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Use of Weigh-in-Motion Data for Pavement, Bridge, Weight Enforcement, and Freight Logistics Applications

Most U.S. state departments of transportation (DOTs) are collecting weigh-in-motion data with a wide variety of sensor types and using them in a variety of applications. Many agencies use WIM data to aid in pavement design, although most are not currently using a Pavement ME (mechanistic-empirical) Design application. WIM for bridge and asset management purposes is used much less often. The TRB National Cooperative Highway Research Program's NCHRP Synthesis 546: Use of Weigh-in-Motion Data for Pavement, ...




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Submit a Research Needs Statement about transportation and pandemics

As all aspects of transportation deal with the unfolding effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, there are research needs, gaps, and potential ways to leverage innovation revealing themselves across all modes, systems, and disciplines in transportation. In keeping with the mission of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine to provide trusted, timely, impartial, and evidence-based information exchange and research, TRB is issuing an urgent and directed call for Research Needs Statements sp...




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Comics – F/U/C/O/T

Finished Comics Characters DC Comics: Grayson, Richard ‘Dick’ (Nightwing/Robin); DC Comics: Death Moved Comics Comic Book Series Johnny the Homicidal Maniac (JtHM) (All) Relationships DC Comics: Kyle, Selina (Catwoman) and Bruce Wayne (Batman); Marvel Comics: Hardy, Felicia (Black Cat) and Peter Parker (Spider-Man) Closed Comics (Open for application) There are no closed forms to process […]




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"Wash Your Lyrics" Makes Handwashing a Little More Fun

One of the most important tips for protecting yourself from COVID-19 is to wash your hands for 20 seconds, or as long as it takes to sing “Happy Birthday” twice. British teen William Gibson decided he wanted the public to have more song options while fighting the spread of coronavirus.

Gibson created an online tool that allows a user to enter the title of their chosen song and artist to automatically generate a poster. The poster matches lyrics from the song to a 13-step washing routine. The UK’s NHS Health Secretary Matt Hancock has publically praised Gibson’s initiative as the posters have been shared extensively on social media. Gibson thought it would be popular, but has still been surprised to see some of his favorite celebrities posting about it. Visit the Wash Your Lyrics website to create your own poster for washing hands with your favorite song.




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Amazon Linguistics




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Particle Physics Turns to Quantum Computing for Solutions to Tomorrow's Big-Data Problems

Giant-scale physics experiments are increasingly reliant on big data and complex algorithms fed into powerful computers, and managing this multiplying mass of data presents its own unique challenges. To better prepare for this data deluge posed by next-generation upgrades and new experiments, physicists are turning to the fledgling field of quantum computing.




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Genetics Society of America honors outstanding contributions to genetics with 2020 GSA Awards

The Genetics Society of America (GSA) is pleased to announce the 2020 recipients of its annual awards for distinguished service in the field of genetics. The awardees were nominated and selected by their colleagues and will be recognized with presentations at The Allied Genetics Conference (TAGC), held April 22-26, 2020, in the metro Washington, DC area.




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UTEP Professor Named Fellow of International Society for Optics and Photonics

Raymond C. Rumpf, Ph.D., professor of electrical and computer engineering at The University of Texas at El Paso, was promoted to Fellow of the International Society for Optics and Photonics (SPIE), an educational nonprofit established to advance light-based science, engineering and technology.




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PHP Internals News: Episode 51: Object Ergonomics - Derick Rethans

PHP Internals News: Episode 51: Object Ergonomics

In this episode of "PHP Internals News" I talk with Larry Garfield (Twitter, Website, GitHub) about a blog post that he was written related to PHP's Object Ergonomics.

The RSS feed for this podcast is https://derickrethans.nl/feed-phpinternalsnews.xml, you can download this episode's MP3 file, and it's available on Spotify and iTunes. There is a dedicated website: https://phpinternals.news

Transcript

Derick Rethans 0:16

Hi, I'm Derick. And this is PHP internals news, a weekly podcast dedicated to demystifying the development of the PHP language. This is Episode 51. Today I'm talking with Larry Garfield, not about an RFC for once, but about a blog post that he's written called Object Ergonomics. Larry, would you please introduce yourself?

Larry Garfield 0:38

Hello World. My name is Larry Garfield, also Crell, CRELL, on various social medias. I work at platform.sh in developer relations. We're a continuous deployment cloud hosting company. I've been writing PHP for 21 years and been a active gadfly and nudge for at least 15 of those.

Derick Rethans 1:01

In the last couple of months, we have seen quite a lot of smaller RFCs about all kinds of little features here and there, to do with making the object oriented model of PHP a little bit better. I reckon this is also the nudge behind you writing a slightly longer blog post titled "Improving PHP object ergonomics".

