Share Manager User Guide

This user guide outlines the functionality of the new Share Manager

The Evolution of myExperiment

The myExperiment social website for sharing scientific workflows, designed according to Web 2.0 principles, has grown to be the largest public repository of its kind. It is distinctive for its focus on sharing methods, its researcher-centric design and its facility to aggregate content into sharable 'research objects'. This evolution of myExperiment has occurred hand in hand with its users. myExperiment now supports Linked Data as a step toward our vision of the future research environment, which we categorise here as '3rd generation e-Research'

Adolescent brain maturation and cortical folding: evidence for reductions in gyrification

Evidence from anatomical and functional imaging studies have highlighted major modifications of cortical circuits during adolescence. These include reductions of gray matter (GM), increases in the myelination of cortico-cortical connections and changes in the architecture of large-scale cortical networks. It is currently unclear, however, how the ongoing developmental processes impact upon the folding of the cerebral cortex and how changes in gyrification relate to maturation of GM/WM-volume, thickness and surface area. In the current study, we acquired high-resolution (3 Tesla) magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data from 79 healthy subjects (34 males and 45 females) between the ages of 12 and 23 years and performed whole brain analysis of cortical folding patterns with the gyrification index (GI). In addition to GI-values, we obtained estimates of cortical thickness, surface area, GM and white matter (WM) volume which permitted correlations with changes in gyrification. Our data show pronounced and widespread reductions in GI-values during adolescence in several cortical regions which include precentral, temporal and frontal areas. Decreases in gyrification overlap only partially with changes in the thickness, volume and surface of GM and were characterized overall by a linear developmental trajectory. Our data suggest that the observed reductions in GI-values represent an additional, important modification of the cerebral cortex during late brain maturation which may be related to cognitive development

The impact of sound field systems on learning and attention in elementary school classrooms

Purpose: An evaluation of the installation and use of sound field systems (SFS) was carried out to investigate their impact on teaching and learning in elementary school classrooms. Methods: The evaluation included acoustic surveys of classrooms, questionnaire surveys of students and teachers and experimental testing of students with and without the use of SFS. Students ’ perceptions of classroom environments and objective data evaluating change in performance on cognitive and academic assessments with amplification over a six month period are reported. Results: Teachers were positive about the use of SFS in improving children’s listening and attention to verbal instructions. Over time students in amplified classrooms did not differ from those in nonamplified classrooms in their reports of listening conditions, nor did their performance differ in measures of numeracy, reading or spelling. Use of SFS in the classrooms resulted in significantly larger gains in performance in the number of correct items on the nonverbal measure of speed of processing and the measure of listening comprehension. Analysis controlling for classroom acoustics indicated that students ’ listening comprehension score

Inflammasome-independent role of AIM2 in suppressing colon tumorigenesis via DNA-PK and Akt

The inflammasome activates caspase-1 and the release of interleukin-1β (IL-1β) and IL-18, and several inflammasomes protect against intestinal inflammation and colitis-associated colon cancer (CAC) in animal models. The absent in melanoma 2 (AIM2) inflammasome is activated by double-stranded DNA, and AIM2 expression is reduced in several types of cancer, but the mechanism by which AIM2 restricts tumor growth remains unclear. We found that Aim2-deficient mice had greater tumor load than Asc-deficient mice in the azoxymethane/dextran sodium sulfate (AOM/DSS) model of colorectal cancer. Tumor burden was also higher in Aim2−/−/ApcMin/+ than in APCMin/+ mice. The effects of AIM2 on CAC were independent of inflammasome activation and IL-1β and were primarily mediated by a non–bone marrow source of AIM2. In resting cells, AIM2 physically interacted with and limited activation of DNA-dependent protein kinase (DNA-PK), a PI3K-related family member that promotes Akt phosphorylation, whereas loss of AIM2 promoted DNA-PK–mediated Akt activation. AIM2 reduced Akt activation and tumor burden in colorectal cancer models, while an Akt inhibitor reduced tumor load in Aim2−/− mice. These findings suggest that Akt inhibitors could be used to treat AIM2-deficient human cancers

Filtrering av trycksvängningar i en railtrycksignal med IIR bandstoppfilter för bränslemängdsestimering

