Dipping Wings:for flute (alto fl), clarinet (bass cot), tpt, vla, vcl, perc and live electronics

commissioned by Ballet Rambert for 60th Anniversary season, choreographer Mary Evelyn, designer Liz Emmanuel. World premiere: Theatre Royal York 03/06/86

Functional characterization of UDP-glucose:undecaprenyl-phosphate glucose-1-phosphate transferases of Escherichia coli and Caulobacter crescentus

Escherichia coli K-12 WcaJ and the Caulobacter crescentus HfsE, PssY, and PssZ enzymes are predicted to initiate the synthesis of colanic acid (CA) capsule and holdfast polysaccharide, respectively. These proteins belong to a prokaryotic family of membrane enzymes that catalyze the formation of a phosphoanhydride bond joining a hexose-1-phosphate with undecaprenyl phosphate (Und-P). In this study, in vivo complementation assays of an E. coli K-12 wcaJ mutant demonstrated that WcaJ and PssY can complement CA synthesis. Furthermore, WcaJ can restore holdfast production in C. crescentus. In vitro transferase assays demonstrated that both WcaJ and PssY utilize UDP-glucose but not UDP-galactose. However, in a strain of Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium deficient in the WbaP O antigen initiating galactosyltransferase, complementation with WcaJ or PssY resulted in O-antigen production. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis of the lipopolysaccharide (LPS) revealed the attachment of both CA and O-antigen molecules to lipid A-core oligosaccharide (OS). Therefore, while UDP-glucose is the preferred substrate of WcaJ and PssY, these enzymes can also utilize UDP-galactose. This unexpected feature of WcaJ and PssY may help to map specific residues responsible for the nucleotide diphosphate specificity of these or similar enzymes. Also, the reconstitution of O-antigen synthesis in Salmonella, CA capsule synthesis in E. coli, and holdfast synthesis provide biological assays of high sensitivity to examine the sugar-1-phosphate transferase specificity of heterologous proteins.

The palliative care link nurse role in nursing homes: barriers and facilitators

Aim. This paper is a report of a study to explore link nurses' views and experiences regarding the development, barriers and facilitators to the implementation of the role in palliative care in the nursing home.
Background. The delivery of palliative care in nursing homes is widely advocated; one approach is to develop the link nurse role to cascade good practice and training to nurses and other care staff to enhance patient care.
Method. A descriptive qualitative study was conducted with a purposive sample of 14 link nurses from 10 nursing homes in Northern Ireland during 2006. Three focus groups, composed of all Registered Nurses currently acting as link nurses in their nursing homes participated, and the data were audio recorded, fully transcribed and content analysed.
Findings. The link nurse system shows potential to enhance palliative care within nursing homes. However, link nurses experienced a number of difficulties in implementing education programmes. Facilitators of the role included external support, monthly meetings, access to a resource file and peer support among link nurses themselves. Lack of management support, a transient workforce and lack of adequate preparation for link nurses were barriers to fulfilling this role.
Conclusion. Whilst palliative care link nurses can improve care for residents in nursing homes, consideration must be given to overcome the types of barriers identified in order to enable the link nurse system to function effectively. © 2008 The Authors.

Learning, development, and support needs of community palliative care clinical nurse specialists

Background: The palliative care clinical nurse specialist (PC-CNS) is a core member of the specialist palliative care team. According to professional policy, the role has four specific components: clinical practice, education, research, and leadership and management. Little is known about how to support staff in this role. Aim: The aim of this study was to explore what learning, development, and support PC-CNSs in one hospice need to enable them to fulfil all components of their role. Design: Using a descriptive exploratory approach, semi-structured interviews were undertaken with a purposive sample of community PC-CNSs from a hospice in Northern Ireland. Interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim, and thematically analysed. Findings: Seventeen interviews were analysed and three themes identified: influence of organisational culture, influence of the individual, and learning and development solutions. Conclusions: Participants reported that the PC-CNS role was stressful. They identified that the organisational culture and indeed individuals themselves influenced the learning and development support available to help them fulfil the four components of the role. Working relationships and stability within teams affected how supported individuals felt and had implications for managers in meeting the needs of staff while balancing the needs of the service.

Genome-wide association study reveals greater polygenic loading for schizophrenia in cases with a family history of illness

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) of schizophrenia have yielded more than 100 common susceptibility variants, and strongly support a substantial polygenic contribution of a large number of small allelic effects. It has been hypothesized that familial schizophrenia is largely a consequence of inherited rather than environmental factors. We investigated the extent to which familiality of schizophrenia is associated with enrichment for common risk variants detectable in a large GWAS. We analyzed single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) data for cases reporting a family history of psychotic illness (N = 978), cases reporting no such family history (N = 4,503), and unscreened controls (N = 8,285) from the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium (PGC1) study of schizophrenia. We used a multinomial logistic regression approach with model-fitting to detect allelic effects specific to either family history subgroup. We also considered a polygenic model, in which we tested whether family history positive subjects carried more schizophrenia risk alleles than family history negative subjects, on average. Several individual SNPs attained suggestive but not genome-wide significant association with either family history subgroup. Comparison of genome-wide polygenic risk scores based on GWAS summary statistics indicated a significant enrichment for SNP effects among family history positive compared to family history negative cases (Nagelkerke's R(2 ) = 0.0021; P = 0.00331; P-value threshold <0.4). Estimates of variability in disease liability attributable to the aggregate effect of genome-wide SNPs were significantly greater for family history positive compared to family history negative cases (0.32 and 0.22, respectively; P = 0.031). We found suggestive evidence of allelic effects detectable in large GWAS of schizophrenia that might be specific to particular family history subgroups. However, consideration of a polygenic risk score indicated a significant enrichment among family history positive cases for common allelic effects. Familial illness might, therefore, represent a more heritable form of schizophrenia, as suggested by previous epidemiological studies.