2,373 research outputs found
Unravelling the Mysteries of the Leo Ring: An Absorption Line Study of an Unusual Gas Cloud
Since the 1980's discovery of the large (2x10^9 Msun) intergalactic cloud
known as the Leo Ring, this object has been the center of a lively debate about
its origin. Determining the origin of this object is still important as we
develop a deeper understanding of the accretion and feedback processes that
shape galaxy evolution. We present HST/COS observations of three sightlines
near the Ring, two of which penetrate the high column density neutral hydrogen
gas visible in 21 cm observations of the object. These observations provide the
first direct measurement of the metallicity of the gas in the Ring, an
important clue to its origins. Our best estimate of the metallicity of the ring
is ~10% Zsun, higher than expected for primordial gas but lower than expected
from an interaction. We discuss possible modifications to the interaction and
primordial gas scenarios that would be consistent with this metallicity
measurement.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figures, accepted Ap
Weak and strong fillability of higher dimensional contact manifolds
For contact manifolds in dimension three, the notions of weak and strong
symplectic fillability and tightness are all known to be inequivalent. We
extend these facts to higher dimensions: in particular, we define a natural
generalization of weak fillings and prove that it is indeed weaker (at least in
dimension five),while also being obstructed by all known manifestations of
"overtwistedness". We also find the first examples of contact manifolds in all
dimensions that are not symplectically fillable but also cannot be called
overtwisted in any reasonable sense. These depend on a higher-dimensional
analogue of Giroux torsion, which we define via the existence in all dimensions
of exact symplectic manifolds with disconnected contact boundary.Comment: 68 pages, 5 figures. v2: Some attributions clarified, and other minor
edits. v3: exposition improved using referee's comments. Published by Invent.
Mat
Antonio Gramsciâs impact on critical pedagogy
This paper provides an account of Antonio Gramsciâs impact on the area of critical pedagogy. It indicates the Gramscian influence on the thinking of major exponents of the field. It foregrounds Gramsci's ideas and then indicates how they have been taken up by a selection of critical pedagogy exponents who were chosen on the strength of their identification and engagement with Gramsci's ideas, some of them even having written entire essays on Gramsci. The essay concludes with a discussion concerning an aspect of Gramsci's concerns, the question of powerful knowledge, which, in the present author's view, provides a formidable challenge to critical pedagogues.peer-reviewe
A case study of using community-based consensus methods to facilitate shared decision-making among a spinal cord injury network
Spinal cord injury (SCI) research and policy decisions are rarely made in partnership with people with SCI, making them less relevant, applicable, and used by those whom the decisions are intended to support. Across disciplines, consensus methods have been promoted as a viable solution for supporting shared research and policy-based decision-making. In this paper, we describe a partnered approach between academic researchers and the Ontario SCI Alliance, a non-profit, SCI community mobilization network to co-develop and co-disseminate a community-based consensus exercise. The community-based consensus exercise included two modified Delphi surveys and one in-person retreat. The partnership's goal with this exercise was to facilitate shared decision-making for the development of their upcoming strategic plan. We then interviewed partners and participants from the Delphi and in-person retreat to discuss successes, challenges, and lessons learned from the exercise. Survey 1 was disseminated to over 2,500 members of the Ontario SCI community and received 374 responses (276 coming from people with SCI). Survey 2 had 118 responses, with 87 coming from people with SCI. The retreat had 73 attendees, including people with SCI, family/friends of people with SCI, clinicians, researchers, and SCI community and research organization staff/volunteers. The retreat included a presentation of the survey results, a clinician/researcher panel, and externally-facilitated working groups. All survey responses and retreat materials were synthesized. Using the synthesized feedback, the Ontario SCI Alliance was able to implement several changes for the Ontario SCI community, including higher-quality primary care experiences (reduced wait times, more accessible examining rooms), the development of a wound care strategy with the Ontario government, and an advocacy campaign for public coverage for catheters and urinary care supplies. From the five interviews conducted, five themes were co-constructed regarding the successes, challenges, and lessons learned from the exercise: (1) Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility; (2) Partnership; (3) Design Considerations; (4) Transparency and Clarity in Communication; and (5) Sustainability. Findings from this community case study demonstrate the feasibility of conducting a community-level consensus exercise among an equity-deserving group while providing detailed guidance for how to ensure future research and policy-based decision-making is shared across diverse knowledge users
New HST Observations of the Halo Gas of NGC 3067: Limits on the Extragalactic Ionizing Background at Low Redshift and the Lyman Continuum Escape Fraction
We present UV spectroscopy from HST/GHRS and reanalyze existing H_alpha
images of the quasar/galaxy pair 3C 232/NGC 3067 and of the halo gas associated
with NGC 3067. The spectra permit measurement of, or limits on, the column
densities of Fe I, Fe II, Mg I, and Mg II in the absorbing cloud. Two distinct
models of the extragalactic radiation field are considered: (1) the ionizing
spectrum is dominated by a power-law extragalactic continuum, and (2) the
power-law spectrum contains a Lyman break, implying enhanced flux longward of
912 A relative to the hydrogen-ionizing flux. The H_alpha images constrain the
escape fraction of Lyman continuum photons from the galaxy to f_esc <= 0.02.
