Hydraulophone design considerations : absement, displacement, and velocity-sensitive music keyboard in which each key is a water jet

We present a musical keyboard that is not only velocity-sensitive, but in fact responds to absement (presement), displacement (placement), velocity, acceleration, jerk, jounce, etc. (i.e. to all the derivatives, as well as the integral, of displacement). Moreover, unlike a piano keyboard in which the keys reach a point of maximal displacement, our keys are essentially infinite in length, and thus never reach an end to their key travel. Our infinite length keys are achieved by using water jet streams that continue to flow past the fingers of a person playing the instrument. The instrument takes the form of a pipe with a row of holes, in which water flows out of each hole, while a user is invited to play the instrument by interfering with the flow of water coming out of the holes. The instrument resembles a large flute, but, unlike a flute, there is no complicated fingering pattern. Instead, each hole (each water jet) corresponds to one note (as with a piano or pipe organ). Therefore, unlike a flute, chords can be played by blocking more than one water jet hole at the same time. Because each note corresponds to only one hole, different fingers of the musician can be inserted into, onto, around, or near several of the instrument’s many water jet holes, in a variety of different ways, resulting in an ability to independently control the way in which each note in a chord sounds. Thus the hydraulophone combines the intricate embouchure control of woodwind instruments with the polyphony of keyboard instruments. Various forms of our instrument include totally acoustic, totally electronic, as well as hybrid instruments that are acoustic but also include an interface to a multimedia computer to produce a mixture of sounds that are produced by the acoustic properties of water screeching through orific plates, as well as synthesized sounds

The Cranberry Scare of 1959: The Beginning of the End of the Delaney Clause

The cranberry scare of 1959 was the first food scare in the United States involving food additives to have a national impact. It was also the first event to test the Delaney clause, part of a 1958 amendment to the 1938 Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act prohibiting cancer-causing chemicals in food. Although lasting only a few weeks, the scare significantly affected the cranberry industry and brought the regulation of chemical residues in food to the national stage. Generated by a complex interaction of legislation, technology, media, and science, the scare had far-reaching effects in all areas of the cranberry industry, food legislation, and the perception of the public toward additives and residues in their food. The ripples caused by the scare permanently altered the cranberry industry and, after numerous subsequent scares and challenges to the law, eventually resulted in the repeal of the Delaney clause. The goal of this investigation was to demonstrate how the social, scientific, and political climates in the United States interacted and led to such an event. It shows how science, politics, and contemporary social anxiety combined, with technology as a catalyst, and how the resulting scare left significant marks on the development of both legislation and industry. It also improves our understanding of this seminal event in American social history by exploring the events surrounding the scare, as well as by comparing the perspectives and reactions of the public, the Eisenhower administration, the cranberry industry, and other industries affected by the scare and its aftermath

Hyperacoustic instruments: Computer-controlled instruments that are not electrophones

This paper describes a musical instrument consisting of a physical process that acoustically generates sound from the material world (i.e. sound derived from matter such as solid, liquid, gas, or plasma) which is modified by a secondary in-put from the informatic world. This informatic input selects attributes such as the frequency range of the musical note be-ing sounded, while the acoustic process is kept in close con-tact with the user, to ensure a high degree of expressivity. In one example, ice skates with acoustic pickups are used to play music while the skater simultaneously controls a bandpass fil-ter with a hand-held keyer and wearable computer. Each skate works much like the bow on a violin, allowing the player to hit, scrape, rub, or “bow”, the ice in various ways to create a wide variety of musical textures. Additionally the player can select sound samples on a per-note basis and then “scratch” out a melody or harmony (playing multiple samples at once) on the ice on the rink like a team of Disk Jockeys (DJs) work-ing together to “scratch ” an array of vinyl records. Because the grooves on an ice rink are made by the player in a freeform fashion, there is much more room for variations in musical timbres and textures than with the fixed grooves of a record. Rather than merely using the keyer to trigger musical notes through MIDI note on/note off commands, we create acoustic sound through a physical process such as skating, and then turn those physical sounds into musical notes with the handheld keyer that functions as a modifier input. This combination combines the expressivity of non-electrophonic musical instruments like the violin with the flexibility of electrophones like the sound synthesizer. As a further contribution of the paper, a general taxonomy of acoustic transducers and a link to physical organology is provided, in which the top-level of the taxonomy is the state-of-matter in which the transducer operates

Identification of Birds through DNA Barcodes

Short DNA sequences from a standardized region of the genome provide a DNA barcode for identifying species. Compiling a public library of DNA barcodes linked to named specimens could provide a new master key for identifying species, one whose power will rise with increased taxon coverage and with faster, cheaper sequencing. Recent work suggests that sequence diversity in a 648-bp region of the mitochondrial gene, cytochrome c oxidase I (COI), might serve as a DNA barcode for the identification of animal species. This study tested the effectiveness of a COI barcode in discriminating bird species, one of the largest and best-studied vertebrate groups. We determined COI barcodes for 260 species of North American birds and found that distinguishing species was generally straightforward. All species had a different COI barcode(s), and the differences between closely related species were, on average, 18 times higher than the differences within species. Our results identified four probable new species of North American birds, suggesting that a global survey will lead to the recognition of many additional bird species. The finding of large COI sequence differences between, as compared to small differences within, species confirms the effectiveness of COI barcodes for the identification of bird species. This result plus those from other groups of animals imply that a standard screening threshold of sequence difference (10× average intraspecific difference) could speed the discovery of new animal species. The growing evidence for the effectiveness of DNA barcodes as a basis for species identification supports an international exercise that has recently begun to assemble a comprehensive library of COI sequences linked to named specimens

Spatiotemporal integration of molecular and anatomical data in virtual reality using semantic mapping

We have developed a computational framework for spatiotemporal integration of molecular and anatomical datasets in a virtual reality environment. Using two case studies involving gene expression data and pharmacokinetic data, respectively, we demonstrate how existing knowledge bases for molecular data can be semantically mapped onto a standardized anatomical context of human body. Our data mapping methodology uses ontological representations of heterogeneous biomedical datasets and an ontology reasoner to create complex semantic descriptions of biomedical processes. This framework provides a means to systematically combine an increasing amount of biomedical imaging and numerical data into spatiotemporally coherent graphical representations. Our work enables medical researchers with different expertise to simulate complex phenomena visually and to develop insights through the use of shared data, thus paving the way for pathological inference, developmental pattern discovery and biomedical hypothesis testing

Work-family life courses and metabolic markers in mid-life: evidence from the British National Child Development Study

Background Previous studies have found generally better health among those who combine employment and family responsibilities; however, most research excludes men, and relies on subjective measures of health and information on work and family activities from only 1 or 2 time points in the life course. This study investigated associations between work-family life course types (LCTs) and markers of metabolic risk in a British birth cohort study. Methods Multichannel sequence analysis was used to generate work-family LCTs, combining annual information on work, partnership and parenthood between 16 and 42 years for men and women in the British National Child Development Study (NCDS, followed since their birth in 1958). Associations between work-family LCTs and metabolic risk factors in mid-life (age 44-45) were tested using multivariate linear regression in multiply imputed data. Results Life courses characterised by earlier transitions into parenthood were associated with significantly increased metabolic risk, regardless of attachment to paid work or marital stability over the life course. These associations were only partially attenuated by educational qualifications, early life circumstances and adult mediators. The positive association between weak labour markets ties and metabolic risk was weaker than might be expected from previous studies. Associations between work-family LCTs and metabolic risk factors did not differ significantly by gender. Conclusions Earlier transitions to parenthood are linked to metabolic risk in mid-life