Teaching young learners a foreign language via tangible and graphical user interfaces

The use of tangible interfaces in teaching has been proved more effective, user -friendly and helpful in collaborative learning departments, when compared to traditional teaching approaches. In particular, the tangible interface "Makey Makey"is a modern tool that enhances collaboration between pupils, with positive results in education, despite the limited research done on this interface so far. "Makey Makey" succeeds in motivating and engaging young learners in the learning process, showing better performance and scoring results. In addition, its use in teaching has been shown to benefit the learning process in every age learning group.The development and use of such an innovative teaching/learning approach helps young learners perceive the educational process in a different way and assimilate new cognitive fields more effectively. Moreover, educators profit as well, as they can eliminate difficulties and teach more efficiently using examples based on their teaching approach, while enhancing young learners parallel skills as well. This study will confirm previous research results stating that assimilation of new concepts is easier with tangible interfaces than with graphical ones, as well as that young learners participating in the survey have shown significant progress in knowledge acquisition when compared to their prior knowledge

The use of dolomite as foaming agent and its effect on the microstructure of aluminium metal foams—Comparison to titanium hydride

Proceedings of: 8th EUFOAM Conference. Borovets, Bulgaria, 14-16 July 2010.In this paper dolomite MgCa(CO₃)₂ a naturally occurring mineral was demonstrated to be an effective foaming and stabilizing agent for aluminium with several notable advantages relative to the currently used titanium hydride foaming agent. Characteristic cell structures and microstructural features of foams produced with a dolomite foaming agent are examined and the properties of dolomite based foams produced in a one step process are compared with those produced using titanium hydride based process. The most notable structural feature of dolomite based foams is a smaller cell size and thinner cell faces. Foaming with MgCa(CO₃)₂ also gives rise to a marked increase in the stability of molten foams with a large range of foaming temperatures possible, and an almost complete absence of melt drainage even with extended foaming times. Many of these properties are attributed to the cell surfaces being covered by a thin oxide film formed during the foaming process.Publicad

Increased prevalence of prolonged QT interval in males with primary or secondary hypogonadism : a pilot study

P>Symptoms and signs of male hypogonadism span all organ systems, including the cardiovascular apparatus. The electrocardiographic QT interval reflects cardiac ventricular repolarization and, if prolonged, increases the risk of malignant arrhythmias. QT interval duration is similar in boys and girls during childhood, but shortens in males after puberty and experimental studies suggest that testosterone is a major contributor to shortening of QT interval in men. The aim of the present pilot study was to assess the duration of ventricular repolarization in adult males with primary or secondary hypogonadism. Standard ECG recordings were performed in 26 men (mean age 39.2 +/- 2.17 years) with pituitary or testicular hypogonadism and repeated in 15 patients during testosterone replacement. Twenty-six age-matched control men were also analysed. Measured QT intervals were corrected for heart rate according to Bazzett's formula (QTc = QT/root RR interval). The prevalence of prolonged QTc was considerably higher in hypogonadal patients (four of 26 men) than in control men (none, p < 0.05) and in the general, healthy population (< 2.5%). QTc interval normalized on hormone replacement therapy in the four patients presenting prolonged QTc in the hypogonadal state. Heart rate and left ventricular mass did not differ among the two groups and no known QT-prolonging factor was apparent in patients with abnormal QTc interval. In conclusion, a high number prolonged QT interval measurements was observed in hypogonadal men who may therefore be at increased risk for cardiac arrhythmias. This observation reveals an additional feature of male hypogonadism, which may benefit from testosterone replacement therapy

