Leap of Death

‘Leap of Death’ is collaborative, multi-media project by composer Robert Stillman, artist Anna Fewster, and bookbinder Sarah Bryant. It seeks to interpret archival material for the ‘lost’ 1929 F.W. Murnau film ‘4 Devils’. The main output of the project is a limited edition of 50 bookwork/LP’s that use letterpress text, trace-monotype print images, and recorded music to construct an abstract, non-linear ‘impression’ of the film’s narrative. The project also included a ‘live’ version of this work using projections of the bookwork text and imagery, and performance of the music by the ensemble The Archaic Future Players. The wider research questions for this project include: • Can archival research be carried out and disseminated as contemporary artistic/creative work? What is distinctive about such an approach (compared, for example, to scholarly research). • How can creative content (i.e. narrative) in one form, like film, be translated into, or indeed extended by, other forms like still image, text, and music? • How can ‘traditional’ media like slideshows, live/recorded music, or books present narrative structure in an ‘open’ (i.e. non-linear way?) • How can a digital format (i.e. web) most effectively represent physical media (i.e. an artist’s bookwork)

Excess noise in GaAs and AlGaAs avalanche photodiodes with GaSb absorption regions—composite structures grown using interfacial misfit arrays

Interfacial misfit arrays were embedded within two avalanche photodiode (APD) structures. This allowed GaSb absorption layers to be combined with wide-bandgap multiplication regions, consisting of GaAs and Al0.8Ga0.2As, respectively. The GaAs APD represents the simplest case. The Al0.8Ga0.2As APD shows reduced dark currents of 5.07 μAcm−2 at 90% of the breakdown voltage, and values for effective below 0.2. Random-path-length modeled excess noise is compared with experimental data, for both samples. The designs could be developed further, allowing operation to be extended to longer wavelengths, using other established absorber materials which are lattice matched to GaSb

Kleptoparasitic melees--modelling food stealing featuring contests with multiple individuals

Kleptoparasitism is the stealing of food by one animal from another. This has been modelled in various ways before, but all previous models have only allowed contests between two individuals. We investigate a model of kleptoparasitism where individuals are allowed to fight in groups of more than two, as often occurs in real populations. We find the equilibrium distribution of the population amongst various behavioural states, conditional upon the strategies played and environmental parameters, and then find evolutionarily stable challenging strategies. We find that there is always at least one ESS, but sometimes there are two or more, and discuss the circumstances when particular ESSs occur, and when there are likely to be multiple ESSs

Aeronautic Instruments. Section IV : Direction Instruments

Part one points out the adequacy of a consideration of the steady state gyroscopic motion as a basis for the discussion of displacements of the gyroscope mounted on an airplane, and develops a simple theory on this basis. Principal types of gyroscopic inclinometers are described and requirements stated. Part two describes a new type of stabilizing gyro mounted on top of a spindle by means of a universal joint, the spindle being kept in a vertical position by supporting it as a pendulum of which the bob is the driving motor. Methods of tests and the difficulties in designing a satisfactory and reliable compass for aircraft use in considered in part three. Part four contains a brief general treatment of the important features of construction of aircraft compasses and description of the principal types used

Mining Disaggregase Sequence Space to Safely Counter TDP-43, FUS, and α-Synuclein Proteotoxicity.

Hsp104 is an AAA+ protein disaggregase, which can be potentiated via diverse mutations in its autoregulatory middle domain (MD) to mitigate toxic misfolding of TDP-43, FUS, and α-synuclein implicated in fatal neurodegenerative disorders. Problematically, potentiated MD variants can exhibit off-target toxicity. Here, we mine disaggregase sequence space to safely enhance Hsp104 activity via single mutations in nucleotide-binding domain 1 (NBD1) or NBD2. Like MD variants, NBD variants counter TDP-43, FUS, and α-synuclein toxicity and exhibit elevated ATPase and disaggregase activity. Unlike MD variants, non-toxic NBD1 and NBD2 variants emerge that rescue TDP-43, FUS, and α-synuclein toxicity. Potentiating substitutions alter NBD1 residues that contact ATP, ATP-binding residues, or the MD. Mutating the NBD2 protomer interface can also safely ameliorate Hsp104. Thus, we disambiguate allosteric regulation of Hsp104 by several tunable structural contacts, which can be engineered to spawn enhanced therapeutic disaggregases with minimal off-target toxicity

Scavenging in Northwestern Europe: A Survey of UK Police Specialist Search Officers

Physical search methods used by police specialist searchers are based on counter-terrorism methods and not on the search and recovery of outdoor surface deposited human remains, nevertheless these methods are applied to scenes involving human remains. Additionally, there is limited published forensic literature within Northwestern Europe on the potential taphonomic agents within this region that are capable of modifying human remains through scavenging, scattering and removal. The counter-terrorism basis in physical search methods and the gap in published forensic literature regarding scavenging in this region can potentially impede searchers’ abilities to adapt physical search methods to their full efficiency in the search and recovery of scavenged human remains. This paper analysed through a questionnaire survey of 111 police specialist searchers, within the U.K., the impact of animal scavenging on the search and recovery of human remains.According to questionnaire respondents’ experiences and knowledge, the occurrence of scavenging at scenes in which respondents took part in a physical search for human remains was common (63.46%,n= 66) and happened most frequently with surface deposits (68.25%,n= 43). Scavenging resulted in the recovery of incomplete sets of remains (59.79%, n= 58) and influenced search perimeters (58.33%, n= 35). Scavenging also affected recovery rates at scene searches (80.43%,n= 74) that included the use of cadaver dogs with police handlers. The impact scavengers within this region have on different crime scene scenarios and search methods is not reflected in current published literature or search standards