Design and Make a Climbing Structure for the School Playground

This project is based around an extension of a similar one undertaken last year, which involved pupils looking at ways in which the school's playground could be improved. Amongst the various ideas generated, one plan was to incorporate play equipment and climbing frames into the playground. The Whittington Agenda 22 Project (concerned with looking after the environment by using reclaimed materials) worked together with the school on this project. For this year's project David Stone from the Islington Schools Environment Project was also brought in to collaborate with the class on the design of and construction of the structures which will hopefully be built and placed in the playground when funding is available. One consideration to be taken into account whilst planning the project was that David was being funded by the Whit

From Interpreting Student to Deaf Interpreter: A Case Study of Vocational Identity Development

Research indicates that the development of a vocational identity is critical to the process of adult maturation and for creating a sense of purpose in one’s life. Deaf individuals in the United States are increasingly interested in establishing a vocation in signed language interpreting, despite workplace obstacles experienced by other oppressed and marginalized populations. Career identity has been examined in several professions, but little is known about the factors underlying the vocational identity development of Deaf interpreters. To address this gap, the researchers adopted a case study approach to explore the experiences of two Deaf students during their first semester in an undergraduate interpreting program. We analyzed video recordings of interaction between the students and a Deaf instructor, the students’ responses during an end-of-semester interview, and the students’ biographical information. Taken together, the data reveal factors that shaped their paths as interpreters including: (a) educational background, (b) professional experience, (c) bilingual and bicultural fluency, (d) personal identity, and (e) guidance from a Deaf instructor. This paper illuminates how two Deaf students who engaged in separate but interlocking paths developed a vocational identity as interpreters – or changed course – in their career trajectories

Ternary Through Time: Why Understanding Form Enhances Casual Listening

This presentation will compare the use of ternary form from two different time periods to support our claim that ternary form creates an enjoyable experience for the listener because of the devices used in the form. We will be performing and presenting our analysis of Chopin\u27s Nocturne in C minor (Op. 48 No. 1) and Friends by Joe Hisaishi. The first was written in the mid-nineteenth century and the second in the early twenty-first century, but both maintain a similar structure, showing the effectiveness of this form in creating memorable and gratifying experience. Our research on this topic will benefit those who see it because they will be able to better recognize how the structure of the music they listen to supports their enjoyment of music. Our presentation will also strengthen the idea that while the aesthetic of music may change over time, music across generations has more in common than some listeners may realize and can be enjoyed in similar ways because of the devices employed by these popular forms. Our research will consist largely of analysis of these two pieces, comparing and contrasting the form and devices employed that make these pieces enjoyable, and preparing a performance presentation. We plan to include audience participation to help support our ideas and to connect the audience to the material, and then visually present analysis of the form of these two pieces in conjunction with the performance

Faculty experiences and motivations in design thinking teaching and learning

IntroductionDesign thinking (DT) is a creative, iterative approach to generating solutions that are desirable, feasible, and viable. Given its role in fostering creativity and innovation, a growing number of higher education instructors are teaching DT. Exploring how and what instructors know about DT and why they might teach it could provide critical insight into the ways in which DT is operationalized in higher education teaching and learning.Materials and methodsA convergent parallel mixed methods design was used for data collected from online surveys administered to faculty teaching DT. The survey included items about DT practices, outcomes from DT, demographic characteristics, and course characteristics. Five open-text survey items queried participants about their definition of DT, why they teach DT, and what additional outcomes they observed. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze quantitative items and thematic analysis was used to analyze qualitative items.ResultsParticipants (n = 49) represented various academic ranks, disciplines, types of institutions, and geographic locations. Analyses indicated clear congruence between quantitative and qualitative data. Definitions of DT aligned with well-known models of DT. Motivations for teaching DT included the promotion of personal development, DT proficiency, impact, and interpersonal skill development. Other positive student outcomes observed included increases in enthusiasm, self-awareness, empowerment, optimism, and a sense of belonging. Negative student outcomes included time constraints, teamwork conflicts, and student frustration.ConclusionFaculty believe that DT leads to highly valuable social innovation skill sets for students. This cross-institutional, multi-disciplinary study provides critical insight into faculty experiences and motivations for teaching DT, offering various strategies for instructors and institutions interested in fostering the uptake of DT within higher education

SUSTAINABLE LOW ENERGY DESALINATION OF ROAD SALT RUNOFF USING ION EXCHANGE RESINS

Gemstone Team MELTSNaCl is used to deice roads during winter storms, but the resulting salty runoff has detrimental environmental effects. A novel low-energy approach for desalinating snowmelt runoff using ion exchange resins was explored. Strong-acid cation and strong-base anion resins were tested in parallel gravity flow columns to determine their efficacy in removing Na+ and Cl− from saline solutions of varying concentrations (0%, 1%, 5%, 10% w/w). Ion exchange was quantified via pH measurements of column effluent samples. Cation resin capacity was positively correlated with influent Na+ concentration, while removal efficiency was negatively correlated with Na+ concentration. Neither the anion resins’ capacity nor removal efficiency followed any correlation with Cl− concentrations. More 1% influent solution compared to 5% or 10% was required to exhaust both resins. Future research should confirm current findings, test resins in realistic field conditions, explore resin regeneration, and examine engineering efficacy in a field setting

