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Graduate Attributes are the core abilities and values a higher education institute community agrees all its graduates should develop. They are the abilities employers deem necessary for today’s knowledge workers and graduate success (HEA UK, 2013). The National Framework for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education identifies ‘Student Success’ as: ‘Student success optimises the learning and development opportunities for each student to recognise and fulfil their potential to contribute to, and flourish in, society. To be achieved, this requires a culture in Irish higher education that values inclusivity, equity and meaningful engagement between students, staff, their institutions, and the wider community…’ (Farrell & McEvoy, 2019) The Graduate Attribute agenda is key to fulfilling this promise to its students by Dundalk Institute of Technology, and this report outlines the results of our research with the goal of establishing our own graduate attribute framework. First, we review the development of the policy context driving graduate attribute development nationwide, and then turn to a discussion of relevant graduate attribute theories to ground our research. Finally, we present the main results of our first piece of research on graduate attributes, namely our Focus Group Consultation, and outline the implications.

Phenylketonuria (PKU) is an autosomal recessive inherited disorder affecting one in every 10,000 to 15,000 newborn children in the US each year. PKU patients' metabolism of an essential amino acid, phenylalanine (PHE), is impaired, resulting in concentrations of PHE in the circulating blood and brain that are potentially toxic. Individuals with PKU restrict dietary intakes of PHE by consuming medical foods formulated with low PHE concentrations. In this study, an alkaline serine protease (ASP) expressed in Bacillus licheniformis strain 2709, which is composed of90% protein with a concentration of0.25% PHE, was heat deactivated (becoming deactivated ASP (DASP)) and evaluated for safe use as an ingredient in foods, including medical foods. DASP was non-mutagenic with and without metabolic activation up to 5000 μg DASP/plate. 14-Day dietary studies supported a Maximum Tolerated Dose (MTD) of 115000 ppm DASP. In a 90-day dietary toxicity study, CRL SD CD® rats were administered 0, 28750, 57500, 115500 ppm DASP in the diet. No DASP-related adverse effects were observed at the high dose. As such, a No Observable Adverse Effect Level (NOAEL) of 115,500 ppm DASP or 6224.1 mg DASP/kg bw/day (males) and 7500.9 mg DASP/kg bw/day (females) was established.

NephureTM is a proprietary oxalate decarboxylase (OxDC) enzyme being developed as a food ingredient. In this study, the safety of NephureTM was evaluated in a bacterial mutagenicity assay and in a sub-chronic (13-week) oral toxicity study in rats. NephureTM did not show any mutagenic properties in the mutagenicity assay. In the 13-week sub-chronic oral toxicity study in which 10 Sprague Dawley rats per sex were administered 0, 118, 235 and 475 mg/kg bw/day (8260, 16450 and 33,250 Units/kg bw/day, respectively) of NephureTM by gavage, male and female rats did not show any test article-related clinical observations or effects on body weight, body weight gain, food consumption, food efficiency, ophthalmology, functional observational battery parameters or motor activity. Furthermore, there were no changes in coagulation, clinical chemistry, urinalysis or hematology parameters, macroscopic/microscopic findings or organ weights that could be attributed to the test article. Based on these results, NephureTM was not mutagenic and the no-adverse-effect level (NOAEL) in the 13-week study was determined to be 475 mg/kg bw/day (33,250 Units/kg bw/day). Evaluation of the estimated consumption of NephureTM, generation of the metabolite formate, and the current safety studies resulted in a conclusion of a tolerable upper limit of 3450 Units of OxDC activity/day (57.5 Units activity/kg bw/day), when NephureTM is added to food to decrease dietary oxalate.

This workshop was created for a local art group, consisting largely of a collection of nursing and health professionals, looking to attract more attention to their art program. Taking to their art in their downtime and retirement, this community of professionally trained and self-taught artists often holds charity events to raise money for causes in need, and exhibits at local cultural events. Their next step was to take their talents and awareness building to the digital domain. Step by step, this 6-hour workshop showed the group how to take to the likes of Facebook, LinkedIn and other platforms to help develop a social media plan for their work and sponsored exhibitions throughout the annual calendar. Their chosen channel Facebook now helps to facilitate their marketing program of creative working and fundraising. Indeed this workshop has received almost 7000 reads on ResearchGate, and for a small group of hobbyists or part-time professionals it will be most instructive.

Linked Finance is Ireland’s leading peer-to-peer lending (P2P) platform. It provides a fast, easy and efficient way for Irish SMEs to access unsecured business loans of up to €300,000 in just 24 hours. When Linked Finance was originally launched in 2013, businesses across Ireland were struggling to access the finance that they needed to operate. Many long-standing companies were having credit facilities withdrawn as the market continued to contract. For those that could access capital, the process was often painfully slow or laden with piles of paper and hours of form-filling. Many business owners became disillusioned with the process of applying for credit and resolved to make do; funding what ambitions they had from their own resources or stalling plans for expansion. This was hugely detrimental to Ireland's economic recovery. Linked Finance created a business model founded on connecting local companies who need loans with a vibrant online lending community. A community that now consists of more than 23,000 local individuals, international investors and large institutions. Linked Finance uses technology to cut out the middle man, cut through the red tape and cut down on the time it takes to access funding. They have facilitated more than 2,300 loans to business in every county of the country and in every sector of the Irish economy. Delivering more than €120 million in much needed funding. This collection of financial blogs presents a key component of Linked Finance's marketing strategy to help educate SMEs about crowd funding and P2P finance as an option to grow their business. In the year 2019-2020, Linked Finance was a P2P Lending Finalist at the prestigious IC Financial Times Investment & Wealth Management Awards 2019, and the Deloitte's Financial Services Innovation Awards 2019. Readers can simply click on the link to the research topic for each title and find the article on Linked Finance's 'The Business Lending Blog'. The slides present links to 20+ researched contemporary topics relevant to the SME Market addressing themes such as 'Preparing for Brexit', 'Getting Ready for Export to the EU', 'Digitalising Your Business', 'Geo-Mapping P2P Lending Nationwide and County-Wise' and many more. Each article is succinct 500-800 words, and downloadable. This collection should appeal to those interested in eCommerce, Crowd Funding, P2P Finance, Fintech, Irish Business Markets, and SME Sector more generally.

This paper summarises the theory and method behind the findings of paper: Cowley, M., & Colyer, J. B. (2010). Asymmetries in prior conviction reasoning: Truth suppression effects in child protection contexts, Psychology, Crime and Law, 16(3), 211-231. to make its quantitative findings more accessible to law and criminology student readerships. The premise behind examining prior conviction evidence as a biasing psychological construct, i.e. a mental representation held in mind that can take over a set of evidence rather than act as an additive probative value, is outlined. The results of three mock juror studies are summarised in which prior conviction evidence for violent offences, or prior conviction evidence for sexual offences, was disclosed. Some of the results are quite emphatic, and show that jurors will move towards guilty verdicts for as little as evidence of defendant handedness corroboration, when a defendant's prior conviction for a similar violent offence is disclosed. What's more, the results show that where prior conviction evidence is disclosed, the volume of available alternative explanations of the evidence offered by jurors is significantly reduced. The main interpretation of such a finding is that a mental representation is being held in mind for such evidence, rather than a smaller psychological construct or thought component. The implication is that the psychological weight ascribed by jurors to prior conviction evidence may go against any prescriptions of legal instruction (e.g., Criminal Justice Act, 2003; Chapter 11). The presentation slides outline the full methodology in easy to read graphs and summaries, and draws some inferences about the implications for the soundness of verdicts in such contexts.

