Life’s a Pattern

Life\u27s a Pattern - questions one\u27s capacity to infer patterned stimulus. Stimulus that\u27s representative of one\u27s lifetime, but into a twelve-minute visual/sonic experience. This experience reminds us that one\u27s life experiences are full of varying patterns, and suggests, if one can understand these patterns as a detached observer (free of time), they\u27ll most likely produce rhythmic joy for others. To extenuate this notion - this experience concludes with world-renowned drummer Keith Carlock, whose credits include: Sting, Toto, John Mayor & Steely Dan – a master producer of patterned stimulus

The Patterns of Yarning

The Patterns of Yarning is a 3-minute digital visualisation that\u27s based on the accompanying sunrise themed sonic yarning audio

Using A Phone To Create Music With A Digeridoo

DJ phone apps are not commonly used by percussionists, particularly when performing with an Australian Indigenous Instrument such as a Digeridoo. Therefore, this reflection paper documents one example, titled Sonic Yarns. Sonic Yarns is an improvised duo performance piece performed by University of Newcastle staff members, Ray Kelly Jnr and Adam Manning

The Future in their Imaginations: Music and Robotics School Holidays Program for School-Aged Children

This report reflects on an exploratory STEAM workshop at the University of Newcastle, School of Creative Industries, Conservatorium of Music, Australia. Twenty-six middle school-aged students attended the two-day workshop. On the final day, students presented an immersive concert for parents and friends, showcasing creativity, innovation and teamwork. Interestingly, Lego robots were employed as a physical tool through which music-making students interacted with each other and built attributes of creative engagement. These attributes were measured via the Six C’s established by Bers comprising: (1) Collaboration; (2) Community Building; (3) Communication; (4) Content Creation; (5) Creativity; and (6) Choices of Conduct. This report suggests the integration of robots can also enrich the musicianship of students, building upon their traditional music training

Multilocus sequence typing of Cronobacter sakazakii and Cronobacter malonaticus reveals stable clonal structures with clinical significance which do not correlate with biotypes

Background: The Cronobacter genus (Enterobacter sakazakii) has come to prominence due to its association with infant infections, and the ingestion of contaminated reconstituted infant formula. C. sakazakii and C. malonaticus are closely related, and are defined according their biotype. Due to the ubiquitous nature of the organism, and the high severity of infection for the immunocompromised, a multilocus sequence typing (MLST) scheme has been developed for the fast and reliable identification and discrimination of C. sakazakii and C. malonaticus strains. It was applied to 60 strains of C. sakazakii and 16 strains of C. malonaticus, including the index strains used to define the biotypes. The strains were from clinical and non-clinical sources between 1951 and 2008 in USA, Canada, Europe, New Zealand and the Far East. Results: This scheme uses 7 loci; atpD, fusA, glnS, gltB, gyrB, infB, and pps. There were 12 sequence types (ST) identified in C. sakazakii, and 3 in C. malonaticus. A third (22/60) of C. sakazakii strains were in ST4, which had almost equal numbers of clinical and infant formula isolates from 1951 to 2008. ST8 may represent a particularly virulent grouping of C. sakazakii as 7/8 strains were clinical in origin which had been isolated between 1977 - 2006, from four countries. C. malonaticus divided into three STs. The previous Cronobacter biotyping scheme did not clearly correspond with STs nor with species. Conclusion: In conclusion, MLST is a more robust means of identifying and discriminating between C. sakazakii and C. malonaticus than biotyping. The MLST database for these organisms is available online at http://pubmlst.org/cronobacter

National Outreach Programming for Landowners—Natural Resource Enterprises

We conducted a survey of Mississippi landowners to determine revenues collected and expenditures incurred during 1996-1998 for fee hunting on their properties (inflated to 2011 estimates). Study findings revealed that respondents diversified incomes derived through fee hunting enterprises on their lands. This information has been used to design a series of multi-state landowner workshops about natural resource enterprises development and conservation practices on private lands. With state and local collaborator assistance, we have conducted over 50 landowner workshops in nine U.S. states and Sweden and have received requests to expand outreach programming to other U.S. states

Testbeam studies of pre-prototype silicon strip sensors for the LHCb UT upgrade project

