Collaborative CoVE Projects for Digital Design in FE Teaching and Learning

The Batley School of Art & Design CoVE in Digital Design is a catalyst for collaboration between local schools, colleges and the creative industries. The digital CoVE bridges a regional skills gap in learning and teaching digital imaging technology. The paper discusses two aspects of current FE learning and teaching development. Firstly, the way in which the CoVE digital resource has impacted on the level 2 and 3 student learning experience within the college. Secondly, a case study outlines the fashion and digital textiles design collaboration between London College of Fashion, Chesterfield College and Batley School of Art & Design CoVe’s. The case study provides details of the CoVE project setup and illustrates student and academic experiences during the project

End of the Beginning

This thesis is a collections of short stories which explores the use of non-conventional genres. The research contained within this thesis follows the oldest line of inquiry open to featherless bipeds: what does it mean to be human? As humans compose on and in increasingly multi-modal platforms and sites, the stories we tell will shift in unpredictable ways. This collection is an attempt to capture narrative in these 21st century spaces

Christian Romanticism: T. S. Eliot's response to Percy Bysshe Shelley

This thesis presents a reading of T. S. Eliot's response to the work of Percy Bysshe Shelley, focusing on Eliot's Christian faith and the role it played in this response. Chapter One shows how Shelley was a great influence on Eliot's early work and how, after his Christian conversion, Eliot repudiated his influence. The chapter will show how previous readings of Eliot's relations with Romanticism have tended to centre on a Bloomian poetic 'anxiety of influence'. 1 will then offer my religious reading of Eliot's thought, and show how the period of initial repudiation gives way to a rapprochement with past poetic influences, as Eliot eventually accommodates past influences into his Christian scheme. Chapter Two examines the ways in which Shelley and Eliot address the issue of self-consciousness and our inherent sense of isolation. Chapter Three looks at the treatment of human love m the work of both poets. In both cases, Shelley desires, unsuccessfully, some release from selfhood, either in social communion or with an ideal lover. It is only with the adoption of a divine perspective that human relations can be set in context - something that Eliot came to realise in his later work. Chapter Four looks at the way the two poets reacted to the work of Dante, stressing that Eliot's Christian faith enabled him to relate to Dante's work in a way that Shelley, although appropriating Dantean motifs in his own work, could never fully attain. Chapter Five looks at the way both Eliot and Shelley address the fundamental shortcomings of language, showing how Eliot, in the years after his conversion, could be reconciled to linguistic shortfall because he could relate it to a higher, divine reality. Shelley, like Eliot in his early years, was vexed by this problem because he did not have the faith that offered a transcendent view of it. A concluding section draws together these chapters and sums up my reading of Eliot’s faith, and the extent to which it affected his response to the work of Shelley

Introduction to the new usability

This paper introduces the motivation for and concept of the "new usability" and positions it against existing approaches to usability. It is argued that the contexts of emerging products and systems mean that traditional approaches to usability engineering and evaluation are likely to prove inappropriate to the needs of "digital consumers." The paper briefly reviews the contributions to this special issue in terms of their relation to the idea of the "new usability" and their individual approaches to dealing with contemporary usability issues. This helps provide a background to the "new usability" research agenda, and the paper ends by posing what are argued to be the central challenges facing the area and those which lie at the heart of the proposed research agenda

Comparison fo Reflection Coefficient Minima with Disperion Curves for Ultrasonic Waves in Embedded Layers

Waves which propagate along an embedded layer in a multilayered plate offer potential for the nondestructive characterisation of the layer and of the boundary conditions between the layer and the adjoining layers. Because the energy of these waves is concentrated in the layer, they may be expected to be considerably more sensitive to the local properties than Lamb waves which occupy the whole plate, and relatively insensitive to variations in the properties of other layers in the system

Associations between fibrin D-dimer, markers of inflammation, incident self-reported mobility limitation, and all-cause mortality in older men

