Energy transfer in planetary atmospheres - Optical spectroscopic studies Final technical report, 1 Dec. 1970 - 30 Mar. 1971

Laboratory measurement of cross sections for production of electronically excited species observed in atmospheres of planet

Church, State and the Lemon Test: The Shortcomings of the Supreme Court When Deciding Establishment Clause Cases

This paper argues that the Lemon test is a clear and pragmatic method for ensuring that Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court remain objective when interpreting the Constitution’s Establishment Clause. Critics of the Lemon test have mistakenly suggested that it provides an overly broad interpretation of the Establishment Clause that surpasses its original intent. Analysis of the Supreme Court’s decisions in Lemon v. Kurtzman (1971), Marsh v. Chambers (1983) and Lee v. Weisman (1992) will reveal that blame for the test’s supposed flaws rests on the Justices themselves. Analysis of relevant studies will shed light on the Justices as human decision makers and reinforce the strength of the Lemon test. The test is an important tool to prevent Justices from relying on subjective reasoning and shield their decisions from their limitations as human decisions makers when interpreting the Establishment Clause

Geostrophy and direct measurements in the Straits of Florida

Quantitative agreement between geostrophic computations and direct measurements of current and transport in the Straits of Florida, and elsewhere as well, is found only when observations are made under synoptic conditions. Under other conditions, geostrophic computations often show a multiaxial structure (i.e., bands of current) not found with direct measurements; this apparent multiaxial structure could be caused largely by periodic disturbances related to the tides...

Non-Linearity Analysis of Depth and Angular Indexes for Optimal Stereo SLAM

In this article, we present a real-time 6DoF egomotion estimation system for indoor environments using a wide-angle stereo camera as the only sensor. The stereo camera is carried in hand by a person walking at normal walking speeds 3–5 km/h. We present the basis for a vision-based system that would assist the navigation of the visually impaired by either providing information about their current position and orientation or guiding them to their destination through different sensing modalities. Our sensor combines two different types of feature parametrization: inverse depth and 3D in order to provide orientation and depth information at the same time. Natural landmarks are extracted from the image and are stored as 3D or inverse depth points, depending on a depth threshold. This depth threshold is used for switching between both parametrizations and it is computed by means of a non-linearity analysis of the stereo sensor. Main steps of our system approach are presented as well as an analysis about the optimal way to calculate the depth threshold. At the moment each landmark is initialized, the normal of the patch surface is computed using the information of the stereo pair. In order to improve long-term tracking, a patch warping is done considering the normal vector information. Some experimental results under indoor environments and conclusions are presented