Tensions of network security and collaborative work practice: understanding a single sign-on deployment in a regional hospital.

PubMed

Heckle, Rosa R; Lutters, Wayne G

2011-08-01

Healthcare providers and their IT staff, working in an effort to balance appropriate accessibility with stricter security mandates, are considering the use of a single network sign-on approach for authentication and password management. Single sign-on (SSO) promises to improve usability of authentication for multiple-system users, increase compliance, and help curb system maintenance costs. However, complexities are introduced when SSO is placed within a collaborative environment. These complexities include unanticipated workflow implications that introduce greater security vulnerability for the individual user. OBJECTIVES AND METHODOLOGY: In this work, we examine the challenges of implementing a single sign-on authentication technology in a hospital environment. The aim of the study was to document the factors that affected SSO adoption within the context of use. The ultimate goal is to better inform the design of usable authentication systems within collaborative healthcare work sites. The primary data collection techniques used are ethnographically informed - observation, contextual interviews, and document review. The study included a cross-section of individuals from various departments and varying rolls. These participants were a mix of both clinical and administrative staff, as well as the Information Technology group. The field work revealed fundamental mis-matches between the technology and routine work practices that will significantly impact its effective adoption. While single sign-on was effective in the administrative offices, SSO was not a good fit for collaborative areas. The collaborative needs of the clinical staff unearthed tensions in its implementation. An analysis of the findings revealed that the workflow, activities, and physical environment of the clinical areas create increased security vulnerabilities for the individual user. The clinical users were cognizant of these vulnerabilities and this created resistance to the implementation due to a concern for privacy. From a preliminary analysis of our on-going field study at a community hospital, there appears to be a number of mismatches between the SSO vision and the realities of routine work. While we cannot conclusively say if a SSO adoption will be effective in meeting its goals in a hospital environment, we do know that it will affect the work practice and that will make the management of the SSO system problematic. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

Hypermedia: The Integrated Learning Environment. Fastback 339.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wishnietsky, Dan H.

Hypermedia is not a single technology; it is an integrated electronic environment that combines text, audio, and video into one large file. Users can explore information about a subject using several technologies at the same time. Although the technical foundation for hypermedia was established in the early 1970s, it was not until the late 1980s…

A user-oriented and computerized model for estimating vehicle ride quality

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Leatherwood, J. D.; Barker, L. M.

1984-01-01

A simplified empirical model and computer program for estimating passenger ride comfort within air and surface transportation systems are described. The model is based on subjective ratings from more than 3000 persons who were exposed to controlled combinations of noise and vibration in the passenger ride quality apparatus. This model has the capability of transforming individual elements of a vehicle's noise and vibration environment into subjective discomfort units and then combining the subjective units to produce a single discomfort index typifying passenger acceptance of the environment. The computational procedures required to obtain discomfort estimates are discussed, and a user oriented ride comfort computer program is described. Examples illustrating application of the simplified model to helicopter and automobile ride environments are presented.

Using Learning Analytics to Identify Medical Student Misconceptions in an Online Virtual Patient Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Poitras, Eric G.; Naismith, Laura M.; Doleck, Tenzin; Lajoie, Susanne P.

2016-01-01

This study aimed to identify misconceptions in medical student knowledge by mining user interactions in the MedU online learning environment. Data from 13000 attempts at a single virtual patient case were extracted from the MedU MySQL database. A subgroup discovery method was applied to identify patterns in learner-generated annotations and…

Real-time tracking of visually attended objects in virtual environments and its application to LOD.

PubMed

Lee, Sungkil; Kim, Gerard Jounghyun; Choi, Seungmoon

2009-01-01

This paper presents a real-time framework for computationally tracking objects visually attended by the user while navigating in interactive virtual environments. In addition to the conventional bottom-up (stimulus-driven) saliency map, the proposed framework uses top-down (goal-directed) contexts inferred from the user's spatial and temporal behaviors, and identifies the most plausibly attended objects among candidates in the object saliency map. The computational framework was implemented using GPU, exhibiting high computational performance adequate for interactive virtual environments. A user experiment was also conducted to evaluate the prediction accuracy of the tracking framework by comparing objects regarded as visually attended by the framework to actual human gaze collected with an eye tracker. The results indicated that the accuracy was in the level well supported by the theory of human cognition for visually identifying single and multiple attentive targets, especially owing to the addition of top-down contextual information. Finally, we demonstrate how the visual attention tracking framework can be applied to managing the level of details in virtual environments, without any hardware for head or eye tracking.

Dimensional feature weighting utilizing multiple kernel learning for single-channel talker location discrimination using the acoustic transfer function.

PubMed

Takashima, Ryoichi; Takiguchi, Tetsuya; Ariki, Yasuo

2013-02-01

This paper presents a method for discriminating the location of the sound source (talker) using only a single microphone. In a previous work, the single-channel approach for discriminating the location of the sound source was discussed, where the acoustic transfer function from a user's position is estimated by using a hidden Markov model of clean speech in the cepstral domain. In this paper, each cepstral dimension of the acoustic transfer function is newly weighted, in order to obtain the cepstral dimensions having information that is useful for classifying the user's position. Then, this paper proposes a feature-weighting method for the cepstral parameter using multiple kernel learning, defining the base kernels for each cepstral dimension of the acoustic transfer function. The user's position is trained and classified by support vector machine. The effectiveness of this method has been confirmed by sound source (talker) localization experiments performed in different room environments.

ORBIT: an integrated environment for user-customized bioinformatics tools.

PubMed

Bellgard, M I; Hiew, H L; Hunter, A; Wiebrands, M

1999-10-01

There are a large number of computational programs freely available to bioinformaticians via a client/server, web-based environment. However, the client interface to these tools (typically an html form page) cannot be customized from the client side as it is created by the service provider. The form page is usually generic enough to cater for a wide range of users. However, this implies that a user cannot set as 'default' advanced program parameters on the form or even customize the interface to his/her specific requirements or preferences. Currently, there is a lack of end-user interface environments that can be modified by the user when accessing computer programs available on a remote server running on an intranet or over the Internet. We have implemented a client/server system called ORBIT (Online Researcher's Bioinformatics Interface Tools) where individual clients can have interfaces created and customized to command-line-driven, server-side programs. Thus, Internet-based interfaces can be tailored to a user's specific bioinformatic needs. As interfaces are created on the client machine independent of the server, there can be different interfaces to the same server-side program to cater for different parameter settings. The interface customization is relatively quick (between 10 and 60 min) and all client interfaces are integrated into a single modular environment which will run on any computer platform supporting Java. The system has been developed to allow for a number of future enhancements and features. ORBIT represents an important advance in the way researchers gain access to bioinformatics tools on the Internet.

User manual for SPLASH (Single Panel Lamp and Shroud Helper).

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Larsen, Marvin Elwood

2006-02-01

The radiant heat test facility develops test sets providing well-characterized thermal environments, often representing fires. Many of the components and procedures have become standardized to such an extent that the development of a specialized design tool to determine optimal configurations for radiant heat experiments was appropriate. SPLASH (Single Panel Lamp and Shroud Helper) is that tool. SPLASH is implemented as a user-friendly, Windows-based program that allows a designer to describe a test setup in terms of parameters such as number of lamps, power, position, and separation distance. This document is a user manual for that software. Any incidental descriptions ofmore » theory are only for the purpose of defining the model inputs. The theory for the underlying model is described in SAND2005-2947 (Ref. [1]). SPLASH provides a graphical user interface to define lamp panel and shroud designs parametrically, solves the resulting radiation enclosure problem for up to 2500 surfaces, and provides post-processing to facilitate understanding and documentation of analyzed designs.« less

Sparse super-resolution reconstructions of video from mobile devices in digital TV broadcast applications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Boon, Choong S.; Guleryuz, Onur G.; Kawahara, Toshiro; Suzuki, Yoshinori

2006-08-01

We consider the mobile service scenario where video programming is broadcast to low-resolution wireless terminals. In such a scenario, broadcasters utilize simultaneous data services and bi-directional communications capabilities of the terminals in order to offer substantially enriched viewing experiences to users by allowing user participation and user tuned content. While users immediately benefit from this service when using their phones in mobile environments, the service is less appealing in stationary environments where a regular television provides competing programming at much higher display resolutions. We propose a fast super-resolution technique that allows the mobile terminals to show a much enhanced version of the broadcast video on nearby high-resolution devices, extending the appeal and usefulness of the broadcast service. The proposed single frame super-resolution algorithm uses recent sparse recovery results to provide high quality and high-resolution video reconstructions based solely on individual decoded frames provided by the low-resolution broadcast.

Conceptual Design and Analysis of Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) for Command and Control of Space Assets

DTIC Science & Technology

2010-12-01

strategy “to establish a net- centric environment that increasingly leverages shared services and SOAs that are:  Supported by…a single set of common...component services. As mentioned previously, this is an important characteristic of SOA. Also noteworthy is set of shared services seen on the...transmit information products directly to the user(s). 6. Shared Services One of the key benefits of Service Oriented Architecture is the ability to

Indoor-Outdoor Detection Using a Smart Phone Sensor.

PubMed

Wang, Weiping; Chang, Qiang; Li, Qun; Shi, Zesen; Chen, Wei

2016-09-22

In the era of mobile internet, Location Based Services (LBS) have developed dramatically. Seamless Indoor and Outdoor Navigation and Localization (SNAL) has attracted a lot of attention. No single positioning technology was capable of meeting the various positioning requirements in different environments. Selecting different positioning techniques for different environments is an alternative method. Detecting the users' current environment is crucial for this technique. In this paper, we proposed to detect the indoor/outdoor environment automatically without high energy consumption. The basic idea was simple: we applied a machine learning algorithm to classify the neighboring Global System for Mobile (GSM) communication cellular base station's signal strength in different environments, and identified the users' current context by signal pattern recognition. We tested the algorithm in four different environments. The results showed that the proposed algorithm was capable of identifying open outdoors, semi-outdoors, light indoors and deep indoors environments with 100% accuracy using the signal strength of four nearby GSM stations. The required hardware and signal are widely available in our daily lives, implying its high compatibility and availability.

A new sample environment for cryogenic nuclear resonance scattering experiments on single crystals and microsamples at P01, PETRA III

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rackwitz, Sergej; Faus, Isabelle; Schmitz, Markus; Kelm, Harald; Krüger, Hans-Jörg; Andersson, K. Kristoffer; Hersleth, Hans-Petter; Achterhold, Klaus; Schlage, Kai; Wille, Hans-Christian; Schünemann, Volker; Wolny, Juliusz A.

2014-04-01

In order to carry out orientation dependent nuclear resonance scattering (NRS) experiments on small single crystals of e.g. iron proteins and/or chemical complexes but also on surfaces and other micrometer-sized samples a 2-circle goniometer including sample positioning optics has been installed at beamline P01, PETRA III, DESY, Hamburg. This sample environment is now available for all users of this beamline. Sample cooling is performed with a cryogenic gas stream which allows NRS measurements in the temperature range from 80 up to 400 K. In a first test this new sample environment has been used in order to investigate the orientation dependence of the nuclear inelastic scattering (NIS) signature of (i) a dinuclear iron(II) spin crossover (SCO) system and (ii) a hydrogen peroxide treated metmyoglobin single crystal.

Detecting Planar Surfaces in Outdoor Urban Environments

DTIC Science & Technology

2008-09-01

coplanar or parallel scene points and lines. Sturm and Maybank (18) perform 3D reconstruction given user-provided coplanarity, perpendicularity, and... Maybank , S. J. A method for intactive 3d reconstruction of piercewise planar objects from single images. in BMVC, 1999, 265–274 [19] Schaffalitzky, F

Using Modules with MPICH-G2 (and "Loose Ends")

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chang, Johnny; Thigpen, William W. (Technical Monitor)

2002-01-01

A new approach to running complex, distributed MPI jobs using the MPICH-G2 library is described. This approach allows the user to switch between different versions of compilers, system libraries, MPI libraries, etc. via the "module" command. The key idea is a departure from the prescribed "(jobtype=mpi)" approach to running distributed MPI jobs. The new method requires the user to provide a script that will be run as the "executable" with the "(jobtype=single)" RSL attribute. The major advantage of the proposed method is to enable users to decide in their own script what modules, environment, etc. they would like to have in running their job.

Electronic Cigarette Topography in the Natural Environment

PubMed Central

Morabito, P. N.; Roundtree, K. A.

2015-01-01

This paper presents the results of a clinical, observational, descriptive study to quantify the use patterns of electronic cigarette users in their natural environment. Previously published work regarding puff topography has been widely indirect in nature, and qualitative rather than quantitative, with the exception of three studies conducted in a laboratory environment for limited amounts of time. The current study quantifies the variation in puffing behaviors among users as well as the variation for a given user throughout the course of a day. Puff topography characteristics computed for each puffing session by each subject include the number of subject puffs per puffing session, the mean puff duration per session, the mean puff flow rate per session, the mean puff volume per session, and the cumulative puff volume per session. The same puff topography characteristics are computed across all puffing sessions by each single subject and across all subjects in the study cohort. Results indicate significant inter-subject variability with regard to puffing topography, suggesting that a range of representative puffing topography patterns should be used to drive machine-puffed electronic cigarette aerosol evaluation systems. PMID:26053075

Electronic Cigarette Topography in the Natural Environment.

PubMed

Robinson, R J; Hensel, E C; Morabito, P N; Roundtree, K A

2015-01-01

This paper presents the results of a clinical, observational, descriptive study to quantify the use patterns of electronic cigarette users in their natural environment. Previously published work regarding puff topography has been widely indirect in nature, and qualitative rather than quantitative, with the exception of three studies conducted in a laboratory environment for limited amounts of time. The current study quantifies the variation in puffing behaviors among users as well as the variation for a given user throughout the course of a day. Puff topography characteristics computed for each puffing session by each subject include the number of subject puffs per puffing session, the mean puff duration per session, the mean puff flow rate per session, the mean puff volume per session, and the cumulative puff volume per session. The same puff topography characteristics are computed across all puffing sessions by each single subject and across all subjects in the study cohort. Results indicate significant inter-subject variability with regard to puffing topography, suggesting that a range of representative puffing topography patterns should be used to drive machine-puffed electronic cigarette aerosol evaluation systems.

Systems Engineering Model and Training Application for Desktop Environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

May, Jeffrey T.

2010-01-01

Provide a graphical user interface based simulator for desktop training, operations and procedure development and system reference. This simulator allows for engineers to train and further understand the dynamics of their system from their local desktops. It allows the users to train and evaluate their system at a pace and skill level based on the user's competency and from a perspective based on the user's need. The simulator will not require any special resources to execute and should generally be available for use. The interface is based on a concept of presenting the model of the system in ways that best suits the user's application or training needs. The three levels of views are Component View, the System View (overall system), and the Console View (monitor). These views are portals into a single model, so changing the model from one view or from a model manager Graphical User Interface will be reflected on all other views.

Presence Personalization and Persistence: A New Approach to Building Archives to Support Collaborative Research

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

McGlynn, Thomas A.

2008-01-01

We discuss approaches to building archives that support the way most science is done. Today research is done in formal teams and informal groups. However our on-line services are designed to work with a single user. We have begun prototyping a new approach to building archives in which support for collaborative research is built in from the start. We organize the discussion along three elements that we believe to be necessary for effective support: We must enable user presence in the archive environment; users must be able to interact. Users must be able to personalize the environment, adding data and capabilities useful to themselves and their team. These changes must be persistent: subsequent sessions must be able to build upon previous sessions. In building the archive we see the large multi-player interactive games as a paradigm of how this approach can work. These three 'P's are essential in gaming as well and we shall use insights from the gaming world and virtual reality systems like Second Life in our prototype.

L3 Interactive Data Language

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Hohn, Michael; Adams, Paul

2006-09-05

The L3 system is a computational steering environment for image processing and scientific computing. It consists of an interactive graphical language and interface. Its purpose is to help advanced users in controlling their computational software and assist in the management of data accumulated during numerical experiments. L3 provides a combination of features not found in other environments; these are: - textual and graphical construction of programs - persistence of programs and associated data - direct mapping between the scripts, the parameters, and the produced data - implicit hierarchial data organization - full programmability, including conditionals and functions - incremental executionmore » of programs The software includes the l3 language and the graphical environment. The language is a single-assignment functional language; the implementation consists of lexer, parser, interpreter, storage handler, and editing support, The graphical environment is an event-driven nested list viewer/editor providing graphical elements corresponding to the language. These elements are both the represenation of a users program and active interfaces to the values computed by that program.« less

The social computing room: a multi-purpose collaborative visualization environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Borland, David; Conway, Michael; Coposky, Jason; Ginn, Warren; Idaszak, Ray

2010-01-01

The Social Computing Room (SCR) is a novel collaborative visualization environment for viewing and interacting with large amounts of visual data. The SCR consists of a square room with 12 projectors (3 per wall) used to display a single 360-degree desktop environment that provides a large physical real estate for arranging visual information. The SCR was designed to be cost-effective, collaborative, configurable, widely applicable, and approachable for naive users. Because the SCR displays a single desktop, a wide range of applications is easily supported, making it possible for a variety of disciplines to take advantage of the room. We provide a technical overview of the room and highlight its application to scientific visualization, arts and humanities projects, research group meetings, and virtual worlds, among other uses.

DataBase on Demand

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Gaspar Aparicio, R.; Gomez, D.; Coterillo Coz, I.; Wojcik, D.

2012-12-01

At CERN a number of key database applications are running on user-managed MySQL database services. The database on demand project was born out of an idea to provide the CERN user community with an environment to develop and run database services outside of the actual centralised Oracle based database services. The Database on Demand (DBoD) empowers the user to perform certain actions that had been traditionally done by database administrators, DBA's, providing an enterprise platform for database applications. It also allows the CERN user community to run different database engines, e.g. presently open community version of MySQL and single instance Oracle database server. This article describes a technology approach to face this challenge, a service level agreement, the SLA that the project provides, and an evolution of possible scenarios.

Use of virtual reality to promote hand therapy post-stroke

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tsoupikova, Daria; Stoykov, Nikolay; Vick, Randy; Li, Yu; Kamper, Derek; Listenberger, Molly

2013-03-01

A novel artistic virtual reality (VR) environment was developed and tested for use as a rehabilitation protocol for post-stroke hand rehabilitation therapy. The system was developed by an interdisciplinary team of engineers, art therapists, occupational therapists, and VR artists to improve patients' motivation and engagement. Specific exercises were developed to explicitly promote the practice of therapeutic tasks requiring hand and arm coordination for upper extremity rehabilitation. Here we describe system design, development, and user testing for efficiency, subject's satisfaction and clinical feasibility. We report results of the completed qualitative, pre-clinical pilot study of the system effectiveness for therapy. Fourteen stroke survivors with chronic hemiparesis participated in a single training session within the environment to gauge user response to the protocol through a custom survey. Results indicate that users found the system comfortable, enjoyable, tiring; instructions clear, and reported a high level of satisfaction with the VR environment and rehabilitation task variety and difficulty. Most patients reported very positive impressions of the VR environment and rated it highly, appreciating its engagement and motivation. We are currently conducting a longitudinal intervention study over 6 weeks in stroke survivors with chronic hemiparesis. Initial results following use of the system on the first subjects demonstrate that the system is operational and can facilitate therapy for post stroke patients with upper extremity impairment.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Yang, Chao

Sparx, a new environment for Cryo-EM image processing; Cryo-EM, Single particle reconstruction, principal component analysis; Hardware Req.: PC, MAC, Supercomputer, Mainframe, Multiplatform, Workstation. Software Req.: operating system is Unix; Compiler C++; type of files: source code, object library, executable modules, compilation instructions; sample problem input data. Location/transmission: http://sparx-em.org; User manual & paper: http://sparx-em.org;

ISE: An Integrated Search Environment. The manual

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chu, Lon-Chan

1992-01-01

Integrated Search Environment (ISE), a software package that implements hierarchical searches with meta-control, is described in this manual. ISE is a collection of problem-independent routines to support solving searches. Mainly, these routines are core routines for solving a search problem and they handle the control of searches and maintain the statistics related to searches. By separating the problem-dependent and problem-independent components in ISE, new search methods based on a combination of existing methods can be developed by coding a single master control program. Further, new applications solved by searches can be developed by coding the problem-dependent parts and reusing the problem-independent parts already developed. Potential users of ISE are designers of new application solvers and new search algorithms, and users of experimental application solvers and search algorithms. The ISE is designed to be user-friendly and information rich. In this manual, the organization of ISE is described and several experiments carried out on ISE are also described.

Usage based indicators to assess the impact of scholarly works: architecture and method

DOEpatents

Bollen, Johan [Santa Fe, NM; Van De Sompel, Herbert [Santa Fe, NM

2012-03-13

Although recording of usage data is common in scholarly information services, its exploitation for the creation of value-added services remains limited due to concerns regarding, among others, user privacy, data validity, and the lack of accepted standards for the representation, sharing and aggregation of usage data. A technical, standards-based architecture for sharing usage information is presented. In this architecture, OpenURL-compliant linking servers aggregate usage information of a specific user community as it navigates the distributed information environment that it has access to. This usage information is made OAI-PMH harvestable so that usage information exposed by many linking servers can be aggregated to facilitate the creation of value-added services with a reach beyond that of a single community or a single information service.

MONTE: the next generation of mission design and navigation software

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Evans, Scott; Taber, William; Drain, Theodore; Smith, Jonathon; Wu, Hsi-Cheng; Guevara, Michelle; Sunseri, Richard; Evans, James

2018-03-01

The Mission analysis, Operations and Navigation Toolkit Environment (MONTE) (Sunseri et al. in NASA Tech Briefs 36(9), 2012) is an astrodynamic toolkit produced by the Mission Design and Navigation Software Group at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. It provides a single integrated environment for all phases of deep space and Earth orbiting missions. Capabilities include: trajectory optimization and analysis, operational orbit determination, flight path control, and 2D/3D visualization. MONTE is presented to the user as an importable Python language module. This allows a simple but powerful user interface via CLUI or script. In addition, the Python interface allows MONTE to be used seamlessly with other canonical scientific programming tools such as SciPy, NumPy, and Matplotlib. MONTE is the prime operational orbit determination software for all JPL navigated missions.

Shared direct memory access on the Explorer 2-LX

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Musgrave, Jeffrey L.

1990-01-01

Advances in Expert System technology and Artificial Intelligence have provided a framework for applying automated Intelligence to the solution of problems which were generally perceived as intractable using more classical approaches. As a result, hybrid architectures and parallel processing capability have become more common in computing environments. The Texas Instruments Explorer II-LX is an example of a machine which combines a symbolic processing environment, and a computationally oriented environment in a single chassis for integrated problem solutions. This user's manual is an attempt to make these capabilities more accessible to a wider range of engineers and programmers with problems well suited to solution in such an environment.

EEGLAB: an open source toolbox for analysis of single-trial EEG dynamics including independent component analysis.

PubMed

Delorme, Arnaud; Makeig, Scott

2004-03-15

We have developed a toolbox and graphic user interface, EEGLAB, running under the crossplatform MATLAB environment (The Mathworks, Inc.) for processing collections of single-trial and/or averaged EEG data of any number of channels. Available functions include EEG data, channel and event information importing, data visualization (scrolling, scalp map and dipole model plotting, plus multi-trial ERP-image plots), preprocessing (including artifact rejection, filtering, epoch selection, and averaging), independent component analysis (ICA) and time/frequency decompositions including channel and component cross-coherence supported by bootstrap statistical methods based on data resampling. EEGLAB functions are organized into three layers. Top-layer functions allow users to interact with the data through the graphic interface without needing to use MATLAB syntax. Menu options allow users to tune the behavior of EEGLAB to available memory. Middle-layer functions allow users to customize data processing using command history and interactive 'pop' functions. Experienced MATLAB users can use EEGLAB data structures and stand-alone signal processing functions to write custom and/or batch analysis scripts. Extensive function help and tutorial information are included. A 'plug-in' facility allows easy incorporation of new EEG modules into the main menu. EEGLAB is freely available (http://www.sccn.ucsd.edu/eeglab/) under the GNU public license for noncommercial use and open source development, together with sample data, user tutorial and extensive documentation.

Measuring the Interestingness of Articles in a Limited User Environment Prospectus

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Pon, Raymond K.

2007-04-18

Search engines, such as Google, assign scores to news articles based on their relevancy to a query. However, not all relevant articles for the query may be interesting to a user. For example, if the article is old or yields little new information, the article would be uninteresting. Relevancy scores do not take into account what makes an article interesting, which would vary from user to user. Although methods such as collaborative filtering have been shown to be effective in recommendation systems, in a limited user environment there are not enough users that would make collaborative filtering effective. I presentmore » a general framework for defining and measuring the ''interestingness'' of articles, called iScore, incorporating user-feedback including tracking multiple topics of interest as well as finding interesting entities or phrases in a complex relationship network. I propose and have shown the validity of the following: 1. Filtering based on only topic relevancy is insufficient for identifying interesting articles. 2. No single feature can characterize the interestingness of an article for a user. It is the combination of multiple features that yields higher quality results. For each user, these features have different degrees of usefulness for predicting interestingness. 3. Through user-feedback, a classifier can combine features to predict interestingness for the user. 4. Current evaluation corpora, such as TREC, do not capture all aspects of personalized news filtering systems necessary for system evaluation. 5. Focusing on only specific evolving user interests instead of all topics allows for more efficient resource utilization while yielding high quality recommendation results. 6. Multiple profile vectors yield significantly better results than traditional methods, such as the Rocchio algorithm, for identifying interesting articles. Additionally, the addition of tracking multiple topics as a new feature in iScore, can improve iScore's classification performance. 7. Multiple topic tracking yields better results than the best results from the last TREC adaptive filtering run. As future work, I will address the following hypothesis: Entities and the relationship among these entities using current information extraction technology can be utilized to identify entities of interest and relationships of interest, using a scheme such as PageRank. And I will address one of the following two hypotheses: 1. By addressing the multiple reading roles that a single user may have, classification results can be improved. 2. By tailoring the operating parameters of MTT, better classification results can be achieved.« less

Security enhanced anonymous multiserver authenticated key agreement scheme using smart cards and biometrics.

PubMed

Choi, Younsung; Nam, Junghyun; Lee, Donghoon; Kim, Jiye; Jung, Jaewook; Won, Dongho

2014-01-01

An anonymous user authentication scheme allows a user, who wants to access a remote application server, to achieve mutual authentication and session key establishment with the server in an anonymous manner. To enhance the security of such authentication schemes, recent researches combined user's biometrics with a password. However, these authentication schemes are designed for single server environment. So when a user wants to access different application servers, the user has to register many times. To solve this problem, Chuang and Chen proposed an anonymous multiserver authenticated key agreement scheme using smart cards together with passwords and biometrics. Chuang and Chen claimed that their scheme not only supports multiple servers but also achieves various security requirements. However, we show that this scheme is vulnerable to a masquerade attack, a smart card attack, a user impersonation attack, and a DoS attack and does not achieve perfect forward secrecy. We also propose a security enhanced anonymous multiserver authenticated key agreement scheme which addresses all the weaknesses identified in Chuang and Chen's scheme.

Evaluation of an intelligent wheelchair system for older adults with cognitive impairments

PubMed Central

2013-01-01

Background Older adults are the most prevalent wheelchair users in Canada. Yet, cognitive impairments may prevent an older adult from being allowed to use a powered wheelchair due to safety and usability concerns. To address this issue, an add-on Intelligent Wheelchair System (IWS) was developed to help older adults with cognitive impairments drive a powered wheelchair safely and effectively. When attached to a powered wheelchair, the IWS adds a vision-based anti-collision feature that prevents the wheelchair from hitting obstacles and a navigation assistance feature that plays audio prompts to help users manoeuvre around obstacles. Methods A two stage evaluation was conducted to test the efficacy of the IWS. Stage One: Environment of Use – the IWS’s anti-collision and navigation features were evaluated against objects found in a long-term care facility. Six different collision scenarios (wall, walker, cane, no object, moving and stationary person) and three different navigation scenarios (object on left, object on right, and no object) were performed. Signal detection theory was used to categorize the response of the system in each scenario. Stage Two: User Trials – single-subject research design was used to evaluate the impact of the IWS on older adults with cognitive impairment. Participants were asked to drive a powered wheelchair through a structured obstacle course in two phases: 1) with the IWS and 2) without the IWS. Measurements of safety and usability were taken and compared between the two phases. Visual analysis and phase averages were used to analyze the single-subject data. Results Stage One: The IWS performed correctly for all environmental anti-collision and navigation scenarios. Stage Two: Two participants completed the trials. The IWS was able to limit the number of collisions that occurred with a powered wheelchair and lower the perceived workload for driving a powered wheelchair. However, the objective performance (time to complete course) of users navigating their environment did not improve with the IWS. Conclusions This study shows the efficacy of the IWS in performing with a potential environment of use, and benefiting members of its desired user population to increase safety and lower perceived demands of powered wheelchair driving. PMID:23924489

Semantic Visualization of Wireless Sensor Networks for Elderly Monitoring

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Stocklöw, Carsten; Kamieth, Felix

In the area of Ambient Intelligence, Wireless Sensor Networks are commonly used for user monitoring purposes like health monitoring and user localization. Existing work on visualization of wireless sensor networks focuses mainly on displaying individual nodes and logical, graph-based topologies. This way, the relation to the real-world deployment is lost. This paper presents a novel approach for visualization of wireless sensor networks and interaction with complex services on the nodes. The environment is realized as a 3D model, and multiple nodes, that are worn by a single individual, are grouped together to allow an intuitive interface for end users. We describe application examples and show that our approach allows easier access to network information and functionality by comparing it with existing solutions.

Cooperative mission execution and planning

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Flann, Nicholas S.; Saunders, Kevin S.; Pells, Larry

1998-08-01

Utilizing multiple cooperating autonomous vehicles to perform tasks enhances robustness and efficiency over the use of a single vehicle. Furthermore, because autonomous vehicles can be controlled precisely and their status known accurately in real time, new types of cooperative behaviors are possible. This paper presents a working system called MEPS that plans and executes missions for multiple autonomous vehicles in large structured environments. Two generic spatial tasks are supported, to sweep an area and to visit a location while activating on-board equipment. Tasks can be entered both initially by the user and dynamically during mission execution by both users and vehicles. Sensor data and task achievement data is shared among the vehicles enabling them to cooperatively adapt to changing environmental, vehicle and tasks conditions. The system has been successfully applied to control ATV and micro-robotic vehicles in precision agriculture and waste-site characterization environments.

Security of social network credentials for accessing course portal: Users' experience

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Katuk, Norliza; Fong, Choo Sok; Chun, Koo Lee

2015-12-01

Social login (SL) has recently emerged as a solution for single sign-on (SSO) within the web and mobile environments. It allows users to use their existing social network credentials (SNC) to login to third party web applications without the need to create a new identity in the intended applications' database. Although it has been used by many web application providers, its' applicability in accessing learning materials is not yet fully investigated. Hence, this research aims to explore users' (i.e., instructors' and students') perception and experience on the security of SL for accessing learning contents. A course portal was developed for students at a higher learning institution and it provides two types of user authentications (i) traditional user authentication, and (ii) SL facility. Users comprised instructors and students evaluated the login facility of the course portal through a controlled lab experimental study following the within-subject design. The participants provided their feedback in terms of the security of SL for accessing learning contents. The study revealed that users preferred to use SL over the traditional authentication, however, they concerned on the security of SL and their privacy.

Developing Access Control Model of Web OLAP over Trusted and Collaborative Data Warehouses

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fugkeaw, Somchart; Mitrpanont, Jarernsri L.; Manpanpanich, Piyawit; Juntapremjitt, Sekpon

This paper proposes the design and development of Role- based Access Control (RBAC) model for the Single Sign-On (SSO) Web-OLAP query spanning over multiple data warehouses (DWs). The model is based on PKI Authentication and Privilege Management Infrastructure (PMI); it presents a binding model of RBAC authorization based on dimension privilege specified in attribute certificate (AC) and user identification. Particularly, the way of attribute mapping between DW user authentication and privilege of dimensional access is illustrated. In our approach, we apply the multi-agent system to automate flexible and effective management of user authentication, role delegation as well as system accountability. Finally, the paper culminates in the prototype system A-COLD (Access Control of web-OLAP over multiple DWs) that incorporates the OLAP features and authentication and authorization enforcement in the multi-user and multi-data warehouse environment.

Collaborative Planning of Robotic Exploration

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Norris, Jeffrey; Backes, Paul; Powell, Mark; Vona, Marsette; Steinke, Robert

2004-01-01

The Science Activity Planner (SAP) software system includes an uplink-planning component, which enables collaborative planning of activities to be undertaken by an exploratory robot on a remote planet or on Earth. Included in the uplink-planning component is the SAP-Uplink Browser, which enables users to load multiple spacecraft activity plans into a single window, compare them, and merge them. The uplink-planning component includes a subcomponent that implements the Rover Markup Language Activity Planning format (RML-AP), based on the Extensible Markup Language (XML) format that enables the representation, within a single document, of planned spacecraft and robotic activities together with the scientific reasons for the activities. Each such document is highly parseable and can be validated easily. Another subcomponent of the uplink-planning component is the Activity Dictionary Markup Language (ADML), which eliminates the need for two mission activity dictionaries - one in a human-readable format and one in a machine-readable format. Style sheets that have been developed along with the ADML format enable users to edit one dictionary in a user-friendly environment without compromising

Quiz Making Activities Using the Multi-Mouse Quiz System in an Elementary School

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zhou, Juan; Mori, Mikihiko; Ueda, Hiroshi; Kita, Hajime

2013-01-01

The Multi-Mouse Quiz System is an application used to treat quizzes in a classroom or other learning environment. The system comprises the Multi Mouse Quiz (MMQ) and MMQEditor. The MMQ is an application of Single Display Groupware (SDG), which enables multiple users to answer quizzes by connecting several mice to an ordinary computer. The…

The One Universal Graph — a free and open graph database

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ng, Liang S.; Champion, Corbin

2016-02-01

Recent developments in graph database mostly are huge projects involving big organizations, big operations and big capital, as the name Big Data attests. We proposed the concept of One Universal Graph (OUG) which states that all observable and known objects and concepts (physical, conceptual or digitally represented) can be connected with only one single graph; furthermore the OUG can be implemented with a very simple text file format with free software, capable of being executed on Android or smaller devices. As such the One Universal Graph Data Exchange (GOUDEX) modules can potentially be installed on hundreds of millions of Android devices and Intel compatible computers shipped annually. Coupled with its open nature and ability to connect to existing leading search engines and databases currently in operation, GOUDEX has the potential to become the largest and a better interface for users and programmers to interact with the data on the Internet. With a Web User Interface for users to use and program in native Linux environment, Free Crowdware implemented in GOUDEX can help inexperienced users learn programming with better organized documentation for free software, and is able to manage programmer's contribution down to a single line of code or a single variable in software projects. It can become the first practically realizable “Internet brain” on which a global artificial intelligence system can be implemented. Being practically free and open, One Universal Graph can have significant applications in robotics, artificial intelligence as well as social networks.

Diagnosing anomalies of spacecraft for space maintenance and servicing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lauriente, Michael; Rolincik, Mark; Koons, Harry C.; Gorney, David

1994-01-01

Very often servicing of satellites is necessary to replace components which are responsible for anomalous behavior of satellite operations due to adverse interactions with the natural space environment. A major difficulty with this diagnosis is that those responsible for diagnosing these anomalies do not have the tools to assess the role of the space environment causing the anomaly. To address this issue, we have under development a new rule-based, expert system for diagnosing spacecraft anomalies. The knowledge base consists of over two-hundred rules and provides links to historical and environmental databases. Environmental causes considered are bulk charging, single event upsets (SEU), surface charging, and total radiation dose. The system's driver translates forward chaining rules into a backward chaining sequence, prompting the user for information pertinent to the causes considered. When the user selects the novice mode, the system automatically gives detailed explanations and descriptions of terms and reasoning as the session progresses, in a sense teaching the user. As such it is an effective tutoring tool. The use of heuristics frees the user from searching through large amounts of irrelevant information and allows the user to input partial information (varying degrees of confidence in an answer) or 'unknown' to any question. The system is available on-line and uses C Language Integrated Production System (CLIPS), an expert shell developed by the NASA Johnson Space Center AI Laboratory in Houston.

Synthetic environment employing a craft for providing user perspective reference

DOEpatents

Maples, Creve; Peterson, Craig A.

1997-10-21

A multi-dimensional user oriented synthetic environment system allows application programs to be programmed and accessed with input/output device independent, generic functional commands which are a distillation of the actual functions performed by any application program. A shared memory structure allows the translation of device specific commands to device independent, generic functional commands. Complete flexibility of the mapping of synthetic environment data to the user is thereby allowed. Accordingly, synthetic environment data may be provided to the user on parallel user information processing channels allowing the subcognitive mind to act as a filter, eliminating irrelevant information and allowing the processing of increase amounts of data by the user. The user is further provided with a craft surrounding the user within the synthetic environment, which craft, imparts important visual referential an motion parallax cues, enabling the user to better appreciate distances and directions within the synthetic environment. Display of this craft in close proximity to the user's point of perspective may be accomplished without substantially degrading the image resolution of the displayed portions of the synthetic environment.

Patient privacy protection using anonymous access control techniques.

PubMed

Weerasinghe, D; Rajarajan, M; Elmufti, K; Rakocevic, V

2008-01-01

The objective of this study is to develop a solution to preserve security and privacy in a healthcare environment where health-sensitive information will be accessed by many parties and stored in various distributed databases. The solution should maintain anonymous medical records and it should be able to link anonymous medical information in distributed databases into a single patient medical record with the patient identity. In this paper we present a protocol that can be used to authenticate and authorize patients to healthcare services without providing the patient identification. Healthcare service can identify the patient using separate temporary identities in each identification session and medical records are linked to these temporary identities. Temporary identities can be used to enable record linkage and reverse track real patient identity in critical medical situations. The proposed protocol provides main security and privacy services such as user anonymity, message privacy, message confidentiality, user authentication, user authorization and message replay attacks. The medical environment validates the patient at the healthcare service as a real and registered patient for the medical services. Using the proposed protocol, the patient anonymous medical records at different healthcare services can be linked into one single report and it is possible to securely reverse track anonymous patient into the real identity. The protocol protects the patient privacy with a secure anonymous authentication to healthcare services and medical record registries according to the European and the UK legislations, where the patient real identity is not disclosed with the distributed patient medical records.

Software interface verifier

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Soderstrom, Tomas J.; Krall, Laura A.; Hope, Sharon A.; Zupke, Brian S.

1994-01-01

A Telos study of 40 recent subsystem deliveries into the DSN at JPL found software interface testing to be the single most expensive and error-prone activity, and the study team suggested creating an automated software interface test tool. The resulting Software Interface Verifier (SIV), which was funded by NASA/JPL and created by Telos, employed 92 percent software reuse to quickly create an initial version which incorporated early user feedback. SIV is now successfully used by developers for interface prototyping and unit testing, by test engineers for formal testing, and by end users for non-intrusive data flow tests in the operational environment. Metrics, including cost, are included. Lessons learned include the need for early user training. SIV is ported to many platforms and can be successfully used or tailored by other NASA groups.

Security Enhanced Anonymous Multiserver Authenticated Key Agreement Scheme Using Smart Cards and Biometrics

PubMed Central

Choi, Younsung; Nam, Junghyun; Lee, Donghoon; Kim, Jiye; Jung, Jaewook; Won, Dongho

2014-01-01

An anonymous user authentication scheme allows a user, who wants to access a remote application server, to achieve mutual authentication and session key establishment with the server in an anonymous manner. To enhance the security of such authentication schemes, recent researches combined user's biometrics with a password. However, these authentication schemes are designed for single server environment. So when a user wants to access different application servers, the user has to register many times. To solve this problem, Chuang and Chen proposed an anonymous multiserver authenticated key agreement scheme using smart cards together with passwords and biometrics. Chuang and Chen claimed that their scheme not only supports multiple servers but also achieves various security requirements. However, we show that this scheme is vulnerable to a masquerade attack, a smart card attack, a user impersonation attack, and a DoS attack and does not achieve perfect forward secrecy. We also propose a security enhanced anonymous multiserver authenticated key agreement scheme which addresses all the weaknesses identified in Chuang and Chen's scheme. PMID:25276847

Mac OS X for Astronomy

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Pierfederici, F.; Pirzkal, N.; Hook, R. N.

Mac OS X is the new Unix based version of the Macintosh operating system. It combines a high performance DisplayPDF user interface with a standard BSD UNIX subsystem and provides users with simultaneous access to a broad range of applications which were not previously available on a single system such as Microsoft Office and Adobe Photoshop, as well as legacy X11-based scientific tools and packages like IRAF, SuperMongo, MIDAS, etc. The combination of a modern GUI layered on top of a familiar UNIX environment paves the way for new, more flexible and powerful astronomical tools to be developed while assuring compatibility with already existing, older programs. In this paper, we outline the strengths of the Mac OS X platform in a scientific environment, astronomy in particular, and point to the numerous astronomical software packages available for this platform; most notably the Scisoft collection which we have compiled.

Smart Markets for Water Resources

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Raffensperger, John

2017-04-01

Commercial water users often want to trade water, but their trades can hurt other users and the environment. So government has to check every transaction. This checking process is slow and expensive. That's why "free market" water trading doesn't work, especially with trading between a single buyer and a single seller. This talk will describe a water trading mechanism designed to solve these problems. The trading mechanism is called a "smart market". A smart market allows simultaneous many-to-many trades. It can reduce the transaction costs of water trading, while improving environmental outcomes. The smart market depends on a combination of recent technologies: hydrology simulation, computer power, and the Internet. Our smart market design uses standard hydrological models, user bids from a web page, and computer optimization to maximize the economic value of water while meeting all environmental constraints. Before the smart market can be implemented, however, users and the water agency must meet six critical prerequisites. These prerequisites may be viewed as simply good water management that should be done anyway. I will describe these prerequisites, and I will briefly discuss common arguments against water markets. This talk will be an abstract of a forthcoming book, "Smart Markets for Water Resources: A Manual for Implementation," by John F. Raffensperger and Mark W. Milke, from Springer Publishing.

Rapid prototyping 3D virtual world interfaces within a virtual factory environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Kosta, Charles Paul; Krolak, Patrick D.

1993-01-01

On-going work into user requirements analysis using CLIPS (NASA/JSC) expert systems as an intelligent event simulator has led to research into three-dimensional (3D) interfaces. Previous work involved CLIPS and two-dimensional (2D) models. Integral to this work was the development of the University of Massachusetts Lowell parallel version of CLIPS, called PCLIPS. This allowed us to create both a Software Bus and a group problem-solving environment for expert systems development. By shifting the PCLIPS paradigm to use the VEOS messaging protocol we have merged VEOS (HlTL/Seattle) and CLIPS into a distributed virtual worlds prototyping environment (VCLIPS). VCLIPS uses the VEOS protocol layer to allow multiple experts to cooperate on a single problem. We have begun to look at the control of a virtual factory. In the virtual factory there are actors and objects as found in our Lincoln Logs Factory of the Future project. In this artificial reality architecture there are three VCLIPS entities in action. One entity is responsible for display and user events in the 3D virtual world. Another is responsible for either simulating the virtual factory or communicating with the real factory. The third is a user interface expert. The interface expert maps user input levels, within the current prototype, to control information for the factory. The interface to the virtual factory is based on a camera paradigm. The graphics subsystem generates camera views of the factory on standard X-Window displays. The camera allows for view control and object control. Control or the factory is accomplished by the user reaching into the camera views to perform object interactions. All communication between the separate CLIPS expert systems is done through VEOS.

Data mining in bioinformatics using Weka.

PubMed

Frank, Eibe; Hall, Mark; Trigg, Len; Holmes, Geoffrey; Witten, Ian H

2004-10-12

The Weka machine learning workbench provides a general-purpose environment for automatic classification, regression, clustering and feature selection-common data mining problems in bioinformatics research. It contains an extensive collection of machine learning algorithms and data pre-processing methods complemented by graphical user interfaces for data exploration and the experimental comparison of different machine learning techniques on the same problem. Weka can process data given in the form of a single relational table. Its main objectives are to (a) assist users in extracting useful information from data and (b) enable them to easily identify a suitable algorithm for generating an accurate predictive model from it. http://www.cs.waikato.ac.nz/ml/weka.

Neural decoding of attentional selection in multi-speaker environments without access to clean sources

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

O'Sullivan, James; Chen, Zhuo; Herrero, Jose; McKhann, Guy M.; Sheth, Sameer A.; Mehta, Ashesh D.; Mesgarani, Nima

2017-10-01

Objective. People who suffer from hearing impairments can find it difficult to follow a conversation in a multi-speaker environment. Current hearing aids can suppress background noise; however, there is little that can be done to help a user attend to a single conversation amongst many without knowing which speaker the user is attending to. Cognitively controlled hearing aids that use auditory attention decoding (AAD) methods are the next step in offering help. Translating the successes in AAD research to real-world applications poses a number of challenges, including the lack of access to the clean sound sources in the environment with which to compare with the neural signals. We propose a novel framework that combines single-channel speech separation algorithms with AAD. Approach. We present an end-to-end system that (1) receives a single audio channel containing a mixture of speakers that is heard by a listener along with the listener’s neural signals, (2) automatically separates the individual speakers in the mixture, (3) determines the attended speaker, and (4) amplifies the attended speaker’s voice to assist the listener. Main results. Using invasive electrophysiology recordings, we identified the regions of the auditory cortex that contribute to AAD. Given appropriate electrode locations, our system is able to decode the attention of subjects and amplify the attended speaker using only the mixed audio. Our quality assessment of the modified audio demonstrates a significant improvement in both subjective and objective speech quality measures. Significance. Our novel framework for AAD bridges the gap between the most recent advancements in speech processing technologies and speech prosthesis research and moves us closer to the development of cognitively controlled hearable devices for the hearing impaired.

An efficient biometric and password-based remote user authentication using smart card for Telecare Medical Information Systems in multi-server environment.

PubMed

Maitra, Tanmoy; Giri, Debasis

2014-12-01

The medical organizations have introduced Telecare Medical Information System (TMIS) to provide a reliable facility by which a patient who is unable to go to a doctor in critical or urgent period, can communicate to a doctor through a medical server via internet from home. An authentication mechanism is needed in TMIS to hide the secret information of both parties, namely a server and a patient. Recent research includes patient's biometric information as well as password to design a remote user authentication scheme that enhances the security level. In a single server environment, one server is responsible for providing services to all the authorized remote patients. However, the problem arises if a patient wishes to access several branch servers, he/she needs to register to the branch servers individually. In 2014, Chuang and Chen proposed an remote user authentication scheme for multi-server environment. In this paper, we have shown that in their scheme, an non-register adversary can successfully logged-in into the system as a valid patient. To resist the weaknesses, we have proposed an authentication scheme for TMIS in multi-server environment where the patients can register to a root telecare server called registration center (RC) in one time to get services from all the telecare branch servers through their registered smart card. Security analysis and comparison shows that our proposed scheme provides better security with low computational and communication cost.

Improving User Notification on Frequently Changing HPC Environments

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Fuson, Christopher B; Renaud, William A

2016-01-01

Today s HPC centers user environments can be very complex. Centers often contain multiple large complicated computational systems each with their own user environment. Changes to a system s environment can be very impactful; however, a center s user environment is, in one-way or another, frequently changing. Because of this, it is vital for centers to notify users of change. For users, untracked changes can be costly, resulting in unnecessary debug time as well as wasting valuable compute allocations and research time. Communicating frequent change to diverse user communities is a common and ongoing task for HPC centers. This papermore » will cover the OLCF s current processes and methods used to communicate change to users of the center s large Cray systems and supporting resources. The paper will share lessons learned and goals as well as practices, tools, and methods used to continually improve and reach members of the OLCF user community.« less

Service-oriented model-encapsulation strategy for sharing and integrating heterogeneous geo-analysis models in an open web environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yue, Songshan; Chen, Min; Wen, Yongning; Lu, Guonian

2016-04-01

Earth environment is extremely complicated and constantly changing; thus, it is widely accepted that the use of a single geo-analysis model cannot accurately represent all details when solving complex geo-problems. Over several years of research, numerous geo-analysis models have been developed. However, a collaborative barrier between model providers and model users still exists. The development of cloud computing has provided a new and promising approach for sharing and integrating geo-analysis models across an open web environment. To share and integrate these heterogeneous models, encapsulation studies should be conducted that are aimed at shielding original execution differences to create services which can be reused in the web environment. Although some model service standards (such as Web Processing Service (WPS) and Geo Processing Workflow (GPW)) have been designed and developed to help researchers construct model services, various problems regarding model encapsulation remain. (1) The descriptions of geo-analysis models are complicated and typically require rich-text descriptions and case-study illustrations, which are difficult to fully represent within a single web request (such as the GetCapabilities and DescribeProcess operations in the WPS standard). (2) Although Web Service technologies can be used to publish model services, model users who want to use a geo-analysis model and copy the model service into another computer still encounter problems (e.g., they cannot access the model deployment dependencies information). This study presents a strategy for encapsulating geo-analysis models to reduce problems encountered when sharing models between model providers and model users and supports the tasks with different web service standards (e.g., the WPS standard). A description method for heterogeneous geo-analysis models is studied. Based on the model description information, the methods for encapsulating the model-execution program to model services and for describing model-service deployment information are also included in the proposed strategy. Hence, the model-description interface, model-execution interface and model-deployment interface are studied to help model providers and model users more easily share, reuse and integrate geo-analysis models in an open web environment. Finally, a prototype system is established, and the WPS standard is employed as an example to verify the capability and practicability of the model-encapsulation strategy. The results show that it is more convenient for modellers to share and integrate heterogeneous geo-analysis models in cloud computing platforms.

Cloud hosting of the IPython Notebook to Provide Collaborative Research Environments for Big Data Analysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kershaw, Philip; Lawrence, Bryan; Gomez-Dans, Jose; Holt, John

2015-04-01

We explore how the popular IPython Notebook computing system can be hosted on a cloud platform to provide a flexible virtual research hosting environment for Earth Observation data processing and analysis and how this approach can be expanded more broadly into a generic SaaS (Software as a Service) offering for the environmental sciences. OPTIRAD (OPTImisation environment for joint retrieval of multi-sensor RADiances) is a project funded by the European Space Agency to develop a collaborative research environment for Data Assimilation of Earth Observation products for land surface applications. Data Assimilation provides a powerful means to combine multiple sources of data and derive new products for this application domain. To be most effective, it requires close collaboration between specialists in this field, land surface modellers and end users of data generated. A goal of OPTIRAD then is to develop a collaborative research environment to engender shared working. Another significant challenge is that of data volume and complexity. Study of land surface requires high spatial and temporal resolutions, a relatively large number of variables and the application of algorithms which are computationally expensive. These problems can be addressed with the application of parallel processing techniques on specialist compute clusters. However, scientific users are often deterred by the time investment required to port their codes to these environments. Even when successfully achieved, it may be difficult to readily change or update. This runs counter to the scientific process of continuous experimentation, analysis and validation. The IPython Notebook provides users with a web-based interface to multiple interactive shells for the Python programming language. Code, documentation and graphical content can be saved and shared making it directly applicable to OPTIRAD's requirements for a shared working environment. Given the web interface it can be readily made into a hosted service with Wakari and Microsoft Azure being notable examples. Cloud-hosting of the Notebook allows the same familiar Python interface to be retained but backed by Cloud Computing attributes of scalability, elasticity and resource pooling. This combination makes it a powerful solution to address the needs of long-tail science users of Big Data: an intuitive interactive interface with which to access powerful compute resources. IPython Notebook can be hosted as a single user desktop environment but the recent development by the IPython community of JupyterHub enables it to be run as a multi-user hosting environment. In addition, IPython.parallel allows the exposition of parallel compute infrastructure through a Python interface. Applying these technologies in combination, a collaborative research environment has been developed for OPTIRAD on the UK JASMIN/CEMS facility's private cloud (http://jasmin.ac.uk). Based on this experience, a generic virtualised solution is under development suitable for use by the wider environmental science community - on both JASMIN and portable to third party cloud platforms.

Spaceflight Operations Services Grid (SOSG) Prototype Implementation and Feasibility Study

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bradford, Robert N.; Thigpen, William W.; Lisotta, Anthony J.; Redman, Sandra

2004-01-01

Science Operations Services Grid is focusing on building a prototype grid-based environment that incorporates existing and new spaceflight services to enable current and future NASA programs with cost savings and new and evolvable methods to conduct science in a distributed environment. The Science Operations Services Grid (SOSG) will provide a distributed environment for widely disparate organizations to conduct their systems and processes in a more efficient and cost effective manner. These organizations include those that: 1) engage in space-based science and operations, 2) develop space-based systems and processes, and 3) conduct scientific research, bringing together disparate scientific disciplines like geology and oceanography to create new information. In addition educational outreach will be significantly enhanced by providing to schools the same tools used by NASA with the ability of the schools to actively participate on many levels in the science generated by NASA from space and on the ground. The services range from voice, video and telemetry processing and display to data mining, high level processing and visualization tools all accessible from a single portal. In this environment, users would not require high end systems or processes at their home locations to use these services. Also, the user would need to know minimal details about the applications in order to utilize the services. In addition, security at all levels is an underlying goal of the project. The Science Operations Services Grid will focus on four tools that are currently used by the ISS Payload community along with nine more that are new to the community. Under the prototype four Grid virtual organizations PO) will be developed to represent four types of users. They are a Payload (experimenters) VO, a Flight Controllers VO, an Engineering and Science Collaborators VO and an Education and Public Outreach VO. The User-based services will be implemented to replicate the operational voice, video, telemetry and commanding systems. Once the User-based services are in place, they will be analyzed to establish feasibility for Grid enabling. If feasible then each User-based service will be Grid enabled. The remaining non-Grid services if not already Web enabled will be so enabled. In the end, four portals will be developed one for each VO. Each portal will contain the appropriate User-based services required for that VO to operate.

Dismounted Warrior Network Experiments

DTIC Science & Technology

2000-11-01

Foxtrot Locomotion Human Joystick ODT Joystick Foot Pedal + Head Orientation Visual Display Wireless HMD 4 Projection Desktop Single Screens (WISE... Biomechanics DI-Guy JackML DI-Guy Table 1. VICs Comparison Matrix VIC Alpha is the Dismounted Soldier Simulation (DSS) system developed by Veda, Inc. under a...using a pressure sensitive foot pedal . The user’s head is tracked with a magnetic sensor and is used to control steering through the environment. A

Strategic Mobility 21 Transition Plan: From Research Federation to Business Enterprise

DTIC Science & Technology

2010-12-31

Transportation Management System (GTMS), Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), Service -as-a- Software ( SaaS ), Joint Capability Technolgoy Demonstration...the Software -as-a- Service ( SaaS ) format, whereby users access the application with the appropriate Internet authorizations. Security is provided by...integrating best-of-breed dual-use systems deployed in the software as a service ( SaaS ) environment. It includes single sign-on capabilities and was

A MATLAB-based graphical user interface for the identification of muscular activations from surface electromyography signals.

PubMed

Mengarelli, Alessandro; Cardarelli, Stefano; Verdini, Federica; Burattini, Laura; Fioretti, Sandro; Di Nardo, Francesco

2016-08-01

In this paper a graphical user interface (GUI) built in MATLAB® environment is presented. This interactive tool has been developed for the analysis of superficial electromyography (sEMG) signals and in particular for the assessment of the muscle activation time intervals. After the signal import, the tool performs a first analysis in a totally user independent way, providing a reliable computation of the muscular activation sequences. Furthermore, the user has the opportunity to modify each parameter of the on/off identification algorithm implemented in the presented tool. The presence of an user-friendly GUI allows the immediate evaluation of the effects that the modification of every single parameter has on the activation intervals recognition, through the real-time updating and visualization of the muscular activation/deactivation sequences. The possibility to accept the initial signal analysis or to modify the on/off identification with respect to each considered signal, with a real-time visual feedback, makes this GUI-based tool a valuable instrument in clinical, research applications and also in an educational perspective.

Linking multiple biodiversity informatics platforms with Darwin Core Archives

PubMed Central

2014-01-01

Abstract We describe an implementation of the Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A) standard that allows for the exchange of biodiversity information contained within the Scratchpads virtual research environment with external collaborators. Using this single archive file Scratchpad users can expose taxonomies, specimen records, species descriptions and a range of other data to a variety of third-party aggregators and tools (currently Encyclopedia of Life, eMonocot Portal, CartoDB, and the Common Data Model) for secondary use. This paper describes our technical approach to dynamically building and validating Darwin Core Archives for the 600+ Scratchpad user communities, which can be used to serve the diverse data needs of all of our content partners. PMID:24723785

Mobile user environment and satellite diversity for NGSO S-PCN's

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Werner, Markus; Bischl, Hermann; Lutz, Erich

1995-01-01

The performance of satellite diversity under the influence of the mobile user environment is analyzed. To this end, a digital channel model is presented which takes into account the elevation angle as well as the user mobility in a given environment. For different LEO and MEO systems and for varying mobile user environments, some crucial benefits and drawbacks of satellite diversity are discussed. Specifically, the important GW service area concept is introduced. The conclusions are validated by numerical results from computer simulations. Globalstar (LEO) and Inmarsat (MEO) are compared in terms of visibility, service availability and equivalent handover complexity for different environments and user mobility.

MASTR-MS: a web-based collaborative laboratory information management system (LIMS) for metabolomics.

PubMed

Hunter, Adam; Dayalan, Saravanan; De Souza, David; Power, Brad; Lorrimar, Rodney; Szabo, Tamas; Nguyen, Thu; O'Callaghan, Sean; Hack, Jeremy; Pyke, James; Nahid, Amsha; Barrero, Roberto; Roessner, Ute; Likic, Vladimir; Tull, Dedreia; Bacic, Antony; McConville, Malcolm; Bellgard, Matthew

2017-01-01

An increasing number of research laboratories and core analytical facilities around the world are developing high throughput metabolomic analytical and data processing pipelines that are capable of handling hundreds to thousands of individual samples per year, often over multiple projects, collaborations and sample types. At present, there are no Laboratory Information Management Systems (LIMS) that are specifically tailored for metabolomics laboratories that are capable of tracking samples and associated metadata from the beginning to the end of an experiment, including data processing and archiving, and which are also suitable for use in large institutional core facilities or multi-laboratory consortia as well as single laboratory environments. Here we present MASTR-MS, a downloadable and installable LIMS solution that can be deployed either within a single laboratory or used to link workflows across a multisite network. It comprises a Node Management System that can be used to link and manage projects across one or multiple collaborating laboratories; a User Management System which defines different user groups and privileges of users; a Quote Management System where client quotes are managed; a Project Management System in which metadata is stored and all aspects of project management, including experimental setup, sample tracking and instrument analysis, are defined, and a Data Management System that allows the automatic capture and storage of raw and processed data from the analytical instruments to the LIMS. MASTR-MS is a comprehensive LIMS solution specifically designed for metabolomics. It captures the entire lifecycle of a sample starting from project and experiment design to sample analysis, data capture and storage. It acts as an electronic notebook, facilitating project management within a single laboratory or a multi-node collaborative environment. This software is being developed in close consultation with members of the metabolomics research community. It is freely available under the GNU GPL v3 licence and can be accessed from, https://muccg.github.io/mastr-ms/.

