RES 012. Research methods in the arts and humanities. First edition

A training course that forms part of Epigeum's Research Skills Master Programme.

Teachers’ voices about being a teacher: comparative studies in England, Finland and Sweden

The aim of the article is to present and discuss a study in which Finnish, English and Swedish teachers and student teachers described the implications of being a teacher. It is cross-national and consists of multiple case studies. Data were collected through twenty-four focus group dialogues, and 110 teachers/student teachers participated in the study. According to the study, we have found that teachers and student teachers in all three countries promoted pupils’ development of critical thinking, which is another way of saying that they focused on ‘the attitudes and values’ aspect of citizenship education; however, this was most evident in the Finnish and the Swedish focus groups. In England there is a subject emphasis to the professional role, the three countries ranked the topics (the pupils; the subject; the organization; the society; teacher identity; parents) equally, in Finland the teacher role did not appear to be as post modern as in the two other countries.

Antioxidant and cellular activities of anthocyanins and their corresponding vitisins A - studies in platelets, monocytes, and human endothelial cells

During red wine aging, there is a loss of anthocyanins and the formation of various other pigments, so-called vitisins A, which are formed through the chemical interaction of the original anthocyanins with pyruvic acid. The objective of this study was to investigate the antioxidant activities of the most abundant anthocyanins present in red wine (glycosides of delphinidin, petunidin, and malvidin) and their corresponding vitisins A. Anthocyanins exhibited a higher iron reducing as well as 2,2'-azinobis (3-ethyl-benzothiazoline-6-sulfonate) and peroxyl radical scavenging activity than their corresponding vitisins A. Delphinidin showed the highest antioxidant effect of the tested compounds in all of the assays used. Furthermore, we studied the effect of anthocyanins and vitisins A on platelet aggregation and monocyte and endothelial function. Anthocyanins and vitisins did not affect nitric oxide production and tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-alpha) secretion in lipopolysaccharide plus interferon-gamma-activated macrophages. Furthermore, anthocyanins and vitisins did not change collagen-induced platelet aggregation in vitro. However, anthocyanins and to a lesser extent vitisins exhibited protective effects against TNF-alpha-induced monocyte chemoattractant protein production in primary human endothelial cells.

The property development industry and sustainable urban brownfield regeneration in England: an analysis of case studies in Thames Gateway and Greater Manchester

The property development industry is a key actor in UK brownfield regeneration projects. UK policy has attempted to interlink ‘sustainable development’ and ‘sustainable brownfield’ policy agendas, which have found an additional focus through the UK government’s ‘Sustainable Communities Plan’, part of a growing international emphasis on sustainable development. This paper examines the emergence of these agendas and related policies, and the role of the property development industry in the regeneration of six differing brownfield sites, based in Thames Gateway and Greater Manchester. Using a conceptual framework, the paper investigates aspects of the sustainability of these projects and highlights key lessons from them for both the UK and overseas. The research is based on structured interviews with a variety of stakeholders, including developers, planners, consultants and community representatives to highlight emerging best practice and related policy implications.

Estrogens, brain and behavior: studies in fundamental neurobiology and observations related to women's health

Mechanisms and consequences of the effects of estrogen on the brain have been studied both at the fundamental level and with therapeutic applications in mind. Estrogenic hormones binding in particular neurons in a limbic-hypothalamic system and their effects on the electrophysiology and molecular biology of medial hypothalamic neurons were central in establishing the first circuit for a mammalian behavior, the female-typical mating behavior, lordosis. Notably, the ability of estradiol to facilitate transcription from six genes whose products are important for lordosis behavior proved that hormones can turn on genes in specific neurons at specific times, with sensible behavioral consequences. The use of a gene knockout for estrogen receptor alpha (ERalpha) revealed that homozygous mutant females simply would not do lordosis behavior and instead were extremely aggressive, thus identifying a specific gene as essential for a mammalian social behavior. In dramatic contrast, ERbeta knockout females can exhibit normal lordosis behavior. With the understanding, in considerable mechanistic detail, of how the behavior is produced, now we are also studying brain mechanisms for the biologically adaptive influences which constrain reproductive behavior. With respect to cold temperatures and other environmental or metabolic circumstances which are not consistent with successful reproduction, we are interested in thyroid hormone effects in the brain. Competitive relations between two types of transcription factors - thyroid hormone receptors and estrogen receptors have the potential of subserving the blocking effects of inappropriate environmental circumstances on female reproductive behaviors. TRs can compete with ERalpha both for DNA binding to consensus and physiological EREs and for nuclear coactivators. In the presence of both TRs and ERs, in transfection studies, thyroid hormone coadministration can reduce estrogen-stimulated transcription. These competitive relations apparently have behavioral consequences, as thyroid hormones will reduce lordosis, and a TRbeta gene knockout will increase it. In sum, we not only know several genes that participate in the selective control of this sex behavior, but also, for two genes, we know the causal routes. Estrogenic hormones are also the foci of widespread attention for their potential therapeutic effects improving, for example, certain aspects of mood and cognition. The former has an efficient animal analog, demonstrated by the positive effects of estrogen in the Porsolt forced swim test. The latter almost certainly depends upon trophic actions of estrogen on several fundamental features of nerve cell survival and growth. The hypothesis is raised that the synaptic effects of estrogens are secondary to the trophic actions of this type of hormone in the nucleus and nerve cell body.

