79347 research outputs found
Sort by
Artificial Intelligence in Professional Education: Navigating Opportunities and Challenges in Pharmacy Work-Based Learning
No full textArtificial intelligence is rapidly reshaping educational landscapes including professional learning domains such as pharmacy work-based learning. Tool such as generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) offers many opportunities for enhancing educational practices whilst simultaneously introducing significant challenges. These AI tools can demonstrate considerable potential for adaptive learning and personal learning experiences. However, the integration of GenAI in professional teaching and learning raises critical concerns regarding ethical considerations, privacy protection, and academic integrity. Therefore, it is important to carefully review this phenomenon and reconcile educators to this new technology. This review examines the multifaceted implications of AI integration within professional learning environments, with particular focus on pharmacy work-based education and offers balancing recommendations to inform affordances and prudence required for safeguarding the integrity and equity of professional learning environments
Patterns of disparity: age and socioeconomic differences in women's smoking and quitting outcomes in Great Britain
Get PDFBackground: Smoking poses additional health risks to women across the lifespan. This study aimed to examine age-related differences in smoking, quit attempts, and cessation outcomes among women in Great Britain, both overall and by socioeconomic position. Methods: We analysed cross-sectional data from 30,519 women (≥16y) in Great Britain participating in a nationally representative survey between 2023 and 2025. We used logistic regression with restricted cubic splines to obtain age-specific estimates of smoking prevalence, the quit attempt rate, the success rate of quit attempts, and the overall quit rate, among all women and by socioeconomic position (indexed by occupational social grade; ABC1=more advantaged, C2DE=less advantaged). We calculated prevalence ratios [PR; C2DE/ABC1) to illustrate the extent of socioeconomic disparities. Results: Overall, smoking prevalence was highest among women in their 20s and 30s and declined with age. However, there were notable differences by socioeconomic position. While it declined steadily with age among more advantaged women, smoking prevalence peaked in the early 40s among less advantaged women and was more than twice that of more advantaged women in mid-life (PR range=2.02-2.47 between ages 35-60). Quit attempts decreased linearly with age, with similar prevalence and trends across socioeconomic groups. The success rate of quit attempts was highest among women in their 20s and 30s, but dropped in mid-life and further in older age. Women from less advantaged backgrounds had lower success rates, particularly between ages 45-60 (PR range=0.70-0.73). The overall quit rate was highest at age 31 for more advantaged women (23.3%) and at age 25 for less advantaged women (22.9%). Quit rates were substantially lower between ages 40-60 among less advantaged women (PR range=0.65-0.69). Conclusions: Smoking behaviours and cessation outcomes among women in Great Britain vary by both age and socioeconomic position, with particularly high smoking prevalence and low quit rates among less advantaged women in mid-life, corresponding with perimenopause and the menopausal transition. These disparities highlight the need for tailored smoking cessation strategies to improve quit success and reduce smoking prevalence across the lifespan
'The People' and British Literature:Belonging, Exclusion, and Democracy
No full textWhy do invocations of 'the people' carry such force in current political discourse and public debate? This book offers an ambitiously transhistorical account of the ways that 'the people' has figured in British literature and culture. Ranging from the later mediaeval period to the present, the twenty-three chapters draw on substantial new research to show that the figure of the people has been put to reactionary and progressive ends and that its meanings are less obvious and fixed than contemporary commentators would have us believe. Providing a much-needed critical prehistory for our own current moment, the contributors also build on ideas and methods from other disciplines, such as political theory, sociology, and media history. As such, this important new volume will be of interest to a wide range of readers across periods and disciplines. - Offers a much-needed critical pre-history of contemporary invocations of 'the people' in political discourse and public debate. - Builds on ideas and methods from other disciplines, such as political theory, sociology, and media history. - Ranges across history to provide an ambitiously expansive and timely account of figurations of 'the people' in British literature and culture
