Sisyphus 4.0

This paper was originally written for Dr. Evan Tiffany’s Philosophy 221 course Ethical Theory. The assignment asked students to articulate Richard Taylor's view regarding what makes a life meaningful as presented in his paper “The Meaning of Life.” The paper uses MLA citation style

Applying standards for leaders to the selection of secondary school principals

The purpose of this paper is to report innovative research aimed at ascertaining whether standards for school leaders could be applied to the process of selecting senior secondary school principlas for appointment. Specifically, psychometrically robust measurees of performance are sought that would sufficiently differentiate performance to support judgement about whether or not to appoint candidates in the public educational authority of Western Australi

Designing Authentic Learning Activities to Train Pre-Service Teachers About Teaching Online

Online learning is increasingly being used in K-12 learning environments. A concomitant trend is found towards learning becoming authentic as students learn with tasks that are connected to real-world occupations. In this study, 48 pre-service teachers use an online environment to engage in authentic practice as they developed online learning experiences for their future students. Using a design-based research methodology, the researchers were involved in planning, designing, implementing, and evaluating the higher education class across two macro cycles. An authentic learning framework was utilized in the development of the class. Findings explicate the design of the course and how it aligned to the authentic learning framework. It appears that web-based tools were beneficial as the pre-service teachers designed their own K-12 online classes. Findings show that the pre-service teachers\u27 comfort increased when using the using online web building applications in the authentic environment. Furthermore, a high level of engagement in reflective and collaborative learning was uncovered during the activities. This research acts as a springboard for educators who are interested in designing online higher education courses incorporating authentic learning experiences

Using Twitter to Support Reflective Learning in an Asynchronous Online Course

The purpose of this study was to further our understanding of the use of Twitter for promoting reflective learning. Specifically, this study investigated how students participate in Twitter-supported activities, what type of knowledge are manifested when Twitter is used to reflect on the course readings, and how students perceive the Twitter-supported activities. The data showed that Twitter was successful in keeping the learners engaged in the reflective discussion activities for a prolonged period compared to Blackboard. Students overall had a positive perception towards the integration of Twitter to support reflection and discussion along with active participation. Twitter was effective in increasing perceived learner-content and learner-learner interactivity along with engagement. We also provide recommendations for educational practitioners and direction for future research

Neutron powder diffraction study on the iron-based nitride superconductor ThFeAsN

We report neutron diffraction and transport results on the newly discovered superconducting nitride ThFeAsN with $T_c=$ 30 K. No magnetic transition, but a weak structural distortion around 160 K, is observed cooling from 300 K to 6 K. Analysis on the resistivity, Hall transport and crystal structure suggests this material behaves as an electron optimally doped pnictide superconductors due to extra electrons from nitrogen deficiency or oxygen occupancy at the nitrogen site, which together with the low arsenic height may enhance the electron itinerancy and reduce the electron correlations, thus suppress the static magnetic order.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, Accepted by EP

Lewis Acid Zeolites for Biomass Conversion: Perspectives and Challenges on Reactivity, Synthesis, and Stability

Zeolites containing Sn, Ti, Zr, Hf, Nb, or Ta heteroatoms are versatile catalysts for the activation and conversion of oxygenated molecules owing to the unique Lewis acid character of their tetrahedral metal sites. Through fluoride-mediated synthesis, hydrophobic Lewis acid zeolites can behave as water-tolerant catalysts, which has resulted in a recent surge of experimental and computational studies in the field of biomass conversion. However, many open questions still surround these materials, especially relating to the nature of their active sites. This lack of fundamental understanding is exemplified by the many dissonant results that have been described in recent literature reports. In this review, we use a molecular-based approach to provide insight into the relationship between the structure of the metal center and its reactivity toward different substrates, with the ultimate goal of providing a robust framework to understand the properties that have the strongest influence on catalytic performance for the conversion of oxygenates

Robust Unsupervised Cross-Lingual Word Embedding using Domain Flow Interpolation

This paper investigates an unsupervised approach towards deriving a universal, cross-lingual word embedding space, where words with similar semantics from different languages are close to one another. Previous adversarial approaches have shown promising results in inducing cross-lingual word embedding without parallel data. However, the training stage shows instability for distant language pairs. Instead of mapping the source language space directly to the target language space, we propose to make use of a sequence of intermediate spaces for smooth bridging. Each intermediate space may be conceived as a pseudo-language space and is introduced via simple linear interpolation. This approach is modeled after domain flow in computer vision, but with a modified objective function. Experiments on intrinsic Bilingual Dictionary Induction tasks show that the proposed approach can improve the robustness of adversarial models with comparable and even better precision. Further experiments on the downstream task of Cross-Lingual Natural Language Inference show that the proposed model achieves significant performance improvement for distant language pairs in downstream tasks compared to state-of-the-art adversarial and non-adversarial models

