Estimated Probabililty of Chest Injury During an International Space Station Mission

The Integrated Medical Model (IMM) is a decision support tool that is useful to spaceflight mission planners and medical system designers when assessing risks and optimizing medical systems. The IMM project maintains a database of medical conditions that could occur during a spaceflight. The IMM project is in the process of assigning an incidence rate, the associated functional impairment, and a best and a worst case end state for each condition. The purpose of this work was to develop the IMM Chest Injury Module (CIM). The CIM calculates the incidence rate of chest injury per person-year of spaceflight on the International Space Station (ISS). The CIM was built so that the probability of chest injury during one year on ISS could be predicted. These results will be incorporated into the IMM Chest Injury Clinical Finding Form and used within the parent IMM model

3-dimensional Cauchy-Riemann structures and 2nd order ordinary differential equations

The equivalence problem for second order ODEs given modulo point transformations is solved in full analogy with the equivalence problem of nondegenerate 3-dimensional CR structures. This approach enables an analog of the Feffereman metrics to be defined. The conformal class of these (split signature) metrics is well defined by each point equivalence class of second order ODEs. Its conformal curvature is interpreted in terms of the basic point invariants of the corresponding class of ODEs

Arecibo Timing and Single Pulse Observations of 18 Pulsars

We present new results of timing and single pulse measurements for 18 radio pulsars discovered in 1993 - 1997 by the Penn State/NRL declination-strip survey conducted with the 305-m Arecibo telescope at 430 MHz. Long-term timing measurements have led to significant improvements of the rotational and the astrometric parameters of these sources, including the millisecond pulsar, PSR J1709+2313, and the pulsar located within the supernova remnant S147, PSR J0538+2817. Single pulse studies of the brightest objects in the sample have revealed an unusual "bursting" pulsar, PSR J1752+2359, two new drifting subpulse pulsars, PSR J1649+2533 and PSR J2155+2813, and another example of a pulsar with profile mode changes, PSR J1746+2540. PSR J1752+2359 is characterized by bursts of emission, which appear once every 3-5 min. and decay exponentially on a ~45 sec timescale. PSR J1649+2533 spends ~30% of the time in a null state with no detectable radio emission.Comment: submitted to Ap

Isolated and dynamical horizons and their applications

Over the past three decades, black holes have played an important role in quantum gravity, mathematical physics, numerical relativity and gravitational wave phenomenology. However, conceptual settings and mathematical models used to discuss them have varied considerably from one area to another. Over the last five years a new, quasi-local framework was introduced to analyze diverse facets of black holes in a unified manner. In this framework, evolving black holes are modeled by dynamical horizons and black holes in equilibrium by isolated horizons. We review basic properties of these horizons and summarize applications to mathematical physics, numerical relativity and quantum gravity. This paradigm has led to significant generalizations of several results in black hole physics. Specifically, it has introduced a more physical setting for black hole thermodynamics and for black hole entropy calculations in quantum gravity; suggested a phenomenological model for hairy black holes; provided novel techniques to extract physics from numerical simulations; and led to new laws governing the dynamics of black holes in exact general relativity.Comment: 77 pages, 12 figures. Typos and references correcte

