Research Student Posters

BMRI - Business and Management Research Institute

The influence of enterprise resource planning (ERP) system in improving the quality of internal control

Hani Shaiti, Magdy Abdel-Kader, Syamarlah Rasaratnam
BMRI
Contact: hani.shaiti@beds.ac.uk

Investigating the contributions and challenges that face the improving of the quality of internal control by ERP systems.

Most of the prior studies focused on the impact of Enterprise Resource Planning System (ERP) on Sarbanes-Oxley Act (2002) and internal control factors in ERPs environment. However, this study will focus on the benefits and issues from using the ERP systems in relating to quality of internal control procedure. In addition, there is no research work that had used the Contingency theory to explain the relationship between ERP and internal control. Finally, the study is expected to come up with framework that can assist Stockholders, managements and auditors in verifying the Quality of the internal control. The research will use quantitative approach. The research paradigms will be positivism; it will involve deductive processes to test the observations. The questionnaire will be developed based on the literature review of prior studies and some interviews. Approximately 300 Saudi Arabia firms will be involved in this study and SPSS software will be use to analysis the data.

Manipulating the relationship between input task characteristics and performance on output tasks in language assessment

Carolyn Westbrook, Tony Green
BMRI; Southampton Solent University
Contact: carolyn.westbrook@beds.ac.uk

The effect of manipulating test task input in listening tasks on the output in written tasks within integrated language tests.

This poster will present the author's PhD research in the field of language testing. The author is investigating the relationship between input task characteristics and output task performance on integrated academic listening and writing tests, and the extent to which sensory preferences contribute to performance. The poster will show the planned research methodology and anticipated impacts of the research and the author would appreciate any feedback that is forthcoming.

Bachman L, A Palmer (1996) Language Testing in Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Suspected terrorists, who cares how they are treated?

Joe Stevens, Richard Lang
BMRI
Contact: joe.stevens@beds.ac.uk

The UN has ordered that those suspected of terrorist involvement must have all their assets frozen, but there is no effective appeal

The United Nations Security Council has implemented a number of binding resolutions in relation to the freezing of alleged terrorist assets which are required to be immediately implemented by all member states against those listed as being involved in terrorism. These smart or targeted sanctions are aimed at individuals, entities and organisations. The measures involved are draconian in their breath, onerous not only on those directly affected but also on their families and or employees. They are also without time limit. My main area of interest is due to the overarching control of the UN through its charter provisions, there is no effective legal remedy for those subjected to this regime that allows having their case reviewed by a tribunal capable of being able to give effective relief. My research poses the question 'How can we reconcile peace and security on the one hand and respect for and implementation of human rights on the other?'.

Developing a framework for evaluating e-government success

Obaid Almalki, Yanqing Duan, Arthur Money
BMRI; IRAC
Contact: obaid.almalki@beds.ac.uk

Developing an evaluation framework for e-government systems success based on information systems success theories, using e-government portals in Saudi Arabia.

The framework will, in the first instance, utilize Delone and Mclean IS success model with six dimensions (system quality, Information quality, service quality, use, user satisfaction, and net benefit) with proposed measures for e- government systems. The research will contribute to the field of evaluating e-government systems and will open the doors to other researchers to test the framework/model in order to obtain better results. This research is concerned with measurement issues and therefore, a quantitative approach is the most suitable to use. Special techniques will be developed for data collection. A deductive approach will be adopted beginning with a concept. Next, the empirical measures will be created to capture the concept easily and to express it in numbers. Also, this research uses the process of triangulation since it looks at the e-government evaluation from multiple points of view.

Factors affecting participation in online business communities: a conceptual framework

Abid Ahmad, Elly Philpott, Yanqing Duan
BMRI
Contact: abid.ahmad@beds.ac.uk

Helping Online B2B Community owners and managers to develop better understanding of the factors affecting active participation in Online B2B Communities.

The importance of online communities (OCs) for businesses has been acknowledged and well documented in the current literature. The success of any OC largely depends upon the members' active participation. Researchers have attempted to investigate factors affecting active participation in various types of OCs. However, the factors affecting active participation in business-to-business online business communities (B2B OBCs) needs to be further examined, since research in this field is still evolving. Hence, the primary purpose of this paper is to develop a better understanding on factors affecting active participation in these types of communities. Toward that goal, a conceptual framework is developed based on the Social Exchange Theory, Use and Gratification theory, and the Information Systems Success Model. This framework was further explored and tested using semi structured interview with seven members of B2B OBCs. The proposed framework provides a comprehensive overview of the factors may affect active participation in B2B OBCs.

The sustainability of Corporate Social Responsibility in the financial sector of developing countries: A Sub-Saharan African perspective

Linda Deigh, Jillian Farquhar, Carmine de Vito
BMRI
Contact: Linda.Deigh@beds.ac.uk



Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is increasingly being adopted by organisations as a strategic business approach, and subsequently for internal and external marketing communications. Research indicates that the specific challenges which organisations face in developing countries differ from those of the developed countries. Thus, Carroll’s pyramid of CSR (1991) which prioritises economic, legal, ethical and philanthropic components as the strategic approach cannot necessarily be standardised across different economic regions. This study contributes to existing research on strategic approach to CSR in developing countries, where the existing framework may have to be adapted or extended. The resultant CSR framework will serve as a useful framework for banks in developing economies to adopt to strategically develop and sustain their corporate social responsibility activities, and integrate them successfully with their marketing communication strategy.

Visser W (2007) Revisiting Carroll's CSR Pyramid: An African perspective, In Crane A, Matten D (eds.), Corporate Social Responsibility: Three Volume Set, London: Sage, 195-212

Governmental audit oversight in Egypt

Mohamed Khaled Eldaly, Magdy Abdel-Kader
BMRI
Contact: mohamed.eldaly@beds.ac.uk

A framework of the governmental audit oversight in Egypt

The research aims to discover how does the governmental audit inspection unit work in Egypt, what are the main elements of its framework and how these elements interact together to achieve its objectives. the following outcomes are expected: Identification of a framework of the governmental audit inspection unit in Egypt. Identification of the key success factors of the inspection unit's work. Exploration of the main problems of the audit profession and suggested solutions.

Performance management practices in NGOs; memoirs of NGO leaders

Billy Wadongo, Magdy Abdel-Kader, Georgios Sermpinis
BMRI
Contact: billy.wadongo@beds.ac.uk

We provide empirical evidence of PM Practices that influence NGOs performance in Kenya from memoirs of top Kenyan NGO executives.

Despite continuous calls for performance management (PM) research in Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and importance of performance management to NGOs, systematic review of literature reveals limited strategic PM research in NGOs (compared to private and public organisations). We provide empirical evidence of PM Practices that influence NGOs performance in Kenya from memoirs of top Kenyan NGO executives. The data collected was from six semi-structured interviews with the NGO executives and a focus group discussion with eight NGO managers in April 2011 as part of a research project utilising mixed research approach. Preliminary results reveal diverse PM practices as understood and used by NGO leaders in Kenya in terms of definition, implementation, reporting and management of performance as well as factors and challenges influencing these practices and effectiveness. We conclude that despite the nature of their work and organisations, the NGO leaders understand the importance of effective performance management systems in achievement of their intrinsic missions.

Investigating the cognitive validity of EAP reading-into-writing test tasks. A pilot study

Sathena H C Chan, Cyril J Weir
BMRI
Contact: Sathena.chan@beds.ac.uk

Examining the cognitive processes required to complete English for Academic Purposes (EAP) reading-into- writing test tasks.

Integrated writing test tasks, reading-into-writing in particular, are now considered more important in assessing academic writing by specialists in the field. However, the fact that large-scale EAP (English for Academic Purposes) tests hold diverse attitudes toward integrated writing tasks may well suggest a need to validate such task type. The purpose of this research is to investigate the cognitive validity of EAP reading-into-writing test tasks by comparing the cognitive processes required to complete EAP reading-into-writing test tasks with those processes required to complete predominant academic writing tasks in the Business School in one UK University. The poster will present the design of the study and some preliminary results of a pilot study which examined the cognitive processes elicited by a selected EAP reading-into-writing test task.

Shaw S, Weir C J (2007) Examining writing: Research and practice in assessing second language writing. Studies in Language Testing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Understanding the critical factors influencing the dynamic process of emerging ICT adoption in UK service SMEs

Sunday Eze, Yanqing Duan, Stephen Jackson
BMRI
Contact: sunday.eze@beds.ac.uk

Benefitting small service SMEs in adopting emerging ICT over time

This study reports on research in progress which aims to help service SMEs benefit from the application of emerging ICT by examining the dynamic process of technology adoption using Actor Network Theory (ANT).Traditional adoption theories have contributed to technology adoption studies in the past, but they have limitations in capturing the constant technology advancements and the evolutionary nature of technology adoption. While this PhD work investigates how service SMEs are engaged in emerging ICT adoption by focusing on the adoption process, the role of key actors and critical factors, this paper reports on the critical factors. 13 interviews in 10 service SMEs have been analysed using content analysis. The preliminary findings to date suggest that; technology preparedness, degree of community engagement, performance expectation and value anticipation are among the critical factors influencing the adoption of emerging ICT. ANT can be a fruitful framework for examining the dynamic process of emerging ICT adoption in UK service SMEs

A theoretical framework relating innovation strategy and business growth in SMEs

Roopa Aruvanahalli Nagaraju, Elly Philpott, Muhammad Azam Roomi, Yanqing Duan
BMRI
Contact: roopa.nagaraju@beds.ac.uk

Exploring the relationship between innovation strategy and business growth in SMEs

SMEs are considered to be innovative and an important part of economic growth. They have become the main focus of twentieth century researchers and policy makers. Innovation and strategy are main factors in the growth of the business and strategic management of innovation is a very important factor for success. Few studies address the influence of innovation strategy on business growth. With the literature review the author has developed a list of indicators for innovation, innovation strategy, performance and business growth. The research will explore the relationship between innovation strategy and business growth in high tech SMEs.