In Pseudomonas aeruginosa, the algH gene regulates the cellular concentrations of a number of enzymes and the production of several virulence factors, and is suggested to serve a global regulatory function. The precise mechanism by which the algH gene product, the AlgH protein, functions is unknown. The same is true for AlgH family members from other bacteria. In order to lay the groundwork for understanding the physical underpinnings of AlgH function, we examined the structure and physical properties of AlgH in solution. Under reducing conditions, results of NMR, electrophoretic mobility, and sedimentation equilibrium experiments indicate AlgH is predominantly monomeric and monodisperse in solution. Under non-reducing conditions intra- and intermolecular disulfide bonds form, the latter promoting AlgH oligomerization. The high-resolution solution structure of AlgH reveals alpha/beta-sandwich architecture fashioned from ten beta strands and seven alpha helices. Comparison with available structures of orthologues indicates conservation of overall structural topology. The region of the protein most strongly conserved structurally also shows the highest amino acid sequence conservation and, as revealed by hydrogen-deuterium exchange studies, is also the most stable. In this region, evolutionary trace analysis identifies two clusters of amino acid residues with the highest evolutionary importance relative to all other AlgH residues. These frame a partially solvent exposed shallow hydrophobic cleft, perhaps identifying a site for intermolecular interactions. The results establish a physical foundation for understanding the structure and function of AlgH and AlgH family proteins and should be of general importance for further investigations of these and related proteins.

The research literature on children's testimony in the courtroom, and the factors that either help or hinder consistent and accurate accounts, is a vast one. This short booklet, aimed at busy child services professionals, takes a look at landmark findings on the subject of children's disclosure of abuse and procedural factors that affect their testimony. The research findings, from the psychology of law literature, are detailed for the reader in a light and accessible way. The booklet attends to key behavioural research findings on the following: 1. Case in point: Telling in abuse cases 2. Disclosing abuse: Some findings about why children tell and why they remain silent 3. Non-disclosure and disclosure delay 4. Disclosing abuse: A model of children’s disclosure 5. Factors associated with delay of disclosure (Goodman-Browne et al. 2003) 6. Age and gender: Some criticisms 7. Intrafamilial v. extrafamilial abuse 8. Fear of negative consequences 9. Perceptions of responsibility 10. Testimonial procedures and the reluctance to come forward 11. Improving child witnesses’ memory and minimising the reluctance to testify 12. Testifying via CCTV 13. The presence of a support person Finally, the booklet ends with a critical evaluation of the topic, and tags notes of reference for further supplementary reading.

This lecture presents students, and professionals who are training in crime statistics reporting, with a concrete tutorial in how to critically evaluate government crime statistics with reference to public data collected from public surveys on their recounted experiences of crime. Using historical crime statistics from Home Office UK reports and statistics from what was previously known as the British Crime Survey, the tutorial demonstrates the inconsistencies in police reported crime and crime reported in the same time period by a representative sample of people from public households in England & Wales. What's more, the tutorial explores whether public fear of crime can be justified by crime's extent. The tutorial presents a worked clear example of the 'Dark Figure of Crime' phenomenon, and provides detailed coverage of the following: 1. Advantages and disadvantages of police reporting v public reporting of crime, 2. Understanding the explanatory steps to attend to when discrepancies in official policing crime statistics, and official public crime reporting statistics arise, 3. The circumstances that brought about the 'Simmons Report (2000)', 4. Explanations for the rise in crime according to societal and psychological factors, 5. The 'Social Psychological Fear of Crime Model' of explanation regarding public perception of their likelihood to be victims of crime, regardless of crime statistics reporting, 6. The psychological consequences of victimization and how it relates to lack of crime reporting to the police in the first instance, and finally the presentation closes with an evaluation. The lecture will be suitable to those working in social research and studying criminology, law, socio-legal studies, forensic psychology, critical psychology, or social statistics.

The objective of this research project is twofold: to outline how and why Windsor Group is meeting the challenge of modernising their marketing operations with new digital technology in the automotive sector. Chosen Company: Windsor Group Windsor is held to be one of Ireland's leading automotive dealership franchises. Ranked 314th overall and 34th for transport industry category in the Irish Times Top1000 companies (Irish Times, 2017), Windsor has a long tradition in selling and servicing vehicles from their operational group of dealerships. Established in 1964, employing over 300 staff, and famed for their Dublin car auctions of the 1960s, Windsor have long marketed themselves as putting consumers' best interests at heart by providing affordable options across the life-span of the consumer. Whether a consumer is purchasing their first car, a new car or family car, and wherever a consumer is at on life's journey, Windsor has always had the car for them. They are life-time consumer retention oriented, community based, relationship selling invested, and future focused. With a brand rejuvenation project, a new marketing team of six, and an increased marketing budget in excess of €1million, they recognise that they face considerable technological challenges in terms of: moving their marketing towards a digital media model, integrating zero emissions and hybrid petrol technology models to their brand marque portfolio to align with carbon emissions regulatory requirements, and adapting their service and sales operations to vehicle intelligent mobility and software sophistication for road safety (RSA, 2017). Thus, this report focuses on how new digital technologies will become increasingly important to facilitate this ethos relying on a full-funnel brand marketing framework to produce engagement, lead generation and conversion with the introduction of modern digital channel marketing (e.g., LinkedIn, 2016; HubSpot,2017). Moreover, the report researches why the economic context calls for this full funnel approach to digital modernisation (e.g., profitability by market or competition displacement), to maintain and grow this national leading brand (e.g., CSO Automotive Indices, 2017; CSO Economic Indices, 2017; CSO, Irish Top Motors, 2017; SIMI, 2017). To achieve the research objective a quantitative-qualitative mixed methods research method (e.g., Bryman & Bell, 2015; Bryman, 2016) tested if key communications content (i.e., a manageable cross-section: corporate news), could generate organic industry significant engagement, lead generation, and conversion for target segments key to Windsor’s sales strategy, by introducing a new digital blog and its social media distribution (i.e., website Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter). A full-funnel marketing framework of automotive marketing was used to map consumer engagement from point of brand awareness for the 181 pre-sales period November 2017 (i.e., blog engagement) to lead generation (i.e., clicking through to landing page) aligned to key market segment sales targets to the sales period January 2018 (i.e., market share and sales results 10-day-report 181 for sales period January 2018). An analysis of this engagement and lead data showed that blogging is an effective new digital technology which increased lead generation for the following commercial, community, and trust building automotive content categories: finance offer news on new and used models, commercial product releases and brand marque awards news, road safety, hints and tips, and community sponsorship (see Kotler, 2013; HubSpot, 2017). The results show that our new blog achieved an average click through rate (CTR) 3.5 times greater than the automotive industry average (see HubSpot, 2017), and for early in-house sales figures that have become available; brand marque Nissan achieved a 11.2% sales increase and 0.8 market share increase (versus the same period in 2017; *Nissan represents 70-80% of our dealership capacity; Nissan 10-Day Market Analysis 181, Irish Market, January 12th 2018). Moreover, our new policy of supporting our commercial marketing with 10% communications aligned with national road safety category campaigns (i.e., recycling content from RSA and Government initiatives from September 2017), excitedly became active in a year in which road fatalities were lowest since 1959 (RSA Annual Review, 2017). Finally, Windsor LinkedIn which runs in tandem with the Windsor blog now ranks 3rd rather than 8th for followers compared to key competitors such as Frank Keane BMW and Joe Dufffy Group, with the number of visitors, shares, and comments increasing up to threefold from blog conception in September to end of year 2017 compared to the first half year. The secondary research explains why Windsor must meet the challenge of modernising their marketing due to external factors other than company marketing tradition such as economic market forces, which have defined, and will continue to define all future marketing strategy for the automotive sector regardless of brand identity. Drawing from economic data and secondary data sets and sources such as the Central Statistics Office (CSO), Irish Motor Society (SIMI), KPMG, CDK Global and Red C Research, conclusions are drawn about how population demographics, consumer spending, and UK Imports will impact the Irish automotive market, thereby determining what will constitute viable market segments and digital marketing target audiences moving forward. The report concludes with a discussion of how the evolution and impact of technological innovation may affect: target audience differentiation, impact positively both locally and globally by growing an online automotive market economy with lean operations and community flourishing prospects, prepare automotive industry for the challenges presented by diffuse social media networks, and intelligent mobility software technologies for automotive road safety.

