Precious, Tiny and Shiny: Close range photogrammetry for artists and others

Close Range Photogrammetry is increasingly being used to create digital assets across a range of disciplines, and can provide 3D ‘scans’ and surface ‘textures’ to very high resolution. The techniques of capture and processing usually present challenges for objects that are very small, monochromatic, reflective or relatively lacking in features. This ongoing visual arts project seeks to capture, re-examine and ultimately transform specific military and religious insignia as part of an investigation into their interrelated iconographies and histories. The materiality (highly reflective) and scale (very detailed embroidery) of these objects has required different approaches to achieving the accurate 3D models required. This paper will present the apparatus, methods and devices that have been developed to help solve these problems. Together they offer affordable, reliable, and scalable solutions to the traditional challenges of ‘3D scanning’ for particular types of objects, and robust methods applicable to a wide range of situations. They also help reduce the investment (of capital cost, time and labour) required to achieve accurate digital models with high resolution textures, opening up creative possibilities further down the virtual or material ‘pipeline’

Monoamines, BDNF, Dehydroepiandrosterone, DHEA-Sulfate, and Childhood Depression—An Animal Model Study

Basal levels of monoamines and DHEA in four main limbic brain regions were measured in prepubertal Wistar Kyoto (WKY) rats (a putative animal model of childhood depression). Basal levels of “Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor (BDNF)” were also determined in two regions in the hippocampus, compared with Wistar strain controls. In the second phase, we examined the responsiveness of prepubertal WKY rats to different types of chronic antidepressant treatments: Fluoxetine, Desipramine, and dehydroepiandrosterone sulfate (DHEAS). WKY prepubertal rats exhibited different monoamine levels in the limbic system, reduced DHEA levels in the VTA and lower levels of BDNF in the hippocampus CA3 region compared to controls. In prepubertal WKY rats, only treatment with DHEAS produced a statistically significant decrease in immobility, compared to saline-administered controls in the forced swim test. Wistar controls were not affected by any antidepressant. The results imply that DHEA(S) and BDNF may be involved in the pathophysiology and pharmacotherapy of childhood depression

Baghdad’s thirdspace: Between liminality, anti-structures and territorial mappings

Wedged in-between the dense urban grain of Baghdad, blast walls of t-shaped concrete have littered the streets and neighbourhoods since 2003, after the US led invasion. The idiosyncrasy of these walls lies in their exaggerated spatial liminality. They appear, change location and disappear overnight, and on a daily basis, leaving Iraqis to navigate through labyrinths of in-between spaces. This article critically reveals the new social and power structures that have emerged in the context of the city in response to the condition resulting from this unique urban intervention. This uncanny spatial and social condition of permanent liminality will be analysed through Victor Turner’s critical theories of liminality and anti-structure coupled with Edward Soja’s theory of Thirdspace, interpreting, through a series of territorial mappings, a complex liminal condition in a contested and disrupted city

Non-state space: The strategic ejection of dangerous and high maintenance urban space

Some commentators have characterised so-called ‘no-go’ areas as sites in which the exercise of authority is prevented. Here we suggest that many such spaces are produced by state, policing and citizen repertoires that aim to minimise the costs and risks of engaging, supporting and servicing such spaces and their populations. In this article we locate strategies of public spending, policing and political action that offer a governing logic in which neighbourhoods are essentially subtracted from the constitution of the city. During such designations the assurances of citizenship, vitality of civic institutions and presence of policing may be partially or wholly suspended. We present a framework for the identification of such strategies in which these forms of social, political and spatial exiting are described as being autotomic in nature – spaces that are ejected in order to avoid losses or further damage to the body politic of the city in ways akin to the response of certain animals that protect themselves from predation by shedding a limb or body part. This term adds force and depth to assessments of the ways in which both temporary and more sustained exits by policing, management and state servicing are designed in order to avoid responsibility over, or engagement with, spaces that are deemed a threat in order to maintain the integrity of the remaining, included city

Comparative Genome Analysis of Lactobacillus reuteri and Lactobacillus fermentum Reveal a Genomic Island for Reuterin and Cobalamin Production

Lactobacillus reuteri is a heterofermentative lactic acid bacterium that naturally inhabits the gut of humans and other animals. The probiotic effects of L. reuteri have been proposed to be largely associated with the production of the broad-spectrum antimicrobial compound reuterin during anaerobic metabolism of glycerol. We determined the complete genome sequences of the reuterin-producing L. reuteri JCM 1112T and its closely related species Lactobacillus fermentum IFO 3956. Both are in the same phylogenetic group within the genus Lactobacillus. Comparative genome analysis revealed that L. reuteri JCM 1112T has a unique cluster of 58 genes for the biosynthesis of reuterin and cobalamin (vitamin B12). The 58-gene cluster has a lower GC content and is apparently inserted into the conserved region, suggesting that the cluster represents a genomic island acquired from an anomalous source. Two-dimensional nuclear magnetic resonance (2D-NMR) with 13C3-glycerol demonstrated that L. reuteri JCM 1112T could convert glycerol to reuterin in vivo, substantiating the potential of L. reuteri JCM 1112T to produce reuterin in the intestine. Given that glycerol is shown to be naturally present in feces, the acquired ability to produce reuterin and cobalamin is an adaptive evolutionary response that likely contributes to the probiotic properties of L. reuteri

The faces of enmity in international relations : an introduction

International audienc

Geographies of landscape: Representation, power and meaning

Green criminology has sought to blur the nature-culture binary and this article seeks to extend recent work by geographers writing on landscape to further our understanding of the shifting contours of the divide. The article begins by setting out these different approaches, before addressing how dynamics of surveillance and conquest are embedded in landscape photography. It then describes how the ways we visualize the Earth were reconfigured with the emergence of photography in the 19th century and how the world itself has been transformed into a target in our global media culture

From eviction to evicting: Rethinking the technologies, lives and power sustaining displacement

An unnamed shift has occurred in geographies of eviction. While past research focused on the causes and effects of eviction in political economy, state power, and cultural difference, emerging work emphasises the subjective experience and sustaining practices of eviction as it happens. This paper makes the case for this turn away from causes and outcomes of ‘eviction’, and towards ‘evicting’ as a set of material technologies and practices that sustain displacement, and explores the implications of such a shift. Research into lived durations of eviction, evicting technologies, and eviction enforcement agencies opens up new conceptual and political fields of intervention