Concepts and embodiment design of a reentry recumbent seating system for the NASA Space Shuttle

This report deals with the generation of a recumbent seating system which will be used by NASA to shuttle astronauts from the Russian space station Mir. We begin by examining the necessity for designing a special couch for the returning astronauts. Next, we discuss the operating conditions and constraints of the recumbent seating system and provide a detailed function structure. After working through the conceptual design process, we came up with ten alternative designs which are presented in the appendices. These designs were evaluated and weighted to systematically determine the best choice for embodiment design. A detailed discussion of all components of the selected system follows with design calculations for the seat presented in the appendices. The report concludes with an evaluation of the resulting design and recommendations for further development

Special Issue - Contemporary Youth: Precarity, Resistance and (Re)Imagined Futures

First paragraph: In recent years, the association between youth and precarity has become increasingly strengthened. Most commonly, youth precarity has been linked to the labour market (Shildrick et al., 2010; Crisp and Powell, 2017; Formby, 2017) and the housing market (McKee et al., 2020) although other social strata such as precarity of place (Banki, 2013) and precarious leisure (Batchelor et al., 2020) have also received attention. Deindustrialisation, forceful neoliberal politics, the global financial crisis (GFC) of 2008, austerity measures and, most likely now, the social and economic costs of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic have accelerated academic attention on young people with concern over how they are faring amid a complex web of unpredictable and insecure social structures and what consequences these will have for their futures

Defining Natural History: Assessment of the Ability of College Students to Aid in Characterizing Clinical Progression of Niemann-Pick Disease, Type C

Niemann-Pick Disease, type C (NPC) is a fatal, neurodegenerative, lysosomal storage disorder. It is a rare disease with broad phenotypic spectrum and variable age of onset. These issues make it difficult to develop a universally accepted clinical outcome measure to assess urgently needed therapies. To this end, clinical investigators have defined emerging, disease severity scales. The average time from initial symptom to diagnosis is approximately 4 years. Further, some patients may not travel to specialized clinical centers even after diagnosis. We were therefore interested in investigating whether appropriately trained, community-based assessment of patient records could assist in defining disease progression using clinical severity scores. In this study we evolved a secure, step wise process to show that pre-existing medical records may be correctly assessed by non-clinical practitioners trained to quantify disease progression. Sixty-four undergraduate students at the University of Notre Dame were expertly trained in clinical disease assessment and recognition of major and minor symptoms of NPC. Seven clinical records, randomly selected from a total of thirty seven used to establish a leading clinical severity scale, were correctly assessed to show expected characteristics of linear disease progression. Student assessment of two new records donated by NPC families to our study also revealed linear progression of disease, but both showed accelerated disease progression, relative to the current severity scale, especially at the later stages. Together, these data suggest that college students may be trained in assessment of patient records, and thus provide insight into the natural history of a disease

Understanding how Community Protection Notices are used to manage anti-social behaviour attributed to people experiencing street homelessness

Community Protection Notices (CPNs) were introduced in England and Wales by the Anti-Social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act (2014) to tackle anti-social behaviour (ASB) which ‘spoils the community’s quality of life’. The notices can prevent and/or require specific actions by the recipient where the behaviour in question has a ‘detrimental impact on the quality of life of those in the locality’. Breach of the notice incurs a £100 fine through a Fixed Penalty Notice or a possible criminal conviction. CPNs are issued by individual officers without the need to go to court and a low evidential threshold is employed. Almost any behaviour can be sanctioned by a CPN and they are being used to challenge ASB attributed to people experiencing street homelessness by prohibiting behaviours such as begging, the creation of sleeping structures, and street drinking. This article draws on empirical evidence generated through a qualitative study conducted across four case study areas in England between 2019 and 2021. We use Lipsky’s (2010) work on street-level bureaucracy and Tyler’s (2006) theory of distributive fairness as lenses to explore how frontline practitioners use CPNs within a homelessness context. The findings demonstrate divergent uses of the notices, specifically in relation to the CPN issuing process, the incremental intervention approach, and enforcement for breach. This provides a unique insight into how ASB policy is being used to manage a vulnerable population and we offer three research-informed recommendations for policy and practice