Mineralogy and petrography of some Apollo 12 samples Final report

Analysis of lunar soil samples returned by Apollo 12 fligh

From bedside to bench: Comroe and dripps revisited

Twenty-five years ago a paper published in Science by Julius Comroe and Robert Dripps purported to demonstrate that 41 per cent of all articles judged to be essential for later clinical advances were not clinically oriented at the time of the study and 62 per cent of key articles were the result of basic research. Since that analysis, support for basic research has increased in the G7 countries. In the UK, Research Council expenditure on basic research has increased from a low of £444 million (or 42 per cent of total civil R&D) in 1991/92 to £769 million (or 61 per cent of total civil R&D) in 1998/99. Although it would be difficult to argue that Comroe and Dripps were directly responsible for a strategic shift (or drift) in the type of science supported by research funders, their arguments are often cited (albeit at times implicitly) in support of the increased funding for basic biomedical research. In 1987 Richard Smith wrote a critical paper reassessing Comroe and Dripps. His main argument was that the original study was in itself ‘unscientific’ and that it should be “followed by bigger and better studies”. This study is, in part, an answer to that challenge. Given the increased support for basic research, and the apparent importance based on the work of Comroe and Dripps, we felt it was important to investigate Smith’s comments by replicating Comroe and Dripps’s study and at the same time try to improve upon the methodology. The current project had two objectives: 1. To see if the original Comroe and Dripps’s methodology was ‘replicable’. 2. To validate the key findings of Comroe and Dripps. By looking at neonatal intensive care (NIC), we concluded that Comroe and Dripps’ study – as reported – is not repeatable, reliable or valid, and thus is an insufficient evidence base for increased expenditure on basic biomedical research. We did, however, develop an alternative methodology which used bibliographic databases and bibliometric techniques to describe the research underpinning five of the most important clinical advances in NIC, as identified through a Delphi survey. Using the revised bibliometric protocol, we demonstrated that after a time-lag of about 17 years, between 2 and 21 per cent of research underpinning the clinical advances could be described as basic. This observation is at odds with Comroe and Dripps’s finding that 62 per cent of key research articles judged to be essential for latter clinical advance were the result of basic research. In reaching this conclusion we are acutely aware of the significant limitations to the revised methodology and, therefore, we caution against the over-interpretation of our results. However, we would argue that there needs to be a greater understanding of how basic research supports healthcare and hope this report will inform part of this wider debate.R&D Directorate of the NHS Executive London; Wellcome Trus

NASTRAN solutions of problems described by simultaneous parabolic differential equations

NASTRAN solution techniques are shown for a numerical analysis of a class of coupled vector flow processes described by simultaneous parabolic differential equations. To define one physical problem type where equations of this form arise, the differential equations describing the coupled transfers of heat and mass in mechanical equilibrium with negligible mass average velocity are presented and discussed. Also shown are the equations describing seepage when both electrokinetic and hydrodynamic forces occur. Based on a variational statement of the general problem type, the concepts of scalar transfer elements and parallel element systems are introduced. It is shown that adoptation of these concepts allows the direct use of NASTRAN's existing Laplace type elements for uncoupled flow (the heat transfer elements) for treating multicomponent coupled transfer. Sample problems are included which demonstrate the application of these techniques for both steady-state and transient problems

Dissociative electron attachment to formamide

Formamide (HCONH2) is the smallest molecule with a peptide bond and has recently been observed in the interstellar medium (ISM), suggesting that it may be ubiquitous in star-forming regions. There is therefore considerable interest in the mechanisms by which this molecule may form. One method is electron induced chemistry within the icy mantles on the surface of dust grains. In particular it has been recently shown that functional group dependence exists in electron attachment processes giving rise to site selective fragmentation of molecules at the C-H, O-H and N-H bonds at energies well beyond the threshold for the breaking of any of these bonds allowing novel forms of chemistry that have little or no activation barriers, such as are necessary in the ISM. In this poster we present the results of resent studies on dissociative electron attachment (DEA) to formamide DEA using an improved version of a Velocity Map Imaging (VMI) spectrometer comprised of a magnetically collimated and low energy pulsed electron gun, a Faraday cup (to measure the incident current), an effusive molecular beam, a pulsed field ion extraction, a time of flight analyzer and a two-dimensional position sensitive detector consisting of microchannel plate and a phosphor screen. The VMI spectrometer measures the kinetic energy and angular distribution of the fragment anions produced in the dissociative electron attachment process. The kinetic energy measurements provide information on the internal energies of the fragment anions and determine the dissociation limits of the parent negative ion resonant states responsible for the dissociative electron attachment process. The angular distribution measurements provide the information about the symmetry of these negative ion resonant states. We shall present the details, results and conclusions of these measurements during the conference

