The state of the nation and its public service in contemporary South Africa

The article is an analysis of the state of the nation and its public service in contemporary South Africa. It demonstrates that the Zuma administration is much more responsive to citizen and interest group interests than the Mbeki presidency was. This is not only reflected in the cabinet appointments, but also in the character of public policy, including economic policy. However, ideological divisions within the ruling party and a failure to contain elite and popular expectations have also accompanied this responsiveness. This, in turn, has hindered a social pact from developing between labour, business and the State. The article also demonstrates that state capacity has been compromised by a coupling of Affirmative Action with conservative macro-economics and an infusion of a corporate ethic into the public service. It concludes that this problem will only be addressed with a more nuanced Affirmative Action policy, a reconfiguration of the public mandate of the civil service, a more expansive fiscal agenda centered on the citizenry and firm proactive action taken against corruption

Patterns of Giving in South Africa

This paper reflects on the results of a national quantitative survey on giving in South Africa. It explores the extent and character of giving; who gives, to whom, with what intention

Role of biomechanical forces in the natural history of coronary atherosclerosis.

Atherosclerosis remains a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, and a thorough understanding of the underlying pathophysiological mechanisms is crucial for the development of new therapeutic strategies. Although atherosclerosis is a systemic inflammatory disease, coronary atherosclerotic plaques are not uniformly distributed in the vascular tree. Experimental and clinical data highlight that biomechanical forces, including wall shear stress (WSS) and plaque structural stress (PSS), have an important role in the natural history of coronary atherosclerosis. Endothelial cell function is heavily influenced by changes in WSS, and longitudinal animal and human studies have shown that coronary regions with low WSS undergo increased plaque growth compared with high WSS regions. Local alterations in WSS might also promote transformation of stable to unstable plaque subtypes. Plaque rupture is determined by the balance between PSS and material strength, with plaque composition having a profound effect on PSS. Prospective clinical studies are required to ascertain whether integrating mechanical parameters with medical imaging can improve our ability to identify patients at highest risk of rapid disease progression or sudden cardiac events.This work was supported by the British Heart Foundation (FS/13/33/30168), Heart Research UK (RG2638/14/16), the Cambridge NIHR Biomedical Research Centre, and the BHF Cambridge Centre for Research Excellence.This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Nature Publishing Group at http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nrcardio.2015.203

Automatic memory processes in normal ageing and Alzheimer’s disease

This study examined the contribution of automatic and controlled uses of memory to stem completion in young, middle-aged and older adults, and compared these data with a study involving patients with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) who performed the same task (Hudson and Robertson, 2007). In an inclusion task participants aimed to complete three-letter word stems with a previously studied word, in an exclusion task the aim was to avoid using studied words to complete stems. Performances under inclusion and exclusion conditions were contrasted to obtain estimates of controlled and automatic memory processes using process-dissociation calculations (Jacoby, 1991). An age-related decline, evident from middle age was observed for the estimate of controlled processing, whereas the estimate of automatic processing remained invariant across the age groups. This pattern stands in contrast to what is observed in AD, where both controlled and automatic processes have been shown to be impaired. Therefore, the impairment in memory processing on stem completion that is found in AD is qualitatively different from that observed in normal ageing

High Energy Physics Forum for Computational Excellence: Working Group Reports (I. Applications Software II. Software Libraries and Tools III. Systems)

Computing plays an essential role in all aspects of high energy physics. As computational technology evolves rapidly in new directions, and data throughput and volume continue to follow a steep trend-line, it is important for the HEP community to develop an effective response to a series of expected challenges. In order to help shape the desired response, the HEP Forum for Computational Excellence (HEP-FCE) initiated a roadmap planning activity with two key overlapping drivers -- 1) software effectiveness, and 2) infrastructure and expertise advancement. The HEP-FCE formed three working groups, 1) Applications Software, 2) Software Libraries and Tools, and 3) Systems (including systems software), to provide an overview of the current status of HEP computing and to present findings and opportunities for the desired HEP computational roadmap. The final versions of the reports are combined in this document, and are presented along with introductory material.Comment: 72 page

An exploration of vacuum evaporable non-fullerene acceptors for use in organic solar cells and molecular orientation in evaporated thin films

