INFORMATION SYSTEMS SUPPORT FOR ASSESSMENT OF MANAGEMENT PERFORMANCE: AN EXPERIMENTAL EVALUATION

This paper reports the results of a study to determine how individual managers assemble information from automated systems when the task is evaluating organization performance. An experiment was conducted in which managers were given varying forms of information over a period of time and required to accumulate the information they would need for a later evaluation decision. As the results show, there are differences in the way individuals select and assemble reported information system design practices

Oral History by Naomi Germany

A historical narrative by Naomi Germany regarding her experiences in a one-room school house.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/ors/1047/thumbnail.jp

Experimental determination of a nonclassical Glauber-Sudarshan P function

A quantum state is nonclassical if its Glauber-Sudarshan P function fails to be interpreted as a probability density. This quantity is often highly singular, so that its reconstruction is a demanding task. Here we present the experimental determination of a well-behaved P function showing negativities for a single-photon-added thermal state. This is a direct visualization of the original definition of nonclassicality. The method can be useful under conditions for which many other signatures of nonclassicality would not persist.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

The generalized sampling theorem for transforms of not necessarily square integrable functions

It is known that the generalized sampling theorem is valid for certain finite limit integral transforms of square integrable functions. In this note, we will extend the validity of the theorem to include transforms of absolutely integrable functions associated with differentiable kernels. In the proof, we will use the Hölder inequality and a known theorem concerning the uniform convergence of the orthogonal series to the differentiable kernel of the particular integral transform

Phosphorus Improves Leaf Nutrient Concentrations in Wheat, Oat, and Cereal Rye

Core Ideas: Increased P availability increases leaf P and Mg in wheat, oat, and rye. The grass tetany ratio is improved with greater P availability in these species. Unlike cereal rye and oat, wheat increases shoot growth with high P levels. Winter annual species grown for forage are prone to mineral imbalances that could result in animal nutritional disorders, such as grass tetany. Adequate soil P has been found to be critical for the growth and adequate nutrient content of Mg, Ca, and K in other forages for grazing animals. This study examined the effect of P availability on growth and leaf nutrients in annual cereal grains commonly grown for winter forage. Winter wheat (Triticum aestivum L.), oat (Avena sativa L.), and cereal rye (Secale cereal L.) were grown hydroponically in greenhouse conditions in complete nutrient solutions with P treatments of 0, 200, 400, and 800 µmol L−1 P. After 32 d, plants were harvested and analyzed for P, Mg, Ca, and K content. Shoot growth of all three species increased from 0 to 200 µmol L−1 P; however, only wheat shoots increased incrementally with the other P treatment concentrations. Leaf P also responded incrementally to increased P treatments in all three species. Wheat and cereal rye exhibited increases in leaf Mg and improved grass tetany ratio from 200 to 400 µmol L−1 P, whereas oat showed these improvements from 0 to 200 µmol L−1 P treatments. This study suggests increased P availability could improve the grass tetany ratio, with or without increased shoot growth, in winter annual forage production on low P soils

Engineering sensorial experiences by modulating fragrance microcapsule mechanics and morphology

Fragrance delivery systems and technologies are incorporated into many consumer products in order to enhance the sensorial experience and provide performance cues. To engineer substantive, controlled-release fragrance microcapsules which selectively adhere to targeted substrates, we program large physical deformations into the capsule geometry of stable, oil-loaded microcapsules during the interfacial polymerization process. Shape anisotropy is introduced by exploiting the buckling phenomenon which is related to the interfacial viscoelasticity of the burgeoning membrane, and this shape anisotropy results in the formation of novel ‘suction caps’ with favorable microcapsule-substrate interactions. The deformations are tuned by modulating the mechanical properties of the microcapsule membranes in 3D and 2D, and these mechanical differences are successfully probed by imaging studies and interfacial rheology. The capsule interaction area is enhanced to promote adhesion onto targeted substrates such as glass, hair, skin and fabric in model systems and consumer formulations. Quantitative deposition tests and sensory trials substantiate the benefits of modulating and measuring microcapsule membrane properties and morphology in a scalable, industrially-relevant process while systematically optimizing the consumer product formulation-independent physical parameters of our system

Determination of Grain-Size Distributions from Ultrasonic Attenuation

The overall research goal of this project is the nondestructive measurement of grain-size distribution parameters using ultrasonic attenuation. Ultrasonic attenuation α is dependent upon the sound wavelength (λ), the size of the grains (D), and in many cases elastic constants and sound velocities of the material. Assuming that multiple scattering can be ignored, the expression for the wavelength dependence of the attenuation is 1 α(λ)=∫0∞N(D)α(λ,D)dD where N(D) is the grain-size distribution. In previous work [1] the sizes were assumed to be distributed following a power-law with exponent γ: 2 N(D)=KD−γ,

An interleaved sampling scheme for the characterization of single qubit dynamics

In this paper, we demonstrate that interleaved sampling techniques can be used to characterize the Hamiltonian of a qubit and its environmental decoherence rate. The technique offers a significant advantage in terms of the number of measurements that are required to characterize a qubit. When compared to the standard Nyquist-Shannon sampling rate, the saving in the total measurement time for the interleaved method is approximately proportional to the ratio of the sample rates.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figure

On Fields with Finite Information Density

The existence of a natural ultraviolet cutoff at the Planck scale is widely expected. In a previous Letter, it has been proposed to model this cutoff as an information density bound by utilizing suitably generalized methods from the mathematical theory of communication. Here, we prove the mathematical conjectures that were made in this Letter.Comment: 31 pages, to appear in Phys.Rev.

A malaria vaccine candidate based on an epitope of the Plasmodium falciparum RH5 protein

BACKGROUND: The Plasmodium falciparum protein RH5 is an adhesin molecule essential for parasite invasion of erythrocytes. Recent studies show that anti-PfRH5 sera have potent invasion-inhibiting activities, supporting the idea that the PfRH5 antigen could form the basis of a vaccine. Therefore, epitopes recognized by neutralizing anti-PfRH5 antibodies could themselves be effective vaccine immunogens if presented in a sufficiently immunogenic fashion. However, the exact regions within PfRH5 that are targets of this invasion-inhibitory activity have yet to be identified. METHODS: A battery of anti-RH5 monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) were produced and screened for their potency by inhibition of invasion assays in vitro. Using an anti-RH5 mAb that completely inhibited invasion as the selecting mAb, affinity-selection using random sequence peptide libraries displayed on virus-like particles of bacteriophage MS2 (MS2 VLPs) was performed. VLPs were sequenced to identify the specific peptide epitopes they encoded and used to raise specific antisera that was in turn tested for inhibition of invasion. RESULTS: Three anti-RH5 monoclonals (0.1 mg/mL) were able to inhibit invasion in vitro by >95%. Affinity-selection with one of these mAbs yielded a VLP which yielded a peptide whose sequence is identical to a portion of PfRH5 itself. The VLP displaying the peptide binds strongly to the antibody, and in immunized animals elicits an anti-PfRH5 antibody response. The resulting antisera against the specific VLP inhibit parasite invasion of erythrocytes more than 90% in vitro. CONCLUSIONS: Here, data is presented from an anti-PfRH5 mAb that completely inhibits erythrocyte invasion by parasites in vitro, one of the few anti-malarial monoclonal antibodies reported to date that completely inhibits invasion with such potency, adding to other studies that highlight the potential of PfRH5 as a vaccine antigen. The specific neutralization sensitive epitope within RH5 has been identified, and antibodies against this epitope also elicit high anti-invasion activity, suggesting this epitope could form the basis of an effective vaccine against malaria