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Purpose: This study investigates the challenges faced by European teachers when assessing student learning of democratic citizenship competences by asking about their experiences and opinions in their teaching practices. Design/methodology/approach: Through focus group interviews conducted with the teachers, we investigate the underlying reasons for teachers' choices of using certain forms of assessment methods while excluding other methods. This paper presents the analysis of interviews with 82 schoolteachers from lower secondary schools in eight European countries (average 19 years of teaching experience) participating in an Erasmus + project. Findings: The teachers' responses uncover a need for teachers to be better equipped with relevant knowledge, tools and approaches to practice formative assessment to develop students' democratic citizenship competences. The current common understanding of the summative assessment of knowledge using simple and standardised tools poses one of the main challenges for teachers to use formative assessment methods. Practical implications: The focus on summative assessment significantly limits the teachers' room to work on democratic citizenship competence. There is a need to strengthen this as a democratic citizenship education as a cross-curricular element in education, with an emphasis on formative assessment, to monitor and support students' democratic values and attitudes.

Abstract Background Cancer navigation programs aim to support, educate, and empower patients and families, addressing barriers to diagnostics, treatment, and care. Navigators engage with people to ensure timely access to services and resources. While promising for older people with cancer, these programs are scarce in Europe, and research on their effectiveness and implementation is limited. We describe the protocol of the EU NAVIGATE randomized controlled trial, aimed to evaluate (1) effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of NavCare-EU, an intervention that aims to support older people with cancer throughout their illness trajectory, spanning the continuum of supportive, palliative, and end-of-life care, and (2) the intervention’s implementation processes and feasibility of its integration into different health care systems in Europe, contextual barriers and facilitators for effective and sustainable implementation, and mechanisms involved in reaching the outcomes. Methods We will conduct a multisite pragmatic fast-track randomized controlled trial with embedded convergent mixed-method process evaluation in Belgium, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, and Portugal. The study targets people with cancer and declining health, 70 years or older, and their close family caregivers. The trial compares the NavCare-EU intervention plus standard care with standard care alone. We will perform a baseline measurement prior to randomization and follow-up measurements at 12 weeks, 24 weeks, and 48 weeks in intervention and control group, and an additional measurement at 72 weeks in the control group. Primary outcomes, measured at 24 weeks are (1) the older person’s global health status/quality of life, a 2-item subscale from EORTC-QLQ-C30 (revised) measuring health-related quality of life, (2) level of social support measured with Medical Outcomes Study Social Support Survey (MOS-SSS scale). The study will include at least 246 older persons with completed global health status/quality of life at 24 weeks. Discussion The EU NAVIGATE trial will cross-nationally test the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of a navigation intervention for older people with cancer and their family caregivers, and its implementation in different health care systems in Europe. As continuity and access to health, social, and community care is a priority for patients and caregivers, the trial is timely and critically needed. Trial registration Clinicaltrials.gov: identifier NCT06110312 (2023/10/31).

Measuring the use of natural history collections is essential to understand their past and present impact on science, to underpin decisions about their management and to assist with deploying them optimally to address societal challenges. Using the vast natural history collections of Naturalis Biodiversity Center as an example, this paper assesses the significance and relevance of quantifying collection use. Four aspects are discussed: 1. standardisation, 2. relevance of having standardised metrics on collection use, 3. the level of detail and completeness of the information and 4. the interactions between digitisation of collections and physical collection use. Based on a set of transparent and objective parameters to describe collection use, it is proposed to further develop these into international standards.

