Bristlebots and other friends. A progression of Epistemic insight workshops using small things to ask big questions

Small, handmade and inexpensive robots can help students across a range of ages unpack and explore big questions around the nature of life, curiosity and creativity. This is an introduction to a series of workshops where students learn how to frame and investigate different types of questions including big questions that bridge science, religion, computing and the wider humanities. The first workshop, aimed at upper KS2 looks at the ideas of what we mean by life and to be alive. The second workshop builds on this and asks, ‘can a robot have a sense of curiosity?’ What would a robot need to have a sense of curiosity, what do we need across a range of subject domains. The third workshop takes this further and helps KS3/4 students to ask questions about what it means to be creative, would a robot make a good friend and our we, ourselves, programmed by the society that we grow up in? The workshops are a part of wider activities delivered across primary, secondary, ITE and outreach activities by the LASAR team accompanied by research informing development of epistemic insight in children and young people and equipping them with curiosity, analytical and critical skills to understand current global problems and answer Big Questions

Empirical Evaluation of the Parallel Distribution Sweeping Framework on Multicore Architectures

In this paper, we perform an empirical evaluation of the Parallel External Memory (PEM) model in the context of geometric problems. In particular, we implement the parallel distribution sweeping framework of Ajwani, Sitchinava and Zeh to solve batched 1-dimensional stabbing max problem. While modern processors consist of sophisticated memory systems (multiple levels of caches, set associativity, TLB, prefetching), we empirically show that algorithms designed in simple models, that focus on minimizing the I/O transfers between shared memory and single level cache, can lead to efficient software on current multicore architectures. Our implementation exhibits significantly fewer accesses to slow DRAM and, therefore, outperforms traditional approaches based on plane sweep and two-way divide and conquer.Comment: Longer version of ESA'13 pape

Sleep and daytime sleepiness in methylphenidate medicated and un-medicated children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)

Objective: Excessive daytime sleepiness due to any cause can result in various symptoms similar to those used for the diagnosis of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). A common treatment for children diagnosed with ADHD is methylphenidate which is also used to treat excessive daytime sleepiness. This paper reports on a study which compared the perceived levels of daytime sleepiness and prevalence of sleep disorders in medicated and un-medicated children with ADHD. Method: The sample consisted of two matched groups of children who had been formally diagnosed with ADHD. One group (n=12) was taking immediate release methylphenidate twice daily, while the other group (n=11) had never, and were not currently, taking any medication. The two groups, as well as their parents, rated their levels of daytime sleepiness at three points in a single day. Results: Significantly higher levels of daytime sleepiness were reported by the parents of the un-medicated children between the hours of 13:00 and 15:00, compared to the medicated children. The medicated children became increasingly sleepier from the first to the second measurement in both the morning and afternoon. There was no significant difference in the number of sleep disorders/disruptions reported by the parents of either group. Conclusion: In a group of children with ADHD taking methylphenidate, there was a significant increase in  sleepiness a few hours after taking the medication, which may then have a significant impact on their learning. The data also imply that part of the mechanism of action of methylphenidate effects in these children may be by reduction of daytime sleepiness.Keywords: Attention Deficit Disorder with hyperactivity; Methylphenidate; Disorders of excessive somnolenc

LAI’s Lean Enterprise Value Business Simulation Aids in Mapping Enterprise Value Stream of Textron’s Sensor Fuzed Weapons Program

From August 24 through September 10, members of the Lean Aerospace Initiative (LAI), the Massachusetts Manufacturing Extension Program (Mass MEP), Rockwell Collins and Metis Design met with host company Textron Systems in an historic collaborative effort to map the enterprise value stream of Textron’s Sensor Fuzed Weapons (SFW) program. The workshop also included participation from the US Air Force, Alliant Techsystems, Cessna Aircraft, Herley Industries, and Pioneer Aerospace

Climatic controls on hurricane patterns: A 1200-y near-annual record from Lighthouse Reef, Belize

Tropical cyclones (TCs) are powerful agents of destruction, and understanding climatic controls on TC patterns is of great importance. Over timescales of seasons to several decades, relationships among TC track, frequency, intensity and basin-scale climate changes are well documented by instrumental records. Over centuries to millennia, climate-shift influence on TC regimes remains poorly constrained. To better understand these relationships, records from multiple locations of TC strikes spanning millennia with high temporal resolution are required, but such records are rare. Here we report on a highly detailed sedimentary proxy record of paleo-TC strikes from the Blue Hole of Lighthouse Reef, Belize. Our findings provide an important addition to other high-resolution records, which collectively demonstrate that shifts between active and inactive TC regimes have occurred contemporaneously with shifts hemispheric-scale oceanic and atmospheric circulation patterns such as MDR SSTs and NAO mode, rather than with changes in local climate phenomena as has previously been suggested

