Fabry-Perot Measurements of the Dynamics of Globular Cluster Cores: M15 (NGC~7078)

We report the first use of the Rutgers Imaging Fabry-Perot Spectrophotometer to study the dynamics of the cores of globular clusters. We have obtained velocities for cluster stars by tuning the Fabry-Perot to take a series of narrow-band images at different wavelengths across one of the Na D (5890 AA) absorption lines. Measuring the flux in every frame yields a short portion of the spectrum for each star simultaneously. This proves to be a very efficient method for obtaining accurate stellar velocities; in crowded regions we are able to measure hundreds of velocities in 3-4 hours of observing time. We have measured velocities with uncertainties of less than 5 km/s for 216 stars within 1.5' of the center of the globular cluster M15 (NGC 7078). The paper is a uuencoded compressed postscript file

A Phenomenological Exploration of Principals\u27 Influence on Teacher Attrition

ABSTRACT Classroom teachers\u27 decisions to leave the profession negatively affect the educational experience of the students, burden the remaining teachers, and drain school districts of funds that should go to students but instead are spent on recruiting and training. This phenomenological study examined the experiences of former classroom teachers to determine the role their school principals may have played in their decisions to leave the profession. Ten former elementary school teachers from South Carolina participated in the study. The researcher collected data using interviews; a semi-structured interview protocol was created from current literature and designed to align with the research question. Interviews were held virtually and transcribed by a private, third party company. Upon data analysis, three themes emerged: rules, norms, and security; teaching and learning; and, interpersonal relationships. This study suggests that the relationship between the teacher and his or her principal may be the driving force behind teacher attrition. Index words: teacher attrition, principals, elementary teacher

On Objective Measures of Rule Surprisingness

Most of the literature argues that surprisingness is an inherently subjective aspect of the discovered knowledge, which cannot be measured in objective terms. This paper departs from this view, and it has a twofold goal: (1) showing that it is indeed possible to define objective (rather than subjective) measures of discovered rule surprisingness; (2) proposing new ideas and methods for defining objective rule surprisingness measures

Investigation of the reinforcement of ductile metals with strong, high modulus discontinuous brittle fibers Quarterly report

Factors affecting reinforcement of aluminum with boron carbide whisker

Study of the growth parameters involved in synthesizing boron carbide filaments Second quarterly report

Growth parameters in synthesis of boron carbide whisker

The Stellar Halos of Massive Elliptical Galaxies II: Detailed Abundance Ratios at Large Radius

We study the radial dependence in stellar populations of 33 nearby early-type galaxies with central stellar velocity dispersions sigma* > 150 km/s. We measure stellar population properties in composite spectra, and use ratios of these composites to highlight the largest spectral changes as a function of radius. Based on stellar population modeling, the typical star at 2 R_e is old (~10 Gyr), relatively metal poor ([Fe/H] -0.5), and alpha-enhanced ([Mg/Fe]~0.3). The stars were made rapidly at z~1.5-2 in shallow potential wells. Declining radial gradients in [C/Fe], which follow [Fe/H], also arise from rapid star formation timescales due to declining carbon yields from low-metallicity massive stars. In contrast, [N/Fe] remains high at large radius. Stars at large radius have different abundance ratio patterns from stars in the center of any present-day galaxy, but are similar to Milky Way thick disk stars. Our observations are thus consistent with a picture in which the stellar outskirts are built up through minor mergers with disky galaxies whose star formation is truncated early (z~1.5-2).Comment: ApJ in press, 12 pages, 6 figure

Dynamic critical phenomena in the AdS/CFT duality

In critical phenomena, singular behaviors arise not only for thermodynamic quantities but also for transport coefficients. We study this dynamic critical phenomenon in the AdS/CFT duality. We consider black holes with a single R-charge in various dimensions and compute the R-charge diffusion in the linear perturbations. In this case, the black holes belong to model B according to the classification of Hohenberg and Halperin.Comment: 17 pages, ReVTeX4; v2: added references and discussio

The Effect of Spatial Gradients in Stellar Mass-to-Light Ratio on Black Hole Mass Measurements

We have tested the effect of spatial gradients in stellar mass-to-light ratio (Y) on measurements of black hole masses (MBH) derived from stellar orbit superposition models. Such models construct a static gravitational potential for a galaxy and its central black hole, but typically assume spatially uniform Y. We have modeled three giant elliptical galaxies with gradients alpha = d(log Y)/d(log r) from -0.2 to +0.1. Color and line strength gradients suggest mildly negative alpha in these galaxies. Introducing a negative (positive) gradient in Y increases (decreases) the enclosed stellar mass near the center of the galaxy and leads to systematically smaller (larger) MBH measurements. For models with alpha = -0.2, the best-fit values of MBH are 28%, 27%, and 17% lower than the constant-Y case, in NGC 3842, NGC 6086, and NGC 7768, respectively. For alpha = +0.1, MBH are 14%, 22%, and 17% higher than the constant-Y case for the three respective galaxies. For NGC 3842 and NGC 6086, this bias is comparable to the statistical errors from individual modeling trials. At larger radii, negative (positive) gradients in Y cause the total stellar mass to decrease (increase) and the dark matter fraction within one effective radius to increase (decrease).Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, 1 table. To appear in ApJ

Dynamical modelling of luminous and dark matter in 17 Coma early-type galaxies

Dynamical models for 17 Coma early-type galaxies are presented. The galaxy sample consists of flattened, rotating as well as non-rotating early-types including cD and S0 galaxies with luminosities between M=-18.79 and M=-22.56. Kinematical long-slit observations cover at least the major and minor axis and extend to 1-4 effective radii. Axisymmetric Schwarzschild models are used to derive stellar mass-to-light ratios and dark halo parameters. In every galaxy models with a dark matter halo match the data better than models without. The statistical significance is over 95 percent for 8 galaxies, around 90 percent for 5 galaxies and for four galaxies it is not significant. For the highly significant cases systematic deviations between observed and modelled kinematics are clearly seen; for the remaining galaxies differences are more statistical in nature. Best-fit models contain 10-50 percent dark matter inside the half-light radius. The central dark matter density is at least one order of magnitude lower than the luminous mass density. The central phase-space density of dark matter is often orders of magnitude lower than in the luminous component, especially when the halo core radius is large. The orbital system of the stars along the major-axis is slightly dominated by radial motions. Some galaxies show tangential anisotropy along the minor-axis, which is correlated with the minor-axis Gauss-Hermite coefficient H4. Changing the balance between data-fit and regularisation constraints does not change the reconstructed mass structure significantly. Model anisotropies tend to strengthen if the weight on regularisation is reduced, but the general property of a galaxy to be radially or tangentially anisotropic, respectively, does not change. (abridged)Comment: 31 pages, 34 figures; accepted for publication in MNRA