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The qualification leading to professional practice in speech and language therapy (SLT, also known as speech and language pathology) is not evenly available across the world. Geographic mobility and the availability of information are greater than at any other time in our history. Thus, initial SLT qualification courses in many countries are likely to have students from overseas among their intake. The professional nature of SLT programmes means that many aspects are culturally and linguistically bound. This may impact adversely on international students' success on such courses. A study of all initial SLT qualifying courses in the UK was undertaken to identify the countries of origin of past and current international students, to explore the reasons behind their decision to study in the UK and to find out where and in what role they planned to work, or were already working, on qualification. Analysis of questionnaire and interview data revealed a wide variety of reasons for studying in the UK; linguistic, cultural, financial, and personal. The students come primarily from Europe, particularly Greece; but also from Asia; Africa and the Americas. Familiarity with English language and the perceived status of UK higher education, together with the related colonial and postcolonial links between the student's country of origin and the UK, appear to have an impact on students' decision to study in the UK. The short- and long-term employment plans of respondents are discussed, along with factors influencing decisions about whether to work in Britain, their home country or elsewhere.

In the summer of 1999, typical yellows-type symptoms were observed on garlic and green onion plants in a number of gardens and plots around Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. DNA was extracted from leaf tissues of evidently healthy and infected plants. DNA amplifications were conducted on these samples, using two primer pairs, R16F2n/R2 and R16(1)F1/R1, derived from phytoplasma rDNA sequences. DNA samples of aster yellows (AY), lime witches'-broom (LWB) and potato witches'-broom (PWB) phytoplasmas served as controls and were used to determine group relatedness. In a direct polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assay, DNA amplification with universal primer pair R16F2n/R2 gave the expected amplified products of 1.2 kb. Dilution (1/40) of each of the latter products were used as template and nested with specific primer pair R16(1)F1/R1. An expected PCR product of 1.1 kb was obtained from each phytoplasma-infected garlic and green onion samples, LWB and AY phytoplasmas but not from PWB phytoplasma. An aliquot from each amplification product (1.2 kb) with universal primers was subjected to PCR-based restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) to identify phytoplasma isolates, using four restriction endonucleases (AluI, KpnI, MseI and RsaI). DNA amplification with specific primer pair R16(1)F1/R1 and RFLP analysis indicated the presence of AY phytoplasma in the infected garlic and green onion samples. These results suggest that AY phytoplasma in garlic and green onion samples belong to the subgroup 16Sr1-A.