DNA evidence is one of the most significant modern advances in the search for truth since the cross examination, but its format as a random-match-probability makes it difficult for people to assign an appropriate probative value (Koehler, 2001). While Frequentist theories propose that the presentation of the match as a frequency rather than a probability facilitates more accurate assessment (e.g., Slovic et al., 2000), Exemplar-Cueing Theory predicts that the subjective weight assigned may be affected by the frequency or probability format, and how easily examples of the event, i.e., ‘exemplars’, are generated from linguistic cues that frame the match in light of further evidence (Koehler & Macchi, 2004). This paper presents two juror research studies to examine the difficulties that jurors have in assigning appropriate probative value to DNA evidence when contradictory evidence is presented. Study 1 showed that refuting evidence significantly reduced guilt judgments when exemplars were linguistically cued, even when the probability match and the refuting evidence had the same objective probative value. Moreover, qualitative reason for judgment responses revealed that interpreting refuting evidence was found to be complex and not necessarily reductive; refutation was found indicative of innocence or guilt depending on whether exemplars have been cued or not. Study 2 showed that the introduction of judges’ directions to linguistically cue exemplars, did not increase the impact of refuting evidence beyond its objective probative value, but less guilty verdicts were returned when jurors were instructed to consider all possible explanations of the evidence. The results are discussed in light of contradictory frequentist and exemplar-cueing theoretical positions, and their real-world consequences.

This short study-guide outlines key behavioural science findings about factors affecting how consumers perceive price. The guide extrapolates 12 key findings from the consumer research literature relevant to any Marketer or Market Researcher looking to know more about pricing research, or how to price their product for marketplace more optimally. Objective: To outline key findings from the behavioural sciences demonstrating how consumers judge price attractiveness from a range of considered prices. Key findings are extrapolated for the reader, but the Appendix lists a selection of critical research papers from which these key findings have been drawn. These findings are likely to be of assistance to marketing students, market researchers, marketers, market segmentation strategists, market managers, digital marketers, and eCommerce specialists, who work to persuade consumers to purchase their brands or products.

Background The optimal timing of cholecystectomy for patients admitted with acute gallbladder pathology is unclear. Some studies have shown that emergency cholecystectomy during the index admission can reduce length of hospital stay with similar rates of conversion to open surgery, complications and mortality compared with a ‘delayed’ operation following discharge. Others have reported that cholecystectomy during the index acute admission results in higher morbidity, extended length of stay and increased costs. This study examined the cost-effectiveness of emergency versus delayed cholecystectomy for acute benign gallbladder disease. Methods Using data from a prospective population-based cohort study examining the outcomes of cholecystectomy in the UK and Ireland, a model-based cost–utility analysis was conducted from the perspective of the UK National Health Service, with a 1-year time horizon for costs and outcomes. Probabilistic sensitivity analysis was used to investigate the impact of parameter uncertainty on the results obtained from the model. Results Emergency cholecystectomy was found to be less costly (£4570 versus £4720; €5484 versus €5664) and more effective (0·8868 versus 0·8662 QALYs) than delayed cholecystectomy. Probabilistic sensitivity analysis showed that the emergency strategy is more than 60 per cent likely to be cost-effective across willingness-to-pay values for the QALY from £0 to £100 000 (€0–120 000). Conclusion Emergency cholecystectomy is less costly and more effective than delayed cholecystectomy. This approach is likely to be beneficial to patients in terms of improved health outcomes and to the healthcare provider owing to the reduced costs.

This double-lecture introduces the concept of social cognition and personality theory as a way to study human behaviour through examining social interaction as a function of the dynamic between the self and other. The theories, issues, and studies examined centre on two key debates to understanding all human behaviour: (i) is human behaviour situation or disposition based? and (ii) how can it be that individuals are unique if we can psychologically predict and prescribe behaviour by extricating general principles through the study of social behaviour? Taking a tour through theories of personality set out to resolve these debates, the lectures critically examine interactionist theories, contextual theories, and specifically contemporary theories focused on traits and their underpinning biological determinants as core to any theory of personality. The theories are compared and contrasted for strengths and weaknesses, and the Five Factor Model (FFM) of personality is detailed and comprehensively critically evaluated. The lecture series ends with an overview of the discussion and critique of how personality theory can be construed (or not) as a science.

This summary note series outlines legal empirical approaches to the study of juries and jury decision-making behaviour for undergraduate students of sociology, criminology and legal systems, and forensic psychology. The note series is divided into two lectures. The first lecture attends to the background relevant to the historical rise of juries and socio-legal methodologies used to understand jury behaviour. The second lecture attends to questions surrounding jury competence, classic studies illustrative of juror bias, and a critical comparison of juries to legal alternatives not reliant on jury deliberation for judicial process. Where appropriate the note series indicates key readings relevant to each core component of the note series, for students to develop their understanding in self-study time.

This study guide aims to examine how the psycho-social sciences are applied to current real world issues. There will be an emphasis on how to think critically about the theoretical and practical implications of the psychological perspectives relevant to each issue. You will be encouraged to integrate your knowledge by making connections between the individual issues discussed in this unit, and the knowledge you have acquired during your previous years as a student of the applied social sciences. Throughout the unit you will be prompted to use the new material to evaluate key debates that remain core to theoretical frameworks of the social sciences.

This lecture addresses core issues in choosing a research topic for undergraduate and first time researchers to consider. Taking a year-long view the lecture focuses on: how to generate a research question from a general topic of interest, how to plan a literature review, how to self-monitor one's own thinking as the conception of the research project takes form, and how to pay attention to ethical and feasibility issues as they arise in the course of planning a research design. Where appropriate the note series indicates key readings relevant to each core component of the lecture, for students to develop their understanding in self-study time.

This notebook presents an introductory overview to the cognitive perspective on the psychology of human behaviour for social science students. Starting with an introduction to cognitive developmental theories of how babies reason, the overview then moves to discuss how children develop into better thinkers. Adult theories of cognition are subsequently outlined and critically evaluated. A chronology of topics include: the rise of 'this thing we call cognition', Piaget's theory of cognitive development and its evaluation, problem space theory, and theories of mental representation in adult thought examining, amongst other types of thinking and reasoning, deduction and induction and an evaluation of mental representation theories.

