The evolutionary value of recombination is constrained by genome modularity

Genetic recombination is a fundamental evolutionary mechanism promoting biological adaptation. Using engineered recombinants of the small single-stranded DNA plant virus, Maize streak virus (MSV), we experimentally demonstrate that fragments of genetic material only function optimally if they reside within genomes similar to those in which they evolved. The degree of similarity necessary for optimal functionality is correlated with the complexity of intragenomic interaction networks within which genome fragments must function. There is a striking correlation between our experimental results and the types of MSV recombinants that are detectable in nature, indicating that obligatory maintenance of intragenome interaction networks strongly constrains the evolutionary value of recombination for this virus and probably for genomes in general.

International students using online information resources to learn : complex experience and learning needs

This paper reports the findings of a qualitative study which investigated 25 international students’ use of online information resources for study purposes at two Australian universities. Using an expanded critical incident approach, the study viewed international students through an information literacy lens, as information-using learners. The findings are presented in two complementary parts: as a word picture that describes their whole experience of using online information resources to learn; and as a tabulated set of critical findings that summarises their associated information literacy learning needs. The word picture shows international students’ resource use as a complex interplay of eight inter-related elements: students; information-learning environment; interactions (with online resources); strengths-challenges; learning-help; affective responses; reflective responses; cultural-linguistic dimensions. In using online resources, the international students experience an array of strengths and challenges, and an apparent information literacy imbalance between their more developed information skills and less developed critical information use. The critical findings about information literacy needs provide a framework for developing an inclusive informed learning approach that responds to international students’ complex information using experiences and needs. While the study is situated in Australia, the findings are of potential interest to educators, information professionals and researchers worldwide who seek to support learning in culturally diverse higher education contexts.

Engineering across cultures : new learning resources for intercultural competency in engineering

BACKGROUND The work described in this paper has emerged from an ALTC/OLT funded project, Exploring Intercultural Competency in Engineering. The project indentified many facets of culture and intercultural competence that go beyond a culture-as-nationality paradigm. It was clear from this work that resources were needed to help engineering educators introduce students to the complex issues of culture as they relate to engineering practice. A set of learning modules focussing on intercultural competence in engineering practice were developed early on in the project. Through the OLT project, these modules have been expanded into a range of resources covering various aspects of culture in engineering. Supporting the resources, an eBook detailing the ins and outs of intercultural competency has also been developed to assist engineering educators to embed opportunities for students to develop skills in unpacking and managing cross-cultural challenges in engineering practice. PURPOSE This paper describes the key principles behind the development of the learning modules, the areas they cover and the eBook developed to support the modules. The paper is intended as an introduction to the approaches and resources and extends an invitation to the community to draw from, and contribute to this initial work. DESIGN/METHOD A key aim of this project was to go beyond the culture-as-nationality approach adopted in much of the work around intercultural competency (Deardorff, 2011). The eBook explores different dimensions of culture such as workplace culture, culture’s influence on engineering design, and culture in the classroom. The authors describe how these connect to industry practice and explore what they mean for engineering education. The packaged learning modules described here have been developed as a matrix of approaches moving from familiar known methods through complicated activities relying to some extent on expert knowledge. Some modules draw on the concept of ‘complex un-order’ as described in the ‘Cynefin domains’ proposed by Kurtz and Snowden (2003). RESULTS Several of the modules included in the eBook have already been trialled at a variety of institutions. Feedback from staff has been reassuringly positive so far. Further trials are planned for second semester 2012, and version 1 of the eBook and learning modules, Engineering Across Cultures, is due to be released in late October 2012. CONCLUSIONS The Engineering Across Cultures eBook and learning modules provide a useful and ready to employ resource to help educators tackle the complex issue of intercultural competency in engineering education. The book is by no means exhaustive, and nor are the modules, they instead provide an accessible, engineering specific guide to bringing cultural issues into the engineering classroom.

A meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies to identify prostate cancer susceptibility loci associated with aggressive and non-aggressive disease

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified multiple common genetic variants associated with an increased risk of prostate cancer (PrCa), but these explain less than one-third of the heritability. To identify further susceptibility alleles, we conducted a meta-analysis of four GWAS including 5953 cases of aggressive PrCa and 11 463 controls (men without PrCa). We computed association tests for approximately 2.6 million SNPs and followed up the most significant SNPs by genotyping 49 121 samples in 29 studies through the international PRACTICAL and BPC3 consortia. We not only confirmed the association of a PrCa susceptibility locus, rs11672691 on chromosome 19, but also showed an association with aggressive PrCa [odds ratio = 1.12 (95% confidence interval 1.03-1.21), P = 1.4 × 10(-8)]. This report describes a genetic variant which is associated with aggressive PrCa, which is a type of PrCa associated with a poorer prognosis.

The complete mitochondrial genome of the flesh fly, Sarcophaga impatiens Walker (Diptera: Sarcophagidae)

Approximately 2500 fly species comprise the Sarcophagidae family worldwide. The complete mitochondrial genome of the carrion-breeding, forensically important Sarcophaga impatiens Walker (Diptera: Sarcophagidae) from Australia was sequenced. The 15,169 bp circular genome contains the 37 genes found in a typical Metazoan genome: 13 protein-coding genes, 2 ribosomal RNA genes and 22 transfer RNA genes. It also contains one non-coding A+T-rich region. The arrangement of the genes was the same as that found in the ancestral insect. All the protein initiation codons are ATN, except for cox1 that begins with TCG (encoding S). The 22 tRNA anticodons of S. impatiens are consistent with those observed in Drosophila yakuba, and all form the typical cloverleaf structure, except for tRNA-Ser(AGN) that lacks the DHU arm. The mitochondrial genome of Sarcophaga presented will be valuable for resolving phylogenetic relationships within the family Sarcophagidae and the order Diptera, and could be used to identify favourable genetic markers for species identifications for forensic purposes.

Coping resources, coping strategies and adaptation to organisational change : direct or buffering effects?

This study examined the effects of personal and social resources, coping strategies and appraised stress on employees' levels of anxiety and depression. In relation to the effects of resources and coping strategies, two different models were tested. The main effects model proposes that, irrespective of the level of stress, coping resources and coping strategies have direct effects on well-being. In contrast, the buffering model predicts that the buffering effects of coping resources and strategies are only evident at high levels of stress. One hundred lawyers completed a structured self-administered questionnaire that measured their personal and social resources, use of problem-focused and emotion-focused coping strategies, and appraisals of the stressfulness of the situation. Results revealed generally strong support for the main effects model in the prediction of employee levels of anxiety and depression. Lower levels of anxiety were linked to judgements of lower levels of organizational change, greater self-confidence, greater internality of control beliefs and less use of emotion-focused coping strategies. Lower levels of depression in employees were also linked to judgements of lower levels of organizational change, greater use of resources and less appraised stress. There was only limited support for the buffering effects model. Due to the small size of the sample, the findings need to be explored further in other contexts.

Genome-wide search for markers associated with bovine spongiform encephalopathy

A genome-wide search for markers associated with BSE incidence was performed by using Transmission-Disequilibrium Tests (TDTs). Significant segregation distortion, i.e., unequal transmission probabilities of alleles within a locus, was found for three marker loci on Chromosomes (Chrs) 5, 10, and 20. Although TDTs are robust to false associations owing to hidden population substructures, it cannot distinguish segregation distortion caused by a true association between a marker and bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) from a population-wide distortion. An interaction test and a segregation distortion analysis in half-sib controls were used to disentangle these two alternative hypotheses. None of the markers showed any significant interaction between allele transmission rates and disease status, and only the marker on Chr 10 showed a significant segregation distortion in control individuals. Nevertheless, the control group may have been a mixture of resistant and susceptible but unchallenged individuals. When new genotypes were generated in the vicinity of these three markers, evidence for an association with BSE was confirmed for the locus on Chr 5.