Larry Garfield 1:26

If by slightly longer you mean 14 pages? Yes.

Derick Rethans 1:29

Yes, exactly. Yeah, it took me a while to read through. What made you write this document?

Larry Garfield 1:34

As you said, there's been a lot of discussion around improving PHP's general user experience of working with objects in PHP. Where there's definitely room for improvement, no question. And I found a lot of these to be useful in their own right, but also very narrow and narrow in ways that solve the immediate problem but could get in the way of solving larger problems later on down the line. So I went into this with an attitude of: Okay, we can kind of piecemeal and attack certain parts of the problem space. Or we can take a step back and look at the big picture and say: Alright, here's all the pain points we have. What can we do that would solve not just this one pain point. But let us solve multiple pain points with a single change? Or these two changes together solve this other pain point as well. Or, you know, how can we do this in a way that is not going to interfere with later development that we've talked about. We know we want to do, but isn't been done yet. So how do we not paint ourselves into a corner by thinking too narrow?

Derick Rethans 2:41

It's a curious thing, because a more narrow RFC is likely easier to get accepted, because it doesn't pull in a whole set of other problems as well. But of course, as you say, if the whole idea hasn't been thought through, then some of these things might not actually end up being beneficial. Because it can be combined with some other things to directly address the problems that we're trying to solve, right?

Larry Garfield 3:07

Yeah, it comes down to what are the smallest changes we can make that taken together have the largest impact. That kind of broad picture thinking is something that is hard to do in PHP, just given the way it's structured. So I took a stab at that.

Derick Rethans 3:21

What are the main problems that we should address?

Larry Garf

Truncated by Planet PHP, read more at the original (another 29525 bytes)




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Winter Olympics '06




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Featured - Is bioinformatics the new hot career choice for scientists?

Anyone with strong bioinformatics skills looking for a job with a fantastic energetic new PI at the University of Arizona? Today I spent time with a friend and new PI at the University of Arizona talking about her metagenomics projects. She's been advertising for an opening for a computational biologist for quite a while.  She tells me that she can't find anyone to fill this position beca; (read more)

Source: Suzy - Discipline: Careers





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Distinct immune characteristics distinguish hereditary and idiopathic chronic pancreatitis

Chronic pancreatitis (CP) is considered an irreversible fibroinflammatory pancreatic disease. Despite numerous animal model studies, questions remain about local immune characteristics in human CP. We profiled pancreatic immune cell characteristics in control organ donors and CP patients including those with hereditary and idiopathic CP undergoing total pancreatectomy with islet autotransplantation. Flow cytometric analysis revealed a significant increase in the frequency of CD68+ macrophages in idiopathic CP. In contrast, hereditary CP samples showed a significant increase in CD3+ T cell frequency, which prompted us to investigate the T cell receptor β (TCRβ) repertoire in the CP and control groups. TCRβ sequencing revealed a significant increase in TCRβ repertoire diversity and reduced clonality in both CP groups versus controls. Interestingly, we observed differences in Vβ-Jβ gene family usage between hereditary and idiopathic CP and a positive correlation of TCRβ rearrangements with disease severity scores. Immunophenotyping analyses in hereditary and idiopathic CP pancreases indicate differences in innate and adaptive immune responses, which highlights differences in immunopathogenic mechanisms of disease among subtypes of CP. TCR repertoire analysis further suggests a role for specific T cell responses in hereditary versus idiopathic CP pathogenesis, providing insights into immune responses associated with human CP.




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IBM Gets High Marks on CRN’s 2017 Annual Report Card for Analytics and Storage

IBM announced today that it has been recognized as the winner in the Business Analytics category and the Enterprise Network Storage sub-category in CRN’s 2017 Annual Report Card (ARC) awards program. The Annual Report Card summarizes results from a comprehensive survey that details solution provider satisfaction across product innovation, support and partnership for the hardware, services and software vendors they team up with. The vendors with the highest ratings are named to the prestigious Annual Report Card list of winners and celebrated as best-in-class by their partners. The results also provide the IT vendor community with valuable feedback—directly from their solution providers—that can be used to refine product offerings, enhance support offerings and improve communication with partners.




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AOS and IBM developing logistics and transportation solution built on IBM Blockchain and Watson IoT

IBM and AOS, - a Colombian company specializing in providing business solutions- today announced they are collaborating to create a solution to enhance efficiency in the logistics and transport industry throughout the country, built on IBM Blockchain and Watson IoT on the IBM Cloud.



