Role of asynchronous awareness in digital art creation

Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, School of Architecture and Planning, Program in Media Arts and Sciences, 2008.Includes bibliographical references (p. 83-85).The majority of visitors to sites on the World Wide Web (WWW) have traditionally been only passive observers; consumers of previously created content. More recently, however, these users have been encouraged to contribute to these sites, opening the door to new forms of creative self expression. As we enter this new era of widespread collaboration and sharing made possible by the WWW, one question that remains is how to build appropriate communication channels to and from this new medium with respect to the tools used for digitally mediated creative expression. In this thesis, I will attempt to formulate a coherent set of characteristics that both creative programming environments and their associated WWW sites must possess to help improve, inspire, and support the work of creative individuals using these systems, which I will refer to as architectures for web-based collectivity.by Kyle Matthew Buza.S.M

Global Environmental Micro Sensors Test Operations in the Natural Environment

ENSCO, Inc. is developing an innovative atmospheric observing system known as Global Environmental Micro Sensors (GEMS). The GEMS concept features an integrated system of miniaturized in situ, airborne probes measuring temperature, relative humidity, pressure, and vector wind velocity. In order for the probes to remain airborne for long periods of time, their design is based on a helium-filled super-pressure balloon. The GEMS probes are neutrally buoyant and carried passively by the wind at predetermined levels. Each probe contains onboard satellite communication, power generation, processing, and geolocation capabilities. ENSCO has partnered with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Kennedy Space Center (KSC) for a project called GEMS Test Operations in the Natural Environment (GEMSTONE) that will culminate with limited prototype flights of the system in spring 2007. By leveraging current advances in micro and nanotechnology, the probe mass, size, cost, and complexity can be reduced substantially so that large numbers of probes could be deployed routinely to support ground, launch, and landing operations at KSC and other locations. A full-scale system will improve the data density for the local initialization of high-resolution numerical weather prediction systems by at least an order of magnitude and provide a significantly expanded in situ data base to evaluate launch commit criteria and flight rules. When applied to launch or landing sites, this capability will reduce both weather hazards and weather-related scrubs, thus enhancing both safety and cost-avoidance for vehicles processed by the Shuttle, Launch Services Program, and Constellation Directorates. The GEMSTONE project will conclude with a field experiment in which 10 to 15 probes are released over KSC in east central Florida. The probes will be neutrally buoyant at different altitudes from 500 to 3000 meters and will report their position, speed, heading, temperature, humidity, and pressure via satellite. The GEMS data will be validated against reference observations provided by current weather instrumentation located at KSC. This paper will report on the results of the GEMSTONE project and discuss the challenges encountered in developing an airborne sensor system

Mapping our Universe in 3D with MITEoR

Mapping our universe in 3D by imaging the redshifted 21 cm line from neutral hydrogen has the potential to overtake the cosmic microwave background as our most powerful cosmological probe, because it can map a much larger volume of our Universe, shedding new light on the epoch of reionization, inflation, dark matter, dark energy, and neutrino masses. We report on MITEoR, a pathfinder low-frequency radio interferometer whose goal is to test technologies that greatly reduce the cost of such 3D mapping for a given sensitivity. MITEoR accomplishes this by using massive baseline redundancy both to enable automated precision calibration and to cut the correlator cost scaling from N^2 to NlogN, where N is the number of antennas. The success of MITEoR with its 64 dual-polarization elements bodes well for the more ambitious HERA project, which would incorporate many identical or similar technologies using an order of magnitude more antennas, each with dramatically larger collecting area.Comment: To be published in proceedings of 2013 IEEE International Symposium on Phased Array Systems & Technolog

Prevalence and risk factors for human leptospirosis at a hospital serving a pastoralist community, Endulen, Tanzania

