The Sudbury Neutrino Observatory

The Sudbury Neutrino Observatory is a second generation water Cherenkov detector designed to determine whether the currently observed solar neutrino deficit is a result of neutrino oscillations. The detector is unique in its use of D2O as a detection medium, permitting it to make a solar model-independent test of the neutrino oscillation hypothesis by comparison of the charged- and neutral-current interaction rates. In this paper the physical properties, construction, and preliminary operation of the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory are described. Data and predicted operating parameters are provided whenever possible.Comment: 58 pages, 12 figures, submitted to Nucl. Inst. Meth. Uses elsart and epsf style files. For additional information about SNO see http://www.sno.phy.queensu.ca . This version has some new reference

The searcher/information interface project

The Searcher/Information Interface Project explores the interface between an information searcher and the sources that the searcher uses in order to gather information. A hypothesis is formulated: different search intermediaries with similar training and using the same search tools should obtain similar results when conducting an information search, and all searchers can be expected to trace and report 'core' documents. Reasons for formulating this hypothesis are given and a meth odology is outlined for testing the hypothesis. The methodol ogy involves making comparisons between the search output of a number of searchers working with the same topics, user profiles and sources. Results of a pilot study which tested the methodology and explored the viability of the hypothesis are given

The searcher/information interface project-final report

The Searcher/ Information Interface Project (SIIP) explores the interface between an information searcher and the sources that the searcher uses in order to gather information. The methodology models most closely the interfaces experienced by an intermediary in searching for information on behalf of a user, and concerns itself with the search for, and the identifica tion of, information where it is necessary to consult secondary information sources, such as abstracting and indexing services, bibliographies and databases. A hypothesis is formulated: dif ferent search intermediaries with similar training and using the same search tools should obtam similar results when conduct ing an information search, and all searchers can be expected to trace and report core documents. The methodology involves making comparisons between the search output of a number of searchers working with the same topics, user profiles and searches. It is shown that there are significant differences between the bibliographies produced by the different searchers. The project proceeds by establishing models for identifying the extent of scatter of references retneved by different searchers

The searcher/information interface project 2: manual and online searching - pilot study

The article describes a pilot research project which uses the output of a number of searchers performing the same search, to identify those factors that affect search success. The empha sis is not on any specific printed source or database, but rather on the underlying search process, which involves the use of a number of different information sources. Some comparisons have been made between manual and online sources. Some of the issues that have affected relative manual/online search success are: subject coverage of sources, selection of relevant references, time span coverage of databases, equivalence of sources, errors, abstracts, index and search terminology, search strategies, browsing, thesauri, search time, learning and refer ence location. The project is seen as the basis for a more controlled investigation into the relative success of the searcher/information interface in searching manual and online sources, respectively

Nitrogen isotope evidence for manuring of Early Neolithic Funnel Beaker Culture cereals from Stensborg, Sweden

Little is known about arable agriculture in the Early Neolithic (4000–3300 cal BC, Funnel Beaker Culture) of Southern Scandinavia. Archaeobotanical material is rare and few archaeological sites have yielded more than a small number of charred cereal grains. In this short communication, we present single-entity carbon and nitrogen isotope analyses of charred cereals from Stensborg, an early Funnel Beaker Culture site near Stockholm, Sweden. This cereal assemblage is important as it is large, well-preserved and consists of multiple crop species. Our isotopic results indicate that many of the Stensborg cereal crops had been manured and that there is intra- and inter-species variation in manuring. We interpret these data as evidence of an integrated regime of stock-keeping and small-scale agriculture in the early Funnel Beaker Culture near its northernmost limit

Scotland’s first farmers: new insights into early farming practices in north-west Europe

Thirty years after the discovery of an Early Neolithic timber hall at Balbridie in Scotland was reported in Antiquity, new analysis of the site's archaeobotanical assemblage, featuring 20 000 cereal grains preserved when the building burnt down in the early fourth millennium BC, provides new insights into early farming practices. The results of stable isotope analyses of cereals from Balbridie, alongside archaeobotanical and stable isotope results from three other sites, indicate that while cereals were successfully cultivated in well-established plots without manuring at Balbridie, a variety of manuring strategies was implemented at the other sites. These differences reinforce the picture of variability in cultivation practices across Neolithic North-west Europe