2,065 research outputs found
Population Growth and Other Statistics of Middle-sized Irish Towns. General Research Series Paper No. 85, April 1976
The basic aim of the study is the presentation of tables of comparative
statistical data relating to 97 towns with population 5OO-1O,OOO in
1971 and analyses of such data. The exclusion of the four County Boroughs
and Dun Laoghaire together with twelve other large towns and all small
towns and villages, was to impart a degree of homogeneity to the inquiry, as
regards function of town. The 97 towns range from Mullingar, the largest
with a population of 9,245 to Cootehill with 1,542
US Participation in the GOME and SCIAMACHY Projects
This report summarizes research done under NASA Grant NAGW-2541 through September 30, 1997. The research performed under this grant includes development and maintenance of scientific software for the GOME retrieval algorithms, consultation on operational software development for GOME, sensitivity and instrument studies to define GOME and SCIAMACHY instruments, consultation on optical and detector issues for both GOME and SCIAMACHY, consultation and development for SCIAMACHY near-real-time (NRT) and off-line (OL) data products, and development of infrared line-by-line atmospheric modeling and retrieval capability for SCIAMACHY. The European Space Agency selected the SAO to participate in GOME validation and science studies, part of the overall ERS AO. This provided access to all GOME data; The SAO activities that are carried out as a result of selection by ESA were funded by the present grant. The Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment was successfully launched on the ERS- 2 satellite on April 20, 1995, and remains working in normal fashion. SCIAMACHY is currently scheduled for launch in early 2000. The first two European ozone monitoring instruments (OMI), to fly on the q series of operational meteorological satellites being planned by Eumetsat, have been selected to be GOME-type instruments (the first, in fact, will be the refurbished GOME flight spare). K. Chance is the U.S. member of the OMI Users Advisory Group
Mathematics difficulties in extremely preterm children : evidence of a specific deficit in basic mathematics processing
Background:
Extremely preterm (EP, <26 wk gestation) children have been observed to have poor academic achievement in comparison to their term-born peers, especially in mathematics. This study investigated potential underlying causes of this difficulty.
Methods:
A total of 219 EP participants were compared with 153 term-born control children at 11 y of age. All children were assessed by a psychologist on a battery of standardized cognitive tests and a number estimation test assessing children’s numerical representations.
Results:
EP children underperformed in all tests in comparison with the term controls (the majority of Ps < 0.001). Different underlying relationships between performance on the number estimation test and mathematical achievement were found in EP as compared with control children. That is, even after controlling for cognitive ability, a relationship between number representations and mathematical performance persisted for EP children only (EP: r = 0.346, n = 186, P < 0.001; control: r = 0.095, n = 146, P = 0.256).
Conclusion:
Interventions for EP children may target improving children’s numerical representations in order to subsequently remediate their mathematical skills
Sex differences in mathematics and reading achievement are inversely related: within- and across-nation assessment of 10 years of PISA data
We analyzed one decade of data collected by the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), including the mathematics and reading performance of nearly 1.5 million 15 year olds in 75 countries. Across nations, boys scored higher than girls in mathematics, but lower than girls in reading. The sex difference in reading was three times as large as in mathematics. There was considerable variation in the extent of the sex differences between nations. There are countries without a sex difference in mathematics performance, and in some countries girls scored higher than boys. Boys scored lower in reading in all nations in all four PISA assessments (2000, 2003, 2006, 2009). Contrary to several previous studies, we found no evidence that the sex differences were related to nations’ gender equality indicators. Further, paradoxically, sex differences in mathematics were consistently and strongly inversely correlated with sex differences in reading: Countries with a smaller sex difference in mathematics had a larger sex difference in reading and vice versa. We demonstrate that this was not merely a between-nation, but also a within-nation effect. This effect is related to relative changes in these sex differences across the performance continuum: We did not find a sex difference in mathematics among the lowest performing students, but this is where the sex difference in reading was largest. In contrast, the sex difference in mathematics was largest among the higher performing students, and this is where the sex difference in reading was smallest. The implication is that if policy makers decide that changes in these sex differences are desired, different approaches will be needed to achieve this for reading and mathematics. Interventions that focus on high-achieving girls in mathematics and on low achieving boys in reading are likely to yield the strongest educational benefits
Two 'b's in the Beehive: The Discovery of the First Hot Jupiters in an Open Cluster
We present the discovery of two giant planets orbiting stars in Praesepe
(also known as the Beehive Cluster). These are the first known hot Jupiters in
an open cluster and the only planets known to orbit Sun-like, main-sequence
stars in a cluster. The planets are detected from Doppler shifted radial
velocities; line bisector spans and activity indices show no correlation with
orbital phase, confirming the variations are caused by planetary companions.
Pr0201b orbits a V=10.52 late F dwarf with a period of 4.4264 +/- 0.0070 days
and has a minimum mass of 0.540 +/- 0.039 Mjup, and Pr0211b orbits a V=12.06
late G dwarf with a period of 2.1451 +/- 0.0012 days and has a minimum mass of
1.844 +/- 0.064 Mjup. The detection of 2 planets among 53 single members
surveyed establishes a lower limit on the hot Jupiter frequency of 3.8
(+5.0)(-2.4) % in this metal-rich open cluster. Given the precisely known age
of the cluster, this discovery also demonstrates that, in at least 2 cases,
giant planet migration occurred within 600 Myr after formation. As we endeavor
to learn more about the frequency and formation history of planets,
environments with well-determined properties -- such as open clusters like
Praesepe -- may provide essential clues to this end.Comment: 5 pages, 3 tables, 2 figures. Published in ApJ Letter
Pressure Measurements Using an Airborne Differential Absorption Lidar
Remote airborne measurements of the vertical and horizontal structure of the atmospheric pressure field in the lower troposphere are made with an oxygen differential absorption lidar (DIAL). A detailed analysis of this measurement technique is provided which includes corrections for imprecise knowledge of the detector background level, the oxygen absorption fine parameters, and variations in the laser output energy. In addition, we analyze other possible sources of systematic errors including spectral effects related to aerosol and molecular scattering interference by rotational Raman scattering and interference by isotopic oxygen fines
A Merger Scenario for the Dynamics of Abell 665
We present new redshift measurements for 55 galaxies in the vicinity of the
rich galaxy cluster Abell 665. When combined with results from the literature,
we have good velocity measurements for a sample of 77 confirmed cluster members
from which we derive the cluster's redshift z=0.1829 +/- 0.0005 and
line-of-sight velocity dispersion of 1390 +/- 120 km/s. Our analysis of the
kinematical and spatial data for the subset of galaxies located within the
central 750 kpc reveals only subtle evidence for substructure and
non-Gaussianity in the velocity distribution. We find that the brightest
cluster member is not moving significantly relative to the other galaxies near
the center of the cluster. On the other hand, our deep ROSAT high resolution
image of A665 shows strong evidence for isophotal twisting and centroid
variation, thereby confirming previous suggestions of significant substructure
in the hot X-ray--emitting intracluster gas. In light of this evident
substructure, we have compared the optical velocity data with N-body
simulations of head-on cluster mergers. We find that a merger of two similar
mass subclusters (mass ratios of 1:1 or 1:2) seen close to the time of
core-crossing produces velocity distributions that are consistent with that
observed.Comment: 30 pages and 7 figures. Accepted by the Astrophysical Journal Full
resoultion figures 1 and 3 available in postscript at
http://www.physics.rutgers.edu/~percy/A665paper.htm
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