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Delivering OR Training: Creating Development Opportunities for Research Enabling Staff
Get PDFLibrarians and research support staff play an essential role in promoting engagement with Open Research Practices at UK Higher Education Institutions (UK HEIs), through providing training and academic engagement. However, individuals in these roles may not often gain the opportunity to contextualise the content of their teaching within the wider field, or to receive recognition for their work in driving academic standards.
We describe the development of a pedagogical wrapper at the University of Bristol by Dr Kirsty Merrett. The aim of the wrapper is to support research enablers, such as librarians, in disseminating their areas of expertise to research support staff at other UK HEIs who are then supported to deliver the content in a form that is tailored to their institution. We evaluate how this has been implemented via the UK Reproducibility Network’s ‘Train-the-Trainer’ programme.
We also describe how this has led to career development incentives for librarians that are aligned with the UK Professional Standards Framework. The importance of retaining the specialist knowledge of research enabling individuals, by providing defined career pathways and opportunities, is acknowledged for roles such as technicians however remains undefined for research support staff such as librarians. We hope that by sharing our experiences in this, we will provide a case study to support other research enablers
The New Real Observatory: Art and AI in Conversation with the Environment
Get PDFAn artist stares intently at a computer screen. She\u27s not looking at environmental data in the usual way – charts, graphs or satellite imagery. Instead, she\u27s using an AI system to explore how machines and humans might together make sense of our changing planet. As she adjusts parameters on the screen, the system generates new interpretations of local greenery, revealing something profound about how both humans and machines perceive nature. This is The New Real Observatory, where artists and scientists are working together to create new ways of seeing our changing world
Photographic Cues (2022)
No full textIn a world increasingly mediated by algorithms, artist Keziah MacNeill asks a provocative question: what happens when the tools we use to see the world become indistinguishable from the world itself? Through \u27Photographic Cues,\u27 she explores a speculative future where the boundaries between natural lenses (like bodies of water), mechanical cameras and AI systems dissolve into one another
Responding to Global Challenges Through Data-Driven Art
Get PDFResearcher and curator Martin Zeilinger discusses a landscape review of AI art and artists in the context of responding to global challenges through data-driven art
4-H and the Family Farm as Historical Materialist Connection Between Trans and Animal Struggles: A Response to Trans* New Materialism
Get PDFTrans* new materialism (TNM) is a relatively recent trend in trans studies which attempts to conjoin analyses of transness with insights from posthumanism and animal studies. As of yet, it represents the most substantial corpus of literature engaged with fostering connections between trans people and animals. TNM has, however, come under criticism from within trans studies. Andrea Long Chu provocatively called it “the worst possible direction for trans studies to go in” and authors like Kadji Amin and Josch Hoenes warn that TNM runs the risk of decentring actual lived experiences of trans people and neglecting the specific historical situatedness of power structures. Rather than dismissing TNM’s project of fostering trans-animal connections, I am interested in addressing the concerns of TNM’s critics by linking the struggles of trans people and animals in a historical materialist way. In this paper, I create such an analysis by drawing on Gabriel Rosenberg’s work on the US agricultural youth organisation 4-H and the heteronormative family farm. Extending the purview of Rosenberg’s account to include cisnormativity, this case study reveals that: firstly, the elimination of transness from the bodies of rural youth via 4-H and the family farm was inextricably tied to the capital-intensification of agriculture in the early twentieth century, which aggravated animal domination both qualitatively and quantitatively; and, secondly, the normalisation of children’s bodies according to a eugenic ideal of healthy, white, hetero, and cis bodies was informed by the biopolitical governance of animals and vice versa. Reproduction signified a vital link between the two