Functional Connectivity and Brain Networks in Schizophrenia

Schizophrenia has often been conceived as a disorder of connectivity between components of large-scale brain networks. We tested this hypothesis by measuring aspects of both functional connectivity and functional network topology derived from resting state fMRI time series acquired at 72 cerebral regions over 17 minutes from 15 healthy volunteers (14 male, 1 female) and 12 people diagnosed with schizophrenia (10 male, 2 female). We investigated between-group differences in strength and diversity of functional connectivity in the 0.06–0.125 Hz frequency interval, and some topological properties of undirected graphs constructed from thresholded inter-regional correlation matrices. In people with schizophrenia, strength of functional connectivity was significantly decreased; whereas diversity of functional connections was increased. Topologically, functional brain networks had reduced clustering and small-worldness, reduced probability of high degree hubs and increased robustness in the schizophrenic group. Reduced degree and clustering were locally significant in medial parietal, premotor and cingulate, and right orbitofrontal cortical nodes of functional networks in schizophrenia. Functional connectivity and topological metrics were correlated with each other and with behavioural performance on a verbal fluency task. We conclude that people with schizophrenia tend to have a less strongly integrated, more diverse profile of brain functional connectivity, associated with a less hub-dominated configuration of complex brain functional networks. Alongside these behaviourally disadvantageous differences, however, brain networks in the schizophrenic group also showed a greater robustness to random attack, pointing to a possible benefit of the schizophrenia connectome, if less extremely expressed

The Great Lakes Hydrography Dataset: Consistent, Binational Watersheds for the Laurentian Great Lakes Basin

Ecosystem‐based management of the Laurentian Great Lakes, which spans both the United States and Canada, is hampered by the lack of consistent binational watersheds for the entire Basin. Using comparable data sources and consistent methods, we developed spatially equivalent watershed boundaries for the binational extent of the Basin to create the Great Lakes Hydrography Dataset (GLHD). The GLHD consists of 5,589 watersheds for the entire Basin, covering a total area of approximately 547,967 km2, or about twice the 247,003 km2 surface water area of the Great Lakes. The GLHD improves upon existing watershed efforts by delineating watersheds for the entire Basin using consistent methods; enhancing the precision of watershed delineation using recently developed flow direction grids that have been hydrologically enforced and vetted by provincial and federal water resource agencies; and increasing the accuracy of watershed boundaries by enforcing embayments, delineating watersheds on islands, and delineating watersheds for all tributaries draining to connecting channels. In addition, the GLHD is packaged in a publically available geodatabase that includes synthetic stream networks, reach catchments, watershed boundaries, a broad set of attribute data for each tributary, and metadata documenting methodology. The GLHD provides a common set of watersheds and associated hydrography data for the Basin that will enhance binational efforts to protect and restore the Great Lakes.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/134077/1/jawr12435_am.pdfhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/134077/2/jawr12435.pd

SOX10 requirement for melanoma tumor growth is due, in part, to immune-mediated effects

Developmental factors may regulate the expression of immune modulatory proteins in cancer, linking embryonic development and cancer cell immune evasion. This is particularly relevant in melanoma because immune checkpoint inhibitors are commonly used in the clinic. SRY-box transcription factor 10 (SOX10) mediates neural crest development and is required for melanoma cell growth. In this study, we investigate immune-related targets of SOX10 and observe positive regulation of herpesvirus entry mediator (HVEM) and carcinoembryonic-antigen cell-adhesion molecule 1 (CEACAM1). Sox10 knockout reduces tumor growth in vivo, and this effect is exacerbated in immune-competent models. Modulation of CEACAM1 expression but not HVEM elicits modest effects on tumor growth. Importantly, Sox10 knockout effects on tumor growth are dependent, in part, on CD8+ T cells. Extending this analysis to samples from patients with cutaneous melanoma, we observe a negative correlation with SOX10 and immune-related pathways. These data demonstrate a role for SOX10 in regulating immune checkpoint protein expression and anti-tumor immunity in melanoma

RNASEQR—a streamlined and accurate RNA-seq sequence analysis program

Next-generation sequencing (NGS) technologies-based transcriptomic profiling method often called RNA-seq has been widely used to study global gene expression, alternative exon usage, new exon discovery, novel transcriptional isoforms and genomic sequence variations. However, this technique also poses many biological and informatics challenges to extracting meaningful biological information. The RNA-seq data analysis is built on the foundation of high quality initial genome localization and alignment information for RNA-seq sequences. Toward this goal, we have developed RNASEQR to accurately and effectively map millions of RNA-seq sequences. We have systematically compared RNASEQR with four of the most widely used tools using a simulated data set created from the Consensus CDS project and two experimental RNA-seq data sets generated from a human glioblastoma patient. Our results showed that RNASEQR yields more accurate estimates for gene expression, complete gene structures and new transcript isoforms, as well as more accurate detection of single nucleotide variants (SNVs). RNASEQR analyzes raw data from RNA-seq experiments effectively and outputs results in a manner that is compatible with a wide variety of specialized downstream analyses on desktop computers

Whole-exome sequencing and clinical interpretation of FFPE tumor samples to guide precision cancer medicine

Translating whole exome sequencing (WES) for prospective clinical use may impact the care of cancer patients; however, multiple innovations are necessary for clinical implementation. These include: (1) rapid and robust WES from formalin-fixed paraffin embedded (FFPE) tumor tissue, (2) analytical output similar to data from frozen samples, and (3) clinical interpretation of WES data for prospective use. Here, we describe a prospective clinical WES platform for archival FFPE tumor samples. The platform employs computational methods for effective clinical analysis and interpretation of WES data. When applied retrospectively to 511 exomes, the interpretative framework revealed a “long tail” of somatic alterations in clinically important genes. Prospective application of this approach identified clinically relevant alterations in 15/16 patients. In one patient, previously undetected findings guided clinical trial enrollment leading to an objective clinical response. Overall, this methodology may inform the widespread implementation of precision cancer medicine