Sewerage: a return to basics to benefit the poor

Around 2.8 billion people, mostly in developing countries, currently lack adequate sanitation. Approximately half live in urban areas, where the most appropriate sanitation solution is commonly simplified sewerage. This paper presents the rigorous hydraulic design basis of simplified sewerage and compares this design approach with that used in the UK for conventional sewerage. It reviews simplified sewerage construction and how this achieves major cost savings and also avoids the problems commonly experienced with manholes

Controlling land they call their own: access and women's empowerment in Northern Tanzania

Formal rights to land are often promoted as an essential part of empowering women, particularly in the Global South. We look at two grassroots non-governmental organizations (NGOs) working on land rights and empowerment with Maasai communities in Northern Tanzania. Women involved with both NGOS attest to the power of land ownership for personal empowerment and transformations in gender relations. Yet very few have obtained land ownership titles. Drawing from Ribot and Peluso’s theory of access, we argue that more than ownership rights to land, access–to land, knowledge, social relations and political processes–is leading to empowerment for these women, as well as helping to keep land within communities. We illustrate how the following are key to both empowerment processes and protecting community and women’s land: (1) access to knowledge about legal rights, such as the right to own land; (2) access to customary forms of authority; and (3) access to a joint social identity–as women, as indigenous people, and as Maasai. Through this shared identity and access to knowledge and authority, women are strengthening their access to social relations (amongst themselves, with powerful political players and NGOs), and gaining strength through collective action to protect land rights

Demonstration of a moving guide based atom interferometer for rotation sensing

We demonstrate area-enclosing atom interferometry based on a moving guide. Light pulses along the free propagation direction of a magnetic guide are applied to split and recombine the confined atomic matter-wave, while the atoms are translated back and forth along a second direction in 50 ms. The interferometer is estimated to resolve ten times the earth rotation rate per interferometry cycle. We demonstrate a ``folded figure 8'' interfering configuration for creating a compact, large-area atom gyroscope with multiple-turn interfering paths.Comment: Minor revisio

Sheltering Corporate Assets from Political Extraction

We hypothesize that firms structure their asset holdings so as to shelter assets from extraction by politicians and bureaucrats. In countries where the threat of political extraction is higher, we hypothesize that firms hold a lower fraction of their assets in liquid form. Consistent with this conjecture, using data for over 30,000 firms across 109 countries, we find that corporate holdings of liquid assets are negatively correlated with measures of political corruption. Further, annual investment in property, plant, equipment, and inventory plus dividends is positively correlated with measures of political corruption suggesting that owners channel their cash into harder to extract assets. To the extent that the threat of political extraction moves firms away from their otherwise optimal levels of liquid assets, our findings suggest that the threat of political extraction may reduce economic development not only through the direct costs of political payoffs, but also because the potential for asset extraction moves firms away from their otherwise optimal asset holdings.

From Kansas to Queensland: Global learning in preservice elementary teacher education

Communication of information between groups of humans has been extended through out history progressing from smoke signals, drum beats, message couriers, post, telegraph, telephone and now the ICT. The time between the utterance of a message and the reception of that message has progressively decreased. We are now able to communicate relatively cheaply, simultaneously sharing and responding to ideas and thoughts on a scale never previously possible. Although the technology exists to make possible easy access to people in all parts of the world, we still lack understandings of the aspirations and sensitivities of other cultures with whom we can communicate. This project supported pre-service elementary teachers in two countries – Australia and the United States – to engage in collaborative learning through Internet communications. The purpose of the project was to develop greater understanding of other’s cultures, and practices in teaching elementary students. Students attending an Australian preservice primary science methods course were matched with a cohort of undergraduate preservice elementary student teachers from a university in the United States studying an integrated mathematics science methods course. Over a six-week period the students engaged in the computer-mediated communication and were encouraged to learn about mutual cultural practices and primary/elementary science education in both countries. The outcomes demonstrated that students involved in the project benefited from an array of different and enriching learning experiences. Students benefited through enhanced understanding of the teaching of science and an appreciation of the common problems confronting science education in both countries. However, there was little engagement in debate or discussion of individual differences and the cultural context of each other’s country even when opportunities presented themselves. Nevertheless, the on-line tasks provided the pre-service teachers with the experience and confidence to engage their own students in similar global learning initiatives when they become teachers

Disabilities, Masculinities and Schooling: A Narrative Inquiry into the Stories Lived by Boys and Men with Physical Disabilities

