1,948 research outputs found
The Effect of Project-Based Poetry Writing Intervention on Writing Attitudes among Students with Severe Learning Disabilities
Writing attitudes of three learners with severe disabilities were surveyed in a substantially separate special education classroom within a public school in Massachusetts in order to determine the effect on learners’ writing attitudes after a project-based creative writing intervention in poetry. Writing skills were measured using teacher-created rubrics and attitudes were measured using pre and post survey data. Primary diagnoses of students involved included Intellectual Impairment, Autism, and Traumatic Brain Injury. Findings indicated that the intervention was most successful for the student with autism, moderately successful for the student with Traumatic Brain Injury, and not successful for the student with Intellectual Impairment. Findings are consistent with previous findings that text production plays a major role in writing attitude
Islanding, growth mode and ordering in Si heteroepitaxy on Ge(001) substrates structured by thermal annealing
Si/Ge heteroepitaxial dots under tensile strain are grown on nanostructured
Ge substrates produced by high-temperature flash heating exploiting the
spontaneous faceting of the Ge(001) surface close to the onset of surface
melting. A very diverse growth mode is obtained depending on the specific
atomic structure and step density of nearby surface domains with different
vicinal crystallographic orientations. On highly-miscut areas of the Ge(001)
substrate, the critical thickness for islanding is lowered to about 5 ML, in
contrast to the 11 ML reported for the flat Ge(001) surface, while on
unreconstructed (1x1) domains the growth is Volmer-Weber driven. An explanation
is proposed considering the diverse relative contributions of step and surface
energies on misoriented substrates. In addition, we show that the bottom-up
pattern of the substrate naturally formed by thermal annealing determines a
spatial correlation for the dot sites
Study on the presence and perception of coypu (Myocastor coypus Molina, 1782) in three areas of Lazio region (Italy)
Adriani, S., Bonanni, M., Amici, A
Is the Italian strategy to face the problem of stray dogs sustainable? A case study of two small municipalities in central Italy
Adriani, S., Bonanni, M., Amici, A
Statistical correlation between enterovirus genome copy numbers and infectious viral particles in wastewater samples
Aims: Classic virological tests are time consuming and labour-intensive; realtime
RT-PCR has proven to be a fast method to detect and quantify enterovirus
genomes in clinical and environmental samples. This method is unable to
discriminate between infective and noninfective enterovirus particles; few clinical
studies have compared real-time RT-PCR and viral culture. We wondered if
the enterovirus genome quantification could be correlated to the infectivity.
Methods and Results: We used the statistical approach to verify our hypotheses
to correlate data, obtained by the standard method (most probable number of
cytopathic units—MPNCU) and molecular test (real-time RT-PCR), on wastewater
treatment plant samples. Chi-squared test was used, considering several
cut-off values (‘50’-‘100’-‘200’ genome copy numbers), to determine statistical
significance in comparison of the two methods. Chi-square value was not significant
when cut-off of 50 (P = 0Æ103) and 100 (P = 0Æ178) was assumed but
was significant with cut-off of 200 (P = 0Æ044).
Conclusion: This limit, 200 genome copy, could be used as cut-off value to
indicate enterovirus survival in environmental monitoring.
Significant and Impact of the Study: To introduce a fast procedure that is able
to compensate for disadvantages of cell culture method for viral environmental
analyses
Morphology and stability of Au nanoclusters in HOPG nanopits of well-defined depth
Gold nanoparticles with a diameter comprised between 4 and 6 nm are stabilized in nanosized pits of well defined depth in highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG). These pits are produced by creation of artificial defects, followed by etching under a controlled oxygen atmosphere. At low Au coverage, clusters are found on the edges of the hexagonal pits maximizing the contact to dangling bonds on graphite multisteps. Larger coverage results in Au beads of surprisingly well defined shape and with a constant bead density per unit length. Most remarkable is the stability of these nanostructures under ambient conditions. Temperatures as high as 650K do not alter the morphology of the gold clusters. Higher temperatures do not lead to a change of the cluster morphology but to catalytically driven etching of the HOPG substrat
Spinodal nanodecomposition in magnetically doped semiconductors
This review presents the recent progress in computational materials design,
experimental realization, and control methods of spinodal nanodecomposition
under three- and two-dimensional crystal-growth conditions in spintronic
materials, such as magnetically doped semiconductors. The computational
description of nanodecomposition, performed by combining first-principles
calculations with kinetic Monte Carlo simulations, is discussed together with
extensive electron microscopy, synchrotron radiation, scanning probe, and ion
beam methods that have been employed to visualize binodal and spinodal
nanodecomposition (chemical phase separation) as well as nanoprecipitation
(crystallographic phase separation) in a range of semiconductor compounds with
a concentration of transition metal (TM) impurities beyond the solubility
limit. The role of growth conditions, co-doping by shallow impurities, kinetic
barriers, and surface reactions in controlling the aggregation of magnetic
cations is highlighted. According to theoretical simulations and experimental
results the TM-rich regions appear either in the form of nanodots (the {\em
dairiseki} phase) or nanocolumns (the {\em konbu} phase) buried in the host
semiconductor. Particular attention is paid to Mn-doped group III arsenides and
antimonides, TM-doped group III nitrides, Mn- and Fe-doped Ge, and Cr-doped
group II chalcogenides, in which ferromagnetic features persisting up to above
room temperature correlate with the presence of nanodecomposition and account
for the application-relevant magneto-optical and magnetotransport properties of
these compounds. Finally, it is pointed out that spinodal nanodecomposition can
be viewed as a new class of bottom-up approach to nanofabrication.Comment: 72 pages, 79 figure
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