Archaeological Investigations of Sections of the San Pedro (41BX337) and Upper Labor (41BX1273) Acequias in San Antonio, Bexar County, Texas

On January 21 and February 19 of 2020, the Center for Archaeological Research (CAR) excavated five exploratory backhoe trenches within two project areas in central San Antonio, Bexar County, Texas. Project Area 1 is located at 209 E. Fredericksburg Road, and Project Area 2 is at 712 W. Laurel Street. CAR was contracted by the VIA Metropolitan Transit Authority (VIAMTA) to conduct an archaeological investigation of the two locations as they planned to use the areas for employee parking lots. Plans called for the areas to be excavated to a total depth of 25.4 cm (10 in.), with 15.24 cm (6 in.) of new concrete and 10.16 cm (4 in.) of new base. Archival maps suggested that the proposed parking areas could include the intersection of two Spanish Colonial acequias, the San Pedro (41BX337) and the Upper Labor (41BX1273). Both areas are owned by VIA-MTA, a political subdivision of the State of Texas. As such, the work was carried out under Texas Antiquities Permit No. 9229 according to the requirements of the Texas Antiquities Code and the Unified Development Code of the City of San Antonio (COSA). Dr. Raymond Mauldin served as the Principal Investigator, and Sarah Wigley served as the Project Archaeologist. Five backhoe trenches were excavated in the two project areas. Three trenches were excavated in Project Area 1 and encompassed 0.024 ha (0.06 ac.). Two trenches were excavated within Project Area 2 and encompassed 0.089 ha (0.22 ac.). Four features were documented. Feature 1 was identified as a section of the Upper Labor Acequia (41BX1273), and Feature 3 was identified as a section of the San Pedro Acequia (41BX337). Feature 2 was a late construction dump and was found not to be significant. Feature 4 was documented within the channel of Feature 3 and is also part of 41BX337. The San Pedro Acequia (41BX337) has previously been found to be eligible for the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) and is also eligible for designation as a State Antiquities Landmark (SAL). The Upper Labor Acequia (41BX1273) has been previously recommended as eligible for the NRHP and for designation as a SAL. The acequia is also a contributing resource to Brackenridge Park’s NRHP nomination (National Park Service 2011). Both sites are a part of the San Antonio’s acequia system, which is a designated National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark. CAR recommends that the section of the San Pedro Acequia (41BX337) and the section of the Upper Labor Acequia (41BX1273) documented during the course of this project are eligible for inclusion to the NRHP and for designation as a SAL. However, neither of these sites should be impacted by the proposed parking lot construction that has a maximum depth of impact of 25.4 cm (10 in.), which is a depth above the features. As such, CAR recommends that the construction of both parking areas be allowed to proceed, though with an archaeological monitor present. CAR further recommends that should buried cultural features be encountered during construction work in the immediate area cease and that the Texas Historic Commission (THC) and the COSA Office of Historic Preservation (COSA-OHP) be notified to consult on additional actions that may be necessary to protect the cultural remains. Both the THC and COSA-OHP concurred with the recommendations. However, prior to the issuance of the concurrence documents from the THC, VIA-MTA paved Project Area 2 (712 W. Laurel Street) without notifying CAR. No monitor was present for the excavation or paving. CAR subsequently photographed the area. In addition, VIA-MTA no longer plans to do any work in Project Area 1. No artifacts were collected from Project Area 1, but several historic artifacts were collected from Project Area 2. These artifacts along with all records generated on this project are curated at the CAR facility as accession 2259.

Controllability of Weakly Dependent Siphons under Elementary-Siphon Control

Monitors are added upon problematic siphons to avoid deadlocks. Li and Zhou add monitors to elementary siphons only while controlling the rest dependent siphons to save cost. After failing a Marking Linear Inequality (MLI) test, they perform a Linear Integer Programming (LIP) test (NP-hard). We proposed a new MLI test earlier to avoid the LIP and extended it to S3PGR2 (systems of simple sequential processes with general resource requirements) for strongly dependent siphons (SDS). The control policy for weakly dependent siphons (WDS) is rather conservative due to some negative terms in the MLI. This paper shows that WDS and SDS have the same controllability (i.e., MLI). As a result, the control for WDS needs no longer be that conservative. We also develop an optimization (by redundancy elimination) of the computation required for LIP test to ensure deadlock prevention of S3PR (Systems of Simple Sequential Processes with Resources). A favorable result for this policy is that any n-dependent (n>2) WDS (similar to SDS) needs no monitor and hence the complexity for synthesizing a controller becomes polynomial.