Using qualitative interviews to determine company attitudes to carbon emissions reduction in UK logistics operations

Jimmy Castro Boluarte, Yongmei Bentley, James Crabbe
BMRI
Contact: Jimmy.CastroBoluarte@beds.ac.uk

Initial findings of a qualitative study on the changes in the logistics operations of large UK-based companies in response to carbon emissions concerns

This research reports on the initial findings of a qualitative interviews approach for identifying and analysing changes in the logistics operations of five large UK-based companies in response to increasing concerns about carbon emissions in business operations. The study sheds light on the current state of UK logistics operations regarding carbon emissions. It also contributes to the understanding of how strategy is formed within logistics operations in response of changes in the environment, in this case the increased concern to reduce the carbon emissions from business operations. The study is relevant to practice, as it will assist logistics managers in the adoption of carbon emissions logistics initiatives, and help them embed these into the corporate logistics strategy.

Normal university life events: occurrence and perception

Steve Briggs, Devi Jankowicz
BMRI
Contact: steve.briggs@beds.ac.uk

The student experience is predictable in terms of when normal university life events occur and how these are perceived.

Students encounter life events whilst studying at university which can affect their progression. Some of these events occur randomly (such as death of a significant other) whereas other are more predictable (such as, completing assignments, forming friendships and undertaking employment) and so embody the 'normal' student experience. Although anecdotal evidence exists, very little research has established whether there are patterns in how students report experiencing normal university life events. To address this issue, a Student Life Event Questionnaire was developed which addressed the multiplicity of 'normal' experiences associated with studying. This was administered quasi-longitudinally to students from two fundamentally different types of course: professional (associated with a clear career direction) and generalist (not associated with a clear career direction). This poster presents how normal university life events were reported by students.

Understanding inter-firm networks and types of innovation in SMEs: a social network perspective

Meysam Poorkavoos, Yanqing Duan, John Edwards
BMRI; Aston University
Contact: Meysam.Poorkavoos@beds.ac.uk

Relationships between characteristics of inter-firm knowledge transfer networks and different types of innovation

Innovation is one of the key drivers for gaining competitive advantages in any firms. Understanding knowledge transfer through inter-firm networks and its effects on types of innovation in SMEs is very important in improving SMEs innovation. This study examines relationships between characteristics of inter-firm knowledge transfer networks and types of innovation in SMEs. To achieve this, social network perspective is adopted to understand inter-firm knowledge transfer networks and its impact on innovation by investigating how and to what extent ego network characteristics are affecting types of innovation. A conceptual model and research hypotheses are proposed to establish the possible relationships between network properties and types of innovation. Semi-structured interviews with managers of five SMEs have been carried out, and a thematic qualitative analysis of these interviews has been performed. The interviews helped to revise the questionnaire and provided preliminary evidence to support the hypotheses.

Post-purchase evaluation (P-PE) process in the dietary supplement consumption context: A Thai case

Sophapan Sunyansanoa, Jillian Farquhar, Barbara Czarnecka
BMRI
Contact: sophapan.sunyansanoa@beds.ac.uk

The importance of post-purchase evaluation (P-PE) factors can be leaded to consumer re-purchase which consists of customer satisfaction and customer loyalty.

Post-purchase evaluation (P-PE) is the final stage of consumer decision process (CDP). It plays a key role in purchase decision process and thus presents a challenge to a firm's marketing strategy while creating consumer brand loyalty. Importantly, it consists of four steps: decision confirmation, experience evaluation, satisfaction/dissatisfaction, and future response, which are a framework of this research. Based on the literature review, the current study discovers how consumers react when they have already consumed products and how they integrate information into their future decisions. Specifically, the research focuses on identifying and applying the P-PE process to the dietary supplement context in Thailand. The poster illustrates the P-PE process of dietary supplements in Thailand. It will detail the four steps of P-PE process and the method, which is used in this research to seek the P-PE model of dietary supplements in Thailand.

Sheth J N, Mittal B, Newman B I (1999) Customer behavior: consumer behavior and beyond. Orlando: The Dryden Press

Impact of cross-cultural differences on business-to-business relationships: a case study of Saudi Telecom Company

Waheed Baghdadi, Jillian Farquhar
BMRI
Contact: waheed.baghdadi@beds.ac.uk

Case study research into a middle-east telecoms company suggests that the importance of cross-cultural relationships in business marketing is undervalued

The impact of culture in marketing relationships has become more significant as companies expand into global markets. Understanding the nature of relationships across cultures is therefore critical to organizational expansion. This research builds on and extends existing theory in cross-cultural marketing by investigating business-to-business (B2B) relationships in a middle-eastern telecoms company. The investigation adopts a case study research strategy to elicit data from interviews with telecoms managers and business partners in Saudi Telecom Company (STC) as well as accessing and analysing secondary data from the company. The data sets are triangulated as a means of strengthening the findings. Findings to date suggest that the company as it grows needs to develop cross-cultural awareness at managerial level in order to compete at global level with other telecoms companies. This work contributes to cross cultural theory by extending cross-cultural models developed in a business-to-consumer context to understanding cross-cultural theory in a B2B context.

Hofstede G (1995) The business of international business is culture. In: Jackson T (ed) Cross-cultural Management, Oxford: Butterworth Heinemann, 150-165

An examination of the relationship between corporate governance, ownership structure, firm characteristics and the disclosure of financial reports

Bader Alotaibi, Magdy Abdel-Kader, Walter Mkumbuzi
BMRI
Contact: bader.alotaibi@beds.ac.uk

Investigating the effect of several factors on disclosure of financial reporting and how to reduce these negative effects on the disclosure

The basic significance of this research is to provide evidence from Kuwait; and to demonstrate the significant relationship between corporate governance characteristics, ownership structure and firms' characteristics, and the level of disclosure of annual financial reports as a function of corporate transparency. Emphasizing the role of corporate governance in ensuring the integrity of corporate disclosures and investor confidence in financial data disclosures in firms with high agency costs, the study will be an addition to the literature on corporate governance quality and on transparency factors. The analysis spans a period from 2007 to 2010, All data is obtained from firms' proxy statements filed with the Kuwait Stock Exchange (KSE) or from databases of these companies available online. In the data collection process, care was taken to gather data on all existing and nominated managers, ages, family relationships between managers, nominees, executive officers and any significant business relationships with the firm, the number of shares held by the managers, and other similar data points.

Leadership development in Arab countries: The case of Syria

Majd Megheirkouni, Samar Baddar
BMRI
Contact: majd.megheirkouni@beds.ac.uk

Evaluating leadership development and practices: The case of the banking, leisure and telecommunications sectors in Syria

Leadership development is one of most significant actions used by the field of human resource development where the process of leadership development has implications for three interconnected categories of the field of HRD: career development, training and development, and organization development Accordingly, this research focuses on the need to review the issue of transferring best practices and programmes in leadership development with Western origins to organizational settings in the Arab countries in general and Syria in particular.

Common R (2011) Barriers to Developing Leadership in the Sultanate of Oman. International Journal of Leadership Studies. 6 (2): 215-228

Sociological institutionalist approach on studying banks' lending practices in Myanmar

Sandar Win, Magdy Abdel-Kader, Georgios Sermpinis, Yongmei Bentley
BMRI
Contact: sandar.win@beds.ac.uk

Contributing to the bank lending literature by studying banks in Myanmar which have not been studied before

This paper studies banks' lending practices and decision making from sociological perspective instead of following traditional approaches, classical decision theory, psychological decision theory, and social-psychological judgement and attitude theory. According to Institutional theory, organisations' practices and behaviours in the same institutional environment are homogeneous as they are exposed to the same coercive, normative and mimetic pressures, therefore, their opportunities and actions are limited. In this paper, institutional theory is taken a step further by recognising technical controls from task environment to study heterogeneities in addition to homogeneities among banks' lending practices in Myanmar. Most of the research papers studying banks' financing are based on continental Europe and other well-established economies and no papers have been found that study banks in Myanmar. The results show that coercive or regulative pressures significantly shape bank's lending behaviour in Myanmar.

How HR managers practice HR in MNC subsidiaries?

Nahid Rozalin, Faten Baddar ALHusan
BMRI
Contact: nahid.rozalin@beds.ac.uk

Mechanisms to transfer western HR practices

Research on International Human Resource Management (IHRM) explains mainly the contents of HRM in multinational corporations (MNCs) subsidiaries than the process through which such practices have shaped. Accordingly, this research focuses on the mechanisms of transplanting HRM practices within European MNCs subsidiaries in Bangladesh. The objectives are: to understand how HRM is practiced in foreign subsidiaries; the mechanisms used to transfer practices; local HR managers role; and the contextual factors to explain why certain practices exist. Qualitative multiple-case study has been adopted to provide richer understanding of how and why certain practices become embedded in particular context. This research is expected to contribute to the convergence/divergence debate in the IHRM literature, by shifting the concern of vast research away from India and China to a newly developing country of Asia. Furthermore, it is expected to reveal how the local HR managers may exert possible significant influence on the direction of transfer.

Does an intensive programme of targeted, intentional, vocabulary instruction impact on the development of reading proficiency?

Laurence Kinsella, Stephen Bax
BMRI
Contact: lkinsella@hct.ac.ae

Does targeted vocabulary learning impact on reading ability in a second language?

Arguably, the most important skill for a non-native speaker, studying in English, is reading. Research shows strong links between vocabulary size and reading ability, but how can vocabulary size be quickly developed. This study proposes a classroom approach to rapid vocabulary acquisition and investigates if, and how this affects reading skills. The poster gives the background to the study and describes the steps taken during data collection.

