Academic researchers in many disciplines are facing difficulties in disseminating their research outputs beyond the academic community. Particularly, Information Systems (IS) academic researchers have been struggling to make their research more relevant to practice. The diversity of IS research means that should be a wide audience within and beyond academia who could benefit from IS research outputs. This audience includes educators, practitioners, patients, etc. How IS relevant to practice is a central dilemma of IS research. Research relevance is classified according to dimensions such as interesting, implementable, current, accessible “Article style” by many IS scholars. These dimensions are important to be investigated as some academic papers are yet to be beneficial to an audience beyond academia. The Accessible dimension is the focus of this study where accessible means the academic papers should be readable and understood in terms of tone, style, structure, and semantics by the potential audience beyond the academic community. This study investigates the barriers that limit academic researchers in disseminating and communicating their research outputs beyond academia. This study aims to design a communication method to assist academic researchers in disseminating and communicating their research outputs beyond academia. This study consists of three phases, in the first phase a qualitative method is applied by interviewing academics in the Information System and Computing Department at Brunel University to gain a better understanding of how and why academics disseminate beyond academia. Based on communication theories a research framework is adapted to analyse and explain the interview data. In the second phase, short videos are recorded of 10 academics where each explains one of their papers. In the third phase, two different groups are interviewed to evaluate the 10 short videos in regards the Information Quality (IQ) dimensions (i.e. appropriate amount of information, format, and timeliness). By using the thematic analysis technique the academics highlighted three barriers that limit them to disseminate and communicate their research outputs beyond academia. The three barriers are the message (i.e. academic structure and language of research papers), channel (i.e. academic journal and conferences), and social system (i.e. lack of Incentives, lack of time, and lack of support). Moreover, academics emphasised the vital role of feedback loop in their communication with target audience beyond academia. The 10 short videos are designed to overcome two of these barriers (i.e. message and channels). Each short video is evaluated by its academic author on one hand and the potential audience/stakeholders of the short video from the other hand (e.g. practitioners). Thus, the academic authors of the video suggest some changes by adjusting the video structure and adding some examples for more explanations of their research papers. Also, authors concerned about format particularly the visual elements of the video which have to be completely matched with the title of the video. However, the opinions of potential audiences vary based on their information need. For example, some practitioners are concerned with the practical information, in other words, practitioners seek the applicable part of the information provided in the short video (i.e. how to apply something); and others watch the short video to increase their awareness of a particular topic. This study will assist academic researchers to focus on how to disseminate their research outputs to audience/stakeholders beyond academia using media tools (i.e. video). Also, it provides a novel method of disseminating and communicating their research outputs beyond the academic community. Moreover, this study helps to create an interaction platform that enables academic researchers to build a collaborative framework and a mutual understanding with the audience beyond academia.

M.Sc. / Proteinases are involved in many cellular reactions involving protein degradation, such as degradation of storage proteins and protein degradation during senescence processes. Their action can be inhibited by proteinase inhibitors. Information is still limited about the regulation of these inhibitors in plants and their possible interaction with proteinases under stress conditions. To obtain a better understanding of the physiological role of a proteinase inhibitor in plants under stress, the expression of a papaya cysteine proteinase inhibitor (cystatin) and its relation to proteinase expression was investigated in more detail. For this purpose, expression of the inhibitor was studied in papaya plants exposed to different physiological stress conditions, such as high/low temperature, and treatment with selected chemicals, such as glutathione, OTC (L-2- Oxothiazolidine-4-carboxylate), bestatin ([(2S, 3R)-3-amino-2-hydroxy-4-phenyl butanoylj-L-leu) and 2.4-D (2,4-dichiorophenoxyacetic acid). Using detection tools like activity gel electrophoresis, immunoblotting and enzymatic assays, the production of the cystatin under stress was monitored in different papaya explants, such as roots, leaves and embryos. Inhibitor production increased under different stress conditions when compared to untreated controls. However, this increase was not dramatic in any of the stresses applied. Exact quantification of the increase by using immunoblotting as the only specific tool to determine cystatin expression, was difficult. Neither activity gel electrophoresis nor enzymatic assays were successful to further quantify the exact cystatin levels. Higher cystatin expression was accompanied with a decrease in proteinase activity. Transgenic tobacco plants carrying the gene for a rice cystatin had a significantly lower cysteine proteinase activity when compared to non-transgenic tobacco plants after prolonged cold stress. Furthermore, protein degradation and leaf yellowing as a consequence of cold treatment were prevented in transgenic plants. An attempt to obtain a transformed papaya plant to study silencing of cystatin expression under stress was unsuccessful. In this study, the protective role of a cystatin in cold stress was described for the first time.