Background: Leptospirosis is suspected to be a major cause of illness in rural Tanzania associated with close contact with livestock. We sought to determine leptospirosis prevalence, identify infecting Leptospira serogroups, and investigate risk factors for leptospirosis in a rural area of Tanzania where pastoralist animal husbandry practices and sustained livestock contact are common. Methods: We enrolled participants at Endulen Hospital, Tanzania. Patients with a history of fever within 72 hours, or a tympanic temperature of ≥38.0°C were eligible. Serum samples were collected at presentation and 4–6 weeks later. Sera were tested using microscopic agglutination testing with 20 Leptospira serovars from 17 serogroups. Acute leptospirosis cases were defined by a ≥four-fold rise in antibody titre between acute and convalescent serum samples or a reciprocal titre ≥400 in either sample. Leptospira seropositivity was defined by a single reciprocal antibody titre ≥100 in either sample. We defined the predominant reactive serogroup as that with the highest titre. We explored risk factors for acute leptospirosis and Leptospira seropositivity using logistic regression modelling. Results: Of 229 participants, 99 (43.2%) were male and the median (range) age was 27 (0, 78) years. Participation in at least one animal husbandry practice was reported by 160 (69.9%). We identified 18 (7.9%) cases of acute leptospirosis, with Djasiman 8 (44.4%) and Australis 7 (38.9%) the most common predominant reactive serogroups. Overall, 69 (30.1%) participants were Leptospira seropositive and the most common predominant reactive serogroups were Icterohaemorrhagiae (n = 20, 29.0%), Djasiman (n = 19, 27.5%), and Australis (n = 17, 24.6%). Milking cattle (OR 6.27, 95% CI 2.24–7.52) was a risk factor for acute leptospirosis, and milking goats (OR 2.35, 95% CI 1.07–5.16) was a risk factor for Leptospira seropositivity. Conclusions: We identified leptospirosis in approximately one in twelve patients attending hospital with fever from this rural community. Interventions that reduce risks associated with milking livestock may reduce human infections

CMB-S4: Forecasting Constraints on Primordial Gravitational Waves

CMB-S4---the next-generation ground-based cosmic microwave background (CMB) experiment---is set to significantly advance the sensitivity of CMB measurements and enhance our understanding of the origin and evolution of the Universe, from the highest energies at the dawn of time through the growth of structure to the present day. Among the science cases pursued with CMB-S4, the quest for detecting primordial gravitational waves is a central driver of the experimental design. This work details the development of a forecasting framework that includes a power-spectrum-based semi-analytic projection tool, targeted explicitly towards optimizing constraints on the tensor-to-scalar ratio, $r$, in the presence of Galactic foregrounds and gravitational lensing of the CMB. This framework is unique in its direct use of information from the achieved performance of current Stage 2--3 CMB experiments to robustly forecast the science reach of upcoming CMB-polarization endeavors. The methodology allows for rapid iteration over experimental configurations and offers a flexible way to optimize the design of future experiments given a desired scientific goal. To form a closed-loop process, we couple this semi-analytic tool with map-based validation studies, which allow for the injection of additional complexity and verification of our forecasts with several independent analysis methods. We document multiple rounds of forecasts for CMB-S4 using this process and the resulting establishment of the current reference design of the primordial gravitational-wave component of the Stage-4 experiment, optimized to achieve our science goals of detecting primordial gravitational waves for $r > 0.003$ at greater than $5\sigma$, or, in the absence of a detection, of reaching an upper limit of $r < 0.001$ at $95\%$ CL.Comment: 24 pages, 8 figures, 9 tables, submitted to ApJ. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1907.0447

CMB-S4

We describe the stage 4 cosmic microwave background ground-based experiment CMB-S4

