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Antibiotic pollution in surface fresh waters: Occurrence and effects
Get PDFWorldwide, antibiotic usage exceeds 100,000 tons per year and there is increasing concern over the fate of these substances. Antibiotics are ubiquitous in the environment and significant concentrations have been detected in fresh waters. In this review, we highlight important aspects of antibiotic pollution in fresh waters: that concentrations of antibiotics in the environment are substantial, that micro-organisms are susceptible to this, that bacteria can evolve resistance in the environment, and that antibiotic pollution affects natural food webs while interacting with other stressors; which taken together poses a number of challenges for environmental scientists. In the literature, we found examples of considerable antibiotic pollution in fresh waters. In the Americas, antibiotic concentrations of up to 15 μg/L have been measured; with higher concentrations reported from European and African studies (over 10 μg/L and 50 μg/L respectively), and in Asian-pacific countries concentrations over 450 μg/L have been detected. While these concentrations might not be deemed harmful to humans, non-target freshwater organisms could be affected by them. Bioassays show that some of the antibiotics found in surface waters affect microbes at concentrations below 10 μg/L. Among the most potent antibiotics are those that prevail in streams and rivers in these concentrations, such as ciprofloxacin. Sub-lethal concentrations might not kill prokaryotes but contribute to increased bacterial resistance and change the composition of single-celled communities, as demonstrated in laboratory experiments. This has implications for the microbial food web (e.g. interactions among and between bacteria and their protozoan consumers) and by extension, larger organisms and ecosystem health. The fact that the effects of antibiotics are extremely context-dependent represents a challenge, particularly for in vitro research. We suggest future research avenues, taking into account food web experiments, antibiotics interacting with one another (and other stressors) and discuss how these can help to answer multi-layered research questions
Performance assessment of water reuse strategies using integrated framework of urban water metabolism and water-energy-pollution nexus
Get PDFThis paper evaluates the metabolism-based performance of a number of centralised and decentralised water reuse strategies and their impact on integrated urban water systems (UWS) based on the nexus of water-energy-pollution. The performance assessment is based on a comprehensive and quantitative framework of urban water metabolism developed for integrated UWS over a long-term planning horizon. UWS performance is quantified based on the tracking down of mass balance flows/fluxes of water, energy, materials, costs, pollutants, and other environmental impacts using the WaterMet2 tool. The assessment framework is defined as a set of key performance indicators (KPIs) within the context of the water-energy-pollution nexus. The strategies comprise six decentralised water reuse configurations (greywater or domestic wastewater) and three centralised ones, all within three proportions of adoption by domestic users (i.e. 20, 50, and 100%). This methodology was demonstrated in the real-world case study of San Francisco del Rincon and Purisima del Rincon cities in Mexico. The results indicate that decentralised water reuse strategies using domestic wastewater can provide the best performance in the UWS with respect to water conservation, green house gas (GHG) emissions, and eutrophication indicators, while energy saving is almost negligible. On the other hand, centralised strategies can achieve the best performance for energy saving among the water reuse strategies. The results also show metabolism performance assessment in a complex system such as integrated UWS can reveal the magnitude of the interactions between the nexus elements (i.e. water, energy, and pollution). In addition, it can also reveal any unexpected influences of these elements that might exist between the UWS components and overall system
Boom bap ex machina: hip-hop aesthetics and the Akai MPC
Get PDFOver the past two decades, the growing literature on Hip-Hop musicology has paid ample tribute to Akai’s range of MPCs (Music Production Controllers), acknowledging their pivotal influence on the methodologies of Rap production. The technology’s combined functionality of sampling, drum-programming and MIDI-sequencing has been embraced by practitioners since the release of the standalone MPC60 in 1988, until its more recent computer-dependent incarnations manifested in a multitude of current controllers and DAWs. The timeline coincides with particular sonic priorities in Hip-Hop that can be grouped under the ‘Boom Bap’ aesthetic - an onomatopoeic celebration of the prominence of sampled drum sounds programmed over sparse and heavily syncopated instrumentation. But what is the association between sub-genre aesthetics and MPC functionality, and what parallels can be drawn between the evolution of the technology and stylistic deviations in the genre? The chapter examines how MPC technology impacts upon the stylisation of Hip-Hop as a result of unique sonic, rhythmic and user-interface characteristics, which condition sampling, programming and mixing practices, determining recognisable sonic signatures. Furthermore, the Boom Bap sound is traced from its origins in the late 1980s to its current use as an East Coast production reference, honouring a sample-based philosophy that is facilitated by the MPCs’ physical interface and operating-system scripts. Utilising a two-fold methodology that combines musicological analysis with practice-led actualisation, the research explores a number of representative case studies, before investigating the interactivity of original composition and MPC workflow further. The findings form a systematic typology of technical characteristics correlated to creative approaches and resulting production traits, informing speculation on the future of the MPC, its technological descendants and the footprint of its aesthetic on emerging styles and technologies.