Translation initiation factor 5A (IF5A) is an essential, highly conserved protein found within all eukaryotic (eIF5A) and archaeal (aIF5A) cells. The IF5A protein is unique in that it contains the amino acid hypusine; a two-step post translational modification of a single, conserved lysine residue. Although hypusination of eIF5A is vital for eukaryotic cell viability, the primary role of the protein and its hypusine side chain remain a mystery. eIF5A, initially identified as a translation initiation factor, is not required for global protein synthesis leading to the prevailing proposal that eIF5A is purely involved in the translation of a select subset of mRNAs. Recently a number of mutational studies have focused on the conserved, hypusine-containing loop region of eIF5A where specific residues have been found to be essential for activity without affecting hypusination. It has been postulated that eIF5A exists as a dimer (40 kDa) under native conditions and that these residues may be at the interface of dimerisation. The aim of this research was therefore to conduct a mutational analysis of the loop region in support of this hypothesis. A functional analysis of the Saccharomyces cerevisiae eIF5A mutant proteins K48D, G50A, H52A and K56A revealed that these substitutions impaired growth to varying degrees in vivo with G50A and K48D mutant proteins displaying the most convincing defects. Gel filtration profiles gave unexpected results determining eIF5A mutant and wild type proteins to have a native molecular weight of 30 to 31 kDa, suggesting that the eIF5A oligomeric state may be transitory and subject to certain conditions. The inconclusive results obtained from using gel filtration studies led to an investigation into the feasibility of producing native, hypusinated peptides for future structural studies using nuclear magnetic resonance. Hypusinated and unhypusinated eIF5A were successfully separated into their domains making this a possibility. Finally, this study proposes a role for eIF5A in eukaryotic IRES-driven translation initiation.

This thesis presents the development of chlorophyll, cholic acid, aflatoxin B1 molecularly imprinted polymer (MIP) particles and cholic acid MIP nanofibers for application as selective solid phase extraction (SPE) sorbents. The particles were prepared by bulk polymerization and the nanofibers by a novel approach combining molecular imprinting and electrospinning technology. The AFB1 MIP particles were compared with an aflatoxin specific immunoextraction sorbent in cleaning-up and pre-concentrating aflatoxins from nut extracts. They both recorded high extraction efficiencies (EEs) of > 97 % in selectively extracting the aflatoxins (AFB1, AFB2, AFG1 and AFG2). High reproducibility marked by the low %RSDs of < 1% and low LODs of ≤ 0.02 ng/g were calculated in all cases. The LODs were within the monitoring requirements of the European Commission. The results were validated with a peanut butter certified reference material. The chlorophyll MIP on the other hand selectively removed chlorophyll that would otherwise interfere during pesticide residue analysis (PRA) from > 0.6 to <0.09 Au in green plants extracts. The extracted chlorophyll was removed to far below the level of ≥ 0.399 Au that is usually associated with interference during PRA. Furthermore, the MIP demonstrated better selectivity by removing only chlorophyll (> 99%) in the presence of planar pesticides than the currently employed graphitized carbon black (GCB) that removed both the chlorophyll (> 88%) and planar pesticides (> 89%). For the interfering cholic acid during drug residue analysis, cholic acid MIP electrospun nanofibers demonstrated to be more sensitive and possessing higher loading capacity than the MIP particles. 100% cholic acid was removed by the nanofibers from standard solutions relative to 80% by the particles. This showed that the nanofibers have better performance than the micro particles and as such have potential to replace the particle based SPE sorbents that are currently in use. All the templates were optimally removed from the prepared MIPs by employing a novel pressurized hot water extraction template removal method that was used for the first time in this thesis. The method employed only water, an environmentally friendly solvent to remove templates to ≥ 99.6% with template residual bleeding of ≤ 0.02%.

