Cell locomotion: new research tests old ideas on membrane and cytoskeletal flow

Recent studies on the mobility of membrane markers on crawling cells indicate that there is no long-range centripetal flow of membrane proteins or lipids during cell locomotion. In this article we reflect on the history of ideas about membrane flow in cells, and we discuss how these new findings will shift the focus of research in cell locomotion away from the cell surface to the molecular interactions and dynamics of the actin cytoskeleton.     

The promise of new ideas and new technology for improving teaching and learning

There have been enormous advances in our understanding of human learning in the past three decades. There have also been important advances in our understanding of the nature of knowledge and new knowledge creation. These advances, when combined with the explosive development of the Internet and other technologies, permit advances in educational practices at least as important as the invention of the printing press in 1460. We have built on the cognitive learning theory of David Ausubel and various sources of new ideas on epistemology. Our research program has focused on understanding meaningful learning and on developing better methods to achieve such learning and to assess progress in meaningful learning. The concept map tool developed in our program has proved to be highly effective both in promoting meaningful learning and in assessing learning outcomes. Concept mapping strategies are also proving powerful for eliciting, capturing, and archiving knowledge of experts and organizations. New technology for creating concept maps developed at the University of West Florida permits easier and better concept map construction, thus facilitating learning, knowledge capture, and local or distance creation and sharing of structured knowledge, especially when utilized with the Internet. A huge gap exists between what we now know to improve learning and use of knowledge and the practices currently in place in most schools and corporations. There are promising projects in progress that may help to achieve accelerated advances. These include projects in schools at all educational levels, including projects in Colombia, Costa Rica, Italy, Spain, and the United States, and collaborative projects with corporate organizations and distance learning projects. Results to date have been encouraging and suggest that we may be moving from the lag phase of educational innovation to a phase of exponential growth.     

Geophysiological modeling: new ideas on modeling the evolution of ecosystems.

Living organisms evolve within ecological associations (from ecosystems to the biosphere) that are constituted by a biological component and a physico-chemical component. It is generally supposed that interactions such as competition and predation between the biological components of ecosystems are the main cause for the observed organization of ecosystems. We believe that in the search for a more comprehensive theory of evolution a much greater attention should be paid to the ways in which living organisms interact with the physico-chemical environment. To test our ideas, we develop a mathematical model to study the evolution of ecosystems, and we apply it to the study of hydrothermal vents. The model proposed is still a qualitative model. It tries to study, in a first approximation, the behaviours of the biological and chemical components. In the following we hope to develop and to improve it so to give a more realistic model.     

The emergence of abstract ideas: evidence from networks and babies

What is abstraction? In our view, abstraction is generalization. Specifically, we propose that abstract concepts emerge as the natural product of associative learning and generalization by similarity. We support this proposal by presenting evidence for two ideas: first, that children''s knowledge about how categories are organized and how words refer to them can be explained as learned generalizations over specific experiences of words referring to categories; and second, that the path of concepts from concrete to more abstract can be observed throughout development and that even in their more abstract form, concepts retain some of their original sensory basis. We illustrate these two facts by examining, in two kinds of learners--networks and young children--the development of three abstract ideas: (i) the idea of word; (ii) the idea of object; and (iii) the idea of substance.     

Art and the Twenty-First Century Gift: Corporate Philanthropy and Government Funding in the Cultural Sector

Marcel Mauss's work on the archaic gift contributes to understandings of corporate and government support of arts organisations, or ‘institutional funding’. His approach allows us to see institutional funding as a gift that is embedded in a system of exchange wherein gifts come with a variety of obligations, and self-interest and disinterestedness are inseparable. The institutional gift operates through money and contracts; nevertheless, it entails obligations to give, to receive, and to reciprocate. This system of obligations has been joined, in the contemporary institutional gift, by another obligation: the obligation to ask.

Institutional funding of the arts has acquired additional twenty-first-century elements. The article elaborates these, using the UK as an example. It also argues that the ambivalence felt by some members of the arts world about institutional funding stems, in large part, from the obligations inherent in the gift. The recent imposition of the neo-liberal model into the arts is an intrinsic part of the exchange between institutional funders and arts organisations. Given that Mauss's work is strongly anti-liberal and anti-utilitarian, it is ironic that his ideas should prove so useful for understanding a form of twenty-first-century gift in which neo-liberalism plays such a crucial role.     

