The suitability of DEAE-Cl active groups on customized poly(GMA-co-EDMA) continuous stationary phase for fast enzyme-free isolation of plasmid DNA

The creation of a commercially viable and a large-scale purification process for plasmid DNA (pDNA) production requires a whole-systems continuous or semi-continuous purification strategy employing optimised stationary adsorption phase(s) without the use of expensive and toxic chemicals, avian/bovine-derived enzymes and several built-in unit processes, thus affecting overall plasmid recovery, processing time and economics. Continuous stationary phases are known to offer fast separation due to their large pore diameter making large molecule pDNA easily accessible with limited mass transfer resistance even at high flow rates. A monolithic stationary sorbent was synthesised via free radical liquid porogenic polymerisation of ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EDMA) and glycidyl methacrylate (GMA) with surface and pore characteristics tailored specifically for plasmid binding, retention and elution. The polymer was functionalised with an amine active group for anion-exchange purification of pDNA from cleared lysate obtained from E. coli DH5α-pUC19 pellets in RNase/protease-free process. Characterization of the resin showed a unique porous material with 70% of the pores sizes above 300 nm. The final product isolated from anion-exchange purification in only 5 min was pure and homogenous supercoiled pDNA with no gDNA, RNA and protein contamination as confirmed with DNA electrophoresis, restriction analysis and SDS page. The resin showed a maximum binding capacity of 15.2 mg/mL and this capacity persisted after several applications of the resin. This technique is cGMP compatible and commercially viable for rapid isolation of pDNA.

Electropolymerisation of catalytically active PEDOT from an ionic liquid on a flexible carbon cloth using a sandwich cell configuration

We report the electropolymerization of poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiopene) (PEDOT) from an ionic liquid, butyl-methylpyrrolidinium bis(trifluoromethanesulfonyl)imide (C4mpyrTFSI) onto flexible carbon cloth electrodes. A continuous, homogeneous and well adhered coating of the individual cloth fibres is achieved by employing a sandwich cell arrangement where the carbon cloth which is soaked with electrolyte is placed between two indium tin oxide electrodes isolated from each other by a battery separator. The resultant PEDOT modified carbon cloth electrode demonstrates excellent activity for the oxygen reduction reaction which is due to the doping level, conductivity and morphology of the PEDOT layer and is also tolerant to the presence of methanol in the electrolyte. This simple approach therefore offers a route to fabricate flexible polymer electrodes that could be used in various electronic applications.

Application of TS-Fuzzy Controller for Active Power and DC Capacitor Voltage Control in DFIG-Based Wind Energy Conversion Systems

This chapter focuses on the implementation of the TS (Tagaki-Sugino) fuzzy controller for the Doubly Fed Induction Generator (DFIG) based wind generator. The conventional PI control loops for mantaining desired active power and DC capacitor voltage is compared with the TS fuzzy controllers. DFIG system is represented by a third-order model where electromagnetic transients of the stator are neglected. The effectiveness of the TS-fuzzy controller on the rotor speed oscillations and the DC capacitor voltage variations of the DFIG damping controller on converter ratings is also investigated. The results from the time domain simulations are presented to elucidate the effectiveness of the TS-fuzzy controller over the conventional PI controller in the DFIG system. The proposed TS-fuzzy con-troller can improve the fault ride through capability of DFIG compared to the conventional PI controller.

Bikeshare's impact on active travel: Evidence from the United States, Great Britain, and Australia

