International student mobility has emerged as a key source of societal and educational transformations in the booming economies of East Asia. International competencies are increasingly valued by ...employees and employers alike. Given the uneven distribution of international student flows, and the inequitable levels of benefit that they bring to various locales and institutions, some jurisdictions are seeking the optimal policy instruments for leveraging public and private interests in the mobility of human resources and knowledge. This case study of Hong Kong looks at the outbound-inbound student flows and explains how the government facilitates cross-border education balances. The researchers utilized the four modes of the General Agreement on Trades in Services framework, and found it to be a helpful tool in analyzing the government's balancing act, despite the challenges associated with the conceptualization of international student mobility as a commodity or trade in services.
Celotno besedilo
Dostopno za:
BFBNIB, DOBA, IZUM, KILJ, NUK, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, SIK, UILJ, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
The lack of a proper building care culture has led to serious problems of urban decay in most developed cities, threatening community health and safety. To arrest urban decay, redevelopment is a ...commonly adopted approach for regenerating rundown areas. Redevelopment often results in negative outcomes such as disturbances to existing social networks and burgeoning construction and demolition waste. On the other hand, building rehabilitation is a more socially and environmentally friendly alternative to redevelopment, but its success depends much on residents’ active participation. With a view towards a sustainable strategy for urban renewal, it is necessary to balance the interests of different stakeholders regarding the choice between these two mainstream approaches to renewal. Although economic and physical issues are important decision making considerations, this study explores the aspirations and preferences of local residents in relation to the two options through a structured survey. The findings are conducive to the development of a balanced and socially sustainable strategy of urban renewal.
Pomanjkanje prave kulture skrbi za stavbe je v večini razvitih mest pripeljalo do resnih težav zaradi propadanja mestnih predelov, in to ogroža zdravje in varnost mestnih skupnosti. Sanacija je ...pristop, s katerim navadno ustavimo propadanje in obnovimo propadajoča območja. Pogosto pa ima tudi negativne posledice; zmoti lahko delovanje obstoječih socialnih mrež in pretirano poveča količino odpadkov, ki nastanejo pri gradnji in rušenju zgradb. Po drugi strani je obnova stavb socialno in okolju prijaznejša izbira v primerjavi s prenovo, vendar je njen uspeh kar najbolj odvisen od sodelovanja stanovalcev. Če želimo doseči trajnostno strategijo urbane prenove, moramo najti ravnotežje med interesi različnih déležnikov za enega od obeh glavnih pristopov k prenovi. Čeprav je pomembno, da pri sprejemanju odločitev upoštevamo ekonomska in fizična vprašanja, se v tej raziskavi s strukturirano anketo preučujejo želje in preference lokalnih prebivalcev glede teh dveh možnosti. Ugotovitve prispevajo k razvoju uravnotežene in socialno trajnostne strategije urbane prenove.
This paper attempts to describe and analyze the development and reforms of secondary education in Hong Kong and Shanghai over the past 25 years. Comparing the two cities is useful in constructing a ...spectrum of possibilities on the one hand, and identifying some common themes in the development of secondary education on the other. The commonalities and differences, the experiences and lessons, should shed light on similar reforms in other parts of the world. Section 1 provides the background in which both cities launched their respective education reforms. Section 2 provides contextual descriptions of the two education systems. Section 3 illustrates changes in the workplace in both Hong Kong and Shanghai. Section 4 summarizes the challenges facing education in Shanghai and Hong Kong. Section 5 examines the efforts at reform in both systems, concentrating on secondary education. Section 6 revisits the purpose of secondary education in the context of: (a) almost universal attendance in secondary education in both cities; (b) few job opportunities for fresh secondary graduates; and (c) a majority of the population having to undertake lifelong learning. Finally, Section 7 concludes by stating that there must be a reassessment of the nature, goals, and contents of secondary education. Both cities have done tremendous work in this direction, most significantly in the reform of the curriculum, where the general tendency is to move away from fragmented feeding of specific knowledge toward establishing learning experiences that have long-term significance.
Objective: This in vitro study examined the ultrastructure of resin-infiltrated sclerotic dentine following the application of a self-etching primer, with or without the adjunctive use of phosphoric ...acid pre-conditioning.
