Paper Session I-A - Risks and Trade-Offs for Unproven Launch Vehicles

AMSAT, The Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation, has launched over 30 amateur radio satellites. Most have flown as piggyback payloads where excess payload capacity was not required. Many have flown as test payloads for new launch vehicles on their test flights. The Phase 3-D satellite is scheduled for launch in the second half of 1997 as the primary payload for the Ariane 502 launch vehicle. This paper will discuss the risks and tradeoffs associated with flying on an unproven launch vehicle, insurance issues, and past successes and failures for those 30 satellites

Paper Session II-D - International Cooperation by Amateur Satellites

AMSAT, The Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation, has launched over 30 amateur radio satellites. Most have been cooperative International projects. The first satellites from Argentina, Portugal, Korea, and other countries were amateur satellites, manufactured in cooperation with AMSAT chapters around the world. The Phase 3-D international satellite is a cooperative deal with 14 countries participating. This paper will discuss how the groups around the world decided to cooperate with each other, and lessons learned from the various projects. Examples of how international satellites have been used for education will also be included

Your GAS experiment and the media or why does that other can get all of the publicity?

NASA has flown almost 100 Get Away Special (GAS) cans. Only a few of them are remembered by the general public, including the 'snowflakes in space' from STS-6, 'ants in space' from STS-7, and CanDO from STS-57. Why do some GAS cans get all of the publicity, while others are barely mentioned in press conferences, press kits, and on NASA Select during the mission? How can you make sure your GAS can gets as much attention as the others on your flight? And why is it important for you to make sure the public finds out about your activities? Writer Philip Chien has covered the space program since 1983, and is a regular participant in GAS press conferences. This paper will use STS-57 as a case study showing why some GAS cans got more publicity than others. The paper will offer advice for upcoming GAS payloads and how to prepare your press kits and other handouts

Paper Session III-C - A SAREX Case Study- Getting Teachers Interested in Amateur Radio and Space Education

SAREX, the Shuttle Amateur Radio Experiment, is flown primarily as part of NASA\u27s education program. Any school or educational group can submit a proposal for a prescheduled SAREX contact. It\u27s hoped that schools will get interested in the space program and amateur radio, and make these activities part of the normal curriculum. Sometimes a SAREX contact is incredibly exciting, but forgotten soon after the shuttle mission is over. But in many cases SAREX does leave a lasting impression on the students and teachers. Co-author Joan Freeman is a teacher at South Seminole Middle School in Casselberry Florida. Three years ago she watched television and read the newspaper to find out about the space program. Now she uSes amateur radio every day in her class and completed a SAREX educational contact with the shuttle during the STS-65 mission. This paper will show what has been done, and suggestions for how to increase awareness about ham radio, SAREX, and the shuttle program in schools

Paper Session III-C - AMSAT\u27s Phase 3-D Satellite New opportunities for Space Education

Teachers and amateur radio operators have been using satellites for education since the first OSCAR launch in 196L The recent high power OSCAR satellites are in use every day in classrooms around the world by teachers with amateur radio licenses. Central Florida hams are assembling Phase 3-D, the next generation amateur radio satellite. Phase 3-D will offer many new opportunities for education due to an earth-viewing camera experiment, and higher power which will permit schools to use the satellite with much less hardware. Locally the Phase 3-D integration team is looking for educational groups to participate in the assembly and testing of the spacecraft. We are hoping to offer students from the middle-school to university level hands-on experience with spacecraft manufacturing and testing

Modeling the Balance between Standardization and Innovation in a Flight School

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between standardization and innovation in a university flight training program. Quantitative and qualitative data were generated for this investigation by a human subjects study involving senior students in a collegiate pro-pilot program. The survey provided the following lack of innovation indicators: (a) failure to achieve program goals; (b) loss of flight training students to competitor flight schools; and (c) substandard flight training efficiency. A model describing the balance between standardization and innovation is proposed: (a) too much standardization mires a flight school in stagnation; (b) too little standardization results in a lack of professionalism; (c) too much innovation creates a chaotic training program; (d) too little innovation produces unmotivated students; and (e) too many resistors to change at the management level results in stagnation and a lack of innovation. Flight schools that can achieve a good balance between standardization and innovation would enjoy two main benefits: (a) positive and imaginative learning atmosphere that encourages instructors to train their students above and beyond the minimum standards without sacrificing safety; and (b) exciting and creative training environment that motivates students to achieve their goals without sacrificing professionalism

