Delivery of broadband services to SubSaharan Africa via Nigerian communications satellite

Africa is the least wired continent in the world in terms of robust telecommunications infrastructure and systems to cater for its more than one billion people. African nations are mostly still in the early stages of Information Communications Technology (ICT) development as verified by the relatively low ICT Development Index (IDI) values of all countries in the African region. In developing nations, mobile broadband subscriptions and penetration between 2000-2009 was increasingly more popular than fixed broadband subscriptions. To achieve the goal of universal access, with rapid implementation of ICT infrastructure to complement the sparsely distributed terrestrial networks in the hinterlands and leveraging the adequate submarine cables along the African coastline, African nations and their stakeholders are promoting and implementing Communication Satellite systems, particularly in Nigeria, to help bridge the digital hiatus. This paper examines the effectiveness of communication satellites in delivering broadband-based services

Hydrogen-powered road vehicles : the health benfits and drawbacks of a new fuel

Because of the political, social and environmental problems associated with dependency on fossil fuels, there is considerable interest in alternative energy sources. Hydrogen is regarded as a promising option, particularly as a fuel for road vehicles. The Dutch Energy Research Centre (ECN) recently published a vision of the future, in which it suggested that by 2050 more than half of all cars in the Netherlands could be running on hydrogen. A switch to using hydrogen as the primary energy source for road vehicles would have far-reaching social consequences. As with all technological developments, opportunities would be created, but drawbacks would inevitably be encountered as well. Some of the disadvantages associated with hydrogen are already known, and are to some degree manageable. It is likely, however, that other drawbacks would come to light only once hydrogen-powered cars were actually in use. With that thought in mind, and in view of the social significance of a possible transition to hydrogen, it was decided that the Health Council should assess the positive and negative effects that hydrogen use could have on public health. It is particularly important to make such an assessment at the present early stage in the development of hydrogen technologies, so that gaps in existing scientific knowledge may be identified and appropriate strategies may be developed for addressing such gaps. This report has been produced by the Health and Environment Surveillance Committee, which has special responsibility for the identification of important correlations between environmental factors and public health

MIXED-USE SAFETY ON RURAL FACILITIES IN THE PACIFIC NORTHWEST: Consideration of Vehicular, Non-Traditional, and Non-Motorized Users

In the United States, one in 12 households do not own a personal automobile and approximately 13% of those who are old enough to drive do not. Trips by these individuals are being made in one of many other possible modes, creating the need to “share space” between many forms of travel. The goal of this project is to: improve safety and minimize the dangers for all transportation mode types while traveling in mixed-use environments on rural facilities through the development and use of engineering and education safety measures. To that end, this report documents three specific efforts by the project team. First, a comprehensive literature review of mixed-use safety issues with consideration of non-motorized and non-traditional forms of transportation. Second, a novel analysis of trauma registry data. Third, development, execution and analysis of the Pacific Northwest Transportation Survey geared toward understanding safety perceptions of mixed-use users. Most notably, findings indicate that ATVs (and similar non-traditional-type vehicles) are used on or near roads 24% of the time and snowmachines are used on or near roads 23% of the time. There are significantly more (twice as many) ATV-related on-road traumas in connected places than isolated places in Alaska and three times more traumas in highway connected places than in secondary road connected places. Comparably, bicycles had 449 on-road traumas between 2004 and 2011 whereas ATVs had 352 on-road traumas. Users of all modes who received formalized training felt safer in mixed-use environments than those who reported having no training at all

Planning and Resource Management in an Intelligent Automated Power Management System

Power system management is a process of guiding a power system towards the objective of continuous supply of electrical power to a set of loads. Spacecraft power system management requires planning and scheduling, since electrical power is a scarce resource in space. The automation of power system management for future spacecraft has been recognized as an important R&D goal. Several automation technologies have emerged including the use of expert systems for automating human problem solving capabilities such as rule based expert system for fault diagnosis and load scheduling. It is questionable whether current generation expert system technology is applicable for power system management in space. The objective of the ADEPTS (ADvanced Electrical Power management Techniques for Space systems) is to study new techniques for power management automation. These techniques involve integrating current expert system technology with that of parallel and distributed computing, as well as a distributed, object-oriented approach to software design. The focus of the current study is the integration of new procedures for automatically planning and scheduling loads with procedures for performing fault diagnosis and control. The objective is the concurrent execution of both sets of tasks on separate transputer processors, thus adding parallelism to the overall management process