Laparoscopic cholecystectomy is commonly performed, and several factors increase the risk of open conversion, prolonging operating time and hospital stay. Preoperative stratification would improve consent, scheduling and identify appropriate training cases. The aim of this study was to develop a validated risk score for conversion for use in clinical practice.Preoperative patient and disease-related variables were identified from a prospective cholecystectomy database (CholeS) of 8820 patients, divided into main and validation sets. Preoperative predictors of conversion were identified by multivariable binary logistic regression. A risk score was developed and validated using a forward stepwise approach.Some 297 procedures (3.4%) were converted. The risk score was derived from six significant predictors: age (p = 0.005), sex (p 0.001), indication for surgery (p 0.001), ASA (p 0.001), thick-walled gallbladder (p = 0.040) and CBD diameter (p = 0.004). Testing the score on the validation set yielded an AUROC = 0.766 (p 0.001), and a score6 identified patients at high risk of conversion (7.1% vs. 1.2%).This validated risk score allows preoperative identification of patients at six-fold increased risk of conversion to open cholecystectomy.

It is widely appreciated that well-balanced excitation and inhibition are necessary for proper function in neural networks. However, in principle, such balance could be achieved by many possible configurations of excitatory and inhibitory strengths, and relative numbers of excitatory and inhibitory neurons. For instance, a given level of excitation could be balanced by either numerous inhibitory neurons with weak synapses, or few inhibitory neurons with strong synapses. Among the continuum of different but balanced configurations, why should any particular configuration be favored? Here we address this question in the context of the entropy of network dynamics by studying an analytically tractable network of binary neurons. We find that entropy is highest at the boundary between excitation-dominant and inhibition-dominant regimes. Entropy also varies along this boundary with a trade-off between high and robust entropy: weak synapse strengths yield high network entropy which is fragile to parameter variations, while strong synapse strengths yield a lower, but more robust, network entropy. In the case where inhibitory and excitatory synapses are constrained to have similar strength, we find that a small, but non-zero fraction of inhibitory neurons, like that seen in mammalian cortex, results in robust and relatively high entropy.

This report sets about explicating how the SOSTAC Model (Smith, 2011) makes possible a systematic design and implementation of a digital marketing plan. SOSTAC is an acronym for the six core components to be considered when generating a marketing plan: situation (S), objectives (O), strategy (S), tactics (T), action (A) and control (C). Each component represents a stage in the cycle of planning, and each stage is of equal importance to successful marketing planning, implementation, and review (Chaffey & Smith, 2013). Now widely accepted as the forerunner system for implementing marketing plans and communications strategies, SOSTAC is an extension of the traditional SWOT analysis, that is, a situational analysis of the strengths (S), weaknesses (W), opportunities (O), and threats (T) facing a business at the outset, when introducing a new product line, or when engaging in an organizational change process. Thus, the premises of this report are two-fold. First the report sets about detailing each stage of the SOSTAC model in sequence as it can be applied to start-up online business. Second, the report explicates each stage as a component of a digital marketing plan critiquing the necessary and sufficient operations that may or may not be applied to a start-up online business. Finally, conclusions are drawn as to the suitability of the model’s application to a small to medium sized online business.

Imagine that a client of yours finds their website’s stream of business is at times sporadic rather than regular- it’s either a feast or a famine, and their sales are predictable neither in terms of seasonal nor economic trends. Industry quotas demand a steady flow of business and your client needs to ensure that they are capturing their market consistently from every angle. What are they to do? This article explores what key steps should be taken to evaluate an industry website presenting with irregular sales cycle issues. For example, despite being designed by a top web designer and making an excellent first impression, what else should be in place or be regularly evaluated, to ensure that the website has the ability to attract prospect consumers, generate sales leads, close sales with online payments, and continuously attract a steady stream of business across the company’s target market? Given that the business is beauty - and competition is fierce - we chose Delovely Beauty Academy Ireland as our casing point. This article proposes an industry general nine-step evaluation strategy that this business must, and has since developed, to build on their website’s successfulness, and constantly so, in order to inform their marketing resources across the budget year.

This report sets out the Irish Home Care context for developing contemporary marketing models for care worker recruitment. The report discusses the marketing environment and sets out the economic and demographic circumstances leading to care worker recruitment challenges presently in the Island of Ireland. A Career Pathways approach is embedded within the application of HubSpot's Inbound Methodology to developing buyer personas and decision-making guidance for recruitment in line with the buyer's journey philosophy. The Integrated Marketing Communications component (i.e., IMC) is discussed in light of the Full Funnel Marketing framework, and a group of contemporary digital and financial KPIs are outlined as recommendations for measurement reporting and labour market sustainability review.

This report outlines the core component research necessary to commence a website build to market a small company, namely - a local solicitors. The purpose of the internship corresponding to this report was to apply the technical and theoretical knowledge garnered from studying for the Certificate in Digital Marketing and New Media Management (at DkIT), to a real-life marketing context. This report chose to apply a digital marketing methodology - known as the Inbound Methodology (HubSpot Academy, 2016) to the context of law and legal practice. Dorothy J. Walsh & Co. Solicitors kindly supported this request, and the parameters of the duties and the likely themes, frameworks, and time-lines were defined. We agreed to apply an integrated digital marketing program of work (e.g., Kotler, 2013) to enable the law practice to increase its online visibility to generate business through e-Business services, and in technical terms to construct a new website for the practice. The project embarked on the construction of the website with several task components in mind: First, avenues of the do’s and don’ts, as to how to market legal services, were researched in terms of business law considerations (Keenan, 2008). Second, a clear picture of the target market/audience was drawn up for segmentation/multi-audience resonance based on the structure, background, and professional or community activities of the law practice solicitors. Third, a website platform was chosen to build on our branding storyboard, that is, WordPress was chosen to embed the content researched and constructed in an appropriate contemporary template. Moreover, the technical process of website structure and content building had to be completed to a highly polished standard, bringing professional added value to the marketing effort already present at the practice. Finally, what worked well and what challenges had to be overcome were examined by linking contemporary marketing theory to the realities of day-to-day legal practice. The results are discussed in light of the novelty of an application of digital marketing to law more generally.

We report a 1.55 A X-ray crystal structure of the heme-binding domain of cytochrome b(5) from Musca domestica (house fly; HF b(5)), and compare it with previously published structures of the heme-binding domains of bovine microsomal cytochrome b(5) (bMc b(5)) and rat outer mitochondrial membrane cytochrome b(5) (rOM b(5)). The structural comparison was done in the context of amino acid sequences of all known homologues of the proteins under study. We show that insect b(5)s contain an extended hydrophobic patch at the base of the heme binding pocket, similar to the one previously shown to stabilize mammalian OM b(5)s relative to their Mc counterparts. The hydrophobic patch in insects includes a residue with a bulky hydrophobic side chain at position 71 (Met). Replacing Met71 in HF b(5) with Ser, the corresponding residue in all known mammalian Mc b(5)s, is found to substantially destabilize the holoprotein. The destabilization is a consequence of two related factors: (1) a large decrease in apoprotein stability and (2) extension of conformational disruption in the apoprotein beyond the empty heme binding pocket (core 1) and into the heme-independent folding core (core 2). Analogous changes have previously been shown to accompany replacement of Leu71 in rOM b(5) with Ser. That the stabilizing role of Met71 in HF b(5) is manifested primarily in the apo state is highlighted by the fact that its crystallographic Calpha B factor is modestly larger than that of Ser71 in bMc b(5), indicating that it slightly destabilizes local polypeptide conformation when heme is in its binding pocket. Finally, we show that the final unit of secondary structure in the cytochrome b(5) heme-binding domain, a 3(10) helix known as alpha6, differs substantially in length and packing interactions not only for different protein isoforms but also for given isoforms from different species.

