Site‐specific or target‐specific mutagenesis of viral DNA genomes, using a selectable marker system is a powerful tool for the analysis of the function of specific regions of large DNA genomes. Through these techniques the construction of vectors capable of delivering vaccines for the prevention of infectious disease in humans and animals is possible.

Site‐specific recombination events are of fundamental importance in many biological systems. In vitro experiments using purified proteins and DNA sub‐strates are yielding insights into strand exchange mechanisms and synapsis of recombination sites. By examining results across a range of systems ‐ prokaryotic and eukaryotic ‐ two distinct classes of site‐specific recombinase enzymes can be defined.

본 논문은 여성주의적 실천의 한 방식으로서 장소 특정적 예술이 가질 수 있는 가능성을 미학적 관점에서 탐구하는 것을 목표로 한다. 현대예술의 일반적인 형식중의 하나로서 자리잡은 장소특정적 예술은, 장소라는 요소가 비판적 예술 실천(수행)에서 어떻게 문제적이 되는지 장소적 실천 일반에 대해서 시사하는 바가 크다. 그 중에서도 본 논문은 장소와 여성주의적 실천의 관계를 다루며, 이를 위해, 2000년대 이후 한국 여성예술가의 네 개의 장소특정적 예술들 - 예술가의 서사와 담론이 중심이 되어 장소화나 특정 장소 선정이 이루어지는 두 가지 경우, 특정 지역 관련 기획전시의 경우, 특정 지역연구 (...) 프로젝트의 경우-을 대표 사례로 고려하였다.BR 모더니즘 예술의 매체 특정성과 대조적으로, 장소 특정성은 예술이 놓여있는 사회제도적 장소에 대한 의식과 질문이 주요동기가 되기 때문에, 비판적 문화실천으로서 여성주의적 실천의 가능성이 탐색될 수 있다. 예술에서의 장소특정성이 여성주의적 실천으로 기능하기 위해서 우선적으로 선행되어야 할 것은 장소 혹은 장소정체성이라는 개념에 대한 재해석이다. 장소란 특정 지리적 입지에 교차하는 다양한 사회적 관계라는 비판지리학자 매시Massey의 주장에 따른다면, 장소를 재구성하고 재해석하는 행위는 모두 정치적 행위이며, 예술에서 지역적 정체성이라는 요소의 활용 역시 젠더나 인종, 지역 문제에 대한 진보적 실천의 방식이 될 수 있다. 여성주의적으로 의미있는 장소적 예술실천에서 중요한 것은 이처럼, 우선적으로는 관계적 장소개념에 의해 기존의 지역정체성이 역사적으로 어떻게 구성되었는지의 해체와 재해석, 즉 특정 장소 정체성에 대한 여성주의적 관점에서의 적극적 재해석이다. 또한 장소특정적 예술의 많은 형태가 특정 장소나 지역 연구프로젝트라는 특수한 예술 형식과 관련된다. 이같은 지역연구 프로젝트는 여성예술가(집단)가 그 지역 정체성을 재해석하는 것 뿐 아니라, 그 지역에 살고 있는 여성 공동체의 삶에 개입하게 된다. 따라서 장소특정적 실천이 여성주의적으로서 유의미하게 위해 중요한 두 번째 요소는, 타자로서의 예술가가 지역 공동체와 관계함에 있어 어떤 위치를 취하고 어떤 방식을 택할 것인가에 대한 미학적, 윤리학적 성찰이라고 할 수 있다. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to examine Edmund Husserl’s theory of aesthetic consciousness and the possibility to apply it to site-specific art. The central focus will be on the idea of the limited synthetic unity of the aesthetic object that is introduced by Husserl in order to differentiate positional and aesthetic attitude towards the object. I claim that strongly site-specific art, which is a work of art about a place and in the place, challenges the view that (...) the synthetic unity of the aesthetic object is limited. Moreover, following Husserl’s theory, it becomes questionable whether strongly site-specific art is art at all. I try to answer these objections by explaining how the artist prescribes the appearances and boundaries of a strongly site-specific object of art, thereby satisfying the demand for the limitedness of the synthetic unity of the aesthetic object. (shrink)

본 논문은 메를로-퐁티(Maurice Merleau-Ponty, 1908-1962)의 현상학적 시각으로 리처드 세라(Richard Serra, 1939- )의 장소 특정적 미술(site-specific art)에 관한 예술철학적 고찰을 목적으로 한다. 장소 특정적 미술에서 몸의 체험은 가장 중요한 작품완성 요소이다. 2차원의 회화를 감상하는데 있어서 기본적으로 몸의 일부인 눈의 시각적 체험이 중요하기는 하지만, 장소 특정적 미술에서는 시각 외에도 청각, 촉각, 후각, 운동감각과 공간 감각 등의 다양한 감각이 융합된 총체적 몸의 체험이 부각 된다. 이러한 몸의 체험은 육체와 정신으로 이분화되는 데카르트(René Descartes, 1596-1650)적 사유 방식이나 게슈탈트의 시지각 이론(Gestalttheorie)으로는 이해하기 힘들다고 할 수 (...) 있으며, 이러한 사실을 염두에 두고 본 논문에서는 메를로-퐁티의 몸에 관한 사상을 중심으로 리처드 세라의 장소 특정적 미술에 대한 이해를 도모하고자 한다. 더불어 기존의 비평과 연구에서 한 걸음 나아가기 위해, 세라 작품의 현상학적 측면과 그의 일본 선(禪) 정원에서의 경험에 함께 주목하면서, ‘선 정원 경험의 현상학적 측면’과 ‘동양의 유(有)와 무(無)’ 개념에 대한 논의와 함께 세라의 작품세계에 관한 고찰을 진행한다. (shrink)

