This thesis investigates how to train the increasingly large cast of characters in modern commercial computer games. Modern computer games can contain hundreds or sometimes thousands of non-player characters that each should act coherently in complex dynamic worlds, and engage appropriately with other non-player characters and human players. Too often, it is obvious that computer controlled cha...

BACKGROUND Hippocampal sharp-wave ripples (SWRs) arising from synchronous bursting in CA3 pyramidal cells and propagating to CA1 are thought to facilitate memory consolidation. Stimulation of the CA3 axon collaterals comprising the hippocampal commissure in rats interrupts sharp-wave ripples and leads to memory impairment. In primates, however, these commissural collaterals are limited. Other h...

Adolescents have the highest rates of meningococcal carriage and transmission. Interrupting the adolescent habitat in order to reduce carriage and transmission within adolescents and to other age groups could help to control meningococcal disease at a population level. Compared to immunization strategies restricted to young children, a strategy focused on adolescents may have more profound and ...

Generally speaking, Chinese characters are graphic characters that do not allow immediate pronunciation unless they are accompanied with Mandarin phonetic symbols (zhuyin) or other pinyin methods (e.g. romanization system). In fact, about 80 to 90 percents of Chinese characters are pictophonetic characters which are composed of a phonetic component and a semantic component. Therefore, even if o...

We describe two new methods to partition phylogenetic data sets of discrete characters based on pairwise compatibility. The partitioning methods make no assumptions regarding the phylogeny, model of evolution, or characteristics of the data. The methods first build a compatibility graph, in which each node represents a character in the data set. Edges in the compatibility graph may represent st...

In Paramecium tetraurelia, mating type is determined during the differentiation of the somatic macronucleus from a zygotic nucleus genetically competent for both types, O and E. Determination of the developing macronucleus is controlled by the parental macronucleus through an unknown mechanism resulting in the maternal inheritance of mating types. The pleiotropic mutation mtFE affects macronucl...