Browsing by Author "Fowler, Mark R."
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Item Open Access Addressing the Employability Needs of Forensic Science Graduates(HEA, 2013) Fowler, Mark R.; Brawn, R. J.; Marriott, Anna; Roy, P. Lucy; Scott, Nigel W.; Patterson, H. B.Item Metadata only Arabidopsis CDC2a and cyclin gene promoter::gusA constructs as markers of cell growth and division in heterologous plants.(2003) Fowler, Mark R.; Scott, Nigel W.; Milan, A. R.; McCormac, A. C.; Mishra, Manoj K.; CuiYing, Shao; XiaoCheng, Jiang; ChunLai, Zhang; Yan, Zhou; Elliott, Malcolm C.; Slater, A.Item Open Access Building External Partnerships to Enhance STEM Education Opportunities(HEA, 2012-04-11) Rolfe, Vivien E.; Fowler, Mark R.Item Metadata only Cell cycle in suspension cultured plant cells.(Wiley-Blackwell, 2010-04) Fowler, Mark R.Item Metadata only Changes in the Chlorophyll Content and Cytokinin Levels in the Top Three Leaves of New Plant Type Rice During Grain Filling(Springer, 2013-08) Rubia, Leila; Rangan, Latha; Choudhury, Rimjhim Roy; Kamínek, Miroslav; Dobrev, Petre; Malbeck, Jiri; Slater, A.; Scott, Nigel W.; Bennett, John; Peng, Shaobing; Khush, Gurdev S.; Elliott, Malcolm C.; Fowler, Mark R.This paper reports the ways that the differences in leaf senescence are related to grain filling, grain yield, and the dynamics of cytokinins (CKs) in the top three leaves of four field-grown new plant type (NPT) rice, a tropical japonica developed at the International Rice Research Institute, Philippines, to increase the yield potential of rice. The chlorophyll content in leaves decreased from flowering to maturity in all the NPT lines, whereas the grain filling percentage was higher in the fast-senescing NPT line than in slow-senescing NPT line. Grain yield was positively correlated with senescence in the flag leaf. Rapid changes in the CK levels were recorded in the leaves of the fast-senescing line, whereas the CK levels were relatively stable in leaves of the slow-senescing line, suggesting that the dynamics of CKs in the fast-senescing line are vital for fast senescence. There were no significant changes in bioactive CKs, CK O-glucosides (storage CKs), and cis-zeatin derivatives in different leaves of the slow-senescing NPT line between 0 and 3 weeks after flowering, suggesting that the content of these CKs is relatively stable during grain filling. A progressive increase in levels of bioactive CKs was positively correlated with gradual accumulation of CK N-glucosides (inactive CKs) in the top three leaves of the slow-senescing NPT line, whereas the decrease of bioactive CKs in the flag leaf of the fast-senescing line was accompanied by accumulation of CK O-glucosides. These results suggest that there is a higher rate of biosynthesis and/or import of bioactive CKs as well as their turnover which may favor delay of leaf senescence in the slow-senescing NPT line.Item Metadata only The Co-creation, Connectivism and Collaboration Jigsaw; assembling the puzzle pieces for a successful multi-disciplinary student learning experience(2017) Bassford, Marie; O'Sullivan, Angela; Bacon, Joanne; Crisp, Annette; Nichols-Drew, L.; Fowler, Mark R.CrashEd is a multi-disciplinary, cross-Faculty, University project that arose from five academics’ collaborative commitment to develop a car crash scenario as a widening participation activity. The success of the outreach project culminated in the inspiration to develop more academically challenging forensic scenarios for study at Higher Education level. The ethos of the Forensic Investigation module is on realistic, scenario-based learning and assessment methods, and involves subject specialists across five Schools, an FE college and the Leicestershire Constabulary. CrashEd team members and the police Forensic Crash Investigator have delivered their specialist expertise on anatomy and physiology, ballistics and trauma injuries to students on a local college FdA Theatrical Make-up and Special Effects course. These students have reciprocated the collaboration with the development of bespoke prosthetic resources designed from remits written by University Forensic Science students. The result is realistic latex ‘injuries’ for use as teaching and assessment tools for the new undergraduate module (optional for Physics, Mathematics, Criminology and Forensic Science students). This is a novel example of students working as co-creators. This study involves an investigation into the practicalities, benefits and challenges of co-creation and collaborative work; for example, the expanded specialist knowledge base available to the Physics and Maths undergraduates has provided them with wider vocational career awareness. The connectivist approach has stretched students to think across subject boundaries; a great motivator that has enhanced student engagement. The specialist resources provided by the police have enabled students to learn from real life simulations; a truly ‘hands on’ experiential learning environment.Item Open Access CrashEd - A live immersive, learning experience embedding STEM subjects in a realistic, interactive crime scene(2016-09-20) Bassford, Marie; Crisp, Annette; O'Sullivan, Angela; Bacon, Joanne; Fowler, Mark