Bright ideas to market your department

Nobody can do everything discussed in this article. Choose several ideas and try them. Increase your profile by letting more people in the hospital know who you are, what you do, when you do it, and how you do it. Get noticed and develop a reputation as the "go to" department. It will be worth the effort and increase your stature within the hospital. It may also help you get more staff and assume additional duties. Most of all, it will increase the respect of your department, and promote a more smoothly operating asset management system.     

Probiotics and health: new facts and ideas

Many trials on probiotics are now published that use established methods to demonstrate their clinical efficacy. Convincing progress has been made in the field of inflammatory bowel disease and allergy prevention in infants. Experimental studies show clear differences (and even sometimes opposite effects) between apparently closely related probiotics and suggest new mechanisms for the observed effects, such as immunostimulation by bacterial DNA and interaction with Toll-like receptors and dendritic cells in the gastrointestinal tract.     

Philosophical ideas and scientific practice: A note on the empiricism of T.H. Morgan

In a reply to Marga Vicedo the philosophical inconsistency of Morgan is emphasized. It is argued that even if a strict classification of scientists according to their philosophical position is not possible, their science may still be influenced by their philosophical ideas. Finally it is suggested that philosophical ideas influence science less by a direct effect on the scientists than indirectly through science policy and administration.     

“再野化”:山水林田湖草生态保护修复的新思路

作为一种新兴的生态保护修复方法,“再野化”（rewilding）是指特定区域中荒野程度的提升过程,尤其强调提升生态系统韧性和维持生物多样性。再野化实践的核心要素包括保护核心荒野地、增加荒野地的连通性、保护和重引入关键种（包括大型食肉动物）、适度允许自然干扰的发生、降低人类干扰和管理程度、拆除部分人工基础设施等。评述了北美洲和欧洲的再野化实践。通过比较研究,提出基于再野化的我国山水林田湖草生态保护修复的新思路,包括战略层面的5项转变和行动层面的5项建议。5项战略转变,包括从还原论思维转向整体思维、从工程性修复转向保护优先和自然恢复为主、从项目尺度转向景观尺度、从短期试点转向长期实践、从政府主导转向多方参与;5项行动建议,包括开展荒野和再野化基础调查、保护仅存的高价值荒野地、探索“城-乡-野”系统性再野化途径、以荒野保护区和再野化区域为核心建立大尺度景观保护网络、开展基于再野化的生态体验和自然教育。     

Picornaviral processing: some new ideas

Mature picornaviral proteins are derived by progressive, post-translational cleavage of a giant precursor polyprotein. At least three viral-encoded proteolytic activities are involved in the processing. The first cleavage takes place while the polyprotein is still nascent on a ribosome. In poliovirus, this event is probably catalyzed by peptide 2A, a protein from the middle portion of the genome. Most subsequent processing is effected by viral protease 3C, a thiol-type enzyme, responsible for eight to ten self-cleaving and autocatalytic reactions within the polyprotein. The final proteolytic processing event, maturation of the VPO peptide, may occur by a novel, autocatalytic, serine-type mechanism, where viral RNA serves as proton-acceptor during the cleavage reaction.     

A brief summary of my ideas on evolution

A brief summary of my current ideas on evolution is presented. Three recent books that represent important synopses of evolution are considered in the discussion. Differences between plants and animals that have important implications for evolution in the two groups are discussed. Progress in understanding plant evolution requires synthetic studies integrating data from many different areas of research.     

Observation, objectivity, and the conflict of ideas

The first two terms of this title are clear, representing, respectively, the guiding motto of the Society, and the common thread that unites members with very diverse interests and approaches to the understanding of behavior. Then, the last part of the title is elaborated: the conflict of ideas. This aspect is important both in terms of social values, and in terms of the interests of a scientific society operating in the modern world. Within science, there are forces that weaken genuine scientific discussion, and these need at least to be explicated so that their deleterious effects can be minimized. Finally, it is suggested that although the Society has done well in facilitating oral discussion, there is room for improvement in its readiness to engage in written intellectual conflict.     

Problems and action ideas discussed by first- and second-generation female east asian students during dream sessions.