Building dynamic capabilities in sustainable supply chain management through inter-firm knowledge transfer

Q He, Y Duan
BMRI
Contact: Qiang.Wu@beds.ac.uk

Extending the theory of dynamic capability into the area of sustainable supply chain management

This study provides a comprehensive review of the Dynamic Capability View (DCV) literature, extends the concept of dynamic capabilities into the area of sustainable supply chain management, and identifies the key factors affecting firms' dynamic capabilities building through knowledge transfer in the context of sustainable supply chain management. The conceptual framework and theoretical propositions developed in this research use DCV to offer a new theoretical perspective to explain how firms can enhance sustainable competitive advantage in the contemporary competitive environment.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamic_capabilities

IASR - Institute for Applied Social Research

Creative, cognitive and social - the business of Concept Mapping (CM) and its uses for diverse cohorts of students

Maja Jankowska, Alfredo Gaitan
IASR
Contact: maja.jankowska@beds.ac.uk

The technique of Concept Mapping (CM) as a tool that can facilitate students' reflection, intercultural learning and respectful dialogue, as well as provide useful research data.

As the student population is becoming more and more diverse we are often faced with teaching groups of students coming from dozens of different countries. Listening to individual students' voices and facilitating meaningful intercultural learning may pose challenges as there is only limited time and space in our curricula. Novak (1998), Hay (2007, 2008) and others claim that concept maps have the value of accessing students' thinking or making learning visible as the teacher can actually 'see' what ideas the student has about a particular topic. If introduced recurrently over the time, CM can make the changes in learning structures visible. CM followed by a socially mediated, structured dialogue can also provide a platform for student's expression and an exchange of ideas (Jankowska 2009, 2010). This poster presents some of the research findings and introduces a proposed dialogical approach to concept mapping (Jankowska, 2010).

Jankowska M (2010) Enabling Student Development: with socially mediated concept mapping technique, Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education, Special Edition: Researching PDP Practice, November 2010, ISSN: 1759-667X, http://www.aldinhe.ac.uk/ojs/index.php?journal=jldhe&page=issue&op=view&path%5B%5D=10&path%5B%5D=show Toc

Social anxiety and quality of life in an adolescent population in Saudi Arabia: a cross cultural study

Saleh Alkhathami, Hossein Kaviani, Emma Short
IASR
Contact: saleh.alkhathami@beds.ac.uk

Illuminating the debilitating effect of social phobia on the quality of adolescent life in a new cultural setting in Saudi Arabia

This study is expected to detect cultural differences (individualism and relatedness) in perceived social cues related to social anxiety in two different target cultures. In addition, it will provide a series of reliable and valid measurements (social anxiety, quality of life and individualism-relatedness) for using in Arabic speaking countries. Using appropriate statistical methods, Structural Equation Modelling (SEM), it may find causal links between social anxiety, individualism-relatedness and quality of life. Moreover, this study will detect cultural differences (individualism and relatedness) in perceived social cues related to social anxiety in two different target cultures. It is also expected to observe that levels of social anxiety and quality of life are negatively associated in the target populations.

The significance of social support for parents and young people (aged 10-15) requiring early intervention: the role of the referring practitioner and a multi-agency panel

Cherilyn Dance, Michael Preston Shoot
IASR
Contact: kathryn.nethercott@beds.ac.uk

Early intervention opportunities available to 10-15 year olds and their families, experiencing difficulties, living in one Local Authority.

Adolescence can be difficult for parents and children spanning a period of social, emotional and biological change for the child. It is a time that many parents find the hardest to cope with; nevertheless evidence suggests this is a time when families may struggle to access available services. Using a mixed methods design, the overarching aim of this study is to explore family members' experiences of Local Authority services by following up on their stories from time of referral, to a multi agency panel, to 3 months post referral. It is situated in a framework of social support and considers the role of parents during children's teen years along with service provision, assessment, thresholds and barriers to services that families may encounter. Additionally the experience of the referring practitioner will be investigated in respect of the assessment and referral process. This poster will discuss emerging findings from time 1 data.

The role of disclosure in the Romance Academy; a sex and relationship education programme

Miriam Hubbard, Cherilyn Dance
IASR
Contact: miriam.hubbard@beds.ac.uk

Disclosure is important to young people's overall experience and outcomes of the Romance Academy.

This research examines how young people engage and experience a Sex and Relationship Education (SRE) programme; the Romance Academy (RA). This programme is for people age 14-18 and aims to improve self-esteem, enabling healthy sexual choices. The research used observation of four RA's along with 'before and after' qualitative interviews with young people examining how they engaged in key aspects of the RA. Emerging findings suggest that how the young people engage with the programme is important to their overall experience and outcomes of the programme. Differences have been identified in how young people disclose information and discuss sexual choices and experiences. The role of youth leaders in creating a group culture and guiding discussions has emerged as crucial. Exploring the ways in which young people discuss and disclose issues of sexuality and the role that adults play in facilitating this is central to understanding the potential impact of SRE.

http://www.romanceacademy.org

From adverse childhood experience to antisocial/offending behaviour: the role of emotional intelligence and related concepts in predicting negative outcomes

Jacqui Hart, Gail Kinman, Andy Guppy
IASR; IHR
Contact: jacqui.hart@beds.ac.uk

Emotional intelligence may play a complex role in the pathway between adverse childhood experience and antisocial behaviour.

This project aims to examine relationships between emotional intelligence and associated competencies, such as empathy, and antisocial/offending behaviour. It further investigates the role played by adverse childhood experience (ACE), anger and psychological distress in any relationships found. Participants (n = 153, 79% female) completed an online survey measuring ACE, emotional intelligence, posttraumatic stress, anger and antisocial behaviour. Preliminary analyses found significant inter-relationships between some of the study variables: for example, emotional intelligence was negatively correlated with anger (r=-.39, p<.001), dysfunctional attitudes (r=-.47, p<.001) and posttraumatic stress (r=-.-.43, p<.001), whilst anger was positively associated with antisocial behaviour (r=.32, p<.001). Several exploratory models will be tested, including one that examines emotional intelligence as a mediator between ACE and antisocial behaviour.

Effects of study habits counselling on locus of control among African senior secondary students in Nigeria

P O Ikiriko, J Adonu, A Guppy, A Gaitan
IASR
Contact: patricia.ikiriko@beds.ac.uk

Is Locus of Control amongst African students "bad"?

Locus of control is a problem that has affected the study habits and academic performance of many students in Nigeria. Results of May/June 2008, West African Examination Council showed that 83% of candidates failed (Olugbile 2008). Department of Education Abuja, 2006 analysis report found that learning conditions in schools are alarming; many students who failed feared they will never have good academic success. This study will demonstrate the extent to which counselling can be used to alter students' locus of control and attitudes to studying. Cognitive Behavioural Techniques will be employed as the model to bring attitudinal change. It will use within-subjects design, with four questionnaires, and semi-structured interviews on 50 participants twenty five male and twenty five female students ages 15 - 21, recruited from two schools for the pilot study. This proposed study intends to identify ways to bring improvement on students' study habits and academic performance.

IHR - Institute for Health Research

Exploring the social, genetic and healthcare impacts of consanguinity

Mubasshir Ajaz, Nasreen Ali, Gurch Randhawa
IHR
Contact: mubasshir.ajaz@beds.ac.uk

Consanguinity is an oft misunderstood social phenomenon with major healthcare impacts, that perhaps gets wrongly associated along racial and religious lines.

Consanguinity refers to the marriage between close kin, more commonly referred to as cousin marriage. Consanguinity is a global occurrence but is more common in Africa, the Middle East and South Asia. It is an oft misunderstood social phenomenon with major healthcare impacts, in terms of genetic disorders and disability services, which perhaps gets wrongly associated along racial and religious lines. This will be a qualitative case study of Luton's Pakistani community, that traditionally practices consanguinity, and the healthcare and service providers. It will explore the discourse surrounding consanguinity and focus on bringing to light current views and issues of the community, using in-depth interviews and focus groups, dissecting truth in reality from perceived truths in literature and society. This study will benefit the local community in identifying its underlying social issues and possible gaps in policies and programmes for the care providers. The implications of this research may be relevant to other similar communities, nationally and globally.

http://www.beds.ac.uk/ihr

Exploring emotional intelligence in medical profession: patient and doctor outcomes

A Karypidou, G Kinman, T Dallas
IHR
Contact: anatoli.karypidou@beds.ac.uk

There is a confusion as to the predictive validity of Emotional Intelligence in health care context.

Medical professionals need to possess high levels of interpersonal competence and emotion management skills. It is argued that "emotional Intelligence" (EI) and related competencies (such as appropriate empathy) might promote professional medical practice and enhance quality of health care. There is also some evidence that EI is positively related to personal health status and job satisfaction. However, problems in defining, operationalising and measuring EI raise questions about its predictive validity. This programme of study adopts an inductive approach to examine the emotional competencies in doctors that predict patient care and satisfaction, and their personal wellbeing. This poster describes a series of focus groups to be utilised with patients and doctors. Questions explore perceptions of EI, and its importance in the medical profession. The outcomes of this research will provide insight into the role of EI and related competencies required in medical contexts and inform the next stage of the research programme.

The conceptual combination of the theory of Planned Behaviour and Prototype/Willingness model as a framework for intervention mapping in adolescent alcohol misuse

L Wood, A Guppy, A Chater
IHR
Contact: lynne.wood@beds.ac.uk

A conceptual model as an intervention mapping framework for adolescent risk behaviours.

There is a paucity of models for adolescent risk behaviours such as alcohol misuse. Most models of behaviour such as the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB, Azjen, 1995) tend to suggest a reasoned path of behaviour through intention. The Prototype/Willingness model (PWM, Gibbons and Gerrard, 1997), purports that adolescents do not always follow a reasoned path but may be willing to engage in behaviours should the opportunity present itself. Combining the constructs of the Prototype/Willingness model with the TPB has been demonstrated to enhance the predictive validity of the TPB. The conceptual model is presented here as a theoretical framework for intervention mapping and measuring to reduce risky drinking behaviour in adolescents.

