Thoughts in Space

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Torture, Terror and Truth: On the Meaning of Guantánamo and the Future of Global Order

How are we to grasp the transformation of law, authority, and border that is taking place through the current War on Terror? How are we to understand the return of public torture as a judically sanctioned practice, presented as a just and necessary instrument to defent good society? What is the significance of Guantánamo for the future of global order? The article presents an analysis of the use of torture in the eterna War on Terror from the perspective of globalization theory, inspired in part by Agamben, Carl Schmitt, and a rereading of Foucault

Water quality in the Apac, Mbale & Lira districts, Uganda : a field study evaluating problems and suitable solutions

Safe water is a widespread problem in developing countries. In 2004 The United Nations formed the Lake Victoria Region Water and Sanitation Initiative, which focuses on increasing the water quality and basic sanitation in both rural- and urban areas. The government of Uganda is a part of the initiative, since the quality of the drinking water in the country persists to be a widespread problem. In Uganda the socio-economic situation in the rural areas are contributing to the problems regarding development, safe water and sanitation. This small study contributes to filling the gap regarding the peoples own experiences and ideas about their water and sanitation situation in rural Uganda, as there is a lack of studies bringing up this aspect and its importance for a successful implementation of household water treatment methods. To investigate the water situation in rural areas in Uganda, a field study was preformed and households in seven villages were interviewed about how they experience their water quality. The aim of this study was to investigate how residents in the villages experienced the water situation in relation to experienced health effects. Potential solutions in form of six general household water treatment methods and their suitability to solve the problems found at site were also a part of the aim. The methods weighted and discussed were boiling, Solar disinfection, ceramic filtration, Biosand filtration, chemical disinfection and coagulation systems. Common problems found in the villages were diarrhoeal diseases and undefined stomach complications. Many households brought up human pollution and cattle drinking in the water stations as examples of polluting sources that were contributing to contamination of the water. The study sites were chosen by the help of local guides and limited by time and the resources for this study. To analyse if there is a significant differences between the villages’ answers regarding health and water quality, a chi-square test was preformed. The tests showed a difference between the villages in how unhappy they were with the water quality. The problems that have been pointed out by The United Nation were confirmed during the field study. Many of the visited water sources were in need of restoration and water related health problems were pronounced by households in all the villages. Water purification methods are uncommon in all the villages except for one, where a well working system is already in order. By some of the most commonly used point-of-use methods, the biosand filter and solar disinfection (SODIS) was found to be most suitable for several of the studied villages along with restoration of the water sources

An Examination of the Contextual Environment of Families with Sexually Abused Adolescents

This study examined the impact of the contextual environment of the family on post abuse adjustment of sexually abused adolescents. Bronfenbrenner’s ecological theory was used to investigate how the external influences of the family impact the capacity of families to foster the recovery of sexually abused adolescents. The results from this secondary analysis of data from the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being Wave I (NSCAW, Dowd et al., 2002) support contextually sensitive treatment planning for sexually abused adolescents and their families

Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Ground Control Point Deployment

According to Federal Aviation Regulation (FAR) Part 77, all airports have imaginary approach surfaces which must remain clear of obstructions in order to ensure safe air travel. Threats of penetration to these imaginary surfaces include new construction, telephone poles and lines, and trees. While most potential threats analyzed remain relatively constant in size, objects such as trees which grow require annual analysis for change detection. A variety of methods are available for surveying these surfaces for potential obstructions, one being an aerial mapping from photogrammetric data. Aerial mapping for surveying purposes is a process which ties overlapping photographs together using computer software which detects similar points between the images. These images requires ground control points, also known as GCPs, to create a scale which allows for accurate measurement data. When ground control points with known GPS locations are placed throughout the mapping area all the points within the model can then be tied to their respective GPS coordinates in the longitudinal, latitudinal, and altitude directions. The placement of these markers is one of the most time-consuming but necessary tasks when creating an aerial map. The main objective of this project was for the team to design and produce a method of streamlining the ground control point deployment process. This report introduces a device which, when implemented, can reduce the number of resources and labor needed for this process. A mechanical release system was designed and built to be carried by a drone. Remote control between two XBee RF modules was implemented to activate the rotating notch release system, following user commands. A 90 degree rotation by the servo of the flange would align the flange with the keyslot in the GCP, allowing it to fall. The final design was successfully operated by one pilot and three GCP’s were deployed at various locations. An important factor in designing this system was developing lightweight, high contrast GCPs that would not impact the flight of the drone. The weight and balance of the final product were suitable for the small 3DR Solo drone used in the project. This accomplishment proves this system could be applied to drones with greater payloads and longer flight times for preparing large surveying areas in minimal time