Bile acid receptor in GtoPdb v.2025.3
Get PDFThe bile acid receptor (GPBA) responds to bile acids produced during the liver metabolism of cholesterol. Selective agonists are promising drugs for the treatment of metabolic disorders, such as type II diabetes, obesity and atherosclerosis
Corticotropin-releasing factor receptors in GtoPdb v.2025.3
Get PDFCorticotropin-releasing factor (CRF, nomenclature as agreed by the NC-IUPHAR subcommittee on Corticotropin-releasing Factor Receptors [35]) receptors are activated by the endogenous peptides corticotrophin-releasing hormone, a 41 amino-acid peptide, urocortin 1, 40 amino-acids, urocortin 2, 38 amino-acids and urocortin 3, 38 amino-acids. CRF1 and CRF2 receptors are activated non-selectively by CRH and UCN. CRF2 receptors are selectively activated by UCN2 and UCN3. Binding to CRF receptors can be conducted using radioligands [125I]Tyr0-CRF or [125I]Tyr0-sauvagine with Kd values of 0.1-0.4 nM. CRF1 and CRF2 receptors are non-selectively antagonized by α-helical CRF, D-Phe-CRF-(12-41) and astressin. CRF1 receptors are selectively antagonized by small molecules NBI27914, R121919, antalarmin, CP 154,526, CP 376,395. CRF2 receptors are selectively antagonized by antisauvagine and astressin 2B. Although selective small molecule CRF1 receptor antagonists were not effective in treating major depressive disorder, posttraumatic stress disorder, or alcohol use disorder in clinical trials, recent phase 2 studies have found that CRF1 receptor antagonists effectively reduce adrenocortical androgens and precursors in congentical adrenal hyperplasia [61]
Voltage-gated sodium channels (NaV) in GtoPdb v.2025.3
Get PDFSodium channels are voltage-gated sodium-selective ion channels present in the membrane of most excitable cells. Sodium channels comprise of one pore-forming α subunit, which may be associated with either one or two β subunits [191]. α-Subunits consist of four homologous domains (I-IV), each containing six transmembrane segments (S1-S6) and a pore-forming loop. The positively charged fourth transmembrane segment (S4) acts as a voltage sensor and is involved in channel gating. The crystal structure of the bacterial NavAb channel has revealed a number of novel structural features compared to earlier potassium channel structures including a short selectivity filter with ion selectivity determined by interactions with glutamate side chains [298]. Interestingly, the pore region is penetrated by fatty acyl chains that extend into the central cavity which may allow the entry of small, hydrophobic pore-blocking drugs [298]. Auxiliary β1, β2, β3 and β4 subunits consist of a large extracellular N-terminal domain, a single transmembrane segment and a shorter cytoplasmic domain. Pharmacological targeting of voltage-gated sodium channels has long been a cornerstone of clinical treatment for a range of conditions. Classical sodium channel blockers, many of which act by occluding the central pore, are widely used as local anesthetics, antiarrhythmic agents, and anticonvulsants [135]. More recently, suzetrigine, a highly selective Nav1.8 inhibitor, received FDA approval for the treatment of acute post-operative pain [202, 419]. The nomenclature for sodium channels was proposed by Goldin et al., (2000) [155] and approved by the NC-IUPHAR Subcommittee on sodium channels (Catterall et al., 2005, [54])
Acid-sensing (proton-gated) ion channels (ASICs) in GtoPdb v.2025.3