Assigning unique identification numbers to new user accounts and groups in a computing environment with multiple registries

DOEpatents

DeRobertis, Christopher V.; Lu, Yantian T.

2010-02-23

A method, system, and program storage device for creating a new user account or user group with a unique identification number in a computing environment having multiple user registries is provided. In response to receiving a command to create a new user account or user group, an operating system of a clustered computing environment automatically checks multiple registries configured for the operating system to determine whether a candidate identification number for the new user account or user group has been assigned already to one or more existing user accounts or groups, respectively. The operating system automatically assigns the candidate identification number to the new user account or user group created in a target user registry if the checking indicates that the candidate identification number has not been assigned already to any of the existing user accounts or user groups, respectively.

A Case Study in User Support for Managing OpenSim Based Multi User Learning Environments

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Perera, Indika; Miller, Alan; Allison, Colin

2017-01-01

Immersive 3D Multi User Learning Environments (MULE) have shown sufficient success to warrant their consideration as a mainstream educational paradigm. These are based on 3D Multi User Virtual Environment platforms (MUVE), and although they have been used for various innovative educational projects their complex permission systems and large…

Gay Apps for Seeking Sex Partners in China: Implications for MSM Sexual Health.

PubMed

Bien, Cedric H; Best, John M; Muessig, Kathryn E; Wei, Chongyi; Han, Larry; Tucker, Joseph D

2015-06-01

Anti-gay stigma and harsh local environments in many low and middle-income countries (LMIC) encourage men who have sex with men (MSM) partner-seeking mobile application (gay app) use. To investigate the sexual risk profiles of gay app users and guide future HIV prevention programs, we conducted a cross-sectional online survey among 1,342 MSM in China examining associations between gay app use and sexual behaviors, including HIV and sexually transmitted disease testing. Compared to non-app users, app users were more likely to be younger, better educated, "out" about their sexual orientation, and single. They were also more likely to report multiple recent sex partners and HIV testing, but there was no difference in condomless sex between the two groups. Future research among MSM in LMIC is needed to characterize gay app use and explore its potential for future public health interventions.

Comparison of two underwater acoustic communications techniques for multi-user access

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hursky, Paul; Siderius, T. Martin; Kauaiex Group

2004-05-01

Frequency hopped frequency shift keying (FHFSK) and code division multiple access (CDMA) are two different modulation techniques for multiple users to communicate with a single receiver simultaneously. In July 2003, these two techniques were tested alongside each other in a shallow water coastal environment off the coast of Kauai. A variety of instruments were used to measure the prevailing oceanography, enabling detailed modeling of the channel. The channel was acoustically probed using LFM waveforms and m-sequences as well. We will present the results of demodulating the FHFSK and CDMA waveforms and discuss modeling the channel for the purpose of predicting multi-user communications performance. a)Michael B. Porter, Paul Hursky, Martin Siderius (SAIC), Mohsen Badiey (UD), Jerald Caruthers (USM), William S. Hodgkiss, Kaustubha Raghukumar (SIO), Dan Rouseff, Warren Fox (APL-UW), Christian de Moustier, Brian Calder, Barbara J. Kraft (UNH), Keyko McDonald (SPAWARSSC), Peter Stein, James K. Lewis, and Subramaniam Rajan (SSI).

Development and user evaluation of a virtual rehabilitation system for wobble board balance training.

PubMed

Fitzgerald, Diarmaid; Trakarnratanakul, Nanthana; Dunne, Lucy; Smyth, Barry; Caulfield, Brian

2008-01-01

We have developed a prototype virtual reality-based balance training system using a single inertial orientation sensor attached to the upper surface of a wobble board. This input device has been interfaced with Neverball, an open source computer game to create the balance training platform. Users can exercise with the system by standing on the wobble board and tilting it in different directions to control an on-screen environment. We have also developed a customized instruction manual to use when setting up the system. To evaluate the usability our prototype system we undertook a user evaluation study with twelve healthy novice participants. Participants were required to assemble the system using an instruction manual and then perform balance exercises with the system. Following this period of exercise VRUSE, a usability evaluation questionnaire, was completed by participants. Results indicated a high level of usability in all categories evaluated.

Stage Cylindrical Immersive Display

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Abramyan, Lucy; Norris, Jeffrey S.; Powell, Mark W.; Mittman, David S.; Shams, Khawaja S.

2011-01-01

Panoramic images with a wide field of view intend to provide a better understanding of an environment by placing objects of the environment on one seamless image. However, understanding the sizes and relative positions of the objects in a panorama is not intuitive and prone to errors because the field of view is unnatural to human perception. Scientists are often faced with the difficult task of interpreting the sizes and relative positions of objects in an environment when viewing an image of the environment on computer monitors or prints. A panorama can display an object that appears to be to the right of the viewer when it is, in fact, behind the viewer. This misinterpretation can be very costly, especially when the environment is remote and/or only accessible by unmanned vehicles. A 270 cylindrical display has been developed that surrounds the viewer with carefully calibrated panoramic imagery that correctly engages their natural kinesthetic senses and provides a more accurate awareness of the environment. The cylindrical immersive display offers a more natural window to the environment than a standard cubic CAVE (Cave Automatic Virtual Environment), and the geometry allows multiple collocated users to simultaneously view data and share important decision-making tasks. A CAVE is an immersive virtual reality environment that allows one or more users to absorb themselves in a virtual environment. A common CAVE setup is a room-sized cube where the cube sides act as projection planes. By nature, all cubic CAVEs face a problem with edge matching at edges and corners of the display. Modern immersive displays have found ways to minimize seams by creating very tight edges, and rely on the user to ignore the seam. One significant deficiency of flat-walled CAVEs is that the sense of orientation and perspective within the scene is broken across adjacent walls. On any single wall, parallel lines properly converge at their vanishing point as they should, and the sense of perspective within the scene contained on only one wall has integrity. Unfortunately, parallel lines that lie on adjacent walls do not necessarily remain parallel. This results in inaccuracies in the scene that can distract the viewer and subtract from the immersive experience of the CAVE.

cisTEM, user-friendly software for single-particle image processing.

PubMed

Grant, Timothy; Rohou, Alexis; Grigorieff, Nikolaus

2018-03-07

We have developed new open-source software called cis TEM (computational imaging system for transmission electron microscopy) for the processing of data for high-resolution electron cryo-microscopy and single-particle averaging. cis TEM features a graphical user interface that is used to submit jobs, monitor their progress, and display results. It implements a full processing pipeline including movie processing, image defocus determination, automatic particle picking, 2D classification, ab-initio 3D map generation from random parameters, 3D classification, and high-resolution refinement and reconstruction. Some of these steps implement newly-developed algorithms; others were adapted from previously published algorithms. The software is optimized to enable processing of typical datasets (2000 micrographs, 200 k - 300 k particles) on a high-end, CPU-based workstation in half a day or less, comparable to GPU-accelerated processing. Jobs can also be scheduled on large computer clusters using flexible run profiles that can be adapted for most computing environments. cis TEM is available for download from cistem.org. © 2018, Grant et al.

cisTEM, user-friendly software for single-particle image processing

PubMed Central

2018-01-01

We have developed new open-source software called cisTEM (computational imaging system for transmission electron microscopy) for the processing of data for high-resolution electron cryo-microscopy and single-particle averaging. cisTEM features a graphical user interface that is used to submit jobs, monitor their progress, and display results. It implements a full processing pipeline including movie processing, image defocus determination, automatic particle picking, 2D classification, ab-initio 3D map generation from random parameters, 3D classification, and high-resolution refinement and reconstruction. Some of these steps implement newly-developed algorithms; others were adapted from previously published algorithms. The software is optimized to enable processing of typical datasets (2000 micrographs, 200 k – 300 k particles) on a high-end, CPU-based workstation in half a day or less, comparable to GPU-accelerated processing. Jobs can also be scheduled on large computer clusters using flexible run profiles that can be adapted for most computing environments. cisTEM is available for download from cistem.org. PMID:29513216

Transformational Play as a Curricular Scaffold: Using Videogames to Support Science Education

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Barab, Sasha A.; Scott, Brianna; Siyahhan, Sinem; Goldstone, Robert; Ingram-Goble, Adam; Zuiker, Steven J.; Warren, Scott

2009-08-01

Drawing on game-design principles and an underlying situated theoretical perspective, we developed and researched a 3D game-based curriculum designed to teach water quality concepts. We compared undergraduate student dyads assigned randomly to four different instructional design conditions where the content had increasingly level of contextualization: (a) expository textbook condition, (b) simplistic framing condition, (c) immersive world condition, and (d) a single-user immersive world condition. Results indicated that the immersive-world dyad and immersive-world single user conditions performed significantly better than the electronic textbook group on standardized items. The immersive-world dyad condition also performed significantly better than either the expository textbook or the descriptive framing condition on a performance-based transfer task, and performed significantly better than the expository textbook condition on standardized test items. Implications for science education, and consistent with the goals of this special issue, are that immersive game-based learning environments provide a powerful new form of curriculum for teaching and learning science.

Increasing Accessibility to the Blind of Virtual Environments, Using a Virtual Mobility Aid Based On the "EyeCane": Feasibility Study

PubMed Central

Maidenbaum, Shachar; Levy-Tzedek, Shelly; Chebat, Daniel-Robert; Amedi, Amir

2013-01-01

Virtual worlds and environments are becoming an increasingly central part of our lives, yet they are still far from accessible to the blind. This is especially unfortunate as such environments hold great potential for them for uses such as social interaction, online education and especially for use with familiarizing the visually impaired user with a real environment virtually from the comfort and safety of his own home before visiting it in the real world. We have implemented a simple algorithm to improve this situation using single-point depth information, enabling the blind to use a virtual cane, modeled on the “EyeCane” electronic travel aid, within any virtual environment with minimal pre-processing. Use of the Virtual-EyeCane, enables this experience to potentially be later used in real world environments with identical stimuli to those from the virtual environment. We show the fast-learned practical use of this algorithm for navigation in simple environments. PMID:23977316

Infrastructure-Less Indoor Localization Using the Microphone, Magnetometer and Light Sensor of a Smartphone.

PubMed

Galván-Tejada, Carlos E; García-Vázquez, Juan Pablo; Galván-Tejada, Jorge I; Delgado-Contreras, J Rubén; Brena, Ramon F

2015-08-18

In this paper, we present the development of an infrastructure-less indoor location system (ILS), which relies on the use of a microphone, a magnetometer and a light sensor of a smartphone, all three of which are essentially passive sensors, relying on signals available practically in any building in the world, no matter how developed the region is. In our work, we merge the information from those sensors to estimate the user's location in an indoor environment. A multivariate model is applied to find the user's location, and we evaluate the quality of the resulting model in terms of sensitivity and specificity. Our experiments were carried out in an office environment during summer and winter, to take into account changes in light patterns, as well as changes in the Earth's magnetic field irregularities. The experimental results clearly show the benefits of using the information fusion of multiple sensors when contrasted with the use of a single source of information.

Software Technology for Adaptable Reliable Systems (STARS) Workshop March 24-27 1986.

DTIC Science & Technology

1986-03-01

syntax is aug- monitor program behavior. Trace and mented to accept design notes in arbitrary single-step facilities will provide the capability ... capabilities of these worksta- inrs tions make them a logical choice for hosting The final component of Vise is the a visual development environment. We...the following When the user picks the desired action, capabilities : graphical program display and linguistic analysis is used to extract informa

Single-shot temporal characterization of kilojoule-level, picosecond pulses on OMEGA EP

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Waxer, Leon; Dorrer, Christophe; Kalb, Adam

To achieve a variety of experimental conditions, the OMEGA EP laser provides kilojoule-level pulses over a pulse-width range of 0.6 to 100 ps. Precise knowledge of the pulse width is important for laser system safety and the interpretation of experimental results. This paper describes the development and implementation of a single-shot, ultrashort-pulse measurement diagnostic, which provides an accurate characterization of the output pulse shape. We also present a brief overview of the measurement algorithm; discuss design considerations necessary for implementation in a complex, user-facility environment; and review the results of the diagnostic commissioning shots, which demonstrated excellent agreement with predictions.

Single-shot temporal characterization of kilojoule-level, picosecond pulses on OMEGA EP

DOE PAGES

Waxer, Leon; Dorrer, Christophe; Kalb, Adam; ...

2018-02-19

To achieve a variety of experimental conditions, the OMEGA EP laser provides kilojoule-level pulses over a pulse-width range of 0.6 to 100 ps. Precise knowledge of the pulse width is important for laser system safety and the interpretation of experimental results. This paper describes the development and implementation of a single-shot, ultrashort-pulse measurement diagnostic, which provides an accurate characterization of the output pulse shape. We also present a brief overview of the measurement algorithm; discuss design considerations necessary for implementation in a complex, user-facility environment; and review the results of the diagnostic commissioning shots, which demonstrated excellent agreement with predictions.

The Transportable Applications Environment - An interactive design-to-production development system

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Perkins, Dorothy C.; Howell, David R.; Szczur, Martha R.

1988-01-01

An account is given of the design philosophy and architecture of the Transportable Applications Environment (TAE), an executive program binding a system of applications programs into a single, easily operable whole. TAE simplifies the job of a system developer by furnishing a stable framework for system-building; it also integrates system activities, and cooperates with the host operating system in order to perform such functions as task-scheduling and I/O. The initial TAE human/computer interface supported command and menu interfaces, data displays, parameter-prompting, error-reporting, and online help. Recent extensions support graphics workstations with a window-based, modeless user interface.

CloudDOE: a user-friendly tool for deploying Hadoop clouds and analyzing high-throughput sequencing data with MapReduce.

PubMed

Chung, Wei-Chun; Chen, Chien-Chih; Ho, Jan-Ming; Lin, Chung-Yen; Hsu, Wen-Lian; Wang, Yu-Chun; Lee, D T; Lai, Feipei; Huang, Chih-Wei; Chang, Yu-Jung

2014-01-01

Explosive growth of next-generation sequencing data has resulted in ultra-large-scale data sets and ensuing computational problems. Cloud computing provides an on-demand and scalable environment for large-scale data analysis. Using a MapReduce framework, data and workload can be distributed via a network to computers in the cloud to substantially reduce computational latency. Hadoop/MapReduce has been successfully adopted in bioinformatics for genome assembly, mapping reads to genomes, and finding single nucleotide polymorphisms. Major cloud providers offer Hadoop cloud services to their users. However, it remains technically challenging to deploy a Hadoop cloud for those who prefer to run MapReduce programs in a cluster without built-in Hadoop/MapReduce. We present CloudDOE, a platform-independent software package implemented in Java. CloudDOE encapsulates technical details behind a user-friendly graphical interface, thus liberating scientists from having to perform complicated operational procedures. Users are guided through the user interface to deploy a Hadoop cloud within in-house computing environments and to run applications specifically targeted for bioinformatics, including CloudBurst, CloudBrush, and CloudRS. One may also use CloudDOE on top of a public cloud. CloudDOE consists of three wizards, i.e., Deploy, Operate, and Extend wizards. Deploy wizard is designed to aid the system administrator to deploy a Hadoop cloud. It installs Java runtime environment version 1.6 and Hadoop version 0.20.203, and initiates the service automatically. Operate wizard allows the user to run a MapReduce application on the dashboard list. To extend the dashboard list, the administrator may install a new MapReduce application using Extend wizard. CloudDOE is a user-friendly tool for deploying a Hadoop cloud. Its smart wizards substantially reduce the complexity and costs of deployment, execution, enhancement, and management. Interested users may collaborate to improve the source code of CloudDOE to further incorporate more MapReduce bioinformatics tools into CloudDOE and support next-generation big data open source tools, e.g., Hadoop BigTop and Spark. CloudDOE is distributed under Apache License 2.0 and is freely available at http://clouddoe.iis.sinica.edu.tw/.

CloudDOE: A User-Friendly Tool for Deploying Hadoop Clouds and Analyzing High-Throughput Sequencing Data with MapReduce

PubMed Central

Chung, Wei-Chun; Chen, Chien-Chih; Ho, Jan-Ming; Lin, Chung-Yen; Hsu, Wen-Lian; Wang, Yu-Chun; Lee, D. T.; Lai, Feipei; Huang, Chih-Wei; Chang, Yu-Jung

2014-01-01

Background Explosive growth of next-generation sequencing data has resulted in ultra-large-scale data sets and ensuing computational problems. Cloud computing provides an on-demand and scalable environment for large-scale data analysis. Using a MapReduce framework, data and workload can be distributed via a network to computers in the cloud to substantially reduce computational latency. Hadoop/MapReduce has been successfully adopted in bioinformatics for genome assembly, mapping reads to genomes, and finding single nucleotide polymorphisms. Major cloud providers offer Hadoop cloud services to their users. However, it remains technically challenging to deploy a Hadoop cloud for those who prefer to run MapReduce programs in a cluster without built-in Hadoop/MapReduce. Results We present CloudDOE, a platform-independent software package implemented in Java. CloudDOE encapsulates technical details behind a user-friendly graphical interface, thus liberating scientists from having to perform complicated operational procedures. Users are guided through the user interface to deploy a Hadoop cloud within in-house computing environments and to run applications specifically targeted for bioinformatics, including CloudBurst, CloudBrush, and CloudRS. One may also use CloudDOE on top of a public cloud. CloudDOE consists of three wizards, i.e., Deploy, Operate, and Extend wizards. Deploy wizard is designed to aid the system administrator to deploy a Hadoop cloud. It installs Java runtime environment version 1.6 and Hadoop version 0.20.203, and initiates the service automatically. Operate wizard allows the user to run a MapReduce application on the dashboard list. To extend the dashboard list, the administrator may install a new MapReduce application using Extend wizard. Conclusions CloudDOE is a user-friendly tool for deploying a Hadoop cloud. Its smart wizards substantially reduce the complexity and costs of deployment, execution, enhancement, and management. Interested users may collaborate to improve the source code of CloudDOE to further incorporate more MapReduce bioinformatics tools into CloudDOE and support next-generation big data open source tools, e.g., Hadoop BigTop and Spark. Availability: CloudDOE is distributed under Apache License 2.0 and is freely available at http://clouddoe.iis.sinica.edu.tw/. PMID:24897343

An Improvement of Robust Biometrics-Based Authentication and Key Agreement Scheme for Multi-Server Environments Using Smart Cards.

PubMed

Moon, Jongho; Choi, Younsung; Jung, Jaewook; Won, Dongho

2015-01-01

In multi-server environments, user authentication is a very important issue because it provides the authorization that enables users to access their data and services; furthermore, remote user authentication schemes for multi-server environments have solved the problem that has arisen from user's management of different identities and passwords. For this reason, numerous user authentication schemes that are designed for multi-server environments have been proposed over recent years. In 2015, Lu et al. improved upon Mishra et al.'s scheme, claiming that their remote user authentication scheme is more secure and practical; however, we found that Lu et al.'s scheme is still insecure and incorrect. In this paper, we demonstrate that Lu et al.'s scheme is vulnerable to outsider attack and user impersonation attack, and we propose a new biometrics-based scheme for authentication and key agreement that can be used in multi-server environments; then, we show that our proposed scheme is more secure and supports the required security properties.

Bio-Docklets: virtualization containers for single-step execution of NGS pipelines.

PubMed

Kim, Baekdoo; Ali, Thahmina; Lijeron, Carlos; Afgan, Enis; Krampis, Konstantinos

2017-08-01

Processing of next-generation sequencing (NGS) data requires significant technical skills, involving installation, configuration, and execution of bioinformatics data pipelines, in addition to specialized postanalysis visualization and data mining software. In order to address some of these challenges, developers have leveraged virtualization containers toward seamless deployment of preconfigured bioinformatics software and pipelines on any computational platform. We present an approach for abstracting the complex data operations of multistep, bioinformatics pipelines for NGS data analysis. As examples, we have deployed 2 pipelines for RNA sequencing and chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing, preconfigured within Docker virtualization containers we call Bio-Docklets. Each Bio-Docklet exposes a single data input and output endpoint and from a user perspective, running the pipelines as simply as running a single bioinformatics tool. This is achieved using a "meta-script" that automatically starts the Bio-Docklets and controls the pipeline execution through the BioBlend software library and the Galaxy Application Programming Interface. The pipeline output is postprocessed by integration with the Visual Omics Explorer framework, providing interactive data visualizations that users can access through a web browser. Our goal is to enable easy access to NGS data analysis pipelines for nonbioinformatics experts on any computing environment, whether a laboratory workstation, university computer cluster, or a cloud service provider. Beyond end users, the Bio-Docklets also enables developers to programmatically deploy and run a large number of pipeline instances for concurrent analysis of multiple datasets. © The Authors 2017. Published by Oxford University Press.

Bio-Docklets: virtualization containers for single-step execution of NGS pipelines

PubMed Central

Kim, Baekdoo; Ali, Thahmina; Lijeron, Carlos; Afgan, Enis

2017-01-01

Abstract Processing of next-generation sequencing (NGS) data requires significant technical skills, involving installation, configuration, and execution of bioinformatics data pipelines, in addition to specialized postanalysis visualization and data mining software. In order to address some of these challenges, developers have leveraged virtualization containers toward seamless deployment of preconfigured bioinformatics software and pipelines on any computational platform. We present an approach for abstracting the complex data operations of multistep, bioinformatics pipelines for NGS data analysis. As examples, we have deployed 2 pipelines for RNA sequencing and chromatin immunoprecipitation sequencing, preconfigured within Docker virtualization containers we call Bio-Docklets. Each Bio-Docklet exposes a single data input and output endpoint and from a user perspective, running the pipelines as simply as running a single bioinformatics tool. This is achieved using a “meta-script” that automatically starts the Bio-Docklets and controls the pipeline execution through the BioBlend software library and the Galaxy Application Programming Interface. The pipeline output is postprocessed by integration with the Visual Omics Explorer framework, providing interactive data visualizations that users can access through a web browser. Our goal is to enable easy access to NGS data analysis pipelines for nonbioinformatics experts on any computing environment, whether a laboratory workstation, university computer cluster, or a cloud service provider. Beyond end users, the Bio-Docklets also enables developers to programmatically deploy and run a large number of pipeline instances for concurrent analysis of multiple datasets. PMID:28854616

Cyber Physical Systems for User Reliability Measurements in a Sharing Economy Environment.

PubMed

Seo, Aria; Jeong, Junho; Kim, Yeichang

2017-08-13

As the sharing economic market grows, the number of users is also increasing but many problems arise in terms of reliability between providers and users in the processing of services. The existing methods provide shared economic systems that judge the reliability of the provider from the viewpoint of the user. In this paper, we have developed a system for establishing mutual trust between providers and users in a shared economic environment to solve existing problems. In order to implement a system that can measure and control users' situation in a shared economic environment, we analyzed the necessary factors in a cyber physical system (CPS). In addition, a user measurement system based on a CPS structure in a sharing economic environment is implemented through analysis of the factors to consider when constructing a CPS.

Applying Utility Functions to Adaptation Planning for Home Automation Applications

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bratskas, Pyrros; Paspallis, Nearchos; Kakousis, Konstantinos; Papadopoulos, George A.

A pervasive computing environment typically comprises multiple embedded devices that may interact together and with mobile users. These users are part of the environment, and they experience it through a variety of devices embedded in the environment. This perception involves technologies which may be heterogeneous, pervasive, and dynamic. Due to the highly dynamic properties of such environments, the software systems running on them have to face problems such as user mobility, service failures, or resource and goal changes which may happen in an unpredictable manner. To cope with these problems, such systems must be autonomous and self-managed. In this chapter we deal with a special kind of a ubiquitous environment, a smart home environment, and introduce a user-preference-based model for adaptation planning. The model, which dynamically forms a set of configuration plans for resources, reasons automatically and autonomously, based on utility functions, on which plan is likely to best achieve the user's goals with respect to resource availability and user needs.

Open source integrated modeling environment Delta Shell

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Donchyts, G.; Baart, F.; Jagers, B.; van Putten, H.

2012-04-01

In the last decade, integrated modelling has become a very popular topic in environmental modelling since it helps solving problems, which is difficult to model using a single model. However, managing complexity of integrated models and minimizing time required for their setup remains a challenging task. The integrated modelling environment Delta Shell simplifies this task. The software components of Delta Shell are easy to reuse separately from each other as well as a part of integrated environment that can run in a command-line or a graphical user interface mode. The most components of the Delta Shell are developed using C# programming language and include libraries used to define, save and visualize various scientific data structures as well as coupled model configurations. Here we present two examples showing how Delta Shell simplifies process of setting up integrated models from the end user and developer perspectives. The first example shows coupling of a rainfall-runoff, a river flow and a run-time control models. The second example shows how coastal morphological database integrates with the coastal morphological model (XBeach) and a custom nourishment designer. Delta Shell is also available as open-source software released under LGPL license and accessible via http://oss.deltares.nl.

Design issues and caching strategies for CD-ROM-based multimedia storage

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shastri, Vijnan; Rajaraman, V.; Jamadagni, H. S.; Venkat-Rangan, P.; Sampath-Kumar, Srihari

1996-03-01

CD-ROMs have proliferated as a distribution media for desktop machines for a large variety of multimedia applications (targeted for a single-user environment) like encyclopedias, magazines and games. With CD-ROM capacities up to 3 GB being available in the near future, they will form an integral part of Video on Demand (VoD) servers to store full-length movies and multimedia. In the first section of this paper we look at issues related to the single- user desktop environment. Since these multimedia applications are highly interactive in nature, we take a pragmatic approach, and have made a detailed study of the multimedia application behavior in terms of the I/O request patterns generated to the CD-ROM subsystem by tracing these patterns. We discuss prefetch buffer design and seek time characteristics in the context of the analysis of these traces. We also propose an adaptive main-memory hosted cache that receives caching hints from the application to reduce the latency when the user moves from one node of the hyper graph to another. In the second section we look at the use of CD-ROM in a VoD server and discuss the problem of scheduling multiple request streams and buffer management in this scenario. We adapt the C-SCAN (Circular SCAN) algorithm to suit the CD-ROM drive characteristics and prove that it is optimal in terms of buffer size management. We provide computationally inexpensive relations by which this algorithm can be implemented. We then propose an admission control algorithm which admits new request streams without disrupting the continuity of playback of the previous request streams. The algorithm also supports operations such as fast forward and replay. Finally, we discuss the problem of optimal placement of MPEG streams on CD-ROMs in the third section.

Seamless Digital Environment – Data Analytics Use Case Study

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Oxstrand, Johanna

Multiple research efforts in the U.S Department of Energy Light Water Reactor Sustainability (LWRS) Program studies the need and design of an underlying architecture to support the increased amount and use of data in the nuclear power plant. More specifically the three LWRS research efforts; Digital Architecture for an Automated Plant, Automated Work Packages, Computer-Based Procedures for Field Workers, and the Online Monitoring efforts all have identified the need for a digital architecture and more importantly the need for a Seamless Digital Environment (SDE). A SDE provides a mean to access multiple applications, gather the data points needed, conduct themore » analysis requested, and present the result to the user with minimal or no effort by the user. During the 2016 annual Nuclear Information Technology Strategic Leadership (NITSL) group meeting the nuclear utilities identified the need for research focused on data analytics. The effort was to develop and evaluate use cases for data mining and analytics for employing information from plant sensors and database for use in developing improved business analytics. The goal of the study is to research potential approaches to building an analytics solution for equipment reliability, on a small scale, focusing on either a single piece of equipment or a single system. The analytics solution will likely consist of a data integration layer, predictive and machine learning layer and the user interface layer that will display the output of the analysis in a straight forward, easy to consume manner. This report describes the use case study initiated by NITSL and conducted in a collaboration between Idaho National Laboratory, Arizona Public Service – Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station, and NextAxiom Inc.« less

A Hybrid Scheme for Fine-Grained Search and Access Authorization in Fog Computing Environment

PubMed Central

Xiao, Min; Zhou, Jing; Liu, Xuejiao; Jiang, Mingda

2017-01-01

In the fog computing environment, the encrypted sensitive data may be transferred to multiple fog nodes on the edge of a network for low latency; thus, fog nodes need to implement a search over encrypted data as a cloud server. Since the fog nodes tend to provide service for IoT applications often running on resource-constrained end devices, it is necessary to design lightweight solutions. At present, there is little research on this issue. In this paper, we propose a fine-grained owner-forced data search and access authorization scheme spanning user-fog-cloud for resource constrained end users. Compared to existing schemes only supporting either index encryption with search ability or data encryption with fine-grained access control ability, the proposed hybrid scheme supports both abilities simultaneously, and index ciphertext and data ciphertext are constructed based on a single ciphertext-policy attribute based encryption (CP-ABE) primitive and share the same key pair, thus the data access efficiency is significantly improved and the cost of key management is greatly reduced. Moreover, in the proposed scheme, the resource constrained end devices are allowed to rapidly assemble ciphertexts online and securely outsource most of decryption task to fog nodes, and mediated encryption mechanism is also adopted to achieve instantaneous user revocation instead of re-encrypting ciphertexts with many copies in many fog nodes. The security and the performance analysis show that our scheme is suitable for a fog computing environment. PMID:28629131

A Hybrid Scheme for Fine-Grained Search and Access Authorization in Fog Computing Environment.

PubMed

Xiao, Min; Zhou, Jing; Liu, Xuejiao; Jiang, Mingda

2017-06-17

In the fog computing environment, the encrypted sensitive data may be transferred to multiple fog nodes on the edge of a network for low latency; thus, fog nodes need to implement a search over encrypted data as a cloud server. Since the fog nodes tend to provide service for IoT applications often running on resource-constrained end devices, it is necessary to design lightweight solutions. At present, there is little research on this issue. In this paper, we propose a fine-grained owner-forced data search and access authorization scheme spanning user-fog-cloud for resource constrained end users. Compared to existing schemes only supporting either index encryption with search ability or data encryption with fine-grained access control ability, the proposed hybrid scheme supports both abilities simultaneously, and index ciphertext and data ciphertext are constructed based on a single ciphertext-policy attribute based encryption (CP-ABE) primitive and share the same key pair, thus the data access efficiency is significantly improved and the cost of key management is greatly reduced. Moreover, in the proposed scheme, the resource constrained end devices are allowed to rapidly assemble ciphertexts online and securely outsource most of decryption task to fog nodes, and mediated encryption mechanism is also adopted to achieve instantaneous user revocation instead of re-encrypting ciphertexts with many copies in many fog nodes. The security and the performance analysis show that our scheme is suitable for a fog computing environment.

SOWFA + Super Controller User's Manual

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Fleming, P.; Gebraad, P.; Churchfield, M.

2013-08-01

SOWFA + Super Controller is a modification of the NREL's SOWFA tool which allows for a user to apply multiturbine or centralized wind plant control algorithms within the high-fidelity SOWFA simulation environment. The tool is currently a branch of the main SOWFA program, but will one day will be merged into a single version. This manual introduces the tool and provides examples such that a usercan implement their own super controller and set up and run simulations. The manual only discusses enough about SOWFA itself to allow for the customization of controllers and running of simulations, and details of SOWFAmore » itself are reported elsewhere Churchfield and Lee (2013); Churchfield et al. (2012). SOWFA + Super Controller, and this manual, are in alpha mode.« less

Inspiring Equal Contribution and Opportunity in a 3D Multi-User Virtual Environment: Bringing Together Men Gamers and Women Non-Gamers in Second Life[R

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

deNoyelles, Aimee; Seo, Kay Kyeong-Ju

2012-01-01

A 3D multi-user virtual environment holds promise to support and enhance student online learning communities due to its ability to promote global synchronous interaction and collaboration, rich multisensory experience and expression, and elaborate design capabilities. Second Life[R], a multi-user virtual environment intended for adult users 18 and…

IoT-Based User-Driven Service Modeling Environment for a Smart Space Management System

PubMed Central

Choi, Hoan-Suk; Rhee, Woo-Seop

2014-01-01

The existing Internet environment has been extended to the Internet of Things (IoT) as an emerging new paradigm. The IoT connects various physical entities. These entities have communication capability and deploy the observed information to various service areas such as building management, energy-saving systems, surveillance services, and smart homes. These services are designed and developed by professional service providers. Moreover, users' needs have become more complicated and personalized with the spread of user-participation services such as social media and blogging. Therefore, some active users want to create their own services to satisfy their needs, but the existing IoT service-creation environment is difficult for the non-technical user because it requires a programming capability to create a service. To solve this problem, we propose the IoT-based user-driven service modeling environment to provide an easy way to create IoT services. Also, the proposed environment deploys the defined service to another user. Through the personalization and customization of the defined service, the value and dissemination of the service is increased. This environment also provides the ontology-based context-information processing that produces and describes the context information for the IoT-based user-driven service. PMID:25420153

IoT-based user-driven service modeling environment for a smart space management system.

PubMed

Choi, Hoan-Suk; Rhee, Woo-Seop

2014-11-20

The existing Internet environment has been extended to the Internet of Things (IoT) as an emerging new paradigm. The IoT connects various physical entities. These entities have communication capability and deploy the observed information to various service areas such as building management, energy-saving systems, surveillance services, and smart homes. These services are designed and developed by professional service providers. Moreover, users' needs have become more complicated and personalized with the spread of user-participation services such as social media and blogging. Therefore, some active users want to create their own services to satisfy their needs, but the existing IoT service-creation environment is difficult for the non-technical user because it requires a programming capability to create a service. To solve this problem, we propose the IoT-based user-driven service modeling environment to provide an easy way to create IoT services. Also, the proposed environment deploys the defined service to another user. Through the personalization and customization of the defined service, the value and dissemination of the service is increased. This environment also provides the ontology-based context-information processing that produces and describes the context information for the IoT-based user-driven service.

USMC Installations Command Information Environment: Opportunities and Analysis for Integration of First Responder Communications

DTIC Science & Technology

2014-09-01

becoming a more and more prevalent technology in the business world today. According to Syal and Goswami (2012), cloud technology is seen as a...use of computing resources, applications, and personal files without reliance on a single computer or system ( Syal & Goswami, 2012). By operating in...cloud services largely being web-based, which can be retrieved through most systems with access to the Internet ( Syal & Goswami, 2012). The end user can

Adaptive Dialogue Systems for Assistive Living Environments

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Papangelis, Alexandros

2013-01-01

Adaptive Dialogue Systems (ADS) are intelligent systems, able to interact with users via multiple modalities, such as speech, gestures, facial expressions and others. Such systems are able to make conversation with their users, usually on a specific, narrow topic. Assistive Living Environments are environments where the users are by definition not…

MPS Editor

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mathews, William S.; Liu, Ning; Francis, Laurie K.; OReilly, Taifun L.; Schrock, Mitchell; Page, Dennis N.; Morris, John R.; Joswig, Joseph C.; Crockett, Thomas M.; Shams, Khawaja S.

2011-01-01

Previously, it was time-consuming to hand-edit data and then set up simulation runs to find the effect and impact of the input data on a spacecraft. MPS Editor provides the user the capability to create/edit/update models and sequences, and immediately try them out using what appears to the user as one piece of software. MPS Editor provides an integrated sequencing environment for users. It provides them with software that can be utilized during development as well as actual operations. In addition, it provides them with a single, consistent, user friendly interface. MPS Editor uses the Eclipse Rich Client Platform to provide an environment that can be tailored to specific missions. It provides the capability to create and edit, and includes an Activity Dictionary to build the simulation spacecraft models, build and edit sequences of commands, and model the effects of those commands on the spacecraft. MPS Editor is written in Java using the Eclipse Rich Client Platform. It is currently built with four perspectives: the Activity Dictionary Perspective, the Project Adaptation Perspective, the Sequence Building Perspective, and the Sequence Modeling Perspective. Each perspective performs a given task. If a mission doesn't require that task, the unneeded perspective is not added to that project's delivery. In the Activity Dictionary Perspective, the user builds the project-specific activities, observations, calibrations, etc. Typically, this is used during the development phases of the mission, although it can be used later to make changes and updates to the Project Activity Dictionary. In the Adaptation Perspective, the user creates the spacecraft models such as power, data store, etc. Again, this is typically used during development, but will be used to update or add models of the spacecraft. The Sequence Building Perspective allows the user to create a sequence of activities or commands that go to the spacecraft. It provides a simulation of the activities and commands that have been created.

Is Adolescent Poly-tobacco Use Associated with Alcohol and Other Drug Use?

PubMed Central

Creamer, MeLisa R.; Portillo, Gabriela V.; Clendennen, Stephanie L.; Perry, Cheryl L.

2016-01-01

Objectives To examine associations between current multiple tobacco product use, and current use of alcohol and marijuana, binge drinking, and lifetime use of marijuana, alcohol, and other drugs among US high school students. Methods Using 2013 Youth Risk Behavior Survey data (N = 13,583 high school students), logistic regression analyses were conducted to determine if single tobacco product or multiple tobacco product users are more likely to engage in other risk behaviors than zero tobacco product users, controlling for demographic variables. Results Overall, 23% of the sample used tobacco products and 10% of students reported current use of at least 2 tobacco products. Among single tobacco product users, the odds for engaging in risk behaviors ranged from 3.3 to 9.9 compared to non-tobacco users (p < .0001). Among multiple tobacco product users, the odds ranged from 1.5 to 4.7 (p < .01) compared to single tobacco product users. Conclusions Results suggest dual users are significantly more likely to engage in risk behavior than non-users and single product users. Future interventions should consider identifying dual-users as at higher risk, and targeting multiple risk behaviors. PMID:26685820

Multi-focused geospatial analysis using probes.

PubMed

Butkiewicz, Thomas; Dou, Wenwen; Wartell, Zachary; Ribarsky, William; Chang, Remco

2008-01-01

Traditional geospatial information visualizations often present views that restrict the user to a single perspective. When zoomed out, local trends and anomalies become suppressed and lost; when zoomed in for local inspection, spatial awareness and comparison between regions become limited. In our model, coordinated visualizations are integrated within individual probe interfaces, which depict the local data in user-defined regions-of-interest. Our probe concept can be incorporated into a variety of geospatial visualizations to empower users with the ability to observe, coordinate, and compare data across multiple local regions. It is especially useful when dealing with complex simulations or analyses where behavior in various localities differs from other localities and from the system as a whole. We illustrate the effectiveness of our technique over traditional interfaces by incorporating it within three existing geospatial visualization systems: an agent-based social simulation, a census data exploration tool, and an 3D GIS environment for analyzing urban change over time. In each case, the probe-based interaction enhances spatial awareness, improves inspection and comparison capabilities, expands the range of scopes, and facilitates collaboration among multiple users.

User Centered, Application Independent Visualization of National Airspace Data

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Murphy, James R.; Hinton, Susan E.

2011-01-01

This paper describes an application independent software tool, IV4D, built to visualize animated and still 3D National Airspace System (NAS) data specifically for aeronautics engineers who research aggregate, as well as single, flight efficiencies and behavior. IV4D was origin ally developed in a joint effort between the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the Air Force Research Laboratory (A FRL) to support the visualization of air traffic data from the Airspa ce Concept Evaluation System (ACES) simulation program. The three mai n challenges tackled by IV4D developers were: 1) determining how to d istill multiple NASA data formats into a few minimal dataset types; 2 ) creating an environment, consisting of a user interface, heuristic algorithms, and retained metadata, that facilitates easy setup and fa st visualization; and 3) maximizing the user?s ability to utilize the extended range of visualization available with AFRL?s existing 3D te chnologies. IV4D is currently being used by air traffic management re searchers at NASA?s Ames and Langley Research Centers to support data visualizations.

HDOMO: Smart Sensor Integration for an Active and Independent Longevity of the Elderly.

PubMed

Frontoni, Emanuele; Pollini, Rama; Russo, Paola; Zingaretti, Primo; Cerri, Graziano

2017-11-13

The aim of this paper is to present the main results of HDOMO, an Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) project that involved 16 Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and 2 research institutes. The objective of the project was to create an autonomous and automated domestic environment, primarily for elderly people and people with physical and motor disabilities. A known and familiar environment should help users in their daily activities and it should act as a virtual caregiver by calling, if necessary, relief efforts. Substantially, the aim of the project is to simplify the life of people in need of support, while keeping them autonomous in their private environment. From a technical point of view, the project provides the use of different Smart Objects (SOs), able to communicate among each other, in a cloud base infrastructure, and with the assisted users and their caregivers, in a perspective of interoperability and standardization of devices, usability and effectiveness of alarm systems. In the state of the art there are projects that achieve only a few of the elements listed. The HDOMO project aims to achieve all of them in one single project effectively. The experimental trials performed in a real scenario demonstrated the accuracy and efficiency of the system in extracting and processing data in real time to promptly acting, and in providing timely response to the needs of the user by integrating and confirming main alarms with different interoperable smart sensors. The article proposes a new technique to improve the accuracy of the system in detecting alarms using a multi-SO approach with information fusion between different devices, proving that this architecture can provide robust and reliable results on real environments.

HDOMO: Smart Sensor Integration for an Active and Independent Longevity of the Elderly

PubMed Central

2017-01-01

The aim of this paper is to present the main results of HDOMO, an Ambient Assisted Living (AAL) project that involved 16 Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) and 2 research institutes. The objective of the project was to create an autonomous and automated domestic environment, primarily for elderly people and people with physical and motor disabilities. A known and familiar environment should help users in their daily activities and it should act as a virtual caregiver by calling, if necessary, relief efforts. Substantially, the aim of the project is to simplify the life of people in need of support, while keeping them autonomous in their private environment. From a technical point of view, the project provides the use of different Smart Objects (SOs), able to communicate among each other, in a cloud base infrastructure, and with the assisted users and their caregivers, in a perspective of interoperability and standardization of devices, usability and effectiveness of alarm systems. In the state of the art there are projects that achieve only a few of the elements listed. The HDOMO project aims to achieve all of them in one single project effectively. The experimental trials performed in a real scenario demonstrated the accuracy and efficiency of the system in extracting and processing data in real time to promptly acting, and in providing timely response to the needs of the user by integrating and confirming main alarms with different interoperable smart sensors. The article proposes a new technique to improve the accuracy of the system in detecting alarms using a multi-SO approach with information fusion between different devices, proving that this architecture can provide robust and reliable results on real environments. PMID:29137174

Purple Computational Environment With Mappings to ACE Requirements for the General Availability User Environment Capabilities

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Barney, B; Shuler, J

2006-08-21

Purple is an Advanced Simulation and Computing (ASC) funded massively parallel supercomputer located at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). The Purple Computational Environment documents the capabilities and the environment provided for the FY06 LLNL Level 1 General Availability Milestone. This document describes specific capabilities, tools, and procedures to support both local and remote users. The model is focused on the needs of the ASC user working in the secure computing environments at Los Alamos National Laboratory, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and Sandia National Laboratories, but also documents needs of the LLNL and Alliance users working in the unclassified environment. Additionally,more » the Purple Computational Environment maps the provided capabilities to the Trilab ASC Computing Environment (ACE) Version 8.0 requirements. The ACE requirements reflect the high performance computing requirements for the General Availability user environment capabilities of the ASC community. Appendix A lists these requirements and includes a description of ACE requirements met and those requirements that are not met for each section of this document. The Purple Computing Environment, along with the ACE mappings, has been issued and reviewed throughout the Tri-lab community.« less

Building simplification algorithms based on user cognition in mobile environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shen, Jie; Shi, Junfei; Wang, Meizhen; Wu, Chenyan

2008-10-01

With the development of LBS, mobile map should adaptively satisfy the cognitive requirement of user. User cognition in mobile environment is much more objective oriented and also seem to be a heavier burden than the user in static environment. The holistic idea and methods of map generalization can not fully suitable for the mobile map. This paper took the building simplification in habitation generalization as example, analyzed the characteristic of user cognition in mobile environment and the basic rules of building simplification, collected and studied the state-of-the-art of algorithms of building simplification in the static and mobile environment, put forward the idea of hierarchical building simplification based on user cognition. This paper took Hunan road business district of Nanjing as test area and took the building data with shapfile format of ESRI as test data and realized the simplification algorithm. The method took user as center, calculated the distance between user and the building which will be simplified and took the distance as the basis for choosing different simplification algorithm for different spaces. This contribution aimed to hierarchically present the building in different level of detail by real-time simplification.

Temporal Issues in the Design of Virtual Learning Environments.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Bergeron, Bryan; Obeid, Jihad

1995-01-01

Describes design methods used to influence user perception of time in virtual learning environments. Examines the use of temporal cues in medical education and clinical competence testing. Finds that user perceptions of time affects user acceptance, ease of use, and the level of realism of a virtual learning environment. Contains 51 references.…

Enhancing User Support in Open Problem Solving Environments through Bayesian Network Inference Techniques

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Tselios, Nikolaos; Stoica, Adrian; Maragoudakis, Manolis; Avouris, Nikolaos; Komis, Vassilis

2006-01-01

During the last years, development of open learning environments that support effectively their users has been a challenge for the research community of educational technologies. The open interactive nature of these environments results in users experiencing difficulties in coping with the plethora of available functions, especially during their…

Single-cell RNA-seq of rheumatoid arthritis synovial tissue using low-cost microfluidic instrumentation.

PubMed

Stephenson, William; Donlin, Laura T; Butler, Andrew; Rozo, Cristina; Bracken, Bernadette; Rashidfarrokhi, Ali; Goodman, Susan M; Ivashkiv, Lionel B; Bykerk, Vivian P; Orange, Dana E; Darnell, Robert B; Swerdlow, Harold P; Satija, Rahul

2018-02-23

Droplet-based single-cell RNA-seq has emerged as a powerful technique for massively parallel cellular profiling. While this approach offers the exciting promise to deconvolute cellular heterogeneity in diseased tissues, the lack of cost-effective and user-friendly instrumentation has hindered widespread adoption of droplet microfluidic techniques. To address this, we developed a 3D-printed, low-cost droplet microfluidic control instrument and deploy it in a clinical environment to perform single-cell transcriptome profiling of disaggregated synovial tissue from five rheumatoid arthritis patients. We sequence 20,387 single cells revealing 13 transcriptomically distinct clusters. These encompass an unsupervised draft atlas of the autoimmune infiltrate that contribute to disease biology. Additionally, we identify previously uncharacterized fibroblast subpopulations and discern their spatial location within the synovium. We envision that this instrument will have broad utility in both research and clinical settings, enabling low-cost and routine application of microfluidic techniques.

Dynamic Distribution and Layouting of Model-Based User Interfaces in Smart Environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Roscher, Dirk; Lehmann, Grzegorz; Schwartze, Veit; Blumendorf, Marco; Albayrak, Sahin

The developments in computer technology in the last decade change the ways of computer utilization. The emerging smart environments make it possible to build ubiquitous applications that assist users during their everyday life, at any time, in any context. But the variety of contexts-of-use (user, platform and environment) makes the development of such ubiquitous applications for smart environments and especially its user interfaces a challenging and time-consuming task. We propose a model-based approach, which allows adapting the user interface at runtime to numerous (also unknown) contexts-of-use. Based on a user interface modelling language, defining the fundamentals and constraints of the user interface, a runtime architecture exploits the description to adapt the user interface to the current context-of-use. The architecture provides automatic distribution and layout algorithms for adapting the applications also to contexts unforeseen at design time. Designers do not specify predefined adaptations for each specific situation, but adaptation constraints and guidelines. Furthermore, users are provided with a meta user interface to influence the adaptations according to their needs. A smart home energy management system serves as running example to illustrate the approach.

Cyber Physical Systems for User Reliability Measurements in a Sharing Economy Environment

PubMed Central

Seo, Aria; Kim, Yeichang

2017-01-01

As the sharing economic market grows, the number of users is also increasing but many problems arise in terms of reliability between providers and users in the processing of services. The existing methods provide shared economic systems that judge the reliability of the provider from the viewpoint of the user. In this paper, we have developed a system for establishing mutual trust between providers and users in a shared economic environment to solve existing problems. In order to implement a system that can measure and control users’ situation in a shared economic environment, we analyzed the necessary factors in a cyber physical system (CPS). In addition, a user measurement system based on a CPS structure in a sharing economic environment is implemented through analysis of the factors to consider when constructing a CPS. PMID:28805709

40 CFR 700.41 - Radon user fees.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 30 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Radon user fees. 700.41 Section 700.41 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY (CONTINUED) TOXIC SUBSTANCES CONTROL ACT GENERAL Fees § 700.41 Radon user fees. User fees relating to radon proficiency programs authorized under the...

40 CFR 700.41 - Radon user fees.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 31 2011-07-01 2011-07-01 false Radon user fees. 700.41 Section 700.41 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY (CONTINUED) TOXIC SUBSTANCES CONTROL ACT GENERAL Fees § 700.41 Radon user fees. User fees relating to radon proficiency programs authorized under the...

Selective Neuronal Activation by Cochlear Implant Stimulation in Auditory Cortex of Awake Primate

PubMed Central

Johnson, Luke A.; Della Santina, Charles C.

2016-01-01

Despite the success of cochlear implants (CIs) in human populations, most users perform poorly in noisy environments and music and tonal language perception. How CI devices engage the brain at the single neuron level has remained largely unknown, in particular in the primate brain. By comparing neuronal responses with acoustic and CI stimulation in marmoset monkeys unilaterally implanted with a CI electrode array, we discovered that CI stimulation was surprisingly ineffective at activating many neurons in auditory cortex, particularly in the hemisphere ipsilateral to the CI. Further analyses revealed that the CI-nonresponsive neurons were narrowly tuned to frequency and sound level when probed with acoustic stimuli; such neurons likely play a role in perceptual behaviors requiring fine frequency and level discrimination, tasks that CI users find especially challenging. These findings suggest potential deficits in central auditory processing of CI stimulation and provide important insights into factors responsible for poor CI user performance in a wide range of perceptual tasks. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT The cochlear implant (CI) is the most successful neural prosthetic device to date and has restored hearing in hundreds of thousands of deaf individuals worldwide. However, despite its huge successes, CI users still face many perceptual limitations, and the brain mechanisms involved in hearing through CI devices remain poorly understood. By directly comparing single-neuron responses to acoustic and CI stimulation in auditory cortex of awake marmoset monkeys, we discovered that neurons unresponsive to CI stimulation were sharply tuned to frequency and sound level. Our results point out a major deficit in central auditory processing of CI stimulation and provide important insights into mechanisms underlying the poor CI user performance in a wide range of perceptual tasks. PMID:27927962

Embedded Web Technology: Internet Technology Applied to Real-Time System Control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Daniele, Carl J.

1998-01-01

The NASA Lewis Research Center is developing software tools to bridge the gap between the traditionally non-real-time Internet technology and the real-time, embedded-controls environment for space applications. Internet technology has been expanding at a phenomenal rate. The simple World Wide Web browsers (such as earlier versions of Netscape, Mosaic, and Internet Explorer) that resided on personal computers just a few years ago only enabled users to log into and view a remote computer site. With current browsers, users not only view but also interact with remote sites. In addition, the technology now supports numerous computer platforms (PC's, MAC's, and Unix platforms), thereby providing platform independence.In contrast, the development of software to interact with a microprocessor (embedded controller) that is used to monitor and control a space experiment has generally been a unique development effort. For each experiment, a specific graphical user interface (GUI) has been developed. This procedure works well for a single-user environment. However, the interface for the International Space Station (ISS) Fluids and Combustion Facility will have to enable scientists throughout the world and astronauts onboard the ISS, using different computer platforms, to interact with their experiments in the Fluids and Combustion Facility. Developing a specific GUI for all these users would be cost prohibitive. An innovative solution to this requirement, developed at Lewis, is to use Internet technology, where the general problem of platform independence has already been partially solved, and to leverage this expanding technology as new products are developed. This approach led to the development of the Embedded Web Technology (EWT) program at Lewis, which has the potential to significantly reduce software development costs for both flight and ground software.

Prototype of a Graphical CONOPS (Concept of Operations) Development Environment for Agile Systems Engineering

DTIC Science & Technology

2012-03-23

orthogonal dimensions of cognition : things, places, paths, actions, and causes suggested as key by cognitive linguists. The goal of this research task... stylistic treatment across the system? O O O 1.3 Is a single, selected icon clearly visible when surrounded by unselected icons? O O O 1.4...1.21 Complex tasks: 8-12 seconds O O O 1.22 Are response times appropriate to the user’s cognitive processing? O O O 1.23 Continuity of thinking

Information Power Grid: Distributed High-Performance Computing and Large-Scale Data Management for Science and Engineering

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Johnston, William E.; Gannon, Dennis; Nitzberg, Bill

2000-01-01

We use the term "Grid" to refer to distributed, high performance computing and data handling infrastructure that incorporates geographically and organizationally dispersed, heterogeneous resources that are persistent and supported. This infrastructure includes: (1) Tools for constructing collaborative, application oriented Problem Solving Environments / Frameworks (the primary user interfaces for Grids); (2) Programming environments, tools, and services providing various approaches for building applications that use aggregated computing and storage resources, and federated data sources; (3) Comprehensive and consistent set of location independent tools and services for accessing and managing dynamic collections of widely distributed resources: heterogeneous computing systems, storage systems, real-time data sources and instruments, human collaborators, and communications systems; (4) Operational infrastructure including management tools for distributed systems and distributed resources, user services, accounting and auditing, strong and location independent user authentication and authorization, and overall system security services The vision for NASA's Information Power Grid - a computing and data Grid - is that it will provide significant new capabilities to scientists and engineers by facilitating routine construction of information based problem solving environments / frameworks. Such Grids will knit together widely distributed computing, data, instrument, and human resources into just-in-time systems that can address complex and large-scale computing and data analysis problems. Examples of these problems include: (1) Coupled, multidisciplinary simulations too large for single systems (e.g., multi-component NPSS turbomachine simulation); (2) Use of widely distributed, federated data archives (e.g., simultaneous access to metrological, topological, aircraft performance, and flight path scheduling databases supporting a National Air Space Simulation systems}; (3) Coupling large-scale computing and data systems to scientific and engineering instruments (e.g., realtime interaction with experiments through real-time data analysis and interpretation presented to the experimentalist in ways that allow direct interaction with the experiment (instead of just with instrument control); (5) Highly interactive, augmented reality and virtual reality remote collaborations (e.g., Ames / Boeing Remote Help Desk providing field maintenance use of coupled video and NDI to a remote, on-line airframe structures expert who uses this data to index into detailed design databases, and returns 3D internal aircraft geometry to the field); (5) Single computational problems too large for any single system (e.g. the rotocraft reference calculation). Grids also have the potential to provide pools of resources that could be called on in extraordinary / rapid response situations (such as disaster response) because they can provide common interfaces and access mechanisms, standardized management, and uniform user authentication and authorization, for large collections of distributed resources (whether or not they normally function in concert). IPG development and deployment is addressing requirements obtained by analyzing a number of different application areas, in particular from the NASA Aero-Space Technology Enterprise. This analysis has focussed primarily on two types of users: the scientist / design engineer whose primary interest is problem solving (e.g. determining wing aerodynamic characteristics in many different operating environments), and whose primary interface to IPG will be through various sorts of problem solving frameworks. The second type of user is the tool designer: the computational scientists who convert physics and mathematics into code that can simulate the physical world. These are the two primary users of IPG, and they have rather different requirements. The results of the analysis of the needs of these two types of users provides a broad set of requirements that gives rise to a general set of required capabilities. The IPG project is intended to address all of these requirements. In some cases the required computing technology exists, and in some cases it must be researched and developed. The project is using available technology to provide a prototype set of capabilities in a persistent distributed computing testbed. Beyond this, there are required capabilities that are not immediately available, and whose development spans the range from near-term engineering development (one to two years) to much longer term R&D (three to six years). Additional information is contained in the original.

40 CFR 35.929-2 - General requirements for all user charge systems.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false General requirements for all user charge systems. 35.929-2 Section 35.929-2 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY... than every 2 years the waste water contribution of users and user classes, the total costs of operation...

40 CFR 35.929-2 - General requirements for all user charge systems.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2012 CFR

2012-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2012-07-01 2012-07-01 false General requirements for all user charge systems. 35.929-2 Section 35.929-2 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY... than every 2 years the waste water contribution of users and user classes, the total costs of operation...

40 CFR 35.929-2 - General requirements for all user charge systems.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2013-07-01 2013-07-01 false General requirements for all user charge systems. 35.929-2 Section 35.929-2 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY... than every 2 years the waste water contribution of users and user classes, the total costs of operation...

A web-based information system for management and analysis of patient data after refractive eye surgery.

PubMed

Zuberbuhler, Bruno; Galloway, Peter; Reddy, Aravind; Saldana, Manuel; Gale, Richard

2007-12-01

The aim was to develop a software tool for refractive surgeons using a standard user-friendly web-based interface, providing the user with a secure environment to protect large volumes of patient data. The software application was named "Internet-based refractive analysis" (IBRA), and was programmed with the computer languages PHP, HTML and JavaScript, attached to the opensource MySQL database. IBRA facilitated internationally accepted presentation methods including the stability chart, the predictability chart and the safety chart; it was able to perform vector analysis for the course of a single patient or for group data. With the integrated nomogram calculation, treatment could be customised to reduce the postoperative refractive error. Multicenter functions permitted quality-control comparisons between different surgeons and laser units.

Interactive design and analysis of future large spacecraft concepts

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Garrett, L. B.

1981-01-01

An interactive computer aided design program used to perform systems level design and analysis of large spacecraft concepts is presented. Emphasis is on rapid design, analysis of integrated spacecraft, and automatic spacecraft modeling for lattice structures. Capabilities and performance of multidiscipline applications modules, the executive and data management software, and graphics display features are reviewed. A single user at an interactive terminal create, design, analyze, and conduct parametric studies of Earth orbiting spacecraft with relative ease. Data generated in the design, analysis, and performance evaluation of an Earth-orbiting large diameter antenna satellite are used to illustrate current capabilities. Computer run time statistics for the individual modules quantify the speed at which modeling, analysis, and design evaluation of integrated spacecraft concepts is accomplished in a user interactive computing environment.

Grid Technology as a Cyberinfrastructure for Delivering High-End Services to the Earth and Space Science Community

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hinke, Thomas H.

2004-01-01

Grid technology consists of middleware that permits distributed computations, data and sensors to be seamlessly integrated into a secure, single-sign-on processing environment. In &is environment, a user has to identify and authenticate himself once to the grid middleware, and then can utilize any of the distributed resources to which he has been,panted access. Grid technology allows resources that exist in enterprises that are under different administrative control to be securely integrated into a single processing environment The grid community has adopted commercial web services technology as a means for implementing persistent, re-usable grid services that sit on top of the basic distributed processing environment that grids provide. These grid services can then form building blocks for even more complex grid services. Each grid service is characterized using the Web Service Description Language, which provides a description of the interface and how other applications can access it. The emerging Semantic grid work seeks to associates sufficient semantic information with each grid service such that applications wii1 he able to automatically select, compose and if necessary substitute available equivalent services in order to assemble collections of services that are most appropriate for a particular application. Grid technology has been used to provide limited support to various Earth and space science applications. Looking to the future, this emerging grid service technology can provide a cyberinfrastructures for both the Earth and space science communities. Groups within these communities could transform those applications that have community-wide applicability into persistent grid services that are made widely available to their respective communities. In concert with grid-enabled data archives, users could easily create complex workflows that extract desired data from one or more archives and process it though an appropriate set of widely distributed grid services discovered using semantic grid technology. As required, high-end computational resources could be drawn from available grid resource pools. Using grid technology, this confluence of data, services and computational resources could easily be harnessed to transform data from many different sources into a desired product that is delivered to a user's workstation or to a web portal though which it could be accessed by its intended audience.