Over 800 cities globally now offer bikeshare programs. One of their purported benefits is increased physical activity. Implicit in this claim is that bikeshare replaces sedentary modes of transport, particularly car use. This paper estimates the median changes in physical activity levels as a result of bikeshare in the cities of Melbourne, Brisbane, Washington, D.C., London, and Minneapolis/St. Paul. This study is the first known multi-city evaluation of the active travel impacts of bikeshare programs. To perform the analysis, data on mode substitution (i.e. the modes that bikeshare replaces) were used to determine the extent of shift from sedentary to active transport modes (e.g. when a car trip is replaced by bikeshare). Potentially offsetting these gains, reductions in physical activity when walking trips are replaced by bikeshare was also estimated. Finally a Markov Chain Monte Carlo analysis was conducted to estimate confidence bounds on estimated impacts on active travel given uncertainties in data sources. The results indicate that on average 60% of bikeshare trips replace sedentary modes of transport (from 42% in Minneapolis/St. Paul to 67% in Brisbane). When bikeshare replaces a walking trip, there is a reduction in active travel time because walking a given distance takes longer than cycling. Considering the active travel balance sheet for the cities included in this analysis, bikeshare activity in 2012 has an overall positive impact on active travel time. This impact ranges from an additional 1.4 million minutes of active travel for the Minneapolis/St. Paul bikeshare program, to just over 74 million minutes of active travel for the London program The analytical approach adopted to estimate bikeshare’s impact on active travel may act as the basis for future bikeshare evaluations or feasibility studies.

Pre-packaging preschool literacy: What drives early childhood teachers to use commercially produced phonics programs in prior to school settings

Language-rich environments are key to overall quality in early childhood settings, including frequent child–staff interactions around picture books and dramatic play. In a language-rich environment, explicit teaching of literacy concepts, such as phonics, is embedded in authentic and meaningful situations where alphabet letters and sounds are taught in a context meaningful to the child. Recent research, however, suggests that the use of commercial pre-packaged phonics programs (such as Letterland and Jolly Phonics) is widespread in prior to school settings in Sydney, Australia. Little is known about why early childhood teachers choose to use such programs with children aged five and under. In the present study, thematic analysis of data from interviews with five early childhood teachers using commercial phonics programs found that their reasons were pragmatic rather than pedagogical. Motivations included the idea that the programs reduced their workload, provided tangible evidence to parents of their child’s ‘school readiness’, and served as a marketing tool to attract parents. Further analysis found that the teachers were unable to articulate what phonics and phonological awareness are and how they are learnt in early childhood.

Active aging: Exploration into self-ratings of "being active," out-of-home physical activity, and participation among older Australian adults living in four different settings

We examined whether self-ratings of “being active” among older people living in four different settings (major city high and lower density suburbs, a regional city, and a rural area) were associated with out-of-home participation and outdoor physical activity. A mixed-methods approach (survey, travel diary, and GPS tracking over a one-week period) was used to gather data from 48 individuals aged over 55 years. Self-ratings of “being active” were found to be positively correlated with the number of days older people spent time away from home but unrelated to time traveled by active means (walking and biking). No significant differences in active travel were found between the four study locations, despite differences in their respective built environments.The findings suggest that additional strategies to the creation of “age-friendly” environments are needed if older people are to increase their levels of outdoor physical activity. “Active aging” promotion campaigns may need to explicitly identify the benefits of walking outdoors to ambulatory older people as a means of maintaining their overall health, functional ability, and participation within society in the long-term and also encourage the development of community-based programs in order to facilitate regular walking for this group.

Learning choices, older Australians and active ageing

This paper reports on the findings of qualitative, semi-structured interviews conducted with 40 older Australian participants who either did or did not engage in organized learning. Phenomenology was used to guide the interviews and analysis to explore the lived learning experiences and perspectives of these older people. Their experiences of learning can be described in two main categories of pleasure and leisure or purpose and relevance. Almost all the activities described in these categories have the potential to support health and wellbeing. Organisers of activities should take these reasons into account.

Peptide-functionalized polymeric nanoparticles for active targeting of damaged tissue in animals with experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis

Increased permeability of blood vessels is an indicator for various injuries and diseases, including multiple sclerosis (MS), of the central nervous system. Nanoparticles have the potential to deliver drugs locally to sites of tissue damage, reducing the drug administered and limiting associated side effects, but efficient accumulation still remains a challenge. We developed peptide-functionalized polymeric nanoparticles to target blood clots and the extracellular matrix molecule nidogen, which are associated with areas of tissue damage. Using the induction of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis in rats to provide a model of MS associated with tissue damage and blood vessel lesions, all targeted nanoparticles were delivered systemically. In vivo data demonstrates enhanced accumulation of peptide functionalized nanoparticles at the injury site compared to scrambled and naive controls, particularly for nanoparticles functionalized to target fibrin clots. This suggests that further investigations with drug laden, peptide functionalized nanoparticles might be of particular interest in the development of treatment strategies for MS.

