Scalable Multi-Relational Association Mining

Clare, A., Williams, H. E. and Lester, N. M. (2004) Scalable Multi-Relational Association Mining. In proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Data Mining ICDM '04.

Fuzzy rules from ant-inspired computation

M. Galea and Q. Shen. Fuzzy rules from ant-inspired computation. Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Fuzzy Systems, pages 1691-1696, 2004.

FRANTIC - A system for inducing accurate and comprehensible fuzzy rules

M. Galea and Q. Shen. FRANTIC - A system for inducing accurate and comprehensible fuzzy rules. Proceedings of the 2004 UK Workshop on Computational Intelligence, pages 136-143.

Linguistic hedges for ant-generated rules

M. Galea and Q. Shen. Linguistic hedges for ant-generated rules. Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on Fuzzy Systems, pages 9105-9112, 2006.

Encouraging Complementary Fuzzy Rules within Iterative Rule Learning

M. Galea, Q. Shen and V. Singh. Encouraging Complementary Fuzzy Rules within Iterative Rule Learning. Proceedings of the 2005 UK Workshop on Computational Intelligence, pages 15-22.

Simultaneous ant colony optimisation algorithms for learning linguistic fuzzy rules

M. Galea and Q. Shen. Simultaneous ant colony optimisation algorithms for learning linguistic fuzzy rules. A. Abraham, C. Grosan and V. Ramos (Eds.), Swarm Intelligence in Data Mining, pages 75-99.

A Want of Order and Good Discipline: Rules, Discretion and the Victorian Prison

null RAE2008

In Praise of Folly: International Administration and the Corruption of Humanity

Bain, William, 'In Praise of Folly: International Administration and the Corruption of Humanity', International Affairs, (2006) 82(3) pp.525-538 RAE2008

Association of candidate genes with flowering time and water-soluble carbohydrate content in Lolium perenne (L.)

Sk?t, L., Humphreys, J., Humphreys, M. O., Thorogood, D., Gallagher, J. A., Sanderson, R., Armstead, I. P., Thomas, I. D. (2007). Association of candidate genes with flowering time and water-soluble carbohydrate content in Lolium perenne (L.). Genetics, 177 (1), 535-547. Sponsorship: BBSRC RAE2008

An association mapping approach to identify flowering time genes in natural populations of Lolium perenne (L.)

Sk?t, L., Humphreys, M. O., Armstead, I. P., Heywood, S., Sk?t, K. P., Sanderson, R., Thomas, I. D., Chorlton, K. H., & Sackville Hamilton, N. R. (2005). An association mapping approach to identify flowering time genes in natural populations of Lolium perenne (L.). Molecular Breeding, 15(3), 233-245. Sponsorship: BBSRC RAE2008

Learning from triads: training undergraduates in counselling skills

Background: Research has shown that counselling skills training in undergraduate programmes is effective. However, there is potential that premature intimacy and disclosures during triad work may impact on relationships which must be maintained out-with the counselling component of the course. Little research has examined individual pedagogical practices within training. Aim: The aim of this research was to explore the experience of the practical skills training component of a counselling course for a cohort of undergraduate students, and the impact of this learning experience. The objective being an evaluation of the use of this approach for this group and of the impact of personal sharing within cohorts of undergraduates. Method: Semi-structured interviews focusing on the experience of skills training and self-disclosure during training were carried out on 12 undergraduates taking counselling skills modules as part of their BSc Psychology and Counselling degree. Thematic analysis was carried out on the interview transcripts. Results: As a result of engagement in skills training and acting as ‘clients’ for one another, individuals perceived the formation of a positive group identity with implicit ‘rules’, but also an impact of training on relationships within the group which relied on the ability to maintain boundaries and personal identities with peers, and this influenced the learning experience. The ability to manage their engagement on the programme was dependent on ongoing support and guidance from tutors. Discussion: While this pedagogical approach appears appropriate for facilitating learning and potentially provides a rich learning journey for undergraduate students, tutors must act proactively to ensure a safe learning environment.

Distribution patterns of infection with multiple types of human papillomaviruses and their association with risk factors

Background: Infection with multiple types of human papillomavirus (HPV) is one of the main risk factors associated with the development of cervical lesions. In this study, cervical samples collected from 1, 810 women with diverse sociocultural backgrounds, who attended to their cervical screening program in different geographical regions of Colombia, were examined for the presence of cervical lesions and HPV by Papanicolau testing and DNA PCR detection, respectively. Principal Findings: The negative binomial distribution model used in this study showed differences between the observed and expected values within some risk factor categories analyzed. Particularly in the case of single infection and coinfection with more than 4 HPV types, observed frequencies were smaller than expected, while the number of women infected with 2 to 4 viral types were higher than expected. Data analysis according to a negative binomial regression showed an increase in the risk of acquiring more HPV types in women who were of indigenous ethnicity (+37.8%), while this risk decreased in women who had given birth more than 4 times (-31.1%), or were of mestizo (-24.6%) or black (-40.9%) ethnicity. Conclusions: According to a theoretical probability distribution, the observed number of women having either a single infection or more than 4 viral types was smaller than expected, while for those infected with 2-4 HPV types it was larger than expected. Taking into account that this study showed a higher HPV coinfection rate in the indigenous ethnicity, the role of underlying factors should be assessed in detail in future studies.