Instrumentino: An Open-Source Software for Scientific Instruments.

PubMed

Koenka, Israel Joel; Sáiz, Jorge; Hauser, Peter C

2015-01-01

Scientists often need to build dedicated computer-controlled experimental systems. For this purpose, it is becoming common to employ open-source microcontroller platforms, such as the Arduino. These boards and associated integrated software development environments provide affordable yet powerful solutions for the implementation of hardware control of transducers and acquisition of signals from detectors and sensors. It is, however, a challenge to write programs that allow interactive use of such arrangements from a personal computer. This task is particularly complex if some of the included hardware components are connected directly to the computer and not via the microcontroller. A graphical user interface framework, Instrumentino, was therefore developed to allow the creation of control programs for complex systems with minimal programming effort. By writing a single code file, a powerful custom user interface is generated, which enables the automatic running of elaborate operation sequences and observation of acquired experimental data in real time. The framework, which is written in Python, allows extension by users, and is made available as an open source project.

Analyzing Dynamics of Cooperating Spacecraft

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hughes, Stephen P.; Folta, David C.; Conway, Darrel J.

2004-01-01

A software library has been developed to enable high-fidelity computational simulation of the dynamics of multiple spacecraft distributed over a region of outer space and acting with a common purpose. All of the modeling capabilities afforded by this software are available independently in other, separate software systems, but have not previously been brought together in a single system. A user can choose among several dynamical models, many high-fidelity environment models, and several numerical-integration schemes. The user can select whether to use models that assume weak coupling between spacecraft, or strong coupling in the case of feedback control or tethering of spacecraft to each other. For weak coupling, spacecraft orbits are propagated independently, and are synchronized in time by controlling the step size of the integration. For strong coupling, the orbits are integrated simultaneously. Among the integration schemes that the user can choose are Runge-Kutta Verner, Prince-Dormand, Adams-Bashforth-Moulton, and Bulirsh- Stoer. Comparisons of performance are included for both the weak- and strongcoupling dynamical models for all of the numerical integrators.

Main control computer security model of closed network systems protection against cyber attacks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Seymen, Bilal

2014-06-01

The model that brings the data input/output under control in closed network systems, that maintains the system securely, and that controls the flow of information through the Main Control Computer which also brings the network traffic under control against cyber-attacks. The network, which can be controlled single-handedly thanks to the system designed to enable the network users to make data entry into the system or to extract data from the system securely, intends to minimize the security gaps. Moreover, data input/output record can be kept by means of the user account assigned for each user, and it is also possible to carry out retroactive tracking, if requested. Because the measures that need to be taken for each computer on the network regarding cyber security, do require high cost; it has been intended to provide a cost-effective working environment with this model, only if the Main Control Computer has the updated hardware.

Speech intelligibility and subjective benefit in single-sided deaf adults after cochlear implantation.

PubMed

Finke, Mareike; Strauß-Schier, Angelika; Kludt, Eugen; Büchner, Andreas; Illg, Angelika

2017-05-01

Treatment with cochlear implants (CIs) in single-sided deaf individuals started less than a decade ago. CIs can successfully reduce incapacitating tinnitus on the deaf ear and allow, so some extent, the restoration of binaural hearing. Until now, systematic evaluations of subjective CI benefit in post-lingually single-sided deaf individuals and analyses of speech intelligibility outcome for the CI in isolation have been lacking. For the prospective part of this study, the Bern Benefit in Single-Sided Deafness Questionnaire (BBSS) was administered to 48 single-sided deaf CI users to evaluate the subjectively perceived CI benefit across different listening situations. In the retrospective part, speech intelligibility outcome with the CI up to 12 month post-activation was compared between 100 single-sided deaf CI users and 125 bilaterally implanted CI users (2nd implant). The positive median ratings in the BBSS differed significantly from zero for all items suggesting that most individuals with single-sided deafness rate their CI as beneficial across listening situations. The speech perception scores in quiet and noise improved significantly over time in both groups of CI users. Speech intelligibility with the CI in isolation was significantly better in bilaterally implanted CI users (2nd implant) compared to the scores obtained from single-sided deaf CI users. Our results indicate that CI users with single-sided deafness can reach open set speech understanding with their CI in isolation, encouraging the extension of the CI indication to individuals with normal hearing on the contralateral ear. Compared to the performance reached with bilateral CI users' second implant, speech reception threshold are lower, indicating an aural preference and dominance of the normal hearing ear. The results from the BBSS propose good satisfaction with the CI across several listening situations. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

The ID23-2 structural biology microfocus beamline at the ESRF

PubMed Central

Flot, David; Mairs, Trevor; Giraud, Thierry; Guijarro, Matias; Lesourd, Marc; Rey, Vicente; van Brussel, Denis; Morawe, Christian; Borel, Christine; Hignette, Olivier; Chavanne, Joel; Nurizzo, Didier; McSweeney, Sean; Mitchell, Edward

2010-01-01

The first phase of the ESRF beamline ID23 to be constructed was ID23-1, a tunable MAD-capable beamline which opened to users in early 2004. The second phase of the beamline to be constructed is ID23-2, a monochromatic microfocus beamline dedicated to macromolecular crystallography experiments. Beamline ID23-2 makes use of well characterized optical elements: a single-bounce silicon (111) monochromator and two mirrors in Kirkpatrick–Baez geometry to focus the X-ray beam. A major design goal of the ID23-2 beamline is to provide a reliable, easy-to-use and routine microfocus beam. ID23-2 started operation in November 2005, as the first beamline dedicated to microfocus macromolecular crystallography. The beamline has taken the standard automated ESRF macromolecular crystallography environment (both hardware and software), allowing users of ID23-2 to be rapidly familiar with the microfocus environment. This paper describes the beamline design, the special considerations taken into account given the microfocus beam, and summarizes the results of the first years of the beamline operation. PMID:20029119

Design and Development of a Multiprogramming Operating System for Sixteen Bit Microprocessors.

DTIC Science & Technology

1981-12-01

with the technical details of how services are programmed or produced, except perhaps when they fail to meet user requirements. Users are interested in...locations and loading decks. As the expense *and speed of computers increased, executive programs were created to allow several users to sequence...single user operating system as a companion to the 8080 microprocessor. CP/M (Control Program for Microcomputers) was a single user operating system that

SPARX, a new environment for Cryo-EM image processing.

PubMed

Hohn, Michael; Tang, Grant; Goodyear, Grant; Baldwin, P R; Huang, Zhong; Penczek, Pawel A; Yang, Chao; Glaeser, Robert M; Adams, Paul D; Ludtke, Steven J

2007-01-01

SPARX (single particle analysis for resolution extension) is a new image processing environment with a particular emphasis on transmission electron microscopy (TEM) structure determination. It includes a graphical user interface that provides a complete graphical programming environment with a novel data/process-flow infrastructure, an extensive library of Python scripts that perform specific TEM-related computational tasks, and a core library of fundamental C++ image processing functions. In addition, SPARX relies on the EMAN2 library and cctbx, the open-source computational crystallography library from PHENIX. The design of the system is such that future inclusion of other image processing libraries is a straightforward task. The SPARX infrastructure intelligently handles retention of intermediate values, even those inside programming structures such as loops and function calls. SPARX and all dependencies are free for academic use and available with complete source.

Visualization of unsteady computational fluid dynamics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Haimes, Robert

1994-11-01

A brief summary of the computer environment used for calculating three dimensional unsteady Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) results is presented. This environment requires a super computer as well as massively parallel processors (MPP's) and clusters of workstations acting as a single MPP (by concurrently working on the same task) provide the required computational bandwidth for CFD calculations of transient problems. The cluster of reduced instruction set computers (RISC) is a recent advent based on the low cost and high performance that workstation vendors provide. The cluster, with the proper software can act as a multiple instruction/multiple data (MIMD) machine. A new set of software tools is being designed specifically to address visualizing 3D unsteady CFD results in these environments. Three user's manuals for the parallel version of Visual3, pV3, revision 1.00 make up the bulk of this report.

Visualization of unsteady computational fluid dynamics

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Haimes, Robert

1994-01-01

A brief summary of the computer environment used for calculating three dimensional unsteady Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) results is presented. This environment requires a super computer as well as massively parallel processors (MPP's) and clusters of workstations acting as a single MPP (by concurrently working on the same task) provide the required computational bandwidth for CFD calculations of transient problems. The cluster of reduced instruction set computers (RISC) is a recent advent based on the low cost and high performance that workstation vendors provide. The cluster, with the proper software can act as a multiple instruction/multiple data (MIMD) machine. A new set of software tools is being designed specifically to address visualizing 3D unsteady CFD results in these environments. Three user's manuals for the parallel version of Visual3, pV3, revision 1.00 make up the bulk of this report.

Adaptive User Profiles in Pervasive Advertising Environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Alt, Florian; Balz, Moritz; Kristes, Stefanie; Shirazi, Alireza Sahami; Mennenöh, Julian; Schmidt, Albrecht; Schröder, Hendrik; Goedicke, Michael

Nowadays modern advertising environments try to provide more efficient ads by targeting costumers based on their interests. Various approaches exist today as to how information about the users' interests can be gathered. Users can deliberately and explicitly provide this information or user's shopping behaviors can be analyzed implicitly. We implemented an advertising platform to simulate an advertising environment and present adaptive profiles, which let users setup profiles based on a self-assessment, and enhance those profiles with information about their real shopping behavior as well as about their activity intensity. Additionally, we explain how pervasive technologies such as Bluetooth can be used to create a profile anonymously and unobtrusively.

Space Environments and Effects Program (SEE)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Yhisreal-Rivas, David M.

2013-01-01

The need to preserve works and NASA documented articles is done via the collection of various Space Environments and Effects (SEE) related articles. (SEE) contains and lists the various projects that are ongoing, or have been conducted with the help of NASA. The goal of the (SEE) program is to make publicly available the environment technologies that are required to design, manufacture and operate reliable, cost-effective spacecraft for the government and commercial sectors. Of the many projects contained within the (SEE) program the Lunar-E Library and Spacecraft Materials Selector (SMS) have been selected for a more user friendly means to make the tools easily available to the public. This information which is still available required a person or entity to request access from a point of contact at NASA and wait for the requested bundled software DVD via postal service. Redesigning the material presentation and availability has been mapped to a single step process with faster turnaround time via Materials and Processes Technical Information System (MAPTIS) database. This process requires users to register and be verified in order to gain access to the information contained within. Aiding in the progression of making the software tools/documents available required a combination of specialized in-house data gathering software tools and software archeology.

The structure of the clouds distributed operating system

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Dasgupta, Partha; Leblanc, Richard J., Jr.

1989-01-01

A novel system architecture, based on the object model, is the central structuring concept used in the Clouds distributed operating system. This architecture makes Clouds attractive over a wide class of machines and environments. Clouds is a native operating system, designed and implemented at Georgia Tech. and runs on a set of generated purpose computers connected via a local area network. The system architecture of Clouds is composed of a system-wide global set of persistent (long-lived) virtual address spaces, called objects that contain persistent data and code. The object concept is implemented at the operating system level, thus presenting a single level storage view to the user. Lightweight treads carry computational activity through the code stored in the objects. The persistent objects and threads gives rise to a programming environment composed of shared permanent memory, dispensing with the need for hardware-derived concepts such as the file systems and message systems. Though the hardware may be distributed and may have disks and networks, the Clouds provides the applications with a logically centralized system, based on a shared, structured, single level store. The current design of Clouds uses a minimalist philosophy with respect to both the kernel and the operating system. That is, the kernel and the operating system support a bare minimum of functionality. Clouds also adheres to the concept of separation of policy and mechanism. Most low-level operating system services are implemented above the kernel and most high level services are implemented at the user level. From the measured performance of using the kernel mechanisms, we are able to demonstrate that efficient implementations are feasible for the object model on commercially available hardware. Clouds provides a rich environment for conducting research in distributed systems. Some of the topics addressed in this paper include distributed programming environments, consistency of persistent data and fault-tolerance.

An Improvement of Robust Biometrics-Based Authentication and Key Agreement Scheme for Multi-Server Environments Using Smart Cards

PubMed Central

Moon, Jongho; Choi, Younsung; Jung, Jaewook; Won, Dongho

2015-01-01

In multi-server environments, user authentication is a very important issue because it provides the authorization that enables users to access their data and services; furthermore, remote user authentication schemes for multi-server environments have solved the problem that has arisen from user’s management of different identities and passwords. For this reason, numerous user authentication schemes that are designed for multi-server environments have been proposed over recent years. In 2015, Lu et al. improved upon Mishra et al.’s scheme, claiming that their remote user authentication scheme is more secure and practical; however, we found that Lu et al.’s scheme is still insecure and incorrect. In this paper, we demonstrate that Lu et al.’s scheme is vulnerable to outsider attack and user impersonation attack, and we propose a new biometrics-based scheme for authentication and key agreement that can be used in multi-server environments; then, we show that our proposed scheme is more secure and supports the required security properties. PMID:26709702

Lessons Learned Implementing DOORS in a Citrix Environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bussman, Marie

2005-01-01

NASA's James Web Space Telescope (JWST) Project is a large multi-national project with geographically dispersed contractors that all need access to the Projects requirement database. Initially, the project utilized multiple DOORS databases with the built-in partitions feature to exchange modules amongst the various contractor sites. As the requirements databases matured the use of partitions became extremely difficult. There have been many issues such as incompatible versions of DOORS, inefficient mechanism for sharing modules, security concerns, performance issues, and inconsistent document import and export formats. Deployment of the client software with limited IT resources available was also an issue. The solution chosen by JWST was to integrate the use of a Citrix environment with the DOORS database to address most of the project concerns. The use of the Citrix solution allowed a single Requirements database in a secure environment via a web interface. The Citrix environment allows JWST to upgrade to the most current version of DOORS without having to coordinate multiple sites and user upgrades. The single requirements database eliminates a multitude of Configuration Management concerns and facilitated the standardization of documentation formats. This paper discusses the obstacles and the lessons learned throughout the installation, implementation, usage and deployment process of a centralized DOORS database solution.

Supporting community annotation and user collaboration in the integrated microbial genomes (IMG) system.

PubMed

Chen, I-Min A; Markowitz, Victor M; Palaniappan, Krishna; Szeto, Ernest; Chu, Ken; Huang, Jinghua; Ratner, Anna; Pillay, Manoj; Hadjithomas, Michalis; Huntemann, Marcel; Mikhailova, Natalia; Ovchinnikova, Galina; Ivanova, Natalia N; Kyrpides, Nikos C

2016-04-26

The exponential growth of genomic data from next generation technologies renders traditional manual expert curation effort unsustainable. Many genomic systems have included community annotation tools to address the problem. Most of these systems adopted a "Wiki-based" approach to take advantage of existing wiki technologies, but encountered obstacles in issues such as usability, authorship recognition, information reliability and incentive for community participation. Here, we present a different approach, relying on tightly integrated method rather than "Wiki-based" method, to support community annotation and user collaboration in the Integrated Microbial Genomes (IMG) system. The IMG approach allows users to use existing IMG data warehouse and analysis tools to add gene, pathway and biosynthetic cluster annotations, to analyze/reorganize contigs, genes and functions using workspace datasets, and to share private user annotations and workspace datasets with collaborators. We show that the annotation effort using IMG can be part of the research process to overcome the user incentive and authorship recognition problems thus fostering collaboration among domain experts. The usability and reliability issues are addressed by the integration of curated information and analysis tools in IMG, together with DOE Joint Genome Institute (JGI) expert review. By incorporating annotation operations into IMG, we provide an integrated environment for users to perform deeper and extended data analysis and annotation in a single system that can lead to publications and community knowledge sharing as shown in the case studies.

PROVIDING PLANT DATA ANALYTICS THROUGH A SEAMLESS DIGITAL ENVIRONMENT

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Bly, Aaron; Oxstrand, Johanna

As technology continues to evolve and become more integrated into a worker’s daily routine in the Nuclear Power industry the need for easy access to data becomes a priority. Not only does the need for data increase but the amount of data collected increases. In most cases the data is collected and stored in various software applications, many of which are legacy systems, which do not offer any other option to access the data except through the application’s user interface. Furthermore the data gets grouped in “silos” according to work function and not necessarily by subject. Hence, in order tomore » access all the information needed for a particular task or analysis one may have to access multiple applications to gather all the data needed. The industry and the research community have identified the need for a digital architecture and more importantly the need for a Seamless Digital Environment. An SDE provides a means to access multiple applications, gather the data points needed, conduct the analysis requested, and present the result to the user with minimal or no effort by the user. In addition, the nuclear utilities have identified the need for research focused on data analytics. The effort should develop and evaluate use cases for data mining and analytics for employing information from plant sensors and database for use in developing improved business analytics. Idaho National Laboratory is leading such effort, which is conducted in close collaboration with vendors, nuclear utilities, Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, and Electric Power Research Institute. The goal of the study is to research potential approaches to building an analytics solution for equipment reliability, on a small scale, focusing on either a single piece of equipment or a single system. The analytics solution will likely consist of a data integration layer, predictive and machine learning layer and the user interface layer that will display the output of the analysis in a straight forward, easy to consume manner. This paper will describe the study and the initial results.« less

Detecting Rumors Through Modeling Information Propagation Networks in a Social Media Environment.

PubMed

Liu, Yang; Xu, Songhua; Tourassi, Georgia

2015-01-01

In the midst of today's pervasive influence of social media content and activities, information credibility has increasingly become a major issue. Accordingly, identifying false information, e.g. rumors circulated in social media environments, attracts expanding research attention and growing interests. Many previous studies have exploited user-independent features for rumor detection. These prior investigations uniformly treat all users relevant to the propagation of a social media message as instances of a generic entity. Such a modeling approach usually adopts a homogeneous network to represent all users, the practice of which ignores the variety across an entire user population in a social media environment. Recognizing this limitation of modeling methodologies, this study explores user-specific features in a social media environment for rumor detection. The new approach hypothesizes that whether a user tends to spread a rumor is dependent upon specific attributes of the user in addition to content characteristics of the message itself. Under this hypothesis, information propagation patterns of rumors versus those of credible messages in a social media environment are systematically differentiable. To explore and exploit this hypothesis, we develop a new information propagation model based on a heterogeneous user representation for rumor recognition. The new approach is capable of differentiating rumors from credible messages through observing distinctions in their respective propagation patterns in social media. Experimental results show that the new information propagation model based on heterogeneous user representation can effectively distinguish rumors from credible social media content.

FAST User Guide

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Walatka, Pamela P.; Clucas, Jean; McCabe, R. Kevin; Plessel, Todd; Potter, R.; Cooper, D. M. (Technical Monitor)

1994-01-01

The Flow Analysis Software Toolkit, FAST, is a software environment for visualizing data. FAST is a collection of separate programs (modules) that run simultaneously and allow the user to examine the results of numerical and experimental simulations. The user can load data files, perform calculations on the data, visualize the results of these calculations, construct scenes of 3D graphical objects, and plot, animate and record the scenes. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) visualization is the primary intended use of FAST, but FAST can also assist in the analysis of other types of data. FAST combines the capabilities of such programs as PLOT3D, RIP, SURF, and GAS into one environment with modules that share data. Sharing data between modules eliminates the drudgery of transferring data between programs. All the modules in the FAST environment have a consistent, highly interactive graphical user interface. Most commands are entered by pointing and'clicking. The modular construction of FAST makes it flexible and extensible. The environment can be custom configured and new modules can be developed and added as needed. The following modules have been developed for FAST: VIEWER, FILE IO, CALCULATOR, SURFER, TOPOLOGY, PLOTTER, TITLER, TRACER, ARCGRAPH, GQ, SURFERU, SHOTET, and ISOLEVU. A utility is also included to make the inclusion of user defined modules in the FAST environment easy. The VIEWER module is the central control for the FAST environment. From VIEWER, the user can-change object attributes, interactively position objects in three-dimensional space, define and save scenes, create animations, spawn new FAST modules, add additional view windows, and save and execute command scripts. The FAST User Guide uses text and FAST MAPS (graphical representations of the entire user interface) to guide the user through the use of FAST. Chapters include: Maps, Overview, Tips, Getting Started Tutorial, a separate chapter for each module, file formats, and system administration.

Using a bespoke situated digital kiosk to encourage user participation in healthcare environment design.

PubMed

Mackrill, J; Marshall, P; Payne, S R; Dimitrokali, E; Cain, R

2017-03-01

Involving users through participation in healthcare service and environment design is growing. Existing approaches and toolkits for practitioners and researchers are often paper based involving workshops and other more traditional design approaches such as paper prototyping. The advent of digital technology provides the opportunity to explore new platforms for user participation. This paper presents results from three studies that used a bespoke situated user participation digital kiosk, engaging 33 users in investigating healthcare environment design. The studies, from primary and secondary care settings, allowed participant feedback on each environment and proved a novel, engaging "21st century" way to participate in the appraisal of the design process. The results point toward this as an exciting and growing area of research in developing not just a new method of user participation but also the technology that supports it. Limitations were noted in terms of data validity and engagement with the device. To guide the development of user participation using similar situated digital devices, key lessons and reflections are presented. Copyright © 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.

Measuring sense of presence and user characteristics to predict effective training in an online simulated virtual environment.

PubMed

De Leo, Gianluca; Diggs, Leigh A; Radici, Elena; Mastaglio, Thomas W

2014-02-01

Virtual-reality solutions have successfully been used to train distributed teams. This study aimed to investigate the correlation between user characteristics and sense of presence in an online virtual-reality environment where distributed teams are trained. A greater sense of presence has the potential to make training in the virtual environment more effective, leading to the formation of teams that perform better in a real environment. Being able to identify, before starting online training, those user characteristics that are predictors of a greater sense of presence can lead to the selection of trainees who would benefit most from the online simulated training. This is an observational study with a retrospective postsurvey of participants' user characteristics and degree of sense of presence. Twenty-nine members from 3 Air Force National Guard Medical Service expeditionary medical support teams participated in an online virtual environment training exercise and completed the Independent Television Commission-Sense of Presence Inventory survey, which measures sense of presence and user characteristics. Nonparametric statistics were applied to determine the statistical significance of user characteristics to sense of presence. Comparing user characteristics to the 4 scales of the Independent Television Commission-Sense of Presence Inventory using Kendall τ test gave the following results: the user characteristics "how often you play video games" (τ(26)=-0.458, P<0.01) and "television/film production knowledge" (τ(27)=-0.516, P<0.01) were significantly related to negative effects. Negative effects refer to adverse physiologic reactions owing to the virtual environment experience such as dizziness, nausea, headache, and eyestrain. The user characteristic "knowledge of virtual reality" was significantly related to engagement (τ(26)=0.463, P<0.01) and negative effects (τ(26)=-0.404, P<0.05). Individuals who have knowledge about virtual environments and experience with gaming environments report a higher sense of presence that indicates that they will likely benefit more from online virtual training. Future research studies could include a larger population of expeditionary medical support, and the results obtained could be used to create a model that predicts the level of presence based on the user characteristics. To maximize results and minimize costs, only those individuals who, based on their characteristics, are supposed to have a higher sense of presence and less negative effects could be selected for online simulated virtual environment training.

Rapid-Prototyping of Application Specific Signal Processors (RASSP) Education and Facilitation

DTIC Science & Technology

2000-12-01

Digest 4. User/ passwd /deskey authentication required. o single point RASSP contractor release o phone call authentication required...o user/ passwd /deskey assign over phone 5. WWW user/ passwd used to access release for in component datasheet. o single file for each model

Standards for the user interface - Developing a user consensus. [for Space Station Information System

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Moe, Karen L.; Perkins, Dorothy C.; Szczur, Martha R.

1987-01-01

The user support environment (USE) which is a set of software tools for a flexible standard interactive user interface to the Space Station systems, platforms, and payloads is described in detail. Included in the USE concept are a user interface language, a run time environment and user interface management system, support tools, and standards for human interaction methods. The goals and challenges of the USE are discussed as well as a methodology based on prototype demonstrations for involving users in the process of validating the USE concepts. By prototyping the key concepts and salient features of the proposed user interface standards, the user's ability to respond is greatly enhanced.

Acceptance of Cloud Services in Face-to-Face Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning: A Comparison between Single-User Mode and Multi-User Mode

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Wang, Chia-Sui; Huang, Yong-Ming

2016-01-01

Face-to-face computer-supported collaborative learning (CSCL) was used extensively to facilitate learning in classrooms. Cloud services not only allow a single user to edit a document, but they also enable multiple users to simultaneously edit a shared document. However, few researchers have compared student acceptance of such services in…

High-resolution Single Particle Analysis from Electron Cryo-microscopy Images Using SPHIRE

PubMed Central

Moriya, Toshio; Saur, Michael; Stabrin, Markus; Merino, Felipe; Voicu, Horatiu; Huang, Zhong; Penczek, Pawel A.; Raunser, Stefan; Gatsogiannis, Christos

2017-01-01

SPHIRE (SPARX for High-Resolution Electron Microscopy) is a novel open-source, user-friendly software suite for the semi-automated processing of single particle electron cryo-microscopy (cryo-EM) data. The protocol presented here describes in detail how to obtain a near-atomic resolution structure starting from cryo-EM micrograph movies by guiding users through all steps of the single particle structure determination pipeline. These steps are controlled from the new SPHIRE graphical user interface and require minimum user intervention. Using this protocol, a 3.5 Å structure of TcdA1, a Tc toxin complex from Photorhabdus luminescens, was derived from only 9500 single particles. This streamlined approach will help novice users without extensive processing experience and a priori structural information, to obtain noise-free and unbiased atomic models of their purified macromolecular complexes in their native state. PMID:28570515

The Graphical User Interface: Crisis, Danger, and Opportunity.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Boyd, L. H.; And Others

1990-01-01

This article describes differences between the graphical user interface and traditional character-based interface systems, identifies potential problems posed by graphic computing environments for blind computer users, and describes some programs and strategies that are being developed to provide access to those environments. (Author/JDD)

Identifying research needs for wheelchair transfers in the built environment.

PubMed

Crytzer, Theresa Marie; Cooper, Rory; Jerome, Genevieve; Koontz, Alicia

2017-02-01

The purpose of this study is to describe the results of focus groups held during the Independent Wheelchair Transfer (IWT) Workgroup. The aims were to facilitate exchange of ideas on (1) the impact of the built environment on the wheelchair transfer process within the community (i.e. moving from wheelchair to and from other surfaces (e.g. furniture, toilet seat, bath bench, car seat) to participate in daily activities), (2) wheelchair users' needs during transfers in the built environment, and (3) future research directions. Live web-based conferencing using Adobe Connect technology (Clarix Technologies, Inc., Pittsford, NY) was utilized to conduct three focus groups composed of experts in the field of assistive technology. Investigators independently reviewed focus group meeting transcripts and used qualitative methods to identify main themes. Thirty-one experts in assistive technology and related fields participated in focus groups. Nine main themes were found including the effect of transfer skills training, space considerations in the built environment, wheelchair configuration, and the interaction between the built environment, user preferences, and transfer techniques. All groups raised issues about the transfer process in areas of the built environment with limited access, the effect of wheelchair users' transfer techniques, and user preferences during transfers. The area of independent transfers is multi-faceted and several factors require consideration when contemplating environmental changes to improve accessibility for wheelchair users. Obvious opportunity exists for research which could lead to advances in transfer technology, environments, and techniques for wheelchair users. Implications for Rehabilitation Tremendous opportunities for research collaborations in the field of assistive technology: To develop new terminology to describe wheelchair transfers. To improve the design of the built environment for wheelchair users. To investigate wheelchair transfer training techniques.

A user interface development tool for space science systems Transportable Applications Environment (TAE) Plus

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Szczur, Martha R.

1990-01-01

The Transportable Applications Environment Plus (TAE PLUS), developed at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, is a portable What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) user interface development and management system. Its primary objective is to provide an integrated software environment that allows interactive prototyping and development that of user interfaces, as well as management of the user interface within the operational domain. Although TAE Plus is applicable to many types of applications, its focus is supporting user interfaces for space applications. This paper discusses what TAE Plus provides and how the implementation has utilized state-of-the-art technologies within graphic workstations, windowing systems and object-oriented programming languages.

Enriching Earthdata by Improving Content Curation

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Bagwell, R.; Wong, M. M.; Murphy, K. J.

2014-12-01

Since the launch of Earthdata in the later part of 2011, there has been an emphasis on improving the user experience and providing more enriched content to the user, ultimately with the focus to bring the "pixels to the people" or to ensure that a user clicks the fewest amount of times to get to the data, tools, or information which they seek. Earthdata was founded to be a single source of information for Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS) components and services as a conglomeration between over 15 different websites. With an increased focus on access to Earth science data, the recognition is now on transforming Earthdata from a static website to one that is a dynamic, data-driven site full of enriched content.In the near future, Earthdata will have a number of components that will drive the access to the data, such as Earthdata Search, the Common Metadata Repository (CMR), and a redesign of the Earthdata website. The focus on content curation will be to leverage the use of these components to provide an enriched content environment and a better overall user experience, with an emphasis on Earthdata being "powered by EOSDIS" components and services.

FAST - A multiprocessed environment for visualization of computational fluid dynamics

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Bancroft, Gordon V.; Merritt, Fergus J.; Plessel, Todd C.; Kelaita, Paul G.; Mccabe, R. Kevin

1991-01-01

The paper presents the Flow Analysis Software Toolset (FAST) to be used for fluid-mechanics analysis. The design criteria for FAST including the minimization of the data path in the computational fluid-dynamics (CFD) process, consistent user interface, extensible software architecture, modularization, and the isolation of three-dimensional tasks from the application programmer are outlined. Each separate process communicates through the FAST Hub, while other modules such as FAST Central, NAS file input, CFD calculator, surface extractor and renderer, titler, tracer, and isolev might work together to generate the scene. An interprocess communication package making it possible for FAST to operate as a modular environment where resources could be shared among different machines as well as a single host is discussed.

An Intelligent Man-Machine Interface—Multi-Robot Control Adapted for Task Engagement Based on Single-Trial Detectability of P300

PubMed Central

Kirchner, Elsa A.; Kim, Su K.; Tabie, Marc; Wöhrle, Hendrik; Maurus, Michael; Kirchner, Frank

2016-01-01

Advanced man-machine interfaces (MMIs) are being developed for teleoperating robots at remote and hardly accessible places. Such MMIs make use of a virtual environment and can therefore make the operator immerse him-/herself into the environment of the robot. In this paper, we present our developed MMI for multi-robot control. Our MMI can adapt to changes in task load and task engagement online. Applying our approach of embedded Brain Reading we improve user support and efficiency of interaction. The level of task engagement was inferred from the single-trial detectability of P300-related brain activity that was naturally evoked during interaction. With our approach no secondary task is needed to measure task load. It is based on research results on the single-stimulus paradigm, distribution of brain resources and its effect on the P300 event-related component. It further considers effects of the modulation caused by a delayed reaction time on the P300 component evoked by complex responses to task-relevant messages. We prove our concept using single-trial based machine learning analysis, analysis of averaged event-related potentials and behavioral analysis. As main results we show (1) a significant improvement of runtime needed to perform the interaction tasks compared to a setting in which all subjects could easily perform the tasks. We show that (2) the single-trial detectability of the event-related potential P300 can be used to measure the changes in task load and task engagement during complex interaction while also being sensitive to the level of experience of the operator and (3) can be used to adapt the MMI individually to the different needs of users without increasing total workload. Our online adaptation of the proposed MMI is based on a continuous supervision of the operator's cognitive resources by means of embedded Brain Reading. Operators with different qualifications or capabilities receive only as many tasks as they can perform to avoid mental overload as well as mental underload. PMID:27445742

X based interactive computer graphics applications for aerodynamic design and education

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Benson, Thomas J.; Higgs, C. Fred, III

1995-01-01

Six computer applications packages have been developed to solve a variety of aerodynamic problems in an interactive environment on a single workstation. The packages perform classical one dimensional analysis under the control of a graphical user interface and can be used for preliminary design or educational purposes. The programs were originally developed on a Silicon Graphics workstation and used the GL version of the FORMS library as the graphical user interface. These programs have recently been converted to the XFORMS library of X based graphics widgets and have been tested on SGI, IBM, Sun, HP and PC-Lunix computers. The paper will show results from the new VU-DUCT program as a prime example. VU-DUCT has been developed as an educational package for the study of subsonic open and closed loop wind tunnels.

Mouse manipulation through single-switch scanning.

PubMed

Blackstien-Adler, Susie; Shein, Fraser; Quintal, Janet; Birch, Shae; Weiss, Patrice L Tamar

2004-01-01

Given the current extensive reliance on the graphical user interface, independent access to computer software requires that users be able to manipulate a pointing device of some type (e.g., mouse, trackball) or be able to emulate a mouse by some other means (e.g., scanning). The purpose of the present study was to identify one or more optimal single-switch scanning mouse emulation strategies. Four alternative scanning strategies (continuous Cartesian, discrete Cartesian, rotational, and hybrid quadrant/continuous Cartesian) were selected for testing based on current market availability as well as on theoretical considerations of their potential speed and accuracy. Each strategy was evaluated using a repeated measures study design by means of a test program that permitted mouse emulation via any one of four scanning strategies in a motivating environment; response speed and accuracy could be automatically recorded and considered in view of the motor, cognitive, and perceptual demands of each scanning strategy. Ten individuals whose disabilities required them to operate a computer via single-switch scanning participated in the study. Results indicated that Cartesian scanning was the preferred and most effective scanning strategy. There were no significant differences between results from the Continuous Cartesian and Discrete Cartesian scanning strategies. Rotational scanning was quite slow with respect to the other strategies, although it was equally accurate. Hybrid Quadrant scanning improved access time but at the cost of fewer correct selections. These results demonstrated the importance of testing and comparing alternate single-switch scanning strategies.

Ambient and smartphone sensor assisted ADL recognition in multi-inhabitant smart environments.

PubMed

Roy, Nirmalya; Misra, Archan; Cook, Diane

2016-02-01

Activity recognition in smart environments is an evolving research problem due to the advancement and proliferation of sensing, monitoring and actuation technologies to make it possible for large scale and real deployment. While activities in smart home are interleaved, complex and volatile; the number of inhabitants in the environment is also dynamic. A key challenge in designing robust smart home activity recognition approaches is to exploit the users' spatiotemporal behavior and location, focus on the availability of multitude of devices capable of providing different dimensions of information and fulfill the underpinning needs for scaling the system beyond a single user or a home environment. In this paper, we propose a hybrid approach for recognizing complex activities of daily living (ADL), that lie in between the two extremes of intensive use of body-worn sensors and the use of ambient sensors. Our approach harnesses the power of simple ambient sensors (e.g., motion sensors) to provide additional 'hidden' context (e.g., room-level location) of an individual, and then combines this context with smartphone-based sensing of micro-level postural/locomotive states. The major novelty is our focus on multi-inhabitant environments, where we show how the use of spatiotemporal constraints along with multitude of data sources can be used to significantly improve the accuracy and computational overhead of traditional activity recognition based approaches such as coupled-hidden Markov models. Experimental results on two separate smart home datasets demonstrate that this approach improves the accuracy of complex ADL classification by over 30 %, compared to pure smartphone-based solutions.

Ambient and smartphone sensor assisted ADL recognition in multi-inhabitant smart environments

PubMed Central

Misra, Archan; Cook, Diane

2016-01-01

Activity recognition in smart environments is an evolving research problem due to the advancement and proliferation of sensing, monitoring and actuation technologies to make it possible for large scale and real deployment. While activities in smart home are interleaved, complex and volatile; the number of inhabitants in the environment is also dynamic. A key challenge in designing robust smart home activity recognition approaches is to exploit the users' spatiotemporal behavior and location, focus on the availability of multitude of devices capable of providing different dimensions of information and fulfill the underpinning needs for scaling the system beyond a single user or a home environment. In this paper, we propose a hybrid approach for recognizing complex activities of daily living (ADL), that lie in between the two extremes of intensive use of body-worn sensors and the use of ambient sensors. Our approach harnesses the power of simple ambient sensors (e.g., motion sensors) to provide additional ‘hidden’ context (e.g., room-level location) of an individual, and then combines this context with smartphone-based sensing of micro-level postural/locomotive states. The major novelty is our focus on multi-inhabitant environments, where we show how the use of spatiotemporal constraints along with multitude of data sources can be used to significantly improve the accuracy and computational overhead of traditional activity recognition based approaches such as coupled-hidden Markov models. Experimental results on two separate smart home datasets demonstrate that this approach improves the accuracy of complex ADL classification by over 30 %, compared to pure smartphone-based solutions. PMID:27042240

Smart learning services based on smart cloud computing.

PubMed

Kim, Svetlana; Song, Su-Mi; Yoon, Yong-Ik

2011-01-01

Context-aware technologies can make e-learning services smarter and more efficient since context-aware services are based on the user's behavior. To add those technologies into existing e-learning services, a service architecture model is needed to transform the existing e-learning environment, which is situation-aware, into the environment that understands context as well. The context-awareness in e-learning may include the awareness of user profile and terminal context. In this paper, we propose a new notion of service that provides context-awareness to smart learning content in a cloud computing environment. We suggest the elastic four smarts (E4S)--smart pull, smart prospect, smart content, and smart push--concept to the cloud services so smart learning services are possible. The E4S focuses on meeting the users' needs by collecting and analyzing users' behavior, prospecting future services, building corresponding contents, and delivering the contents through cloud computing environment. Users' behavior can be collected through mobile devices such as smart phones that have built-in sensors. As results, the proposed smart e-learning model in cloud computing environment provides personalized and customized learning services to its users.

A workout for virtual bodybuilders (design issues for embodiment in multi-actor virtual environments)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Benford, Steve; Bowers, John; Fahlen, Lennart E.; Greenhalgh, Chris; Snowdon, Dave

1994-01-01

This paper explores the issue of user embodiment within collaborative virtual environments. By user embodiment we mean the provision of users with appropriate body images so as to represent them to others and also to themselves. By collaborative virtual environments we mean multi-user virtual reality systems which support cooperative work (although we argue that the results of our exploration may also be applied to other kinds of collaborative systems). The main part of the paper identifies a list of embodiment design issues including: presence, location, identity, activity, availability, history of activity, viewpoint, action point, gesture, facial expression, voluntary versus involuntary expression, degree of presence, reflecting capabilities, manipulating the user's view of others, representation across multiple media, autonomous and distributed body parts, truthfulness and efficiency. Following this, we show how these issues are reflected in our own DIVE and MASSIVE prototype collaborative virtual environments.

Transportable Applications Environment (TAE) Plus: A NASA tool for building and managing graphical user interfaces

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Szczur, Martha R.

1991-01-01

The Transportable Applications Environment (TAE) Plus, developed at GSFC, is an advanced portable user interface development environment which simplifies the process of creating and managing complex application graphical user interfaces (GUI's), supports prototyping, allows applications to be ported easily between different platforms and encourages appropriate levels of user interface consistency between applications. The following topics are discussed: the capabilities of the TAE Plus tool; how the implementation has utilized state-of-the-art technologies within graphic workstations; and how it has been used both within and outside of NASA.

Exploring the User Experience of Three-Dimensional Virtual Learning Environments

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shin, Dong-Hee; Biocca, Frank; Choo, Hyunseung

2013-01-01

This study examines the users' experiences with three-dimensional (3D) virtual environments to investigate the areas of development as a learning application. For the investigation, the modified technology acceptance model (TAM) is used with constructs from expectation-confirmation theory (ECT). Users' responses to questions about cognitive…

Rapid Prototyping of Hydrologic Model Interfaces with IPython

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Farthing, M. W.; Winters, K. D.; Ahmadia, A. J.; Hesser, T.; Howington, S. E.; Johnson, B. D.; Tate, J.; Kees, C. E.

2014-12-01

A significant gulf still exists between the state of practice and state of the art in hydrologic modeling. Part of this gulf is due to the lack of adequate pre- and post-processing tools for newly developed computational models. The development of user interfaces has traditionally lagged several years behind the development of a particular computational model or suite of models. As a result, models with mature interfaces often lack key advancements in model formulation, solution methods, and/or software design and technology. Part of the problem has been a focus on developing monolithic tools to provide comprehensive interfaces for the entire suite of model capabilities. Such efforts require expertise in software libraries and frameworks for creating user interfaces (e.g., Tcl/Tk, Qt, and MFC). These tools are complex and require significant investment in project resources (time and/or money) to use. Moreover, providing the required features for the entire range of possible applications and analyses creates a cumbersome interface. For a particular site or application, the modeling requirements may be simplified or at least narrowed, which can greatly reduce the number and complexity of options that need to be accessible to the user. However, monolithic tools usually are not adept at dynamically exposing specific workflows. Our approach is to deliver highly tailored interfaces to users. These interfaces may be site and/or process specific. As a result, we end up with many, customized interfaces rather than a single, general-use tool. For this approach to be successful, it must be efficient to create these tailored interfaces. We need technology for creating quality user interfaces that is accessible and has a low barrier for integration into model development efforts. Here, we present efforts to leverage IPython notebooks as tools for rapid prototyping of site and application-specific user interfaces. We provide specific examples from applications in near-shore environments as well as levee analysis. We discuss our design decisions and methodology for developing customized interfaces, strategies for delivery of the interfaces to users in various computing environments, as well as implications for the design/implementation of simulation models.

Cielo Computational Environment Usage Model With Mappings to ACE Requirements for the General Availability User Environment Capabilities Release Version 1.1

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Vigil,Benny Manuel; Ballance, Robert; Haskell, Karen

Cielo is a massively parallel supercomputer funded by the DOE/NNSA Advanced Simulation and Computing (ASC) program, and operated by the Alliance for Computing at Extreme Scale (ACES), a partnership between Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) and Sandia National Laboratories (SNL). The primary Cielo compute platform is physically located at Los Alamos National Laboratory. This Cielo Computational Environment Usage Model documents the capabilities and the environment to be provided for the Q1 FY12 Level 2 Cielo Capability Computing (CCC) Platform Production Readiness Milestone. This document describes specific capabilities, tools, and procedures to support both local and remote users. The model ismore » focused on the needs of the ASC user working in the secure computing environments at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), Los Alamos National Laboratory, or Sandia National Laboratories, but also addresses the needs of users working in the unclassified environment. The Cielo Computational Environment Usage Model maps the provided capabilities to the tri-Lab ASC Computing Environment (ACE) Version 8.0 requirements. The ACE requirements reflect the high performance computing requirements for the Production Readiness Milestone user environment capabilities of the ASC community. A description of ACE requirements met, and those requirements that are not met, are included in each section of this document. The Cielo Computing Environment, along with the ACE mappings, has been issued and reviewed throughout the tri-Lab community.« less

Cricket: A Mapped, Persistent Object Store

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Shekita, Eugene; Zwilling, Michael

1996-01-01

This paper describes Cricket, a new database storage system that is intended to be used as a platform for design environments and persistent programming languages. Cricket uses the memory management primitives of the Mach operating system to provide the abstraction of a shared, transactional single-level store that can be directly accessed by user applications. In this paper, we present the design and motivation for Cricket. We also present some initial performance results which show that, for its intended applications, Cricket can provide better performance than a general-purpose database storage system.

TrackMate: An open and extensible platform for single-particle tracking.

PubMed

Tinevez, Jean-Yves; Perry, Nick; Schindelin, Johannes; Hoopes, Genevieve M; Reynolds, Gregory D; Laplantine, Emmanuel; Bednarek, Sebastian Y; Shorte, Spencer L; Eliceiri, Kevin W

2017-02-15

We present TrackMate, an open source Fiji plugin for the automated, semi-automated, and manual tracking of single-particles. It offers a versatile and modular solution that works out of the box for end users, through a simple and intuitive user interface. It is also easily scriptable and adaptable, operating equally well on 1D over time, 2D over time, 3D over time, or other single and multi-channel image variants. TrackMate provides several visualization and analysis tools that aid in assessing the relevance of results. The utility of TrackMate is further enhanced through its ability to be readily customized to meet specific tracking problems. TrackMate is an extensible platform where developers can easily write their own detection, particle linking, visualization or analysis algorithms within the TrackMate environment. This evolving framework provides researchers with the opportunity to quickly develop and optimize new algorithms based on existing TrackMate modules without the need of having to write de novo user interfaces, including visualization, analysis and exporting tools. The current capabilities of TrackMate are presented in the context of three different biological problems. First, we perform Caenorhabditis-elegans lineage analysis to assess how light-induced damage during imaging impairs its early development. Our TrackMate-based lineage analysis indicates the lack of a cell-specific light-sensitive mechanism. Second, we investigate the recruitment of NEMO (NF-κB essential modulator) clusters in fibroblasts after stimulation by the cytokine IL-1 and show that photodamage can generate artifacts in the shape of TrackMate characterized movements that confuse motility analysis. Finally, we validate the use of TrackMate for quantitative lifetime analysis of clathrin-mediated endocytosis in plant cells. Copyright © 2016 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Using Cross-Sectional Imaging to Convey Organ Relationships: An Integrated Learning Environment for Students of Gross Anatomy

PubMed Central

Forman, Bruce H.; Eccles, Randy; Piggins, Judith; Raila, Wayne; Estey, Greg; Barnett, G. Octo

1990-01-01

We have developed a visually oriented, computer-controlled learning environment designed for use by students of gross anatomy. The goals of this module are to reinforce the concepts of organ relationships and topography by using computed axial tomographic (CAT) images accessed from a videodisc integrated with color graphics and to introduce students to cross-sectional radiographic anatomy. We chose to build the program around CAT scan images because they not only provide excellent structural detail but also offer an anatomic orientation (transverse) that complements that used in the dissection laboratory (basically a layer-by-layer, anterior-to-posterior, or coronal approach). Our system, built using a Microsoft Windows-386 based authoring environment which we designed and implemented, integrates text, video images, and graphics into a single screen display. The program allows both user browsing of information, facilitated by hypertext links, and didactic sessions including mini-quizzes for self-assessment.

Environet: An interactive space-environment information resource

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Vampola, A. L.; Hall, William N.; Lauriente, Michael

1989-05-01

EnviroNET is an interactive menu-driven system set up as an information resource for experimenters, program managers, and design and test engineers who are involved in space missions. Its basic use is as a fundamental single-source of data for the environment encountered by Shuttle and Space Station payloads, but is also has wider applicability in that it includes information on environments encountered by other satellites in both low altitude and high altitude (including geosynchronous) orbits. It incorporates both a text-retrieval mode and an interactive modeling code mode. The system is maintained on the ENVNET and MicroVAX computer at NASA/Goddard. It's services are available at no cost to any user who has access to a terminal and a dial-up port. It is a tail-node on SPAN and so it is accessible either directly or through BITNET, ARPANET, and GTE/TELENET via NPSS.

Immersive telepresence system using high-resolution omnidirectional movies and a locomotion interface

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ikeda, Sei; Sato, Tomokazu; Kanbara, Masayuki; Yokoya, Naokazu

2004-05-01

Technology that enables users to experience a remote site virtually is called telepresence. A telepresence system using real environment images is expected to be used in the field of entertainment, medicine, education and so on. This paper describes a novel telepresence system which enables users to walk through a photorealistic virtualized environment by actual walking. To realize such a system, a wide-angle high-resolution movie is projected on an immersive multi-screen display to present users the virtualized environments and a treadmill is controlled according to detected user's locomotion. In this study, we use an omnidirectional multi-camera system to acquire images real outdoor scene. The proposed system provides users with rich sense of walking in a remote site.

Safety | Argonne National Laboratory

Science.gov Websites

laboratory's ongoing effort to provide a safe and productive environment for employees, users, other site Skip to main content Argonne National Laboratory Toggle Navigation Toggle Search Energy Environment Careers Education Community Diversity Directory Energy Environment National Security User Facilities

Social and structural aspects of the overdose risk environment in St. Petersburg, Russia.

PubMed

Green, Traci C; Grau, Lauretta E; Blinnikova, Ksenia N; Torban, Mikhail; Krupitsky, Evgeny; Ilyuk, Ruslan; Kozlov, Andrei; Heimer, Robert

2009-05-01

While overdose is a common cause of mortality among opioid injectors worldwide, little information exists on opioid overdoses or how context may influence overdose risk in Russia. This study sought to uncover social and structural aspects contributing to fatal overdose risk in St. Petersburg and assess prevention intervention feasibility. Twenty-one key informant interviews were conducted with drug users, treatment providers, toxicologists, police, and ambulance staff. Thematic coding of interview content was conducted to elucidate elements of the overdose risk environment. Several factors within St. Petersburg's environment were identified as shaping illicit drug users' risk behaviours and contributing to conditions of suboptimal response to overdose in the community. Most drug users live and experience overdoses at home, where family and home environment may mediate or moderate risk behaviours. The overdose risk environment is also worsened by inefficient emergency response infrastructure, insufficient cardiopulmonary or naloxone training resources, and the preponderance of abstinence-based treatment approaches to the exclusion of other treatment modalities. However, attitudes of drug users and law enforcement officials generally support overdose prevention intervention feasibility. Modifiable aspects of the risk environment suggest community-based and structural interventions, including overdose response training for drug users and professionals that encompasses naloxone distribution to the users and equipping more ambulances with naloxone. Local social and structural elements influence risk environments for overdose. Interventions at the community and structural levels to prevent and respond to opioid overdoses are needed for and integral to reducing overdose mortality in St. Petersburg.

A graphical, rule based robotic interface system

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mckee, James W.; Wolfsberger, John

1988-01-01

The ability of a human to take control of a robotic system is essential in any use of robots in space in order to handle unforeseen changes in the robot's work environment or scheduled tasks. But in cases in which the work environment is known, a human controlling a robot's every move by remote control is both time consuming and frustrating. A system is needed in which the user can give the robotic system commands to perform tasks but need not tell the system how. To be useful, this system should be able to plan and perform the tasks faster than a telerobotic system. The interface between the user and the robot system must be natural and meaningful to the user. A high level user interface program under development at the University of Alabama, Huntsville, is described. A graphical interface is proposed in which the user selects objects to be manipulated by selecting representations of the object on projections of a 3-D model of the work environment. The user may move in the work environment by changing the viewpoint of the projections. The interface uses a rule based program to transform user selection of items on a graphics display of the robot's work environment into commands for the robot. The program first determines if the desired task is possible given the abilities of the robot and any constraints on the object. If the task is possible, the program determines what movements the robot needs to make to perform the task. The movements are transformed into commands for the robot. The information defining the robot, the work environment, and how objects may be moved is stored in a set of data bases accessible to the program and displayable to the user.

Computational physics in RISC environments

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Rhoades, C.E. Jr.

The new high performance Reduced Instruction Set Computers (RISC) promise near Cray-level performance at near personal-computer prices. This paper explores the performance, conversion and compatibility issues associated with developing, testing and using our traditional, large-scale simulation models in the RISC environments exemplified by the IBM RS6000 and MISP R3000 machines. The questions of operating systems (CTSS versus UNIX), compilers (Fortran, C, pointers) and data are addressed in detail. Overall, it is concluded that the RISC environments are practical for a very wide range of computational physic activities. Indeed, all but the very largest two- and three-dimensional codes will work quitemore » well, particularly in a single user environment. Easily projected hardware-performance increases will revolutionize the field of computational physics. The way we do research will change profoundly in the next few years. There is, however, nothing more difficult to plan, nor more dangerous to manage than the creation of this new world.« less

Computational physics in RISC environments. Revision 1

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Rhoades, C.E. Jr.

The new high performance Reduced Instruction Set Computers (RISC) promise near Cray-level performance at near personal-computer prices. This paper explores the performance, conversion and compatibility issues associated with developing, testing and using our traditional, large-scale simulation models in the RISC environments exemplified by the IBM RS6000 and MISP R3000 machines. The questions of operating systems (CTSS versus UNIX), compilers (Fortran, C, pointers) and data are addressed in detail. Overall, it is concluded that the RISC environments are practical for a very wide range of computational physic activities. Indeed, all but the very largest two- and three-dimensional codes will work quitemore » well, particularly in a single user environment. Easily projected hardware-performance increases will revolutionize the field of computational physics. The way we do research will change profoundly in the next few years. There is, however, nothing more difficult to plan, nor more dangerous to manage than the creation of this new world.« less

Estimation of the Driving Style Based on the Users' Activity and Environment Influence.

PubMed

Sysoev, Mikhail; Kos, Andrej; Guna, Jože; Pogačnik, Matevž

2017-10-21

New models and methods have been designed to predict the influence of the user's environment and activity information to the driving style in standard automotive environments. For these purposes, an experiment was conducted providing two types of analysis: (i) the evaluation of a self-assessment of the driving style; (ii) the prediction of aggressive driving style based on drivers' activity and environment parameters. Sixty seven h of driving data from 10 drivers were collected for analysis in this study. The new parameters used in the experiment are the car door opening and closing manner, which were applied to improve the prediction accuracy. An Android application called Sensoric was developed to collect low-level smartphone data about the users' activity. The driving style was predicted from the user's environment and activity data collected before driving. The prediction was tested against the actual driving style, calculated from objective driving data. The prediction has shown encouraging results, with precision values ranging from 0.727 up to 0.909 for aggressive driving recognition rate. The obtained results lend support to the hypothesis that user's environment and activity data could be used for the prediction of the aggressive driving style in advance, before the driving starts.

Advantages and limitations for users of double pit pour-flush latrines: a qualitative study in rural Bangladesh.

PubMed

Hussain, Faruqe; Clasen, Thomas; Akter, Shahinoor; Bawel, Victoria; Luby, Stephen P; Leontsini, Elli; Unicomb, Leanne; Barua, Milan Kanti; Thomas, Brittany; Winch, Peter J

2017-05-25

In rural Bangladesh, India and elsewhere, pour-flush pit latrines are the most common sanitation system. When a single pit latrine becomes full, users must empty it themselves and risk exposure to fresh feces, pay an emptying service to remove pit contents or build a new latrine. Double pit pour-flush latrines may serve as a long-term sanitation option including high water table areas because the pits do not need to be emptied immediately and the excreta decomposes into reusable soil. Double pit pour-flush latrines were implemented in rural Bangladesh for 'hardcore poor' households by a national NGO, BRAC. We conducted interviews, focus groups, and spot checks in two low-income, rural areas of Bangladesh to explore the advantages and limitations of using double pit latrines compared to single pit latrines. The rural households accepted the double pit pour-flush latrine model and considered it feasible to use and maintain. This latrine design increased accessibility of a sanitation facility for these low-income residents and provided privacy, convenience and comfort, compared to open defecation. Although a double pit latrine is more costly and requires more space than a single pit latrine the households perceived this sanitation system to save resources, because households did not need to hire service workers to empty pits or remove decomposed contents themselves. In addition, the excreta decomposition process produced a reusable soil product that some households used in homestead gardening. The durability of the latrine superstructures was a problem, as most of the bamboo-pole superstructure broke after 6-18 months of use. Double pit pour-flush latrines are a long-term improved sanitation option that offers users several important advantages over single pit pour-flush latrines like in rural Bangladesh which can also be used in areas with high water table. Further research can provide an understanding of the comparative health impacts and effectiveness of the model in preventing human excreta from entering the environment.

Impossible spaces: maximizing natural walking in virtual environments with self-overlapping architecture.

PubMed

Suma, Evan A; Lipps, Zachary; Finkelstein, Samantha; Krum, David M; Bolas, Mark

2012-04-01

Walking is only possible within immersive virtual environments that fit inside the boundaries of the user's physical workspace. To reduce the severity of the restrictions imposed by limited physical area, we introduce "impossible spaces," a new design mechanic for virtual environments that wish to maximize the size of the virtual environment that can be explored with natural locomotion. Such environments make use of self-overlapping architectural layouts, effectively compressing comparatively large interior environments into smaller physical areas. We conducted two formal user studies to explore the perception and experience of impossible spaces. In the first experiment, we showed that reasonably small virtual rooms may overlap by as much as 56% before users begin to detect that they are in an impossible space, and that the larger virtual rooms that expanded to maximally fill our available 9.14 m x 9.14 m workspace may overlap by up to 31%. Our results also demonstrate that users perceive distances to objects in adjacent overlapping rooms as if the overall space was uncompressed, even at overlap levels that were overtly noticeable. In our second experiment, we combined several well-known redirection techniques to string together a chain of impossible spaces in an expansive outdoor scene. We then conducted an exploratory analysis of users' verbal feedback during exploration, which indicated that impossible spaces provide an even more powerful illusion when users are naive to the manipulation.

Design Guidelines for the User Interface to Computer-Based Information Systems

DTIC Science & Technology

1983-03-01

Marshall and Alderman, 1981. See also: Section 3.1.3. -22 Single Keying for Alphabetic Data -22 When alphabetic data entry is required, the user should be...distinction between single and multiple blanks in data entry; in particular, the user should not have to count blanks. Comment: People cannot be relied upon...logically related items should be accomplished by a single , explicit action at the end, rather than by separate entry of each item. Comment: This practice

High fidelity wireless network evaluation for heterogeneous cognitive radio networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ding, Lei; Sagduyu, Yalin; Yackoski, Justin; Azimi-Sadjadi, Babak; Li, Jason; Levy, Renato; Melodia, Tammaso

2012-06-01

We present a high fidelity cognitive radio (CR) network emulation platform for wireless system tests, measure- ments, and validation. This versatile platform provides the configurable functionalities to control and repeat realistic physical channel effects in integrated space, air, and ground networks. We combine the advantages of scalable simulation environment with reliable hardware performance for high fidelity and repeatable evaluation of heterogeneous CR networks. This approach extends CR design only at device (software-defined-radio) or lower-level protocol (dynamic spectrum access) level to end-to-end cognitive networking, and facilitates low-cost deployment, development, and experimentation of new wireless network protocols and applications on frequency- agile programmable radios. Going beyond the channel emulator paradigm for point-to-point communications, we can support simultaneous transmissions by network-level emulation that allows realistic physical-layer inter- actions between diverse user classes, including secondary users, primary users, and adversarial jammers in CR networks. In particular, we can replay field tests in a lab environment with real radios perceiving and learning the dynamic environment thereby adapting for end-to-end goals over distributed spectrum coordination channels that replace the common control channel as a single point of failure. CR networks offer several dimensions of tunable actions including channel, power, rate, and route selection. The proposed network evaluation platform is fully programmable and can reliably evaluate the necessary cross-layer design solutions with configurable op- timization space by leveraging the hardware experiments to represent the realistic effects of physical channel, topology, mobility, and jamming on spectrum agility, situational awareness, and network resiliency. We also provide the flexibility to scale up the test environment by introducing virtual radios and establishing seamless signal-level interactions with real radios. This holistic wireless evaluation approach supports a large-scale, het- erogeneous, and dynamic CR network architecture and allows developing cross-layer network protocols under high fidelity, repeatable, and scalable wireless test scenarios suitable for heterogeneous space, air, and ground networks.

Reinventing User Applications for Mission Control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Trimble, Jay Phillip; Crocker, Alan R.