Keywords: Hip-Hop, Aesthetics, MPC, Sampling, Boom Bap, Productio
Stronger together: learning from an interdisciplinary dementia, arts and wellbeing network (DA&WN)
Get PDFThe paper reports on the activities and outcomes of the Dementia, Arts and Wellbeing network (DA&WN), established to enable researchers, creative practitioners, carers, and people living with dementia to draw out their tacit knowledge and reveal best practices. Its aims were to: foreground the views of people with dementia, to share different creative approaches, to integrate a variety of academic perspectives, to create inspiring outputs, and to disseminate its activities to the public
The differences of hedonic shopping value and purchase intention in the multichannel shopping environment for apparel shopping
No full textMultichannel shopping has changed the way that consumers shop by offering them more choice and convenience. The growing competitive apparel market forces retailers to assess their current marketing strategies and their implementation. It is fundamental that multichannel retailers constantly provide high levels of hedonic shopping value through multichannel shopping in order to stimulate purchase. The purpose of this chapter is to emphasize the importance of hedonic shopping value in the context of multichannel shopping (in store, website, catalogue, mobile, and social media). The benefits of this chapter are evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses of each channel from the perception of the five channels for apparel shopping based on 18 hedonic shoppers in central London by using semi-structured interviews. The result shows that store and website gain the highest in the level of hedonic shopping value for apparel shopping and those are the most likely channels in which hedonic shoppers intend to shop for apparel in the future, while shopping via catalogue shows the lowest score of both hedonic shopping value and purchase intention. This chapter suggests that exploring the hedonic shopping value that consumers derive across five channels can enhance the understanding of hedonic shopping value in the context of the multichannel shopping environment
'Left with a title but nothing else': the challenges of embedding professional recognition schemes for teachers within higher education institutions
Get PDFWith increasing moves globally towards the professionalisation of teaching in Higher Education, there is growing interest in the role of accredited professional recognition schemes which provide professional development for established university teaching staff. In the UK, There are now over 120 professional recognition schemes, resulting in institutionally focused evaluation studies examining their impact. This paper contributes to this emerging body of work, it draws on cross-institutional data and Foucauldian theorising to address two important questions. In what ways does engagement with an institutional professional recognition scheme impact on participants’ teaching development, and how does institutional culture influence that engagement? The data illustrates that whilst institutional culture drives engagement, it did little to promote teaching development. Across the case-study institutions, neo-liberalism agendas were apparent. Some staff felt pushed to achieve professional recognition in response to the increasing use of metrics to measure the student experience and to inform institutional standing in league tables. Whilst evidence shows the process of seeking accreditation can lead to an enhancement in teaching practices, caution must be taken to ensure that the professional development opportunities offered by accreditation schemes are fully realised
To identify the factors that influence the recognizing and responding to adult patient deterioration in acute hospitals
Get PDFAims
To identify factors that influence recognition and response to adult patient deterioration in acute hospitals.
Design
A Mixed‐Studies Systematic Review.
Data sources
CINAHL, Medline and Web of Science were searched for relevant literature published between; 2007‐2018.
Review Methods: Studies were critically appraised, data extracted and thematically analyzed.
Results
Thirteen papers met the inclusion criteria. Three main themes were identified: (1) Knowledge and understanding of clinical deterioration; (2) Organizational factors; managing deterioration and staffing levels; and (3) Communication; inter‐professional relationships and professional‐patient communication.
Conclusion
Despite national guidelines, the review findings suggest that the recognition and response to adult patient deterioration in acute hospital settings is sub‐optimal. A multitude of factors influencing the recognition and response to adult patient deterioration emerged from the findings.
