Internet Outreach / A Guide for Health Promoters & Peer Educators

This manual brings together the experiences of an Internet outreach project conducted by theWestern Australian AIDS Council (WAAC) and the Western Australian Centre for Health PromotionResearch (WACHPR) at Curtin University of Technology along with other selected research. It presents guidelines on the development and implementation of Internet outreach programs for health promotion practitioners and peer education workers.It is divided into sections for ease of navigation, including an overview of Internet outreach as a health promotion strategy and the CyberReach project (through the implementation of which the contents were produced). There are additional components to support agencies interested in learning more about whether Internet outreach may be a useful strategy for them in expanding the range of their current services.Who this manual is for: Anyone working in health service delivery with an interest in developing Internet-based health promotion outreach programs. Although based on a project targeting same sex attracted youth (SSAY) and men who have sex with men (MSM), we believe there are aspects applicable to health practitioners working with other groups in a range of health and human services areas

Dynamical Decoupling in Optical Fibers: Preserving Polarization Qubits from Birefringent Dephasing

One of the major challenges in quantum computation has been to preserve the coherence of a quantum system against dephasing effects of the environment. The information stored in photon polarization, for example, is quickly lost due to such dephasing, and it is crucial to preserve the input states when one tries to transmit quantum information encoded in the photons through a communication channel. We propose a dynamical decoupling sequence to protect photonic qubits from dephasing by integrating wave plates into optical fiber at prescribed locations. We simulate random birefringent noise along realistic lengths of optical fiber and study preservation of polarization qubits through such fibers enhanced with Carr-Purcell-Meiboom-Gill (CPMG) dynamical decoupling. This technique can maintain photonic qubit coherence at high fidelity, making a step towards achieving scalable and useful quantum communication with photonic qubits.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figure

DSCAM promotes axon fasciculation and growth in the developing optic pathway

Acknowledgments We thank Drs. Robert Burgess, Carol Mason, and Eloisa Herrera for helpful discussions; Dr. Thomas Theil for his invaluable advice on the slice culture methods; Francesca Lamb and Emma Smith for technical assistance; and the Institute of Medical Sciences Microscopy and Imaging Facility for assistance with confocal microscopy. This work was supported by a Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) doctoral training award studentship and a BBSRC project grant (BB/J00815X/1). Freely available online through the PNAS open access option.Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Re-analysis of ammonia spectra: Updating the HITRAN 14NH3 database

AbstractThe data incorporated in the HITRAN database for 14NH3 are analyzed using a comprehensive and consistent set of quantum numbers, empirical lower energy levels and the BYTe variationally calculated line list as reference points. Labelings are checked to ensure that they obey both the usual selection rules and the HITRAN labeling formalisms; the problems identified are corrected where possible. Further assignments are brought into question by combination difference (CD) checking of implied upper energy levels. The CD analysis yields an 89% complete 14NH3 energy level list up to 6610cm−1 and J=21, self-consistent to 0.1cm−1. In combination with the 1723 previously unassigned and unlabeled lines in HITRAN a total of 2529 problem lines were identified for re-analysis. The compiled energy level list was used to label and assign the set of problem transitions, resulting in a total of 249 new assignments and a further 368 new labelings. Assignment by comparison with the reference line list resulted in 111 further new line assignments and 14 new labelings. Intensities are checked against recent measurements and BYTe. New intensities are proposed for the ν2 band with new intensities and line positions for the 2ν2−ν2 and new line lists are created for the ν2−ν2, ν2−ν4 and ν4−ν4 bands. BYTe band intensities are analyzed to identify other regions of missing intensity

The AUSGeoid09 model of the Australian Height Datum

AUSGeoid09 is the new Australia-wide gravimetric quasigeoid model that has been a posteriori fitted to the Australian Height Datum (AHD) so as to provide a product that is practically useful for the more direct determination of AHD heights from Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS). This approach is necessary because the AHD is predominantly a third-order vertical datum that contains a ~1 m north-south tilt and ~0.5 m regional distortions with respect to the quasigeoid, meaning that GNSS-gravimetric-quasigeoid and AHD heights are inconsistent. Since the AHD remains the official vertical datum in Australia, it is necessary to provide GNSS users with effective means of recovering AHD heights. The gravimetric component of the quasigeoid model was computed using a hybrid of the remove-compute-restore technique with a degree-40 deterministically modified kernel over a one-degree spherical cap, which is superior to the remove-compute-restore technique alone in Australia (with or without a cap). This is because the modified kernel and cap combine to filter long-wavelength errors from the terrestrial gravity anomalies. The zero-tide EGM2008 global gravitational model to degree and order 2190 was used as the reference field.Other input data are: ~1.4 million land gravity anomalies from Geoscience Australia, 1'x1' DNSC2008GRA altimeter-derived gravity anomalies offshore, the 9"x9" GEODATA-DEM9S Australian digital elevation model, and a readjustment of Australian National Levelling Network (ANLN) constrained to the CARS2006 dynamic ocean topography model. In order to determine the numerical integration parameters for the modified kernel, the gravimetric component of AUSGeoid09 was compared with 911 GNSS-observed ellipsoidal heights at benchmarks. The standard deviation of fit to the GNSS-AHD heights is 222 mm, which dropped to 134 mm for the readjusted GNSS-ANLN heights, showing that careful consideration now needs to be given to the quality of the levelling data used to assess gravimetric quasigeoid models. The publicly released version of AUSGeoid09 also includes a geometric component that models the difference between the gravimetric quasigeoid and the zero surface of the AHD at 6,794 benchmarks. This a posteriori fitting used least-squares collocation (LSC) in cross-validation mode to determine a correlation length of 75 km for the analytical covariance function, whereas the noise was taken from the estimated standard deviation of the GNSS ellipsoidal heights. After this LSC surface-fitting, the standard deviation of fit reduced to 30 mm, one third of which is attributable to the uncertainty in the GNSS ellipsoidal heights

Time-frequency analysis of extreme-mass-ratio inspiral signals in mock LISA data

Extreme-mass-ratio inspirals (EMRIs) of ~ 1-10 solar-mass compact objects into ~ million solar-mass massive black holes can serve as excellent probes of strong-field general relativity. The Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) is expected to detect gravitational wave signals from apprxomiately one hundred EMRIs per year, but the data analysis of EMRI signals poses a unique set of challenges due to their long duration and the extensive parameter space of possible signals. One possible approach is to carry out a search for EMRI tracks in the time-frequency domain. We have applied a time-frequency search to the data from the Mock LISA Data Challenge (MLDC) with promising results. Our analysis used the Hierarchical Algorithm for Clusters and Ridges to identify tracks in the time-frequency spectrogram corresponding to EMRI sources. We then estimated the EMRI source parameters from these tracks. In these proceedings, we discuss the results of this analysis of the MLDC round 1.3 data.Comment: Amaldi-7 conference proceedings; requires jpconf style file