A review of the NASA V-G/VGH general aviation program

The V-G and VGH data collected from a wide variety of general aviation airplanes since the inception of the NASA V-G/VGH General Aviation Program in 1962 are presented. These data were analyzed to obtain information on the gust and maneuver loads, on the operating practices, and on the effects of different types of operations on these parameters

Corporate Governance and Firm Strategy in the Pharmaceutical Industry

Using the case of the pharmaceutical industry, this paper assesses how the leading German and UK firms are adapting to changes in their competitive environment, at both the national and international level. We attempt to link how firms create governance structures (management decision-making, the organisation of the R&D process, etc.), and the national system of innovation, impact the innovation strategies adopted in leading German and UK firms. Our results show that first, the firm competencies created in order to compete globally may still originate within national economies, in part because the generation of R&D remains relatively national. Second, towards the end of the 1970s, the scientific basis in the pharmaceutical industry began to change rapidly. The evidence presented shows that UK firms rapidly developed new competencies in biotechnology and other research areas in response to the structural changes. However, German firms tended, until very recently, to maintain and in some cases strengthen competencies in traditional research methods based on organic chemistry. ZUSAMMENFASSUNG - (Corporate Governance und Unternehmensstrategie in der pharmazeutischen Industrie) Am Beispiel der pharmazeutischen Industrie wird in diesem Beitrag aufgezeigt, wie führende deutsche und britische Firmen sich an Änderungen in ihrer Unternehmensumwelt anpassen, sowohl der nationalen wie auch der internationalen Umwelt. Es wird gezeigt, wie die Unternehmen Governance-Strukturen (Managemententscheidungen, die Organisation von FuE-Prozessen etc.) schaffen und wie nationale Innovationssysteme die Innovationsstrategien beeinflussen, die von führenden deutschen und britischen Firmen verfolgt werden. Erstens gelangt die Studie zu dem Ergebnis, daß die Kompetenz der Unternehmen so ausgerichtet wurde, daß sie für den globalen Wettbewerb fit sind, aber ihre Wurzeln dennoch innerhalb der nationalen Volkswirtschaften behalten, teilweise deshalb, weil FuE verhältnismäßig national fundiert ist. Zweitens begann zum Ende der siebziger Jahre eine dramatische Änderung in der wissenschaftlichen Basis der pharmazeutischen Industrie. Diese Evidenz zeigt, daß britische Firmen rasch neue Kompetenz in Biotechnologie und anderen Forschungsbereichen entwickelten, um auf die Änderungen zu reagieren. Deutsche Unternehmen tendierten jedoch noch bis vor kurzem dazu, ihre bisherige Kompetenz beizubehalten und in manchen Fällen in traditionellen Forschungsbereichen, basierend auf organischer Chemie, sogar zu verstärken.corporate governance; firm strategy; national systems of innovation; pharmaceuticals

Effort and Selection Effects of Incentive Contracts

We show that the improved effort of employees associated with incentive contracts depends on the properties of the performance measures used in the contract.We also find that the power of incentives in the contract is only indirectly related to any improved employee effort.High powered incentive increase the selection effect of the incentive contract and attract better employees to the firm.The selection effect of the incentive contract depends, in turn, on the (perceived) properties of the performance measures specified in the contract.These results hold after controlling for an array of incentive contract design characteristics and for differences in organizational context.Data is from a third party survey on compensation practices among Chief Executive Officers.Our estimation procedures address several known problems with using secondary datasets.incentives;contracts;performance measurement;employees

Centaur D-1A guidance/software system

The main body of this paper describes the evolution of the Centaur D-1A Guidance and Software System. Specifically, the performance of the explicit guidance equations, using a linear tangent steering law. Inherent flexibility exists in the equations in that they have multimission capability. They can accommodate both Earth-orbital and Earth-escape missions with either one or two Centaur burns. They can also guide for multi-burn orbital missions. The Centaur performance is indicated in terms of optimality (propellant usage), accuracy, flexibility and computer requirements. In the course of the Centaur Guidance development substantial changes and improvements have been made and more improvements are on the way for the Shuttle/Centaur Guidance. It is the intent of this paper to describe, provide insight into, and identify certain unique aspects of the individual Centaur flight profiles. Mission profile(s) are described narratively with some numerical data given in cases where it may be useful

A hydrogen framework for the East Midlands

Profiles capabilities in midlands-based organisations in hydrogen and fuel cell technologies as a rationale for support of a Midlands hydrogen cluster