The eruption of multiple flux tubes in a magnetized plasma is proposed as a mechanism for explosive release of energy in plasmas. A significant fraction of the linearly stable isolated flux tubes are shown to be metastable in a box model magnetized atmosphere in which ends of the field lines are embedded in conducting walls. The energy released by destabilizing such field lines can be a large proportion of the gravitational energy stored in the system. This energy can be released in a fast dynamical time.

We have recently reported that aquo and thioether complexes of the ferric cytochrome c heme peptide N-acetylmicroperoxidase-8 (FeIII-1) exhibit greater low-spin character than do the corresponding complexes of a synthetic, water-soluble, monohistidine-ligated heme peptide (FeIII-2; Cowley, A. B.; Lukat-Rodgers, G. S.; Rodgers, K. R.; Benson, D. R. Biochemistry 2004, 43, 1656-1666). Herein we report results of studies showing that weak-field ligands bearing a full (fluoride, chloride, hydroxide) or partial (phenoxide, thiocyanate) negative charge on the coordinating atom trigger dissociation of the axial His ligand in FeIII-2 but not in FeIII-1. We attribute the greater sensitivity of His ligation in FeIII-1 to weak-field anionic ligands than to weak-field neutral ligands to the following phenomena: (1) anionic ligands pull FeIII further from the mean plane of a porphyrin than do neutral ligands, which will have the effect of straining the His-Fe bond in FeIII-2, and (2) heme in FeIII-2 is likely to undergo a modest doming distortion following anion binding that will render the His-ligated side of the porphyrin concave, thereby increasing porphyrin/ligand steric interactions. We propose that ruffling of the heme in FeIII-1 is an important factor contributing to its ability to resist His dissociation by weak-field anions. First, ruffling should allow His to more closely approach the porphyrin than is possible in FeIII-2, thereby reducing bond strain following anion binding. Second, the ruffling deformation in FeIII-1, which is enforced by the double covalent heme-peptide linkage, will almost certainly prevent significant porphyrin doming.

The outer mitochondrial membrane isoform of mammalian cytochrome b(5) (OM b(5)) is distinguished from the microsomal isoform (Mc b(5)) by its considerably greater stability. In contrast, OM and Mc apocytochrome b(5) (apo-b(5)) exhibit similar thermodynamic stability. Contributing substantially to the greater stability of OM b(5) relative to that of Mc b(5) is the presence of Leu at position 71. Replacing Leu-71 in OM b(5) with the corresponding Mc b(5) residue (Ser) not only diminishes holoprotein stability but also markedly compromises apoprotein stability. The studies reported herein were undertaken to clarify the role played by Leu-71 in stabilizing OM b(5)s relative to Mc b(5)s, and were motivated by the possibility that stability is related to other differences in OM and Mc b(5) properties that are important for their specialized subcellular roles. The results of these studies show that Leu-71 plays an essential role in maintaining the structural integrity of the heme-independent folding core of OM apo-b(5) (core 2), despite its location in the disordered empty heme-binding pocket (core 1). The conformational integrity of core 2 in Mc apo-b(5)s is not similarly dependent on the presence of a hydrophobic residue at position 71, providing new evidence for evolution of compensating structural features not present in OM b(5)s. We propose that Leu-71 achieves its effect on OM apo-b(5) core 2 structure by participating in a nonspecific hydrophobic collapse of disordered core 1, templated by more conformationally restricted side chains of residues in the beta-sheet that separates the two cores. We hypothesize that this has the added effect of maintaining core 1 of OM apo-b(5)s in a state more compact than that which occurs in Mc apo-b(5)s, possibly contributing to stronger heme binding by limiting the number of non-native conformations that the empty heme-binding pocket can populate.

This statistical summary report presents social media impact data for a simulated quarterly report (March 1st to May 31st). Usually quarters run from January to December, but for the purposes of generating a template quarterly report for digital marketing purposes, this report will rely on information from the last three months. These quarterly reports present a forum in which to measure and test recommendations for digital marketing strategy to complement and realise the broader recommendations of the MorSolutions consultation document drawn up for Anglo Printers.This report will focus on Facebook metrics to measure digital marketing campaign success as a template, as Anglo Printers are presently a Facebook-centric digital marketing company in terms of concurrent marketing. A separate Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) report, and a coordinated digital marketing platform metric input analysis can be completed, or strategically added to this report, once Anglo Printers’ Website, Twitter Feeds, Google , and LinkedIn Networks are concurrently embedded in day to day marketing. (Please see Appendix I regarding recommendation for tabularising digital marketing press release scheduling, appropriate to digital platform audience, in Michelle’s one-page summary for Anglo Printers’ Digital Marketing Platform management).

Two main cognitive theories predict that people find refuting evidence that falsifies their theorising difficult, if not impossible to consider, even though such reasoning may be pivotal to grounding their everyday thoughts in reality (i.e., Poletiek, 1996; Klayman & Ha, 1987). In the classic 2-4-6 number sequence task devised by psychologists to test such reasoning skills in a simulated environment – people fail the test more often than not. In the 2-4-6 task participants try to discover what rule the number triple 2-4-6 conforms to. The rule is ‘ascending numbers’, but it is tricky to discover this rule. Participants tend to generate hypotheses with the properties of the 2-4-6 triple, for example, ‘even numbers ascending in twos’. They must search for evidence to test whether their hypothesis is the rule. But experimental evidence has shown that they tend to generate confirming triples that they expect to be consistent with their hypothesis rather than inconsistent falsifying triples. Counter to the two main hypothesis testing theories this paper demonstrates that falsification is possible in five 2-4-6 task experiments when participants consider an Imaginary Participant’s hypothesis. Experiment 1 and 2 show that competition with an opponent hypothesis tester facilitates falsification. Experiments 3 to 5 show that the consideration of an alternative hypothesis helps this falsification of hypotheses lead to rule discovery. The implications of the results for theories of hypothesis testing and reasoning are discussed.

Objective: To evaluate and report a broadband & telecommunications brand-marketing exercise by sending a team of marketers on a targeted retail expedition (Practical Report, City & Guilds, 2015). Design & Procedure: A team of six marketers; four men and two women; approximate age range 24 to 52 years; approximate average age 35 years; divided themselves into three groups of pairs to evaluate brand-marketing effectiveness as consumers. Two broadband providers were evaluated per pair. We selected the following stores to represent Broadband & Telecommunications Brand-Marketed Stores in Drogheda Town Centre: O2 (West St & Scotch Hall), Vodafone (Town Centre), Meteor (Laurence Town Centre), 3 (Laurence Town Centre), & Carphone-Warehouse (Scotch Hall). A 5-point itemised scoring sheet was devised to evaluate how each store conducted its visual Brand-Marketing (e.g., by using Printed Media, Visual Displays, & Store Branding). The categories evaluated whether the store maximised the following categories of visual brand-marketing strategy: 1. Less is More, 2. Brand your Stand, 3. Tell a Story, Sell a Story, 4. Where’s your Wow?, and 5. Fix your Fixtures.Results: The Broadband and Telecommunications retail sector consistently focuses on Brand-Marketing. The consistent results for the Brand your Stand category, regardless of retail outlet, or electronic good manufacturer brand adjacency, demonstrates clearly that Brand-Marketing is a priority visual marketing strategy for Broadband and Telecommunications retail. While o2 dominates the market for its maximal use of multiple and uniform category strategies, other brands choose to segment their market explicitly, using the Less is More strategy to target business users, and the Tell a Story strategy for everyday users (e.g., Vodafone). With o2’s tendency to focus on store brand in the foreground, and electronic product adjacency in the background, and with 3’s focus on the electronic product as foreground runner, the imminent merger of o2 and 3 may leave mid-low marketing performers (e.g., Meteor and Carphone-Warehouse) with less resistant marketing futures.