  • IBM Watson Internet of Things (IoT)

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Southern Connecticut State University Enrolls IBM Watson Analytics To Help Improve Student Academic Achievement

IBM announced today that Southern Connecticut State University (SCSU) has integrated IBM Watson Analytics to help create new services and programs based on data-driven insights to improve students’ academic achievement and development.



  • IBM Watson Analytics

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Fusion Genomics Turns to IBM Cloud to Help Support Advances Designed to Conquer Global Pandemics

IBM today announced that Vancouver-based company Fusion Genomics selected IBM’s cloud capabilities to help advance Fusion’s ability to detect pandemics before they happen. Fusion Genomics has developed disruptive DNA and RNA technology that it believes can positively identify infectious diseases and enhance the surveillance of emerging pathogens like MERS, SARS, avian flu, and swine flu.



  • IBM Cloud Computing

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IBM Services and Retail Analytics to Support Walgreens Field Service Nationwide

IBM today announced a new agreement with Walgreens, one of the country’s largest drugstore chains, to deploy IBM retail analytics at more than 8,100 locations nationwide to help improve the efficiency of field service support for these locations.



  • Services and solutions

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IBM Unveils a New High-Powered Analytics System for Fast Access to Data Science

IBM today announced the Integrated Analytics System, a new unified data system designed to give users fast, easy access to advanced data science capabilities and the ability to work with their data across private, public or hybrid cloud environments.




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IBM to Collaborate with Leading Singapore Institutions Using Analytics to Improve the Quality of Water, Transportation and Energy Services in a City

IBM today announced a research collaboratory in Singapore, where researchers from IBM intend to collaborate with scientists and engineers from public agencies in Singapore to improve the quality of its urban services. The focus of this research effort will be to use sensor networks to more effectively model, predict and manage the use of natural and physical infrastructure resources – water, transport and energy.  




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IBM Verse, el mail social, combina tecnologías Cloud, Social, Analytics e innovación en diseño para transformar la forma en que trabajamos

IBM (NYSE: IBM) reinventa hoy el correo electrónico empresarial con una nueva oferta de colaboración social freemium que utiliza la tecnología de analítica integrada para dar a los empleados una nueva forma de conversar, encontrar a las personas y la información correcta rápidamente, y hacer su trabajo de manera eficiente. IBM Verse es el resultado de una inversión de US$100 millones en diseño e innovación, y reúne las plataformas líderes cloud, analytics, social y de seguridad de la compañía para transformar el futuro del trabajo.




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IBM Analytics Speeds healthAlliance Business Management Reporting

IBM (NYSE:IBM) today announced that healthAlliance, New Zealand’s largest shared services organisation for the health sector, will use an IBM Netezza analytics appliance to provide faster, more accurate clinical and business analysis to better manage hospital resources and services.



  • Healthcare and Life Sciences

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IBM Announces Smart Analytics and Transactional Systems to Draw Key Insights from Vast Amounts of Data

IBM today announced new systems highly-tuned and optimised to help clients more quickly draw insights from vast amounts of data to anticipate emerging business trends, capture new opportunities and avoid risks. These new optimised systems support all environments in a data center, enabling clients to handle higher volumes of transactions and analyse data where it resides.




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IBM injects analytics into data centre consolidation and relocation services

IBM today announced a new analytics-based tool for its data centre consolidation and relocation services which help clients gain up to 50% operational savings from the consolidation of IT assets and data centres.



  • Global Technology Services

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IBM Smarter Water Solution Enables Yarra Valley Water to Use Analytics to Improve Customer Outcomes

IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced a business consulting and technology partnership with Yarra Valley Water to enhance the management and functionality of its assets and customer service to over 1.7 million people and 50,000 businesses throughout Melbourne now and in the future. Through this partnership Yarra Valley Water will gain access to critical insights to maximise asset performance and improve customer service outcomes across its operations.



  • Energy & Utilities

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Australian Bureau of Statistics Adopts IBM Social Software to Boost Employee Collaboration

IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced that the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) is adopting IBM social software to support the way thousands of employees connect and interact.




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Surviving The World - classic comics


So, hey, STW alumni, long time no lecture. How are things?

Happy New Year to you all. May 2020 bring you nothing but good, and may we all fight all the monsters together.

Figured I would start running old comics through the RSS feed, so here you go.

In case you missed when Surviving the World ended, we ran a Kickstarter to put together a book collection of some of the best STW comics from the entire 10+ year run. The book came out pretty tremendous - there's 300 comics in beautiful color, all the 'file under' jokes, all the addendum and archive jokes, some new jokes, a soundtrack listing, a foreword by Christopher Moore - it's really nice and most people liked it as much as I did!

Anyway, we have some additional copies that are now on sale at Topatoco if you want an extra copy or a first copy, whatever the case may be. I will eventually get the PDF version of the book up and available for sale as well, if any of you are so inclined.