National canons of history sparked intense debate among historians over the last years, history educators have regularly shown concerns regarding these canons. The main arguments are that history is instrumentalized for political purposes, and that canons are incompatible with multiculturality. In this study, the cases of the Netherlands and Belgium (Flanders) are used to discuss these concerns. The aim of this article is to gain a more complex understanding of the use of canonical discourse in the setting of history education. The current study actualizes and reconsiders Banks' typologies of knowledge, and applies them to multicultural history education. Hence, the canon debates in the low countries are contextualized from an international perspective of debates on canon and history teaching. It is argued that both national canons specifically intend to confront popular knowledges and historical myths with academic historiographic discourses. More particularly both canons seek to include discourses on minority groups and multiculturality, which may benefit the use of transformative knowledge in history education. The use of canonical discourses however must not be reduced to transmission. Beside qualification history education also strives towards socialization and subjectivation. It is discussed how a thoughtful use of canonical discourse may add to realizing these purposes of education.

Abstract Parkinson’s disease is highly heterogeneous across disease symptoms, clinical manifestations and progression trajectories, hampering the identification of therapeutic targets. Despite knowledge gleaned from genetics analysis, dysregulated proteome mechanisms stemming from genetic aberrations remain underexplored. In this study, we develop a three-phase system-level proteogenomic analytical framework to characterize disease-associated proteins and dysregulated mechanisms. Proteogenomic analysis identified 577 proteins that enrich for Parkinson’s disease-related pathways, such as cytokine receptor interactions and lysosomal function. Converging lines of evidence identified nine proteins, including LGALS3, CSNK2A1, SMPD3, STX4, APOA2, PAFAH1B3, LDLR, HSPB1, BRK1, with potential roles in disease pathogenesis. This study leverages the largest population-scale proteomics dataset, the UK Biobank Pharma Proteomics Project, to characterize genetically-driven protein disturbances associated with Parkinson’s disease. Taken together, our work contributes to better understanding of genome-proteome dynamics in Parkinson’s disease and sets a paradigm to identify potential indirect mediators connected to GWAS signals for complex neurodegenerative disorders.

Abstract The perivascular space (PVS) surrounds cerebral blood vessels and plays an important role in clearing waste products from the brain. Their anatomy and function have been described for arteries, but PVS around veins remain poorly characterized. Using in vivo 2-photon imaging in mice, we determined the size of the PVS around arteries and veins, and their connection with the subarachnoid space. After infusion of 70 kD FITC-dextran into the cerebrospinal fluid via the cisterna magna, labeled PVS were evident around arteries, but veins showed less frequent labeling of the PVS. The size of the PVS correlated with blood vessel size for both pial arteries and veins, but not for penetrating vessels. The PVS around pial arteries and veins was separated from the subarachnoid space by a thin meningeal layer, which did not form a barrier for the tracer. In vivo, FITC-dextran signal was observed adjacent to the vessel wall, but minimally within the wall itself. Post-mortem, there was a significant shift in the tracer's location within the arterial wall, extending into the smooth muscle layer. Taken together, these findings suggest that the PVS around veins has a limited role in the exchange of solutes between CSF and brain parenchyma.

Abstract Evidence of microscopic inhomogeneities of the side source/drain contacts in 300 mm wafer integrated MoS2 field-effect transistors is presented. In particular, the presence of a limited number of low Schottky barrier spots through which channel carriers are predominantly injected is demonstrated by the dramatic current changes induced by individual charge traps located near the source contact. Two distinct types of “contact-impacting traps” are identified. Type-1 trap is adjacent to the contact interface and exchanges carriers with the metal. Its impact is only observable when the adjacent contact is the reverse-biased FET source and limits the channel current. Type-2 trap is located in the AlOx gate oxide interlayer, near the source contact, and exchanges carriers with the channel. Its capture/emission time constants exhibit both a gate and drain bias dependence due to the high sensitivity of the contact regions to the applied lateral and vertical fields. Unlike typical channel-impacting oxide traps, both types of reported defects affect the Schottky barrier height and width rather than the threshold voltage and result in giant random telegraph noise (RTN). These observations indicate that the contact quality and geometry play a fundamental role in the ultimate scaling of 2D FETs.

