Simon N. Williams

Nanostructured Co1−xNixSb3 skutterudites: Synthesis, thermoelectric properties, and theoretical modeling

Nanostructured skutterudite Co1-xNixSb3 has been synthesized by chemical alloying with Ni substitution for Co up to 27.5 at. %. High concentration of grain boundaries provided by nanostructuring is ...

Nanostructured Co1-xNix(Sb1-yTey)(3) skutterudites : Theoretical modeling, synthesis and thermoelectric properties

The properties of Te-doped Co(Sb1-yTey)(3) and Te-Ni double-doped Co1-xNix(Sb1-yTey)(3) nanostructured skutterudites were evaluated by means of x-ray powder diffraction, and transport properties me ...

Tobacco Industry Manipulation of Tobacco Excise and Tobacco Advertising Policies in the Czech Republic: An Analysis of Tobacco Industry Documents

Risako Shirane and colleagues examined the the Legacy Tobacco Documents Library and found evidence of transnational tobacco company influence over tobacco advertising and excise policy in the Czech Republic, a country with one of the poorest tobacco control records in Europe.

The Academy for Future Science Faculty: randomized controlled trial of theory-driven coaching to shape development and diversity of early-career scientists

BackgroundApproaches to training biomedical scientists have created a talented research community. However, they have failed to create a professional workforce that includes many racial and ethnic minorities and women in proportion to their representation in the population or in PhD training. This is particularly true at the faculty level. Explanations for the absence of diversity in faculty ranks can be found in social science theories that reveal processes by which individuals develop identities, experiences, and skills required to be seen as legitimate within the profession.Methods/DesignUsing the social science theories of Communities of Practice, Social Cognitive Career Theory, identity formation, and cultural capital, we have developed and are testing a novel coaching-based model to address some of the limitations of previous diversity approaches. This coaching intervention (The Academy for Future Science Faculty) includes annual in-person meetings of students and trained faculty Career Coaches, along with ongoing virtual coaching, group meetings and communication. The model is being tested as a randomized controlled trial with two cohorts of biomedical PhD students from across the U.S., one recruited at the start of their PhDs and one nearing completion. Stratification into the experimental and control groups, and to coaching groups within the experimental arms, achieved equal numbers of students by race, ethnicity and gender to the extent possible. A fundamental design element of the Academy is to teach and make visible the social science principles which highly influence scientific advancement, as well as acknowledging the extra challenges faced by underrepresented groups working to be seen as legitimate within the scientific communities.DiscussionThe strategy being tested is based upon a novel application of the well-established principles of deploying highly skilled coaches, selected and trained for their ability to develop talents of others. This coaching model is intended to be a complement, rather than a substitute, for traditional mentoring in biomedical research training, and is being tested as such.

Coaching to Augment Mentoring to Achieve Faculty Diversity: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

Purpose The Academy for Future Science Faculty (the Academy) is a novel coaching intervention for biomedical PhD students designed to address limitations in previous efforts to promote faculty diversity. Unlike traditional research mentoring, the Academy includes both group and individual coaching, coaches have no research or evaluation roles with the students, and it is based on social science theories. The authors present a qualitative case study of one of the coaching groups and provide statistical analyses indicating whether one year in the Academy effects students’ perceptions of the achievability and desirability of an academic career. Method The authors tested (July 2012–July 2013), with Northwestern University ethical approval, the Academy via a longitudinal randomized controlled trial. Participants were 121 latter-stage biomedical PhD students. The authors collected data via questionnaires, interviews, and meeting recordings. Results The case study shows how group career coaching can effectively supplement traditional one-to-one research mentoring; provide new role models for underrepresented minority students; and provide theory-based lenses through which to engage in open conversations about race, gender, and science careers. Repeated-measures analysis of variance showed that perceived achievability increased in the Academy group from baseline to one-year follow-up (mean, 5.75 versus 6.39) but decreased in the control group (6.58 versus 5.81). Perceived desirability decreased significantly less (P < .05) in the Academy group (7.00 versus 6.36) than in the control group (7.83 versus 5.97). Conclusions Early results suggest that an academic career coaching model can effectively supplement traditional research mentoring and promote persistence toward academic careers.

Action needed to combat food and drink companies' social media marketing to adolescents.

Reports have shown how behavioural marketing through social media sites is heavily dominated by soft drink and fast food franchises, with additional concern arising due to the direct targeting of this marketing at 13 to 17-year-olds. Dr Simon Williams from Northwestern University, Chicago, USA suggests ways in which the medical community can tackle this threat to public health.