The Effects of Shoe Design on Lower Limb Running Kinematics

The preference of running as a form of exercise exposes more recreational athletes to the risk of injury. Stress fractures occur for 0.7-20% of all running injuries (Wilder & Sethi, 2004) and 24-50% of stress fractures occur in the tibia (Aweid, Aweid, Talibi, & Porter, 2013). Stress fractures have been associated with high vertical impact peaks while running (Willy & Davis, 2013) so methods such as barefoot running and minimalist shoes aim to reduce these impact peaks by enforcing a more forefoot running pattern. Shoes with a lower drop height have been shown to induce a more forefoot running pattern without the discomfort of running barefoot or in non-cushioned minimalist shoes (Horvais & Samozino, 2012). The purpose of this study was to compare ankle joint kinematics, dorsiflexor muscle activity, and tibial axial acceleration while wearing low and high heel-drop shoes. Six female participants (19.8(1.0) years, 163.0(3.8) cm, and 60.4(5.5) kg) who ran a minimum of 10 miles per week provided informed consent prior to testing. Participants were equipped with a 16g BioNomadix tri-axial accelerometer attached to the tibia, a Bi-axial electrogoniometer attached at the ankle, two Ag-AgCl surface electrodes attached to the tibialis anterior with adhesive discs, one reference electrode placed on the anteromedial aspect of the tibia (not above a muscle), and a heart rate monitor. Participants completed two data running trials at a target effort of 65-70% of the heart rate reserve. Trials were performed in different shoes (drop heights 4mm(S1) and 11.7mm(S2)) with a minimum 10-minute rest between trials. Paired t-tests were used to compare conditions for each variable. Mean ankle angles at ground contact (S1=100.9(3.8)°, S2=102.6(3.0)°) were not significantly different (t(5)=-1.465, p=0.203) and had a small effect size (Cohen d=0.598). Mean peak tibial accelerations (S1=5.22(2.51g), S2=5.90(2.90)g) were not significantly different (t(5)=-1.238, p=0.271) and had a small effect size (Cohen d=0.505). The mean percentages of maximal EMG for the tibialis anterior (S1=66.2(45.7)%, S2=55.6(38.5)%) were not significant (t(5)=1.380, p=0.226) and had a small effect size (Cohen d=0.563). Though differences were observed between shoe conditions for each participant, the shoe drop height did not significantly affect the measured variables and cannot be assumed to be responsible for these observed differences

PhiXing-it, displaying foreign peptides on bacteriophage ΦX174

AbstractAlthough bacteriophage φX174 is easy to propagate and genetically tractable, it is use as a peptide display platform has not been explored. One region within the φX174 major spike protein G tolerated 13 of 16 assayed insertions, ranging from 10 to 75 amino acids. The recombinant proteins were functional and incorporated into infectious virions. In the folded protein, the peptides would be icosahedrally displayed within loops that extend from the protein׳s β-barrel core. The well-honed genetics of φX174 allowed permissive insertions to be quickly identified by the cellular phenotypes associated with cloned gene expression. The cloned genes were easily transferred from plasmids to phage genomes via recombination rescue. Direct ELISA validated several recombinant virions for epitope display. Some insertions conferred a temperature-sensitive (ts) protein folding defect, which was suppressed by global suppressors in protein G, located too far away from the insertion to directly alter peptide display

Cross-Document Pattern Matching

We study a new variant of the string matching problem called cross-document string matching, which is the problem of indexing a collection of documents to support an efficient search for a pattern in a selected document, where the pattern itself is a substring of another document. Several variants of this problem are considered, and efficient linear-space solutions are proposed with query time bounds that either do not depend at all on the pattern size or depend on it in a very limited way (doubly logarithmic). As a side result, we propose an improved solution to the weighted level ancestor problem

Gladstone air study 2009-2010 : Monitoring for polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), and polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins (PCDDs) & furans (PCDFs) and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs).