Objective: To evaluate retail standards by sending a team of mystery shoppers on a targeted retail expedition. Design & Procedure: First, we divided ourselves into three groups of pairs to examine whether being a Luxury Purchase Shopper or a General Purpose Shopper affected the evaluation. One person from each pair was a luxury purchase shopper (e.g., purchasing make-up counter or electrical goods), and the other person was a general purchase shopper (e.g., purchasing dry-skin cream). Second, we selected the following stores to represent Health & Beauty Pharmacy Retail: Family Stores, National Stores, & International Stores. We chose Maher’s Family Pharmacy, Hickey’s Nationwide Chain-Store, & Boots International. The Mystery Shoppers were: A team of five; three men and two women; approximate age range 24 to 52 years; approximate average age 35 years. Before the exercise began we constructed a 12-point itemised questionnaire to assign marks out of ten, on a scale where ten was the highest standard of customer satisfaction, and where zero was the lowest standard of customer satisfaction per evaluation question. Four questions for each of three pre-chosen categories were included in the questionnaire to representatively evaluate Store Appearance, Customer Service, & Store Products. See Appendix I for a copy of the Itemised Questionnaire. Finally, each Mystery Shopper visited each store, for up to 15mins, to complete their assigned Luxury or General Purchase Task, and to fill in the questionnaire after each visit for each store. Once completed, Mystery Shoppers returned to meet their team to compile composite scores and a cross-table record of store performance for the stores’: Overall Evaluation, Overall Type of Purchase Evaluation, and Overall Evaluation for the categories of Store Appearance, Customer Service, & Store Products. Results: For a retail sector associated with Health & Beauty, the stores’ appearance, cleanliness, and structured product signposting, varied to a surprising degree. Pragmatically a pharmacy should prioritise cleanliness and hygiene, as well as the appearance of a clean, hygienic, brightly lit, and clearly product sign-posted premises. The stores’ displays of products varied from store to store, where a confused layout for a family pharmacy contributed heavily to their lower scores, in comparison to the supermarket marketing display typology, or the brand-specific marketing predominance of the nationwide approach.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a detailed technical protocol analysis of chess masters' evaluative expertise, paying particular attention to the analysis of the structure of their memory process in evaluating foreseen possibilities in games of dynamic equilibrium. The paper has two purposes. First, to publish a results chapter from my DPhil thesis (in revised journal article form) attending to the measurement of foresight in chess masters' evaluation process, testing alternative theories of cognitive expertise in the domain of chess; and second to provide the technical graphical analysis that corresponds to that measurement in order to preserve this protocol analysis for access in the academic domain for future studies of expert memory and foresight (e.g., Ericsson & Simon, 1993). The step-by-step protocol analysis consists of: (i) an introduction to foresight cognition as hypothesis testing, (ii) a theoretical review in the domain of chess masters' expertise according to the theoretical frameworks in that field purporting hypotheses relevant to chess masters' evaluative skill processes, and (iii) summary tables and non-parametric statistical analysis corroborating chunking theory frameworks of expert cognition (e.g., DeGroot, 1965; Newell & Simon, 1972; Gobet, 1998; Gobet et al., 2004) and refuting the alternative search-evaluation models (e.g., Holding & Reynolds, 1982). Moreover, the journal article espouses the preservation of the traditional protocol analysis method core to the field of expert cognition’s conception (DeGroot, 1969; Kotov, 1971). The protocol analysis takes the form of a specialist population study (e.g., detailed case study work; Luria, 1987). Thus the outline consists of a short introduction, a theoretical methodological review discussing protocol analysis methods for specialist population studies in cognition (with particular attention to the preservation protocol analysis methods for chess studies in cognition and expert memory with a fresh angle on the foresight process), and the full set of protocol analyses with corresponding problem behaviour graphs. A subset of the main results has been published elsewhere (e.g., Cowley & Byrne, 2004; Cowley 2006), receiving scientific and scientific journalistic acclaim (e.g., Nature Online News 2004).

Objective: To apply Legal, Regulatory, & Ethical Requirements in Mock Labour Trials. Method: The objective of this task was to apply an understanding of an organisation’s procedures for dealing with legal, regulatory, and ethical requirements, as the Equality Act (2010) and the Health & Safety at Work Act (1974) stipulates, to organisational grievance-solving. A training class was separated into two groups based on whether they had, an Equality Act (2010) relevant grievance, or a Health & Safety at Work Act (1974) relevant grievance. Each group was sub-divided into aggrieved staff and non-aggrieved management (encompassing HR, i.e., Human Resources). A boardroom was re-organised to resemble a labour court setting. Three Labour Court Judges (i.e., one head judge, and two co-judges) were previously independently selected and designated to: procedurally adjudicate the proceedings; note-take and ask probing questions; and then to deliberate on the merits of each group and their grievance based on their arguments and evidential reasoning in form of a written judgment. The findings in light of the case summary method are discussed.

As part of a larger effort to engineer the stability and hemin-binding properties of microsomal (Mc) cytochromes b(5) into rat liver outer mitochondrial membrane (OM) cytochrome (cyt) b(5), several mutants of rat OM cyt b(5) were prepared to study the effect of gradual and complete elimination of two extended hydrophobic networks, which are present in the structure of the mitochondrial protein and are absent in the structure of mammalian Mc cytochromes b(5). One of the hydrophobic networks, identified in a previous study [Altuve, A., Silchenko, S., Lee, K.-H., Kuczera, K., Terzyan, S., Zhang, X., Benson, D. R., and Rivera, M. (2001) Biochemistry 40, 9469-9483], encompasses the side chains of Ala-18, Ile-32, Leu-36, and Leu-47, whereas a second hydrophobic network, identified as part of this work, encompasses the side chains of Ile-25, Phe-58, Leu-71, and the heme. The X-ray structure of the A18S/I25L/I32L/L47R/L71S quintuple mutant of rat OM cyt b(5) demonstrates that both hydrophobic networks have been eliminated and that the corresponding structural elements of the Mc isoform have been introduced. The stability of the rat OM mutant proteins studied was found to decrease in the order wild type > I25L > A18S/I32L/L47R > L71S > A18S/I32L/L47R/L71S > 18S/I25L/I32L/L47R/L71S, indicating that the two hydrophobic networks do indeed contribute to the high stability of rat OM cyt b(5) relative to the bovine Mc isoform. Surprisingly, the quintuple mutant of rat OM cyt b(5) is less stable than bovine Mc cyt b(5), even though the former exhibits significantly slower rates of hemin release and hemin reorientation at pH 7.0. However, at pH 5.0 the bovine Mc and rat OM quintuple mutant proteins release hemin at comparable rates, suggesting that one or both of the His axial ligands in the rat OM protein are more resistant to protonation under physiological conditions. Results obtained from chemical denaturation experiments conducted with the apoproteins demonstrated that mutants containing L71S are significantly less stable than bovine Mc apocyt b(5), strongly suggesting that Leu-71 plays a pivotal role in the stabilization of rat OM apocyt b(5), presumably via hydrophobic interactions with Ile-25 and Phe-58. Because comparable interactions are absent in bovine Mc apocyt b(5), which contains Ser at position 71, it must resort to different interactions to stabilize its fold, thus highlighting yet another difference between rat OM and bovine Mc cyt b(5). During the course of these investigations we also discovered that rat OM cyt b(5) can be made to strongly favor hemin orientational isomer A (I32L) or isomer B (L71S) with a single point mutation and that release of hemin orientational isomers A and B can be kinetically resolved in certain rat OM mutants.

