Inverse fusion PCR cloning.

Inverse fusion PCR cloning (IFPC) is an easy, PCR based three-step cloning method that allows the seamless and directional insertion of PCR products into virtually all plasmids, this with a free choice of the insertion site. The PCR-derived inserts contain a vector-complementary 5'-end that allows a fusion with the vector by an overlap extension PCR, and the resulting amplified insert-vector fusions are then circularized by ligation prior transformation. A minimal amount of starting material is needed and experimental steps are reduced. Untreated circular plasmid, or alternatively bacteria containing the plasmid, can be used as templates for the insertion, and clean-up of the insert fragment is not urgently required. The whole cloning procedure can be performed within a minimal hands-on time and results in the generation of hundreds to ten-thousands of positive colonies, with a minimal background.

Improving Pediatric Basic Life Support Performance Through Blended Learning With Web-Based Virtual Patients: Randomized Controlled Trial

BACKGROUND E-learning and blended learning approaches gain more and more popularity in emergency medicine curricula. So far, little data is available on the impact of such approaches on procedural learning and skill acquisition and their comparison with traditional approaches. OBJECTIVE This study investigated the impact of a blended learning approach, including Web-based virtual patients (VPs) and standard pediatric basic life support (PBLS) training, on procedural knowledge, objective performance, and self-assessment. METHODS A total of 57 medical students were randomly assigned to an intervention group (n=30) and a control group (n=27). Both groups received paper handouts in preparation of simulation-based PBLS training. The intervention group additionally completed two Web-based VPs with embedded video clips. Measurements were taken at randomization (t0), after the preparation period (t1), and after hands-on training (t2). Clinical decision-making skills and procedural knowledge were assessed at t0 and t1. PBLS performance was scored regarding adherence to the correct algorithm, conformance to temporal demands, and the quality of procedural steps at t1 and t2. Participants' self-assessments were recorded in all three measurements. RESULTS Procedural knowledge of the intervention group was significantly superior to that of the control group at t1. At t2, the intervention group showed significantly better adherence to the algorithm and temporal demands, and better procedural quality of PBLS in objective measures than did the control group. These aspects differed between the groups even at t1 (after VPs, prior to practical training). Self-assessments differed significantly only at t1 in favor of the intervention group. CONCLUSIONS Training with VPs combined with hands-on training improves PBLS performance as judged by objective measures.

How Plankton Swim: An Interdisciplinary Approach for Using Mathematics & Physics to Understand the Biology of the Natural World

The authors have developed and field-tested high school-level curricular materials that guide students to use biology, mathematics, and physics to understand plankton and how these tiny organisms move in a world where their intuition does not apply. The authors chose plankton as the focus of their materials primarily because the challenges faced by plankton are novel problems to most students, forcing adoption of new perspectives and making the study of plankton exciting. Additional reasons that they chose plankton to focus on include their ecological importance, their availability to most teachers and students, the ease with which they can be collected and observed, and the current focus of some scientific researchers on their movement and behavior. These curricular materials include a series of inquiry-based, hands-on exercises designed to be accessible to students with a range of backgrounds. Many of these materials could be adapted for use by middle-school, and/or college-level students. In this article, the authors describe sample lessons, summarize what worked well, and flag obstacles they encountered while integrating mathematics and physics into the biology classroom.

Improving Health Literacy in Connecticut: A Prescription for Healthy Lives and Communities

The Practicum Project is a supervised service-learning experience that integrates curriculum with hands-on experience in a public health setting. All 2nd year students are expected to work collaboratively in assessing the extent, causes and public health responses to a selected public health problem confronting citizens of Connecticut. The focal topic for the 2006 Project was Health Literacy in Connecticut. During this past spring, 17 students of our program, working alongside and in partnership with more than 75 community-based stakeholders across Connecticut, completed over 1800 hours of service-learning in pursuit of answers to 3 questions: Can the present and future burden of health literacy be estimated for Connecticut? What is the current capacity of Connecticut’s health and social service system to halt the crisis we confront today? Can new policy and regulatory strategies be put forth to reduce the severity and scope of the problem? This occasion and the accompanying report mark the completion of their project and acknowledge the considerable contributions that many have made to the success of this educational experience. Through those combined efforts, students gained experience and skill addressing one of the most significant public health issues of our time; also, they gained insight into the breadth and capacity of our public health system and established invaluable relationships with public health practitioners, agencies and institutions around the state. Their report documents a rich campus-community partnership to advance public health goals.

