Science Models as Value-Added Services for Scholarly Information Systems

The paper introduces scholarly Information Retrieval (IR) as a further dimension that should be considered in the science modeling debate. The IR use case is seen as a validation model of the adequacy of science models in representing and predicting structure and dynamics in science. Particular conceptualizations of scholarly activity and structures in science are used as value-added search services to improve retrieval quality: a co-word model depicting the cognitive structure of a field (used for query expansion), the Bradford law of information concentration, and a model of co-authorship networks (both used for re-ranking search results). An evaluation of the retrieval quality when science model driven services are used turned out that the models proposed actually provide beneficial effects to retrieval quality. From an IR perspective, the models studied are therefore verified as expressive conceptualizations of central phenomena in science. Thus, it could be shown that the IR perspective can significantly contribute to a better understanding of scholarly structures and activities.Comment: 26 pages, to appear in Scientometric

Black Holes in Modified Gravity (MOG)

The field equations for Scalar-Tensor-Vector-Gravity (STVG) or modified gravity (MOG) have a static, spherically symmetric black hole solution determined by the mass $M$ with two horizons. The strength of the gravitational constant is $G=G_N(1+\alpha)$ where $\alpha$ is a parameter. A regular singularity-free MOG solution is derived using a nonlinear field dynamics for the repulsive gravitational field component and a reasonable physical energy-momentum tensor. The Kruskal-Szekeres completion of the MOG black hole solution is obtained. The Kerr-MOG black hole solution is determined by the mass $M$, the parameter $\alpha$ and the spin angular momentum $J=Ma$. The equations of motion and the stability condition of a test particle orbiting the MOG black hole are derived, and the radius of the black hole photosphere and the shadows cast by the Schwarzschild-MOG and Kerr-MOG black holes are calculated. A traversable wormhole solution is constructed with a throat stabilized by the repulsive component of the gravitational field.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figures. Upgraded version of paper to match published version in European Physics Journal

Assessment of Equine Autoimmune Thrombocytopenia (EAT) by flow cytometry

RATIONALE: Thrombocytopenia is a platelet associated process that occurs in human and animals as result of i) decreased production; ii) increased utilization; iii) increased destruction coupled to the presence of antibodies, within a process know as immune-mediated thrombocytopenia (IMT); or iv) platelet sequestration. Thus, the differentiation of the origin of IMT and the development of reliable diagnostic approaches and methodologies are important in the clarification of IMT pathogenesis. Therefore, there is a growing need in the field for easy to perform assays for assessing platelet morphological characteristics paired with detection of platelet-bound IgG. OBJECTIVES: This study is aimed to develop and characterize a single color flow cytometric assay for detection of platelet-bound IgG in horses, in combination with flow cytometric assessment of platelet morphological characteristics. FINDINGS: The FSC and SSC evaluation of the platelets obtained from the thrombocytopenic animals shows several distinctive features in comparison to the flow cytometric profile of platelets from healthy animals. The thrombocytopenic animals displayed i) increased number of platelets with high FSC and high SSC, ii) a significant number of those gigantic platelets had strong fluorescent signal (IgG bound), iii) very small platelets or platelet derived microparticles were found significantly enhanced in one of the thrombocytopenic horses, iv) significant numbers of these microplatelet/microparticles/platelet-fragments still carry very high fluorescence. CONCLUSIONS: This study describes the development and characterization of an easy to perform, inexpensive, and noninvasive single color flow cytometric assay for detection of platelet-bound IgG, in combination with flow cytometric assessment of platelet morphological characteristics in horses

Sub-kilometre scale distribution of snow depth on Arctic sea ice from Soviet drifting stations

The sub-kilometre scale distribution of snow depth on Arctic sea ice impacts atmosphere-ice fluxes of energy and mass, and is of importance for satellite estimates of sea-ice thickness from both radar and lidar altimeters. While information about the mean of this distribution is increasingly available from modelling and remote sensing, the full distribution cannot yet be resolved. We analyse 33 539 snow depth measurements from 499 transects taken at Soviet drifting stations between 1955 and 1991 and derive a simple statistical distribution for snow depth over multi-year ice as a function of only the mean snow depth. We then evaluate this snow depth distribution against snow depth transects that span first-year ice to multiyear ice from the MOSAiC, SHEBA and AMSR-Ice field campaigns. Because the distribution can be generated using only the mean snow depth, it can be used in the downscaling of several existing snow depth products for use in flux modelling and altimetry studies

Designing citizen science tools for learning: lessons learnt from the iterative development of nQuire

This paper reports on a 4-year research and development case study about the design of citizen science tools for inquiry learning. It details the process of iterative pedagogy-led design and evaluation of the nQuire toolkit, a set of web-based and mobile tools scaffolding the creation of online citizen science investigations. The design involved an expert review of inquiry learning and citizen science, combined with user experience studies involving more than 200 users. These have informed a concept that we have termed ‘citizen inquiry’, which engages members of the public alongside scientists in setting up, running, managing or contributing to citizen science projects with a main aim of learning about the scientific method through doing science by interaction with others. A design-based research (DBR) methodology was adopted for the iterative design and evaluation of citizen science tools. DBR was focused on the refinement of a central concept, ‘citizen inquiry’, by exploring how it can be instantiated in educational technologies and interventions. The empirical evaluation and iteration of technologies involved three design experiments with end users, user interviews, and insights from pedagogy and user experience experts. Evidence from the iterative development of nQuire led to the production of a set of interaction design principles that aim to guide the development of online, learning-centred, citizen science projects. Eight design guidelines are proposed: users as producers of knowledge, topics before tools, mobile affordances, scaffolds to the process of scientific inquiry, learning by doing as key message, being part of a community as key message, every visit brings a reward, and value users and their time

