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Sketching snapshots:reflecting on human-computer interaction education through sketching
No full textReflection provides students and instructors insight into mindsets, learning progress, and course design. However, most reflective activities in HCI courses focus on specific skills and content. We propose sketching as a flexible and expressive medium for reflecting on larger topics to reveal implicit perspectives about multifaceted concepts of HCI. We developed “Sketching Snapshots,” an activity to elicit student perspectives on high-level concepts. To evaluate this activity, we ran pre- and post-semester workshops in two HCI courses in the US and UK. We analyze 68 sketches from 41 students, 9 student interviews, and 2 instructor interviews, and find that sketching is effective for supporting student and instructor reflection. We then report case studies in two additional contexts and synthesize recommendations for deploying reflective sketching. We propose incorporating Sketching Snapshots in courses can facilitate reflection on complex concepts, improve teaching, and spark conversations about what HCI means to us and our students
Urban-rural disparity:temporal trends in dementia prevalence and the impact of demographic transition in Taiwan (2000–2020)
No full textObjectivesWhile the simultaneous rise of two major demographic trends—population aging and urbanization—has created significant global challenges, the long-term demographic impact on dementia prevalence remains unclear. This study aimed to examine temporal trends and urban–rural differences in dementia prevalence over a 20-year period (2000–2020) in Taiwan.MethodsThis study analyzed cross-sectional trends in dementia prevalence between urban and rural areas in Taiwan over five time points (2000, 2005, 2010, 2015, 2020) using the full population National Health Insurance database. Logistic regression models estimated adjusted odds ratios (AORs) for urban–rural comparisons of dementia prevalence, reporting AORs with 95% CI.ResultsUrbanization among older adults rose from 63.4% to 73.0%, alongside rising dementia prevalence in both settings. Initially higher in urban areas (2.79% vs. 2.56% in 2000), rural prevalence surpassed urban prevalence around 2010–2015 and widened by 2020 (8.23% rural vs. 6.81% urban). AORs for urban vs. rural prevalence declined from 1.02 (95% CI: 0.99–1.04) in 2000 to 0.95 (0.94–0.96) in 2020.DiscussionThis study highlights the significant impact of population aging and urbanization on dementia prevalence in Taiwan over two decades. Dementia prevalence increased markedly across both urban and rural areas, with rural areas surpassing urban prevalence between 2010 and 2015, likely due to decentralized healthcare and long-term care policies. These findings underscore the need for tailored dementia care strategies, especially in rural settings, to inform effective public health planning
Old and new censorship in contemporary Spanish theatre
No full textThis chapter focuses on three aspects. Firstly, the longevity of dictatorship-era censorship in Spanish society and the persistent hold of old orthodoxies; secondly, the way a previously silenced past is remembered through contemporary performance; and, thirdly, the continuing existence of cultural control in the present. Although the Franco regime ended in the 1970s, its legacy lives on in the cultural sphere and the chapter looks at how old orthodoxies retain a hold on dramatists, practitioners and the public. It also considers how the legacy of past censorship interacts with current debates about cultural and historical memory. As Spain continues to experience an often-painful reckoning with its past, the theatre is once again a site of collective exploration, contestation, and hope. This chapter shows how versions of history that the Franco regime sought to censor are being reimagined and enacted on the contemporary stage. Finally, and whilst understanding censorship to operate on a continuum and as a practice that always exists in society and culture in some form, the chapter briefly considers the presence of new forms of censorship in the Spanish theatre and the difficulty this poses for contemporary practitioners wishing to bring innovative and provocative theatre to the stage. <br/
Changing volatile emissions and sources along the Ethiopian Rift
No full textRift volcanoes are sites of intense volatile emissions. However, major uncertainties remain about the magnitude of rift volatile fluxes, particularly for greenhouse gases (e.g. CO2) and whether along-rift variations in degassing relate to changing mantle sources and/or rifting processes (i.e. melt production and lithospheric thinning). Here, we investigate CO2 flux and gas isotopes in Ethiopia; a mature, plume-influenced continental rift. We focus on one of the largest caldera volcanoes, Bora-Baricha-Tulu Moye (BBTM), which is situated in a region of high mantle melt production in the Central Main Ethiopian rift (∼500 km south-west the putative plume head). BBTM gases are characterized by plume-like 3He/4He values up to 17 Ra (the highest ever observed in Ethiopian Rift fumaroles) and we calculate total magmatic CO2 flux of 757–901 t d-1 (making BBTM the largest volcanic CO2 emitter in the Ethiopian Rift). Using our CO2 flux measurements, we estimate total CO2 emissions from Ethiopia’s volcanic systems to be 2500–9200 kt yr-1 and reveal important along-rift variation in CO2 flux. High CO2 flux sectors are found in Central Afar, as well as the Northern and Central Main Ethiopian Rift. These sectors are all regions of high partial melt content (evidenced by low seismic velocity in the underlying mantle) and also show the greatest 3He/4He values (>14 Ra). Cooccurrence of high mantle melt production, elevated CO2 emissions and high 3He/4He demonstrates that in mature continental rifts carbon emissions and plume volatile contributions are particularly elevated in regions of greatest lithospheric thinning and mantle melting
Review: Understanding Scotland Musically: Folk, Tradition and Policy:Simon McKerrell and Gary West (eds.)
