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Multi-omic biomarker panel in pancreatic cyst fluid and serum predicts patients at a high risk of pancreatic cancer development
Get PDFIntegration of multi-omic data for the purposes of biomarker discovery can provide novel and robust panels across multiple biological compartments. Appropriate analytical methods are key to ensuring
accurate and meaningful outputs in the multi-omic setting. Here, we extensively profile the proteome and transcriptome of patient pancreatic cyst fluid (PCF) (n=32) and serum (n=68), before integrating matched omic and biofluid data, to identify biomarkers of pancreatic cancer risk. Differential expression analysis, feature reduction, multi-omic data integration, unsupervised hierarchical clustering, principal component analysis, spearman correlations and leave-one-out cross-validation
were performed using RStudio and CombiROC software. An 11-feature multi-omic panel in PCF [PIGR, S100A8, REG1A, LGALS3, TCN1, LCN2, PRSS8, MUC6, SNORA66, miR-216a-5p, miR-216b-5p] generated an AUC=0.806. A 13-feature multi-omic panel in serum [SHROOM3, IGHV3-72, IGJ, IGHA1, PPBP, APOD, SFN, IGHG1, miR-197-5p, miR-6741-5p, miR-3180, miR-3180-3p, miR-6782-5p] produced an AUC=0.824. Integration of the strongest performing biomarkers generated a 10-feature crossbiofluid multi-omic panel [S100A8, LGALS3, SNORA66, miR-216b-5p, IGHV3-72, IGJ, IGHA1, PPBP, miR-3180, miR-3180-3p] with an AUC=0.970. Multi-omic profiling provides an abundance of potential biomarkers. Integration of data from different omic compartments, and across biofluids, produced a biomarker panel that performs with high accuracy, showing promise for the risk stratification of
patients with pancreatic cystic lesions
‘Not trendy, not cool’: the future of Catholic primary school leadership in the Republic of Ireland
Get PDFThe role of the primary school principal (headteacher) in Ireland (Republic) is deeply embedded in the historical, cultural, and educational fabric of the nation. The principal serves not only as educational leader but also has a devolved responsibility to lead the characteristic spirit (ethos) of the school. Significant societal changes such as the decline in religious practice have influenced the demographic landscape, yet 88% of primary schools retain a Catholic patron and thereby a Catholic ethos. In an increasingly diverse society with rapidly falling numbers of people who identify and practice as Catholic, the possibility of recruiting principals able and willing to sustain this dual mission comes into question. This paper arises from the first large scale, mixed-methods empirical study into Catholic schools in the Republic of Ireland.
Through an examination of quantitative and qualitative data, it analyses the practices, views and experiences of primary school principals to highlight the role and reality of leading a Catholic primary school in Ireland today. Their voices were then used to extract implications for patrons and policy makers. Research results indicate that principals are largely committed and professional in their approaches to ethos leadership. However, they also indicate a mismatch between demographic realities and the largely denominational primary school
system, giving rise to leadership support and succession concerns. While the study is carried out in Ireland, it is also of interest to other jurisdictions where schools are faced with similar challenges and education systems are looking to the future of school leadership
The lived experiences of English language teachers in conflict-affected settings: a study of the Palestinian context
Get PDFEnglish language instruction is a priority for low, middle and high income countries. English unlocks educational and occupational possibilities, and is the global lingua franca par excellence. In conflict and post-conflict settings, its utility goes beyond social and economic mobility; English can arguably act as a neutral, politically disengaged alternative to languages associated with a destabilising threat. Given the international demand, English teachers regularly embark on short and long term experiences to teach, train and develop curricula in situations of recent or ongoing conflict. As very little is known about the impact of the sociopolitical environment on these educators, this study investigates the lived experiences of English language teachers in conflict-affected settings. Using hermeneutic phenomenology (or lived experience research) as a theoretical and applied methodology, this research focuses on the experiences of educators who taught English abroad to adult learners in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt), specifically East Jerusalem and the West Bank. The teachers were mobilised through international non-governmental organisations (INGOs) and government-affiliated educational diplomacy initiatives. Phenomenological (or open-unstructured) interviews were conducted and the resulting data was analysed iteratively, then organised into thematic categories for coherence. The research explores the role of the English language in the Palestinian context and the act of teaching English under occupation, in addition to foreign language education against the backdrop of ethno-national conflict. While the language teachers’ identities and political views emerged as central to their experiences, a number of other findings
were identified, such as deficits in sociocultural training, discomfort with positionality in unilateral exchanges, and the impact of being a witness to the conflict in the oPt. These observations result in suggestions for more ethical and productive interventions. The recommendations include fostering equitable exchanges, providing adequate sociopolitical, cultural, educational and psychosocial training, and generating support systems and offering guidance
Herding unmasked: Insights into cryptocurrencies, stocks and US ETFs.
