Digital Techniques for Documenting and Preserving Cultural Heritage

In this unique collection the authors present a wide range of interdisciplinary methods to study, document, and conserve material cultural heritage. The methods used serve as exemplars of best practice with a wide variety of cultural heritage objects having been recorded, examined, and visualised. The objects range in date, scale, materials, and state of preservation and so pose different research questions and challenges for digitization, conservation, and ontological representation of knowledge. Heritage science and specialist digital technologies are presented in a way approachable to non-scientists, while a separate technical section provides details of methods and techniques, alongside examples of notable applications of spatial and spectral documentation of material cultural heritage, with selected literature and identification of future research. This book is an outcome of interdisciplinary research and debates conducted by the participants of the COST Action TD1201, Colour and Space in Cultural Heritage, 2012–16 and is an Open Access publication available under a CC BY-NC-ND licence.https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/mip_arc_cdh/1000/thumbnail.jp

The mechanisms underlying nuptial colouration in the white Threespine Stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus)

1 online resource (53 pages) : illustrations (some colour), colour mapIncludes abstract.Includes bibliographical references (pages 45-53).Often the most striking displays of colour in animals arise from interactions during mating. Nuptial colouration is exclusively associated with mating and typically functions in either female mate choice by signalling male quality, or male competition by asserting dominance and possession of a territory. Animal colouration is the result of various chromatophores found within the integument. Changes in the number and distribution of chromatophores and pigments over time causes seasonal colour change associated with nuptial colouration. The Threespine Stickleback (Gasterosteus aculeatus) is a teleost fish found throughout the northern hemisphere that displays large variation in nuptial colouration among populations. The white Threespine Stickleback, endemic to Nova Scotia, displays a pearlescent white colour during breeding season in contrast to the common Threespine Stickleback which is a dark green/brown colour. Although Threespine Sticklebacks are a model system for many evolutionary studies, the mechanisms involved in the evolution of the contrasting nuptial colouration of the white and common males are not well understood. The purpose of this study was to determine the cellular mechanisms underlying the differences in nuptial colouration of these ecotypes. In particular, I looked at both melanophore and iridophore coverage as well as melanophore number and percent of isolated iridophores in the two dermal chromatophore layers of stickleback. My results indicate that common males have a higher melanophore coverage and fewer isolated iridophores in the deep dermal layer than the white males. However, the number of melanophores and the iridophore coverage in each layer, as well as the surface melanophore coverage, did not significantly differ between the two groups. These finding indicate that the integumental chromatophores in these males are quite morphologically similar in number and distribution. Future studies should investigate the thickness of chromatophores and the orientation and spacing of platelet crystals within iridophores among white and common stickleback

Reduced-order model framework for thermochemical non-equilibrium hypersonic flows

