Exploring the Link between Reformed Teaching Practices and Pupil Learning in Elementary School Mathematics

This study examined the classroom practices of beginning elementary school teachers' instruction of mathematics and how it connected to their pupils' learning. The Reformed Teaching Observation Protocol (RTOP) was used to measure the extent to which beginning teachers used reformed teaching practices. As a measure of pupil learning, we utilized assessment scores specific to the mathematics unit observed and correlated them with teachers' RTOP scores. We found that beginning teachers who implemented reformed teaching practices tended to have pupils who scored higher on the district mathematics test with a statistically significant correlation of 0.56 (p < .05). Implications of these findings and others are discussed in terms of using the RTOP to improve practice at the elementary school level and for future school‐based research.     

Whittaker Categories and Whittaker Modules for Lie Superalgebras

Following analogous constructions for Lie algebras, we define Whittaker modules and Whittaker categories for finite-dimensional simple Lie superalgebras. Results include a decomposition of Whittaker categories for a Lie superalgebra according to the action of an appropriate sub-superalgebra; and, for basic classical Lie superalgebras of type I, the construction of Whittaker modules from Whittaker modules for the even part.     

Reactivity of wine polyphenols under oxidation conditions: Hemisynthesis of adducts between grape catechins or oak ellagitannins and odoriferous thiols

The reasons for the loss of characteristic odoriferous thiols during the aging of wine in oak-made barrels and subsequent storage in bottles have been in part attributed to covalent capture of these thiols by polyphenolic wine components that are dehydrogenated into electrophilic ortho-quinones upon wine oxygenation. Herein, FeCl₃ was used as oxidant in oxygen-deprived aqueous solutions to dehydrogenate grape (epi)catechins and oak ellagitannins in the presence of two typical odoriferous thiols, 2-furanmethanethiol (2FMT) and 3-sulfanylhexan-1-ol (3SH). The preparative-scale conditions used enabled the isolation of six novel 2FMT-bearing (epi)catechin derivatives, three known 3SH-bearing catechin derivatives (the structures of two of those were revised to be strictly derived from 1,6-conjugate addition), three novel 2FMT-bearing castalagin derivatives, and one novel 3SH-bearing castalagin derivative. The structures of these castalagin-based thio-adducts revealed that the capture of thiols by the different dehydrogenated pyrogallol rings of castalagin starts at ring IV, then ring III, and finally ring V.     

Simultaneous estimation of attenuation and structure parameters of aggregated red blood cells from backscatter measurements

The analysis of the ultrasonic frequency-dependent backscatter coefficient of aggregating red blood cells reveals information about blood structural properties. The difficulty in applying this technique in vivo is due to the frequency-dependent attenuation caused by intervening tissue layers that distorts the spectral content of backscattering properties from blood microstructures. An optimization method is proposed to simultaneously estimate tissue attenuation and blood structure factor. With in vitro experiments, the method gave satisfactory estimates with relative errors below 22% for attenuations between 0.101 and 0.317 dBcmMHz, signal-to-noise ratios>28 dB and kR<2.7 (k being the wave number and R the aggregate radius).     

Transient adaptivity applied to two-phase incompressible flows

An anisotropic adaptation process is applied to a three-dimensional incompressible two-phase flow solver. The solver uses a level set/finite element method on unstructured tetrahedral meshes. We show how the level set function can be used to build an anisotropic mesh with good properties. Some computations with a strong transient character and large densities ratios (1/1000) are presented. We show that the efficiency of the computations can be deeply enhanced by mesh adaptations.     

Re-Analysis of Abdominal Gland Volatilome Secretions of the African Weaver Ant,Oecophylla longinoda (Hymenoptera: Formicidae)

The African weaver ant, Oecophylla longinoda, is used as a biological control agent for the management of pests. The ant has several exocrine glands in the abdomen, including Dufour’s, poison, rectal, and sternal glands, which are associated with pheromone secretions for intra-specific communication. Previous studies have analyzed the gland secretions of Dufour’s and poison glands. The chemistry of the rectal and sternal glands is unknown. We re-analyzed the secretions from Dufour’s and poison glands plus the rectal and sternal glands to compare their chemistries and identify additional components. We used the solid-phase microextraction (SPME) technique to collect gland headspace volatiles and solvent extraction for the secretions. Coupled gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis detected a total of 78 components, of which 62 were being reported for the first time. These additional components included 32 hydrocarbons, 12 carboxylic acids, 5 aldehydes, 3 alcohols, 2 ketones, 4 terpenes, 3 sterols, and 1 benzenoid. The chemistry of Dufour’s and poison glands showed a strong overlap and was distinct from that of the rectal and sternal glands. The different gland mixtures may contribute to the different physiological and behavioral functions in this ant species.     

Analysis of high molecular mass proteins larger than 150 kDa using cyanogen bromide cleavage and conventional 2-DE

Proteomic approaches including high-resolution 2-DE are providing the tools needed to discover disease-associated biomarkers in complex biological samples. Although 2-DE is an extremely powerful approach to analyze the proteome, the separation of proteins with extreme molecular masses still remains an issue requiring improvement. Because high molecular mass (HMM) proteins larger than 150 kDa have already been observed to be differentially expressed in several pathologies such as cancer, we developed an original strategy to analyze this part of the proteome that is not easily separated by 2-DE in polyacrylamide gels. This strategy is based on the 2-DE separation of cyanogen bromide (CNBr) fragments of purified HMM protein fractions, and combines techniques including SEC fractionation, TCA precipitation, CNBr cleavage, 2-DE and MS analysis. The method was first tested on a model protein, the BSA. Preliminary results obtained using colonic tissues led to the identification of six HMM proteins with M(r) comprised between 163 and 533 kDa in their reduced state. These results demonstrated that our CNBr/2-DE approach should provide a powerful tool for identification of new biomarkers larger than 150 kDa.