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'Artificialis' at the Saatchi Gallery, London, UK
No full textCollaboration with artist Cyril de Commarque for his artist-in-residence exhibition 'Artificialis' at the Saatchi Gallery from 2nd November 2019 to 3rd March 202
'Das Magische Theatre' at Chateau Papillon, St Moritz, Switzerland
No full textMy composition 'Call Thou My Name Into Eternity And It Shall Never Fail' was part of the group exhibition 'Das Magische Theatre' organised by Primo Piano and curated by AD Diego & Alexeja that took place at the Chateau de Papillon during the 26th-30th Dec 2019 in St Moritz, Switzerland
Public-private partnership and the right to property in Nigeria
Get PDFGovernments across the globe are challenged by endemic budget deficits and find it impossible to reduce significantly their infrastructure deficit without the option of calling upon private sector funding. In addition, the public sector is better served to make policy decisions and provide opportunities for the private sector to design, fund, manage, maintain and operate public facilities using a public-private partnership model. To achieve this aim, it is the responsibility of the public authority to make land available for new projects and for the expansion or rehabilitation of existing public facilities. The objective of this article is to examine the process of land expropriation for public-private partnership projects in Nigeria in relation to the right of the citizen to property but who might be affected when such a decision is taken. The article reviews legislation, court decisions and literature on the subject and proffers recommendations
Developing a cross-curricular session about evolution for initial teacher education: findings from a small-scale study with pre-service primary school teachers
Get PDFThe study reported here is part of a larger project which began when it was announced that the science curriculum for primary schools in England would include the teaching of evolution. Evolution is widely seen by teachers and pre-service teachers as an area of science that is challenging to teach; one of the reasons often given is a concern that the science may conflict with some children’s religious beliefs. Teacher education courses were provided for pre-service primary school teachers to address the teaching of science and also RE (religious education). The motivation for the current study was to discover how, if at all, pre-service primary teachers changed their planned approaches to teaching evolution as a result of a cross-curricular seminar session that explored issues and questions that are frequently raised by school students and teachers as areas of concern. In particular, we looked for changes in pre-service teachers’ attitudes to teaching about evolution, their planned approach to teaching evolution, subject knowledge of science and perception of the relationship between religion and the nature of science before and after participating in the workshop. The data indicated that the experience of taking part in a cross-curricular session informed participants’ own understanding of evolution and of how science and religion relate and prompted this cohort to consider using this strategy as part of their own teaching
Exploring dialogic space: a case study of a religious education classroom
Get PDFDialogic approaches to pedagogy have received increased attention in educational research in the past decades (Authors 2013). Despite the substantial body of research on the quality of classroom talk, the secondary education context still remains less explored (Authors 2014). The aim of the paper is to contribute to our understanding of dialogic practices in this context with a particular focus on: a) the creation of dialogic space (Wegerif 2007); and b) the enactment of dialogic interactions in this space. The paper presents a case study on a Year 13 Religious Education classroom in the South of England, UK. Data are drawn from a videorecorded lesson and audiorecorded teacher interviews. A qualitative analysis of the data revealed the importance of certain factors in creating dialogic space, including teacher instructions, activity type and teacher dialogic strategies. It is argued that being condusive to dialogue, the context of RE can be studied further. With growing evidence coming from this context, pedagogical guidelines can be created for teachers who wish to develop a more dialogic pedagogy
Use of the pathfinder network scaling to measure online customer reviews: a theme park study
Get PDFPathfinder Network Scaling (PFNETs) as an effective tool of big data analytics can be used to identify unobserved meaningful interrelationships between concepts. Although there are many research analysing online reviews, this study is the first attempt to use an analytical approach of Pathfinder Network Scaling (PFNETs) to explore online reviews in Theme park visitors experiences. The paper collects 14,142 effective reviews of the World’s first Disneyland in California from Trip Advisor. Using parallel and similarity comparison in Pathfinder scaling, four individually but fully connected networks were generated to reveal different visitors’ experiences in different segments. The findings indicate the dissimilarity of concept relatedness between different segments and revealed the knowledge gap of marketing to different segments in theme parks
