Intracapsular pressure and interleukin-1β cytokine in hips with acetabular dysplasia

Background and purpose Several studies have demonstrated an increased intracapsular pressure in several hip disorders such as septic arthritis, synovitis, and trauma. We therefore measured the intracapsular pressure in different positions in early dysplasic hips and its relation to the concentration of interleukin-1β (IL-1β), the volume of joint fluid, and the clinical and radiographic findings before a periacetabular osteotomy

Confinement studies of neutral beam heated discharges in TFTR

The TFTR tokamak has reached its original machine design specifications (I/sub p/ = 2.5 MA and B/sub T/ = 5.2T). Recently, the D/sup 0/ neutral beam heating power has been increased to 6.3 MW. By operating at low plasma current (I/sub p/ approx. = 0.8 MA) and low density anti n/sub e/ approx. = 1 x 10/sup 19/m/sup -3/), high ion temperatures (9 +- keV) and rotation speeds (7 x 10/sup 5/ m/s) have been achieved during injection. At the opposite extreme, pellet injection into high current plasmas has been used to increase the line-average density to 8 x 10/sup 19/m/sup -3/ and the central density to 1.6 x 10/sup 20/m/sup -3// This wide range of operating conditions has enabled us to conduct scaling studies of the global energy confinement time in both ohmically and beam heated discharges as well as more detailed transport studies of the profile dependence. In ohmic discharges, the energy confinement time is observed to scale linearly with density only up to anti n/sub e/ approx. 4.5 x 10/sup 19/m/sup -3/ and then to increase more gradually, achieving a maximum value of approx. 0.45 s. In beam heated discharges, the energy confinement time is observed to decrease with beam power and to increase with plasma current. With P/sub b/ = 5.6 MW, anti n/sub e/ = 4.7 x 10/sup 19/m/sup -3/, I/sub p/ = 2.2 MA and B/sub T = 4.7T, the gross energy confinement time is 0.22 s and T/sub i/(0) = 4.8 keV. Despite shallow penetration of D/sup 0/ beams (at the beam energy less than or equal to 80 keV with low species yield), tau/sub E/(a) values are as large as those for H/sup 0/ injection, but central confinement times are substantially greater. This is a consequence of the insensitivity of the temperature and safety factor profile shapes to the heating profile. The radial variation of tau/sub E/ is even more pronounced with D/sup 0/ injection into high density pellet-injected plasmas. 25 refs

Development and Implementation of a Curricular-wide Electronic Portfolio System in a School of Pharmacy

The Feik School of Pharmacy collaborated with a commercial software development company to create a Web-based e-portfolio system to document student achievement of curricular outcomes and performance in pharmacy practice experiences. The multi-functional system also could be used for experiential site selection and assignment and continuing pharmacy education. The pharmacy school trained students, faculty members, and pharmacist preceptors to use the e-portfolio system. All pharmacy students uploaded the required number of documents and assessments to the program as evidence of achievement of each of the school's curricular outcomes and completion of pharmacy practice experiences

Experimental results from detached plasmas in TFTR

Detached plasmas are formed in TFTR which have the principal property of the boundary to the high temperature plasma core being defined by a radiating layer. This paper documents the properties of TFTR ohmic-detached plasmas with a range of plasma densities at two different plasma currents

Confinement studies in TFTR

The paper describes the present (end of February 1985) status of the plasma confinement studies in the TFTR tokamak with emphasis on those with neutral beam injection (NBI). Recent improvements in the device capabilities have substantially extended operating parameters: B/sub T/ increased to 4.0 T, I/sub p/ to 2.0 MA, injection power (P/sub b/) to 5 MW with H/sup 0/ or D/sup 0/ beams anti n/sub e/ to 5 x 10/sup 19/ m/sup -3/, and Z/sub eff/ reduced to 1.4. With ohmic heating (OH) alone, the previously established scaling for gross energy confinement time (tau/sub E/ = anti n/sub e/q) has been confirmed at higher I/sub p/ and B/sub T/, and the maximum tau/sub E/ of 0.4 sec has been achieved. With NBI at P/sub b/ substantially (by factor >2) higher than P/sub OH/, excellent power and particle accountability have been established. This suggests that the less-than-expected increase in stored energy with NBI is not due to problems of power delivery, but due to problems of confinement deterioration. tau/sub E/ is observed to scale approximately as I/sub p/ P/sub b//sup -0.5/ (independent of anti n/sub e/), consistent with previous L-mode scalings. With NBI we have achieved the maximum tau/sub E/ of 0.2 sec and the maximum T/sub i/(o) of 4.4 keV in the normal operating regime, and even higher T/sub i/(o) in the energetic-ion regime with low-n/sub e/ and low-I/sub p/ operation

Discharge control and evolution in TFTR

The TFTR tokamak is used to evaluate discharge evolution and control, when these are broken down into discharge, initiation, volt-second consumption, and current and density ramp-up and ramp-down. Control of the current ramp-up using a plasma growing technique will be described, and the advantages of this method compared to using constant major and minor radii will be discussed. The control of density using gas puffing, pellet injection, and neutral beam fueling will be presented, along with a discussion of the density range which is found to increase with plasma current. 23 refs., 11 figs., 2 tabs

Confinement studies of ohmically heated plasmas in TFTR

Systematic scans of density in large deuterium plasmas (a = 0.83 m) at several values of plasma current and toroidal magnetic field strength indicate that the total energy confinement time, tau/sub E/, is proportional to the line-average density anti n/sub e/ and the limiter q. Confinement times of approx. 0.3 s have been observed for anti n/sub e/ = 2.8 x 10/sup 19/ m/sup -3/. Plasma size scaling experiments with plasmas of minor radii a = 0.83, 0.69, 0.55, and 0.41 m at constant limiter q reveal a confinement dependence on minor radius. The major-radius dependence of tau/sub E/, based on a comparison between TFTR and PLT results, is consistent with R/sup 2/ scaling. From the power balance, the thermal diffusivity chi/sub e/ is found to be significantly less than the INTOR value. In the a = 0.41 m plasmas, saturation of confinement is due to neoclassical ion conduction (chi/sub i/ neoclassical >> chi/sub e/)