Helping Adult Learners Plan For Success

We recognize there are significant external and internal barriers to effective planning and goal pursuit that are particular concerns for adult learners. Often, these barriers arise from conflicting adult roles (e.g. parent and adult learner), as well from a real or perceived lack of resources. We begin this session by reviewing common barriers to goal pursuit within the adult education environment, and we will explain how these barriers serve as a starting point for the ideas presented in this session

What is the Brightest Source for Dilepton Emissions at RHIC?

We calculate the dilepton emissions as the decay product of the charm and bottom quarks produced in heavy-ion collisions at RHIC energy. We take into account the next-to-leading-order radiative corrections in perturbative QCD to the heavy quark production from both an initial hard parton-parton scattering and an ideal quark-gluon plasma. We find that the thermal charm decay dominates the dilepton production in the low dilepton mass region ($<2$ GeV), while the heavy quark production from the initial scattering takes over the intermediate and high mass regions ($> 2$ GeV). Our result also indicates the importance of the bottom quark in the high mass region ($>4$ GeV ) due to its large mass and cascade decay. If the initial scattering produced charm suffers a significant energy loss due to the secondary interaction, the bottom decay constitutes the major background for the thermal dileptons.Comment: 12 pages in RevTeX, 3 epsf figures embedde

A framework for experimental-data-driven assessment of Magnetized Liner Inertial Fusion stagnation image metrics

A variety of spherical crystal x-ray imager (SCXI) diagnostics have been developed and fielded on Magnetized Liner Inertial Fusion (MagLIF) experiments at the Sandia National Laboratories Z-facility. These different imaging modalities provide detailed insight into different physical phenomena such as mix of liner material into the hot fuel, cold liner emission, or reduce impact of liner opacity. However, several practical considerations ranging from the lack of a consistent spatial fiducial for registration to different point-spread-functions and tuning crystals or using filters to highlight specific spectral regions make it difficult to develop broadly applicable metrics to compare experiments across our stagnation image database without making significant unverified assumptions. We leverage experimental data for a model-free assessment of sensitivities to instrumentation-based features for any specified image metric. In particular, we utilize a database of historical and recent MagLIF data including $N_{\text{scans}} = 139$ image plate scans gathered across $N_{\text{exp}} = 67$ different experiments to assess the impact of a variety of features in the experimental observations arising from uncertainties in registration as well as discrepancies in signal-to-noise ratio and instrument resolution. We choose a wavelet-based image metric known as the Mallat Scattering Transform for the study and highlight how alternate metric choices could also be studied. In particular, we demonstrate a capability to understand and mitigate the impact of signal-to-noise, image registration, and resolution difference between images. This is achieved by utilizing multiple scans of the same image plate, sampling random translations and rotations, and applying instrument specific point-spread-functions found by ray tracing to high-resolution datasets, augmenting our data in an effectively model-free fashion.Comment: 17 pages, 14 figure

Universal criterion for the breakup of invariant tori in dissipative systems

The transition from quasiperiodicity to chaos is studied in a two-dimensional dissipative map with the inverse golden mean rotation number. On the basis of a decimation scheme, it is argued that the (minimal) slope of the critical iterated circle map is proportional to the effective Jacobian determinant. Approaching the zero-Jacobian-determinant limit, the factor of proportion becomes a universal constant. Numerical investigation on the dissipative standard map suggests that this universal number could become observable in experiments. The decimation technique introduced in this paper is readily applicable also to the discrete quasiperiodic Schrodinger equation.Comment: 13 page

Frateuria defendens reduces yellows disease symptoms in grapevine under field conditions

Yellows diseases in grapevine, associated with the presence of different phytoplasmas, are a major problem for growers, with no environmentally friendly means of control. Frateuria defendens (Frd), a bacterium with endophytic traits, has been shown to reduce yellows symptoms in grapevine plantlets under laboratory conditions. The objective of this study was to test whether similar effects could be achieved under field conditions. A trial was conducted in a heavily infected vineyard in northern Israel for two consecutive years. A suspension of Frd cells (108·mL-1) was applied bi-weekly by foliar spray on grapevines from bud burst to leaf senescence. Frd penetrated the leaves during the growing period but not during leaf senescence and could be detected in the leaves by PCR analysis up to 14 days post-spraying. The rate of yellows infection was lower in the treated grapevines compared to its increase in untreated grapevines and the yield of symptomatic plants was improved by 10 to 20 %. Taken together, the results suggest Frd acted as a biological control agent in vineyards under the experimental conditions tested

Verified and potential pathogens of predatory mites (Acari: Phytoseiidae)

Several species of phytoseiid mites (Acari: Phytoseiidae), including species of the genera Amblyseius, Galendromus, Metaseiulus, Neoseiulus, Phytoseiulus and Typhlodromus, are currently reared for biological control of various crop pests and/or as model organisms for the study of predator¿prey interactions. Pathogen-free phytoseiid mites are important to obtain high efficacy in biological pest control and to get reliable data in mite research, as pathogens may affect the performance of their host or alter their reproduction and behaviour. Potential and verified pathogens have been reported for phytoseiid mites during the past 25 years. The present review provides an overview, including potential pathogens with unknown host effects (17 reports), endosymbiotic Wolbachia (seven reports), other bacteria (including Cardinium and Spiroplasma) (four reports), cases of unidentified diseases (three reports) and cases of verified pathogens (six reports). From the latter group four reports refer to Microsporidia, one to a fungus and one to a bacterium. Only five entities have been studied in detail, including Wolbachia infecting seven predatory mite species, other endosymbiotic bacteria infecting Metaseiulus (Galendromus, Typhlodromus) occidentalis (Nesbitt), the bacterium Acaricomes phytoseiuli infecting Phytoseiulus persimilis Athias-Henriot, the microsporidium Microsporidium phytoseiuli infecting P. persimilis and the microsporidium Oligosproridium occidentalis infecting M. occidentalis. In four cases (Wolbachia, A. phytoseiuli, M. phytoseiuli and O. occidentalis) an infection may be connected with fitness costs of the host. Moreover, infection is not always readily visible as no obvious gross symptoms are present. Monitoring of these entities on a routine and continuous basis should therefore get more attention, especially in commercial mass-production. Special attention should be paid to field-collected mites before introduction into the laboratory or mass rearing, and to mites that are exchanged among rearing facilities. However, at present general pathogen monitoring is not yet practical as effects of many entities are unknown. More research effort is needed concerning verified and potential pathogens of commercially reared arthropods and those used as model organisms in research

Counter-propagating radiative shock experiments on the Orion laser and the formation of radiative precursors

We present results from new experiments to study the dynamics of radiative shocks, reverse shocks and radiative precursors. Laser ablation of a solid piston by the Orion high-power laser at AWE Aldermaston UK was used to drive radiative shocks into a gas cell initially pressurised between $0.1$ and $1.0 \ bar with different noble gases. Shocks propagated at {80 \pm 10 \ km/s} and experienced strong radiative cooling resulting in post-shock compressions of { \times 25 \pm 2}. A combination of X-ray backlighting, optical self-emission streak imaging and interferometry (multi-frame and streak imaging) were used to simultaneously study both the shock front and the radiative precursor. These experiments present a new configuration to produce counter-propagating radiative shocks, allowing for the study of reverse shocks and providing a unique platform for numerical validation. In addition, the radiative shocks were able to expand freely into a large gas volume without being confined by the walls of the gas cell. This allows for 3-D effects of the shocks to be studied which, in principle, could lead to a more direct comparison to astrophysical phenomena. By maintaining a constant mass density between different gas fills the shocks evolved with similar hydrodynamics but the radiative precursor was found to extend significantly further in higher atomic number gases (\sim$$4$ times further in xenon than neon). Finally, 1-D and 2-D radiative-hydrodynamic simulations are presented showing good agreement with the experimental data.Comment: HEDLA 2016 conference proceeding

Large mass dileptons from the passage of jets through quark gluon plasma

We calculate the emission of large mass dileptons originating from the annihilation of quark jets passing through quark gluon plasma. Considering central collisions of heavy nuclei at SPS, RHIC and LHC energies, we find that the yield due to the jet-plasma interaction gets progressively larger as the collision energy increases. We find it to be negligible at SPS energies, of the order of the Drell-Yan contribution and much larger than the normal thermal yield at RHIC energies and up to a factor of ten larger than the Drell-Yan contribution at LHC energies. An observation of this new dilepton source would confirm the occurrence of jet-plasma interactions and of conditions suitable for jet-quenching to take place.Comment: 9 pages, 11 figures; references added, improved calculation, conclusions unchange