As for me, I am professoring away, working on some other projects, still doing bad jokes and things on social media, all while still making STEM comics, and hopefully will have some new work to share with you soon.

Other than that, for now, I hope life-long learning continues to bring you new enlightenment and I hope you all continue to get all joy and happiness you deserve.




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Surviving The World - classic comics


The STW Book!











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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2018.

Thoughts from 2020: If I had ever had an agent, I would have pitched a book of nothing but mazes like this. Maybe I should find an agent and pitch this anyway. This is definitely not the best known STW maze - it's not the one that people kept trying to rip off for their own shirts and designs and companies - but it was a pretty good one to be the final maze of the comic.

Also, this was #3500, and it was a pretty good one for the last big numbered comic. I won't lie, looking back, a lot of STW is only 'just okay', but I can enjoy when some were slightly better than others. I think this was one?

The STW Book!




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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2014.

Thoughts from 2020: We still can't keep flowers in the house because of the cat. This is why the aloe plant is now in my office at work. Did you know aloe is poisonous to cats or something like that?

The STW Book!




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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2012.

Thoughts from 2020: Sprite the cat is still with us, by the way. She's at least 14 now and we've had her for 13 years as of last October. She is still the greatest cat ever created. And she pretty much always hated being put in the labcoat like this.

The STW Book!




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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2014 on the "I Love Charts" Medium site - I was allowed to repost comics on STW but I don't think I ever did, so this is the first time this comic has appeared on STW.

Thoughts from 2020: The worst part about being in every STW means that I get to see how freakishly young I looked even just six years ago. Stupid children stealing my youth.

"Hark" was the four-letter new-slang insult that a reader suggested adopting sometime in 2011, and it remains a stupidly fun curse word for me, especially around the holidays.

I got 2 cents for every view of the comics on the Medium site during the first 3 months it ran, and then got 1 cent for every view during the last 3 months (incidentally, also why I started making 2 additional comics per week for them as opposed to 1). I think I spent most of the income on comics.

The STW Book!




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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2016.

Thoughts from 1/14/2020: I developed IBS-like symptoms, or what is essentially an allergy, to caffeine about 8 months ago. Looking back on all the comics that involve coffee like this one, I'm not surprised why. By the way, it's difficult to get through the day without caffeine and caffeine-free tea just doesn't cut it.

The STW Book!




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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2008.

Thoughts from 1/15/2020: I don't continue to hold that you will get the same grade in ChemE whether you study all night or get drunk the night before, but I use that line with my students all the time. That said, electrical engineering remains black magic.

The STW Book!






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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2016.

Thoughts from 1/18/2020: This comic was kind of simple and dumb and yet you still maybe learned something from it, so all in all it was kind of the perfect STW.

The STW Book!




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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2009.

Thoughts from 1/19/2020: This comic came out in December of 2009, about six months after STW got really popular, and I remember someone shared the image on Twitter and Neil Gaiman retweeted it, and that led to another brief boost in popularity. It's weird to think that STW started at exactly the right time - I don't think it would have made a dent if it started today, and I don't think something like this really could have started today. Anyway, life and history are weird.

Get the STW Book!




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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2016.

Thoughts from 1/20/2020: My smile in this one perfectly captures my true delight in this terrible pun. In so many ways, this is one of my favorite STWs. It's also in the STW book. Speaking of ...

Get the STW Book!




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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2014.

Thoughts from 1/21/2020: There was a brief period of time when I was being asked to submit various chart jokes to WIRED. One got in - a pie chart showing Vin Diesel's moods were 50% fast and 50% furious. This one was one that got rejected so screw it, I made it into a STW.

Get the STW Book!





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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2012.

Thoughts from 1/23/2020: It's a living.

I only had one newly born baby at the time of this comic. Remember people asking for updates about Cannonball as we were doing our best to keep her from arriving early? Now she's got a sibling and Cannonball is almost 8. Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana.

Get the STW Book!




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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2013.

Thoughts from 1/24/2020: One of my students, the semester this comic was released, drunkenly typed this up and submitted it as a comment in my course evaluations, which means the text here has been a part of every promotion dossier I've had to submit.

Oh, look, you can see I'm kneeling, like I was in about 60-70% of all the comics I made. That's just bad cropping, there.

Get the STW Book!




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Surviving The World - classic comics


This comic was originally posted in 2008.

Thoughts from 1/25/2020: I did this far more often than I should have and was a terrible example of safety - to be fair, I was following the culture that was set at the time. Now I teach safety and so it's very much a case of "Look at me, kids, do you want to be as pathetic and awful as me?"

Get the STW Book!