A new chiral electro-optic effect: Sum-frequency generation from optically active liquids in the presence of a dc electric field

We report the observation of sum-frequency signals that depend linearly on an applied electrostatic field and that change sign with the handedness of an optically active solution. This recently predicted chiral electro-optic effect exists in the electric-dipole approximation. The static electric field gives rise to an electric-field-induced sum-frequency signal (an achiral third-order process) that interferes with the chirality-specific sum-frequency at second-order. The cross-terms linear in the electrostatic field constitute the effect and may be used to determine the absolute sign of second- and third-order nonlinear optical susceptibilities in isotropic media.Comment: Submitted to Physical Revie

Moderating the Influence of Current Intention to Improve Suicide Risk Prediction

When assessors evaluate a person's risk of completing suicide, the person's expressed current intention is one of the most influential factors. However, if people say they have no intention, this may not be true for a number of reasons. This paper explores the reliability of negative intention in data provided by mental-health services using the GRiST decision support system in England. It identifies features within a risk assessment record that can classify a negative statement regarding current intention of suicide as being reliable or unreliable. The algorithm is tested on previously conducted assessments, where outcomes found in later assessments do or do not match the initially stated intention. Test results show significant separation between the two classes. It means suicide predictions could be made more accurate by modifying the assessment process and associated risk judgement in accordance with a better understanding of the person's true intention

Effects of moisture in infrared thermography of resin matrix composites

Several multiply graphite polyimide composite specimens were examined by real-time infrared thermography in order to study the effects of moisture on their thermograms. Heat was injected from one side and IR emission detected on the opposite side using AGA Thermovision System-680. No differences between the thermograms of dry and water containing specimens were detected for defect-free specimens. However, the presence of trapped water in defective specimens modified the thermographic contrast significantly. It is concluded that: (1) IR thermography can be used to detect moisture in defective composites, and (2) because of the possibility of moisture camouflaging defects, IR thermography for subsurface defect detection should be supplemented by other techniques - such as acoustical imaging and X-radiography

Using XML and XSLT for flexible elicitation of mental-health risk knowledge

Current tools for assessing risks associated with mental-health problems require assessors to make high-level judgements based on clinical experience. This paper describes how new technologies can enhance qualitative research methods to identify lower-level cues underlying these judgements, which can be collected by people without a specialist mental-health background. Methods and evolving results: Content analysis of interviews with 46 multidisciplinary mental-health experts exposed the cues and their interrelationships, which were represented by a mind map using software that stores maps as XML. All 46 mind maps were integrated into a single XML knowledge structure and analysed by a Lisp program to generate quantitative information about the numbers of experts associated with each part of it. The knowledge was refined by the experts, using software developed in Flash to record their collective views within the XML itself. These views specified how the XML should be transformed by XSLT, a technology for rendering XML, which resulted in a validated hierarchical knowledge structure associating patient cues with risks. Conclusions: Changing knowledge elicitation requirements were accommodated by flexible transformations of XML data using XSLT, which also facilitated generation of multiple data-gathering tools suiting different assessment circumstances and levels of mental-health knowledge

Darcy-Bénard-Bingham convection

The present paper is the first to consider Darcy–Bénard–Bingham convection. A Bingham fluid saturates a horizontal porous layer that is subjected to heating from below. It is shown that this simple extension to the classical Darcy–Bénard problem is linearly stable to small-amplitude disturbances but nevertheless admits strongly nonlinear convection. The Pascal model for a Bingham fluid occupying a porous medium is adopted, and this law is regularized in a frame-invariant manner to yield a set of two-dimensional governing equations that are then solved numerically using finite difference approximations. A weakly nonlinear theory of the regularized Pascal model is used to show that the onset of convection is via a fold bifurcation. Some parametric studies are performed to show that this non-linear onset of convection arises at increasing values of the Darcy–Rayleigh number as the Rees–Bingham number increases and that, for a fixed Rees–Bingham number, the wavenumber at which the rate of heat transfer is maximized increases with the Darcy–Rayleigh number

Lorentz-Lorenz Coefficient, Critical Point Constants, and Coexistence Curve of 1,1-Difluoroethylene

We report measurements of the Lorentz-Lorenz coefficient density dependence, the critical temperature, and the critical density, of the fluid 1,1-difluoroethylene. Lorentz-Lorenz coefficient data were obtained by measuring refractive index and density of the same fluid sample independently of one another. Accurate determination of the Lorentz-Lorenz coefficient is necessary for transformation of refractive index data into density data from optics-based experiments on critical phenomena of fluid systems done with different apparatus, with which independent measurement of the refractive indes and density is not possible. Measurements were made along the coexistence curve of the fluid and span the density range 0.01 to 0.80 g/cc. The Lorentz-Lorenz coefficient results show a stronger density dependence along the coexistence curve than previously observed in other fluids, with a monotonic decrease from a density of about 0.2 g/cc onwards, and an overall variation of about 2.5% in the density range studied. No anomaly in the Lorentz-Lorenz coefficient was observed near the critical density. The critical temperature is measured at Tc=(302.964+-0.002) K (29.814 C) and the measured critical density is (0.4195+-0.0018)g/cc.Comment: 14 pages, 6 figures, MikTeX 2.4, submitted to Physical Review

Problems and Prospects of Developing Countries in Forestry and Wood-Processing Industries. Report from an IIASA/UNIDO Workshop

This paper reports in a summary form on the discussions during a workshop organized by IIASA and UNIDO in January 1983. The workshop treated problems and prospects relating to developing countries in the sectors of forestry and wood-processing industries. The results of the workshop will be used in IIASA's project "Structural Change in the Forest Sector" and in UNIDO's work on its world-wide study on wood and wood processing industries. The invited participants came mainly from developing countries and from the two institutions mentioned. The issues raised during the meeting are summarized systematically in Figure 2. The main concern of the meeting related to the sustainability of the wood resources, over-exploitation and depletion and suitable counter-balancing measures, such as afforestation, reforestation, and more efficient use of available resources. Trade patterns were also discussed. A global trade model for forestry industry products was presented

Cues and knowledge structures used by mental-health professionals when making risk assessments

Background: Research into mental-health risks has tended to focus on epidemiological approaches and to consider pieces of evidence in isolation. Less is known about the particular factors and their patterns of occurrence that influence clinicians’ risk judgements in practice. Aims: To identify the cues used by clinicians to make risk judgements and to explore how these combine within clinicians’ psychological representations of suicide, self-harm, self-neglect, and harm to others. Method: Content analysis was applied to semi-structured interviews conducted with 46 practitioners from various mental-health disciplines, using mind maps to represent the hierarchical relationships of data and concepts. Results: Strong consensus between experts meant their knowledge could be integrated into a single hierarchical structure for each risk. This revealed contrasting emphases between data and concepts underpinning risks, including: reflection and forethought for suicide; motivation for self-harm; situation and context for harm to others; and current presentation for self-neglect. Conclusions: Analysis of experts’ risk-assessment knowledge identified influential cues and their relationships to risks. It can inform development of valid risk-screening decision support systems that combine actuarial evidence with clinical expertise

Baddies in the classroom: media education and narrative writing

When teachers allow pupils to write stories that include elements of popular media, we must ask what to do with media once it has entered the classroom. This article relates findings from a classroom study which focuses on children’s media-based story writing. The study looks at children as producers of new media texts and describes their activities as a form of ‘media education’. The research shows that through their production of media-based stories, children are reflecting on their consumption of media. Furthermore, children’s media-based stories make explicit some of their implicit knowledge of new media forms. Finally, children’s stories provide ample opportunities for teachers to engage in important discussions about media within the framework of existing writing programmes