Halting Childhood Obesity in Connecticut

The Practicum Project is a supervised service-learning experience that integrates curriculum with hands-on experience in a public health setting. All 2nd year students are expected to work collaboratively in assessing the extent, causes and public health responses to a selected public health problem confronting citizens of Connecticut. The focal topic for the 2005 Project was Control of Childhood Obesity in Connecticut. During this past spring, 25 students of our program, working alongside and in partnership with more than 130 community-based stakeholders across Connecticut, completed 2,083 hours of service-learning in pursuit of answers to 3 questions: Can the present and future burden of childhood obesity be estimated for Connecticut? What is the current capacity of Connecticut’s health and social service system to address the crisis we confront today? Can new policy and regulatory strategies be put forth to reduce the severity and scope of the problem? This occasion and the accompanying report mark the completion of their project and acknowledges the considerable contributions that many have made to the success of this educational experience. Through those combined efforts, students gained experience and skill addressing one of the most significant public health issues of our time; also, they gained insight into the breadth and capacity of our public health system and established invaluable relationships with public health practitioners, agencies and institutions around the state. Their report documents a rich campus-community partnership to advance public health goals.

The Challenges of Living with Disabilities in Connecticut

The UCONN Master of Public Health Program’s Practicum Project The Practicum Project is a supervised service-learning experience that integrates curriculum with hands-on experience in a public health setting. All 2nd year students are expected to work collaboratively in assessing the extent, causes and public health responses to a selected public health problem confronting citizens of Connecticut. The focal topic for the 2007 Project was The Challenges of Living with Disabilities in Connecticut. During this past spring, 17 students of our program, working alongside 50 communitybased stakeholders across Connecticut, completed 1,800 hours of service-learning in pursuit of answers to the following questions: • How is the concept of disability defined by various health and social service providers? • What are the estimated numbers of persons living with disabilities in Connecticut and what is the range of their disabling conditions? • What arrays of services are in place to facilitate the full integration of persons with disabilities into their communities? • What opportunities exist to expand our understanding of the challenges faced by persons living with disabilities and promote public policy on their behalf? This occasion and the accompanying report marks the completion of the 3rd in a series of practicum project reports by UCONN MPH students. Through their combined efforts, students gained experience and skill addressing one of the most significant public health issues of our time; they gained insight into the breadth and capacity of our public health system and established invaluable relationships with public health practitioners, agencies and institutions around the state. Their report documents a rich campus-community partnership to advance public health goals.

Systematic review of interventions designed to reduce screen time in children and adolescents

This descriptive systematic review describes intervention trials for children and youth that targeted screen time (ST) as a way to prevent or control obesity and measured ST, and at least one of the following: physical activity, dietary intake, and adiposity. Both “hands-on” (e.g., video games) and “hands free” (e.g., television viewing) ST were included. Published, completed intervention trials (k=12), not-yet-published, completed trials (k=6), and in-progress trials (k=11) were identified through searches of electronic databases, including trial registries and bibliographies of eligible study reports. Study characteristics of the 29 identified trials were coded and presented in evidence tables. Considerable attention was paid to the type of ST addressed, measures used, and the type of interventions. Based on the number of in-progress and not-yet-published trials, the number of completed, published reports will double in the next three years. Most of the studies were funded by federal sources. General populations, not restricted by race, gender, or weight status, were targets of most interventions with children ages 9-12 yeas as the modal age group. Most trials used randomized control trials in which the majority of control or comparison group received an intervention. The mean number of participants was 242.8 (SD=314.7) and interventions were delivered over an average of 10.5 months and consisted of approximately 16 sessions, with a total time of about eight hours. The majority of completed trials evaluate each of the four constructs, however, most studies have more than one measure to assess each construct (e.g., BMI and tricep skinfold thickness to evaluate adiposity) and rarely did studies use the same measures. This is likely why the majority of studies produced at least one significant intervention effect on each outcome that was assessed. The four major outcomes should be evaluated in all interventions attempting to reduce screen time in order to determine the mechanisms involved that may contribute to obesity. More importantly researchers should work together to determine the best measures to evaluate the four main constructs to allow studies to be compared. Another area for consensus is the definition of ST. ^

