Solar cell research, phase 2 Semiannual report

Radiation effects on properties of lithium solar cell

Expanding access to HIV counselling and testing at schools – the Manguzi experience

South Africa’s HIV epidemic disproportionately affects the youth.¹ The importance of knowing one’s status via voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) is recognised as a key strategy in fighting the epidemic and is reflected in the National Strategic Plan (NSP),2 which has set targets of 70% of all adults knowing their status by 2011 and 25% of all adults having been tested in the past 12 months. The Human Sciences Research Council survey in 2008¹ showed that 50.8% of all South Africans 15 years and older have had an HIV test, pointing to wider acceptance of VCT. As a further response to reaching the NSP target, the national HIV counselling and testing campaign3 was launched in April 2010 with a focus on mobilising all South Africans to be tested for HIV and ensuring that every South African knows their HIV status. Both the NSP and the national HIV testing campaign recognise the importance of community mobilisation and community-based models of VCT to achieve these targets. The NSP in particular has a goal to expand successful strategies of testing outside health care facilities to cover 70% of all districts by 2011. Young people are reluctant to use health care facilities, and several ‘youth friendly’ strategies have been tried to target adolescents. This case study serves to document the successes of one such community-based VCT strategy, aimed at young people in northern KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa

DC Electric Fields, Associated Plasma Drifts, and Irregularities Observed on the C/NOFS Satellite

Results are presented from the Vector Electric Field Investigation (VEFI) on the Air Force Communication/Navigation Outage Forecasting System (C/NOFS) satellite, a mission designed to understand, model, and forecast the presence of equatorial ionospheric irregularities. The VEFI instrument includes a vector DC electric field detector, a fixed-bias Langmuir probe operating in the ion saturation regime, a flux gate magnetometer, an optical lightning detector, and associated electronics including a burst memory. Compared to data obtained during more active solar conditions, the ambient DC electric fields and their associated E x B drifts are variable and somewhat weak, typically < 1 mV/m. Although average drift directions show similarities to those previously reported, eastward/outward during day and westward/downward at night, this pattern varies significantly with longitude and is not always present. Daytime vertical drifts near the magnetic equator are largest after sunrise, with smaller average velocities after noon. Little or no pre-reversal enhancement in the vertical drift near sunset is observed, attributable to the solar minimum conditions creating a much reduced neutral dynamo at the satellite altitude. The nighttime ionosphere is characterized by larger amplitude, structured electric fields, even where the plasma density appears nearly quiescent. Data from successive orbits reveal that the vertical drifts and plasma density are both clearly organized with longitude. The spread-F density depletions and corresponding electric fields that have been detected thus far have displayed a preponderance to appear between midnight and dawn. Associated with the narrow plasma depletions that are detected are broad spectra of electric field and plasma density irregularities for which a full vector set of measurements is available for detailed study. The VEFI data represents a new set of measurements that are germane to numerous fundamental aspects of the electrodynamics and irregularities inherent to the Earth s low latitude ionosphere

Striking the Balance: US Army Force Posture in Europe, 2028—A Study Sponsored by the Office of the Secretary of the Army

Within the context of Europe, the US Army must develop a force posture that best navigates the tensions between deterring or defeating armed conflict at an acceptable cost, successfully competing below armed conflict, and maintaining global responsiveness and institutional flexibility through the global operating model and dynamic force employment. While Russia’s economy, and consequently military capability will likely shrink over the next 10 years, which can make them more dangerous as the Kremlin continues to try to punch above its weight. The ideal force posture needs to accomplish a range of on-going and contingency missions and also be adaptive enough to remain viable despite any number of potential swings in resources, military balance, or the domestic politics of allies. This study recommends five possible strategic approaches and specifies what conditions and priorities optimize each. The principal investigators recommend investing in a multidomain alliance. This strategic approach enables the joint force and multinational partners to get the most of their capabilities and makes the best use of the Army’s top modernization priorities, such as long-range fires in a way that alters the strategic balance of a theater to avert a potentially catastrophic, albeit low probability, scenario of armed conflict. More importantly, this strategic approach is far more stable in a crisis, as it does not place policymakers in having to rush this critical, escalatory capability into theater at a moment of high tension. Moreover, invest in a multidomain alliance has the flexibility to allow a later build-up of heavy forces if conditions still warrant.https://press.armywarcollege.edu/monographs/1906/thumbnail.jp