3MT (Three-minute thesis) presentations, in which students communicate their theses to non-specialist audiences within three minutes, have emerged as an important academic genre, echoing current ...practices in scientific communication where researchers report their research work to a heterogeneous audience. Although increasing attention has been paid to 3MT presentations, we still lack sufficient knowledge of how presenters should communicate disciplinary knowledge to a wide audience. To address this gap, this corpus-based study investigates the rhetorical organization of moves (i.e. discoursal units serving various coherent communicative functions in text) in 80 3MT presentations from six disciplines. It is found that orientation, rationale, purpose, methods and results are five obligatory moves, among which the results move comprises more than one-fifth of the total length. The rationale and results moves are more often applied in hard sciences than in soft knowledge fields. The findings shed light on advanced academic literacy and how students communicate disciplinary knowledge to a wide audience.
The regenerative capacity of skeletal muscle declines with age. Previous studies suggest that this process can be reversed by exposure to young circulation; however, systemic age-specific factors ...responsible for this phenomenon are largely unknown. Here we report that oxytocin--a hormone best known for its role in lactation, parturition and social behaviours--is required for proper muscle tissue regeneration and homeostasis, and that plasma levels of oxytocin decline with age. Inhibition of oxytocin signalling in young animals reduces muscle regeneration, whereas systemic administration of oxytocin rapidly improves muscle regeneration by enhancing aged muscle stem cell activation/proliferation through activation of the MAPK/ERK signalling pathway. We further show that the genetic lack of oxytocin does not cause a developmental defect in muscle but instead leads to premature sarcopenia. Considering that oxytocin is an FDA-approved drug, this work reveals a potential novel and safe way to combat or prevent skeletal muscle ageing.
The COVID-19 pandemic increased demands for respiratory disease testing to facilitate treatment and limit transmission, demonstrating in the process that most existing test options were too complex ...and expensive to perform in point-of-care or home scenarios. Lab-based molecular techniques can detect viral RNA in respiratory illnesses but are expensive and require trained personnel, while affordable antigen-based home tests lack sensitivity for early detection in newly infected or asymptomatic individuals. The few home RNA detection tests deployed were prohibitively expensive. Here, we demonstrate a point-of-care, paper-based rapid analysis device that simultaneously detects multiple viral RNAs; it is demonstrated on two common respiratory viruses (COVID-19 and influenza A) spiked onto a commercial nasal swab. The automated device requires no sample preparation by the user after insertion of the swab, minimizing user operation steps. We incorporated lyophilized amplification reagents immobilized in a porous matrix, a novel thermally actuated valve for multiplexed fluidic control, a printed circuit board that performs on-device lysis and amplification within a cell-phone-sized disposable device. Reverse transcription loop-mediated isothermal amplification (RT-LAMP) products are visualized
fluorescent dyes using a modified cell phone, resulting in detection of as few as 10
viral copies per swab across both pathogens within 30 minutes. This integrated platform could be commercialized in a form that would be inexpensive, portable, and sensitive; it can readily be multiplexed to detect as many as 8 different RNA or DNA sequences, and adapted to any desired RNA or DNA detection assays.
Nowadays, open science communication is facilitated with the affordance of multimodal semiotic resources. Against this backdrop, graphical abstracts have emerged as a digitally mediated genre and ...have become an important means of knowledge communication in academic settings. While its interactive visual designs have been discussed in the literature, the rhetorical patterns of verbal and visual resources used in this genre warrant more empirical investigation. Therefore, based on a corpus of 90 graphical abstracts from journals in biology, chemistry and engineering, this study explores the organizational use of verbal and visual resources to mediate knowledge presentation. Five moves were identified in the textual components of the graphical abstract: reference to visuals, research background, report of results, interpretation of results, and implications or applications of the research. Furthermore, we examined what and how contents are visualized in the graphical abstracts. We found that the most visually displayed contents are the results and the overview of research, and that the duplication of pictures in the full article is a dominant source of the graphical abstracts. Additionally, the most commonly used layout patterns in the graphical abstracts are narratives or ‘evolutions’.
Adulte interfollicular epidermis (IFE) renewal is likely orchestrated by physiological demands of its complex tissue architecture comprising spatial and cellular heterogeneity. Mouse tail and back ...skin display two kinds of basal IFE spatial domains that regenerate at different rates. Here, we elucidate the molecular and cellular states of basal IFE domains by marker expression and single‐cell transcriptomics in mouse and human skin. We uncover two paths of basal cell differentiation that in part reflect the IFE spatial domain organization. We unravel previously unrecognized similarities between mouse tail IFE basal domains defined as scales and interscales versus human rete ridges and inter‐ridges, respectively. Furthermore, our basal IFE transcriptomics and gene targeting in mice provide evidence supporting a physiological role of IFE domains in adaptation to differential UV exposure. We identify Sox6 as a novel UV‐induced and interscale/inter‐ridge preferred basal IFE‐domain transcription factor, important for IFE proliferation and survival. The spatial, cellular, and molecular organization of IFE basal domains underscores skin adaptation to environmental exposure and its unusual robustness in adult homeostasis.
Synopsis
Adult skin interfollicular epidermis (IFE) serves as an essential body barrier to environmental insults, yet its composition and renewal mechanisms remain debated. This work identifies two distinct spatial domains of the basal IFE in mouse and human, suggesting tissue adaptation to differential environmental challenges.
Cell tracing combined with single‐cell expression profiling uncovers two IFE basal domains with distinct gene expression patterns and cell differentiation paths in the mouse tail.
IFE scale and interscale domains contain comparable mixtures of stem, proliferating, and differentiating basal cell type states.
Basal IFE domain organization is shared between mouse tail and human.
Sox6 is enriched in more UV‐exposed IFE regions and is required for basal cell proliferation and survival during homeostasis and acute UV exposure.
Adult interfollicular epidermis in mouse and human shows unexpected spatial and molecular heterogeneity, suggesting adaption to differential environmental challenges.
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