Investigations into Enhancing Yersinia pestis Cells Viability following Environmental Sampling for Forensic Analysis

Following an intentional or accidental bio-warfare agent (BWA) release, environmental sample analysis is absolutely critical to determine the extent of contamination. When dealing with nonspore forming BWA (e.g., Yersinia pestis), retention of cell viability is central to such analyses. Even though significant advances have been achieved in DNA sequencing technologies, a positive identification of BWAs in environmental samples must be made through the ability of cells to form colony-forming units upon culturing. Inability to revive the cells between collection and analysis renders such studies inconclusive. Commercial kits designed to preserve the viability of pathogens contained within clinical samples are available, but many of them have not been examined for their ability to preserve samples containing suspected BWAs. The study was initiated to examine the applicability of commercial solutions aiding in retention of Y. pestis viability in samples stored under nonpermissive temperatures, that is, 40 and 37°C. While none of the tested solutions sustained cell viability at 40°C, the results show five out of 17 tested preservatives were capable of supporting viability of Y. pestis at 37°C.     

Curriculum Reform in The Common Core Era: Evaluating Elementary Math Textbooks Across Six U.S. States

Can a school or district improve student achievement simply by switching to a higher-quality textbook or curriculum? We conducted the first multi-textbook, multi-state effort to estimate textbook efficacy following widespread adoption of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and associated changes in the textbook market. Pooling textbook adoption and student test score data across six geographically and demographically diverse U.S. states, we found little evidence of differences in average achievement gains for schools using different math textbooks. We found some evidence of greater variation in achievement gains among schools using pre-CCSS editions, which may have been more varied in their content than post-CCSS editions because they were written for a broader set of standards. We also found greater variation among schools that had more exposure to a given text. However, these differences were small. Despite considerable interest and attention to textbooks as a low-cost, “silver bullet” intervention for improving student outcomes, we conclude that the adoption of a new textbook or set of curriculum materials, on its own, is unlikely to achieve this goal.     

Turkish delight a public affairs study on family business: The influence of owners in the entrepreneurship orientation of family‐owned businesses

Family‐owned businesses (FOBs) are as unique as the families that own and control them. As reported by Miller, Steier, and Le Breton‐Miller (2003, p.513), the founders of many of these businesses try to continue their legacy and ensure continued family control via intergenerational succession, as when they hand over leadership to their children. The initial statistics suggest only approximately one third of FOBs survive into the second generation, with just 12% remaining “viable” by the third, and only about 3% operating into the fourth generation or beyond. Thus, one of the central problems for FOBs is this inability to ensure competent cross‐generational family leadership through successful transfer of ownership and management to the next family generation. This is a core issue for the modern public affairs practitioner and policy maker, nationally and internationally, and the Turkish case is a good example of the multicomplex issues evident in succession planning and leadership for business founders and leaders in these organisations. A firm's strategic orientation is an indicator of the processes developed to integrate new information, to coordinate decisions, to examine the evolution of environmental factors, and to assess new projects (Escriba‐Esteve, Sanchez‐Peinado & Sanchez‐Peinado, 2009). However, few studies have provided a framework that jointly analyses the FOB owner characteristics, the mediating processes and attitudes by which owners shape the direction of their family firms, and the effect of these postures on firm performance. This paper addresses the influence of family business owner, over the behaviour of FOBs. By treating FOB owners' characteristics as predictors of a firm's strategic orientation, we seek to provide a deeper understanding of how the characteristics of FOB owners shape decision making process and FOBs' behaviours in order to successfully survive in generations. This study introduced the concept of FOB's entrepreneurship orientation (EO) as a variable that mediates between FOB owners' characteristics and business performance. The objective of this paper is twofold: (a) to identify the demographic predictors FOBs' EO and (b) to analyse the role of EO as a mediator of the relationship between FOB owners' characteristics and FOBs' performance.     