Planning of collision-free paths for a reconfigurable dual manipulator equipped mobile robot

Includes bibliographical references (pages 241-242).In this paper, we study the problem of finding a collision-free path for a mobile robot which possesses manipulators. The task of the robot is to carry a polygonal object from a starting point to a destination point in a possibly culttered environment. In most of the existing research on robot path planning, a mobile robot is approximated by a fixed shape, i.e., a circle or a polygon. In our task planner, the robot is allowed to change configurations for avoiding collision. This path planner operates using two algorithms: the collision-free feasible configuration finding algorithm and the collision-free path finding algorithm. The collision-free feasible configuration finding algorithm finds all collision-free feasible configurations for the robot when the position of the carried object is given. The collision-free path finding algorithm generates some candidate paths first and then uses a graph search method to find a collision-free path from all the collision-free feasible configurations along the candidate paths. The proposed algorithms can deal with a cluttered environment and is guaranteed to find a solution if one exists

Library Assessment and Data Analytics in the Big Data Era: Practice and Policies

Emerging technologies have offered libraries and librarians new ways and methods to collect and analyze data in the era of accountability to justify their value and contributions. For example, Gallagher, Bauer and Dollar (2005) analyzed the paper and online journal usage from all possible data sources and discovered that users at the Yale Medical Library preferred the electronic format of articles to the print version. After this discovery, they were able to take necessary steps to adjust their journal subscriptions. Many library professionals advocate such data-driven library management to strengthen and specify library budget proposals

Translation and Validation of the Chinese ICD-11 International Trauma Questionnaire (ITQ) for the Assessment of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Complex PTSD (CPTSD)

Background: Two stress-related disorders have been proposed for inclusion in the revised ICD-11: Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Complex PTSD (CPTSD). The International Trauma Questionnaire (ITQ) is a bespoke measure of PTSD and CPTSD and has been widely used in English-speaking countries. Objective: The primary aim of this study was to develop a Chinese version of the ITQ and assess its content, construct, and concurrent validity. Methods: Six mental health practitioners and experts rated the Chinese translated and back-translated items to assess content validity. A sample of 423 Chinese young adults completed the ITQ, the WHO Adverse Childhood Experiences International Questionnaire, and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale. Among them, 31 participants also completed the English and Chinese versions of the ITQ administered in random order at retest. Four alternative confirmatory factor analysis models were tested using data from participants who reported at least one adverse childhood experience (ACE; N = 314). Results: The Chinese ITQ received excellent ratings on relevance and appropriateness. Test–retest reliability and semantic equivalence across English and Chinese versions were acceptable. The correlated first-order six-factor model and a second-order two-factor (PTSD and DSO) both provided an acceptable model fit. The six ITQ symptoms clusters were all significantly correlated with anxiety, depression, and the number of ACEs. Conclusions: The Chinese ITQ generates scores with acceptable psychometric properties and provides evidence for including PTSD and CPTSD as separate diagnoses in ICD-11

Life-history constraints, short adult life span and reproductive strategies in coral reef gobies of the genus Trimma

Body size influences many life-history traits, with small-bodied animals tending to have short life spans, high mortality and greater reproductive effort early in life. In this study, the authors investigated the life-history traits and reproductive strategies of three small-bodied coral reef gobies of the genus Trimma: Trimma benjamini, Trimma capostriatum and Trimma yanoi. The authors found all Trimma species studied attained a small body size of <25 mm, had a short life span of <140 days and experienced high estimated daily mortality of 3.0%–6.7%. Furthermore, the pelagic larval phase accounted for 25.3%–28.5% of the maximum life span, and maturation occurred between 74.1 and 82.1 days at 15.2–15.8 mm, leaving only 35%–43% of the total life span as a reproductively viable adult. All mature individuals had gonad structures consistent with bidirectional sex change, with bisexual gonads including both ovarian and testicular portions separated by a thin wall of connective tissue. In the female and male phases, only ovaries or testes were mature, whereas gonadal tissue of the non-active sex remained. One T. benjamini individual and one T. yanoi individual had ovarian and testicular tissue active simultaneously. The results of this study highlight the life-history challenges small CRFs face on their path to reproduction and reproductive strategies that could be beneficial in fishes with high and unpredictable mortality and short reproductive life spans