Using Consensual Qualitative Research-Cases (CQR-C), we investigated differences in types of problems and action ideas of 7 first- and 7 second-generation female students of Asian origin as expressed in relation to working with dreams. Interpersonal issues and academic/postgraduation/career issues were typical for both groups, but first-generation Asian women more often disclosed concerns related to immigration/cultural/adjustment and distress related to physical/health issues than did second-generation Asian-American women. In terms of action ideas, both groups typically proposed interpersonal behavioral changes, but first-generation Asian women proposed changes in their thoughts and feelings more often than did second-generation Asian women. Implications for practice and research are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Bodies and borders: a new cultural history of medicine

Both medicine and the history of medicine have seen many changes in the last four decades. The way we tell the story of medical developments no longer concentrates on the important doctors and their ideas. The influences of social history in the 1960s and 1970s and cultural history in the 1980s and 1990s have broadened and enriched the interpretations of our medical past. The social historians have helped us to include politics, economics, and the leading ideas of any period we wanted to study; the cultural approach has added ethnography as well as an emphasis on language or discourse.Today there is a new history of medicine, one far more willing to cross disciplinary boundaries to ask questions about how we know what we know and why we do what we do.This article highlights some of the work in the adjoining fields of medical anthropology and of literature and medicine to demonstrate new interests, new questions, and new methods of inquiry. However, although we have cast our nets far more widely in the process of professionalizing the history of medicine, there is a question about whether we have lost the appeal to one of our core constituencies: medical students and physicians. We need to welcome some of the new changes in medical history as in medicine itself; the common goal is to achieve a better understanding of what we have done and what we are doing.     

The core principles ("big ideas") of physiology: results of faculty surveys

Physiology faculty members at a wide range of institutions (2-yr colleges to medical schools) were surveyed to determine what core principles of physiology they want their students to understand. From the results of the first survey, 15 core principles were described. In a second survey, respondents were asked to rank order these 15 core principles and, independently, to identify the three most important for their students to understand. The five most important core principles were "cell membrane," "homeostasis," "cell-to-cell communications," "interdependence," and "flow down gradients." We then "unpacked" the flow down gradients core principle into the component ideas of which it is comprised. This unpacking was sent to respondents who were asked to identify the importance of each of the component ideas. Respondents strongly agreed with the importance of the component ideas we had identified. We will be using the responses to our surveys as we begin the development of a conceptual assessment of physiology instrument (i.e., a concept inventory).     

Imperfect eggs and oviform nymphs: a history of ideas about the origins of insect metamorphosis

The problem of insect metamorphosis has inspired naturalistsfor centuries. One question that often arises is why some insects,such as butterflies and bees, undergo a fairly radical metamorphosiswhile others, such as crickets and lice, do not. Even beforethe concept of homology emerged scientists speculated whichstage found in more direct-developing insects would correspondwith the pupal stage of metamorphosing insects. William Harvey(1651) considered the pupal stage to be a continuation of embryonicevents, calling it a "second egg." Since then variations ofthis idea have emerged over the centuries of scientific researchand have been supported by a wide variety of methods and rationales.This review will follow those ideas and the ideas that emergedin opposition to them to the present state of the field.     

Harry Harlow: Lessons on explanations,ideas, and mentorship

Harry F. Harlow died on December 6, 1981, in Tucson, Arizona. An examination of the process of his professional contributions reveals an intensely antagonistic attitude toward simplistic explanations of psychological phenomena, and a willingness to entertain experimental ideas born in a wide variety of ways. Harlow exemplified these attitudes by designing often disarmingly simple experiments which served as crucial rejoinders to firmly stated explanatory positions. It is also clear that Harlow considered his own constructions as fair game for this style of direct analysis. As a person, Harlow is pictured as a loyal, laissez faire mentor who desired affection but not academic conformity.     

Regulated exocytosis: merging ideas on fusing membranes

Cellular trafficking pathways end with fusion reactions at the target. These reactions have been studied extensively for many decades, but recent studies have been particularly productive in providing new solutions to old problems, especially in some of the most complex fusion reactions, like synaptic vesicle secretion in neurons. Here, we discuss new studies that begin to merge ideas on three central questions: (A) are all releasable vesicles equally likely to undergo fusion, (B) do different fusion modes contribute to synaptic transmission, and (C) which molecular events are 'upstream' and which ones 'downstream' of SNARE complex assembly.     

Protein folding mechanisms: new methods and emerging ideas

During the past year, advances in our understanding of folding mechanisms have been made through detailed experimental and theoretical studies of a number of proteins. The development of new methods has allowed the earliest events in folding to be probed and the measurement of folding at the level of individual molecules is now possible, opening the door to exciting new experiments.