Infant and Child Multisensory Attention Skills: Methods, Measures, and Language Outcomes

Intersensory processing (e.g., matching sights and sounds based on audiovisual synchrony) is thought to be a foundation for more complex developmental outcomes including language. However, the body of research on intersensory processing is characterized by different measures, paradigms, and research questions, making comparisons across studies difficult. Therefore, Manuscript 1 provides a systematic review and synthesis of research on intersensory processing, integrating findings across multiple methods, along with recommendations for future research. This includes a call for a shift in the focus of intersensory processing research from that of assessing average performance of groups of infants, to one assessing individual differences in intersensory processing. Individual difference measures allow researchers to assess developmental trajectories and understand developmental pathways from basic skills to later outcomes. Bahrick and colleagues introduced the first two new individual difference measures of intersensory processing: The Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol (MAAP) and The Intersensory Processing Efficiency Protocol (IPEP). My prior research using the MAAP has shown that accuracy of intersensory processing at 12 months of age predicted 18- and 24-month child language outcomes. Moreover, it predicted child language to a greater extent than well-established predictors, including parent language input and SES (Edgar et al., under review)! Manuscript 2 extends this research to examine both speed and accuracy of intersensory processing using the IPEP. A longitudinal sample of 103 infants were tested with the IPEP to assess relations between intersensory processing at 6 months of age and language outcomes at 18, 24, and 36 months, while controlling for traditional predictors, parent language input and SES. Results demonstrate that even at 6 months, intersensory processing predicts 18-, 24-, and 36-month child language skills, over and above the traditional predictors. This novel finding reveals the powerful role of intersensory processing in shaping language development and highlights the importance of incorporating individual differences in intersensory processing as a predictor in models of developmental pathways to language. In turn, these findings can inform interventions where intersensory processing can be used as an early screener for children at risk for language delays

Improving Homeownership Among Poor and Moderate-Income Households

Looks at rates of homeownership, trends in federal low-income rental housing assistance, and types of homeownership programs for low-income households

Dual-pool, three-phase kinetic model of anaerobic digestion in batch mode

Research ArticleThe ability of anaerobic digestion to create value from waste gives it an important role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions and in the transition to a circular economy. For a better understanding of the digestion process and in order to reduce the number of time-consuming batch tests, an analytical model was developed to describe the kinetics of biogas production. Assuming that the organic fraction of the substrate has different degradation rates, the whole process was modelled as two groups of 1storder reactions. The model was tested with published data and showed an excellent performance in reproducing the experimental information. Moreover, its kinetic constants provided a useful insight into the internal processes of anaerobic digestion and the substrate characteristics. Given its accuracy in fitting the data, the model can be used as an auxiliary tool to determine the biogas potential, presenting itself as the most complete empirical model currently availableinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Análisis de factibilidad para la implementación de una cafetería virtual con entrega a domicilio en la ciudad de Guayaquil

Los efectos de un estilo de vida acelerado, son cada vez más evidentes en un mundo globalizado. La utilización de las tecnologías de comunicación e información (TIC) y del internet nace como una respuesta a este efecto. Modificando drásticamente la metodología laboral y la rutina social de las personas, al punto que muchos procesos, anteriormente análogos, han sido virtualziados, logrando con esto un trabajo más eficiente y una comunicación más efectiva. En Ecuador como en muchos países esta desmedida velocidad de vida trae consigo repercusiones negativas, cuando la necesidad de resultados inmediatos obliga a los individuos a priorizar las horas de trabajo sobre una adecuada alimentación. Pues estos se ven en la necesidad de comprar comida rápida, de dudosa calidad nutricional e higiénica, y esto si es que encuentran el tiempo para hacerlo. Este estudio para la implementación de una cafetería virtual, nace como respuesta a esta necesidad de un estilo de vida más sano con una alimentación conveniente, y utilizando para su fin las TIC y el internet de manera que se pueda adaptar sistemáticamente al estilo de vida de la población laboral. El estudio de factibilidad financiera incluye un completo desglose de la proyección de ingresos por ventas, gastos y costos de producción en los que se incurrirán en la implementación de dicha tienda virtual. Toda esta información será utilizada para determinar la factibilidad económica del proyecto mediante los métodos de evaluación del VAN y la TIR.EDCOM - ESPO

Remote Data Collection During a Pandemic: A New Approach for Assessing and Coding Multisensory Attention Skills in Infants and Young Children