A project to improve the information seeking skills and increase the use of evidence-based research in public health practice

The ability of public health practitioners (PHPs) to work efficiently and effectively is negatively impacted by their lack of knowledge of the broad range of evidence-based practice information resources and tools that can be utilized to guide them in their development of health policies and programs. This project, a three-hour continuing education hands-on workshop with supporting resources, was designed to increase knowledge and skills of these resources. The workshop was presented as a pre-conference continuing education program for the Texas Public Health Association (TPHA) 2008 Annual Conference. Topics included: identification of evidence-based practice resources to aid in the development of policies and programs; identification of sources of publicly available data; utilization of data for community assessments; and accessing and searching the literature through a collection of databases available to all citizens of Texas. Supplemental resources included a blog that served as a gateway to the resources explored during the presentation, a community assessment workbook that incorporates both Healthy People 2010 objectives and links to reliable sources of data, and handouts providing additional instruction on the use of the resources covered during the workshop.^ Before- and after-workshop surveys based on Kirkpatrick's 4-level model of evaluation and the Theory of Planned Behavior were administered. Of the questions related to the trainer, the workshop, and the usefulness of the workshop, participants gave "Good" to "Excellent" responses to all one question. Confidence levels overall increased a statistically significant amount; measurements of attitude, social norms, and control showed no significant differences before and after the workshop. Lastly, participants indicated they were likely to use resources shown during the workshop within a one to three month time period on average. ^ The workshop and creation of supplemental resources served as a pilot for a funded project that will be continued with the development and delivery of four 4-week long webinar-based training sessions to be completed by December 2008. ^

Marketing physical activity and healthy eating: A literature review of recent social marketing campaigns and development of a social marketing plan for the CATCH program

Background. This culminating experience project was inspired by an independent study conducted at The University of Texas School of Public Health with Dr. Andrew Springer, DrPH, who works on the evaluation of the Coordinated Approach to Child Health (CATCH) program in Travis County, Texas. It was indicated that a social marketing plan could enhance current efforts for the CATCH program. The aims of the project were to (1) review and synthesize literature on social marketing, with a specific focus on diet, physical activity, and obesity prevention; and (2) apply the gained knowledge toward a practical solution – a social marketing plan for the CATCH program.^ Methods. The literature review aimed to answer the following questions: (1) What audiences (ethnic and age groups), settings, health behaviors, and behavioral science theories have been used in social marketing campaigns? (2) What features of social marketing were used (e.g. formative research, segmentation, and the marketing mix - including promotional strategies and communication channels)? (3) What were the outcomes of the social marketing campaigns? The search aimed to identify studies that met the following inclusion criteria: (a) The study explicitly stated that social marketing was used; (b) The intervention promoted physical activity and/or healthy eating; (c) The population was children, adolescents, young adults, and/or parents; (d) Results of the intervention were available in the published literature The literature review includes studies from the past five years (2004 to 2009). After reviewing the social marketing literature, the insight and knowledge gained was applied to develop a social marketing plan for the CATCH program. The plan was guided by Hands-on Social Marketing, A Step-by-Step Guide and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention's Social Marketing web course.^

Determining the feasibility and acceptability of a garden-based nutrition curriculum for preschoolers

