Development and Evaluation of an Educational Computer Game for a Certification Examination

Professional certification has become one of the important criteria for people to apply job positions in industries. Recently, computer-based learning has been widely adopted for helping students prepare for various professional certifications. However, most of the computer-based learning materials are not attractive to students, such that their learning performance is significantly affected owing to the lack of learning interests. Researchers have presented that joyful game-based learning can increase learner’s motive and pleasure. Therefore, this study builds a certification tutorial system containing two different modules that are the traditional e-version and the joyful game-based version. Moreover, an experiment has been conducted to explore the participants’ engagement and learning effectiveness of the proposed approach. Some terms are explained that the “prior knowledge” is represented by the “pre-test,” and the “level of effort” (equivalent to the “engagement”) is represented by the “experience” which is the cumulative number of correct answers. The result indicates that the traditional e-version may be slightly helpful for those participants with higher/middle prior knowledge and level of effort, and the joyful game-based version may be more helpful for those participants with lower prior knowledge and level of effort

Experience Sharing and Evaluation Results of Adaptation Technologies Due to Global Climate Change in Water Shortage Irrigation Zone of Taiwan

Source: ICHE Conference Archive - https://mdi-de.baw.de/icheArchive

Interpretation Structure Modeler for FOL

Import 05/08/2014Obsahem této diplomové práce je analýza a návrh systému pro podporu výuky předmětu Matematická logika. Vytvářený systém se bude týkat problematiky 3D vizualizace úlohy na hledání modelu množiny formulí v predikátové logice prvního řádu a modelování důležitých vlastností relací. Nástroj bude také obsahovat nápovědu pro vytvoření modelu množiny. V první části práce, je čtenář seznámen s teoretickými základy z dané oblasti, na které plynule navazuje specifikace požadavků na nový systém. Dále je text práce zaměřen především na analýzu a návrh jednotlivých částí systému, která je doplněna o třídní a sekvenční diagramy UML.The goal of this thesis is to Provide design and analysis of a new system, which could then be used as a teaching tool in subject called Mathematical Logic. The new system will consist of two main parts. The first part will be dealing with the problem of 3D visualization of formula set models. The second part will include an environment for modeling important properties of relations. Our system will also include an aid for creating formula set models. In the first part of the thesis we focus on theoretical background and requirement specification for the new system. Following parts ot the thesis are mainly focused on analysis and design of individual system parts, accompanied with class and sequence UML diagrams.460 - Katedra informatikydobř

Schizophrenia, autism spectrum disorders and developmental disorders share specific disruptive coding mutations

People with schizophrenia are enriched for rare coding variants in genes associated with neurodevelopmental disorders, particularly autism spectrum disorders and intellectual disability. However, it is unclear if the same changes to gene function that increase risk to neurodevelopmental disorders also do so for schizophrenia. Using data from 3444 schizophrenia trios and 37,488 neurodevelopmental disorder trios, we show that within shared risk genes, de novo variants in schizophrenia and neurodevelopmental disorders are generally of the same functional category, and that specific de novo variants observed in neurodevelopmental disorders are enriched in schizophrenia (P = 5.0 × 10−6). The latter includes variants known to be pathogenic for syndromic disorders, suggesting that schizophrenia be included as a characteristic of those syndromes. Our findings imply that, in part, neurodevelopmental disorders and schizophrenia have shared molecular aetiology, and therefore likely overlapping pathophysiology, and support the hypothesis that at least some forms of schizophrenia lie on a continuum of neurodevelopmental disorders

Impaired Flush Response to Niacin Skin Patch Among Schizophrenia Patients and Their Nonpsychotic Relatives: The Effect of Genetic Loading

We previously reported familial aggregation in flush response to niacin skin patch among schizophrenia patients and their nonpsychotic relatives. However, little is known about whether this abnormal skin response is associated with genetic loading for schizophrenia. This study compared the niacin flush response in subjects from families with only one member affected with schizophrenia (simplex families) with those from families having a sib-pair with schizophrenia (multiplex families). Subjects were patients with schizophrenia and their nonpsychotic first-degree relatives from simplex families (176 probands, 260 parents, and 80 siblings) and multiplex families (311 probands, 180 parents, and 52 siblings) as well as 94 healthy controls. Niacin patches of 3 concentrations (0.001M, 0.01M, and 0.1M) were applied to forearm skin, and the flush response was rated at 5, 10, and 15 minutes, respectively, with a 4-point scale. More attenuated flush response to topical niacin was shown in schizophrenia probands and their relatives from multiplex families than in their counterparts from simplex families, and the differentiation was better revealed using 0.1M concentration of niacin than 0.01M or 0.001M. For the highest concentration of 0.1M and the longest time lag of 15 minutes, a subgroup of probands (23%), parents (27%), and siblings (19%) still exhibited nonflush response. Flush response to niacin skin patch is more impaired in schizophrenia patients and their relatives from families with higher genetic loading for schizophrenia, and this finding has implications for future genetic dissection of schizophrenia

A Genome-Wide Linkage Scan for Distinct Subsets of Schizophrenia Characterized by Age at Onset and Neurocognitive Deficits

As schizophrenia is genetically and phenotypically heterogeneous, targeting genetically informative phenotypes may help identify greater linkage signals. The aim of the study is to evaluate the genetic linkage evidence for schizophrenia in subsets of families with earlier age at onset or greater neurocognitive deficits.Patients with schizophrenia (n  =  1,207) and their first-degree relatives (n  =  1,035) from 557 families with schizophrenia were recruited from six data collection field research centers throughout Taiwan. Subjects completed a face-to-face semi-structured interview, the Continuous Performance Test (CPT), the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, and were genotyped with 386 microsatellite markers across the genome.A maximum nonparametric logarithm of odds (LOD) score of 4.17 at 2q22.1 was found in 295 families ranked by increasing age at onset, which had significant increases in the maximum LOD score compared with those obtained in initial linkage analyses using all available families. Based on this subset, a further subsetting by false alarm rate on the undegraded and degraded CPT obtained further increase in the nested subset-based LOD on 2q22.1, with a score of 7.36 in 228 families and 7.71 in 243 families, respectively.We found possible evidence of linkage on chromosome 2q22.1 in families of schizophrenia patients with more CPT false alarm rates nested within the families with younger age at onset. These results highlight the importance of incorporating genetically informative phenotypes in unraveling the complex genetics of schizophrenia