Experiences of training for a profession and commitment

Andrew Clements, Andy Guppy, Gail Kinman
IHR
Contact: andrew.clements@beds.ac.uk

Support is a key feature in fostering and maintaining commitment.

There have been calls for qualitative research regarding commitment and how it develops in occupational settings (Klein, Brinsfield and Molloy, 2006). The programme of study aims to examine how students training for vocations experience commitment to their chosen profession, and the factors that they perceive as influencing their commitment. This poster reports on a qualitative study. In this study students training for midwifery, nursing or social work qualifications took part in semi-structured interviews. Questions selected were informed by a previous qualitative study involving members of relevant university faculties. Interviews were transcribed and subsequently thematically analysed. This poster will focus upon the themes identified in the interviews, with particular focus on motivation and commitment, and the support given to students during their training.

Informal carers in diabetes - who are they and what difference do they make?

Frances Moss, Gurch Randhawa, Alan Sinclair
IHR
Contact: Frances.moss@study.beds.ac.uk

Informal caregiver's role in the management of the elderly housebound with diabetes - what are the contributing factors that enhance patient care?

The aim of the literature review was to explore what evidence exists about the role of informal caregivers in diabetes management of the elderly housebound and the contextual factors which influence their care. The review identified that caregivers are a contributing factor in preventing the elderly housebound, with decreased functional status, being admitted to residential and nursing homes. The main objective was to determine the educational needs and skills which would influence diabetes management and to ascertain the views and perceptions of informal caring in terms of outcome measures which would influence and reduce admissions to residential and nursing homes. The specific objectives are; What impact do caregivers have in diabetes management of the elderly housebound diagnosed with diabetes? What explanatory evidence is available to measure the views of informal carers relating to educational support from health care professionals? Do carers make a difference in diabetes management of the elderly housebound?

The POhWER of advocacy: a critical analysis of the role and impact of generic advocacy services

Yvonne Sekiwa, Gurch Randhawa, Ravi Kohli, Karen Butterfield
IHR, IASR; POhWER
Contact: yvonne.sekiwa@beds.ac.uk

Exploring generic advocacy services and to investigate and analyse the impact that it has upon its users.

The aims of the research are to firstly, investigate the impact of generic advocacy services and to also contribute to existing theoretical and methodological body of knowledge on advocacy and impact analysis. The study will take a qualitative case study approach. Methods such as interviews, focus groups, and data obtained from an advocacy service database will be used and analysed thematically. The expected results of the study are: 1) To have achieved and answered questions raised within the aims and objectives of the study; 2) To have developed an in-depth understanding of generic advocacy that will contribute to the development of practice and policy regarding generic advocacy; 3) To have contributed to the methodologies used to measure and analyse impact.

To understand the psychological factors that influence adolescents decisions to exercise and eat fruit/vegetables

Lena Nilsson, Angel Chater, Andrew Guppy
IHR
Contact: lena.nilsson@beds.ac.uk

Extending theory on adolescents’ healthy behaviours and developing interventions to significantly enhance them

Objective: This study aimed to investigate whether the constructs from the Theory of planned behaviour (Ajzen et al., 1991), Image/Prototype (Gibbons and Gerrard, 1995) past and parental behaviour influenced fruit/vegetable intake and physical activity levels. It also tested the effectiveness of an action planning intervention on these health behaviours. Design and Methodology: 61 expatriate high school students aged 11-14 living in UAE completed measures of parental behaviour, attitude, subjective norm, perceived behavioural control, prototype perceptions, and willingness. They were then given an action planning activity and asked to make a specific plan how to eat fruit/vegetables and be physically active. Result: The constructs from the TPB, prototype and parental behaviour played important roles in predicting fruit/vegetable intake and physical activity levels. The action planning activity also significantly increased both health behaviours. Conclusion: Image/Prototype should be included to extend the TPB. Action planning may be an important tool in interventions aimed at enhancing health behaviours in adolescents. The next step is to continue data collection within other schools, as well as to test the effectiveness of a prototype intervention.

Reducing the cost of medically unexplained symptoms

Jean Penman, Gurch Randhawa, Lesley Baillie
IHR
Contact: jean.penman@ccs.nhs.uk

Development of a positive therapeutic approach using psychodynamic principles for healthcare professionals in addressing sufferers of medically unexplained symptoms in practice.

Research shows that Medically Unexplained Symptoms (MUS) are not confined to Western cultures. Patients are recorded as high frequency users of healthcare services and resources for addressing MUS are in short supply. Aim: To develop, test and evaluate a positive therapeutic framework in which to develop an exploratory partnership with the patient. Methodology: Background-systematic literature search and focus groups to identify and evaluate the current treatment approaches to MUS and to obtain the views of sufferers. Research-to conduct a thematic analysis of in depth case study(ies) to determine whether the method, delivered by primary care counselor, releases the patient's personal coping resources (with validated before and after measures). Expected outcome: Reduction in severity of physical symptoms with improvement in well-being. Impact: The study will provide a researched tool, opening up untapped resources within the patient with the potential to reduce the cost burden of MUS within the UK.

Penman J (2010) Exploring the meaning of medically unexplained symptoms. Healthcare Counselling and Psychotherapy Journal,10(1): 20-24

Who uses NHS Direct? Investigating the geographical and socio-demographic characteristics of NHS Direct users

Erica Cook, Andy Guppy, Shirley Large, Gurch Randhawa
IHR; NHS Direct
Contact: erica.cook@beds.ac.uk

Enabling NHS Direct to become a more 'person centered' and accessible service for the population in England.

NHS Direct (NHSD) provides 24/7 telephone based health care information to the public in England. This research builds on existing research to investigate the socio-demographic characteristics of NHSD users to determine equality of use. One month of call data was taken from the NHSD database for July 2010 and evaluated for socio- demographic characteristics. Females used NHSD significantly more than males, with call usage lower than expected in age groups 10-19 and 40+. Highest use of NHSD was found in children <4 and young adults (20-40). Minority ethnic groups used the service significantly less than expected; whereby, deprivation significantly increased use. Results suggest that although NHSD is predominantly used by females and calls on behalf of children <5, utilisation is underrepresented by minority ethnic groups, older people and men suggesting inequality of use. Further research should explore the underlying factors that contribute to low utilisation to help shape future promotional campaigns.

Cook E, Large S, Guppy A, Randhawa G (2010) Who uses NHS Direct? Geographical and socio-demographic characteristics of NHS Direct users. PsyPAG Quarterly, 76, 25-27

SOARing SPIRIT: Development of the SPIRIT model of peer coaching in higher education

Sarah Baker, Emma Short, Gail Kinman
IHR
Contact: sarah.baker@beds.ac.uk

A SPIRIT model of peer coaching was developed that can be integrated with the SOAR approach for personal development in Higher Education.

To investigate peer coaches experience of peer coaching intervention a volunteer sample of eight 3rd year psychology undergraduate students from the University of Bedfordshire took part in the study. The participants engaged in 5 sessions of supervised peer coaching practice with two fellow students. Reflective logs were kept for each of the coaching sessions. The transcripts were analysed using interpretative phenomenological analysis. Emergent theme included effectiveness of the teaching strategy, supportive relationships, emotional intelligence, self efficacy and resilience were identified The study suggested that peer coaching may be an effective tool to aid students in self reflection, goal setting, evaluative skills and development of interpersonal skills. These attributes can be mapped onto the SOAR approach to personalised learning. The SPIRIT model of the peer coaching process was developed in accordance with emergent themes.

Short E, Kinman G, Baker S (2010) Evaluating the impact of a peer coaching intervention on well-being amongst psychology undergraduate students, International Coaching Psychology Review 5 (1): 27-35

Experiences, utilisation and outcomes of health services in Saudi Arabia (a comparative study between rural and urban patients)

Ghadah Alfaqeeh, Gurch Randhawa
IHR
Contact: Ghadah.Alfaqeeh@beds.ac.uk

Patients in both rural and urban areas should have equal access to health services regardless of their place of residence.

This research project intends to examine the utilisation of health services among rural and urban communities in Saudi Arabia. It intends to shed light on factors associated with the differences (if any) in the use of health resources in both rural and urban areas. Data will be collected from patients attending primary health care facilities at different geographical locations. The appropriate data collection tools are going to be used to gather information relevant to the study. Data will be analysed using the appropriate statistical techniques. It is expected that the findings of this study will be of value for decision makers and researchers in the Saudi health care system and may help them allocate health resources or tackle some of the barriers to the access of health care.

INTOUR - Institute for Tourism Research

Politicized sites: Tourism significance in Communist Romania

Carla Cretan, Nazia Ali, Keith Hollinshead
INTOUR
Contact: carla.cretan@beds.ac.uk

A heritage for which there is little desire to remember, and the transformative power of politicized sites as places of revisiting history.

The legacy of communism is constructed as heritage for the Western tourists which require an interpretation of the communist past for tourists. M Palin writes that of all places visited in the past decades, Eastern Europe is the least discovered. The research uses anthropology visuals for the descriptions of sites characterised by unprecedented political and social transformations of contested structures and symbols of the tragedy of totalitarianism which involved displacement of people and erasing space.

An investigation of the motivations and impacts of volunteer tourism in Tai Muang sub-district, PhangNga province, Thailand

R Proyrungroj, A Holden, N Ali
INTOUR
Contact: Raweewan.Proyrungroj@beds.ac.uk

How volunteer tourism can be developed and implemented sustainably in Thailand.

Volunteer tourism has emerged and gained popularity as an alternative to mass tourism during the last decades. McGehee and Santos (2005, p.760) defines volunteer tourism as "utilizing discretionary time and income to go out of the regular sphere of activity to assist others in need". It is argued to be a more sustainable form of tourism which provides mutually beneficial experiences for the tourist as well as the host community. Specifically, this research focuses on the motivations and experiences of volunteer tourists and the impacts of volunteer tourism development in Tai Muang sub-district, PhangNga province, Thailand.