Objectives<p></p> To examine the independent relationships between fibrin D-dimer, interleukin 6 (IL-6), C-reactive protein (CRP), and fibrinogen and incident mobility limitation and mortality.<p></p> Design<p></p> Prospective.<p></p> Setting<p></p> General practice in 24 British towns.<p></p> Participants<p></p> Men aged 60 to 79 without prevalent heart failure followed up for an average of 11.5 years (N = 3,925).<p></p> Measurements<p></p> All-cause mortality (n = 1,286) and self-reported mobility disability obtained at examination in 1998 to 2000 and in a postal questionnaire 3 to 5 years later in 2003.<p></p> Results<p></p> High D-dimer (top vs lowest tertile: adjusted odds ratio (aOR) = 1.46, 95% confidence interval = 1.02–2.05) and IL-6 (aOR = 1.43, 95% CI = 1.01–2.02) levels (but not CRP or fibrinogen) were associated with greater incident mobility limitation after adjustment for confounders and prevalent disease status. IL-6, CRP, fibrinogen, and D-dimer were significantly associated with total mortality after adjustment for confounders. Only D-dimer and IL-6 predicted total mortality independent of each other and the other biomarkers. The adjusted hazard ratio (aHR) was 1.16 (95% CI = 1.10–1.22) for a standard deviation increase in log D-dimer and 1.10 (95% CI = 1.04–1.18) for a standard deviation increase in log IL-6. D-dimer was independently related to vascular and nonvascular mortality, and IL-6 was independently related to vascular mortality. Risks of mobility limitation and mortality were greatest in those with a combination of high D-dimer and IL-6 levels.<p></p> Conclusion<p></p> D-dimer and IL-6 are associated with risk of mobility limitation and mortality in older men without heart failure. The findings suggest that coagulation leads to functional decline and mortality s that inflammation does not explain

Feasibility and tolerability of whole-body, low-intensity vibration and its effects on muscle function and bone in patients with dystrophinopathies: a pilot study.

IntroductionDystrophinopathies are X-linked muscle degenerative disorders that result in progressive muscle weakness complicated by bone loss. This study's goal was to evaluate feasibility and tolerability of whole-body, low-intensity vibration (WBLIV) and its potential effects on muscle and bone in patients with Duchenne or Becker muscular dystrophy.MethodsThis 12-month pilot study included 5 patients (age 5.9-21.7 years) who used a low-intensity Marodyne LivMD plate vibrating at 30-90 Hz for 10 min/day for the first 6 months. Timed motor function tests, myometry, and peripheral quantitative computed tomography were performed at baseline and at 6 and 12 months.ResultsMotor function and lower extremity muscle strength remained either unchanged or improved during the intervention phase, followed by deterioration after WBLIV discontinuation. Indices of bone density and geometry remained stable in the tibia.ConclusionsWBLIV was well tolerated and appeared to have a stabilizing effect on lower extremity muscle function and bone measures. Muscle Nerve 55: 875-883, 2017

Quaternary stratigraphy, landscape, and soils of the Hamilton Basin

The Hamilton Basin is a roughly oval shaped depression 80 km north to south and 40 km wide centered about Hamilton City (Fig. 1). The basin is surrounded by ranges up to 300 m high developed mainly in Mesozoic basement strata. The physiographic basin is essentially a fault bounded basement depression of Late Tertiary and Pleistocene age. Throughout the Quaternary this basin has been a receptacle of terrestrial sedimentation; the materials have derived mainly from extrabasin sources and principally the Central Volcanic Region to the southeast. In addition, materials have been derived from erosion of the bounding ranges, and Coromandel Peninsula. The last major depositional episode involved flood deposit s of the Taupo Pumice. The present landscape has evolved through several episodes of deposition and incision. During the excursion it is intended to show the participants exposures of the major Quaternary units of basin infilling, and some aspects of the landscape and the soil pattern, within the environs of Hamilton City. The standard geological reference covering the geology of Hamilton Basin is New Zealand Geological Survey Bulletin 88 (Kear & Schofield, 1978) . The surface features and soil pattern of the basin are succinctly covered by McCraw (1967) and Bruce (1979)