Organic solar cells (OSCs) offer an attractive pathway for next-generation photovoltaic technologies. Recent advances in molecular design have advanced the technology with the advent of non-fullerene acceptors (NFAs). NFAs have enabled rapid efficiency gains in OSCs, with state-of-the-art OSCs showcasing efficiencies of close to 20%. These advances are constrained to the solution processing field and are not compatible with vacuum deposition, a more industrially mature and commercially relevant manufacturing method which also eliminates the need for solvent use and related components in the fabrication process. In the first part of this thesis various NFA molecules, specifically oligothiophenes and a perylene diimide, are investigated for use as a vacuum evaporable NFA. the investigation focused on studying the optical and energetic behaviour, primarily using spectroscopic ellipsometry (SE) and ambient photoelectron spectroscopy, of these materials. Based on the results, the oligiothiophene BTIC-H was identified as a strong candidate for use in vacuum evaporated NFA OSCs with a good extinction coefficient k = 0.6, and a HOMO and LUMO of −5.9 and −3.6 eV, respectively. Planar and bulk heterojunction devices using BTIC-H were explored. PHJ devices showcased promising performance (good VOC ≈ 1V with low voltage losses ≈ 0.8 V), however, photocurrents in BHJ devices were poor (≈ 0.5 mA/cm2). These results showed that there is very real promise for vacuum evaporable NFAs, however, significant optimisation of devices as well as molecular design are needed. The second part of this thesis explored a comprehensive analysis of molecular orientation in vacuum evaporated organic thin films, a concept which is often poorly understood but plays a critical role in the photophysics of organic electronics. This was done using SE and near edge X-ray absorption fine structure (NEXAFS) spectroscopy. Three different molecules were investigated, namely alpha-sexithiophene, the merocyanine dye HB194, and the donor-acceptor (DA) type donor DTDCPB. NEXAFS was used to calculate the mean facial orientation of the molecules while SE was used to calculate the backbone orientation, with the results supplemented by grazing incidence wide-angle X-ray scattering (GIWAXS). Results were compared to literature, showing strong agreement in the case of alpha-sexithiophene and revealing significant changes in orientation upon substrate heating, which were broken down into their respective facial and backbone orientation changes. These results showed that understanding both the facial and backbone changes reveal rich information about the microstructure of organic thin films and provide a foundation for more comprehensive analysis of blended films which may reveal device relevant insights

Glypican-1 is enriched in circulating-exosomes in pancreatic cancer and correlates with tumor burden

Background Glypican-1 (GPC1) is expressed in pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma (PDAC) cells and adjacent stromal fibroblasts. Recently, GPC1 circulating exosomes (crExos) have been shown to be able to detect early stages of PDAC. In this study, we investigated the usefulness of crExos GPC1 as a biomarker for PDAC. Methods Plasma was obtained from patients with benign pancreatic disease ( = 16) and PDAC ( = 27) prior to pancreatectomy, and crExos were isolated by ultra-centrifugation. Protein was extracted from surgical specimens (adjacent normal pancreas, = 13; and PDAC, = 17). GPC1 levels were measured using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Results There was no significant difference in GPC1 levels between normal pancreas and PDAC tissues. This was also true when comparing matched pairs. However, GPC1 levels were enriched in PDAC crExos ( = 11), compared to the source tumors ( = 11; 97 ± 54 vs. 20.9 ± 12.3 pg/mL; 4 cm; = 0.012). Conclusions High GPC1 crExos may be able to determine PDAC tumor size and disease burden. However, further efforts are needed to elucidate its role as a diagnostic and/or prognostic biomarker using larger cohorts of PDAC patients

Seeding a New World: Lessons from the FeesMustFall Movement for the Advancement of Social Justice

The author interrogates the empirical experience of #FeesMustFall—which is extensively detailed in the book Rebels & Rage from which this article flows—with a view to understanding social movements and in turn enhancing the effectiveness of social justice struggles in the future. He discusses the value of social mobilization in effecting change, but demonstrates that this is only sustainable if the protest is structured within certain strategic and ethical parameters. He then proceeds to interrogate the issues of violence, the framing of the struggle and outcomes, the decision-making processes associated with the protest, and the importance of ethical conduct by leaders and activists. He concludes by underscoring the legitimacy of the social justice struggles but insists that these have to be more effectively conducted if they are to culminate in the establishment of a more humane social order

Does fiscal consolidation affect non-performing loans? Global evidence from Heavily Indebted Countries (HICs)

This study explores fiscal consolidations’ impact on non-performing loans (NPLs) in highly indebted countries (HICs) following the global financial crisis (GFC) and subsequent sovereign debt crisis. A dynamic panel data estimator was applied to obtain the unbiased estimator due to NPLs’ time persistence. The findings reveal that fiscal consolidation measures increase NPLs since they limit the household and business loan-serving capacity. Extended analysis categorises fiscal consolidation episodes into (1) the fiscal consolidation weak form (FCWE) and (2) the fiscal consolidation strong form (FCSE). The extended analysis results reveal that the FCWE and FCSE improve NPLs by 1.55% and 31.10%, respectively. The weak-to-strong form transition of the fiscal consolidation analysis resulted in improving NPLs by 28.55 percentage points. NPL definition challenges, the potential influence of loan restructuring and regulatory restrictions, and implications for policymakers and financial institutions in managing NPLs in highly indebted economies were explored. Investigating the potentially different effects of both forms of fiscal consolidation (FCWE and FCSE) on NPLs in countries with different definitions of NPLs, including a comparison study between different definitions, was identified as an implication for future research. Finally, future studies should examine how restrictions on IFRS 9 may affect the FCWE and NPL as well as FCSE and NPL associations