Comportamento supersticioso em esquemas múltiplos: estudo sobre a interação do comportamento verbal com o comportamento mantido por relação acidental com reforço

A interação do comportamento “supersticioso” com o comportamento verbal foi avaliada em três experimentos. Os participantes receberam diferentes instruções sugerindo que responder poderia produzir pontos. Nas sessões experimentais, a cor de um retângulo que aparecia no monitor de um computador era relacionada à vigência de uma situação de apresentação de pontos independentemente do responder ou à vigência de outra situação em que os pontos não eram apresentados (mult VT 8 s EXT). Ao final de cada sessão, os participantes tinham que descrever o que faziam na sessão. Nos três experimentos, apenas alguns participantes desenvolveram comportamento “supersticioso”, independentemente do tipo de instrução apresentada no início da sessão. Ao final das sessões, os participantes descreviam seus próprios comportamentos. Os resultados sugerem que o desempenho não-verbal do participante controlou seus auto-relatos e que as próprias contingências do esquema múltiplo foram responsáveis pelo comportamento “supersticioso” mais do que instruções ou autorelatos. Palavras-chave: comportamento “supersticioso”; contigüidade; instruções; comportamento verbal.

Simplificando a obtenção e a utilização de imagens digitais: scanners e câmeras digitais

Um dos grandes benefícios que a evolução tecnológica proporcionou à Ortodontia foi a utilização das imagens digitais. O uso dessa nova tecnologia em Odontologia, e especificamente em Ortodontia, aliada à introdução da Fotografia Digital, permite aos profissionais desta área utilizar recursos, antes inimagináveis, facilitando a elaboração do diagnóstico ortodôntico, auxiliando a comunicação entre profissionais, bem como com os pacientes, além de ilustrar comunicações científicas, em conferências, cursos e publicações, sendo uma excelente ferramenta para o ensino e pesquisa. Com o objetivo de lançar mão dessa nova tecnologia, o ortodontista pode obter imagens digitais por meio da digitalização da documentação ortodôntica convencional composta basicamente de fotografias analógicas (em papel ou em slide), modelos de estudo e radiografias ou pela obtenção de imagens digitais com câmeras fotográficas digitais. Desta forma, o objetivo desse trabalho é esclarecer alguns conceitos básicos relacionados às imagens digitais e tentar responder às perguntas mais freqüentes em relação ao tema: Como digitalizar as minhas documentações ortodônticas com um scanner? Como obter imagens digitais com uma câmera fotográfica digital? Que tipo de resolução em DPI (dots per inch, ou pontos por polegada) ou em Megapixel (MP), tamanho e formato de arquivo devo utilizar para as minhas necessidades ortodônticas de rotina? A obtenção de imagens com finalidade apenas de visualização no monitor do computador é diferenciada daquela para outros fins, como impressão de relatórios, banners ou apresentações com recurso de multimídia? E por fim, qual resolução deve ser utilizada para obter imagens digitais que serão encaminhadas para publicações científicas?

Embedded ASR: Lessons Learned Integrating Speech Control into Embedded Systems

For the most basic embedded systems, an integrator must assume that the system has no keyboard support, no mouse, and no monitor. A programmable keypad and a limited alphanumeric display are the usual interface devices. Our research looks at the new generation of powerful embedded platforms and operating systems to investigate the potential integration of automatic speech recognition (ASR) to control high-end diagnostic systems. Our goal is to present a working design model and identify critical issues to aid future designers and system engineers in the process of incorporating speech control into embedded systems. Critical issues discussed include hardware platforms, use of off-the-shelf ASR software, real-time versus near-real-time operating systems, and user system navigation and location awareness.

