Improving the quality and conduct of multi-center clinical trials is essential to the generation of generalizable knowledge about the safety and efficacy of healthcare treatments. Despite significant effort and expense, many clinical trials are unsuccessful. The National Center for Advancing Translational Science launched the Trial Innovation Network to address critical roadblocks in multi-center trials by leveraging existing infrastructure and developing operational innovations. We provide an overview of the roadblocks that led to opportunities for operational innovation, our work to develop, define, and map innovations across the network, and how we implemented and disseminated mature innovations.

There is accumulating evidence that distinct forms of domain-general inhibition underlie the selection of lexical candidates from among co-activated representations in single-word production. It is less clear whether similar control processes are engaged in the resolution of syntactic conflict in sentence production. This study assessed the relative contribution of three types of inhibitory control operating at different stages of information processing to syntactic interference resolution in an active-passive voice production task. Inhibition of response execution (the anti-saccade effect) and resolution of representational conflict (the flanker effect) were related to the occurrence of repairs and sentence onset latencies in passive voice trials. The results suggest not only that general-purpose mechanisms may be in place that resolve conflict regardless of whether it stems from syntactic or non-syntactic (non-verbal) representations, but also that they operate at dissociable processing stages.

An increasing number of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are focusing on sustainable development and on embracing sustainable business models (SBMs). Despite the growing interest of academics and practitioners in SBMs, and the benefits for stakeholders, there is limited knowledge regarding the factors enabling SME transition toward SBMs, leading them to integrate sustainable principles in their BMs. This study explores the enabling factors for SBM adoption by SMEs and provides an improved understanding of this recent phenomenon. Understanding what factors enable adoption of SBMs is crucial for both SMEs and policymakers. The research uses an inductive qualitative research design approach focused on multiple case studies. The findings reveal that both internal and external factors play a key role in enabling SME transition toward SBM adoption. The internal factors that emerged include openness, change of mindset, problemistic search, social exchange, and resource valorization, while external factors included markets change, technological innovation, stakeholders’ influences, policy and institutions.

The present study evaluated the reproductive compatibility of Trichogramma pretiosum Riley, 1879, through an integrative approach using biological data and morphometry of three isofemale lines (isolines) collected from two geographical areas. These isolines differed in sequences of mitochondrial DNA and reproductive performance in the laboratory. The wasps used to initiate the isolines were collected in different environments: two lines from a Mediterranean climate in Irvine, California, USA, and one line from a tropical climate in Piracicaba, São Paulo, Brazil. Reproductive compatibility was studied by evaluating the sex ratio and number of adult offspring produced of all mating combinations between adults from these isolines. Morphometry was studied by measuring 26 taxonomically useful characters, followed by a multivariate analysis. For the allopatric matings among Brazilian and North American isolines, a low level of crossing incompatibility was recorded, in only one direction of the crosses; whereas the sympatric North American isolines were incompatible in both directions. Multivariate analysis of the morphometric data indicated no distinct groups, suggesting that despite the genetic and biological differences, the isofemale lines are morphologically similar.

As interest in Australian native products continues to grow worldwide, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples (First Peoples) are striving to be industry leaders in the production of their traditional foods that are being developed for commercial markets. To successfully gain market approval both within Australia and globally, food regulatory authorities require at least a documented history of safe use to indicate dietary safety. Moreover, many countries also require compositional analysis and safety data to further support their safe human consumption. However, safety data are lacking for many of these traditional food items and the history that surrounds their safe use has rarely been recorded in written form, but rather passed on through cultural practices and language. This review evaluates the suitability of current frameworks for assessing the dietary safety of traditional foods and highlights the food-safety regulatory hurdles currently felt by First Peoples and their businesses attempting to enter the Australian native foods industry. These issues also extend to the requirements of food regulatory authorities around the world, when assessing the market eligibility of traditional food items. Potential solutions to these problems are discussed, including new proposed processes that can be incorporated into the current food regulatory frameworks. Importantly, these proposed processes would allow the dietary risk assessment of traditional foods to be completed in a manner that better accommodates the stories, traditional knowledge and interests of First Peoples, while also meeting the safety data requirements set out by regulatory bodies both within Australia and around the world.

The density structure of firn has implications for hydrological and climate modelling, and ice-shelf stability. The structure of firn can be evaluated from depth models of seismic velocity, widely obtained with Herglotz–Wiechert inversion (HWI), an approach that considers the slowness of refracted seismic arrivals. However, HWI is strictly appropriate only for steady-state firn profiles and the inversion accuracy can be compromised where firn contains ice layers. In these cases, full waveform inversion (FWI) may yield more success than HWI. FWI extends HWI capabilities by considering the full seismic waveform and incorporates reflected arrivals. Using synthetic firn density profiles, assuming both steady- and non-steady-state accumulation, we show that FWI outperforms HWI for detecting ice slab boundaries (5–80 m thick, 5–80 m deep) and velocity anomalies within firn. FWI can detect slabs thicker than one wavelength (here, 20 m, assuming a maximum frequency of 60 Hz) but requires the starting velocity model to be accurate to ±2.5%. We recommend for field practice that the shallowest layers of velocity models are constrained with ground-truth data. Nonetheless, FWI shows advantages over established methods, and should be considered when the characterisation of firn ice slabs is the goal of the seismic survey.

Social learning is a critical adaptation for dealing with different forms of variability. Uncertainty is a severe form of variability where the space of possible decisions or probabilities of associated outcomes are unknown. We identified four theoretically important sources of uncertainty: temporal environmental variability; payoff ambiguity; selection-set size; and effective lifespan. When these combine, it is nearly impossible to fully learn about the environment. We develop an evolutionary agent-based model to test how each form of uncertainty affects the evolution of social learning. Agents perform one of several behaviours, modelled as a multi-armed bandit, to acquire payoffs. All agents learn about behavioural payoffs individually through an adaptive behaviour-choice model that uses a softmax decision rule. Use of vertical and oblique payoff-biased social learning evolved to serve as a scaffold for adaptive individual learning – they are not opposite strategies. Different types of uncertainty had varying effects. Temporal environmental variability suppressed social learning, whereas larger selection-set size promoted social learning, even when the environment changed frequently. Payoff ambiguity and lifespan interacted with other uncertainty parameters. This study begins to explain how social learning can predominate despite highly variable real-world environments when effective individual learning helps individuals recover from learning outdated social information.

The authors present preliminary results from a new research project based in Jebel Shaqadud, Sudan. Their findings highlight the potential for this region's archaeological record to expand our understanding of the adaptation strategies used by human groups in arid north-east African environments away from rivers and lakes during the Holocene. Furthermore, they present exceptionally early radiocarbon dates that push postglacial human occupation in the eastern Sahel back to the twelfth millennium BP.