Get PDFHerding behavior has become a familiar phenomenon to investors, with potential dangers of both undervaluing and overvaluing assets, while also threatening market stability. This study contributes to the literature on herding behavior by using a recent dataset, covering the most impactful events of recent years. To our knowledge, this is the first study examining herding behavior across three different types of investment vehicle and also the first study observing herding at a community (subset) level. Specifically, we first explore this phenomenon in each separate type of investment vehicle, namely stocks, US ETFs and cryptocurrencies, using the Cross-Sectional Absolute Deviation model. We find mostly similar herding patterns for stocks and US ETFs. Subsequently, the same experiment is implemented on a combination of all three investment vehicles. For a deeper investigation, we adopt graph-based techniques including the Minimum Spanning Tree and Louvain community detection to partition the combination into smaller subsets to detect herding behavior for each subset. We find that herding behavior exists at all times across all types of investment vehicle at a subset level, although perhaps not at the superset level, and that this herding behavior tends to stem from specific events that solely impact that subset of assets. Lastly, we explore herding by examining the financial contagion effects between these types of investment vehicle. Results show that US ETFs not only have a tendency to propagate similar trading behaviors in stocks and especially cryptocurrencies but also show self-reinforcing herding behavior, acting as drivers of their own trends
Investigating perspectives on the role of visual arts education in children’s inventive development
Get PDFThe very evolution of art is not driven by creativity alone. It is also shaped by groundbreaking inventions that have transformed the way artists express, create and curate their work. This research was motivated by personal professional observations and experiences as a primary school
teacher regarding the varying quality of children’s art-making experiences from an inventive perspective. Consequently, the primary purpose of this research is to examine perspectives regarding the potential role visual arts education plays in terms of developing children’s inventiveness at a time of significant change in the Irish primary school curriculum.
Following a review of relevant literature concerning what is known about visual arts, inventive development and how perspectives shape teaching practice, two key research methods were employed. This includes a deductive thematic analysis of visual arts curriculum documents from 1999, 2023, and 2024, and semi-structured interviews with primary school teachers.
Findings reveal a striking difference between the 1999, 2023 and 2024 curriculum documents regarding the role of inventiveness in visual arts education. While the 2024 curriculum promotes creativity, it lacks explicit reference to "invention," unlike the 1999 curriculum, which often linked visual arts to inventive development. This omission raises concerns about how effectively the new curriculum supports inventiveness.
The teacher interviews reveal that teachers value the link between visual arts and inventiveness. They believe creating a supportive, playful environment that encourages creative freedom is key to fostering inventive development. However, challenges such as time constraints,
lack of student confidence, and inconsistent teaching practices, along with insufficient resources and technology, hinder this process.
The study concludes by recommending a re-evaluation of how inventiveness is recognised in visual arts education. It stresses the need for clearer guidance in the curriculum and increased support for teachers to cultivate artistic inventiveness, ensuring that visual arts can nurture inventive play and development effectively
The Portuguese Muslim community: integration and its role against radicalization
Get PDFPortugal has never reported any case of violent radicalization from Islamist-inspired terrorism. To analyze some of the reasons why, this article sets two goals: understand the integration factors of the Muslim community and identify strategies to prevent radicalization implemented by its members. An exploratory qualitative study was conducted with interviews with 11 Muslim leaders. The results describe the characteristics of integration of the Muslim community and the strategies implemented by them to prevent radicalization. The results are important to inform policy and practice related to immigrants’ integration, and to understand how community resilience can be built to prevent radicalization
Market-Based Measures for International Aviation and Shipping: Lessons Learned from a Cross-Sectoral Analysis of EU ETS.