Mitochondria are the major effectors of cardioprotection by procedures that open the mitochondrial ATP-sensitive potassium channel (mitoKATP), including ischemic and pharmacological preconditioning. MitoKATP opening leads to increased reactive oxygen species (ROS), which then activate a mitoKATP-associated PKCε, which phosphorylates mitoKATP and leaves it in a persistent open state (Costa, ADT and Garlid, KD. Am J Physiol 295, H874-82, 2008). Superoxide (O2•-), hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), and hydroxyl radical (HO•) have each been proposed as the signaling ROS but the identity of the ROS responsible for this feedback effect is not known. Superoxide was excluded in earlier work on the basis that it does not activate PKCε and does not induce mitoKATP opening.To further examine the identity of the signaling ROS, respiring rat heart mitochondria were preincubated with ATP and diazoxide to induce the phosphorylation-dependent open state, together with agents that may interrupt feedback activation of mitoKATP by ROS scavenging or by blocking ROS transformations. Swelling assays of the preincubated mitochondria revealed that dimethylsulfoxide (DMSO), dimethylformamide (DMF), deferoxamine, trolox, and bromoenol lactone (BEL) each blocked the ROS-dependent open state but catalase did not interfere with this step. The lack of a catalase effect and the inhibitory effects of agents acting downstream of HO• excludes H2O2 as the endogenous signaling ROS and focuses attention on HO•. In support of the hypothesis that HO• is required, we also found that HO•-scavenging by DMF blocked cardioprotection by both ischemic preconditioning and diazoxide in the Langendorff perfused rat heart. HO• itself cannot act as a signaling molecule, because its lifetime is too short and it reacts immediately with nearest neighbor phospholipids and proteins. Therefore, these findings point to a product of phospholipid peroxidation, such as hydroperoxy-fatty acids. Indeed, this hypothesis was supported by the finding that hydroperoxylinoleic acid (LAOOH) opens the ATP-inhibited mitoKATP in isolated mitochondria. This effect was blocked by the specific PKCε inhibitor peptide εV1-2, showing that LAOOH activates the mitoKATP-associated PKCε. During ischemia, catabolism of mitochondrial phospholipids is accelerated, causing accumulation of plasmalogens and free fatty acids (FA) in the heart by the action of calcium independent phospholipases A2 (iPLA2). We first assessed the role of FAs and hydroxy FAs on mitoKATP opening and cardioprotection. Swelling assays of isolated rat heart mitochondria showed that naturally formed free FAs inhibit mitoKATP opening and that they are more potent inhibitors of the pharmacological open state of mitoKATP than the phosphorylation-dependent open state. That is, sustained mitoKATP opening induced by the phosphorylation-dependent feedback loop is more resistant to FA inhibition than direct mitoKATP opening by a potassium channel opener. Moreover, rat hearts perfused with micromolar concentrations of FA were resistant to cardioprotection by diazoxide or ischemic preconditioning. Racemic bromoenol lactone (BEL), a selective inhibitor of iPLA2, confers protection to otherwise untreated Langendorff perfused hearts by preventing ischemic FA release. To bring this story full circle, BEL blocks protection afforded by preconditioning and postconditioning by preventing the iPLA2-mediated release of FAOOH generated in the conditioned heart. HO• resulting from mitoKATP opening oxidizes polyunsaturated fatty acid components of the membrane phospholipids, resulting in a peroxidized side chain. FAOOH must be released in order to act on the mitochondrial PKCε, and this is achieved by the action of iPLA2. iPLA2 is essential for most modes of cardioprotection because it catalyzes the release of FAOOH. This fully supports the hypothesis that the second messenger of cardioprotective ROS-mediated signaling is hydroperoxy fatty acid (FAOOH), a downstream oxidation product of HO•.

