Design, fabricaton, and testing of a compact quasi-isothermal PROX reactor using micro heat exchangers

A two stage PROX reactor with micro heat exchangers was designed, built, and tested to demonstrate the ability to control the temperature in the reactor and improve PROX performance in terms of CO conversion and selectivity. The gas stream was composed of 40% H2, 1% CO, 9% CO2, 0.5% O2, and 49.5% Ar. Metal foams were used to support a 5 wt% Pt/0.5 wt% Fe/γ-Al2O3 catalyst. Two sections of foam catalyst were used with heat exchangers positioned before and after each section. The resulting axial temperature profile of the gas stream showed an expected temperature rise in the catalyst beds and a sudden drop in the heat exchangers. The heat exchangers were successful in reducing the gas temperature to within 4 °C of the coolant fluid at gas stream linear velocities of 60 cm/sec over a 3 mm axial distance when the upstream gas temperature was over 250 °C greater than that of the coolant. Results consistently showed an improvement in CO selectivity due to the efficient removal of heat

Mapping Sex Offender Addresses: The Utility of the Alaska Sex Offender Registry as a Research Data Base

The registration of sex offenders was part of a national effort to enhance public safety by permitting law enforcement officials to track the location of convicted sex offenders after their release. All fifty states have enacted legislation requiring persons convicted of various sex-related offenses to register with law enforcement agencies; many states also grant public access to all or a portion of their registries. This document reports on the Alaska Statistical Analysis Center's efforts to improve data accuracy in the Alaska Sex Offender Registry, maintained by the Alaska State Troopers, and to assess the registry's utility as a research tool.Bureau of Justice Statistics, Grant No. 1999-RU-RX-K006Background of the Project / Research Methodology / Results / Utility: Spatial Justice Research / APPENDICES / A. Alaska’s Sex Offender Registration Law / B. Establishment of a Central Registry of Sex Offenders in Alaska / C. Definitions of Offenses for which Convicted Persons Must Register as Sex Offenders in Alask

Charges for commercially applied pesticides

Published January 1958. Facts and recommendations in this publication may no longer be valid. Please look for up-to-date information in the OSU Extension Catalog: http://extension.oregonstate.edu/catalo

Development and psychometric properties of the client's assessment of treatment scale for supported accommodation (CAT-SA)

This paper presents independent research funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) under its Programme Grants for Applied Research scheme (RP-PG-0610-10097)

Adaptation of the Quality Indicator for Rehabilitative Care (QuIRC) for use in mental health supported accommodation services (QuIRC-SA).

BACKGROUND: No standardised tools for assessing the quality of specialist mental health supported accommodation services exist. To address this, we adapted the Quality Indicator for Rehabilitative care-QuIRC-that was originally developed to assess the quality of longer term inpatient and community based mental health facilities. The QuIRC, which is completed by the service manager and gives ratings of seven domains of care, has good psychometric properties. METHODS: Focus groups with staff of the three main types of supported accommodation in the UK (residential care, supported housing and floating outreach services) were carried out to identify potential amendments to the QuIRC. Additional advice was gained from consultation with three expert panels, two of which comprised service users with lived experience of mental health and supported accommodation services. The amended QuIRC (QuIRC-SA) was piloted with a manager of each of the three service types. Item response variance, inter-rater reliability and internal consistency were assessed in a random sample of 52 services. Factorial structure and discriminant validity were assessed in a larger random sample of 87 services. RESULTS: The QuIRC-SA comprised 143 items of which only 18 items showed a narrow range of response and five items had poor inter-rater reliability. The tool showed good discriminant validity, with supported housing services generally scoring higher than the other two types of supported accommodation on most domains. Exploratory factor analysis showed that the QuIRC-SA items loaded onto the domains to which they had been allocated. CONCLUSIONS: The QuIRC-SA is the first standardised tool for quality assessment of specialist mental health supported accommodation services. Its psychometric properties mean that it has potential for use in research as well as audit and quality improvement programmes. A web based application is being developed to make it more accessible which will produce a printable report for the service manager about the performance of their service, comparison data for similar services and suggestions on how to improve service quality

Adult Human Brain Neural Progenitor Cells (NPCs) and Fibroblast-Like Cells Have Similar Properties In Vitro but Only NPCs Differentiate into Neurons

The ability to culture neural progenitor cells from the adult human brain has provided an exciting opportunity to develop and test potential therapies on adult human brain cells. To achieve a reliable and reproducible adult human neural progenitor cell (AhNPC) culture system for this purpose, this study fully characterized the cellular composition of the AhNPC cultures, as well as the possible changes to this in vitro system over prolonged culture periods. We isolated cells from the neurogenic subventricular zone/hippocampus (SVZ/HP) of the adult human brain and found a heterogeneous culture population comprised of several types of post-mitotic brain cells (neurons, astrocytes, and microglia), and more importantly, two distinct mitotic cell populations; the AhNPCs, and the fibroblast-like cells (FbCs). These two populations can easily be mistaken for a single population of AhNPCs, as they both proliferate under AhNPC culture conditions, form spheres and express neural progenitor cell and early neuronal markers, all of which are characteristics of AhNPCs in vitro. However, despite these similarities under proliferating conditions, under neuronal differentiation conditions, only the AhNPCs differentiated into functional neurons and glia. Furthermore, AhNPCs showed limited proliferative capacity that resulted in their depletion from culture by 5–6 passages, while the FbCs, which appear to be from a neurovascular origin, displayed a greater proliferative capacity and dominated the long-term cultures. This gradual change in cellular composition resulted in a progressive decline in neurogenic potential without the apparent loss of self-renewal in our cultures. These results demonstrate that while AhNPCs and FbCs behave similarly under proliferative conditions, they are two different cell populations. This information is vital for the interpretation and reproducibility of AhNPC experiments and suggests an ideal time frame for conducting AhNPC-based experiments

Denser brain capillary network with preserved pericytes in Alzheimer's disease

Pericytes are vascular mural cells that surround capillaries of the central nervous system (CNS). They are crucial for brain development and contribute to CNS homeostasis by regulating blood-brain barrier function and cerebral blood flow. It has been suggested that pericytes are lost in Alzheimer's disease (AD), implicating this cell type in disease pathology. Here, we have employed state-of-the-art stereological morphometry techniques as well as tissue clearing and two-photon imaging to assess the distribution of pericytes in two independent cohorts of AD (n = 16 and 13) and non-demented controls (n = 16 and 4). Stereological quantification revealed increased capillary density with a normal pericyte population in the frontal cortex of AD brains, a region with early amyloid beta deposition. Two-photon analysis of cleared frontal cortex tissue confirmed the preservation of pericytes in AD cases. These results suggest that pericyte demise is not a general hallmark of AD pathology

The State of the Region: Hampton Roads 2007

This is Old Dominion University\u27s eighth annual State of the Region report. While it represents the work of many people connected in various ways to the university, the report does not constitute an official viewpoint of Old Dominion or it\u27s president, Roseann Runte. The report maintains the goal of stimulating thought and discussion that ultimately will make Hampton Roads an even better place to live. We are proud of our region\u27s many successes, but realize that it is possible to improve our performance. In order to do so, we must have accurate information about where we are and a sound understanding of the policy options open to us.https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/economics_books/1011/thumbnail.jp