Dynamic Community Detection into Analyzing of Wildfires Events

The study and comprehension of complex systems are crucial intellectual and scientific challenges of the 21st century. In this scenario, network science has emerged as a mathematical tool to support the study of such systems. Examples include environmental processes such as wildfires, which are known for their considerable impact on human life. However, there is a considerable lack of studies of wildfire from a network science perspective. Here, employing the chronological network concept -- a temporal network where nodes are linked if two consecutive events occur between them -- we investigate the information that dynamic community structures reveal about the wildfires' dynamics. Particularly, we explore a two-phase dynamic community detection approach, i.e., we applied the Louvain algorithm on a series of snapshots. Then we used the Jaccard similarity coefficient to match communities across adjacent snapshots. Experiments with the MODIS dataset of fire events in the Amazon basing were conducted. Our results show that the dynamic communities can reveal wildfire patterns observed throughout the year.Comment: 16 pages, 8 figure

Long-term follow-up of beryllium sensitized workers from a single employer

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Up to 12% of beryllium-exposed American workers would test positive on beryllium lymphocyte proliferation test (BeLPT) screening, but the implications of sensitization remain uncertain.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Seventy two current and former employees of a beryllium manufacturer, including 22 with pathologic changes of chronic beryllium disease (CBD), and 50 without, with a confirmed positive test were followed-up for 7.4 +/-3.1 years.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Beyond predicted effects of aging, flow rates and lung volumes changed little from baseline, while D_LCO dropped 17.4% of predicted on average. Despite this group decline, only 8 subjects (11.1%) demonstrated physiologic or radiologic abnormalities typical of CBD. Other than baseline status, no clinical or laboratory feature distinguished those who clinically manifested CBD at follow-up from those who did not.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The clinical outlook remains favorable for beryllium-sensitized individuals over the first 5-12 years. However, declines in D_LCO may presage further and more serious clinical manifestations in the future. These conclusions are tempered by the possibility of selection bias and other study limitations.</p

Influence of wiring cost on the large-scale architecture of human cortical connectivity

In the past two decades some fundamental properties of cortical connectivity have been discovered: small-world structure, pronounced hierarchical and modular organisation, and strong core and rich-club structures. A common assumption when interpreting results of this kind is that the observed structural properties are present to enable the brain's function. However, the brain is also embedded into the limited space of the skull and its wiring has associated developmental and metabolic costs. These basic physical and economic aspects place separate, often conflicting, constraints on the brain's connectivity, which must be characterized in order to understand the true relationship between brain structure and function. To address this challenge, here we ask which, and to what extent, aspects of the structural organisation of the brain are conserved if we preserve specific spatial and topological properties of the brain but otherwise randomise its connectivity. We perform a comparative analysis of a connectivity map of the cortical connectome both on high- and low-resolutions utilising three different types of surrogate networks: spatially unconstrained (‘random’), connection length preserving (‘spatial’), and connection length optimised (‘reduced’) surrogates. We find that unconstrained randomisation markedly diminishes all investigated architectural properties of cortical connectivity. By contrast, spatial and reduced surrogates largely preserve most properties and, interestingly, often more so in the reduced surrogates. Specifically, our results suggest that the cortical network is less tightly integrated than its spatial constraints would allow, but more strongly segregated than its spatial constraints would necessitate. We additionally find that hierarchical organisation and rich-club structure of the cortical connectivity are largely preserved in spatial and reduced surrogates and hence may be partially attributable to cortical wiring constraints. In contrast, the high modularity and strong s-core of the high-resolution cortical network are significantly stronger than in the surrogates, underlining their potential functional relevance in the brain

New Mechanics of Traumatic Brain Injury

The prediction and prevention of traumatic brain injury is a very important aspect of preventive medical science. This paper proposes a new coupled loading-rate hypothesis for the traumatic brain injury (TBI), which states that the main cause of the TBI is an external Euclidean jolt, or SE(3)-jolt, an impulsive loading that strikes the head in several coupled degrees-of-freedom simultaneously. To show this, based on the previously defined covariant force law, we formulate the coupled Newton-Euler dynamics of brain's micro-motions within the cerebrospinal fluid and derive from it the coupled SE(3)-jolt dynamics. The SE(3)-jolt is a cause of the TBI in two forms of brain's rapid discontinuous deformations: translational dislocations and rotational disclinations. Brain's dislocations and disclinations, caused by the SE(3)-jolt, are described using the Cosserat multipolar viscoelastic continuum brain model. Keywords: Traumatic brain injuries, coupled loading-rate hypothesis, Euclidean jolt, coupled Newton-Euler dynamics, brain's dislocations and disclinationsComment: 18 pages, 1 figure, Late