IRAC - Institute for Research in Applicable Computing

Decision support model for cost effective implementations of network security solutions

Valentina Viduto, Wei Huang, Carsten Maple
IRAC
Contact: valentina.viduto@beds.ac.uk

How to balance the investment cost and risk related factors? What are the trade-offs?

Budget cuts and high demand in strengthening the security of computer systems and services today are hardly balanced facts. To address the problem of selecting appropriate security measures we have developed a novel risk optimisation model (ROM) which can be used as an extension of the standard risk assessment procedures. As part of the model a novel multi-objective optimisation problem consisting of two objectives has been introduced to find a Pareto Front of solutions with the good approximation between investment cost and risk factors while countermeasures are selected. A multi-objective Tabu Search(TS) algorithm has been developed to solve the problem stated. It is discovered that TS provides near optimal results for this type of the problem and eventually leads to an efficient model used to support financial investment decisions.

High-level skill acquisition for Homecare Robots

Tao Cao, Dayou Li
IRAC
Contact: tao.cao@beds.ac.uk

Enabling robots to understand tasks and be capable to learn skills from previous experience to acquire high-level skills to fulfil similar tasks in different environments.

This paper introduces an approach to enable the robot to build up high level skills which are connected with tasks. A specific task will be broken down into subtasks, which are linked with corresponding actions. We model the subtasks as states of the robot, to successfully complete a task, the robot will fulfil these subtasks sequentially and the states of the robot will transform accordingly. Undertaking a subtask is to execute a corresponding action, therefore, monitoring robot's state transformation can evaluate a particular action's contribution for a task. This contribution can help the robot to understand an action and aware the process for complete a task. Using this method, we enable a robot to abstract useful action sequences in order to acquire high level skills.

Decentralized Dynamic Hybrid (DDH) MAC protocol for cognitive radio networks

Munam A Shah, Ghazanfar A Safdar, Carsten Maple
IRAC
Contact: munam.shah@beds.ac.uk

The spectrum band is highly under utilized. Cognitive Radio is a technology which uses the spectrum band when it's not being used by licensed user. A MAC protocol for this technology is presented.

The scarcity and under utilization of the radio spectrum has created a need for a technology which can be used to address the proliferation of new wireless applications. Cognitive Radio Technology is an opportunistic network technology, equipped with fully programmable wireless devices that self empower the network by OODA cycle and then make intelligent decisions by dynamically adapting their MAC and physical layer characteristics (such as waveform). In this research, a novel Decentralized Dynamic Hybrid DDH-MAC protocol for Cognitive Radio Networks has been presented which combines the best features of having a universal Common Control Channel (CCC) over ISM. To the best of the authors' knowledge, DDH-MAC is the first protocol which is hybrid in nature and lies between GCCC and non-GCCC protocols. The novelty in DDH-MAC makes it more efficient over the other MAC protocols in terms of security and performance.

Proposed electroencephalogram feature extraction technique increases the accuracy of newborn brain maturity differentiation by 6%.

Livija Jakaite, Vitaly Schetinin
IRAC
Contact: livija.jakaite@beds.ac.uk

New electroencephalogram features extracted by the proposed technique increases the accuracy of newborn brain maturity differentiation by 6%.

We explored the feature extraction techniques for Bayesian assessment of EEG maturity of newborns in the context that the continuity of EEG is the most important feature for assessment of the brain development. The continuity is associated with EEG "stationarity" which we propose to evaluate with adaptive segmentation of EEG into pseudo- stationary intervals. The histograms of these intervals are then used as new features for the assessment of EEG maturity. In our experiments, we used Bayesian model averaging over decision trees to differentiate two age groups, each included 110 EEG recordings. The use of the proposed EEG features has shown, on average, a 6% increase in the accuracy of age differentiation.

http://www.nnlab.co.uk/downloads/cbms_jakaite.pdf

The reliability of log file data in heterogeneous networks for evidence in digital forensic investigations

Raymond Brown, Carsten Maple, Yong Yue
IRAC
Contact: raymond.brown@beds.ac.uk

There are many log files generated by computer systems and devices in heterogeneous network. How reliable is the data in these logs suitable for use as evidence in court?

Digital data recorded in network log files and collected as evidence, though circumstantial, are comparable to fingerprints in a conventional crime scene. Issues of the reliability of the collection, analysis, preservation and presentation are addressed via standards, guidelines and the testing of tools and techniques used. However, it is acknowledged that digital data is vulnerable to malware attacks, software bugs, hardware failure, anti-forensics, etc., which can result in misleading and unsubstantiated evidence. Considering that the completeness of evidence collected can prove an attacker's guilt or innocence, this work in progress proposes use of the OSI Model to theoretically address at each layer, the multiple factors that can affect digital data within computer systems, network devices and along transmission lines. IP Trace-back, Source Address Validation (SAV), encryption and other tools and techniques can counter corresponding suggestions of malware attacks, failures and errors. A reliability rating of evidence data is also proposed.

Wireless security: Luton wardrive 2011

Geraint Williams, Carsten Maple
IRAC
Contact: geraint.williams@beds.ac.uk

Insecure wireless networks are placing owners at risk of a security breach or false imprisonment

Part of my research into security and performance of home wireless networks (WLAN) involves conducting a wardrive around Luton; a wardrive is a WLAN survey conducted whilst driving around an area; to identify the number of unsecured access points. This poster gives the current state of the wardrive and initial comparisons to a previous survey. The results indicate that today more users of WLAN are using secure settings than previously, however there has been a big increase in WLAN usage and the total number of insecure networks is higher. The risk to owners of unsecure WLANs is highlighted by two events, Google whilst collecting data for wireless location services captured and stored communications, breaching data protection and privacy laws, in America a couple was arrested for downloading indecent images of children, a forensic investigation proved their innocence eventually their neighbour was convicted of being a paedophile who had download the images through the couples unsecured WLAN.

Williams G, Maple C, Yue Y (2007) Reliability, Availability and Security of Wireless Networks in the Community, Informatica Journal, 31

Digital forensics: a combined framework

Moniphia Hewling Paul Sant
IRAC
Contact: moniphia.hewling@beds.ac.uk

The definition of a framework that includes all core fields involved in digital forensics process will alleviate issues currently experienced by practitioners.

Digital forensics fast is becoming quite predominant within the legal court system which has had to deal with an increase of cases that involve the use of digital devices over the past decade. The procedures currently used in the digital forensic process were developed with a focus on the acquisition of specific areas of digital evidence all of which has been dependent on the practitioner's expertise or interest. This resulted in very little regard for all fields that may be impacted by any one investigation. Such omissions have resulted in digital forensics seeming to be an ad hoc process resulting in a number of cases in which digital evidence has been deemed invalid, producing negative results in a number of cases. This paper proposes the development of such a framework integrating technical and legal dimensions.

Garfinkel S (2010) Digital forensics research: The next 10 years. Digital Investigations 7. 2010 S64-S73. Available from www.sciencedirect.com

Localisation algorithm in Wireless Sensor Networks

Shuang Gu, Yong Yue, Carsten Maple, Chengdong Wu
IRAC
Contact: shuang.gu@beds.ac.uk

Wireless sensor networks consist of many thousands of nodes, each node able to sense the environment, perform simple computations and communicate with others. It is of great importance to design an efficient localisation algorithm.

Progress in micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) and radio frequency (RF) technology has fostered the development of wireless sensor networks (WSNs). WSNs have been successfully applied in emergency rescuer, disaster relief, smart buildings and patient monitoring. As one of the key enabling technologies and research hotpots, node localisation is very important due to its direct correlation with theory and practical applications. This research reviews different approaches to node localisation discovery in WSNs and addresses issues of localisation with a variation of localisation techniques and their features and shortcomings. To understand how the performance of localisation techniques is evaluated, several evaluation metrics are studied and results verified in Matlab simulations.

Efficient dynamic Groups PCI assignment scheme

Xu Zhang, DiBin Zhou, Enjie Liu, Jie Zhang, Andres Alayon Glazunov
IRAC
Contact: xuzhang@beds.ac.uk



The Physical Cell Identity (PCI) is used to identify femtocell in LTE femtocell as the physical layer identity. Due to the fact that a) the PCIs are normally allocated without planning; and b) the limitation of the number of PCI, the cross-tier PCI confusion problem has arisen. The current solution in 3GPP Release 9 is to use Cell Global Identity (CGI) associated with PCI to solve this problem of confusion. However, using CGI has many serious drawbacks. Especially CGI might cause the inbound-handover is failure. In order to mitigate the CGI problem, this research proposes a dynamic PCI assignment scheme of DG-PCI in the macrocell and femtocell environment. The proposed scheme is tested by using system-level simulation. The simulations showed that the approach offers an optimal PCI distribution between macrocell and femtocell. The test showed that the CGI problem can be solved, and hence increase the successful rate of inbound-handover.

State of information security management in the public sector of developing countries: experience from Zanzibar, Tanzania

Hussein Shaaban, Carsten Maple, Peter Norrington
IRAC
Contact: Hussein.Shaaban@beds.ac.uk

Information assets are vital in digital economy. It is critical for developing countries to provide proper countermeasures to secure these assets.

Information systems have become important tools in developing countries. It is vital to provide measures to protect them as threats to them are much closer to home than ever before. The purpose of this paper was to investigate the current state of information security management in developing countries, with Zanzibar's public sector as the case study. The investigation involved ten public organisations in Zanzibar. The investigation adopted a questionnaire based on ISO/IEC27002, ISO/EIC27005 and OWASP best practice. The findings showed that organisations involved with finance and identification have adopted better information security management compared to other organisations. Physical and environmental controls tend to be better managed whilst business continuity plan controls have weak management. Developing countries need to invest in information security management capacity building as well as adopting information security management standards, with more emphasis on the adoption of web security best practices in order to take advantage of e-commerce.

