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This article presents examples from England of the participation of children with caring responsibilities (young carers) in policy and practice at both local and national levels. The \"voices\" of young carers themselves have become more prominent at many levels and in diverse contexts such as through local young carers' fora and through dialogue with decision makers, including social care commissioners and Members of Parliament. This participation has for a number of years in England, been strongly advocated for and facilitated by voluntary sector services in particular. Drawing on a number of practice examples, the article will highlight a range of young carers' participatory activity and the extent to which this is woven into policy development and practice. It will consider the processes and protocols of recruitment and safeguarding and the outcomes of young carers' participation, including the influence of their \"voices\" in bringing about real change and the impacts on themselves as individuals. Consideration will be given as to whether the voices of young carers has been truly representative of children and young people with caring responsibilities and where particular attention may need to be focused when listening to their voices. The potential risks of young carers' participation at a practical level will be explored as well as the barriers to participation for young carers and approaches for enhancing their participation.

During regulatory and routine surveillance sampling of apparently healthy baitfish from the state of Minnesota, a novel totivirus (tentatively named “golden shiner totivirus”, GSTV) was detected in a homogenate of kidney and spleen of golden shiner ( Notemigonus crysoleucas ). The nearly complete genome is 7788 nt long with a complete 5’ untranslated region (UTR) of 135 nt (1-135 nt position), complete open reading frames (ORFs) and a partial 3’ UTR of 54 nt (7734-7788). The sequence is comprised of two ORFs (ORF1 and ORF2). The larger ORF1 encodes a 1659-aa polypeptide in frame +1 from nt position 136 to 5115 (4980 nt) with a start codon at position 136-138 and a stop codon at position 5113-5115. The ORF1 is 54 aa longer than the 1605-aa ORF1-encoded protein of a reference strain of infectious myonecrosis virus (IMNV), ID-EJ-12-1(AIC34743.1). The predicted ORF1 and ORF2 fusion protein sequence was NFQDGG. Hence, an overlapping region of 99 nt was observed, which is shorter than the 172-nt and 199-nt overlapping regions in Armigeres subalbatus totivirus (AsTV) and IMNV, respectively. GSTV formed a separate lineage based on phylogenetic analysis of ORF1-encoded major capsid protein (MCP) and ORF2-encoded RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) sequences. Based on ORF1 MCP sequence analysis, GSTV was most closely related to IMNV, with maximum aa sequence identity of 26.42-27.86 %, followed by 26.59, 22.94 and 21.75 % for Drosophila totivirus (DTV), AsTV and Omono River virus (OMRV), respectively. Similar to ORF1, the ORF2 (RdRp) of GSTV formed a separate clade with maximum identity of 38.10 % and 38.50 % to IMNV and DTV, respectively. The virus identified here differs enough from its closest relative that it may represent a new genus in the family Totiviridae . The disease-causing potential and management impact of this novel virus is unknown at this time.

In 2016, the Children’s Commissioner for England reported that the most frequent provision for young carers (YCs) comes from dedicated YC services. This study formed one part of a three-year evaluation of support for YCs and their families provided by the Hampshire YCs Alliance (HYCA), a county-wide collaboration of ten YC services in the UK. It set out to explore the following primary questions; (a) what are the most important changes that the YC services made to YCs and their families? (b) what is it about the services that creates those changes? Semi-structured interviews were carried out in 2017, with YCs aged 9–17 (n = 8), their parents (n = 5), HYCA staff (n = 6) and professionals from other stakeholder organisations (n = 5) and a thematic analysis was undertaken. Reflecting previous research that YCs and their families have a broad range of needs, findings also reveal how YC services support them through a diverse range of interventions. Support led to a diverse range of positive changes for YCs and their families. A number of service features that facilitate change for YCs, as well as ‘key dynamics’ important in facilitating change were identified. These findings have led to a conceptual framework of how YC services facilitate change for YCs and are important for understanding the impact these dedicated services can make to the lives of YCs and how they facilitate change. Together they have implications for the development and commissioning of interventions for YCs and families and how service providers promote their support provision.

