Navigation by satellite using two-way range and doppler data

Navigation by satellite using two-way range and Doppler dat

The development of party activism in Russia: a local perspective

One of the great opportunities afforded to the political scientist since the fall of the Soviet Union has been that of examining politics ‘on the ground’ in non-metropolitan areas. The current study addresses the development of regional and local political party organisations in post-communist Russia. Focusing on the six movements which won representation in the 1999 election to the State Duma, it uses three case study regions in the middle Volga - the Republic of Tatarstan and the provinces of Samara and Ul’yanovsk - to examine party activity at the regional and district levels. Based on extensive fieldwork in Russia, the investigation utilises a broad range of local sources and interviews in its analysis. However, in order to avoid the danger of simply providing an observational study of local politics, wide use is also made of national opinion survey and focus group data. The study begins by examining the context of party activity in Russia, giving a brief history of the party system and its institutional framework. Thereafter, examination is made of the role of parties in regional and local politics, based mainly on official electoral statistics from 1995-2001. This analysis begins by looking at the Russian Federation’s eighty-nine regions in a comparative context, before narrowing the focus to the three case study regions. Parties’ activities, and their interactions with the respective political systems in each region, are examined in detail. Thereafter, the functioning of parties at three levels - federal, regional and district - is examined, using both theoretical and empirical methods. The study goes on to examine the role played by members in Russia’s political parties, most specifically at a regional and local level, utilising survey and focus group material (undertaken specifically for this study) to case new light on the entry patterns, bases of activism, and attitudes of party members in the middle Volga. Furthermore, parties are examined in the context of the 1999-2001 electoral cycle. This analysis concludes that, in the federal elections, particularly that to the State Duma in December 1999, regional nuances dominated over the national campaign; but that party participation was limited in region-specific elections

Function-based Design Tools for Analyzing the Behavior and Sensitivity of Complex Systems During Conceptual Design

Complex engineering systems involve large numbers of functional elements. Each functional element can exhibit complex behavior itself. Ensuring the ability of such systems to meet the customer's needs and requirements requires modeling the behavior of these systems. Behavioral modeling allows a quantitative assessment of the ability of a system to meet specific requirements. However, modeling the behavior of complex systems is difficult due to the complexity of the elements involved and more importantly the complexity of these elements' interactions. In prior work, formal functional modeling techniques have been applied as a means of performing a qualitative decomposition of systems to ensure that needs and requirements are addressed by the functional elements of the system. Extending this functional decomposition to a quantitative representation of the behavior of a system represents a significant opportunity to improve the design process of complex systems. To this end, a functionality-based behavioral modeling framework is proposed along with a sensitivity analysis method to support the design process of complex systems. These design tools have been implemented in a computational framework and have been used to model the behavior of various engineering systems to demonstrate their maturity, application and effectiveness. The most significant result is a multi-fidelity model of a hybrid internal combustion-electric racecar powertrain that enabled a comprehensive quantitative study of longitudinal vehicle performance during various stages in the design process. This model was developed using the functionality-based framework and allowed a thorough exploration of the design space at various levels of fidelity. The functionality-based sensitivity analysis implemented along with the behavioral modeling approach provides measures similar to a variance-based approach with a computation burden of a local approach. The use of a functional decomposition in both the behavioral modeling and sensitivity analysis significantly contributes to the flexibility of the models and their application in current and future design efforts. This contribution was demonstrated in the application of the model to the 2009 Texas A&M Formula Hybrid powertrain design

Changes Suggested in Washington Practice and Procedure: Comparative Analysis of State Rules and Statutes with New Federal Rules Points to Desirable Amendments

In accordance with action taken at the July Convention of the Washington State Bar Association, the Board of Governors appointed a committee (Paul P. Ashley of Seattle, chairman) on Judicial Administration to concern itself with the matters considered and reported upon by the section on Judicial Administration of the American Bar Association. This committee divided itself into sections, and to each was assigned one of the subjects under consideration, including Pre-trial Procedure, Improvement in the Law of Evidence, Trial Practice and Administrative Agencies and Tribunals. Among other things the American Bar Association recommended that the State Bar Associations undertake to bring state practice into close conformity with the Rules of Civil Procedure for the District Courts of the United States, as recently adopted. The section on this subject consists of Honorable George Donworth, formerly District Judge for the Western District of Washington and member of the advisory committee appointed by the United States Supreme Court for the drafting of the new federal rules; the Honorable John S. Robinson, Justice of the Supreme Court of the State of Washington; Mr. Elwood Hutchinson, member of the Yakima Bar and winner of the Ross A. B. A. award in 1937, and Mr. L. B. Hamblen of Spokane, chairman. Already noted for their leadership in matters of judicial reform, the Bench and Bar of the state of Washington now have at their disposal the specific proposals formulated after careful study by these able men. Suggestions and criticisms from the Bar are invited and, in light of those received, further study will be given to this material before it is presented to the annual convention in July