No full textAcid-sensing ion channels (ASICs, nomenclature as agreed by NC-IUPHAR [52, 2, 3]) are members of a Na+ channel superfamily that includes the epithelial Na+ channel (ENaC), the FMRF-amide activated channel (FaNaC) of invertebrates, the degenerins (DEG) of Caenorhabitis elegans, channels in Drosophila melanogaster and the mammalian bile acid-activated ion channel BASIC [94], previously known as BLINaC [75] and INaC [77]. ASIC subunits contain 2 TM domains and a large extracellular part whose shape resembles that of a hand, as shown by high-resolution structures of chicken and human ASIC1a [49, 43, 7, 101, 100, 81]. They assemble as homo- or heterotrimers to form proton-gated, voltage-insensitive, Na+ permeable, channels that are activated by levels of acidosis occurring in both physiological and pathophysiological conditions with ASIC3 also playing a role in mechanosensation (reviewed in [48, 93, 52, 74, 23]). Splice variants of ASIC1 [termed ASIC1a (ASIC, ASICα, BNaC2α) [88], ASIC1b (ASICβ, BNaC2β) [19] and ASIC1b2 (ASICβ2) [83]; note that ASIC1a is also permeable to Ca2+], ASIC2 [termed ASIC2a (MDEG1, BNaC1α, BNC1α) [70, 89, 42] and ASIC2b (MDEG2, BNaC1β) [60]] differ in the first third of the protein. Unlike ASIC2a (listed in table), heterologous expression of ASIC2b alone does not support H+-gated currents. A third member, ASIC3 (DRASIC, TNaC1) [87] is one of the most pH-sensitive isoforms (along with ASIC1a) and has the fastest activation and desensitisation kinetics, however can also carry small sustained currents. ASIC4 (SPASIC) evolved as a proton-sensitive channel but seems to have lost this function in mammals [62]. Mammalian ASIC4 does not support a proton-gated channel in heterologous expression systems but is reported to downregulate the expression of ASIC1a and ASIC3 [1, 47, 35, 58, 24]. ASICs channels are primarily expressed in central (ASIC1a, -2a, 2b and -4) and peripheral neurons including nociceptors (ASIC1-3) where they participate in neuronal sensitivity to acidosis. Humans express, in contrast to rodents, ASIC3 also in the brain [28]. ASICs have also been detected in photoreceptors and retinal cells (ASIC1-3), cochlear hair cells (ASIC1b), testis (hASIC3), pituitary gland (ASIC4), lung epithelial cells (ASIC1a and -3), urothelial cells, adipose cells (ASIC3), vascular smooth muscle cells (ASIC1-3), immune cells (ASIC1,-3 and -4) and bone (ASIC1-3) (ASIC distribution is reviewed in [59, 29, 46]). A neurotransmitter-like function of protons has been suggested, involving postsynaptically located ASICs of the CNS in functions such as learning and fear perception [36, 54, 104] and of the PNS in mechanoreceptor-neurite transmission [98, 97]. ASIC activation also contributes to cell damage in focal ischemia [95, 73] and autoimmune inflammation (arthritis and multiple sclerosis) [41, 96], as well as neuron activation during seizures and pain [93, 30, 31, 13, 33]. Heterologously expressed heteromultimers form ion channels with differences in kinetics, ion selectivity, pH- sensitivity and sensitivity to blockers that resemble some of the native proton activated currents recorded from neurones [60, 5, 39, 11]. In general, the known small molecule inhibitors of ASICs are non-selective or partially selective, whereas the venom peptide inhibitors have substantially higher selectivity and potency. Several clinically used drugs are known to inhibit ASICs, however they are generally more potent at other targets (e.g. amiloride at ENaCs, ibuprofen at COX enzymes) [72, 67]. The information in the tables below are for the effects of inhibitors on homomeric channels, for information of known effects on heteromeric channels see the comments below
Eicosanoid turnover in GtoPdb v.2025.3
Get PDFEicosanoids are 20-carbon fatty acids, where the usual focus is the polyunsaturated analogue arachidonic acid and its metabolites. Arachidonic acid is thought primarily to derive from phospholipase A2 action on membrane phosphatidylcholine, and may be re-cycled to form phospholipid through conjugation with coenzyme A and subsequently glycerol derivatives. Oxidative metabolism of arachidonic acid is conducted through three major enzymatic routes: cyclooxygenases; lipoxygenases and cytochrome P450-like epoxygenases, particularly CYP2J2. Isoprostanes are structural analogues of the prostanoids (hence the nomenclature D-, E-, F-isoprostanes and isothromboxanes), which are produced in the presence of elevated free radicals in a non-enzymatic manner, leading to suggestions for their use as biomarkers of oxidative stress. Molecular targets for their action have yet to be defined