An Overview on Charter Schools: Historical Rise and Opposing Views

As a relatively new concept in the American public school model, charter schools have emerged as a critical issue in education. Gaining political momentum in the call for K-12 educational reforms of the 1980s, charter schools have expanded throughout the United States, in both number and scope. Alongside the speedy growth of the charter school movement, support and opposition have both developed. In this charter schools overview, we explore the historical background of charter schools, highlight the various types, examine varying viewpoints, and then place charters in the context of Texas.Educatio

Predictability of the Arctic sea ice edge

Skillful sea ice forecasts from days to years ahead are becoming increasingly important for the operation and planning of human activities in the Arctic. Here we analyze the potential predictability of the Arctic sea ice edge in six climate models. We introduce the integrated ice-edge error (IIEE), a user-relevant verification metric defined as the area where the forecast and the “truth” disagree on the ice concentration being above or below 15%. The IIEE lends itself to decomposition into an absolute extent error, corresponding to the common sea ice extent error, and a misplacement error. We find that the often-neglected misplacement error makes up more than half of the climatological IIEE. In idealized forecast ensembles initialized on 1 July, the IIEE grows faster than the absolute extent error. This means that the Arctic sea ice edge is less predictable than sea ice extent, particularly in September, with implications for the potential skill of end-user relevant forecasts

The Abisko Polar Prediction School

Polar regions are experiencing rapid climate change, faster than elsewhere on Earth with consequences for the weather and sea ice. This change is opening up new possibilities for businesses such as tourism, shipping, fisheries and oil and gas extraction, but also bringing new risks to delicate polar environments. Effective weather and climate prediction is essential to managing these risks, however our ability to forecast polar environmental conditions over periods from days to decades ahead falls far behind our abilities in the mid-latitudes. In order to meet the growing societal need for young scientists trained in this area, a Polar Prediction School for early career scientists from around the world was held in April 2016

The preliminary design of a scaled Composite UHBR Fan for a wind tunnel test campaign

AbstractThe ambition of the CA3ViAR project is to design an open test case fan that experiences instability mechanisms, which are representative for ultra-high bypass ratio (UHBR) fans of civil aircrafts, and to perform a comprehensive experimental investigation to measure aerodynamic, aeroelastic and aeroacoustic performance in a wide range of operational conditions. Experimental tests will be performed in the Propulsion-Test-Facility (PTF) of the Institute of Jet Propulsion and Turbomachinery (IFAS) of Technische Universität Braunschweig, Germany. The final objective of the project is to provide an open test case for the entire research community, with geometries, numerical and experimental results to establish a new reference for composite UHBR fan design. This will support the development of new methods and tools for the development of safer, lighter and more efficient composite fans for greener UHBR engines. In this work the preliminary design of the low transonic fan (LTF) to be used as test article, whose main requirement is to be operated in a safe and controlled way in conditions of aerodynamic and/or aeroelastic instability during wind tunnel operations, is presented. More in particular, consolidated aerodynamic design, strategy adopted to drive the structural design, flutter analysis taking into account acoustic reflection at the intake, dynamic and stress analyses, as well as aeroacoustic measurement optimization are presented and discussed. The preliminary mechanical design of composite blades and the rotor hub, together with the rotor instrumentation and related studies to embed sensors in the composite blades, are also part of this article, and complemented by manufacturing trials and demonstration tests give the full picture of all the project activities up to the preliminary design review

Experimental study of double beta decay modes using a CdZnTe detector array

An array of sixteen 1 cm^3 CdZnTe semiconductor detectors was operated at the Gran Sasso Underground Laboratory (LNGS) to further investigate the feasibility of double-beta decay searches with such devices. As one of the double-beta decay experiments with the highest granularity the 4 x 4 array accumulated an overall exposure of 18 kg days. The setup and performance of the array is described. Half-life limits for various double-beta decay modes of Cd, Zn and Te isotopes are obtained. No signal has been found, but several limits beyond 10^20 years have been performed. They are an order of magnitude better than those obtained with this technology before and comparable to most other experimental approaches for the isotopes under investigation. An improved limit for the beta^+/EC decay of Te 120 is given.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figure

