Fluid Interfaces of Triangular Containers in Reduced Gravity Environments

Capillary dominated fluid dynamics will be examined in a reduced-gravity environment onboard the KC-135; in particular, the behavior of the lower portion of the meniscus in triangular tank geometries. Seven clear acrylic tanks were constructed to view seven angles of the four geometries. Silicon oil with two different viscosities, 2cs and 5cs silicon oil, were used on different days of the flight. Six tanks and one control tank are filled with a certain viscosity fluid for each flight day. During each parabola, three tanks are tested at time. The experimental tanks are exchanged between parabola sets on the KC-135. The 60deg -60deg -60deg control tank is viewed throughout the flight. To gather data, two digital video cameras and one digital still camera are placed perpendicular the viewing surface. To provide a greater contrast in the meniscus, an EL backlighting sheet was used to backlight the tanks. These images and video are then digitized, passed through NASA's mini-tracker software, and compared to a theory published my M. M. Weislogel, "Fluid Interface Phenomena in a Low-Gravity Environment: Recent Results from Drop Tower Experimentation." By focusing on a lower portion of the meniscus and using longer periods of reduced gravity, this experiment may confirm that a stationary point exists on the fluid surface. This information will enable better designing of propellant management devices, especially satellite propellant refilling and gas venting. Also, biological and material processing systems in reduced gravity environments will benefit from this data

An examination of the political and religious conflicts involved in the provision of elementary education in Enfield between 1870 and 1903

The immediacy and importance of local as opposed to national politics in the nineteenth century has been well charted by historians. W.E.Forster's Education Act of 1870 created a new local political context by allowing for the creation of ad hoc bodies, the School Boards, to fill up the gaps in elementary school provision. Nineteenth-century Enfield was a community undergoing fundamental social and economic changes. Urgent solutions were needed to the urgent problems of religious rivalry, education, housing, the administration of the Poor Law and public health. The processes of urbanisation profoundly disturbed the existing hierarchies of society and new and powerful commercial, professional and bureaucratic elites were formed. Such a process led to conflict, not least in the matter of elementary school provision. Yet Enfield, with rapidly expanding population, with many advocates for secular education and surrounded by parishes with School Boards, did not have a School Board until 1894. This thesis is an examination of the many dimensions of conflict which surrounded elementary school provision in Enfield in the period under review. It is necessary to assess whether the Church schools were offering adequate school accommodation or whether there was a hidden deficiency. The conflicts over school provision ultimately led to the establishment of a School Board. The first School Board Election fully revealed, for the first time, the complex nature of conflict in the community. Religious and party lines were crossed on the issue of elementary education. The personal bitterness manifested in the Election continued on the School Board throughout the years of its existence, 1894-1903. Although the School Board still had a deficiency of school accommodation at its demise, the Board had built four fine school buildings and offered to working-class children a higher standard of excellence in both equipment and teachers

Capillary Pressure of a Liquid Between Uniform Spheres Arranged in a Square-Packed Layer

The capillary pressure in the pores defined by equidimensional close-packed spheres is analyzed numerically. In the absence of gravity the menisci shapes are constructed using Surface Evolver code. This permits calculation the free surface mean curvature and hence the capillary pressure. The dependences of capillary pressure on the liquid volume constructed here for a set of contact angles allow one to determine the evolution of basic capillary characteristics under quasi-static infiltration and drainage. The maximum pressure difference between liquid and gas required for a meniscus passing through a pore is calculated and compared with that for hexagonal packing and with approximate solution given by Mason and Morrow [l]. The lower and upper critical liquid volumes that determine the stability limits for the equilibrium capillary liquid in contact with square packed array of spheres are tabulated for a set of contact angles

Increasing Readiness to Change Among Smokers in a Primary Care Setting

This study compared the effectiveness of two brief interventions, direct advice and motivational interviewing, for increasing motivation to quit among male smokers in the pre-contemplation and contemplation stages of change who were primary care patients at an Eastern urban VA medical center. Contrary to expectations, participants receiving motivational interviews did not increase more in readiness to change, motivation, and actions to quit, than those receiving direct advice or a control conversation, nor did they smoke fewer cigarettes per day. As expected, contemplators reported more cutting down and quit attempts than pre-contemplators. Factors that may have limited the effectiveness of interventions are discussed

Investigation of chiral silicon compounds for the determination of enantiomeric purity

Over the past two decades, chiral synthesis and separation have grown in importance, particularly in pharmaceuticals, where gross differences in pharmacological behaviour can occur between the enantiomers of a compound. The most tragic example is that of the racemic sedative, thalidomide. Widely used by pregnant women in the 1960's, it was the cause of deformity in many of their children. Under certain circumstances, only the S-(-)-enantiomer produces the teratogenic effect. The search for specific information on the effects of different enantiomers and increasing attempts to prepare enantiomerically enriched compounds has led to a large demand for enantioselective analytical methods. The two most widely employed techniques are NMR spectroscopy and chromatography. My research at the Open University focused on reagents based on silicon which could be used for derivatisation with the facility of the ubiquitous trimethylsilyl (TMS) reagents. I have investigated chiral chiorosilanes, in racemic form, to derivatise nucleophilic analytes. Because of the symmetry properties of some of the chiral silicon reagents prepared, the stereochemistry of the products is not dependent on the mechanism of reaction between an analyte and the reagent. The reagents were assessed by derivatising three chiral alcohols, which were used as model analytes: (1R, 2S, 5R)-menthol, 2-octanol and 1-phenylethanol. Chloromethylphenylsilane produced derivatives that were well resolved by GC, but was considered a poor choice of reagent on the grounds of its instability to racemisation and the instability of the diastereoisomeric products. 1 -Phenylethylchlorodimethylsilane gave derivatives that were well distinguished by NMR, while only partial separation by HPLC was obtained from the 2-octanol and 1-phenylethanol derivatives. No GC separations were achieved from this reagent. Two reagents possessing pseudo-C 2 symmetry, bis(1-phenylethyl)chloromethylsilane and 1 -chloro-1-methyl-2,5-diphenylsilacyclopentane were also unsuccessful in GC analysis, but the latter provided some promise for NMR analysis, with the derivatives of menthol being particularly well resolved