2010-01-01

In 2006, NASA Ames Research Center's (ARC) Intelligent Systems Division, and NASA Johnson Space Centers (JSC) Mission Operations Directorate (MOD) began a collaboration to move user applications for JSC's mission control center to a new software architecture, intended to replace the existing user applications being used for the Space Shuttle and the International Space Station. It must also carry NASA/JSC mission operations forward to the future, meeting the needs for NASA's exploration programs beyond low Earth orbit. Key requirements for the new architecture, called Mission Control Technologies (MCT) are that end users must be able to compose and build their own software displays without the need for programming, or direct support and approval from a platform services organization. Developers must be able to build MCT components using industry standard languages and tools. Each component of MCT must be interoperable with other components, regardless of what organization develops them. For platform service providers and MOD management, MCT must be cost effective, maintainable and evolvable. MCT software is built from components that are presented to users as composable user objects. A user object is an entity that represents a domain object such as a telemetry point, a command, a timeline, an activity, or a step in a procedure. User objects may be composed and reused, for example a telemetry point may be used in a traditional monitoring display, and that same telemetry user object may be composed into a procedure step. In either display, that same telemetry point may be shown in different views, such as a plot, an alpha numeric, or a meta-data view and those views may be changed live and in place. MCT presents users with a single unified user environment that contains all the objects required to perform applicable flight controller tasks, thus users do not have to use multiple applications, the traditional boundaries that exist between multiple heterogeneous applications disappear, leaving open the possibility of new operations concepts that are not constrained by the traditional applications paradigm.

Perception of Graphical Virtual Environments by Blind Users via Sensory Substitution

PubMed Central

Maidenbaum, Shachar; Buchs, Galit; Abboud, Sami; Lavi-Rotbain, Ori; Amedi, Amir

2016-01-01

Graphical virtual environments are currently far from accessible to blind users as their content is mostly visual. This is especially unfortunate as these environments hold great potential for this population for purposes such as safe orientation, education, and entertainment. Previous tools have increased accessibility but there is still a long way to go. Visual-to-audio Sensory-Substitution-Devices (SSDs) can increase accessibility generically by sonifying on-screen content regardless of the specific environment and offer increased accessibility without the use of expensive dedicated peripherals like electrode/vibrator arrays. Using SSDs virtually utilizes similar skills as when using them in the real world, enabling both training on the device and training on environments virtually before real-world visits. This could enable more complex, standardized and autonomous SSD training and new insights into multisensory interaction and the visually-deprived brain. However, whether congenitally blind users, who have never experienced virtual environments, will be able to use this information for successful perception and interaction within them is currently unclear.We tested this using the EyeMusic SSD, which conveys whole-scene visual information, to perform virtual tasks otherwise impossible without vision. Congenitally blind users had to navigate virtual environments and find doors, differentiate between them based on their features (Experiment1:task1) and surroundings (Experiment1:task2) and walk through them; these tasks were accomplished with a 95% and 97% success rate, respectively. We further explored the reactions of congenitally blind users during their first interaction with a more complex virtual environment than in the previous tasks–walking down a virtual street, recognizing different features of houses and trees, navigating to cross-walks, etc. Users reacted enthusiastically and reported feeling immersed within the environment. They highlighted the potential usefulness of such environments for understanding what visual scenes are supposed to look like and their potential for complex training and suggested many future environments they wished to experience. PMID:26882473

Perception of Graphical Virtual Environments by Blind Users via Sensory Substitution.

PubMed

Maidenbaum, Shachar; Buchs, Galit; Abboud, Sami; Lavi-Rotbain, Ori; Amedi, Amir

2016-01-01

Graphical virtual environments are currently far from accessible to blind users as their content is mostly visual. This is especially unfortunate as these environments hold great potential for this population for purposes such as safe orientation, education, and entertainment. Previous tools have increased accessibility but there is still a long way to go. Visual-to-audio Sensory-Substitution-Devices (SSDs) can increase accessibility generically by sonifying on-screen content regardless of the specific environment and offer increased accessibility without the use of expensive dedicated peripherals like electrode/vibrator arrays. Using SSDs virtually utilizes similar skills as when using them in the real world, enabling both training on the device and training on environments virtually before real-world visits. This could enable more complex, standardized and autonomous SSD training and new insights into multisensory interaction and the visually-deprived brain. However, whether congenitally blind users, who have never experienced virtual environments, will be able to use this information for successful perception and interaction within them is currently unclear.We tested this using the EyeMusic SSD, which conveys whole-scene visual information, to perform virtual tasks otherwise impossible without vision. Congenitally blind users had to navigate virtual environments and find doors, differentiate between them based on their features (Experiment1:task1) and surroundings (Experiment1:task2) and walk through them; these tasks were accomplished with a 95% and 97% success rate, respectively. We further explored the reactions of congenitally blind users during their first interaction with a more complex virtual environment than in the previous tasks-walking down a virtual street, recognizing different features of houses and trees, navigating to cross-walks, etc. Users reacted enthusiastically and reported feeling immersed within the environment. They highlighted the potential usefulness of such environments for understanding what visual scenes are supposed to look like and their potential for complex training and suggested many future environments they wished to experience.

Transportable Applications Environment (TAE) Plus: A NASA user interface development and management system

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Szczur, Martha R.

1991-01-01

The transportable Applications Environment Plus (TAE Plus), developed at the NASA Goddard Space FLight Center, is a portable, What you see is what you get (WYSIWYG) user interface development and management system. Its primary objective is to provide an integrated software environment that allows interactive prototyping and development of graphical user interfaces, as well as management of the user interface within the operational domain. TAE Plus is being applied to many types of applications, and what TAE Plus provides, how the implementation has utilizes state-of-the-art technologies within graphic workstations, and how it has been used both within and without NASA are discussed.

A Framework to Develop Persuasive Smart Environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lobo, Pedro; Romão, Teresa; Dias, A. Eduardo; Danado, José Carlos

This paper presents a framework for the creation of context-sensitive persuasive applications. The framework allows the authoring of new persuasive smart environments producing the appropriate feedback to the users based on different sensors spread throughout the environment to capture contextual information. Using this framework, we created an application, Smart Bins, aimed at promoting users' behavioural changes regarding the recycling of waste materials. Furthermore, to evaluate the usability of our authoring tool, we performed user tests to analyze if developers could successfully create the Smart Bins application using the framework. A description of the Smart Bins application, as well as the results of the user tests, are also presented in this paper.

Generating Multispectral VIIRS Imagery in Near Real-Time for Use by the National Weather Service in Alaska

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Broderson, D.; Dierking, C.; Stevens, E.; Heinrichs, T. A.; Cherry, J. E.

2016-12-01

The Geographic Information Network of Alaska (GINA) at the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) uses two direct broadcast antennas to receive data from a number of polar-orbiting weather satellites, including the Suomi National Polar Partnership (S-NPP) satellite. GINA uses data from S-NPP's Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) to generate a variety of multispectral imagery products developed with the needs of the National Weather Service operational meteorologist in mind. Multispectral products have two primary advantages over single-channel products. First, they can more clearly highlight some terrain and meteorological features which are less evident in the component single channels. Second, multispectral present the information from several bands through just one image, thereby sparing the meteorologist unnecessary time interrogating the component single bands individually. With 22 channels available from the VIIRS instrument, the number of possible multispectral products is theoretically huge. A small number of products will be emphasized in this presentation, with the products chosen based on their proven utility in the forecasting environment. Multispectral products can be generated upstream of the end user or by the end user at their own workstation. The advantage and disadvantages of both approaches will be outlined. Lastly, the technique of improving the appearance of multispectral imagery by correcting for atmospheric reflectance at the shorter wavelengths will be described.

Supporting community annotation and user collaboration in the integrated microbial genomes (IMG) system

DOE PAGES

Chen, I-Min A.; Markowitz, Victor M.; Palaniappan, Krishna; ...

2016-04-26

Background: The exponential growth of genomic data from next generation technologies renders traditional manual expert curation effort unsustainable. Many genomic systems have included community annotation tools to address the problem. Most of these systems adopted a "Wiki-based" approach to take advantage of existing wiki technologies, but encountered obstacles in issues such as usability, authorship recognition, information reliability and incentive for community participation. Results: Here, we present a different approach, relying on tightly integrated method rather than "Wiki-based" method, to support community annotation and user collaboration in the Integrated Microbial Genomes (IMG) system. The IMG approach allows users to use existingmore » IMG data warehouse and analysis tools to add gene, pathway and biosynthetic cluster annotations, to analyze/reorganize contigs, genes and functions using workspace datasets, and to share private user annotations and workspace datasets with collaborators. We show that the annotation effort using IMG can be part of the research process to overcome the user incentive and authorship recognition problems thus fostering collaboration among domain experts. The usability and reliability issues are addressed by the integration of curated information and analysis tools in IMG, together with DOE Joint Genome Institute (JGI) expert review. Conclusion: By incorporating annotation operations into IMG, we provide an integrated environment for users to perform deeper and extended data analysis and annotation in a single system that can lead to publications and community knowledge sharing as shown in the case studies.« less

Supporting community annotation and user collaboration in the integrated microbial genomes (IMG) system

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Chen, I-Min A.; Markowitz, Victor M.; Palaniappan, Krishna

Background: The exponential growth of genomic data from next generation technologies renders traditional manual expert curation effort unsustainable. Many genomic systems have included community annotation tools to address the problem. Most of these systems adopted a "Wiki-based" approach to take advantage of existing wiki technologies, but encountered obstacles in issues such as usability, authorship recognition, information reliability and incentive for community participation. Results: Here, we present a different approach, relying on tightly integrated method rather than "Wiki-based" method, to support community annotation and user collaboration in the Integrated Microbial Genomes (IMG) system. The IMG approach allows users to use existingmore » IMG data warehouse and analysis tools to add gene, pathway and biosynthetic cluster annotations, to analyze/reorganize contigs, genes and functions using workspace datasets, and to share private user annotations and workspace datasets with collaborators. We show that the annotation effort using IMG can be part of the research process to overcome the user incentive and authorship recognition problems thus fostering collaboration among domain experts. The usability and reliability issues are addressed by the integration of curated information and analysis tools in IMG, together with DOE Joint Genome Institute (JGI) expert review. Conclusion: By incorporating annotation operations into IMG, we provide an integrated environment for users to perform deeper and extended data analysis and annotation in a single system that can lead to publications and community knowledge sharing as shown in the case studies.« less

Supervised learning of tools for content-based search of image databases

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Delanoy, Richard L.

1996-03-01

A computer environment, called the Toolkit for Image Mining (TIM), is being developed with the goal of enabling users with diverse interests and varied computer skills to create search tools for content-based image retrieval and other pattern matching tasks. Search tools are generated using a simple paradigm of supervised learning that is based on the user pointing at mistakes of classification made by the current search tool. As mistakes are identified, a learning algorithm uses the identified mistakes to build up a model of the user's intentions, construct a new search tool, apply the search tool to a test image, display the match results as feedback to the user, and accept new inputs from the user. Search tools are constructed in the form of functional templates, which are generalized matched filters capable of knowledge- based image processing. The ability of this system to learn the user's intentions from experience contrasts with other existing approaches to content-based image retrieval that base searches on the characteristics of a single input example or on a predefined and semantically- constrained textual query. Currently, TIM is capable of learning spectral and textural patterns, but should be adaptable to the learning of shapes, as well. Possible applications of TIM include not only content-based image retrieval, but also quantitative image analysis, the generation of metadata for annotating images, data prioritization or data reduction in bandwidth-limited situations, and the construction of components for larger, more complex computer vision algorithms.

Adaptive User Model for Web-Based Learning Environment.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Garofalakis, John; Sirmakessis, Spiros; Sakkopoulos, Evangelos; Tsakalidis, Athanasios

This paper describes the design of an adaptive user model and its implementation in an advanced Web-based Virtual University environment that encompasses combined and synchronized adaptation between educational material and well-known communication facilities. The Virtual University environment has been implemented to support a postgraduate…

Automating Mid- and Long-Range Scheduling for the NASA Deep Space Network

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Johnston, Mark D.; Tran, Daniel

2012-01-01

NASA has recently deployed a new mid-range scheduling system for the antennas of the Deep Space Network (DSN), called Service Scheduling Software, or S(sup 3). This system was designed and deployed as a modern web application containing a central scheduling database integrated with a collaborative environment, exploiting the same technologies as social web applications but applied to a space operations context. This is highly relevant to the DSN domain since the network schedule of operations is developed in a peer-to-peer negotiation process among all users of the DSN. These users represent not only NASA's deep space missions, but also international partners and ground-based science and calibration users. The initial implementation of S(sup 3) is complete and the system has been operational since July 2011. This paper describes some key aspects of the S(sup 3) system and on the challenges of modeling complex scheduling requirements and the ongoing extension of S(sup 3) to encompass long-range planning, downtime analysis, and forecasting, as the next step in developing a single integrated DSN scheduling tool suite to cover all time ranges.

Access to Space Interactive Design Web Site

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Leon, John; Cutlip, William; Hametz, Mark

2000-01-01

The Access To Space (ATS) Group at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) supports the science and technology community at GSFC by facilitating frequent and affordable opportunities for access to space. Through partnerships established with access mode suppliers, the ATS Group has developed an interactive Mission Design web site. The ATS web site provides both the information and the tools necessary to assist mission planners in selecting and planning their ride to space. This includes the evaluation of single payloads vs. ride-sharing opportunities to reduce the cost of access to space. Features of this site include the following: (1) Mission Database. Our mission database contains a listing of missions ranging from proposed missions to manifested. Missions can be entered by our user community through data input tools. Data is then accessed by users through various search engines: orbit parameters, ride-share opportunities, spacecraft parameters, other mission notes, launch vehicle, and contact information. (2) Launch Vehicle Toolboxes. The launch vehicle toolboxes provide the user a full range of information on vehicle classes and individual configurations. Topics include: general information, environments, performance, payload interface, available volume, and launch sites.

An e-caring chair for physiological signal measurement and recording.

PubMed

Chang, Hsien-Tsung; Chung, Chyan-Goei; Chen, Ming-Wei

2013-02-01

There is an increasing awareness among the populace of the need for regular health check-up to detect diseases in their early stages and thereby administer treatments in a timely fashion. However, commercially available physiological signal monitoring devices, which may offer clues on the onset of diseases, are time-consuming, far from user friendly and limited in their applications. We design an e-caring chair that combines six modular physiological signal measurement instruments into a single unit, enabling users to simultaneously measure the blood pressure, body temperature, heart rate, height, weight and body fat percentage, and display the results and simple diagnoses in real time. The e-caring chair further allows for easy integration of additional physiological signal measuring devices, speedy measurements and long term monitoring of any trends that may emerge, making it easier for users to be alerted to physiological changes in the body without the need to enlist assistance from medical personnel. In this paper, we describe how this e-caring chair can be placed in several different environments for different purposes. Copyright © 2011 IPEM. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Hydrologic data-verification management program plan

USGS Publications Warehouse

Alexander, C.W.

1982-01-01

Data verification refers to the performance of quality control on hydrologic data that have been retrieved from the field and are being prepared for dissemination to water-data users. Water-data users now have access to computerized data files containing unpublished, unverified hydrologic data. Therefore, it is necessary to develop techniques and systems whereby the computer can perform some data-verification functions before the data are stored in user-accessible files. Computerized data-verification routines can be developed for this purpose. A single, unified concept describing master data-verification program using multiple special-purpose subroutines, and a screen file containing verification criteria, can probably be adapted to any type and size of computer-processing system. Some traditional manual-verification procedures can be adapted for computerized verification, but new procedures can also be developed that would take advantage of the powerful statistical tools and data-handling procedures available to the computer. Prototype data-verification systems should be developed for all three data-processing environments as soon as possible. The WATSTORE system probably affords the greatest opportunity for long-range research and testing of new verification subroutines. (USGS)

Pharmit: interactive exploration of chemical space.

PubMed

Sunseri, Jocelyn; Koes, David Ryan

2016-07-08

Pharmit (http://pharmit.csb.pitt.edu) provides an online, interactive environment for the virtual screening of large compound databases using pharmacophores, molecular shape and energy minimization. Users can import, create and edit virtual screening queries in an interactive browser-based interface. Queries are specified in terms of a pharmacophore, a spatial arrangement of the essential features of an interaction, and molecular shape. Search results can be further ranked and filtered using energy minimization. In addition to a number of pre-built databases of popular compound libraries, users may submit their own compound libraries for screening. Pharmit uses state-of-the-art sub-linear algorithms to provide interactive screening of millions of compounds. Queries typically take a few seconds to a few minutes depending on their complexity. This allows users to iteratively refine their search during a single session. The easy access to large chemical datasets provided by Pharmit simplifies and accelerates structure-based drug design. Pharmit is available under a dual BSD/GPL open-source license. © The Author(s) 2016. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

Micrometeoroid and Orbital Debris (MMOD) Shield Ballistic Limit Analysis Program

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ryan, Shannon

2013-01-01

This software implements penetration limit equations for common micrometeoroid and orbital debris (MMOD) shield configurations, windows, and thermal protection systems. Allowable MMOD risk is formulated in terms of the probability of penetration (PNP) of the spacecraft pressure hull. For calculating the risk, spacecraft geometry models, mission profiles, debris environment models, and penetration limit equations for installed shielding configurations are required. Risk assessment software such as NASA's BUMPERII is used to calculate mission PNP; however, they are unsuitable for use in shield design and preliminary analysis studies. The software defines a single equation for the design and performance evaluation of common MMOD shielding configurations, windows, and thermal protection systems, along with a description of their validity range and guidelines for their application. Recommendations are based on preliminary reviews of fundamental assumptions, and accuracy in predicting experimental impact test results. The software is programmed in Visual Basic for Applications for installation as a simple add-in for Microsoft Excel. The user is directed to a graphical user interface (GUI) that requires user inputs and provides solutions directly in Microsoft Excel workbooks.

Implementation of hospital examination reservation system using data mining technique.

PubMed

Cha, Hyo Soung; Yoon, Tae Sik; Ryu, Ki Chung; Shin, Il Won; Choe, Yang Hyo; Lee, Kyoung Yong; Lee, Jae Dong; Ryu, Keun Ho; Chung, Seung Hyun

2015-04-01

New methods for obtaining appropriate information for users have been attempted with the development of information technology and the Internet. Among such methods, the demand for systems and services that can improve patient satisfaction has increased in hospital care environments. In this paper, we proposed the Hospital Exam Reservation System (HERS), which uses the data mining method. First, we focused on carrying clinical exam data and finding the optimal schedule for generating rules using the multi-examination pattern-mining algorithm. Then, HERS was applied by a rule master and recommending system with an exam log. Finally, HERS was designed as a user-friendly interface. HERS has been applied at the National Cancer Center in Korea since June 2014. As the number of scheduled exams increased, the time required to schedule more than a single condition decreased (from 398.67% to 168.67% and from 448.49% to 188.49%; p < 0.0001). As the number of tests increased, the difference between HERS and non-HERS increased (from 0.18 days to 0.81 days). It was possible to expand the efficiency of HERS studies using mining technology in not only exam reservations, but also the medical environment. The proposed system based on doctor prescription removes exams that were not executed in order to improve recommendation accuracy. In addition, we expect HERS to become an effective system in various medical environments.

Web-accessible molecular modeling with Rosetta: The Rosetta Online Server that Includes Everyone (ROSIE).

PubMed

Moretti, Rocco; Lyskov, Sergey; Das, Rhiju; Meiler, Jens; Gray, Jeffrey J

2018-01-01

The Rosetta molecular modeling software package provides a large number of experimentally validated tools for modeling and designing proteins, nucleic acids, and other biopolymers, with new protocols being added continually. While freely available to academic users, external usage is limited by the need for expertise in the Unix command line environment. To make Rosetta protocols available to a wider audience, we previously created a web server called Rosetta Online Server that Includes Everyone (ROSIE), which provides a common environment for hosting web-accessible Rosetta protocols. Here we describe a simplification of the ROSIE protocol specification format, one that permits easier implementation of Rosetta protocols. Whereas the previous format required creating multiple separate files in different locations, the new format allows specification of the protocol in a single file. This new, simplified protocol specification has more than doubled the number of Rosetta protocols available under ROSIE. These new applications include pK a determination, lipid accessibility calculation, ribonucleic acid redesign, protein-protein docking, protein-small molecule docking, symmetric docking, antibody docking, cyclic toxin docking, critical binding peptide determination, and mapping small molecule binding sites. ROSIE is freely available to academic users at http://rosie.rosettacommons.org. © 2017 The Protein Society.

ProteoSign: an end-user online differential proteomics statistical analysis platform.

PubMed

Efstathiou, Georgios; Antonakis, Andreas N; Pavlopoulos, Georgios A; Theodosiou, Theodosios; Divanach, Peter; Trudgian, David C; Thomas, Benjamin; Papanikolaou, Nikolas; Aivaliotis, Michalis; Acuto, Oreste; Iliopoulos, Ioannis

2017-07-03

Profiling of proteome dynamics is crucial for understanding cellular behavior in response to intrinsic and extrinsic stimuli and maintenance of homeostasis. Over the last 20 years, mass spectrometry (MS) has emerged as the most powerful tool for large-scale identification and characterization of proteins. Bottom-up proteomics, the most common MS-based proteomics approach, has always been challenging in terms of data management, processing, analysis and visualization, with modern instruments capable of producing several gigabytes of data out of a single experiment. Here, we present ProteoSign, a freely available web application, dedicated in allowing users to perform proteomics differential expression/abundance analysis in a user-friendly and self-explanatory way. Although several non-commercial standalone tools have been developed for post-quantification statistical analysis of proteomics data, most of them are not end-user appealing as they often require very stringent installation of programming environments, third-party software packages and sometimes further scripting or computer programming. To avoid this bottleneck, we have developed a user-friendly software platform accessible via a web interface in order to enable proteomics laboratories and core facilities to statistically analyse quantitative proteomics data sets in a resource-efficient manner. ProteoSign is available at http://bioinformatics.med.uoc.gr/ProteoSign and the source code at https://github.com/yorgodillo/ProteoSign. © The Author(s) 2017. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

The I4 Online Query Tool for Earth Observations Data

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Stefanov, William L.; Vanderbloemen, Lisa A.; Lawrence, Samuel J.

2015-01-01

The NASA Earth Observation System Data and Information System (EOSDIS) delivers an average of 22 terabytes per day of data collected by orbital and airborne sensor systems to end users through an integrated online search environment (the Reverb/ECHO system). Earth observations data collected by sensors on the International Space Station (ISS) are not currently included in the EOSDIS system, and are only accessible through various individual online locations. This increases the effort required by end users to query multiple datasets, and limits the opportunity for data discovery and innovations in analysis. The Earth Science and Remote Sensing Unit of the Exploration Integration and Science Directorate at NASA Johnson Space Center has collaborated with the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University (ASU) to develop the ISS Instrument Integration Implementation (I4) data query tool to provide end users a clean, simple online interface for querying both current and historical ISS Earth Observations data. The I4 interface is based on the Lunaserv and Lunaserv Global Explorer (LGE) open-source software packages developed at ASU for query of lunar datasets. In order to avoid mirroring existing databases - and the need to continually sync/update those mirrors - our design philosophy is for the I4 tool to be a pure query engine only. Once an end user identifies a specific scene or scenes of interest, I4 transparently takes the user to the appropriate online location to download the data. The tool consists of two public-facing web interfaces. The Map Tool provides a graphic geobrowser environment where the end user can navigate to an area of interest and select single or multiple datasets to query. The Map Tool displays active image footprints for the selected datasets (Figure 1). Selecting a footprint will open a pop-up window that includes a browse image and a link to available image metadata, along with a link to the online location to order or download the actual data. Search results are either delivered in the form of browse images linked to the appropriate online database, similar to the Map Tool, or they may be transferred within the I4 environment for display as footprints in the Map Tool. Datasets searchable through I4 (http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/I4_tool) currently include: Crew Earth Observations (CEO) cataloged and uncataloged handheld astronaut photography; Sally Ride EarthKAM; Hyperspectral Imager for the Coastal Ocean (HICO); and the ISS SERVIR Environmental Research and Visualization System (ISERV). The ISS is a unique platform in that it will have multiple users over its lifetime, and that no single remote sensing system has a permanent internal or external berth. The open source I4 tool is designed to enable straightforward addition of new datasets as they become available such as ISS-RapidSCAT, Cloud Aerosol Transport System (CATS), and the High Definition Earth Viewing (HDEV) system. Data from other sensor systems, such as those operated by the ISS International Partners or under the auspices of the US National Laboratory program, can also be added to I4 provided sufficient access to enable searching of data or metadata is available. Commercial providers of remotely sensed data from the ISS may be particularly interested in I4 as an additional means of directing potential customers and clients to their products.

Intelligent Motion and Interaction Within Virtual Environments

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ellis, Stephen R. (Editor); Slater, Mel (Editor); Alexander, Thomas (Editor)

2007-01-01

What makes virtual actors and objects in virtual environments seem real? How can the illusion of their reality be supported? What sorts of training or user-interface applications benefit from realistic user-environment interactions? These are some of the central questions that designers of virtual environments face. To be sure simulation realism is not necessarily the major, or even a required goal, of a virtual environment intended to communicate specific information. But for some applications in entertainment, marketing, or aspects of vehicle simulation training, realism is essential. The following chapters will examine how a sense of truly interacting with dynamic, intelligent agents may arise in users of virtual environments. These chapters are based on presentations at the London conference on Intelligent Motion and Interaction within a Virtual Environments which was held at University College, London, U.K., 15-17 September 2003.

Tavaxy: integrating Taverna and Galaxy workflows with cloud computing support.

PubMed

Abouelhoda, Mohamed; Issa, Shadi Alaa; Ghanem, Moustafa

2012-05-04

Over the past decade the workflow system paradigm has evolved as an efficient and user-friendly approach for developing complex bioinformatics applications. Two popular workflow systems that have gained acceptance by the bioinformatics community are Taverna and Galaxy. Each system has a large user-base and supports an ever-growing repository of application workflows. However, workflows developed for one system cannot be imported and executed easily on the other. The lack of interoperability is due to differences in the models of computation, workflow languages, and architectures of both systems. This lack of interoperability limits sharing of workflows between the user communities and leads to duplication of development efforts. In this paper, we present Tavaxy, a stand-alone system for creating and executing workflows based on using an extensible set of re-usable workflow patterns. Tavaxy offers a set of new features that simplify and enhance the development of sequence analysis applications: It allows the integration of existing Taverna and Galaxy workflows in a single environment, and supports the use of cloud computing capabilities. The integration of existing Taverna and Galaxy workflows is supported seamlessly at both run-time and design-time levels, based on the concepts of hierarchical workflows and workflow patterns. The use of cloud computing in Tavaxy is flexible, where the users can either instantiate the whole system on the cloud, or delegate the execution of certain sub-workflows to the cloud infrastructure. Tavaxy reduces the workflow development cycle by introducing the use of workflow patterns to simplify workflow creation. It enables the re-use and integration of existing (sub-) workflows from Taverna and Galaxy, and allows the creation of hybrid workflows. Its additional features exploit recent advances in high performance cloud computing to cope with the increasing data size and complexity of analysis.The system can be accessed either through a cloud-enabled web-interface or downloaded and installed to run within the user's local environment. All resources related to Tavaxy are available at http://www.tavaxy.org.

A real-time expert system for self-repairing flight control

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gaither, S. A.; Agarwal, A. K.; Shah, S. C.; Duke, E. L.

1989-01-01

An integrated environment for specifying, prototyping, and implementing a self-repairing flight-control (SRFC) strategy is described. At an interactive workstation, the user can select paradigms such as rule-based expert systems, state-transition diagrams, and signal-flow graphs and hierarchically nest them, assign timing and priority attributes, establish blackboard-type communication, and specify concurrent execution on single or multiple processors. High-fidelity nonlinear simulations of aircraft and SRFC systems can be performed off-line, with the possibility of changing SRFC rules, inference strategies, and other heuristics to correct for control deficiencies. Finally, the off-line-generated SRFC can be transformed into highly optimized application-specific real-time C-language code. An application of this environment to the design of aircraft fault detection, isolation, and accommodation algorithms is presented in detail.

A Two-Stage Composition Method for Danger-Aware Services Based on Context Similarity

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wang, Junbo; Cheng, Zixue; Jing, Lei; Ota, Kaoru; Kansen, Mizuo

Context-aware systems detect user's physical and social contexts based on sensor networks, and provide services that adapt to the user accordingly. Representing, detecting, and managing the contexts are important issues in context-aware systems. Composition of contexts is a useful method for these works, since it can detect a context by automatically composing small pieces of information to discover service. Danger-aware services are a kind of context-aware services which need description of relations between a user and his/her surrounding objects and between users. However when applying the existing composition methods to danger-aware services, they show the following shortcomings that (1) they have not provided an explicit method for representing composition of multi-user' contexts, (2) there is no flexible reasoning mechanism based on similarity of contexts, so that they can just provide services exactly following the predefined context reasoning rules. Therefore, in this paper, we propose a two-stage composition method based on context similarity to solve the above problems. The first stage is composition of the useful information to represent the context for a single user. The second stage is composition of multi-users' contexts to provide services by considering the relation of users. Finally the danger degree of the detected context is computed by using context similarity between the detected context and the predefined context. Context is dynamically represented based on two-stage composition rules and a Situation theory based Ontology, which combines the advantages of Ontology and Situation theory. We implement the system in an indoor ubiquitous environment, and evaluate the system through two experiments with the support of subjects. The experiment results show the method is effective, and the accuracy of danger detection is acceptable to a danger-aware system.

A Middleware Solution for Wireless IoT Applications in Sparse Smart Cities

PubMed Central

Lanzone, Stefano; Riberto, Giulio; Stefanelli, Cesare; Tortonesi, Mauro

2017-01-01

The spread of off-the-shelf mobile devices equipped with multiple wireless interfaces together with sophisticated sensors is paving the way to novel wireless Internet of Things (IoT) environments, characterized by multi-hop infrastructure-less wireless networks where devices carried by users act as sensors/actuators as well as network nodes. In particular, the paper presents Real Ad-hoc Multi-hop Peer-to peer-Wireless IoT Application (RAMP-WIA), a novel solution that facilitates the development, deployment, and management of applications in sparse Smart City environments, characterized by users willing to collaborate by allowing new applications to be deployed on their smartphones to remotely monitor and control fixed/mobile devices. RAMP-WIA allows users to dynamically configure single-hop wireless links, to manage opportunistically multi-hop packet dispatching considering that the network topology (together with the availability of sensors and actuators) may abruptly change, to actuate reliably sensor nodes specifically considering that only part of them could be actually reachable in a timely manner, and to upgrade dynamically the nodes through over-the-air distribution of new software components. The paper also reports the performance of RAMP-WIA on simple but realistic cases of small-scale deployment scenarios with off-the-shelf Android smartphones and Raspberry Pi devices; these results show not only the feasibility and soundness of the proposed approach, but also the efficiency of the middleware implemented when deployed on real testbeds. PMID:29099745

A Middleware Solution for Wireless IoT Applications in Sparse Smart Cities.

PubMed

Bellavista, Paolo; Giannelli, Carlo; Lanzone, Stefano; Riberto, Giulio; Stefanelli, Cesare; Tortonesi, Mauro

2017-11-03

The spread of off-the-shelf mobile devices equipped with multiple wireless interfaces together with sophisticated sensors is paving the way to novel wireless Internet of Things (IoT) environments, characterized by multi-hop infrastructure-less wireless networks where devices carried by users act as sensors/actuators as well as network nodes. In particular, the paper presents Real Ad-hoc Multi-hop Peer-to peer-Wireless IoT Application (RAMP-WIA), a novel solution that facilitates the development, deployment, and management of applications in sparse Smart City environments, characterized by users willing to collaborate by allowing new applications to be deployed on their smartphones to remotely monitor and control fixed/mobile devices. RAMP-WIA allows users to dynamically configure single-hop wireless links, to manage opportunistically multi-hop packet dispatching considering that the network topology (together with the availability of sensors and actuators) may abruptly change, to actuate reliably sensor nodes specifically considering that only part of them could be actually reachable in a timely manner, and to upgrade dynamically the nodes through over-the-air distribution of new software components. The paper also reports the performance of RAMP-WIA on simple but realistic cases of small-scale deployment scenarios with off-the-shelf Android smartphones and Raspberry Pi devices; these results show not only the feasibility and soundness of the proposed approach, but also the efficiency of the middleware implemented when deployed on real testbeds.

Analysis of severe storm data

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hickey, J. S.

1983-01-01

The Mesoscale Analysis and Space Sensor (MASS) Data Management and Analysis System developed by Atsuko Computing International (ACI) on the MASS HP-1000 Computer System within the Systems Dynamics Laboratory of the Marshall Space Flight Center is described. The MASS Data Management and Analysis System was successfully implemented and utilized daily by atmospheric scientists to graphically display and analyze large volumes of conventional and satellite derived meteorological data. The scientists can process interactively various atmospheric data (Sounding, Single Level, Gird, and Image) by utilizing the MASS (AVE80) share common data and user inputs, thereby reducing overhead, optimizing execution time, and thus enhancing user flexibility, useability, and understandability of the total system/software capabilities. In addition ACI installed eight APPLE III graphics/imaging computer terminals in individual scientist offices and integrated them into the MASS HP-1000 Computer System thus providing significant enhancement to the overall research environment.

An interactive web-based system using cloud for large-scale visual analytics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kaseb, Ahmed S.; Berry, Everett; Rozolis, Erik; McNulty, Kyle; Bontrager, Seth; Koh, Youngsol; Lu, Yung-Hsiang; Delp, Edward J.

2015-03-01

Network cameras have been growing rapidly in recent years. Thousands of public network cameras provide tremendous amount of visual information about the environment. There is a need to analyze this valuable information for a better understanding of the world around us. This paper presents an interactive web-based system that enables users to execute image analysis and computer vision techniques on a large scale to analyze the data from more than 65,000 worldwide cameras. This paper focuses on how to use both the system's website and Application Programming Interface (API). Given a computer program that analyzes a single frame, the user needs to make only slight changes to the existing program and choose the cameras to analyze. The system handles the heterogeneity of the geographically distributed cameras, e.g. different brands, resolutions. The system allocates and manages Amazon EC2 and Windows Azure cloud resources to meet the analysis requirements.

Students' perceptions of constructivist Internet learning environments by a physics virtual laboratory: the gap between ideal and reality and gender differences.

PubMed

Chuang, Shih-Chyueh; Hwang, Fu-Kwun; Tsai, Chin-Chung

2008-04-01

The purpose of this study was to investigate the perceptions of Internet users of a physics virtual laboratory, Demolab, in Taiwan. Learners' perceptions of Internet-based learning environments were explored and the role of gender was examined by using preferred and actual forms of a revised Constructivist Internet-based Learning Environment Survey (CILES). The students expressed a clear gap between ideal and reality, and they showed higher preferences for many features of constructivist Internet-based learning environments than for features they had actually learned in Demolab. The results further suggested that male users prefer to be involved in the process of discussion and to show critical judgments. In addition, male users indicated they enjoyed the process of negotiation and discussion with others and were able to engage in reflective thoughts while learning in Demolab. In light of these findings, male users seemed to demonstrate better adaptability to the constructivist Internet-based learning approach than female users did. Although this study indicated certain differences between males and females in their responses to Internet-based learning environments, they also shared numerous similarities. A well-established constructivist Internet-based learning environment may encourage more female learners to participate in the science community.

Making Dynamic Digital Maps Cross-Platform and WWW Capable

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Condit, C. D.

2001-05-01

High-quality color geologic maps are an invaluable information resource for educators, students and researchers. However, maps with large datasets that include images, or various types of movies, in addition to site locations where analytical data has been collected, are difficult to publish in a format that facilitates their easy access, distribution and use. The development of capable desktop computers and object oriented graphical programming environments has facilitated publication of such data sets in an encapsulated form. The original Dynamic Digital Map (DDM) programs, developed using the Macintosh based SuperCard programming environment, exemplified this approach, in which all data are included in a single package designed so that display and access to the data did not depend on proprietary programs. These DDMs were aimed for ease of use, and allowed data to be displayed by several methods, including point-and-click at icons pin-pointing sample (or image) locations on maps, and from clicklists of sample or site numbers. Each of these DDMs included an overview and automated tour explaining the content organization and program use. This SuperCard development culminated in a "DDM Template", which is a SuperCard shell into which SuperCard users could insert their own content and thus create their own DDMs, following instructions in an accompanying "DDM Cookbook" (URL http://www.geo.umass.edu/faculty/condit/condit2.html). These original SuperCard-based DDMs suffered two critical limitations: a single user platform (Macintosh) and, although they can be downloaded from the web, their use lacked an integration into the WWW. Over the last eight months I have been porting the DDM technology to MetaCard, which is aggressively cross-platform (11 UNIX dialects, WIN32 and Macintosh). The new MetaCard DDM is redesigned to make the maps and images accessible either from CD or the web, using the "LoadNGo" concept. LoadNGo allows the user to download the stand-alone DDM program using a standard browser, and then use the program independently to access images, maps and data with fast web connections. DDMs are intended to be a fast and inexpensive way to publish and make accessible, as an integrated product, high-quality color maps and data sets. They are not a substitute for the analytical capability of GIS; however maps produced using GIS and CAD programs can be easily integrated into DDMs. The preparation of any map product is a time consuming effort. To compliment that effort, the DDM Templates have build into them the capability to contain explanatory text at three different user levels (or perhaps in three different languages), thus one DDM may be used as both a research publication medium and an educational outreach product, with the user choosing which user mode to access the data.

Transportable Applications Environment Plus, Version 5.1

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1994-01-01

Transportable Applications Environment Plus (TAE+) computer program providing integrated, portable programming environment for developing and running application programs based on interactive windows, text, and graphical objects. Enables both programmers and nonprogrammers to construct own custom application interfaces easily and to move interfaces and application programs to different computers. Used to define corporate user interface, with noticeable improvements in application developer's and end user's learning curves. Main components are; WorkBench, What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) software tool for design and layout of user interface; and WPT (Window Programming Tools) Package, set of callable subroutines controlling user interface of application program. WorkBench and WPT's written in C++, and remaining code written in C.

NASA Meteoroid Engineering Model Release 2.0

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Moorhead, A. V.; Koehler, H. M.; Cooke, W. J.

2015-01-01

The Meteoroid Engineering Model release 2.0 (MEMR2) software is NASA's most current and accurate model of the meteoroid environment. It enables the user to generate a trajectory-specific meteoroid environment for spacecraft traveling within the inner solar system. In addition to the total meteoroid flux, MEMR2 provides the user with meteoroid directionality and velocity information. Users have the ability to make a number of analysis and output choices that tailor the resulting environment to their needs. This Technical Memorandum outlines the history of MEMR2, the meteoroid environment it describes, and makes recommendations for the correct use of the software and interpretation of its results.

Performance Analysis of Diversity-Controlled Multi-User Superposition Transmission for 5G Wireless Networks

PubMed Central

Yeom, Jeong Seon; Jung, Bang Chul; Jin, Hu

2018-01-01

In this paper, we propose a novel low-complexity multi-user superposition transmission (MUST) technique for 5G downlink networks, which allows multiple cell-edge users to be multiplexed with a single cell-center user. We call the proposed technique diversity-controlled MUST technique since the cell-center user enjoys the frequency diversity effect via signal repetition over multiple orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) sub-carriers. We assume that a base station is equipped with a single antenna but users are equipped with multiple antennas. In addition, we assume that the quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK) modulation is used for users. We mathematically analyze the bit error rate (BER) of both cell-edge users and cell-center users, which is the first theoretical result in the literature to the best of our knowledge. The mathematical analysis is validated through extensive link-level simulations. PMID:29439413

Performance Analysis of Diversity-Controlled Multi-User Superposition Transmission for 5G Wireless Networks.

PubMed

Yeom, Jeong Seon; Chu, Eunmi; Jung, Bang Chul; Jin, Hu

2018-02-10

In this paper, we propose a novel low-complexity multi-user superposition transmission (MUST) technique for 5G downlink networks, which allows multiple cell-edge users to be multiplexed with a single cell-center user. We call the proposed technique diversity-controlled MUST technique since the cell-center user enjoys the frequency diversity effect via signal repetition over multiple orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) sub-carriers. We assume that a base station is equipped with a single antenna but users are equipped with multiple antennas. In addition, we assume that the quadrature phase shift keying (QPSK) modulation is used for users. We mathematically analyze the bit error rate (BER) of both cell-edge users and cell-center users, which is the first theoretical result in the literature to the best of our knowledge. The mathematical analysis is validated through extensive link-level simulations.

Perspectives on User Satisfaction Surveys.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Cullen, Rowena

2001-01-01

Discusses academic libraries, digital environments, increasing competition, the relationship between service quality and user satisfaction, and user surveys. Describes the SERVQUAL model that measures service quality and user satisfaction in academic libraries; considers gaps between user expectations and managers' perceptions of user…

Automated DICOM metadata and volumetric anatomical information extraction for radiation dosimetry

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Papamichail, D.; Ploussi, A.; Kordolaimi, S.; Karavasilis, E.; Papadimitroulas, P.; Syrgiamiotis, V.; Efstathopoulos, E.

2015-09-01

Patient-specific dosimetry calculations based on simulation techniques have as a prerequisite the modeling of the modality system and the creation of voxelized phantoms. This procedure requires the knowledge of scanning parameters and patients’ information included in a DICOM file as well as image segmentation. However, the extraction of this information is complicated and time-consuming. The objective of this study was to develop a simple graphical user interface (GUI) to (i) automatically extract metadata from every slice image of a DICOM file in a single query and (ii) interactively specify the regions of interest (ROI) without explicit access to the radiology information system. The user-friendly application developed in Matlab environment. The user can select a series of DICOM files and manage their text and graphical data. The metadata are automatically formatted and presented to the user as a Microsoft Excel file. The volumetric maps are formed by interactively specifying the ROIs and by assigning a specific value in every ROI. The result is stored in DICOM format, for data and trend analysis. The developed GUI is easy, fast and and constitutes a very useful tool for individualized dosimetry. One of the future goals is to incorporate a remote access to a PACS server functionality.

WiseEye: Next Generation Expandable and Programmable Camera Trap Platform for Wildlife Research.

PubMed

Nazir, Sajid; Newey, Scott; Irvine, R Justin; Verdicchio, Fabio; Davidson, Paul; Fairhurst, Gorry; Wal, René van der

2017-01-01

The widespread availability of relatively cheap, reliable and easy to use digital camera traps has led to their extensive use for wildlife research, monitoring and public outreach. Users of these units are, however, often frustrated by the limited options for controlling camera functions, the generation of large numbers of images, and the lack of flexibility to suit different research environments and questions. We describe the development of a user-customisable open source camera trap platform named 'WiseEye', designed to provide flexible camera trap technology for wildlife researchers. The novel platform is based on a Raspberry Pi single-board computer and compatible peripherals that allow the user to control its functions and performance. We introduce the concept of confirmatory sensing, in which the Passive Infrared triggering is confirmed through other modalities (i.e. radar, pixel change) to reduce the occurrence of false positives images. This concept, together with user-definable metadata, aided identification of spurious images and greatly reduced post-collection processing time. When tested against a commercial camera trap, WiseEye was found to reduce the incidence of false positive images and false negatives across a range of test conditions. WiseEye represents a step-change in camera trap functionality, greatly increasing the value of this technology for wildlife research and conservation management.

WiseEye: Next Generation Expandable and Programmable Camera Trap Platform for Wildlife Research

PubMed Central

Nazir, Sajid; Newey, Scott; Irvine, R. Justin; Verdicchio, Fabio; Davidson, Paul; Fairhurst, Gorry; van der Wal, René

2017-01-01

The widespread availability of relatively cheap, reliable and easy to use digital camera traps has led to their extensive use for wildlife research, monitoring and public outreach. Users of these units are, however, often frustrated by the limited options for controlling camera functions, the generation of large numbers of images, and the lack of flexibility to suit different research environments and questions. We describe the development of a user-customisable open source camera trap platform named ‘WiseEye’, designed to provide flexible camera trap technology for wildlife researchers. The novel platform is based on a Raspberry Pi single-board computer and compatible peripherals that allow the user to control its functions and performance. We introduce the concept of confirmatory sensing, in which the Passive Infrared triggering is confirmed through other modalities (i.e. radar, pixel change) to reduce the occurrence of false positives images. This concept, together with user-definable metadata, aided identification of spurious images and greatly reduced post-collection processing time. When tested against a commercial camera trap, WiseEye was found to reduce the incidence of false positive images and false negatives across a range of test conditions. WiseEye represents a step-change in camera trap functionality, greatly increasing the value of this technology for wildlife research and conservation management. PMID:28076444

Security in Distributed Collaborative Environments: Limitations and Solutions

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Saadi, Rachid; Pierson, Jean-Marc; Brunie, Lionel

The main goal of establishing collaboration between heterogeneous environment is to create such as Pervasive context which provide nomadic users with ubiquitous access to digital information and surrounding resources. However, the constraints of mobility and heterogeneity arise a number of crucial issues related to security, especially authentication access control and privacy. First of all, in this chapter we explore the trust paradigm, specially the transitive capability to enable a trust peer to peer collaboration. In this manner, when each organization sets its own security policy to recognize (authenticate) users members of a trusted community and provide them a local access (access control), the trust transitivity between peers will allows users to gain a broad, larger and controlled access inside the pervasive environment. Next, we study the problem of user's privacy. In fact in pervasive and ubiquitous environments, nomadic users gather and exchange certificates or credential which providing them rights to access by transitivity unknown and trusted environments. These signed documents embeds increasing number of attribute that require to be filtered according to such contextual situation. In this chapter, we propose a new morph signature enabling each certificate owner to preserve his privacy by discloses or blinds some sensitive attributes according to faced situation.

75 FR 62847 - Notice of Issuance of Final Determination Concerning an ADFLOTM

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2010-10-13

... country of origin of an Adflo TM Respiration System used in a welding environment. Based upon the facts... used for respiratory protection in a welding environment. The Adflo TM respiration system utilizes a... by the user in a welding environment. The helmet provides the primary protection for the user's head...

Preservice Teachers' Perception and Use of Personal Learning Environments (PLEs)

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sahin, Sami; Uluyol, Çelebi

2016-01-01

Personal learning environments (PLEs) are Web 2.0 tools and services by which users' access, construct, manage, and share educational contents in order to meet their learning needs. These environments enable users to manage their learning according to their own personal preferences. They further promote socialization and collaboration with their…

Remote Sensing Time Series Product Tool

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Predos, Don; Ryan, Robert E.; Ross, Kenton W.

2006-01-01

The TSPT (Time Series Product Tool) software was custom-designed for NASA to rapidly create and display single-band and band-combination time series, such as NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) images, for wide-area crop surveillance and for other time-critical applications. The TSPT, developed in MATLAB, allows users to create and display various MODIS (Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) or simulated VIIRS (Visible/Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite) products as single images, as time series plots at a selected location, or as temporally processed image videos. Manually creating these types of products is extremely labor intensive; however, the TSPT development tool makes the process simplified and efficient. MODIS is ideal for monitoring large crop areas because of its wide swath (2330 km), its relatively small ground sample distance (250 m), and its high temporal revisit time (twice daily). Furthermore, because MODIS imagery is acquired daily, rapid changes in vegetative health can potentially be detected. The new TSPT technology provides users with the ability to temporally process high-revisit-rate satellite imagery, such as that acquired from MODIS and from its successor, the VIIRS. The TSPT features the important capability of fusing data from both MODIS instruments onboard the Terra and Aqua satellites, which drastically improves cloud statistics. With the TSPT, MODIS metadata is used to find and optionally remove bad and suspect data. Noise removal and temporal processing techniques allow users to create low-noise time series plots and image videos and to select settings and thresholds that tailor particular output products. The TSPT GUI (graphical user interface) provides an interactive environment for crafting what-if scenarios by enabling a user to repeat product generation using different settings and thresholds. The TSPT Application Programming Interface provides more fine-tuned control of product generation, allowing experienced programmers to bypass the GUI and to create more user-specific output products, such as comparison time plots or images. This type of time series analysis tool for remotely sensed imagery could be the basis of a large-area vegetation surveillance system. The TSPT has been used to generate NDVI time series over growing seasons in California and Argentina and for hurricane events, such as Hurricane Katrina.

Shared virtual environments for aerospace training

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Loftin, R. Bowen; Voss, Mark

1994-01-01

Virtual environments have the potential to significantly enhance the training of NASA astronauts and ground-based personnel for a variety of activities. A critical requirement is the need to share virtual environments, in real or near real time, between remote sites. It has been hypothesized that the training of international astronaut crews could be done more cheaply and effectively by utilizing such shared virtual environments in the early stages of mission preparation. The Software Technology Branch at NASA's Johnson Space Center has developed the capability for multiple users to simultaneously share the same virtual environment. Each user generates the graphics needed to create the virtual environment. All changes of object position and state are communicated to all users so that each virtual environment maintains its 'currency.' Examples of these shared environments will be discussed and plans for the utilization of the Department of Defense's Distributed Interactive Simulation (DIS) protocols for shared virtual environments will be presented. Finally, the impact of this technology on training and education in general will be explored.

A virtual therapeutic environment with user projective agents.

PubMed

Ookita, S Y; Tokuda, H

2001-02-01

Today, we see the Internet as more than just an information infrastructure, but a socializing place and a safe outlet of inner feelings. Many personalities develop aside from real world life due to its anonymous environment. Virtual world interactions are bringing about new psychological illnesses ranging from netaddiction to technostress, as well as online personality disorders and conflicts in multiple identities that exist in the virtual world. Presently, there are no standard therapy models for the virtual environment. There are very few therapeutic environments, or tools especially made for virtual therapeutic environments. The goal of our research is to provide the therapy model and middleware tools for psychologists to use in virtual therapeutic environments. We propose the Cyber Therapy Model, and Projective Agents, a tool used in the therapeutic environment. To evaluate the effectiveness of the tool, we created a prototype system, called the Virtual Group Counseling System, which is a therapeutic environment that allows the user to participate in group counseling through the eyes of their Projective Agent. Projective Agents inherit the user's personality traits. During the virtual group counseling, the user's Projective Agent interacts and collaborates to recover and increase their psychological growth. The prototype system provides a simulation environment where psychologists can adjust the parameters and customize their own simulation environment. The model and tool is a first attempt toward simulating online personalities that may exist only online, and provide data for observation.

CRANS - CONFIGURABLE REAL-TIME ANALYSIS SYSTEM

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Mccluney, K.

1994-01-01

In a real-time environment, the results of changes or failures in a complex, interconnected system need evaluation quickly. Tabulations showing the effects of changes and/or failures of a given item in the system are generally only useful for a single input, and only with regard to that item. Subsequent changes become harder to evaluate as combinations of failures produce a cascade effect. When confronted by multiple indicated failures in the system, it becomes necessary to determine a single cause. In this case, failure tables are not very helpful. CRANS, the Configurable Real-time ANalysis System, can interpret a logic tree, constructed by the user, describing a complex system and determine the effects of changes and failures in it. Items in the tree are related to each other by Boolean operators. The user is then able to change the state of these items (ON/OFF FAILED/UNFAILED). The program then evaluates the logic tree based on these changes and determines any resultant changes to other items in the tree. CRANS can also search for a common cause for multiple item failures, and allow the user to explore the logic tree from within the program. A "help" mode and a reference check provide the user with a means of exploring an item's underlying logic from within the program. A commonality check determines single point failures for an item or group of items. Output is in the form of a user-defined matrix or matrices of colored boxes, each box representing an item or set of items from the logic tree. Input is via mouse selection of the matrix boxes, using the mouse buttons to toggle the state of the item. CRANS is written in C-language and requires the MIT X Window System, Version 11 Revision 4 or Revision 5. It requires 78K of RAM for execution and a three button mouse. It has been successfully implemented on Sun4 workstations running SunOS, HP9000 workstations running HP-UX, and DECstations running ULTRIX. No executable is provided on the distribution medium; however, a sample makefile is included. Sample input files are also included. The standard distribution medium is a .25 inch streaming magnetic tape cartridge (Sun QIC-24) in UNIX tar format. Alternate distribution media and formats are available upon request. This program was developed in 1992.

Single Cell Assay for Analyzing Single Cell Exosome and Endocrine Secretion and Cancer Markers

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Chiu, Yu-Jui

To understand the inhomogeneity of cells in biological systems, there is a growing demand for the capability to characterize the properties of individual single cells. Since single cell studies require continuous monitoring of the cell behaviors instead of a snapshot test at a single time point, an effective single-cell assay that can support time lapsed studies in a high throughput manner is desired. Most currently available single-cell technologies cannot provide proper environments to sustain cell growth and cannot provide, for appropriate cell types, proliferation of single cells and convenient, non-invasive tests of single cell behaviors from molecular markers. In this dissertation, I present a highly versatile single-cell assay that can accommodate different cellular types, enable easy and efficient single cell loading and culturing, and be suitable for the study of effects of in-vitro environmental factors in combination with drug screening. The salient features of the assay are the non-invasive collection and surveying of single cell secretions at different time points and massively parallel translocation of single cells by user defined criteria, producing very high compatibility to the downstream process such as single cell qPCR and sequencing. Above all, the acquired information is quantitative -- for example, one of the studies is measured by the number of exosomes each single cell secretes for a given time period. Therefore, our single-cell assay provides a convenient, low-cost, and enabling tool for quantitative, time lapsed studies of single cell properties.

User modeling for distributed virtual environment intelligent agents

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Banks, Sheila B.; Stytz, Martin R.

1999-07-01

This paper emphasizes the requirement for user modeling by presenting the necessary information to motivate the need for and use of user modeling for intelligent agent development. The paper will present information on our current intelligent agent development program, the Symbiotic Information Reasoning and Decision Support (SIRDS) project. We then discuss the areas of intelligent agents and user modeling, which form the foundation of the SIRDS project. Included in the discussion of user modeling are its major components, which are cognitive modeling and behavioral modeling. We next motivate the need for and user of a methodology to develop user models to encompass work within cognitive task analysis. We close the paper by drawing conclusions from our current intelligent agent research project and discuss avenues of future research in the utilization of user modeling for the development of intelligent agents for virtual environments.

Opportunities and Efficiencies in Building a New Service Desk Model.

PubMed

Mayo, Alexa; Brown, Everly; Harris, Ryan

2017-01-01

In July 2015, the Health Sciences and Human Services Library (HS/HSL) at the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB), merged its reference and circulation services, creating the Information Services Department and Information Services Desk. Designing the Information Services Desk with a team approach allowed for the re-examination of the HS/HSL's service model from the ground up. With the creation of a single service point, the HS/HSL was able to create efficiencies, improve the user experience by eliminating handoffs, create a collaborative team environment, and engage information services staff in a variety of new projects.

A Modular Pipelined Processor for High Resolution Gamma-Ray Spectroscopy

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Veiga, Alejandro; Grunfeld, Christian

2016-02-01

The design of a digital signal processor for gamma-ray applications is presented in which a single ADC input can simultaneously provide temporal and energy characterization of gamma radiation for a wide range of applications. Applying pipelining techniques, the processor is able to manage and synchronize very large volumes of streamed real-time data. Its modular user interface provides a flexible environment for experimental design. The processor can fit in a medium-sized FPGA device operating at ADC sampling frequency, providing an efficient solution for multi-channel applications. Two experiments are presented in order to characterize its temporal and energy resolution.

A computer tool to support in design of industrial Ethernet.

PubMed

Lugli, Alexandre Baratella; Santos, Max Mauro Dias; Franco, Lucia Regina Horta Rodrigues

2009-04-01

This paper presents a computer tool to support in the project and development of an industrial Ethernet network, verifying the physical layer (cables-resistance and capacitance, scan time, network power supply-POE's concept "Power Over Ethernet" and wireless), and occupation rate (amount of information transmitted to the network versus the controller network scan time). These functions are accomplished without a single physical element installed in the network, using only simulation. The computer tool has a software that presents a detailed vision of the network to the user, besides showing some possible problems in the network, and having an extremely friendly environment.

A Framework for WWW Query Processing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wu, Binghui Helen; Wharton, Stephen (Technical Monitor)

2000-01-01

Query processing is the most common operation in a DBMS. Sophisticated query processing has been mainly targeted at a single enterprise environment providing centralized control over data and metadata. Submitting queries by anonymous users on the web is different in such a way that load balancing or DBMS' accessing control becomes the key issue. This paper provides a solution by introducing a framework for WWW query processing. The success of this framework lies in the utilization of query optimization techniques and the ontological approach. This methodology has proved to be cost effective at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Distributed Active Archive Center (GDAAC).

A Coalition Approach to Higher-Level Fusion

DTIC Science & Technology

2009-07-01

environment and as a simulation which operates without any human interaction . In a typical wargame, WISE might portray a complex warfighting...the environment , while higher-level fusion is about establishing the story behind the data. Thus, achieving situational awareness for the users of...It is important to manage the relationship between the users and the virtual adviser so that context can be conveyed without disrupting the users

Transportable Applications Environment (TAE) Plus - A NASA productivity tool used to develop graphical user interfaces

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Szczur, Martha R.

1991-01-01

The Transportable Applications Environment (TAE) Plus, developed at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, is an advanced portable user interface development environment which simplifies the process of creating and managing complex application graphical user interfaces (GUIs), supports prototyping, allows applications to be oported easily between different platforms, and encourages appropriate levels of user interface consistency between applications. This paper discusses the capabilities of the TAE Plus tool, and how it makes the job of designing and developing GUIs easier for the application developers. The paper also explains how tools like TAE Plus provide for reusability and ensure reliability of UI software components, as well as how they aid in the reduction of development and maintenance costs.

Closing Keynote Presentation on the Genomics of Energy and the Environment (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

ScienceCinema

Benner, Steve

2018-05-08

Steve Benner, a distinguished chemist at the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution, Westheimer Institute of Science and Technology, provides the closing keynote address for the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

Combining Unsupervised and Supervised Classification to Build User Models for Exploratory Learning Environments

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Amershi, Saleema; Conati, Cristina

2009-01-01

In this paper, we present a data-based user modeling framework that uses both unsupervised and supervised classification to build student models for exploratory learning environments. We apply the framework to build student models for two different learning environments and using two different data sources (logged interface and eye-tracking data).…

A Proposed Integration Environment for Enhanced User Interaction and Value-Adding of Electronic Documents: An Empirical Evaluation.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Liew, Chern Li; Chennupati, K. R.; Foo, Schubert

2001-01-01

Explores the potential and impact of an innovative information environment in enhancing user activities in using electronic documents for various tasks, and to support the value-adding of these e-documents. Discusses the conceptual design and prototyping of a proposed environment, PROPIE. Presents an empirical and formative evaluation of the…

Managing Cognitive Load in Educational Multi-User Virtual Environments: Reflection on Design Practice

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Nelson, Brian C.; Erlandson, Benjamin E.

