An exploration of integrating the computer into the artroom : curriculum development and teacher training.

The purpose of this dissertation is to explore the integration of the computer into the art classroom with specific intent to provide teacher training and to determine the need for standards in curriculum development. The following questions will be addressed: What (if any) direction should be followed to implement a systematic curriculum methodology for computer graphics? What are we currently doing to meet this need? How are we training our art educators to integrate the computer for art and design, and what do these teachers need in the way of background? What considerations become relevant to the classroom art teacher in the logistical procedures of setting up labs or utilizing pre-existing labs in a school district? The conclusions of this study were based on results from both qualitative and quantitative investigations. The quantitative results were obtained by sending out close-ended questionnaires for self-completion, by mail. The sample included 276 public school districts. The demographic results reviewed include statistical data which is displayed in chart and graphed formats. The qualitative results were obtained by creating and then implementing a teacher training tutorial program for 10 teachers in respective school districts. The results of pre- and post-assessment questionnaires were evaluated regarding each teacher\u27s documented variances in attitudes, performances, acquired skills, knowledge, and opinions. While carrying out part two of the study, I intended to promote literacy, awareness, and understanding to the participating art teachers on the potential usage of the computer for art in the art classroom. If teachers have a stronger foundation and confidence in this area, they will more effectively integrate this tool into the art curriculum. Such grounding will hopefully give students in art the opportunity to use computers more efficiently and, it will create an awareness of the inherent possibilities this tool offers at an early stage

Elastic Behavior of a Two-dimensional Crystal near Melting

Using positional data from video-microscopy we determine the elastic moduli of two-dimensional colloidal crystals as a function of temperature. The moduli are extracted from the wave-vector-dependent normal mode spring constants in the limit $q\to 0$ and are compared to the renormalized Young's modulus of the KTHNY theory. An essential element of this theory is the universal prediction that Young's modulus must approach $16 \pi$ at the melting temperature. This is indeed observed in our experiment.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Valuable Information and Costly Liquidity: Evidence from Individual Mutual Fund Trades

Until recently, all Canadian mutual funds were required to disclose all their individual trades, offering a unique and ideal opportunity to measure and analyze the cost and performance of mutual funds\u27 trades. We find that active management delivers both cheaper trades and better subsequent performance, and that the dissipative effect of flow-driven transactions costs is primarily through forced sales. Fund size associates with both cheaper trades and better subsequent performance, and a series of trades predicts more price movement in the predicted direction, indicating the value to funds of keeping their trading anonymous

Nonlocal elastic compliance for soft solids: theory, simulations, and experiments

The nonlocal elastic response function is crucial for understanding many properties of soft solids. This may be obtained by measuring strain-strain autocorrelation functions. We use computer simulations as well as video microscopy data of superparamagnetic colloids to obtain these correlations for two-dimensional triangular solids. Elastic constants and elastic correlation lengths are extracted by analyzing the correlation functions. We show that to explain our observations displacement fluctuations in a soft solid need to contain affine (strain) as well as nonaffine components

Tumor-reactive immune cells protect against metastatic tumor and induce immunoediting of indolent but not quiescent tumor cells

Two major barriers to cancer immunotherapy include tumor-induced immune suppression mediated by myeloid-derived suppressor cells and poor immunogenicity of the tumor-expressing self-antigens. To overcome these barriers, we reprogrammed tumor-immune cell cross-talk by combined use of decitabine and adoptive immunotherapy, containing tumor-sensitized T cells and CD25+ NKT cells. Decitabine functioned to induce the expression of highly immunogenic cancer testis antigens in the tumor, while also reducing the frequency of myeloid-derived suppressor cells and the presence of CD25+ NKT cells rendered T cells, resistant to remaining myeloid-derived suppressor cells. This combinatorial therapy significantly prolonged survival of animals bearing metastatic tumor cells. Adoptive immunotherapy also induced tumor immunoediting, resulting in tumor escape and associated disease-related mortality. To identify a tumor target that is incapable of escape from the immune response, we used dormant tumor cells. We used Adriamycin chemotherapy or radiation therapy, which simultaneously induce tumor cell death and tumor dormancy. Resultant dormant cells became refractory to additional doses of Adriamycin or radiation therapy, but they remained sensitive to tumor-reactive immune cells. Importantly, we discovered that dormant tumor cells contained indolent cells that expressed low levels of Ki67 and quiescent cells that were Ki67 negative. Whereas the former were prone to tumor immunoediting and escape, the latter did not demonstrate immunoediting. Our results suggest that immunotherapy could be highly effective against quiescent dormant tumor cells. The challenge is to develop combinatorial therapies that could establish a quiescent type of tumor dormancy, which would be the best target for immunotherapy

Anisotropic elasticity in confocal studies of colloidal crystals

We consider the theory of fluctuations of a colloidal solid observed in a confocal slice. For a cubic crystal we study the evolution of the projected elastic properties as a function of the anisotropy of the crystal using numerical methods based on the fast Fourier transform. In certain situations of high symmetry we find exact analytic results for the projected fluctuations.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figure

Quadrupole Moments of Neutron-Deficient 20,21^{20, 21}Na

The electric-quadrupole coupling constant of the ground states of the proton drip line nucleus $^{20}$Na($I^{\pi}$ = 2$^{+}$, $T_{1/2}$ = 447.9 ms) and the neutron-deficient nucleus $^{21}$Na($I^{\pi}$ = 3/2$^{+}$, $T_{1/2}$ = 22.49 s) in a hexagonal ZnO single crystal were precisely measured to be $|eqQ/h| = 690 \pm 12$ kHz and 939 $\pm$ 14 kHz, respectively, using the multi-frequency $\beta$-ray detecting nuclear magnetic resonance technique under presence of an electric-quadrupole interaction. A electric-quadrupole coupling constant of $^{27}$Na in the ZnO crystal was also measured to be $|eqQ/h| = 48.4 \pm 3.8$ kHz. The electric-quadrupole moments were extracted as $|Q(^{20}$Na)$|$ = 10.3 $\pm$ 0.8 $e$ fm$^2$ and $|Q(^{21}$Na)$|$ = 14.0 $\pm$ 1.1 $e$ fm$^2$, using the electric-coupling constant of $^{27}$Na and the known quadrupole moment of this nucleus as references. The present results are well explained by shell-model calculations in the full $sd$-shell model space.Comment: Accepted for publication in Physics Letters

Functional Brain Imaging with Multi-Objective Multi-Modal Evolutionary Optimization

Functional brain imaging is a source of spatio-temporal data mining problems. A new framework hybridizing multi-objective and multi-modal optimization is proposed to formalize these data mining problems, and addressed through Evolutionary Computation (EC). The merits of EC for spatio-temporal data mining are demonstrated as the approach facilitates the modelling of the experts' requirements, and flexibly accommodates their changing goals