With the assumption that the cloud is shielded from all galactic contributions,
we can constrain the intensity and shape of the extragalactic continuum. For an
AGN-dominated power-law extragalactic spectrum, we derive a limit on the
extragalactic ionizing flux Phi_ion >= 2600 photons cm^-2 s^-1, or I_0 >=
10^-23 erg cm^-2 s^-1 Hz^-1 sr^-1 for an ionizing spectrum with power-law index
of 1.8 and a cloud of constant density. When combined with previous upper
limits from the absence of H_alpha recombination emission from intergalactic
clouds, our observations require 2600 <= Phi_ion <= 10000 photons cm^-2 s^-1.
We show that if galactic contributions to the incident radiation are important,
it is difficult to constrain Phi_ion. These results demonstrate that galactic
halo opacities and their wavelength dependence are crucial to understanding the
abundance of low-ionization metals in the IGM.Comment: 25 Pages LaTex, 8 PostScript Figures, accepted for publication in AJ,
Nov. 99 issu
Tight Beltrami fields with symmetry
Let be a compact orientable Seifered fibered 3-manifold without a
boundary, and an -invariant contact form on . In a suitable
adapted Riemannian metric to , we provide a bound for the volume
and the curvature, which implies the universal tightness of the
contact structure .Comment: 26 page
Reinventing College Physics for Biologists: Explicating an epistemological curriculum
The University of Maryland Physics Education Research Group (UMd-PERG)
carried out a five-year research project to rethink, observe, and reform
introductory algebra-based (college) physics. This class is one of the Maryland
Physics Department's large service courses, serving primarily life-science
majors. After consultation with biologists, we re-focused the class on helping
the students learn to think scientifically -- to build coherence, think in
terms of mechanism, and to follow the implications of assumptions. We designed
the course to tap into students' productive conceptual and epistemological
resources, based on a theoretical framework from research on learning. The
reformed class retains its traditional structure in terms of time and
instructional personnel, but we modified existing best-practices curricular
materials, including Peer Instruction, Interactive Lecture Demonstrations, and
Tutorials. We provided class-controlled spaces for student collaboration, which
allowed us to observe and record students learning directly. We also scanned
all written homework and examinations, and we administered pre-post conceptual
and epistemological surveys. The reformed class enhanced the strong gains on
pre-post conceptual tests produced by the best-practices materials while
obtaining unprecedented pre-post gains on epistemological surveys instead of
the traditional losses.Comment: 35 pages including a 15 page appendix of supplementary material
Overtwisted energy-minimizing curl eigenfields
We consider energy-minimizing divergence-free eigenfields of the curl
operator in dimension three from the perspective of contact topology. We give a
negative answer to a question of Etnyre and the first author by constructing
curl eigenfields which minimize energy on their co-adjoint orbit, yet are
orthogonal to an overtwisted contact structure. We conjecture that -contact
structures on -bundles always define tight minimizers, and prove a partial
result in this direction.Comment: published versio
Towards a framework for critical citizenship education
Increasingly countries around the world are promoting forms of "critical" citizenship in the planned curricula of schools. However, the intended meaning behind this term varies markedly and can range from a set of creative and technical skills under the label "critical thinking" to a desire to encourage engagement, action and political emancipation, often labelled "critical pedagogy". This paper distinguishes these manifestations of the "critical" and, based on an analysis of the prevailing models of critical pedagogy and citizenship education, develops a conceptual framework for analysing and comparing the nature of critical citizenship
The Metagalactic Ionizing Radiation Field at Low Redshift
We compute the ionizing radiation field at low redshift, arising from
Seyferts, QSOs, and starburst galaxies. This calculation combines recent
Seyfert luminosity functions, extrapolated ultraviolet fluxes from our IUE-AGN
database, and a new intergalactic opacity model based on Hubble Space Telescope
and Keck Ly-alpha absorber surveys. At z = 0 for AGN only, our best estimate
for the specific intensity at 1 Ryd is I_0 = 1.3 (+0.8/-0.5) x 10^-23
ergs/cm^2/s/Hz/sr, independent of H_0, Omega_0, and Lambda. The one-sided
ionizing photon flux is Phi_ion = 3400 (+2100/-1300) photons/cm^2/s, and the H
I photoionization rate is Gamma_HI = 3.2 (+2.0/-1.2) x 10^-14 s^-1 for alpha_s
= 1.8. We also derive Gamma_ HI for z = 0 - 4. These error ranges reflect
uncertainties in the spectral indexes for the ionizing EUV (alpha_s = 1.8 +/-
0.3) and the optical/UV (alpha_UV = 0.86 +/- 0.05), the IGM opacity model, the
range of Seyfert luminosities (0.001 - 100 L*) and the completeness of the
luminosity functions. Our estimate is a factor of three lower than the most
stringent upper limits on the ionizing background (Phi_ion < 10^4
photons/cm^2/s) obtained from H-alpha observations in external clouds, and it
lies within the range implied by other indirect measures. Starburst galaxies
with a sufficiently large Lyman continuum escape fraction, f_ esc > 0.05, may
provide a comparable background to AGN, I_0 (z=0) = 1.1 (+1.5/-0.7) x 10^{-23).
An additional component of the ionizing background of this magnitude would
violate neither upper limits from H-alpha observations nor the acceptable range
from other measurements.Comment: 30 pages, 9 figures, accepted for Astronomical J. (Oct. 1999
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