Ablation debris control by means of closed thick film filtered water immersion

The performance of laser ablation generated debris control by means of open immersion techniques have been shown to be limited by flow surface ripple effects on the beam and the action of ablation plume pressure loss by splashing of the immersion fluid. To eradicate these issues a closed technique has been developed which ensured a controlled geometry for both the optical interfaces of the flowing liquid film. This had the action of preventing splashing, ensuring repeatable machining conditions and allowed for control of liquid flow velocity. To investigate the performance benefits of this closed immersion technique bisphenol A polycarbonate samples have been machined using filtered water at a number of flow velocities. The results demonstrate the efficacy of the closed immersion technique: a 93% decrease in debris is produced when machining under closed filtered water immersion; the average debris particle size becomes larger, with an equal proportion of small and medium sized debris being produced when laser machining under closed flowing filtered water immersion; large debris is shown to be displaced further by a given flow velocity than smaller debris, showing that the action of flow turbulence in the duct has more impact on smaller debris. Low flow velocities were found to be less effective at controlling the positional trend of deposition of laser ablation generated debris than high flow velocities; but, use of excessive flow velocities resulted in turbulence motivated deposition. This work is of interest to the laser micromachining community and may aide in the manufacture of 2.5D laser etched patterns covering large area wafers and could be applied to a range of wavelengths and laser types

HOPE Longitudinal Study: First Year Results

The first wave of the six-year HOPE Longitudinal Study, commissioned by the Council for School Performance and partially sponsored by the Board of Regents, addresses three major questions. First, to what extent do thirteen to fifteen-year-olds and their parents know about the eligibility requirements of the HOPE Scholarship and the associated benefits? Second, what factors affect the expectations students form about attending and graduating from college? Finally, seventh and eighth graders were asked about the new PREP It Up! Program to determine how they heard about the program and to what extent they are able to recall college prep curriculum requirements.The survey was undertaken during the spring of 1997. Given that a database of students with telephone numbers is generally not available, the Applied Research Center called over 44,000 households throughout the state to locate and gain consent of 800 students and their parents to participate in the study

A hybrid sensitivity analysis for use in early design

Sensitivity analyses are frequently used during the design of engineering systems to qualify and quantify the effect of parametric variation i

Hydrogeology and Ground-Water Monitoring of Coal-Ash Disposal Sites in a Karst Terrane near Burnside, South-Central Kentucky

The effects of two coal-ash disposal facilities on ground-water quality at the John Sherman Cooper Power Plant, located in a karst region of south-central Kentucky, were evaluated using dye traces in springs. Springs were used for monitoring rather than wells, because in a karst terrane wells are unlikely to intercept individual conduits. A closed-out ash pond located over a conduit-flow system discharges to three springs in the upper Salem and Warsaw Formations along Lake Cumberland. Water discharging from these downgradient springs is similar to springs unaffected by ash-disposal facilities and is a calcium-bicarbonate type. No constituent concentrations found in this flow system exceeded maximum contaminant levels (MCL’s) or secondary maximum contaminant levels (SMCL’s) defined by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. An active ash pond is situated over another conduit-flow system that discharges to springs in the lower St. Louis Limestone. Water discharging from these downgradient springs is intermediate between the calciumbicarbonate type of the unaffected springs and the calcium-sulfate type of the active ash pond. No constituent concentrations found in this flow system exceeded MCL’s or SMCL’s. A third flow system associated with a coal stockpile adjacent to the plant is delineated by springs in the St. Louis Limestone and the Salem and Warsaw Formations that discharge calcium-sulfate type water. Chromium and cadmium concentrations exceeded MCL’s in at least one sample from this flow system. Iron, manganese, sulfate, and total dissolved solid concentrations exceeded SMCL’s in at least one sample. The closed-out ash pond appears to have no adverse impact on the water quality, nor does the active ash pond. In general, the coal stockpile has a more adverse impact on ground-water quality in the study area than the ash-disposal facilities

Symptom Burden in Long-Term Survivors of Head and Neck Cancer: Patient-Reported Versus Clinical Data

Introduction: The symptom burden faced by long-term head and neck cancer survivors is not well understood. In addition, the accuracy of clinical data sources for symptom ascertainment is not clear. Objective: To 1) describe the prevalence of symptoms in 5-year survivors of head and neck cancer, and 2) to evaluate agreement between symptoms obtained via self-report and symptoms obtained from clinical data sources. Methods: We recruited 5-year survivors of head and neck cancer enrolled at Kaiser Permanente Washington (n = 54). Symptoms were assessed using the MD Anderson Symptom Inventory head and neck cancer module. For each symptom, we assessed the agreement of the patient\u27s survey response ( gold standard ) with the 1) medical chart and 2) administrative health care claims data. We computed the sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV), and negative predictive value, along with their 95 percent confidence intervals, for each clinical data source. Results: Eighty percent of patients responded. Nearly all participants (95 percent) reported experiencing at least one symptom from the MDASI-HN, and 93 percent reported two or more symptoms. Among patients reporting a given symptom, there was generally no evidence of the symptom from either clinical data source (i.e., sensitivity was generally no greater than 40 percent). The specificity and PPV of the clinical data sources were generally higher than the sensitivity. Conclusion: Relying only on medical chart review and/or administrative health data would substantially underestimate symptom burden in long-term head and neck cancer survivors