Evaluation of advanced light scattering technology for microgravity experiments

The capabilities of modern light scattering equipment and the uses it might have in studying processes in microgravity are evaluated. Emphasis is on the resolution of polydisperse systems. This choice was made since a major use of light scattering was expected to be the study of crystal growth of macromolecules in low gravity environments. An evaluation of a modern photon correlation spectrometer and a Mie spectrometer is presented

Attitude-behavior relationships: A comparison of the Fishbein-Ajzen and Bentler-Speckart models

This study compared the Fishbein-Ajzen (1975) model of attitude-behavior relationships with Bentler-Speckart\u27s (1979) modifications of the model. Subjects were 236 undergraduate college students and the measures of behavior were repeated self-reports of class attendance. An analysis of linear structural relationships, using multiple indicators for each underlying construct, supported the Bentler-Speckart addition to the Fishbein- Aj zen model of prior behavior as a direct causal influence on both subsequent behavior and behavioral intentions. However, consistent with the original Fishbein-Ajzen model, a direct causal path from attitude to subsequent behavioral intentions was not found. Directions for future studies and respecification of the model were discussed

The integration of a child with autism into a fourth grade class : a case study.

Over the past twenty years, an increasing number of schools have been integrating individuals with autism into general education classes. Although the benefits of this practice have been questioned, there has been little formal research on this subject. This qualitative study attempted to examine the short-term effects of the integration of one child with autism, Karl, into his neighborhood elementary school. Data were collected through direct observation in the classroom and interviews with the classroom teacher, support staff, the parents of the child who has autism, the parents of two classmates, the child with autism, and two classmates. The observations and interview questions focused on the behavior and perceptions of (a) the child with autism, (b) two classmates and (c) the adults participating in the integration. The participants identified locations (where the student is) and social opportunities (who the student is with) as important characteristics of an integration program, rather than strictly adhering to formal definitions of mainstreaming, integration, and inclusion. Although many of the participants were aware of the characteristics of autism, their definition of Karl was focused on who he was and what he did, rather than his label. Class membership included (a) the activities in which Karl participated, (b) the peers with whom he associated, (c) the changes that occurred in the classroom, (d) his ability to blend in, and (e) his perception of himself as a member of the class. The success of this integration program was attributed to the addition of a one-to-one integration assistant and the communication, consistency, support, and flexibility of the integration team. This study provides a rare view of an integration program that worked for a student with autism. Regardless of the characteristics unique to Karl, the participants, and this situation, this study demonstrates that it is possible to integrate a student with autism, provided the appropriate resources are made available

Turbulence in the coastal environment during HYCODE

A tall tripod equipped with two acoustic Doppler velocimeters (ADVs) was deployed at a water depth of 15 m off the coast of New Jersey near the LEO-15 site. Sensors were co-located near the bottom to provide good estimates of Reynolds stress. Thermistors were located within several centimeters of the velocity sample volume to provide simultaneously sampled estimates of turbulent temperature variance and vertical temperature flux. One of the ADVs was equipped with a pressure and a temperature sensor. A wave/tide gauge was placed at 4 meters above bottom. The instruments were deployed late July through early December of 2000 and late June through early August of 2001. For the 2001 deployment, a single beam acoustic Doppler velocity sensor (DopBeam) was added to measure high frequency vertical velocity variance and echo intensity within the bottom boundary layer. A second tripod was deployed nearby and was equipped with an array of LISST sensors and an MSCAT. The purpose of this report is to document the instrumentation and deployment of the tripods and to document the tall tripod data by providing a description of the processing and data formats, time-series summaries of the burst averaged data along with preliminary analyses.Funding was provided by the Office of Naval Research under Contract No. N00014-99-1-0213

Insured Pension Funds Who Benefits?

The defined pension plans of many firms are underfunded.  The Pension Benefits Guaranty Corporation was created to protect retirees, but who really benefits

Energy Prices And The Global Economic Recovery

Global economies seem on their way to recovery after the recent downturn.  However, one dilemma has emerged that could halt expansion and raise the specter of inflation – energy prices

Observations of cross-shelf flow driven by cross-shelf winds on the inner continental shelf

Author Posting. © American Meteorological Society, 2008. This article is posted here by permission of American Meteorological Society for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Journal of Physical Oceanography 38 (2008): 2358-2378, doi:10.1175/2008JPO3990.1.Six-yr-long time series of winds, waves, and water velocity from a cabled coastal observatory in 12 m of water reveal the separate dependence of the cross-shelf velocity profile on cross-shelf and along-shelf winds, waves, and tides. During small waves, cross-shelf wind is the dominant mechanism driving the cross-shelf circulation after tides and tidal residual motions are removed. The along-shelf wind does not drive a substantial cross-shelf circulation. During offshore winds, the cross-shelf circulation is offshore in the upper water column and onshore in the lower water column, with roughly equal and opposite volume transports in the surface and bottom layers. During onshore winds, the circulation is nearly the reverse. The observed profiles and cross-shelf transport in the surface layer during winter agree with a simple two-dimensional unstratified model of cross-shelf wind stress forcing. The cross-shelf velocity profile is more vertically sheared and the surface layer transport is stronger in summer than in winter for a given offshore wind stress. During large waves, the cross-shelf circulation is no longer roughly symmetric in the wind direction. For onshore winds, the cross-shelf velocity profile is nearly vertically uniform, because the wind- and wave-driven shears cancel; for offshore winds, the profile is strongly vertically sheared because the wind- and wave-driven shears have the same sign. The Lagrangian velocity profile in winter is similar to the part of the Eulerian velocity profile due to cross-shelf wind stress alone, because the contribution of Stokes drift to the Lagrangian velocity approximately cancels the contribution of waves to the Eulerian velocity.This research was funded by the Ocean Sciences Division of the National Science Foundation under Grants OCE-0241292 and OCE-0548961 and by National Aeronautics and Space Administration Headquarters under Grant NNG04GL03G and the Earth System Science Fellowship Grant NNG04GQ14H. MVCO is partly funded by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and the Jewett/EDUC/Harrison Foundation

Vorticity measurements within the bottom boundary layer in the Strait of Juan De Fuca

Electromagnetic fluctuations and turbulent vorticity fluctuations were measured over a nine month period in the strong tidal flows of the Strait of Juan De Fuca off the coast of the Olympic Peninsula of Washington. A collaborative experiment was designed to test the hypothesis that electromagnetic fluctuations at the sea floor are forced by turbulent vorticity fluctuations in the bottom boundary layer. This report describes the measurement of turbulent vorticity fluctuations and the associated analysis which focuses on testing existing theoretical predictions for the inertial subrange and on characterizing spectra at frequencies below the inertial subrange.Funding was provided by the Office of Naval Research through Grant No. N00014-94-I-0436

Turbulence in the shallow nearshore environment during SANDYDUCK '97

An array of five acoustic Doppler velocimeters (ADV), which produce high quality measurements of the three-dimensional velocity vector in a sample volume with a scale of one centimeter, was deployed from late August through late November of 1997 at a water depth of approximately 4.5 m off Duck, North Carolina. The sensors were deployed near the sea floor but above the centimeters-thick wave boundary layer, and the sampling scheme was designed to resolve turbulence statistics averaged over tens of minutes, much longer than typical wave periods but shorter than time scales associated with variablity of energetic wind-driven and wave-driven alongshore flows.Funding was provided by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. OCE-9810609, the Mellon Foundation and Rinehart Coastal Research Center