In Pseudomonas aeruginosa, the algH gene regulates the cellular concentrations of a number of enzymes and the production of several virulence factors, and is suggested to serve a global regulatory function. The precise mechanism by which the algH gene product, the AlgH protein, functions is unknown. The same is true for AlgH family members from other bacteria. In order to lay the groundwork for understanding the physical underpinnings of AlgH function, we examined the structure and physical properties of AlgH in solution. Under reducing conditions, results of NMR, electrophoretic mobility, and sedimentation equilibrium experiments indicate AlgH is predominantly monomeric and monodisperse in solution. Under non-reducing conditions intra- and intermolecular disulfide bonds form, the latter promoting AlgH oligomerization. The high-resolution solution structure of AlgH reveals alpha/beta-sandwich architecture fashioned from ten beta strands and seven alpha helices. Comparison with available structures of orthologues indicates conservation of overall structural topology. The region of the protein most strongly conserved structurally also shows the highest amino acid sequence conservation and, as revealed by hydrogen-deuterium exchange studies, is also the most stable. In this region, evolutionary trace analysis identifies two clusters of amino acid residues with the highest evolutionary importance relative to all other AlgH residues. These frame a partially solvent exposed shallow hydrophobic cleft, perhaps identifying a site for intermolecular interactions. The results establish a physical foundation for understanding the structure and function of AlgH and AlgH family proteins and should be of general importance for further investigations of these and related proteins.

Background The Surgical Safety Checklist (SSC) has been shown to reduce perioperative errors and complications and its implementation is recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO). However, it is unknown how widely this intervention is used. We investigated attitudes and factors associated with use of WHO SSC in frontline medical professionals across the globe using a survey distributed through social networks. Methods A survey of usage and opinions regarding the SSC was posted on the Facebook and Twitter pages of a not-for-profit surgical news website for one month (March 2013). Respondents were grouped into four groups based on their country's Gross National Income: high, upper middle, lower middle and low income. Univariate and multivariate analyses were performed to investigate how different factors were associated with the use of the SSC. Results 6269 medical professionals from 69 countries responded to the survey: most respondents were from lower middle (47.4%) countries, followed by: high (35.0%), upper middle (14.6%), and low (3.0%) income countries. In total, 57.5% reported that they used the WHO SSC perioperatively. Fewer respondents used the WHO SSC in upper middle, lower middle and low income countries (LMICs) compared to high income countries (43.5% vs. 83.5%, p, Highlights • This study suggests wide but variable use of the surgical safety checklist by frontline medical professionals. • This variation in the use of the checklist is most apparent in low and middle income countries. • Factors linked to individual's reluctance to were identified as attitudes to the usefulness of the checklist. • Novel methodolgy using social media to perform a cross sectional observational study to survey opinions.

What do we mean by the quantitative-qualitative research process in contemporary socio-legal empirical research? When we conduct research using experimental designs, engage with survey data, or build secondary data sets, there are often questions unanswered by quantitative data only. New research questions need to be derived, often requiring both new quantification hypotheses, or further examinations of the original measures of quantification. In particular must we always qualitatively validate the quantitative measures originally taken in legal empirical research, given that participants are qualitative end-users of the law, and given that the quantification of the law must be always qualitatively comprehensible? This seminar paper proposes that quantitative measures of the research participant's own words in legal research can tell us something new about the accuracy of the correspondence between the participant's actual reasoning on quantitative measures, to provide a measure of validation, or indeed provide a measure of accuracy assessment for an original research question, given a known theory and accepted data in a field. Given that the nature of quantification in law tends to qualify quantitative concepts in linguistic terms only, the qualitative-quantitative method may be a particularly important component to quantitative data collection in socio-legal studies. To this end this seminar paper will provide a framework for analysing these qualitative components of research participant's protocols in legal empirical research by taking an introductory tour through quantitative methodology and providing demonstrative examples. Recorded utterances and dialogue, recorded both during the research task, and retrospectively for qualitative-quantitative validation of quantification will be explicated as a workbook method for the following practical discussions: Experimental design-manipulation; Quasi-experimental design; Cross-sectional design; Longitudinal design; and Case study design.

Commonwealth Scientific & Industrial Research Organization has been working since 2000 to develop twin-roll strip casting of magnesium alloy. The primary objective was to significantly reduce the manufacturing cost of the magnesium sheet through the twin-roll casting process. This article describes the goals and challenges of this project as well as pilot plant test results.

We consider least squares estimators of carrier phase and amplitude from a noisy communications signal. We focus on signaling constellations that have symbols evenly distributed on the complex unit circle, i.e., M-ary phase shift keying. We show, under reasonably mild conditions on the distribution of the noise, that the least squares estimator of carrier phase is strongly consistent and asymptotically normally distributed. However, the amplitude estimator is not consistent, but converges to a positive real number that is a function of the true carrier amplitude, the noise distribution and the size of the constellation. The results of Monte Carlo simulations are provided and these corroborate the theoretical results. Refereed/Peer-reviewed

The barriers to peace in terrorist societies can seem senseless to outside observers. A role-play experiment in which participants take the perspective of terrorists or landowners based on the N. Ireland conflict is reported. Participants were put in the shoes of either a Plutat (Protestant) or a Camta (Catholic). They each knew that both imaginary societies used bombing and assassination strategies, and that three thousand people had been killed on both sides. Blame was first apportioned equally, both ceased military offensives together, and a map sharing the land equally between them was chosen. After receiving an envelope containing information randomly labelling one society as ‘landowners’ and the other as ‘terrorists’ they each blamed one another, expected the other to ceasefire first, and the ‘landowners’ refused to share the land equally with their ‘terrorist’ counterparts. The results are relevant for understanding social behaviour in contemporary terrorist contexts, and they confirm that perspective taking cannot presuppose that positive rather than negative representations of another will be activated (Epley et al., 2006).

This paper presents empirical findings from a set of reasoning and mock jury studies presented at the Experimental Psychology Oxford Seminar Series (2010) and the King's Bench Chambers KBW Barristers Seminar Series (2010). The presentation asks the following questions and presents empirical answers using the Lenses of Evidence Framework (Cowley & Colyer, 2010; see also van Koppen & Wagenaar, 1993): Why is mental representation important for psychology? Why is mental representation important for evidence law? Lens 1: The self representation - Key findings Lens 2: The expert representation - Key findings Lens 3: The anchor representation - Key findings Conclusions & Future directions. The series of research essentially explores how people represent evidence in mind and presents key findings now cited in the following literatures: Philosophy of Science, Cognitive Expertise, Behavioural Economics, Cognitive Science, Psychology and Public Policy, & Causation and the Law.

Therapeutic angiography with embolization is fast becoming the preferred treatment modality for major bleeding in the lower gastrointestinal (LGI) tract. The aim of this study was to determine the long term outcome and complications of percutaneous coil embolization (PCE) and its efficacy as definitive therapy in patients with major LGI bleeding.All patients presenting to our institution with a haemodynamically significant LGI tract bleed between 1995 and 2001 that were unresponsive to conservative measures were considered for emergency angiography and coil embolization where appropriate. The outcome of these individuals was determined by case note review and telephone interview.There were 20 patients (11 females) with a mean follow-up period 72 months, mean age was 67 years. All underwent PCE following positive angiogram. The most common site of bleeding was the right colon (40%); haemostasis was successfully achieved in 16 (80%) patients. Five of the 20 patients died within 30 days of the intervention, three following PCE and two following surgery. None of the mortality following PCE was considered procedure related. On long term follow-up four patients required readmission to hospital for further LGI bleeds at 1, 2, 12 and 16 months respectively. Ischaemic complications occurred in 23%.Superselective embolization as the primary technique for the treatment of haemodynamically significant LGI bleeding is an effective, feasible and safe technique. Long term follow-up in our series up to 72 months has shown that it should be considered as both a primary and potentially definitive treatment for life threatening LGI bleeds.