R.Interactive experiences are rapidly becoming popular via the surge of ‘escape rooms’: Part game, part theatre, they are exploding globally, having gone from zero at the outset of 2010 to at least 2800 world-wide today. CrashEd is an interactive learning experience that parallels many of the attractions of an escape room – it incorporates a staged, realistic ‘crime scene’ and invites participants to work together to gather forensic evidence and question a witness in order to solve a crime, all against the backdrop of a ticking clock. An animation can enhance reality and engage with cognitive processes to help learning; in CrashEd it is the last piece of the jigsaw that embeds the students’ incremental acquisition of knowledge to tie together the pieces of evidence, identify a suspect and ultimately solve the crime. This paper presents the background to CrashEd and an overview of how a timely placed animation at the end of an educational experience can enhance learning. Our lessons learned from delivering bespoke tailored versions of the experience to different ages and demographics are discussed. The paper will consider the successes and challenges raised by the collaborative project, future developments and potential wider implications of the development of CrashEd.Item Metadata only Crime Scenes: cultivating colleagueship and enabling connectivist learning(2015) Bassford, Marie; O'Sullivan, Angela; Bacon, Joanne; Crisp, Annette; Fowler, Mark R.A cross-Faculty collaboration has brought together five academics from a variety of disciplines at De Montfort University (DMU), resulting in a novel project that inspires year 8-12 students to learn collaboratively and apply their mathematics, physics and other classroom learning in a practical context. The exercise centres around the collision of a real motor vehicle on campus at DMU and a realistic injured manikin. Along the way students have to question a witness, measure skid marks to calculate speed and collate additional forensic evidence to enable them to identify the cause of the crash. An animated film finally shows the cause of the accident – texting while driving. Ainsworth’s six different levels of explanation that can and should be evoked to understand learning with animation [1] are explored as part of this paper, namely a) expressive, b) cognitive, motor and perceptual, c) affective and motivational, d) strategic, e) metacognitive and f) rhetorical. An animation can enhance reality and engage with cognitive processes to help learning and in our project is the last piece of the jigsaw that embeds the student’s incremental acquisition of knowledge to tie together the pieces of evidence, identify a suspect and ultimately solve the crime. The ‘hands on’ initiative was initially developed for a TeenTech event in April 2014 and hosted at the University. Since then, more than 200 school pupils along with visitors at three university-wide open days have participated in this practical challenge. Collaboration with local police Crash Scene Investigators (CSI) and Artistic Make-Up and Special Effects (AMSE) students from a Leicester college helped to increase the authenticity of the project. It has proven especially effective as a way to enthuse and motivate pupils identified as disengaged from education and demonstrates the importance of connective knowledge requiring an interaction. Downes posed ‘Is the knowledge being produced the product of an interaction between the members, or is it a (mere) aggregation of the members’ perspectives?’ [2]. We have observed that a different type of knowledge is indeed produced when student learners interact as a network to solve a crime and concurs with one of Siemen’s principle of connectivism, namely that the ‘ability to see connections between fields, ideas, and concepts is a core skill’ [3]. We will discuss the successes and challenges raised by the collaborative project, and consider the numerous nodes and connections in our network as well as future developments and potential wider implications. [1] Ainsworth, S. (2008). How do animations influence learning? In D. Robinson & G. Schraw (Eds.), Current Perspectives on Cognition, Learning, and Instruction: Recent Innovations in Educational Technology that Facilitate Student Learning. pp 37-67: Information Age Publishing. [2] Downes, S. (2007). An Introduction to Connective Knowledge, Media, Knowledge & Education – Exploring new Spaces, Relations and Dynamics in Digital Media Ecologies. Proceedings of the International Conference held on June 25-26, 2007. [3] Siemens, G. (2005). Connectivism: A Learning Theory for the Digital Age, International Journal of Instructional Technology and Distance Learning, Vol. 2 No. 1.Item Metadata only Efficient co-transformation of Nicotiana tabacum by two independent T-DNAs, the effect of T-DNA size and implications for genetic separation(Springer, 2001) McCormac, Alex; Fowler, Mark R.; Chen, D. F.; Elliott, Malcolm C.Item Open Access Embedding employability in forensic science provision.