This paper examines the assumptions underpinning one of the constitutive elements of the modern concept of art: the idea of aesthetic autonomy. I argue that the orientation of recent art practice towards what has come to be termed ‘site-specificity’ is best understood as a progressive relinquishment of the principle of aesthetic autonomy. I develop this position through a close analysis of the work of Miwon Kwon. The paper is intended as a case-study that investigates the problematic relation between (...) historical and philosophical enquiry. CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)

Many who write about the playwright Maria Irene Fornes’s work comment with reverence about the experience of watching those productions she herself directed.1 Managing somehow to combine frank depictions of cruelty and violence with an odd, otherworldly charm, Fornes’s direction conveyed a distinct sui generis quality that has deflected analytic scrutiny—the exterior operates in such an exquisite fashion one hesitates to lift the hood and look beneath. The set is a wooden room which sits on an earth promontory. The promontory (...) is five feet high and covers the same periphery as the room. The wood has the color and texture of bone that has dried in the sun. It is ashen and cold. In Mud’s opening notes.. (shrink)

The recombinational repair of chromosomal double‐strand breaks (DSBs) is of critical importance to all organisms, who devote considerable genetic resources to ensuring such repair is accomplished. In Saccharomyces cerevisiae, DSB‐mediated recombination can be initiated synchronously by the conditional expression of two site‐specific endonucleases, HO or I‐Scel. DNA undergoing recombination can then be extracted at intervals and analyzed. Recombination initiated by meiotic‐specific DSBs can be followed in a similar fashion. This type of ‘in vivo biochemistry’ has been used to describe (...) several discrete steps in two different homologous recombination pathways: gene conversion and single‐strand annealing. The roles of specific proteins during recombination can be established by examining DNA in strains deleted for the corresponding gene. These same approaches are now becoming available for the study of recombination in both higher plants and animals. Physical monitoring can also be used to analyze nonhomologous recombination events, whose mechanisms appear to be conserved from yeast to mammals. (shrink)

The article investigates how dancers can actively shape and handle the ways they are affected throughout their artistic practices. To do so, we adopt a phenomenological-ethnographic approach, analysing the dance-artist Kitt Johnson's site-specific performance production called Mellemrum ('the space between spaces'). We put ethnographically based interview data in a dialectical interaction with the existing notions of affectivity and affective scaffolding — showing their usefulness, while also noting the need for the further notion of what we call affective engagement. This (...) notion, we argue, is needed to account for how artists actively handle their affective involvements. Specifically, as we show, in Mellemrum the dancers deliberately and strategically juggle between (i) a self-affective engagement, (ii) an affective engagement with the environment (space and people), and(iii) an affective-aesthetic engagement with the choreography and artistic ideas of the performance. (shrink)

Extract: Clearly, academic life takes place at the intersection of many social practices. If MacIntyre is right, the role-specific virtues of academic life should be understood in terms of these practices.2 Academic virtues are those excellences required to obtain the internal goods of the social practices constituting academic life. And the social practices of academic life are sustained, competitive and cooperative attempts to achieve a set of academic goals and realize academic forms of excellence. They are also sustained attempts to (...) expand and improve conceptions of these goals and forms of excellence. They emerge out of traditions—for instance the tradition of scientific argument— and must be understood in terms of these traditions. MacIntyre argues that this preliminary account of virtues in relation to social practices needs to be deepened in two ways: connecting it to the unity of an individual’s life on the one hand and to a coherent historical tradition on the other. Virtues are not just any set of traits delivering the internal goods of social practices, but those that serve to make coherent a person’s life and her place in an on-going tradition. They are crucial to lending meaning to one’s life and its struggles. (shrink)

BackgroundMulti-centre studies generally cost more than single-centre studies because of larger sample sizes and the need for multiple ethical approvals. Multi-centre studies include clinical trials, clinical quality registries, observational studies and implementation studies. We examined the costs of two large Australian multi-centre studies in obtaining ethical and site-specific approvals.MethodsWe collected data on staff time spent on approvals and expressed the overall cost as a percent of the total budget.ResultsThe total costs of gaining approval were 38 % of the budget (...) for a study of 50 centres (mean cost AUD $6960 per site) and 2 % for a study of 11 centres (mean cost AUD $2300 per site). Seventy-five and 90 % of time was spent on repeated tasks, respectively, and many time-consuming tasks, such as reformatting documents, did nothing to improve the study design or participant safety.ConclusionsImprovements have been made to the ethical approval application system, but more gains could be made without increasing risks of harm to research participants. We propose that ethical review bodies and individual sites publish statistics on how long they take to process approvals which could then be nationally benchmarked. (shrink)

