Establishing confidence in CCV/ACT technology

Despite significant advancements in controls configured vehicles/active controls technology (CCV/ACT) in the past decade, few applications of this promising technology have appeared in recent aircraft designs. The status of CCV/ACT is summarized, and some of the constraints which are retarding its wider application are described. Suggestions toward establishing an increased level of confidence in the technology are given

The Origin of X-shaped Radio Galaxies: Clues from the Z-symmetric Secondary Lobes

Existing radio images of a few X-shaped radio galaxies reveal Z-symmetric morphologies in their weaker secondary lobes which cannot be naturally explained by either the galactic merger or radio-lobe backflow scenarios, the two dominant models for these X-shaped radio sources. We show that the merger picture can explain these morphologies provided one takes into account that, prior to the coalescence of their supermassive black holes, the smaller galaxy releases significant amounts of gas into the ISM of the dominant active galaxy. This rotating gas, whose angular momentum axis will typically not be aligned with the original jets, is likely to provide sufficient ram pressure at a distance ~10 kpc from the nucleus to bend the extant jets emerging from the central engine, thus producing a Z-symmetry in the pair of radio lobes. Once the two black holes have coalesced some 10^7 yr later, a rapid reorientation of the jets along a direction close to that of the orbital angular momentum of the swallowed galaxy relative to the primary galaxy would create the younger primary lobes of the X-shaped radio galaxy. This picture naturally explains why such sources typically have powers close to the FR I/II break. We suggest that purely Z-symmetric radio sources are often en route to coalescence and the concomitant emission of substantial gravitational radiation, while X-shaped ones have already merged and radiated.Comment: 12 pages, 1 compressed figure; accepted for publication in ApJ Letter

'Open Marxism' against and beyond the 'Great Enclosure'? Reflections on How (Not) to Crack Capitalism

The main purpose of this article is to provide an in-depth discussion of John Holloway’s recent book, Crack Capitalism. To this end, the paper offers a detailed account of the key strengths and weaknesses of Holloway’s version of ‘open Marxism’. The analysis is divided into two parts. The first part focuses on six significant strengths of Crack Capitalism: (1) its insistence upon the importance of autonomous forms of agenda-setting for both individual and collective emancipation; (2) its emphasis on the ordinary constitution of social struggles; (3) its fine-grained interpretation of the socio-ontological conditions underlying human agency; (4) its processual conception of radical social transformation; (5) its recognition of the elastic, adaptable, and integrative power of capitalism; and (6) its proposal for an alternative critical theory, commonly known as ‘open Marxism’ or ‘autonomous Marxism’. The second part of the study examines the principal weaknesses of Crack Capitalism: (1) the counterproductive implications of the preponderance of negativity, owing to a one-sided concern with critique, cracks, and crises; (2) conceptual vagueness; (3) an overuse of poetic and metaphorical language; (4) the absence of a serious engagement with the question of normativity; (5) a lack of substantive evidence; (6) a residual economic reductionism; (7) a simplistic notion of gender; (8) the continuing presence of various problematic ‘isms’; (9) the misleading distinction between ‘doing’ and ‘labour’; (10) a reductive understanding of capitalism; (11) an unrealistic view of society; and (12) socio-ontological idealis

Robotic milking technologies and renegotiating situated ethical relationships on UK dairy farms

Robotic or automatic milking systems (AMS) are novel technologies that take over the labor of dairy farming and reduce the need for human-animal interactions. Because robotic milking involves the replacement of 'conventional' twice-a-day milking managed by people with a system that supposedly allows cows the freedom to be milked automatically whenever they choose, some claim robotic milking has health and welfare benefits for cows, increases productivity, and has lifestyle advantages for dairy farmers. This paper examines how established ethical relations on dairy farms are unsettled by the intervention of a radically different technology such as AMS. The renegotiation of ethical relationships is thus an important dimension of how the actors involved are re-assembled around a new technology. The paper draws on in-depth research on UK dairy farms comparing those using conventional milking technologies with those using AMS. We explore the situated ethical relations that are negotiated in practice, focusing on the contingent and complex nature of human-animal-technology interactions. We show that ethical relations are situated and emergent, and that as the identities, roles, and subjectivities of humans and animals are unsettled through the intervention of a new technology, the ethical relations also shift. © 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