Abstract Background Although regular health screening is recommended, long‐term follow‐up data in healthy aged cats are lacking. Objectives Determine the most common conditions in a large group of apparently healthy older cats and which diseases are manifested within 2 years in cats confirmed to be healthy based on extensive health screening. Animals Client‐owned cats. Methods Prospective study. Thorough history, physical examination, blood tests, and urinalysis were performed in 259 apparently healthy mature adult (7‐10 years) and senior (>10 years) cats. Semi‐annual follow‐up examinations were performed in 201 confirmed healthy cats. Results At baseline, 21% of apparently healthy cats were not considered healthy but were diagnosed with International Renal Interest Society (IRIS) ≥ stage 2 chronic kidney disease (CKD; 7.7%) or hyperthyroidism (4.6%), among other disorders. Disease occurred significantly more frequently in senior cats compared with mature adult cats. In addition, 40% cats were overweight, 35% had moderate to severe dental disease, and 22% had abnormal cardiac auscultation findings. Within 2 years, 28% of mature adult and 54% of senior cats that were confirmed healthy at inclusion developed new diseases, most commonly IRIS ≥ stage 2 CKD (cumulative incidence, 13.4%), hyperthyroidism (8.5%), chronic enteropathy, hepatopathy or pancreatitis (7.5%), or neoplasia (7%). Conclusions and Clinical Importance The high prevalence and 2‐year incidence of physical examination abnormalities and systemic diseases in apparently healthy older cats argue for regular health screening in cats ≥7 years of age. Although more common in senior cats, occult disease also occurs in mature adult cats, and owners should be informed accordingly.

Leaves harbor distinct microbial communities that can have an important impact on plant health and microbial ecosystems worldwide. Nevertheless, the ecological processes that shape the composition of leaf microbial communities remain unclear, with previous studies reporting contradictory results regarding the importance of bacterial dispersal versus host selection. This discrepancy could be driven in part because leaf microbiome studies typically consider the upper and lower leaf surfaces as a single entity despite these habitats possessing considerable anatomical differences. We characterized the composition of bacterial phyllosphere communities from the upper and lower leaf surfaces across 24 plant species. Leaf surface pH and stomatal density were found to shape phyllosphere community composition, and the underside of leaves had lower richness and higher abundances of core community members than upper leaf surfaces. We found fewer endemic bacteria on the upper leaf surfaces, suggesting that dispersal is more important in shaping these communities, with host selection being a more important force in microbiome assembly on lower leaf surfaces. Our study illustrates how changing the scale in which we observe microbial communities can impact our ability to resolve and predict microbial community assembly patterns on leaf surfaces. IMPORTANCE Leaves can harbor hundreds of different bacterial species that form unique communities for every plant species. Bacterial communities on leaves are really important because they can, for example, protect their host against plant diseases. Usually, bacteria from the whole leaf are considered when trying to understand these communities; however, this study shows that the upper and lower sides of a leaf have a very different impact on how these communities are shaped. It seems that the bacteria on the lower leaf side are more closely associated with the plant host, and communities on the upper leaf side are more impacted by immigrating bacteria. This can be really important when we want to treat, for example, crops in the field with beneficial bacteria or when trying to understand host-microbe interactions on the leaves.

Assessing the pathogenicity of a disease-associated genetic variant in animals accurately is vital, both on a population and individual scale. At the population level, breeding decisions based on invalid DNA tests can lead to the incorrect inclusion or exclusion of animals and compromise the long-term health of a population, and at the level of the individual animal, lead to incorrect treatment and even life-ending decisions. Criteria to determine pathogenicity are not standardized, i.e., no guidelines for animal variants are available. Here, we aimed to develop and validate guidelines to be used by the community for Mendelian disorders in domestic animals to classify variants in categories based on standardized criteria. These so-called animal variant classification guidelines (AVCG) were based on those developed for humans by The American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics (ACMG). In a direct comparison, 83% of the pathogenic variants were correctly classified with ACMG, while this increased to 92% with AVCG. We described methods to develop datasets for benchmarking the criteria and identified the most optimal in silico variant effect predictor tools. As the reproducibility was high, we classified 72 known disease-associated variants in cats and 40 other disease-associated variants in eight additional species.

Background: Maternity care increasingly aims to achieve Shared Decision-making (SDM), yet seemingly not to the benefit of clients with low health literacy (HL). We developed an SDM training for healthcare professionals (HCPs) and a conversation aid to support HL-sensitive SDM in maternity care. Methods: The training and conversation aid were based on previous needs assessments and expert consultation, and were developed in co-creation with clients (n = 15) and HCPs (n = 7). Usability, acceptability and comprehension of the conversation aid were tested among new clients (n = 14) and HCPs (n = 6). Acceptability of the training was tested among midwifery students (n = 5). Results: In the co-creation sessions, clients reported to expect that their midwife becomes acquainted with their general values, priorities and daily context. Clients also emphasized wanting to be supported in their preferred decisional role. User test interviews showed that clients and HCPs were positive towards using the conversation aid, but also apprehensive about the time it required. The user test of the training showed that more attention was needed for recognizing and adapting information provision to clients' HL level. Conclusion and innovation: The newly developed conversation aid and training have potential to support HCPs and clients in HL-sensitive SDM.

Differentiated instruction is an approach to teaching in which teachers respond proactively to the needs and preferences of students in their classroom. This study seeks to increase insight in which instructional design pre-service history teachers use to cater for heterogeneity in the classroom. It draws on pre-service history teachers’ lesson plans. Data regarding pre-service teachers’ actual implementation of differentiated teaching practices were collected based on natural and purposeful designed lesson plans. Three types of heterogeneity as described by Tomlinson were further refined for the domain of history education. Three types of instructional strategies to cater for heterogeneity in history education were found: collaborative learning, tiered approaches, guiding and scaffolding. It is concluded that pre-history teachers manage to design history lessons in which instructional adaptations are made to cater for heterogeneity, but that often no systematic link could be found between assessment of heterogeneity and instructional design.

The editorial introduces the articles in this thematic issue, which provides a multifaceted analyses on how residents of vulnerable neighbourhoods cope with stressful circumstances and various crises. The aim is to understand daily survival at the neighbourhood level amid rapidly changing conditions. The articles present both quantitative and qualitative analyses that make detailed observations of agency, resilience, and community in diverse sociocultural contexts.

Background: Navigation interventions could support, educate and empower older people with cancer and/or their family caregivers by addressing barriers and ensuring timely access to needed services and resources throughout the continuum of supportive, palliative and end-of-life care. Objectives: European Union (EU) NAVIGATE is an interdisciplinary and cross-country Horizon Europe-funded project (2022–2027) aiming to evaluate the effectiveness, cost-effectiveness and implementation of a navigation intervention for older people with cancer and their family caregivers in Europe. EU NAVIGATE aims to advance the evidence on cancer patient navigation in Europe. Design: Adaptation, implementation and evaluation of a navigation intervention with an international pragmatic randomized controlled trial (RCT) and embedded mixed-method process evaluation at its core. A logic model guides dissemination and impact-generating strategies. EU NAVIGATE involves six experienced EU academic partners; one EU national cancer league with their affiliated academic partner; three EU dissemination partners; and a Canadian partner. Methods: We adapted the Canadian Navigation: Connecting, Advocating, Resourcing, and Engaging (Nav-CARE © ) volunteer programme to healthcare contexts in Belgium, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and Portugal following the new ADAPT guidance. Nav-CARE was developed over the past 15 years and supports people with declining health and their families to improve their quality of life and well-being, foster empowerment and facilitate timely and equitable access to healthcare and social services. In EU NAVIGATE, the navigation intervention is being provided by trained and mentored social workers in Poland and by trained and mentored volunteers in the other five countries. Via a pragmatic RCT with process evaluation, we implement and evaluate the navigation intervention to study its impact on older people with cancer and their family caregivers. We also aim to understand its cost-effectiveness, how to optimally implement it in different countries, and its differential effects in patient subgroups. We will also map existing cancer navigation interventions in Europe, the United States and Canada to position EU NAVIGATE within the field of navigation interventions worldwide. Conclusion: EU NAVIGATE aims to deliver high-quality evidence on a navigation intervention for older people with cancer in Europe and to develop practice and policy recommendations for sustainable implementation of navigation interventions in Europe and beyond.

