Are the Financial Accounting Standards Board's Current Standards for Nonprofit Organizations More Useful Than Previous Guidance?

The purpose of this paper is to find out whether the Statement of Financial Accounting Standards No. 117 provides more useful information to users than previous nonprofit financial accounting guidance under individual audit guides. More information is required under the new standards, as well as different financial statement formats. However, some users may find new financial statements confusing. Furthermore, the financial statements require no measure of operating income, despite users' request for some type of "bottom line". However, most users should find the new information helpful and the new format more useful. In my study, I administered a questionnaire to 66 accounting students to determine if they could assess from the financial statements information deemed to be useful. Overall, the statements prepared under SFAS No. 117 appear to present that information better than the financial statements under the audit guides.B.S. (Bachelor of Science

Release kinetics of metronidazole from 3D printed silicone scaffolds.

Sustained local administration of active agents has been proposed to cure bacterial vaginosis in the female reproductive tract and restore the resident bacterial fauna. Bioprinting has shown promise for the development of systems for local agent delivery. In contrast to oral ingestion, agent release kinetics can be fine-tuned by bioprinting specialized scaffold designs tailored for particular treatments while enhancing dosage effectiveness via localized sustained release. It has been challenging to establish scaffold properties for sustained release as a function of fabrication parameters. Towards this goal, we evaluate 3D printed scaffold formulation and feasibility to sustain release of metronidazole, a representative antibiotic. Silicone scaffolds were printed in a cylindrical design and cured using three different conditions relevant to potential future incorporation of temperature-sensitive labile biologics. Scaffold A was cured 4 hr at 50C followed by 72 hr at 4C, while Scaffold B was cured 4 hr at 50C followed by 24 hr desiccation at room temperature and Scaffold C was cured 24 hr at 50C. Drug release and compressive strength were monitored for 14 d in simulated vaginal fluid to assess long-term effects of fabrication conditions on release kinetics and mechanical integrity. Release profiles were vi fitted to previous kinetic models to differentiate potential release mechanisms. Scaffold A released 54.1% of drug over 14 d compared to 40.8% for Scaffold B and 33.7% for Scaffold C. Of six models evaluated, the Higuchi, Korsmeyer-Peppas, and Peppas-Sahlin models best described the release, indicating similarity to release from insoluble or polymeric matrices. All scaffolds were axially and radially compressed to determine compressive strength and compressive Young’s modulus. For all metronidazole-containing scaffolds, similar axial and radial compression was observed between post-cure and 24 hr and 14 d groups. We conclude that 3D printed silicone scaffolds can provide sustained metronidazole release over 14 d, with release kinetics and compressive strength tuned by the fabrication parameters

A suite of mathematical models to simulate the water and salt circulation in the Vaal River water supply system

A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Engineering University of the Witwatersrand Johannesburg ' for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy September 1981The Pretoria-Witwatersrand-Vereeniging (PW) complex relies for water supply on the resources of the Vaal basin# supplemented by Importation from the Tugela river. Most of the water supplied to the region is abstracted from the Vaal Barrage# which is also the sink for much of the water-borne pollution generated in the southern portion of the PWV complex. This feature of the system has led to an ever-increasing build-up of total dissolved solids (TDS) in the water supplies# resulting in substantial economic loss to consumers. Increasing mineralization is ascribable mainly to return of effluents to the Vaal Barrage where the concentrated salts are re-introduced to the Rand Water Board distribution system. The problem is exacerbated by the washoff, during the wet season# of enormous diffuse-source salt loads# leading to intolerably high peak TDS concentrations. A suite of deterministic mathematical models has been developed, and successfully tested, with the aim of predicting the anticipated severity of mineralization problems of the future and of facilitating objective comparison of the merits of various ameliorative measures. The first of the suite is the daily washoff model, designed to simulate daily catchment runoffs and associated daily diffusesource salt washoff. Basic input is daily meteorological data. In the model account is taken of both surface and sub-surface flow processes. Calibration of the model parameters for each of the twelve sub-catchments comprising the southern PWV region was effected with records of discharge and water quality at key monitoring points. A relationship was established between industrial water consumption and diffuse-source salt generation rates by means of which pollution levels likely to arise in the future could be predicted. Daily fluctuations of discharge and salt concentration at any point in the tributaries of the southern PWV region and in the Vaal Barrage, as well as water and salt storages in the major impoundments of the Vaal basin are simulated by means of the daily feed-back model. A feed-back element is incorporated which accounts for the mixing of water distributed to each of 27 sub-regions of the southern PWV catchment, the addition of salts through usage and the routing of effluents, together with diffuse-source washoff generated by the first model, through the tributary system back into the Barrage. The transmission of pollutants through the Barrage is simulated by means of a one-dimensional, cell-type level-pool model. This model was used to check the reliability of calibrated parameter values used in the daily washoff model by comparing simulated daily salt concentrations in the Vaal Barrage with those observed at the Rand Water Board Barrage intakes. The third model, a simplified version of the daily feed-back model designed to operate at a monthly computational time step, was developed to facilitate preliminary comparisons of the various options. This coarse tlme-etep model is relatively cheaper to run and makes pos-lble the testing of each option with several different hydrological sequences. Economic factors relating salt concentration in water supply to costs to consumers have also been incorporated. The two feed-back models were designed in such a way that a wide variety of planning and management options could be modelled with the minimum of programming changes. Procedures for comparing, with the aid of the models, the merits of various planning and management options to improve water quality have been evolved and are illustrated by way of example