Get PDFThe reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from international
aviation and shipping is a key priority for policymakers. The International Maritime Organization (IMO) has adopted its 2023 Greenhouse Gas Strategy and is working on the adoption of a carbon pricing instrument to decarbonize international shipping. Similarly, the European Union (EU) has extended its emission allowance trading scheme (ETS) to international shipping, while the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) has adopted the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation (CORSIA). CORSIA runs in parallel to the
EU ETS to intra-EEA flights. The paper analyzes the approach taken by EU policymakers for the inclusion of aviation and shipping in the EU ETS. In particular, it discusses the regulated entities, exemptions, allowance types, geographical scope, GHG types, revenue use, fines, Monitoring Reporting and Verification (MRV) and allocation rules. By exploring the policy progress made in the two sectors and the lessons learnt from a cross-sectoral comparison of the market-based measures,
this article provides valuable insights for policymakers, industry stakeholders, and other interested parties seeking to promote an effective and equitable energy transition in international aviation and shipping
Corruption and SDG 6: Clean Water and Sanitation for All
No full textThis chapter explores the relationship between corruption and the achievement of Sustainable Development Goal 6 (SDG 6) – ensuring clean water and sanitation for all. We begin by reviewing key literature on the impact of corruption in the water and sanitation sector. We then use a case study of the wastewater sector in Bangkok’s Extended Metropolitan Region (EBMR) to illustrate these issues in practice. Through interviews with key stakeholders, the chapter examines how corrupt practices, weak governance, and regulatory fragmentation hinder access to clean water and sanitation, exacerbating social inequalities. Finally, we offer recommendations aimed at improving transparency, strengthening regulatory frameworks, and empowering local groups to combat corruption and promote sustainable water management
An exploration of domain generalisation through vision benchmarking, masking, and pruning
Get PDFThere are many computer vision applications including object segmentation, classification, object detection, and reconstruction for which Machine Learning (ML) shows state-of-the-art performance. Nowadays, we can build ML tools for such applications with real-world accuracy. However, each tool works well within the domain in which it has been trained and developed. Often, when we train a model on a dataset in one specific domain and test on another unseen domain known as an Out-of-Distribution (OOD) dataset, models or ML tools show a decrease in performance.
Previously, in the literature different solutions have been proposed to tackle with Domain Shifting problem which occurs during the inference of models, like adversarial training, feature alignment, learning distribution invariant features, meta learn- ing and many more. Similarly, to understand the behaviour of ML models for serious challenges of Domain Generalisation (DG), Domain Adaptation (DA), and Domain Shifting, in summary, this thesis presents novel work at the intersection of vision-based technologies for domain-specific and domain-generalised methods, vision transformers for DG, synthetic data generation for OOD data with detailed analysis, and the effects of pruning on DG.
The underlying hypothesis is that to solve complex challenges like DG and DA, “it is possible to say that domain-generalised learning which can refer to dynamic learning could be better than domain-specific learning which can refer to static learning”. It means that under domain shifting, dynamic learning can also have better, reliable, and faster adaptation than static learning.
Some initial experiments are conducted on two popular vision-based benchmarks, PACS and Office Home and we introduce an implementation pipeline for domain generalisation methods and conventional deep learning models. The results illustrates that domain generalised models have better accuracy than domain specific methods for these chosen benchmarks.
Since domain generalisation involves pooling knowledge from source domain(s) into a single model that can generalise to unseen target domain(s), recent trends motivate us to conduct an investigation into the factors which could affect the DG ability of a model and this inspired us to explore vision transformers.
Initially, we examined four vision transformer architectures namely ViT, LeViT, DeiT, and BEIT on out-of-distribution data. Due to advantages like self-attention, self-supervised fine-tuning, and mask image modeling, we use the BEIT architecture for further experiments on three benchmarks PACS, Home Office, and DomainNet.
In summary, under few conditions and selected measurement metrics, our experiments demonstrate that it is true to say domain generalised learning provides better solutions than domain specific learning
Language and trust: Struggles for recognition of migrant people in the political realm
Get PDFThis article explores the influence of language on the political participation of people who have migrated. It examines the ways in which language-related features shape the recognition and trust-building processes for migrant individuals during their engagement with the public in local-level political elections in Ireland. Adopting a relational approach to the concepts of political recognition and trust, the article examines data from interviews with councillors and candidates of migrant background who either speak English as an additional language or speak a variety other than Irish English. The study reveals a nuanced perspective of the impact of language on political participation, with varying viewpoints among participants. These differences can be partly attributed to the different forms of capital associated with candidates