The study of vehicles traveling at hypersonic speeds is extremely complex and involves many different non-equilibrium physical phenomena occurring on many different time-scales. As a result, work focused on modeling this type of flowfield has been hindered by inaccurate physical and chemical models. For example, the conventional approach to model chemical non-equilibrium, still widely used today, was developed nearly 40 years ago and relies heavily on calibration with heritage experimental data. However, advances in both computational chemistry and computational power have enabled the construction of extremely detailed models for the chemical non-equilibrium effects based on ab initio quantum chemistry data, called the state-to-state (StS) approach. Although the StS approach affords unprecedented accuracy for predictions of thermochemical non-equilibrium, it cannot be applied to study molecule-molecule interactions due to the massive computational cost. Unfortunately, due to the enormous cost of both computing data for and applying the StS approach, this method can only be used in highly simplified test cases. This motivates the development of reduced order models for chemical non-equilibrium which can capture the essential physics at a massively reduced cost. The objective of this work is twofold: first to present a model reduction framework for application to chemical non-equilibrium based on fundamental physics principles; and second, to use this framework to study thermochemical non-equilibrium in a variety of conditions for a gas composed of nitrogen atoms and molecules. In order to construct the reduced order model directly from ab initio quantum chemistry data, kinetic data is calculated directly for the model using the quasi-classical trajectory (QCT) method. This bypasses the need to compute StS kinetic data for 10^15 reactions resulting from the interaction between two nitrogen molecules, an impossible task. The model reduction framework, called the multi-group maximum-entropy quasi-classical trajectory (MGME-QCT) method, provides a crucial link between the ab initio quantum chemistry data and multi-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD). The MGME-QCT method is used to construct a reduced order model for a mixture of nitrogen atoms and molecules using an ab initio potential energy surface (PES) to describe the interaction between particles. In the MGME model, energy states are lumped together into groups containing states with similar properties, and the distribution of states within each of these groups is reconstructed by leveraging the maximum entropy principle. Two types of reduced order models are constructed: one based on conventional wisdom which relies on the assumption of strict separation of rotational and vibrational energy, and one which relies on the assumption of strong rovibrational coupling. In a study of the isothermal relaxation of nitrogen molecules, it is found using these two approaches that the underlying assumptions made in conventional chemical non-equilibrium models (i.e., that vibrational and rotational modes are decoupled) result in incorrect predictions about the dissociation process. In contrast, the groups constructed assuming rovibrational equilibrium better capture the dynamics of the dissociation process. This finding is confirmed through comparison with a detailed molecular dynamics approach. Finally, the applicability of the MGME-QCT method to CFD is demonstrated through application to a handful of simple test cases including a standing shock wave, and the flow through a nozzle. These test cases demonstrate the flexibility of this approach in modeling a variety of flow regimes (e.g., both compressing and expanding flows)

Nurse Talk: Features of Effective Verbal Communication Used by Expert District Nurses

This thesis represents an appreciative enquiry to identify features of effective verbal communication between nurses and patients. Using a method developed by the Language in the Workplace Project (Stubbe 1998) two nurse participants recorded a small sample of their conversations with patients as they occurred naturally in clinical practice. These six conversations constitute the main body of raw data for the study. The data was analysed using a combination of discourse and ethnographic analysis. Experience in nursing, particularly insider knowledge of the context of district nursing, helped me to uncover the richness of meaning in the conversations. The subtle interconnections and nuances could easily have been missed by an outside observer. The study has shown that in their interactions with patients, expert nurses follow a pattern in terms of the structure and content of the conversations and it is possible to identify specific features of effective nurse-patient communication within these conversations. The most significant of these are the repertoire of linguistic skills available to nurses, the importance of small talk and the attention paid by nurses to building a working relationship with patients, in part, through conversation. The findings have implications for nursing education and professional development

SenseBelt:a belt-worn sensor to support cross-device interaction

Mobile interaction is shifting from a single device to simultaneous interaction with ensembles of devices such as phones, tablets, or watches. Spatially-aware cross-device interaction between mobile devices typically requires a fixed tracking infrastructure, which lim- its mobility. In this paper, we present SenseBelt – a sensing belt that enhances existing mobile interactions and enables low-cost, ad hoc sensing of cross-device gestures and interactions. SenseBelt enables proxemic interactions between people and their personal devices. SenseBelt also supports cross-device interaction be- tween personal devices and stationary devices, such as public displays. We discuss the design and implementation of SenseBelt together with possible applications. With an initial evaluation, we provide insights into the benefits and drawbacks of a belt-worn mediating sensor to support cross-device interactions

Cultural Heritage Destruction: Experiments with Parchment and Multispectral Imaging

This chapter describes a highly collaborative project in digital humanities, which used tools and expertise from a diverse range of disciplines: medical physics, image science, and conservation. We describe this collaboration through three examples: the use of phantoms taken from medical physics, a historically accurate model of parchment degradation, and a detailed description of the steps taken to run experiments and collect data within a manageable budget. Each example highlights how procedures from a discipline were adapted for the project through collaboration. Whilst conservation focuses on developing methods to best preserve cultural heritage documents, we describe an unusual collaboration between conservation and image science to document through multispectral imaging the deliberate damage of a manuscript. Multispectral imaging has been utilised to examine cultural heritage documents by providing information about their physical properties. However, current digitisation efforts concentrate on recording documents in their current state. In this project, we aimed at recording the process of macroscopic document degradation using multispectral imaging, and the digital recovery of the writing using standard image processing methodologies. This project’s success lay in the intersection of knowledge of the processes of parchment deterioration and the specific processes that occur when a document is imaged: this has permitted us to construct a more successful and informed experiment. The knowledge acquired during the project allows us to address the issues related to the recovery of information from damaged parchment documents, and to determine which research questions can be addressed, and through which imaging methodology

