Socio-Digital Nonsense

Socio-Digital Nonsense is a bi-column paper that references the dualistic systems upon which much Western thought is premised; however, the implementation of its 'sense' and 'nonsense' columns is proffered as a stratagem to disrupt the striations of logic and the ideological movement from disorder to order

Three is a Crowd: A potential exception to an oppositional rule

The oppositional rule, established upon the philosophical traditions of binarism and dialecticism, situates the two protagonists in this research (the artistic collaboration matthews and allen) as antithetical systems. This discourse proposes a disruption to a metaphysical dichotomy between the noetic authorial text and the poetic paratext. The non-oppositional premise of collaborative dialogue is proposed as a method to resist the oppositional logic of dialecticism and the homogenous ‘third hand’ of collaboration theory. Michel Serres’ assertion that to ‘hold a dialogue is to suppose a third man and seek to exclude him’ positions the ‘third man’ of communication as a disruptive force. The excluded third is a noise in the background of ideological unity, the ‘potential for surprise’, an intervallic exception in a paradigmatic order. This collaborative game breaks the rule of opposition and subsequently generates a third space where the indeterminate relation between the scholastic text and matthews and allen’s paratext performs disruption in the authorial system

Planning and Estimation of Operations Support Requirements

Life Cycle Cost (LCC) estimates during the proposal and early design phases, as well as project replans during the development phase, are heavily focused on hardware development schedules and costs. Operations (phase E) costs are typically small compared to the spacecraft development and test costs. This, combined with the long lead time for realizing operations costs, can lead to de-emphasizing estimation of operations support requirements during proposal, early design, and replan cost exercises. The Discovery and New Frontiers (D&NF) programs comprise small, cost-capped missions supporting scientific exploration of the solar system. Any LCC growth can directly impact the programs' ability to fund new missions, and even moderate yearly underestimates of the operations costs can present significant LCC impacts for deep space missions with long operational durations. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) D&NF Program Office at Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) recently studied cost overruns and schedule delays for 5 missions. The goal was to identify the underlying causes for the overruns and delays, and to develop practical mitigations to assist the D&NF projects in identifying potential risks and controlling the associated impacts to proposed mission costs and schedules. The study found that 4 out of the 5 missions studied had significant overruns at or after launch due to underestimation of the complexity and supporting requirements for operations activities; the fifth mission had not launched at the time of the mission. The drivers behind these overruns include overly optimistic assumptions regarding the savings resulting from the use of heritage technology, late development of operations requirements, inadequate planning for sustaining engineering and the special requirements of long duration missions (e.g., knowledge retention and hardware/software refresh), and delayed completion of ground system development work. This paper updates the D&NF LCC study, looking at the operations (phase E) cost drivers in more detail and extending the study to include 2 additional missions and identifies areas for increased emphasis by project management in order to improve the fidelity of operations estimates

N-3 Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids Reduce Th17 Differentiation by Decreasing Responsiveness to Interleukin-6 in Mice

CD4^(+) effector T cell subsets (e.g., Th1, Th17) are implicated in autoimmune and inflammatory disorders such as multiple sclerosis, psoriasis and rheumatoid arthritis. For optimal activation, IL-6 induces Th17 polarization and signals through the membrane-bound signal transducer, gp130. Previously, we have demonstrated that n-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA), when supplied in the diet or in fat-1 transgenic mice which generate n-3 PUFA de novo, suppress CD4^(+) T cell activation and differentiation into pathogenic Th17 cells. Here we report that n-3 PUFA alter the response of CD4^(+) T cells to IL-6 in a lipid raft membrane-dependent fashion. Naïve splenic CD4^(+) T cells from fat-1 mice exhibited significantly lower surface expression of the IL-6 receptor (IL-6R). This membrane bound receptor is known to be shed upon cellular activation in response to antigen; however, the release of soluble IL-6R after treatment with anti-CD3 and anti-CD28 was not changed in fat-1 mice suggesting that the decrease in surface expression is not due to ectodomain release. We observed a significant decrease in the association of gp130 with lipid rafts in activated fat-1 CD4^(+) T cells and a 35% reduction in gp130 homodimerization, an obligate requirement for downstream signaling. The phosphorylation of STAT3, a downstream target of IL-6-dependent signaling, was also decreased in response to exogenous IL-6 in fat-1 CD4^(+) T cells. Our results suggest that n-3 PUFA suppress Th17 cell differentiation, in part, by reducing membrane raft-dependent responsiveness to IL-6, an essential polarizing cytokine

A Most Unusual Zeolite Templating: Cage to Cage Connection of One Guest Molecule

An unusual case of a diquaternary ammonium dication, with large bulky end groups built from the tropane moiety and connected by a C4 methylene chain, is found to reside in zeolite SSZ-35 (STF). The structure of the guest/host product is such that the tropane bicylic entities reside in the shallow cavities of the cages of the STF structure and the C4 methylene chain runs through the 10-ring (~5.5 Å) window that connects the cages. This is a most unusual (and energy-intensive) templating of a zeolite structure with the guest molecule spanning two unit cells. The unusual result was found by single crystal studies with the addition of the use of the SQUEEZE program to show a consistent fit for the guest molecule following from measured electron densities in the crystal structure work. These analyses were followed with MAS NMR studies to confirm the integrity of the diquaternary guest molecule in the host sieve. A few comparative diquaternary guest molecules in MFI zeolite are also studied

A Collaborative Game

In 2015 matthews and allen engaged in a durational dialogic exchange. This exchange took the form of a collaborative game undertaken over a period of 19 days. The Collaborative Game was enacted via a set of rules. matthews and allen’s ‘rules of the game’ parodically exaggerate the social and cultural rules with which we inevitably engage. This textual game adopts the 140 character edict imposed by the social media website Twitter. matthews and allen take this arbitrary rule to its extreme by restricting each communication to precisely 140 characters. The Collaborative Game is constructed from ‘the words of others’ wherein appropriated words are relocated to interrupt the expectation of a linear, monologic narrative. matthews and allen’s game performs their non-oppositional approach to collaborative dialogue, with neither a winner, a loser, nor consensus

The Ursinus Weekly, March 8, 1954

WAA schedules musical revue Thursday night • AAUW holds program for senior women • West Chester STC group conducts vespers program • Greek columns • Roland Dedekind is Weekly editor; Killheffer named managing editor • Debating team has contest with Temple • U. of P. band will give concert here, March 18 • Dr. A. Rice reads Swedish works • Women\u27s club plans coffee for senior girls • Dr. Bachrach to speak on civil liberties at forum • J. Canady speaks on impressionist art • Committee leaders announced for play • Conflicting schedule causes Group II to postpone play • Editorials: Information please • Letters to the editor • Thief of time • Group III plays reviewed • Dawkins and Padula win MAC crowns; Ed Dawkins voted most valuable wrestler by MAC • Belles outplay Penn, 57-27; Kuhn tallies 29 points • Belles topple West Chester • Burger, Knull in finale, Delaware defeats Bearshttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/weekly/1491/thumbnail.jp

The relationship of readiness factors to Jan. first grade reading achievement

Thesis (Ed.M.)--Boston Universit