Mount Vernon Student Association

A collection of materials concerning the Mount Vernon Student Association during 1967-1969 maintained by the School of Theology Library and Archives.

Integration of relational and hierarchical network information for protein function prediction

BACKGROUND:In the current climate of high-throughput computational biology, the inference of a protein's function from related measurements, such as protein-protein interaction relations, has become a canonical task. Most existing technologies pursue this task as a classification problem, on a term-by-term basis, for each term in a database, such as the Gene Ontology (GO) database, a popular rigorous vocabulary for biological functions. However, ontology structures are essentially hierarchies, with certain top to bottom annotation rules which protein function predictions should in principle follow. Currently, the most common approach to imposing these hierarchical constraints on network-based classifiers is through the use of transitive closure to predictions.RESULTS:We propose a probabilistic framework to integrate information in relational data, in the form of a protein-protein interaction network, and a hierarchically structured database of terms, in the form of the GO database, for the purpose of protein function prediction. At the heart of our framework is a factorization of local neighborhood information in the protein-protein interaction network across successive ancestral terms in the GO hierarchy. We introduce a classifier within this framework, with computationally efficient implementation, that produces GO-term predictions that naturally obey a hierarchical 'true-path' consistency from root to leaves, without the need for further post-processing.CONCLUSION:A cross-validation study, using data from the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, shows our method offers substantial improvements over both standard 'guilt-by-association' (i.e., Nearest-Neighbor) and more refined Markov random field methods, whether in their original form or when post-processed to artificially impose 'true-path' consistency. Further analysis of the results indicates that these improvements are associated with increased predictive capabilities (i.e., increased positive predictive value), and that this increase is consistent uniformly with GO-term depth. Additional in silico validation on a collection of new annotations recently added to GO confirms the advantages suggested by the cross-validation study. Taken as a whole, our results show that a hierarchical approach to network-based protein function prediction, that exploits the ontological structure of protein annotation databases in a principled manner, can offer substantial advantages over the successive application of 'flat' network-based methods.

Genome-wide association study for subclinical atherosclerosis in major arterial territories in the NHLBI's Framingham Heart Study

INTRODUCTION:Subclinical atherosclerosis (SCA) measures in multiple arterial beds are heritable phenotypes that are associated with increased incidence of cardiovascular disease. We conducted a genome-wide association study (GWAS) for SCA measurements in the community-based Framingham Heart Study.METHODS:Over 100,000 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were genotyped (Human 100K GeneChip, Affymetrix) in 1345 subjects from 310 families. We calculated sex-specific age-adjusted and multivariable-adjusted residuals in subjects tested for quantitative SCA phenotypes, including ankle-brachial index, coronary artery calcification and abdominal aortic calcification using multi-detector computed tomography, and carotid intimal medial thickness (IMT) using carotid ultrasonography. We evaluated associations of these phenotypes with 70,987 autosomal SNPs with minor allele frequency [greater than or equal to] 0.10, call rate [greater than or equal to] 80%, and Hardy-Weinberg p-value [greater than or equal to] 0.001 in samples ranging from 673 to 984 subjects, using linear regression with generalized estimating equations (GEE) methodology and family-based association testing (FBAT). Variance components LOD scores were also calculated.RESULTS:There was no association result meeting criteria for genome-wide significance, but our methods identified 11 SNPs with p < 10-5 by GEE and five SNPs with p < 10-5 by FBAT for multivariable-adjusted phenotypes. Among the associated variants were SNPs in or near genes that may be considered candidates for further study, such as rs1376877 (GEE p < 0.000001, located in ABI2) for maximum internal carotid artery IMT and rs4814615 (FBAT p = 0.000003, located in PCSK2) for maximum common carotid artery IMT. Modest significant associations were noted with various SCA phenotypes for variants in previously reported atherosclerosis candidate genes, including NOS3 and ESR1. Associations were also noted of a region on chromosome 9p21 with CAC phenotypes that confirm associations with coronary heart disease and CAC in two recently reported genome-wide association studies. In linkage analyses, several regions of genome-wide linkage were noted, confirming previously reported linkage of internal carotid artery IMT on chromosome 12. All GEE, FBAT and linkage results are provided as an open-access results resource at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/projects/gap/cgi-bin/study.cgi?id=phs000007.CONCLUSION:The results from this GWAS generate hypotheses regarding several SNPs that may be associated with SCA phenotypes in multiple arterial beds. Given the number of tests conducted, subsequent independent replication in a staged approach is essential to identify genetic variants that may be implicated in atherosclerosis.