A data-driven approach to guest experiences and satisfaction in sharing
Get PDFAccommodation sharing provides unique experiences for tourists. This study collects 33,892 guest reviews of Airbnb. A text analytic approach to deconstruct the nature of sharing experiences is explored. The data-driven approach extracts the following dimensions contributing to the core experiences of sharing, namely, housing, location, host-guest interaction, facility, overall sensation and others. A regression analysis further demonstrates a strong association between attributes of sharing experiences and guest satisfaction. Factors such as room facilities and home experience convey different semantic space and significantly affect guest satisfaction. They serve as hygiene factor and motivator, respectively, confirming the two-factor theory
The influence of neighbourhood environment on Airbnb: a geographically weighed regression analysis
Get PDFSharing accommodation has emerged recently as a new business model in the accommodation sector. Due to the potential gentrification Airbnb might bring to an area, it is critical to understand the spatial patterns of sharing economy and its possible determinants.The neighbourhood environment has proven to be an important factor in the traditional hotel business, and whether it is the same for sharing accommodation is worth investigating. In this study, location data of 29,780 houses/apartments on Airbnb.com in London was collected. Using Ordinal Least Square and Geography Weighed Regression analysis, the spatial distribution features of Airbnb and its relationship with neighbourhood environment in London were explored. The results show that sharing accommodation is mainly located in the city centre and around tourist attractions.Neighbourhood elements such as Water, Vegetation Coverage, Art & Human Landscape, Travel & Transport, University, Nightlife Spot emerged as important factors influencing Airbnb. In addition, the distribution of Airbnb in London is spatially non-stationary, in some areas high Airbnb is associated with higher transportation accessibility,in other areas, high Airbnb is associated with more attractions or nightlife spots, suggesting that the role of different factors varies in different regions, proving Tobler’s first law of geography
Novel methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus CC8 clone identified in a hospital setting in Armenia
Get PDFWhole-genome sequencing (WGS) of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) has been sparse in low- and middle-income countries, therefore, its population structure is unknown for many regions. We conducted a pilot surveillance of MRSA in the maternity ward of a teaching hospital in Armenia, to characterize the genotypes of circulating MRSA clones. In total, 10 MRSA isolates from a hospital environment (n = 4) and patients (n = 6) were recovered between March and May 2015 and April and May 2016, respectively. WGS analysis showed that the isolates belonged to two clonal complexes (CCs): CC8 (n = 8) and CC30 (n = 2). MRSA CC30 isolates carried staphylococcal cassette chromosome mec (SCCmec) type IVa, whereas MRSA CC8 revealed a type-VT-related SCCmec, which contained a CRISPR/Cas array and showed a high similarity to SCCmec found in coagulase-negative staphylococci. All but one MRSA CC8 isolates carried a plasmid identical to the pSK67 and four also carried a pathogenicity island similar to SaPI5. Phylogenetic analysis showed that the MRSA CC8 isolates formed a monophyletic cluster, which emerged around 1995 and was distinct from representatives of globally-distributed MRSA CC8 lineages. WGS characterization of MRSA in countries with no previous S. aureus genomic surveillance can therefore reveal an unrecognized diversity of MRSA lineages
Intracellular Staphylococcus aureus elicits the production of host very long-chain saturated fatty acids with antimicrobial activity
No full textAs a facultative intracellular pathogen, Staphylococcus aureus is able to invade and proliferate within many types of mammalian cells. Intracellular bacterial replication relies on host nutrient supplies and, therefore, cell metabolism is closely bound to intracellular infection. Here, we investigated how S. aureus invasion affects the host membrane-bound fatty acids. We quantified the relative levels of fatty acids and their labelling pattern after intracellular infection by gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS). Interestingly, we observed that the levels of three host fatty acids—docosanoic, eicosanoic and palmitic acids—were significantly increased in response to intracellular S. aureus infection. Accordingly, labelling carbon distribution was also affected in infected cells, in comparison to the uninfected control. In addition, treatment of HeLa cells with these three fatty acids showed a cytoprotective role by directly reducing S. aureus growth