Neutron imaging and tomography with MCPs

A neutron imaging detector based on neutron-sensitive microchannel plates (MCPs) was constructed and tested at beamlines of thermal and cold neutrons. The MCPs are made of a glass mixture containing B-10 and natural Gd, which makes the bulk of the MCP an efficient neutron converter. Contrary to the neutron sensitive scintillator screens normally used in neutron imaging, spatial resolution is not traded off with detection efficiency. While the best neutron imaging scintillators have a detection efficiency around a percent, a detection efficiency of around 50% for thermal neutrons and 70% for cold neutrons has been demonstrated with these MCPs earlier. Our tests show a performance similar to conventional neutron imaging detectors, apart from the orders of magnitude better sensitivity. We demonstrate a spatial resolution better than 150 um. The sensitivity of this detector allows fast tomography and neutron video recording, and will make smaller reactor sites and even portable sources suitable for neutron imaging.Comment: Submitted to the proceedings of the 19th International Workshop on Radiation Imaging Detectors (iWoRiD) 2-6 July 2017, Krakow, Polan

Scaling up and industrialization the production and purification of viral vectors for therapeutic use: Challenges and progress

With several recent FDA approvals and a strong drug pipeline, gene therapy is coming of age. With this comes the requirement to ensure that there are robust manufacturing processes in place in order to scale with demand and to make these therapies readily accessible to those who need them. However, current manufacturing processes for gene therapies have often been developed with limited scalability in mind and large shifts in technology have to take place to enable industrialization. This also has to be done while keeping costs in mind. Here, we will present a case study which illustrates the challenges and solutions to scale both up and downstream process steps required to manufacture adenovirus. After implementation of a bioreactor, the bioreactor scale increased 125 fold, from 0.53m2 to 66 m2. With the implementation of several scalable unit operations on the downstream, this took 1 day as opposed to 3 – 4 days required for the entire optimized process generating purified viral vector for the successfully completion of a global in vivo toxicology study. Altogether, the practicalities around manufacturing virus to industrial scale. Please click Additional Files below to see the full abstract

Enzymic synthesis of N-acetyl-D-mannosamine

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/32482/1/0000568.pd

Behavioural and electrophysiological characterisation of experimentally induced osteoarthritis and neuropathy in C57Bl/6 mice

Background: Osteoarthritis is a widespread condition affecting the elderly where similar to 70-90% of over 75 year olds are affected, representing one of the largest cost burdens to healthcare in the western world. The monosodium iodoacetate (MIA) osteoarthritis model has been well described in the rat especially in terms of the pathological progression of the disease and more recently pain behaviour. In this study, we characterise, for the first time, MIA induced osteoarthritis in mice and compare it with nerve-injured mice (partial sciatic nerve injury), using both behavioural and in vivo electrophysiological measurements. These approaches uniquely allow the threshold and suprathreshold measures to many modalities to be quantified and so form a basis for improving and expanding transgenic studies.Results: Significant mechanical hypersensitivity was observed in the ipsilateral hindpaw in MIA injected mice at all observed time points following infrapetellar MIA injection (p < 0.05). The mechanical hypersensitivity exhibited a partial biphasic temporal pattern, but thermal hypersensitivity was absent. Electrically-evoked dorsal horn neuronal responses in MIA injected mice were significantly elevated (p < 0.05) with respect to A- and C-fibre firing, input, pinch and noxious von Frey (26 and 60 g). No significant changes in A- or C-fibre thresholds were observed. Nerve-injured mice displayed significant behavioural thermal and mechanical hypersensitivity (p < 0.05) and evoked dorsal horn responses were significantly increased with respect to C-fibre firing, pinch and wind-up (p < 0.05).Conclusion: The MIA model of osteoarthritic pain in mice displays behavioural characteristics similar to those observed in rats. Changes in both behavioural measures and neuronal activity from the paw, suggest that central changes are involved in this pain state, although a role for peripheral drives is also likely. Moreover, the behavioural and neuronal measures in these two pain models showed overlapping alterations in terms of certain neuronal measures and mechanical sensitivity despite their very different pathologies and a loss of input in neuropathy, suggesting some commonalities in the central processing of different peripheral pain states. This murine model of osteoarthritis will allow the exploitation of knock out animals to better understand underlying mechanisms and identify novel molecular targets