No full textReview of this collection of essays, published Routledge 2019
Early-life thermal stress reduces survival but has no long-term effects on reproduction in an insect
No full textEnvironmental temperature is a key determinant of fitness, influencing survival, reproduction, activity and behaviour. With climate change increasing the frequency and intensity of extreme thermal events, it is crucial to understand the capacity of organisms to adapt to a new thermal reality. While the impacts of acute thermal stress on physiological traits are well-documented, less is known about the ontogenetic effects of such extreme events, particularly regarding how they interact with complex behavioural mechanisms like parental care. Here, we investigated how exposure to a heatwave during the larval stage influences adult reproductive success and parental care in the burying beetle Nicrophorus vespilloides. Larvae were exposed to a simulated heatwave (26°C for 72 hours) or maintained under control conditions (20°C). We then assessed reproductive and behavioural outcomes in adulthood, along with downstream effects on offspring fitness. We found that larvae exposed to a heatwave suffered a significant reduction in survival to adulthood. However, for individuals that survived, there was no significant effect on their reproductive success, the amount of parental care provided to their offspring, or their offspring’s fitness. These findings offer a nuanced perspective on the prevailing assumption that fertility and reproductive behaviour are more sensitive to thermal stress than survival. Our results underscore the need to consider stage-specific and trait-specific responses when evaluating the biological impacts of climate extremes and highlight the complexity of thermal resilience in ectotherm life histories
Steroid-dependent metabolic rewiring reveals novel therapeutic and imaging approaches for glioblastoma
No full textSteroid anti-inflammatory drugs, such as dexamethasone, are routinely used to manage brain tumor?associated edema, yet their impact on brain tumor metabolism remains understudied. Here, a metabolomic screen in naïve glioblastoma cells treated with dexamethasone revealed the accumulation of N1-methylnicotinamide, a nicotinamide N-methyltransferase (NNMT) product, through glucocorticoid receptor activation. Using stable isotope-assisted metabolomics in patients with glioblastoma, we showed that nicotinamide conversion into N1-methylnicotinamide exceeds that into NAD+, leading to a ~7-fold accumulation of N1-methylnicotinamide in tumor compared to surrounding brain tissue. In orthotopic models, NNMT activity was enhanced by dexamethasone selectively in glioblastoma tumors but not in contralateral brain. Leveraging the tumor-specific activity of NNMT, we developed a novel 11C-nicotinamide?based positron emission tomography (PET) approach to visualizing glioblastoma tumors. Furthermore, our findings demonstrate that the dexamethasone-induced methionine-dependent nicotinamide methylation becomes detrimental for glioblastoma when combined with a methionine-restricted diet. These results show that steroids rewire methionine and nicotinamide metabolism, enabling the development of innovative PET imaging and metabolic therapies for glioblastoma. Dexamethasone reprograms glioblastoma nicotinamide metabolism, sensitizing tumors to methionine restriction and enabling PET
Improved abundance trajectories with Bayesian population dynamics models:case study with a Hawaiian honeycreeper
No full textMany wildlife monitoring programmes collect annual data on population abundance. The resulting abundance estimates fluctuate over time partly because of true population change and partly because of observation error. These two components of variation can be separated by fitting the estimates to a population dynamics model within a Bayesian state-space modelling framework. By constraining the population trajectory to be biologically realistic, more precise estimates can be obtained. Independent biological knowledge can be incorporated through choice of model structure and by specifying informative prior distributions on demographic parameters. We illustrate the approach using a 31-year point transect study of the Hawai’i ’ākepa (Loxops coccineus). We fitted five models, each making different assumptions about how population change, recruitment and/or adult survival varied over time. Overall, the ’ākepa geometric mean growth rate was 1.02, indicating an increasing population over the 31-year time series, although there were periods of slow decline potentially associated with low recruitment and more rapid recovery associated with pulses of high recruitment. Abundance estimates derived from the population models were substantially more precise than the ‘raw’ point transect estimates: 95% credible interval (CrI) was on average 51.7% (s.d. = 14.1%) narrower
Obtaining the Fourier spectrum via Fourier coefficients
No full textThe Fourier spectrum is a family of dimensions that interpolates between the Fourier and Hausdorff dimensions and is defined in terms of certain energies which capture Fourier decay. In this paper we obtain a convenient discrete representation of those energies using Fourier coefficients. As an example application, we use this representation to establish sharp bounds for the Fourier spectrum of a general measure with bounded support, improving previous estimates of the second-named author
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