A narrative review of adaptive testing and its application to medical education.

Adaptive testing has a long but largely unrecognized history. The advent of computer-based testing has created new opportunities to incorporate adaptive testing into conventional programmes of study. Relatively recently software has been developed that can automate the delivery of summative assessments that adapt by difficulty or content. Both types of adaptive testing require a large item bank that has been suitably quality assured. Adaptive testing by difficulty enables more reliable evaluation of individual candidate performance, although at the expense of transparency in decision making, and requiring unidirectional navigation. Adaptive testing by content enables reduction in compensation and targeted individual support to enable assurance of performance in all the required outcomes, although at the expense of discovery learning. With both types of adaptive testing, candidates are presented a different set of items to each other, and there is the potential for that to be perceived as unfair. However, when candidates of different abilities receive the same items, they may receive too many they can answer with ease, or too many that are too difficult to answer. Both situations may be considered unfair as neither provides the opportunity to demonstrate what they know. Adapting by difficulty addresses this. Similarly, when everyone is presented with the same items, but answer different items incorrectly, not providing individualized support and opportunity to demonstrate performance in all the required outcomes by revisiting content previously answered incorrectly could also be considered unfair; a point addressed when adapting by content. We review the educational rationale behind the evolution of adaptive testing and consider its inherent strengths and limitations. We explore the continuous pursuit of improvement of examination methodology and how software can facilitate personalized assessment. We highlight how this can serve as a catalyst for learning and refinement of curricula; fostering engagement of learner and educator alike

Multijet production in neutral current deep inelastic scattering at HERA and determination of α_{s}

Multijet production rates in neutral current deep inelastic scattering have been measured in the range of exchanged boson virtualities 10 5 GeV and –1 < η_{LAB}^{jet} < 2.5. Next-to-leading-order QCD calculations describe the data well. The value of the strong coupling constant α_{s} (M_{z}), determined from the ratio of the trijet to dijet cross sections, is α_{s} (M_{z}) = 0.1179 ± 0.0013 (stat.)_{-0.0046}^{+0.0028}(exp.)_{-0.0046}^{+0.0028}(th.)

Observation of isolated high-E_T photons in deep inelastic scattering

First measurements of cross sections for isolated prompt photon production in deep inelastic ep scattering have been made using the ZEUS detector at the HERA electron-proton collider using an integrated luminosity of 121 pb^-1. A signal for isolated photons in the transverse energy and rapidity ranges 5 < E_T^gamma < 10 GeV and -0.7 < eta^gamma < 0.9 was observed for virtualities of the exchanged photon of Q^2 > 35 GeV^2. Cross sections are presented for inclusive prompt photons and for those accompanied by a single jet in the range E_T^jet \geq 6 GeV and -1.5 \leq eta^jet < 1.8. Calculations at order alpha^3alpha_s describe the data reasonably well.Comment: 16 pages, 5 figure

Observation of Scaling Violations in Scaled Momentum Distributions at HERA

Charged particle production has been measured in deep inelastic scattering (DIS) events over a large range of $x$ and $Q^2$ using the ZEUS detector. The evolution of the scaled momentum, $x_p$, with $Q^2,$ in the range 10 to 1280 $GeV^2$, has been investigated in the current fragmentation region of the Breit frame. The results show clear evidence, in a single experiment, for scaling violations in scaled momenta as a function of $Q^2$.Comment: 21 pages including 4 figures, to be published in Physics Letters B. Two references adde

Measurement of Elastic Φ Photoproduction at HERA

The production of φ mesons in the reaction e+p → e+φp (φ → K+K-) at a median Q2 of 10-4 GeV2 has been studied with the ZEUS detector at HERA. The differential φ photoproduction cross section dσ/dt has an exponential shape and has been determined in the kinematic range 0.1 \u3c |t| \u3c 0.5 GeV2 and 60 \u3c W \u3c 80 GeV. An integrated cross section of σγp→φp = 0.96 ± 0.19+0.21-.18 μb has been obtained by extrapolating to t = 0. When compared to lower energy data, the results show a weak energy dependence of both σγp→φp and the slope of the t distribution. The φ decay angular distributions are consistent with s-channel helicity conservation. From lower energies to HERA energies, the features of φ photoproduction are compatible with those of a soft diffractive process

Measurement of beauty production in deep inelastic scattering at HERA

The beauty production cross section for deep inelastic scattering events with at least one hard jet in the Breit frame together with a muon has been measured, for photon virtualities Q^2 > 2 GeV^2, with the ZEUS detector at HERA using integrated luminosity of 72 pb^-1. The total visible cross section is sigma_b-bbar (ep -> e jet mu X) = 40.9 +- 5.7 (stat.) +6.0 -4.4 (syst.) pb. The next-to-leading order QCD prediction lies about 2.5 standard deviations below the data. The differential cross sections are in general consistent with the NLO QCD predictions; however at low values of Q^2, Bjorken x, and muon transverse momentum, and high values of jet transverse energy and muon pseudorapidity, the prediction is about two standard deviations below the data.Comment: 18 pages, 4 figure

Multijet production in neutral current deep inelastic scattering at HERA and determination of alpha_s

Multijet production rates in neutral current deep inelastic scattering have been measured in the range of exchanged boson virtualities 10 < Q2 < 5000 GeV2. The data were taken at the ep collider HERA with centre-of-mass energy sqrt(s) = 318 GeV using the ZEUS detector and correspond to an integrated luminosity of 82.2 pb-1. Jets were identified in the Breit frame using the k_T cluster algorithm in the longitudinally invariant inclusive mode. Measurements of differential dijet and trijet cross sections are presented as functions of jet transverse energy E_{T,B}{jet}, pseudorapidity eta_{LAB}{jet} and Q2 with E_{T,B}{jet} > 5 GeV and -1 < eta_{LAB}{jet} < 2.5. Next-to-leading-order QCD calculations describe the data well. The value of the strong coupling constant alpha_s(M_Z), determined from the ratio of the trijet to dijet cross sections, is alpha_s(M_Z) = 0.1179 pm 0.0013(stat.) {+0.0028}_{-0.0046}(exp.) {+0.0064}_{-0.0046}(th.)Comment: 22 pages, 5 figure

Measurement of (anti)deuteron and (anti)proton production in DIS at HERA

The first observation of (anti)deuterons in deep inelastic scattering at HERA has been made with the ZEUS detector at a centre-of-mass energy of 300--318 GeV using an integrated luminosity of 120 pb-1. The measurement was performed in the central rapidity region for transverse momentum per unit of mass in the range 0.3<p_T/M<0.7. The particle rates have been extracted and interpreted in terms of the coalescence model. The (anti)deuteron production yield is smaller than the (anti)proton yield by approximately three orders of magnitude, consistent with the world measurements.Comment: 26 pages, 9 figures, 5 tables, submitted to Nucl. Phys.

Measurement of event shapes in deep inelastic scattering at HERA

Inclusive event-shape variables have been measured in the current region of the Breit frame for neutral current deep inelastic ep scattering using an integrated luminosity of 45.0 pb^-1 collected with the ZEUS detector at HERA. The variables studied included thrust, jet broadening and invariant jet mass. The kinematic range covered was 10 < Q^2 < 20,480 GeV^2 and 6.10^-4 < x < 0.6, where Q^2 is the virtuality of the exchanged boson and x is the Bjorken variable. The Q dependence of the shape variables has been used in conjunction with NLO perturbative calculations and the Dokshitzer-Webber non-perturbative corrections (`power corrections') to investigate the validity of this approach.Comment: 7+25 pages, 6 figure

Observation of hard scattering in photoproduction events with a large rapidity gap at HERA

Events with a large rapidity gap and total transverse energy greater than 5 GeV have been observed in quasi-real photoproduction at HERA with the ZEUS detector. The distribution of these events as a function of the $\gamma p$ centre of mass energy is consistent with diffractive scattering. For total transverse energies above 12 GeV, the hadronic final states show predominantly a two-jet structure with each jet having a transverse energy greater than 4 GeV. For the two-jet events, little energy flow is found outside the jets. This observation is consistent with the hard scattering of a quasi-real photon with a colourless object in the proton.Comment: 19 pages, latex, 4 figures appended as uuencoded fil