Leading Departments with Contingent and Tenure-Eligible Faculty: Strategies and Solutions

Leadership and communication strategies for leading departments that include both contingent and tenure-eligible faculty through three case studies, dealing with 1) voting rights and other claims upon resources; 2) a lack of career milestones, making contingent faculty feel “stuck”; and 3) ways to value contributions of contingent faculty

Brayton Power Conversion System Parametric Design Modelling for Nuclear Electric Propulsion

The parametrically based closed Brayton cycle (CBC) computer design model was developed for inclusion into the NASA LeRC overall Nuclear Electric Propulsion (NEP) end-to-end systems model. The code is intended to provide greater depth to the NEP system modeling which is required to more accurately predict the impact of specific technology on system performance. The CBC model is parametrically based to allow for conducting detailed optimization studies and to provide for easy integration into an overall optimizer driver routine. The power conversion model includes the modeling of the turbines, alternators, compressors, ducting, and heat exchangers (hot-side heat exchanger and recuperator). The code predicts performance to significant detail. The system characteristics determined include estimates of mass, efficiency, and the characteristic dimensions of the major power conversion system components. These characteristics are parametrically modeled as a function of input parameters such as the aerodynamic configuration (axial or radial), turbine inlet temperature, cycle temperature ratio, power level, lifetime, materials, and redundancy

Microbial-Host Dynamics and the Evolution of Nearshore Diversity in \u3ci\u3eHippocampus abdominalis\u3c/i\u3e

Local adaptation is a fundamental concept at the core of evolutionary process. Devising means to break down larger concepts and systematically test internal mechanisms are key to understanding the driving forces behind the influence of environmental differences on biological systems. To understand dynamic processes in the natural world, we must strip away layers and confounding variables that may mask the signal we hope to understand. In this case seahorse species, Hippocampus abdominalis, or the pot-bellied seahorse, made an unlikely but ideal study system. The first layer to strip away was neutral genetic variation within the population. A multilocus genetic dataset composed of the mitochondrial control region and nuclear microsatellites revealed population structure throughout the species’ geographical range. Australian H. abdominalis colonized the South Island of New Zealand during the previous interglacial-glacial cycle between twelve and 120 Ka followed by population expansion and migration northward to the North Island of New Zealand. While the region is highly diverse with strong evidence of ancestral and contemporary connectivity, Australian populations demonstrated higher geographic structure, lower diversity and lower connectivity than New Zealand populations. Contemporary migration via rafting is thought to be responsible for low but significant dispersal in the direction of New Zealand to Australia. All contemporary population sizes were smaller than ancestral estimates throughout the range, suggesting the potential loss of rare alleles over time. By comparison, immune gene locus major histocompatibility class II alpha and beta (MHIIab) had a similar level of diversity to neutral nuclear microsatellites with contrasting patterns of distribution across the species range. Specific MHIIab alleles correlated highly with particular microbes identified in the gut tract, which were derived from the environment. While gut microbial communities significantly differed by environmental types defined by terrestrial wastewater contributions from human activity (or a lack thereof), overall MHIIab population structure did not demonstrate the same pattern. Heterozygote advantage appeared to yield a stronger signal due to observed heterozygote excess at this locus than selection pressure from any particular microbe or microbial community. A subset of these microbial-host correlations within environmental types, however, followed expected patterns. Candidate microbes were selected for controlled exposure trials that were associated with alleles specific to urban human-associated nearshore environments (Photobacterium phosphoreum) or rural pristine-associated nearshore environments remote from any human activity including agriculture or aquaculture (Staphylococcus epidermidis). Supertyping analyses of all potentially expressed MHIIab cell surface proteins from wild populations identified 17 functionally similar gene clusters. Experimental populations of H. abdominalis fry were bred from captive adults carrying supertypes containing MHIIab alleles correlated with either of the two microbes. Overall, fitness and survival were higher after pristine-associated microbial exposure and lower after human-associated microbial exposure for the twenty genotypes vs. supertypes tested relative to the total range of growth observed over time. Two genotypes (one from each associated exposure condition) demonstrated increased fitness with one microbe over the other, and three genotypes (from the human-associated exposure condition) demonstrated decreased fitness. Results from the mixed-effects treatment were highly variable among the genotypes, supporting the paradigm that these microbial-host relationships are influenced by microbe community and concentration in the natural environment. To further isolate important relationships and selection pressures between differing environments, these investigations can be repeated, additional microbes and genotypes can be tested, and eventually in situ transplant experiments can be conducted. Hopefully this research inspires further studies of non-model organisms or novel systems that can look at important scientific questions from new or different angles, yielding transformative insights into mechanisms driving local adaptation

