Managing falls onsite in residential aged care homes reduced hospitalisation: Mixed methods results from the Falls Outreach and Residential Mobile Assessment Team (FORMAT) pilot study.

OBJECTIVE: Falls are the leading cause of hospital transfer from residential aged care homes (RACHs). However, many falls do not result in significant injury, and ageing patients are exposed to complications while hospitalised. Inreach services are designed to reduce hospital transfer by providing care, support and assessment to residents at the RACH. This study evaluated a pilot inreach program targeting ageing patients following a fall. METHODS: We conducted a prospective, mixed methods evaluation of a 5-month (May-September 2022) pilot implementation across 108 government-funded RACHs within a single health-care network in Melbourne, Australia. RESULTS: A total of 123 residents (median [interquartile range] age: 88 [82, 94] years, female: 49%) were included in the intervention. The majority (n = 116, 94%) of residents were managed onsite and required no further investigation (n = 80, 69%) or treatment (n = 63, 54%). Among the seven residents referred to the emergency department (ED), two received hospital admission and five were transferred back to residential care. In the 7 days following referral to the intervention, four additional residents were referred to the ED and one received hospital admission. Qualitative feedback (n = 40) included specific comments relating to themes of general satisfaction (n = 20, 50%), compliments for staff (n = 16, 40%) and acknowledgement of comprehensiveness (n = 9, 23%). CONCLUSIONS: Implementation of a specialised fall assessment team to complement an existing geriatric-led RACH assessment service meant that a high rate of eligible residents were managed onsite, with very low need for subsequent hospitalisation. Residents, family members and caregivers expressed high rates of satisfaction with the service.

Investigating the Interplay Between Participation in a STEM-Focused Student Success Program and Workforce Participation on STEM Undergraduate Degree Completion.

This study longitudinally tracks students participating in a STEM-focused intervention program to investigate workforce participation patterns and their association with degree completion in a STEM field. Using longitudinal data from the University of Houston's Education Research Center, this study examines the extent to which students participating in a STEM intervention program require additional work to fund tuition and other life expenses. Findings demonstrated a negative effect of workforce participation on college completion and showed that minority students were more likely to participate in the workforce while also receiving financial support from the STEM program compared to peers from other racial backgrounds. Results inform institutional and financial aid policies, as well as admission criteria as it relates to broadening access of under-represented students in STEM.

SUGAR-INSENSITIVE3, a RING E3 ligase, is a new player in plant sugar response.

Sugars, such as sucrose and glucose, have been implicated in the regulation of diverse developmental events in plants and other organisms. We isolated an Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) mutant, sugar-insensitive3 (sis3), that is resistant to the inhibitory effects of high concentrations of exogenous glucose and sucrose on early seedling development. In contrast to wild-type plants, sis3 mutants develop green, expanded cotyledons and true leaves when sown on medium containing high concentrations (e.g. 270 mm) of sucrose. Unlike some other sugar response mutants, sis3 exhibits wild-type responses to the inhibitory effects of abscisic acid and paclobutrazol, a gibberellic acid biosynthesis inhibitor, on seed germination. Map-based cloning revealed that SIS3 encodes a RING finger protein. Complementation of the sis3-2 mutant with a genomic SIS3 clone restored sugar sensitivity of sis3-2, confirming the identity of the SIS3 gene. Biochemical analyses demonstrated that SIS3 is functional in an in vitro ubiquitination assay and that the RING motif is sufficient for its activity. Our results indicate that SIS3 encodes a ubiquitin E3 ligase that is a positive regulator of sugar signaling during early seedling development.

Generating Novel Materials Using the Intrinsically Disordered Protein Ubx.

The development of functionalized materials is needed to enable diverse applications. Protein-based materials are typically biocompatible and biodegradable and can exhibit a wide variety of useful mechanical properties. Most importantly, gene fusion enables facile incorporation of active proteins into the materials. However, many protocols rely on denaturing conditions to stimulate materials formation. These conditions would be expected to inactivate any appended functional proteins. This chapter describes methods to create protein fibers and films in a mild aqueous buffer near neutral pH. This facile, inexpensive single-pot approach to materials assembly does not require any special equipment. Also included in this chapter are methods to fuse fibers to form fiber bundles, and to use fibers for cell culture. Although these methods were developed to generate materials from the Drosophila Hox transcription factor Ultrabithorax, they may also work for other self-assembling proteins, many of which have sequence features in common with Ubx.

Generation and validation of a Shewanella oneidensis MR-1 clone set for protein expression and phage display.

A comprehensive gene collection for S. oneidensis was constructed using the lambda recombinase (Gateway) cloning system. A total of 3584 individual ORFs (85%) have been successfully cloned into the entry plasmids. To validate the use of the clone set, three sets of ORFs were examined within three different destination vectors constructed in this study. Success rates for heterologous protein expression of S. oneidensis His- or His/GST-tagged proteins in E. coli were approximately 70%. The ArcA and NarP transcription factor proteins were tested in an in vitro binding assay to demonstrate that functional proteins can be successfully produced using the clone set. Further functional validation of the clone set was obtained from phage display experiments in which a phage encoding thioredoxin was successfully isolated from a pool of 80 different clones after three rounds of biopanning using immobilized anti-thioredoxin antibody as a target. This clone set complements existing genomic (e.g., whole-genome microarray) and other proteomic tools (e.g., mass spectrometry-based proteomic analysis), and facilitates a wide variety of integrated studies, including protein expression, purification, and functional analyses of proteins both in vivo and in vitro.