Aplicabilidade do georreferenciamento de aerofotos de pequeno formato na formação de bancos de dados espaciais: uma alternativa para o cadastro técnico rural municipal

A falta de base cartográfica adequada para certas regiões, tem levado a um uso mais intensivo de aerofotos de pequeno formato como fonte de informação espacial ágil e de baixo custo aos usuários de sistemas que tratam imagens georreferenciadas para diversas finalidades. Uma destas finalidades é o Cadastro Técnico Rural Municipal (CTRM), o que exige que seja conhecida a magnitude dos erros inerentes ao processo. Foi desenvolvido um estudo para quantificar a imprecisão originada do uso direto, sem restituição, destas aerofotos, nas duas principais formas de entrada da informação espacial nesses sistemas: a digitalização manual, via mesa digitalizadora, utilizando-se osistema CR-SIGDER 2.0; e a digitalização eletrônica, via "scanner", com vetorizaçãio direta no monitor SVGA, com "mouse", utilizando-se o sistema CR-IMAREA 1.0. Os pontos de apoio para transformação de escalas foram georreferenciados aosistema UTM através de GPS e topografia. O principal parâmetro analisado foi o erro médio de posicionamento nas coordenadas. Procurou-se, ainda, descobrir qual a melhor distribuição dos pontos de apoio de campo para a transformação de escalas nestes sistemas. A melhor distribuição de pontos apresentou um erro médio de posicionamento nas coordenadas de 6.96 metros para a mesa digitalizadora, e de 7.53 metros para o monitor SVGA. Levando-se em consideração a pequena escala utilizada, estes resultados mostram o grande potencial das aerofotos de pequeno formato para as finalidades propostas neste trabalho, pois os mesmos se traduzem em erros de distâncias e áreas dentro da tolerância topográfica, desde que os pontos de apoio esfejam distribuídos um em cada canto da aerofoto.

Effect of dedicated monitor watchers on patients' outcomes

BACKGROUND: In 55% of progressive care units, someone is assigned to watch the cardiac monitors at all times, but the effect of this practice on patients' outcomes has not been examined. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effect of continual observation of telemetry units by a monitor watcher on mortality, frequency of transfer to a critical care unit, and the occurrence of five life-threatening dysrhythmias. METHODS: Data for this quasi-experimental study were collected on 1185 patients for a 9-month period in 1993 when the cardiac progressive care unit had a monitor watcher and on 1198 patients for a 9-month period in 1994 when the unit had no monitor watcher. RESULTS: We found no significant differences in mortality, frequency of transfer to a critical care unit, or the occurrence of three of the five dysrhythmias examined. The presence of a monitor watcher was associated with significantly fewer episodes of sustained ventricular tachycardia but more bradyarrhythmias. For both sustained ventricular tachycardia and bradyarrhythmias, the monitor watcher variable remained in the final multivariate logistic regression models. CONCLUSIONS: The presence of a monitor watcher was not associated with lower rates of most adverse outcomes evaluated; however, fewer episodes of sustained ventricular tachycardia occurred when a monitor watcher was present. Sustained ventricular tachycardia is life-threatening, disturbing to the patient, and may result in a longer hospital stay while medical therapy is being adjusted. The results of this study support the use of a monitor watcher to prevent sustained ventricular tachycardia.

Accuracy of detection of clinically important dysrhythmias with and without a dedicated monitor watcher

BACKGROUND: Although dedicated monitor watchers are used in many progressive care units with telemetry monitors, this costly practice has not been evaluated. OBJECTIVE: To compare the accuracy of detection of clinically important dysrhythmias with and without a dedicated monitor watcher. METHODS: On a 26-bed cardiac progressive care unit, documentation of four categories of dysrhythmias during a 7-week period when a monitor watcher was present was compared with that during a 7-week period when no monitor watcher was present. The Hewlett-Packard CareVue Clinical Event Review, a full-disclosure system, was used as the gold standard. RESULTS: Accuracy of detection of nonsustained ventricular tachycardia, supraventricular tachycardia, and pauses was significantly better with a monitor watcher than without. Although the detection of life-threatening rhythms was correct a higher percentage of the time with a monitor watcher, the difference was not significant. CONCLUSIONS: The efficiency and quality of patient care can be enhanced by using a dedicated monitor watcher. The results of this study raise the question of whether improved accuracy of detection of dysrhythmias results in better outcomes for patients.