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Gladstone Air Study was initiated as part of the Clean & Healthy Air for Gladstone (CHAG) project established by Queensland Health and the Department of Environment and Resource Management. This project arose in response to community concern regarding the perceived cumulative impact of industrial growth in the Gladstone region on air quality and the consequences for human health. The Gladstone Air Study, as a component of CHAG, aimed to provide data which will profile the levels and types of specific hazardous air pollutants (HAPs) and allow for an assessment of the subsequent health risks they pose to humans living and working in the Gladstone region. The specific HAPs, which were targeted in the Gladstone Air Study, included polycylic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), polychlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins and furans (PCDD/Fs). These HAPs were monitored over a twelve month period between February 2009 and January 2010. Monitoring was conducted on a monthly basis at two sites (South Gladstone and Targinie) and in winter (June/July 2009) and summer (December 2009) at an additional four sites (Boyne Island, Clinton, Auckland Point, and Boat Creek) within the Gladstone Air Monitoring Network. Some additional monthly monitoring occurred at Boyne Island in October and November. Overall this monitoring for HAPs in the Gladstone region has found that the concentrations of PAHs, PCBs and PCDD/Fs in air: „h are within available health based guidelines (National Environmental Protection Measure (Air Toxics) monitoring investigation levels) established for benzo[a]pyrene as a marker for PAH exposure; „h do not contribute significantly to nor exceed available international exposure standards for intake of ¡§dioxin-like¡¨ PCBs and PCDD/Fs recommended by the National Health and Medical Research Council within Australia; and „h are consistent with, or lower than the concentrations measured in other parts of Australia. There was however considerable variation in the concentrations and profiles of specific HAPs within the Gladstone region. Overall the maximum concentrations of all PAH markers of exposure for the region occurred at the South Gladstone site and in summer. The maximum monthly and annual average concentrations of benzo[a]pyrene at this location were 0.14 ng.m-3 and 0.046 ¡Ó 0.045 ng.m-3 respectively, while the regional average concentration (all data) was 0.032 ¡Ó 0.034 ng.m-3. These average concentrations are approximately an order of magnitude lower than the annual average monitoring investigation level of 0.3 ng.m-3 established under the National Environmental Protection Measure (Air Toxics). The concentrations of benzo[a]pyrene in the Gladstone region are similarly lower than the concentrations measured previously in ambient air in major cities in Australia. The maximum monthly concentrations of PCDD/Fs and ¡§dioxin-like¡¨ PCBs expressed as World Health Organization toxic equivalent air concentrations (WHO05 TEQDF and WHO05 TEQP respectively) occurred at South Gladstone in summer (12 fg.m-3) and Boyne Island in winter (0.40 fg.m-3). South Gladstone also had the highest annual average WHO05 TEQDF (4.5 fg.m-3) in the region while Auckland Point had the highest average WHO05TEQP (0.34 fg.m-3). The regional average WHO05 TEQDF and WHO05 TEQP were 2.3 fg.m-3 and 0.14 fg.m-3 respectively. The regional average and range of 2.3 ¡Ó 2.4 (0.24 ¡V 12) fg.m-3 for WHO05 TEQDF measured in the Gladstone region are very consistent with the finding of the National Dioxin Program Page 2 conducted in 2003 which indicated that the concentrations in ambient air in Australia are very low by world standards. For example WHO98 TEQDF average (and range) concentrations of 8.9 (0.73 ¡V 41), 1.5 (0.27 ¡V 4.04), 1.1 (0.11 -121), 2.8 (0.29 ¡V 13) fg.m-3 were reported for Eagle Farm in Brisbane, Mutdapilly south west of Brisbane, Cape Grim in Tasmania and Berrimah in Darwin, respectively. The dominant PCDD congener across the Gladstone region was octachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (OCDD) which is approximately 10 000 times less potent than the reference dioxin congener 2,3,7,8-tetrachnlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (2,3,7,8-TCDD). Average OCDD concentrations ranged from 30 ¡Ó 24 fg.m-3 at Boyne Island to 78 ¡Ó 57 fg.m-3 at South Gladstone. 2,3,7,8-TCDD was only detected at the South Gladstone site in concentrations ranging from 0.50 fg.m-3 to 2.9 fg.m-3. The highest concentrations of PCDF congeners occurred at Targinie and Boat Creek in the north of the region. These elevated PCDF profiles, where maximum concentrations were observed in winter, may reflect some preservation of wood smoke source profiles within the ambient profiles at these locations. The dominant non-ortho PCB congener in the Gladstone region was PCB 77. The average concentrations for this congener ranged from 10 fg.m-3 at Boat Creek and Targinie in the north of the region to 55 fg.m-3 at Auckland Point. The most potent ¡§dioxin-like¡¨ PCB monitored was the non-ortho congener PCB 126 which has an WHO05 TEF of 0.1 (10 times less potent than 2,3,7,8-TCDD). This congener was present at relatively low concentrations across the region with average concentrations ranging from 0.75 ¡V 2.8 fg.m-3 at Clinton and Auckland Point respectively. The most dominant mono-ortho ¡§dioxin-like¡¨ PCB was PCB 118 which was present at maximum values ranging from 517 fg.m-3 at South Gladstone to 1321 fg.m-3 at Auckland Point. It should be noted that this congener was not detected in any of the monitoring periods at sites to the north of Gladstone (Targinie and Boat Creek). While PCB 118 was detected at relatively high concentrations compared to many of the other ¡§dioxin-like¡¨ PCBs, all of the mono-ortho PCBs exhibit a relatively low potency with respect to 2,3,7,8-TCDD