This project concerns an inline six-cylinder (I6) diesel truck engine equipped with common-rail injection system. It has been done at the Swedish truck manufacturer Scania CV AB. The main focus is digital signal processing of the rail pressure sensor signal from the injection system. A low-pass filter and a band stop filter of type infinite impulse response (IIR), both of order two, has been used to attenuate high frequency noise and pressure oscillations that are seen as unwanted information. The pressure oscillations occur in the fuel rail after an injection due to the water hammer effect. These have been analyzed in two different engines which showed that they vary depending on the engine used. An increase in frequency for the oscillations was seen when the rail pressure increases. It was also found that the oscillations from a specific injector had an almost identical behavior from one injection to another. It is suggested to use narrow band stop filters about the oscillation frequencies. A requirement of maximum one injection cycle was set for the phase delay of the filter to make it usable in real time. The phase shift could be kept significantly smaller without compromising any other filtering aspects. The resulting phase shift from the filters can be seen in chapter 5.4. The filter algorithm has been implemented with fixed point precision in MATLAB and in a microcontroller unit from NXP called MPC5777C. Digital hardware filters and direct memory access is used in the MPC5777C to avoid load on the central processing unit. In [1], it was advised that the sampling of the rail pressure signal needed to be at least 10 kHz to retain a high resolution of the injections. 20 kHz has been used in this project. An evaluation of the filtering through injected fuel amount estimation has been made based on the pressure drop in the filtered signal during an injection. The goal of the injected fuel estimation was to have a mean relative error below 20 %, as this was achieved in a similar study by Namir Askari and MathiasNiemand [2], which also utilized the pressure drop for the injected fuel amount estimation. This was achieved for two out of three tested injection amounts independently of the rail pressure. For the last and highest injection amount, it was above 20 % for most rail pressures.Detta projekt behandlar en rak sexcylindrig (I6) diesellastbilsmotor utrustad med common-railinsprutningssystem. Projektet har gjorts hos den svenska lastbilstillverkaren Scania CV AB. Huvudfokus är digital signalbehandling av railtrycksensorsignalen från insprutningssystemet. Ett lågpassfilter och ett bandstoppfilter av typen infinite impulse response (IIR), båda av ordning två, har använts för att dämpa högfrekvent brus och trycksvängningar som ses som oönskad information. Trycksvängningarna uppstår i bränsleskenan efter en insprutning på grund av water hammer-effekten. Dessa har analyserats i två olika motorer som visade att de varierar beroende på vilken motor som används. En ökning av frekvensen för svängningarna sågs när railtrycket ökar. Det sågs även att trycksvängningarna var väldigt lika för en specifik injektor för en injektion till en annan. Det rekommenderas att använda bandstoppfilter med smala stoppband kring frekvenserna för svängningarna för att dämpa dessa. Ett krav på filtrering var att ha maximalt en injektionscykel i fördröjning för att det skulle vara användbart i realtid. Fördröjningen kunde hållas betydligt lägre utan att kompromissa med någon annan filtreringsaspekt. Resulterande fördröjning för filterna visas i kapitel 5.4. Filteralgoritmen har implementerats med fixpunktsprecision i MATLAB och i en mikrokontrollerenhet från NXP kallad MPC5777C. Digitala hårdvarufilter och direkt minnesåtkomst används i MPC5777C för att undvika belastning på huvudprocessorn. I [1] rekommenderas det att railtrycksignalen ska samplas med minst 10 kHz för att bevara hög upplösning på injektionerna. I detta projekt har 20 kHz använts. En utvärdering av filtreringen genom uppskattning av insprutad bränslemängd har gjorts. Målet med estimeringen var att medelvärdet av det relativa felet ska vara under 20 %, eftersom detta uppnådes i en liknande studie av Namir Askari and Mathias Niemand [2], som också utnyttjade tryckfallet för bränslemängdsestimering. Detta uppnåddes för två av tre testade injektionsmängder oberoende av railtryck. För den sista och högsta injektionsmängden var det relativa felet över 20 % för de flesta railtrycken

MePrints: Building User Centred Repositories

Over the last few years we have been working to reinvent Teaching and Learning Repositories learning from the best practices of Web 2.0. Over this time we have successfully deployed a number of innovative repositories, including Southampton University EdShare, The Language Box, The HumBox, Open University’s LORO and Worcester Learning Box. A key part of this work has been the development of an extension for the EPrints repository platform, called MePrints, that enables configurable profile pages, and works alongside existing extensions such as IRStats and SNEEP in order to give users live feeds about repository events that matter to them. Through these deployments we have discovered that more sophisticated profile pages give users a home within a repository, act as a focus for their work, and help them feel more ownership of the work that they deposit. This increases the visibility of the repository and encourages more deposits

Ku complex interacts with and stimulates the Werner protein

Werner syndrome (WS) is the hallmark premature aging disorder in which affected humans appear older than their chronological age. The protein WRNp, defective in WS, has helicase function, DNA-dependent ATPase, and exonuclease activity. Although WRNp functions in nucleic acid metabolism, there is little or no information about the pathways or protein interactions in which it participates. Here we identify Ku70 and Ku86 as proteins that interact with WRNp. Although Ku proteins had no effect on ATPase or helicase activity, they strongly stimulated specific exonuclease activity. These results suggest that WRNp and the Ku complex participate in a common DNA metabolic pathway