Haute plates 美味新境界

From ancient Rome to modern-day San Sebastián, the presentation and plating of food have been an integral part of the dining experience. 從古羅馬到今日的聖塞巴斯蒂安，菜式的呈現方式及擺盤藝術成為體驗美食不可或缺的一部分

Ambassador class 親善大廚

From humble Italian-family kitchen to Michelin-starred greatness as an ambassador of Italy’s cuisine in Hong Kong, chef Umberto Bombana has come a long way. 由意大利家庭 簡樸的廚房出發，到躋身米芝蓮星級大廚之列，在香港被視為意大利廚藝大使的名廚Umberto Bombana，多年來走過漫長的廚藝旅程

Distribution and Abundance of Roof-Nesting Gulls in the Great Lakes Region of the United States

In 1994, we conducted aerial, mail, and telephone surveys to determine the distribution and abundance of roof-nesting gulls in states bordering the Great Lakes. We documented more than 7,922 nesting pairs of gulls at 30 colonies in four states; species composition was 71% ring-billed (Larus delawarensis^, 24% herring (Z. argentatus^, and 5% unknown. Colony size ranged from 1 to 1,003 nesting pairs. Proportions of ring-billed gulls nesting less that 5.0 and more than 10.0 km from the Great Lakes were 31% and 39%, in contrast to 63% and less than 1% for herring gulls, respectively. Maximum distances herring and ring-billed gull colonies were located from the Great Lakes were 23.5 and 58.0 km, respectively. Roof-nesting ring-billed and herring gulls represented approximately 2% and 4%, respectively, of the total nesting population for these species in the U.S. portion of the Great Lakes. As previous surveys of colonial waterbirds in the Great Lakes did not document roof-nesting gull colonies, future surveys should include potential inland colony sites, particularly roofs and other urban habitats, to obtain more accurate estimates of total population size and to monitor population trends of roof-nesting gulls

Tetratrichomonas and Trichomonas spp.-Associated Disease in Free-Ranging Common Eiders (Somateria mollissima) from Wellfleet Bay, MA and Description of ITS1 Region Genotypes

During an outbreak of Wellfleet Bay virus (WFBV) in common eiders (Somateria mollissima) from the Cape Cod region of Massachusetts, several birds were diagnosed with trichomonosis consisting of multiple trichomonad species. Six birds were examined, with trichomonads found in ceca in four birds and associated typhlitis in three of these four birds. PCR and DNA sequencing utilizing trichomonad-specific primers targeting the ITS1 region of the ribosomal DNA (rDNA) revealed the presence of Tetratrichomonas gallinarum in the gastrointestinal tracts of five birds and Trichomonas spp. in the livers of two birds, one of which had a dual Te. gallinarum-Trichomonas gallinae infection. Sequence analysis revealed no variation between Te. gallinarum sequences whereas the ITS1 sequences obtained from the other Trichomonas spp. demonstrated the presence of multiple genotypes. One sequence had 100% identity to a Trichomonas sp. previously isolated from a Cooper\u27s hawk (Accipiter cooperii) and the other sequence was 100% identical to a previously described Tr. gallinae isolate obtained from a Pacific Coast band-tailed pigeon (Patagioenas fasciata monilis). These findings suggest Te. gallinarum and other Trichomonas spp. possibly contributed to morbidity and mortality in this species. Furthermore, to the authors\u27 knowledge, this is the first report of trichomonad-associated disease in a free-ranging sea duck

Hitching a ride on Hercules:fatal epibiosis drives ecosystem change from mud banks to oyster reefs

[Excerpt] Best known as a "love them or hate them" luxury food, or for their pearls, oysters are also ecosystem engineers, forming vast oyster reefs. Oyster reefs provide habitat for a myriad of species, and support fisheries, improve water quality and provide coastal protection. These services are estimated to be worth US$5,500–$99,000 per hectare per year (Grabowski et al. 2012). Globally, oyster reefs have declined by 85% through destructive overfishing, coastal development, pollution, and introduced competitors, predators and diseases (Beck et al. 2011). Active restoration is becoming an increasingly popular tool to bring back lost oyster reefs and the ecosystem services they provide (Fitzsimons et al. 2019). However, restoration is not always successful, and knowledge about how reefs naturally form and function is vital to improve restoration success. Oyster larvae only settle on hard substrates. Reefs proliferate because oyster shells provide a settlement surface, and oysters provide chemical and sound cues that facilitate larval settlement (Lillis et al. 2013). However, these reefs often form on intertidal sand and mud banks. This raises the question, how do oyster reefs form on mud banks in the absence of hard surfaces