The Hexactinellid Deep-Water Sponge Vazella pourtalesii (Schmidt, 1870) (Rossellidae) Copes With Temporarily Elevated Concentrations of Suspended Natural Sediment

Plumes of re-suspended sediment potentially smother and clog the aquiferous system of filter-feeding sponges with unknown implications for their health. For the first time, we examined the physiological responses of repeated exposure to natural sediment in the glass sponge Vazella pourtalesii, which forms dense sponge grounds in Emerald Basin off Nova Scotia, Canada. Ex situ chamber-based measurements of bacterial clearance and oxygen consumption (respiration) rates indicated that individuals subjected to elevated concentrations of suspended sediment expressed normal clearance and respiration rates over 7 days of sediment exposure, indicating an ability to cope with elevated concentrations of indigestible sediment particles. However, clearance rates significantly declined after 14 days of sediment exposure, suggesting an inability to cope with long-term exposure to increased sediment load. Therefore, long-term exposure to elevated concentrations of suspended sediment should be avoided in order to minimize adverse effects on the abundant Vazella sponge grounds.publishedVersio

Art is Not Research. Research is not Art.

Art is not Research. Research is not Art. is a multimedia, multi-site participatory installation by a collective of artists and researchers from Calgary, Toronto, and Lancaster; it is informed by these contexts. It reflects the tensions between how "participants"are treated in participatory art and interaction research. It offers a framework through which we can explore how epistemologies might evolve in a blending between Art and Research. Visitors download the paper to read, critically reflect on the relationship between art and research, and experientially engage with the material through a series of creative prompts. A performance variation of the piece will be performed in-person and online through the ACM SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems alt.chi track

How informed is declared altruism in clinical trials? A qualitative interview study of patient decision-making about the QUEST trials (Quality of Life after Mastectomy and Breast Reconstruction)

Background Randomised controlled trials (RCTs) often fail to recruit sufficient participants, despite altruism being cited as their motivation. Previous investigations of factors influencing participation decisions have been methodologically limited. This study evaluated how women weigh up different motivations after initially expressing altruism, and explored their understanding of a trial and its alternatives. The trial was the 'Quality of Life after Mastectomy and Breast Reconstruction' (QUEST) trial.Methods Thirty-nine women participated in qualitative interviews 1 month post-surgery. Twenty-seven women (10 trial decliners and 17 acceptors) who spontaneously mentioned 'altruism' were selected for thematic analysis. Verbatim transcripts were coded independently by two researchers. Participants' motivations to accept or decline randomisation were cross-referenced with their understanding of the QUEST trials and the process of randomisation.Results The seven emerging themes were: (1) altruism expressed by acceptors and decliners; (2) overriding personal needs in decliners; (3) pure altruism in acceptors; (4) 'hypothetical altruism' amongst acceptors; (5) weak altruism amongst acceptors; (6) conditional altruism amongst acceptors; and (7) sense of duty to participate. Poor understanding of the trial rationale and its implications was also evident.Conclusions Altruism was a motivating factor for participation in the QUEST randomised controlled trials where the main outcomes comprised quality of life and allocated treatments comprised established surgical procedures. Women's decisions were influenced by their understanding of the trial. Both acceptors and decliners of the trial expressed 'altruism', but most acceptors lacked an obvious treatment preference, hoped for personal benefits regarding a treatment allocation, or did not articulate complete understanding of the trial.Trial registration QUEST A, ISRCTN38846532 ; Date assigned 6 January 2010. QUEST B, ISRCTN92581226 ; Date assigned 6 January 2010