774 research outputs found
Adopting a blended approach to learning: experiences from radiography at Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh
The perspective of the radiography teaching team at Queen Margaret University (QMU) was that a transmission mode of programme delivery was sub-optimal in helping students to learn and make links between theory and practice. Programme redesign adopted a blended learning approach with both face-to-face and online learning aimed at enhancing the students’ control over their own learning. Online tasks within Web Classroom Tools (WebCT) were used as an integral part of careful programme design, which resulted in a programme enabling synthesis of the skills, knowledge and competencies acquired in the academic and clinical environments.
With the move towards a more learner-centred, blended educational experience for the students the lecturers’ role shifted to that of facilitator with WebCT providing the tutor with a more transparent view of student learning. Lecturers plan learning activities that build upon the skills students have developed through learning in groups, online and in class.
The explicit connections that now exist between the academic programme and the opportunities for applying knowledge in practice allow students to engage more deeply in their learning
Magnetic Order in YBaCuO Superconductors
Polarized and unpolarized neutron diffraction has been used to search for
magnetic order in YBaCuO superconductors. Most of the
measurements were made on a high quality crystal of YBaCuO. It
is shown that this crystal has highly ordered ortho-II chain order, and a sharp
superconducting transition. Inelastic scattering measurements display a very
clean spin-gap and pseudogap with any intensity at 10 meV being 50 times
smaller than the resonance intensity. The crystal shows a complicated magnetic
order that appears to have three components. A magnetic phase is found at high
temperatures that seems to stem from an impurity with a moment that is in the
- plane, but disordered on the crystal lattice. A second ordering occurs
near the pseudogap temperature that has a shorter correlation length than the
high temperature phase and a moment direction that is at least partly along the
c-axis of the crystal. Its moment direction, temperature dependence, and Bragg
intensities suggest that it may stem from orbital ordering of the -density
wave (DDW) type. An additional intensity increase occurs below the
superconducting transition. The magnetic intensity in these phases does not
change noticeably in a 7 Tesla magnetic field aligned approximately along the
c-axis. Searches for magnetic order in YBaCuO show no signal
while a small magnetic intensity is found in YBaCuO that is
consistent with c-axis directed magnetic order. The results are contrasted with
other recent neutron measurements.Comment: 11 pages with 10 figure
Effect of left ventricular hypertrophy on long-term survival of patients with coronary artery disease following percutaneous coronary intervention
The impact of left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) on survival among patients with established coronary artery disease (CAD) is not well understood. We sought to evaluate the effect of LVH on the survival of patients with CAD following percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Three hospitals in New York City contributed prospectively defined data on 4284 consecutive patients undergoing PCI. Allcause mortality at a mean follow-up of three years was the primary endpoint. LVH was present in 383 patients (8.9%). LVH patients had a greater prevalence of hypertension (88% vs. 68%, p<0.001), vascular disease (21% vs. 6.6%, p=0.001), and prior heart failure (10% vs. 5.5%, p<0.001). LVH patients presented less often with one-vessel disease (38% vs. 50%, p=0.040) and more often with two- (34% vs. 29%, p=0.014) or three-vessel (22% vs. 18%, p=0.044) disease. Ejection fractions and angiographic success were similar in both groups. In-hospital mortality did not differ between groups. At three-year follow-up, the survival rate for patients with LVH was 86% vs. 91% in patients without LVH (log-rank p=0.001). However, after adjustment for differences in baseline characteristics using Cox proportional hazards analysis, LVH was found not to be an independent predictor of mortality (hazard ratio, 0.93; 95% confidence interval, 0.68–1.28; p=0.67). We conclude that LVH at the time of PCI is not independently associated with an increase in the hazard of death at three years
Shrinking a large dataset to identify variables associated with increased risk of Plasmodium falciparum infection in Western Kenya
Large datasets are often not amenable to analysis using traditional single-step approaches. Here, our general objective was to apply imputation techniques, principal component analysis (PCA), elastic net and generalized linear models to a large dataset in a systematic approach to extract the most meaningful predictors for a health outcome. We extracted predictors for Plasmodium falciparum infection, from a large covariate dataset while facing limited numbers of observations, using data from the People, Animals, and their Zoonoses (PAZ) project to demonstrate these techniques: data collected from 415 homesteads in western Kenya, contained over 1500 variables that describe the health, environment, and social factors of the humans, livestock, and the homesteads in which they reside. The wide, sparse dataset was simplified to 42 predictors of P. falciparum malaria infection and wealth rankings were produced for all homesteads. The 42 predictors make biological sense and are supported by previous studies. This systematic data-mining approach we used would make many large datasets more manageable and informative for decision-making processes and health policy prioritization
