I'm streaming of a white Christmas

A presentation outlining the use of Kaltura Streaming Video tool at Canterbury Christ Church University

The learner, the curriculum and the wardrobe

The workshop will examine and present examples of how e-portfolios (the ‘wardrobe’ of the title) can be embedded within the curriculum, thus allowing students to demonstrate the development of their skills and learning across a range of personal, academic and professional touch points. Furthermore, it is envisaged that e-portfolios could enable students to become 21st century self-reflective practitioners, a critical graduate skill, and to develop ‘multiple voices’ that are suitable for different audiences. Delegates will be asked to consider how e-portfolios could be situated within their own subject and professional disciplines and discuss the opportunities and challenges in embedding such a tool within their own curriculum

Master of Science

thesisFlying rotorcraft, such as helicopters and quadrotors, can gather useful information without the need for human presence, but they consume a great deal of power and have limited on-board energy resources. Our work aims to provide a passive perching mechanism so that a rotorcraft is able to grip branch-like perches and resist external wind disturbances, using only the weight of the rotorcraft to maintain the grip. Deviating from previous bio-inspired approaches, in this thesis, we propose a mechanism that incorporates a Sarrus linkage to convert the weight of the rotorcraft into grip force. We provide an analysis of the mechanism's kinematics, we present the static force equations that describe how the weight of the rotorcraft is converted into grip force onto a cylindrical perch, and we describe how grip forces relate to the ability to reject horizontal disturbances such as wind gusts. The mechanism is then optimized for use on a single perch size, and then for a range of perch sizes. We conclude by constructing a prototype mechanism, and we demonstrate its use with a remote-controlled helicopter

Effects of thermal cycling on epoxy bonded materials

Thesis (S.B.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2011.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references (p. 21-22).Thermal cycling is a concern to those who use epoxy as an adhesion in space applications due to the mechanical and thermal properties of both the epoxy and adhered materials. These properties include the thermal expansion coefficient, a, and the stress at which the epoxy will yield fracture. An experiment was carried out to find out if failure would occur by thermal cycling of epoxy bonded components in the propulsion components of a small satellite. Failure did not occur due to shear stress attributed to the thermal expansion coefficient but unexpectedly to the liquefaction of epoxy in 3 of the 6 samples. The samples with thicker epoxy layers failed in contrast to the thinner epoxy layer samples. Overall, thermal cycling is still a concern for failure of the epoxy bond.by Michelle Burroughs.S.B

Melarete and peech: preface to an international philosophy with children collaboration

In this paper we discuss two research programs \u2013 MELARETE (Verona, Italy) and Philosophical Ethics in Early Childhood (PEECh) (State College, Pennsylvania, USA) \u2013 and an emerging international research collaboration based on the benefits of practicing philosophy for meaning in early and middle childhood education. We argue for the good of philosophical thinking and its benefits to young students, with a particular focus on ethical development and meaning. We contend that through philosophical pedagogy we can make learning, meaning, vital to students. This is particularly relevant when dealing with questions of ethics and virtue, questions that are close to the lives of children from their earliest years. By discussing these questions and advancing philosophical ethics and virtue programs philosophers can play a central role in the development of responsible and ethical persons in the world. In order to do this, we contend, it is im portant that philosophy be introduced to children from a young age, in the early stages of schooling. Following a discussion of our respective research and education programs in Italy and USA, we discuss our current and ongoing plans for an international research collaboration on ethics and philosophy with children

Pre-service Teachers in Mathematics Lesson Study

This paper presents qualitative evidence to answer the questions, “What are the outcomes of engaging pre-service and in-service teachers in a collaborative lesson study experience” and “How can the outcomes of this experience inform future ways to include preservice teachers in lesson study?” The data gathered demonstrate that including pre-service teachers in lesson study can introduce them to lesson-building as a process and cross-grades teacher collaboration. It can give them opportunities to be critical thinkers in the context of mathematics education and encourages them to think as teachers. One weakness the pre-service teachers demonstrated was an incomplete understanding of the appropriate use of technology in algebra. Consideration of prior knowledge and anticipation of student responses was lacking among both pre-service and in-service teachers. Overall, the data show that pre-service teachers can contribute to the lesson study process as researchers

Unraveling the biochemistry and provenance of pupylation: a prokaryotic analog of ubiquitination

