Educational LED Board

The goal of this project is to develop a programmable LED board to be used for educational purposes and encourage students to pursue degrees in the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (S.T.E.M.) fields. When the board is complete, it will be brought into middle and high school classrooms for use as an interactive activity to demonstrate the basics of memory and programming. When students are finished programming their boards, they can mount it on a stick and swing it in circles to display their message in the air. The goal is to make the average production cost of each board under $5 so that the students can take them home and demonstrate the project to their friends and parents. The LED board will communicate with a user interface that will allow students to program the LEDs to light up in a desired design with dipswitches. The user interface features four pushbuttons, a bank of eight dipswitches, a 3-D printed case, and an LCD display. For each “bit” the students program into the LED board their selection will be displayed on an LCD display. Eventually after programming in their select word or character the LCD will display their whole series. After the student moves from each memory location to the next, the sequence will be saved into the LED board for when it is mounted. The LED board will be mounted on a 3D-printed box attached to a piece of PVC pipe. After being disconnected from the user interface, the LED board will be powered with AA batteries. The teacher will receive a user interface to keep in the classroom for future use

Genetic and epigenetic interactions in adaptive thermogenesis pathways in association with obesity from a Public Health Genomics perspective

Background: studying and apprehending the pathways and mechanisms by which overweight and obesity trigger complex disease progression is of prime importance for the development of therapy and prevention measures of this major public health burden. This review describes Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms (SNPs) and epigenetic methylation as well as histone modification in genes with relevance in adaptive thermogenesis and their possible role in the development of obesity. Epigenetic marks are discussed as solid biomarkers for gene-environment interactions. Methods: a PubMed search on genetic and epigenetic variation of genes involved in adaptive thermogenesis was performed. The search included English publications between December 1996 and July 2010 reporting associations between SNPs and obesity in Caucasians. The search on epigenetic regulation was limited to DNA methylation and histone modifications. Genes that were found to be associated with the adaptive thermogenesis pathway included beta-3 adrenergic receptor (ADRB3), uncoupling protein 1 (UCP1), the transcription factors peroxisome proliferated activator receptor gamma (PPARγ), peroxisome proliferated activator receptor gamma co-activator 1 alpha (PGC1α), retinoid acid X receptor alpha (RXRα), CCAAT/enhancer-binding protein alpha (C/EBPα), fatty acid binding protein 4 (FABP4) and lipoprotein lipase (LPL). Results: epigenetic studies are mainly discovery orientated and do not test hypotheses. However, SNPs as well as epigenetic mechanisms seem to regulate obesity and adaptive thermogenesis whereas genetic association studies are inconsistent. Conclusions: the aim of this work was to confirm evidences on the contribution of genetic variations as well as epigenetic regulatory mechanisms of genes associated to obesity. The integration of epigenetic markers in epidemiologic research could help to unravel multi gene-environment interactions. With this article we show the importance to introduce aspects of the epigenetic regulation in the assessment of obesity: We also discuss the benefits of including epigenomics as an integrative way to account for an individual’s environmental impact in public health policies

Influence of total sugar intake on metabolic blood markers at 8 years of age in the Childhood Obesity Project

PURPOSE We aimed to characterize the association of dietary sugar intake with blood lipids and glucose-related markers in childhood. METHODS Data from the multicentric European Childhood Obesity Project Trial were used. Three-day weighed dietary records were obtained at 8~years of age along with serum concentrations of triglycerides, total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), glucose, and insulin. Total sugar intake comprised all mono- and disaccharides; different sugar sources were defined. Linear regression models were applied to investigate the cross-sectional association of total sugar intake with blood lipids and glucose-related markers with adjustment for total energy intake using the residual method. RESULTS Data were available for 325 children. Children consumed on average 332~kcal (SD 110) and 21% (SD 6) of energy from total sugar. In an energy-adjusted model, an increase of 100~kcal from total sugar per day was significantly associated with a z score HDL-C decrease (-~0.14; 95% CI -~0.01, -~0.27; p value = 0.031). Concerning different food groups of total sugar intake, 100~kcal total sugar from sweetened beverages was negatively associated with z score HDL-C (-~1.67; 95% CI -~0.42, -~2.91; p value = 0.009), while total sugar from milk products was positively related to z score HDL-C (1.38, 95% CI 0.03, 2.72; p value = 0.045). None of the other blood lipids or glucose-related markers showed a significant relationship with total sugar intake. CONCLUSION Increasing dietary total sugar intake in children, especially from sweetened beverages, was associated with unfavorable effects on HDL-C, which might increase the long-term risk for dyslipidemia and cardiovascular disease. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRY ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT00338689; Registered: June 19, 2006. URL: https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT00338689?term=NCT00338689&rank=1

How the Pernkopf controversy facilitated a historical and ethical analysis of the anatomical sciences in Austria and Germany: A recommendation for the continued use of the Pernkopf atlas

Eduard Pernkopf's Topographical Anatomy of Man has been a widely used standard work of anatomy for over sixty years. International inquiries about the National Socialist (NS) political background of Eduard Pernkopf and the use of bodies of NS victims for the atlas were first directed at the University of Vienna in 1996. A public discussion about the further use of the book followed and led to the creation of the Senatorial Project of the University of Vienna in 1997. This historical research project confirmed the strong NS affiliation of Pernkopf and revealed the delivery of at least 1,377 bodies of executed persons to the Anatomical Institute of Vienna during the NS time. The possible use of these bodies as models cannot be excluded for up to half of the approximately 800 plates in the atlas. In addition tissue specimens from NS victims were found and removed from the collections of the Viennese Medical School and received a burial in a grave of honor. The Pernkopf controversy facilitated the historical and ethical analysis of the anatomical sciences in Austria and Germany during the NS regime. The continued use of the Pernkopf atlas is not only justifiable but desirable as a tool in the teaching of anatomy, history, and ethics. Clin. Anat. 19:91–100, 2006. © 2006 Wiley-Liss, Inc.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/49530/1/20272_ftp.pd

Geospatial Semantics

Geospatial semantics is a broad field that involves a variety of research areas. The term semantics refers to the meaning of things, and is in contrast with the term syntactics. Accordingly, studies on geospatial semantics usually focus on understanding the meaning of geographic entities as well as their counterparts in the cognitive and digital world, such as cognitive geographic concepts and digital gazetteers. Geospatial semantics can also facilitate the design of geographic information systems (GIS) by enhancing the interoperability of distributed systems and developing more intelligent interfaces for user interactions. During the past years, a lot of research has been conducted, approaching geospatial semantics from different perspectives, using a variety of methods, and targeting different problems. Meanwhile, the arrival of big geo data, especially the large amount of unstructured text data on the Web, and the fast development of natural language processing methods enable new research directions in geospatial semantics. This chapter, therefore, provides a systematic review on the existing geospatial semantic research. Six major research areas are identified and discussed, including semantic interoperability, digital gazetteers, geographic information retrieval, geospatial Semantic Web, place semantics, and cognitive geographic concepts.Comment: Yingjie Hu (2017). Geospatial Semantics. In Bo Huang, Thomas J. Cova, and Ming-Hsiang Tsou et al. (Eds): Comprehensive Geographic Information Systems, Elsevier. Oxford, U

Retrieving metadata for your local scholarly papers

We present a novel approach to retrieve metadata to scholarly papers stored locally as PDF files. A fingerprint is produced from the PDF fulltext to query an online metadata repository. The returned results are matched back to identify the correct metada