The nature of innate and adaptive interleukin-17A responses in sham or bacterial inoculation

Streptococcus pyogenes is the causative agent of numerous diseases ranging from benign infections (pharyngitis and impetigo) to severe infections associated with high mortality (necrotizing fasciitis and bacterial sepsis). As with other bacterial infections, there is considerable interest in characterizing the contribution of interleukin-17A (IL-17A) responses to protective immunity. We here show significant il17a up-regulation by quantitative real-time PCR in secondary lymphoid organs, correlating with increased protein levels in the serum within a short time of S. pyogenes infection. However, our data offer an important caveat to studies of IL-17A responsiveness following antigen inoculation, because enhanced levels of IL-17A were also detected in the serum of sham-infected mice, indicating that inoculation trauma alone can stimulate the production of this cytokine. This highlights the potency and speed of innate IL-17A immune responses after inoculation and the importance of proper and appropriate controls in comparative analysis of immune responses observed during microbial infection.

Staffing, status and subject knowledge: what does the construction of citizenship as a new curriculum subject in England tell us about the nature of school subjects?

Almost a decade ago, the new subject of citizenship was created in the English National Curriculum and several universities were funded to train teachers in this new subject. This presented a rare challenge, namely how to train people to teach a subject that did not exist in schools, and in which they were unlikely to have a specialist degree. In this article we have taken the opportunity afforded by the
tenth birthday of the report in which Crick recommended this curriculum reform to reflect on that experience from the perspective of teacher educators. Through reflecting on the case study of citizenship education in England we highlight several themes that are of more general interest to teacher educators. The key issues that have emerged in this case study relate to the general problems of translating central policy into classroom practice; the nature and aims of subjects in the curriculum; and the identities of teachers in secondary schools. The article illustrates how teacher educators responded to the formidable challenge of creating (or at least contributing to) a new subject and a subject community.

Electrooxidation of methanol in an alkaline fuel cell: determination of the nature of the initial adsorbate

It is essential to correctly determine the nature of the initial adsorbate in order to calculate the pathway for any given reaction. Recent literature provides conflicting information on the first step in the methanol decomposition pathway. This work sets out to establish what role the solution and the surface have to play in the initial adsorption-deprotonation process. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations, in combination with a cluster-continuum model approach are used to resolve the nature of the adsorbing species. We show that methanol is the dominant species in solution over methoxide, and also has a smaller barrier to adsorption. The nature of the surface species is revealed to be a methanol-OH complex.

Further refinement of the nature of the communication impairment in Cornelia de Lange syndrome

Purpose – Research into the communication skills of individuals with Cornelia de Lange syndrome (CdLS) is extremely limited. This paper aims to evaluate the nature of these skills and impairments in CdLS using a detailed informant assessment of pre-verbal communication skills.
Design/methodology/approach – The study used the Pre-verbal Communication Schedule to evaluate communication skills in individuals with CdLS (n ¼ 14), aged five to14 years. The group was compared with a contrast group of individuals with Cri du Chat syndrome (CdCS; n ¼ 14) who were matched for age and intellectual ability.
Findings – A significant difference was identified in understanding non-vocal communication (p , 0.005), with the CdLS group showing a greater deficit. These findings indicate the presence of a syndrome-specific deficit in understanding non-verbal communication in individuals with CdLS and suggest that there may be a dissociation between the processing of verbal and non-verbal communication.
Originality/value – The findings indicate that, in many ways, these two syndrome groups are not dissimilar in terms of their communication skills. However, individuals with CdLS show a syndrome-specific deficit in understanding non-vocal communication relative to the CdCS group.

Islands: Nature and Culture

Islands are contradictory places: they can be remote, mysterious spots, or lively centres of holiday revelry. They are associated alternately with escape, imprisonment, holiday and exile, and their exotic, otherworldly beauty has inspired artists and writers across the centuries. Islands have been sites of immense political, creative and scientific importance from Charles Darwin's enlightening voyage to the Gálapagos Islands, which resulted in his groundbreaking theory of evolution, to the moat-encased prisons incarcerating the world's most dangerous convicts.
Despite the common view of islands as earthly paradises, their often small size means they have restricted resources and limited opportunities for their inhabitants to thrive. In response, islanders have welcomed or sternly rejected, the fresh opportunities offered by turning their homes into tourist destinations. For people seeking beautiful landscapes, solitude or exciting adventure, islands are the most popular holiday spots in the world. They entice the rich and famous, and their allure has provided refuge and inspiration for artists and writers, from Paul Gauguin in Tahiti to George Orwell on Jura in the Hebrides, and general visitors alike.
Filled with illustrations, Islands is a comprehensive exploration of the geographical and cultural aspects of island life – their habitations and environments, their permanent residents and vast transitional populace, their colonial history and their enduring appeal to people around then world.

The Nature of Religious Diversity: A Cultural Ecosystem Approach

Studies of religious and other cultural groups tend to be particularistic or focus on one or more axes of variation. In this article we develop a more comprehensive approach to studying cultural diversity that emulates the study of biological diversity. We compare our cultural ecosystem approach with the axis approach, using the distinction between “tight” and “loose” cultures as an example. We show that while the axis approach is useful, the cultural ecosystem approach adds considerable value to the axis approach. We end by advocating the establishment of field sites for the study of religious and cultural diversity, comparable to biological field sites.

Ecopoetics: The Language of Nature, The Nature of Language by Scott Knickerbocker (review)

Review of Ecopoetics: The Language of Nature, The Nature of Language by Scott Knickerbocker Boston: University of Massachusetts Press, 2012. Pp. x + 203.
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