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ABSTRACTWe review the performance of the PollyVote, which combined forecasts from polls, prediction markets, experts' judgment, political economy models, and index models to predict the two-party popular vote in the 2012 US presidential election. Throughout the election year the PollyVote provided highly accurate forecasts, outperforming each of its component methods, as well as the forecasts fromFiveThirtyEight.com. Gains in accuracy were particularly large early in the campaign, when uncertainty about the election outcome is typically high. The results confirm prior research showing that combining is one of the most effective approaches to generating accurate forecasts.

AbstractEducation, research, and contribution to society through innovation are the three missions of post-secondary educational institutions. There is a gap in understanding the concept of social innovation for post-second educational institutions. A clear definition would: (a) guide institutional strategic direction and supports, (b) recognize and reward academic research in social innovation, and (c) enable accurate measurement of outcomes and impact of social innovation activities. To redress the definitional imprecision, Walker and Avant's method was used to conduct a concept analysis of social innovation. Four multi-disciplinary databases were searched to identify 1830 records. Antecedents, defining attributes, and consequences of social innovation were extracted from 272 of these articles. Defining attributes were reconstructed to develop a new definition. For post-secondary educational institutions, social innovation was defined as the intentional implementation of a transdisciplinary initiative to address a social challenge enabled through collaborative action leading to new or improved capabilities and relationships with community to generate evidence-informed solutions that are more effective, efficient, just, and sustainable. With greater clarity about the definition of social innovation, post-secondary educational institutions can create strategic plans and allocate resources to fulfil the Third Mission. With an evidence-informed definition, post-secondary educational institutions can develop a measurement framework to demonstrate outcomes and impacts of social innovation.

The proteome of the postsynaptic terminal of excitatory synapses comprises over one thousand proteins in vertebrate species and plays a central role in behavior and brain disease. The brain is organized into anatomically distinct regions and whether the synapse proteome differs across these regions is poorly understood. Postsynaptic proteomes were isolated from seven forebrain and hindbrain regions in mice and their composition determined using proteomic mass spectrometry. Seventy-four percent of proteins showed differential expression and each region displayed a unique compositional signature. These signatures correlated with the anatomical divisions of the brain and their embryological origins. Biochemical pathways controlling plasticity and disease, protein interaction networks and individual proteins involved with cognition all showed differential regional expression. Combining proteomic and connectomic data shows that interconnected regions have specific proteome signatures. Diversity in synapse proteome composition is key feature of mouse and human brain structure. ; Support was obtained from the Medical Research Council (G0802238), European Union Seventh Framework Programme (FP7 grant agreement No. 604102) and Horizon 2020 (grant agreement No. 72027). We thank T. Le Bihan and L. Imrie at SynthSys, University of Edinburgh, for mass spectrometry sample analysis. The LC-MS QExactive equipment was purchased by a Wellcome Trust Institutional Strategic Support Fund and a strategic award from the Wellcome Trust for the Centre for Immunity, Infection and Evolution (095831/Z/11/Z). Data were extracted from Neuroimaging Informatics Technology Initiative (NIFTI) files using a custom automated script written by J. Roy, MEMEX, Inc. (Burlington, Ontario, Canada). We thank K. Elsegood for laboratory management and D. Maizels for artwork; C.S. Davey, editing. ; Peer reviewed

This is the report from the fifth meeting of the Harmonising Outcome Measures for Eczema initiative (HOME V). The meeting was held on 12-14 June 2017 in Nantes, France, with 81 participants. The main aims of the meeting were (i) to achieve consensus over the definition of the core domain of long-term control and how to measure it and (ii) to prioritize future areas of research for the measurement of the core domain of quality of life (QoL) in children. Moderated whole-group and small-group consensus discussions were informed by presentations of qualitative studies, systematic reviews and validation studies. Small-group allocations were performed a priori to ensure that each group included different stakeholders from a variety of geographical regions. Anonymous whole-group voting was carried out using handheld electronic voting pads according to pre-defined consensus rules. It was agreed by consensus that the long-term control domain should include signs, symptoms, quality of life and a patient global instrument. The group agreed that itch intensity should be measured when assessing long-term control of eczema in addition to the frequency of itch captured by the symptoms domain. There was no recommendation of an instrument for the core outcome domain of quality of life in children, but existing instruments were assessed for face validity and feasibility, and future work that will facilitate the recommendation of an instrument was agreed upon.