The effective incorporation of research in undergraduate econometrics
Get PDFThis chapter examines the integration of research into undergraduate econometrics teaching through a focus on replication and reproduction (R&R) of published studies. Rather than limiting students to the passive reception of research findings, the R&R approach fosters active engagement by requiring them to work directly with real data and methods in order to reproduce results and interrogate techniques. The discussion situates R&R within broader debates on the role of research in teaching, highlighting its potential to make scholarship more accessible and relevant to students. Practical case studies and classroom-ready materials from the Economics Network Ideas Bank are presented, illustrating how this approach can enhance learning, develop quantitative skills, and build student confidence. Finally, the chapter shows how R&R aligns with wider educational goals, including employability, self-efficacy, and sustained engagement
An observational record of global gridded near-surface air temperature change over land and ocean from 1781
No full textWe present a new gridded data set of air temperature change across global land and ocean extending back to the 1780s. This data set, called the GloSAT reference analysis, has two novel features: it uses marine air temperature observations rather than the sea surface temperature measurements typically used by pre-existing data sets, and it extends further into the past than existing merged land and ocean instrumental temperature records which typically estimate temperature changes from the middle to late 19th century onwards. New estimates of diurnal-heating biases in marine air temperatures have enabled the use of daytime observations, extending the data set further into the past compared to nighttime-only marine air temperature data. The data set uses an extended version of the CRUTEM5 station database over land areas, incorporating newly available bias adjustments for non-standard thermometer enclosures used prior to the adoption of Stevenson screens and new climatological normal estimates for stations with limited data in the 1961–1990 baseline period. Land and marine temperature anomalies are combined to produce a gridded data set following the methods developed for HadCRUT5. The GloSAT global and hemispheric temperature anomaly series show close agreement with those based on sea surface temperature for much of the overlapping period of their records but with slightly less warming overall. The GloSAT reference analysis is available from https://doi.org/10.5285/a2519624a593402a83246bd359d098be (Morice et al., 2025b), the GloSATLAT data set is available from https://doi.org/10.5285/ef237f578329487eb02fb42f9db56bb2 (Morice et al., 2025a), and the GloSATMAT data set is available from https://doi.org/10.5285/e6251bf935304cfbb9c9269dc7757a35 (Cornes et al., 2025b)
Enzymology and structural basis of glycosyltransferases involved in saponin C28 carboxylic acid O-d-fucosylation
Get PDFSaponins are a class of natural products composed of an oxidized triterpene core adorned with glycosylations, ultimately giving rise to medicinally important compounds bearing bioactivity that includes, but is not limited to, anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, antifungal, antiarrhythmic, and immunostimulatory activities. QS-21 is a prominent immunostimulatory saponin and is a critical adjuvant component of several FDA-approved vaccines. One linchpin modification in the biosynthesis and bioactivity of several saponins, including QS-21, is O-d-fucosylation via an ester linkage. In QS-21, the C28-COOH O-d-fucose residue is part of a linear oligosaccharide that is an integral component of the “core pharmacophore” responsible for its immunomodulatory activity. In this work, we performed in-depth in vitro enzymological characterization of two glycosyltransferases involved in C28-COOH O-d-fucosylation during the maturation of two saponin natural products: QsFucT from QS-21 biosynthesis and SvFucT from vaccaroside biosynthesis. QsFucT was previously shown to be a UDP-4-keto-6-deoxy-d-glucosyltransferase; our data reveal that the taxonomically distant SvFucT also functions as a UDP-4-keto-6-deoxy-d-glucosyltransferase and that both glycosyltransferases act on a triterpene acceptor with low-micromolar affinity. Substrate scope studies demonstrate that both enzymes are highly permissive with regard to both the triterpene acceptor and, unexpectedly, the UDP-sugar donor. These data also reveal that the conserved C3-OH branched trisaccharide of QS-21 and other saponins may serve an unusual biosynthetic role in protecting the C23 aldehyde from spurious reduction during biosynthesis. In addition, we crystallized and solved the structures of QsFucT and SvFucT, providing the first structural characterization of 4-keto-6-deoxy-d-glucosyltranferases in the glycosyltransferase family 1 (GT1) class of enzymes and used these structures to explore the importance of conserved residues in the active site. These data suggest that both QsFucT and SvFucT could be leveraged to rapidly explore saponin chemical space and glycodiversify these important medicinal compounds through engineered biosynthesis or in vitro enzymatic synthesis, possibly leading to novel analogs with enhanced physicochemical or pharmacological properties