Recently Mycobacterium tuberculosis was shown to possess a novel protein modification, in which a small protein Pup is conjugated to the epsilon-amino groups of lysines in target proteins. Analogous to ubiquitin modification in eukaryotes, this remarkable modification recruits proteins for degradation via archaeal-type proteasomes found in mycobacteria and allied actinobacteria. While a mycobacterial protein named PafA was found to be required for this conjugation reaction, its biochemical mechanism has not been elucidated. Using sensitive sequence profile comparison methods we establish that the PafA family proteins are related to the γ-glutamyl-cysteine synthetase and glutamine synthetase. Hence, we predict that PafA is the Pup ligase, which catalyzes the ATP-dependent ligation of the terminal γ-carboxylate of glutamate to lysines, similar to the above enzymes. We further discovered that an ortholog of the eukaryotic PAC2 (e.g. cg2106) is often present in the vicinity of the actinobacterial Pup-proteasome gene neighborhoods and is likely to represent the ancestral proteasomal chaperone. Pup-conjugation is sporadically present outside the actinobacteria in certain lineages, such as verrucomicrobia, nitrospirae, deltaproteobacteria and planctomycetes, and in the latter two lineages it might modify membrane proteins

Study Of Spatial Biological Systems Using a Graphical User Interface

Proceedings of the Tenth International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction, Crete, Greece, 22-27 June 2003In this paper, we describe a Graphical User Interface (GUI) designed to manage large quantities of image data of a biological system. After setting the design requirements for the system, we developed an ecology quantification GUI that assists biologists in analysing data. We focus on the main features of the interface and we present the results and an evaluation of the system. Finally, we provide some directions for some future work

Dose-adapted post-transplant cyclophosphamide for HLA-haploidentical transplantation in Fanconi anemia.

We developed a haploidentical transplantation protocol with post-transplant cyclophosphamide (CY) for in vivo T-cell depletion (TCD) using a novel adapted-dosing schedule (25 mg/kg on days +3 and +4) for Fanconi anemia (FA). With median follow-up of 3 years (range, 37 days to 6.2 years), all six patients engrafted. Two patients with multiple pre-transplant comorbidities died, one from sepsis and one from sepsis with associated chronic GVHD. Four patients without preexisting comorbidities and early transplant referrals are alive with 100% donor chimerism and excellent performance status. We conclude that adjusted-dosing post-transplant CY is effective in in vivo TCD to promote full donor engraftment in patients with FA

Tribology of Protective Hard Coatings for Use in Oil-Less, Piston-Type Compressors

A systematic analysis of prokaryotic ubiquitin-related beta-grasp fold proteins provides new insights into the Ubiquitin family functional history. BACKGROUND. Ubiquitin (Ub)-mediated signaling is one of the hallmarks of all eukaryotes. Prokaryotic homologs of Ub (ThiS and MoaD) and E1 ligases have been studied in relation to sulfur incorporation reactions in thiamine and molybdenum/tungsten cofactor biosynthesis. However, there is no evidence for entire protein modification systems with Ub-like proteins and deconjugation by deubiquitinating enzymes in prokaryotes. Hence, the evolutionary assembly of the eukaryotic Ub-signaling apparatus remains unclear. RESULTS. We systematically analyzed prokaryotic Ub-related β-grasp fold proteins using sensitive sequence profile searches and structural analysis. Consequently, we identified novel Ub-related proteins beyond the characterized ThiS, MoaD, TGS, and YukD domains. To understand their functional associations, we sought and recovered several conserved gene neighborhoods and domain architectures. These included novel associations involving diverse sulfur metabolism proteins, siderophore biosynthesis and the gene encoding the transfer mRNA binding protein SmpB, as well as domain fusions between Ub-like domains and PIN-domain related RNAses. Most strikingly, we found conserved gene neighborhoods in phylogenetically diverse bacteria combining genes for JAB domains (the primary de-ubiquitinating isopeptidases of the proteasomal complex), along with E1-like adenylating enzymes and different Ub-related proteins. Further sequence analysis of other conserved genes in these neighborhoods revealed several Ub-conjugating enzyme/E2-ligase related proteins. Genes for an Ub-like protein and a JAB domain peptidase were also found in the tail assembly gene cluster of certain caudate bacteriophages. CONCLUSION. These observations imply that members of the Ub family had already formed strong functional associations with E1-like proteins, UBC/E2-related proteins, and JAB peptidases in the bacteria. Several of these Ub-like proteins and the associated protein families are likely to function together in signaling systems just as in eukaryotes.National Library of Medicine, National Institute of Healt