I. Chloramphenicol (CAP) is a potent and selective mechanism-based inactivator of the major phenobarbital (PB)-inducible form of dog liver cytochrome P-450 (PBD-2) in vitro. In a reconstituted system, CAP inactivates PBD-2 in a time- and NADPH-dependent manner and binds covalently to the protein moiety of PBD-2 with a stoichiometry of 1 nmol CAP bound/nmol P-450 inactivated. In intact liver microsomes from PB-treated male Beagle dogs, CAP irreversibly inhibits androstenedione 16α- and 16β-hydroxylation and 2,4,5, 2',4',5'-hexachlorobiphenyl hydroxylation but not androstenedione 6 β -hydroxylation or NADPH-dependent triacetyloleandomycin (TAO) complex formation. Covalent binding of CAP to dog liver microsomes in vitro is increased 5.5-fold by PB induction. This increase correlates well with the increased levels of immunochemically determined PBD-2 (5.8-fold) and 16α - and 16β -hydroxylation of androstenedione (5.7- and 5.8-fold) in microsomes from PB-treated dogs. Anti-PBD-2 IgG significantly inhibits the covalent binding of CAP to microsomes from untreated and PB-treated dogs. Finally, CAP appears to bind covalently with a single protein with the same molecular weight as PBD-2, as evidenced by SDS-PAGE. II. A cytochrome P-450 called PBD-1 isolated from liver microsomes of an adult male Beagle dog treated with PB is structurally and functionally similar to members of the P450IIIA gene subfamily in rat and human liver microsomes. The sequence of the first 28 amino terminal residues of PBD-1 is identical in 15 and 20 positions, respectively, to the P450IIIA forms P450p from rat and P450(NF) from human. Upon immunoblot analysis, anti-PBD-1 IgG recognizes PCNa (P450p) and PCNb (PB\PCN-E) from rat, P450(NF) from human, and two proteins in liver microsomes from untreated and PB-treated dogs. Anti-PBD-1 IgG selectively inhibits P450IIIA form marker activities, including steroid 6β -hydroxylase, erythromycin demethylase and NADPH-dependent TAO complex formation in microsomes from PB-treated dogs. Major species differences exist in the apparent K(m) for 6β -hydroxylation of androstenedione by liver microsomes from humans, untreated rats and untreated dogs. In addition, evidence for functional heterogeneity of dog P450IIIA forms is presented: pretreatment of microsomes from PB-treated dogs with TAO plus NADPH had no effect on androstenedione 6β -hydroxylase activity.

Published Article / The epistemological and ontological orientations relevant for this research are positivism, interpretivism and pragmatism. These paradigms of inquiry are associated with quantitatively oriented research traditions, qualitatively oriented research traditions and mixed methods research respectively. Researchers who use mixed methods build on the strengths of quantitative and qualitative methods and minimize their weaknesses. Since educational research is primarily evidence-based, the aim of the study was to explore the extent to which mixed methods research was reflected in two eminent South African educational research journals during the 11 year period, 2000 to 2010. To this end 1392 articles were analysed. Of the research articles published in the two journals, 17.8% and 15.1% respectively reported on the use of mixed methods. Quantitative methods dominated between 2000 and 2002, followed by a paradigm war in 2003 to 2007, and mainly qualitative methods from 2008 onwards. Mixed methods research was mostly used in the educational domains of didactics (inclusive of curriculum studies), management and social studies. The most dominant themes investigated in these fields were related to curricula and the NQF/OBE, transformation, staff diversity, e-learning and other teaching methods. The need to develop mixed methods research in all branches of social research in South Africa is indicated.

Optical, electrical, and microstructural effects of Ar ion bombardment and Ar incorporation on thermally evaporated Ag and Al thin films were investigated. The results show that as the momentum supplied to the growing films by the bombarding Ar ions per arriving metal atom increases, refractive index at 632.8 nm increases and extinction coefficient decreases, lattice spacing expands, grain size decreases, electrical resistivity increases, and trapped Ar increases slightly. In Ag films, stress reverses from tensile to compressive; in AI films compressive stress increases. In both films, the change in optical constants can be explained by variation in void volume. The reversal of stress from tensile to compressive in Ag films requires a threshold level of momentum. The increase in electrical resistivity is related to the increase in the void fraction, decrease in the grain size, and increase in trapped Ar in both types of films. Many of these properties correlate well with the momentum transferred, suggesting that the momentum is an important physical parameter in describing the influence of ion beams on growing thin films and determining the characteristics of thin metal films prepared by ion-assisted deposition (IAD). With a low energy ion beam, the Ar concentration in IAD Ag films was negligible. When the bombarded film thickness was less than 5 nm, the electrical resistivity of IAD Ag films tended to decrease slightly from that of the non-IAD film. Using the Bruggeman effective medium theory, a formula for the void fraction at any given wavelength was derived. We investigated optical properties, stoichiometry, chemical bonding states, and structure of aluminum oxynitride thin films prepared by reactive ion-assisted deposition. Variations of optical constants and chemical bonding states are related to the stoichiometry. We found that our amorphous aluminum oxynitride film is not simply a mixture of aluminum oxide and nitride but a compound. A rugate filter using a step-index profile of aluminum oxynitride films was fabricated by nitrogen ion beam bombardment of a growing Al film with backfilled oxygen pressure as the sole variable. The effects of ultrasound-assisted deposition (UAD) on the optical properties of ZrO₂, Ta₂O₅, and MgF₂ films were investigated. UAD is likely to induce oxygen and fluoride deficiencies in oxide and fluoride films and increase the packing density of films.