A twenty-first century Citizens’ POLIS: introducing a democratic experiment in electronic citizen participation in science and technology decision-making:

Related to ongoing debates concerning the future of “deliberative democracy” and “public sociology,” this article introduces a new approach to citizen participation in science and technology decision-making. The Citizens’ POLIS (Participatory On-Line Interactive System) is a multi-method, multi-stage, semi-structured, electronic public participation process. This pragmatic experiment is influenced by the philosophy of John Dewey and James Bohman, and sees the citizen as the primary democratic inquirer and the social scientist as the key organizer and creator of the “institutional space for deliberation.” This article discusses the role of the social scientist in organizing an electronic participation experiment, one which seeks to reach a compromise between democratic legitimacy and political effectiveness. A recently completed pilot study on “Mobile Phones, Risk and Health” is used to illustrate the approach. In conclusion, the need for further empirical experimentation with this, and other processes for electronic citizen participation, is asserted.

In situ x‐ray diffraction studies of YBa2Cu3Ox

Using a specially designed off‐axis faced magnetron sputtering chamber we have performed in situ x‐ray diffraction studies of the growth of YBa2Cu3Ox films using a synchrotron light source. The orientation and rocking curve width were studied as a function of substrate temperature, O2/Ar partial pressures, and deposition rate. Growth rate was studied on SrTiO3, LaAlO3, and MgO.

The incursion of ‘Big Food’ in middle-income countries: a qualitative documentary case study analysis of the soft drinks industry in China and India

Public health research is only just beginning to explore the myriad ways in which the food and beverage industry, or ‘Big Food’, has sought to influence policy and increase consumption of energy-dense products high in sugar, salt, and fat in middle-income countries. In particular, very little research has focused on Asia-Pacific markets, including China and India. This article uses the soft drink sector as a case study, and focuses on The Coca-Cola Company – the largest soft drinks company in both China and India. Documentary data from company reports, news articles, industry analyst reports, and industry magazines are analyzed to explore how the company successfully re-entered these markets following liberalization of their economies, and how it subsequently sought to influence government and key organizations in order to increase consumption and challenge public health policy. Applying a framework previously used in an analysis of Big Food in high income countries like the United States, I find that Coca-Cola has used the same strategies in China and India. Findings reveal that Coca-Cola lobbied US Government officials (in order to influence international issues); made political contributions; participated in a ‘revolving door’ between government and industry; funded professional organizations; and generally lobbied to resist regulation or urge weak regulation. The findings of this study could help to inform public health debates about Big Food in other emerging markets, including the Middle East and Africa.

‘Big Food’: taking a critical perspective on a global public health problem

Global increase in the consumption of low-nutrition products, such as soft drinks and processed foods, is associated with global increases in obesity and its associated diseases, most prominently type 2 diabetes (Basu, McKee, Galea, & Stuckler, 2013; Drewnowski & Popkin, 1997; Stuckler, McKee, Ebrahim, & Basu, 2012). The ongoing expansion of multinational food and beverage companies – ‘Big Food’ – is a key factor behind these increases in consumption (Stuckler & Nestle, 2012; Williams, in press). This special issue provides critical insight into the global marketing practices of Big Food, including a focus on their incursion into low-and middle-income countries (LMICs). Despite all being focused on Big Food, the papers in this special issue are diverse in a couple of key respects. The studies focus on multiple countries: the US, Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, Mongolia, the Philippines, Guatemala, Kenya and India. They also employ multiple research methods such as quantitative analyses of food supply datasets, qualitative interviews with key food policy stakeholders, ethnographic observations of the food marketing environment, geographic mapping of food advertisements and content analysis of documentation of food companies’ public reports. Taken together, these papers provide substantial evidence for the changing dynamics of the global food supply, including new insights into the ‘nutrition transition’ (Drewnowski & Popkin, 1997). This special issue deals particularly with issues related to the marketing strategies of Big Food, especially the ways in which companies advertise to youth and the rural poor. The papers demonstrate the importance of recent public health initiatives such as corporate promotion of nutritionally ‘better for you’ products and advocates’ promotion of soda taxes. The paper by Basu (2015) uses global food supply data to challenge the notion that changes in the food supply are a necessary consequence of economic development. He shows how such changes are more complex than a simple notion of ‘Westernization’ would have us assume. Instead, he argues we should consider the existence of multiple nutrition transitions and the extent to which they occur as the result of national policy choices as well as of global economic trends. O’Neill’s (2015) case study shows how Kenya, unlike many LMICs, has been slow to adopt the ‘Big Food diet’. In that country, the availability of meats has remained constant and the availability of sugars and sweeteners has actually declined during what O’Neill refers to as the ‘Corporate-Environmental food regime’. Although the Kenya case is an encouraging example of how multinational companies’ expansion in LMICs can be checked by a state focus on national food self-sufficiency, it also warns us that most of the recent evidence suggests that ‘the state’s ability to manage food supplies is changing, and so are diets’.