Current and Potential Future use of Facilities on the Crichton Estate by Students Attending Academic Institutions located on, and adjacent to, it

No abstract available

The Impact of Starbursts on the Circumgalactic Medium

We present a study exploring the impact of a starburst on the properties of the surrounding circum-galactic medium (CGM): gas located beyond the galaxy's stellar body and extending out to the virial radius (200 kpc). We obtained ultraviolet spectroscopic data from the Cosmic Origin Spectrograph (COS) probing the CGM of 20 low-redshift foreground galaxies using background QSOs. Our sample consists of starburst and control galaxies. The latter comprises normal star-forming and passive galaxies with similar stellar masses and impact parameters as the starbursts. We used optical spectra from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey(SDSS) to estimate the properties of the starbursts, inferring average ages of 200 Myrs and burst fractions involving ~10% of their stellar mass. The COS data reveal highly ionized gas traced by CIV in 80%(4/5) of the starburst and in 17%(2/12) of the control sample. The two control galaxies with CIV absorbers differed from the four starbursts in showing multiple low-ionization transitions and strong saturated Lyman-alpha lines. They therefore appear to be physically different systems. We show that the CIV absorbers in the starburst CGM represent a significant baryon repository. The high detection rate of this highly ionized material in the starbursts suggests that starburst-driven winds can affect the CGM out to radii as large as 200 kpc. This is plausible given the inferred properties of the starbursts and the known properties of starburst-driven winds. This would represent the first direct observational evidence of local starbursts impacting the bulk of their gaseous halos, and as such provides new evidence of the importance of this kind of feedback in the evolution of galaxies.Comment: Accepted for publication in Ap

Mapping the “housing with care” concept with stakeholders: insights from a UK case study

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to present the findings of an early stage, exploratory case study of a proposed housing with care initiative (the Crichton Care Campus (CCC)). This sought the perspectives of a range of key stakeholders on the proposed model and how it might be best realised. The analyses of these findings show their relevance to debates on integrated housing with care, and reflect on the methodology used and its potential relevance to similar projects. Design/methodology/approach - The study used a transactive planning approach, where grounded views are sought from a variety of stakeholders. A purposive sample identified informants from relevant health, social care and housing organisations and nine semi-structured interviews were conducted. These were transcribed and data analysis was undertaken on an “interactive” basis, relating care theory to empirical expressions. Findings - The authors identify two contrasting orientations – inclusive “community-oriented” and professional “service-oriented”. This distinction provides the basis for a rudimentary conceptual map which can continue to be used in the planning process. Two significant variables within the conceptual map were the extent to which CCC should be intergenerational and as such, the degree to which care should come from formalised and self-care/informal sources. The potential to achieve an integrated approach was high with stakeholders across all sectors fully supporting the CCC concept and agreeing on the need for it to have a mixed tenure basis and include a range of non-care amenities. Originality/value- This paper offers originality in two respects. Methodologically, it describes an attempt to undertake early stage care planning using a needs led transactive methodology. In more practical terms, it also offers an innovative environment for considering any approach to care planning that actively seeks integration – based on an acknowledgement of complexity, a variety of perspectives and possible conflicts. The authors propose that the concepts of “community-orientation” and “service-orientation” are used as a helpful basis for planning negotiations, making implicit divergences explicit and thus better delineated

Computer assessment in mathematics

This thesis investigates methods of assessing students' mathematical ability by using the computer. It starts by reviewing the general types of assessment within mathematics educational software and then describes some different ways of presenting the assessment on the computer by the use of varying types of questions. In Chapter 2 there is a review of the literature and research conducted in the area of computer assessment of mathematics. In particular, the most prevalent dilemmas of computer aided learning and computer aided assessment are highlighted whilst looking forward at how the contents of further chapters in the thesis can help in addressing some of these difficulties. The following chapter gives an historical account of how the CALM(1) software has addressed some of the inherent difficulties of assessment and highlights the ways in which some of these hurdles have been overcome. The shortfalls of CALM are described and, where relevant, pointers to the parts of thesis which tackle these shortfalls are given. In particular, the work in Chapter 4 undertakes an improvement in the way simple mathematical expressions(2) can be handled as it shows how binary tree constructions can be utilised within an educational environment. Chapter 5 tests out two applications of the binary tree structures with the creation of a tool to aid student-computer communication of mathematics and by providing a method of comparing student-set questions against a true answer. The following chapter describes an educational experiment which set out to show how a computer can be used to assess students' mathematical ability during a formal university examination. It deals with very important educational issues which arise when performing such examinations and gives conclusions as to their educational validity. In particular, issues of student input, partial credit, objectivity, consistency, flexibility and efficiency are considered along with the impact that this research could have for future testing of mathematics. The final chapter describes how the thesis has been instrumental in further research and development within the field of computer assessment of mathematics. (1)CALM is the acronym for the Computer Aided Learning in Mathematics project at the Department of Mathematics, Heriot- Watt University. (2)in this thesis, the word expression is taken to be a mathematical entity which does not contain any comparison operators

Current and Potential Future use of Facilities on the Crichton Estate by Students Attending Academic Institutions located on, and adjacent to, it

No abstract available

Modeling and visualizing uncertainty in gene expression clusters using Dirichlet process mixtures

Although the use of clustering methods has rapidly become one of the standard computational approaches in the literature of microarray gene expression data, little attention has been paid to uncertainty in the results obtained. Dirichlet process mixture (DPM) models provide a nonparametric Bayesian alternative to the bootstrap approach to modeling uncertainty in gene expression clustering. Most previously published applications of Bayesian model-based clustering methods have been to short time series data. In this paper, we present a case study of the application of nonparametric Bayesian clustering methods to the clustering of high-dimensional nontime series gene expression data using full Gaussian covariances. We use the probability that two genes belong to the same cluster in a DPM model as a measure of the similarity of these gene expression profiles. Conversely, this probability can be used to define a dissimilarity measure, which, for the purposes of visualization, can be input to one of the standard linkage algorithms used for hierarchical clustering. Biologically plausible results are obtained from the Rosetta compendium of expression profiles which extend previously published cluster analyses of this data