Can We Build Social in Face of Conflict

Conference paper, presented at 'Designed to Improve', Hambur

Los códigos visuales asociados al deporte: una interpretación del espacio público

Este artículo se centra en algunos temas descubiertos mediante el análisis del aspecto visual o del diseño realizado en los estudios de espacios públicos que se utilizan para las actividades deportivas. Se basa en la investigación realizada sobre redes sociales en los espacios públicos de Barcelona (Puig y Maza, 2008) El artículo se fundamenta en la idea de que el  desarrollo de redes sociales a través de la práctica del deporte en espacios públicos, mejora la posibilidad de mantener la llamada “calidad de vida” en dichos espacios y para las personas que en ellos se encuentran. El objetivo concreto es, sobre la base de la perspectiva de la práctica “centrada en el usuario”, analizar cómo se pueden combinar determinados elementos existentes en los espacios públicos para definir o comunicar códigos visuales, que para mucha gente no son sino pequeños elementos sin interconexión, pero que para quienes practican determinados deportes son ‘ingredientes’ básicos, buscados por la propia actividad deportiva y por las redes sociales asociadas a la misma. Del mismo modo, los ‘códigos visuales’ emitidos por un espacio indican si en él se ‘practica’o no un deporte concreto, el modo en que se realiza y quiénes toman parte en la actividad

Beyond BRIC: offshoring in non-BRIC countries: Egypt – a new growth market: an LSE Outsourcing Unit report January 2009

This report was commissioned as an independently researched report by Hill & Knowlton, acting for the Information Technology Industry Development Agency (ITIDA) of Egypt. The global offshore outsourcing market for IT and business services exceeded $55 billion USD in 2008, and some estimates suggest an annual growth rate of 20% over the next five years. It is common to talk of Brazil, Russia, India and China as the BRIC inheritors of globalisation, offering both offshore IT and back-office services, and also, with their vast populations and developing economies, huge potential markets. This report, however, which was commissioned by the Information Technology Industry Development Agency (ITIDA) of Egypt, set out to investigate to what extent, within this context, non-BRIC countries could also be seen to be potential inheritors of globalisation. A representative sample of 14 countries drawn from Central and Eastern Europe, the African Mediterranean, the Americas and Asia Pacific, where the main active non-BRIC economies can be found, provided the focus for the systematic comparison of their relative competitiveness from which a benchmarking index could be developed. Setting out the long-term context and trends through which these countries are emerging as IT and business service 'hot spots', and identifying the global sourcing trends and pressures that are likely to develop in the next five years and their implications for these non-BRIC countries, the report turns in its final chapters to consider Egypt in more detail to assess its current positioning, the future path that it can take, and the challenges it faces as well as actions needed for it to get there

The Anti-bag Theft and ASB-resistant “Camden Bench"

Case Study

ATM and cashpoint art: what’s at stake in designing against crime

When Hammersmith Police approached the Design Against Crime Research Centre (DACRC) at the University of Arts London, for help in dealing with theft and fraud linked to users of ATM’s, the DACRC team looked sideways, beyond traditional ‘security solutions’, collaborating with artist Steve Russell, to help find some new and creative ways of influencing behaviour around “cashpoints”. Hammersmith Police contacted DACRC because Prof. Lorraine Gamman, who directs the Centre, has written about design against pickpocketing and bag theft, and works closely with businesses in her role as advisor to the Home Office’s “Design Technology Alliance Against Crime

Investigation of metabolic responses to exercise in adolescents and adults during high intensity exercise and recovery

Children and adolescents are thought to use oxidative metabolism to a greater extent than adults during high intensity exercise. The studies reported in this thesis examine the nature and implications of age-related differences in muscle metabolism during high intensity exercise and recovery. Chapter 4 concluded that during heavy intensity exercise, phosphocreatine (PCr) kinetics did not differ with age or sex, while Chapter 5 revealed that during very heavy intensity exercise, the fundamental τ was slower and slow component amplitude greater in men compared with adolescent boys, indicating that exercise intensity might play a role in determining age-related differences in muscle metabolism. In Chapter 6, two bouts of very heavy intensity exercise were completed, and prior exercise reduced the PCr slow component amplitude in men but not boys. Deoxyhaemoglobin (HHb) kinetics was faster in adolescents compared with adults during both heavy and very heavy intensity exercise, indicating that matching of oxygen delivery to oxygen utilisation is less precise at the onset of exercise in adolescents compared with adults. PCr recovery from high intensity exercise was faster in boys than men, but not different in girls and women, as described in Chapter 7. The speed of PCr recovery was correlated with maturity in adolescents, but was not correlated with end-exercise [PCr] or pH. Two different tests to measure mitochondrial capacity in adolescents were evaluated in Chapter 8, and a fitted curve and gated test were both used to determine PCr recovery kinetics. Finally, in Chapter 9, age-related differences in muscle metabolism and oxygenation during fatiguing exercise were examined; a strong trend for greater fatigue in adults compared with adolescents was accompanied by greater metabolic perturbation in adults. Overall, these data show that muscle metabolism and oxygenation differs between adolescents and adults during and following very high intensity exercise

