Exceptional Lifespans

How long can humans live? This open access book documents, verifies and brings to life the advance of the frontier of human survival. It carefully validates data on supercentenarians, aged 110+, and semi-supercentenarians, aged 105-109, stored in the International Database on Longevity (IDL). The chapters in this book contribute substantial advances in rigorously checked facts about exceptional lifespans and in the application of state-of-the-art analytical strategies to understand trends and patterns in these rare lifespans. The book includes detailed accounts of extreme long-livers and how their long lifespans were documented, as well as reports on the causes of death at the oldest ages. Its key finding, based on the analysis of 1,219 validated supercentenarians, is that the annual probability of death is constant at 50% after age 110. In contrast to previous assertions about a ceiling on the human lifespan, evidence presented in this book suggests that lifespan records in specific countries and globally will be broken again and again as more people survive to become supercentenarians.

Circular economy in architecture:sustainable principles for future design

Abstract. At present, construction is one of the most destructive, energy consuming and material wasting industries. The current linear system cannot last, and to change anything, we need to redesign the system and our way of thinking. In my thesis, I will explain the theory behind a circular economy and how it could be applied to building, as well as discuss waste issues and material sources. Deconstruction is also a big polluter, and one solution to combat that problem would be to design buildings to be readily disassembled. The aim of this project is to bring awareness about the subject of sustainable design in a modern context and gather this information into one place. Many ideas presented are ones that have been around for as long as people have built buildings, such as material scarcity, resource efficiency and reusing existing materials while reducing waste. Some ecobuilding projects that have successfully implemented these ideas will be presented. In the conclusion, I will present certain concrete ideas and methods for bringing about circular thinking into the built environment. A good starting point would be to decide whether a building needs to be demolished, if so, can the elements be reused or recycled, or if designing a new build with renewable raw materials is the best option.Tiivistelmä. Yhteiskunnassamme rakennusalla kulutetaan nykyään eniten energiaa ja haaskataan materiaaleja. Lineaarinen talous ei kestä nykyistä toimintatapaamme ja muutoksia saamme aikaan vain muuttamalla järjestelmää ja ajattelutapojamme. Diplomityössäni käsittelen kiertotalouden teoriaa ja sen hyödyntämistä rakentamisessa, sekä pohdin jäteongelmia sekä materiaalilähteitä. Myös purkutyö on rakentamisessa suuri saastuttaja ja siihen esitän ratkaisuksi rakennusten suunnittelemista purettaviksi. Diplomityöni tavoitteena on lisästä tietoisuutta kestävän suunnittelun aiheesta (nykyhetken viitekehyksessä) ja koota nämä tiedot yhteen. Monissa esittämistäni konsepteissa hyödynnetään olemassa olevia ideoita, kuten materiaalien saatavuutta ja uudelleenkäyttöä sekä jätteenhallintaa, mutta oleellista on kuinka kokonaisvaltaisesti niitä käytämme. Esimerkkiprojektien avulla havainnollistan konseptien sovellutuksia käytännössä. Lopuksi ehdotan käytännön esimerkein miten kestäviä suunnitteluideoita voi käyttää rakennetussa ympäristössä. Rakentamisessa hyvänä lähtökohtana voi pitää, että rakennusten tulisi olla purettavia, kierrätettäviä ja että uusissa rakennuksissa käytettäisiin uusiutuvia raaka-aineita

How Visualization Supports the Daily Work in Traditional Humanities on the Example of Visual Analysis Case Studies

Attempts to convince humanities scholars of digital approaches are met with resistance, often. The so-called Digitization Anxiety is the phenomenon that describes the fear of many traditional scientists of being replaced by digital processes. This hinders not only the progress of the scientific domains themselves – since a lot of digital potential is missing – but also makes the everyday work of researchers unnecessarily difficult. Over the past eight years, we have made various attempts to walk the tightrope between 'How can we help traditional humanities to exploit their digital potential?' and 'How can we make them understand that their expertise is not replaced by digital means, but complemented?' We will present our successful interdisciplinary collaborations: How they came about, how they developed, and the problems we encountered. In the first step, we will look at the theoretical basics, which paint a comprehensive picture of the digital humanities and introduces us to the topic of visualization. The field of visualization has shown a special ability: It manages to walk the tightrope and thus keeps digitization anxiety at bay, while not only making it easier for scholars to access their data, but also enabling entirely new research questions. After an introduction to our interdisciplinary collaborations with the Musical Instrument Museum of Leipzig University, as well as with the Bergen-Belsen Memorial, we will present a series of user scenarios that we have collected in the course of 13 publications. These show our cooperation partners solving different research tasks, which we classify using Brehmer and Munzner’s Task Classification. In this way, we show that we provide researchers with a wide range of opportunities: They can answer their traditional research questions – and in some cases verify long-standing hypotheses about the data for the first time – but also develop their own interest in previously impossible, new research questions and approaches. Finally, we conclude our insights on individual collaborative ideas with perspectives on our newest projects. These have risen from the growing interest of collaborators in the methods we deliver. For example, we get insights into the music of real virtuosos of the 20th century. The necessary music storage media can be heard for the first time through digital tools without risking damage to the old material. In addition, we can provide computer-aided analysis capabilities that help musicologists in their work. In the course of the visualization project at the Bergen-Belsen memorial, we will see that what was once a small diary project has grown into a multimodal and international project with institutions of culture and science from eight countries. This is dedicated not only to the question of preserving cultural objects from Nazi persecution contexts but also to modern ways of disseminating and processing knowledge around this context. Finally, we will compile our experience and accumulated knowledge in the form of problems and challenges at the border between computer science and traditional humanities. These will serve as preparation and assistance for future and current interested parties of such interdisciplinary collaborative project

