Search

Most high schools offer remedial learning sessions to their students; however, very little is known about the perception of these activities, especially with regards to the students' motivations. In order to gain insights into both topics, an exploratory study was conducted within a sample of 1388 high school students in the Province of Quebec (Canada). Participants were selected on the basis of their voluntary participation or non-participation in remedial learning sessions held at school. School motivation was measured with a questionnaire based on Deci and Ryan's SDT (Self Determination Theory); perceptions were gathered and measured with open-ended and multiple choice items. Quantitative results indicated that participants of remedial learning sessions were more strongly motivated towards school. No significant relationships were found between attendance and grades, with similar proportions of high, average and below average participating and non-participating students; however, among participants, girls outnumbered boys by 2:1. Two main categories emerged from qualitative analyses: remedial learning can be seen as: a) an instrumental support linked to the subject matter; or b) a relational support which fosters better learning. (Contains 1 figure and 2 tables.)

Inhibition of the tyrosine kinase erythropoietin-producinghumanhepatocellular carcinoma receptor B4 (EphB4) is an effective strategyfor the treatment of solid tumors. We have previously reported a lownanomolar ATP-competitive inhibitor of EphB4 discovered in silicoby fragment-based high-throughput docking combined with explicit solventmolecular dynamics simulations. Here we present a second generationof EphB4 inhibitors that show high inhibitory potency in both enzymaticand cell-based assays while preserving the appealing selectivity profileexhibited by the parent compound. In addition, respectable levelsof antiproliferative activity for these compounds have been obtained.Finally, the binding mode predicted by docking and molecular dynamicssimulations is validated by solving the crystal structures of threemembers of this chemical class in complex with the EphA3 tyrosinekinase whose ATP-binding site is essentially identical to that ofEphB4. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Motivation and method: Small-molecule inhibitors targeting the adenosine triphosphate (ATP) binding pocket of the catalytic domain of protein kinases have potential to become drugs devoid of (major) side effects, particularly if they bind selectively. Here, the sequences of the 518 human kinases are first mapped onto the structural alignment of 116 kinases of known three-dimensional structure. The multiple structure alignment is then used to encode the known strategies for developing selective inhibitors into a fingerprint. Finally, a network analysis is used to partition the kinases into clusters according to similarity of their fingerprints, i.e. physico-chemical characteristics of the residues responsible for selective binding. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]