Plain packaging for the Pacific Rim: The Trans-Pacific Partnership and tobacco control

Big Tobacco has been engaged in a dark, shadowy plot and conspiracy to hijack the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) and undermine tobacco control measures – such as graphic health warnings and the plain packaging of tobacco products... In the context of this heavy lobbying by Big Tobacco and its proxies, this chapter provides an analysis of the debate over trade, tobacco, and the TPP. This discussion is necessarily focused on the negotiations of the free trade agreement – the shadowy conflicts before the finalisation of the text. This chapter contends that the trade negotiations threaten hard-won gains in public health – including international developments such as the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, and domestic measures, such as graphic health warnings and the plain packaging of tobacco products. It maintains that there is a need for regional trade agreements to respect the primacy of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. There is a need both to provide for an open and transparent process regarding such trade negotiations, as well as a due and proper respect for public health in terms of substantive obligations. Part I focuses on the debate over the intellectual property chapter of the TPP, within the broader context of domestic litigation against Australia’s plain tobacco packaging regime and associated WTO disputes. Part II examines the investment chapter of the TPP, taking account of ongoing investment disputes concerning tobacco control and the declared approaches of Australia and New Zealand to investor-state dispute settlement. Part III looks at the discussion as to whether there should be specific text on tobacco control in the TPP, and, if so, what should be its nature and content. This chapter concludes that the plain packaging of tobacco products – and other best practices in tobacco control – should be adopted by members of the Pacific Rim.

The High Court of Australia and the Marlboro Man: The Battle Over the Plain Packaging of Tobacco Products

In 2012, the High Court of Australia handed down a landmark decision on the plain packaging of tobacco products. This chapter considers the historic ruling in the case of JT International SA v Commonwealth; British American Tobacco Australasia Ltd v Commonwealth. This chapter explores several themes in the decision. First, it highlights the historical work by the High Court of Australia on the role of health regulation, the use of health warnings, and tobacco control. Second, the chapter considers the High Court of Australia's view that intellectual property law promotes the public interest.Third, it explores the High Court of Australia’s analysis of the constitutional law on acquisition of property on just terms. Finally, this chapter contends that the High Court of Australia's ruling on plain packaging of tobacco products will spark an 'Olive Revolution' — and will encourage superior courts and policy-makers to follow suit.

Who won the argument over plain packaging?

Government and tobacco companies recently faced off in Australia's High Court over the legality of plain packaging for cigarettes. Stephen Stern and Matthew Rimmer give their contrasting views on the arguments and implications

Active learning: A step towards automating medical concept extraction

Objective This paper presents an automatic active learning-based system for the extraction of medical concepts from clinical free-text reports. Specifically, (1) the contribution of active learning in reducing the annotation effort, and (2) the robustness of incremental active learning framework across different selection criteria and datasets is determined. Materials and methods The comparative performance of an active learning framework and a fully supervised approach were investigated to study how active learning reduces the annotation effort while achieving the same effectiveness as a supervised approach. Conditional Random Fields as the supervised method, and least confidence and information density as two selection criteria for active learning framework were used. The effect of incremental learning vs. standard learning on the robustness of the models within the active learning framework with different selection criteria was also investigated. Two clinical datasets were used for evaluation: the i2b2/VA 2010 NLP challenge and the ShARe/CLEF 2013 eHealth Evaluation Lab. Results The annotation effort saved by active learning to achieve the same effectiveness as supervised learning is up to 77%, 57%, and 46% of the total number of sequences, tokens, and concepts, respectively. Compared to the Random sampling baseline, the saving is at least doubled. Discussion Incremental active learning guarantees robustness across all selection criteria and datasets. The reduction of annotation effort is always above random sampling and longest sequence baselines. Conclusion Incremental active learning is a promising approach for building effective and robust medical concept extraction models, while significantly reducing the burden of manual annotation.