The craft training requirements of the hotel and restaurant sectors of the hotel and catering industry

The subject of this thesis is an evaluation of college-based and industry-based craft training courses designed for those wishing to become professional chefs and waiters. The main issues addressed are the effectiveness of college-based craft training courses in meeting the future requirements of the hotel and catering industry, the needs of the employer and the future career horizons of craft students once they leave college. Having identified the main issues for research, the ways of evaluating college-based craft courses are considered. The thesis is presented in seven parts. Each section or chapter is concerned with a particular facet of the environment in which craft courses operate and their purpose. Research methods included surveys, field research, desk research, interviews and participative observation. At the outset, the reasons are outlined why the thesis is of importance to the writer as a craft lecturer and the likely benefits that may accrue to those who design and teach craft courses are discussed. This is followed by a description of how the data were gathered. An overview of recent research into craft training and education then follows as a basis for further development and application. An audit is made of the commercial, economic and manpower predictions for the industry; and this is followed by a discussion on technological developments, eating fashions and eating trends that will inevitably have an effect upon craft training. A profile of craftspeople in the industry is presented and predictions made of numbers required within the different industrial sectors. An analysis is made of the tasks and skills needed, and areas of knowledge considered by craftspeople as essential in the performance of their work. This leads into a consideration of the college environment, craft courses, their design, structure and content. Teaching approaches are discussed, together with the personal development of those who teach craft subjects. The findings are then brought into the context of the different views held by those involved in catering training and education; this sets the scene for the drawing together of the key findings and conclusions

Giant thermopower and figure of merit in single-molecule devices

We present a study of the thermopower $S$ and the dimensionless figure of merit $ZT$ in molecules sandwiched between gold electrodes. We show that for molecules with side groups, the shape of the transmission coefficient can be dramatically modified by Fano resonances near the Fermi energy, which can be tuned to produce huge increases in $S$ and $ZT$. This shows that molecules exhibiting Fano resonances have a high efficiency of thermoelectric cooling which is not present for conventional un-gated molecules with only delocalized states along their backbone.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Space Shuttle: MDAC/MMC space shuttle booster determination of stability and control characteristics and power effects at subsonic speed, Mach numbers zero and 0.26

Low speed wind tunnel tests of stability and control characteristics of space shuttle booster at subsonic speed

Ebola and Social Media

We were interested in knowing the impact of social media during the 2014-2015 West Africa Ebola epidemic. The aim of this systematic review is to provide clinicians, public health practitioners and policy-makers with a comprehensive overview of the up-to-date literature on Ebola and social media. We critically appraised the quality and utility of these studies, and identified the gaps in our current understanding that invite further research efforts. In particular, we focused on the research questions and the methods of the studies: a) What were the research questions of a given study? b) What study design and research methods were used by the researchers to address those questions? c) What were the strengths and limitations of these methods in addressing the given research questions? We searched six databases (ACM Digital Library, EBSCOhost, LILACS, PubMed, SciELO, and Web of Science) for research articles pertinent to Ebola and social media. We extracted the data using a standardized form, and we evaluated the quality of the included articles using Downs and Black‰Ûªs Checklist and/or the CASP Qualitative Research Checklist. A total of eleven articles were included in the main analysis: seven on Twitter with one also including Weibo, three on YouTube, and one on Instagram and Flickr. All the studies were cross-sectional. Studies on Twitter varied greatly on the research questions and the methods used. Ten of the eleven articles studied one or more of these three elements of social media and their relationships: (a) Themes or topics of social media contents, (b) Meta-data of social media posts (such as frequency of original posts and re-posts, and impressions) and (c) Characteristics of the social media accounts that made these posts (such as whether they are individuals or institutions). One paper studied how external information (news videos) influenced Twitter traffic. Content analysis methods included text mining (n=3) and manual coding (n=1). Two studies involved mathematical modeling. All three YouTube studies and the Instagram/Flickr study used manual coding of videos and images respectively. Published Ebola-related social media research focused on Twitter and YouTube. Researchers explored different research questions and methods, but their study design was limited to cross-sectional study. These studies suggest that a variety of methods, both quantitative and qualitative, may help improve public health communication surveillance. Public health agencies can incorporate these methods into their routine practice during emergency response (if resources permit) to enhance their performance. Social media should be considered part and parcel of a holistic health/risk communication strategy that also includes engagement with traditional mass media. The utility of social media research to public health practitioners is warranted but further research is neede

Scalar Top Quark Studies with Various Visible Energies

The precision determination of scalar top quark properties will play an important role at a future International Linear Collider (ILC). Recent and ongoing studies are discussed for different experimental topologies in the detector. First results are presented for small mass differences between the scalar top and neutralino masses. This corresponds to a small expected visible energy in the detector. An ILC will be a unique accelerator to explore this scenario. In addition to finding the existence of light stop quarks, the precise measurement of their properties is crucial for testing their impact on the dark matter relic abundance and the mechanism of electroweak baryogenesis. Significant sensitivity for mass differences down to 5 GeV are obtained. The simulation is based on a fast and realistic detector simulation. A vertex detector concept of the Linear Collider Flavor Identification (LCFI)collaboration, which studies pixel detectors for heavy quark flavour identification, is implemented in the simulations for c-quark tagging. The study extends simulations for large mass differences (large visible energy) for which aspects of different detector simulations, the vertex detector design, and different methods for the determination of the scalar top mass are discussed. Based on the detailed simulations we study the uncertainties for the dark matter density predictions and their estimated uncertainties from various sources. In the region of parameters where stop-neutralino co-annihilation leads to a value of the relic density consistent with experimental results, as precisely determined by the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), the stop-neutralino mass difference is small and the ILC will be able to explore this region efficiently.Comment: 11 pages, 11 figures, presented at SUSY'0