618 research outputs found
Asymptotic description of transients and synchronized states of globally coupled oscillators
A two-time scale asymptotic method has been introduced to analyze the
multimodal mean-field Kuramoto-Sakaguchi model of oscillator synchronization in
the high-frequency limit. The method allows to uncouple the probability density
in different components corresponding to the different peaks of the oscillator
frequency distribution. Each component evolves toward a stationary state in a
comoving frame and the overall order parameter can be reconstructed by
combining them. Synchronized phases are a combination of traveling waves and
incoherent solutions depending on parameter values. Our results agree very well
with direct numerical simulations of the nonlinear Fokker-Planck equation for
the probability density. Numerical results have been obtained by finite
differences and a spectral method in the particular case of bimodal (symmetric
and asymmetric) frequency distribution with or without external field. We also
recover in a very easy and intuitive way the only other known analytical
results: those corresponding to reflection-symmetric bimodal frequency
distributions near bifurcation points.Comment: Revtex,12 pag.,9 fig.;submitted to Physica
The Williams Scale of Attitude toward Paganism: development and application among British Pagans
This article builds on the tradition of attitudinal measures of religiosity established by Leslie Francis and colleagues with the Francis Scale of Attitude toward Christianity (and reflected in the Sahin-Francis Scale of Attitude toward Islam, the Katz-Francis Scale of Attitude toward Judaism, and the Santosh-Francis Scale of Attitude toward Hinduism) by introducing a new measure to assess the attitudinal disposition of Pagans. A battery of items was completed by 75 members of a Pagan Summer Camp. These items were reduced to produce a 21-item scale that measured aspects of Paganism concerned with: the God/Goddess, worshipping, prayer, and coven. The scale recorded an alpha coefficient of 0.93. Construct validity of the Williams Scale of Attitude toward Paganism was demonstrated by the clear association with measures of participation in private rituals
Wound healing and hyper-hydration - a counter intuitive model
Winters seminal work in the 1960s relating to providing an optimal level of moisture to aid wound healing (granulation and re-epithelialisation) has been the single most effective advance in wound care over many decades. As such the development of advanced wound dressings that manage the fluidic wound environment have provided significant benefits in terms of healing to both patient and clinician. Although moist wound healing provides the guiding management principle confusion may arise between what is deemed to be an adequate level of tissue hydration and the risk of developing maceration. In addition, the counter-intuitive model âhyper-hydrationâ of tissue appears to frustrate the moist wound healing approach and advocate a course of intervention whereby tissue is hydrated beyond what is a normally acceptable therapeutic level. This paper discusses tissue hydration, the cause and effect of maceration and distinguishes these from hyper-hydration of tissue. The rationale is to provide the clinician with a knowledge base that allows optimisation of treatment and outcomes and explains the reasoning behind wound healing using hyper-hydration
The Oxytocin Product Correlates with Total Oxytocin Received during Labor: A Research Methods Study
Objective Total dose of oxytocin received during labor is an important variable in studies of human labor but is difficult to calculate. We sought to identify a surrogate measure for total dose of oxytocin received. Study Design For each subject receiving oxytocin during labor, the oxytocin total dose received in labor was calculated as the area under the curve. Maximal oxytocin infusion rate, total duration of oxytocin infusion, and the product of both, defined as the oxytocin product, were then each correlated with the total dose of oxytocin received using the Pearson's correlation coefficient. Results Oxytocin dosing data were available from 402 women at Duke and 6,907 women from Pithagore6. The two variables alone, or combined as the oxytocin product, demonstrated a high correlation with the oxytocin total dose (r > 0.7), with the oxytocin product demonstrating the highest (r > 0.9). This was true whether labor was induced or augmented and whether delivery was vaginal or cesarean. Conclusion The oxytocin product, composed of two easily obtained variables, demonstrated a very high correlation with total oxytocin dose received in labor and represents a simple and accurate surrogate for total dose of oxytocin received during labor. The oxytocin product can be used in clinical studies in which oxytocin dose is an important variable
Coupled dark matter-dark energy in light of near Universe observations
Cosmological analysis based on currently available observations are unable to
rule out a sizeable coupling among the dark energy and dark matter fluids. We
explore a variety of coupled dark matter-dark energy models, which satisfy
cosmic microwave background constraints, in light of low redshift and near
universe observations. We illustrate the phenomenology of different classes of
dark coupling models, paying particular attention in distinguishing between
effects that appear only on the expansion history and those that appear in the
growth of structure. We find that while a broad class of dark coupling models
are effectively models where general relativity (GR) is modified --and thus can
be probed by a combination of tests for the expansion history and the growth of
structure--, there is a class of dark coupling models where gravity is still
GR, but the growth of perturbations is, in principle modified. While this
effect is small in the specific models we have considered, one should bear in
mind that an inconsistency between reconstructed expansion history and growth
may not uniquely indicate deviations from GR. Our low redshift constraints
arise from cosmic velocities, redshift space distortions and dark matter
abundance in galaxy voids. We find that current data constrain the
dimensionless coupling to be |xi|<0.2, but prospects from forthcoming data are
for a significant improvement. Future, precise measurements of the Hubble
constant, combined with high-precision constraints on the growth of structure,
could provide the key to rule out dark coupling models which survive other
tests. We shall exploit as well weak equivalence principle violation arguments,
which have the potential to highly disfavour a broad family of coupled models.Comment: 34 pages, 6 figures; changes to match published versio
First principles electronic structure of spinel LiCr2O4: A possible half-metal?