QGECE research on delineation of Australian geothermal resources

The geology/reservoir program of the Queensland Geothermal Energy Centre of Excellence (QGECE) has the mission to improve the existing knowledge and develop new innovative scientific approaches for the identification of geothermal resources in Australia, with a particular focus on Queensland. Specifically, the QGECE geology/reservoir program is currently (1) producing a comprehensive geochemical dataset for high heat producing rocks, (2) conducting detailed mineralogical and geochronological studies of granites and hydrothermal alteration minerals, and ; (3) investigating the Cooper Basin representing a superb natural laboratory for understanding of radiogenic heat enrichment process and possible involvement of mantle heat flow. Seven research projects have been established, which are being conducted largely as PhD studies. In the preliminary studies, high quality and valuable results were obtained to address the research topics of understanding the causes and timing of heat producing element enrichment.

Overvoltage prevention in LV smart grid using customer resources coordination

Voltage rise is one of the main factors which limits the capacity of Low Voltage (LV) network to accommodate more Renewable Energy (RE) sources. This paper proposes a robust and effective approach to coordinate customers’ resources and manage voltage rise in residential LV networks. PV is considered as the customer RE source. The suggested coordination approach in this paper includes both localized control strategy, based on local measurement, and distributed control strategy based on consensus algorithm. This approach can completely avoid maximum permissible voltage limit violation. A typical residential LV network is used as the case study where the simulated results are shown to verify the effectiveness of the proposed approach.

Genome-scale phylogeny and the detection of systematic biases

Phylogenetic inference from sequences can be misled by both sampling (stochastic) error and systematic error (nonhistorical signals where reality differs from our simplified models). A recent study of eight yeast species using 106 concatenated genes from complete genomes showed that even small internal edges of a tree received 100% bootstrap support. This effective negation of stochastic error from large data sets is important, but longer sequences exacerbate the potential for biases (systematic error) to be positively misleading. Indeed, when we analyzed the same data set using minimum evolution optimality criteria, an alternative tree received 100% bootstrap support. We identified a compositional bias as responsible for this inconsistency and showed that it is reduced effectively by coding the nucleotides as purines and pyrimidines (RY-coding), reinforcing the original tree. Thus, a comprehensive exploration of potential systematic biases is still required, even though genome-scale data sets greatly reduce sampling error.

Stratospheric dust collections : valuable resources for space and atmospheric scientists

Collections of solid particles from the Earths' stratosphere have been a significant part of atmospheric research programs since 1965 [1], but it has only been in the past decade that space-related disciplines have provided the impetus for a continued interest in these collections. Early research on specific particle types collected from the stratosphere established that interplanetary dust particles (IDP's) can be collected efficiently and in reasonable abundance using flat-plate collectors [2-4]. The tenacity of Brownlee and co-workers in this subfield of cosmochemistry has led to the establishment of a successful IDP collection and analysis program (using flat-plate collectors on high-flying aircraft) based on samples available for distribution from Johnson Space Center [5]. Other stratospheric collections are made, but the program at JSC offers a unique opportunity to study well-documented, individual particles (or groups of particles) from a wide variety of sources [6]. The nature of the collection and curation process, as well as the timeliness of some sampling periods [7], ensures that all data obtained from stratospheric particles is a valuable resource for scientists from a wide range of disciplines. A few examples of the uses of these stratospheric dust collections are outlined below.

Conflicts over protection of marine living resources : the ‘Volga Case’ revisited

Non-traditional maritime security concerns have become more importantthan ever in the post-Cold War era. Naval forces of most developedcountries are more concerned about these threats than conventional war.One of the main maritime security issues for many countries in the world isillegal, unreported and unregulated (IUU) fishing in the marine area. Withthese burgeoning issues comes the potential for a large number of disputesinvolving international law. In early 2002, a long-line fishing vessel under aRussian flag –the Volga, was detained by Australian authorities a few hundred meters outside the Exclusive Economic Zone of Australia’s Heard and McDonald Islands in the Southern Ocean. The vessel was reportedly engaged in illegal fishing. This incident gave birth to litigation in international and Australian courts. Apart from these cases, Russia also announced separate litigation against Australia for violation of Articles 111and 87 of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (NCLOS).Considering the outcome of these cases, this article critically examines thecharacteristics of litigation as a strategy for pacific settlement of disputesover marine living resources. Using the Volga Case as an example, thisarticle explores some issues related to the judicial settlement of disputes over marine living resources. This article demonstrates that the legal certainty of winning a case may not be the only factor influencing the strategy for settlement of an international dispute.