Attentive reading is a complex and cognitively demanding task that uses note-taking and annotation to support the reader's interpretation of the document. When reading on paper, extensive use of highlighting and other activities are conducted to support the reading process, but this rich behaviour is not used with digital documents. Many users therefore print digital documents and then interact...

Thermosensors detect temperature changes and trigger cellular responses crucial for survival at different temperatures. The thermosensor DesK is a transmembrane (TM) histidine kinase which detects a decrease in temperature through its TM segments (TMS). Here, we address a key issue: how a physical stimulus such as temperature can be converted into a cellular response. We show that the thickness...

Obliquity influences the latitudinal position of Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ). However, specific forcing mechanism remains unclear due to scarcity long-term and high-resolution precipitation records from Indo-Pacific region. Here, we present a new, extended, (∼2 kyr) record covering past ∼410 kyr marine sedimentary sequence collected at southern margin ITCZ's displacement within By int...

BACKGROUND Pleural effusion adversely affects the pressuregenerating capacity of the diaphragm. It uncouples the lung and chest wall, which may result in diaphragmatic dysfunction. Information on the effects of effusion drainage on diaphragmatic function is limited, but several studies report relief of dyspnoea after drainage, which was attributed to improved diaphragmatic mechanics, even if th...

Large organizations always have a strong demand for storage from data-intensive applications and instruments. In this paper, we present the design, implementation, and evaluation of a new virtual storage system, Storage@desk, which can aggregate a large number of distributed machines within an organization to provide storage services with quality of service guarantees. Because storage virtualiz...

This paper introduces a new breed of natural language dialog applications which we refer to as the Help Desk. These voiceenabled applications are an evolution from Help Desk services that are currently available on the web or being supported by human agents. The goals of a voice-enabled Help Desk are to route calls to appropriate agents or departments, provide a wealth of information about vari...

This paper introduces a new breed of natural language dialog applications which we refer to as the Help Desk. These voiceenabled applications are an evolution from Help Desk services that are currently available on the web or being supported by human agents. The goals of a voice-enabled Help Desk are to route calls to appropriate agents or departments, provide a wealth of information about vari...

Information technology has changed the way organizations function. This resulted in the reliance of help desks to deal with information technology related areas such as hardware, software, and telecommunication. Besides, the adoption of business process reengineering and downsizing have led to the shrinkage of the size of help desk. The shorter information technology product life cycle has wors...

In spite of numerous clinical studies, there is no consensus on the benefit Heliox mixtures can bring to asthmatic patients in terms of work of breathing and ventilation distribution. In this article we use a 3D finite element mathematical model of the lung to study the impact of asthma on effort and ventilation distribution along with the effect of Heliox compared to air. Lung surface displace...