Obesity rates around the nation have risen to epidemic proportions. Rates of childhood obesity are at very high levels with 24.4% of preschool-aged children in the U.S. currently considered as overweight or obese. The percentage of childhood obesity is much higher in the southern part of the United States as compared to the rest of the nation. Minority populations, especially African American and Hispanic, are affected more than other ethnic groups. Obesity prevention programs are needed targeting young children <6 years of age from minority populations. Currently, there are few obesity prevention programs that have been implemented and evaluated in children <6 years of age. Gardening programs have been successful in improving the health status of elementary school children by increasing fruit and vegetable intake and increasing preferences for healthier food choices. However, there is no evidence of the feasibility and acceptability of a garden-based obesity prevention program among preschoolers. This pretest study, a classroom-based gardening curriculum program with 16 lesson plans and coordinating activities for preschool age children (3-5 years old) enrolled in Head Start, provides the opportunity to address this need. The study included 103 preschoolers from two centers and 9 teachers or teachers' aides. Qualitative data on feasibility and acceptability was collected from process evaluation forms of individual lesson plans and focus groups with teachers. Teacher questionnaires assessed individual teacher characteristics and provided feedback regarding the curriculum. Quantitative measures of teachers' self-efficacy, attitudes, and knowledge pertaining to nutrition were analyzed from pre and post-test surveys. Results revealed this preschool garden-based nutrition curriculum was both feasible and acceptable. The program improved teacher's self-efficacy, knowledge, and attitudes about nutrition, with teacher's confidence in ability to teach a gardening curriculum increasing from a mean score of 2.14 to 3.00 from pre to post test (P value = 0.0046). These results indicate implementing garden-based nutrition lessons within preschools is achievable. Employing garden-based nutrition lessons in the classroom is the first step in teaching children about nutrition and gardening concepts. Constructing gardening beds for more hands-on learning is the next proposed step in the larger parent study of this program.^

Workers and respirators: What factors influence medical clearance? Experience in the petrochemical industry 2004--2008

This retrospective cohort study analyzed data from more than 2200 OSHA-mandated respirator medical evaluations performed between 2004 and 2008, with information initially obtained using an online questionnaire, to determine what factors influence medical clearance and the ability to safely wear respiratory protection in a large petrochemical company.^ The employees were mostly white males with a high school education, ranging in age from 25 to 60 years of age, who had been employed with the company an average of eight years. Their work was typically performed outdoors in a rural or offshore setting. Respirators were typically required for emergency response – escape or rescue only – and/or limited to less than four hours per month.^ Approximately 90% of the population achieved medical clearance by utilizing the online questionnaire. Of the remaining 10%, 66% were cleared after additional "hands-on" medical examination exam; 28% of the individuals' jobs were modified by their supervisor in order to not use a respirator, and 6% of the individuals (n=13) were excluded from wearing a respirator on the basis of the medical examination. The primary causes for exclusion from respirator use were cardiovascular (37.5%) and respiratory (31.3%) issues, followed by psychological (18.8%) and musculoskeletal (12.5%) concerns. Ultimately, over 99% of workers evaluated under this system were found capable of using respiratory protection safely. This questionnaire has proven to be an excellent health screening tool capable of initiating early detection and further investigation of potentially serious medical conditions within a large and diverse population in multiple locations. ^