2008-01-01

In this paper, we explore how the application of multimedia design principles may inform the development of educational multi-user virtual environments (MUVEs). We look at design principles that have been shown to help learners manage cognitive load within multimedia environments and conduct a conjectural analysis of the extent to which such…

Closing Keynote Presentation on the Genomics of Energy and the Environment (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Benner, Steve

2012-03-22

Steve Benner, a distinguished chemist at the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution, Westheimer Institute of Science and Technology, provides the closing keynote address for the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

E-Drama: Facilitating Online Role-Play Using an AI Actor and Emotionally Expressive Characters

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zhang, Li; Gillies, Marco; Dhaliwal, Kulwant; Gower, Amanda; Robertson, Dale; Crabtree, Barry

2009-01-01

This paper describes a multi-user role-playing environment, referred to as "e-drama", which enables groups of people to converse online, in scenario driven virtual environments. The starting point of this research, is an existing application known as "edrama", a 2D graphical environment in which users are represented by static…

Touch in Computer-Mediated Environments: An Analysis of Online Shoppers' Touch-Interface User Experiences

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chung, Sorim

2016-01-01

Over the past few years, one of the most fundamental changes in current computer-mediated environments has been input devices, moving from mouse devices to touch interfaces. However, most studies of online retailing have not considered device environments as retail cues that could influence users' shopping behavior. In this research, I examine the…

Socialisation for Learning at a Distance in a 3-D Multi-User Virtual Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Edirisingha, Palitha; Nie, Ming; Pluciennik, Mark; Young, Ruth

2009-01-01

This paper reports findings of a pilot study that examined the pedagogical potential of "Second Life" (SL), a popular three-dimensional multi-user virtual environment (3-D MUVE) developed by the Linden Lab. The study is part of a 1-year research and development project titled "Modelling of Secondlife Environments"…

Controlling QoS in a collaborative multimedia environment

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Alfano, M.; Sigle, R.

1996-12-31

A collaborative multimedia environment allows users to work remotely on common projects by sharing applications (e.g., CAD tools, text editors, white boards) and simultaneously communicate audiovisually. Several dedicated applications (e.g., MBone tools) exist for transmitting video, audio and data between users. Due to the fact that they have been developed for the Internet which does not provide any Quality of Service (QoS) guarantee, these applications do not or only partially support specification of QoS requirements by the user. In addition, they all come with different user interfaces. In this paper we first discuss the problems that we experienced both atmore » the host and network levels when executing a multimedia application and varying its resource requirements. We then present the architectural details of a collaborative multimedia environment (CME) that we have been developing in order to help a user to set up and control a collaborative multimedia session.« less

Action tagging in a multi-user indoor environment for behavioural analysis purposes.

PubMed

Guerra, Claudio; Bianchi, Valentina; De Munari, Ilaria; Ciampolini, Paolo

2015-01-01

EU population is getting older, so that ICT-based solutions are expected to provide support in the challenges implied by the demographic change. At the University of Parma an AAL (Ambient Assisted Living) system, named CARDEA, has been developed. In this paper a new feature of the system is introduced, in which environmental and personal (i.e., wearable) sensors coexist, providing an accurate picture of the user's activity and needs. Environmental devices may greatly help in performing activity recognition and behavioral analysis tasks. However, in a multi-user environment, this implies the need of attributing environmental sensors outcome to a specific user, i.e., identifying the user when he performs a task detected by an environmental device. We implemented such an "action tagging" feature, based on information fusion, within the CARDEA environment, as an inexpensive, alternative solution to the problematic issue of indoor locationing.

An Execution Service for Grid Computing

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Smith, Warren; Hu, Chaumin

2004-01-01

This paper describes the design and implementation of the IPG Execution Service that reliably executes complex jobs on a computational grid. Our Execution Service is part of the IPG service architecture whose goal is to support location-independent computing. In such an environment, once n user ports an npplicntion to one or more hardware/software platfrms, the user can describe this environment to the grid the grid can locate instances of this platfrm, configure the platfrm as required for the application, and then execute the application. Our Execution Service runs jobs that set up such environments for applications and executes them. These jobs consist of a set of tasks for executing applications and managing data. The tasks have user-defined starting conditions that allow users to specih complex dependencies including task to execute when tasks fail, afiequent occurrence in a large distributed system, or are cancelled. The execution task provided by our service also configures the application environment exactly as specified by the user and captures the exit code of the application, features that many grid execution services do not support due to dflculties interfacing to local scheduling systems.

Using Multi-modal Sensing for Human Activity Modeling in the Real World

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Harrison, Beverly L.; Consolvo, Sunny; Choudhury, Tanzeem

Traditionally smart environments have been understood to represent those (often physical) spaces where computation is embedded into the users' surrounding infrastructure, buildings, homes, and workplaces. Users of this "smartness" move in and out of these spaces. Ambient intelligence assumes that users are automatically and seamlessly provided with context-aware, adaptive information, applications and even sensing - though this remains a significant challenge even when limited to these specialized, instrumented locales. Since not all environments are "smart" the experience is not a pervasive one; rather, users move between these intelligent islands of computationally enhanced space while we still aspire to achieve a more ideal anytime, anywhere experience. Two key technological trends are helping to bridge the gap between these smart environments and make the associated experience more persistent and pervasive. Smaller and more computationally sophisticated mobile devices allow sensing, communication, and services to be more directly and continuously experienced by user. Improved infrastructure and the availability of uninterrupted data streams, for instance location-based data, enable new services and applications to persist across environments.

visnormsc: A Graphical User Interface to Normalize Single-cell RNA Sequencing Data.

PubMed

Tang, Lijun; Zhou, Nan

2017-12-26

Single-cell RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) allows the analysis of gene expression with high resolution. The intrinsic defects of this promising technology imports technical noise into the single-cell RNA-seq data, increasing the difficulty of accurate downstream inference. Normalization is a crucial step in single-cell RNA-seq data pre-processing. SCnorm is an accurate and efficient method that can be used for this purpose. An R implementation of this method is currently available. On one hand, the R package possesses many excellent features from R. On the other hand, R programming ability is required, which prevents the biologists who lack the skills from learning to use it quickly. To make this method more user-friendly, we developed a graphical user interface, visnormsc, for normalization of single-cell RNA-seq data. It is implemented in Python and is freely available at https://github.com/solo7773/visnormsc . Although visnormsc is based on the existing method, it contributes to this field by offering a user-friendly alternative. The out-of-the-box and cross-platform features make visnormsc easy to learn and to use. It is expected to serve biologists by simplifying single-cell RNA-seq normalization.

Blind information-theoretic multiuser detection algorithms for DS-CDMA and WCDMA downlink systems.

PubMed

Waheed, Khuram; Salem, Fathi M

2005-07-01

Code division multiple access (CDMA) is based on the spread-spectrum technology and is a dominant air interface for 2.5G, 3G, and future wireless networks. For the CDMA downlink, the transmitted CDMA signals from the base station (BS) propagate through a noisy multipath fading communication channel before arriving at the receiver of the user equipment/mobile station (UE/MS). Classical CDMA single-user detection (SUD) algorithms implemented in the UE/MS receiver do not provide the required performance for modern high data-rate applications. In contrast, multi-user detection (MUD) approaches require a lot of a priori information not available to the UE/MS. In this paper, three promising adaptive Riemannian contra-variant (or natural) gradient based user detection approaches, capable of handling the highly dynamic wireless environments, are proposed. The first approach, blind multiuser detection (BMUD), is the process of simultaneously estimating multiple symbol sequences associated with all the users in the downlink of a CDMA communication system using only the received wireless data and without any knowledge of the user spreading codes. This approach is applicable to CDMA systems with relatively short spreading codes but becomes impractical for systems using long spreading codes. We also propose two other adaptive approaches, namely, RAKE -blind source recovery (RAKE-BSR) and RAKE-principal component analysis (RAKE-PCA) that fuse an adaptive stage into a standard RAKE receiver. This adaptation results in robust user detection algorithms with performance exceeding the linear minimum mean squared error (LMMSE) detectors for both Direct Sequence CDMA (DS-CDMA) and wide-band CDMA (WCDMA) systems under conditions of congestion, imprecise channel estimation and unmodeled multiple access interference (MAI).

Comparing SiGe HBT Amplifier Circuits for Fast Single-shot Spin Readout

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

England, Troy; Curry, Matthew; Carr, Stephen; Mounce, Andrew; Jock, Ryan; Sharma, Peter; Bureau-Oxton, Chloe; Rudolph, Martin; Hardin, Terry; Carroll, Malcolm

Fast, low-power quantum state readout is one of many challenges facing quantum information processing. Single electron transistors (SETs) are potentially fast, sensitive detectors for performing spin readout. From a circuit perspective, however, their output impedance and nonlinear conductance are ill suited to drive the parasitic capacitance of coaxial conductors used in cryogenic environments, necessitating a cryogenic amplification stage. We will compare two amplifiers based on single-transistor circuits implemented with silicon germanium heterojunction bipolar transistors. Both amplifiers provide gain at low power levels, but the dynamics of each circuit vary significantly. We will explore the gain mechanisms, linearity, and noise of each circuit and explain the situations in which each amplifier is best used. This work was performed, in part, at the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies, a U.S. DOE Office of Basic Energy Sciences user facility. Sandia National Laboratories is a multi-program laboratory operated by Sandia Corporation, a Lockheed-Martin Company, for the U. S. Department of Energy under Contract No. DE-AC04-94AL85000.

Jupiter Environment Tool

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sturm, Erick J.; Monahue, Kenneth M.; Biehl, James P.; Kokorowski, Michael; Ngalande, Cedrick,; Boedeker, Jordan

2012-01-01

The Jupiter Environment Tool (JET) is a custom UI plug-in for STK that provides an interface to Jupiter environment models for visualization and analysis. Users can visualize the different magnetic field models of Jupiter through various rendering methods, which are fully integrated within STK s 3D Window. This allows users to take snapshots and make animations of their scenarios with magnetic field visualizations. Analytical data can be accessed in the form of custom vectors. Given these custom vectors, users have access to magnetic field data in custom reports, graphs, access constraints, coverage analysis, and anywhere else vectors are used within STK.

Common HEP UNIX Environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Taddei, Arnaud

After it had been decided to design a common user environment for UNIX platforms among HEP laboratories, a joint project between DESY and CERN had been started. The project consists in 2 phases: 1. Provide a common user environment at shell level, 2. Provide a common user environment at graphical level (X11). Phase 1 is in production at DESY and at CERN as well as at PISA and RAL. It has been developed around the scripts originally designed at DESY Zeuthen improved and extended with a 2 months project at CERN with a contribution from DESY Hamburg. It consists of a set of files which are customizing the environment for the 6 main shells (sh, csh, ksh, bash, tcsh, zsh) on the main platforms (AIX, HP-UX, IRIX, SunOS, Solaris 2, OSF/1, ULTRIX, etc.) and it is divided at several "sociological" levels: HEP, site, machine, cluster, group of users and user with some levels which are optional. The second phase is under design and a first proposal has been published. A first version of the phase 2 exists already for AIX and Solaris, and it should be available for all other platforms, by the time of the conference. This is a major collective work between several HEP laboratories involved in the HEPiX-scripts and HEPiX-X11 working-groups.

Virtual button interface

DOEpatents

Jones, Jake S.

1999-01-01

An apparatus and method of issuing commands to a computer by a user interfacing with a virtual reality environment. To issue a command, the user directs gaze at a virtual button within the virtual reality environment, causing a perceptible change in the virtual button, which then sends a command corresponding to the virtual button to the computer, optionally after a confirming action is performed by the user, such as depressing a thumb switch.

Review of Data Integrity Models in Multi-Level Security Environments

DTIC Science & Technology

2011-02-01

2: (E-1 extension) Only executions described in a (User, TP, (CDIs)) relation are allowed • E-3: Users must be authenticated before allowing TP... authentication and verification procedures for upgrading the integrity of certain objects. The mechanism used to manage access to objects is primarily...that is, the self-consistency of interdependent data and the consistency of real-world environment data. The prevention of authorised users from making

COSMIC: Software catalog 1991 edition diskette format

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

1991-01-01

The PC edition of the annual COSMIC Software contains descriptions of the over 1,200 computer programs available for use within the United States as of January 1, 1991. By using the PC version of the catalog, it is possible to conduct extensive searches of the software inventory for programs that meet specific criteria. Elements such as program keywords, hardware specifications, source code languages, and title acronyms can be used for the basis of such searches. After isolating those programs that might be of best interest to the user, it is then possible to either view at the monitor, or generate a hardcopy listing of all information on those packages. In addition to the program elements that the user can search on, information such as total program size, distribution media, and program price, as well as extensive abstracts on the program, are also available to the user at this time. Another useful feature of the catalog allows for the retention of programs that meet certain search criteria between individual sessions of using the catalog. This allows users to save the information on those programs that are of interest to them in different areas of application. They can then recall a specific collection of programs for information retrieval or further search reduction if desired. In addition, this version of the catalog is adaptable to a network/shared resource environment, allowing multiple users access to a single copy of the catalog database simultaneously.

JADA: a graphical user interface for comprehensive internal dose assessment in nuclear medicine.

PubMed

Grimes, Joshua; Uribe, Carlos; Celler, Anna

2013-07-01

The main objective of this work was to design a comprehensive dosimetry package that would keep all aspects of internal dose calculation within the framework of a single software environment and that would be applicable for a variety of dose calculation approaches. Our MATLAB-based graphical user interface (GUI) can be used for processing data obtained using pure planar, pure SPECT, or hybrid planar/SPECT imaging. Time-activity data for source regions are obtained using a set of tools that allow the user to reconstruct SPECT images, load images, coregister a series of planar images, and to perform two-dimensional and three-dimensional image segmentation. Curve fits are applied to the acquired time-activity data to construct time-activity curves, which are then integrated to obtain time-integrated activity coefficients. Subsequently, dose estimates are made using one of three methods. The organ level dose calculation subGUI calculates mean organ doses that are equivalent to dose assessment performed by OLINDA/EXM. Voxelized dose calculation options, which include the voxel S value approach and Monte Carlo simulation using the EGSnrc user code DOSXYZnrc, are available within the process 3D image data subGUI. The developed internal dosimetry software package provides an assortment of tools for every step in the dose calculation process, eliminating the need for manual data transfer between programs. This saves times and minimizes user errors, while offering a versatility that can be used to efficiently perform patient-specific internal dose calculations in a variety of clinical situations.

Tobacco Product Use Patterns, and Nicotine and Tobacco-Specific Nitrosamine Exposure: NHANES 1999-2012.

PubMed

Choi, Kelvin; Sabado, Melanie; El-Toukhy, Sherine; Vogtmann, Emily; Freedman, Neal D; Hatsukami, Dorothy

2017-10-01

Background: Few studies have examined differences in product consumption patterns and nicotine and tobacco-specific nitrosamines (TSNA) exposure between single versus dual- and poly-tobacco users. We applied the Tobacco Product Use Patterns (T-PUPs) model to fill this gap in the literature. Methods: Data from adults (age ≥18 years) who used any tobacco products during the 5 days prior to participating in the 1999-2012 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) were analyzed. Participants were classified into seven T-PUPs: (1) cigarettes only, (2) noncigarette combustibles only, (3) noncombustibles only, (4) dual noncigarette combustibles and noncombustibles, (5) dual cigarettes and noncombustibles, (6) dual cigarettes and noncigarette combustibles, and (7) poly-tobacco use. Weighted regression models were used to compare product consumption, serum cotinine, and urinary total 4-(methylnitrosamino)-1-(3-pyridyl)-1-butanol (i.e., NNAL) levels between single-, dual-, and poly-tobacco T-PUPs. Results: Dual- and poly-tobacco T-PUPs were associated with lower product consumption compared with single-product T-PUPs only in some cases (e.g., dual cigarette and noncombustible users smoked cigarettes on 0.6 fewer days in the past 5 days compared with cigarette-only users; P < 0.05). Dual- and poly-tobacco T-PUPs had either nondistinguishable or higher levels of serum cotinine and urinary total NNAL than corresponding single-product T-PUPs. Conclusions: Product consumption, and nicotine and TSNAs exposure of dual- and poly-tobacco product category users somewhat differ from those of single-product category users as defined by the T-TUPs model. Impact: Higher levels of cotinine and NNAL among dual- and poly-tobacco T-TUPs users compared with the single-product T-TUPs users may indicate health concerns. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev; 26(10); 1525-30. ©2017 AACR . ©2017 American Association for Cancer Research.

Analysis of Means for Building Context-Aware Recommendation System for Mobile Learning

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Shcherbachenko, Larysa; Nowakowski, Samuel

2017-01-01

One of the rapidly developing tools for online learning is learning through a mobile environment. Therefore, developing and improving mobile learning environments is an active topic now. One of the ways to adapt the learning environment to the user's needs is to use his context. Context of the user consists of the current context in online…

BioSMACK: a linux live CD for genome-wide association analyses.

PubMed

Hong, Chang Bum; Kim, Young Jin; Moon, Sanghoon; Shin, Young-Ah; Go, Min Jin; Kim, Dong-Joon; Lee, Jong-Young; Cho, Yoon Shin

2012-01-01

Recent advances in high-throughput genotyping technologies have enabled us to conduct a genome-wide association study (GWAS) on a large cohort. However, analyzing millions of single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) is still a difficult task for researchers conducting a GWAS. Several difficulties such as compatibilities and dependencies are often encountered by researchers using analytical tools, during the installation of software. This is a huge obstacle to any research institute without computing facilities and specialists. Therefore, a proper research environment is an urgent need for researchers working on GWAS. We developed BioSMACK to provide a research environment for GWAS that requires no configuration and is easy to use. BioSMACK is based on the Ubuntu Live CD that offers a complete Linux-based operating system environment without installation. Moreover, we provide users with a GWAS manual consisting of a series of guidelines for GWAS and useful examples. BioSMACK is freely available at http://ksnp.cdc. go.kr/biosmack.

ARIES: Acquisition of Requirements and Incremental Evolution of Specifications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Roberts, Nancy A.

1993-01-01

This paper describes a requirements/specification environment specifically designed for large-scale software systems. This environment is called ARIES (Acquisition of Requirements and Incremental Evolution of Specifications). ARIES provides assistance to requirements analysts for developing operational specifications of systems. This development begins with the acquisition of informal system requirements. The requirements are then formalized and gradually elaborated (transformed) into formal and complete specifications. ARIES provides guidance to the user in validating formal requirements by translating them into natural language representations and graphical diagrams. ARIES also provides ways of analyzing the specification to ensure that it is correct, e.g., testing the specification against a running simulation of the system to be built. Another important ARIES feature, especially when developing large systems, is the sharing and reuse of requirements knowledge. This leads to much less duplication of effort. ARIES combines all of its features in a single environment that makes the process of capturing a formal specification quicker and easier.

A Web-Based Earth-Systems Knowledge Portal and Collaboration Platform

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

D'Agnese, F. A.; Turner, A. K.

2010-12-01

In support of complex water-resource sustainability projects in the Great Basin region of the United States, Earth Knowledge, Inc. has developed several web-based data management and analysis platforms that have been used by its scientists, clients, and public to facilitate information exchanges, collaborations, and decision making. These platforms support accurate water-resource decision-making by combining second-generation internet (Web 2.0) technologies with traditional 2D GIS and web-based 2D and 3D mapping systems such as Google Maps, and Google Earth. Most data management and analysis systems use traditional software systems to address the data needs and usage behavior of the scientific community. In contrast, these platforms employ more accessible open-source and “off-the-shelf” consumer-oriented, hosted web-services. They exploit familiar software tools using industry standard protocols, formats, and APIs to discover, process, fuse, and visualize earth, engineering, and social science datasets. Thus, they respond to the information needs and web-interface expectations of both subject-matter experts and the public. Because the platforms continue to gather and store all the contributions of their broad-spectrum of users, each new assessment leverages the data, information, and expertise derived from previous investigations. In the last year, Earth Knowledge completed a conceptual system design and feasibility study for a platform, which has a Knowledge Portal providing access to users wishing to retrieve information or knowledge developed by the science enterprise and a Collaboration Environment Module, a framework that links the user-access functions to a Technical Core supporting technical and scientific analyses including Data Management, Analysis and Modeling, and Decision Management, and to essential system administrative functions within an Administrative Module. The over-riding technical challenge is the design and development of a single technical platform that is accessed through a flexible series of knowledge portal and collaboration environment styles reflecting the information needs and user expectations of a diverse community of users. Recent investigations have defined the information needs and expectations of the major end-users and also have reviewed and assessed a wide variety of modern web-based technologies. Combining these efforts produced design specifications and recommendations for the selection and integration of web- and client-based tools. When fully developed, the resulting platform will: -Support new, advanced information systems and decision environments that take full advantage of multiple data sources and platforms; -Provide a distribution network tailored to the timely delivery of products to a broad range of users that are needed to support applications in disaster management, resource management, energy, and urban sustainability; -Establish new integrated multiple-user requirements and knowledge databases that support researchers and promote infusion of successful technologies into existing processes; and -Develop new decision support strategies and presentation methodologies for applied earth science applications to reduce risk, cost, and time.

Week Long Topography Study of Young Adults Using Electronic Cigarettes in Their Natural Environment.

PubMed

Robinson, R J; Hensel, E C; Roundtree, K A; Difrancesco, A G; Nonnemaker, J M; Lee, Y O

2016-01-01

Results of an observational, descriptive study quantifying topography characteristics of twenty first generation electronic nicotine delivery system users in their natural environment for a one week observation period are presented. The study quantifies inter-participant variation in puffing topography between users and the intra-participant variation for each user observed during one week of use in their natural environment. Puff topography characteristics presented for each user include mean puff duration, flow rate and volume for each participant, along with descriptive statistics of each quantity. Exposure characteristics including the number of vaping sessions, total number of puffs and cumulative volume of aerosol generated from ENDS use (e-liquid aerosol) are reported for each participant for a one week exposure period and an effective daily average exposure. Significant inter-participant and intra-participant variation in puff topography was observed. The observed range of natural use environment characteristics is used to propose a set of topography protocols for use as command inputs to drive machine-puffed electronic nicotine delivery systems in a controlled laboratory environment.

Week Long Topography Study of Young Adults Using Electronic Cigarettes in Their Natural Environment

PubMed Central

Roundtree, K. A.; Difrancesco, A. G.; Nonnemaker, J. M.; Lee, Y. O.

2016-01-01

Results of an observational, descriptive study quantifying topography characteristics of twenty first generation electronic nicotine delivery system users in their natural environment for a one week observation period are presented. The study quantifies inter-participant variation in puffing topography between users and the intra-participant variation for each user observed during one week of use in their natural environment. Puff topography characteristics presented for each user include mean puff duration, flow rate and volume for each participant, along with descriptive statistics of each quantity. Exposure characteristics including the number of vaping sessions, total number of puffs and cumulative volume of aerosol generated from ENDS use (e-liquid aerosol) are reported for each participant for a one week exposure period and an effective daily average exposure. Significant inter-participant and intra-participant variation in puff topography was observed. The observed range of natural use environment characteristics is used to propose a set of topography protocols for use as command inputs to drive machine-puffed electronic nicotine delivery systems in a controlled laboratory environment. PMID:27736944

Video personalization for usage environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Tseng, Belle L.; Lin, Ching-Yung; Smith, John R.

2002-07-01

A video personalization and summarization system is designed and implemented incorporating usage environment to dynamically generate a personalized video summary. The personalization system adopts the three-tier server-middleware-client architecture in order to select, adapt, and deliver rich media content to the user. The server stores the content sources along with their corresponding MPEG-7 metadata descriptions. Our semantic metadata is provided through the use of the VideoAnnEx MPEG-7 Video Annotation Tool. When the user initiates a request for content, the client communicates the MPEG-21 usage environment description along with the user query to the middleware. The middleware is powered by the personalization engine and the content adaptation engine. Our personalization engine includes the VideoSue Summarization on Usage Environment engine that selects the optimal set of desired contents according to user preferences. Afterwards, the adaptation engine performs the required transformations and compositions of the selected contents for the specific usage environment using our VideoEd Editing and Composition Tool. Finally, two personalization and summarization systems are demonstrated for the IBM Websphere Portal Server and for the pervasive PDA devices.

An electric stimulation system for electrokinetic particle manipulation in microfluidic devices.

PubMed

Lopez-de la Fuente, M S; Moncada-Hernandez, H; Perez-Gonzalez, V H; Lapizco-Encinas, B H; Martinez-Chapa, S O

2013-03-01

Microfluidic devices have grown significantly in the number of applications. Microfabrication techniques have evolved considerably; however, electric stimulation systems for microdevices have not advanced at the same pace. Electric stimulation of micro-fluidic devices is an important element in particle manipulation research. A flexible stimulation instrument is desired to perform configurable, repeatable, automated, and reliable experiments by allowing users to select the stimulation parameters. The instrument presented here is a configurable and programmable stimulation system for electrokinetic-driven microfluidic devices; it consists of a processor, a memory system, and a user interface to deliver several types of waveforms and stimulation patterns. It has been designed to be a flexible, highly configurable, low power instrument capable of delivering sine, triangle, and sawtooth waveforms with one single frequency or two superimposed frequencies ranging from 0.01 Hz to 40 kHz, and an output voltage of up to 30 Vpp. A specific stimulation pattern can be delivered over a single time period or as a sequence of different signals for different time periods. This stimulation system can be applied as a research tool where manipulation of particles suspended in liquid media is involved, such as biology, medicine, environment, embryology, and genetics. This system has the potential to lead to new schemes for laboratory procedures by allowing application specific and user defined electric stimulation. The development of this device is a step towards portable and programmable instrumentation for electric stimulation on electrokinetic-based microfluidic devices, which are meant to be integrated with lab-on-a-chip devices.

An electric stimulation system for electrokinetic particle manipulation in microfluidic devices

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lopez-de la Fuente, M. S.; Moncada-Hernandez, H.; Perez-Gonzalez, V. H.; Lapizco-Encinas, B. H.; Martinez-Chapa, S. O.

2013-03-01

Microfluidic devices have grown significantly in the number of applications. Microfabrication techniques have evolved considerably; however, electric stimulation systems for microdevices have not advanced at the same pace. Electric stimulation of micro-fluidic devices is an important element in particle manipulation research. A flexible stimulation instrument is desired to perform configurable, repeatable, automated, and reliable experiments by allowing users to select the stimulation parameters. The instrument presented here is a configurable and programmable stimulation system for electrokinetic-driven microfluidic devices; it consists of a processor, a memory system, and a user interface to deliver several types of waveforms and stimulation patterns. It has been designed to be a flexible, highly configurable, low power instrument capable of delivering sine, triangle, and sawtooth waveforms with one single frequency or two superimposed frequencies ranging from 0.01 Hz to 40 kHz, and an output voltage of up to 30 Vpp. A specific stimulation pattern can be delivered over a single time period or as a sequence of different signals for different time periods. This stimulation system can be applied as a research tool where manipulation of particles suspended in liquid media is involved, such as biology, medicine, environment, embryology, and genetics. This system has the potential to lead to new schemes for laboratory procedures by allowing application specific and user defined electric stimulation. The development of this device is a step towards portable and programmable instrumentation for electric stimulation on electrokinetic-based microfluidic devices, which are meant to be integrated with lab-on-a-chip devices.

Single-Trial Analysis of Inter-Beat Interval Perturbations Accompanying Single-Switch Scanning: Case Series of Three Children With Severe Spastic Quadriplegic Cerebral Palsy.

PubMed

Leung, Brian; Chau, Tom

2016-02-01

Single-switch access in conjunction with scanning remains a fundamental solution in restoring communication for many children with profound physical disabilities. However, untimely switch inaction and unintentional switch activations can lead to user frustration and impede functional communication. A previous preliminary study, in the context of a case series with three single-switch users, reported that correct, accidental and missed switch activations could elicit cardiac deceleration and increased phasic skin conductance on average, while deliberate switch non-use was associated with autonomic nonresponse. The present study investigated the possibility of using blood volume pulse recordings from the same three pediatric single-switch users to track the aforementioned switch events on a single-trial basis. Peaks of the line length time series derived from the empirical mode decomposition of the inter-beat interval time series matched, on average, a high percentage (above 80%) of single-switch events, while unmatched peaks coincided moderately (below 37%) with idle time during scanning. These results encourage further study of autonomic measures as complementary information channels to enhance single-switch access.

Using Genomics to Dissect Seed Development (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment Meeting)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Goldberg, Robert

2012-03-21

Robert Goldberg of UCLA presents "Using Genomics to Dissect Seed Development" at the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

Using Genomics to Dissect Seed Development (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment Meeting)

ScienceCinema

Goldberg, Robert

2018-04-27

Robert Goldberg of UCLA presents "Using Genomics to Dissect Seed Development" at the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

Extracting an evaluative feedback from the brain for adaptation of motor neuroprosthetic decoders.

PubMed

Mahmoudi, Babak; Principe, Jose C; Sanchez, Justin C

2010-01-01

The design of Brain-Machine Interface (BMI) neural decoders that have robust performance in changing environments encountered in daily life activity is a challenging problem. One solution to this problem is the design of neural decoders that are able to assist and adapt to the user by participating in their perception-action-reward cycle (PARC). Using inspiration both from artificial intelligence and neurobiology reinforcement learning theories, we have designed a novel decoding architecture that enables a symbiotic relationship between the user and an Intelligent Assistant (IA). By tapping into the motor and reward centers in the brain, the IA adapts the process of decoding neural motor commands into prosthetic actions based on the user's goals. The focus of this paper is on extraction of goal information directly from the brain and making it accessible to the IA as an evaluative feedback for adaptation. We have recorded the neural activity of the Nucleus Accumbens in behaving rats during a reaching task. The peri-event time histograms demonstrate a rich representation of the reward prediction in this subcortical structure that can be modeled on a single trial basis as a scalar evaluative feedback with high precision.

Evaluating Health Advice in a Web 2.0 Environment: The Impact of Multiple User-Generated Factors on HIV Advice Perceptions.

PubMed

Walther, Joseph B; Jang, Jeong-Woo; Hanna Edwards, Ashley A

2018-01-01

Unlike traditional media, social media systems often present information of different types from different kinds of contributors within a single message pane, a juxtaposition of potential influences that challenges traditional health communication processing. One type of social media system, question-and-answer advice systems, provides peers' answers to health-related questions, which yet other peers read and rate. Responses may appear good or bad, responders may claim expertise, and others' aggregated evaluations of an answer's usefulness may affect readers' judgments. An experiment explored how answer feasibility, expertise claims, and user-generated ratings affected readers' assessments of advice about anonymous HIV testing. Results extend the heuristic-systematic model of persuasion (Chaiken, 1980) and warranting theory (Walther & Parks, 2002). Information that is generally associated with both systematic and heuristic processes influenced readers' evaluations. Moreover, content-level cues affected judgments about message sources unexpectedly. When conflicting cues were present, cues with greater warranting value (consensus user-generated ratings) had greater influence on outcomes than less warranted cues (self-promoted expertise). Findings present a challenge to health professionals' concerns about the reliability of online health information systems.

Toward virtual anatomy: a stereoscopic 3-D interactive multimedia computer program for cranial osteology.

PubMed

Trelease, R B

1996-01-01

Advances in computer visualization and user interface technologies have enabled development of "virtual reality" programs that allow users to perceive and to interact with objects in artificial three-dimensional environments. Such technologies were used to create an image database and program for studying the human skull, a specimen that has become increasingly expensive and scarce. Stereoscopic image pairs of a museum-quality skull were digitized from multiple views. For each view, the stereo pairs were interlaced into a single, field-sequential stereoscopic picture using an image processing program. The resulting interlaced image files are organized in an interactive multimedia program. At run-time, gray-scale 3-D images are displayed on a large-screen computer monitor and observed through liquid-crystal shutter goggles. Users can then control the program and change views with a mouse and cursor to point-and-click on screen-level control words ("buttons"). For each view of the skull, an ID control button can be used to overlay pointers and captions for important structures. Pointing and clicking on "hidden buttons" overlying certain structures triggers digitized audio spoken word descriptions or mini lectures.

A Multifactor Secure Authentication System for Wireless Payment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Sanyal, Sugata; Tiwari, Ayu; Sanyal, Sudip

Organizations are deploying wireless based online payment applications to expand their business globally, it increases the growing need of regulatory requirements for the protection of confidential data, and especially in internet based financial areas. Existing internet based authentication systems often use either the Web or the Mobile channel individually to confirm the claimed identity of the remote user. The vulnerability is that access is based on only single factor authentication which is not secure to protect user data, there is a need of multifactor authentication. This paper proposes a new protocol based on multifactor authentication system that is both secure and highly usable. It uses a novel approach based on Transaction Identification Code and SMS to enforce another security level with the traditional Login/password system. The system provides a highly secure environment that is simple to use and deploy with in a limited resources that does not require any change in infrastructure or underline protocol of wireless network. This Protocol for Wireless Payment is extended as a two way authentications system to satisfy the emerging market need of mutual authentication and also supports secure B2B communication which increases faith of the user and business organizations on wireless financial transaction using mobile devices.

Batching System for Superior Service

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

2001-01-01

Veridian's Portable Batch System (PBS) was the recipient of the 1997 NASA Space Act Award for outstanding software. A batch system is a set of processes for managing queues and jobs. Without a batch system, it is difficult to manage the workload of a computer system. By bundling the enterprise's computing resources, the PBS technology offers users a single coherent interface, resulting in efficient management of the batch services. Users choose which information to package into "containers" for system-wide use. PBS also provides detailed system usage data, a procedure not easily executed without this software. PBS operates on networked, multi-platform UNIX environments. Veridian's new version, PBS Pro,TM has additional features and enhancements, including support for additional operating systems. Veridian distributes the original version of PBS as Open Source software via the PBS website. Customers can register and download the software at no cost. PBS Pro is also available via the web and offers additional features such as increased stability, reliability, and fault tolerance.A company using PBS can expect a significant increase in the effective management of its computing resources. Tangible benefits include increased utilization of costly resources and enhanced understanding of computational requirements and user needs.

A theoretical basis for the analysis of redundant software subject to coincident errors

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eckhardt, D. E., Jr.; Lee, L. D.

1985-01-01

Fundamental to the development of redundant software techniques fault-tolerant software, is an understanding of the impact of multiple-joint occurrences of coincident errors. A theoretical basis for the study of redundant software is developed which provides a probabilistic framework for empirically evaluating the effectiveness of the general (N-Version) strategy when component versions are subject to coincident errors, and permits an analytical study of the effects of these errors. The basic assumptions of the model are: (1) independently designed software components are chosen in a random sample; and (2) in the user environment, the system is required to execute on a stationary input series. The intensity of coincident errors, has a central role in the model. This function describes the propensity to introduce design faults in such a way that software components fail together when executing in the user environment. The model is used to give conditions under which an N-Version system is a better strategy for reducing system failure probability than relying on a single version of software. A condition which limits the effectiveness of a fault-tolerant strategy is studied, and it is posted whether system failure probability varies monotonically with increasing N or whether an optimal choice of N exists.

Social and structural aspects of the overdose risk environment in St. Petersburg, Russia

PubMed Central

Grau, Lauretta E.; Blinnikova, Ksenia N.; Torban, Mikhail; Krupitsky, Evgeny; Ilyuk, Ruslan; Kozlov, Andrei; Heimer, Robert

2009-01-01

Background While overdose is a common cause of mortality among opioid injectors worldwide, little information exists on opioid overdoses or how context may influence overdose risk in Russia. This study sought to uncover social and structural aspects contributing to fatal overdose risk in St. Petersburg and assess prevention intervention feasibility. Methods Twenty-one key informant interviews were conducted with drug users, treatment providers, toxicologists, police, and ambulance staff. Thematic coding of interview content was conducted to elucidate elements of the overdose risk environment. Results Several factors within St. Petersburg’s environment were identified as shaping illicit drug users’ risk behaviors and contributing to conditions of suboptimal response to overdose in the community. Most drug users live and experience overdoses at home, where family and home environment may mediate or moderate risk behaviors. The overdose risk environment is also worsened by inefficient emergency response infrastructure, insufficient cardiopulmonary or naloxone training resources, and the preponderance of abstinence-based treatment approaches to the exclusion of other treatment modalities. However, attitudes of drug users and law enforcement officials generally support overdose prevention intervention feasibility. Modifiable aspects of the risk environment suggest community-based and structural interventions, including overdose response training for drug users and professionals that encompasses naloxone distribution to the users and equipping more ambulances with naloxone. Conclusion Local social and structural elements influence risk environments for overdose. Interventions at the community and structural levels to prevent and respond to opioid overdoses are needed for and integral to reducing overdose mortality in St. Petersburg. PMID:18774283

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory shared control architecture and implementation

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Backes, Paul G.; Hayati, Samad

1990-01-01

A hardware and software environment for shared control of telerobot task execution has been implemented. Modes of task execution range from fully teleoperated to fully autonomous as well as shared where hand controller inputs from the human operator are mixed with autonomous system inputs in real time. The objective of the shared control environment is to aid the telerobot operator during task execution by merging real-time operator control from hand controllers with autonomous control to simplify task execution for the operator. The operator is the principal command source and can assign as much autonomy for a task as desired. The shared control hardware environment consists of two PUMA 560 robots, two 6-axis force reflecting hand controllers, Universal Motor Controllers for each of the robots and hand controllers, a SUN4 computer, and VME chassis containing 68020 processors and input/output boards. The operator interface for shared control, the User Macro Interface (UMI), is a menu driven interface to design a task and assign the levels of teleoperated and autonomous control. The operator also sets up the system monitor which checks safety limits during task execution. Cartesian-space degrees of freedom for teleoperated and/or autonomous control inputs are selected within UMI as well as the weightings for the teleoperation and autonmous inputs. These are then used during task execution to determine the mix of teleoperation and autonomous inputs. Some of the autonomous control primitives available to the user are Joint-Guarded-Move, Cartesian-Guarded-Move, Move-To-Touch, Pin-Insertion/Removal, Door/Crank-Turn, Bolt-Turn, and Slide. The operator can execute a task using pure teleoperation or mix control execution from the autonomous primitives with teleoperated inputs. Presently the shared control environment supports single arm task execution. Work is presently underway to provide the shared control environment for dual arm control. Teleoperation during shared control is only Cartesian space control and no force-reflection is provided. Force-reflecting teleoperation and joint space operator inputs are planned extensions to the environment.

Use of electronic cigarettes in smoke-free environments.

PubMed

Shi, Yuyan; Cummins, Sharon E; Zhu, Shu-Hong

2017-03-01

Although most US states prohibit cigarette smoking in public places and worksites, fewer jurisdictions regulate indoor use of electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes). Given the dramatic increase in e-cigarette use and concern about its impact on non-users, there is a need to examine the use of e-cigarettes in smoke-free environments and related attitudes and perceptions. Recruited from a nationally representative adult panel (GfK's KnowledgePanel), 952 current users of e-cigarettes completed a cross-sectional online survey in 2014. Multivariate logistic regressions were conducted to examine the factors associated with ever using e-cigarettes in smoke-free environments. Overall, 59.5% of e-cigarette users had vaped where cigarette smoking was not allowed. Young adults (18-29 years) were most likely to do so, 74.2%. The places of first-time use most often mentioned were service venues (bar, restaurant, lounge and club), 30.7%, followed by worksites, 23.5%. Daily e-cigarette users were more likely to have vaped in smoke-free environments than non-daily users (OR=2.08, p=0.012). Only 2.5% of those who used e-cigarettes in smoke-free environments reported negative reactions from other people. Most e-cigarette users did not think e-cigarettes are harmful to themselves or to by-standers, and thus should not be banned where smoking is; those who had used e-cigarettes where smoking is banned were even more likely to hold these views. E-cigarette use in smoke-free environments was common, suggesting that most e-cigarette users do not consider smoke-free laws to apply to e-cigarettes. Explicit laws should be considered if jurisdictions want to prohibit e-cigarette use in public places. Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://www.bmj.com/company/products-services/rights-and-licensing/.

NASCAP user's manual, 1978

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cassidy, J. J., III

1978-01-01

NASCAP simulates the charging process for a complex object in either tenuous plasma (geosynchronous orbit) or ground test (electron gun source) environment. Program control words, the structure of user input files, and various user options available are described in this computer programmer's user manual.

Differences in the Limits of Stability Between Older Rolling Walker Users and Older Single-Tip-Cane Users - A Preliminary Study.

PubMed

Liu, Hao Howe; Quiben, Myles; Holmes, Clayton; Connors, Michael; Salem, Yasser

To identify the differences in the limits of stability (LOS) between older rolling walker and single-tip-cane users. This was a matched paired t-test design with repeated measure. Eighteen older subjects were matched based on age, gender, and functional level. The subjects were assessed using the multidirectional reach test initially and 5-month later in four directions: forward, backward, leftward, and rightward. Initially, there were no differences between cane users and rolling walker users in the LOS in all directions. However, 5-month later, the cane users who held their canes in their right hand had significantly better stability in forward and rightward reach than the walker users (p < .05). Further, the walker users demonstrated significantly decreased functional reach in forward reach (p < .05). Cane users might have better stability than walker users in the forward direction and in the direction toward the side holding the cane. This study may provide guide for clinicians including nurses for selecting appropriate rehabilitative interventions for older adults using walkers and canes.

Virtual button interface

DOEpatents

Jones, J.S.

1999-01-12

An apparatus and method of issuing commands to a computer by a user interfacing with a virtual reality environment are disclosed. To issue a command, the user directs gaze at a virtual button within the virtual reality environment, causing a perceptible change in the virtual button, which then sends a command corresponding to the virtual button to the computer, optionally after a confirming action is performed by the user, such as depressing a thumb switch. 4 figs.

Research on multi-user encrypted search scheme in cloud environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Yu, Zonghua; Lin, Sui

2017-05-01

Aiming at the existing problems of multi-user encrypted search scheme in cloud computing environment, a basic multi-user encrypted scheme is proposed firstly, and then the basic scheme is extended to an anonymous hierarchical management authority. Compared with most of the existing schemes, the scheme not only to achieve the protection of keyword information, but also to achieve the protection of user identity privacy; the same time, data owners can directly control the user query permissions, rather than the cloud server. In addition, through the use of a special query key generation rules, to achieve the hierarchical management of the user's query permissions. The safety analysis shows that the scheme is safe and that the performance analysis and experimental data show that the scheme is practicable.

Characterization of Young Adult Emergency Department Users: Evidence to Guide Policy.

PubMed

Burns, Carson; Wang, N Ewen; Goldstein, Benjamin A; Hernandez-Boussard, Tina

2016-12-01

The purpose of this study was to characterize young adult patients aged 19-25 years who are emergency department (ED) frequent users and study factors associated with frequent ED use. ED visits among 19- to 25-year olds were identified from administrative records in California, Florida, Iowa, Massachusetts, and New York, 2010. Patients were analyzed for 12 months to study the frequency of their ED utilization. ED visits were categorized according to primary diagnosis. Patients were stratified by frequency of ED use: one visit (single users), two to four visits (infrequent users), and five or more visits (frequent users) in a 1-year period. We identified 1,711,774 young adult patients who made 3,650,966 ED visits. Sixty-six percent of patients were single users, 29% were infrequent users, and 4.6% were frequent users. Frequent users accounted for a disproportionate 28.8% of visits within the population studied. Frequent users had the largest proportion of visits for complications of pregnancy (13.6%) compared to single users (6.1%) and Medicaid (42.6%) compared to private insurance (17.3%). There was an increased risk of frequent ED use associated with females (odds ratio [OR]: 1.77), Medicaid (OR: 3.21), and Medicare insurance (OR: 4.22) compared to private insurance, and diseases of the blood (OR: 3.36) and mental illness (OR: 1.99) compared to injury and poisoning. Frequent users comprise a significant portion of the young adult ED population and present with a large proportion of visits for complications of pregnancy. Policies targeting this population might focus on improved access to primary and urgent care, acute obstetric care, and better coordination of care. Copyright © 2016 Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

MyWelch: building an information portal system in a medical library environment.

PubMed

Zhang, Dongming; Zambrowicz, Caroline; Zhou, Hong; Roderer, Nancy

2003-01-01

MyWelch is a medical library portal system that users can use to create customized web sites that reflect their research needs and personal interests. In the MyWelch environment, faculty and students are empowered to take a greater role in identifying their needs and determining their requirements in the electronic environment. The portal system also facilitates interaction among library users and staff.

Keynote Presentation: Genome Beat (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

ScienceCinema

Zimmer, Carl [New York Times, New York, NY (United States)

2018-05-23

Carl Zimmer, a reporter for the New York Times, speaks on "The Genome Beat," the opening keynote presentation at the JGI User 7th Annual Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

Keynote Presentation: Genome Beat (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Zimmer, Carl

Carl Zimmer, a reporter for the New York Times, speaks on "The Genome Beat," the opening keynote presentation at the JGI User 7th Annual Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

A Virtual Geant4 Environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Iwai, Go

2015-12-01

We describe the development of an environment for Geant4 consisting of an application and data that provide users with a more efficient way to access Geant4 applications without having to download and build the software locally. The environment is platform neutral and offers the users near-real time performance. In addition, the environment consists of data and Geant4 libraries built using low-level virtual machine (LLVM) tools which can produce bitcode that can be embedded in HTML and accessed via a browser. The bitcode is downloaded to the local machine via the browser and can then be configured by the user. This approach provides a way of minimising the risk of leaking potentially sensitive data used to construct the Geant4 model and application in the medical domain for treatment planning. We describe several applications that have used this approach and compare their performance with that of native applications. We also describe potential user communities that could benefit from this approach.

Single-cell regulome data analysis by SCRAT.

PubMed

Ji, Zhicheng; Zhou, Weiqiang; Ji, Hongkai

2017-09-15

Emerging single-cell technologies (e.g. single-cell ATAC-seq, DNase-seq or ChIP-seq) have made it possible to assay regulome of individual cells. Single-cell regulome data are highly sparse and discrete. Analyzing such data is challenging. User-friendly software tools are still lacking. We present SCRAT, a Single-Cell Regulome Analysis Toolbox with a graphical user interface, for studying cell heterogeneity using single-cell regulome data. SCRAT can be used to conveniently summarize regulatory activities according to different features (e.g. gene sets, transcription factor binding motif sites, etc.). Using these features, users can identify cell subpopulations in a heterogeneous biological sample, infer cell identities of each subpopulation, and discover distinguishing features such as gene sets and transcription factors that show different activities among subpopulations. SCRAT is freely available at https://zhiji.shinyapps.io/scrat as an online web service and at https://github.com/zji90/SCRAT as an R package. hji@jhu.edu. Supplementary data are available at Bioinformatics online. © The Author(s) 2017. Published by Oxford University Press.

A user-system interface agent

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wakim, Nagi T.; Srivastava, Sadanand; Bousaidi, Mehdi; Goh, Gin-Hua

1995-01-01

Agent-based technologies answer to several challenges posed by additional information processing requirements in today's computing environments. In particular, (1) users desire interaction with computing devices in a mode which is similar to that used between people, (2) the efficiency and successful completion of information processing tasks often require a high-level of expertise in complex and multiple domains, (3) information processing tasks often require handling of large volumes of data and, therefore, continuous and endless processing activities. The concept of an agent is an attempt to address these new challenges by introducing information processing environments in which (1) users can communicate with a system in a natural way, (2) an agent is a specialist and a self-learner and, therefore, it qualifies to be trusted to perform tasks independent of the human user, and (3) an agent is an entity that is continuously active performing tasks that are either delegated to it or self-imposed. The work described in this paper focuses on the development of an interface agent for users of a complex information processing environment (IPE). This activity is part of an on-going effort to build a model for developing agent-based information systems. Such systems will be highly applicable to environments which require a high degree of automation, such as, flight control operations and/or processing of large volumes of data in complex domains, such as the EOSDIS environment and other multidisciplinary, scientific data systems. The concept of an agent as an information processing entity is fully described with emphasis on characteristics of special interest to the User-System Interface Agent (USIA). Issues such as agent 'existence' and 'qualification' are discussed in this paper. Based on a definition of an agent and its main characteristics, we propose an architecture for the development of interface agents for users of an IPE that is agent-oriented and whose resources are likely to be distributed and heterogeneous in nature. The architecture of USIA is outlined in two main components: (1) the user interface which is concerned with issues as user dialog and interaction, user modeling, and adaptation to user profile, and (2) the system interface part which deals with identification of IPE capabilities, task understanding and feasibility assessment, and task delegation and coordination of assistant agents.

Enhancing user acceptance of mandated mobile health information systems: the ePOC (electronic point-of-care project) experience.

PubMed

Burgess, Lois; Sargent, Jason

2007-01-01

From a clinical perspective, the use of mobile technologies, such as Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) within hospital environments is not new. A paradigm shift however is underway towards the acceptance and utility of these systems within mobile-based healthcare environments. Introducing new technologies and associated work practices has intrinsic risks which must be addressed. This paper contends that intervening to address user concerns as they arise throughout the system development lifecycle will lead to greater levels of user acceptance, while ultimately enhancing the deliverability of a system that provides a best fit with end user needs. It is envisaged this research will lead to the development of a formalised user acceptance framework based on an agile approach to user acceptance measurement. The results of an ongoing study of user perceptions towards a mandated electronic point-of-care information system in the Northern Illawarra Ambulatory Care Team (TACT) are presented.

The EVER-EST Virtual Research Environment for the European Volcano Supersites

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Salvi, S.; Trasatti, E.; Rubbia, G.; Romaniello, V.; Marelli, F.

2017-12-01

EVER-EST (European Virtual Environment for Research - Earth Science Themes) is an European H2020 project (2015-2018) aimed at the creation of a Virtual Research Environment (VRE) for the Earth Sciences. The VRE is intended to enhance the ability to collaborate and share knowledge and experience among scientists. One of the innovations of the project is the exploitation of the "Research Object" concept (http://www.rohub.org). Research Objects encapsulate not only data and publications, but also algorithms, codes, results, and workflows that can be stored, shared and re-used. Four scientific communities are involved in the EVER-EST project: land monitoring, natural hazards, marine biology, and the GEO Geohazard Supersites community (http://www.earthobservations.org/gsnl.php). The latter is represented in the project by INGV and the University of Iceland, and has provided user requirements to tailor the VRE to the common needs of the worldwide Supersite communities. To develop and test the VRE we have defined user scenarios and created Research Objects embedding research activities and workflows on the Permanent Supersites Campi Flegrei, Mount Etna and Icelandic Volcanoes (http://vm1.everest.psnc.pl/supersites/). While these Supersites are test sites for the platform, during the last year of the project other Supersites may also be involved to demonstrate the added value of the collaborative environment in research activities aiming to support Disaster Risk Reduction. Using the VRE, scientists are able to collaborate with colleagues located in different parts of the world, in a simple and effective way. This includes being able to remotely access and share data, research results and ideas, to carry out training sessions and discussions, to compare different results and models, and to synthesize many different pieces of information in a single consensus product to be disseminated to end-users. In particular, a further need of the Supersite scientists, which can be fulfilled by EVER-EST especially in less developed countries, is the need to access computing resources and software codes for data processing and modelling, as well as tutoring in data analysis and interpretation. Examples and results illustrating the effective use of the VRE will be presented at the conference.

Effective user management with high strength crypto -key in dynamic group environment in cloud

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kumar, P. J.; Suganya, P.; Karthik, G.

2017-11-01

Cloud Clusters consists of various collections of files which are being accessed by multiple users of Cloud. The users are managed as a group and the association of the user to a particular group is dynamic in nature. Every group has a manager who handles the membership of a user to a particular group by issuing keys for encryption and decryption. Due to the dynamic nature of a user he/she may leave the group very frequently. But an attempt can be made by the user who has recently left the group to access a file maintained by that group. Key distribution becomes a critical issue while the behavior of the user is dynamic. Existing techniques to manage the users of group in terms of security and key distribution has been investigated so that to arrive at an objective to identify the scopes to increase security and key management scheme in cloud. The usage of various key combinations to measure the strength of security and efficiency of user management in dynamic cloud environment has been investigated.

Re-Imagining Archival Display: Creating User-Friendly Finding Aids

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Daines, J. Gordon, III; Nimer, Cory L.

2011-01-01

This article examines how finding aids are structured and delivered, considering alternative approaches. It suggests that single-level displays, those that present a single component of a multilevel description to users at a time, have the potential to transform the delivery and display of collection information while improving the user…

Space Environment Information System (SPENVIS)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Kruglanski, M.; Messios, N.; de Donder, E.; Gamby, E.; Calders, S.; Hetey, L.; Evans, H.

2009-04-01

SPENVIS is an ESA operational software developed and maintained at BIRA-IASB since 1996. It provides standardized access to most of the recent models of the hazardous space environment, through a user-friendly Web interface (http://www.spenvis.oma.be/). The system allows spacecraft engineers to perform a rapid analysis of environmental problems related to natural radiation belts, solar energetic particles, cosmic rays, plasmas, gases, magnetic fields and micro-particles. Various reporting and graphical utilities and extensive help facilities are included to allow engineers with relatively little familiarity to produce reliable results. SPENVIS also contains an active, integrated version of the ECSS Space Environment Standard and access to in-flight data on the space environment. Although SPENVIS in the first place is designed to help spacecraft engineers, it is also used by technical universities in their educational programs. At present more than 4000 users are registered. With SPENVIS, one can generate a spacecraft trajectory or a coordinate grid and then calculate: geomagnetic coordinates; trapped proton and electron fluxes; solar proton fluences; cosmic ray fluxes; radiation doses (ionising and non-ionising) for simple geometries; a sectoring analysis for dose calculations in more complex geometries; damage equivalent fluences for Si, GaAs and multi-junction solar cells; Geant4 Monte Carlo analysis for doses and pulse height rates in planar and spherical shields; ion LET and flux spectra and single event upset rates; trapped proton flux anisotropy; atmospheric and ionospheric densities and temperatures; atomic oxygen erosion depths; surface and internal charging characteristics; solar array current collections and power losses; wall damage. The new version of SPENVIS (to be released in January 2009) also allows mission analysis for Mars and Jupiter.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Guha, Saikat; Shapiro, Jeffrey H.; Erkmen, Baris I.

Previous work on the classical information capacities of bosonic channels has established the capacity of the single-user pure-loss channel, bounded the capacity of the single-user thermal-noise channel, and bounded the capacity region of the multiple-access channel. The latter is a multiple-user scenario in which several transmitters seek to simultaneously and independently communicate to a single receiver. We study the capacity region of the bosonic broadcast channel, in which a single transmitter seeks to simultaneously and independently communicate to two different receivers. It is known that the tightest available lower bound on the capacity of the single-user thermal-noise channel is thatmore » channel's capacity if, as conjectured, the minimum von Neumann entropy at the output of a bosonic channel with additive thermal noise occurs for coherent-state inputs. Evidence in support of this minimum output entropy conjecture has been accumulated, but a rigorous proof has not been obtained. We propose a minimum output entropy conjecture that, if proved to be correct, will establish that the capacity region of the bosonic broadcast channel equals the inner bound achieved using a coherent-state encoding and optimum detection. We provide some evidence that supports this conjecture, but again a full proof is not available.« less

Theory and experimental validation of SPLASH (Single Panel Lamp and Shroud Helper).

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Larsen, Marvin Elwood; Porter, Jason M.

2005-06-01

The radiant heat test facility develops test sets providing well-characterized thermal environments, often representing fires. Many of the components and procedures have become standardized to such an extent that the development of a specialized design tool was appropriate. SPLASH (Single Panel Lamp and Shroud Helper) is that tool. SPLASH is implemented as a user-friendly program that allows a designer to describe a test setup in terms of parameters such as lamp number, power, position, and separation distance. Thermal radiation is the dominant mechanism of heat transfer and the SPLASH model solves a radiation enclosure problem to estimate temperature distributions inmore » a shroud providing the boundary condition of interest. Irradiance distribution on a specified viewing plane is also estimated. This document provides the theoretical development for the underlying model. A series of tests were conducted to characterize SPLASH's ability to analyze lamp and shroud systems. The comparison suggests that SPLASH succeeds as a design tool. Simplifications made to keep the model tractable are demonstrated to result in estimates that are only approximately as uncertain as many of the properties and characteristics of the operating environment.« less

Distributed user interfaces for clinical ubiquitous computing applications.

PubMed

Bång, Magnus; Larsson, Anders; Berglund, Erik; Eriksson, Henrik

2005-08-01

Ubiquitous computing with multiple interaction devices requires new interface models that support user-specific modifications to applications and facilitate the fast development of active workspaces. We have developed NOSTOS, a computer-augmented work environment for clinical personnel to explore new user interface paradigms for ubiquitous computing. NOSTOS uses several devices such as digital pens, an active desk, and walk-up displays that allow the system to track documents and activities in the workplace. We present the distributed user interface (DUI) model that allows standalone applications to distribute their user interface components to several devices dynamically at run-time. This mechanism permit clinicians to develop their own user interfaces and forms to clinical information systems to match their specific needs. We discuss the underlying technical concepts of DUIs and show how service discovery, component distribution, events and layout management are dealt with in the NOSTOS system. Our results suggest that DUIs--and similar network-based user interfaces--will be a prerequisite of future mobile user interfaces and essential to develop clinical multi-device environments.

Pricing the Services in Dynamic Environment: Agent Pricing Model

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Žagar, Drago; Rupčić, Slavko; Rimac-Drlje, Snježana

New Internet applications and services as well as new user demands open many new issues concerning dynamic management of quality of service and price for received service, respectively. The main goals of Internet service providers are to maximize profit and maintain a negotiated quality of service. From the users' perspective the main goal is to maximize ratio of received QoS and costs of service. However, achieving these objectives could become very complex if we know that Internet service users might during the session become highly dynamic and proactive. This connotes changes in user profile or network provider/s profile caused by high level of user mobility or variable level of user demands. This paper proposes a new agent based pricing architecture for serving the highly dynamic customers in context of dynamic user/network environment. The proposed architecture comprises main aspects and basic parameters that will enable objective and transparent assessment of the costs for the service those Internet users receive while dynamically change QoS demands and cost profile.

ZeBase: an open-source relational database for zebrafish laboratories.

PubMed

Hensley, Monica R; Hassenplug, Eric; McPhail, Rodney; Leung, Yuk Fai

2012-03-01

Abstract ZeBase is an open-source relational database for zebrafish inventory. It is designed for the recording of genetic, breeding, and survival information of fish lines maintained in a single- or multi-laboratory environment. Users can easily access ZeBase through standard web-browsers anywhere on a network. Convenient search and reporting functions are available to facilitate routine inventory work; such functions can also be automated by simple scripting. Optional barcode generation and scanning are also built-in for easy access to the information related to any fish. Further information of the database and an example implementation can be found at http://zebase.bio.purdue.edu.

A Collaborative Extensible User Environment for Simulation and Knowledge Management

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Freedman, Vicky L.; Lansing, Carina S.; Porter, Ellen A.

2015-06-01

In scientific simulation, scientists use measured data to create numerical models, execute simulations and analyze results from advanced simulators executing on high performance computing platforms. This process usually requires a team of scientists collaborating on data collection, model creation and analysis, and on authorship of publications and data. This paper shows that scientific teams can benefit from a user environment called Akuna that permits subsurface scientists in disparate locations to collaborate on numerical modeling and analysis projects. The Akuna user environment is built on the Velo framework that provides both a rich client environment for conducting and analyzing simulations andmore » a Web environment for data sharing and annotation. Akuna is an extensible toolset that integrates with Velo, and is designed to support any type of simulator. This is achieved through data-driven user interface generation, use of a customizable knowledge management platform, and an extensible framework for simulation execution, monitoring and analysis. This paper describes how the customized Velo content management system and the Akuna toolset are used to integrate and enhance an effective collaborative research and application environment. The extensible architecture of Akuna is also described and demonstrates its usage for creation and execution of a 3D subsurface simulation.« less

The Paleontology Portal: An online resource meeting the needs a spectrum of learners

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Lindberg, D.; Scotchmoor, J. G.