In early 2020, in-person data collection dramatically slowed or was completely halted across the world as many labs were forced to close due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Developmental researchers who assess looking time (especially those who rely heavily on in-lab eye-tracking or live coding techniques) were forced to re-think their methods of data collection. While a variety of remote or online platforms are available for gathering behavioral data outside of the typical lab setting, few are specifically designed for collecting and processing looking time data in infants and young children. To address these challenges, our lab developed several novel approaches for continuing data collection and coding for a remotely administered audiovisual looking time protocol. First, we detail a comprehensive approach for successfully administering the Multisensory Attention Assessment Protocol (MAAP), developed by our lab to assess multisensory attention skills (MASks; duration of looking, speed of shifting/disengaging, accuracy of audiovisual matching). The MAAP is administered from a distance (remotely) by using Zoom, Gorilla Experiment Builder, an internet connection, and a home computer. This new data collection approach has the advantage that participants can be tested in their homes. We discuss challenges and successes in implementing our approach for remote testing and data collection during an ongoing longitudinal project. Second, we detail an approach for estimating gaze direction and duration collected remotely from webcam recordings using a post processing toolkit (OpenFace) and demonstrate its effectiveness and precision. However, because OpenFace derives gaze estimates without translating them to an external frame of reference (i.e., the participant\u27s screen), we developed a machine learning (ML) approach to overcome this limitation. Thus, third, we trained a ML algorithm [(artificial neural network (ANN)] to classify gaze estimates from OpenFace with respect to areas of interest (AOI) on the participant\u27s screen (i.e., left, right, and center). We then demonstrate reliability between this approach and traditional coding approaches (e.g., coding gaze live). The combination of OpenFace and ML will provide a method to automate the coding of looking time for data collected remotely. Finally, we outline a series of best practices for developmental researchers conducting remote data collection for looking time studies

Adjustable Portable Makeup Chair

This Final Design Report (FDR) presents the development and evaluation of our adjustable portable makeup chair that is designed to meet the specific needs of makeup artists. To remedy the lack of height adjusting and compact makeup chairs in the market currently, our senior design project planned on creating a height adjusting and portable makeup chair that will be suitable for makeup artists of different heights and is easily transported from one location to another, ideally in the makeup artists car backseat. After finalizing our design, through CAD (SolidWorks), dimensions, equipment and materials which were needed to create our chair, we ordered our materials through different vendors and started building in the machine shops available to us. We used various manufacturing processes such as metal saw cutting, welding, hydraulic tube bending, and 3D printing. The main gas spring we were planning on using to be the main mechanism to activate the height adjusting feature of the chair as well as make it compact was unavailable due to time and manufacturing constraints, so a 3D printed telescoping cylinder was used. Some tolerancing issues also arose when it came time to build the chair. These issues while creating obstacles led us to refine our design and learn from them in order to improve the manufacturing and building of the chair for future production. There was also some instability in the chair that might cause it to tip over and this observation was important to us to make some recommendations or let our sponsor know this might be an aspect that needs refining as well to make a more stable chair. After manufacturing we finished our prototype that showed the functionality of the chair and that it would be compact. Again, without the spring we could not lock the chair at various heights, but our prototype showed it could be compact and ideally it would be suitable to be height adjusted if a proper mechanism could be locked at a certain height

Sewage sludge co-digestion with mango peel liquor: impact of hydraulic retention time on methane yield and bioenergy recovery

As the shift towards renewable energy sources continues, new approaches for energy recovery from sewage sludge must be established. This paper explores the feasibility of implementing full-scale co-digestion of municipal sewage sludge with fruit biowaste through the synergistic effects obtained at laboratory scale. The efficiency/stability of the process was studied for three hydraulic retention times. By using simple tools to evaluate the performance of the anaerobic digestion system, such as the specific methane indicator and the energy potential recovery indicator, it was shown that the shortest retention time of 13 days had the highest methane production and almost doubled the specific methane production, thus contributing to sustainable waste management and energy self-sufficiency of wastewater treatment plants

A co-opted steroid synthesis gene, maintained in sorghum but not maize, is associated with a divergence in leaf wax chemistry

Virtually all land plants are coated in a cuticle, a waxy polyester that prevents nonstomatal water loss and is important for heat and drought tolerance. Here, we describe a likely genetic basis for a divergence in cuticular wax chemistry between Sorghum bicolor, a drought tolerant crop widely cultivated in hot climates, and its close relative Zea mays (maize). Combining chemical analyses, heterologous expression, and comparative genomics, we reveal that: 1) sorghum and maize leaf waxes are similar at the juvenile stage but, after the juvenile-to-adult transition, sorghum leaf waxes are rich in triterpenoids that are absent from maize; 2) biosynthesis of the majority of sorghum leaf triterpenoids is mediated by a gene that maize and sorghum both inherited from a common ancestor but that is only functionally maintained in sorghum; and 3) sorghum leaf triterpenoids accumulate in a spatial pattern that was previously shown to strengthen the cuticle and decrease water loss at high temperatures. These findings uncover the possibility for resurrection of a cuticular triterpenoid-synthesizing gene in maize that could create a more heat-tolerant water barrier on the plant’s leaf surfaces. They also provide a fundamental understanding of sorghum leaf waxes that will inform efforts to divert surface carbon to intracellular storage for bioenergy and bioproduct innovations