Follow that! Redeploying project investment for future activities

JISC Digital Content Conference 2009 Parallel session on Institutional approaches to content management and the digitisation life cycle. paper describes how the University of Southampton Library Digitisation Unit is redeveloping and repurposing its digitisation hardware infrastructure following the completion of two major JISC project

A large-scale numerical model for computing isochrone geometry

A finite-difference model for the calculation of radar layer geometries in large ice masses is presented. Balance velocities are used as coefficients in the age equation and in the heat equation. Solution of the heat equation allows prediction of sliding areas and computation of basal melt rates. Vertical distributions of velocity are parameterized using shape functions. These can be set uniformly, or allowed to vary in space according to the distribution of sliding. The vertical coordinate can either be uniformly distributed within the thickness of the ice, or be uniformly distributed within the flux. The finite-difference scheme results in a large set of linear equations. These are solved using a nested factorization preconditioned conjugate gradient scheme. The convergence properties of some other iteration solution schemes are studied. The output is computations of age and temperature assuming steady state, in large ice masses at high resolution. Age calculations are used to generate isochrones which show the best fit to observed layers. Comparisons with analytical solutions are made, and the influence of the order of the finite-difference approximation and the choice of vertical coordinate on solution accuracy is considered

RADCAP: a potential model tool for direct capture reactions

A computer program is presented aiming at the calculation of bound and continuum states, reduced transition probabilities, phase-shifts, photo-disintegration cross sections, radiative capture cross sections, and astrophysical S-factors, for a two-body nuclear system. The code is based on a potential model of a Woods-Saxon, a Gaussian, or a M3Y, type. It can be used to calculate nuclear reaction rates in numerous astrophysical scenarios.Comment: 29 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in Computer Physics Communication

Coloring translates and homothets of a convex body

We obtain improved upper bounds and new lower bounds on the chromatic number as a linear function of the clique number, for the intersection graphs (and their complements) of finite families of translates and homothets of a convex body in \RR^n.Comment: 11 pages, 2 figure

The Williams Scale of Attitude toward Paganism: development and application among British Pagans

This article builds on the tradition of attitudinal measures of religiosity established by Leslie Francis and colleagues with the Francis Scale of Attitude toward Christianity (and reflected in the Sahin-Francis Scale of Attitude toward Islam, the Katz-Francis Scale of Attitude toward Judaism, and the Santosh-Francis Scale of Attitude toward Hinduism) by introducing a new measure to assess the attitudinal disposition of Pagans. A battery of items was completed by 75 members of a Pagan Summer Camp. These items were reduced to produce a 21-item scale that measured aspects of Paganism concerned with: the God/Goddess, worshipping, prayer, and coven. The scale recorded an alpha coefficient of 0.93. Construct validity of the Williams Scale of Attitude toward Paganism was demonstrated by the clear association with measures of participation in private rituals

The Photodissociation of 8B^8B and the Solar Neutrino Problem

The extraction of the photodissociation cross sections of $^8B$ from Coulomb dissociation experiments is investigated. A careful study is done on the contributions of the E1, E2 and M1 multipolarities to the breakup. A comparison with the data of a recent experiment is performed. It is shown that the extraction of the radiative capture cross sections $^7Be(p,\ \gamma)^8B$ which are relevant for the solar neutrino problem is not affected appreciably by Coulomb reacceleration. A non-perturbative model is used for the purpose. Emphasis is put on the perspectives for future experiments which are planned at the University of Notre Dame, RIKEN (Japan), and GSI (Germany). An analysis of the total yields of ``photon-point" processes in inelastic electron scattering is also done.Comment: 23 pages, plain Latex. 12 figures available upon request

Combination anti-Aβ treatment maximizes cognitive recovery and rebalances mTOR signaling in APP mice

Drug development for Alzheimer\u27s disease has endeavored to lower amyloid β (Aβ) by either blocking production or promoting clearance. The benefit of combining these approaches has been examined in mouse models and shown to improve pathological measures of disease over single treatment; however, the impact on cellular and cognitive functions affected by Aβ has not been tested. We used a controllable APP transgenic mouse model to test whether combining genetic suppression of Aβ production with passive anti-Aβ immunization improved functional outcomes over either treatment alone. Compared with behavior before treatment, arresting further Aβ production (but not passive immunization) was sufficient to stop further decline in spatial learning, working memory, and associative memory, whereas combination treatment reversed each of these impairments. Cognitive improvement coincided with resolution of neuritic dystrophy, restoration of synaptic density surrounding deposits, and reduction of hyperactive mammalian target of rapamycin signaling. Computational modeling corroborated by in vivo microdialysis pointed to the reduction of soluble/exchangeable Aβ as the primary driver of cognitive recovery

Illuminating spindle convex bodies and minimizing the volume of spherical sets of constant width

A subset of the d-dimensional Euclidean space having nonempty interior is called a spindle convex body if it is the intersection of (finitely or infinitely many) congruent d-dimensional closed balls. The spindle convex body is called a "fat" one, if it contains the centers of its generating balls. The core part of this paper is an extension of Schramm's theorem and its proof on illuminating convex bodies of constant width to the family of "fat" spindle convex bodies.Comment: 17 page

Quantum suppression of shot noise in field emitters

We have analyzed the shot noise of electron emission under strong applied electric fields within the Landauer-Buttiker scheme. In contrast to the previous studies of vacuum-tube emitters, we show that in new generation electron emitters, scaled down to the nanometer dimensions, shot noise much smaller than the Schottky noise is observable. Carbon nanotube field emitters are among possible candidates to observe the effect of shot-noise suppression caused by quantum partitioning.Comment: 5 pages, 1 fig, minor changes, published versio

Engineering Pathways in Central Carbon Metabolism Help to Increase Glycan Production and Improve N-Type Glycosylation of Recombinant Proteins in E. coli.

Escherichia coli strains have been modified in a variety of ways to enhance the production of different recombinant proteins, targeting membrane protein expression, proteins with disulphide bonds, and more recently, proteins which require N-linked glycosylation. The addition of glycans to proteins remains a relatively inefficient process and here we aimed to combine genetic modifications within central carbon metabolic pathways in order to increase glycan precursor pools, prior to transfer onto polypeptide backbones. Using a lectin screen that detects cell surface representation of glycans, together with Western blot analyses using an O-antigen ligase mutant strain, the enhanced uptake and phosphorylation of sugars (ptsA) from the media combined with conservation of carbon through the glyoxylate shunt (icl) improved glycosylation efficiency of a bacterial protein AcrA by 69% and over 100% in an engineered human protein IFN-α2b. Unexpectedly, overexpression of a gene involved in the production of DXP from pyruvate (dxs), which was previously seen to have a positive impact on glycosylation, was detrimental to process efficiency and the possible reasons for this are discussed