2005-12-01

The Paleontology Portal website provides a central, interactive entry point to high-quality North American paleontology resources on the Internet for multiple audiences: the research community, government and industry, K-16 students, and the general public. The Portal successfully blends research and education, pulling together information with reviewed and annotated website links for a wide variety of informal learners. Using web-based technology and relational databases, users can explore an interactive map and associated stratigraphic column to access information about particular geographic regions, geologic time periods, depositional environments, and representative taxa. Users are also able to search multiple museum collection databases using a single query form of their own design. Other features include highlights of famous fossil sites and assemblages and a fossil image gallery. Throughout the site, users find images and links to information specific to each time period or geographic region, including current research projects and publications, websites, on-line exhibits and educational materials, and information on collecting fossils. The next phase of development will target the development of resource modules on topics such as collection management and fossil preparation, appropriate for users ranging from the general public to professional paleontologists. Another initiative includes developing methods of personalizing the Portal to support exhibits at museums and other venues on geological history and paleontology. The Paleontology Portal, built by the UC Museum of Paleontology, is a joint project of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, the Paleontological Society, and the US Geological Survey, in collaboration with the Paleontological Research Institution, the Fort Worth Museum of Science and History, and the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, which serve as hubs for the project. Paleoportal serves as an effective model in two aspects: (1) providing access to a spectrum of reviewed resources from a single starting interface that enables users from novice to professional to access background-appropriate information, and (2) involvement of a wide range of stakeholders (professional societies, universities and museums, and individuals) in both concept development and management. The project is funded by the National Science Foundation under award no. 0234594

Development of a prototype spatial information processing system for hydrologic research

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sircar, Jayanta K.

1991-01-01

Significant advances have been made in the last decade in the areas of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and spatial analysis technology, both in hardware and software. Science user requirements are so problem specific that currently no single system can satisfy all of the needs. The work presented here forms part of a conceptual framework for an all-encompassing science-user workstation system. While definition and development of the system as a whole will take several years, it is intended that small scale projects such as the current work will address some of the more short term needs. Such projects can provide a quick mechanism to integrate tools into the workstation environment forming a larger, more complete hydrologic analysis platform. Described here are two components that are very important to the practical use of remote sensing and digital map data in hydrology. Described here is a graph-theoretic technique to rasterize elevation contour maps. Also described is a system to manipulate synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data files and extract soil moisture data.

Tool for the Integrated Dynamic Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS)/Turbine Engine Closed-Loop Transient Analysis (TTECTrA) User's Guide

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Chin, Jeffrey C.; Csank, Jeffrey T.

2016-01-01

The Tool for Turbine Engine Closed-Loop Transient Analysis (TTECTrA ver2) is a control design tool thatenables preliminary estimation of transient performance for models without requiring a full nonlinear controller to bedesigned. The program is compatible with subsonic engine models implemented in the MATLAB/Simulink (TheMathworks, Inc.) environment and Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS) framework. At a specified flightcondition, TTECTrA will design a closed-loop controller meeting user-defined requirements in a semi or fully automatedfashion. Multiple specifications may be provided, in which case TTECTrA will design one controller for each, producing acollection of controllers in a single run. Each resulting controller contains a setpoint map, a schedule of setpointcontroller gains, and limiters; all contributing to transient characteristics. The goal of the program is to providesteady-state engine designers with more immediate feedback on the transient engine performance earlier in the design cycle.

Automated Routines for Calculating Whole-Stream Metabolism: Theoretical Background and User's Guide

USGS Publications Warehouse

Bales, Jerad D.; Nardi, Mark R.

2007-01-01

In order to standardize methods and facilitate rapid calculation and archival of stream-metabolism variables, the Stream Metabolism Program was developed to calculate gross primary production, net ecosystem production, respiration, and selected other variables from continuous measurements of dissolved-oxygen concentration, water temperature, and other user-supplied information. Methods for calculating metabolism from continuous measurements of dissolved-oxygen concentration and water temperature are fairly well known, but a standard set of procedures and computation software for all aspects of the calculations were not available previously. The Stream Metabolism Program addresses this deficiency with a stand-alone executable computer program written in Visual Basic.NET?, which runs in the Microsoft Windows? environment. All equations and assumptions used in the development of the software are documented in this report. Detailed guidance on application of the software is presented, along with a summary of the data required to use the software. Data from either a single station or paired (upstream, downstream) stations can be used with the software to calculate metabolism variables.

Development and experimental validation of downlink multiuser MIMO-OFDM in gigabit wireless LAN systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ishihara, Koichi; Asai, Yusuke; Kudo, Riichi; Ichikawa, Takeo; Takatori, Yasushi; Mizoguchi, Masato

2013-12-01

Multiuser multiple-input multiple-output (MU-MIMO) has been proposed as a means to improve spectrum efficiency for various future wireless communication systems. This paper reports indoor experimental results obtained for a newly developed and implemented downlink (DL) MU-MIMO orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) transceiver for gigabit wireless local area network systems in the microwave band. In the transceiver, the channel state information (CSI) is estimated at each user and fed back to an access point (AP) on a real-time basis. At the AP, the estimated CSI is used to calculate the transmit beamforming weight for DL MU-MIMO transmission. This paper also proposes a recursive inverse matrix computation scheme for computing the transmit weight in real time. Experiments with the developed transceiver demonstrate its feasibility in a number of indoor scenarios. The experimental results clarify that DL MU-MIMO-OFDM transmission can achieve a 972-Mbit/s transmission data rate with simple digital signal processing of single-antenna users in an indoor environment.

Document similarity measures and document browsing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ahmadullin, Ildus; Fan, Jian; Damera-Venkata, Niranjan; Lim, Suk Hwan; Lin, Qian; Liu, Jerry; Liu, Sam; O'Brien-Strain, Eamonn; Allebach, Jan

2011-03-01

Managing large document databases is an important task today. Being able to automatically com- pare document layouts and classify and search documents with respect to their visual appearance proves to be desirable in many applications. We measure single page documents' similarity with respect to distance functions between three document components: background, text, and saliency. Each document component is represented as a Gaussian mixture distribution; and distances between dierent documents' components are calculated as probabilistic similarities between corresponding distributions. The similarity measure between documents is represented as a weighted sum of the components' distances. Using this document similarity measure, we propose a browsing mechanism operating on a document dataset. For these purposes, we use a hierarchical browsing environment which we call the document similarity pyramid. It allows the user to browse a large document dataset and to search for documents in the dataset that are similar to the query. The user can browse the dataset on dierent levels of the pyramid, and zoom into the documents that are of interest.

The Creation of a Theoretical Framework for Avatar Creation and Revision

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Beck, Dennis; Murphy, Cheryl

2014-01-01

Multi-User Virtual Environments (MUVE) are increasingly being used in education and provide environments where users can manipulate minute details of their avatar's appearance including those traditionally associated with gender and race identification. The ability to choose racial and gender characteristics differs from real-world educational…

40 CFR 35.925-11 - User charges and industrial cost recovery.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false User charges and industrial cost recovery. 35.925-11 Section 35.925-11 Protection of Environment ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY GRANTS AND OTHER FEDERAL ASSISTANCE STATE AND LOCAL ASSISTANCE Grants for Construction of Treatment Works-Clean...

Reprogramming Bacteria to Seek and Destroy Small Molecules (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Gallivan, Justin

2012-03-21

Justin Gallivan, of Emory University presents a talk titled "Reprogramming Bacteria to Seek and Destroy Small Molecules" at the JGI User 7th Annual Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 21, 2012 in Walnut Creek, CA.

Reprogramming Bacteria to Seek and Destroy Small Molecules (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

ScienceCinema

Gallivan, Justin

2018-05-01

Justin Gallivan, of Emory University presents a talk titled "Reprogramming Bacteria to Seek and Destroy Small Molecules" at the JGI User 7th Annual Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 21, 2012 in Walnut Creek, CA.

Global Village as Virtual Community (On Writing, Thinking, and Teacher Education).

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Polin, Linda

1993-01-01

Describes virtual communities known as Multi-User Simulated Environment (MUSE) or Multi-User Object Oriented environment (MOO), text-based computer "communities" whose inhabitants are a combination of the real people and constructed objects that people agree to treat as real. Describes their uses in the classroom. (SR)

Computing Spacecraft Solar-Cell Damage by Charged Particles

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Gaddy, Edward M.

2006-01-01

General EQFlux is a computer program that converts the measure of the damage done to solar cells in outer space by impingement of electrons and protons having many different kinetic energies into the measure of the damage done by an equivalent fluence of electrons, each having kinetic energy of 1 MeV. Prior to the development of General EQFlux, there was no single computer program offering this capability: For a given type of solar cell, it was necessary to either perform the calculations manually or to use one of three Fortran programs, each of which was applicable to only one type of solar cell. The problem in developing General EQFlux was to rewrite and combine the three programs into a single program that could perform the calculations for three types of solar cells and run in a Windows environment with a Windows graphical user interface. In comparison with the three prior programs, General EQFlux is easier to use.

Operation of a single-channel, sequential Navstar GPS receiver in a helicopter mission environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Edwards, F. G.; Hamlin, J. R.

1984-01-01

It is pointed out that the future utilization of the Navstar Global Positioning System (GPS) by civil helicopters will provide an enhanced performance not obtainable with current navigations systems. GPS will supply properly equipped users with extremely accurate three-dimensional position and velocity information anywhere in the world. Preliminary studies have been conducted to investigate differential GPS concept mechanizations and cost, and to theoretically predict navigation performance and the impact of degradation of the GPS C/A code for national security considerations. The obtained results are encouraging, but certain improvements are needed. As a second step in the program, a single-channel sequential GPS navigator was installed and operated in the NASA SH-3G helicopter. A series of flight tests were conducted. It is found that performance of the Navstar GPS Z-set is quite acceptable to support area navigation and nonprecision approach operations.

Multi-User Hardware Solutions to Combustion Science ISS Research

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Otero, Angel M.

2001-01-01

In response to the budget environment and to expand on the International Space Station (ISS) Fluids and Combustion Facility (FCF) Combustion Integrated Rack (CIR), common hardware approach, the NASA Combustion Science Program shifted focus in 1999 from single investigator PI (Principal Investigator)-specific hardware to multi-user 'Minifacilities'. These mini-facilities would take the CIR common hardware philosophy to the next level. The approach that was developed re-arranged all the investigations in the program into sub-fields of research. Then common requirements within these subfields were used to develop a common system that would then be complemented by a few PI-specific components. The sub-fields of research selected were droplet combustion, solids and fire safety, and gaseous fuels. From these research areas three mini-facilities have sprung: the Multi-user Droplet Combustion Apparatus (MDCA) for droplet research, Flow Enclosure for Novel Investigations in Combustion of Solids (FEANICS) for solids and fire safety, and the Multi-user Gaseous Fuels Apparatus (MGFA) for gaseous fuels. These mini-facilities will develop common Chamber Insert Assemblies (CIA) and diagnostics for the respective investigators complementing the capability provided by CIR. Presently there are four investigators for MDCA, six for FEANICS, and four for MGFA. The goal of these multi-user facilities is to drive the cost per PI down after the initial development investment is made. Each of these mini-facilities will become a fixture of future Combustion Science NASA Research Announcements (NRAs), enabling investigators to propose against an existing capability. Additionally, an investigation is provided the opportunity to enhance the existing capability to bridge the gap between the capability and their specific science requirements. This multi-user development approach will enable the Combustion Science Program to drive cost per investigation down while drastically reducing the time required to go from selection to space flight.

Trade Space Specification Tool (TSST) for Rapid Mission Architecture (Version 1.2)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wang, Yeou-Fang; Schrock, Mitchell; Borden, Chester S.; Moeller, Robert C.

2013-01-01

Trade Space Specification Tool (TSST) is designed to capture quickly ideas in the early spacecraft and mission architecture design and categorize them into trade space dimensions and options for later analysis. It is implemented as an Eclipse RCP Application, which can be run as a standalone program. Users rapidly create concept items with single clicks on a graphical canvas, and can organize and create linkages between the ideas using drag-and-drop actions within the same graphical view. Various views such as a trade view, rules view, and architecture view are provided to help users to visualize the trade space. This software can identify, explore, and assess aspects of the mission trade space, as well as capture and organize linkages/dependencies between trade space components. The tool supports a user-in-the-loop preliminary logical examination and filtering of trade space options to help identify which paths in the trade space are feasible (and preferred) and what analyses need to be done later with executable models. This tool provides multiple user views of the trade space to guide the analyst/team to facilitate interpretation and communication of the trade space components and linkages, identify gaps in combining and selecting trade space options, and guide user decision-making for which combinations of architectural options should be pursued for further evaluation. This software provides an environment to capture mission trade space elements rapidly and assist users for their architecture analysis. This is primarily focused on mission and spacecraft architecture design, rather than general-purpose design application. In addition, it provides more flexibility to create concepts and organize the ideas. The software is developed as an Eclipse plug-in and potentially can be integrated with other Eclipse-based tools.

Dynamics of backlight luminance for using smartphone in dark environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Na, Nooree; Jang, Jiho; Suk, Hyeon-Jeong

2014-02-01

This study developed dynamic backlight luminance, which gradually changes as time passes for comfortable use of a smartphone display in a dark environment. The study was carried out in two stages. In the first stage, a user test was conducted to identify the optimal luminance by assessing the facial squint level, subjective glare evaluation, eye blink frequency and users' subjective preferences. Based on the results of the user test, the dynamics of backlight luminance was designed. It has two levels of luminance: the optimal level for initial viewing to avoid sudden glare or fatigue to users' eyes, and the optimal level for constant viewing, which is comfortable, but also bright enough for constant reading of the displayed material. The luminance for initial viewing starts from 10 cd/m2, and it gradually increases to 40 cd/m2 for users' visual comfort at constant viewing for 20 seconds; In the second stage, a validation test on dynamics of backlight luminance was conducted to verify the effectiveness of the developed dynamics. It involving users' subjective preferences, eye blink frequency, and brainwave analysis using the electroencephalogram (EEG) to confirm that the proposed dynamic backlighting enhances users' visual comfort and visual cognition, particularly for using smartphones in a dark environment.

Tavaxy: Integrating Taverna and Galaxy workflows with cloud computing support

PubMed Central

2012-01-01

Background Over the past decade the workflow system paradigm has evolved as an efficient and user-friendly approach for developing complex bioinformatics applications. Two popular workflow systems that have gained acceptance by the bioinformatics community are Taverna and Galaxy. Each system has a large user-base and supports an ever-growing repository of application workflows. However, workflows developed for one system cannot be imported and executed easily on the other. The lack of interoperability is due to differences in the models of computation, workflow languages, and architectures of both systems. This lack of interoperability limits sharing of workflows between the user communities and leads to duplication of development efforts. Results In this paper, we present Tavaxy, a stand-alone system for creating and executing workflows based on using an extensible set of re-usable workflow patterns. Tavaxy offers a set of new features that simplify and enhance the development of sequence analysis applications: It allows the integration of existing Taverna and Galaxy workflows in a single environment, and supports the use of cloud computing capabilities. The integration of existing Taverna and Galaxy workflows is supported seamlessly at both run-time and design-time levels, based on the concepts of hierarchical workflows and workflow patterns. The use of cloud computing in Tavaxy is flexible, where the users can either instantiate the whole system on the cloud, or delegate the execution of certain sub-workflows to the cloud infrastructure. Conclusions Tavaxy reduces the workflow development cycle by introducing the use of workflow patterns to simplify workflow creation. It enables the re-use and integration of existing (sub-) workflows from Taverna and Galaxy, and allows the creation of hybrid workflows. Its additional features exploit recent advances in high performance cloud computing to cope with the increasing data size and complexity of analysis. The system can be accessed either through a cloud-enabled web-interface or downloaded and installed to run within the user's local environment. All resources related to Tavaxy are available at http://www.tavaxy.org. PMID:22559942

The ESA Space Environment Information System (SPENVIS)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Heynderickx, D.; Quaghebeur, B.; Evans, H. D. R.

2002-01-01

The ESA SPace ENVironment Information System (SPENVIS) provides standardized access to models of the hazardous space environment through a user-friendly WWW interface. The interface includes parameter input with extensive defaulting, definition of user environments, streamlined production of results (both in graphical and textual form), background information, and on-line help. It is available on-line at http://www.spenvis.oma.be/spenvis/. SPENVIS Is designed to help spacecraft engineers perform rapid analyses of environmental problems and, with extensive documentation and tutorial information, allows engineers with relatively little familiarity with the models to produce reliable results. It has been developed in response to the increasing pressure for rapid-response tools for system engineering, especially in low-cost commercial and educational programmes. It is very useful in conjunction with radiation effects and electrostatic charging testing in the context of hardness assurance. SPENVIS is based on internationally recognized standard models and methods in many domains. It uses an ESA-developed orbit generator to produce orbital point files necessary for many different types of problem. It has various reporting and graphical utilities, and extensive help facilities. The SPENVIS radiation module features models of the proton and electron radiation belts, as well as solar energetic particle and cosmic ray models. The particle spectra serve as input to models of ionising dose (SHIELDOSE), Non-Ionising Energy Loss (NIEL), and Single Event Upsets (CREME). Material shielding is taken into account for all these models, either as a set of user-defined shielding thicknesses, or in combination with a sectoring analysis that produces a shielding distribution from a geometric description of the satellite system. A sequence of models, from orbit generator to folding dose curves with a shielding distribution, can be run as one process, which minimizes user interaction and facilitates multiple runs with different orbital or shielding configurations. SPENVIS features a number of models and tools for evaluating spacecraft charging. The DERA DICTAT tool for evaluation of internal charging calculates the electron current that passes through a conductive shield and becomes deposited inside a dielectric, and predicts whether an electrostatic discharge will occur. SPENVIS has implemented the DERA EQUIPOT non-geometrical tool for assessing material susceptibility to charging in typical orbital environments, including polar and GEO environments. SPENVIS Also includes SOLARC, for assessment of the current collection and the floating potential of solar arrays in LEO. Finally, the system features access to data from surface charging events on CRRES and the Russian Gorizont spacecraft, in the form of spectrograms and double Maxwellian fit parameters. SPENVIS also contains an active, integrated version of the ECSS Space Environment Standard, and access to in-flight data. Apart from radiation and plasma environments, SPENVIS includes meteoroid and debris models, atmospheric models (including atomic oxygen), and magnetic field models implemented by means of the UNILIB library for magnetic coordinate evaluation, magnetic field line tracing and drift shell tracing. The UNILIB library is freely accessible from the Web (http://www.magnet.oma.be/unilib/) for downloading in the form of a Fortran object library for different platforms (DecAlpha, SunOS, HPUX and PC/MS-Windows).

3D multiplayer virtual pets game using Google Card Board

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Herumurti, Darlis; Riskahadi, Dimas; Kuswardayan, Imam

2017-08-01

Virtual Reality (VR) is a technology which allows user to interact with the virtual environment. This virtual environment is generated and simulated by computer. This technology can make user feel the sensation when they are in the virtual environment. The VR technology provides real virtual environment view for user and it is not viewed from screen. But it needs another additional device to show the view of virtual environment. This device is known as Head Mounted Device (HMD). Oculust Rift and Microsoft Hololens are the most famous HMD devices used in VR. And in 2014, Google Card Board was introduced at Google I/O developers conference. Google Card Board is VR platform which allows user to enjoy the VR with simple and cheap way. In this research, we explore Google Card Board to develop simulation game of raising pet. The Google Card Board is used to create view for the VR environment. The view and control in VR environment is built using Unity game engine. And the simulation process is designed using Finite State Machine (FSM). This FSM can help to design the process clearly. So the simulation process can describe the simulation of raising pet well. Raising pet is fun activity. But sometimes, there are many conditions which cause raising pet become difficult to do, i.e. environment condition, disease, high cost, etc. this research aims to explore and implement Google Card Board in simulation of raising pet.

Design strategies and functionality of the Visual Interface for Virtual Interaction Development (VIVID) tool

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Nguyen, Lac; Kenney, Patrick J.

1993-01-01

Development of interactive virtual environments (VE) has typically consisted of three primary activities: model (object) development, model relationship tree development, and environment behavior definition and coding. The model and relationship tree development activities are accomplished with a variety of well-established graphic library (GL) based programs - most utilizing graphical user interfaces (GUI) with point-and-click interactions. Because of this GUI format, little programming expertise on the part of the developer is necessary to create the 3D graphical models or to establish interrelationships between the models. However, the third VE development activity, environment behavior definition and coding, has generally required the greatest amount of time and programmer expertise. Behaviors, characteristics, and interactions between objects and the user within a VE must be defined via command line C coding prior to rendering the environment scenes. In an effort to simplify this environment behavior definition phase for non-programmers, and to provide easy access to model and tree tools, a graphical interface and development tool has been created. The principal thrust of this research is to effect rapid development and prototyping of virtual environments. This presentation will discuss the 'Visual Interface for Virtual Interaction Development' (VIVID) tool; an X-Windows based system employing drop-down menus for user selection of program access, models, and trees, behavior editing, and code generation. Examples of these selection will be highlighted in this presentation, as will the currently available program interfaces. The functionality of this tool allows non-programming users access to all facets of VE development while providing experienced programmers with a collection of pre-coded behaviors. In conjunction with its existing, interfaces and predefined suite of behaviors, future development plans for VIVID will be described. These include incorporation of dual user virtual environment enhancements, tool expansion, and additional behaviors.

78 FR 19714 - User Fees and Refunds for Premarket Approval Applications and Device Biologics License...

Federal Register 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014

2013-04-02

...] User Fees and Refunds for Premarket Approval Applications and Device Biologics License Applications... availability of the guidance entitled ``User Fees and Refunds for Premarket Approval Applications (PMAs) and... for single copies of the guidance document entitled ``User Fees and Refunds for Premarket Approval...

Enabling a systems biology knowledgebase with gaggle and firegoose

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Baliga, Nitin S.

The overall goal of this project was to extend the existing Gaggle and Firegoose systems to develop an open-source technology that runs over the web and links desktop applications with many databases and software applications. This technology would enable researchers to incorporate workflows for data analysis that can be executed from this interface to other online applications. The four specific aims were to (1) provide one-click mapping of genes, proteins, and complexes across databases and species; (2) enable multiple simultaneous workflows; (3) expand sophisticated data analysis for online resources; and enhance open-source development of the Gaggle-Firegoose infrastructure. Gaggle is anmore » open-source Java software system that integrates existing bioinformatics programs and data sources into a user-friendly, extensible environment to allow interactive exploration, visualization, and analysis of systems biology data. Firegoose is an extension to the Mozilla Firefox web browser that enables data transfer between websites and desktop tools including Gaggle. In the last phase of this funding period, we have made substantial progress on development and application of the Gaggle integration framework. We implemented the workspace to the Network Portal. Users can capture data from Firegoose and save them to the workspace. Users can create workflows to start multiple software components programmatically and pass data between them. Results of analysis can be saved to the cloud so that they can be easily restored on any machine. We also developed the Gaggle Chrome Goose, a plugin for the Google Chrome browser in tandem with an opencpu server in the Amazon EC2 cloud. This allows users to interactively perform data analysis on a single web page using the R packages deployed on the opencpu server. The cloud-based framework facilitates collaboration between researchers from multiple organizations. We have made a number of enhancements to the cmonkey2 application to enable and improve the integration within different environments, and we have created a new tools pipeline for generating EGRIN2 models in a largely automated way.« less

Auditory Environment Across the Life Span of Cochlear Implant Users: Insights From Data Logging.

PubMed

Busch, Tobias; Vanpoucke, Filiep; van Wieringen, Astrid

2017-05-24

We describe the natural auditory environment of people with cochlear implants (CIs), how it changes across the life span, and how it varies between individuals. We performed a retrospective cross-sectional analysis of Cochlear Nucleus 6 CI sound-processor data logs. The logs were obtained from 1,501 people with CIs (ages 0-96 years). They covered over 2.4 million hr of implant use and indicated how much time the CI users had spent in various acoustical environments. We investigated exposure to spoken language, noise, music, and quiet, and analyzed variation between age groups, users, and countries. CI users spent a substantial part of their daily life in noisy environments. As a consequence, most speech was presented in background noise. We found significant differences between age groups for all auditory scenes. Yet even within the same age group and country, variability between individuals was substantial. Regardless of their age, people with CIs face challenging acoustical environments in their daily life. Our results underline the importance of supporting them with assistive listening technology. Moreover, we found large differences between individuals' auditory diets that might contribute to differences in rehabilitation outcomes. Their causes and effects should be investigated further.

Non-cigarette tobacco and poly-tobacco use among persons living with HIV drawn from a nationally representative sample*

PubMed Central

Pacek, Lauren R.; Sweitzer, Maggie M.; McClernon, F. Joseph

2016-01-01

Introduction Smoking is more prevalent among persons living with HIV (PLWH) than the general population. Little is known about the prevalence of non-cigarette tobacco and poly-tobacco use (PTU; using multiple tobacco products) among this population, which, in the general population is associated with poor health and cessation outcomes. We aimed to characterize the prevalence of cigarette and non-cigarette tobacco use, PTU, and correlates of tobacco use status among a nationally-representative sample of PLWH. Methods Data came from 472 HIV-positive adults from the 2005-2013 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH). Results The prevalence of PTU overall was 8.7% (95% CI=5.6-13.2), and 16.6% (95% CI=10.2-25.7) among past-year tobacco users. In multinomial logistic regression analyses, participants with a high school education or greater (aRRR=2.03, 95% CI=1.03-4.00) were more likely to be non-tobacco users than single product users. Past year drug users (aRRR=0.35, 95% CI=0.19-0.66) and past month binge drinkers (aRRR=0.24, 95% CI=0.12-0.50) were less likely to be non-tobacco users than single product users. Compared to 18-25 year olds, individuals age 26-34 (aRRR=0.13, 95% CI=0.03-0.65) and 35+ (aRRR=0.24, 95% CI=0.09-0.63), and with lifetime anxiety disorder(s) (aRRR=0.18, 95% CI=0.06-0.57) were less likely to be PTUs as compared to single product users. Individuals who reported liking to test themselves by doing risky things were more likely to be PTUs than single product users (aRRR=2.95, 95% CI=1.27-6.84). Conclusions PTU was slightly higher than in the general population, and should be taken into account when developing cessation interventions tailored to tobacco users living with HIV. PMID:27049581

User-Centered Computer Aided Language Learning

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zaphiris, Panayiotis, Ed.; Zacharia, Giorgos, Ed.

2006-01-01

In the field of computer aided language learning (CALL), there is a need for emphasizing the importance of the user. "User-Centered Computer Aided Language Learning" presents methodologies, strategies, and design approaches for building interfaces for a user-centered CALL environment, creating a deeper understanding of the opportunities and…

Prototyping an institutional IAIMS/UMLS information environment for an academic medical center.

PubMed

Miller, P L; Paton, J A; Clyman, J I; Powsner, S M

1992-07-01

The paper describes a prototype information environment designed to link network-based information resources in an integrated fashion and thus enhance the information capabilities of an academic medical center. The prototype was implemented on a single Macintosh computer to permit exploration of the overall "information architecture" and to demonstrate the various desired capabilities prior to full-scale network-based implementation. At the heart of the prototype are two components: a diverse set of information resources available over an institutional computer network and an information sources map designed to assist users in finding and accessing information resources relevant to their needs. The paper describes these and other components of the prototype and presents a scenario illustrating its use. The prototype illustrates the link between the goals of two National Library of Medicine initiatives, the Integrated Academic Information Management System (IAIMS) and the Unified Medical Language System (UMLS).

Using a commodity high-definition television for collaborative structural biology

PubMed Central

Yennamalli, Ragothaman; Arangarasan, Raj; Bryden, Aaron; Gleicher, Michael; Phillips, George N.

2014-01-01

Visualization of protein structures using stereoscopic systems is frequently needed by structural biologists working to understand a protein’s structure–function relationships. Often several scientists are working as a team and need simultaneous interaction with each other and the graphics representations. Most existing molecular visualization tools support single-user tasks, which are not suitable for a collaborative group. Expensive caves, domes or geowalls have been developed, but the availability and low cost of high-definition televisions (HDTVs) and game controllers in the commodity entertainment market provide an economically attractive option to achieve a collaborative environment. This paper describes a low-cost environment, using standard consumer game controllers and commercially available stereoscopic HDTV monitors with appropriate signal converters for structural biology collaborations employing existing binary distributions of commonly used software packages like Coot, PyMOL, Chimera, VMD, O, Olex2 and others. PMID:24904249

Accuracy assessment of the Precise Point Positioning method applied for surveys and tracking moving objects in GIS environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ilieva, Tamara; Gekov, Svetoslav

2017-04-01

The Precise Point Positioning (PPP) method gives the users the opportunity to determine point locations using a single GNSS receiver. The accuracy of the determined by PPP point locations is better in comparison to the standard point positioning, due to the precise satellite orbit and clock corrections that are developed and maintained by the International GNSS Service (IGS). The aim of our current research is the accuracy assessment of the PPP method applied for surveys and tracking moving objects in GIS environment. The PPP data is collected by using preliminary developed by us software application that allows different sets of attribute data for the measurements and their accuracy to be used. The results from the PPP measurements are directly compared within the geospatial database to different other sets of terrestrial data - measurements obtained by total stations, real time kinematic and static GNSS.

An authentication infrastructure for today and tomorrow

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Engert, D.E.

1996-06-01

The Open Software Foundation`s Distributed Computing Environment (OSF/DCE) was originally designed to provide a secure environment for distributed applications. By combining it with Kerberos Version 5 from MIT, it can be extended to provide network security as well. This combination can be used to build both an inter and intra organizational infrastructure while providing single sign-on for the user with overall improved security. The ESnet community of the Department of Energy is building just such an infrastructure. ESnet has modified these systems to improve their interoperability, while encouraging the developers to incorporate these changes and work more closely together tomore » continue to improve the interoperability. The success of this infrastructure depends on its flexibility to meet the needs of many applications and network security requirements. The open nature of Kerberos, combined with the vendor support of OSF/DCE, provides the infrastructure for today and tomorrow.« less

Securing Sensitive Flight and Engine Simulation Data Using Smart Card Technology

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Blaser, Tammy M.

2003-01-01

NASA Glenn Research Center has developed a smart card prototype capable of encrypting and decrypting disk files required to run a distributed aerospace propulsion simulation. Triple Data Encryption Standard (3DES) encryption is used to secure the sensitive intellectual property on disk pre, during, and post simulation execution. The prototype operates as a secure system and maintains its authorized state by safely storing and permanently retaining the encryption keys only on the smart card. The prototype is capable of authenticating a single smart card user and includes pre simulation and post simulation tools for analysis and training purposes. The prototype's design is highly generic and can be used to protect any sensitive disk files with growth capability to urn multiple simulations. The NASA computer engineer developed the prototype on an interoperable programming environment to enable porting to other Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS) capable operating system environments.

A visualization environment for supercomputing-based applications in computational mechanics

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Pavlakos, C.J.; Schoof, L.A.; Mareda, J.F.

1993-06-01

In this paper, we characterize a visualization environment that has been designed and prototyped for a large community of scientists and engineers, with an emphasis in superconducting-based computational mechanics. The proposed environment makes use of a visualization server concept to provide effective, interactive visualization to the user`s desktop. Benefits of using the visualization server approach are discussed. Some thoughts regarding desirable features for visualization server hardware architectures are also addressed. A brief discussion of the software environment is included. The paper concludes by summarizing certain observations which we have made regarding the implementation of such visualization environments.

Research on Influence of Cloud Environment on Traditional Network Security

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ming, Xiaobo; Guo, Jinhua

2018-02-01

Cloud computing is a symbol of the progress of modern information network, cloud computing provides a lot of convenience to the Internet users, but it also brings a lot of risk to the Internet users. Second, one of the main reasons for Internet users to choose cloud computing is that the network security performance is great, it also is the cornerstone of cloud computing applications. This paper briefly explores the impact on cloud environment on traditional cybersecurity, and puts forward corresponding solutions.

An Interactive, Web-based High Performance Modeling Environment for Computational Epidemiology.

PubMed

Deodhar, Suruchi; Bisset, Keith R; Chen, Jiangzhuo; Ma, Yifei; Marathe, Madhav V

2014-07-01

We present an integrated interactive modeling environment to support public health epidemiology. The environment combines a high resolution individual-based model with a user-friendly web-based interface that allows analysts to access the models and the analytics back-end remotely from a desktop or a mobile device. The environment is based on a loosely-coupled service-oriented-architecture that allows analysts to explore various counter factual scenarios. As the modeling tools for public health epidemiology are getting more sophisticated, it is becoming increasingly hard for non-computational scientists to effectively use the systems that incorporate such models. Thus an important design consideration for an integrated modeling environment is to improve ease of use such that experimental simulations can be driven by the users. This is achieved by designing intuitive and user-friendly interfaces that allow users to design and analyze a computational experiment and steer the experiment based on the state of the system. A key feature of a system that supports this design goal is the ability to start, stop, pause and roll-back the disease propagation and intervention application process interactively. An analyst can access the state of the system at any point in time and formulate dynamic interventions based on additional information obtained through state assessment. In addition, the environment provides automated services for experiment set-up and management, thus reducing the overall time for conducting end-to-end experimental studies. We illustrate the applicability of the system by describing computational experiments based on realistic pandemic planning scenarios. The experiments are designed to demonstrate the system's capability and enhanced user productivity.

An Interactive, Web-based High Performance Modeling Environment for Computational Epidemiology

PubMed Central

Deodhar, Suruchi; Bisset, Keith R.; Chen, Jiangzhuo; Ma, Yifei; Marathe, Madhav V.

2014-01-01

We present an integrated interactive modeling environment to support public health epidemiology. The environment combines a high resolution individual-based model with a user-friendly web-based interface that allows analysts to access the models and the analytics back-end remotely from a desktop or a mobile device. The environment is based on a loosely-coupled service-oriented-architecture that allows analysts to explore various counter factual scenarios. As the modeling tools for public health epidemiology are getting more sophisticated, it is becoming increasingly hard for non-computational scientists to effectively use the systems that incorporate such models. Thus an important design consideration for an integrated modeling environment is to improve ease of use such that experimental simulations can be driven by the users. This is achieved by designing intuitive and user-friendly interfaces that allow users to design and analyze a computational experiment and steer the experiment based on the state of the system. A key feature of a system that supports this design goal is the ability to start, stop, pause and roll-back the disease propagation and intervention application process interactively. An analyst can access the state of the system at any point in time and formulate dynamic interventions based on additional information obtained through state assessment. In addition, the environment provides automated services for experiment set-up and management, thus reducing the overall time for conducting end-to-end experimental studies. We illustrate the applicability of the system by describing computational experiments based on realistic pandemic planning scenarios. The experiments are designed to demonstrate the system's capability and enhanced user productivity. PMID:25530914

Pulse sequence programming in a dynamic visual environment: SequenceTree.

PubMed

Magland, Jeremy F; Li, Cheng; Langham, Michael C; Wehrli, Felix W

2016-01-01

To describe SequenceTree, an open source, integrated software environment for implementing MRI pulse sequences and, ideally, exporting them to actual MRI scanners. The software is a user-friendly alternative to vendor-supplied pulse sequence design and editing tools and is suited for programmers and nonprogrammers alike. The integrated user interface was programmed using the Qt4/C++ toolkit. As parameters and code are modified, the pulse sequence diagram is automatically updated within the user interface. Several aspects of pulse programming are handled automatically, allowing users to focus on higher-level aspects of sequence design. Sequences can be simulated using a built-in Bloch equation solver and then exported for use on a Siemens MRI scanner. Ideally, other types of scanners will be supported in the future. SequenceTree has been used for 8 years in our laboratory and elsewhere and has contributed to more than 50 peer-reviewed publications in areas such as cardiovascular imaging, solid state and nonproton NMR, MR elastography, and high-resolution structural imaging. SequenceTree is an innovative, open source, visual pulse sequence environment for MRI combining simplicity with flexibility and is ideal both for advanced users and users with limited programming experience. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Modeling users, context and devices for ambient assisted living environments.

PubMed

Castillejo, Eduardo; Almeida, Aitor; López-de-Ipiña, Diego; Chen, Liming

2014-03-17

The participation of users within AAL environments is increasing thanks to the capabilities of the current wearable devices. Furthermore, the significance of considering user's preferences, context conditions and device's capabilities help smart environments to personalize services and resources for them. Being aware of different characteristics of the entities participating in these situations is vital for reaching the main goals of the corresponding systems efficiently. To collect different information from these entities, it is necessary to design several formal models which help designers to organize and give some meaning to the gathered data. In this paper, we analyze several literature solutions for modeling users, context and devices considering different approaches in the Ambient Assisted Living domain. Besides, we remark different ongoing standardization works in this area. We also discuss the used techniques, modeled characteristics and the advantages and drawbacks of each approach to finally draw several conclusions about the reviewed works.

Modeling Users, Context and Devices for Ambient Assisted Living Environments

PubMed Central

Castillejo, Eduardo; Almeida, Aitor; López-de-Ipiña, Diego; Chen, Liming

2014-01-01

The participation of users within AAL environments is increasing thanks to the capabilities of the current wearable devices. Furthermore, the significance of considering user's preferences, context conditions and device's capabilities help smart environments to personalize services and resources for them. Being aware of different characteristics of the entities participating in these situations is vital for reaching the main goals of the corresponding systems efficiently. To collect different information from these entities, it is necessary to design several formal models which help designers to organize and give some meaning to the gathered data. In this paper, we analyze several literature solutions for modeling users, context and devices considering different approaches in the Ambient Assisted Living domain. Besides, we remark different ongoing standardization works in this area. We also discuss the used techniques, modeled characteristics and the advantages and drawbacks of each approach to finally draw several conclusions about the reviewed works. PMID:24643006

Virtual World Currency Value Fluctuation Prediction System Based on User Sentiment Analysis.

PubMed

Kim, Young Bin; Lee, Sang Hyeok; Kang, Shin Jin; Choi, Myung Jin; Lee, Jung; Kim, Chang Hun

2015-01-01

In this paper, we present a method for predicting the value of virtual currencies used in virtual gaming environments that support multiple users, such as massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs). Predicting virtual currency values in a virtual gaming environment has rarely been explored; it is difficult to apply real-world methods for predicting fluctuating currency values or shares to the virtual gaming world on account of differences in domains between the two worlds. To address this issue, we herein predict virtual currency value fluctuations by collecting user opinion data from a virtual community and analyzing user sentiments or emotions from the opinion data. The proposed method is straightforward and applicable to predicting virtual currencies as well as to gaming environments, including MMORPGs. We test the proposed method using large-scale MMORPGs and demonstrate that virtual currencies can be effectively and efficiently predicted with it.

Enhancing user experience by using multi-sensor data fusion to predict phone's luminance

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Marhoubi, Asmaa H.

2017-09-01

The movement of a phone in an environment with different brightness, makes the luminance prediction challenging. The ambient light sensor takes time to modify the brightness of the screen based on the environment it is placed in. This causes an unsatisfactory user experience and delays in adjustment of the screen brightness. In this research, a method is proposed for enhancing the prediction of luminance using accelerometer, gyroscope and speed measurement technique. The speed of the phone is identified using Sum-of-Sine parameters. The lux values are then fused with the accelerometer and gyroscope data to present more accurate luminance values for the ALS based on the movement of the phone. An investigation is made during the movement of the user in a standard lighting environment. This enhances the user experience and improves the screen brightness precision. The accuracy has given an R-Square value of up to 0.97.

Securing the User's Work Environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Cardo, Nicholas P.

2004-01-01

High performance computing at the Numerical Aerospace Simulation Facility at NASA Ames Research Center includes C90's, J90's and Origin 2000's. Not only is it necessary to protect these systems from outside attacks, but also to provide a safe working environment on the systems. With the right tools, security anomalies in the user s work environment can be deleted and corrected. Validating proper ownership of files against user s permissions, will reduce the risk of inadvertent data compromise. The detection of extraneous directories and files hidden amongst user home directories is important for identifying potential compromises. The first runs of these utilities detected over 350,000 files with problems. With periodic scans, automated correction of problems takes only minutes. Tools for detecting these types of problems as well as their development techniques will be discussed with emphasis on consistency, portability and efficiency for both UNICOS and IRIX.

Virtual World Currency Value Fluctuation Prediction System Based on User Sentiment Analysis

PubMed Central

Kim, Young Bin; Lee, Sang Hyeok; Kang, Shin Jin; Choi, Myung Jin; Lee, Jung; Kim, Chang Hun

2015-01-01

In this paper, we present a method for predicting the value of virtual currencies used in virtual gaming environments that support multiple users, such as massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPGs). Predicting virtual currency values in a virtual gaming environment has rarely been explored; it is difficult to apply real-world methods for predicting fluctuating currency values or shares to the virtual gaming world on account of differences in domains between the two worlds. To address this issue, we herein predict virtual currency value fluctuations by collecting user opinion data from a virtual community and analyzing user sentiments or emotions from the opinion data. The proposed method is straightforward and applicable to predicting virtual currencies as well as to gaming environments, including MMORPGs. We test the proposed method using large-scale MMORPGs and demonstrate that virtual currencies can be effectively and efficiently predicted with it. PMID:26241496

Dairy Analytics and Nutrient Analysis (DANA) Prototype System User Manual

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sam Alessi; Dennis Keiser

2012-10-01

This document is a user manual for the Dairy Analytics and Nutrient Analysis (DANA) model. DANA provides an analysis of dairy anaerobic digestion technology and allows users to calculate biogas production, co-product valuation, capital costs, expenses, revenue and financial metrics, for user customizable scenarios, dairy and digester types. The model provides results for three anaerobic digester types; Covered Lagoons, Modified Plug Flow, and Complete Mix, and three main energy production technologies; electricity generation, renewable natural gas generation, and compressed natural gas generation. Additional options include different dairy types, bedding types, backend treatment type as well as numerous production, and economicmore » parameters. DANA’s goal is to extend the National Market Value of Anaerobic Digester Products analysis (informa economics, 2012; Innovation Center, 2011) to include a greater and more flexible set of regional digester scenarios and to provide a modular framework for creation of a tool to support farmer and investor needs. Users can set up scenarios from combinations of existing parameters or add new parameters, run the model and view a variety of reports, charts and tables that are automatically produced and delivered over the web interface. DANA is based in the INL’s analysis architecture entitled Generalized Environment for Modeling Systems (GEMS) , which offers extensive collaboration, analysis, and integration opportunities and greatly speeds the ability construct highly scalable web delivered user-oriented decision tools. DANA’s approach uses server-based data processing and web-based user interfaces, rather a client-based spreadsheet approach. This offers a number of benefits over the client-based approach. Server processing and storage can scale up to handle a very large number of scenarios, so that analysis of county, even field level, across the whole U.S., can be performed. Server based databases allow dairy and digester parameters be held and managed in a single managed data repository, while allows users to customize standard values and perform individual analysis. Server-based calculations can be easily extended, versions and upgrades managed, and any changes are immediately available to all users. This user manual describes how to use and/or modify input database tables, run DANA, view and modify reports.« less

CLIPS, AppleEvents, and AppleScript: Integrating CLIPS with commercial software

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Compton, Michael M.; Wolfe, Shawn R.

1994-01-01

Many of today's intelligent systems are comprised of several modules, perhaps written in different tools and languages, that together help solve the user's problem. These systems often employ a knowledge-based component that is not accessed directly by the user, but instead operates 'in the background' offering assistance to the user as necessary. In these types of modular systems, an efficient, flexible, and eady-to-use mechanism for sharing data between programs is crucial. To help permit transparent integration of CLIPS with other Macintosh applications, the AI Research Branch at NASA Ames Research Center has extended CLIPS to allow it to communicate transparently with other applications through two popular data-sharing mechanisms provided by the Macintosh operating system: Apple Events (a 'high-level' event mechanism for program-to-program communication), and AppleScript, a recently-released scripting language for the Macintosh. This capability permits other applications (running on either the same or a remote machine) to send a command to CLIPS, which then responds as if the command were typed into the CLIPS dialog window. Any result returned by the command is then automatically returned to the program that sent it. Likewise, CLIPS can send several types of Apple Events directly to other local or remote applications. This CLIPS system has been successfully integrated with a variety of commercial applications, including data collection programs, electronics forms packages, DBMS's, and email programs. These mechanisms can permit transparent user access to the knowledge base from within a commercial application, and allow a single copy of the knowledge base to service multiple users in a networked environment.

BIRCH: a user-oriented, locally-customizable, bioinformatics system.

PubMed

Fristensky, Brian

2007-02-09

Molecular biologists need sophisticated analytical tools which often demand extensive computational resources. While finding, installing, and using these tools can be challenging, pipelining data from one program to the next is particularly awkward, especially when using web-based programs. At the same time, system administrators tasked with maintaining these tools do not always appreciate the needs of research biologists. BIRCH (Biological Research Computing Hierarchy) is an organizational framework for delivering bioinformatics resources to a user group, scaling from a single lab to a large institution. The BIRCH core distribution includes many popular bioinformatics programs, unified within the GDE (Genetic Data Environment) graphic interface. Of equal importance, BIRCH provides the system administrator with tools that simplify the job of managing a multiuser bioinformatics system across different platforms and operating systems. These include tools for integrating locally-installed programs and databases into BIRCH, and for customizing the local BIRCH system to meet the needs of the user base. BIRCH can also act as a front end to provide a unified view of already-existing collections of bioinformatics software. Documentation for the BIRCH and locally-added programs is merged in a hierarchical set of web pages. In addition to manual pages for individual programs, BIRCH tutorials employ step by step examples, with screen shots and sample files, to illustrate both the important theoretical and practical considerations behind complex analytical tasks. BIRCH provides a versatile organizational framework for managing software and databases, and making these accessible to a user base. Because of its network-centric design, BIRCH makes it possible for any user to do any task from anywhere.

BIRCH: A user-oriented, locally-customizable, bioinformatics system

PubMed Central

Fristensky, Brian

2007-01-01

Background Molecular biologists need sophisticated analytical tools which often demand extensive computational resources. While finding, installing, and using these tools can be challenging, pipelining data from one program to the next is particularly awkward, especially when using web-based programs. At the same time, system administrators tasked with maintaining these tools do not always appreciate the needs of research biologists. Results BIRCH (Biological Research Computing Hierarchy) is an organizational framework for delivering bioinformatics resources to a user group, scaling from a single lab to a large institution. The BIRCH core distribution includes many popular bioinformatics programs, unified within the GDE (Genetic Data Environment) graphic interface. Of equal importance, BIRCH provides the system administrator with tools that simplify the job of managing a multiuser bioinformatics system across different platforms and operating systems. These include tools for integrating locally-installed programs and databases into BIRCH, and for customizing the local BIRCH system to meet the needs of the user base. BIRCH can also act as a front end to provide a unified view of already-existing collections of bioinformatics software. Documentation for the BIRCH and locally-added programs is merged in a hierarchical set of web pages. In addition to manual pages for individual programs, BIRCH tutorials employ step by step examples, with screen shots and sample files, to illustrate both the important theoretical and practical considerations behind complex analytical tasks. Conclusion BIRCH provides a versatile organizational framework for managing software and databases, and making these accessible to a user base. Because of its network-centric design, BIRCH makes it possible for any user to do any task from anywhere. PMID:17291351

Mobile agent location in distributed environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fountoukis, S. G.; Argyropoulos, I. P.

2012-12-01

An agent is a small program acting on behalf of a user or an application which plays the role of a user. Artificial intelligence can be encapsulated in agents so that they can be capable of both behaving autonomously and showing an elementary decision ability regarding movement and some specific actions. Therefore they are often called autonomous mobile agents. In a distributed system, they can move themselves from one processing node to another through the interconnecting network infrastructure. Their purpose is to collect useful information and to carry it back to their user. Also, agents are used to start, monitor and stop processes running on the individual interconnected processing nodes of computer cluster systems. An agent has a unique id to discriminate itself from other agents and a current position. The position can be expressed as the address of the processing node which currently hosts the agent. Very often, it is necessary for a user, a processing node or another agent to know the current position of an agent in a distributed system. Several procedures and algorithms have been proposed for the purpose of position location of mobile agents. The most basic of all employs a fixed computing node, which acts as agent position repository, receiving messages from all the moving agents and keeping records of their current positions. The fixed node, responds to position queries and informs users, other nodes and other agents about the position of an agent. Herein, a model is proposed that considers pairs and triples of agents instead of single ones. A location method, which is investigated in this paper, attempts to exploit this model.

Suggestions for Layout and Functional Behavior of Software-Based Voice Switch Keysets

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Scott, David W.

2010-01-01

Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) provides communication services for a number of real time environments, including Space Shuttle Propulsion support and International Space Station (ISS) payload operations. In such settings, control team members speak with each other via multiple voice circuits or loops. Each loop has a particular purpose and constituency, and users are assigned listen and/or talk capabilities for a given loop based on their role in fulfilling the purpose. A voice switch is a given facility's hardware and software that supports such communication, and may be interconnected with other facilities switches to create a large network that, from an end user perspective, acts like a single system. Since users typically monitor and/or respond to several voice loops concurrently for hours on end and real time operations can be very dynamic and intense, it s vital that a control panel or keyset for interfacing with the voice switch be a servant that reduces stress, not a master that adds it. Implementing the visual interface on a computer screen provides tremendous flexibility and configurability, but there s a very real risk of overcomplication. (Remember how office automation made life easier, which led to a deluge of documents that made life harder?) This paper a) discusses some basic human factors considerations related to keysets implemented as application software windows, b) suggests what to standardize at the facility level and what to leave to the user's preference, and c) provides screen shot mockups for a robust but reasonably simple user experience. Concepts apply to keyset needs in almost any type of operations control or support center.

Mixed Initiative Visual Analytics Using Task-Driven Recommendations

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Cook, Kristin A.; Cramer, Nicholas O.; Israel, David

2015-12-07

Visual data analysis is composed of a collection of cognitive actions and tasks to decompose, internalize, and recombine data to produce knowledge and insight. Visual analytic tools provide interactive visual interfaces to data to support tasks involved in discovery and sensemaking, including forming hypotheses, asking questions, and evaluating and organizing evidence. Myriad analytic models can be incorporated into visual analytic systems, at the cost of increasing complexity in the analytic discourse between user and system. Techniques exist to increase the usability of interacting with such analytic models, such as inferring data models from user interactions to steer the underlying modelsmore » of the system via semantic interaction, shielding users from having to do so explicitly. Such approaches are often also referred to as mixed-initiative systems. Researchers studying the sensemaking process have called for development of tools that facilitate analytic sensemaking through a combination of human and automated activities. However, design guidelines do not exist for mixed-initiative visual analytic systems to support iterative sensemaking. In this paper, we present a candidate set of design guidelines and introduce the Active Data Environment (ADE) prototype, a spatial workspace supporting the analytic process via task recommendations invoked by inferences on user interactions within the workspace. ADE recommends data and relationships based on a task model, enabling users to co-reason with the system about their data in a single, spatial workspace. This paper provides an illustrative use case, a technical description of ADE, and a discussion of the strengths and limitations of the approach.« less

Modularizing Spatial Ontologies for Assisted Living Systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hois, Joana

Assisted living systems are intended to support daily-life activities in user homes by automatizing and monitoring behavior of the environment while interacting with the user in a non-intrusive way. The knowledge base of such systems therefore has to define thematically different aspects of the environment mostly related to space, such as basic spatial floor plan information, pieces of technical equipment in the environment and their functions and spatial ranges, activities users can perform, entities that occur in the environment, etc. In this paper, we present thematically different ontologies, each of which describing environmental aspects from a particular perspective. The resulting modular structure allows the selection of application-specific ontologies as necessary. This hides information and reduces complexity in terms of the represented spatial knowledge and reasoning practicability. We motivate and present the different spatial ontologies applied to an ambient assisted living application.

SmallTool - a toolkit for realizing shared virtual environments on the Internet

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Broll, Wolfgang

1998-09-01

With increasing graphics capabilities of computers and higher network communication speed, networked virtual environments have become available to a large number of people. While the virtual reality modelling language (VRML) provides users with the ability to exchange 3D data, there is still a lack of appropriate support to realize large-scale multi-user applications on the Internet. In this paper we will present SmallTool, a toolkit to support shared virtual environments on the Internet. The toolkit consists of a VRML-based parsing and rendering library, a device library, and a network library. This paper will focus on the networking architecture, provided by the network library - the distributed worlds transfer and communication protocol (DWTP). DWTP provides an application-independent network architecture to support large-scale multi-user environments on the Internet.

Tapping the Molecular Potential of Microalgae to Produce Biomass (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

ScienceCinema

Sayre, Richard; Kyrpides, Nikos

2018-05-03

Richard Sayre, from Los Alamos National Laboratory, presents a talk titled "Tapping the Molecular Potential of Microalgae to Produce Biomass" at the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

Getting to the Root of Things: Spatiotemporal Regulatory Networks (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

ScienceCinema

Brady, Siobhan

2018-02-12

Siobhan Brady from University of California, Davis, gives a talk titled "Getting to the Root of things: Spatiotemporal Regulatory Networks" at the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

Getting to the Root of Things: Spatiotemporal Regulatory Networks (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Brady, Siobhan

2012-03-22

Siobhan Brady from University of California, Davis, gives a talk titled "Getting to the Root of things: Spatiotemporal Regulatory Networks" at the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

Introducing ORACLE: Library Processing in a Multi-User Environment.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Queensland Library Board, Brisbane (Australia).

Currently being developed by the State Library of Queensland, Australia, ORACLE (On-Line Retrieval of Acquisitions, Cataloguing, and Circulation Details for Library Enquiries) is a computerized library system designed to provide rapid processing of library materials in a multi-user environment. It is based on the Australian MARC format and fully…

The VERITAS Facility: A Virtual Environment Platform for Human Performance Research

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-01-01

IAE The IAE supports the audio environment that users experience during the course of an experiment. This includes environmental sounds, user-to...future, we are looking towards a database-based system that would use MySQL or an equivalent product to store the large data sets and provide standard

Cross-Cultural Interface Design and the Classroom-Learning Environment in Taiwan

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chang, Chia-Lin; Su, Yelin

2012-01-01

This study examined whether using localized interface designs would make a difference in users' learning results and their perceptions of the interface design in a classroom learning environment. This study also sought to learn more about users' attitudes toward the localized interface features. To assess the impact of using localized interfaces…

Tapping the Molecular Potential of Microalgae to Produce Biomass (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Sayre, Richard; Kyrpides, Nikos

2012-03-22

Richard Sayre, from Los Alamos National Laboratory, presents a talk titled "Tapping the Molecular Potential of Microalgae to Produce Biomass" at the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

Preservice Teachers Experience Reading Response Pedagogy in a Multi-User Virtual Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dooley, Caitlin McMunn; Calandra, Brendan; Harmon, Stephen

2014-01-01

This qualitative case study describes how 18 preservice teachers learned to nurture literary meaning-making via activities based on Louise Rosenblatt's Reader Response Theory within a multi-user virtual environment (MUVE). Participants re-created and responded to scenes from selected works of children's literature in Second Life as a way to…

Social Tagging in a Scholarly Digital Library Environment: Users' Perspectives

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Noorhidawati, A.; Hanum, N. Fariza; Zohoorian-Fooladi, N.

2013-01-01

Introduction: This paper reports an exploratory study examining how users participate in social tagging activities in a scholarly digital library environment to learn about their motivations, behaviour, and practices. Method: This study was conducted in two phases: a survey to investigate usage and attitudes of social tagging tool, and a…

Genome-Scale Discovery of Cell Wall Biosynthesis Genes in Populus (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

ScienceCinema

Muchero, Wellington

2018-01-15

Wellington Muchero from Oak Ridge National Laboratory gives a talk titled "Discovery of Cell Wall Biosynthesis Genes in Populus" at the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

The Use, Users, and Role of Abstracts in the Digital Scholarly Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Nicholas, David; Huntington, Paul; Jamali, Hamid R.

2007-01-01

Utilizing transactional log data taken from digital journal libraries and attitudinal and demographic data derived from a questionnaire survey, the article pieces together evidence concerning the use, users, and role of abstracts in a digital environment. It shows that abstracts are used in large quantities, even when full-text viewing facilities…

Web-Based Virtual Microscopy of Digitized Blood Slides for Malaria Diagnosis: An Effective Tool for Skills Assessment in Different Countries and Environments.

PubMed

Ahmed, Laura; Seal, Leonard H; Ainley, Carol; De la Salle, Barbara; Brereton, Michelle; Hyde, Keith; Burthem, John; Gilmore, William Samuel

2016-08-11

Morphological examination of blood films remains the reference standard for malaria diagnosis. Supporting the skills required to make an accurate morphological diagnosis is therefore essential. However, providing support across different countries and environments is a substantial challenge. This paper reports a scheme supplying digital slides of malaria-infected blood within an Internet-based virtual microscope environment to users with different access to training and computing facilities. The feasibility of the approach was established, allowing users to test, record, and compare their own performance with that of other users. From Giemsa stained thick and thin blood films, 56 large high-resolution digital slides were prepared, using high-quality image capture and 63x oil-immersion objective lens. The individual images were combined using the photomerge function of Adobe Photoshop and then adjusted to ensure resolution and reproduction of essential diagnostic features. Web delivery employed the Digital Slidebox platform allowing digital microscope viewing facilities and image annotation with data gathering from participants. Engagement was high with images viewed by 38 participants in five countries in a range of environments and a mean completion rate of 42/56 cases. The rate of parasite detection was 78% and accuracy of species identification was 53%, which was comparable with results of similar studies using glass slides. Data collection allowed users to compare performance with other users over time or for each individual case. Overall, these results demonstrate that users worldwide can effectively engage with the system in a range of environments, with the potential to enhance personal performance through education, external quality assessment, and personal professional development, especially in regions where educational resources are difficult to access.

Distributed user services for supercomputers

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Sowizral, Henry A.

1989-01-01

User-service operations at supercomputer facilities are examined. The question is whether a single, possibly distributed, user-services organization could be shared by NASA's supercomputer sites in support of a diverse, geographically dispersed, user community. A possible structure for such an organization is identified as well as some of the technologies needed in operating such an organization.