Deep learning and (meta)genomics to characterise ice-binding proteins and predict population extinction risk
No full textGenomes reflect the evolutionary history and adaptive potential of organisms. Understanding how genetic diversity permits adaptation to extreme and changing environments will guide efforts to preserve it. Despite their harshness, frozen environments harbour diverse microbiota. Microorganisms produce ice-binding proteins (IBPs) with the domain of unknown function 3494 (DUF3494) as an adaptation to freezing, allowing them to maintain liquid habitats and prevent cellular damage from ice. IBPs display a range of functions in addition to freezing point depression. This thesis explores the diversity of microbial IBPs in metagenomes and individual genomes, and develops a deep-learning model to identify environment-specific differences between proteins. This method of classifying genomic data with machine learning is then used to predict long-term extinction risk of populations from genomic features only.
Metagenomes and metagenome-assembled genomes from the central Arctic Ocean were used to investigate taxonomy, predicted protein structures, domain architectures and synteny of IBPs. We expanded the previously known complement of IBPs by an order of magnitude, revealing a novel extended DUF3494 structure, and possible taxon-specific domain shuffling. We then built an interpretable deep learning model to classify IBPs across frozen environments. We investigated 50,669 IBPs from glacier ice, rock, subsurface, frozen sediment and polar marine environments, classifying 75.9%-97.8% correctly and revealing the protein structural features which drove these differences. We then investigated IBPs in single genomes, comparing IBPs from 10 strains of the cold-adapted diatom Fragilariopsis cylindrus. This revealed that following acquisition via horizontal gene transfer and subsequent duplications, while most IBPs are under purifying selection in the genome, some show signs of divergence. Finally, we tested machine learning models that could predict extinction risk of simulated populations from their genomic features. Models learned genomic indicators of demography to make predictions, and including life-history traits such as fecundity improved model performance
The SIMPLER Nutrition Pathway for Fragility Fractures:A Quality Improvement Initiative
No full textBackground/Objectives: Malnutrition is a key contributor to poor outcomes in older adults with fragility fractures, increasing the risk of complications, functional decline, prolonged hospital stays, mortality, and healthcare costs. Substantial evidence limited to hip fracture supports early, interdisciplinary nutrition care. However, global audits reveal that most hip fracture patients do not receive recommended interventions. This quality improvement (QI) project aimed to co-create and test a pathway and toolkit to help apply evidence-based nutrition care in different fragility fracture settings globally. Methods: The SIMPLER Pathway and toolkit (SIMPLER) were developed through a multiphase, co-creation QI initiative (2018–2025), guided by the Knowledge-to-Action framework. Global experts and clinical teams synthesized evidence, identified the “know-do” gap, and adapted SIMPLER to context through iterative action–reflection cycles. The Model for Improvement guided team building, goal setting, testing changes, and measuring outcomes at pilot sites. Results: Over 100 co-creation activities between 2018 and 2025 engaged staff and patients to shape and refine SIMPLER. A global clinician survey (n = 308, 46 countries), two bi-national audits (n = 965, 63 hospitals), and qualitative interviews (n = 15) confirmed a widespread evidence-practice gap. The pathway and toolkit were pilot-tested in five hospitals across four countries, with action–reflection cycles enabling continuous refinement of prioritized nutrition improvements tailored to the local context. Following endorsement in late 2024, 46 healthcare services in 23 countries have formally committed to implementing SIMPLER. Conclusions: The SIMPLER Nutrition Pathway provides a scalable, adaptable framework to support the delivery of evidence-based nutrition care in fragility fracture settings. A global evaluation is underway