Lively commodities and endemic diseases: Shifting commodity situations and nonhuman disability in cattle and sheep on UK farms

\ua9 2024 The Authors. The concept of ‘lively commodities’ captures how aspects of the life of certain entities affect their commodification and exchange within capitalist economic systems. Their status as being, or comprised of, living things matters to their commodification in different ways in particular places and spaces and at particular times. This paper uses the empirical example of diseased farmed animals in the north of England to examine the effects of susceptibility to disease on the process of lively commodification, drawing on conceptualisations of nonhuman disability and relations of care alongside literature on lively commodities, and exploring cases of multi-lifeform co-production of disease. It thus focuses on moments where the liveliness of animals means that commodification ‘goes wrong’, because liveliness means susceptibility to injury and disease, alongside its potential for economic production. The paper focuses on two important endemic conditions affecting UK farming: lameness in cattle and sheep, and bovine viral diarrhoea (BVD) in cattle. These conditions significantly affect animals\u27 welfare and impact on farm productivity. Drawing on qualitative analysis of transcripts from in-depth interviews with 29 farmers and 21 farm advisers (e.g. vets), the paper examines three empirical themes where farming practices are strongly affected by the lively nature of the commodities being produced: first, the anticipatory practice of breeding animals resistant or vulnerable to disease; second, lameness and nonhuman disability; and third, BVD and threats to agricultural biosecurity. The paper concludes by revisiting the concept of lively commodities in situations where farmed animals are diseased, and reflects on the implications of this for their shifting commodity status in particular times and places

Making a mark on the farm: the marks and traces of farm animals and infectious diseases in northern England

\ua9 2024 Royal Scottish Geographical Society. Farmed animals are expected to move through farmed spaces in certain ways to maximise their productivity. These spaces are also designed to limit the movement of disease-causing organisms. However, both types of lifeforms do not always move in expected ways. We focus on the mark-making of these organisms to explore: 1) the evidence of their movements through farm spaces; and 2) the effects of these movements on managing farm animal disease. We explore these questions via social-scientific and artistic practices. The social science draws on in-depth interviews with UK cattle and sheep farmers, and farm advisors. The artistic component draws on work conducted by an ‘artist in residence\u27 engaging with farm animals and farmer-livestock relationships. Farm animals and infectious micro-organisms were found to move in different ways and create different marks and traces across farms, bodies, and how diseases were managed. These lifeforms often frustrated biosecurity practices of exclusion and enclosure and existed on a spectrum of disease risk. Human actors needed to learn to become attuned to lifeform movements in order to enact disease management. We conclude by suggesting a continued focus in future social-scientific research on how the ‘sub-animal body\u27 contributes to the enacting of farm disease management

An annular gap acceleration model for γ\gamma-ray emission of pulsars

If the binding energy of the pulsar's surface is not so high (the case of a neutron star), both the negative and positive charges will flow out freely from the surface of the star. The annular free flow model for $\gamma$-ray emission of pulsars is suggested in this paper. It is emphasized that: (1). Two kinds of acceleration regions (annular and core) need to be taken into account. The annular acceleration region is defined by the magnetic field lines that cross the null charge surface within the light cylinder. (2). If the potential drop in the annular region of a pulsar is high enough (normally the cases of young pulsars), charges in both the annular and the core regions could be accelerated and produce primary gamma-rays. Secondary pairs are generated in both regions and stream outwards to power the broadband radiations. (3). The potential drop in the annular region grows more rapidly than that in the core region. The annular acceleration process is a key point to produce wide emission beams as observed. (4). The advantages of both the polar cap and outer gap models are retained in this model. The geometric properties of the $\gamma$-ray emission from the annular flow is analogous to that presented in a previous work by Qiao et al., which match the observations well. (5). Since charges with different signs leave the pulsar through the annular and the core regions, respectively, the current closure problem can be partially solved.Comment: 11 pages 2 figures, accepted by Chinese Journal of Astronomy and Astrophysic