Suffolk University Newsletter (SUN), vol. 32, no. 7, 2006

https://dc.suffolk.edu/sun/1286/thumbnail.jp

Re-Discovering & Re-Conceptualising Local Area Plans: A Qualitative Investigation in Guiding Spatial Sustainability in Maitland, Cape Town

Cities and their sub-units are increasingly conceived as being dynamic, relational, and unbounded. Due to these attributes, they are recognised as a key means of driving sustainability and sustainable urban development (which is best understood as the entwined requirements for progress towards lasting wellbeing). In response to this, the global policy document the New Urban Agenda Illustrated introduced a fourth dimension to sustainable urban development: spatial sustainability, wherein guiding the physical form of urban environments towards specific spatial conditions can enhance social, economic, and environmental value and wellbeing and, in so doing, arrive at equity. The document recommends the use of local area plans to guide urban development toward spatial sustainability. However, South Africa's local area plans are currently not conceptualised to guide spatial sustainability which, as a recent global concept, has yet to be rigorously researched in specific contexts. Moreover, local area plans are generally under-explored and under-utilised in South African planning theory and policy, where the emphasis is on large-scale strategic spatial plans and spatial development frameworks. In response to this, the research aims to 1) establish whether South Africa's planning system requires local area plans and, if so, to clarify their contribution, and 2) to enrich the interpretation of spatial sustainability, with the view to 3) exploring how planners might re-discover and re-conceptualise local area plans to guide spatial sustainability. The research aims were achieved through the qualitative research approach that methodologically made use of a case study in Maitland, Cape Town. Data was collected and analysed through various techniques and against a conceptual framework derived from a literature review. The study employed design-orientated inquiry in which an initial local area plan proposal was presented to a focus group and – based on their feedback – undetected facets of analysis were further explored and the local area plan proposal was redrafted. The enriched interpretation of spatial sustainability recognises that space that seeks to achieve equity comprises relations and processes as much as the substantive features of physical form. To this end, the research suggests that it is necessary to appreciate the context, structure, and dynamics of place (the product of planned space), which is best understood through analysing the activity, psychology, and physicality of place. The results of this analysis in Maitland are threefold. Firstly, the analysis confirms that local area plans are a crucial component of South Africa's planning system when situated in areas of strategic importance. Secondly, Maitland is revealed to be a multifaceted port-of-entry neighbourhood where relations and practices extend beyond the area's boundaries. Thirdly, the results suggest that a local area plan re-conceptualised to guide spatial sustainability should be viewed as both a process and a product. In other words, local area planning requires two responses: it needs to produce a material local area plan (the plan as a noun), and the method of achieving that plan needs to foster the conditions for diverse current and future involvement in the planning process (planning as a verb). Based on these significant findings and using Maitland as a point of reference, the research proposes recommendations for preparing for, producing, and sustaining a local area plan in areas of strategic importance. Re-discovered and re-conceptualised in this way, local area plans are an essential means of achieving equity and lasting wellbeing in complex contemporary contexts, which is the fundamental objective of spatial sustainability

Teaching computer science principles using StarLogoTNG

Thesis: M. Eng., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2013.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references (pages 81-83).This thesis outlines the development of a 3-module set of lesson plans implemented using StarLogoTNG. The purpose of these lesson plans are to serve as a vehicle for teaching and reinforcing specific learning objectives of the CollegeBoard's Advanced Placement Computer Science Principles course, which has 7 main themes. Each lesson plan has as its focus a subset of learning objectives from one of the themes of Creativity, Data, or Internet, while simultaneously incorporating additional learning goals from the themes of Abstraction, Programming, Algorithms, and Impact. These interactive lesson plans go beyond the use of StarLogoTNG to complete specific tasks by integrating meaningful class discussions and occasional peer instruction and peer review activities. Such activities become catalysts for students to develop a deeper understanding of the course materials. By connecting learning goals from different themes of the course and packaging them in cohesive lesson plans that utilize methods of teaching for understanding, this thesis aims to provide a useful and effective set of a materials for the instruction of computer science principles.by Tamika P. Tannis.M. Eng