Flow, thermal and structural application of Ni-foam as volumetric solar receiver

Open-cell nickel foams with 92% porosity and uniform pore size and distribution were used in this study. The main objective of this work was to evaluate the behaviour of Ni-foam, when treated as volumetric receivers under concentrated solar radiation while improving their oxidation resistance, in order to make them attractive for such applications. The experimental investigation showed that their efficiency was depending on both materials parameters and flow conditions, the latter affecting the pressure drop and the heat transfer behaviour. The microstructural characterisation of oxide surface morphologies formed on the open-cell Ni foams exposed to concentrated solar radiation is investigated by the use of SEM and EDXS. SEM observations revealed a rapid homogeneous oxidation in the Ni-foam with three different surface oxide structures formed in relation with the process temperature. A novel slurry-based process for aluminising nickel foams while retaining their geometrical properties is applied in order to develop an aluminide-nickel intermetallic coating on a Ni foam thus enhancing the oxidation resistance. Scanning electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction were applied to assess the effectiveness of the aluminising process and determine the optimum parameters of the procedure (slurry composition, holding temperature and time).The authors would like to thank the PROcedes Materiaux et Energie Solaire (PROMES)–Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) for their support in the experimental procedure in the frame of the European Project SOLFACE.Publicad

Visualization of positive and negative sense viral RNA for probing the mechanism of direct-acting antivirals against hepatitis C virus

RNA viruses are highly successful pathogens and are the causative agents for many important diseases. To fully understand the replication of these viruses it is necessary to address the roles of both positive-strand RNA ((+)RNA) and negative-strand RNA ((-)RNA), and their interplay with viral and host proteins. Here we used branched DNA (bDNA) fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) to stain both the abundant (+)RNA and the far less abundant (-)RNA in both hepatitis C virus (HCV)- and Zika virus-infected cells, and combined these analyses with visualization of viral proteins through confocal imaging. We were able to phenotypically examine HCV-infected cells in the presence of uninfected cells and revealed the effect of direct-acting antivirals on HCV (+)RNA, (-)RNA, and protein, within hours of commencing treatment. Herein, we demonstrate that bDNA FISH is a powerful tool for the study of RNA viruses that can provide insights into drug efficacy and mechanism of action

The Effect of Body Mass on the Shoe-Athlete Interaction

Long-distance running is known to induce joint overloading and elevate cytokine levels, which are the hallmarks for a variety of running-related injuries. To address this, footwear systems incorporate cushioning midsoles to mitigate injurious mechanical loading. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of athlete body mass on the cushioning capacity of technical footwear. An artificial heel was prototyped to fit the impact pattern of a heel-strike runner and used to measure shock attenuation by an automated drop test. Impact mass and velocity were modulated to simulate runners of various body mass and speeds. The investigation provided refined insight on running-induced impact transmission to the human body. The examined midsole system was optimized around anthropometric data corresponding to an average (normal) body mass. The results suggest that although modern footwear is capable of attenuating the shock waves occurring during foot strike, improper shoe selection could expose an athlete to high levels of peak stress that could provoke an abnormal cartilage response. The selection of a weight-specific cushioning system could provide optimum protection and could thus prolong the duration of physical exercise beneficial to maintaining a simulated immune system

Efficient exact pattern-matching in proteomic sequences

This paper proposes a novel algorithm for complete exact pattern-matching focusing the specificities of protein sequences (alphabet of 20 symbols) but, also highly efficient considering larger alphabets. The searching strategy uses large search windows allowing multiple alignments per iteration. A new filtering heuristic, named compatibility rule, contributed decisively to the efficiency improvement. The new algorithm’s performance is, on average, superior in comparison with its best-rated competitors

MORCIC: Model Order Reduction Techniques for Electromagnetic Models of Integrated Circuits

Model order reduction (MOR) is crucial for the design process of integrated circuits. Specifically, the vast amount of passive RLCk elements in electromagnetic models extracted from physical layouts exacerbates the extraction time, the storage requirements, and, most critically, the post-layout simulation time of the analyzed circuits. The MORCIC project aims to overcome this problem by proposing new MOR techniques that perform better than commercial tools. Experimental evaluation on several analog and mixed-signal circuits with millions of elements indicates that the proposed methods lead to x5.5 smaller ROMs while maintaining similar accuracy compared to golden ROMs provided by ANSYS RaptorX.Comment: arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:2311.0847