Impact
Patients are receiving sub‐optimal care due to failure in recognizing and responding to patient deterioration in an appropriate and timely manner. Nurses lack knowledge and understanding of deterioration. Organizational factors contribute to inadequate care and communication among professionals was highlighted as challenging. The factors that influence the recognizing and responding to patient deterioration in acute hospitals are multi‐faceted, however this review highlights immediate recommendations for professionals in the acute care setting
Esophageal abnormality detection using DenseNet based Faster R-CNN with Gabor features
Get PDFEarly detection of esophageal abnormalities can help in preventing the progression of the disease into later stages. During esophagus examination, abnormalities are often overlooked due to the irregular shape, variable size and the complex surrounding area which requires a significant effort and experience. In this paper, a novel deep learning model which is based on Faster Region-Based Convolution Neural Network (Faster R-CNN) is presented to automatically detect abnormalities in the esophagus from endoscopic images. The proposed detection system is based on a combination of Gabor handcrafted features with CNN features. The Densely Connected Convolution Networks (DenseNets) architecture is embraced to extract CNN features providing a strengthened feature propagation between the layers and allay the vanishing gradient problem. To address the challenges of detecting abnormal complex regions, we propose fusing extracted Gabor features with CNN features through concatenation to enhance texture details in the detection stage. Our newly designed architecture is validated on two datasets (Kvasir and MICCAI 2015). Regarding the Kvasir, the results show an outstanding performance with a recall of 90.2% and precision of 92.1% with a mean of average precision (mAP) of 75.9%. While for the Miccai 2015 dataset, the model is able to surpass the state-of-the-art performance with 95% recall and 91% precision with mAP value of 84%. Experimental results demonstrate that the system is able to detect abnormalities in endoscopic images with good performance without any human intervention
A practical study on reducing CO2 concentration in educational buildings in north-east China
Get PDFIndoor air quality is a major contributor to the quality of people’s lives. Notwithstanding pollutants that are becoming increasingly prevalent from new building materials, furnishings and consumer products, CO2 concentration in educational buildings has been identified as a significant issue affecting students’ performance. This study measures and addresses how serious the CO2 levels are in differing educational facilities in north-east China during the winter period when windows have remained typically always closed to minimise heat loss. The research is based on indoor air
quality measurement with the CO2 and temperature & humidity data log, and also the users’ experience. The negative impacts of CO2 concentration are demonstrated to affect students’ decision-making capabilities,
and the relevant Chinese building regulations related to the requirements of indoor air exchange have also been reviewed. The paper also proffers practical solutions from architects’ point of views to improve indoor air quality, specifically related to CO2 concentration in educational buildings. A brief comparison of the indoor air quality with a specific focus of CO2 concentration in educational buildings in China, and other countries
around the world based on literature has been addressed. This intends to highlight the severe situations in Chinese education buildings
NMR based metabolomics comparison of different blood sampling techniques in awake and anesthetized rats
Get PDFThe composition of body fluids has become one of the most commonly used methods for diagnosing various diseases or monitoring the drug responses, especially in serum/plasma. It is therefore vital for investigators to find an appropriate way to collect blood samples from laboratory animals. This study compared blood samples collected from different sites using the NMR based metabolomics approach. Blood samples were collected from the saphenous vein (awake state), tail vein (awake and anesthetized states after administration of sevoflurane or pentobarbital) and the inferior thoracic vena cava (ITVC, anesthetized state). These approaches from the saphenous and tail veins have the potential to enable the collection of multiple samples, and the approach from ITVC is the best method for the collection of blood for the terminate state. The compositions of small molecules in the serum were determined using the 1H-NMR method, and the data were analyzed with traditional correlation analysis, principle component analysis (PCA) and OPLS-DA methods. The results showed that acute anesthesia significantly influenced the composition of serum in a very short period, such as the significant increase in glucose, and decrease in lactate. This indicates that it is better to obtain blood samples under the awake state. From the perspective of animal welfare and multiple sampling, the current study shows that the saphenous vein and tail vein are the best locations to collect multiple blood samples for a reduced risk of injury in the awake state. Furthermore, it is also suitable for investigating pharmacokinetics and the effects of drug intervention on animals