Applying a Modified Technology Acceptance Model to Qualitatively Analyse the Factors Affecting Microblogging Integration

The purpose of this research is to examine factors affecting students’ perception and engagement of microblogging integration using a qualitative approach. We employed a qualitative case study design to explore potential factors affecting microblogging integration in a hybrid course. Using the technology acceptance model (TAM) model as an umbrella framework, we examined through in-depth interviews with 18 participants the impact of microblogging integration into instruction that affected students’ reported use and perceptions of their microblogging-supported learning experiences. We found that individual differences, system characteristics, social influence and facilitating conditions all have impact on student participation and engagement in microblogging integration to varying degrees. We identified more granular factors within each of the four dimensions. Additionally, we proposed a Twitter user taxonomy based on perceived usefulness and usage behaviour and discussed its broad implications in higher education learning environments. Finally, we identified several pedagogical implications pertaining to strategies of microblogging integration under the context of a hybrid course and offered pertinent recommendations for future research

MAVS Is essential for primary CD4 + T cell immunity but not for recall T cell responses following an attenuated West Nile virus infection

ABSTRACT The use of pathogen recognition receptor (PRR) agonists and the molecular mechanisms involved have been the major focus of research in individual vaccine development. West Nile virus (WNV) nonstructural (NS) 4B-P38G mutant has several features for an ideal vaccine candidate, including significantly reduced neuroinvasiveness, induction of strong adaptive immunity, and protection of mice from wild-type (WT) WNV infection. Here, we determined the role of mitochondrial antiviral signaling protein (MAVS), the adaptor protein for RIG-I-like receptor in regulating host immunity against the NS4B-P38G vaccine. We found that Mavs −/− mice were more susceptible to NS4B-P38G priming than WT mice. Mavs −/− mice had a transiently reduced production of antiviral cytokines and an impaired CD4 + T cell response in peripheral organs. However, antibody and CD8 + T cell responses were minimally affected. NS4B-P38G induced lower type I interferon (IFN), IFN-stimulating gene, and proinflammatory cytokine responses in Mavs −/− dendritic cells and subsequently compromised the antigen-presenting capacity for CD4 + T cells. Interestingly, Mavs −/− mice surviving NS4B-P38G priming were all protected from a lethal WT WNV challenge. NS4B-P38G-primed Mavs −/− mice exhibited equivalent levels of protective CD4 + T cell recall response, a modestly reduced WNV-specific IgM production, but more robust CD8 + T cell recall response. Taken together, our results suggest that MAVS is essential for boosting optimal primary CD4 + T cell responses upon NS4B-P38G vaccination and yet is dispensable for host protection and recall T cell responses during secondary WT WNV infection. IMPORTANCE The production of innate cytokines induced by the recognition of pathogen recognition receptors (PRRs) via their cognate ligands are critical for enhancing antigen-presenting cell functions and influencing T cell responses during microbial infection. The use of PRR agonists and the underlying molecular mechanisms have been the major focus in individual vaccine development. Here, we determined the role of mitochondrial antiviral-signaling protein (MAVS), the adaptor protein for RIG-I like receptor in regulating host immunity against the live attenuated West Nile virus (WNV) vaccine strain, the nonstructural (NS) 4B-P38G mutant. We found that MAVS is important for boosting optimal primary CD4 + T cell response during NS4B-P38G vaccination. However, MAVS is dispensable for memory T cell development and host protection during secondary wild-type WNV infection. Overall, these results may be utilized as a paradigm to aid in the rational development of other efficacious live attenuated flavivirus vaccines

One-pot synthesis of MWW zeolite nanosheets using a rationally designed organic structure-directing agent

A new material MIT-1 comprised of delaminated MWW zeolite nanosheets is made in a one-pot synthesis using a rationally designed organic structure-directing agent (OSDA). The OSDA consists of a hydrophilic head segment that resembles the OSDA used to synthesize the zeolite precursor MCM-22(P), a hydrophobic tail segment that resembles the swelling agent used to swell MCM-22(P), and a di-quaternary ammonium linker that connects both segments. MIT-1 features high crystallinity and surface areas exceeding 500 m[superscript 2] g[superscript −1], and can be synthesized over a wide synthesis window that includes Si/Al ratios ranging from 13 to 67. Characterization data reveal high mesoporosity and acid strength with no detectable amorphous silica phases. Compared to MCM-22 and MCM-56, MIT-1 shows a three-fold increase in catalytic activity for the Friedel–Crafts alkylation of benzene with benzyl alcohol.United States. Dept. of Energy. Office of Basic Energy Sciences. Chemical Sciences, Geosciences, & Biosciences Division (DE-FG0212ER16352)Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship