Media and Technology in Counseling: Emerging Practices and Ethical Considerations in Response to COVID-19

COVID-19 has ushered in a new chapter of counseling in the United States and throughout the world. Counselors’ responses to the pandemic have been fundamentally reshaped by universal elements of the information age, including high-speed internet, smartphones, and computerbased technologies such as synchronous meeting software and collaboration tools. Now, clinicians can use technology to ally with clients, deliver psychoeducational media, and open new categories of intervention and engagement that alter the size, shape, and availability of the “counseling room” by extending it into a virtual space. The immediate investment in information technology demanded by the pandemic highlights an increasing need to deepen clinicians’ awareness of the psychology of cyberspace, the clinical applications of technological capabilities, and the use of synchronous online video counseling, all of which can directly increase quality of care, strengthen the therapeutic bond, and improve clinical outcomes. This manuscript explores the pairing of technology and counseling, outlining an open, integrative approach to counseling with updated practice and ethical competence. Properly conceived and combined, technical innovation and advanced counseling strategies developed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic will lead to updated practices of technology-assisted counseling that offer a new modality of care as fundamental and as potentially impactful as talk therapy was over a century ago

AI for Investment: A Platform Disruption

With the investment landscape becoming more competitive, efficiently scaling deal sourcing and improving deal insights have become a dominant strategy for funds. While funds are already spending significant efforts on these two tasks, they cannot be scaled with traditional approaches; hence, there is a surge in automating them. Many third party software providers have emerged recently to address this need with productivity solutions, but they fail due to a lack of personalization for the fund, privacy constraints, and natural limits of software use cases. Therefore, most major funds and many smaller funds have started developing their in-house AI platforms: a game changer for the industry. These platforms grow smarter by direct interactions with the fund and can be used to provide personalized use cases. Recent developments in large language models, e.g. ChatGPT, have provided an opportunity for other funds to also develop their own AI platforms. While not having an AI platform now is not a competitive disadvantage, it will be in two years. Funds require a practical plan and corresponding risk assessments for such AI platforms

Speed Control and Regenerative Braking of Bidirectional DC-DC Converter Fed Permanent Magnet DC Motor

This thesis mainly emphasis on speed control and regenerative braking of PMDC motor fed by a bidirectional DC-DC converter. The main objective is to increase the efficiency of the motor and also the power flow in both directions which also further improves efficiency during regenerative braking mode. Different types of bidirectional DC-DC converters have been studied. As we all know that during the buck mode operation of converter regenerative braking occurs which in turn charges the battery whereas in boost mode the battery supplies the required power to run the motor. So out of all the present bidirectional DC-DC converters we have opted for half bridge non-isolated bidirectional DC-DC converter because it is cheap, less number of components and due to its low weight. In order to decrease the switching losses we have implemented International rectifiers (IR2110), in which the input is a pulse and its outputs are two pulses complimentary to each other of required period through which MOSFET can be triggered. So for further reduction in losses we have optimized all the values of inductor, capacitor by zero voltage techniques so as to achieve the required specifications. All the parameters discussed in the thesis have been controlled and simulated during both the operations and are verified with theoretical results

A phase of liposomes with entangled tubular vesicles

An equilibrium phase belonging to the family of bilayer liposomes in ternary mixtures of dimyristoylphosphatidylcholine (DMPC), water, and geraniol (a biological alcohol derived from oil-soluble vitamins that acts as a cosurfactant) has been identified. Electron and optical microscopy reveal the phase, labeled Ltv, to be composed of highly entangled tubular vesicles. In situ x-ray diffraction confirms that the tubule walls are multilamellar with the lipids in the chain-melted state. Macroscopic observations show that the Ltv phase coexists with the well-known L4 phase of spherical vesicles and a bulk L alpha phase. However, the defining characteristic of the Ltv phase is the Weissenberg rod climbing effect under shear, which results from its polymer-like entangled microstructure

Batch and fed-batch growth of Pichia pastoris under increased air pressure

Pichia pastoris CBS 2612 behavior under air pressures of 1 bar, 3 bar and 5 bar in culture media of glycerol (pure and crude) and methanol was studied. Generally, the increase in oxygen transfer rate due to the increase of total pressure improved cellular growth for all carbon sources and for batch and fed-batch processes with different feeding rate strategies. In batch cultures, 1.4-fold, 1.2-fold, and 1.5-fold improvement in biomass production was obtained with the increase of air pressure up to 5 bar, using methanol, pure glycerol, and crude glycerol, respectively. The raise of air pressure to 5 bar using exponential feeding rate leaded to 1.4-fold improvement in biomass yield per glycerol mass consumed, for crude and pure glycerol. The current low cost of crude glycerol from the biodiesel production together with the present results shows the possibility of improving cell mass production of P. pastoris using increased air pressure.The authors acknowledge the financial support provided by "Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia" (Grant SFRH/BD/47371/2008)

Fermentation studies on recombinant yeast

Recombinant Pichia pastoris fermentations consist of a batch growth phase on glycerol and a protein production phase on methanol. The overall fermentation process can be improved by optimizing the two phases separately. Using glycerol concentrations of up to 12%, a dry cell mass of 90 g L\sp{-1} was achieved during growth at a constant pH of 5.00. When the pH was not externally controlled, growth stopped at pH 2.2 and glycerol concentration above 2% remained unutilized. There was no difference between the growth characteristics of a Mut\sp+ strain and a Mut\sp- strain on glycerol. Heterologous protein expression under the regulation of the AOXI promoter was partially repressed by higher glycerol feed-rates and by ethanol accumulation in the medium. With the Mut\sp- strain, a constant glycerol feed-rate of 1 g L\sp{-1} h\sp{-1} resulted in the highest specific yield of the recombinant protein, $\beta$-galactosidase. Higher glycerol feed-rates gave increased cell mass and ethanol, resulting in lower specific yields of the recombinant protein. The fermentation process with the Mut\sp- strain used around 30-fold less methanol than with the fermentation process using the Mut\sp+ strain. Protein yields between the two processes were comparable

Virtual display aids for teleoperation

Thesis (M.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 1991.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 73-74).by Ravi K. Chiruvolu.M.S