CMB-S4: Forecasting Constraints on Primordial Gravitational Waves

Abstract: CMB-S4—the next-generation ground-based cosmic microwave background (CMB) experiment—is set to significantly advance the sensitivity of CMB measurements and enhance our understanding of the origin and evolution of the universe. Among the science cases pursued with CMB-S4, the quest for detecting primordial gravitational waves is a central driver of the experimental design. This work details the development of a forecasting framework that includes a power-spectrum-based semianalytic projection tool, targeted explicitly toward optimizing constraints on the tensor-to-scalar ratio, r, in the presence of Galactic foregrounds and gravitational lensing of the CMB. This framework is unique in its direct use of information from the achieved performance of current Stage 2–3 CMB experiments to robustly forecast the science reach of upcoming CMB-polarization endeavors. The methodology allows for rapid iteration over experimental configurations and offers a flexible way to optimize the design of future experiments, given a desired scientific goal. To form a closed-loop process, we couple this semianalytic tool with map-based validation studies, which allow for the injection of additional complexity and verification of our forecasts with several independent analysis methods. We document multiple rounds of forecasts for CMB-S4 using this process and the resulting establishment of the current reference design of the primordial gravitational-wave component of the Stage-4 experiment, optimized to achieve our science goals of detecting primordial gravitational waves for r > 0.003 at greater than 5σ, or in the absence of a detection, of reaching an upper limit of r < 0.001 at 95% CL

Global Environmental Micro Sensors Test Operations in the Natural Environment (GEMSTONE)

ENSCO, Inc. is developing an innovative atmospheric observing system known as Global Environmental Micro Sensors (GEMS). The GEMS concept features an integrated system of miniaturized in situ, airborne probes measuring temperature, relative humidity, pressure, and vector wind velocity. In order for the probes to remain airborne for long periods of time, their design is based on a helium-filled super-pressure balloon. The GEMS probes are neutrally buoyant and carried passively by the wind at predetermined levels. Each probe contains on-board satellite communication, power generation, processing, and geolocation capabilities. ENSCO has partnered with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC) Weather Office for a project called GEMS Test Operations in the Natural Environment (GEMSTONE). The goal of the GEMSTONE project was to build and field-test a small system of prototype probes in the Earth’s atmosphere. This paper summarizes the 9-month GEMSTONE project (Sep 2006 – May 2007) including probe and system engineering as well as experiment design and data analysis from laboratory and field tests. These tests revealed issues with reliability, sensor accuracy, electronics miniaturization, and sub-system optimization. Nevertheless, the success of the third and final free flight test provides a solid foundation to move forward in follow on projects addressing these issues as highlighted in the technology roadmap for future GEMS development

Lipid nanoparticle-encapsulated mRNA therapy corrects serum total bilirubin level in Crigler-Najjar syndrome mouse model

Crigler-Najjar syndrome is a rare disorder of bilirubin metabolism caused by uridine diphosphate glucuronosyl transferase 1A1 (UGT1A1) mutations characterized by hyperbilirubinemia and jaundice. No cure currently exists; treatment options are limited to phototherapy, whose effectiveness diminishes over time, and liver transplantation. Here, we evaluated the therapeutic potential of systemically administered, lipid nanoparticle-encapsulated human UGT1A1 (hUGT1A1) mRNA therapy in a Crigler-Najjar mouse model. Ugt1 knockout mice were rescued from lethal post-natal hyperbilirubinemia by phototherapy. These adult Ugt1 knockout mice were then administered a single lipid nanoparticle-encapsulated hUGT1A1 mRNA dose. Within 24 h, serum total bilirubin levels decreased from 15 mg/dL (256 μmol/L) to <0.5 mg/dL (9 μmol/L), i.e., slightly above wild-type levels. This reduction was sustained for 2 weeks before bilirubin levels rose and returned to pre-treatment levels by day 42 post-administration. Sustained reductions in total bilirubin levels were achieved by repeated administration of the mRNA product in a frequency-dependent manner. We were also able to rescue the neonatal lethality phenotype seen in Ugt1 knockout mice with a single lipid nanoparticle dose, which suggests that this may be a treatment modality appropriate for metabolic crisis situations. Therefore, lipid nanoparticle-encapsulated hUGT1A1 mRNA may represent a potential treatment for Crigler-Najjar syndrome