Computing environments for reproducibility: Capturing the 'Whole Tale'

The act of sharing scientific knowledge is rapidly evolving away from traditional articles and presentations to the delivery of executable objects that integrate the data and computational details (e.g., scripts and workflows) upon which the findings rely. This envisioned coupling of data and process is essential to advancing science but faces technical and institutional barriers. The Whole Tale project aims to address these barriers by connecting computational, data-intensive research efforts with the larger research process—transforming the knowledge discovery and dissemination process into one where data products are united with research articles to create “living publications” or tales. The Whole Tale focuses on the full spectrum of science, empowering users in the long tail of science, and power users with demands for access to big data and compute resources. We report here on the design, architecture, and implementation of the Whole Tale environment

Do Children with Fragile X Syndrome Show Declines or Plateaus in Adaptive Behavior?

This study explores if children with fragile X syndrome (FXS) show advances, declines, or plateaus in adaptive behavior over time and the relationship of nonverbal cognitive abilities and autistic behavior on these trajectories. Parents of 55 children with FXS completed the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales between 3 and 6 times from 2 to 10 years of age. Using raw scores, results indicate that about half of the sample showed advances in adaptive behavior, while the other half showed declines, indicating a regression in skills. Children who were more cognitively advanced and had less autistic behaviors had higher trajectories. Understanding the developmental course of adaptive behavior in FXS has implications for educational planning and intervention, especially for those children showing declines

Effectiveness and impact of the national Healthy Homes Partnership on occupant health

It is important to translate healthy housing research into real-time action steps that people can take to improve their indoor environment. The Healthy Homes Partnership does this by uniting the efforts of Cooperative Extension professionals at eight universities in the United States. Cooperative Extension is an outreach arm of land-grant universities to provide the public with evidence-based information that can help them make informed decisions. For the last fifteen years the Healthy Homes Partnership has assisted individuals, families, and professionals using a variety of tools, including publications and curricula that addressed mould, safe drinking water, lead poisoning, pests, pesticides and chemicals, carbon monoxide poisoning, radon, and other toxins. The educational toolkit incorporates eight principles of healthy housing (dry, clean, maintained, safe, ventilated, pest-free, contaminant-free, and green) that are widely recognized across federal agencies and national organizations. Using a variety of outreach methods, including programs, exhibits, and media (broadcast, print and social), between September 1, 2014 and November 30, 2015 we had 9,617 direct contacts and 2,000,838 indirect contacts. Effective programming requires an understanding of the audiences, potential barriers, and different tools that can be used to reach them. Increasingly, people are going online for information. With so much information online, it is critical that we provide sources for trustworthy information on healthy housing. In this paper the authors discuss the effectiveness of this comprehensive approach, the different methods of relaying healthy housing research, and provide short, intermediate, and long-term impacts