Pediatrics

OBJECTIVESTo describe the prevalence and secular trends of high weight-for-length among infants (ages, 3\u201323 months) in the biennial US Department of Agriculture Women, Infants, and Children Program and Participants Characteristic (WIC-PC) Survey from 2000 through 2014 (n = 16 927 120).METHODSWeight-for-length was considered to be \u201chigh\u201d if it was 652 SDs above the sex-and age-specific median in the World Health Organization growth standards. Poisson regression was used to calculate adjusted prevalence ratios.RESULTSThe overall prevalence of high weight-for-length increased from 13.4% in 2000 to 14.5% in 2004, remained constant until 2010, and then decreased by >2 percentage points (to 12.3%) through 2014. The prevalence of high weight-for-length was associated with sex (higher among boys), race-ethnicity (highest among American Indians/Alaskan Natives), and with both age (positive) and family income (inverse). The secular trends, however, were fairly similar within categories of these variables. From 2010 to 2014, the prevalence of high weight-for-length decreased in 40 states and 3 (of 5) US territories, with the largest decreases seen in Puerto Rico ( 129 percentage points) and Kentucky ( 127 percentage points), and the largest increase (+2 percentage points) seen in West Virginia.CONCLUSIONSAlthough the current results cannot be considered representative of infants in the populations, the prevalence of a high weight-for-length has decreased among infants in WIC-PC since 2010. These decreases were similar across categories of most characteristics, but there were substantial differences across jurisdictions, possibly reflecting differences in policy and local programs that target maternal and infant health.20162018-01-01T00:00:00ZCC999999/Intramural CDC HHS/United States27965380PMC5359001777

The Arctic Predictability and Prediction on Seasonal-to-Interannual TimEscales (APPOSITE) data set version 1

Abstract. Recent decades have seen significant developments in climate prediction capabilities at seasonal-to-interannual timescales. However, until recently the potential of such systems to predict Arctic climate had rarely been assessed. This paper describes a multi-model predictability experiment which was run as part of the Arctic Predictability and Prediction On Seasonal to Interannual Timescales (APPOSITE) project. The main goal of APPOSITE was to quantify the timescales on which Arctic climate is predictable. In order to achieve this, a coordinated set of idealised initial-value predictability experiments, with seven general circulation models, was conducted. This was the first model intercomparison project designed to quantify the predictability of Arctic climate on seasonal to interannual timescales. Here we present a description of the archived data set (which is available at the British Atmospheric Data Centre), an assessment of Arctic sea ice extent and volume predictability estimates in these models, and an investigation into to what extent predictability is dependent on the initial state. The inclusion of additional models expands the range of sea ice volume and extent predictability estimates, demonstrating that there is model diversity in the potential to make seasonal-to-interannual timescale predictions. We also investigate whether sea ice forecasts started from extreme high and low sea ice initial states exhibit higher levels of potential predictability than forecasts started from close to the models' mean state, and find that the result depends on the metric. Although designed to address Arctic predictability, we describe the archived data here so that others can use this data set to assess the predictability of other regions and modes of climate variability on these timescales, such as the El Niño–Southern Oscillation

Hypoxia as a therapy for mitochondrial disease

Defects in the mitochondrial respiratory chain (RC) underlie a spectrum of human conditions, ranging from devastating inborn errors of metabolism to aging. We performed a genome-wide Cas9-mediated screen to identify factors that are protective during RC inhibition. Our results highlight the hypoxia response, an endogenous program evolved to adapt to limited oxygen availability. Genetic or small-molecule activation of the hypoxia response is protective against mitochondrial toxicity in cultured cells and zebrafish models. Chronic hypoxia leads to a marked improvement in survival, body weight, body temperature, behavior, neuropathology, and disease biomarkers in a genetic mouse model of Leigh syndrome, the most common pediatric manifestation of mitochondrial disease. Further preclinical studies are required to assess whether hypoxic exposure can be developed into a safe and effective treatment for human diseases associated with mitochondrial dysfunction.National Institute of Mental Health (U.S.) (Grant 5DP1-MH100706)National Institute of Mental Health (U.S.) (Grant 1R01-MH110049)National Institute of Neurological Diseases and Stroke (U.S.) (Grant 5R01DK097768-03