Engaging Human-in-the-Loop for Autonomous Vehicle Simulation

Many autonomous vehicles are still in the development phase due to limited research and testing and will take a considerable amount of time to further develop before they are ready for public release. The main objective of this study is to introduce a human-in-the-loop simulation framework for supporting autonomous vehicle research. Our proposed simulation framework aims to facilitate AV assessment by providing a safer and more efficient way. Functionally, it is focused on the understanding of AVs’ operations in the presence of pedestrian users. The developed simulation framework allows a human pedestrian avatar to be integrated into the high-fidelity 3D virtual environment and interact with simulated autonomous vehicles via standard keyboard input methods or virtual reality (VR) methods. This enables safer pedestrian-AV integration research and testing, and the ability to implement a series of risky edge-case scenarios in less time and cost than would be feasible in a real-world setting

INRA Water Resource Management Research and EducationNeeds Assessment Project

The Water Resources Research Needs Assessment team received funding in summer 2006 from the Inland Northwest Research Alliance (INRA) Water Resources Steering Committee to conduct a structured needs assessment study. The study was motivated by the desire to allow future INRA research and educational programs to meet better the needs of water resources managers in the five state INRA region

Prelamin A impairs 53BP1 nuclear entry by mislocalizing NUP153 and disrupting the Ran gradient.

The nuclear lamina is essential for the proper structure and organization of the nucleus. Deregulation of A-type lamins can compromise genomic stability, alter chromatin organization and cause premature vascular aging. Here, we show that accumulation of the lamin A precursor, prelamin A, inhibits 53BP1 recruitment to sites of DNA damage and increases basal levels of DNA damage in aged vascular smooth muscle cells. We identify that this genome instability arises through defective nuclear import of 53BP1 as a consequence of abnormal topological arrangement of nucleoporin NUP153. We show for the first time that this nucleoporin is important for the nuclear localization of Ran and that the deregulated Ran gradient is likely to be compromising the nuclear import of 53BP1. Importantly, many of the defects associated with prelamin A expression were significantly reduced upon treatment with Remodelin, a small molecule recently reported to reverse deficiencies associated with abnormal nuclear lamina.British Heart Foundation (Grant ID: RG/11/14/29056), Medical Research Council (Grant ID: MR/L019116/1), Cancer Research UK (Grant IDs: C6/A11224, C6946/A14492), European Research Council, European Community Seventh Framework Programme (Grant ID: HEALTH-F2-2010-259893) , Wellcome Trust (Grant ID: WT092096), University of CambridgeThis is the final version of the article. It first appeared from Wiley via http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/acel.1250

Chronic Kidney Disease in Cats and the Risk of Total Hypercalcemia

BACKGROUND: Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is a common comorbidity in cats with hypercalcemia, but whether CKD is a risk factor for hypercalcemia is unclear. Hypercalcemia often is diagnosed based on total calcium concentration (tCa), which tends to underestimate the ionized calcium concentration (iCa) in cats. OBJECTIVES: Assessment of the performance of tCa for the diagnosis of ionized hypercalcemia, and exploration of factors influencing the relationship between iCa and tCa. Determination of risk factors for incident total hypercalcemia (ie, the development of hypercalcemia based on tCa during follow‐up). ANIMALS: Records of a cross‐section (n = 477) and observational cohort (n = 367) of client‐owned cats with and without azotemic CKD from first opinion practice. METHODS: Retrospective cross‐sectional and retrospective cohort study. The diagnostic accuracy of tCa as an index test for ionized hypercalcemia was evaluated, and risk factors for underestimation were explored by binary logistic and linear regression in a cross‐section of cats with and without azotemic CKD. Chronic kidney disease and clinicopathological variables were assessed as predictors of incident total hypercalcemia by both time‐invariant and time‐dependent Cox regression in a cohort of cats. RESULTS: Specificity of tCa for identification of ionized hypercalcemia was high (100%), but sensitivity was low. Underestimation was associated with lower venous bicarbonate concentrations. Cats with CKD had increased risk for incident total hypercalcemia (hazard ratio, 4.29; 95% confidence interval, 1.96–9.37; P < .001). Higher tCa predicted incident total hypercalcemia in both azotemic and nonazotemic cats (P < .001). CONCLUSIONS AND CLINICAL IMPORTANCE: Chronic kidney disease is a risk factor for incident total hypercalcemia, and most cats with increased tCa had concurrent ionized hypercalcemia. Higher baseline tCa predicts incident total hypercalcemia. Prospective studies assessing changes in iCa are warranted

Science and economics in the management of an invasive species

Author Posting. © American Institute of Biological Sciences, 2006. This article is posted here by permission of American Institute of Biological Sciences for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in BioScience 56 (2006): 931-935, doi: 10.1641/0006-3568(2006)56[931:SAEITM]2.0.CO;2Estimates of the economic impacts of nonnative nuisance ("invasive") species must rely on both a sound ecological understanding and the proper application of economic methods. Focusing on the example of the invasive European green crab (Carcinus maenas), we show that the crab's estimated economic impact—which has been used to help justify recent public policy—is based on data taken from the wrong geographic location. Furthermore, the predictions of ecological effects appear to rest on loose footing, and economic methods have been misapplied in constructing the estimate. Our purpose is to call attention to the need for the more careful application of science and economics in managing this pressing environmental issue.This work was supported by a research grant from the US Department of Commerce,National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Project no. NA16RG1698