Recent discoveries have suggested the concept that intracellular signals are the sum of multiple, site‐specified subsignals, rather than single, homogeneous entities. In the context of cancer, searching for compounds that selectively block subsignals essential for tumor progression, but not those regulating “house‐keeping” functions, could help in producing drugs with reduced side effects compared to compounds that block signaling completely. The Ras‐ERK pathway has become a paradigm of how space can differentially shape signaling. Today, we know that Ras proteins are (...) found in different plasma membrane microdomains and endomembranes. At these localizations, Ras is subject to site‐specific regulatory mechanisms, distinctively engaging effector pathways and switching‐on diverse genetic programs to generate different biological responses. The Ras effector pathway leading to ERKs activation is also under strict, space‐related regulatory processes. These findings may open a gate for aiming at the Ras‐ERK pathway in a spatially restricted fashion, in our quest for new anti‐tumor therapies. (shrink)

There is increasing appreciation for the role that location plays in the experience of a musical event. This paper seeks to understand this role in terms of our habitual relationships to place, asking whether and how being musical somewhere can expand and transform our habituated comportment there, and with what consequences. This inquiry is anchored in a series of site-specific improvised performances by Jen Reimer and Max Stein, and the theory and practice of the late experimental music pioneer Pauline (...) Oliveros. The argument made interpreting these performances is grounded in Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology of embodiment, and Alia Al-Saji’s reception of it. This paper claims that such site-specific improvised performances can elicit a sort of hesitation in our everyday style of sensory-motor conditioning, and, concomitantly, awaken a layer of sensory living amenable to radically new sonic and behavioural configurations. (shrink)

The “Human Genome Project” was completed in 2003, shifting the focus to proteome and transcriptome research. One approach to proteomics involves the comprehensive visualization of the localization of proteins in all tissues and organs. We discuss in situ phospho‐protein atlases, which are systematized representations of the localization of proteins. Protein atlases provide important information about the identity and presence of proteins in specific organs, tissues and cells under physiological and pathological conditions. Antibody‐based immunohistochemical analysis is a powerful method for generating (...) a protein atlas. However, it is difficult to localize phosphorylated proteins under in vivo physiological conditions, even with immunohistochemistry, because these proteins tend to be dephosphorylated or phosphorylated due to the experimental manipulations. We also discuss an improved immunohistochemical method for precisely detecting phosphorylated protein, using the detection of phosphorylated ERK1/2 as an example. We consider that it is possible and useful to generate a phospho‐protein atlas. (shrink)

Entry into mitosis is driven by the activity of kinases, which phosphorylate over 7000 proteins on multiple sites. For cells to exit mitosis and segregate their genome correctly, these phosphorylations must be removed in a specific temporal order. This raises a critical and important question: how are specific phosphorylation sites on an individual protein removed? Traditionally, the temporal order of dephosphorylation was attributed to decreasing kinase activity. However, recent evidence in human cells has identified unique patterns of dephosphorylation during mammalian (...) mitotic exit that cannot be fully explained by the loss of kinase activity. This suggests that specificity is determined in part by phosphatases. In this review, we explore how the physicochemical properties of an individual phosphosite and its surrounding amino acids can affect interactions with a phosphatase. These positive and negative interactions in turn help determine the specific pattern of dephosphorylation required for correct mitotic exit. (shrink)

Several contemporary architects have designed architectural objects that are closely linked to their particular sites. An in-depth study of the relevant relationship holding between those objects and their sites is, however, missing. This paper addresses the issue, arguing that those architectural objects are akin to works of site-specific art. In section (1), I introduce the topic of the paper. In section (2), I critically analyse the debate on the categorisation of artworks as site-specific. In section (3), I apply (...) to architecture the lesson learned from the analysis of the art debate. (shrink)

Oligonucleotide‐directed, site‐specific mutagenesis is being applied to the problem of ion‐gradient driven active transport with the lac permease as a model system. It has been shown that Arg‐302, His‐322 and Glu‐325, neighboring residues in putative transmembrane helices IX and X, play an important role in lactose‐coupled H+ translocation, possibly as components of a catalytic triad similar to that found in the serine proteases. In addition, Cys residues, long thought to be involved in the mechanism of the permease, are not (...) directly involved in either substrate binding or H+ translocation. Finally, a variety of mutations have no effect on permease activity indicating that single amino acid changes do not lead indiscriminately to long‐range conformational alterations. (shrink)

Phenotypic divergence among animal species may be due in part to species‐specific (SS) regulation of gene expression by small, non‐coding regulatory RNAs termed “microRNAs”. This phenomenon can be modulated by several variables. First, microRNA genes vary by their level of conservation, many of them being SS, or unique to a particular evolutionary lineage. Second, microRNA expression levels vary spatially and temporally in different species. Lastly, while microRNAs bind the 3′UTR of target genes in order to silence their expression, the binding (...) sites themselves are often non‐conserved. The variability of the miRNA‐target paradigm between different species is thus multifactorial, and this paradigm has only just started to gain attention from researchers in various fields. Here we present and discuss recent findings regarding the characteristics and implications of SS microRNA regulation. (shrink)

Each Site Specific is always and above all Time Specific, that is marked by Time and by the times from which it is generated, defined and set in a place. Space is a significant environment a work that works in the Work that re-means, in its transformation, the very connotations of performing action. To contain the never-ending process of meaning to which such a work would be subjected, it will be Time: that granitic categorial essence that philosophy, together with (...) Space, indicates as fundamental for any cognitive and speculative exercise. Moreover such an artifact, incorporating History and stories, re-reads – making them readable – living testimonies that animate the place of existence of subjects and objects that last the relative time of their existence, in an attempt to make them and itself eternal. As if the work could take charge of the task of triggering the memorative (making memory) device of the Real, a mysterious aesthetic mechanism that interfaces subjects and objects in the common project to adapt, know and make the world – which is more than the Real, imbued as it is of significant connections and correlations. The object work of art in its positioning (making room) in a place, invites the subject –through an imaginative pact – to signify the world through a simulation of sight that allows Man to pre-see his own possibility of existence before the unknown the real proposes him, responding to his personal S.o.S. he sends daily, threatened by the indecipherable fear of sinking in the unknown. (shrink)

The paper draws its inspiration from the provocation which Merton offered sociology both to engage with empirical data and to perform analyses adequate to guide intervention beyond the particular case. Whilst contemporary STS is very different both in its models of theory and its forms of methodology, this paper suggests Merton's concerns with engagement and adequacy provide a useful way to interrogate current approaches. Specifically, the paper explores some recent anthropological conceptions of ethnographic fieldwork that have provided potent models for (...) the study of scientific and technological cultures. These multi-sited approaches have also provided the opportunity to develop new notions of intervention and explore alternative ways of making contributions to development of theory and practice. In the process of pursuing the goals of engagement and adequacy notions of ethnography have however become stretched. This sense of detachment from methodological canons accentuates the need for methodological debate and skill-sharing in STS. (shrink)

L’exposition d’art dans des paysages est devenu populaire au Japon, avec la multiplication récente de festivals d’art locaux. Dans ces festivals, qui attirent chacun des centaines de milliers de visiteurs, coexistent des œuvres hétérogènes. Certaines sont des sculptures autonomes, d’autres des installations qui se fondent dans le paysage, et d’autres encore sont des œuvres de type « art relationnel ». Bien que ces œuvres in situ affirment leur lien essentiel avec le site naturel rural et avec le corps du (...) spectateur — constituant un événement, une expérience, une rencontre éphémère —, les relations avec le site comme avec le visiteur sont complexes et ambigües. Il y a des œuvres in situ, mais parfois aussi in aliquo situ : des œuvres qui peuvent être installées n’importe où. Qu’est-ce qui attire les visiteurs dans ces expositions? Quels sont donc la nature et le mérite de leur localisation? Si les visiteurs apprécient de voir des œuvres dans ces paysages cela peut être en partie lié au principe japonais traditionnel d’expérience des lieux dit meisho-meguri, ou « pèlerinage vers des sites célèbres ». Cette pratique issue du Moyen Âge est associée historiquement au sacré. Aujourd’hui ce pèlerinage prend la forme du tourisme moderne mais conserve un sens traditionnel invisible car les visiteurs se déplacent à travers une série de lieux géographiques selon un jeu culturellement codé. Selon nous, dans le cas des visites d’œuvres d’art en zones rurales, l’appréciation des œuvres d’art participe à ce même jeu traditionnel de se déplacer physiquement dans une série de lieux. Cette dimension spirituelle implicite modifie à son tour la perception des œuvres. Ainsi on dira que la pratique japonaise de visiter ces expositions d’art in situ témoigne de la survivance d’une tradition, et constitue ainsi un système alternatif d’expérience esthétique. The installations of artwork in natural landscapes have become popular in Japan with the recent increase in local art festivals. In these art festivals where hundreds of thousands of visitors gather, heterogeneous installations coexist; some are autonomous sculptures, some are fused into the natural landscape, and some belong to “relational art”. Although most works assert the essential quality of their location, and the experience as “an event”, their relationships to the rural areas and to the body of the visitor are complex and ambiguous. Some works are really in situ, but some are in aliquo situ—that is, works that could be installed anywhere. What attracts visitors to these exhibitions? Hence what is the nature and merit of the location? What is the relation to the visitor’s bodily presence? If visitors enjoy the site-specificity of the artwork this may be linked to the traditional Japanese system of experiencing places as meisho-meguri—i.e. “a pilgrimage to a series of famous sites”. This practice comes from the Middle Ages and was by then spiritual. While today these pilgrimages appear as a form of modern tourism, they retain a culturally coded character because visitors’s journey is like “a game of visiting a series of geographical places”. According to me, in the case of the visit of artistic sites, the appreciation of the artwork participates in this same game of bodily displacement to a series of places. This implicit spiritual underpinning conversely modifies the visitor’s perception of the works. Thus I propose that visiting artistic sites in natural settings in Japan appears as informed by this Japanese particular tradition, and thus constitutes an alternative system of contemporary aesthetic experience. (shrink)

This article explores how nuclear disaster narratives have both been informed by and articulated collective images of risk and uncertainty since the 1980s. Drawing on ideas from classical and affective narratology that are framed by a perspective informed by the sociology of knowledge, we examine three variations of narrating nuclear disasters in different media: (1) sociologist Charles Perrow’s detailed analysis of the Three Mile Island accident in his popular science book _Normal Accidents_ (1984), (2) Svetlana Alexievich’s _Chernobyl Prayer_ (1997), a (...) literary/journalistic account of the Chernobyl disaster that chronicles individuals’ experiences through eyewitness accounts, and (3) the television series _Chernobyl_ (2019), which, in a docufictional style, combines what is staged as an objective reconstruction of the unfolding of the disaster with subjective memories of those affected while reflecting on the incident’s larger political, scientific, and environmental contexts. We suggest that these three stories of nuclear incidents not only produce specific knowledges about the disaster in question but also address the fragility of knowledge systems and social structures as well as assessments of agency. As such, these narratives function as sites of mitigation that offer their readers/viewers certainty in times of crisis. (shrink)