Problem of Time in Quantum Gravity

The Problem of Time occurs because the `time' of GR and of ordinary Quantum Theory are mutually incompatible notions. This is problematic in trying to replace these two branches of physics with a single framework in situations in which the conditions of both apply, e.g. in black holes or in the very early universe. Emphasis in this Review is on the Problem of Time being multi-faceted and on the nature of each of the eight principal facets. Namely, the Frozen Formalism Problem, Configurational Relationalism Problem (formerly Sandwich Problem), Foliation Dependence Problem, Constraint Closure Problem (formerly Functional Evolution Problem), Multiple Choice Problem, Global Problem of Time, Problem of Beables (alias Problem of Observables) and Spacetime Reconstruction/Replacement Problem. Strategizing in this Review is not just centred about the Frozen Formalism Problem facet, but rather about each of the eight facets. Particular emphasis is placed upon A) relationalism as an underpinning of the facets and as a selector of particular strategies (especially a modification of Barbour relationalism, though also with some consideration of Rovelli relationalism). B) Classifying approaches by the full ordering in which they embrace constrain, quantize, find time/history and find observables, rather than only by partial orderings such as "Dirac-quantize". C) Foliation (in)dependence and Spacetime Reconstruction for a wide range of physical theories, strategizing centred about the Problem of Beables, the Patching Approach to the Global Problem of Time, and the role of the question-types considered in physics. D) The Halliwell- and Gambini-Porto-Pullin-type combined Strategies in the context of semiclassical quantum cosmology.Comment: Invited Review: 26 pages including 2 Figures. This v2 has a number of minor improvements and correction

The influence of the self in partner behavior interpretation

This study examined how aspects of the self (i.e. self-concept clarity, self-expansion, and inclusion of the other in the self) influence relationship attributions. A sample of 92 (20 males, 72 females) college students in a relationship received a series of surveys assessing their levels of self-concept clarity, self-expansion, and inclusion of the other in the self Additionally, they completed a survey assessing whether they make relationship enhancing attributions when interpreting behavior. Self expansion and inclusion of the other in the self positively correlated with relationship enhancing attributions. However, there was no significant relationship between self-concept clarity and relationship enhancing attributions. Regression analyses revealed that self-expansion was more important for making relationship enhancing attributions than inclusion of the other in the self. Overall, results suggest that those high on self-expansion and inclusion of the other in the self will make attributions that enhance their relationship

Stationary Black Holes: Uniqueness and Beyond

The spectrum of known black-hole solutions to the stationary Einstein equations has been steadily increasing, sometimes in unexpected ways. In particular, it has turned out that not all black-hole-equilibrium configurations are characterized by their mass, angular momentum and global charges. Moreover, the high degree of symmetry displayed by vacuum and electro-vacuum black-hole spacetimes ceases to exist in self-gravitating non-linear field theories. This text aims to review some developments in the subject and to discuss them in light of the uniqueness theorem for the Einstein-Maxwell system.Comment: Major update of the original version by Markus Heusler from 1998. Piotr T. Chru\'sciel and Jo\~ao Lopes Costa succeeded to this review's authorship. Significantly restructured and updated all sections; changes are too numerous to be usefully described here. The number of references increased from 186 to 32

Quantization of Midisuperspace Models

We give a comprehensive review of the quantization of midisuperspace models. Though the main focus of the paper is on quantum aspects, we also provide an introduction to several classical points related to the definition of these models. We cover some important issues, in particular, the use of the principle of symmetric criticality as a very useful tool to obtain the required Hamiltonian formulations. Two main types of reductions are discussed: those involving metrics with two Killing vector fields and spherically symmetric models. We also review the more general models obtained by coupling matter fields to these systems. Throughout the paper we give separate discussions for standard quantizations using geometrodynamical variables and those relying on loop quantum gravity inspired methods.Comment: To appear in Living Review in Relativit

LCA applied to perennial cropping systems: a review focused on the farm stage

International audienc

Search for rare quark-annihilation decays, B --> Ds(*) Phi

We report on searches for B- --> Ds- Phi and B- --> Ds*- Phi. In the context of the Standard Model, these decays are expected to be highly suppressed since they proceed through annihilation of the b and u-bar quarks in the B- meson. Our results are based on 234 million Upsilon(4S) --> B Bbar decays collected with the BABAR detector at SLAC. We find no evidence for these decays, and we set Bayesian 90% confidence level upper limits on the branching fractions BF(B- --> Ds- Phi) Ds*- Phi)<1.2x10^(-5). These results are consistent with Standard Model expectations.Comment: 8 pages, 3 postscript figues, submitted to Phys. Rev. D (Rapid Communications