“A Defeat not to Be Ultra-Fit”: Expectations and Experiences Related to Pregnancy and Employment in Contemporary Norway

Managing work while pregnant has long been a challenge for women in both paid and unpaid work. With Norway as the case in point, the aim of this study was to explore expectations and experiences among women relating to work-life and pregnancy health. Employing the constant comparison method, we drew on interviews, Internet discussions, newspapers, and health information booklets. The findings revealed strong discourses on pregnancy as health, and high expectations among pregnant women to be healthy, fit, and maintain their working capacity throughout pregnancy. Women who needed to slow down failed to fulfil these normative expectations and commonly experienced this as a personal defeat. Despite policies and regulations protecting women's pregnancy-related needs vis-à-vis their employer, some women hesitated to claim their eligibility to special rights. Many pregnant women overstretched, compromising their own health. This, we argue, reflects the ambiguity in policy and in the public debate. Ideas about pregnant women as a vulnerable group needing special protection on the one hand, and the expectations to perform as usual throughout pregnancy on the other, are discussed here in view of a gender-difference versus a gender-neutral discourse, the latter being foundational to the public debate on gender in contemporary Norway.     

Is an exemption from US groundwater regulations a loophole or a noose?

In the United States, the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) regulates most groundwater used for drinking water. The Act covers most urban areas but because it does not cover small water systems, it implicitly exempts nearly half of those living in rural America. In large measure, monitoring required by the SDWA has illustrated the prevalence of naturally occurring arsenic in groundwater in concentrated areas throughout the country. Even though many in Congress seem aware of this threat and have, indeed, supported more stringent arsenic standards, Congress, on the whole, has failed to update the SDWA to cover those water systems left unprotected by the Act. Conventional political science theory suggests that effective congressional oversight depends on Congress creating both active (e.g., hearings and commissioned studies) and passive oversight mechanisms (i.e., citizen suits and opportunities for constituent feedback). In this case, Congress had, in fact, created sufficient tools to detect a serious problem but, having identified it, nevertheless failed to respond. Why? In exploring Congress’s inaction, we find something unexpected: the structure of the SDWA has created perverse incentives not only for unregulated water systems but also for regulated systems to push to keep exempted water systems unregulated. The outcome is that those outside of the SDWA’s protections remain outside and continue to drink contaminated water by the glass full. So, while Congress created a loophole, it may have inadvertently tied a noose.     

Age-related differences when measuring political hypocrisy

This article aims to develop a scale for measuring political hypocrisy (conceptualized as the inconsistency between values publicly expressed by politicians and the behavior they actually demonstrate) and to explore the role of age in voters' perceptions of politicians' hypocrisy, analyzing if citizens belonging to different age groups may identify politicians' hypocrisy with a different detail. Results show that the 19-item scale of political hypocrisy—composed of three dimensions, called “ambiguity,” “slyness,” and “deceit”—has good psychometric properties, and that age-related differences when measuring political hypocrisy do exist (young voters show a greater awareness of the hypocritical behavior held by politicians). Furthermore, results suggest that the perception of political hypocrisy may vary according both to voters' political orientation and voting intention.     

How political malpractice affects trust in EU institutions

Abstract

Political misconduct is known to harm the politicians involved. Yet, we know less about how such events affect trust in political institutions. We study a real-world political malpractice affair in the European Commission, using a three-wave panel design to investigate how information about the affair influences trust in EU institutions. This enables us, first, to isolate the impact of new information on political trust, remedying endogeneity issues common in political trust research. Second, we assess which institutions are affected most (specificity) and whether effects depend upon citizens’ sophistication levels (conditionality). Finally, we assess the durability of effects over time. Our findings demonstrate that citizens obtain knowledge about EU affairs through the media, and use this knowledge in their trust evaluations. In doing so, citizens differentiate between EU and national institutions, with trust in the European Commission affected most. This suggests a sophisticated process and highlights the evaluative nature of political trust.