Multiple tobacco product use among US adolescents and young adults

PubMed Central

Soneji, Samir; Sargent, James; Tanski, Susanne

2016-01-01

Objective To assess the extent to which multiple tobacco product use among adolescents and young adults falls outside current Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulatory authority. Methods We conducted a web-based survey of 1596 16–26-year-olds to assess use of 11 types of tobacco products. We ascertained current (past 30 days) tobacco product use among 927 respondents who ever used tobacco. Combustible tobacco products included cigarettes, cigars (little filtered, cigarillos, premium) and hookah; non-combustible tobacco products included chew, dip, dissolvables, e-cigarettes, snuff and snus. We then fitted an ordinal logistic regression model to assess demographic and behavioural associations with higher levels of current tobacco product use (single, dual and multiple product use). Results Among 448 current tobacco users, 54% were single product users, 25% dual users and 21% multiple users. The largest single use category was cigarettes (49%), followed by hookah (23%), little filtered cigars (17%) and e-cigarettes (5%). Most dual and multiple product users smoked cigarettes, along with little filtered cigars, hookah and e-cigarettes. Forty-six per cent of current single, 84% of dual and 85% of multiple tobacco product users consumed a tobacco product outside FDA regulatory authority. In multivariable analysis, the adjusted risk of multiple tobacco use was higher for males, first use of a non-combustible tobacco product, high sensation seeking respondents and declined for each additional year of age that tobacco initiation was delayed. Conclusions Nearly half of current adolescent and young adult tobacco users in this study engaged in dual and multiple tobacco product use; the majority of them used products that fall outside current FDA regulatory authority. This study supports FDA deeming of these products and their incorporation into the national media campaign to address youth tobacco use. PMID:25361744

StarView: The object oriented design of the ST DADS user interface

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Williams, J. D.; Pollizzi, J. A.

1992-01-01

StarView is the user interface being developed for the Hubble Space Telescope Data Archive and Distribution Service (ST DADS). ST DADS is the data archive for HST observations and a relational database catalog describing the archived data. Users will use StarView to query the catalog and select appropriate datasets for study. StarView sends requests for archived datasets to ST DADS which processes the requests and returns the database to the user. StarView is designed to be a powerful and extensible user interface. Unique features include an internal relational database to navigate query results, a form definition language that will work with both CRT and X interfaces, a data definition language that will allow StarView to work with any relational database, and the ability to generate adhoc queries without requiring the user to understand the structure of the ST DADS catalog. Ultimately, StarView will allow the user to refine queries in the local database for improved performance and merge in data from external sources for correlation with other query results. The user will be able to create a query from single or multiple forms, merging the selected attributes into a single query. Arbitrary selection of attributes for querying is supported. The user will be able to select how query results are viewed. A standard form or table-row format may be used. Navigation capabilities are provided to aid the user in viewing query results. Object oriented analysis and design techniques were used in the design of StarView to support the mechanisms and concepts required to implement these features. One such mechanism is the Model-View-Controller (MVC) paradigm. The MVC allows the user to have multiple views of the underlying database, while providing a consistent mechanism for interaction regardless of the view. This approach supports both CRT and X interfaces while providing a common mode of user interaction. Another powerful abstraction is the concept of a Query Model. This concept allows a single query to be built form a single or multiple forms before it is submitted to ST DADS. Supporting this concept is the adhoc query generator which allows the user to select and qualify an indeterminate number attributes from the database. The user does not need any knowledge of how the joins across various tables are to be resolved. The adhoc generator calculates the joins automatically and generates the correct SQL query.

Staradmin -- Starlink User Database Maintainer

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Fish, Adrian

The subject of this SSN is a utility called STARADMIN. This utility allows the system administrator to build and maintain a Starlink User Database (UDB). The principal source of information for each user is a text file, named after their username. The content of each file is a list consisting of one keyword followed by the relevant user data per line. These user database files reside in a single directory. The STARADMIN program is used to manipulate these user data files and automatically generate user summary lists.

Integration Of Space Weather Into Space Situational Awareness

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Reeves, G.

2010-09-01

Rapid assessment of space weather effects on satellites is a critical step in anomaly resolution and satellite threat assessment. That step, however, is often hindered by a number of factors including timely collection and delivery of space weather data and the inherent complexity of space weather information. As part of a larger, integrated space situational awareness program, Los Alamos National Laboratory has developed prototype operational space weather tools that run in real time and present operators with customized, user-specific information. The Dynamic Radiation Environment Assimilation Model (DREAM) focuses on the penetrating radiation environment from natural or nuclear-produced radiation belts. The penetrating radiation environment is highly dynamic and highly orbitdependent. Operators often must rely only on line plots of 2 MeV electron flux from the NOAA geosynchronous GOES satellites which is then assumed to be representative of the environment at the satellite of interest. DREAM uses data assimilation to produce a global, real-time, energy dependent specification. User tools are built around a distributed service oriented architecture (SOA) which allows operators to select any satellite from the space catalog and examine the environment for that specific satellite and time of interest. Depending on the application operators may need to examine instantaneous dose rates and/or dose accumulated over various lengths of time. Further, different energy thresholds can be selected depending on the shielding on the satellite or instrument of interest. In order to rapidly assess the probability that space weather effects, the current conditions can be compared against the historical distribution of radiation levels for that orbit. In the simplest operation a user would select a satellite and time of interest and immediately see if the environmental conditions were typical, elevated, or extreme based on how often those conditions occur in that orbit. This allows users to rapidly rule in or out environmental causes of anomalies. The same user interface can also allow users to drill down for more detailed quantitative information. DREAM can be run either from a distributed web-based user interface or as a stand-alone application for secure operations. We will discuss the underlying structure of the DREAM model and demonstrate the user interface that we have developed. We will also discuss future development plans for DREAM and how the same paradigm can be applied to integrating other space environment information into operational SSA systems.

Learning and mastery behaviours as risk factors to abandonment in a paediatric user of advanced single-switch access technology.

PubMed

Brian, Leung; Jessica A, Brian; Tom, Chau

2013-09-01

The present descriptive case study documents the behaviours of a child single-switch user in the community setting and draws attention to learning and mastery behaviours as risk factors to single-switch abandonment. Our observations were interpreted in the context of a longer term school-based evaluation of an advanced single-switch access technology with a nine year-old user with severe spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy. The child completed 25 experiment sessions averaging a rate of three sessions every two weeks. During each session he worked on several blocks of single-switch computer activity using his vocal cord vibration switch. Despite high levels of single-switch sensitivity and specificity that suggested a good fit between the participant and the technology, the participant perceived a lower proficiency level of his own abilities, demonstrated impatience and intolerance to interaction errors, and was apprehensive of making mistakes when using his switch in public. The benefit of gaining some degree of independent physical access might not necessarily enhance resilience to interaction errors or bouts of poor task performance. On the other hand, the participant's behaviours were consistent with those of a typically developing child learning or mastering any new skill or task. Implications for Rehabilitation The attitude and behaviour of a paediatric switch user towards skill development can be risk factors to abandonment of an access technology, despite successful clinical trial with the device. Children with severe disabilities can be associated with the same types of skill development behaviour patterns and achievement motivation as their typically developing peers. Empirical observations of the case participant's switch use behaviours suggest that user training could be adaptive in order to account for individual differences in skill development and achievement motivation.

Contraceptive vaccines for the humane control of community cat populations

PubMed Central

Levy, Julie K.

2011-01-01

Problem Free-roaming unowned stray and feral cats exist throughout the world, creating concerns regarding their welfare as well as their impact on the environment on public health. Millions of healthy cats are culled each year in an attempt to control their numbers. Surgical sterilization followed by return to the environment is an effective nonlethal population control method but is limited in scope due to expense and logistical impediments. Immunocontraception has the potential to be a more practical and cost-effective method of control. Method of study This is a review of current research in immunocontraception in domestic cats. Functional characteristics of an ideal immunocontraceptive for community cats would include a wide margin of safety for target animals and the environment, rapid onset and long duration of activity following a single treatment in males and females of all ages, and sex hormone inhibition. In addition, product characteristics should include stability and ease of use under field conditions, efficient manufacturing process, and low cost to the user. Two reproductive antigens, zona pellucida and GnRH, have been identified as possible targets for fertility control in cats. Results Zona pellucida, which is used successfully in multiple wildlife species, has achieved little success in cats. In contrast, immunization against GnRH has resulted in long-term contraception in both male and female cats following a single dose. GnRH is an ideal contraceptive target because it regulates pituitary and gonadal hormone responses in both males and females, thus suppressing nuisance behaviors associated with sex hormones in addition to preventing pregnancy. Conclusion The responsiveness of cats to fertility control via GnRH suppression should encourage researchers and cat control stakeholders to continue efforts to optimize vaccines that induce multi-year contraception following a single dose in a high proportion of treated cats. PMID:21501281

Skylab S-191 spectrometer single spectral scan analysis program. [user manual

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Downes, E. L.

1974-01-01

Documentation and user information for the S-191 single spectral scan analysis program are reported. A breakdown of the computational algorithms is supplied, followed by the program listing and examples of sample output. A copy of the flow chart which describes the driver routine in the body of the main program segment is included.

Single Logon: balancing security and healthcare productivity.

PubMed

Sapp, Margaret J; Behrens, Terrence L

2004-01-01

Mayo Single Logon (MSL) has faced the traditional dilemma that is painful to all IT organizations because it forces the tradeoff between user productivity and security. Recent regulatory initiatives, such as HIPAA, have caused the issue of security to take on more importance, forcing organizations to revisit the balance of security and productivity. MSL is a security application that brokers user credentials and facilitates desktop security. The simple design, functionality and stability have allowed MSL to speed up user productivity, keep satisfaction high and help solve many security initiatives.

UGV technology for urban environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Christensen, Henrik I.; Folkeson, John; Hedstrom, Andreas; Lundberg, Carl

2004-09-01

Deployment of humans in an urban setting for search and rescue type missions poses a major risk to the personnel. In rescue missions the risk can stem from debris, gas, etc. and in a strategic setting the risk can stem from snipers, mines, gas, etc. There is consequently a natural interest in studies of how UGV technology can be deployed for tasks such as reconnaissance, retrieval of objects (bombs, injured people, etc.). Today most vehicles used by the military and bomb squads are tele-operated and without any autonomony. This implies that operation of the vehicles is a stressful and demanding task. Part of this stress can be removed through introduction of autonomous functionality. Autonomy implicitly requires use of map information to allow the system to localize and traverse a particular area in addition autonomous mapping of an area is a valuable functionality as part of reconnaissance missions to provide an initial inventory of a new area. A host of different sensory modalities can be used for mapping. In general no single modality is, however, sufficient for robust and efficient mapping. In the present study GPS, Inertial Cues, Laser ranging and Odometry is used for simultaneous mapping and localization in urban environments. The mapping is carried out autonomously using a coverage strategy to ensure full mapping of a particular area. In relation to mapping another important issue is the design of an efficient user interface that allows a regular rescue worker, or a soldier, to operate the vehicle without detailed knowledge about robotics. A number of different designs for user interfaces will be presented and results from studies with a range of end-users (soldiers) will also be reported. The complete system has been tested in an urban warfare facility outside of Stockholm. Detailed results will be reposted from two different test facilities.

SPICE Module for the Satellite Orbit Analysis Program (SOAP)

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Coggi, John; Carnright, Robert; Hildebrand, Claude

2008-01-01

A SPICE module for the Satellite Orbit Analysis Program (SOAP) precisely represents complex motion and maneuvers in an interactive, 3D animated environment with support for user-defined quantitative outputs. (SPICE stands for Spacecraft, Planet, Instrument, Camera-matrix, and Events). This module enables the SOAP software to exploit NASA mission ephemeris represented in the JPL Ancillary Information Facility (NAIF) SPICE formats. Ephemeris types supported include position, velocity, and orientation for spacecraft and planetary bodies including the Sun, planets, natural satellites, comets, and asteroids. Entire missions can now be imported into SOAP for 3D visualization, playback, and analysis. The SOAP analysis and display features can now leverage detailed mission files to offer the analyst both a numerically correct and aesthetically pleasing combination of results that can be varied to study many hypothetical scenarios. The software provides a modeling and simulation environment that can encompass a broad variety of problems using orbital prediction. For example, ground coverage analysis, communications analysis, power and thermal analysis, and 3D visualization that provide the user with insight into complex geometric relations are included. The SOAP SPICE module allows distributed science and engineering teams to share common mission models of known pedigree, which greatly reduces duplication of effort and the potential for error. The use of the software spans all phases of the space system lifecycle, from the study of future concepts to operations and anomaly analysis. It allows SOAP software to correctly position and orient all of the principal bodies of the Solar System within a single simulation session along with multiple spacecraft trajectories and the orientation of mission payloads. In addition to the 3D visualization, the user can define numeric variables and x-y plots to quantitatively assess metrics of interest.

Crack-cocaine users have less family cohesion than alcohol users.

PubMed

Marchi, Nino C; Scherer, Juliana N; Pachado, Mayra P; Guimarães, Luciano S; Siegmund, Gerson; de Castro, Melina N; Halpern, Silvia; Benzano, Daniela; Formigoni, Maria L; Cruz, Marcelo; Pechansky, Flavio; Kessler, Felix H

2017-01-01

Many studies correlate characteristics of family functioning and the development of drug addiction. This study sought to evaluate and compare the family environment styles of two groups of psychoactive substance users: 1) alcohol-only users and 2) crack-cocaine users. Three hundred and sixty-four users of alcohol, crack-cocaine, and other drugs, recruited from research centers in four Brazilian capitals participated in this study. Subjects were evaluated through the Family Environment Scale and the Addiction Severity Index, 6th version (ASI-6). ASI-6 t-scores were compared by analysis of variance (ANOVA) and post-hoc tests. A final model was obtained using a logistic regression analysis. All analyses were adjusted for partner, age, and psychiatric t-score. We found a significant difference between groups in the cohesion subscale (p = 0.044). The post-hoc test revealed a difference of 1.06 points (95%CI 0.11-2.01) between groups 1 (6.45±0.28) and 2 (5.38±0.20). No significant between-group differences were observed in the other subscales. However, categorical analyses of variables regarding family dynamic showed that crack users more often reported that sometimes people in their family hit each other (30.4% vs. 13.2%, p = 0.007) and that people in their family frequently compared each other regarding work and/or school achievement (57.2% vs. 42.6%, p = 0.041). These results suggest that families of crack-cocaine users are less cohesive than families of alcohol users. This type of family environment may affect treatment outcome, and should thus be adequately approached.

Integration of space weather into space situational awareness

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Reeves, Geoffrey D

Rapid assessment of space weather effects on satellites is a critical step in anomaly resolution and satellite threat assessment. That step, however, is often hindered by a number of factors including timely collection and delivery of space weather data and the inherent com plexity of space weather information. As part of a larger, integrated space situational awareness program, Los Alamos National Laboratory has developed prototype operational space weather tools that run in real time and present operators with customized, user-specific information. The Dynamic Radiation Environment Assimilation Model (DREAM) focuses on the penetrating radiation environment from natural or nuclear-produced radiation belts.more » The penetrating radiation environment is highly dynamic and highly orbit-dependent. Operators often must rely only on line plots of 2 MeV electron flux from the NOAA geosynchronous GOES satellites which is then assumed to be representative of the environment at the satellite of interest. DREAM uses data assimilation to produce a global, real-time, energy dependent specification. User tools are built around a distributed service oriented architecture (SOA) which will allow operators to select any satellite from the space catalog and examine the environment for that specific satellite and time of interest. Depending on the application operators may need to examine instantaneous dose rates and/or dose accumulated over various lengths of time. Further, different energy thresholds can be selected depending on the shielding on the satellite or instrument of interest. In order to rapidly assess the probability that space weather was the cause of anomalous operations, the current conditions can be compared against the historical distribution of radiation levels for that orbit. In the simplest operation a user would select a satellite and time of interest and immediately see if the environmental conditions were typical, elevated, or extreme based on how often those conditions occur in that orbit. This allows users to rapidly rule in or out environmental causes of anomalies. The same user interface can also allow users to drill down for more detailed quantitative information. DREAM can be run either from a distributed web-based user interface or as a stand-alone application for secure operations. In this paper we discuss the underlying structure of the DREAM model and demonstrate the user interface that we have developed . We also present some prototype data products and user interfaces for DREAM and discuss how space environment information can be seamlessly integrated into operational SSA systems.« less

Implications of the Social Web Environment for User Story Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Fancott, Terrill; Kamthan, Pankaj; Shahmir, Nazlie

2012-01-01

In recent years, user stories have emerged in academia, as well as industry, as a notable approach for expressing user requirements of interactive software systems that are developed using agile methodologies. There are social aspects inherent to software development, in general, and user stories, in particular. This paper presents directions and…

Accidental Discovery of Information on the User-Defined Social Web: A Mixed-Method Study

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Lu, Chi-Jung

2012-01-01

Frequently interacting with other people or working in an information-rich environment can foster the "accidental discovery of information" (ADI) (Erdelez, 2000; McCay-Peet & Toms, 2010). With the increasing adoption of social web technologies, online user-participation communities and user-generated content have provided users the…

40 CFR 35.929-3 - Implementation of the user charge system.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false Implementation of the user charge... Water Act § 35.929-3 Implementation of the user charge system. (a) When a grantee's user charge system is approved, implementation of the approved system shall become a condition of the grant. (b) The...

40 CFR 35.929-3 - Implementation of the user charge system.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2011 CFR

2011-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2011-07-01 2011-07-01 false Implementation of the user charge... Water Act § 35.929-3 Implementation of the user charge system. (a) When a grantee's user charge system is approved, implementation of the approved system shall become a condition of the grant. (b) The...

40 CFR 35.929-3 - Implementation of the user charge system.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2013-07-01 2013-07-01 false Implementation of the user charge... Water Act § 35.929-3 Implementation of the user charge system. (a) When a grantee's user charge system is approved, implementation of the approved system shall become a condition of the grant. (b) The...

40 CFR 35.929-3 - Implementation of the user charge system.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 1 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false Implementation of the user charge... Water Act § 35.929-3 Implementation of the user charge system. (a) When a grantee's user charge system is approved, implementation of the approved system shall become a condition of the grant. (b) The...

Measuring User Experience of the Student-Centered e-Learning Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Santoso, Harry B.; Schrepp, Martin; Isal, R. Yugo Kartono; Utomo, Andika Yudha; Priyogi, Bilih

2016-01-01

The aim of the current study is to develop an adapted version of User Experience Questionnaire (UEQ) and evaluate a learning management system. Although there is a growing interest on User Experience, there are still limited resources (i.e. measurement tools or questionnaires) available to measure user experience of any products, especially…

Comparative study on collaborative interaction in non-immersive and immersive systems

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Shahab, Qonita M.; Kwon, Yong-Moo; Ko, Heedong; Mayangsari, Maria N.; Yamasaki, Shoko; Nishino, Hiroaki

2007-09-01

This research studies the Virtual Reality simulation for collaborative interaction so that different people from different places can interact with one object concurrently. Our focus is the real-time handling of inputs from multiple users, where object's behavior is determined by the combination of the multiple inputs. Issues addressed in this research are: 1) The effects of using haptics on a collaborative interaction, 2) The possibilities of collaboration between users from different environments. We conducted user tests on our system in several cases: 1) Comparison between non-haptics and haptics collaborative interaction over LAN, 2) Comparison between non-haptics and haptics collaborative interaction over Internet, and 3) Analysis of collaborative interaction between non-immersive and immersive display environments. The case studies are the interaction of users in two cases: collaborative authoring of a 3D model by two users, and collaborative haptic interaction by multiple users. In Virtual Dollhouse, users can observe physics law while constructing a dollhouse using existing building blocks, under gravity effects. In Virtual Stretcher, multiple users can collaborate on moving a stretcher together while feeling each other's haptic motions.

Ensemble Eclipse: A Process for Prefab Development Environment for the Ensemble Project

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Wallick, Michael N.; Mittman, David S.; Shams, Khawaja, S.; Bachmann, Andrew G.; Ludowise, Melissa

2013-01-01

This software simplifies the process of having to set up an Eclipse IDE programming environment for the members of the cross-NASA center project, Ensemble. It achieves this by assembling all the necessary add-ons and custom tools/preferences. This software is unique in that it allows developers in the Ensemble Project (approximately 20 to 40 at any time) across multiple NASA centers to set up a development environment almost instantly and work on Ensemble software. The software automatically has the source code repositories and other vital information and settings included. The Eclipse IDE is an open-source development framework. The NASA (Ensemble-specific) version of the software includes Ensemble-specific plug-ins as well as settings for the Ensemble project. This software saves developers the time and hassle of setting up a programming environment, making sure that everything is set up in the correct manner for Ensemble development. Existing software (i.e., standard Eclipse) requires an intensive setup process that is both time-consuming and error prone. This software is built once by a single user and tested, allowing other developers to simply download and use the software

Software Architecture for a Virtual Environment for Nano Scale Assembly (VENSA).

PubMed

Lee, Yong-Gu; Lyons, Kevin W; Feng, Shaw C

2004-01-01

A Virtual Environment (VE) uses multiple computer-generated media to let a user experience situations that are temporally and spatially prohibiting. The information flow between the user and the VE is bidirectional and the user can influence the environment. The software development of a VE requires orchestrating multiple peripherals and computers in a synchronized way in real time. Although a multitude of useful software components for VEs exists, many of these are packaged within a complex framework and can not be used separately. In this paper, an architecture is presented which is designed to let multiple frameworks work together while being shielded from the application program. This architecture, which is called the Virtual Environment for Nano Scale Assembly (VENSA), has been constructed for interfacing with an optical tweezers instrument for nanotechnology development. However, this approach can be generalized for most virtual environments. Through the use of VENSA, the programmer can rely on existing solutions and concentrate more on the application software design.

Software Architecture for a Virtual Environment for Nano Scale Assembly (VENSA)

PubMed Central

Lee, Yong-Gu; Lyons, Kevin W.; Feng, Shaw C.

2004-01-01

A Virtual Environment (VE) uses multiple computer-generated media to let a user experience situations that are temporally and spatially prohibiting. The information flow between the user and the VE is bidirectional and the user can influence the environment. The software development of a VE requires orchestrating multiple peripherals and computers in a synchronized way in real time. Although a multitude of useful software components for VEs exists, many of these are packaged within a complex framework and can not be used separately. In this paper, an architecture is presented which is designed to let multiple frameworks work together while being shielded from the application program. This architecture, which is called the Virtual Environment for Nano Scale Assembly (VENSA), has been constructed for interfacing with an optical tweezers instrument for nanotechnology development. However, this approach can be generalized for most virtual environments. Through the use of VENSA, the programmer can rely on existing solutions and concentrate more on the application software design. PMID:27366610

Software-supported USER cloning strategies for site-directed mutagenesis and DNA assembly.

PubMed

Genee, Hans Jasper; Bonde, Mads Tvillinggaard; Bagger, Frederik Otzen; Jespersen, Jakob Berg; Sommer, Morten O A; Wernersson, Rasmus; Olsen, Lars Rønn

2015-03-20

USER cloning is a fast and versatile method for engineering of plasmid DNA. We have developed a user friendly Web server tool that automates the design of optimal PCR primers for several distinct USER cloning-based applications. Our Web server, named AMUSER (Automated DNA Modifications with USER cloning), facilitates DNA assembly and introduction of virtually any type of site-directed mutagenesis by designing optimal PCR primers for the desired genetic changes. To demonstrate the utility, we designed primers for a simultaneous two-position site-directed mutagenesis of green fluorescent protein (GFP) to yellow fluorescent protein (YFP), which in a single step reaction resulted in a 94% cloning efficiency. AMUSER also supports degenerate nucleotide primers, single insert combinatorial assembly, and flexible parameters for PCR amplification. AMUSER is freely available online at http://www.cbs.dtu.dk/services/AMUSER/.

Sharing skills: using augmented reality for human-robot collaboration

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Giesler, Bjorn; Steinhaus, Peter; Walther, Marcus; Dillmann, Ruediger

2004-05-01

Both stationary 'industrial' and autonomous mobile robots nowadays pervade many workplaces, but human-friendly interaction with them is still very much an experimental subject. One of the reasons for this is that computer and robotic systems are very bad at performing certain tasks well and robust. A prime example is classification of sensor readings: Which part of a 3D depth image is the cup, which the saucer, which the table? These are tasks that humans excel at. To alleviate this problem, we propose a team approah, wherein the robot records sensor data and uses an Augmented-Reality (AR) system to present the data to the user directly in the 3D environment. The user can then perform classification decisions directly on the data by pointing, gestures and speech commands. After the classification has been performed by the user, the robot takes the classified data and matches it to its environment model. As a demonstration of this approach, we present an initial system for creating objects on-the-fly in the environment model. A rotating laser scanner is used to capture a 3D snapshot of the environment. This snapshot is presented to the user as an overlay over his view of the scene. The user classifies unknown objects by pointing at them. The system segments the snapshot according to the user's indications and presents the results of segmentation back to the user, who can then inspect, correct and enhance them interactively. After a satisfying result has been reached, the laser-scanner can take more snapshots from other angles and use the previous segmentation hints to construct a 3D model of the object.

Detection of Anomalous Insiders in Collaborative Environments via Relational Analysis of Access Logs

PubMed Central

Chen, You; Malin, Bradley

2014-01-01

Collaborative information systems (CIS) are deployed within a diverse array of environments, ranging from the Internet to intelligence agencies to healthcare. It is increasingly the case that such systems are applied to manage sensitive information, making them targets for malicious insiders. While sophisticated security mechanisms have been developed to detect insider threats in various file systems, they are neither designed to model nor to monitor collaborative environments in which users function in dynamic teams with complex behavior. In this paper, we introduce a community-based anomaly detection system (CADS), an unsupervised learning framework to detect insider threats based on information recorded in the access logs of collaborative environments. CADS is based on the observation that typical users tend to form community structures, such that users with low a nity to such communities are indicative of anomalous and potentially illicit behavior. The model consists of two primary components: relational pattern extraction and anomaly detection. For relational pattern extraction, CADS infers community structures from CIS access logs, and subsequently derives communities, which serve as the CADS pattern core. CADS then uses a formal statistical model to measure the deviation of users from the inferred communities to predict which users are anomalies. To empirically evaluate the threat detection model, we perform an analysis with six months of access logs from a real electronic health record system in a large medical center, as well as a publicly-available dataset for replication purposes. The results illustrate that CADS can distinguish simulated anomalous users in the context of real user behavior with a high degree of certainty and with significant performance gains in comparison to several competing anomaly detection models. PMID:25485309

Multi-modal virtual environment research at Armstrong Laboratory

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Eggleston, Robert G.

1995-01-01

One mission of the Paul M. Fitts Human Engineering Division of Armstrong Laboratory is to improve the user interface for complex systems through user-centered exploratory development and research activities. In support of this goal, many current projects attempt to advance and exploit user-interface concepts made possible by virtual reality (VR) technologies. Virtual environments may be used as a general purpose interface medium, an alternative display/control method, a data visualization and analysis tool, or a graphically based performance assessment tool. An overview is given of research projects within the division on prototype interface hardware/software development, integrated interface concept development, interface design and evaluation tool development, and user and mission performance evaluation tool development.

TAE Plus: Transportable Applications Environment Plus tools for building graphic-oriented applications

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Szczur, Martha R.

1989-01-01

The Transportable Applications Environment Plus (TAE Plus), developed by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, is a portable User Interface Management System (UIMS), which provides an intuitive WYSIWYG WorkBench for prototyping and designing an application's user interface, integrated with tools for efficiently implementing the designed user interface and effective management of the user interface during an application's active domain. During the development of TAE Plus, many design and implementation decisions were based on the state-of-the-art within graphics workstations, windowing system and object-oriented programming languages. Some of the problems and issues experienced during implementation are discussed. A description of the next development steps planned for TAE Plus is also given.

Adam: a Unix Desktop Application Manager

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

LiÉBana, M.; Marquina, M.; Ramos, R.

ADAM stands for Affordable Desktop Application Manager. It is a GUI developed at CERN with the aim to ease access to applications. The motivation to develop ADAM came from the unavailability of environments like COSE/CDE and their heavy resource consumption. ADAM has proven to be user friendly: new users are able to customize it to their needs in few minutes. Groups of users may share through ADAM a common application environment. ADAM also integrates the Unix and the PC world. PC users can access Unix applications in the same way as their usual Windows applications. This paper describes all the ADAM features, how they are used at CERN Public Services, and the future plans for ADAM.

Bringing your tools to CyVerse Discovery Environment using Docker

PubMed Central

Devisetty, Upendra Kumar; Kennedy, Kathleen; Sarando, Paul; Merchant, Nirav; Lyons, Eric

2016-01-01

Docker has become a very popular container-based virtualization platform for software distribution that has revolutionized the way in which scientific software and software dependencies (software stacks) can be packaged, distributed, and deployed. Docker makes the complex and time-consuming installation procedures needed for scientific software a one-time process. Because it enables platform-independent installation, versioning of software environments, and easy redeployment and reproducibility, Docker is an ideal candidate for the deployment of identical software stacks on different compute environments such as XSEDE and Amazon AWS. CyVerse’s Discovery Environment also uses Docker for integrating its powerful, community-recommended software tools into CyVerse’s production environment for public use. This paper will help users bring their tools into CyVerse Discovery Environment (DE) which will not only allows users to integrate their tools with relative ease compared to the earlier method of tool deployment in DE but will also help users to share their apps with collaborators and release them for public use. PMID:27803802

Bringing your tools to CyVerse Discovery Environment using Docker.

PubMed

Devisetty, Upendra Kumar; Kennedy, Kathleen; Sarando, Paul; Merchant, Nirav; Lyons, Eric

2016-01-01

Docker has become a very popular container-based virtualization platform for software distribution that has revolutionized the way in which scientific software and software dependencies (software stacks) can be packaged, distributed, and deployed. Docker makes the complex and time-consuming installation procedures needed for scientific software a one-time process. Because it enables platform-independent installation, versioning of software environments, and easy redeployment and reproducibility, Docker is an ideal candidate for the deployment of identical software stacks on different compute environments such as XSEDE and Amazon AWS. CyVerse's Discovery Environment also uses Docker for integrating its powerful, community-recommended software tools into CyVerse's production environment for public use. This paper will help users bring their tools into CyVerse Discovery Environment (DE) which will not only allows users to integrate their tools with relative ease compared to the earlier method of tool deployment in DE but will also help users to share their apps with collaborators and release them for public use.

Measurement, modeling, and simulation of cryogenic SiGe HBT amplifier circuits for fast single spin readout

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

England, Troy; Curry, Matthew; Carr, Steve; Swartzentruber, Brian; Lilly, Michael; Bishop, Nathan; Carrol, Malcolm

2015-03-01

Fast, low-power quantum state readout is one of many challenges facing quantum information processing. Single electron transistors (SETs) are potentially fast, sensitive detectors for performing spin readout of electrons bound to Si:P donors. From a circuit perspective, however, their output impedance and nonlinear conductance are ill suited to drive the parasitic capacitance typical of coaxial conductors used in cryogenic environments, necessitating a cryogenic amplification stage. We will discuss calibration data, as well as modeling and simulation of cryogenic silicon-germanium (SiGe) heterojunction bipolar transistor (HBT) circuits connected to a silicon SET and operating at 4 K. We find a continuum of solutions from simple, single-HBT amplifiers to more complex, multi-HBT circuits suitable for integration, with varying noise levels and power vs. bandwidth tradeoffs. This work was performed, in part, at the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies, a U.S. DOE Office of Basic Energy Sciences user facility. Sandia National Laboratories is a multi-program laboratory operated by Sandia Corporation, a Lockheed-Martin Company, for the U. S. Department of Energy under Contract No. DE-AC04-94AL85000.

GEANT4 distributed computing for compact clusters

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Harrawood, Brian P.; Agasthya, Greeshma A.; Lakshmanan, Manu N.; Raterman, Gretchen; Kapadia, Anuj J.

2014-11-01

A new technique for distribution of GEANT4 processes is introduced to simplify running a simulation in a parallel environment such as a tightly coupled computer cluster. Using a new C++ class derived from the GEANT4 toolkit, multiple runs forming a single simulation are managed across a local network of computers with a simple inter-node communication protocol. The class is integrated with the GEANT4 toolkit and is designed to scale from a single symmetric multiprocessing (SMP) machine to compact clusters ranging in size from tens to thousands of nodes. User designed 'work tickets' are distributed to clients using a client-server work flow model to specify the parameters for each individual run of the simulation. The new g4DistributedRunManager class was developed and well tested in the course of our Neutron Stimulated Emission Computed Tomography (NSECT) experiments. It will be useful for anyone running GEANT4 for large discrete data sets such as covering a range of angles in computed tomography, calculating dose delivery with multiple fractions or simply speeding the through-put of a single model.

MotiveValidator: interactive web-based validation of ligand and residue structure in biomolecular complexes.

PubMed

Vařeková, Radka Svobodová; Jaiswal, Deepti; Sehnal, David; Ionescu, Crina-Maria; Geidl, Stanislav; Pravda, Lukáš; Horský, Vladimír; Wimmerová, Michaela; Koča, Jaroslav

2014-07-01

Structure validation has become a major issue in the structural biology community, and an essential step is checking the ligand structure. This paper introduces MotiveValidator, a web-based application for the validation of ligands and residues in PDB or PDBx/mmCIF format files provided by the user. Specifically, MotiveValidator is able to evaluate in a straightforward manner whether the ligand or residue being studied has a correct annotation (3-letter code), i.e. if it has the same topology and stereochemistry as the model ligand or residue with this annotation. If not, MotiveValidator explicitly describes the differences. MotiveValidator offers a user-friendly, interactive and platform-independent environment for validating structures obtained by any type of experiment. The results of the validation are presented in both tabular and graphical form, facilitating their interpretation. MotiveValidator can process thousands of ligands or residues in a single validation run that takes no more than a few minutes. MotiveValidator can be used for testing single structures, or the analysis of large sets of ligands or fragments prepared for binding site analysis, docking or virtual screening. MotiveValidator is freely available via the Internet at http://ncbr.muni.cz/MotiveValidator. © The Author(s) 2014. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Nucleic Acids Research.

NeuroMatic: An Integrated Open-Source Software Toolkit for Acquisition, Analysis and Simulation of Electrophysiological Data

PubMed Central

Rothman, Jason S.; Silver, R. Angus

2018-01-01

Acquisition, analysis and simulation of electrophysiological properties of the nervous system require multiple software packages. This makes it difficult to conserve experimental metadata and track the analysis performed. It also complicates certain experimental approaches such as online analysis. To address this, we developed NeuroMatic, an open-source software toolkit that performs data acquisition (episodic, continuous and triggered recordings), data analysis (spike rasters, spontaneous event detection, curve fitting, stationarity) and simulations (stochastic synaptic transmission, synaptic short-term plasticity, integrate-and-fire and Hodgkin-Huxley-like single-compartment models). The merging of a wide range of tools into a single package facilitates a more integrated style of research, from the development of online analysis functions during data acquisition, to the simulation of synaptic conductance trains during dynamic-clamp experiments. Moreover, NeuroMatic has the advantage of working within Igor Pro, a platform-independent environment that includes an extensive library of built-in functions, a history window for reviewing the user's workflow and the ability to produce publication-quality graphics. Since its original release, NeuroMatic has been used in a wide range of scientific studies and its user base has grown considerably. NeuroMatic version 3.0 can be found at http://www.neuromatic.thinkrandom.com and https://github.com/SilverLabUCL/NeuroMatic. PMID:29670519

Altering User Movement Behaviour in Virtual Environments.

PubMed

Simeone, Adalberto L; Mavridou, Ifigeneia; Powell, Wendy

2017-04-01

In immersive Virtual Reality systems, users tend to move in a Virtual Environment as they would in an analogous physical environment. In this work, we investigated how user behaviour is affected when the Virtual Environment differs from the physical space. We created two sets of four environments each, plus a virtual replica of the physical environment as a baseline. The first focused on aesthetic discrepancies, such as a water surface in place of solid ground. The second focused on mixing immaterial objects together with those paired to tangible objects. For example, barring an area with walls or obstacles. We designed a study where participants had to reach three waypoints laid out in such a way to prompt a decision on which path to follow based on the conflict between the mismatching visual stimuli and their awareness of the real layout of the room. We analysed their performances to determine whether their trajectories were altered significantly from the shortest route. Our results indicate that participants altered their trajectories in presence of surfaces representing higher walking difficulty (for example, water instead of grass). However, when the graphical appearance was found to be ambiguous, there was no significant trajectory alteration. The environments mixing immaterial with physical objects had the most impact on trajectories with a mean deviation from the shortest route of 60 cm against the 37 cm of environments with aesthetic alterations. The co-existance of paired and unpaired virtual objects was reported to support the idea that all objects participants saw were backed by physical props. From these results and our observations, we derive guidelines on how to alter user movement behaviour in Virtual Environments.

Meeting People's Needs in a Fully Interoperable Domotic Environment

PubMed Central

Miori, Vittorio; Russo, Dario; Concordia, Cesare

2012-01-01

The key idea underlying many Ambient Intelligence (AmI) projects and applications is context awareness, which is based mainly on their capacity to identify users and their locations. The actual computing capacity should remain in the background, in the periphery of our awareness, and should only move to the center if and when necessary. Computing thus becomes ‘invisible’, as it is embedded in the environment and everyday objects. The research project described herein aims to realize an Ambient Intelligence-based environment able to improve users' quality of life by learning their habits and anticipating their needs. This environment is part of an adaptive, context-aware framework designed to make today's incompatible heterogeneous domotic systems fully interoperable, not only for connecting sensors and actuators, but for providing comprehensive connections of devices to users. The solution is a middleware architecture based on open and widely recognized standards capable of abstracting the peculiarities of underlying heterogeneous technologies and enabling them to co-exist and interwork, without however eliminating their differences. At the highest level of this infrastructure, the Ambient Intelligence framework, integrated with the domotic sensors, can enable the system to recognize any unusual or dangerous situations and anticipate health problems or special user needs in a technological living environment, such as a house or a public space. PMID:22969322

Red Storm usage model :Version 1.12.

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Jefferson, Karen L.; Sturtevant, Judith E.

Red Storm is an Advanced Simulation and Computing (ASC) funded massively parallel supercomputer located at Sandia National Laboratories (SNL). The Red Storm Usage Model (RSUM) documents the capabilities and the environment provided for the FY05 Tri-Lab Level II Limited Availability Red Storm User Environment Milestone and the FY05 SNL Level II Limited Availability Red Storm Platform Milestone. This document describes specific capabilities, tools, and procedures to support both local and remote users. The model is focused on the needs of the ASC user working in the secure computing environments at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL),more » and SNL. Additionally, the Red Storm Usage Model maps the provided capabilities to the Tri-Lab ASC Computing Environment (ACE) requirements. The ACE requirements reflect the high performance computing requirements for the ASC community and have been updated in FY05 to reflect the community's needs. For each section of the RSUM, Appendix I maps the ACE requirements to the Limited Availability User Environment capabilities and includes a description of ACE requirements met and those requirements that are not met in that particular section. The Red Storm Usage Model, along with the ACE mappings, has been issued and vetted throughout the Tri-Lab community.« less

Meeting people's needs in a fully interoperable domotic environment.

PubMed

Miori, Vittorio; Russo, Dario; Concordia, Cesare

2012-01-01

The key idea underlying many Ambient Intelligence (AmI) projects and applications is context awareness, which is based mainly on their capacity to identify users and their locations. The actual computing capacity should remain in the background, in the periphery of our awareness, and should only move to the center if and when necessary. Computing thus becomes 'invisible', as it is embedded in the environment and everyday objects. The research project described herein aims to realize an Ambient Intelligence-based environment able to improve users' quality of life by learning their habits and anticipating their needs. This environment is part of an adaptive, context-aware framework designed to make today's incompatible heterogeneous domotic systems fully interoperable, not only for connecting sensors and actuators, but for providing comprehensive connections of devices to users. The solution is a middleware architecture based on open and widely recognized standards capable of abstracting the peculiarities of underlying heterogeneous technologies and enabling them to co-exist and interwork, without however eliminating their differences. At the highest level of this infrastructure, the Ambient Intelligence framework, integrated with the domotic sensors, can enable the system to recognize any unusual or dangerous situations and anticipate health problems or special user needs in a technological living environment, such as a house or a public space.

SoftLab: A Soft-Computing Software for Experimental Research with Commercialization Aspects

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Akbarzadeh-T, M.-R.; Shaikh, T. S.; Ren, J.; Hubbell, Rob; Kumbla, K. K.; Jamshidi, M

1998-01-01

SoftLab is a software environment for research and development in intelligent modeling/control using soft-computing paradigms such as fuzzy logic, neural networks, genetic algorithms, and genetic programs. SoftLab addresses the inadequacies of the existing soft-computing software by supporting comprehensive multidisciplinary functionalities from management tools to engineering systems. Furthermore, the built-in features help the user process/analyze information more efficiently by a friendly yet powerful interface, and will allow the user to specify user-specific processing modules, hence adding to the standard configuration of the software environment.

A Multi-User Virtual Environment for Building and Assessing Higher Order Inquiry Skills in Science

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ketelhut, Diane Jass; Nelson, Brian C.; Clarke, Jody; Dede, Chris

2010-01-01

This study investigated novel pedagogies for helping teachers infuse inquiry into a standards-based science curriculum. Using a multi-user virtual environment (MUVE) as a pedagogical vehicle, teams of middle-school students collaboratively solved problems around disease in a virtual town called River City. The students interacted with "avatars" of…

User-Centered Iterative Design of a Collaborative Virtual Environment

DTIC Science & Technology

2001-03-01

cognitive task analysis methods to study land navigators. This study was intended to validate the use of user-centered design methodologies for the design of...have explored the cognitive aspects of collaborative human way finding and design for collaborative virtual environments. Further investigation of design paradigms should include cognitive task analysis and behavioral task analysis.

What Do Context Aware Electronic Alerts from Virtual Learning Environments Tell Us about User Time & Location?

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Crane, Laura; Benachour, Phillip

2013-01-01

The paper describes the analysis of user location and time stamp information automatically logged when students receive and interact with electronic updates from the University's virtual learning environment. The electronic updates are sent to students' mobile devices using RSS feeds. The mobile reception of such information can be received in…

Civic Participation among Seventh-Grade Social Studies Students in Multi-User Virtual Environments

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Zieger, Laura; Farber, Matthew

2012-01-01

Technological advances on the Internet now enable students to develop participation skills in virtual worlds. Similar to controlling a character in a video game, multi-user virtual environments, or MUVEs, allow participants to interact with others in synchronous, online settings. The authors of this study created a link between MUVEs and…

A Development of Learning Widget on M-Learning and E-Learning Environments

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kim, SooHwan; Kim, HyeonCheol; Han, SeonKwan

2013-01-01

This article describes the development of learning widget on m-learning and e-learning environments. A widget is a small, simple and useful application supporting user-oriented contents. The user may select and install widgets that are convenient as well as an auto-updating application including weather or calendar. These widgets are especially…

MOO: Using a Computer Gaming Environment to Teach about Community Arts

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Garber, Elizabeth

2004-01-01

In this paper, the author discusses the use of an interactive computer technology, "MOO" (Multi-user domain, Object-Oriented), in her art education classes for preservice teachers. A MOO is a text-based environment wherein interactivity is centered on text exchanges made between users based on problems or other materials created by teachers. The…

Intelligence Community Forum

DTIC Science & Technology

2008-11-05

Description Operationally Feasible? EEG ms ms cm Measures electrical activity in the brain. Practical tool for applications - real time monitoring or...Cognitive Systems Device Development & Processing Methods Brain activity can be monitored in real-time in operational environments with EEG Brain...biological and cognitive findings about the user to customize the learning environment Neurofeedback • Present the user with real-time feedback

Exploring the Integration of Technology into Jewish Education: Multi-User Virtual Environments and Supplementary School Settings

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Sohn, Johannah Eve

2014-01-01

This descriptive case study explores the implementation of a multi-user virtual environment (MUVE) in a Jewish supplemental school setting. The research was conducted to present the recollections and reflections of three constituent populations of a new technology exploring constructivist education in the context of supplemental and online…

User Identification and Tracking in an Educational Web Environment.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Marzo-Lazaro, J. L.; Verdu-Carbo, T.; Fabregat-Gesa, R.

This paper describes a solution to the user identification and tracking problem within an educational World Wide Web environment. The paper begins with an overview of the Teaching Support System project at the University of Girona (Spain); the main objective of the project is to create an integrated set of tools for teachers to use to create and…

Applications of the JPEG standard in a medical environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Wittenberg, Ulrich

1993-10-01

JPEG is a very versatile image coding and compression standard for single images. Medical images make a higher demand on image quality and precision than the usual 'pretty pictures'. In this paper the potential applications of the various JPEG coding modes in a medical environment are evaluated. Due to legal reasons the lossless modes are especially interesting. The spatial modes are equally important because medical data may well exceed the maximum of 12 bit precision allowed for the DCT modes. The performance of the spatial predictors is investigated. From the users point of view the progressive modes, which provide a fast but coarse approximation of the final image, reduce the subjective time one has to wait for it, so they also reduce the user's frustration. Even the lossy modes will find some applications, but they have to be handled with care, because repeated lossy coding and decoding leads to a degradation of the image quality. The amount of this degradation is investigated. The JPEG standard alone is not sufficient for a PACS because it does not store enough additional data such as creation data or details of the imaging modality. Therefore it will be an imbedded coding format in standards like TIFF or ACR/NEMA. It is concluded that the JPEG standard is versatile enough to match the requirements of the medical community.

Initial Efforts in Characterizing Radiation and Plasma Effects on Space Assets: Bridging the Space Environment, Engineering and User Community

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zheng, Y.; Ganushkina, N. Y.; Guild, T. B.; Jiggens, P.; Jun, I.; Mazur, J. E.; Meier, M. M.; Minow, J. I.; Pitchford, D. A.; O'Brien, T. P., III; Shprits, Y.; Tobiska, W. K.; Xapsos, M.; Rastaetter, L.; Jordanova, V. K.; Kellerman, A. C.; Fok, M. C. H.

2017-12-01

The Community Coordinated Modeling Center (CCMC) has been leading the community-wide model validation projects for many years. Such effort has been broadened and extended via the newly-launched International Forum for Space Weather Modeling Capabilities Assessment (https://ccmc.gsfc.nasa.gov/assessment/), Its objective is to track space weather models' progress and performance over time, which is critically needed in space weather operations. The Radiation and Plasma Effects Working Team is working on one of the many focused evaluation topics and deals with five different subtopics: Surface Charging from 10s eV to 40 keV electrons, Internal Charging due to energetic electrons from hundreds keV to several MeVs. Single Event Effects from solar energetic particles (SEPs) and galactic cosmic rays (GCRs) (several MeV to TeVs), Total Dose due to accumulation of doses from electrons (>100 KeV) and protons (> 1 MeV) in a broad energy range, and Radiation Effects from SEPs and GCRs at aviation altitudes. A unique aspect of the Radiation and Plasma Effects focus area is that it bridges the space environments, engineering and user community. This presentation will summarize the working team's progress in metrics discussion/definition and the CCMC web interface/tools to facilitate the validation efforts. As an example, tools in the areas of surface charging/internal charging will be demoed.

A Web-Based Development Environment for Collaborative Data Analysis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Erdmann, M.; Fischer, R.; Glaser, C.; Klingebiel, D.; Komm, M.; Müller, G.; Rieger, M.; Steggemann, J.; Urban, M.; Winchen, T.

2014-06-01

Visual Physics Analysis (VISPA) is a web-based development environment addressing high energy and astroparticle physics. It covers the entire analysis spectrum from the design and validation phase to the execution of analyses and the visualization of results. VISPA provides a graphical steering of the analysis flow, which consists of self-written, re-usable Python and C++ modules for more demanding tasks. All common operating systems are supported since a standard internet browser is the only software requirement for users. Even access via mobile and touch-compatible devices is possible. In this contribution, we present the most recent developments of our web application concerning technical, state-of-the-art approaches as well as practical experiences. One of the key features is the use of workspaces, i.e. user-configurable connections to remote machines supplying resources and local file access. Thereby, workspaces enable the management of data, computing resources (e.g. remote clusters or computing grids), and additional software either centralized or individually. We further report on the results of an application with more than 100 third-year students using VISPA for their regular particle physics exercises during the winter term 2012/13. Besides the ambition to support and simplify the development cycle of physics analyses, new use cases such as fast, location-independent status queries, the validation of results, and the ability to share analyses within worldwide collaborations with a single click become conceivable.

SCENERY: a web application for (causal) network reconstruction from cytometry data

PubMed Central

Papoutsoglou, Georgios; Athineou, Giorgos; Lagani, Vincenzo; Xanthopoulos, Iordanis; Schmidt, Angelika; Éliás, Szabolcs; Tegnér, Jesper

2017-01-01

Abstract Flow and mass cytometry technologies can probe proteins as biological markers in thousands of individual cells simultaneously, providing unprecedented opportunities for reconstructing networks of protein interactions through machine learning algorithms. The network reconstruction (NR) problem has been well-studied by the machine learning community. However, the potentials of available methods remain largely unknown to the cytometry community, mainly due to their intrinsic complexity and the lack of comprehensive, powerful and easy-to-use NR software implementations specific for cytometry data. To bridge this gap, we present Single CEll NEtwork Reconstruction sYstem (SCENERY), a web server featuring several standard and advanced cytometry data analysis methods coupled with NR algorithms in a user-friendly, on-line environment. In SCENERY, users may upload their data and set their own study design. The server offers several data analysis options categorized into three classes of methods: data (pre)processing, statistical analysis and NR. The server also provides interactive visualization and download of results as ready-to-publish images or multimedia reports. Its core is modular and based on the widely-used and robust R platform allowing power users to extend its functionalities by submitting their own NR methods. SCENERY is available at scenery.csd.uoc.gr or http://mensxmachina.org/en/software/. PMID:28525568

The Simple Concurrent Online Processing System (SCOPS) - An open-source interface for remotely sensed data processing

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Warren, M. A.; Goult, S.; Clewley, D.

2018-06-01

Advances in technology allow remotely sensed data to be acquired with increasingly higher spatial and spectral resolutions. These data may then be used to influence government decision making and solve a number of research and application driven questions. However, such large volumes of data can be difficult to handle on a single personal computer or on older machines with slower components. Often the software required to process data is varied and can be highly technical and too advanced for the novice user to fully understand. This paper describes an open-source tool, the Simple Concurrent Online Processing System (SCOPS), which forms part of an airborne hyperspectral data processing chain that allows users accessing the tool over a web interface to submit jobs and process data remotely. It is demonstrated using Natural Environment Research Council Airborne Research Facility (NERC-ARF) instruments together with other free- and open-source tools to take radiometrically corrected data from sensor geometry into geocorrected form and to generate simple or complex band ratio products. The final processed data products are acquired via an HTTP download. SCOPS can cut data processing times and introduce complex processing software to novice users by distributing jobs across a network using a simple to use web interface.

Development and Control of the Naval Postgraduate School Planar Autonomous Docking Simulator (NPADS)

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Porter, Robert D.

2002-09-01

The objective of this thesis was to design, construct and develop the initial autonomous control algorithm for the NPS Planar Autonomous Docking Simulator (NPADS) The effort included hardware design, fabrication, installation and integration; mass property determination; and the development and testing of control laws utilizing MATLAB and Simulink for modeling and LabView for NPADS control, The NPADS vehicle uses air pads and a granite table to simulate a 2-D, drag-free, zero-g space environment, It is a completely self-contained vehicle equipped with eight cold-gas, bang-bang type thrusters and a reaction wheel for motion control, A 'star sensor' CCD camera locates the vehicle on the table while a color CCD docking camera and two robotic arms will locate and dock with a target vehicle, The on-board computer system leverages PXI technology and a single source, simplifying systems integration, The vehicle is powered by two lead-acid batteries for completely autonomous operation, A graphical user interface and wireless Ethernet enable the user to command and monitor the vehicle from a remote command and data acquisition computer. Two control algorithms were developed and allow the user to either control the thrusters and reaction wheel manually or simply specify a desired location and rotation angle,

Evaluation of the Next-Gen Exercise Software Interface in the NEEMO Analog

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Hanson, Andrea; Kalogera, Kent; Sandor, Aniko; Hardy, Marc; Frank, Andrew; English, Kirk; Williams, Thomas; Perera, Jeevan; Amonette, William

2017-01-01

NSBRI (National Space Biomedical Research Institute) funded research grant to develop the 'NextGen' exercise software for the NEEMO (NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations) analog. Develop a software architecture to integrate instructional, motivational and socialization techniques into a common portal to enhance exercise countermeasures in remote environments. Increase user efficiency and satisfaction, and institute commonality across multiple exercise systems. Utilized GUI (Graphical User Interface) design principals focused on intuitive ease of use to minimize training time and realize early user efficiency. Project requirement to test the software in an analog environment. Top Level Project Aims: 1) Improve the usability of crew interface software to exercise CMS (Crew Management System) through common app-like interfaces. 2) Introduce virtual instructional motion training. 3) Use virtual environment to provide remote socialization with family and friends, improve exercise technique, adherence, motivation and ultimately performance outcomes.

Haptic interfaces: Hardware, software and human performance

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Srinivasan, Mandayam A.

1995-01-01

Virtual environments are computer-generated synthetic environments with which a human user can interact to perform a wide variety of perceptual and motor tasks. At present, most of the virtual environment systems engage only the visual and auditory senses, and not the haptic sensorimotor system that conveys the sense of touch and feel of objects in the environment. Computer keyboards, mice, and trackballs constitute relatively simple haptic interfaces. Gloves and exoskeletons that track hand postures have more interaction capabilities and are available in the market. Although desktop and wearable force-reflecting devices have been built and implemented in research laboratories, the current capabilities of such devices are quite limited. To realize the full promise of virtual environments and teleoperation of remote systems, further developments of haptic interfaces are critical. In this paper, the status and research needs in human haptics, technology development and interactions between the two are described. In particular, the excellent performance characteristics of Phantom, a haptic interface recently developed at MIT, are highlighted. Realistic sensations of single point of contact interactions with objects of variable geometry (e.g., smooth, textured, polyhedral) and material properties (e.g., friction, impedance) in the context of a variety of tasks (e.g., needle biopsy, switch panels) achieved through this device are described and the associated issues in haptic rendering are discussed.

LivePhantom: Retrieving Virtual World Light Data to Real Environments.

PubMed

Kolivand, Hoshang; Billinghurst, Mark; Sunar, Mohd Shahrizal

2016-01-01

To achieve realistic Augmented Reality (AR), shadows play an important role in creating a 3D impression of a scene. Casting virtual shadows on real and virtual objects is one of the topics of research being conducted in this area. In this paper, we propose a new method for creating complex AR indoor scenes using real time depth detection to exert virtual shadows on virtual and real environments. A Kinect camera was used to produce a depth map for the physical scene mixing into a single real-time transparent tacit surface. Once this is created, the camera's position can be tracked from the reconstructed 3D scene. Real objects are represented by virtual object phantoms in the AR scene enabling users holding a webcam and a standard Kinect camera to capture and reconstruct environments simultaneously. The tracking capability of the algorithm is shown and the findings are assessed drawing upon qualitative and quantitative methods making comparisons with previous AR phantom generation applications. The results demonstrate the robustness of the technique for realistic indoor rendering in AR systems.

LivePhantom: Retrieving Virtual World Light Data to Real Environments

PubMed Central

2016-01-01

To achieve realistic Augmented Reality (AR), shadows play an important role in creating a 3D impression of a scene. Casting virtual shadows on real and virtual objects is one of the topics of research being conducted in this area. In this paper, we propose a new method for creating complex AR indoor scenes using real time depth detection to exert virtual shadows on virtual and real environments. A Kinect camera was used to produce a depth map for the physical scene mixing into a single real-time transparent tacit surface. Once this is created, the camera’s position can be tracked from the reconstructed 3D scene. Real objects are represented by virtual object phantoms in the AR scene enabling users holding a webcam and a standard Kinect camera to capture and reconstruct environments simultaneously. The tracking capability of the algorithm is shown and the findings are assessed drawing upon qualitative and quantitative methods making comparisons with previous AR phantom generation applications. The results demonstrate the robustness of the technique for realistic indoor rendering in AR systems. PMID:27930663

Token-based information security for commercial and federal information networks

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rohland, William S.

1996-03-01

The planning of cryptographic solutions for messaging and electronic commerce applications in the United States during the past few years has been motivated by a high level of interest in the technology on the part of potential users. It has been marked by a high level of controversy over algorithms, patent rights and escrow policy. The diverse needs of the government and commercial sectors have led to mutually exclusive solutions based on different algorithms and policy; this phenomenon is fairly unique to the United States. Because of the strong requirement to preserve the differences that make these solutions unique for the two environments, the near-term evolution of a single standard appears unlikely. Furthermore, the need on the part of some government agencies and some commercial establishments exists to operate in both environments. This paper deals with the technical definition and design approach to a dual-use cryptographic device and the migration paths to the dual-use device from both environments. Such a device is further considered as a component of a secure cryptographic translation facility.

Miami Valley ITS : early deployment plan : final user service plan

DOT National Transportation Integrated Search

1997-07-01

This User Service Plan is the first major product of the process to develop an Intelligent Transportation System (ITS) Early Deployment Plan (EDP) for the Miami Valley. This User Service Plan documents the travel environment, growth trends and transp...

Direct measurement of toxicants inhaled by water pipe users in the natural environment using a real-time in situ sampling technique.

PubMed

Katurji, M; Daher, N; Sheheitli, H; Saleh, R; Shihadeh, A

2010-11-01

While narghile water pipe smoking has become a global phenomenon, knowledge regarding its toxicant content and delivery, addictive properties, and health consequences is sorely lagging. One challenge in measuring toxicant content of the smoke in the laboratory is the large number of simplifying assumptions that must be made to model a "typical" smoking session using a smoking machine, resulting in uncertainty over the obtained toxicant yields. In this study, we develop an alternative approach in which smoke generated by a human water pipe user is sampled directly during the smoking session. The method, dubbed real-time in situ sampling (RINS), required developing a self-powered portable instrument capable of automatically sampling a fixed fraction of the smoke generated by the user. Instrument performance was validated in the laboratory, and the instrument was deployed in a field study involving 43 ad libitum water pipe use sessions in Beirut area cafés in which we measured inhaled nicotine, carbon monoxide (CO), and water pipe ma'ssel-derived "tar." We found that users drew a mean of 119 L of smoke containing 150 mg of CO, 4 mg of nicotine, and 602 mg of ma'ssel-derived "tar" during a single use session (mean duration = 61 min). These first direct measurements of toxicant delivery demonstrate that ordinary water pipe use involves inhaling large quantities of CO, nicotine, and dry particulate matter. Results are compared with those obtained using the Beirut method smoking machine protocol.

SurfaceSlide: a multitouch digital pathology platform.

PubMed

Wang, Yinhai; Williamson, Kate E; Kelly, Paul J; James, Jacqueline A; Hamilton, Peter W

2012-01-01

Digital pathology provides a digital environment for the management and interpretation of pathological images and associated data. It is becoming increasing popular to use modern computer based tools and applications in pathological education, tissue based research and clinical diagnosis. Uptake of this new technology is stymied by its single user orientation and its prerequisite and cumbersome combination of mouse and keyboard for navigation and annotation. In this study we developed SurfaceSlide, a dedicated viewing platform which enables the navigation and annotation of gigapixel digitised pathological images using fingertip touch. SurfaceSlide was developed using the Microsoft Surface, a 30 inch multitouch tabletop computing platform. SurfaceSlide users can perform direct panning and zooming operations on digitised slide images. These images are downloaded onto the Microsoft Surface platform from a remote server on-demand. Users can also draw annotations and key in texts using an on-screen virtual keyboard. We also developed a smart caching protocol which caches the surrounding regions of a field of view in multi-resolutions thus providing a smooth and vivid user experience and reducing the delay for image downloading from the internet. We compared the usability of SurfaceSlide against Aperio ImageScope and PathXL online viewer. SurfaceSlide is intuitive, fast and easy to use. SurfaceSlide represents the most direct, effective and intimate human-digital slide interaction experience. It is expected that SurfaceSlide will significantly enhance digital pathology tools and applications in education and clinical practice.