More is Less, Less is More: Molecular-Scale Photonic NoC Power Topologies

Abstract Molecular-scale Network-on-Chip (mNoC) crossbars use quantum dot LEDs as an on-chip light source, and chromophores to provide optical signal filtering for receivers. An mNoC reduces power consumption or enables scaling to larger crossbars for a reduced energy budget compared to current nanophotonic NoC crossbars. Since communication latency is reduced by using a high-radix crossbar, minimizing power consumption becomes a primary design target. Conventional Single Writer Multiple Reader (SWMR) photonic crossbar designs broadcast all packets, and incur the commensurate required power, even if only two nodes are communicating. This paper introduces power topologies, enabled by unique capabilities of mNoC technology, to reduce overall interconnect power consumption. A power topology corresponds to the logical connectivity provided by a given power mode. Broadcast is one power mode and it consumes the maximum power. Additional power modes consume less power but allow a source to communicate with only a statically defined, potentially non-contiguous, subset of nodes. Overall interconnect power is reduced if the more frequently communicating nodes use modes that consume less power, while less frequently communicating nodes use modes that consume more power. We also investigate thread mapping techniques to fully exploit power topologies. We explore various mNoC power topologies with one, two and four power modes for a radix-256 SWMR mNoC crossbar. Our results show that the combination of power topologies and intelligent thread mapping can reduce total mNoC power by up Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]. to 51% on average for a set of 12 SPLASH benchmarks. Furthermore performance is 10% better than conventional resonator-based photonic NoCs and energy is reduced by 72%

Leadership Styles of Park and Recreation Professionals in GRPA

Undergraduates in the Park and Recreation program at Columbus State University conducted a temperament survey using the Keirsey Temperament Sorter II to identify the temperaments/leadership styles of 50 randomly chosen Park and Recreation professionals within GRPA (Georgia Recreation and Park Association). The Keirsey divides individuals into four main temperaments: Guardian, Artisan, Idealist, and Rational. It is the duty of every leader to evaluate himself or herself in recognizing strengths, weaknesses, capabilities, and limitations. Of the 33 respondents, 73% tested as Guardians, 12% as Artisans, 6% as Idealists, and 3% as Rational. Twenty-seven percent (27%) are more specifically described as Guardian Supervisors. According to http://www.keirsey.com, Guardian Supervisors are squarely on the side of rules and procedures, and they can be quite serious about seeing to it that others toe the mark or else face the consequences. They do not hesitate to give their stamp of approval, nor do they withhold their directions or suggestions for improvement

Smart garment fabrics to enable non-contact opto-physiological monitoring

Imaging photoplethysmography (iPPG) is an emerging technology used to assess microcirculation and cardiovascular signs by collecting backscattered light from illuminated tissue using optical imaging sensors. The aim of this study was to study how effective smart garment fabrics could be capturing physiological signs in a non-contact mode. The present work demonstrates a feasible approach of, instead of using conventional high-power illumination sources, integrating a grid of surface-mounted light emitting diodes (LEDs) into cotton fabric to spotlight the region of interest (ROI). The green and the red LEDs (525 and 660 nm) placed on a small cotton substrate were used to locally illuminate palm skin in a dual-wavelength iPPG setup, where the backscattered light is transmitted to a remote image sensor through the garment fabric. The results show that the illuminations from both wavelength LEDs can be used to extract heart rate (HR) reaching an accuracy of 90% compared to a contact PPG probe. Stretching the fabric over the skin surface alters the morphology of iPPG signals, demonstrating a significantly higher pulsatile amplitude in both channels of green and red illuminations. The skin compression by the fabric could be potentially utilised to enhance the penetration of illumination into cutaneous microvascular beds. The outcome could lead a new avenue of non-contact opto-physiological monitoring and assessment with functional garment fabrics

Approaching the motional ground state of a 10-kg object

The motion of a mechanical object— even a human-sized object— should be governed by the rules of quantum mechanics. Coaxing them into a quantum state is, however, difficult: the thermal environment effectively masks any quantum signature of the object’s motion. Indeed, it also masks effects of proposed modifications of quantum mechanics at large mass scales. We prepare the center-of-mass motion of a 10 kg mechanical oscillator in a state with an average phonon occupation of 10.8. The reduction in oscillator temperature, from room temperature to 77 nK, represents a 100-fold improvement in the reduction of temperature of a solid-state mechanical oscillator— commensurate with a 11 orders-of-magnitude suppression of quantum back-action by feedback — and a 10 orders-of-magnitude increase in the mass of an object prepared close to its motional ground state