Hypermedia Learning Objects System - On the Way to a Semantic Educational Web

While eLearning systems become more and more popular in daily education, available applications lack opportunities to structure, annotate and manage their contents in a high-level fashion. General efforts to improve these deficits are taken by initiatives to define rich meta data sets and a semanticWeb layer. In the present paper we introduce Hylos, an online learning system. Hylos is based on a cellular eLearning Object (ELO) information model encapsulating meta data conforming to the LOM standard. Content management is provisioned on this semantic meta data level and allows for variable, dynamically adaptable access structures. Context aware multifunctional links permit a systematic navigation depending on the learners and didactic needs, thereby exploring the capabilities of the semantic web. Hylos is built upon the more general Multimedia Information Repository (MIR) and the MIR adaptive context linking environment (MIRaCLE), its linking extension. MIR is an open system supporting the standards XML, Corba and JNDI. Hylos benefits from manageable information structures, sophisticated access logic and high-level authoring tools like the ELO editor responsible for the semi-manual creation of meta data and WYSIWYG like content editing.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figure

Intraspecific Combinations of Flower and Leaf Volatiles Act Together in Attracting Hawkmoth Pollinators

Insects pinpoint mates, food and oviposition sites by olfactory cues. Recognizing and localizing a suitable target by olfaction is demanding. Odor sources emit characteristic blends of compounds that have to be identified against an environmentally derived olfactory background. This background, however, does not necessarily disturb the localization of a source. Rather, the contrary. Sex pheromones become more attractive to male moths when being presented against a relevant plant background. Here we asked whether such olfactory coaction also characterizes foraging cues. The tobacco hornworm Manduca sexta feeds on nectar from wild tobacco Nicotiana attenuata and sacred datura Datura wrightii flowers. We tested how leaf-derived volatile blends as a background affect the moths' approach to flower blends. We found coaction when a flower blend was presented against a conspecific leaf volatile background but not when the blend was presented against volatiles emitted by the other host plant or by a non-host plant. Hence, our results reveal a species-specific coaction between flower blend and leaf volatile background. The ability to integrate information from different odor sources on one plant might provide the moth with a fine-grained analysis of food site quality

An environment for processing compound media streams : work in progress paper V 2.0

With today s widespread availability of networked multimedia potentials embedded in an infrastructure of qualitative superior kind the distribution of professionally styled multimedia streams has fallen in the realm of possibility. This paper presents a prototypic environment - both model and runtime system - for processing composite media streams variably composed of multimedia data objects. The system consists of an intelligent media database, a Web-authoring tool, a time directed presentation stream and is based on a hypermedia data model of reusable object components. The plug-in free runtime system is designed as a pure JAVA implementation. Further educational applications of our architecture are presented, as well

An environment for processing compound media streams

With today's widespread availability of networked multimedia potentials embedded in an infrastructure of qualitative superior kind the distribution of professionally styled multimedia streams has fallen in the realm of possibility. This paper presents a prototypic environment - both model and runtime system - for processing composite media streams variably composed of multimedia data objects. The system consists of an intelligent media database, a Web-authoring tool, a time directed presentation stream and is based on a hypermedia data model of reusable object components. The plug-in free runtime system is designed as a pure JAVA implementation. Further educational applications of our architecture are presented, as well

An environment for processing compound media streams : work in progress paper V 2.0

With today s widespread availability of networked multimedia potentials embedded in an infrastructure of qualitative superior kind the distribution of professionally styled multimedia streams has fallen in the realm of possibility. This paper presents a prototypic environment - both model and runtime system - for processing composite media streams variably composed of multimedia data objects. The system consists of an intelligent media database, a Web-authoring tool, a time directed presentation stream and is based on a hypermedia data model of reusable object components. The plug-in free runtime system is designed as a pure JAVA implementation. Further educational applications of our architecture are presented, as well

Educational Content Management : A Cellular Approach

In recent times online educational applications more and more are requested to provide self-consistent learning offers for students at the university level. Consequently they need to cope with the wide range of complexity and interrelations university course teaching brings along. An urgent need to overcome simplistically linked HTML content pages becomes apparent. In the present paper we discuss a schematic concept of educational content construction from information cells and introduce its implementation on the storage and runtime layer. Starting from cells content is annotated according to didactic needs, structured for dynamic arrangement, dynamically decorated with hyperlinks and, as all works are based on XML, open to any presentation layer. Data can be variably accessed through URIs built on semantic path-names and edited via an adaptive authoring toolbox. Our content management approach is based on the more general Multimedia Information Repository MIR. and allows for personalisation, as well. MIR is an open system supporting the standards XML, Corba and JNDI.

An Environment for Processing Compound Media Streams - Work in progress paper V 2.0 -

With today s widespread availability of networked multimedia potentials embedded in an infrastructure of qualitative superior kind the distribution of professionally styled multimedia streams has fallen in the realm of possibility. This paper presents a prototypic environment - both model and runtime system - for processing composite media streams variably composed of multimedia data objects. The system consists of an intelligent media database, a Web-authoring tool, a time directed presentation stream and is based on a hypermedia data model of reusable object components. The plug-in free runtime system is designed as a pure JAVA implementation. Further educational applications of our architecture are presented, as well

Schematic drawing of the wind tunnel (length, 250 cm; width, 90 cm; height, 90 cm).

<p>Females were released from a platform 50(distance between sources, 20 cm) were placed at the upwind entrance to the wind tunnel. These consisted of filter papers loaded with synthetic flower odors. Headspace volatiles from non-flowering plants placed in a glass cylinder outside the tunnel were released close to the source of flower volatiles.</p

Attraction of <i>M. sexta</i> females to plant and flower odors.

<p>(a) No-choice experiment: Percentage of moths that flew upwind towards the presented odor source (duf) and reached the source with extended proboscis (sc). (b) Two-choice experiment with two single odor sources presented in the wind tunnel (20 cm apart). (b-i) Number of first source contacts. (b-ii) Total number of approaches per moth within 5 min. (c) Two-choice experiment, presenting a single flower blend stimulus and a combined flower and plant odor. (c-i) Number of first source contacts. (c-ii) Total number of approaches per moth within 5 min. Error bars depict the standard deviation.</p