Economic considerations for adaptability in buildings

The existing buildings in the UK are not designed to be functionally adaptive to fit a spectrum of purposes. Alternatively, scrapping these buildings and building anew does not appear to be an economically viable and environmentally sustainable solution either. Proactive solutions to respond to future potential changes of use are rare in previous and current building designs, which ultimately make these buildings functionally redundant. At present, curiosity about adaptable buildings is spreading among owners, developers and policy makers; however, no detailed investigation has been undertaken to identify the economic costs and benefits of adaptability in new buildings. Thus, the present endeavour was designed to bridge this gap. The research exploited both case studies and survey designs to explore the answers to the above problem. Two case studies were undertaken to establish that building changes occur over time, as well as to assess their economic implications in the current built environment at both macro and micro levels. Three web-based surveys (WBS) were designed and circulated among quantity surveyors and architects of the 100 leading consultancy practices in the UK to identify both the design and economic aspects of adaptability in buildings. The total numbers of respondents to WBS1, WBS2 and WBS3 were 13, 32 and 42, respectively. In addition, data was collected from semi-structured interviews with two policy makers, two structural engineers, a quantity surveyor and a facilities manager. Unstructured interviews with a senior planner, a project manager, two architects and a services engineer were used to clarify the issues of design and planning for adaptability in buildings. The findings were interwoven to develop a conceptual framework to identify the economic considerations for adaptability in new buildings. Two workshops were undertaken with the industry partners for the Adaptable Futures research project to verify the results obtained from the case studies and to test the usability of the developed conceptual framework. The group members had multi-disciplinary backgrounds of architecture, quantity surveying and structural engineering, allowing a robust grounding for verification. The results contribute to the body of knowledge in two ways. Firstly, the developed conceptual framework identifies the economic considerations (costs and benefits) for change of use in buildings within the wider context of adaptability over the lifecycle aspects. This will assist owners/clients and developers in their economic decisions for designing new buildings for potential adaptations. Secondly, the research findings strengthen the reliability of the existing body of knowledge whilst confirming the urgent need for designing new buildings towards potential adaptations. In addition, the findings strongly emphasise plan depth and floor to ceiling height as the most influential design parameters for building change of use, the details of which are not highlighted in the previous literature

Telomere biology in metazoa

Tese de doutoramento, Engenharia Biomédica e Biofísica, Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Ciências, 2011Telomerase, the enzyme that maintains telomeres, is absent from most adult human somatic cells, producing a progressive telomere shortening that limits the proliferative potential of primary human cell cultures (Shay and Wright 2007). This programmed telomere shortening, replicative aging, functions as a tumor suppressor program that generates a barrier for the outgrowth of tumors. Remarkably, this telomere tumor suppressor program is not conserved in laboratory rats and mice, which have long telomeres and constitutive telomerase (Sherr and DePinho 2000; Wright and Shay 2000). The present study examines over 60 mammalian species to determine the phylogenetic distribution of the telomere tumor suppressor pathway. Phylogeny based statistical analysis demonstrates that telomere length inversely correlates with lifespan but not body size, while telomerase expression inversely correlates with body size but not lifespan. The ancestral mammalian phenotype was determined to have short telomeres and repressed telomerase. At least 5-7 independent times in different orders smaller, shorter lived species changed to having long telomeres and expressing telomerase, suggesting tradeoffs between the advantages and drawbacks of using replicative aging as a tumor suppression mechanism. We show that one advantage is consistent with reducing the energetic/cellular costs of specific oxidative protection mechanism needed to maintain short telomeres. We propose that the telomere tumor suppressor pathway represents an initial adaptation to the increased mutational load of homeothermy by ancestral mammals, has adaptive advantage in large and long-lived animals, but has been abandoned by many species. These observations resolve a longstanding confusion about the use of telomeres in humans and mice, support a role for telomere length in limiting lifespan, provide a critical framework for interpreting studies of the role of oxidative protection in the biology of aging, and identify which mammals can be used as appropriate model organisms for the study of the role of telomeres in human cancer and aging.European Union Programs POCI 2010 & FSE and by national funds from the Portuguese Ministry for Science, Technology and Superior Education ((N.M.V.G); Keck Foundation and the National Institute on Aging (W.E.W. & J.W.S.