Inter-rater reliability and validity of the Australian Football League\u27s kicking and handball tests

Talent identification tests used at the Australian Football League’s National Draft Combine assess the capacities of athletes to compete at a professional level. Tests created for the National Draft Combine are also commonly used for talent identification and athlete development in development pathways. The skills tests created by the Australian Football League required players to either handball (striking the ball with the hand) or kick to a series of 6 randomly generated targets. Assessors subjectively rate each skill execution giving a 0-5 score for each disposal. This study aimed to investigate the inter-rater reliability and validity of the skills tests at an adolescent sub-elite level. Male Australian footballers were recruited from sub-elite adolescent teams (n=121, age=15.7 ± 0.3 years, height=1.77 ± 0.07 m, mass=69.17 ± 8.08 kg). The coaches (n=7) of each team were also recruited. Inter-rater reliability was assessed using Inter-class correlations (ICC) and Limits of Agreement analysis. Both the kicking (ICC=0.96, P\u3c0.01) and handball tests (ICC=0.89, P\u3c0.01) demonstrated strong reliability and acceptable levels of absolute agreement. Content validity was determined by examining test scores sensitivity to laterality and distance. Concurrent validity was assessed by comparing coaches’ perceptions of skill to actual test outcomes. Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) examined the main effect of laterality, with scores on the dominant hand (P=0.04) and foot (P\u3c0.01) significantly higher compared to the non-dominant side. Follow-up univariate analysis showing significant differences at every distance in the kicking test. A poor correlation was found between coaches’ perceptions of skill and testing outcomes. The results of this study demonstrate both skill tests demonstrate acceptable inter-rater reliable. Partial content validity was confirmed for the kicking test, however further research is required to confirm validity of the handball test

Co-ordinating retinal histogenesis: early cell cycle exit enhances early cell fate determination in the Xenopus retina

The laminar arrays of distinct cell types in the vertebrate retina are built by a histogenic process in which cell fate is correlated with birth order. To explore this co-ordination mechanistically, we altered the relative timing of cell cycle exit in the developing Xenopus retina and asked whether this affected the activity of neural determinants. We found that Xath5, a bHLH proneural gene that promotes retinal ganglion cell (RGC) fate, ( Kanekar, S., Perron, M., Dorsky, R., Harris, W. A., Jan, L. Y., Jan, Y. N. and Vetter, M. L. (1997) Neuron 19, 981-994), does not cause these cells to be born prematurely. To drive cells out of the cell cycle early, therefore, we misexpressed the cyclin kinase inhibitor, p27Xic1. We found that early cell cycle exit potentiates the ability of Xath5 to promote RGC fate. Conversely, the cell cycle activator, cyclin E1, which inhibits cell cycle exit, biases Xath5-expressing cells toward later neuronal fates. We found that Notch activation in this system caused cells to exit the cell cycle prematuely, and when it is misexpressed with Xath5, it also potentiates the induction of RGCs. The potentiation is counteracted by co-expression of cyclin E1. These results suggest a model of histogenesis in which the activity of factors that promote early cell cycle exit enhances the activity of factors that promote early cellular fates

Judges’ evaluation reliability changes between identifiable and anonymous performance of hip-hop dance movements

© 2021 Sato, Hopper. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Hip-hop competitions are performed across the world. In the recent inclusion in the 2018 Youth Olympic Games, the assessment of hip-hop performance is undertaken by a panel of judges. The purpose of this study was to determine the reliability of different visualisation tools utilised in the assessment of the hip-hop dance movements. Ten dancers performed basic rhythmic hip-hop movements which were captured using a motion capture system and video camera. Humanoid and stick figure animations of the dancers’ movements were created from the motion capture data. Ten judges then assessed 20 dance trials through observation using three different visualisation tools on a computer display, each of which provided different representations of a given hip-hop performance: (1) the actual video of the dancers; (2) an anonymous stick figure animation; (3) an anonymous humanoid animation. Judges were not informed that they were repeating an assessment of the performances across the three visualisation tools. The humanoid animation demonstrated the highest inter-class correlation coefficients among the three methods. Despite the stick figure animation demonstrating moderate to high reliability, both the humanoid animation and the video demonstrated very high reliability in the intra-class correlation coefficient. It is recommended that further research is undertaken exploring the use of humanoid animation as a formative assessment tool in the evaluation of hip-hop dance and the evolution of hip-hop into a respected artistic athletic discipline