Although virtually all comparative research about risk perception focuses on which hazards are of concern to people in different culture groups, much can be gained by focusing on predictors of levels of risk perception in various countries and places. In this case, we examine standard and novel predictors of risk perception in seven sites among communities affected by a flood in Mexico (one site) and volcanic eruptions in Mexico (one site) and Ecuador (five sites). We conducted more than (...) 450 interviews with questions about how people feel at the time (after the disaster) regarding what happened in the past, their current concerns, and their expectations for the future. We explore how aspects of the context in which people live have an effect on how strongly people perceive natural hazards in relationship with demographic, well-being, and social network factors. Generally, our research indicates that levels of risk perception for past, present, and future aspects of a specific hazard are similar across these two countries and seven sites. However, these contexts produced different predictors of risk perception—in other words, there was little overlap between sites in the variables that predicted the past, present, or future aspects of risk perception in each site. Generally, current stress was related to perception of past danger of an event in the Mexican sites, but not in Ecuador; network variables were mainly important for perception of past danger (rather than future or present danger), although specific network correlates varied from site to site across the countries. (shrink)

The PhD is concerned with the construction of site knowledge and how this is transformed into knowing where and how to intervene in a river system close to ecological collapse. It involves three overlapping topics: • Site knowledge and its impact upon the design process • Development of tools and techniques appropriate for working on a particular type of site condition: the threshold between land and water • Transitory: the impact of dynamic processes and events on inhabitation (...) Site knowledge emerges from a process of investigating a location. It is generated by on-site and off-site operations. This involves the architect in a dynamic set of relationships - between encounters on the ground in the here and now, with more remote encounters with the site from the studio and archive. This mode of site study amplifies the impact of scale shift and it exposes the variable and provisional status of a location, while also providing a way of operating in environments that can be considered dynamic. The PhD is premised upon the need for a work to relate to its surrounding environment. The hinged meaning between the terms a site and to site have relevance to the design process. A site, as a noun, suggests a specific place, such as a plot of land, whereas the verb to site, suggests that a work will be placed in relation to other things. Site knowledge is thus generated through the act of describing a place, through the act of making drawings and other descriptions of that place. It generates ways of conceptualising a site and leads to action: knowing how and where to intervene in a location. The River Murray provided a context for the project work of the PhD. Research led to tools for recording and interpreting the impacts of flood events on the settlements on the riverbanks that were protected by levees that worked against the natural forces of the system. The research culminated in a range of designs that demonstrated how to integrate town and tourist developments into the re-established cyclical flows necessary for the health of the system. (shrink)

On the occasion of Peru’s Independence, the champions of the Creole nation elevated the Inca State Indian to the status of a respectable ancestor, thus eliminating the Amerindian historicity of the population. The archaeological remains provide support to an indigenist ideology that ignores the sociological Indian, considered to be ontologically inferior. Today, these Inca vestiges contribute to the construction of the national narrative: the Inca solar cult is thus reinvented on the site of Sacsayhuaman. To what extent can the (...) work of archaeologists serve to corroborate partisan ideologies? The presidents of the Peruvian and Bolivian Republics were inducted as pre-Hispanic rulers, the first on the Inca site of Machu Picchu, the second at the Tiwanaku Sun gate. To what extent can the vestiges of a civilization be instrumentalized by politics? The Inca sites are now assailed by New Age mystics from the United States and Europe under the leadership of local neo-shamans. They are indeed reputed to carry positive “energy”, one that is exploited by mystical tourism agencies. To what extent can the heritage of the nation, maintained by public services, be the object of private profits, ideologies that may be sectarian and possibly irreparable damages? In the culture of traditional Andean communities, the pre-Hispanic ruins had a classificatory and symbolic function. This function disappears when the setting of a myth is replaced by a historical site. How can we respect the indigenous perception of archaeological remains? These are the ethical questions that this article seeks to raise on the basis of specific and concrete cases of archaeological sites on which the author has carried out excavations. (shrink)

The ultimate purpose of this research is to investigate how far Google Sites can develop students' learning outcomes in writing ability. The need for English becomes one of the reasons why the requirement of universities in public consisting of speaking English. This research was conducted as a case study, with the objective of investigating the integration of Google Sites into language teaching strategies, specifically the design and execution of creating web-based instructional resources in Google Sites, and the benefits it provides (...) in inspiring students to enhance their authentic writing skills. This research included 31 second-semester students, all of whom were enrolled in one of the universities in Indonesia. Among these students, 19 were female (61.29%) and 12 were male (38.71%), and they were all enrolled in the Department of English Education. These individuals were chosen based on their prior experience in language education, as they had received instruction in the subject. Based on the outcomes of the teaching treatment that utilized Google Sites to enhance students' writing skills, it can be inferred that Google Sites serves as an effective media blog for improving students' writing abilities. These results show the effectiveness of using Google Sites in both face-to-face and non-face-to-face learning settings for teaching English to students with various text materials and categories, as determined by a p-value of less than 0.01. Therefore, Google Sites can be considered an effective tool for teaching English. (shrink)

This article aims to analyse one specific type of memorial site that furnishes an indexical link to past traumatic events which took place in precisely these places. Such memorials will be defined here as trauma sites. It will be shown how the semiotic trait of indexicality produces unique meaning effects, forcing a reframing of the issue of representation, with all its aesthetic and ethical dimensions. In contrast to other forms of memorial site, trauma sites exist factually as material (...) testimonies of the violence and horror that took place there. The fact they still exist, more or less as they were, implies a precise choice on the part of post-conflict societies regarding which traces of the past ought to be preserved and in which ways. In other words, a decision is made about what politics of memory to adopt in each case. Trauma sites thus become unique, privileged observatories that allow us to understand better the emergence of post-conflict societies. The various forms of conservation, transformation, memorialization of places where slaughter, torture and horror have been carried out are key clues to better understandings of the relationship between memory and history in each post-conflict society studied. This article presents a close reading of three very different trauma sites: the Tuol Sleng Museum of the Crimes of Genocide in Phnom Penh, Cambodia; Villa Grimaldi in Santiago, Chile; and a third, more recent, museum: The Ustica Memorial Museum (Museo per la Memoria di Ustica) in Bologna, Italy. These memorials represent instances of three very different traumatic memory politics: in Tuol Sleng, visitors are relocated in the trauma space, in a sort of ‘frozen past’; in Villa Grimaldi, a process of attenuation is at work, the traces of the past are less evident, and their emotional effects weaker. The Ustica Museum represents yet another option, a movement towards an artistic and creative reinterpretation of the traumatic event itself. (shrink)

Topologically associating domain (TAD) boundaries are the flanking edges of TADs, also known as insulated neighborhoods, within the 3D structure of genomes. A prominent feature of TAD boundaries in mammalian genomes is the enrichment of clustered CTCF sites often with mixed orientations, which can either block or facilitate enhancer–promoter (E‐P) interactions within or across distinct TADs, respectively. We will discuss recent progress in the understanding of fundamental organizing principles of the clustered CTCF insulator codes at TAD boundaries. Specifically, both inward‐ (...) and outward‐oriented CTCF sites function as topological chromatin insulators by asymmetrically blocking improper TAD‐boundary‐crossing cohesin loop extrusion. In addition, boundary stacking and enhancer clustering facilitate long‐distance E‐P interactions across multiple TADs. Finally, we provide a unified mechanism for RNA‐mediated TAD boundary function via R‐loop formation for both insulation and facilitation. This mechanism of TAD boundary formation and insulation has interesting implications not only on how the 3D genome folds in the Euclidean nuclear space but also on how the specificity of E‐P interactions is developmentally regulated. (shrink)

The stock of Albania buildings dating between 1955 and 1985 during the communist period is a very powerful and important footprint not only in the city of Tirana, Albania, but all over the country. This category of buildings is positioned mostly in the center of the city, within the inner historical ring of the city of Tirana. They are designed considering the mottos: standardization and typification representing the standards of the time. In the city of Tirana almost in every neighborhood (...) are located underground anti-bomb tunnels. Since the majority of them nowadays are out of functions, they are destroyed. Despite this fact, the specific neighborhood taken into consideration includes in the inner block area these shelters. The socialist regime and professionals of the time do not consider the orientation of the building toward sun in order to benefit from the solar radiation. Furthermore, the buildings are placed randomly in the urban structure of the city. Regardless to that fact the analysis of the WWR and WFR showed relatively good results compared to the international case studies. Building thermography and U-value measurements of the building showed poor results compared to international and national standards. Taking into consideration this fact, immediate improvements are needed in order to include the buildings within the comfort zone, enhancing its thermal potential category. The analysis of the existing building structures and their construction materials is crucial in order to have a better understanding of the thermal potential of them. The structures are measured and designed according to their actual physical conditions. The buildings require an immediate energetic requalification, avoiding at the maximum the thermal bridges as part of them. (shrink)

This article argues that localizing access – a general ethical principle – is a workable strategy that can be used in approaching participants in qualitative research across disciplines and in coping with respective institutional practices in order to collect meaningful data. This article is based on the autobiographical, lived experiences of the authors during the period of their data collection in Cameroon in 2013 and 2015, by the second and first author, respectively. Therefore, generalization across a broader context is somewhat (...) restricted, and a closer analysis of specific cultural and situational realities is needed. The article addresses two main objectives, that is, to identify factors that inhibit and factors that facilitate access to individuals and institutions. To this end, the article employs self-reflexivity and provides valuable explanations on the workability of applying skills of negotiating access in a local cultural context. (shrink)

Social network sites are a new communication channel to convey CSR information. They are interactive channels that let users participate, spread content and generate positive and negative electronic word-of-mouth about companies that can dramatically affect their reputation and future business. To identify the factors behind this behaviour, we designed a causal model to explain the intention to both comment on and share a negative corporate social responsibility news posted on Facebook. We included the following as explanatory variables: social consciousness, environmental (...) consciousness, information usefulness, corporate image and attitude towards sharing and commenting on CSR news. We surveyed 208 Facebook users who evaluated a fictitious news item about an environmental issue. We observed that social and environmental consciousness influences the usefulness of information and the attitude towards behaviour, which may explain the eWOM intention of the specific news. However, corporate image can cause people to refrain from generating eWOM and spreading the news on their friend social network. (shrink)

Here, we review genomic target site selection during retroviral integration as a multistep process in which specific biases are introduced at each level. The first asymmetries are introduced when the virus takes a specific route into the nucleus. Next, by co‐opting distinct host cofactors, the integration machinery is guided to particular chromatin contexts. As the viral integrase captures a local target nucleosome, specific contacts introduce fine‐grained biases in the integration site distribution. In vivo, the established population of proviruses (...) is subject to both positive and negative selection, thereby continuously reshaping the integration site distribution. By affecting stochastic proviral expression as well as the mutagenic potential of the virus, integration site choice may be an inherent part of the evolutionary strategies used by different retroviruses to maximise reproductive success. (shrink)

Within the highly organized nuclear structure, specific nuclear domains (ND10) are defined by accumulations of proteins that can be interferon-upregulated, implicating ND10 as sites of a nuclear defense mechanism.Compatible with such a mechanism is the deposition of herpesvirus, adenovirus, and papovavirus genomes at the periphery of ND10. However, these DNA viruses begin their transcription at ND10 and consequently initiate replication at these sites, suggesting that viruses have evolved ways to circumvent this potential cellular defense and exploit it. Other ND10-associated proteins (...) belong to ubiquitin-related pathways. These findings, together with the accumulation of various overexpressed cellular and viral proteins, suggest that ND10 function as nuclear dumps or as nuclear depots. Consistent with the recruitment or deposition of various proteins and viral genomes adjacent to ND10, ND10 themselves may only be protein accumulations at specific but as yet undefined nuclear deposition sites. The concept of specific nuclear deposition sites may explain the juxtaposition of various nuclear bodies and allows testable predictions about a potential supramolecular regulatory mechanism whereby proteins are selectively segregated or released by global changes induced in nuclear functions such as viral infections, stress, or hormonal induction. BioEssays 20:660–667, 1998.© 1998 John Wiley & Sons Inc. (shrink)

In today’s social online world there is a variety of interaction and participatory possibilities which enable web users to actively produce content themselves. This user-generated content is omnipresent in the web and there is growing evidence that it is used to select or evaluate professionally created online information. The present study investigated how this surrounding content affects online advertising by drawing from social influence theory. Specifically, it was assumed that web users sharing an interpersonal relationship and/or a group membership with (...) authors of user-generated content which appears next to advertising on the web page are more strongly influenced in their response to the advertising than unrelated users. These assumptions were tested in a 2 × 2 between-subject experiment with 118 students who were exposed to four different Facebook profiles that differed in terms of interpersonal connection to the source and collective connection to the source. The results show a significant impact in the case of collective influence, but not in the case of interpersonal influence. The underlying mechanisms of this effect and implications of the results for online advertising are discussed. (shrink)

Public debate about who or what is to blame for the rising rates of obesity and overweight shifts between two extreme opinions. The first posits overweight as the result of a lack of individual will, the second as the outcome of bodily drives, potentially triggered by the environment. Even though apparently clashing, these positions are in fact two faces of the same liberal coin. When combined, drives figure as a complication on the road to health, while a strong will should (...) be able to counter obesity. Either way, the body’s propensity to eat is to be put under control. Drawing on fieldwork in several obesity clinics and prevention sites in the Netherlands, this paper first traces how this ‘logic of control’ presents itself in clinical practices targeted at overweight people, and then goes on to explore how these practices move beyond that logic. Using the concepts of ‘will’ and ‘drives’ as analytical tools, I sketch several modes of ordering reality in which bodies, subjects, food and the environment are configured in different ways. In this way it appears that in clinical practices the terms found in public discourse take on different meanings and may even lose all relevance. The analysis reveals a richness of practiced ideals. The paper argues, finally, that making visible these alternative modes of ordering opens up a space for normative engagements with obesity care that move beyond the logic of control and its critiques. (shrink)

Social networking sites have challenged ethical issues about users’ information security and privacy. SNS users are concerned about their privacy and need to control the information they share and its use. This paper examines the security of SNS by taking a look at the influence of users’ perceived control of information over their information-sharing behaviors. Employing an empirical study, this paper demonstrates the importance of perceived control in SNS users’ information-sharing behaviors. Specifically, perceived control has been found to be negatively (...) related to perceived privacy risk and attitude toward information sharing, which in turn has an impact on their information-sharing behaviors. In addition, gender has been shown to be an important factor that moderates the influences of both perceived control and perceived privacy risk on SNS users’ attitudes toward information sharing. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed. (shrink)

The article analyzes the process of group-dynamic change and the way of leading a training group in the transition from an on-site to a virtual form of work. This change is analyzed in the form of a case study, which describes the specifics of the pandemic crisis and the need to move to a virtual form of leadership. The change in the group dynamics is commented on, and the interventions of leaders are described, which make the crisis functioning more (...) adaptable and functional in relation to the task of the training group. (shrink)

