Voice Enabled Indoor Localisation

The ability to track objects in real time offers a wide range of beneficial applications that include safety, security and the supply chain. The problem with location based systems is that they can be inconvenient and time-consuming to locate an object. A user has to access a computer and log onto a location system to locate an object. There are several problems with current location determination interfaces. Firstly a user has to log on to a computer; this can be inconvenient and time consuming as the user may have to locate a computer (which may be in another area of a building) and then log onto the system. The user has to look at a map that is displayed on screen to see where the object is located; the problem with this is that the user could make a mistake by looking at the wrong object or the wrong area of the building. Incorporating a voice control function into the system can solve interaction problems with some location based systems. This paper provides an overview of integrating voiceXML with an indoor location positioning system to locate objects through voice commands

Deciphering User-Generated Content in Transitional Societies: A Syria Coverage Case Study

Social media and user-generated content (UGC) — photos and videos taken by members of the public — played an important role in coverage of the revolutions in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya, but, this was chiefly supplementary to traditional newsgathering for covering those revolutions. However in Syria with the tight control on foreign media denying access for foreign journalists, especially in the early months of the uprising, news organizations had to rely almost exclusively on this UGC via social media and their own UGC intake platforms. Much of the UGC used by news outlets is fielded by Syrian activists both inside Syria and based overseas who are in contact with Syrian demonstrators and planners. The objective of this study is to look at how two prominent Arab-language news organisations, BBC Arabic and Al Jazeera Arabic (AJA), have used social media and UGC — photos, videos and comments — to provide coverage of the uprising in Syria

Attenuating Diabetic Vascular and Neuronal Defects by Targeting P2rx7.

Retinal vascular and neuronal degeneration are established pathological features of diabetic retinopathy. Data suggest that defects in the neuroglial network precede the clinically recognisable vascular lesions in the retina. Therefore, new treatments that target early-onset neurodegeneration would be expected to have great value in preventing the early stages of diabetic retinopathy. Here, we show that the nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitor lamivudine (3TC), a newly discovered P2rx7 inhibitor, can attenuate progression of both neuronal and vascular pathology in diabetic retinopathy. We found that the expression of P2rx7 was increased in the murine retina as early as one month following diabetes induction. Compared to non-diabetic controls, diabetic mice treated with 3TC were protected against the formation of acellular capillaries in the retina. This occurred concomitantly with a maintenance in neuroglial function, as shown by improved a- and b-wave amplitude, as well as oscillatory potentials. An improvement in the number of GABAergic amacrine cells and the synaptophysin-positive area was also observed in the inner retina of 3TC-treated diabetic mice. Our data suggest that 3TC has therapeutic potential since it can target both neuronal and vascular defects caused by diabetes

Defective Hand1 phosphoregulation uncovers essential roles for Hand1 in limb morphogenesis

The morphogenesis of the vertebrate limbs is a complex process in which cell signaling and transcriptional regulation coordinate diverse structural adaptations in diverse species. In this study, we examine the consequences of altering Hand1 dimer choice regulation within developing vertebrate limbs. Although Hand1 deletion via the limb-specific Prrx1-Cre reveals a non-essential role for Hand1 in mouse limb morphogenesis, altering Hand1 phosphoregulation, and consequently Hand1 dimerization affinities, results in a severe truncation of proximal-anterior limb elements. Molecular analysis reveals a non-cell-autonomous mechanism that causes widespread cell death within the embryonic limb bud. In addition, we observe changes in proximal-anterior gene regulation, including a reduction in the expression of Irx3, Irx5, Gli3 and Alx4, all of which are upregulated in Hand2 limb conditional knockouts. A reduction of Hand2 and Shh gene dosage improves the integrity of anterior limb structures, validating the importance of the Twist-family bHLH dimer pool in limb morphogenesis., Summary: Altering Hand1 phosphoregulation, and consequently Hand1 dimerization affinities, results in a severe truncation of anterior-proximal limb elements in mice

IL-33 deficiency causes persistent inflammation and severe neurodegeneration in retinal detachment.

BACKGROUND: Interleukin-33 (IL-33) belongs to the IL-1 cytokine family and resides in the nuclei of various cell types. In the neural retina, IL-33 is predominately expressed in Müller cells although its role in health and disease is ill-defined. Müller cell gliosis is a critical response during the acute phase of retinal detachment (RD), and in this study, we investigated if IL-33 was modulatory in the inflammatory and neurodegenerative pathology which is characteristic of this important clinical condition. METHODS: RD was induced by subretinal injection of sodium hyaluronate into C57BL/6 J (WT) and IL-33-/- mice and confirmed by fundus imaging and optical coherence tomography (OCT). The expression of inflammatory cytokines, complement components and growth factors was examined by RT-PCR. Retinal neurodegeneration, Müller cell activation and immune cell infiltration were assessed using immunohistochemistry. The expression of inflammatory cytokines in primary Müller cells and bone marrow-derived macrophages (BM-DMs) was assessed by RT-PCR and Cytometric Bead Array. RESULTS: RD persisted for at least 28 days after the injection of sodium hyaluronate, accompanied by significant cone photoreceptor degeneration. The mRNA levels of CCL2, C1ra, C1s, IL-18, IL-1β, TNFα, IL-33 and glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) were significantly increased at day 1 post-RD, reduced gradually and, with the exception of GFAP and C1ra, returned to the basal levels by day 28 in WT mice. In IL-33-/- mice, RD induced an exacerbated inflammatory response with significantly higher levels of CCL2, IL-1β and GFAP when compared to WT. Sustained GFAP activation and immune cell infiltration was detected at day 28 post-RD in IL-33-/- mice. Electroretinography revealed a lower A-wave amplitude at day 28 post-RD in IL-33-/- mice compared to that in WT RD mice. IL-33-/- mice subjected to RD also had significantly more severe cone photoreceptor degeneration compared to WT counterparts. Surprisingly, Müller cells from IL-33-/- mice expressed significantly lower levels of CCL2 and IL-6 compared with those from WT mice, particularly under hypoxic conditions, whereas IL-33-/- bone marrow-derived macrophages expressed higher levels of inducible nitric oxide synthase, TNFα, IL-1β and CCL2 after LPS + IFNγ stimulation compared to WT macrophages. CONCLUSION: IL-33 deficiency enhanced retinal degeneration and gliosis following RD which was related to sustained subretinal inflammation from infiltrating macrophages. IL-33 may provide a previously unrecognised protective response by negatively regulating macrophage activation following retinal detachment

Potassium and sodium microdomains in thin astroglial processes: A computational model study

A biophysical model that captures molecular homeostatic control of ions at the perisynaptic cradle (PsC) is of fundamental importance for understanding the interplay between astroglial and neuronal compartments. In this paper, we develop a multi-compartmental mathematical model which proposes a novel mechanism whereby the flow of cations in thin processes is restricted due to negatively charged membrane lipids which result in the formation of deep potential wells near the dipole heads. These wells restrict the flow of cations to “hopping” between adjacent wells as they transverse the process, and this surface retention of cations will be shown to give rise to the formation of potassium (K+) and sodium (Na+) microdomains at the PsC. We further propose that a K+ microdomain formed at the PsC, provides the driving force for the return of K+ to the extracellular space for uptake by the neurone, thereby preventing K+ undershoot. A slow decay of Na+ was also observed in our simulation after a period of glutamate stimulation which is in strong agreement with experimental observations. The pathological implications of microdomain formation during neuronal excitation are also discussed