A New Arthritis Therapy with Oxidative Burst Inducers

BACKGROUND: Despite recent successes with biological agents as therapy for autoimmune inflammatory diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis (RA), many patients fail to respond adequately to these treatments, making a continued search for new therapies extremely important. Recently, the prevailing hypothesis that reactive oxygen species (ROS) promote inflammation was challenged when polymorphisms in Ncf1, that decrease oxidative burst, were shown to increase disease severity in mouse and rat arthritis models. Based on these findings we developed a new therapy for arthritis using oxidative burst-inducing substances. METHODS AND FINDINGS: Treatment of rats with phytol (3,7,11,15-tetramethyl-2-hexadecene-1-ol) increased oxidative burst in vivo and thereby corrected the effect of the genetic polymorphism in arthritis-prone Ncf1 (DA) rats. Importantly, phytol treatment also decreased the autoimmune response and ameliorated both the acute and chronic phases of arthritis. When compared to standard therapies for RA, anti-tumour necrosis factor-α and methotrexate, phytol showed equally good or better therapeutic properties. Finally, phytol mediated its effect within hours of administration and involved modulation of T cell activation, as injection prevented adoptive transfer of disease with arthritogenic T cells. CONCLUSIONS: Treatment of arthritis with ROS-promoting substances such as phytol targets a newly discovered pathway leading to autoimmune inflammatory disease and introduces a novel class of therapeutics for treatment of RA and possibly other chronic inflammatory diseases

Alteration of the murine gut microbiota during infection with the parasitic helminth Heligmosomoides polygyrus

Background: In a murine model of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), treatment of colitis in IL-10 gene-deficient mice with the parasitic helminth Heligmosomoides polygyrus ameliorates colonic inflammation. The cellular and molecular mechanisms driving this therapeutic host response are being studied vigorously. One proposed mechanism is that H. polygyrus infection favors the outgrowth or suppression of certain bacteria, which in turn help modulate host immunity. Methods: To quantify the effect of H. polygyrus infection on the composition of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract microbiota, we conducted two independent microbial ecology analyses of C57BL/6 mice. We obtained and analyzed 3,353 bacterial 16S rRNA encoding gene sequences from the ileum and cecum of infected and uninfected mice as well as incective H. polygyrus larvae at the outset of the second experiment and adult worms taken directly from the mouse duodenum at the end of the second experiment. Results: We found that a significant shift in the abundance and relative distribution of bacterial species in the ileum of mice is associated with H. polygyrus infection. Members of the bacterial family Lactobacillaceae significantly increased in abundance in the ileum of infected mice reproducibly in two independent experiments despite having different microbiotas present at the outset of each experiment. Conclusions: These data support the concept that helminth infection shifts the composition of intestinal bacteria. The clinical consequences of these shifts in intestinal flora are yet to be explored. (Inflamm Bowel Dis 2010)Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/78230/1/21299_ftp.pd

Unwanted pregnancy, mental health and abortion: untangling the evidence

Abortion policy is still contentious in many parts of the world, and periodically it emerges to dominate health policy debates. This paper examines one such debate in Australia centering on research findings by a New Zealand research group, Fergusson, Horwood & Ridder, published in early 2006. The debate highlighted the difficulty for researchers when their work is released in a heightened political context. We argue that the authors made a logical error in constructing their analysis and interpreting their data, and are therefore not justified in making policy claims for their work. The paper received significant public attention, and may have influenced the public policy position of a major professional body. Deeply held views on all sides of the abortion debate are unlikely to be reconciled, but if policy is to be informed by research, findings must be based on sound science

Roy-Steiner-equation analysis of pion-nucleon scattering

We review the structure of Roy-Steiner equations for pion-nucleon scattering, the solution for the partial waves of the t-channel process $\pi\pi\to \bar N N$, as well as the high-accuracy extraction of the pion-nucleon S-wave scattering lengths from data on pionic hydrogen and deuterium. We then proceed to construct solutions for the lowest partial waves of the s-channel process $\pi N\to \pi N$ and demonstrate that accurate solutions can be found if the scattering lengths are imposed as constraints. Detailed error estimates of all input quantities in the solution procedure are performed and explicit parameterizations for the resulting low-energy phase shifts as well as results for subthreshold parameters and higher threshold parameters are presented. Furthermore, we discuss the extraction of the pion-nucleon $\sigma$-term via the Cheng-Dashen low-energy theorem, including the role of isospin-breaking corrections, to obtain a precision determination consistent with all constraints from analyticity, unitarity, crossing symmetry, and pionic-atom data. We perform the matching to chiral perturbation theory in the subthreshold region and detail the consequences for the chiral convergence of the threshold parameters and the nucleon mass.Comment: 101 pages, 28 figures; journal versio