Effectiveness of blended learning to improve medical students' communication skills: a randomized, controlled trial.

Background: This study aimed to evaluate whether a blended learning course improves medical students' communication skills compared to a face-to-face only lecture.

Methods: After completing a face-to-face lecture on communication skills, 2nd year medical students were gender-matched and randomized to either an intervention receiving an interactive video-based online learning module covering the content of the previous lecture and including a knowledge assessment or a control group only receiving a knowledge assessment. The primary endpoint was students' knowledge about communication techniques assessed by a predefined score from 0 to 100.

Unsealing behaviour: Variation in harbour seal (Phoca vitulina) responses to anthropogenic sound in relation to individual health.

Anthropogenic underwater noise can affect animal behaviour, which in turn is influenced by other intrinsic and extrinsic factors. In this case study, we explored links between behaviour, underwater noise and health on 18 free-ranging harbour seals (Phoca vitulina) in the Elbe estuary and Wadden Sea. Individuals were captured and blood samples were taken to assess the health status through leukograms and molecular biomarkers indicative of stress, sound exposure and immunological status.

Computational Modeling Reveals a Catch-and-Guide Interaction Between Kinesin-1 and Tubulin C-Terminal Tails.

The delivery of intracellular cargoes by kinesins is modulated at scales ranging from the geometry of the microtubule networks down to interactions with individual tubulins and their code. The complexity of the tubulin code and the difficulty in directly observing motor-tubulin interactions have hindered progress in pinpointing the precise mechanisms by which kinesin's function is modulated. As one such example, past experiments show that cleaving tubulin C-terminal tails (CTTs) lowers kinesin-1's processivity and velocity on microtubules, but how these CTTs intertwine with kinesin's processive cycle remains unclear.