(HEA, 2012-05-24) Fowler, Mark R.; Brawn, R. J.; Scott, Nigel W.; Patterson, H. B.Item Metadata only Engaging; Employers, Porfessional Bodies and OER(2012) Fowler, Mark R.; Rolfe, Vivien E.Item Metadata only The Evidence: Translating a crime scene outreach activity for school pupils into a Higher Education module whilst maintaining student engagement(2015) Bassford, Marie; O'Sullivan, Angela; Bacon, Joanne; Crisp, Annette; Fowler, Mark R.In April 2014, a team of academics at [anonymised] University developed a ‘hands on’ outreach initiative for year 8 school pupils attending a TeenTech event. A realistic crime scene was set: the pupils, dressed in forensic overalls, approached the ‘live’ scene of a crime whereby a car had just crashed, a ‘body’ lay injured in the vehicle and a distressed witness was causing havoc nearby. On cue a Police Officer approached the scene of the crime and the children were led through a process of gathering evidence and interviewing the witness in order to identify the cause of the crash. In the past year, the outreach activity has been incorporated into numerous other on-campus school visits and university-wide open days, with more than 200 school pupils to date participating in our practical challenge. The age range of participants has naturally increased to include pupils in year 8 to year 12, and accordingly the content and pitch of the activity has evolved significantly. Feedback from schools and TeenTech organisers has been extremely positive; student engagement is exceptionally high. It has proven especially effective as a way to enthuse and motivate pupils identified as disengaged from education. The academic team recently acquired University funding to adapt and enhance the scenario to develop a new cross-Faculty module on Forensic Investigation aimed at Physics, Mathematics and Forensics undergraduates. The translation of a single, focused activity lasting between 20-30 minutes into a 12-week module involves significant new material development, however the ethos of the module will continue to centre about our innovative ‘hands on’ crime solving scenarios. This is because with striking consistency, studies show that innovative, active, collaborative, and constructivist instructional approaches shape learning more powerfully, in some forms by substantial margins, than do conventional lecture- discussion and text-based approaches [1]. Another step towards the improvement of student engagement is the provision of clear, immediate feedback. Our crime scene scenario concludes with an animated film that shows the cause of the accident – texting while driving, which immediately confirms the students’ success or otherwise in solving the crime. This paper presents our collaborative experiences in translating a successful school activity into a HE module, and includes the benefits and challenges to raising the academic level whilst maintaining student engagement. [1] Pascarella, E.T. and Terenzini, P.T. (2005). How college affects students, Volume 2, A Third Decade of Research, p.646, San Fransisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.Item Metadata only Fingerprint longevity under different environmental conditions(The Fingerprint Society, 2008) Kerr, Vicki; Stringer, Karen; Thompson, Gwen; Scott, Nigel W.; Fowler, Mark R.Item Open Access From small beginings come great things? International consultancy as a means to Internationalisation(HEA, 2012-05) Brawn, R. J.; Fowler, Mark R.; Scott, Nigel W.Item Metadata only Genetic approaches to sustainable pest management in sugar beet (Beta vulgaris).(Association of Applied Biologists, 2008) Zhang, C. L.; Xu, D.-C.; Jiang, X-C; Zhou, Y.; Zhang, C-X; Cui, J.; Chen, D. F.; Fowler, Mark R.; Elliott, Malcolm C.; Scott, Nigel W.; Dewar, A. M.; Slater, A.Item Open Access HEA/JISC Open Educational Resources; How institutional culture can change to adopt open practices(JISC/HEA, 2012) Rolfe, Vivien E.; Fowler, Mark R.Item Metadata only Molecular identification of Hypericum perforatum L. by PCR amplification of the ITS and 5.8S rDNA region(Georg Thieme Verlag, 2009) Howard, Caroline; Bremner, Paul; Fowler, Mark R.; Isodo, B.; Scott, Nigel W.; Slater, A.Item Metadata only A Novel Pedagogical Approach In Higher Education Using Blood Pattern Analysis(2017-06) Nichols-Drew, L.; Fowler, Mark R.; Vamathevan, N.; Dougan, L.; Ford, A.; Irvine, C.; Atkinson, A.The BSc (Hons) Forensic Science undergraduate degree course at De Montfort University in Leicester is accredited by the Chartered Society of Forensic Sciences and involves students undertaking a final year practical research project. Within higher education, there is an expectation of autonomous independent initiative alongside collaborative group working. Here, we highlight a novel integrated research approach involving five blood pattern analysis related projects. This student driven research has culminated in a research informed teaching approach and is a paradigm shift in forensic science educational delivery and engagement.Item Metadata only A one-tube assay for four Hypericum species - PlantID(Georg Thieme Verlag, 2011) Howard, C.; Socratous, E.; Williams, S.; Graham, Eleanor; Fowler, Mark R.; Scott, Nigel W.; Bremner, Paul; Slater, A.Item Metadata only Plant biotechnology: the genetic manipulation of plants(OUP, 2003) Slater, A.; Scott, Nigel W.; Fowler, Mark R.