Conditional variances in UK regional house prices

The returns of house price indices for the 13 UK regions are modelled using time series processes, including conditional variances. The first conclusion is that the UK follows the USA, with some regions displaying time-varying variances and others with constant variances. Secondly, there is limited evidence of an asymmetric component in six of the seven regions displaying autoregressive conditional heteroskedasticity. Thirdly, the results suggest that there are three distinct housing markets in the UK, based on common structures within their mean and variance processes, and that South West England is the region driving the other time-varying variances. Variances conditionnelles dans les prix regionaux de l'immobilier au Royaume-Uni Resume Les resultats de l'indice des prix de l'immobilier pour les 13 regions du Royaume-Uni sont modelises ici au moyen de procedes de series chronologiques, y compris des variances conditionnelles. La premiere conclusion est que le Royaume-Uni suit les Etats-Unis, certaines regions presentant des variances temporelles, d'autres des variances constantes. Deuxiemement, on releve peu de traces d'un composant asymetrique dans six des sept regions presentant une heteroscedasticite conditionnelle autoregressive. Troisiemement, les resultats indiquent qu'il y aurait trois marches de l'immobilier distincts au Royaume-Uni, sur la base de structures communes dans le cadre de leurs procedes moyens et de variance, et que le sud-ouest de l'Angleterre est la region qui dynamise les autres variances temporelles. Varianzas condicionales en los precios regionales de la vivienda en el Reino Unido Extracto Las cifras de los indices de precios de la vivienda en 13 regiones del Reino Unido se modelan utilizando procesos de series temporales, incluyendo varianzas condicionales. La primera conclusion es que el Reino Unido sigue a los EE UU, con varias regiones que muestran varianzas fluctuantes con el tiempo y otras con varianzas constantes. En segundo lugar, existe evidencia limitada de un componente asimetrico en seis de las siete regiones que muestran una heteroesquedacidad condicional autorregresiva. En tercer lugar, los resultados sugieren que existen tres mercados distintivos de la vivienda en el Reino Unido, basados en estructuras comunes dentro de sus procesos de media y varianza, y que el sudoeste de Inglaterra es la region que dirige las otras varianzas fluctuantes con el tiemp

Subordination in Children’s Writing

This paper reports an investigation into the use of subordinate clauses in the writing of a class of seven to nine year old children when attempting five different writing tasks. The investigation was undertaken in part-response to an inspection report on the school by the Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted) which recommended that the school should extend the writing skills of pupils in this age-range. The importance of developing subordination in writing is related to previous research and to evidence from reviews of Ofsted inspection evidence. The different patterns of subordination are discussed, between tasks and pupils and in relation to variation in the writing of individual children when tackling the different tasks. The paper ends by suggesting how similar informal investigations can assist schools in promoting writing development. It also outlines how the teaching approaches outlined in the National Literacy Strategy will provide opportunities for this promotion, particularly by exploiting links between reading and writing

Extracting 3D parametric curves from 2D images of Helical objects

Helical objects occur in medicine, biology, cosmetics, nanotechnology, and engineering. Extracting a 3D parametric curve from a 2D image of a helical object has many practical applications, in particular being able to extract metrics such as tortuosity, frequency, and pitch. We present a method that is able to straighten the image object and derive a robust 3D helical curve from peaks in the object boundary. The algorithm has a small number of stable parameters that require little tuning, and the curve is validated against both synthetic and real-world data. The results show that the extracted 3D curve comes within close Hausdorff distance to the ground truth, and has near identical tortuosity for helical objects with a circular profile. Parameter insensitivity and robustness against high levels of image noise are demonstrated thoroughly and quantitatively