First Stars III Conference Summary

The understanding of the formation, life, and death of Population III stars, as well as the impact that these objects had on later generations of structure formation, is one of the foremost issues in modern cosmological research and has been an active area of research during the past several years. We summarize the results presented at "First Stars III," a conference sponsored by Los Alamos National Laboratory, the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology, and the Joint Institute for Nuclear Astrophysics. This conference, the third in a series, took place in July 2007 at the La Fonda Hotel in Santa Fe, New Mexico, U.S.A.Comment: 11 pages, no figures; Conference summary for First Stars III, which was held in Santa Fe, NM on July 15-20, 2007. To appear in "Proceedings of First Stars III," Eds. Brian W. O'Shea, Alexander Heger & Tom Abe

The Human Keyboard

Most products that implement features for user interactions utilize buttons or switches for the user to command to select actions to perform. Such designs are typically controlled with direct motions, such as touch or voice and are seldom designed in consideration of those unable to utilize direct control. In this project, we designed technology that reads naturally occuring biosignals from the body, which then can be apply those signals with any interface. For our specific application in this project, we decided to implement a keyboard. Instead of teaching the fingers how to type on a mechanical keyboard, the body can designate an action with a more native motion. We aim to take ‘body language’ to the next level. By making the human body the centerpiece, and building the interconnects between people (reading and comprehending EMG signals), we strive to create a more interconnected world. Using our custom implementation of an analog to digital converter, the amplitude of EMG signals at carefully placed muscle probes are collected and translated into a digital signal. The resulting signal values are sent to a remote server where key characteristics are calculated. The backend of the system consists of a mathematical model that continuously uses these calculated characteristics to re-parameterize itself for recognition. After the signals are recognized, they are assigned an appropriate output at the user’s request. This document includes the requirements, design, use cases, risk tables, workflow and the architecture for the device we developed

Laboratory investigation of radiative transfer in cloud fields, A

April 1978.Includes bibliographical references (page 46).Sponsored by the Global Atmospheric Research Program, National Science Foundation, and the GATE Project Office, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ATM-77-15369.Sponsored by the Global Atmospheric Research Program, National Science Foundation, and the GATE Project Office, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration OCD-74-21678

THE FAIRNESS PROJECT: DOING WHAT WE CAN, WHERE WE ARE

The legal profession, in common with other professions, does not represent the diverse society it serves. In England and Wales, it is significantly more difficult to become a lawyer if you are not white, male, middle class, privately and Oxbridge educated: this is also true for other protected characteristics, such as disability, sexual orientation and age. The students we teach are fundamentally and structurally disadvantaged. This article reports on the aims and objectives of The Fairness Project, and the consequent design of its learning materials. Structural inequalities are all- pervasive and long-standing. No one project, no one generation, will secure equality, more diversity and fairness in the legal profession. But that is not a reason to do nothing. As educators and as human beings, who ourselves are relatively advantaged, we have a moral and pedagogical imperative to do what we can, where we are. That is what The Fairness Project is all about

Donor support for health policy and systems research: barriers to financing and opportunities for overcoming them

Background: The vast investments that have been made in recent decades in new medicines, vaccines, and technologies will only lead to improvements in health if there are appropriate and well-functioning health systems to make use of them. However, despite the growing acceptance by major global donors of the importance of health systems, there is an enthusiasm gap when it comes to disbursing funds needed to understand the intricacies of how, why and when these systems deliver effective interventions. To understand the reasons behind this, we open up the black box of donor decision-making vis-à-vis Health Policy and Systems Research (HPSR) financing: what are the organizational processes behind the support for HPSR, and what are the barriers to increasing engagement? Methods: We conducted 27 semi-structured interviews with staff of major global health funders, asking them about four key issues: motivations for HPSR financing; priorities in HPSR financing; barriers for increasing HPSR allocations; and challenges or opportunities for the future. We transcribed the interviews and manually coded responses. Results: Our findings point to the growing appreciation that funders have of HPSR, even though it is often still seen as an 'afterthought' to larger programmatic interventions. In identifying barriers to funding HPSR, our informants emphasised the perceived lack of mandate and capacities of their organizations. For most funding organisations, a major barrier was that their leadership often voiced scepticism about HPSR's long time horizons and limited ability to quantify results. Conclusion: Meeting contemporary health challenges requires strong and effective health systems. By allocating more resources to HPSR, global donors can improve the quality of their interventions, and also contribute to building up a stock of knowledge that domestic policymakers and other funders can draw on to develop better targeted programmes and policies

Cochleates derived from Vibrio cholerae O1 proteoliposomes : The impact of structure transformation on mucosal immunisation

Cochleates are phospholipid-calcium precipitates derived from the interaction of anionic lipid vesicles with divalent cations. Proteoliposomes from bacteria may also be used as a source of negatively charged components, to induce calcium-cochleate formation. In this study, proteoliposomes from V. cholerae O1 (PLc) (sized 160.7±1.6 nm) were transformed into larger (16.3±4.6 µm) cochleate-like structures (named Adjuvant Finlay Cochleate 2, AFCo2) and evaluated by electron microscopy (EM). Measurements from transmission EM (TEM) showed the structures had a similar size to that previously reported using light microscopy, while observations from scanning electron microscopy (SEM) indicated that the structures were multilayered and of cochleate-like formation. The edges of the AFCo2 structures appeared to have spaces that allowed penetration of negative stain or Ovalbumin labeled with Texas Red (OVA-TR) observed by epi-fluorescence microscopy. In addition, freeze fracture electron microscopy confirmed that the AFCo2 structures consisted of multiple overlapping layers, which corresponds to previous descriptions of cochleates. TEM also showed that small vesicles co-existed with the larger cochleate structures, and in vitro treatment with a calcium chelator caused the AFCo2 to unfold and reassemble into small proteoliposome-like structures. Using OVA as a model antigen, we demonstrated the potential loading capacity of a heterologous antigen and in vivo studies showed that with simple admixing and administration via intragastric and intranasal routes AFCo2 provided enhanced adjuvant properties compared with PLc

Softening the blow of the pandemic: will the International Monetary Fund and World Bank make things worse?

Softening the blow of the pandemic: will the International Monetary Fund and World Bank make things worse

Circadian clock protein BMAL1 broadly influences autophagy and endolysosomal function in astrocytes

An emerging role for the circadian clock in autophagy and lysosome function has opened new avenues for exploration in the field of neurodegeneration. The daily rhythms of circadian clock proteins may coordinate gene expression programs involved not only in daily rhythms but in many cellular processes. In the brain, astrocytes are critical for sensing and responding to extracellular cues to support neurons. The core clock protein BMAL1 serves as the primary positive circadian transcriptional regulator and its depletion in astrocytes not only disrupts circadian function but also leads to a unique cell-autonomous activation phenotype. We report here that astrocyte-specific deletion o