Oil in subsurface reservoirs is biodegraded by resident microbial communities. Water-mediated, anaerobic conversion of hydrocarbons to methane and CO2, catalyzed by syntrophic bacteria and methanogenic archaea, is thought to be one of the dominant processes. We compared 160 microbial community compositions in ten hydrocarbon resource environments (HREs) and sequenced twelve metagenomes to characterize their metabolic potential. Although anaerobic communities were common, cores from oil sands and coal beds had unexpectedly high proportions of aerobic hydrocarbon-degrading bacteria. Likewise, most metagenomes had high proportions of genes for enzymes involved in aerobic hydrocarbon metabolism. Hence, although HREs may have been strictly anaerobic and typically methanogenic for much of their history, this may not hold today for coal beds and for the Alberta oil sands, one of the largest remaining oil reservoirs in the world. This finding may influence strategies to recover energy or chemicals from these HREs by in situ microbial processes.

Gregor Wolbring at the invitation of the Editor to continue the ideas of an earlier article published in volume 49 number 4 shares with Development readers his understanding of the concept of ableism. He argues that the term ability should not be used just in relation to disabled people but understood in a broader cultural perspective. He highlights different forms of ableism, the role of new and emerging technologies, the consequences of different forms of ableism and the importance of dealing with the concept of ableism on the policy level, and proposes the need for a field of ability studies that examine ableism. Development (2008) 51, 252–258. doi:10.1057/dev.2008.17

CC-4047 (Actimid) and CC-5013 (Revimid) belong to a class of thalidomide analogs collectively known as the immunomodulatory drugs (IMiDs), which are currently being assessed in the treatment of patients with multiple myeloma and other cancers.

A comprehensive understanding of the experiences of post secondary students with diverse abilities is needed. The ways in which 'disabled' postsecondary students make meaning of their experiences in postsecondary education was explored. Eight participants (self-identified disabled post secondary students) were recruited from post secondary institutions in Calgary, Alberta. Five themes (hegemonic voice, voice of the body, voice of silence, voice of assertion, voice of change) were identified within a body-social-self framework. Findings demonstrate a continued need for critical examination of higher education policy and its capacity to address differences in ability. The concept of ableism (hegemonic ability preferences which inaugurate the norm) is presented and is demonstrated to be of utility as an analytical lens. Findings are highly anticipated to address existing literature gaps and to be of importance to policymakers, researchers, and ability-diverse student populations.

This paper highlights the utility of an expanded ableism concept beyond how it is used in disability studies; expanding the concept of ableism so it connects with all aspects of societies and making ableism applicable to many academic fields. It introduces this expanded form of ableism as a new angle of cultural research and suggests it to be one possible venue for disability studies scholars to escape the ghettoization of their impact.

No abstract

cGMP and Ca2+ are intracellular messengers in vertebrate rod photoreceptors. cGMP is the excitatory messenger, while intracellular free Ca2+ has been implied to be (one of) the messenger(s) in the process of light adaptation in vertebrate rod photoreceptors. The enzyme guanylyl cyclase (GC, EC 4.6.1.2.) catalyzes the reaction GTP-->cGMP + PPi. Bovine retinal rod outer segments (ROS) contain a particulate GC which is inhibited by an increase in free Ca2+ in the submicromolar range, although the precise molecular mechanism underlying this inhibition is unclear. We have developed an optical enzyme-coupled assay to study regulation of the particulate GC endogenous to bovine ROS. The particulate GC exhibited a Ca(2+)-inhibited (IC50 83-144 nM) activity of 13-23 nmol of PPi/(min-(mg of rhodopsin)). ATP increased the maximal velocity of GC by about 2-fold, and this increase was inhibited by the specific PKC inhibitors chelerythrine and the pseudosubstrate-based peptide inhibitor PKC R10-31N. When the factor that mediated the ATP-dependent increase in GC rate was removed by washing, the ATP-dependent increase in GC rate could be reestablished by addition of purified, constitutively active PKC.

The origin of equity/equality, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) initiatives at universities are rooted in the 2005 Athena SWAN (Scientific Women’s Academic Network) charter from Advance HE in the UK, which has the purpose of initiating actions that generate gender equality in UK universities. Since then, Advance HE also set up a “race charter” to deal with equality issues that are experienced by ethnic staff and students within higher education. Today “equality, diversity and inclusion” and “equity, diversity and inclusion” (from now on both called EDI) are used as phrases by universities in many countries to highlight ongoing efforts to rectify the problems that are linked to EDI of students, non-academic staff, and academic staff, whereby the focus broadened from gender to include other underrepresented groups, including disabled students, disabled non-academic staff, and disabled academic staff. How EDI efforts are operationalized impacts the success and utility of EDI efforts for disabled students, non-academic staff, and academic staff, and impacts the social situation of disabled people in general. As such, we analysed in a first step using a scoping review approach, how disabled students, non-academic staff, and academic staff are engaged with in the EDI focused academic literature. Little engagement (16 sources, some only abstracts, some abstracts, and full text) with disabled students, non-academic staff, and academic staff was found. This bodes ill for the utility of existing EDI efforts for disabled students, non-academic staff, and academic staff, but also suggests an opening for many fields to critically analyse EDI efforts in relation to disabled students, non-academic staff, and academic staff, the intersectionality of disabled people with other EDI groups and the impact of the EDI efforts on the social situation of disabled people beyond educational settings. The problematic findings are discussed through the lens of ability studies and EDI premises, as evident in EDI policy documents, EDI academic, and non-academic literature covering non-disability groups, and policy documents, such as the 2017 “UNESCO Recommendation on Science and Scientific Researchers” and the 1999 “UNESCO World Conference on Sciences” recommendations that engage with the situation of researchers and research in universities.