Augmented Reality Photography Assistant

An augmented reality photography assistant or a virtual reality photography assisted mode allows a photographer to compose a particular shot and save the settings for that particular shot. The settings can include more than just typical camera settings like white balance, aperture, shutter speed, and ISO settings. The saved settings can also include positions of objects or persons within the particular shot, orientation of the camera itself, or physical location of the camera. The photographer can pass the camera or the saved settings to another person to take the particular shot. In a viewfinder or other shot-framing device of a camera featuring a virtual reality or augmented reality environment, the other person may see a series of guidelines or other positioning guides that allow the other person to compose the shot as the photographer envisioned. Alternatively, the photographer could save or receive the necessary settings and replicate a photo taken previously or recreate a photo taken by another photographer

Getting on the Map: Using GIS to Assess Risk and Create Resilience Throughout Campus

The University of Oregon’s Emergency Management (UOEM) program is taking a unique service learning approach to building a “living” risk assessment and continuity of operations plans on campus. UOEM has partnered with the Geography Department’s InfoGraphics Laboratory to build, update, maintain and improve the Campus Hazard Identification Risk and Vulnerability Assessment (CHIRVA) which is based on the Campus GIS. The Campus GIS is a university-wide enterprise geodatabase that connects the campus community to a room-level GIS. This system provides UO staff and managers with the ability to track infrastructure and assets including utility systems, hazardous materials, capital construction projects, and individual data/voice jacks and networks throughout all of the buildings and grounds on campus. This data is being updated and improved upon on a room-by-room level through a pilot project to develop continuity of operations plans (COOP) for several units within the research enterprise. A team of UOEM staff and InfoGraphics staff along with graduate teaching fellows tour the pilot research facilities along with research staff to identify the facility’s critical functions as well as the rooms that support those critical functions. The end result of the pilot project is the development of unit-level COOPs, but also an advanced dataset that highlights the interdependencies on critical infrastructure and services not only within that particular unit, but eventually, across units. The project benefits emergency planning efforts by identifying campus exposure, vulnerability, and sensitivity; and can also help to improve daily operations by identifying opportunities for system and process efficiencies

β-Lactoglobulin-linoleate complexes: In vitro digestion and the role of protein in fatty acids uptake

peer-reviewedThe dairy protein β-lactoglobulin (BLG) is known to bind fatty acids such as the salt of the essential longchain fatty acid linoleic acid (cis,cis-9,12-octadecadienoic acid, n-6, 18:2). The aim of the current study was to investigate how bovine BLG-linoleate complexes, of various stoichiometry, affect the enzymatic digestion of BLG and the intracellular transport of linoleate into enterocyte-like monolayers. Duodenal and gastric digestions of the complexes indicated that BLG was hydrolyzed more rapidly when complexed with linoleate. Digested as well as undigested BLG-linoleate complexes reduced intracellular linoleate transport as compared with free linoleate. To investigate whether enteroendocrine cells perceive linoleate differently when part of a complex, the ability of linoleate to increase production or secretion of the enteroendocrine satiety hormone, cholecystokinin, was measured. Cholecystokinin mRNA levels were different when linoleate was presented to the cells alone or as part of a protein complex. In conclusion, understanding interactions between linoleate and BLG could help to formulate foods with targeted fatty acid bioaccessibility and, therefore, aid in the development of food matrices with optimal bioactive efficacyS. Le Maux is currently supported by a Teagasc Walsh Fellowship and the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (FIRM project 08/RD/TMFRC/650). We also acknowledge funding from IRCSET-Ulysses Travel Grant

Lab-on-a-chip Raman sensors outperforming Raman microscopes

We demonstrate that the signal-to-noise ratio and signal collection efficiency in evanescent waveguide-based Raman spectroscopy exceeds that in Raman microscopes. We investigate the effect of silicon-nitride waveguide geometry to further improve the performance

The deep-sea macrobenthos on the continental slope of the northwestern Mediterranean Sea: a quantitative approach

As part of the ECOMARGE operation (J.G.O.F.S. France), macrobenthic assemblages in the Toulon Canyon were described and quantified on the basis of sampling carried out between 250 and 2000 m depth on the Mediterranean continental slope. Results show that Mediterranean bathyal assemblages are made up mainly of continental shelf eurybathic species. The qualitative and quantitative composition of populations varies with depth on the slope and also varies with station position at equivalent depth, whether on the flanks or in the canyon channel. Various analyses have provided evidence on the factors responsible for this population distribution pattern. No single factor emerges as predominant, but rather a group of factors, which are related to the nature and origin of sediments and more particularly their grain size distribution, geochemical composition and mode of transportation and sedimentation (benthic nepheloid or originating from the water column), act in conjunction to determine the pattern. Comparison with ocean continental slopes shows that in the Mediterranean Sea the absence of tidal current modifies the trophic structure of the macrobenthic assemblages, which are characterized by a dominance of surface and subsurface deposit feeders as compared to a dominance of suspension feeders and carnivores in the upper and median part of the slope in the ocean. Surface dumping of dredge spoil at the canyon head and channelling of waste induces an increase of organic matter and pollutant concentrations in sediment from the upper part of the canyon channel but does not give rise to any marked population degradation