Are You Ready for a Crisis? Communication and Continuity in the Aftermath

Institutions of higher education face numerous crises from natural disasters to mass shootings to sexual abuse scandals. Our interactive workshop will engage participants in planning, negotiating, and recovering from a variety of institutional crises. Participants will develop concrete plans for crisis preparation and recovery, including retrospective sensemaking

“everything in one place”

Purpose: To describe older adults’ perspectives on a new patient education manual for the recovery process after hip fracture. Materials and methods: The Fracture Recovery for Seniors at Home (FReSH) Start manual is an evidence- based manual for older adults with fall-related hip fracture. The manual aims to support the transition from hospital to home by facilitating self- management of the recovery process. We enrolled 31 community-dwelling older adults with previous fall-related hip fracture and one family member. We collected data using a telephone-based questionnaire with eight five-point Likert items and four semi-structured open-ended questions to explore participants’ perceptions on the structure, content, and illustration of the manual. The questionnaire also asked participants to rate the overall utility (out of 10 points) and length of the manual. We used content analysis to describe main themes from responses to the open-ended interview questions. Results: Participants’ ratings for structure, content, and illustrations ranged from 4 to 5 (agree to highly agree), and the median usefulness rating was 9 (10th percentile: 7, 90th percentile: 10). Main themes from the content analysis included: ease of use and presentation; health literacy; illustration utility; health care team delivery; general impression, information support from hospital to home; emotional and decision-making support; and the novelty of the manual. Conclusion: The FReSH Start manual was perceived as comprehensive in content and acceptable for use with older adults post-fall- related hip fracture. Participants expressed a need for delivery and explanation of the manual by a health care team member

Creep Forming of Carbon-Reinforced Ceramic-Matrix Composites

A set of lecture slides describes an investigation of creep forming as a means of imparting desired curvatures to initially flat stock plates of carbon-reinforced ceramic-matrix composite (C-CMC) materials. The investigation is apparently part of a continuing effort to develop improved means of applying small CCMC repair patches to reinforced carbon-carbon leading edges of aerospace vehicles (e.g., space shuttles) prior to re-entry into the atmosphere of the Earth. According to one of the slides, creep forming would be an intermediate step in a process that would yield a fully densified, finished C-CMC part having a desired size and shape (the other steps would include preliminary machining, finish machining, densification by chemical vapor infiltration, and final coating). The investigation included experiments in which C-CMC disks were creep-formed by heating them to unspecified high temperatures for time intervals of the order of 1 hour while they were clamped into single- and double-curvature graphite molds. The creep-formed disks were coated with an oxidation- protection material, then subjected to arc-jet tests, in which the disks exhibited no deterioration after exposure to high-temperature test conditions lasting 490 seconds

Polarimetric imaging for air accident investigation

We report a trial wherein a simple 4 CCD visible-band Polarimetric Imaging (PI) camera was fielded against aircraft debris distributed across an arid terrain, a littoral region and a small number of maritime debris targets A debris field realistically simulating an aircrash and a debris grid of aircraft remains were observed from an air platform flying in dry and sunny conditions. We report PI utility in support of air accident investigation by an enhanced ability to successfully locate small targets within the scene via the use of colour enhanced and decorrelated intensity PI products. Our results indicate that handheld PI capability may represent an effective low cost, upgrade and augmentation option for existing and future imaging systems that would support air accident investigators and assist in the cueing of more sophisticated assets and/or analyst attention