High-Velocity Spoke Cavities

There are several current and recent projects which explore the feasibility of spoke-loaded cavities operating in the high-velocity region. Spoke cavities have a large number of geometric parameters which often influence multiple rf properties. Fabricating, handling, and processing these cavities presents some unique challenges, not unlike other TEM-class structures. This paper will summarize the current efforts toward the design, fabrication, and testing of spoke cavities with optimum beta greater than 0.8

The regulation that comes from combination : the effects of combining multiple policy areas within a single environmental protection agency in the states

Abstract from short.pdf file.Dissertation supervisor: Dr. Lael Keiser.Includes vita.In twenty American states, regulatory environmental programs are combined with either public health or natural resource conservation programs. Natural resource conservation and public health agencies have historically embraced regulatory styles that rely less heavily on enforcement, while the Environmental Protection Agency cites enforcement actions, such as monetary penalties, as being pivotal to protecting the environment and public health. In this dissertation, I ask the following question: what regulatory style emerges from the combination of these differing preferences for the use of enforcement. Through in-depth case studies, interviews with environmental agency workers, and time-series analyses on enforcement actions, I find that the choice to nest regulatory environmental programs within preexisting natural resource conservation and public health agencies helps to maintain an anti-enforcement agency culture that is inherent within natural resource and public health agencies. This anti-enforcement culture continually affects how agency workers think about enforcement actions. As a result, combined agencies categorize less violations as severe and penalize violators less than independent pollution control agencies. This is especially the case for those agencies where natural resource conservation and environmental protection are combined. In these agencies, the effect of the combined structure persists, even when other traditional predictors of regulatory behavior are considered, including the states' environmental ideology and the partisanship of state legislatures and governors.Includes bibliographical references (pages 130-139)

Higher Order Mode Damping in Superconducting Spoke Cavities

Parasitic higher order modes (HOMs) can be severely detrimental to the performance of superconducting cavities. For this reason, the mode spectrum and beam coupling strength must be examined in detail to determine which modes must be damped. One advantage of the spoke cavity geometry is that couplers can be placed on the outer body of the cavity rather than in the beam line space. We present an overview of the HOM properties of spoke cavities and methods for suppressing the most harmful ones

Multipacting Analysis of High-Velocity Superconducting Spoke Resonators

Some of the advantages of superconducting spoke cavities are currently being investigated for the high-velocity regime. When determining a final, optimized geometry, one must consider the possible limiting effects multipacting could have on the cavity. We report on the results of analytical calculations and numerical simulations of multipacting electrons in superconducting spoke cavities and methods for reducing their impact

Superconducting Spoke Cavities For High-Velocity Applications

To date, superconducting spoke cavities have been designed, developed, and tested for particle velocities up to β0 ~ to 0.6, but there is a growing interest in possible applications of multispoke cavities for high-velocity applications. We have explored the design parameter space for low-frequency, high-velocity, double-spoke superconducting cavities in order to determine how each design parameter affects the electromagnetic properties, in particular the surface electromagnetic fields and the shunt impedance. We present detailed design for cavities operating at 325 and 352 MHz and optimized for β0 = 0.82 and 1

Bioinspired low-frequency material characterisation

New-coded signals, transmitted by high-sensitivity broadband transducers in the 40–200 kHz range, allow subwavelength material discrimination and thickness determination of polypropylene, polyvinylchloride, and brass samples. Frequency domain spectra enable simultaneous measurement of material properties including longitudinal sound velocity and the attenuation constant as well as thickness measurements. Laboratory test measurements agree well with model results, with sound velocity prediction errors of less than 1%, and thickness discrimination of at least wavelength/15. The resolution of these measurements has only been matched in the past through methods that utilise higher frequencies. The ability to obtain the same resolution using low frequencies has many advantages, particularly when dealing with highly attenuating materials. This approach differs significantly from past biomimetic approaches where actual or simulated animal signals have been used and consequently has the potential for application in a range of fields where both improved penetration and high resolution are required, such as nondestructive testing and evaluation, geophysics, and medical physics

Design of Superconducting Multi-Spoke Cavities for High Velocity Applications

Superconducting spoke cavities have been designed and tested for particle velocities up to β0 ~ 0.6 and are currently being designed for velocities up to β0 = 1. We present the electromagnetic designs for two-spoke cavities operating at 325 MHz for β0 = 0.82 and β0 = 1