The modified k-means algorithm and its application to Type-I Diabetes glucose data clustering

Jin Dai, Dayou Li, Carsten Maple
IRAC
Contact: dayou.li@beds.ac.uk

Proposing an approach to decide borderline cases to match insulin injection treatment programs to patients’ needs

Most previous relevant studies have concentrated on data mining algorithms for Type 2 Diabetes patients. This study aims to design and implement a data mining algorithm to assist doctors to diagnose and analyze Type 1 Diabetes patient conditions. In order to achieve the aim of this study, glucose data from the diabetes patients were collected first. Mainstream data mining algorithms were then studied and compared through literatures review. K-means algorithm was initially selected to be applied to the diabetic patient data. However, there are three disadvantages of K-means algorithm: a) The performance of K-means algorithm tightly relies on the order of input data. b) Outliers can decrease the performance of the algorithm. c) The data samples which fall into the overlap are difficult to deal with. Therefore, fuzzy logic has been introduced to collaboratively work with K-means algorithm. Experiments will be carried out in order to test and verify the proposed algorithm after the implementation of the software. The proposed algorithm and the software are going to be optimized in the near future.

IRED - Institute for Research in Education

Knowledge mobilisation: a questionnaire to determine teacher use of research in schools

Richard Procter, Marilyn Leask
IRED
Contact: richard.procter@beds.ac.uk

Design of a dual scale questionnaire to determine how much teachers use research in their practice and how much they value the use of research.

Research shows that one of the best and most effective ways to improve the quality of an educational systems is by improving the quality of the teachers in them. Thus this study aims to help teachers use research knowledge to help inform their practice by providing web based professional research knowledge to teachers in support of their professional development. The work highlights how a baseline questionnaire was designed to establish teachers current use of research knowledge in schools. An innovative dual scale questionnaire was developed. This design allows teachers two responses to each questionnaire item - firstly, their perception of the extent to which they are doing a practice or a practice is happening in their school and secondly, their value of that practice. This questionnaire will be piloted with University of Bedfordshire teacher training students, thus helping students to consider if and how they use research knowledge in their practice but also their feedback will be used in the next design iteration of the questionnaire.

Levin B, Cooper A, Mascarenhas S, Thompson K (2010) Using interventions to increase knowledge mobilization in Canadian secondary schools. Paper presented at the American Educational Research Association Conference, Denver, April.

Normalising Computer Assisted Language Learning (CALL) in the context of primary education

Monika Pazio, Marilyn Leask, Andrea Raiker, Mario Moya
IRED
Contact: monika.pazio@beds.ac.uk

Integrating ICT in the foreign language classroom - towards new normalised pedagogy.

Integration of ICT into primary foreign language education has been recognised by the authorities as being an important component for early language learning. The ultimate goal of integration is normalisation, namely the stage when ICT is used by language teachers on an everyday basis without fear or inhibition. Even though more and more teachers decide to integrate ICT into Modern Foreign Language (MFL) teaching, the pedagogy lags behind the resources. The proposed research will identify factors which contribute and impede normalisation in the primary MFL context and will focus primarily on pedagogical aspects of integration, examining how interaction is structured around ICT and what type of talk that interaction elicits. The study will result in producing a new normalised pedagogical framework which will allow teachers to use ICT in the primary MFL classroom to its best advantage.

Chambers A, Bax S (2006) Making CALL work: Towards normalisation. System, 34 (4), pp. 465-479

ISPAR - Institute for Sport and Physical Activity Research

Identifying the physical cultural discourses informing the PESSCL strategy and its implementation during the last decade

Hyunwoo Jung, David Kirk, Stephen Harvey
ISPAR
Contact: Hyunwoo.Jung@beds.ac.uk

It is crucial that physical cultural discourse is embodied in physical education and sport policy.

Drawing on Basil Bernstein's (1996) theory of the social production of pedagogic discourse, the primary aim of this presentation is to identify the physical cultural discourses that have informed the PESSCL strategy and its implementation between 2000 and 2010. I present the results of our analysis of government sport policy documents originating in the recontextualising field in order to trace and identify the physical cultural discourses that have informed them. I also analyse the outputs of various media in order to triangulate our investigation and provide a degree of verification of our findings. I conclude by signalling the way forward for the next part of our study, which is to investigate in further depth and detail the processes of delocating and relocating the physical cultural discourses we identified by key agencies and the ways in which the interests and values of the producers of these discourses are reproduced in policies.

Modelling a hypertrophic stimulus in 3D tissue engineered skeletal muscle

N R W Martin, D J Player, A P Sharples, S Passey, P C Castle, M P Lewis
ISPAR
Contact: neil.martin@beds.ac.uk

Tissue engineered 3D skeletal muscle can be used to investigate the regulation of muscle mass via stimulation protocols.

The mechanisms regulating skeletal muscle mass in health and disease are slowly being elucidated using in vivo studies. However these experiments are limited by ethical implications and the inability to tightly control the environment or muscle niche. The aim of this experiment was to model an acute hypertrophic stimulus as measured by molecular outputs in tissue engineered 3D muscle constructs. 3D constructs were engineered as previously described and electrically stimulated on day 11. The stimulation protocol consisted of 5 pulses at 20Hz every 4 seconds (at 5V with an 8% duty cycle). Gels were immediately sampled for qPCR and for histology. There was a trend towards increased expression of hypertrophic genes (MyoD, Myogenin, IGF-1) in stimulated constructs versus controls. Histology showed no damage to constructs and similar morphology. Investigating genes implicated in atrophy will give further data regarding the nature of this stimulation protocol. Sampling at later time points may also be required for increased gene expression to be realised.

Huang Y C, Dennis R G, Larkin L, Baar K (2005) Rapid formation of functional muscle in vitro using fibrin gels. Journal of Applied Physiology 98: 706-713

A putative model of endurance exercise using bio-engineered skeletal muscle

D J Player, N R W Martin, P C Castle, A P Sharples, S Passey, V Mudera,
ISPAR; University College London; Institute of Orthopaedics and Musculoskeletal Science, Stanmore
Contact: darren.player@beds.ac.uk

This is the first investigation to show an increase in mtDNA copy number following an acute bout of mechanical stimulation in vitro.

Models of skeletal muscle in vitro which respond physiologically will allow for insight into the cellular and molecular mechanisms involved in the adaptation of skeletal muscle following exercise. A 3D skeletal muscle construct was cultured for 14 days and mechanically stimulated as follows; 7.5% strain, cyclic continuous stretch at 0.4Hz for 60 minutes. 60 minutes of cyclic stretch increased [Lactate] at every time point compared to 0 minutes from 1.83±0.23mmol.L to 4.52±0.21mmol.L (p<0.05). There were no significant differences between each time point after 0 minutes (p>0.05) indicative of a 'steady state' in Lactate production. The index of uptake ([Glucose] at 0 minutes - [Glucose] at experimental time point) of Glucose was significant after 30 minutes of the stretch protocol from 0mmol.L to 1.5±0.12mmol.L (p<0.05). There were no changes in Lactate or Glucose for controls. mtDNA copy number per nuclear diploid genome increased compared to control immediately post stretch (p<0.05). This model of mechanical stretch ('exercise') has shown in vivo-like responses with respect to both Lactate and Glucose metabolism.

Mechanisms of action of testosterone: preliminary data

David C Hughes, Nick Sculthorpe, Adam P Sharples, Mark P Lewis
ISPAR
Contact: david.hughes@beds.ac.uk

Understanding a mechanism of action for testosterone may help underpin therapeutic interventions in ageing and disease.

Testosterone (17ß-Hydroxyandrost-4-en-3-one: C19H2802) is a potent naturally occurring steroid hormone (androgen), responsible for regulating many physiological processes such as skeletal muscle maintenance. The molecular mechanisms by which testosterone stimulates anabolic processes to elicit a hypertrophic response in skeletal muscle remain poorly understood. Various pathways have been addressed within the literature for which testosterone may influence either directly (Androgen receptor) or indirectly (IGF-I, mTOR MAPK, ß-Catenin etc.) or by the interaction between IGF-I and AR to promote muscle growth and hypertrophy. Despite this recent research results still remain inconclusive as to the predominant pathway. Therefore, the current research utilised a monolayer skeletal muscle model to address the influence of testosterone on the androgen receptor (AR) and IGF-I signalling pathways. This preliminary data will provide the basis for further 3 -Dimensional culture systems which is more reflective of the in vivo environment and elucidate key cellular and molecular mechanisms involved in testosterone's action in skeletal muscle hypertrophy.

Vingren J L, Kraemer W J, Ratamess N A, Anderson, J M, Volek J S, Maresh C M (2010) Testosterone physiology in resistance training: The up-stream regulatory elements, Sports Medicine, 40 (12), pp.1037-1063

A case study of the knowledge base for Physical Education Teacher Education (PETE)

C-H Lee, D Kirk, T O'Donovan
ISPAR
Contact: Chang-Hyun.Lee@beds.ac.uk

Teachers of physical education no longer gain sufficient subject knowledge in their training to teach physical activities beyond introductory levels.

The aim of this study is to explain the knowledge base (Shulman, 1987) for teaching physical education in PETE programmes. The erosion of time spent on content knowledge (CK) for PETE has been noted as a matter of concern. However, the academicisation has been identified as major factors in PETE. We present data from one university's PETE programme. We identify three key findings in the PETE knowledge base. First, Pedagogical Content Knowledge (PCK) formed the largest proportion. Second, most physical education teacher educators (PETErs) believed that PCK was the most important component. Third, the PETErs believed their students possessed sufficient CK. We conclude that CK forms only a relatively small proportion of the knowledge base for PETE suggesting that this was not considered to be a major concern among PETErs. We propose that we need to study these issues further by interviewing student teachers, and expanding the study to include further institutions.

Using ultrasound imaging to quantify the activity of the 'core' abdominal muscles following shoulder movement

P Davies, M P Lewis, N Sculthorpe
ISPAR; Loughborough University; University College London
Contact: pauld.davies@beds.ac.uk

Identifying the characteristics of 'core' abdominal muscles in both young and old adults and the molecular mechanisms responsible for any differences

With advancing age, the performance of skeletal muscle declines. It is hypothesised that this contributes to low back pain as the performance of the 'core' abdominal muscles is affected. Ultrasonography has been used to measure the contraction speed of the core abdominal muscles in response to voluntary activation of the shoulder. Currently baseline measurements are being taken in young adults, with measurements on aged individuals to follow. Early results suggest that in healthy young adults, the core muscles contract prior to the voluntary activation of the Deltoid muscle in the shoulder. This 'feed-forward' activation supports previous research that the core muscles offer support to the lumbar spine during limb motion. With the in vitro model used by the research group, the capacity exists to manipulate the cellular environment to mimic ageing muscle. This work is on-going and seeks to identify some of the causes of age-related muscle impairment.

Physical literacy and the teacher's subjective warrant for becoming a physical education teacher

Michelle Flemons, Ashley Casey, David Kirk
ISPAR
Contact: Michelle.Flemons@beds.ac.uk

The identification of the relationship between the subjective warrant and the development of physical literacy in young people

Physical literacy has significant implications for the dispositions, knowledge and skills teachers must foster in order to enable young people to develop a holistic approach to physical activity throughout the lifecourse. The occupational socialisation literature on physical education suggests that teachers come into teaching with a predefined 'subjective warrant' that comprises three dimensions: a love of sport, the desire to work with people and a preference for an active, outdoor job. This paper begins to investigate how teachers' orientations to the subject and their motivation to become a physical education teacher impacts on their adoption and articulation of the physically literate child. Furthermore it seeks ways of promoting a curriculum that compliments the overall development of each and every individual.

The impact of a low glycaemic index diet on the metabolic health of postpubertal adolescents with features of the metabolic syndrome

Ben Davies, Catherine Kerr
ISPAR
Contact: ben.davies@beds.ac.uk

Assessing the impact of an under-researched nutritional approach on the health of an under-researched population.

Although advocated for weight loss and improved metabolic health, reduced fat diets typically lead to an increase in dietary carbohydrate and Glycaemic Index (GI). Recently, dietary GI has been related to poor metabolic health. A limited number of studies have shown low GI diets to positively impact on metabolic health in children and adolescents. Low glycaemic index foods promote satiety and allow for an ad libitum approach, which, unlike a strictly controlled diet, may be particularly beneficial for adolescents. The adolescent population is one at risk of developing metabolic abnormalities that track into adulthood, and thus a diet that is well adhered to is imperative. Furthermore, a limitation of current research using adolescents is the lack of consideration for hormonal changes during puberty that negatively impact on metabolic health. Therefore, the pending investigation will assess the impact of an ad libitum, low GI dietary intervention in overweight and obese postpubertal adolescents.

Cardiac adaptation in sedentary females: moderate versus high intensity exercise

R E Lancaster, N Sculthorpe
ISPAR
Contact: rosalind.lancaster@beds.ac.uk

Does high intensity exercise elicit greater improvements in the cardiac structure and function of females than moderate intensity exercise?

The aim of this study is to establish the intensity and frequency of exercise required to elicit the greatest improvements in cardiac structure and function. Sedentary females aged 18-35 will be randomly assigned to a 10- week exercise intervention: no exercise, moderate1, high1, moderate3 and high3. Where moderate/high refers to the intensity of exercise and 1/3 refers to the frequency of exercise per week. The energy expended within same frequency moderate and high intensity exercise programmes will be matched. Blood pressure, body composition, V02max and echocardiography will be measured at baseline, week 3, week 7 and week 10. Results will be normalised for fat-free mass. It is expected that participants in the high intensity exercise groups will gain the most cardiac benefit.

Six weeks resistance training has no effect on left ventricular structure

J Richards, C Kerr, K Biswell, D Oxborough, K George, N Sculthorpe
ISPAR; Leeds University; RISES Liverpool John Moores
Contact: joanna.richards@beds.ac.uk

Do the initial stages of strength training where afterload on the left ventricle is elevated induce concentric hypertrophy of the left ventricle?

The 'Morganroth Hypothesis' suggests that strength training causes significant increases in left ventricular (LV) wall thickness and thus LV mass due to the high afterload associated with that type of exercise. Eight inactive males (aged 18-20 years; height 179.7 ±8.4 cm; body mass 79.39 ± 18.84 kg) followed a progressive 6-week resistance training programme. Interventricular septal wall (IVS), LV internal dimension (LVD) and LV posterior wall (PW) measurements were assessed from M-mode echocardiograms (Vivid 7, GE Healthcare) at baseline and after training. FFM was estimated via air displacement plethysmography. Strength was assessed weekly by 1 repetition maximum (RM) prediction. Six weeks of resistance training increased strength (P<0.05) but not FFM (P>0.05) and is thought to be due to neuromuscular adaptation. The afterload induced by the resistance exercise however, did not bring about measurable changes in cardiac dimensions (P>0.05).

The distribution of body image disturbance in physical education: within and between class variance

C Kerner, D Kirk , C Kerr, L Haerens
ISPAR; Ghent University
Contact: charlotte.kerner@beds.ac.uk

Are there any between-pupil and between-class differences in body image within year 9 physical education.

It has been well documented that adolescents have concerns about body weight and shape. This has implications for physical education engagement as an individual suffering with a poor body image is likely to adopt certain behavioural strategies as a means of controlling the associated anxiety. Based upon a cognitive-behavioural paradigm, proximal events are significant for the construction of contextual bodily attitudes and perceptions. Thus, specific factors within the physical education environment have the potential to impact situational body image. The research will seek to assess the between pupil and between class differences in body image disturbance within year 9 physical education. Perceptual and attitudinal levels of trait body image disturbance will be assessed alongside situational, affective body image disturbance within physical education. Factors such as perceived competence and motivation for physical education will be measured to provide an understanding of within class variances in body image disturbance.

LIRANS - Institute for Research in Applied Natural Sciences

Protective role of zVADfmk and Salubrine against 6OHD-induced neurotoxicity in dopaminergic neurons

Zahara L Chaudhry, Adam J W Paige, Bushra Y Ahmed
LIRANS
Contact: Bushra.ahmed@beds.ac.uk

The inhibitory effect of Salubrinal and zVADfmk. Both inhibitors were able to suppress 6OHD mediated neurotoxicity in ReN VM neurons.

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disorder that is characterised by uncontrollable shaking, muscular rigidity and poor cognitive development. As the quantity of dopamine containing neurons (DCN) decrease in the substantia nigra region, low levels of dopamine is observed in the PD individual. The loss of DCN has been strongly associated with the activation of protein which encourage cell death, the Caspases and the activation of associated pathways (NFkB and ER). In this study, 6OHD, a potent neurotoxic drug was used to cause stress in dopamine containing neurons (DCN), differentiated from a commercially available cell line (ReNVM). Our results indicate that 6OHD was able to increase induction of active Caspases 2, 3 and 8 in DCN triggering Caspase activation through NFkB and ER pathways. The inhibitors, Salubrinal and carbobenzoxy-valyl-alanyl-aspartyl-[O-methyl]- fluoromethylketone (zVADfmk) were able to suppress Caspase activation pathways promoting survival of 6OHD treated DCN.

Development and characterisation of a 3D culture system for Zebrafish muscle cells to investigate cells to investigate their adaptability to different environmental stresses

Krishan Vishnolia, Mark P Lewis, Emma Spikings
LIRANS, ISPAR
Contact: krishan.vishnolia@beds.ac.uk

Developing a 3D culture model to reduce the number of animals in research.

The aim of this project is to develop a protocol for culturing zebrafish (Danio rerio) muscle cells. Cells firstly were cultured in 2D and characterised using immuno cytochemistry with stain for desmin (a marker for myogenic cells), DAPI (for identification of nuclei) and phalloidin (for actin). Various culture conditions have been tested and those with the best growth for myogenic cells were selected. Further genetic studies will be performed on the cells in 2D using quantitative real time PCR for molecular markers of muscle differentiation such as MyoD, Myogenin, MRf4, MRf5. Cells will then be transferred to 3D collagen set up (Eastwood et al., 1994), to provide them with a more physiologically relevant environment in-vitro (Vandenburgh et al., 1988; Vandenburgh and Kaufman, 1979) and also to test effect of different temperature stresses followed by comparative physiology with mammals. This 3D culture system for zebrafish muscle cells will reduce the number of higher animals required for research studies, which will have benefits in terms of time, cost and ethics.

Western Blot protocol for zebrafish embryos

Raju Ahmed, Tiantian Zhang, Emma Spikings
LIRANS
Contact: raju.ahmed@beds.ac.uk

Some parameters to be considered while carrying out western blot experiments using zebrafish embryos

This study was carried out to optimise the Western Blot protocol for zebrafish embryos. It was estimated that 5 mg/ml of total protein was required for subsequent experiments. Therefore, in an experiment, the number of embryos that would yield proteins of the required concentration was determined. The result showed that 75 embryos would yield the required concentration. Then, the amount of proteins to be probed was determined in a second experiment. The result showed that 40 µg would result in very good separation of proteins. Next, with the number of embryos and the amount of protein to be loaded determined, the blotting and immuno-detection protocols were optimised. The result showed a 45-minutes blotting at 10 volt using Semi-Dry method resulted in efficient transfer of proteins. It was also apparent that incubating membranes with the primary antibody overnight at 4°C resulted in specific binding. These optimised parameters would be used in subsequent western blot experiments.

Quantifying adaptations in the heart disease

Khadar Dudekula, Robin Maytum
LIRANS
Contact: khadar.dudekula@beds.ac.uk

Improving prognosis and diagnosis of heart disease by quantitative analysis of protein adaptations

Nearly 41% of all deaths in the UK, 200,000 deaths per year, are due to coronary heart disease (CHD). During disease the heart tries to adapt to improve function. Part of the adaptation consists of post-translational modification of the proteins or changes in the isoforms of the proteins that are expressed. Some heart diseases like familial hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and myocardial damage can be directly caused by mutations in heart proteins such as tropomyosin and troponins that form different isoforms. The main aim of this project is to quantify the protein isoforms present and the levels of post-translational modifications in the normal and diseased heart using liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC/MS).This will give information that can be related to the disease progression and adaptation of the heart during the diseased state. The data produced will therefore have potential application as a prognostic indicator and in the diagnosis of heart diseases.

Effects of caffeine on in vitro maturation of dog oocytes: arrest or promote

Mazdak Salavati, Tiantian Zhang, Ali Fouladi Nashta, Fataneh Ghafari
LIRANS; University of London
Contact: mazdak.salavati@beds.ac.uk

Improving of canine-assisted reproductive techniques

In vitro maturation of canid species oocytes has been a conundrum during the past 50 years due to their poor nuclear and cytoplasmic development leading to incompetency within in vitro circumstances of assisted reproductive techniques. Canine female gamete ovulates from the ovaries dyactated at the diplotene stage of first meiosis (Germinal Vesicle-GV) in contrast with other domestic species of which the oocyte ovulates arrested at second metaphase (M-II). Maintenance of the oocyte in the meiotic arrest is believed to be orchestrated via the high cAMP concentration inside the oocyte which prevents the activation of pathways responsible of meiotic resumption. In this study effects of caffeine as a phosphodiesterase inhibitor which inhibits the degradation of cAMP and preserves accumulation of it inside oocytes, has been investigated during the in vitro maturation process. We have postulated that 10mM caffeine treatment of oocytes for 12hrs improves the maturation rate of oocytes up to M-II (P<0.05).

Application of proteomic techniques for the discovery of zinc status biomarkers

H Yang, F Nicol, M D Reid, O Ou, M J Gordon, T Zhang, J H Beattie, S Zhou
LIRANS; Aberdeen University
Contact: henian.yang@beds.ac.uk



Zinc is an essential trace element and plays an important role in maintaining mammalian physiological functions. However, there is no reliable biomarker for the determination of zinc status. The aim of this study was to develop a reliable plasma sample preparation method and apply 2-DE proteomic analysis, using plasma from zinc deficient rats, to find novel biomarkers of zinc status. 20 rats were randomly divided into 5 groups and fed for 2 weeks with the semi-synthetic diet with different Zn content (mg/kg): <1mg, 3mg and 35mg, along with pair-fed groups. Seppro rat spin columns were used to remove the seven most abundant proteins from plasma. Different protein loading amounts, two sizes of 2-DE gels and two staining procedures were also compared. 200µg of protein loaded on 17cm 2-DE gel stained with coomassie. Both flow-through fractions and bound protein gels from 20 rats and 4 internal-standard were analysed using Samespots software. Six proteins were up-regulated and 5 spots down-regulated by acute zinc deficiency. In conclusion, the statistical significance of results was limited because of the low reproducibility of the Seppro column. Further columns are being evaluated for their utility and reproducibility.

Low dissolved oxygen levels in the Lea Navigation (NE London)

D Patroncini, D M Rawson, R Andres
LIRANS
Contact: deborah.patroncini@beds.ac.uk

An application of ecotoxicity techniques in order to investigate the water quality and identify the most likely causes of contamination.

The Lea Navigation between the confluence with Pymmes Brook, which receives water from Deephams sewage treatment final effluent, and Lea Bridge (Hackney) in North East London is affecting by a low concentration of dissolved oxygen. In this study the river water toxicity to the freshwater alga Pseudokirchneriella subcapitata was tested by algal growth inhibition test (OECD 201, 2006) conducted with free algae and algae immobilized in calcium alginate beads. Results show inhibition after 24 hours, and this is most marked when the algal populations were exposed to the polar compounds fraction of the river water samples. Rapid acute toxicity tests were carried out using mediated amperometric whole cell biosensors (CellSense). Results indicated there is no evidence of acute toxicity in the river water, with an exposure time of 30 minutes. These results indicate a chronic herbicidal pollution of the river, affecting photosynthetic algae during long-term, several hours, exposure.

Development of in-vitro culture method for zebrafish ovarian tissue fragments

Siji Anil, Tiziana Zampolla, Tiantian Zhang
LIRANS
Contact: siji.anil@beds.ac.uk

Development of in-vitro culture method for zebrafish ovarian tissue fragments provides a vital assessment method after cryopreservation

In order to identify an optimum in-vitro culture protocol, zebrafish ovarian tissue fragments were used. To develop an in-vitro culture method, effects of different growth factors like Foetal Bovine Serum (FBS), Bovine Serum Albumin (BSA) and gonadotropins like human Chorionic Gonadotropin (hCG), Follicle Stimulating Hormone (FSH) has been studied on the tissue fragments. Experiments were conducted on tissue fragments of size 350µm-450µm. Tissue fragments were cultured in 90% L-15 medium containing different concentration of growth factors for 24 h. After culture, ovarian follicles growth was assessed by measuring its diameter in bright field with confocal microscope. Preliminary results indicated that after 24h in-vitro culture, ovarian follicles diameter increased when the tissue fragments were cultured with 20% FBS. Treatment with BSA did not show any increase in diameter and furthermore in some samples it induced damage to early stage follicles within the ovarian fragments. Studies with hCG and FSH are underway.

Cryoletters Journal

Studies on the role of hsp47 and hsp90 in zebrafish (Danio rerio) embryos under chilled condition

Kunjan Desai, Tiantian Zhang, Emma Spikings
LIRANS
Contact: kunjan.desai@beds.ac.uk

Development of protocols for short term storage of fish embryos which will not compromise their genetic integrity

Heat shock proteins express under heat stress conditions. This study aims to investigate potential roles of hsp47 and hsp90 under chilled conditions as a first step in studying the possible interactions of heat shock proteins with other developmental genes under stress conditions. Zebrafish embryos were warmed at 28°C for up to 60 min following chilling at 0°C for 30 min. RNA was extracted and reverse transcribed into cDNA for real time PCR analysis of hsp47 and hsp90 expression. In control embryos, the expression of hsp47 gradually increased over the treatment time period whilst hsp90 expression remained stable throughout. Significant increases in expressions of hsp47 and hsp90 were observed following warming in the embryos that had been chilled for 30 min. The increases in gene expressions may be explained by up regulation mechanisms within the embryos aiming to restore cell function and/or to activate repair mechanisms and maintain homeostasis.

Development of sensor systems for monitoring phase transition changes in cryoprotectant mixtures and assessing cell viability during cryopreservation

Jahanbeen Jahangir, David Rawson, Roberto Andres, John Morris
LIRANS; Asymptote Ltd
Contact: jahanbeen.jahangir@beds.ac.uk

Effect of cryoprotectants and cryoprotocols must be investigated in order to optimise cell survival

Phase transition is the change of a solution from (liquid) to another (ice or glass) state. The aims of the project are (1) to design a resistivity sensor system which monitors phase change in cryoprotectant mixtures to allow optimisation of cryoprotocols, and (2) to check the viability of cells by real time monitoring using a mediated amperometric sensor system. To date, glass transition temperature (Tg) of glycerol, sucrose and dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) media have been investigated. The values obtained agree with those reported in literature using the standard monitoring system of differential scanning calorimeter (DSC). All tests were performed in cryotubes and cryostraws for microvolume analysis. An application for this work has already been identified - the optimisation of protocols for cryopreservation of Lactobacillus bulgaricus. Investigations will determine the impact of cooling rates and Tg temperatures on cell viability.

http://www.beds.ac.uk/research/lirans

The effect of aberrant cell signalling on kidney disease

Emma Amir-Ebrahimi, Jan Domin
LIRANS
Contact: emma.amir-ebrahimi@beds.ac.uk

How does the loss of the signalling molecule PI3K C2a leads to damage in specialized kidney cells, called podocytes.

Kidney disease affects approximately 10% of the UK population, placing a substantial burden on the NHS. The primary role of the kidneys is to filter blood, remove waste products and produce urine. A common symptom of kidney disease is the appearance of protein in the urine (proteinuria). This is frequently observed following damage to a specialised type of kidney cell called a podocyte. Podocytes overlay blood vessels and form a molecular 'sieve', retaining protein within the circulation. Previous work from my laboratory demonstrates that podocytes require a signaling molecule; class II phosphoinositide 3 kinase alpha (PI3K-C2a for normal function. When absent, podocytes become damaged which can lead to kidney failure. The reason for this injury is presently unclear. The aim of this project is to determine how PI3K-C2a maintains healthy podocytes and examine whether this knowledge can be used to develop treatments for those suffering from long term kidney disease.

Harris et al (2011) Requirement for class II phosphoinositide 3-kinase C2a in maintenance of glomerular structure and function. Mol. Cell Biol. 31. 1. 63-80.

RIMAD - Research Institute in Media, Art and Design

Integrating handskills with 21st century technology in garment making

Catherine Pritchard, Beverley Bothwell
RIMAD
Contact: catherine.pritchard@beds.ac.uk

Identifying the importance of maintaining manual skills in garment pattern-cutting and construction in a growing technological environment and the necessity of sustainability in a disposable world.

It appears the difference between creating a couture garment and the production of a commercial garment is becoming wider as hand techniques, individuality and creativity can only be afforded by the elite. This raises questions such as; 'Does cheap justify demise in quality?' and 'Can appreciation of the artisan exist in a society that demands speed?' From a practitioner research approach it is the purpose of this project to apply these findings to the training room of the fashion student, further benefiting and preparing individuals wanting to maintain manual pattern-cutting techniques enabling learnt skills of the past to inform a digitised future. An outcome of this research will be both visual and tactile as identical garments will be constructed using different methods. The aim of this process is to highlight any changes needed or skills required to transform a 2D sketch into a 3D affordable, sustainable garment for the high street.

http://www.drapersonline.com/news/save-our-skills (Drapers is a weekly fashion trade magazine)