Outer mitochondrial membrane cytochrome b5 (OM b5) is the most thermostable cytochrome b5 isoform presently known. Herein, we show that OM b5 thermal stability is substantially enhanced by swapping an apparently invariant motif in its heme-independent folding core with the corresponding motif characteristic of its less stable evolutionary relative, microsomal cytochrome b5 (Mc b5). The motif swap involved replacing two residues, Arg15 with His and Glu20 with Ser, thereby introducing a Glu11-His15-Ser20 H-bonding triad on the protein surface along with a His15/Trp22 pi-stacking interaction. The ferric and ferrous forms of the OM b5 R15H/E20S double mutant have thermal denaturation midpoints (Tm values) of approximately 93 degrees C and approximately 104 degrees C, respectively. A 15 degrees C increase in apoprotein Tm plays a key role in the holoprotein thermal stability enhancement, and is achieved by one of the most common natural mechanisms for stabilization of thermophilic versus mesophilic proteins: raising the unfolding free energy along the entire stability curve.

We describe detailed studies of peptide-sandwiched mesohemes PSMA and PSMW, which comprise two histidine (His)-containing peptides covalently attached to the propionate groups of iron mesoporphyrin II. Some of the energy produced by ligation of the His side chains to Fe in the PSMs is invested in inducing helical conformations in the peptides. Replacing an alanine residue in each peptide of PSMA with tryptophan (Trp) to give PSMW generates additional energy via Trp side chain-porphyrin interactions, which enhances the peptide helicity and stability of the His-ligated state. The structural change strengthened His-FeIII ligation to a greater extent than His-FeII ligation, leading to a 56-mV negative shift in the midpoint reduction potential at pH 8 (Em,8 value). This is intriguing because converting PSMA to PSMW decreased heme solvent exposure, which would normally be expected to stabilize FeII relative to FeIII. This and other results presented herein suggest that differences in stability may be at least as important as differences in porphyrin solvent exposure in governing redox potentials of heme protein variants having identical heme ligation motifs. Support for this possibility is provided by the results of studies from our laboratories comparing the microsomal and mitochondrial isoforms of mammalian cytochrome b5. Our studies of the PSMs also revealed that reduction of FeIII to FeII reversed the relative affinities of the first and second His ligands for Fe (K2IIIK1III; K2IIK1II). We propose that this is a consequence of conformational mobility of the peptide components, coupled with the much greater ease with which FeII can be pulled from the mean plane of a porphyrin. An interesting consequence of this phenomenon, which we refer to as "dynamic strain", is that an exogenous ligand can compete with one of the His ligands in an FeII-PSM, a reaction accompanied by peptide helix unwinding. In this regard, the PSMs are better models of neuroglobin, CooA, and other six-coordinate ligand-sensing heme proteins than of stably bis(His)-ligated electron-transfer heme proteins such as cytochrome b5. Exclusive binding of exogenous ligands by the FeII form of PSMA led to positive shifts in its Em,8 value, which increases with increasing ligand strength. The possible relevance of this observation to the function of six-coordinate ligand-sensing heme proteins is discussed.

An empirical corroboration of two tenets of the philosopher Karl Popper's theses on epistemology.

The outer mitochondrial membrane isoform of mammalian cytochrome b 5 (OM b 5 ) is much less prone to lose heme than the microsomal isoform (Mc b 5 ), with a conserved difference at position 71 (leucine versus serine) playing a major role. We replaced Ser71 in Mc b 5 with Leu, with the prediction that it would retard heme loss by diminishing polypeptide expansion accompanying rupture of the histidine to iron bonds. The strategy was partially successful in that it slowed dissociation of heme from its less stable orientation in bMc b 5 (B). Heme dissociation from orientation A was accelerated to a similar extent, however, apparently owing to increased binding pocket dynamic mobility related to steric strain. A second mutation (L32I) guided by results of previous comparative studies of Mc and OM b 5 s diminished the steric strain, but much greater relief was achieved by replacing heme with iron deuteroporphyrin IX (FeDPIX). Indeed, the stability of the Mc S 7 I L b 5 FeDPIX complex is similar to that of the FeDPIX complex of OM b 5 . The results suggest that maximizing heme binding pocket compactness in the apo state is a useful general strategy for increasing the stability of engineered or designed proteins.

The most common cause of mortality among cystic fibrosis sufferers is infection by antibiotic resistant strains of Pseudomonas aeruginosa . Means to control these strains continue to be an important goal. An integral component of the ability of many of these strains to defy antibiotic therapies is the protection afforded by the mucoexopolysaccharide alginate. Production of alginate by P. aeruginosa is tightly regulated at the transcriptional level. AlgH, a putative transcriptional regulator, is involved in regulating alginate biosynthesis as well as nucleoside diphosphate kinase activity and succinyl coenzyme A synthetase activity in P. aeruginosa . Sequence homologues are found in many bacterial species. Here, we describe a method for high level overexpression and high yield/high purity production of AlgH for biophysical and functional studies. The algH gene was cloned and AlgH was overexpressed in Escherichia coli using a commercially available vector with an inducible T7 promoter. We purified the recombinantly produced protein using a rapid classical purification scheme. The yield of purified protein, either isotopically labeled for NMR studies or unlabeled, is excellent (30–37 mg of purified protein per liter of minimal media culture), as is the purity (>95% pure). Analysis of the secondary structure using circular dichroism and NMR indicates that the protein is comprised of both β-sheet and α-helical secondary structural elements. Heteronuclear NMR spectra indicate that AlgH is a monodisperse, folded globular protein. This rapid, high yield, and high purity method for AlgH production will permit further biophysical characterization of this protein including high resolution structural studies.

The microsomal (Mc) and mitochondrial (OM) isoforms of mammalian cytochrome b5 are the products of different genes, which likely arose via duplication of a primordial gene and subsequent functional divergence. Despite sharing essentially identical folds, heme-polypeptide interactions are stronger in OM b5s than in Mc b5s due to the presence of two conserved patches of hydrophobic amino acid side chains in the OM heme binding pockets. This is of fundamental interest in terms of understanding heme protein structure-function relationships, because stronger heme-polypeptide interactions in OM b5s in comparison to Mc b5s may represent a key source of their more negative reduction potentials. Herein we provide evidence that interactions amongst the amino acid side chains contributing to the hydrophobic patches in rat OM (rOM) b5 persist when heme is removed, rendering the empty heme binding pocket of rOM apo-b5 more compact and less conformationally dynamic than that in bovine Mc (bMc) apo-b5. This may contribute to the stronger heme binding by OM apo-b5 by reducing the entropic penalty associated with polypeptide folding. We also show that when bMc apo-b5 unfolds it adopts a structure that is more compact and contains greater nonrandom secondary structure content than unfolded rOM apo-b5. We propose that a more robust beta-sheet in Mc apo-b5s compensates for the absence of the hydrophobic packing interactions that stabilize the heme binding pocket in OM apo-b5s.