3,719 research outputs found
Teaching introductory undergraduate Physics using commercial video games
Commercial video games are increasingly using sophisticated physics
simulations to create a more immersive experience for players. This also makes
them a powerful tool for engaging students in learning physics. We provide some
examples to show how commercial off-the-shelf games can be used to teach
specific topics in introductory undergraduate physics. The examples are
selected from a course taught predominantly through the medium of commercial
video games.Comment: Accepted to Physics Education, Fig1 does not render properly in this
versio
17 ways to say yes:Toward nuanced tone of voice in AAC and speech technology
People with complex communication needs who use speech-generating devices have very little expressive control over their tone of voice. Despite its importance in human interaction, the issue of tone of voice remains all but absent from AAC research and development however. In this paper, we describe three interdisciplinary projects, past, present and future: The critical design collection Six Speaking Chairs has provoked deeper discussion and inspired a social model of tone of voice; the speculative concept Speech Hedge illustrates challenges and opportunities in designing more expressive user interfaces; the pilot project Tonetable could enable participatory research and seed a research network around tone of voice. We speculate that more radical interactions might expand frontiers of AAC and disrupt speech technology as a whole
Heart Development, Coronary Vascularization and Ventricular Maturation in a Giant Danio (Devario malabaricus)
Giant danios (genus Devario), like zebrafish, are teleosts belonging to the danioninae subfamily of cyprinids. Adult giant danios are used in a variety of investigations aimed at understanding cellular and physiological processes, including heart regeneration. Despite their importance, little is known about development and growth in giant danios, or their cardiac and coronary vessels development. To address this scarcity of knowledge, we performed a systematic study of a giant danio (Devario malabaricus), focusing on its cardiac development, from the segmentation period to ten months post-fertilization. Using light and scanning electron microscopy, we documented that its cardiovascular development and maturation proceed along well defined dynamic and conserved morphogenic patterns. The overall size and cardiovascular expansion of this species was significantly impacted by environmental parameters such as rearing densities. The coronary vasculature began to emerge in the late larval stage. More importantly, we documented two possible loci of initiation of the coronary vasculature in this species, and compared the emergence of the coronaries to that of zebrafish and gourami. This is the first comprehensive study of the cardiac growth in a Devario species, and our findings serve as an important reference for further investigations of cardiac biology using this species
High volume fabrication of laser targets using MEMS techniques
The latest techniques for the fabrication of high power laser targets, using processes developed for the manufacture of Micro-Electro-Mechanical System (MEMS) devices are discussed. These laser targets are designed to meet the needs of the increased shot numbers that are available in the latest design of laser facilities. Traditionally laser targets have been fabricated using conventional machining or coarse etching processes and have been produced in quantities of 10s to low 100s. Such targets can be used for high complexity experiments such as Inertial Fusion Energy (IFE) studies and can have many complex components that need assembling and characterisation with high precision. Using the techniques that are common to MEMS devices and integrating these with an existing target fabrication capability we are able to manufacture and deliver targets to these systems. It also enables us to manufacture novel targets that have not been possible using other techniques. In addition, developments in the positioning systems that are required to deliver these targets to the laser focus are also required and a system to deliver the target to a focus of an F2 beam at 0.1Hz is discussed
Closing of the Induced Gap in a Hybrid Superconductor-Semiconductor Nanowire
Hybrid superconductor-semiconductor nanowires are predicted to undergo a
field-induced phase transition from a trivial to a topological superconductor,
marked by the closure and re-opening of the excitation gap, followed by the
emergence of Majorana bound states at the nanowire ends. Many local
density-of-states measurements have reported signatures of the topological
phase, however this interpretation has been challenged by alternative
explanations. Here, by measuring nonlocal conductance, we identify the closure
of the excitation gap in the bulk of the semiconductor before the emergence of
zero-bias peaks. This observation is inconsistent with scenarios where
zero-bias peaks occur due to end-states with a trivially gapped bulk, which
have been extensively considered in the theoretical and experimental
literature. We observe that after the gap closes, nonlocal signals fluctuate
strongly and persist irrespective of the presence of local-conductance
zero-bias peaks. Thus, our observations are also incompatible with a simple
picture of clean topological superconductivity. This work presents a new
experimental approach for probing the spatial extent of states in Majorana
wires, and reveals the presence of a regime with a continuum of spatially
extended states and uncorrelated zero-bias peaks
A Novel Approach Using Transcomplementing Adenoviral Vectors for Gene Therapy of Adrenocortical Cancer
Femtosecond X-Ray Diffraction Studies of the Reversal of the Microstructural Effects of Plastic Deformation during Shock Release of Tantalum
We have used femtosecond x-ray diffraction (XRD) to study laser-shocked fiber-textured polycrystalline tantalum targets as the 37-253 GPa shock waves break out from the free surface. We extract the time and depth-dependent strain profiles within the Ta target as the rarefaction wave travels back into the bulk of the sample. In agreement with molecular dynamics (MD) simulations the lattice rotation and the twins that are formed under shock-compression are observed to be almost fully eliminated by the rarefaction process
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