Writing the Dark Side of Travel

The travel experience filled with personal trauma; the pilgrimage through a war-torn place; the journey with those suffering: these represent the darker sides of travel. What is their allure and how are they represented? This volume takes an ethnographic and interdisciplinary approach to explore the writings and texts of dark journeys and travels. In traveling over the dead, amongst the dying, and alongside the suffering, the authors give us a tour of humanity’s violence and misery. And yet, from this dark side, there comes great beauty and poignancy in the characterization of plight; creativity in the comic, graphic, and graffiti sketches and comments on life; and the sense of profound and spiritual journeys being undertaken, recorded, and memorialized.

A virtual surgery in general practice: evaluation of a novel undergraduate virtual patient learning package

Background: A suite of 10 online virtual patients developed using the IVIMEDS ‘Riverside’ authoring tool has been introduced into our undergraduate general practice clerkship. These cases provide a multimedia-rich experience to students. Their interactive nature promotes the development of clinical reasoning skills such as discriminating key clinical features, integrating information from a variety of sources and forming diagnoses and management plans.

Aims: To evaluate the usefulness and usability of a set of online virtual patients in an undergraduate general practice clerkship.
Method: Online questionnaire completed by students after their general practice placement incorporating the System Usability Scale questionnaire.

Results: There was a 57% response rate. Ninety-five per cent of students agreed that the online package was a useful learning tool and ranked virtual patients third out of six learning modalities. Questions and answers and the use of images and videos were all rated highly by students as useful learning methods. The package was perceived to have a high level of usability among respondents.

Conclusion: Feedback from students suggest that this implementation of virtual patients, set in primary care, is user friendly and rated as a valuable adjunct to their learning. The cost of production of such learning resources demands close attention to design.

This is Not a Photo Opportunity: Verbal/Visual Struggle in Francophone Travel Narratives

This article explores the ethics and aesthetics of representing travel and intercultural encounter in textual and photographic forms. Taking as its starting point two textual accounts of journeys in the course of which photographic narratives were also produced, the article explores the possibilities and limitations of textuality and visuality and thus considers the implications of, or new opportunities afforded by, reading – and ultimately publishing – these narratives as iconotexts. Focusing on Pierre Loti's L'Inde (sans les Anglais) (1901) and Ella Maillart's Oasis interdites (1937), the article also offers an alternative perspective on writers whose work is commonly associated with an imperialist or exoticist discourse, with cliché and one-dimensionality. As such, it aims to replace the monolithic, orientalist vision often attributed to these writers with ambiguity, ethical hesitation and a plurality of perspectives. Using these examples as a springboard, the article seeks to argue that verbal/visual mobility in narratives representing mobility contributes to resisting static, monolithic perceptions of other cultures. Using the work of British graffiti artist Banksy as a foil for exploring photography as cultural commodification and art as commodity, the article also seeks to engage with current debates in Humanities research on ekphrasis and iconotextuality and on the problematics of representing other cultures within an ethical and/or humanist frame.

Food-poisoning and commercial air travel

With the introduction of budget airlines and greater competitiveness amongst all airlines, air travel has now become an extremely popular form of travel, presenting its own unique set of risks from food poisoning. Foodborne illness associated with air travel is quite uncommon in the modern era. However, when it occurs, it may have serious implications for passengers and when crew are affected, has the potential to threaten safety. Quality, safe, in-flight catering relies on high standards of food preparation and storage; this applies at the airport kitchens (or at subcontractors' facilities), on the aircraft and in the transportation vehicles which carry the food from the ground source to the aircraft. This is especially challenging in certain countries. Several foodborne outbreaks have been recorded by the airline industry as a result of a number of different failures of these systems. These have provided an opportunity to learn from past mistakes and current practice has, therefore, reached such a standard so as to minimise risk of failures of this kind. This review examines: (i) the origin of food safety in modern commercial aviation; (ii) outbreaks which have occurred previously relating to aviation travel; (iii) the microbiological quality of food and water on board commercial aircraft; and (iv) how Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points may be employed to maintain food safety in aviation travel.

Complete nucleotide sequence of pVQS1 containing a quinolone resistance determinant from Salmonella enterica serovar Virchow associated with foreign travel

Nalidixic acid-resistant Salmonella enterica serovars Kentucky (n5) and Virchow (n6) cultured from individuals were investigated for the presence of plasmid-mediated quinolone resistance (PMQR) determinants.

PMQR markers and mutations within the quinolone resistance-determining regions of the target genes were investigated by PCR followed by DNA sequencing. Conjugation, plasmid profiling and targeted PCR were performed to demonstrate the transferability of the qnrS1 gene. Subsequently, a plasmid was identified that carried a quinolone resistance marker and this was completely sequenced.

A Salmonella Virchow isolate carried a qnrS1 gene associated with an IncN incompatibility group conjugative plasmid of 40995 bp, which was designated pVQS1. The latter conferred resistance to ampicillin and nalidixic acid and showed sequence similarity in its core region to plasmid R46, whilst the resistance-encoding region was similar to pAH0376 from Shigella flexneri and pINF5 from Salmonella Infantis and contained an IS26 remnant, a complete Tn3 structure, a truncated IS2 element and a qnrS1 marker, followed by IS26. In contrast to pINF5, IS26 was identified immediately downstream of the qnrS1 gene.

This is the first known report of a qnrS1 gene in Salmonella spp. in Switzerland. Analysis of the complete nucleotide sequence of the qnrS1-containing plasmid showed a novel arrangement of this antibiotic resistance-encoding region.

DiveRsity: An R package for the estimation and exploration of population genetics parameters and their associated errors

Summary: We present a new R package, diveRsity, for the calculation of various diversity statistics, including common diversity partitioning statistics (?, G) and population differentiation statistics (D, GST ', ? test for population heterogeneity), among others. The package calculates these estimators along with their respective bootstrapped confidence intervals for loci, sample population pairwise and global levels. Various plotting tools are also provided for a visual evaluation of estimated values, allowing users to critically assess the validity and significance of statistical tests from a biological perspective. diveRsity has a set of unique features, which facilitate the use of an informed framework for assessing the validity of the use of traditional F-statistics for the inference of demography, with reference to specific marker types, particularly focusing on highly polymorphic microsatellite loci. However, the package can be readily used for other co-dominant marker types (e.g. allozymes, SNPs). Detailed examples of usage and descriptions of package capabilities are provided. The examples demonstrate useful strategies for the exploration of data and interpretation of results generated by diveRsity. Additional online resources for the package are also described, including a GUI web app version intended for those with more limited experience using R for statistical analysis. © 2013 British Ecological Society.

Botanical travel, climate and David Moore’s moral geographies of Europe

During his forty-year curatorship of the Royal Dublin Society's botanical gardens in Glasnevin (1838–1879), David Moore undertook a number of excursions to continental Europe. These served to deepen the networks of plant exchange between Dublin and other botanical institutions and allowed him to examine the relationships between climate, plant survivability and societal development. This paper focuses on two trips taken in the 1860s to Scandinavia and Iberia and charts how Moore situated his experience of these places within a climatic hermeneutic. Moore's understanding of northern and southern Europe was organized around a set of judgments about their relative backwardness or advancement with respect to his experience of home and was seen through the lens of a moral climatology. Moreover, his Scots Presbyterian background and his commitment to natural theology informed his interpretation of the landscapes he encountered in his excursions across Europe.

A function-based treatment package aiming at decreasing self-injurious behaviour and tantrums.

Self-injurious and aggressive behaviours have often been identified as the cause for students’ lack of academic progress, parental distress, health risks and teachers´ low satisfaction levels. Functional analysis has been identified in the research literature as the benchmark of effective treatments for disruptive and/or inappropriate behaviours. The present study was completed with a girl diagnosed with ASD. An experimental functional analysis was conducted identifying the function of self-injurious behaviours and tantrums to be escaping from tasks. A treatment package was consequently put in place integrating several components that aimed at reducing overall levels of inappropriate behaviours. Results showed a clear and meaningful improvement in the student´s overall health and academic progress, as well as in parental involvement, teachers’ satisfaction and school inclusion. These outcomes are discussed in the light of evidence-based experimental procedures based on applied behaviour analysis and more specifically on the functional-analytic literature, which, if put in place consistently, can bring valuable positive changes in the quality of life of individuals with ASD.