnisse der Schülerinnen und Schüler zu f?rdern. Zur überprüfung der Ausgangslage und der Wirkungen des Programms diente ein Vergleich mit einer repr?sentativen Schulstichprobe. Dazu wurden an den SINUS-Schulen Erhebungen mit nationalen PISA-Instrumenten durchgeführt. Die Ergebnisse der Abschlusserhebung im Jahr 2003 zeigen, dass SINUS im Verlauf der Programmzeit auf allen untersuchten Ebenen Wirkungen entfaltet hat. Dies betrifft die erfolgreiche Umsetzung der Projektinhalte auf Seiten der Lehrkr?fte, die positive Wahrnehmung des Unterrichts auf Seiten der Schülerschaft sowie die Interessen, Haltungen und Kompetenzen der Schülerinnen und Schüler an SINUS-Schulen. Die schulartspezifischen Analysen zeigen jedoch, dass SINUS nicht in allen Schularten die gleiche Wirksamkeit erzielt hat. In erster Linie scheinen die Hauptschulen, die Schulen mit mehreren Bildungsg?ngen und die Integrierten Gesamtschulen profitiert zu haben.     

Deaf and hard-of-hearing adolescents’ experiences of inclusion and exclusion in mainstream and special schools in Sweden

This study examines the question of which school environment – special or mainstream school – is more favourable for deaf and hard-of-hearing students in Sweden, when it comes to their well-being, and their social and academic inclusion. The aim is threefold: first to compare the well-being of adolescents who are deaf or hard-of-hearing, who are deaf or hard-of-hearing and have additional disabilities, and who have no disabilities; second to compare the adolescents from the two deaf and hard-of-hearing groups and their experiences of inclusion and exclusion in school; and third to ascertain if any gender differences exist between the two groups of deaf and hard-of-hearing students concerning their experiences of inclusion and exclusion. A total of 7865 adolescents (13–18 years of age) answered a total survey about the life and health of young people in a county in Sweden. The results show that both boys and girls in the hard-of-hearing groups rated their well-being lower and were less satisfied with their lives than pupils without disabilities. They also show that the hard-of-hearing boys and girls attending special school were more satisfied with their lives and to a greater extent felt included both socially and academically than students in mainstream school.     

Wege in die Wissenschaft

Zusammenfassung Dieser Artikel besch?ftigt sich mit einem Themengebiet, das in der erziehungswissenschaftlichen Wissenschafts-, Hochschul-und Berufsforschung bislang kaum analysiert worden ist. Unter Bezug auf die Ergebnisse einer schriftlichen Befragung von rund 3.800 Absolventen erziehungswissenschaftlicher Hauptfachstudieng?nge (Diplom, Magister) in ganz Deutschland wird die Frage untersucht, wie gro? die Gruppe der Studierenden aus diesen Studieng?ngen ist, die sich einige Jahre nach dem Studienabschluss im Arbeitsfeld Hochschule und Forschung beruflich platzieren kann bzw. promoviert, durch welche Merkmale diese Gruppe gekennzeichnet ist und welche Bedingungsfaktoren den Weg in die Wissenschaft beeinflussen. Nach einem überblick über den bisherigen Stand der Forschung und der Darstellung zentraler Resultate des Diplom-und Magister-Surveys zum Weg in die Wissenschaft werden abschlie?end einige Konsequenzen diskutiert, die sich aus den Befunden für eine Reform der bisherigen Hauptfachstudieng?nge bzw. für die zukünftige Gestaltung neuer Studieng?nge mit Blick auf eine Verbesserung der Nachwuchsf?rderung für das Fach Erziehungswissenschaft ergeben.

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Summary Paths into Science: The Results of a National Survey of Graduates from Diplom and Magister Programs in Educational Science This article examines a topic which has hardly been dealt with in the field of Educational Science. A survey of around 3,800 graduates of Educational Science in both Diplom and Magister programs in Germany asked what proportion of graduates went on to work or commence a Ph.D. in higher education. It also investigated the characteristics of such graduates and the conditions which determined their path into science. Following an overview of preceding research in this area and a presentation of the central results of the survey, the consequences of the findings for a reform of courses and an improvement in the training of academics in the field of Educational Science will be discussed.

     

The Body as a Site of Reproduction and Resistance: Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and the Classroom

In addition to transferring ideas, one of the primary tasks of schools, as theorized in the work of Pierre Bourdieu, is to monitor and shape bodies. The category of Attention Deficity Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and the practices associated with it can be understood more thoroughly as a way in which schools reproduce a body management system. This article reviews the historical and critical literature on ADHD to show that the classroom has had, and still has, an essential place in the origination and implementation of the category; yet, the classroom context has been virtually absent from the causal analysis. The classroom has received attention from those in the behaviour modification camp, but this approach has reduced it to a set of contingencies between the teacher and the student. More often than not, the biological explanation has dominated thus entirely removing the classroom and its meanings from the explanation of ADHD. The classroom is one of the critical mechanisms which allows for the emergence of the behaviours and the practices associated with the category known as ADHD.     

Is Word-Problem Solving a Form of Text Comprehension?

This study’s hypotheses were that (a) word-problem (WP) solving is a form of text comprehension that involves language comprehension processes, working memory, and reasoning, but (b) WP solving differs from other forms of text comprehension by requiring WP-specific language comprehension as well as general language comprehension. At the start of the 2nd grade, children (n = 206; on average, 7 years, 6 months) were assessed on general language comprehension, working memory, nonlinguistic reasoning, processing speed (a control variable), and foundational skill (arithmetic for WPs; word reading for text comprehension). In spring, they were assessed on WP-specific language comprehension, WPs, and text comprehension. Path analytic mediation analysis indicated that effects of general language comprehension on text comprehension were entirely direct, whereas effects of general language comprehension on WPs were partially mediated by WP-specific language. By contrast, effects of working memory and reasoning operated in parallel ways for both outcomes.