The LHCb experiment is preparing for a major upgrade in 2018-2019. One of the key components in the upgrade is a new silicon tracker situated upstream of the analysis magnet of the experiment. The Upstream Tracker (UT) will consist of four planes of silicon strip detectors, with each plane covering an area of about 2 m$^2$. An important consideration of these detectors is their performance after they have been exposed to a large radiation dose. In this article we present test beam results of pre-prototype n-in-p and p-in-n sensors that have been irradiated with fluences up to $4.0\times10^{14}$ $n_{\rm eq}$ cm$^{-2}$.Comment: 25 pages, 20 figure

Rapid, cost-effective and scalable gmp-compliant simian adenovirus-vectored vaccine production for early-phase clinical trials using entirely disposable product-contact components

The Jenner Institute, University of Oxford, develops and produces a range of vaccines against emerging threats (such as Zika) and current global health challenges (including malaria, HIV and rabies). The Jenner Clinical Biomanufacturing Facility (CBF) manufactures multiple simian adenovirus-vectored vaccines for early phase clinical trials each year. Hitherto we have used shake flasks for upstream production and caesium chloride gradient ultracentrifugation for downstream purification. This process is robust and simple but also slow, human resource intensive and lacks scalability. Here we report the development of a novel process using a 2 x 3L single-use stirred tank bioreactor system (MilliporeSigma Mobius®), coupled to a tangential flow filtration (TFF) and anion exchange chromatography (AEX)-based downstream process. The process also includes particle lysis and nucleic acid digestion inside the bioreactor, as well as clarification of cells and debris using depth filters. As our test case, we used a novel simian adenovirus-vectored rabies vaccine (ChAdOx2 RabG), which we will manufacture to GMP standards in the coming year. Each process run yields \u3e5x1013 ChAdOx2 RabG virus particles (approximately 1000 human doses), with residual host cell DNA, host cell protein and nuclease levels suitable for clinical trial use. While similar processes have been previously reported for adenovirus manufacture, we will report a number of points of novelty. Firstly, we use single-use disposable product-contact components from beginning to end, greatly simplifying small-scale GMP manufacturing of multiple products. Secondly, we will report results of comparative testing with a range of modern ion exchange media (including resins, membrane adsorbers, monoliths and functionalized hydrogel formats). Thirdly, we will report the development and validation of novel quality control methods suitable for this process. The resulting process will allow the CBF to increase production yield and produce more vaccines that transfer more easily to larger facilities

Experimental strategies for the investigation of low temperature properties in granitic and pegmatitic melts

The physical behavior of silicate melts during the final stages of intrusion in the earth's crust are poorly understood. In particular, the low temperature limit of igneous petrogenesis is poorly constrained. The extreme differentiates of granitic magmatism that lead to pegmatite genesis span a very large range of composition not normally considered to be within the domain of igneous melt compositions. This combination of very low petrogenetic temperatures and extreme chemistries requires a concentrated effort for the determination of melt properties under conditions of pressure, temperature and composition appropriate to these systems. An experimental strategy for the determination of melt properties under appropriate conditions is presented. The determination of individual melt properties at very low temperatures is described with the aid of three examples, heat capacity, volume and viscosity. In this way the physical behavior of an important component of the earth's crust will become accessible

Community-Informed Relationship Violence Intervention in a HighStress, Low-Income Urban Context

To evaluate the effectiveness of the House of Ruth Maryland’s Gateway Project, a community-informed and oppression-sensitive relationship violence intervention program (RVIP; commonly labeled “batterer intervention”), designed for a predominantly low-income, racial minority population residing in a high-stress urban context. Method: Propensity score matching with data on 744 male program participants (89% Black; 59% unemployed; 76% on probation) was used to compare recidivism rates for those who did, and did not, complete the intervention program. The propensity score matching created comparison groups (n = 216 per group) with very similar distributions on 28 balancing factors. Results: During the year after program enrollment, program completers had significantly lower frequency of re-arrest for all criminal offenses, d = 0.16, p = .018 and marginally lower frequency of violent offenses, d = 0.12, p = .075 than matched non-completers. No treatment effect was identified for partner-abuse-related legal involvements, d = 0.06, p = .365. Secondary analyses controlling for propensity score in the full sample yielded similar results, and analyses of session attendance as a continuous variable found additional evidence of a significant program effect on violent offenses in the matched sample. Conclusions: In contrast to a carefully matched sample of program non-completers, men who completed this 28-session intervention, which adapts the traditional RVIP focus on power and control to address the life context of participants who experience systemic oppression, discrimination, economic distress, and community violence, had lower overall involvement with the criminal justice system