The Effect of Patient Portals on the Quality of Care of Patients

Caroline Golmon is a student in Health Informatics and Information Management at Louisiana Tech University

Scientific Articles and Inquiry in the Biology Classroom

Although much emphasis has been placed, in professional journals, science textbooks and teacher training programs, on the inquiry method of teaching, the inquiry teaching concept has achieved only a limited acceptance in secondary schools

Assessing Laboratory Instruction in Biology

Biology curriculum developments of the last decade have emphasized the importance of laboratory instruction in the learning environment. Not only do most students enjoy laboratory work but it provides them with an opportunity to make first hand observations, manipulate equipment, collect data, organize data, and draw their own conclusions concerning this information. One teaching strategy for laboratory instruction developed by the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (BSCS) creates a setting in which a question can be formulated that may be answered as a result of laboratory work. Special instruction is given for specific laboratory techniques and skills when necessary but major emphasis is directed toward solving a problem or answering a question. The student then performs the laboratory investigation by making observations, collecting data, and interpreting results to obtain answers to the question. There is evidence to suggest that laboratory experiences should be designed as problem solving experiences, and should be directed toward specified learning outcomes (Ramsey and Howe, 1969)

Selected Outcomes of a Summer Institute for High School Biology Teachers

The 1972 University of Iowa Summer Institute for High School Biology Teachers was designed to assist participants in implementing the course, Biological Science: Molecules to Man (Blue Version), developed by the Biological Sciences Curriculum Study (BSCS). The program consisted of eight weeks of classroom instruction and was supported by the National Science Foundation. Instruction was planned to provide the participants with an opportunity to improve their competence in biological subject matter and to become acquainted with teaching strategies inherent in materials produced by BSCS. In order to accomplish these objectives, participants were enrolled in three related courses

Model Reduction for Multiscale Lithium-Ion Battery Simulation

In this contribution we are concerned with efficient model reduction for multiscale problems arising in lithium-ion battery modeling with spatially resolved porous electrodes. We present new results on the application of the reduced basis method to the resulting instationary 3D battery model that involves strong non-linearities due to Buttler-Volmer kinetics. Empirical operator interpolation is used to efficiently deal with this issue. Furthermore, we present the localized reduced basis multiscale method for parabolic problems applied to a thermal model of batteries with resolved porous electrodes. Numerical experiments are given that demonstrate the reduction capabilities of the presented approaches for these real world applications

Sustainable Roof Systems: Design Report

This report describes the design of a prefabricated sustainable roof system for LionForce Systems. While being economical, environmentally sustainable, aesthetically pleasing, and easy to assemble on site, the design includes a sturdy and durable roof-to-wall joint that minimizes waste, insulates the interior, and locks out moisture. In addition, the design facilitates a 20-foot unsupported roof span and a 4-foot overhang beyond the exterior wall, with allowances for variation in roof pitch. The roof-to-wall joint was successfully designed and prototyped with less than half the $1200 allowable budget using galvanized steel with Expanded Polystyrene (EPS) insulation

Anisotropic surface reaction limited phase transformation dynamics in LiFePO4

A general continuum theory is developed for ion intercalation dynamics in a single crystal of a rechargeable battery cathode. It is based on an existing phase-field formulation of the bulk free energy and incorporates two crucial effects: (i) anisotropic ionic mobility in the crystal and (ii) surface reactions governing the flux of ions across the electrode/electrolyte interface, depending on the local free energy difference. Although the phase boundary can form a classical diffusive "shrinking core" when the dynamics is bulk-transport-limited, the theory also predicts a new regime of surface-reaction-limited (SRL) dynamics, where the phase boundary extends from surface to surface along planes of fast ionic diffusion, consistent with recent experiments on LiFePO4. In the SRL regime, the theory produces a fundamentally new equation for phase transformation dynamics, which admits traveling-wave solutions. Rather than forming a shrinking core of untransformed material, the phase boundary advances by filling (or emptying) successive channels of fast diffusion in the crystal. By considering the random nucleation of SRL phase-transformation waves, the theory predicts a very different picture of charge/discharge dynamics from the classical diffusion-limited model, which could affect the interpretation of experimental data for LiFePO4.Comment: 15 pages, 10 figure

Multi-Scale Simulation and Optimization of Lithium Battery Performance

The performance and degradation of lithium batteries strongly depends on electrochemical, mechanical, and thermal phenomena. While a large volume of work has focused on thermal management, mechanical phenomena relevant to battery design are not fully understood. Mechanical degradation of electrode particles has been experimentally linked to capacity fade and failure of batteries; an understanding of the interplay between mechanics and electrochemistry in the battery is necessary in order to improve the overall performance of the battery. A multi-scale model to simulate the coupled electrochemical and mechanical behavior of Li batteries has been developed, which models the porous electrode and separator regions of the battery. The porous electrode includes a liquid electrolyte and solid active materials. A multi-scale finite element approach is used to analyze the electrochemical and mechanical performance. The multi-scale model includes a macro- and micro-scale with analytical volume-averaging methods to relate the scales. The macro-scale model describes Li-ion transport through the electrolyte, electric potentials, and displacements throughout the battery. The micro-scale considers the surface kinetics and electrochemical and mechanical response of a single particle of active material evaluated locally within the cathode region. Both scales are non-linear and dependent on the other. The electrochemical and mechanical response of the battery are highly dependent on the porosity in the electrode, the active material particle size, and discharge rate. Balancing these parameters can improve the overall performance of the battery. A formal design optimization approach with multi-scale adjoint sensitivity analysis is developed to find optimal designs to improve the performance of the battery model. Optimal electrode designs are presented which maximize the capacity of the battery while mitigating stress levels during discharge over a range of discharge rates