ResearchPod

 There are many reasons why people drop out of high school education, from bullying or family circumstances to having unrecognised learning difficulties. So, how can staff professional development bring lasting change in education for those who've missed out? 

Research by Dr Alexandra Youmans and Dr Lorraine Godden suggests that paying greater attention to the professional development of teachers and support staff can increase the accessibility of adult education and improve educational outcomes for adult learners. 

Read more about their research: doi.org/10.1080/13540602.2022.2062716


Read the original article in Research Outreach

The computer chip shortage has prompted Dr Geert van Kollenburg and his colleagues at Eindhoven University of Technology, the Netherlands, to find data-driven methods to optimise chip manufacturing processes.

As part of the MadeIn4 project, they have developed a predictive discarding framework in which quality predictions from artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms are used to decide on whether to discard an unfinished product. This approach can improve both the profitability and sustainability of manufacturing processes.

Read more in Research Outreach

Read their original research: https://doi.org/10.1080/09537287.2022.2103471

Women with functional hypothalamic amenorrhea, or FHA – one of the most common types of secondary amenorrhoea - do not ovulate. 

Johannes Ott and Marlene Hager of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, at the Medical University of Vienna, in Austria are investigating the causes of secondary amenorrhoea - also known as “paused periods” or “missed periods,” which are not due to pregnancy, and how FHA, Polycystic Ovarian Morphology (PCOM) and serum hormone balances impact diagnoses.

Read more about their research:  https://doi.org/10.1186/s12958-022-00961-y

Electronic waste (e-waste) contains a range of materials, including precious metals, which could be salvaged for reusable components and continue to offer economic value.

Dr Aidan Marc Wong investigates the central role of informal labour, in particular the karung guni in Singapore and Malaysia, who collect, disassemble, sort, and transform recycling and e-waste into raw materials for reuse.  Dr Wong discusses how such informal labourers can identify raw materials that contain unrealised value, and can give discarded items a new lease of economic life rather than letting them find their way to dump sites.

Read more about his research: https://doi.org/10.1111/gec3.12616

Ophelia Mantz and Rafael Beneytez Duran from the Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture and Design at the University of Houston present nature as a source of inspiration for architecture in contribution to a new book about urban resilience. 

They argue that humanity has forgotten its origins and its dependence on nature, and that what we need is a new contract with nature and a new paradigm – contingency.

Read more about their work : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-85847-6_26

In her book 'Advancing Healthcare Through Personalized Medicine', science writer Dr Priya Hays has compiled an authoritative and highly detailed account of how technology is changing healthcare.

Read more in Research Features

Read it now at :https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-80100-7 

Programming codes are traditionally based on binary numbering systems–everything is expressed in values of 0 or 1 in line with the true or false principles of classical logic. Fuzzy logic is different in that it takes a non-binary approach and allows for infinite values between 0 and 1.

Andreas Meier, emeritus professor of data science at the Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences of the University of Fribourg in Switzerland, is on a mission to raise awareness of the importance of fuzzy-based computing for business, government and society.

Read more about his research in Fuzzy Management Methods, here: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-03368-2

Preschool children have an extraordinary capacity to learn and use different languages, embracing the gestural, musical, and visual cues associated with languages to make sense of the world around them. This ‘translanguaging’ transcends concerns of socially and politically defined boundaries beyond multilingualism.

Dr Gabrijela Aleksić and colleagues designed a programme to help teachers leverage children’s translanguaging skills, especially in classes with children from immigrant or refugee families.

Read more in Research Outreach.

Find their original research at: doi.org/10.1080/13670050.2022.2085029

Mathematics and physics extend the notion of dimensionality beyond the usual perception of three dimensions to consider higher-dimensional spaces. The formulae describing properties such as area and volume of some geometric objects can result in indefiniteness, particularly when dealing with negative dimensions.

Dr Szymon Łukaszyk, an independent researcher in Poland, has discovered recurrence relations that can remove the indefiniteness in these formulae. His investigation into the properties of regular convex polytopes and balls reveals previously unknown properties of these objects in negative dimensions.

Read more in Research Outreach

Read some of their latest work here: https://doi.org/10.3390/math10132212

Lung surgery, like every other type of surgery, can have complications that sometimes require further procedures to be dealt with. Surgeons are always looking for new ways to keep these procedures as minimally invasive as possible, but they also have to ensure these are effective and safe.

Consultant surgeon Mr David Waller  and his surgical trainee Miss Michelle Lee at the Department of Thoracic Surgery in St Bartholomew’s Hospital, London, routinely deal with complex cases of lung surgery. They have recently shared an unusual case of foreign body migration of an endobronchial valve implanted  in one of  their patients.

Read some of their latest work here:  https://doi.org/10.1177/20542704221074148