Abstract Background People with dementia and their family caregivers often encounter challenges in engaging in advance care planning (ACP), such as a lack of information and difficulties in engaging in ACP conversations. Using a user-centred design, we developed two interactive web-based tools as part of an ACP support website to stimulate ACP reflection and communication: (1) the ‘Thinking Now About Later’ tool, with open-ended questions about ‘what matters most’, and (2) a digital version of the ‘Life Wishes Cards’, a card tool with pre-formulated statements that prompt reflection about wishes for future care. This study aimed to evaluate the use of and experiences with two web-based tools by people with dementia and their family caregivers. Methods During an eight-week period, people with dementia and family caregivers were invited to use the ACP support website in the way they preferred. The mixed-methods evaluation of the ACP tools involved capturing log data to assess website use and semi-structured qualitative interviews to capture experiences. Analyses included descriptive statistics of log data and framework analysis for qualitative data. Results Of 52 participants, 21 people had dementia and 31 were family caregivers. The ‘Thinking Now About Later’ tool and ‘Life Wishes Cards’ were accessed 136 and 91 times respectively, with an average session duration of 14 minutes (SD = 27.45 minutes). 22 participants actively engaged with the tools, with the majority using the tools once, and seven revisiting them. Those who used the tools valued the guidance it provided for ACP conversations between people with dementia and their family caregivers. Participants reported that people with dementia experienced barriers to using the tools on their own, hence family caregivers usually facilitated the use and participation of people with dementia. Some highlighted not knowing what next steps to take after completing the tools online. Conclusions Although less than half the people used the ACP tools, those who used them found them helpful to facilitate communication between people with dementia and their family. Family caregivers of people with dementia played a crucial role in facilitating the use of the web-based tools.

Abstract Assessing volcanic hazards in locations exposed to multiple central volcanoes requires to consider multiple potential eruption sources and their respective characteristics. While this is common practice in ashfall hazard assessment, this is generally not considered for topography-controlled volcanic flow processes. Yet, in volcanic areas with closely spaced volcanic systems, eruptions fed from several contrasted volcanic systems might threaten one given area. Considering the case of the Nyiragongo and Nyamulagira volcanoes in the Virunga Volcanic Province (D.R.Congo), we present a method to produce a combined lava flow inundation susceptibility map that integrates both volcanoes. The spatial distribution of the probability of vent opening for the next eruption is separately constrained for both volcanoes based on the mapping of historical and pre-historical eruptive vents and fissures. The Q-LavHa lava flow probability model is then calibrated separately for each volcano, considering several historical lava flows of Nyamulagira (2004, 2006, 2010) and Nyiragongo (2002). The maps for the two volcanoes are thereafter integrated based on a weighted sum of both individual lava flow inundation probability maps, assuming historically-based relative eruption frequency of the two volcanoes. The accuracy of this probabilistic susceptibility map for the most active volcanic region in Africa was unfortunately validated by the May 2021 lava flow produced by Nyiragongo. This map was discussed and validated in 2019 with local scientists, as well as representatives of disaster management and urban planning institutions, but was not included in the regional contingency plan ahead of the 2021 eruption crisis. Updating the volcanic crisis and evacuation management plans with this lava flow probability map could contribute to reinforce risk awareness among the population and inform the future development of the city of Goma.