Restructuring in manufacturing: case studies in Chile, Mexico and Venezuela

Includes bibliography

Regulación y supervisión de la banca e instituciones financieras: estudios de caso de América Latina y el Caribe: conclusiones y recomendaciones, Santiago 3-5 diciembre 1990 y 22-23 agosto 1991 = Regulation and supervision of banks and financial institutions: case studies in Latin America and the Caribbean: conclusions and recommendations, Santiago, 3-5 December 1990 and 22-23 August 1991

Documentos presentados a dos seminarios realizados en la Sede de CEPAL en Santiago entre el 3 y 5 de diciembre de 1990 y el 22 y 23 de agosto de 1991

Sistemas de pensiones de América Latina, diagnóstico y alternativas de reforma. Estudios de caso de América Latina y el Caribe: conclusiones y recomendaciones, Santiago 3-5 diciembre 1990 y 22-23 agosto 1991 = Pension systems in Latin America: diagnosis and reform alternatives. Case studies in Latin America and the Caribbean: conclusions and recommendations, Santiago, 3-5 December 1990 and 22-23 August 1991

Documentos presentados a dos seminarios realizados en la Sede de CEPAL en Santiago entre el 3 y 5 de diciembre de 1990 y el 22 y 23 de agosto de 1991

Expression studies in the embryo and in the micropylar endosperm of germinating coffee (Coffea arabica cv. Rubi) seeds

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

Nuclear structure studies in the xenon and radon region and the discovery of a new radon isotope by Penning trap mass spectrometry

Heutzutage gewähren hochpräzise Massenmessungen mit Penning-Fallen tiefe Einblicke in die fundamentalen Eigenschaften der Kernmaterie. Zu diesem Zweck wird die freie Zyklotronfrequenz eines Ions bestimmt, das in einem starken, homogenen Magnetfeld gespeichert ist. Am ISOLTRAP-Massenspektrometer an ISOLDE / CERN können die Massen von kurzlebigen, radioaktiven Nukliden mit Halbwertszeiten bis zu einigen zehn ms mit einer Unsicherheit in der Größenordnung von 10^-8 bestimmt werden. ISOLTRAP besteht aus einem Radiofrequenz-Quadrupol zum akkumulieren der von ISOLDE gelieferten Ionen, sowie zwei Penning-Fallen zum säubern und zur Massenbestimmung der Ionen. Innerhalb dieser Arbeit wurden die Massen von neutronenreichen Xenon- und Radonisotopen (138-146Xe und 223-229Rn) gemessen. Für elf davon wurde zum ersten Mal die Masse direkt bestimmt; 229Rn wurde im Zuge dieses Experimentes sogar erstmalig beobachtet und seine Halbwertszeit konnte zu ungefähr 12 s bestimmt werden. Da die Masse eines Nuklids alle Wechselwirkungen innerhalb des Kerns widerspiegelt, ist sie einzigartig für jedes Nuklid. Eine dieser Wechselwirkungen, die Wechselwirkung zwischen Protonen und Neutronen, führt zum Beispiel zu Deformationen. Das Ziel dieser Arbeit ist eine Verbindung zwischen kollektiven Effekten, wie Deformationen und Doppeldifferenzen von Bindungsenergien, sogenannten deltaVpn-Werten zu finden. Insbesondere in den hier untersuchten Regionen zeigen deltaVpn-Werte ein sehr ungewöhnliches Verhalten, das sich nicht mit einfachen Argumenten deuten lässt. Eine Erklärung könnte das Auftreten von Oktupoldeformationen in diesen Gebieten sein. Nichtsdestotrotz ist eine quantitative Beschreibung von deltaVpn-Werten, die den Effekt von solchen Deformationen berücksichtigt mit modernen Theorien noch nicht möglich.