Introduction to the Plasma Issue

The study of the physics of ionized gases has had a long and complicated history. The word "plasma" was first coined by Langmuir and Tonks in 1929 to denote a gas in which an important fraction of the molecules are dissociated into ions and electrons, the gas as a whole remaining electrically neutral. The laboratory study of plasmas, of course, had been pursued long before that, many important discoveries in the realm of gas discharge phenomena having been made in the 1800's. These studies, continuing into the Twentieth Century as exemplified by the work of Langmuir, served as the foundation for many practical electronic devices used for the generation, rectification, and control of electrical energy. The plasmas used in these devices usually have a low-charge density, and the fractional ionization is ordinarily less than one per cent. This small percentage of ionization is sufficient to provide good electrical conductivity which can be controlled externally, but it is difficult to study theoretically because of the numerous competing processes involving neutral atoms, metastable atoms, ions, electrons, and collective oscillations of ions and electrons

Conformations and membrane-driven self-organization of rodlike fd virus particles on freestanding lipid membranes.

Membrane-mediated interactions and aggregation of colloidal particles adsorbed to responsive elastic membranes are challenging problems relevant for understanding the microscopic organization and dynamics of biological membranes. We experimentally study the behavior of rodlike semiflexible fd virus particles electrostatically adsorbed to freestanding cationic lipid membranes and find that their behavior can be controlled by tuning the membrane charge and ionic strength of the surrounding medium. Three distinct interaction regimes of rodlike virus particles with responsive elastic membranes can be observed. (i) A weakly charged freestanding cationic lipid bilayer in a low ionic strength medium represents a gentle quasi-2D substrate preserving the integrity, structure, and mechanical properties of the membrane-bound semiflexible fd virus, which under these conditions is characterized by a monomer length of 884 ± 4 nm and a persistence length of 2.5 ± 0.2 mum, in perfect agreement with its properties in bulk media. (ii) An increase in the membrane charge leads to the membrane-driven collapse of fd virus particles on freestanding lipid bilayers and lipid nanotubes into compact globules. (iii) When the membrane charge is low, and the mutual electrostatic repulsion of membrane-bound virus particles is screened to a considerable degree, membrane-driven self-organization of membrane-bound fd virus particles into long linear tip-to-tip aggregates showing dynamic self-assembly/disassembly and quasi-semiflexible behavior takes place. These observations are in perfect agreement with the results of recent theoretical and simulation studies predicting that membrane-mediated interactions can control the behavior of colloidal particles adsorbed on responsive elastic membranes

Cardiac Function Evaluation with Cine MRI of the Heart

Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/145199/1/cpmia1104.pd

Cardiac Function Evaluation with Cine MRI of the Heart

This unit describes how to determine hemodynamic parameters of cardiac function such as ejection fraction (EF), end diastolic volume (EDV), end systolic volume (ESV), stroke volume (SV), and cardiac mass, based on experience using a Siemens 1.5 T Sonata scanner. Briefly, cine loops are acquired over several heartbeats, synchronized with the heart cycle by gating of the encoding steps with the patients electrocardiogram (ECG). Recently, it has become feasible to acquire cine loops in real time, although the temporal resolution is not optimal. Options discussed in this unit include breath hold versus free breathing, prospective triggering versus retrospective gating, and volumetric data sets versus biplanar approaches. Patient parameters such as heart rate or rhythm, degree of functional impairment, the presence of valvular disease, and the need to assess for jets from shunts or valve dysfunction are also treated.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/145342/1/cpmia1104.pd

STS-2 sail non-avionics subsystems math model requirements

Using a mathematical model, requirements for each of the nonavionic subsystems that interface with the shuttle avionics system are given

Effects of Matching Protein to Requirements on Performance and Waste Management in the Feedlot

Four experiments were conducted, two with calves in the winter/spring and two with yearlings during the summer, to evaluate the effects of decreasing protein levels on nutrient balance in the feedlot. The control diet was formulated for 13.5 percent protein; the experimental diets were formulated using the 1996 NRC model to predict protein requirements. Nutrient balances for organic matter (OM) and nitrogen (N) were measured. Nitrogen intake and subsequent excretion were decreased with steers fed the experimental treatment. During the summer more N was removed from pens on the experimental treatment since OM excretion was greater which led to decreased N volatilization. N losses were lower in the winter/spring feeding periods when expressed as percentage volatilized