Mg/Ca ratios in planktonic foraminifera

The primary Mg/Ca ratio of foraminiferal shells is a potentially valuable paleoproxy for sea surface temperature (SST) reconstructions. However, the reliable extraction of this ratio from sedimentary calcite assumes that we can overcome artifacts related to foraminiferal ecology and partial dissolution, as well as contamination by secondary calcite and clay. The standard batch method for Mg/Ca analysis involves cracking, sonicating, and rinsing the tests to remove clay, followed by chemical cleaning, and finally acid-digestion and single-point measurement. This laborious procedure often results in substantial loss of sample (typically 30-60%). We find that even the earliest steps of this procedure can fractionate Mg from Ca, thus biasing the result toward a more variable and often anomalously low Mg/Ca ratio. Moreover, the more rigorous the cleaning, the more calcite is lost, and the more likely it becomes that any residual clay that has not been removed by physical cleaning will increase the ratio. These potentially significant sources of error can be overcome with a flow-through (FT) sequential leaching method that makes time- and labor-intensive pretreatments unnecessary. When combined with time-resolved analysis (FT-TRA) flow-through, performed with a gradually increasing and highly regulated acid strength, produces continuous records of Mg, Sr, Al, and Ca concentrations in the leachate sorted by dissolution susceptibility of the reacting material. Flow-through separates secondary calcite from less susceptible biogenic calcite and clay, and further resolves the biogenic component into primary and more resistant fractions. FT-TRA reliably separates secondary calcite (which is not representative of original life habitats) from the more resistant biogenic calcite (the desired signal) and clay (a contaminant of high Mg/Ca, which also contains Al), and further resolves the biogenic component into primary and more resistant fractions that may reflect habitat or other changes during ontogeny. We find that the most susceptible fraction of biogenic calcite in surface dwelling foraminifera gives the most accurate value for SST and therefore best represents primary calcite. Sequential dissolution curves can be used to correct the primary Mg/Ca ratio for clay, if necessary. However, the temporal separation of calcite from clay in FT-TRA is so complete that this correction is typically <=2%, even in clay-rich sediments. Unlike hands-on batch methods, that are difficult to reproduce exactly, flow-through lends itself to automation, providing precise replication of treatment for every sample. Our automated flow-through system can process 22 samples, two system blanks, and 48 mixed standards in <12 hours of unattended operation. FT-TRA thus represents a faster, cheaper, and better way to determine Mg/Ca ratios in foraminiferal calcite.

An overview of the ciao system

Ciao is a logic-based, multi-paradigm programming system. One of its most distinguishing features is that it supports a large number of semantic and syntactic language features which can be selectively activated or deactivated for each program module. As a result, a module can be written in, for example, ISO-Prolog plus constraints and higher order, while another can be a puré logic module with a different control rule such as iterative deepening and/or tabling, and perhaps using constructive negation. A powerful and modular extensión mechanism allows user-level design and implementation of such features and sub-languages. Another distinguishing feature of Ciao is its powerful assertion language, which allows expressing many kinds of program properties (ranging from, e.g., moded types to resource consumption), as well as tests and documentation. The compiler is capable of statically ñnding violations of these properties or verifying that programs comply with them, and issuing certiñcates of this compliance. The compiler also performs many types of optimizations, including automatic parallelization. It offers very competitive performance, while retaining the flexibility and interactive development of a dynamic language. We will present a hands-on overview of the system, through small examples which emphasize the novel aspects and the motivations which lie behind Ciao's design and implementation.

Program analysis, debugging and optimization using the ciao system preprocessor

We present a tutorial overview of Ciaopp, the Ciao system preprocessor. Ciao is a public-domain, next-generation logic programming system, which subsumes ISO-Prolog and is specifically designed to a) be highly extensible via librarles and b) support modular program analysis, debugging, and optimization. The latter tasks are performed in an integrated fashion by Ciaopp. Ciaopp uses modular, incremental abstract interpretation to infer properties of program predicates and literals, including types, variable instantiation properties (including modes), non-failure, determinacy, bounds on computational cost, bounds on sizes of terms in the program, etc. Using such analysis information, Ciaopp can find errors at compile-time in programs and/or perform partial verification. Ciaopp checks how programs cali system librarles and also any assertions present in the program or in other modules used by the program. These assertions are also used to genérate documentation automatically. Ciaopp also uses analysis information to perform program transformations and optimizations such as múltiple abstract specialization, parallelization (including granularity control), and optimization of run-time tests for properties which cannot be checked completely at compile-time. We illustrate "hands-on" the use of Ciaopp in all these tasks. By design, Ciaopp is a generic tool, which can be easily tailored to perform these and other tasks for different LP and CLP dialects.

Resources to introduce Inquire Based Scientic Education in Secondary and High School

The global Hands-on Universe association is producing and distributing free resources world- wide to implement Inquire Based Scienti?c Education (IBSE) at secondary and high school levels. The materials are inspired in astronomical research and space exploration. The association is implementing the Galileo Teacher Training Program world-wide. In this contribution, a summary on the most recent resources being implemented by HOU-Espa~na and developed with Spanish participation is presented.