Infusing an inter‐professional and inter‐university perspective into healthcare education

A national (USA) student‐led, case‐based CLinician/Administrator Relationship Improvement OrganizatioN (CLARION) competition focuses students in medical and related healthcare programs on the provision of healthcare that is safe, timely, equitable, patient‐centred, effective and efficient. Students work in four‐person, inter‐professional teams to research and analyse a designated case. They then present their findings and recommendations to a panel of independent judges. Students, with support from their faculty advisors, approach the case as they see fit. Following initial participation in this CLARION competition, an inter‐professional team of students from two universities and their advisory faculty developed a two‐semester, pre‐competition course as a model to facilitate transformation in healthcare education. The course is theoretical, empirical and practical. It has multiple levels of learning and is designed to mentor students, develop faculty, measure learning outcomes and stimulate administrators in higher education to think creatively about curriculum development across disciplines. This integrated and inter‐professional approach is pivotal in healthcare education to ensure students learn safe and evidence‐based clinical practice that meets the highest standards for quality care.     

The Monsoon Wedding phenomenon: understanding Indian students studying in Australian universities

How does the University sector identify and support the diverse needs of Indian students? This paper reports on a research project carried out on undergraduate students from India enrolled at a Melbourne‐based University. The focus is the need to understand why Indian students choose an overseas destination for tertiary study. The intent is to explore how the curriculum that they have experienced in their country prepares them for study in another. We examine the expectations of students in relation to studying overseas. The suggestion underlying this paper is that if academic and support staff in tertiary education understand international students in cultural cohorts, then it is more likely that their transition to tertiary education will be easier. We envisage that this may also lead to a greater retention rate for universities.     

Peter Debye and electrochemistry

Debye won the 1936 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his contributions to molecular structure, dipole moment relationship and for diffraction of X-rays and electrons. Electrochemists, however, remember him for the Debye-Hückel limiting law that describes the behavior of strong electrolytes. In explaining the non-ideal behavior of strong electrolytes, his mathematical treatment assumes that each ion is surrounded by an ionic cloud of oppositely charged ions, which retards the movement of ions in the medium. The theory not only provides a method for calculation of activity coefficients, but has also helped, among other things, in our understanding of diffusion in ionic media, change in the rate of ionic reactions upon addition of salts, and biochemical reactions.     

Network coding

Network coding is a technique to increase the amount of information flow in a network by making the key observation that information flow is fundamentally different from commodity flow. Whereas, under traditional methods of operation of data networks, intermediate nodes are restricted to simply forwarding their incoming message symbols downstream, network coding achieves vast performance gains by permitting intermediate nodes to carry out algebraic operations on the incoming data. In this article we present a tutorial introduction to network coding as well as an application to the efficient operation of distributed data-storage networks.     

Regulation of DNA conformations and dynamics in flows with hybrid field microfluidics

Visualizing single DNA dynamics in flow provides a wealth of physical insights in biophysics and complex flow study. However, large signal fluctuations, generated from diversified conformations, deformation history dependent dynamics and flow induced stochastic tumbling, often frustrate its wide adoption in single molecule and polymer flow study. We use a hybrid field microfluidic (HFM) approach, in which an electric field is imposed at desired locations and appropriate moments to balance the flow stress on charged molecules, to effectively regulate the initial conformations and the deformation dynamics of macromolecules in flow. With λ-DNA and a steady laminar shear flow as the model system, we herein studied the performance of HFM on regulating DNA trapping, relaxation, coil-stretch transition, and accumulation. DNA molecules were found to get captured in the focused planes when motions caused by flow, and the electric field were balanced. The trapped macromolecules relaxed in two different routes while eventually became more uniform in size and globule conformations. When removing the electric field, the sudden stretching dynamics of DNA molecules exhibited a more pronounced extension overshoot in their transient response under a true step function of flow stress while similar behaviors to what other pioneering work in steady shear flow. Such regulation strategies could be useful to control the conformations of other important macromolecules (e.g., proteins) and help better reveal their molecular dynamics.     

Nature Watch

India is the main abode of theworld’s tallest flying bird called the Sarus Crane. Their population, however, has shown a steady decline over the past few decades. Several factors are believed to be responsible for this. Alterations of the landscape to agriculture leading to habitat loss and other socioecological factors are the main reasons of this declination. This article will introduce some of these features and current status of this famous historical bird.     