Through narrative inquiry (NI), this dissertation investigates how boys and men with physical disabilities (BMPDs) come to embody particular subject positions as disabled and masculine subjects. Such a study is important given that disability is often perceived as being at odds with Western notions of masculinity (Connell, 2005) and that schools are a major site of masculinity formation (Connell, 2000). Furthermore, within the context of what has been identified as the “boy turn” in educational policy and research (Weaver-Hightower, 2003), a focus on boys with disabilities has not been included. Using Butlerian theories on performativity, materiality of the body and precarity as well as Foucauldian analytics of power, the NI examines how institutions such as schools inscribe ableist and masculine norms surrounding independence, bodily integrity, productivity and heteronormative relationships. A detailed analysis of personal narratives drawn from in-depth interviews of two participants illustrates how each negotiates his masculinity and humanness from locations of precarity within ableist systems that seek to render him invisible and abject. The participants respond in iterative and improvisational ways to sustain lives that are viable. Their stories contribute to a nuancing of the social processes of embodiment. As an alternative to ableist norms of independence and autonomy, their stories explore interdependence as an ethos. The dissertation also raises ethical questions pertaining to researcher/researched dynamics and argues for a need to engage in critical conversations with subjugated classes in order to open up fields of possibility for generating knowledge about disablility and ableism that refuses neocolonial appropriation of voice. Keywords: narrative inquiry, performativity, materiality, precarity, masculinities, physical disabilities, intersectionality, ableism, embodiment, analytics of power, Foucault, Butler, Connell, situated knowledge

DISABILITY, MASCULINITIES AND TEACHING: AN AUTOETHNOGRAPHY

This autoethnography focuses on issues of masculinity, disability and education. Drawing on the work of Connell (2005) who offers an important theorization of masculinities and on the work of Shakespeare (1999) who elaborates a critical sociological perspective on disability studies the study challenges some o f the common-sense assumptions about male teachers. Namely, men are needed to solve the problem of failing and disaffected boys. The author draws upon his own narratives as a teacher and as a disabled man living with a spinal cord injury to interrogate such assumptions, and to illustrate a more complex and nuanced lived experience. He interweaves personal narratives with theoretical perspectives to elaborate on themes of voice, invisibility, embodiment, masculinities and hegemony. An analysis o f the themes produces several implications for the author and reader

Geologic Factors in the Isolation of Nuclear Waste: Evaluation of Long-Term Geomorphic Processes and Catastrophic Events

Associated with commercial nuclear power production in the United States is the generation of potentially hazardous radioactive waste products. The Department of Energy (DOE), through the National Waste Terminal Storage (NWTS) Program and the Office of Nuclear Waste Isolation (ONWI), is seeking to develop nuclear waste isolation systems in geologic formations. These underground waste isolation systems will prevent contact between waste radionuclides and the biosphere, ensuring they don't reach concentrations harmful to humans or the environment. Comprehensive analyses of specific isolation systems are needed to assess their long-term effectiveness. The Assessment of Effectiveness of Geologic Isolation Systems (AEGIS) Program has been established to develop the capability of making those analyses. Among the analyses required for system evaluation is the detailed assessment of the post-closure performance of nuclear waste repositories in geologic formations. This assessment focuses on aspects of the nuclear program that have not been previously addressed. The nature of the isolation systems (e.g., potential for breaches and transport through the geosphere) and the extremely long time periods over which the wastes must be controlled necessitate the development, demonstration, and application of novel assessment capabilities. The assessment methodology must be thorough, flexible, objective, and scientifically defensible. Furthermore, the data utilized must be accurate, documented, reproducible, and based on sound scientific principles.Bureau of Economic Geolog

Steve Sussman Substance and behavioral addictions: Concepts, causes, and cures

Steve Sussman: Substance and behavioral addictions: Concepts, causes, and cure

Deformation mechanism map of Cu/Nb nanoscale metallic multilayers as a function of temperature and layer thickness

The mechanical properties and deformation mechanisms of Cu/Nb nanoscale metallic multilayers (NMMs) manufactured by accumulative roll bonding (ARB) are studied at 25C and 400C. Cu/Nb NMMs with individual layer thicknesses between 7 and 63 nm were tested by in-situ micropillar compression inside a scanning electron microscope Yield strength, strain-rate sensitivities and activation volumes were obtained from the pillar compression tests. The deformed micropillars were examined under scanning and transmission electron microscopy in order to examine the deformation mechanisms active for different layer thicknesses and temperatures. The analysis suggests that room temperature deformation was determined by dislocation glide at larger layer thicknesses and interface-related mechanisms at the thinner layer thicknesses. The high temperature compression tests, in contrast, revealed superior thermo-mechanical stability and strength retention for the NMMs with larger layer thicknesses with deformation controlled by dislocation glide. A remarkable transition in deformation mechanism occurred as the layer thickness decreased, to a deformation response controlled by diffusion processes along the interfaces, which resulted in temperature-induced softening. A deformation mechanism map, in terms of layer thickness and temperature, is proposed from the results obtained in this investigation