We have employed first-principles electronic structure calculations to
examine the hypothetical (but plausible) oxide spinel, LiCr2O4 with the d^{2.5}
electronic configuration. The cell (cubic) and internal (oxygen position)
structural parameters have been obtained for this compound through structural
relaxation in the first-principles framework. Within the one-electron band
picture, we find that LiCr2O4 is magnetic, and a candidate half-metal. The
electronic structure is substantially different from the closely related and
well known rutile half-metal CrO2. In particular, we find a smaller conduction
band width in the spinel compound, perhaps as a result of the distinct topology
of the spinel crystal structure, and the reduced oxidation state. The magnetism
and half-metallicity of LiCr2O4 has been mapped in the parameter space of its
cubic crystal structure. Comparisons with superconducting LiTi2O4 (d^{0.5}),
heavy-fermion LiV2O4 (d^{1.5}) and charge-ordering LiMn2O4 (d^{3.5}) suggest
the effectiveness of a nearly-rigid band picture involving simple shifts of the
position of E_F in these very different materials. Comparisons are also made
with the electronic structure of ZnV2O4 (d^{2}), a correlated insulator that
undergoes a structural and antiferromagnetic phase transition.Comment: 9 pages, 7 Figures, version as published in PR
Fertility, Living Arrangements, Care and Mobility
There are four main interconnecting themes around which the contributions in this book are based. This introductory chapter aims to establish the broad context for the chapters that follow by discussing each of the themes. It does so by setting these themes within the overarching demographic challenge of the twenty-first century â demographic ageing. Each chapter is introduced in the context of the specific theme to which it primarily relates and there is a summary of the data sets used by the contributors to illustrate the wide range of cross-sectional and longitudinal data analysed
Reading religion in Norwegian textbooks: are individual religions ideas or people?
Different religions are treated in different ways in Norwegian sixth form textbooks. We carried out an exhaustive content analysis of the chapters devoted to individual religions in textbooks for the Religion and Ethics course currently available in Norway, using rigorous indicators to code each word, image and question according to whether they were treated the religion as a set of ideas or a group of people. After adjusting for trends in the different kinds of data (word, image, question), we found that Buddhism and Christianity receive significantly more attention for their ideas than Hinduism, Islam and Judaism, which are treated more as people. This difference cannot be explained by the national syllabus or the particularities of the individual religions. The asymmetry also has implications for the pupilsâ academic, moral and pedagogical agency for which teachers play a critical role in compensating.acceptedVersio
Demonstration of a novel technique to measure two-photon exchange effects in elastic scattering
The discrepancy between proton electromagnetic form factors extracted using
unpolarized and polarized scattering data is believed to be a consequence of
two-photon exchange (TPE) effects. However, the calculations of TPE corrections
have significant model dependence, and there is limited direct experimental
evidence for such corrections. We present the results of a new experimental
technique for making direct comparisons, which has the potential to
make precise measurements over a broad range in and scattering angles. We
use the Jefferson Lab electron beam and the Hall B photon tagger to generate a
clean but untagged photon beam. The photon beam impinges on a converter foil to
generate a mixed beam of electrons, positrons, and photons. A chicane is used
to separate and recombine the electron and positron beams while the photon beam
is stopped by a photon blocker. This provides a combined electron and positron
beam, with energies from 0.5 to 3.2 GeV, which impinges on a liquid hydrogen
target. The large acceptance CLAS detector is used to identify and reconstruct
elastic scattering events, determining both the initial lepton energy and the
sign of the scattered lepton. The data were collected in two days with a
primary electron beam energy of only 3.3 GeV, limiting the data from this run
to smaller values of and scattering angle. Nonetheless, this measurement
yields a data sample for with statistics comparable to those of the
best previous measurements. We have shown that we can cleanly identify elastic
scattering events and correct for the difference in acceptance for electron and
positron scattering. The final ratio of positron to electron scattering:
for GeV and
Effects of mineralogy, chemistry and physical properties of basalts on carbon capture potential and plant-nutrient element release via enhanced weathering
Mafic igneous rocks, such as basalt, are composed of abundant calcium- and magnesium-rich silicate minerals widely proposed to be suitable for scalable carbon dioxide removal (CDR) by enhanced rock weathering (ERW). Here, we report a detailed characterization of the mineralogy, chemistry, particle size and surface area of six mined basalts being used in large-scale ERW field trials. We use 1-D reactive transport modelling (RTM) of soil profile processes to simulate inorganic CDR potential via cation flux (Mg2+, Ca2+, K+ and Na+) and assess the release of the essential plant nutrients phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) for a typical clay-loam agricultural soil. The basalts are primarily composed of pyroxene and plagioclase feldspar (up to 71âŻwt%), with accessory olivine, quartz, glass and alkali feldspar. Mean crushed particle size varies by a factor of 10, owing to differences in the mining operations and grinding processes. RTM simulations, based on measured mineral composition and N2-gas BET specific surface area (SSA), yielded potential CDR values of between c. 1.3 and 8.5âŻt CO2 haâ1 after 15 years following a baseline application of 50âŻtâŻhaâ1 basalt. The RTM results are comparative for the range of inputs that are described and should be considered illustrative for an agricultural soil. Nevertheless, they indicate that increasing the surface area for slow-weathering basalts through energy intensive grinding prior to field application in an ERW context may not be warranted in terms of additional CDR gains. We developed a function to convert CDR based on widely available and easily measured rock chemistry measures to more realistic determinations based on mineralogy. When applied to a chemistry dataset for >1300 basalt analyses from 25 large igneous provinces, we simulated cumulative CDR potentials of up to c. 8.5âŻt CO2 haâ1 after 30 years of weathering, assuming a single application of basalt with a SSA of 1âŻm2âŻgâ1. Our RTM simulations suggest that ERW with basalt releases sufficient phosphorus (P) to substitute for typical arable crop P-fertiliser usage in Europe and the USA offering potential to reduce demand for expensive rock-derived P
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