Effective teaching approach employed by primary school science teachers

Teachers are often urged to use a variety of modes of instruction to ensure that diverse student interests and abilities can be accomodated. Yet teachers can be limited in the instructional modes they can use because of insufficient background or knowledge about a specific instructional mode （Dawson, 2004）. Teaching approaches are various in purposes such as to trigger students＇ interest in science, to discover through inquiry approach, to build students understanding through constructivism approach or to introduce a concept through demontration approach. Every approach has the strength and weakness in its use. Although inquiry may not be the only way to teach science, many science educators believe that it may be the best way for students to learn science （Audet ＆ Jordan, 2005）. According to Woolfolk （2001）, constructivism is a mode of instruction that emphasizes the active role of the learner in building, understanding and making sense of information. Demonstrations by teacher can be used with students of all ages and across all subjects. The teacher is not only knowledgeable about the topic but also uses a variety of aids to ensure that students understand what is being demonstrated （Marsh, 2004）. By studying their teaching approaches and methods, the actual practices could be analysed and the effectiveness status of their effectiveness could be determined. Specifically, this study aimed to answer these questions in terms of three approaches namely inquiry, constructivism and demonstrations; how far is this approach effective in terms of teaching and learning, and what is the correlation between these three approaches. Data were collected from primary school science teachers （N=239） and the results shown that the teachers were agreeable with the three approaches, inquiry approach （mean=3.74, SD=0.27）, demonstration approach （mean=3.61, SD=0.27） and constructivism approach （mean=3.86, SD=0.30）. The results also showed that there are significant correlations among inquiry, demonstration and constructivism approach. This finding showed that primary school science teachers not depend only on one type of approach and apply variously in teaching science. There are also positive and significant correlation between that approaches used by primary school science teachers.     

Experimental stem cell therapy: biohierarchies and bionetworking in Japan and India

This article concerns new developments in autologous adult stem cell research in Japan and India through the notions of biohierarchy and bionetworking. It conceptualizes how human subject research in one country may be turned into experimental stem cell therapies in another through bionetworks. We analyse the processes that enable researchers in Japan to discard a therapy as being of reputational risk, while researchers in India employ it so that it becomes reputation enhancing. At the same time, scientists from both countries collaborate in and potentially benefit from the same bionetwork. Explaining how the recruitment of patients and scientists is organized through bionetworking, this article analyses how experimental research in India thrives using Japanese technologies. The concept of biohierarchy illustrates how inequalities in health and standards of living in India and in Japan underpin the methods by which researchers, medical professionals, managers and patients collaborate in bionetworks. The concept of 'boundary object' here captures the ways in which the meaning of experimental therapy is defined by subjective categories projected onto it by patients and scientists alike. The article is based on fieldwork conducted by both authors during 3 months between September and December 2008 at various locations in India and Japan. Data for this article were collected from a wide range of interviews with stem cell researchers, medical doctors, coordinators, managers and patients, primary and secondary sources gathered at these centres, and through web and archival research.     

Quantitative Assessment of Expression of Lactate Dehydrogenase and its Isoforms 3 and 4 may Serve as Useful Indicators of Progression of Gallbladder Cancer: A Pilot Study

We have studied the expression of lactate dehydrogenase and its isoforms in gall bladder cancer, cholelithiasis and chronic cholecystitis. Quantitative and qualitative assays of lactate dehydrogenase and its various isoforms were carried out in the blood sera of patients and healthy controls along with parallel estimation of various liver function test enzymes. Statistical analysis was done using the software Graph Pad Prism. Significantly high expression of lactate dehydrogenase along with alkaline phosphatase and total bilirubin (P ≤ 0.05) was observed in all the three clinical conditions as compared to controls. LDH showed an increasing trend from stage I to stage IV of GBC indicating a significant positive association with the disease progression. The levels of LDH 3 and 4 isoforms appeared significantly more elevated in GBC than cholelithiasis or chronic cholecystitis. We suggest that a careful estimation of total LDH and its isoforms 3 and 4 alone or along with alkaline phosphatase and total bilirubin during different clinical stages, like chronic cholecystitis, cholelithiasis and GBC, may prove to be a potentially useful biomarker in the prognostic management of gall bladder diseases, specifically GBC.     

Gram-schmidt orthogonalization and legendre polynomials

In this section of Resonance, we invite readers to pose questions likely to be raised in a classroom situation. We may suggest strategies for dealing with them, or invite responses, or both. “Classroom” is equally a forum for raising broader issues and sharing personal experiences and viewpoints on matters related to teaching and learning science.