Design study of a device to simulate the dynamic environment encountered under condi- tions of reduced or zero gravity final report

Design study of reduced or zero gravity environment simulation devic

Emotions in business-to-business service relationships

Emotion in business-to-business service relationships regarding cargo services is explored. The service relationship is characterised by mutual trust and cooperation. Contact is mainly via telephone or e-mail with some face-to-face interactions and participants providing a complex, multi-skilled seamless service. Experience rather than training plays a vital role with long-term service relationships built up and maintained. Emotional sensitivity is acquired partly by experience and a repeat customer base but mainly through a genuine desire to help and get to know others. In contrast to the view of emotional labour bringing managerial control or adverse affects to service staff, the emotion engendered by this work is authentic expression bringing personal satisfaction

Recording advances for neural prosthetics

An important challenge for neural prosthetics research is to record from populations of neurons over long periods of time, ideally for the lifetime of the patient. Two new advances toward this goal are described, the use of local field potentials (LFPs) and autonomously positioned recording electrodes. LFPs are the composite extracellular potential field from several hundreds of neurons around the electrode tip. LFP recordings can be maintained for longer periods of time than single cell recordings. We find that similar information can be decoded from LFP and spike recordings, with better performance for state decodes with LFPs and, depending on the area, equivalent or slightly less than equivalent performance for signaling the direction of planned movements. Movable electrodes in microdrives can be adjusted in the tissue to optimize recordings, but their movements must be automated to be a practical benefit to patients. We have developed automation algorithms and a meso-scale autonomous electrode testbed, and demonstrated that this system can autonomously isolate and maintain the recorded signal quality of single cells in the cortex of awake, behaving monkeys. These two advances show promise for developing very long term recording for neural prosthetic applications

More than a cognitive experience: unfamiliarity, invalidation, and emotion in organizational learning

Literature on organizational learning (OL) lacks an integrative framework that captures the emotions involved as OL proceeds. Drawing on personal construct theory, we suggest that organizations learn where their members reconstrue meaning around questions of strategic significance for the organization. In this 5-year study of an electronics company, we explore the way in which emotions change as members perceive progress or a lack of progress around strategic themes. Our framework also takes into account whether OL involves experiences that are familiar or unfamiliar and the implications for emotions. We detected similar patterns of emotion arising over time for three different themes in our data, thereby adding to OL perspectives that are predominantly cognitive in orientation

Organizational learning and emotion: constructing collective meaning in support of strategic themes

Missing in the organizational learning literature is an integrative framework that reflects the emotional as well as the cognitive dynamics involved. Here, we take a step in this direction by focusing in depth over time (five years) on a selected organization which manufactures electronic equipment for the office industry. Drawing on personal construct theory, we define organizational learning as the collective re-construal of meaning in the direction of strategically significant themes. We suggest that emotions arise as members reflect on progress or lack of progress in achieving organizational learning. Our evidence suggests that invalidation – where organizational learning fails to correspond with expectations – gives rise to anxiety and frustration, while validation – where organizational learning is aligned with or exceeds expectations – evokes comfort or excitement. Our work aims to capture the key emotions involved as organizational learning proceeds

Surveillance sanitaire des cocoteraies adultes en Afrique de l'Ouest. I. Contrôles ordinaires

La plupart des ravageurs connus dans les cocoteraies d'Afrique de l'Ouest passent le plus souvent inaperçus, bien qu'ils soient toujours présents. Dans certaines conditions, difficiles à définir, il y a pullulation d'un ou de plusieurs d'entre eux et, en conséquence, des dégâts importants peuvent alors se produire. Des contrôles sanitaires fréquents sont nécessaires pour la conduite de la méthode de lutte intégrée, généralement adoptée à présent en défense des cultures, ce qui suppose une bonne connaissance des ravageurs, de leur biologie et de leurs ennemis naturels. Comme pour le palmier à huile, il y a deux types de contrôles phytosanitaires : - les contrôles ordinaires, décrits dans ces " Conseils ", qui permettent de suivre l'ensemble des populations de ravageurs, d'insectes auxiliaires, et de détecter toute anomalie susceptible de se traduire par des dégâts préjudiciables ; - les contrôles spéciaux, spécifiques d'un ravageur donné, qui feront l'objet d'une autre page de Pratique agricole (1 ), et sont réalisés sur un échantillon d'observation plus important. Ils permettent de suivre plus précisément l'évolution de ce ravageur, l'intensité et l'étendue des dégâts qu'il provoque. Toutefois, la décision d'intervention par traitement ne peut être prise à bon escient qu'après examen attentif des résultats d'un ou de plusieurs contrôles spéciaux réalisés après détection de l'attaque par un contrôle ordinaire. La présente " Page de pratique agricole " traite de la conduite des contrôles phytosanitaires en cocoteraie de plus de quatre ans, entrée en production. La surveillance des jeunes cocoteraies, beaucoup plus vulnérables, fera également l'objet d'autres " Conseils ". (Résumé d'auteur

A new conceptual framework for revenge firesetting

Revenge has frequently been acknowledged to account for a relatively large proportion of motives in deliberate firesetting. However, very little is actually known about the aetiology of revenge firesetting. Theoretical approaches to revenge-seeking behaviour are discussed. A brief review of how revenge is accounted for in existing theoretical explanations of deliberate firesetting and the known characteristics of revenge firesetters are provided. On this basis, the authors suggest, as a motive, revenge firesetting has to date been misconceptualised. A new conceptual framework is thus proposed, paying particular attention to the contextual, affective, cognitive, volitional and behavioural factors which may influence and generate a single episode of revenge firesetting. Treatment implications and suggestions for future research are also provided

The golden circle: A way of arguing and acting about technology in the London ambulance service

This paper analyses the way in which the London Ambulance Service recovered from the events of October 1992, when it implemented a computer-aided despatch system (LASCAD) that remained in service for less than two weeks. It examines the enactment of a programme of long-term organizational change, focusing on the implementation of an alternative computer system in 1996. The analysis in this paper is informed by actor-network theory, both by an early statement of this approach developed by Callon in the sociology of translation, and also by concepts and ideas from Latour’s more recent restatement of his own position. The paper examines how alternative interests emerged and were stabilized over time, in a way of arguing and acting among key players in the change programme, christened the Golden Circle. The story traces four years in the history of the London Ambulance Service, from the aftermath of October 1992 through the birth of the Golden Circle to the achievement of National Health Service (NHS) trust status. LASCAD was the beginning of the story, this is the middle, an end lies in the future, when the remaining elements of the change programme are enacted beyond the Golden Circle

Quasi-fission reactions as a probe of nuclear viscosity

Fission fragment mass and angular distributions were measured from the ^{64}Ni+^{197}Au reaction at 418 MeV and 383 MeV incident energy. A detailed data analysis was performed, using the one-body dissipation theory implemented in the code HICOL. The effect of the window and the wall friction on the experimental observables was investigated. Friction stronger than one-body was also considered. The mass and angular distributions were consistent with one-body dissipation. An evaporation code DIFHEAT coupled to HICOL was developed in order to predict reaction time scales required to describe available data on pre-scission neutron multiplicities. The multiplicity data were again consistent with one-body dissipation. The cross-sections for touch, capture and quasi-fission were also obtained.Comment: 25 pages REVTeX, 3 tables, 13 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev