Snapshots of the EYES project

The EYES project (IST-2001-34734) is a three years European research project on self-organizing and collaborative energy-efficient sensor networks. It addresses the convergence of distributed information processing, wireless communications, and mobile computing. The goal of the project is to develop the architecture and the technology which enables the creation of a new generation of sensors that can effectively network together so as to provide a flexible platform for the support of a large variety of mobile sensor network applications. This paper provides a broad overview of the EYES project and highlights some approaches and results of the architecture

Supporting informal communication and closeness through video snapshots

As organisations grow and the physical distance between individuals increases, the simple informal communication that is essential for creativity declines. This paper presents a prototype system that was designed to increase informal communication by restoring awareness between physically distant employees. The key representation of individuals within this prototype was through frequently updated video snapshots. Users of the system reported feeling 'closer' to each other. We also suggest further experiments to assess the effects of video snapshots on trust

Blast-wave snapshots from RHIC

I present fits with the so-called blast-wave model to single-particle spectra and HBT correlations from Au+Au collisions at a CMS energy of 130 AGeV. There is only little choice of freeze-out temperature and transverse flow velocity for which the model fits both the identified spectra and the correlation radii just well enough not to be excluded. The observed steep M_t dependence of R_side leads to a temperature which it is problematic to interpret. The applicability of the model for the freeze-out description is thus questioned.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures, proceedings of 38 Rencontres de Moriond, QCD and hadronic interaction

Environmental Snapshots from ACE-Asia

On five occasions spanning the Asian Pacific Regional Aerosol Characterization Experiment (ACE-Asia) field campaign in spring 2001, the Multiangle Imaging Spectroradiometer spaceborne instrument took data coincident with high-quality observations by instruments on two or more surface and airborne platforms. The cases capture a range of clean, polluted, and dusty aerosol conditions. With a three-stage optical modeling process, we synthesize the data from over 40 field instruments into layer-by-layer environmental snapshots that summarize what we know about the atmospheric and surface states at key locations during each event. We compare related measurements and discuss the implications of apparent discrepancies, at a level of detail appropriate for satellite retrieval algorithm and aerosol transport model validation. Aerosols within a few kilometers of the surface were composed primarily of pollution and Asian dust mixtures, as expected. Medium- and coarse-mode particle size distributions varied little among the events studied; however, column aerosol optical depth changed by more than a factor of 4, and the near-surface proportion of dust ranged between 25% and 50%. The amount of absorbing material in the submicron fraction was highest when near-surface winds crossed Beijing and the Korean Peninsula and was considerably lower for all other cases. Having simultaneous single-scattering albedo measurements at more than one wavelength would significantly reduce the remaining optical model uncertainties. The consistency of component particle microphysical properties among the five events, even in this relatively complex aerosol environment, suggests that global, satellite-derived maps of aerosol optical depth and aerosol mixture (air-mass-type) extent, combined with targeted in situ component microphysical property measurements, can provide a detailed global picture of aerosol behavior