Global Search for New Physics with 2.0/fb at CDF
Data collected in Run II of the Fermilab Tevatron are searched for
indications of new electroweak-scale physics. Rather than focusing on
particular new physics scenarios, CDF data are analyzed for discrepancies with
the standard model prediction. A model-independent approach (Vista) considers
gross features of the data, and is sensitive to new large cross-section
physics. Further sensitivity to new physics is provided by two additional
algorithms: a Bump Hunter searches invariant mass distributions for "bumps"
that could indicate resonant production of new particles; and the Sleuth
procedure scans for data excesses at large summed transverse momentum. This
combined global search for new physics in 2.0/fb of ppbar collisions at
sqrt(s)=1.96 TeV reveals no indication of physics beyond the standard model.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figures. Final version which appeared in Physical Review D
Rapid Communication
Observation of Orbitally Excited B_s Mesons
We report the first observation of two narrow resonances consistent with
states of orbitally excited (L=1) B_s mesons using 1 fb^{-1} of ppbar
collisions at sqrt{s} = 1.96 TeV collected with the CDF II detector at the
Fermilab Tevatron. We use two-body decays into K^- and B^+ mesons reconstructed
as B^+ \to J/\psi K^+, J/\psi \to \mu^+ \mu^- or B^+ \to \bar{D}^0 \pi^+,
\bar{D}^0 \to K^+ \pi^-. We deduce the masses of the two states to be m(B_{s1})
= 5829.4 +- 0.7 MeV/c^2 and m(B_{s2}^*) = 5839.7 +- 0.7 MeV/c^2.Comment: Version accepted and published by Phys. Rev. Let
Measurement of the Bottom-Strange Meson Mixing Phase in the Full CDF Data Set
We report a measurement of the bottom-strange meson mixing phase \beta_s
using the time evolution of B0_s -> J/\psi (->\mu+\mu-) \phi (-> K+ K-) decays
in which the quark-flavor content of the bottom-strange meson is identified at
production. This measurement uses the full data set of proton-antiproton
collisions at sqrt(s)= 1.96 TeV collected by the Collider Detector experiment
at the Fermilab Tevatron, corresponding to 9.6 fb-1 of integrated luminosity.
We report confidence regions in the two-dimensional space of \beta_s and the
B0_s decay-width difference \Delta\Gamma_s, and measure \beta_s in [-\pi/2,
-1.51] U [-0.06, 0.30] U [1.26, \pi/2] at the 68% confidence level, in
agreement with the standard model expectation. Assuming the standard model
value of \beta_s, we also determine \Delta\Gamma_s = 0.068 +- 0.026 (stat) +-
0.009 (syst) ps-1 and the mean B0_s lifetime, \tau_s = 1.528 +- 0.019 (stat) +-
0.009 (syst) ps, which are consistent and competitive with determinations by
other experiments.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures, Phys. Rev. Lett 109, 171802 (2012
Search for a W' boson decaying to a bottom quark and a top quark in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV
Results are presented from a search for a W' boson using a dataset
corresponding to 5.0 inverse femtobarns of integrated luminosity collected
during 2011 by the CMS experiment at the LHC in pp collisions at sqrt(s)=7 TeV.
The W' boson is modeled as a heavy W boson, but different scenarios for the
couplings to fermions are considered, involving both left-handed and
right-handed chiral projections of the fermions, as well as an arbitrary
mixture of the two. The search is performed in the decay channel W' to t b,
leading to a final state signature with a single lepton (e, mu), missing
transverse energy, and jets, at least one of which is tagged as a b-jet. A W'
boson that couples to fermions with the same coupling constant as the W, but to
the right-handed rather than left-handed chiral projections, is excluded for
masses below 1.85 TeV at the 95% confidence level. For the first time using LHC
data, constraints on the W' gauge coupling for a set of left- and right-handed
coupling combinations have been placed. These results represent a significant
improvement over previously published limits.Comment: Submitted to Physics Letters B. Replaced with version publishe
Search for the standard model Higgs boson decaying into two photons in pp collisions at sqrt(s)=7 TeV
A search for a Higgs boson decaying into two photons is described. The
analysis is performed using a dataset recorded by the CMS experiment at the LHC
from pp collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV, which corresponds to an
integrated luminosity of 4.8 inverse femtobarns. Limits are set on the cross
section of the standard model Higgs boson decaying to two photons. The expected
exclusion limit at 95% confidence level is between 1.4 and 2.4 times the
standard model cross section in the mass range between 110 and 150 GeV. The
analysis of the data excludes, at 95% confidence level, the standard model
Higgs boson decaying into two photons in the mass range 128 to 132 GeV. The
largest excess of events above the expected standard model background is
observed for a Higgs boson mass hypothesis of 124 GeV with a local significance
of 3.1 sigma. The global significance of observing an excess with a local
significance greater than 3.1 sigma anywhere in the search range 110-150 GeV is
estimated to be 1.8 sigma. More data are required to ascertain the origin of
this excess.Comment: Submitted to Physics Letters
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