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Referrals To A Regional Allergy Clinic - An Eleven Year Audit., Ray B. Jones, Paul Hewson, Edward R. Kaminski Dec 2010

Referrals To A Regional Allergy Clinic - An Eleven Year Audit., Ray B. Jones, Paul Hewson, Edward R. Kaminski

School of Nursing and Midwifery

BACKGROUND: Allergy is a serious and apparently increasing public health problem yet relatively little is known about the types of allergy seen in routine tertiary practice, including their spatial distribution, co-occurrence or referral patterns. This study reviewed referrals over an eleven year period to a regional allergy clinic that had a well defined geographical boundary. For those patients confirmed as having an allergy we explored: (i) differences over time and by demographics, (ii) types of allergy, (iii) co-occurrence, and (iv) spatial distributions. METHODS: Data were extracted from consultant letters to GPs, from September 1998 to September 2009, for patients confirmed …


Tests Of The Elaborated Intrusion Theory Of Craving And Desire: Features Of Alcohol Craving During Treatment For An Alcohol Disorder, David J. Kavanagh, Jon May, Jackie Andrade Dec 2010

Tests Of The Elaborated Intrusion Theory Of Craving And Desire: Features Of Alcohol Craving During Treatment For An Alcohol Disorder, David J. Kavanagh, Jon May, Jackie Andrade

School of Psychology

No abstract provided.


Mate Choice In Fish: A Review, Hannah Gardner Dec 2010

Mate Choice In Fish: A Review, Hannah Gardner

The Plymouth Student Scientist

Literature review


The Effect Of Forest Edges On The Community Structure Of Tropical Fruit-Feeding Butterflies, Claire Armstrong Dec 2010

The Effect Of Forest Edges On The Community Structure Of Tropical Fruit-Feeding Butterflies, Claire Armstrong

The Plymouth Student Scientist

Artificial edges in tropical forests are known to have profound effects on microclimate, tree mortality, forest structure, and community composition. While edges between continuous forest and clear felled stands have been well-researched, less attention has been paid to the effects of logging roads and smaller tracks. This study focuses on the effect a small (2-3m wide) road has on the community structure of the guild of fruit-feeding Nymphalidae butterflies in Sabah, Borneo. Traps were hung at ground-level along the road and 100m into the adjacent primary forest. In total, 43 individuals from 17 species were caught. Both the edge and …


Moderating The Influence Of A Prime: Can Self-Focused Attention Inhibit Response Preparation Behaviour In An Interpersonal Context?, Alexandra C. Wyatt-Barton Dec 2010

Moderating The Influence Of A Prime: Can Self-Focused Attention Inhibit Response Preparation Behaviour In An Interpersonal Context?, Alexandra C. Wyatt-Barton

The Plymouth Student Scientist

Research into the effects of focused attention on prime-to-behaviour effects indicates that heightened self-focus can eliminate stereotype and trait activation. The present research investigated the influence of focused attention on prime-to-behaviour effects after the exposure to a threatening social group (‘hoodies’). In particular it was predicted that focusing on an irrelevant target after ‘hoodie’ priming would result in response preparation behaviour whereas self-focusing would inhibit it. Results revealed that self-focusing does indeed inhibit response preparation behaviour during an interpersonal context but failed to show the opposite effect for non self-focusing. This suggests that purely focusing attention away from prime related …


Developing Students As Researchers - It's All A Muddle, Pauline Kneale Dec 2010

Developing Students As Researchers - It's All A Muddle, Pauline Kneale

The Plymouth Student Scientist

Prof Pauline Kneale, Director, The Higher Education Academy Subject Centre for Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences


Beneficial Roles Of Microorganisms In The Coral Reef Ecosystem, Katie R. Laming Dec 2010

Beneficial Roles Of Microorganisms In The Coral Reef Ecosystem, Katie R. Laming

The Plymouth Student Scientist

Coral reef biodiversity has declined over the past few decades and despite recent significant scientific interest in reefs in light of noticeable effects of climate change on this fragile habitat there is still much undiscovered about the true diversity of the symbiont community. There is also much to ascertain about underlying holobiont mechanisms relating to beneficial properties resident bacteria possess to help their hosts defend themselves from pathogenic xenobacteria or how symbionts provide the holobiont and other reef organisms with nutrition by utilising the carbon and nitrogen cycles. These are some of the questions addressed in this literature review. It …


The Effect Of Different Dosages Of Caffeine On Time To Exhaustion In Prolonged Exercise In Trained Athletes (A Meta Analysis), Kristina Marshall Dec 2010

The Effect Of Different Dosages Of Caffeine On Time To Exhaustion In Prolonged Exercise In Trained Athletes (A Meta Analysis), Kristina Marshall

The Plymouth Student Scientist

Background The world anti doping organisation removed caffeine from the banned list of substances in 2004; yet, research shows over recent years caffeine has become one of the most widely used ergogenic aids by athletes in the UK. This analysis investigates one of the suggested ergogenic benefits of caffeine, increasing time to exhaustion, and whether this effect relates to specific dosages of caffeine ingested before exercise. Objectives To assess the effects of two different dosages of caffeine on trained athlete’s time to exhaustion in endurance exercise. Search methods “caffeine” and “time to exhaustion” were entered into Pubmed, Scirus and Google …


The Effect Of Physiological Arousal On Item And Associative Memory Consolidation, Lucinda Sturton Dec 2010

The Effect Of Physiological Arousal On Item And Associative Memory Consolidation, Lucinda Sturton

The Plymouth Student Scientist

This article does not feature an abstract.


Using A Community Of Practice To Develop Standards Of Practice And Education For Genetic Counsellors In Europe, H Skirton, C Patch, M-A Voelckel Dec 2010

Using A Community Of Practice To Develop Standards Of Practice And Education For Genetic Counsellors In Europe, H Skirton, C Patch, M-A Voelckel

School of Nursing and Midwifery

The profession of genetic counselling is developing in Europe in response to the increased need for genetic healthcare. Standards of education and professional practice are needed to ensure that patients are provided with genetic counselling of an appropriate quality. However, such standards need to be relevant to practitioners in many different national and healthcare settings. In order to develop appropriate standards and a code of practice to guide professionals in Europe, we formed a community of practice that includes genetic nurses and counsellors, plus other interested health professionals, from 23 European countries. With reference to the European core competences for …


Losing Our Way?: Declining Outdoor Opportunities For Learning For Children Aged Between 2 And 11, Sj Waite Dec 2010

Losing Our Way?: Declining Outdoor Opportunities For Learning For Children Aged Between 2 And 11, Sj Waite

Plymouth Institute of Education

This paper draws on three related empirical studies in the South West of England: a survey of outdoor experiential learning opportunities, examining attitudes, practice and aspirations of practitioners and children in educational and care settings for children between 2–11 years within a rural county; a follow-up series of five case studies; and an ongoing ESRC funded study of outdoor learning practice across the transition between Foundation Stage and Year 1 in two city-based schools. It charts the journey of outdoor learning from early years to primary practice in England and indicates the ‘navigational tools’ used by practitioners and the possibly …


Biparental Mucus Feeding: A Unique Example Of Parental Care In An Amazonian Cichlid., Jonathan Buckley, Richard J. Maunder, Andrew Foey, Janet Pearce, Adalberto L. Val, Katherine A. Sloman Nov 2010

Biparental Mucus Feeding: A Unique Example Of Parental Care In An Amazonian Cichlid., Jonathan Buckley, Richard J. Maunder, Andrew Foey, Janet Pearce, Adalberto L. Val, Katherine A. Sloman

School of Biomedical Sciences

Vertebrates display a wide variety of parental care behaviours, including the guarding of offspring pre and post nutritional independence as well as the direct provision of nutrients during the early development period. The Amazonian cichlid Symphysodon spp. (discus fish) is unusual among fish species, in that both parents provide offspring with mucus secretions to feed from after hatching. This extensive provision of care, which can last up to a month, imposes a physiological demand on both parents and gives rise to conflict between the parent and offspring. Here, we investigated the relationship between parents and offspring during a breeding cycle, …


Association Between The Squat Lobster Gastroptychus Formosus And Cold-Water Corals In The North Atlantic, Guilloux E Le, J. M. Hall-Spencer, M. K. Söffker, K. Olu Nov 2010

Association Between The Squat Lobster Gastroptychus Formosus And Cold-Water Corals In The North Atlantic, Guilloux E Le, J. M. Hall-Spencer, M. K. Söffker, K. Olu

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

Although there are no previous descriptions of the habits of chirostylids in the North Atlantic, it is likely that species in the genera Uroptychus, Eumunida and Gastroptychus have close ecological ties with deep-sea corals since they have all been recorded in trawl samples containing corals from ∼200m depth. We analysed in situ distribution of Gastroptychus formosus and potential hosts using a ROV at a range of north-eastern Atlantic sites and found that this species forms a close association with deep-sea corals that resembles the chirostylid-anthozoan associations reported in shallow Indo-Pacific waters. We update the known distribution for G. formosus, confirming …


Effects Of Dietary Mannan Oligosaccharide (Mos) Supplementation In Relation To Intestinal Integrity, Microbiota, Health And Production Of Cultured Fish Species, Arkadios Dimitroglou Nov 2010

Effects Of Dietary Mannan Oligosaccharide (Mos) Supplementation In Relation To Intestinal Integrity, Microbiota, Health And Production Of Cultured Fish Species, Arkadios Dimitroglou

School of Biological and Marine Sciences Theses

A series of investigations were conducted in order to evaluate the effect of MOS supplementation in finfish aquaculture. Fish with great potential in aquaculture industry were tested with regards to effect of dietary MOS supplementation on intestinal histology and microbiology as well as overall animal health and production. Two levels of MOS supplementation were applied 0.2% and 0.4%. Experimental fish were Atlantic salmon (Salmon salar), rainbow trout (Oncorhynchys mykiss), sole (Solea senegalensis) and gilthead sea bream (Sparus aurata). The results from the sea bream studies revealed that MOS supplementation may have a beneficial effect on growth performance of fish greater …


Climate Change And The Green Energy Paradox: The Consequences For Twaite Shad Alosa Fallax From The River Severn, U.K., Mw Aprahamian, Cd Aprahamian, Am Knights Nov 2010

Climate Change And The Green Energy Paradox: The Consequences For Twaite Shad Alosa Fallax From The River Severn, U.K., Mw Aprahamian, Cd Aprahamian, Am Knights

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

A stock–recruitment model with a temperature component was used to estimate the effect of an increase in temperature predicted by climate change projections on population persistence and distribution of twaite shad Alosa fallax. An increase of 1 and 2° C above the current mean summer (June to August) water temperature of 17·8° C was estimated to result in a three and six-fold increase in the population, respectively. Climate change is also predicted to result in an earlier commencement to their spawning migration into fresh water. The model was expanded to investigate the effect of any additional mortality that might arise …


Patient-Orientated Longitudinal Study Of Multiple Sclerosis In South West England (The South West Impact Of Multiple Sclerosis Project, Swims) 1: Protocol And Baseline Characteristics Of Cohort., John P. Zajicek, Wendy M. Ingram, Jane Vickery, Siobhan Creanor, Dave E. Wright, Jeremy C. Hobart Oct 2010

Patient-Orientated Longitudinal Study Of Multiple Sclerosis In South West England (The South West Impact Of Multiple Sclerosis Project, Swims) 1: Protocol And Baseline Characteristics Of Cohort., John P. Zajicek, Wendy M. Ingram, Jane Vickery, Siobhan Creanor, Dave E. Wright, Jeremy C. Hobart

Peninsula Medical School

BACKGROUND: There is a need for greater understanding of the impact of multiple sclerosis (MS) from the perspective of individuals with the condition. The South West Impact of MS Project (SWIMS) has been designed to improve understanding of disease impact using a patient-centred approach. The purpose is to (1) develop improved measurement instruments for clinical trials, (2) evaluate longitudinal performance of a variety of patient-reported outcome measures, (3) develop prognostic predictors for use in individualising drug treatment for patients, particularly early on in the disease course. METHODS: This is a patient-centred, prospective, longitudinal study of multiple sclerosis and clinically isolated …


Marine Plankton Phenology And Life History In A Changing Climate: Current Research And Future Directions, R Ji, M Edwards, Dl Mackas, Ja Runge, Ac Thomas Oct 2010

Marine Plankton Phenology And Life History In A Changing Climate: Current Research And Future Directions, R Ji, M Edwards, Dl Mackas, Ja Runge, Ac Thomas

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

Increasing availability and extent of biological ocean time series (from both in situ and satellite data) have helped reveal significant phenological variability of marine plankton. The extent to which the range of this variability is modified as a result of climate change is of obvious importance. Here we summarize recent research results on phenology of both phytoplankton and zooplankton. We suggest directions to better quantify and monitor future plankton phenology shifts, including (i) examining the main mode of expected future changes (ecological shifts in timing and spatial distribution to accommodate fixed environmental niches vs. evolutionary adaptation of timing controls to …


Teaching And Research Within Further Education Colleges: Chalk And Cheese?, M Mason, J Bardsley, J Mann, R Turner Oct 2010

Teaching And Research Within Further Education Colleges: Chalk And Cheese?, M Mason, J Bardsley, J Mann, R Turner

Plymouth Institute of Education

The expansion of Higher Education (HE) into Further Education (FE) Colleges has resulted in college lecturers with responsibility for teaching HE courses experiencing considerable changes in their working practices. College lecturers have worked collaboratively with universities to develop HE courses and been presented with opportunities to engage in scholarly activity and research. This paper draws on the experience of a group of college lecturers who undertook research into aspects of their teaching practice through an initiative introduced by the Higher Education Learning Partnerships (HELP) Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL). Through a series of semi-structured interviews, this paper …


Selective Self-Categorization: Meaningful Categorization And The In-Group Persuasion Effect, Na Wyer Sep 2010

Selective Self-Categorization: Meaningful Categorization And The In-Group Persuasion Effect, Na Wyer

School of Psychology

Research stemming from self-categorization theory (Turner et al., 1987) has demonstrated that individuals are typically more persuaded by messages from their in-group than by messages from the out-group. The present research investigated the role of issue relevance in moderating these effects. In particular, it was predicted that in-groups would only be more persuasive when the dimension on which group membership was defined was meaningful or relevant to the attitude issue. In two studies, participants were presented with persuasive arguments from either an in-group source or an out-group source, where the basis of the in-group/out-group distinction was either relevant or irrelevant …


Stereotyping Starlings Are More ‘Pessimistic’, Bo Brilot, L Asher, M Bateson Sep 2010

Stereotyping Starlings Are More ‘Pessimistic’, Bo Brilot, L Asher, M Bateson

School of Biological and Marine Sciences

Negative affect in humans and animals is known to cause individuals to interpret ambiguous stimuli pessimistically, a phenomenon termed 'cognitive bias'. Here, we used captive European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris) to test the hypothesis that a reduction in environmental conditions, from enriched to non-enriched cages, would engender negative affect, and hence 'pessimistic' biases. We also explored whether individual differences in stereotypic behaviour (repetitive somersaulting) predicted 'pessimism'. Eight birds were trained on a novel conditional discrimination task with differential rewards, in which background shade (light or dark) determined which of two covered dishes contained a food reward. The reward was small when …


The Exposure Of Shipping Firms’ Stock Returns To Financial Risks And Oil Prices: A Global Perspective, Ahmed A. El-Masry, John Pointon, Mojisola Olugbode Sep 2010

The Exposure Of Shipping Firms’ Stock Returns To Financial Risks And Oil Prices: A Global Perspective, Ahmed A. El-Masry, John Pointon, Mojisola Olugbode

Plymouth Business School

Shipping is an industry that is highly geared towards international trade and therefore, would seem to be highly susceptible to fluctuations in macroeconomic factors. This article investigates the impact of exchange rates, interest rates and oil prices on stock returns of 143 shipping companies from 16 countries. We also investigate the factors which determine the extent to which firm are sensitive to macroeconomic variables. Our results indicate that the low incidence of significant exposure to exchange rate and interest rates suggests that most shipping firms have utilised reasonably successful hedging strategies to reduce the impact of these macroeconomic risks. Finally, …


Integration Of Action And Language Knowledge: A Roadmap For Developmental Robotics, A Cangelosi, G Metta, G Sagerer, S Nolfi, C Nehaniv, K Fischer, J Tani, T Belpaeme, G Sandini, F Nori, L Fadiga, B Wrede, K Rohlfing, E Tuci, K Dautenhahn, J Saunders, A Zeschel Sep 2010

Integration Of Action And Language Knowledge: A Roadmap For Developmental Robotics, A Cangelosi, G Metta, G Sagerer, S Nolfi, C Nehaniv, K Fischer, J Tani, T Belpaeme, G Sandini, F Nori, L Fadiga, B Wrede, K Rohlfing, E Tuci, K Dautenhahn, J Saunders, A Zeschel

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

This position paper proposes that the study of embodied cognitive agents, such as humanoid robots, can advance our understanding of the cognitive development of complex sensorimotor, linguistic, and social learning skills. This in turn will benefit the design of cognitive robots capable of learning to handle and manipulate objects and tools autonomously, to cooperate and communicate with other robots and humans, and to adapt their abilities to changing internal, environmental, and social conditions. Four key areas of research challenges are discussed, specifically for the issues related to the understanding of: 1) how agents learn and represent compositional actions; 2) how …


A Review Of Human Factors Principles For The Design And Implementation Of Medication Safety Alerts In Clinical Information Systems, S Phansalkar, J Edworthy, E Hellier, Dl Seger, Et Al Sep 2010

A Review Of Human Factors Principles For The Design And Implementation Of Medication Safety Alerts In Clinical Information Systems, S Phansalkar, J Edworthy, E Hellier, Dl Seger, Et Al

School of Psychology

The objective of this review is to describe the implementation of human factors principles for the design of alerts in clinical information systems. First, we conduct a review of alarm systems to identify human factors principles that are employed in the design and implementation of alerts. Second, we review the medical informatics literature to provide examples of the implementation of human factors principles in current clinical information systems using alerts to provide medication decision support. Last, we suggest actionable recommendations for delivering effective clinical decision support using alerts. A review of studies from the medical informatics literature suggests that many …


Symmetry Breaking, Conformal Geometry And Gauge Invariance, Anton Ilderton, Martin Lavelle, David Mcmullan Aug 2010

Symmetry Breaking, Conformal Geometry And Gauge Invariance, Anton Ilderton, Martin Lavelle, David Mcmullan

School of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

When the electroweak action is rewritten in terms of SU(2) gauge-invariant variables, the Higgs can be interpreted as a conformal metric factor. We show that asymptotic flatness of the metric is required to avoid a Gribov problem: without it, the new variables fail to be nonperturbatively gauge invariant. We also clarify the relations between this approach and unitary gauge fixing, and the existence of similar transformations in other gauge theories.


Six Decades Of Agricultural Land Use Change In Bangladesh: Effects On Crop Diversity, Productivity, Food Availability And The Environment, 1948-2006, S Rahman Jul 2010

Six Decades Of Agricultural Land Use Change In Bangladesh: Effects On Crop Diversity, Productivity, Food Availability And The Environment, 1948-2006, S Rahman

School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences

This paper provides a detailed analysis of agricultural land use change in Bangladesh over a 59-year period (1948-2006) and examines how these have impacted crop diversity, productivity, food availability and the environment. The key findings of the analysis are: first, land use intensity has increased significantly over this period, mainly from the widespread adoption of a rice-based Green Revolution technology package beginning in the early 1960s; second, contrary to expectation, crop diversity too has increased; third, although land productivity has increased significantly, declines in the productivity of fertilizers and pesticides raise doubts over sustaining agricultural growth; fourth, food availability has …


The Cytotoxic Effect Of Glycerophospholipid: Cholesterol Acyltransferase (Gcat) On Mammalian And Fish Cell Lines In Vitro, Andrew Moriarty Jul 2010

The Cytotoxic Effect Of Glycerophospholipid: Cholesterol Acyltransferase (Gcat) On Mammalian And Fish Cell Lines In Vitro, Andrew Moriarty

The Plymouth Student Scientist

Glycerophospholipid: cholesterol acyltransferase (GCAT) is an enzyme produced by the bacteria Aeromonas salmonicida. A. salmonicida is the causative agents of the fish disease furunculosis and GCAT is an important enzyme when considering the virulence and progression of this disease. This study aims to show how the cytotoxic affects of the GCAT enzyme can vary between mammalian and fish cells. Both cloned and crude native forms of GCAT were exposed to mammalian and fish cell lines and observed for signs of damage over a 24 hour period. The cloned GCAT extraction was exposed to both fish and mammalian erythrocytes, while the …


The Mitochondrial Permeability Transition Pore Components, Zoltan Mohar Jul 2010

The Mitochondrial Permeability Transition Pore Components, Zoltan Mohar

The Plymouth Student Scientist

The mitochondrial permeability transition pore (MPTP) is a non-specific channel in the inner mitochondrial membrane (IMM) that opens following ischaemia and reperfusion due to the presence of various stimuli, such as oxidative stress, elevated phosphate concentration, and adenine nucleotide depletion. MPTP opening causes the mitochondria to swell and become dysfunctional. This results in cell death, especially by necrosis, due to the loss of oxidative phosphorylation and the subsequent drop in adenosine triphosphate levels. In search of the identity of the pore numerous studies have been done by several research groups in the last three decades. For many years a widely …


Characteristics Of Wool Fibres From Mule Sheep, Nicola Bishop Jul 2010

Characteristics Of Wool Fibres From Mule Sheep, Nicola Bishop

The Plymouth Student Scientist

A study was conducted to find out if there were any differences in the characteristics of wool fibres from mule sheep in sheep of different ages. Wool samples were taken from 91 North of England Mule Sheep from Seale Hayne Farm in Newton Abbot, Devon. The hypothesis tested was that there are no differences in the characteristics of wool fibres (greasy weight, clean weight, dirt content, mean length and mean diameter) due to the age of the sheep. The age of each sheep was determined by the number of pairs of incisor teeth located on their lower jaw according to …


The Mechanisms Of Marine Bacterial Interactions, Grace Phillips Jul 2010

The Mechanisms Of Marine Bacterial Interactions, Grace Phillips

The Plymouth Student Scientist

Bacteria are found in numerous habitats within the vast marine realm. Many marine bacteria live together as a biofilm which allows them to closely interact and intimately influence each other‟s lives, mainly by the production of extracellular compounds such as antibiotics and exopolysaccharides. Coordination of the biofilm and communication between bacteria is controlled by a mechanism known as quorum sensing in which signal molecules called autoinducers are released and detected, resulting in an alteration of behaviour. These activities ultimately have implications on other organisms; controlling populations of invertebrates and algae, and affecting the health of eukaryotes, a major cause for …


Abundance And Diversity Of Anuran Species In Danum Valley, Sabah, Borneo, Abigail Porter Jul 2010

Abundance And Diversity Of Anuran Species In Danum Valley, Sabah, Borneo, Abigail Porter

The Plymouth Student Scientist

1. Anurans are important components of tropical ecosystems; however, the biodiversity of these species is under threat due to the rapid deforestation of Southeast Asian forests. 2. Abundances and numbers of individuals of anuran species from three different sites were surveyed. One site being that of a relatively undisturbed primary Dipterocarp forest, the other two being disturbed habitats, a secondary forest recovering from logging and a drainage ditch which has formed a pool site. 3. Species abundance and numbers of individuals was significantly different P<0.05 between the three sites. The primary forest site showed higher mean abundances of species and individuals of anuran species, with the secondary forest having the lowest abundances and the pool site having an intermediate value. 4. Variables of temperature and light levels were shown to have an impact upon frog species, with the highest temperatures and light readings found in the sites with less species and individuals. pH was neutral for all three sites so was not seen as a consequence effecting anurans. 5. The differences in anuran abundances and species in the three sites may indicate that environmental factors may be having detrimental impacts on anurans. 6. The need to census amphibians has never been more urgent than it is now. Among herpetologists, there is a growing awareness that amphibians are declining and becoming extinct in many parts of the world.