Possible applications of soaring technology to drag reduction in powered general aviation aircraft

A brief examination of the performance figures achieved by modern soaring machines and a little reflection on the often huge disparity in L/D values between sailplanes and GA aircraft indicates that careful attention to lessons learned in sailplane design and manufacture hold realistic promise for substantial gains in the aerodynamic efficiency of several GA types

EKG isolator

Light beam transmits heartbeat signal from electrodes on patient to electrocardiograph without exposing patient to possible severe electrical shock. System provides complete isolation between patient and EKG instrumentation

Three methods of presenting flight vector information in a head-up display during simulated STOL approaches

A simulator study was conducted to determine the usefulness of adding flight path vector symbology to a head-up display designed to improve glide-slope tracking performance during steep 7.5 deg visual approaches in STOL aircraft. All displays included a fixed attitude symbol, a pitch- and roll-stabilized horizon bar, and a glide-slope reference bar parallel to and 7.5 deg below the horizon bar. The displays differed with respect to the flight-path marker (FPM) symbol: display 1 had no FPM symbol; display 2 had an air-referenced FPM, and display 3 had a ground-referenced FPM. No differences between displays 1 and 2 were found on any of the performance measures. Display 3 was found to decrease height error in the early part of the approach and to reduce descent rate variation over the entire approach. Two measures of workload did not indicate any differences between the displays

The limitations of speech control: perceptions of provision of speech-driven environmental controls

This study set out to collect data from assistive technology professionals about their provision of speech-driven environmental control systems. This study is part of a larger study looking at developing a new speech-driven environmental control system

Sustaining Collection Value: Managing Collection/Item Metadata Relationships

Many aspects of managing collection/item metadata relationships are critical to sustaining collection value over time. Metadata at the collection-level not only provides context for finding, understanding, and using the items in the collection, but is often essential to the particular research and scholarly activities the collection is designed to support. Contemporary retrieval systems, which search across collections, usually ignore collection level metadata. Alternative approaches, informed by collection-level information, will require an understanding of the various kinds of relationships that can obtain between collection-level and item-level metadata. This paper outlines the problem and describes a project that is developing a logic-based framework for classifying collection-level/item-level metadata relationships. This framework will support (i) metadata specification developers defining metadata elements, (ii) metadata librarians describing objects, and (iii) system designers implementing systems that help users take advantage of collection-level metadata.Institute for Museum and Libary Services (Grant #LG06070020)published or submitted for publicationis peer reviewe

Six-Dimensional (1,0) Superconformal Models and Higher Gauge Theory

We analyze the gauge structure of a recently proposed superconformal field theory in six dimensions. We find that this structure amounts to a weak Courant-Dorfman algebra, which, in turn, can be interpreted as a strong homotopy Lie algebra. This suggests that the superconformal field theory is closely related to higher gauge theory, describing the parallel transport of extended objects. Indeed we find that, under certain restrictions, the field content and gauge transformations reduce to those of higher gauge theory. We also present a number of interesting examples of admissible gauge structures such as the structure Lie 2-algebra of an abelian gerbe, differential crossed modules, the 3-algebras of M2-brane models and string Lie 2-algebras.Comment: 31+1 pages, presentation slightly improved, version published in JM