Multidimensional scaling of D15 caps: Color-vision defects among tobacco smokers?

Tobacco smoke contains a range of toxins including carbon monoxide and cyanide. With specialized cells and high metabolic demands, the optic nerve and retina are vulnerable to toxic exposure. We examined the possible effects of smoking on color vision: specifically, whether smokers perceive a different pattern of suprathreshold color dissimilarities from nonsmokers. It is already known that smokers differ in threshold color discrimination, with elevated scores on the Roth 28-Hue Desaturated panel test. Groups of smokers and nonsmokers, matched for sex and age, followed a triadic procedure to compare dissimilarities among 32 pigmented stimuli (the caps of the saturated and desaturated versions of the D15 panel test). Multidimensional scaling was applied to quantify individual variations in the salience of the axes of color space. Despite the briefness, simplicity, and “low-tech” nature of the procedure, subtle but statistically significant differences did emerge: on average the smoking group were significantly less sensitive to red–green differences. This is consistent with some form of injury to the optic nerve

Environmental impact of various kayak core materials

Thesis (S.B.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2008.Includes bibliographical references (p. 26).This thesis compares the environmental impact of fiberglass, Kevlar, carbon fiber, and cork. A kayak company is interested in using cork as a core material, and would like to claim that it is the most environmentally friendly of the four materials listed above. The efficacy of that claim is evaluated by modeling the manufacturing process, generating an input - output model and performing an exergy analysis. The environmental impact of kayak core material construction on the over impact of kayak construction is nominal. Beyond that, the comparison of core materials results in a qualitative ranking from least to most impact, which is fiberglass, cork, carbon fiber then Kevlar. The diversity of impact, from noxious gases, energy use, volatile liquids, land use and toxic wastes necessitates a qualitative analysis when full exergy data wasn't available. Because of this, the comparison was quantitatively based on the energy use and qualitatively based on each chemicals material safety data.by David R. Kirkland.S.B

That Driving Sound: Use of Tempo in Traditional Cape Breton Fiddle Performance

In Cape Breton traditional dance fiddling, the intimate rhythmic relationship between fiddle and feet yields smooth transitions from one tune type to another in order to facilitate the steps. Through analysis of 17 recorded performances of march, strathspey, and reel sets, I measure minute tempo fluctuations as they correspond to the concert presentation of a medley of tunes to explain the mechanics and roots of the large-scale continuous tempo acceleration. This acceleration comes out of the music’s relationship to dance, shaping the performance and helping to define the sound of Cape Breton fiddling.Dans les airs traditionnels de danse joués au violon à Cap-Breton, la relation rythmique intime entre le violon et les pieds permet des transitions fluides d'un type d'air à l'autre afin de faciliter les pas de danse. En analysant 17 enregistrements d'airs de marche, de strathspeys et de reels, je mesure jusqu'aux plus petites fluctuations de tempo correspondant à l'exécution en concert d'un pot-pourri de chansons pour expliquer la mécanique et les racines de l'accélération continue et à grande échelle du rythme. Cette accélération provient de la relation de la musique à la danse, qui modèle l'exécution et qui contribue à définir le son du violon de Cap-Breton

Motherboards, Microphones and Metaphors: Re-examining New Literacies and Black Feminist Thought through Technologies of Self

ABSTRACT This article examines how two African American females composed counter-selves using a computer motherboard and a stand-alone microphone as critical identity texts. Situated within sociocultural and critical traditions in new literacy studies and black feminist thought, the authors extend conceptions of language, literacy and black femininity via the agentic, powerful and knowledgeable selves of African American women, constructs that are often missing from the scholarship on young African American women and their practices of self-definition. The motherboard and microphone serve as analytical constructs for understanding critical new literacies and subject malleability, which crisscrosses in complex configurations across the experiences, histories and relationships that carry meaning for those who struggle through scenes of silence. Motherboards and microphones act metaphorically as technologies of the self, which resist and reformat cosmologies of black femininity that have long patterned gender oppression. The findings suggest that technologies exist everywhere, and technology related to literacy and language exists in many forms, including vocabularies of motherboards and microphones. The authors conclude that using such vocabularies for expressing identity can work through the power of metaphor in its richest sense to offer new conceptions of self, whereby the subject becomes a personal artifact capable of immense transformative potential. The things we call ‘technologies’ are ways of building order in our world. Many technological devices and systems important in everyday life contain possibilities for many different ways of ordering human activity. (Matlow, 2000, p. 167