Critical Evaluation and Compilation of Viscosity and Diffusivity Data Semiannual Status Report No. 1, Jul. 1 - Dec. 31, 1965

Compilation and evaluation of diffusivity and viscosity data on gas and liquid turbulent flow system

Representation of South Asian people in randomised clinical trials: analysis of trials' data

Excluding patients of ethnic minority groups from clinical trials is unethical, introduces substantial bias, and means that findings are based on unrepresentative populations. The National Institutes of Health Revitalization Act 1993 requires that all minority groups be represented in the sample in research projects supported by the National Institutes of Health, unless there is a clear and compelling justification not to do so. In the United Kingdom no such legislation exists

Extraction of tidal channel networks from airborne scanning laser altimetry and aerial photography

The study of the morphodynamics of tidal channel networks is important because of their role in tidal propagation and the evolution of salt-marshes and tidal flats. Channel dimensions range from tens of metres wide and metres deep near the low water mark to only 20-30cm wide and 20cm deep for the smallest channels on the marshes. The conventional method of measuring the networks is cumbersome, involving manual digitising of aerial photographs. This paper describes a semi-automatic knowledge-based network extraction method that is being implemented to work using airborne scanning laser altimetry (and later aerial photography). The channels exhibit a width variation of several orders of magnitude, making an approach based on multi-scale line detection difficult. The processing therefore uses multi-scale edge detection to detect channel edges, then associates adjacent anti-parallel edges together to form channels using a distance-with-destination transform. Breaks in the networks are repaired by extending channel ends in the direction of their ends to join with nearby channels, using domain knowledge that flow paths should proceed downhill and that any network fragment should be joined to a nearby fragment so as to connect eventually to the open sea

PIA update: Correlation analyses of mass spectra

The PIA instrument aboard the Giotto spacecraft (a time of flight spectrometer) has been presented elsewhere. The mass spectra used in this analysis were decoded and mass numbers assigned according to the presence of carbon and silver, using the global values for these elements in their spectral absence. The results presented here were obtained using a frequency of occurrence based on analysis which correlated how often mass numbers appear in the mass spectra and which mass numbers tend to occur together in the same spectra; no amplitude information is utilized. The data are presented as plots of mass vs coincident mass for different subsets of the PIA data set, with both axes having units of atomic mass. Frequency contours are plotted at approximately five percent contour intervals, relative to the maximum AMU occurrence in that plot. The plots presented are symmetrical about the matrix diagonal, i.e., every mass is coincident with itself in a given spectra

The COREL and W12SC3 computer programs for supersonic wing design and analysis

Two computer codes useful in the supersonic aerodynamic design of wings, including the supersonic maneuver case are described. The nonlinear full potential equation COREL code performs an analysis of a spanwise section of the wing in the crossflow plane by assuming conical flow over the section. A subsequent approximate correction to the solution can be made in order to account for nonconical effects. In COREL, the flow-field is assumed to be irrotional (Mach numbers normal to shock waves less than about 1.3) and the full potential equation is solved to obtain detailed results for the leading edge expansion, supercritical crossflow, and any crossflow shockwaves. W12SC3 is a linear theory panel method which combines and extends elements of several of Woodward's codes, with emphasis on fighter applications. After a brief review of the aerodynamic theory used by each method, the use of the codes is illustrated with several examples, detailed input instructions and a sample case