SurfaceSlide: A Multitouch Digital Pathology Platform

PubMed Central

Wang, Yinhai; Williamson, Kate E.; Kelly, Paul J.; James, Jacqueline A.; Hamilton, Peter W.

2012-01-01

Background Digital pathology provides a digital environment for the management and interpretation of pathological images and associated data. It is becoming increasing popular to use modern computer based tools and applications in pathological education, tissue based research and clinical diagnosis. Uptake of this new technology is stymied by its single user orientation and its prerequisite and cumbersome combination of mouse and keyboard for navigation and annotation. Methodology In this study we developed SurfaceSlide, a dedicated viewing platform which enables the navigation and annotation of gigapixel digitised pathological images using fingertip touch. SurfaceSlide was developed using the Microsoft Surface, a 30 inch multitouch tabletop computing platform. SurfaceSlide users can perform direct panning and zooming operations on digitised slide images. These images are downloaded onto the Microsoft Surface platform from a remote server on-demand. Users can also draw annotations and key in texts using an on-screen virtual keyboard. We also developed a smart caching protocol which caches the surrounding regions of a field of view in multi-resolutions thus providing a smooth and vivid user experience and reducing the delay for image downloading from the internet. We compared the usability of SurfaceSlide against Aperio ImageScope and PathXL online viewer. Conclusion SurfaceSlide is intuitive, fast and easy to use. SurfaceSlide represents the most direct, effective and intimate human–digital slide interaction experience. It is expected that SurfaceSlide will significantly enhance digital pathology tools and applications in education and clinical practice. PMID:22292040

'Putting it on the table': direct-manipulative interaction and multi-user display technologies for semi-immersive environments and augmented reality applications.

PubMed

Encarnação, L Miguel; Bimber, Oliver

2002-01-01

Collaborative virtual environments for diagnosis and treatment planning are increasingly gaining importance in our global society. Virtual and Augmented Reality approaches promised to provide valuable means for the involved interactive data analysis, but the underlying technologies still create a cumbersome work environment that is inadequate for clinical employment. This paper addresses two of the shortcomings of such technology: Intuitive interaction with multi-dimensional data in immersive and semi-immersive environments as well as stereoscopic multi-user displays combining the advantages of Virtual and Augmented Reality technology.

Projection Mapping User Interface for Disabled People

PubMed Central

Simutis, Rimvydas; Maskeliūnas, Rytis

2018-01-01

Difficulty in communicating is one of the key challenges for people suffering from severe motor and speech disabilities. Often such person can communicate and interact with the environment only using assistive technologies. This paper presents a multifunctional user interface designed to improve communication efficiency and person independence. The main component of this interface is a projection mapping technique used to highlight objects in the environment. Projection mapping makes it possible to create a natural augmented reality information presentation method. The user interface combines a depth sensor and a projector to create camera-projector system. We provide a detailed description of camera-projector system calibration procedure. The described system performs tabletop object detection and automatic projection mapping. Multiple user input modalities have been integrated into the multifunctional user interface. Such system can be adapted to the needs of people with various disabilities. PMID:29686827

Projection Mapping User Interface for Disabled People.

PubMed

Gelšvartas, Julius; Simutis, Rimvydas; Maskeliūnas, Rytis

2018-01-01

Difficulty in communicating is one of the key challenges for people suffering from severe motor and speech disabilities. Often such person can communicate and interact with the environment only using assistive technologies. This paper presents a multifunctional user interface designed to improve communication efficiency and person independence. The main component of this interface is a projection mapping technique used to highlight objects in the environment. Projection mapping makes it possible to create a natural augmented reality information presentation method. The user interface combines a depth sensor and a projector to create camera-projector system. We provide a detailed description of camera-projector system calibration procedure. The described system performs tabletop object detection and automatic projection mapping. Multiple user input modalities have been integrated into the multifunctional user interface. Such system can be adapted to the needs of people with various disabilities.

Generation of development environments for the Arden Syntax.

PubMed Central

Bång, M.; Eriksson, H.

1997-01-01

Providing appropriate development environments for specialized languages requires a significant development and maintenance effort. Specialized environments are therefore expensive when compared to their general-language counterparts. The Arden Syntax for Medical Logic Modules (MLM) is a standardized language for representing medical knowledge. We have used PROTEGE-II, a knowledge-engineering environment, to generate a number of experimental development environments for the Arden Syntax. MEDAILLE is the resulting MLM editor, which provides a user-friendly environment that allows users to create and modify MLM definitions. Although MEDAILLE is a generated editor, it has similar functionality, while reducing the programming effort, as compared to other MLM editors developed using traditional programming techniques. We discuss how developers can use PROTEGE-II to generate development environments for other standardized languages and for general programming languages. PMID:9357639

User and Performance Impacts from Franklin Upgrades

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

He, Yun

2009-05-10

The NERSC flagship computer Cray XT4 system"Franklin" has gone through three major upgrades: quad core upgrade, CLE 2.1 upgrade, and IO upgrade, during the past year. In this paper, we will discuss the various aspects of the user impacts such as user access, user environment, and user issues etc from these upgrades. The performance impacts on the kernel benchmarks and selected application benchmarks will also be presented.

Learning To Live with Complexity.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Dosa, Marta

Neither the design of information systems and networks nor the delivery of library services can claim true user centricity without an understanding of the multifaceted psychological environment of users and potential users. The complexity of the political process, social problems, challenges to scientific inquiry, entrepreneurship, and…

Tools to manage the enterprise-wide picture archiving and communications system environment.

PubMed

Lannum, L M; Gumpf, S; Piraino, D

2001-06-01

The presentation will focus on the implementation and utilization of a central picture archiving and communications system (PACS) network-monitoring tool that allows for enterprise-wide operations management and support of the image distribution network. The MagicWatch (Siemens, Iselin, NJ) PACS/radiology information system (RIS) monitoring station from Siemens has allowed our organization to create a service support structure that has given us proactive control of our environment and has allowed us to meet the service level performance expectations of the users. The Radiology Help Desk has used the MagicWatch PACS monitoring station as an applications support tool that has allowed the group to monitor network activity and individual systems performance at each node. Fast and timely recognition of the effects of single events within the PACS/RIS environment has allowed the group to proactively recognize possible performance issues and resolve problems. The PACS/operations group performs network management control, image storage management, and software distribution management from a single, central point in the enterprise. The MagicWatch station allows for the complete automation of software distribution, installation, and configuration process across all the nodes in the system. The tool has allowed for the standardization of the workstations and provides a central configuration control for the establishment and maintenance of the system standards. This report will describe the PACS management and operation prior to the implementation of the MagicWatch PACS monitoring station and will highlight the operational benefits of a centralized network and system-monitoring tool.

Context-aware brain-computer interfaces: exploring the information space of user, technical system and environment

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Zander, T. O.; Jatzev, S.

2012-02-01

Brain-computer interface (BCI) systems are usually applied in highly controlled environments such as research laboratories or clinical setups. However, many BCI-based applications are implemented in more complex environments. For example, patients might want to use a BCI system at home, and users without disabilities could benefit from BCI systems in special working environments. In these contexts, it might be more difficult to reliably infer information about brain activity, because many intervening factors add up and disturb the BCI feature space. One solution for this problem would be adding context awareness to the system. We propose to augment the available information space with additional channels carrying information about the user state, the environment and the technical system. In particular, passive BCI systems seem to be capable of adding highly relevant context information—otherwise covert aspects of user state. In this paper, we present a theoretical framework based on general human-machine system research for adding context awareness to a BCI system. Building on that, we present results from a study on a passive BCI, which allows access to the covert aspect of user state related to the perceived loss of control. This study is a proof of concept and demonstrates that context awareness could beneficially be implemented in and combined with a BCI system or a general human-machine system. The EEG data from this experiment are available for public download at www.phypa.org. Parts of this work have already been presented in non-journal publications. This will be indicated specifically by appropriate references in the text.

Important wheelchair skills for new manual wheelchair users: health care professional and wheelchair user perspectives.

PubMed

Morgan, Kerri A; Engsberg, Jack R; Gray, David B

2017-01-01

The purpose of this project was to identify wheelchair skills currently being taught to new manual wheelchair users, identify areas of importance for manual wheelchair skills' training during initial rehabilitation, identify similarities and differences between the perspectives of health care professionals and manual wheelchair users and use the ICF to organize themes related to rehabilitation and learning how to use a manual wheelchair. Focus groups were conducted with health care professionals and experienced manual wheelchair users. ICF codes were used to identify focus group themes. The Activities and Participation codes were more frequently used than Structure, Function and Environment codes. Wheelchair skills identified as important for new manual wheelchair users included propulsion techniques, transfers in an out of the wheelchair, providing maintenance to the wheelchair and navigating barriers such as curbs, ramps and rough terrain. Health care professionals and manual wheelchair users identified the need to incorporate the environment (home and community) into the wheelchair training program. Identifying essential components for training the proper propulsion mechanics and wheelchair skills in new manual wheelchair users is an important step in preventing future health and participation restrictions. Implications for Rehabilitation Wheelchair skills are being addressed frequently during rehabilitation at the activity-dependent level. Propulsion techniques, transfers in an out of the wheelchair, providing maintenance to the wheelchair and navigating barriers such as curbs, ramps and rough terrain are important skills to address during wheelchair training. Environment factors (in the home and community) are important to incorporate into wheelchair training to maximize safe and multiple-environmental-setting uses of manual wheelchairs. The ICF has application to understanding manual wheelchair rehabilitation for wheelchair users and therapists for improving the understanding of manual wheelchair use.

Performance-Driven Hybrid Full-Body Character Control for Navigation and Interaction in Virtual Environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Mousas, Christos; Anagnostopoulos, Christos-Nikolaos

2017-06-01

This paper presents a hybrid character control interface that provides the ability to synthesize in real-time a variety of actions based on the user's performance capture. The proposed methodology enables three different performance interaction modules: the performance animation control that enables the direct mapping of the user's pose to the character, the motion controller that synthesizes the desired motion of the character based on an activity recognition methodology, and the hybrid control that lies within the performance animation and the motion controller. With the methodology presented, the user will have the freedom to interact within the virtual environment, as well as the ability to manipulate the character and to synthesize a variety of actions that cannot be performed directly by him/her, but which the system synthesizes. Therefore, the user is able to interact with the virtual environment in a more sophisticated fashion. This paper presents examples of different scenarios based on the three different full-body character control methodologies.

Virtual hand: a 3D tactile interface to virtual environments

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Rogowitz, Bernice E.; Borrel, Paul

2008-02-01

We introduce a novel system that allows users to experience the sensation of touch in a computer graphics environment. In this system, the user places his/her hand on an array of pins, which is moved about space on a 6 degree-of-freedom robot arm. The surface of the pins defines a surface in the virtual world. This "virtual hand" can move about the virtual world. When the virtual hand encounters an object in the virtual world, the heights of the pins are adjusted so that they represent the object's shape, surface, and texture. A control system integrates pin and robot arm motions to transmit information about objects in the computer graphics world to the user. It also allows the user to edit, change and move the virtual objects, shapes and textures. This system provides a general framework for touching, manipulating, and modifying objects in a 3-D computer graphics environment, which may be useful in a wide range of applications, including computer games, computer aided design systems, and immersive virtual worlds.

KIPSE1: A Knowledge-based Interactive Problem Solving Environment for data estimation and pattern classification

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Han, Chia Yung; Wan, Liqun; Wee, William G.

1990-01-01

A knowledge-based interactive problem solving environment called KIPSE1 is presented. The KIPSE1 is a system built on a commercial expert system shell, the KEE system. This environment gives user capability to carry out exploratory data analysis and pattern classification tasks. A good solution often consists of a sequence of steps with a set of methods used at each step. In KIPSE1, solution is represented in the form of a decision tree and each node of the solution tree represents a partial solution to the problem. Many methodologies are provided at each node to the user such that the user can interactively select the method and data sets to test and subsequently examine the results. Otherwise, users are allowed to make decisions at various stages of problem solving to subdivide the problem into smaller subproblems such that a large problem can be handled and a better solution can be found.

Latent Classes of Polydrug Users as a Predictor of Crash Involvement and Alcohol Consumption.

PubMed

Scherer, Michael; Romano, Eduardo; Voas, Robert; Taylor, Eileen

2018-05-01

Polydrug users have been shown to be at higher risk for alcohol consumption and crash involvement. However, research has shown that polydrug groups differ in some important ways. It is currently unknown how polydrug-using groups differ in terms of crash involvement and alcohol consumption. The current study used latent class analysis to examine subgroups of polydrug users (n = 384) among a sample of drivers in Virginia Beach, Virginia (N = 10,512). A series of logistic regression analyses were conducted to determine the relationship between polydrug use categories and crash involvement and alcohol consumption. Four distinct subclasses of users were identified among polydrug-using drivers: Class 1 is the "marijuana-amphetamines class" and accounts for 21.6% of polydrug users. Class 2 is the "benzo-antidepressant class" and accounts for 39.0% of polydrug users. Class 3 is the "opioid-benzo class" and accounts for 32.7% of polydrug users. Finally, Class 4 is the "marijuana-cocaine class" and accounts for 6.7% of the study sample. Drivers in the opioid-benzo class were significantly more likely than those in any other class as well as non-drug users and single-drug users to be involved in a crash and were more likely than those in most other conditions to consume alcohol. No significant difference was found between marijuana-amphetamine users or benzo-antidepressant users and non-drug users on crash risk. Some polydrug users are indeed at greater risk for crash involvement and alcohol consumption; however, not all polydrug users are significantly worse than single-drug users and/or non-drug users, and the practice of lumping polydrug users together when predicting crash risk runs the risk of inaccurately attributing crash involvement to certain drivers.

Bidirectional teleportation of a pure EPR state by using GHZ states

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Hassanpour, Shima; Houshmand, Monireh

2016-02-01

In the present paper, a novel bidirectional quantum teleportation protocol is proposed. By using entanglement swapping technique, two GHZ states are shared as a quantum channel between Alice and Bob as legitimate users. In this scheme, based on controlled-not operation, single-qubit measurement, and appropriate unitary operations, two users can simultaneously transmit a pure EPR state to each other, While, in the previous protocols, the users can just teleport a single-qubit state to each other via more than four-qubit state. Therefore, the proposed scheme is economical compared with previous protocols.

CyanoGEBA: A Better Understanding of Cynobacterial Diversity through Large-Scale Genomics (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Shih, Patrick

2012-03-22

Patrick Shih, representing both the University of California, Berkeley and JGI, gives a talk titled "CyanoGEBA: A Better Understanding of Cynobacterial Diversity through Large-scale Genomics" at the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

Facilitating 3D Virtual World Learning Environments Creation by Non-Technical End Users through Template-Based Virtual World Instantiation

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Liu, Chang; Zhong, Ying; Ozercan, Sertac; Zhu, Qing

2013-01-01

This paper presents a template-based solution to overcome technical barriers non-technical computer end users face when developing functional learning environments in three-dimensional virtual worlds (3DVW). "iVirtualWorld," a prototype of a platform-independent 3DVW creation tool that implements the proposed solution, facilitates 3DVW…

In Situ Expression of Acidic and Thermophilic Carbohydrate Active Enzymes by Filamentous Fungi (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

ScienceCinema

Mosier, Annika

2018-01-22

Annika Mosier, graduate student from Stanford University presents a talk titled "In Situ Expression of Acidic and Thermophilic Carbohydrate Active Enzymes by Filamentous Fungi" at the JGI User 7th Annual Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, CA.

Systems Biology Approaches to Dissecting Plant Cell Wall Biosynthesis Genes in Poplus (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

ScienceCinema

Glass, N. Louise; Pennacchio, Len

2018-02-13

N. Louise Glass from the University of California, Berkeley, presents a talk titled "Systems Biology Approaches to Dissecting Plant Cell Wall Biosynthesis Genes in Poplus" at the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

CyanoGEBA: A Better Understanding of Cynobacterial Diversity through Large-Scale Genomics (JGI Seventh Annual User Meeting 2012: Genomics of Energy and Environment)

ScienceCinema

Shih, Patrick

2018-01-10

Patrick Shih, representing both the University of California, Berkeley and JGI, gives a talk titled "CyanoGEBA: A Better Understanding of Cynobacterial Diversity through Large-scale Genomics" at the JGI 7th Annual Users Meeting: Genomics of Energy & Environment Meeting on March 22, 2012 in Walnut Creek, California.

Efficient Learning Using a Virtual Learning Environment in a University Class

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Stricker, Daniel; Weibel, David; Wissmath, Bartholomaus

2011-01-01

This study examines a blended learning setting in an undergraduate course in psychology. A virtual learning environment (VLE) complemented the face-to-face lecture. The usage was voluntary and the VLE was designed to support the learning process of the students. Data from users (N = 80) and non-users (N = 82) from two cohorts were collected.…

Pre-Service Teachers' Perspectives on Using Scenario-Based Virtual Worlds in Science Education

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kennedy-Clark, Shannon

2011-01-01

This paper presents the findings of a study on the current knowledge and attitudes of pre-service teachers on the use of scenario-based multi-user virtual environments in science education. The 28 participants involved in the study were introduced to "Virtual Singapura," a multi-user virtual environment, and completed an open-ended questionnaire.…

The Impact of Student Self-Efficacy on Scientific Inquiry Skills: An Exploratory Investigation in "River City," a Multi-User Virtual Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Ketelhut, Diane Jass

2007-01-01

This exploratory study investigated data-gathering behaviors exhibited by 100 seventh-grade students as they participated in a scientific inquiry-based curriculum project delivered by a multi-user virtual environment (MUVE). This research examined the relationship between students' self-efficacy on entry into the authentic scientific activity and…

Real-Life Migrants on the MUVE: Stories of Virtual Transitions

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Perkins, Ross A.; Arreguin, Cathy

2007-01-01

The communication and collaborative interface known as a multi-user virtual environment (MUVE), has existed since as early as the late 1970s. MUVEs refer to programs that have an animated character ("avatar") controlled by a user within a wider environment that can be explored--or built--at will. Second Life, a MUVE created by San Francisco-based…

Development of an audio-based virtual gaming environment to assist with navigation skills in the blind.

PubMed

Connors, Erin C; Yazzolino, Lindsay A; Sánchez, Jaime; Merabet, Lotfi B

2013-03-27

Audio-based Environment Simulator (AbES) is virtual environment software designed to improve real world navigation skills in the blind. Using only audio based cues and set within the context of a video game metaphor, users gather relevant spatial information regarding a building's layout. This allows the user to develop an accurate spatial cognitive map of a large-scale three-dimensional space that can be manipulated for the purposes of a real indoor navigation task. After game play, participants are then assessed on their ability to navigate within the target physical building represented in the game. Preliminary results suggest that early blind users were able to acquire relevant information regarding the spatial layout of a previously unfamiliar building as indexed by their performance on a series of navigation tasks. These tasks included path finding through the virtual and physical building, as well as a series of drop off tasks. We find that the immersive and highly interactive nature of the AbES software appears to greatly engage the blind user to actively explore the virtual environment. Applications of this approach may extend to larger populations of visually impaired individuals.

Virtual reality and telerobotics applications of an Address Recalculation Pipeline

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Regan, Matthew; Pose, Ronald

1994-01-01

The technology described in this paper was designed to reduce latency to user interactions in immersive virtual reality environments. It is also ideally suited to telerobotic applications such as interaction with remote robotic manipulators in space or in deep sea operations. in such circumstances the significant latency is observed response to user stimulus which is due to communications delays, and the disturbing jerkiness due to low and unpredictable frame rates on compressed video user feedback or computationally limited virtual worlds, can be masked by our techniques. The user is provided with highly responsive visual feedback independent of communication or computational delays in providing physical video feedback or in rendering virtual world images. Virtual and physical environments can be combined seamlessly using these techniques.

Search Strategies of Visually Impaired Persons using a Camera Phone Wayfinding System

PubMed Central

Manduchi, R.; Coughlan, J.; Ivanchenko, V.

2016-01-01

We report new experiments conducted using a camera phone wayfinding system, which is designed to guide a visually impaired user to machine-readable signs (such as barcodes) labeled with special color markers. These experiments specifically investigate search strategies of such users detecting, localizing and touching color markers that have been mounted in various ways in different environments: in a corridor (either flush with the wall or mounted perpendicular to it) or in a large room with obstacles between the user and the markers. The results show that visually impaired users are able to reliably find color markers in all the conditions that we tested, using search strategies that vary depending on the environment in which they are placed. PMID:26949755

Search Strategies of Visually Impaired Persons using a Camera Phone Wayfinding System.

PubMed

Manduchi, R; Coughlan, J; Ivanchenko, V

2008-07-01

We report new experiments conducted using a camera phone wayfinding system, which is designed to guide a visually impaired user to machine-readable signs (such as barcodes) labeled with special color markers. These experiments specifically investigate search strategies of such users detecting, localizing and touching color markers that have been mounted in various ways in different environments: in a corridor (either flush with the wall or mounted perpendicular to it) or in a large room with obstacles between the user and the markers. The results show that visually impaired users are able to reliably find color markers in all the conditions that we tested, using search strategies that vary depending on the environment in which they are placed.

CLIPS: A proposal for improved usability

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Patton, Charles R.

1990-01-01

This paper proposes the enhancement of the CLIPS user interface to improve the over-all usability of the CLIPS development environment. It suggests some directions for the long term growth of the user interface, and discusses some specific strengths and weaknesses of the current CLIPS PC user interface. Every user of CLIPS shares a common experience: his/her first interaction with the system itself. As with any new language, between the process of installing CLIPS on the appropriate computer and the completion of a large application, an intensive learning process takes place. For those with extensive programming knowledge and LISP backgrounds, this experience may have been mostly interesting and pleasant. Being familiar with products that are similar to CLIPS in many ways, these users enjoy a relatively short training period with the product. Already familiar with many of the functions they wish to employ, experienced users are free to focus on the capabilities of CLIPS that make it uniquely useful within their working environment.

The Technology Information Environment with Industry{trademark} system description

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Detry, R.; Machin, G.

The Technology Information Environment with Industry (TIE-In{trademark}) provides users with controlled access to distributed laboratory resources that are packaged in intelligent user interfaces. These interfaces help users access resources without requiring the user to have technical or computer expertise. TIE-In utilizes existing, proven technologies such as the Kerberos authentication system, X-Windows, and UNIX sockets. A Front End System (FES) authenticates users and allows them to register for resources and subsequently access them. The FES also stores status and accounting information, and provides an automated method for the resource owners to recover costs from users. The resources available through TIE-In aremore » typically laboratory-developed applications that are used to help design, analyze, and test components in the nation`s nuclear stockpile. Many of these applications can also be used by US companies for non-weapons-related work. TIE-In allows these industry partners to obtain laboratory-developed technical solutions without requiring them to duplicate the technical resources (people, hardware, and software) at Sandia.« less

Service user governors in mental health foundation trusts: accountability or business as usual?

PubMed

MacDonald, Dee; Barnes, Marian; Crawford, Mike; Omeni, Edward; Wilson, Aaron; Rose, Diana

2015-12-01

National Health Foundation Trusts present opportunities for individual mental health service users to be active in the governance of trusts. This is one of a range of mechanisms for patient and public involvement and one which promotes an individual rather than collective approach to involvement. Within the context of a broader study of the impact of service user involvement in mental health services, the objective of this article was to explore the experience of service user governors in foundation trusts and their capacity to hold boards to account. The Council of Governors in three foundation trusts were observed for a year. Focus groups with service user governors were undertaken in each trust. Service users had different expectations and understandings of the role and approached it in different ways. Key themes that emerged concerned: the role of a governor, conduct and content of meetings, agenda setting, relationships and representation. The experiences of mental health service user governors need to be understood within the complex environment of patient and public involvement in general and of mental health service user involvement in particular. The dislocation of the service user governor role from other forms of service user activity and involvement result in confusion about how notions of holding a trust to account and representation of other service users can be addressed within a boundaried institutional environment. © 2014 John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Low cost heads-up virtual reality (HUVR) with optical tracking and haptic feedback

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Margolis, Todd; DeFanti, Thomas A.; Dawe, Greg; Prudhomme, Andrew; Schulze, Jurgen P.; Cutchin, Steve

2011-03-01

Researchers at the University of California, San Diego, have created a new, relatively low-cost augmented reality system that enables users to touch the virtual environment they are immersed in. The Heads-Up Virtual Reality device (HUVR) couples a consumer 3D HD flat screen TV with a half-silvered mirror to project any graphic image onto the user's hands and into the space surrounding them. With his or her head position optically tracked to generate the correct perspective view, the user maneuvers a force-feedback (haptic) device to interact with the 3D image, literally 'touching' the object's angles and contours as if it was a tangible physical object. HUVR can be used for training and education in structural and mechanical engineering, archaeology and medicine as well as other tasks that require hand-eye coordination. One of the most unique characteristics of HUVR is that a user can place their hands inside of the virtual environment without occluding the 3D image. Built using open-source software and consumer level hardware, HUVR offers users a tactile experience in an immersive environment that is functional, affordable and scalable.

The AstroVR Collaboratory, an On-line Multi-User Environment for Research in Astrophysics

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

van Buren, D.; Curtis, P.; Nichols, D. A.; Brundage, M.

We describe our experiment with an on-line collaborative environment where users share the execution of programs and communicate via audio, video, and typed text. Collaborative environments represent the next step in computer-mediated conferencing, combining powerful compute engines, data persistence, shared applications, and teleconferencing tools. As proof of concept, we have implemented a shared image analysis tool, allowing geographically distinct users to analyze FITS images together. We anticipate that \\htmllink{AstroVR}{http://astrovr.ipac.caltech.edu:8888} and similar systems will become an important part of collaborative work in the next decade, including with applications in remote observing, spacecraft operations, on-line meetings, as well as and day-to-day research activities. The technology is generic and promises to find uses in business, medicine, government, and education.

The AE-8 trapped electron model environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Vette, James I.

1991-01-01

The machine sensible version of the AE-8 electron model environment was completed in December 1983. It has been sent to users on the model environment distribution list and is made available to new users by the National Space Science Data Center (NSSDC). AE-8 is the last in a series of terrestrial trapped radiation models that includes eight proton and eight electron versions. With the exception of AE-8, all these models were documented in formal reports as well as being available in a machine sensible form. The purpose of this report is to complete the documentation, finally, for AE-8 so that users can understand its construction and see the comparison of the model with the new data used, as well as with the AE-4 model.

TrackArt: the user friendly interface for single molecule tracking data analysis and simulation applied to complex diffusion in mica supported lipid bilayers.

PubMed

Matysik, Artur; Kraut, Rachel S

2014-05-01

Single molecule tracking (SMT) analysis of fluorescently tagged lipid and protein probes is an attractive alternative to ensemble averaged methods such as fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) or fluorescence recovery after photobleaching (FRAP) for measuring diffusion in artificial and plasma membranes. The meaningful estimation of diffusion coefficients and their errors is however not straightforward, and is heavily dependent on sample type, acquisition method, and equipment used. Many approaches require advanced computing and programming skills for their implementation. Here we present TrackArt software, an accessible graphic interface for simulation and complex analysis of multiple particle paths. Imported trajectories can be filtered to eliminate spurious or corrupted tracks, and are then analyzed using several previously described methodologies, to yield single or multiple diffusion coefficients, their population fractions, and estimated errors. We use TrackArt to analyze the single-molecule diffusion behavior of a sphingolipid analog SM-Atto647N, in mica supported DOPC (1,2-dioleoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine) bilayers. Fitting with a two-component diffusion model confirms the existence of two separate populations of diffusing particles in these bilayers on mica. As a demonstration of the TrackArt workflow, we characterize and discuss the effective activation energies required to increase the diffusion rates of these populations, obtained from Arrhenius plots of temperature-dependent diffusion. Finally, TrackArt provides a simulation module, allowing the user to generate models with multiple particle trajectories, diffusing with different characteristics. Maps of domains, acting as impermeable or permeable obstacles for particles diffusing with given rate constants and diffusion coefficients, can be simulated or imported from an image. Importantly, this allows one to use simulated data with a known diffusion behavior as a comparison for results acquired using particular algorithms on actual, "natural" samples whose diffusion behavior is to be extracted. It can also serve as a tool for demonstrating diffusion principles. TrackArt is an open source, platform-independent, Matlab-based graphical user interface, and is easy to use even for those unfamiliar with the Matlab programming environment. TrackArt can be used for accurate simulation and analysis of complex diffusion data, such as diffusion in lipid bilayers, providing publication-quality formatted results.

Automating Mid- and Long-Range Scheduling for NASA's Deep Space Network

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Johnston, Mark D.; Tran, Daniel; Arroyo, Belinda; Sorensen, Sugi; Tay, Peter; Carruth, Butch; Coffman, Adam; Wallace, Mike

2012-01-01

NASA has recently deployed a new mid-range scheduling system for the antennas of the Deep Space Network (DSN), called Service Scheduling Software, or S(sup 3). This system is architected as a modern web application containing a central scheduling database integrated with a collaborative environment, exploiting the same technologies as social web applications but applied to a space operations context. This is highly relevant to the DSN domain since the network schedule of operations is developed in a peer-to-peer negotiation process among all users who utilize the DSN (representing 37 projects including international partners and ground-based science and calibration users). The initial implementation of S(sup 3) is complete and the system has been operational since July 2011. S(sup 3) has been used for negotiating schedules since April 2011, including the baseline schedules for three launching missions in late 2011. S(sup 3) supports a distributed scheduling model, in which changes can potentially be made by multiple users based on multiple schedule "workspaces" or versions of the schedule. This has led to several challenges in the design of the scheduling database, and of a change proposal workflow that allows users to concur with or to reject proposed schedule changes, and then counter-propose with alternative or additional suggested changes. This paper describes some key aspects of the S(sup 3) system and lessons learned from its operational deployment to date, focusing on the challenges of multi-user collaborative scheduling in a practical and mission-critical setting. We will also describe the ongoing project to extend S(sup 3) to encompass long-range planning, downtime analysis, and forecasting, as the next step in developing a single integrated DSN scheduling tool suite to cover all time ranges.

Ubiquitous User Localization in LBS - The Need for Implementing Ethical Thinking in Our Research Field

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Retscher, Guenther; Obex, Franz

2015-12-01

Location-based Services (LBS) influence nowadays every individual's life due to the emerging market penetration of smartphones and other mobile devices. For smartphone Apps localization technologies are developed ranging from GNSS beyond to other alternative ubiquitous positioning methods as well as the use of the in-built inertial sensors, such as accelerometers, gyroscopes, magnetometer, barometer, etc. Moreover, signals-of-opportunity which are not intended for positioning at the first sight but are receivable in many environments such as in buildings and public spaces are more and more utilized for positioning and navigation. The use of Wi-Fi (Wireless Fidelity) is a typical example. These technologies, however, have become very powerful tools as the enable to track an individual or even a group of users. Most technical researchers imply that it is mainly about further enhancing technologies and algorithms including the development of new advanced Apps to improve personal navigation and to deliver location oriented information just in time to a single LBS user or group of users. The authors claim that there is a need that ethical and political issues have to be addressed within our research community from the very beginning. Although there is a lot of research going on in developing algorithms to keep ones data and LBS search request in private, researchers can no longer keep their credibility without cooperating with ethical experts or an ethical committee. In a study called InKoPoMoVer (Cooperative Positioning for Real-time User Assistance and Guidance at Multi-modal Public Transit Junctions) a cooperation with social scientists was initiated for the first time at the Vienna University of Technology, Austria, in this context. The major aims of this study in relation to ethical questions are addressed in this paper.

Adaptable Computing Environment/Self-Assembling Software

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Osbourn, Gordon C.; Bouchard, Ann M.; Bartholomew, John W.

Complex software applications are difficult to learn to use and to remember how to use. Further, the user has no control over the functionality available in a given application. The software we use can be created and modified only by a relatively small group of elite, highly skilled artisans known as programmers. "Normal users" are powerless to create and modify software themselves, because the tools for software development, designed by and for programmers, are a barrier to entry. This software, when completed, will be a user-adaptable computing environment in which the user is really in control of his/her own software,more » able to adapt the system, make new parts of the system interactive, and even modify the behavior of the system itself. Som key features of the basic environment that have been implemented are (a) books in bookcases, where all data is stored, (b) context-sensitive compass menus (compass, because the buttons are located in compass directions relative to the mouose cursor position), (c) importing tabular data and displaying it in a book, (d) light-weight table querying/sorting, (e) a Reach&Get capability (sort of a "smart" copy/paste that prevents the user from copying invalid data), and (f) a LogBook that automatically logs all user actions that change data or the system itself. To bootstrap toward full end-user adaptability, we implemented a set of development tools. With the development tools, compass menus can be made and customized.« less

An Empirical Study of User Experience on Touch Mice

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Chou, Jyh Rong

2016-01-01

The touch mouse is a new type of computer mouse that provides users with a new way of touch-based environment to interact with computers. For more than a decade, user experience (UX) has grown into a core concept of human-computer interaction (HCI), describing a user's perceptions and responses that result from the use of a product in a particular…

Usability and Acceptance of the Librarian Infobutton Tailoring Environment: An Open Access Online Knowledge Capture, Management, and Configuration Tool for OpenInfobutton.

PubMed

Jing, Xia; Cimino, James J; Del Fiol, Guilherme

2015-11-30

The Librarian Infobutton Tailoring Environment (LITE) is a Web-based knowledge capture, management, and configuration tool with which users can build profiles used by OpenInfobutton, an open source infobutton manager, to provide electronic health record users with context-relevant links to online knowledge resources. We conducted a multipart evaluation study to explore users' attitudes and acceptance of LITE and to guide future development. The evaluation consisted of an initial online survey to all LITE users, followed by an observational study of a subset of users in which evaluators' sessions were recorded while they conducted assigned tasks. The observational study was followed by administration of a modified System Usability Scale (SUS) survey. Fourteen users responded to the survey and indicated good acceptance of LITE with feedback that was mostly positive. Six users participated in the observational study, demonstrating average task completion time of less than 6 minutes and an average SUS score of 72, which is considered good compared with other SUS scores. LITE can be used to fulfill its designated tasks quickly and successfully. Evaluators proposed suggestions for improvements in LITE functionality and user interface.

LTCP 2D Graphical User Interface. Application Description and User's Guide

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Ball, Robert; Navaz, Homayun K.

1996-01-01

A graphical user interface (GUI) written for NASA's LTCP (Liquid Thrust Chamber Performance) 2 dimensional computational fluid dynamic code is described. The GUI is written in C++ for a desktop personal computer running under a Microsoft Windows operating environment. Through the use of common and familiar dialog boxes, features, and tools, the user can easily and quickly create and modify input files for the LTCP code. In addition, old input files used with the LTCP code can be opened and modified using the GUI. The application is written in C++ for a desktop personal computer running under a Microsoft Windows operating environment. The program and its capabilities are presented, followed by a detailed description of each menu selection and the method of creating an input file for LTCP. A cross reference is included to help experienced users quickly find the variables which commonly need changes. Finally, the system requirements and installation instructions are provided.

Digital Environment for Movement Control in Surgical Skill Training.

PubMed

Juanes, Juan A; Gómez, Juan J; Peguero, Pedro D; Ruisoto, Pablo

2016-06-01

Intelligent environments are increasingly becoming useful scenarios for handling computers. Technological devices are practical tools for learning and acquiring clinical skills as part of the medical training process. Within the framework of the advanced user interface, we present a technological application using Leap Motion, to enhance interaction with the user in the process of a laparoscopic surgical intervention and integrate the navigation through augmented reality images using manual gestures. Thus, we intend to achieve a more natural interaction with the objects that participate in a surgical intervention, which are augmented and related to the user's hand movements.

Program Helps Simulate Neural Networks

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Villarreal, James; Mcintire, Gary

1993-01-01

Neural Network Environment on Transputer System (NNETS) computer program provides users high degree of flexibility in creating and manipulating wide variety of neural-network topologies at processing speeds not found in conventional computing environments. Supports back-propagation and back-propagation-related algorithms. Back-propagation algorithm used is implementation of Rumelhart's generalized delta rule. NNETS developed on INMOS Transputer(R). Predefines back-propagation network, Jordan network, and reinforcement network to assist users in learning and defining own networks. Also enables users to configure other neural-network paradigms from NNETS basic architecture. Small portion of software written in OCCAM(R) language.

Granular Security in a Graph Database

DTIC Science & Technology

2016-03-01

have a presence in more than one layer. For example, a single social media user may have an account in Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram with... Instagram layers. This restriction re- flects the reality that user A’s Facebook account cannot connect directly to user B’s Twitter account. A security

[A comparative study of three types of IUD].

PubMed

Lai, K R; Chen, Q B

1991-11-01

In Zhejiang Province, China, there are 2.7 million IUD users. 90% of them use stainless steel single ring. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the IUDs, the Provincial Family Planning Commission organized a prospective comparative study on 3 kinds of IUDs: the single ring made in Wuxi, the metal ring with plastic core made in Beijing, and the copper TCU 220c made in Tianjin. Between October 1985 and March 1986 1199 healthy women aged 20-39 who had 2 or fewer normal deliveries and without previous history of ectopic pregnancy were screened and recruited to the study. They were randomly assigned to be inserted with the IUDs. 400 women had single ring, 402 women had metal with plastic core, and 397 had TCu 220c. 8 postinsertion follow-up visits were conducted up to 3 years, and menstruations were recorded every month. During the study, 4 cases were lost to follow-up. In the single-ring group, the cumulative continuation rates at 12, 24, and 36 months were 73.4, 66.7, and 65.7% respectively. For the metal-plastic ring group, it was 80.9, 72.3, and 69.3% and for the TCu 220c group, it was 94.5, 88.4, and 83.1%, respectively. The expulsion rates among the 3 kinds of IUDs were statistically significant at 12, 24, and 36 months. The highest expulsion rates were the single ring and TCu 220c were the lowest. The pregnancy rates were highest among metal-plastic ring users and lowest among TCu 220c users. The differences were not statistically significant between single ring and metal-plastic ring users. Discontinuation due to excessive menstrual bleeding were similar among the 3 methods probably due to treatment of the users who experienced excessive bleeding. Younger women and women who experienced fewer pregnancies were found to have higher expulsion and pregnancy rates. But the occurrence of side effects such as prolonged menstrual periods, spotting, and back pain were highest among TCu 220c users. It was recommended that the more effective TCu 220c should be promoted to replace the single ring. Since different sizes of TCu IUDs have been developed, it would be possible to reduce excessive menstrual bleeding and its side effects.

User Authentication and Authorization Challenges in a Networked Library Environment.

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Machovec, George S.

1997-01-01

Discusses computer user authentication and authorization issues when libraries need to let valid users access databases and information services without making the process too difficult for either party. Common solutions are explained, including filtering, passwords, and kerberos (cryptographic authentication scheme for secure use over public…

Knowledge Provenance in Semantic Wikis

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Ding, L.; Bao, J.; McGuinness, D. L.

2008-12-01

Collaborative online environments with a technical Wiki infrastructure are becoming more widespread. One of the strengths of a Wiki environment is that it is relatively easy for numerous users to contribute original content and modify existing content (potentially originally generated by others). As more users begin to depend on informational content that is evolving by Wiki communities, it becomes more important to track the provenance of the information. Semantic Wikis expand upon traditional Wiki environments by adding some computationally understandable encodings of some of the terms and relationships in Wikis. We have developed a semantic Wiki environment that expands a semantic Wiki with provenance markup. Provenance of original contributions as well as modifications is encoded using the provenance markup component of the Proof Markup Language. The Wiki environment provides the provenance markup automatically, thus users are not required to make specific encodings of author, contribution date, and modification trail. Further, our Wiki environment includes a search component that understands the provenance primitives and thus can be used to provide a provenance-aware search facility. We will describe the knowledge provenance infrastructure of our Semantic Wiki and show how it is being used as the foundation of our group web site as well as a number of project web sites.

Scripting human animations in a virtual environment

NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS)

Goldsby, Michael E.; Pandya, Abhilash K.; Maida, James C.

1994-01-01

The current deficiencies of virtual environment (VE) are well known: annoying lag time in drawing the current view, drastically simplified environments to reduce that time lag, low resolution and narrow field of view. Animation scripting is an application of VE technology which can be carried out successfully despite these deficiencies. The final product is a smoothly moving high resolution animation displaying detailed models. In this system, the user is represented by a human computer model with the same body proportions. Using magnetic tracking, the motions of the model's upper torso, head and arms are controlled by the user's movements (18 degrees of freedom). The model's lower torso and global position and orientation are controlled by a spaceball and keypad (12 degrees of freedom). Using this system human motion scripts can be extracted from the user's movements while immersed in a simplified virtual environment. Recorded data is used to define key frames; motion is interpolated between them and post processing adds a more detailed environment. The result is a considerable savings in time and a much more natural-looking movement of a human figure in a smooth and seamless animation.

Drone-Augmented Human Vision: Exocentric Control for Drones Exploring Hidden Areas.

PubMed

Erat, Okan; Isop, Werner Alexander; Kalkofen, Denis; Schmalstieg, Dieter

2018-04-01

Drones allow exploring dangerous or impassable areas safely from a distant point of view. However, flight control from an egocentric view in narrow or constrained environments can be challenging. Arguably, an exocentric view would afford a better overview and, thus, more intuitive flight control of the drone. Unfortunately, such an exocentric view is unavailable when exploring indoor environments. This paper investigates the potential of drone-augmented human vision, i.e., of exploring the environment and controlling the drone indirectly from an exocentric viewpoint. If used with a see-through display, this approach can simulate X-ray vision to provide a natural view into an otherwise occluded environment. The user's view is synthesized from a three-dimensional reconstruction of the indoor environment using image-based rendering. This user interface is designed to reduce the cognitive load of the drone's flight control. The user can concentrate on the exploration of the inaccessible space, while flight control is largely delegated to the drone's autopilot system. We assess our system with a first experiment showing how drone-augmented human vision supports spatial understanding and improves natural interaction with the drone.

Prior exposure to a reverberant listening environment improves speech intelligibility in adult cochlear implant listeners.

PubMed

Srinivasan, Nirmal Kumar; Tobey, Emily A; Loizou, Philipos C

2016-01-01

The goal of this study is to investigate whether prior exposure to reverberant listening environment improves speech intelligibility of adult cochlear implant (CI) users. Six adult CI users participated in this study. Speech intelligibility was measured in five different simulated reverberant listening environments with two different speech corpuses. Within each listening environment, prior exposure was varied by either having the same environment across all trials (blocked presentation) or having different environment from trial to trial (unblocked). Speech intelligibility decreased as reverberation time increased. Although substantial individual variability was observed, all CI listeners showed an increase in the blocked presentation condition as compared to the unblocked presentation condition for both speech corpuses. Prior listening exposure to a reverberant listening environment improves speech intelligibility in adult CI listeners. Further research is required to understand the underlying mechanism of adaptation to listening environment.

The Development and Validation of an End-User Satisfaction Measure in a Student Laptop Environment

ERIC Educational Resources Information Center

Kim, Sung; Meng, Juan; Kalinowski, Jon; Shin, Dooyoung

2014-01-01

The purpose of this paper is to present the development and validation of a measurement model for student user satisfaction in a laptop environment. Using a "quasi Delphi" method in addition to contributions from prior research we used EFA and CFA (LISREL) to identify a five factor (14 item) measurement model that best fit the data. The…

Comparing two anesthesia information management system user interfaces: a usability evaluation.

PubMed

Wanderer, Jonathan P; Rao, Anoop V; Rothwell, Sarah H; Ehrenfeld, Jesse M

2012-11-01

Anesthesia information management systems (AIMS) have been developed by multiple vendors and are deployed in thousands of operating rooms around the world, yet not much is known about measuring and improving AIMS usability. We developed a methodology for evaluating AIMS usability in a low-fidelity simulated clinical environment and used it to compare an existing user interface with a revised version. We hypothesized that the revised user interface would be more useable. In a low-fidelity simulated clinical environment, twenty anesthesia providers documented essential anesthetic information for the start of the case using both an existing and a revised user interface. Participants had not used the revised user interface previously and completed a brief training exercise prior to the study task. All participants completed a workload assessment and a satisfaction survey. All sessions were recorded. Multiple usability metrics were measured. The primary outcome was documentation accuracy. Secondary outcomes were perceived workload, number of documentation steps, number of user interactions, and documentation time. The interfaces were compared and design problems were identified by analyzing recorded sessions and survey results. Use of the revised user interface was shown to improve documentation accuracy from 85.1% to 92.4%, a difference of 7.3% (95% confidence interval [CI] for the difference 1.8 to 12.7). The revised user interface decreased the number of user interactions by 6.5 for intravenous documentation (95% CI 2.9 to 10.1) and by 16.1 for airway documentation (95% CI 11.1 to 21.1). The revised user interface required 3.8 fewer documentation steps (95% CI 2.3 to 5.4). Airway documentation time was reduced by 30.5 seconds with the revised workflow (95% CI 8.5 to 52.4). There were no significant time differences noted in intravenous documentation or in total task time. No difference in perceived workload was found between the user interfaces. Two user interface design problems were identified in the revised user interface. The usability of anesthesia information management systems can be evaluated using a low-fidelity simulated clinical environment. User testing of the revised user interface showed improvement in some usability metrics and highlighted areas for further revision. Vendors of AIMS and those who use them should consider adopting methods to evaluate and improve AIMS usability.

Multiple tobacco product use among US adolescents and young adults.

PubMed

Soneji, Samir; Sargent, James; Tanski, Susanne

2016-03-01

To assess the extent to which multiple tobacco product use among adolescents and young adults falls outside current Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulatory authority. We conducted a web-based survey of 1596 16-26-year-olds to assess use of 11 types of tobacco products. We ascertained current (past 30 days) tobacco product use among 927 respondents who ever used tobacco. Combustible tobacco products included cigarettes, cigars (little filtered, cigarillos, premium) and hookah; non-combustible tobacco products included chew, dip, dissolvables, e-cigarettes, snuff and snus. We then fitted an ordinal logistic regression model to assess demographic and behavioural associations with higher levels of current tobacco product use (single, dual and multiple product use). Among 448 current tobacco users, 54% were single product users, 25% dual users and 21% multiple users. The largest single use category was cigarettes (49%), followed by hookah (23%), little filtered cigars (17%) and e-cigarettes (5%). Most dual and multiple product users smoked cigarettes, along with little filtered cigars, hookah and e-cigarettes. Forty-six per cent of current single, 84% of dual and 85% of multiple tobacco product users consumed a tobacco product outside FDA regulatory authority. In multivariable analysis, the adjusted risk of multiple tobacco use was higher for males, first use of a non-combustible tobacco product, high sensation seeking respondents and declined for each additional year of age that tobacco initiation was delayed. Nearly half of current adolescent and young adult tobacco users in this study engaged in dual and multiple tobacco product use; the majority of them used products that fall outside current FDA regulatory authority. This study supports FDA deeming of these products and their incorporation into the national media campaign to address youth tobacco use. Published by the BMJ Publishing Group Limited. For permission to use (where not already granted under a licence) please go to http://www.bmj.com/company/products-services/rights-and-licensing/

A highly modular beamline electrostatic levitation facility, optimized for in situ high-energy x-ray scattering studies of equilibrium and supercooled liquids

DOE Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI.GOV)

Mauro, N.A.; Kelton, K.F.

2011-10-27

High-energy x-ray diffraction studies of metallic liquids provide valuable information about structural evolution on the atomic length scale, leading to insights into the origin of the nucleation barrier and the processes of supercooling and glass formation. The containerless processing of the beamline electrostatic levitation (BESL) facility allows coordinated thermophysical and structural studies of equilibrium and supercooled liquids to be made in a contamination-free, high-vacuum ({approx}10{sup -8} Torr) environment. To date, the incorporation of electrostatic levitation facilities into synchrotron beamlines has been difficult due to the large footprint of the apparatus and the difficulties associated with its transportation and implementation. Here,more » we describe a modular levitation facility that is optimized for diffraction studies of high-temperature liquids at high-energy synchrotron beamlines. The modular approach used in the apparatus design allows it to be easily transported and quickly setup. Unlike most previous electrostatic levitation facilities, BESL can be operated by a single user instead of a user team.« less

Extended spectrum SWIR camera with user-accessible Dewar

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Benapfl, Brendan; Miller, John Lester; Vemuri, Hari; Grein, Christoph; Sivananthan, Siva

2017-02-01

Episensors has developed a series of extended short wavelength infrared (eSWIR) cameras based on high-Cd concentration Hg1-xCdxTe absorbers. The cameras have a bandpass extending to 3 microns cutoff wavelength, opening new applications relative to traditional InGaAs-based cameras. Applications and uses are discussed and examples given. A liquid nitrogen pour-filled version was initially developed. This was followed by a compact Stirling-cooled version with detectors operating at 200 K. Each camera has unique sensitivity and performance characteristics. The cameras' size, weight and power specifications are presented along with images captured with band pass filters and eSWIR sources to demonstrate spectral response beyond 1.7 microns. The soft seal Dewars of the cameras are designed for accessibility, and can be opened and modified in a standard laboratory environment. This modular approach allows user flexibility for swapping internal components such as cold filters and cold stops. The core electronics of the Stirlingcooled camera are based on a single commercial field programmable gate array (FPGA) that also performs on-board non-uniformity corrections, bad pixel replacement, and directly drives any standard HDMI display.

The effect of extended sensory range via the EyeCane sensory substitution device on the characteristics of visionless virtual navigation.

PubMed

Maidenbaum, Shachar; Levy-Tzedek, Shelly; Chebat, Daniel Robert; Namer-Furstenberg, Rinat; Amedi, Amir

2014-01-01

Mobility training programs for helping the blind navigate through unknown places with a White-Cane significantly improve their mobility. However, what is the effect of new assistive technologies, offering more information to the blind user, on the underlying premises of these programs such as navigation patterns? We developed the virtual-EyeCane, a minimalistic sensory substitution device translating single-point-distance into auditory cues identical to the EyeCane's in the real world. We compared performance in virtual environments when using the virtual-EyeCane, a virtual-White-Cane, no device and visual navigation. We show that the characteristics of virtual-EyeCane navigation differ from navigation with a virtual-White-Cane or no device, and that virtual-EyeCane users complete more levels successfully, taking shorter paths and with less collisions than these groups, and we demonstrate the relative similarity of virtual-EyeCane and visual navigation patterns. This suggests that additional distance information indeed changes navigation patterns from virtual-White-Cane use, and brings them closer to visual navigation.

BIDS apps: Improving ease of use, accessibility, and reproducibility of neuroimaging data analysis methods

PubMed Central

Auer, Tibor; Churchill, Nathan W.; Flandin, Guillaume; Guntupalli, J. Swaroop; Raffelt, David; Quirion, Pierre-Olivier; Smith, Robert E.; Strother, Stephen C.; Varoquaux, Gaël

2017-01-01

The rate of progress in human neurosciences is limited by the inability to easily apply a wide range of analysis methods to the plethora of different datasets acquired in labs around the world. In this work, we introduce a framework for creating, testing, versioning and archiving portable applications for analyzing neuroimaging data organized and described in compliance with the Brain Imaging Data Structure (BIDS). The portability of these applications (BIDS Apps) is achieved by using container technologies that encapsulate all binary and other dependencies in one convenient package. BIDS Apps run on all three major operating systems with no need for complex setup and configuration and thanks to the comprehensiveness of the BIDS standard they require little manual user input. Previous containerized data processing solutions were limited to single user environments and not compatible with most multi-tenant High Performance Computing systems. BIDS Apps overcome this limitation by taking advantage of the Singularity container technology. As a proof of concept, this work is accompanied by 22 ready to use BIDS Apps, packaging a diverse set of commonly used neuroimaging algorithms. PMID:28278228

Inertial Sensor-Based Touch and Shake Metaphor for Expressive Control of 3D Virtual Avatars

PubMed Central

Patil, Shashidhar; Chintalapalli, Harinadha Reddy; Kim, Dubeom; Chai, Youngho

2015-01-01

In this paper, we present an inertial sensor-based touch and shake metaphor for expressive control of a 3D virtual avatar in a virtual environment. An intuitive six degrees-of-freedom wireless inertial motion sensor is used as a gesture and motion control input device with a sensor fusion algorithm. The algorithm enables user hand motions to be tracked in 3D space via magnetic, angular rate, and gravity sensors. A quaternion-based complementary filter is implemented to reduce noise and drift. An algorithm based on dynamic time-warping is developed for efficient recognition of dynamic hand gestures with real-time automatic hand gesture segmentation. Our approach enables the recognition of gestures and estimates gesture variations for continuous interaction. We demonstrate the gesture expressivity using an interactive flexible gesture mapping interface for authoring and controlling a 3D virtual avatar and its motion by tracking user dynamic hand gestures. This synthesizes stylistic variations in a 3D virtual avatar, producing motions that are not present in the motion database using hand gesture sequences from a single inertial motion sensor. PMID:26094629

Selection criteria for water disinfection techniques in agricultural practices.

PubMed

Haute, Sam van; Sampers, Imca; Jacxsens, Liesbeth; Uyttendaele, Mieke

2015-01-01

This paper comprises a selection tool for water disinfection methods for fresh produce pre- and postharvest practices. A variety of water disinfection technologies is available on the market and no single technology is the best choice for all applications. It can be difficult for end users to choose the technology that is best fit for a specific application. Therefore, the different technologies were characterized in order to identify criteria that influence the suitability of a technology for pre- or postharvest applications. Introduced criteria were divided into three principal components: (i) criteria related to the technology and which relate to the disinfection efficiency, (ii) attention points for the management and proper operation, and (iii) necessities in order to sustain the operation with respect to the environment. The selection criteria may help the end user of the water disinfection technology to obtain a systematic insight into all relevant aspects to be considered for preliminary decision making on which technologies should be put to feasibility testing for water disinfection in pre- and postharvest practices of the fresh produce chain.

Contribution of the EVER-EST project to the community of the Geohazard Supersites initiative

NASA Astrophysics Data System (ADS)

Trasatti, Elisa; Rubbia, Giuliana; Romaniello, Vito; Merucci, Luca; Corradini, Stefano; Spinetti, Claudia; Puglisi, Giuseppe; Borgstrom, Sven; Salvi, Stefano; Parks, Michelle; Dürig, Tobias; Sigmundsson, Freysteinn

2017-04-01

The EVER-EST project (European Virtual Environment for Research - Earth Science Themes: a solution) is a H2020 project (2015-2018) aimed at the creation of a Virtual Research Environment (VRE) focused on the requirements of the Earth Science community. The VRE is intended to enhance the ability to collaborate, interoperate and share knowledge and experience between all relevant stakeholders, including researchers, monitoring teams and civil protection agencies. Among the innovations of the project is the exploitation of the "Research Object" concept (http://www.rohub.org), i.e. "digital objects that encapsulate essential information about experiments and investigations to facilitate their reusability, reproducibility and better understanding". Research Objects encapsulate not only data and publications, but also algorithms, codes, results, and workflows that can be stored, shared and re-used. The European subgroup of the GEO Geohazard Supersites community involved in the project (INGV, University of Iceland) has provided user requirements and user scenarios, as well as created Research Objects embedding research activities and workflows on the Permanent Supersites Campi Flegrei, Mount Etna and Icelandic Volcanoes. These Supersites play the role of test sites for the platform, but during the last year of the project other Supersites may also be involved, to demonstrate the added value of the collaborative environment in research activities aiming to support Disaster Risk Reduction. Using the VRE, the Supersite scientists should be able to collaborate with colleagues located in different parts of the world, in a simple and effective way. This includes being able to remotely access and share data, research results and ideas, to carry out training sessions and discussions, to compare different results and models, and to synthesize many different pieces of information in a single consensus product to be disseminated to end-users. A further need of the Supersite scientists, which can be fulfilled by EVER-EST especially in less developed countries, is the need to access computing resources and software codes for data processing and modelling, as well as tutoring in data analysis and interpretation. Examples and results illustrating the effective use of the first release of the VRE will be presented at the conference.

LifeWatchGreece Portal development: architecture, implementation and challenges for a biodiversity research e-infrastructure.

PubMed

Gougousis, Alexandros; Bailly, Nicolas

2016-01-01

Biodiversity data is characterized by its cross-disciplinary character, the extremely broad range of data types and structures, and the plethora of different data sources providing resources for the same piece of information in a heterogeneous way. Since the web inception two decades ago, there are multiple initiatives to connect, aggregate, share, and publish biodiversity data, and to establish data and work flows in order to analyze them. The European program LifeWatch aims at establishing a distributed network of nodes implementing virtual research environment in Europe to facilitate the work of biodiversity researchers and managers. LifeWatchGreece is one of these nodes where a portal was developed offering access to a suite of virtual laboratories and e-services. Despite its strict definition in information technology, in practice "portal" is a fairly broad term that embraces many web architectures. In the biodiversity domain, the term "portal" is usually used to indicate either a web site that provides access to a single or an aggregation of data repositories (like: http://indiabiodiversity.org/, http://www.mountainbiodiversity.org/, http://data.freshwaterbiodiversity.eu), a web site that gathers information about various online biodiversity tools (like http://test-eubon.ebd.csic.es/, http://marine.lifewatch.eu/) or a web site that just gathers information and news about the biodiversity domain (like http://chm.moew.government.bg). LifeWatchGreece's portal takes the concept of a portal a step further. In strict IT terms, LifeWatchGreece's portal is partly a portal, partly a platform and partly an aggregator. It includes a number of biodiversity-related web tools integrated into a centrally-controlled software ecosystem. This ecosystem includes subsystems for access control, traffic monitoring, user notifications and web tool management. These subsystems are shared to all the web tools that have been integrated to the portal and thereby are part of this ecosystem. These web tools do not consist in external and completely independent web applications as it happens in most other portals. A quite obvious (to the user) indication of this is the Single-Sign-On (SSO) functionality for all tools and the common user interface wrapper that most of these tools use. Another example of a less obvious functionality is the common user profile that is shared and can be utilized by all tools (e.g user's timezone).

40 CFR 166.7 - User notification; advertising.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2010 CFR

2010-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 23 2010-07-01 2010-07-01 false User notification; advertising. 166.7... § 166.7 User notification; advertising. (a) A State or Federal agency that obtains an exemption may... received) delivers or offers to deliver any pesticide, to advertise the pesticide for any use authorized by...

40 CFR 166.7 - User notification; advertising.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2013 CFR

2013-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 25 2013-07-01 2013-07-01 false User notification; advertising. 166.7... § 166.7 User notification; advertising. (a) A State or Federal agency that obtains an exemption may... received) delivers or offers to deliver any pesticide, to advertise the pesticide for any use authorized by...

40 CFR 166.7 - User notification; advertising.

Code of Federal Regulations, 2014 CFR

2014-07-01

... 40 Protection of Environment 24 2014-07-01 2014-07-01 false User notification; advertising. 166.7... § 166.7 User notification; advertising. (a) A State or Federal agency that obtains an exemption may... received) delivers or offers to deliver any pesticide, to advertise the pesticide for any use authorized by...