639 research outputs found
Myths about HIV and AIDS among serodiscordant couples in Malawi
Purpose: The paper reports on research that uncovered myths about HIV and AIDS held by
serodiscordant couples in Malawi, and the sources of these myths. The paper reflects on how
the myths affect serodiscordant couples’ engagement with HIV and AIDS information.
Design
Van Manen's (1997) approach to analysis of phenomenological data is used to analyse data from indepth
interviews conducted in Malawi with 21 serodiscordant couples and 3 individuals who had
separated from their partners because of serodiscordance.
Findings
Serodiscordant couples in Malawi believe and hold on to some inaccurate HIV and AIDS information
that can be seen as ‘myths’. Some of these myths are perpetuated by official HIV and AIDS information
when it is translated into the local languages. Other myths derive from social norms of the societies
where the couples live.
Practical implications: The findings of this paper have practical implications for how HIV and AIDS
information providers should engage with target audiences to understand the origins of the myths they
hold. The findings also imply that some myths have technical, religious, moral and cultural bases which
need to be addressed before challenging the myth itself.
Originality/Value: Using real-life descriptions of experiences of HIV and AIDS information provided by
serodiscordant couples, the authors reveal how myths can affect engagement with the information. The
authors make recommendations on how to address myths in ways that contribute to a positive
experience of HIV and AIDS information by serodiscordant couple
Myths about HIV and AIDS among serodiscordant couples in Malawi
Purpose: The paper reports on research that uncovered myths about HIV and AIDS held by
serodiscordant couples in Malawi, and the sources of these myths. The paper reflects on how
the myths affect serodiscordant couples’ engagement with HIV and AIDS information.
Design
Van Manen's (1997) approach to analysis of phenomenological data is used to analyse data from indepth
interviews conducted in Malawi with 21 serodiscordant couples and 3 individuals who had
separated from their partners because of serodiscordance.
Findings
Serodiscordant couples in Malawi believe and hold on to some inaccurate HIV and AIDS information
that can be seen as ‘myths’. Some of these myths are perpetuated by official HIV and AIDS information
when it is translated into the local languages. Other myths derive from social norms of the societies
where the couples live.
Practical implications: The findings of this paper have practical implications for how HIV and AIDS
information providers should engage with target audiences to understand the origins of the myths they
hold. The findings also imply that some myths have technical, religious, moral and cultural bases which
need to be addressed before challenging the myth itself.
Originality/Value: Using real-life descriptions of experiences of HIV and AIDS information provided by
serodiscordant couples, the authors reveal how myths can affect engagement with the information. The
authors make recommendations on how to address myths in ways that contribute to a positive
experience of HIV and AIDS information by serodiscordant couple
Risk transfer policies and climate-induced immobility among smallholder farmers
Climate change is anticipated to impact smallholder farmer livelihoods substantially. However, empirical evidence is inconclusive regarding how increased climate stress affects smallholder farmers’ deployment of various livelihood strategies, including rural–urban migration. Here we use an agent-based model to show that in a South Asian agricultural community experiencing a 1.5 oC temperature increase by 2050, climate impacts are likely to decrease household income in 2050 by an average of 28%, with fewer households investing in both economic migration and cash crops, relative to a stationary climate. Pairing a small cash transfer with risk transfer mechanisms significantly increases the adoption of migration and cash crops, improves community incomes and reduces community inequality. While specific results depend on contextual factors such as risk preferences and climate risk exposure, these interventions are robust in improving adaptation outcomes and alleviating immobility, by addressing the intersection of risk aversion, financial constraints and climate impacts
Magnetic fields in protoplanetary disks
Magnetic fields likely play a key role in the dynamics and evolution of
protoplanetary discs. They have the potential to efficiently transport angular
momentum by MHD turbulence or via the magnetocentrifugal acceleration of
outflows from the disk surface, and magnetically-driven mixing has implications
for disk chemistry and evolution of the grain population. However, the weak
ionisation of protoplanetary discs means that magnetic fields may not be able
to effectively couple to the matter. I present calculations of the ionisation
equilibrium and magnetic diffusivity as a function of height from the disk
midplane at radii of 1 and 5 AU. Dust grains tend to suppress magnetic coupling
by soaking up electrons and ions from the gas phase and reducing the
conductivity of the gas by many orders of magnitude. However, once grains have
grown to a few microns in size their effect starts to wane and magnetic fields
can begin to couple to the gas even at the disk midplane. Because ions are
generally decoupled from the magnetic field by neutral collisions while
electrons are not, the Hall effect tends to dominate the diffusion of the
magnetic field when it is able to partially couple to the gas.
For a standard population of 0.1 micron grains the active surface layers have
a combined column of about 2 g/cm^2 at 1 AU; by the time grains have aggregated
to 3 microns the active surface density is 80 g/cm^2. In the absence of grains,
x-rays maintain magnetic coupling to 10% of the disk material at 1 AU (150
g/cm^2). At 5 AU the entire disk thickness becomes active once grains have
aggregated to 1 micron in size.Comment: 11 pages, 11 figs, aastex.cls. Accepted for publication in
Astrophysics & Space Science. v3 corrects bibliograph
Angular dependence of domain wall resistivity in SrRuO films
is a 4d itinerant ferromagnet (T 150 K) with
stripe domain structure. Using high-quality thin films of SrRuO we study
the resistivity induced by its very narrow ( nm) Bloch domain walls,
(DWR), at temperatures between 2 K and T as a function of the
angle, , between the electric current and the ferromagnetic domains
walls. We find that which provides the first experimental
indication that the angular dependence of spin accumulation contribution to DWR
is . We expect magnetic multilayers to exhibit a similar
behavior.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure
Spin decay and quantum parallelism
We study the time evolution of a single spin coupled inhomogeneously to a
spin environment. Such a system is realized by a single electron spin bound in
a semiconductor nanostructure and interacting with surrounding nuclear spins.
