New experimental evidence that the proton develops asymptotically into a black disk

Recently, the Auger group has extracted the proton-air cross section from observations of air showers produced by cosmic ray protons (and nuclei) interacting in the atmosphere and converted it into measurements of the total and inelastic $pp$ cross sections $\sigma_{\rm tot}$ and $\sigma_{\rm inel}$ at the super-LHC energy of 57 TeV. Their results reinforce our earlier conclusions that the proton becomes a black disk at asymptotic energies, a prediction reached on the basis of sub-LHC \pbar p and $pp$ measurements of $\sigma_{\rm tot}$ and $\rho$, the ratio of the real to the imaginary part of the forward scattering amplitude [M. M. Block and F. Halzen, Phys. Rev. Lett. {\bf 107}, 212002 (2011)]. The same black disk description of the proton anticipated the values of $\sigma_{\rm tot}$ and $\sigma_{\rm inel}$ measured by the TOTEM experiment at the LHC cms (center of mass) energy of $\sqrt s=7$ TeV, as well as those of $\sigma_{\rm inel}$ measured by ALICE, ATLAS and CMS, as well as the ALICE measurement at 2.76 TeV. All data are consistent with a proton that is asymptotically a black disk of gluons: (i) both $\sigma_{\rm tot}$ and $\sigma_{\rm inel}$ behave as $\ln^2s$, saturating the Froissart bound, (ii) the forward scattering amplitude becomes pure imaginary (iii) the ratio $\sigma_{\rm inel}/\sigma_{\rm tot}=0.509 \pm 0.021$, compatible with the black disk value of 1/2, and (iv) proton interactions become flavor blind.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Forward hadronic scattering at 8 TeV: predictions for the LHC

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) recently started operating at 8 TeV. In this note, we update our earlier LHC forward hadronic scattering predictions \cite{physicsreports,update7, blackdisk}, giving new predictions, including errors, for the $pp$ total and inelastic cross sections, the $\rho$-value, the nuclear slope parameter $B$, $d\sigma_{\rm el}/dt$, and the large gap survival probability at 8 TeV.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figure, 1 table. arXiv admin note: substantial text overlap with arXiv:1102.316

The Extent to Which Public Universities in Kenya Experience Managerial and Environmental Challenges

The environment in which organisations operate is continuously changing, thereby posing challenges to the organisations, and higher education institutions are no exception. This study was undertaken to understand the managerial and environmental challenges faced by public universities in Kenya. The study design was descriptive and utilized a cross-sectional survey of all the public universities in Kenya through administration of a structured questionnaire to the top management team. Secondary data were collected from published works and, universities and government documents in public domain in order to corroborate the data collected from the primary sources. Positive responses were received from 63 respondents out of 91, yielding a 69.4 percent response rate. Of the respondents, 76 percent had basic training in the sciences and only 3 percent in business; 79 percent had no training in management and only 8 percent each had training in management at postgraduate diploma and postgraduate degree levels. The universities faced managerial challenges ‘to a greater extent’ than they faced environmental challenges. The control function of management, and competitive and economic macro-economic factors posed the highest challenges. A significant difference (p<0.05) in the managerial and environmental challenges existed between new and old universities, and rural and urban universities, respectively. There was significant difference (p<0.05) and no significant difference (p<0.05) among the three categories of public universities (old, new and university colleges) in managerial and environmental challenges, respectively. The results indicate that the managerial and environmental challenges experienced by public universities in Kenya could be related to lack of training in management. The results further indicate that public universities in Kenya are dependent on the environment in which they operate and, therefore, the study contributes to the environment-dependence theory of organizations. Keywords: Environmental challenge, environment-dependence theory, higher education institutions, Kenya, managerial challenge, public universit