Non-visual game design and training in gameplay skill acquisition – A puzzle game case study

This paper reports the results of a study on the design and evaluation of the game and techniques which allow puzzles to be played in the absence of visual feedback. We have demonstrated that a camera-mouse can be used successfully for blind navigation and target location acquisition within a game field. To gradually teach the players the sequential learning method was applied. Blind exploration of the gamespace was augmented with sticky labels and overview sound cues, verbal and non-verbal, which can significantly reduce the cognitive load and facilitate mental matching and integration. The full-sticky labels technique does not require fine motor skills and allows a user to gain control over the game with a minimum level of skills. With the vertical sticky labels technique training was focused on the development of accurate head movements only on a horizontal plane. With practice, the players can use the non-sticky labels technique. After 240 trials (3–4 h), the cumulative experience of the blindfolded players was increased 22.5–27 times compared to the initial 10 trials.     

(1S)-1-Ethyl-2-Methylpropyl 3,13-Dimethylpentadecanoate: Major Sex Pheromone Component of Paulownia Bagworm, Clania variegata

The Paulownia bagworm, Clania variegata Snell. (Lepidoptera: Psychidae), is one of the most significant forest defoliators in China. In gas chromatographic (GC)–electroantennographic detection analyses of pheromone gland extracts of female C. variegata on three GC columns (DB-5, DB-23, DB-210), two compounds (A and B) elicited strong responses from male antennae. The more abundant component B was isolated by high-performance liquid chromatography and identified as 1-ethyl-2-methylpropyl 3,13-dimethylpentadecanoate by transesterification, GC-mass spectrometry (MS), and comparison of its spectral and GC retention characteristics with those of synthetic compounds. In field trapping experiments in China, racemic and (1S)-1-ethyl-2-methylpropyl 3,13-dimethylpentadecanoate [but not the (1R)-stereoisomer] attracted male C. variegata. The absolute configuration of B (a molecule with three chiral centers) and the structure of component A remain to be determined.     

Electrostatic nanolithography in polymers using atomic force microscopy

The past decade has witnessed an explosion of techniques used to pattern polymers on the nano (1-100 nm) and submicrometre (100-1,000 nm) scale, driven by the extensive versatility of polymers for diverse applications, such as molecular electronics, data storage, optoelectronics, displays, sacrificial templates and all forms of sensors. Conceptually, most of the patterning techniques, including microcontact printing (soft lithography), photolithography, electron-beam lithography, block-copolymer templating and dip-pen lithography, are based on the spatially selective removal or formation/deposition of polymer. Here, we demonstrate an alternative and novel lithography technique--electrostatic nanolithography using atomic force microscopy--that generates features by mass transport of polymer within an initially uniform, planar film without chemical crosslinking, substantial polymer degradation or ablation. The combination of localized softening of attolitres (10(2)-10(5) nm3) of polymer by Joule heating, extremely non-uniform electric field gradients to polarize and manipulate the soften polymer, and single-step process methodology using conventional atomic force microscopy (AFM) equipment, establishes a new paradigm for polymer nanolithography, allowing rapid (of the order of milliseconds) creation of raised (or depressed) features without external heating of a polymer film or AFM tip-film contact.     

Parallel spherical harmonic transforms on heterogeneous architectures (graphics processing units/multi‐core CPUs)

Spherical harmonic transforms (SHT) are at the heart of many scientific and practical applications ranging from climate modelling to cosmological observations. In many of these areas, new cutting‐edge science goals have been recently proposed requiring simulations and analyses of experimental or observational data at very high resolutions and of unprecedented volumes. Both these aspects pose formidable challenge for the currently existing implementations of the transforms. This paper describes parallel algorithms for computing SHT with two variants of intra‐node parallelism appropriate for novel supercomputer architectures, multi‐core processors and Graphic Processing Units (GPU). It also discusses their performance, alone and embedded within a top‐level, Message Passing Interface‐based parallelisation layer ported from the S²HAT library, in terms of their accuracy, overall efficiency and scalability. We show that our inverse SHT run on GeForce 400 Series GPUs equipped with latest Compute Unified Device Architecture architecture (Fermi) outperforms the state of the art implementation for a multi‐core processor executed on a current Intel Core i7‐2600K. Furthermore, we show that an Message Passing Interface/Compute Unified Device Architecture version of the inverse transform run on a cluster of 128 Nvidia Tesla S1070 is as much as 3 times faster than the hybrid Message Passing Interface/OpenMP version executed on the same number of quad‐core processors Intel Nehalem for problem sizes motivated by our target applications. Performance of the direct transforms is however found to be at the best comparable in these cases. We discuss in detail the algorithmic solutions devised for the major steps involved in the transforms calculation, emphasising those with a major impact on their overall performance and elucidates the sources of the dichotomy between the direct and the inverse operations.Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.