We find striking dependencies on the type of the initial state of the nuclear
spin system. Simple product states show a profoundly different behavior than
randomly correlated states whose time evolution provides an illustrative
example of quantum parallelism and entanglement in a decoherence phenomenon.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures included, version to appear in Phys. Rev.
Dimensionality of spin modulations in 1/8-doped lanthanum cuprates from the perspective of NQR and muSR experiments
We investigate the dimensionality of inhomogeneous spin modulation patterns
in the cuprate family of high-temperature superconductors with particular focus
on 1/8-doped lanthanum cuprates. We compare one-dimensional stripe modulation
pattern with two-dimensional checkerboard of spin vortices in the context of
nuclear quadrupole resonance(NQR) and muon spin rotation(muSR) experiments. In
addition, we also consider the third pattern, a two-dimensional superposition
of spin spirals. Overall, we have found that none of the above patterns leads
to a consistent interpretation of the two types of experiments considered.
This, in particular, implies that the spin vortex checkerboard cannot be ruled
out on the basis of available NQR/muSR experimental results.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure
A Monitor of Beam Polarization Profiles for the TRIUMF Parity Experiment
TRIUMF experiment E497 is a study of parity violation in pp scattering at an
energy where the leading term in the analyzing power is expected to vanish,
thus measuring a unique combination of weak-interaction flavour conserving
terms. It is desired to reach a level of sensitivity of 2x10^-8 in both
statistical and systematic errors. The leading systematic errors depend on
transverse polarization components and, at least, the first moment of
transverse polarization. A novel polarimeter that measures profiles of both
transverse components of polarization as a function of position is described.Comment: 19 pages LaTeX, 10 PostScript figures. To appear in Nuclear
Instruments and Methods in Physics Research, Section
Parity Violation in Proton-Proton Scattering
Measurements of parity-violating longitudinal analyzing powers (normalized
asymmetries) in polarized proton-proton scattering provide a unique window on
the interplay between the weak and strong interactions between and within
hadrons. Several new proton-proton parity violation experiments are presently
either being performed or are being prepared for execution in the near future:
at TRIUMF at 221 MeV and 450 MeV and at COSY (Kernforschungsanlage Juelich) at
230 MeV and near 1.3 GeV. These experiments are intended to provide stringent
constraints on the set of six effective weak meson-nucleon coupling constants,
which characterize the weak interaction between hadrons in the energy domain
where meson exchange models provide an appropriate description. The 221 MeV is
unique in that it selects a single transition amplitude (3P2-1D2) and
consequently constrains the weak meson-nucleon coupling constant h_rho{pp}. The
TRIUMF 221 MeV proton-proton parity violation experiment is described in some
detail. A preliminary result for the longitudinal analyzing power is Az = (1.1
+/-0.4 +/-0.4) x 10^-7. Further proton-proton parity violation experiments are
commented on. The anomaly at 6 GeV/c requires that a new multi-GeV
proton-proton parity violation experiment be performed.Comment: 13 Pages LaTeX, 5 PostScript figures, uses espcrc1.sty. Invited talk
at QULEN97, International Conference on Quark Lepton Nuclear Physics --
Nonperturbative QCD Hadron Physics & Electroweak Nuclear Processes --, Osaka,
Japan May 20--23, 199
Spin-Charge Separation in the Model: Magnetic and Transport Anomalies
A real spin-charge separation scheme is found based on a saddle-point state
of the model. In the one-dimensional (1D) case, such a saddle-point
reproduces the correct asymptotic correlations at the strong-coupling
fixed-point of the model. In the two-dimensional (2D) case, the transverse
gauge field confining spinon and holon is shown to be gapped at {\em finite
doping} so that a spin-charge deconfinement is obtained for its first time in
2D. The gap in the gauge fluctuation disappears at half-filling limit, where a
long-range antiferromagnetic order is recovered at zero temperature and spinons
become confined. The most interesting features of spin dynamics and transport
are exhibited at finite doping where exotic {\em residual} couplings between
spin and charge degrees of freedom lead to systematic anomalies with regard to
a Fermi-liquid system. In spin dynamics, a commensurate antiferromagnetic
fluctuation with a small, doping-dependent energy scale is found, which is
characterized in momentum space by a Gaussian peak at (, ) with
a doping-dependent width (, is the doping
concentration). This commensurate magnetic fluctuation contributes a
non-Korringa behavior for the NMR spin-lattice relaxation rate. There also
exits a characteristic temperature scale below which a pseudogap behavior
appears in the spin dynamics. Furthermore, an incommensurate magnetic
fluctuation is also obtained at a {\em finite} energy regime. In transport, a
strong short-range phase interference leads to an effective holon Lagrangian
which can give rise to a series of interesting phenomena including linear-
resistivity and Hall-angle. We discuss the striking similarities of these
theoretical features with those found in the high- cuprates and give aComment: 70 pages, RevTex, hard copies of 7 figures available upon request;
minor revisions in the text and references have been made; To be published in
July 1 issue of Phys. Rev. B52, (1995
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