For the first time, this article will provide a cross-national profile of adolescents who provide unpaid care to their ill or disabled family members in six European countries with varied levels of awareness, policy and service provision regarding adolescent young carers. Utilising an online survey, 2,099 adolescent young carers were identified in Italy, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK. This article focuses on the impact of unpaid care on their mental health, well-being, physical health and education. Their preferences for informal and formal support were also examined. These groundbreaking findings help promote a ‘rights’ approach to adolescent young carers, which can serve as a critical driver for supportive policy creation on both a country-specific and pan-European level.

For over 30 years, the classification and definition of Mixed Reality experiences have been debated and amended. However, the technology-centered frameworks of these experiences have not distanced themselves from the outdated definitions of the mid-90s. The technocentric debate prevents academic and industry professionals from reaching a consensus on standardized definitions for what defines an experience as virtual, augmented, extended, or simply immersive. Over the past decade, however, evaluating and studying these experiences has expanded to include user experience as a defining criterion. This broadened definition applies findings based on objective and subjective user metrics, advancing scholarship and consumer growth in this field.Beyond user experience, outdated thinking of what constitutes an MR experience influences financial and intellectual investments. Today’s focus on wearable computing as the sole source for MR experiences has limited our study and practice. This oversight has continued to tie experiences to head-mounted displays without considering modern experiences mediated by technology outside the sphere of wearable computing. These experiences may employ voxel-based displays (holograms), image reprojection techniques, parallax simulation, transparent displays, or massive outdoor screens to mediate an environment. The speed at which technology can be developed and deployed has led to new affordances for mixed reality experiences, outpacing the analytical models that define them. For this reason, a new classification model of reality mediators is needed.

A new genus and species of carneyellid edrioasteroid, Spiracarneyella florencei n. gen. n. sp., is described from the Upper Ordovician (Kaitian) Point Pleasant Formation of northern Kentucky and southern Ohio. Spiracarneyella n. gen. is characterized by having all five ambulacra curving clockwise around the theca, having small node-bearing interambulacral plates in the distal interambulacra, and having the periproct placement slightly offset to the right side of the CD interambulacrum. The oral area of carneyellids evolved by paedomorphosis of the oral plates covering the mouth. The straight ambulacra of Cryptogoleus and the spiraling ambulacra of Spiracarneyella n. gen. evolved by paedomorphosis and peramorphosis, respectively.

Young carers provide a substantial amount of care to family members and support to friends, yet their situation has not been actively addressed in research and policy in many European countries or indeed globally. Awareness of their situation by professionals and among children and young carers themselves remains low overall. Thus, young carers remain a largely hidden group within society. This study reports and analyses the recruitment process in a multi-centre intervention study offering psychosocial support to adolescent young carers (AYCs) aged 15–17 years. A cluster-randomised controlled trial was designed, with recruitment taking place in Italy, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom exploiting various channels, including partnerships with schools, health and social services and carers organisations. In total, 478 AYCs were recruited and, after screening failures, withdrawals and initial dropouts, 217 were enrolled and started the intervention. Challenges encountered in reaching, recruiting and retaining AYCs included low levels of awareness among AYCs, a low willingness to participate in study activities, uncertainty about the prevalence of AYCs, a limited school capacity to support the recruitment; COVID-19 spreading in 2020–2021 and related restrictions. Based on this experience, recommendations are put forward for how to better engage AYCs in research.

Young carers are children and adolescents who provide care to other family members or friends, taking over responsibilities that are usually associated with adulthood. There is emerging but still scarce knowledge worldwide about the phenomenon of young carers and the impact of a caring role on their health, social and personal development spheres. This paper provides an overview of the main results from the ME-WE project, which is the first European research and innovation project dedicated to adolescent young carers (AYCs) (15–17 years). The project methods relied on three main activities: (1) a systematization of knowledge (by means of a survey to AYCs, country case studies, Delphi study, literature review); (2) the co-design, implementation and evaluation of a primary prevention intervention addressing AYCs’ mental health (by means of Blended Learning Networks and a clinical trial in six European countries); (3) the implementation of knowledge translation actions for dissemination, awareness, advocacy and lobbying (by means of national and international stakeholder networks, as well as traditional and new media). Project results substantially contributed to a better understanding of AYCs’ conditions, needs and preferences, defined tailored support intervention (resilient to COVID-19 related restrictions), and significant improvements in national and European policies for AYCs.