Materials and Methods: Non-carious, natural cervical sclerotic lesions were hand-cleaned with a slurry of pumice and chlorhexidine and bonded without further cavity preparation. One group was bonded using Clearfil Liner Bond 2V (Kuraray Co. Ltd, Osaka, Japan) alone. Specimens from the other group were pre-conditioned with K-etchant (40% phosphoric acid gel, Kuraray) prior to the application of the same self-etching primer. Artificially prepared wedge-shaped lesions were also made in sound bicuspids, bonded using the two methods, and used as controls for the two groups. For SEM examination, each specimen was cryofractured into two halves through a pre-formed slit made on the lingual surface, after the respective conditioning treatment. Different locations within the lesions were examined after rinsing of the phosphoric acid/self-etching primer and specimen dehydration. For TEM investigation, specimens were bonded with the adhesive. Both demineralised and undemineralised ultrathin sections were prepared from the occlusal, gingival and deepest part of the wedge-shaped bonded lesions following specimen fixation, dehydration and resin embedding.
Results: A hypermineralised surface layer was present on the surface of etched sclerotic dentine. This layer was thicker in the deepest part of the natural lesions, where bacterial colonisation of the lesion surface was also apparent. Both treatment protocols were unable to effectively dissolve sclerotic casts that occluded the dentinal tubules. Depending upon the thickness of the surface layers at different locations in the natural lesion, self-etching primer treatment alone resulted in reduction of the thickness of the authentic hybrid layer (i.e. hybridised intertubular dentine). This was also true of phosphoric acid pre-conditioning along the deepest part of the natural lesions. Within this region, intertubular dentine completely devoid of an authentic hybrid layer could be seen in both treatment groups. Resin tags were also sparsely observed in such regions.
Conclusions: Adhesive strategies that rely mostly on micromechanical retention alone may be compromised by the sporadic absence of the hybrid layer and resin tags in sclerotic dentine. Based on the ultrastructural features presented, it is further speculated that adaptive strategies such as removal of the surface layers and extended etching time may not be completely effective in improving bonding efficacy in highly sclerotic dentine. Interdisciplinary research should be continued to develop alternative procedures for bonding resins equally well to sound and sclerotic dentine.
Actinomyces species are predominant early colonizers of the oral cavity and prime mediators of inter-bacterial adhesion and coaggregation. Previous workers have evaluated the adhesion of
Actinomyces ...spp. by quantitative assessment of sessile, as opposed to planktonic cells attached to substrates, but did not quantify the cell surface interactive forces. Therefore we used atomic force microscopy to directly detect the interactive force between an approaching silicon tip and sessile
Actinomyces spp. adhering to a substrate, at nanonewton (nN) range force levels. A total of eight strains each belonging to fimbriated and non-fimbriated
Actinomyces species were employed, namely
A. bovis,
A. gerencseriae,
A. israelii,
A. meyeri,
A. naeslundii genospecies 1 and 2,
A. odontolyticus and
A. viscosus. The sterile mica discs, used as the adhesion substrate, were immersed in mono-species bacterial suspensions for five days to obtain a thin bacterial biofilm. Interactive forces were measured using a silicon nitride cantilever attached to a Nanoscope IIIA atomic force microscope. The interactive forces between the approaching silicon nitride tip and bacterial biofilm surfaces were randomly quantified at three different locations on each cell; namely, the cell surface proper, the periphery of the cell and the substrate and, the interface between two cells. When the interactive forces at these locations of the same species were compared, significantly higher force levels at the cell–cell interface than the other two locations were noted with
A. gerencseriae (
P < 0.001),
A. viscosus (
P < 0.01) and
A. israelii (
P < 0.05). When the interactive forces of different
Actinomyces spp. at an identical location were compared, fimbriated
A. naeslundii genospecies 2 showed the greatest interactive force at the cell surface proper (−32.6 ± 8.7
nN,
P < 0.01).
A. naeslundii genospecies 1, 2 and
A. viscosus demonstrated greater interactive force at the cell-mica periphery than the other five species (
P < 0.05);
A. viscosus (−34.6 ± 10.5
nN) displayed greater interactive force at the cell–cell interface than the others (
P < 0.01), except for
A. gerencseriae (
P > 0.05). These data indicate that fimbriated
Actinomyces spp., including
A. naeslundii genospecies 1, 2 and
A. viscosus exert higher cell surface interactive forces than those devoid of fimbriae and, such variable force levels may modulate their adhesion and coaggregation during biofilm formation.
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