Choices We Can Believe In: City Parents and School Choice

“Choices We Can Believe In” explores (parental) “school choice” as postcolonial phenomenon. Based on ethnographic interviews Kirkland finds that, for four inner city parents, available school choices are in essence forced choices: the choice to remain in one’s community but endure poor schools, or the choice to abandon one’s community for better schools but endure nascent and sometimes blatant discrimination and other associated hardships. Each of these choices comes with ulterior consequences that eliminate them from being rational or free. As such, neither of these options is adequate for citizens of an evolved democracy. In this way, Kirkland argues that the “free choice” movement is very much a mirage that obscures historical integration efforts, leaving today’s schools to bathe in the failed backdrop of a pre-Brown educational politic that sanctions schooling as a way to reproduce social inequities. Without a true treatise toward making all school integrateable, Kirkland suggests that any effort at providing broad school choices will disintegrate into what amounts to neo-segregation or educational colonialism. To resolve this dilemma, Kirkland calls for comprehensive school reform that has at its end “integrateable schools” as opposed to integration itself. For Kirkland, integrateable schools can move us closer to integration by offering parents real school choice based on an available pool of schools that are safe, non-discriminatory and have as their design a holistic model that values and mixes the common and complex cultures of all Americans

Kennesaw State University Wind Ensemble

KSU School of Music presents Wind Ensemble featuring Sam Skelton, soprano saxophone, David Kirkland, guest composer and Daniel S. Papp, special guest conductor.https://digitalcommons.kennesaw.edu/musicprograms/1217/thumbnail.jp

ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE: AN EXAMINATION OF THE ROLE OF LEADERSHIP IN NEUTRALIZING THE NEGATIVE EFFECTS OF TECHNOSTRESS DURING OPERATIONAL SHIFTS

COVID-19 created a support problem for public universities across the United States and required that IT departments and professionals alter how they performed in 2020, and perhaps beyond. IT professionals tasked with safeguarding large amounts of data were required to shift to a teleworking posture to continue offering a similar level of service as previously expected. In addition to the technological shift that organizations experienced because of COVID-19, leadership challenges also impacted IT departments across the United States. The rapid shift of operational duties has the propensity to increase technology-related stress, due to employee perception of being successful in their role. The purpose of this quantitative, non-experimental, correlational pilot study was to examine the relationship between technostress, job satisfaction, burnout, and demographic characteristics of age, gender, and years of experience of an IT professional working in higher education. This pilot study included a convenience sample of IT professionals from a single public university in the United States and an online survey was administered to discover the impact operational shifts have on levels of technostress, job satisfaction, and job burnout. To be considered, the respondent had to meet specific criteria: (a) be an adult of at least 18 years of age, (b) work as an IT professional within the university, and (c) work for a minimum of one year as an IT professional. The sample of 116 potential respondents were emailed to request participation in the study. There were 46 survey submissions received (roughly 40% of likely respondents). Of those surveys received, there were 31 completed cases (approximately 27%), which were analyzed using multiple linear regression. Results of this study suggested there was no predictive relationship of technostress on job satisfaction. However, results did show decreased job satisfaction for demographic characteristics, such as age. Additionally, there was no overall predictive relationship of technostress on job burnout, however, results suggest that compared with people over 55, people who were between 35-44 experienced increased burnout overall

The role of reactive oxygen intermediates in experimental coccidioidomycois in mice

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Coccidioidomycosis is usually a self-limited infection in immunocompentent people. In immunocompentent human beings second infections due to <it>Coccidioides </it>are very rare, indicating that recovery from infection results in protective immunity. In experimental animals, immunization with several different proteins or attenuated mutants protects against a virulent challenge. To explore what mechanisms are responsible for protective immunity, we investigated the course of <it>Coccidioides </it>infection in the gp91^phoxknock out mouse that has a defect in the oxidative burst that results in chronic granulomatous disease.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We found that the gp91^phoxknock out mice were somewhat more resistant to intraperitoneal infection and equally as resistant to low dose intranasal infection, but slightly more susceptible to high dose intranasal infection compared to control mice. The gp91^phoxknock out mice made a more robust inflammatory response to infection than controls, as measured by histology and production of inflammatory cytokines. The gp91^phoxknock out mice were as protected by immunization with the recombinant <it>Coccidioides </it>protein Ag2/PRA as the controls were against either intraperitoneal or intranasal infection. <it>Coccidioides immitis </it>arthroconidia and spherules were significantly more resistant to H₂O₂treatment in vitro than <it>Aspergillus fumigatus </it>spores.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>These data suggest that oxidative burst may not be required for protective immunity to coccidioidomycois.</p