Although interactions of proteins with glycosaminoglycans (GAGs), such as heparin and heparan sulphate, are of great biological importance, structural requirements for protein‐GAG binding have not been well‐characterised. Ionic interactions are important in promoting protein‐GAG binding. Polyelectrolyte theory suggests that much of the free energy of binding comes from entropically favourable release of cations from GAG chains. Despite their identical charges, arginine residues bind more tightly to GAGs than lysine residues. The spacing of these residues may determine protein‐GAG affinity and (...) class='Hi'>specificity. Consensus sequences such as XBBBXXBX, XBBXBX and a critical 20 Å spacing of basic residues are found in some protein sites that bind GAG. A new consensus sequence TXXBXXTBXXXTBB is described, where turns bring basic interacting amino acid residues into proximity. Clearly, protein‐GAG interactions play a prominent role in cell‐cell interaction and cell growth. Pathogens including virus particles might target GAG‐binding sites in envelope proteins leading to infection. BioEssays 20:156–167, 1998. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

This research explores the marginal stakeholder engagement and propensity to value cocreation in the fast-fashion industry by taking Generation Z consumers (GZCs) as observation unit and social networking sites (SNSs) as context of investigation. By undertaking 24 in-depth interviews with US and Italian GZCs, the study uncovers the main elements that influence their engagement generation on SNSs and highlights that at least four main paradoxes (PXs) exist in this scenario. Specifically, the interviewees reported that they do not trust those brands (...) that make them feel as marginal consumers (PX1) and that they are likely to be extremely loyal to those brands that actively take them into consideration in their activities on SNSs (PX2). In addition, although GZCs concerned about the environment, in most cases, they will buy repeatedly from fast-fashion brands for convenience reasons (PX3). Finally, social dimension of GZCs engagement appears to be influenced by their peers' preferences (PX4). This research is the first that explored GZCs by considering them under the lenses of stakeholder engagement and offering novel insights about common believes on this generation of consumers. Therefore, theoretical and managerial implications are discussed to advance current knowledge on GZCs and to help the development of new strategies to engage them on SNSs. (shrink)

As the contract cheating market has become more sophisticated and competition has intensified, the contract cheating industry has had to redevelop its approach to gain custom. The industry has developed new models of internal operation and providers are using more sophisticated techniques to reach potential customers. This paper discusses contract cheating industry workflows and introduces terminology to allow complexities of the industry to be more consistently discussed. Examples are provided throughout to indicate the scale and challenge of the contract cheating (...) industry operations.An analysis of contract cheating operations on the micro-outsourcing website Fiverr.com is presented, using comparative data collected in June 2016 and October 2018. The analysis of the data demonstrates how the contract cheating industry is seeing continual change. Specifically, on Fiverr.com, this includes an increase in the number of providers offering essay writing services, particularly those from Kenya and Pakistan. The increase in service availability is accompanied by an associated reduction in essay pricing. The advertised pricing per 1000 words has dropped substantially, from $31.73 USD to $5.73 USD. The accounts used by contract cheating providers are also being replaced at an increased rate.Based on the data, contract cheating providers on Fiverr.com are currently estimated to be taking a minimum of $92,001 USD per year in revenue. This is an example calculated from only one search term on which contract cheating providers advertise on only one micro-outsourcing site used for contract cheating. The actual industry income from micro-outsourcing web sites is likely to be substantially higher. (shrink)

Attitudes toward repository projects cannot be explained merely on the basis of perceived risks, trust, or technical information. Issues of justice and fairness frequently arise when burdens and benefits are to be allocated. A fair distribution across the various parts of a given territory of the waste to be stored is unlikely to be accomplished as it is contingent on appropriate geological formations and other factors. The process by which the specific distribution is determined and accomplished needs to be taken (...) into account as well. Thus, justice evaluations of both the distributive outcome and the process itself, by which the outcome is accomplished, are likely to affect people’s attitudes toward and acceptance of siting decisions. Data from a number of methodically different studies conducted over the last eight years on site selection in Switzerland suggest that a fair procedure is more essential than a fair distribution to a consensus about the decisions made. As a consequence, even normative assessments of the fairness of a distribution of nuclear waste must consider procedural justice as a valuable indicator, independently of the particular shape of the distribution. However, contextual factors, such as the wider nuclear energy strategy of a country, may compete with procedural fairness in terms of importance. Even though fairness is a requirement it does not guarantee acceptance. It may, however, enhance acceptability from a moral standpoint. (shrink)

This article investigates the potential for new television as arts practice. It explores this potential by revisiting acts and sites of television's history through processes of enactment, specifically the reenactment of The Man with the Flower in his Mouth, the first drama broadcast by John Logie Baird in 1930. This took place in Baird's studio at 133 Long Acre, London. The article outlines key features of various possibilities for a “new” television and a new television arts practice and considers how (...) reenactment as an arts process might address the “trace” of historical television's archive, and in doing so also give it a particular contemporary relevance. Theorists of memory and storage are drawn upon to develop forms of thinking about television and performance as archive which are then drawn on to consider the prospects for reenacttv.net. Reenacttv.net is an art and television history project which will reenact The Man with the Flower in His Mouth in the summer of 2012. (shrink)

A stereospecific binding site is not the only determinant governing the selectivity of transport proteins. An understanding of transport across cellular membranes requires a description of the different compartments within a transmembrane channel; evidence for the existence of these compartments comes from the selectivity properties of genetically modified maltoporin. Such compartments may also be of significance in determining the specificity of other transport proteins.