Medical education has changed focus to a more learner-centred model, placing learners at the centre of innovations in training.The escape room is one such innovative learner-focused activity, in which a team of players cooperatively discover clues, solve puzzles and complete tasks in order to progress through the challenge to achieve a specific goal. Escape rooms can be used in medical education as a tool for team building, an entertaining way of delivering technical and non-technical skills, to read and acquire or refresh knowledge, as well as for educational research. Despite appearing to be a superficial form of entertainment, escape rooms can be grounded in sound educational theory and, when used effectively, act as a low-cost, high-impact resource for a variety of learners. While escape rooms may well be an example of yet another educational 'fad' demonstrating the rising influence of 'Millennial MedEd', it signals a promising shift to more learner-centred, team-based methods which are essential to the practice of safe modern healthcare during the current COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.

To date, a range of ion channels have been identified in chondrocytes using a number of different techniques, predominantly electrophysiological and/or biomolecular; each of these has its advantages and disadvantages. Here we aim to compare and contrast the data available from biophysical and microarray experiments. This letter analyses recent transcriptomics datasets from chondrocytes, accessible from the European Bioinformatics Institute (EBI). We discuss whether such bioinformatic analysis of microarray datasets can potentially accelerate identification and discovery of ion channels in chondrocytes. The ion channels which appear most frequently across these microarray datasets are discussed, along with their possible functions. We discuss whether functional or protein data exist which support the microarray data. A microarray experiment comparing gene expression in osteoarthritis and healthy cartilage is also discussed and we verify the differential expression of 2 of these genes, namely the genes encoding large calcium-activated potassium (BK) and aquaporin channels.

Protection of monkeys against experimental challenge with a living attenuated oral polyvalent dysentery vaccine. J. Bacteriol. 91:17-22. 1966.-Virulent strains of Shigella flexneri lb, S. flexneri 3, and S. sonnei I were mated with an Hfr strain of Escherichia coli K-12, and hybrids were selected for the xylose marker. One hybrid strain of each of the serotypes was chosen for study of their biological characteristics. Their capacity to cause a fatal enteric infection in starved guinea pigs was reduced, they failed to cause dysentery when fed to monkeys, they caused keratoconjunctivitis in the guinea pig eye, and they penetrated HeLa cells. Two doses of a polyvalent oral vaccine composed of S. flexneri lb, 2a, and 3, and S. sonnei I hybrid strains were fed to groups of monkeys at an interval of 4 to 7 days, and they, together with controls, were challenged 10 days after the last dose with one or another of the virulent parent dysentery strains. A significant degree of protection was afforded in all vaccinated groups with the exception of one group challenged with S. flexneri 6, a component not included in the vaccine. When animals were challenged with virulent S. flexneri 2a 1 month after oral vaccination, they were also protected. The vaccine produced a rise in serum antibody, but we were not able to detect coproantibody in saline extracts of feces from animals which received the vaccine. We previously have shown that a strain of