Linking rural tourism to agriculture. Evidences from comparative case studies in Kosovo, Italy and Spain

Rural tourism has been widely promoted in the European Union as an effective measure counteracting economic and social challenges facing rural areas especially those with declining agriculture economies. Particularly its role is seen in provision and maintenance of public goods which are more and more demanded by the public and considered in the policymaking. In Kosovo, rural tourism has been developed through the support of the international organizations and private sector initiatives, with primary aim to generate additional income for rural households and sustainable management of natural and cultural resources. Anyhow, it could be stated that the use of territorial capital to enhance the quality of the tourist offer and undertake promotion at wider circles of people has not been well explored so far, particularly possible links with agriculture that would satisfy visitors demand. In this regard this research study analyzes involvement of local stakeholders and use of territorial capital to develop tourist offer in rural areas of Kosovo. Beside, study applies comparative approach with other two areas of the European Union, Appennino Bolognese in Italy and Alpujara in Spain, to understand and compare the process of rural tourism development and demand characteristics between Kosovo and these areas. A survey has been conducted in all three study areas with rural tourism visitors to understand their preferences for public and private goods and services when visiting rural areas and the role of agriculture in sustaining rural tourism. Results show that there is a potential to link rural tourism with agriculture in Kosovo, which would help in sustaining agriculture and add additional value to local food products, which in return would enhance the tourist offer and make it more attractive for the visitors but also for the farmers as an additional revenue generating sector.

Nucleon electromagnetic structure studies in the spacelike and timelike regions

The thesis investigates the nucleon structure probed by the electromagnetic interaction. One of the most basic observables, reflecting the electromagnetic structure of the nucleon, are the form factors, which have been studied by means of elastic electron-proton scattering with ever increasing precision for several decades. In the timelike region, corresponding with the proton-antiproton annihilation into a electron-positron pair, the present experimental information is much less accurate. However, in the near future high-precision form factor measurements are planned. About 50 years after the first pioneering measurements of the electromagnetic form factors, polarization experiments stirred up the field since the results were found to be in striking contradiction to the findings of previous form factor investigations from unpolarized measurements. Triggered by the conflicting results, a whole new field studying the influence of two-photon exchange corrections to elastic electron-proton scattering emerged, which appeared as the most likely explanation of the discrepancy. The main part of this thesis deals with theoretical studies of two-photon exchange, which is investigated particularly with regard to form factor measurements in the spacelike as well as in the timelike region. An extraction of the two-photon amplitudes in the spacelike region through a combined analysis using the results of unpolarized cross section measurements and polarization experiments is presented. Furthermore, predictions of the two-photon exchange effects on the e+p/e-p cross section ratio are given for several new experiments, which are currently ongoing. The two-photon exchange corrections are also investigated in the timelike region in the process pbar{p} -> e+ e- by means of two factorization approaches. These corrections are found to be smaller than those obtained for the spacelike scattering process. The influence of the two-photon exchange corrections on cross section measurements as well as asymmetries, which allow a direct access of the two-photon exchange contribution, is discussed. Furthermore, one of the factorization approaches is applied for investigating the two-boson exchange effects in parity-violating electron-proton scattering. In the last part of the underlying work, the process pbar{p} -> pi0 e+e- is analyzed with the aim of determining the form factors in the so-called unphysical, timelike region below the two-nucleon production threshold. For this purpose, a phenomenological model is used, which provides a good description of the available data of the real photoproduction process pbar{p} -> pi0 gamma.

Tradeoffs or Synergies? Assessing Local and Regional Food Aid Procurement through Case Studies in Burkina Faso and Guatemala

We compare the impacts across a range of criteria of local and regional procurement (LRP) relative to transoceanic shipment of food aid in Burkina Faso and Guatemala. We find that neither instrument dominates the other across all criteria in either country, although LRP commonly performs at least as well as transoceanic shipment with respect to timeliness, cost, market price impacts, satisfying recipients' preferences, food quality and safety, and in benefiting smallholder suppliers. LRP is plainly a valuable food assistance tool, but its advantages and disadvantages must be carefully weighed, compared, and prioritized depending on the context and program objectives. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.