Eight cyclic analogues of Substance P were made in order to investigate the conformation of the C-terminal end of the peptide. These analogues were designed to test three literature models describing the active conformation of substance P. Although the potencies of the analogues were low (in the micromolar range), our results support Cotrait's and Hospital's model (1986). Several substance P antagonists were synthesized. These compounds did not demonstrate agonistic activity nor anatagonistic activity. The tryptophan side chain is contributing to the antagonistic activity of these analogues, and not just the chirality of the α-carbon. Highly potent and selective photoaffinity ligands of H-Tyr-D-Pen-Gly-Phe-D-Pen-OH (DPDPE) and D-Phe-Cys-Tyr-D-Trp-Lys-Thr-Pen-Thr-NH₂ (CTP) were synthesized. These compounds will be useful in the isolation of δ and μ opioid receptors. Several new amino acids designed and synthesized to contain both the natural amino acid side chain and a thiol group which can be used to make disulfide constraints. The racemic amino acids made were as follows: (1) 2-amino-4-methyl-2- [(p-methylbenzyl)thiomethyl] pentanoic acid; (2) 2-amino-2- [(p-methylbenzyl)thiomethyl] -3-phenylpropanoic acid; (3) 2-amino-e- [(p-methylbenzyl)thio] pentanoic acid; and (4) 2-amino-3- [(p-methylbenzyl)-thio] -3-phenyl-pentanoic acid. These amino acids will be useful in the conformational restriction of peptides. To investigate the δ-opioid receptor conformation proposed for DPDPE by Hruby et al. (1988) and the μ-opioid receptor conformation proposed for Tyr-c [Abu₂,Gly,Phe,Leu] by Mierke et al. (1988), constrained phenylalanine amino acids were incorporated into H-Try-D-Pen-Gly-Phe-D-Pen-OH (DPDPE) in the four position. Our results indicate that these models are correct. And in an investigation into the physical-chemical properties of the delta opioid receptor, our results suggest that the δ receptor topochemical site for the Phe⁴ residue contains a partial positive charge on its surface and has specific steric requirements.

An observational study was conducted examining the social and cognitive play of young children with hearing-impairment playing in small groups composed of both hearing and hearing-impaired peers. The questions addressed the effects of the hearing status of the play partner upon the social/cognitive play patterns of children with hearing-impairment, and the relationship between their play patterns and their communicative competence, social competence and speech intelligibility. Forty-eight hearing-impaired subjects ranging in age from 3-6 to 6-1 were observed playing with partners of same and different hearing status during integrated play sessions at 13 school sites. The social play categories included solitary, parallel and group play, while the cognitive play categories included functional, constructive and dramatic play. Results of the study showed that the play patterns of the hearing-impaired children differed significantly for each group of partners. When playing with hearing-impaired partners, subjects engaged in group functional and constructive play more frequently than parallel functional and constructive play, and with equal frequency in parallel dramatic and group dramatic play. When playing with hearing partners, subjects engaged with equal frequency in group and parallel play. When playing with mixed groups of hearing and hearing-impaired partners, subjects engaged in group dramatic play more frequently than parallel dramatic play, and with equal frequency in group functional and constructive play, and parallel functional and constructive play. Communicative competence was negatively correlated to functional play. A positive correlation was found between social competence and constructive play, and between speech intelligibility and dramatic play. These correlations remained significant when age was partialed out. The hearing-impaired subjects spent similar percentages of time in social/cognitive play as those reported for hearing children. The study supports the premise that the play of young hearing-impaired children varies according to the hearing status of the play partner and is neither delayed nor deficient.