The review and evaluation of the Brazilian maritime education system against the new revised STCW international training and competency standards

This dissertation is research into the Examinations and Certifications of seafarers in Brazil as related to the International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watchkeeping for Seafarers 1978, (as amended). The author has attempted to analyze the existing system and propose ways and means to improve the training, examination and certification system taking into account international developments including new technology, methodologies and quality assurance system. An examination is made of management theories on quality and quality assurance. A discussion is made on all the steps necessary for successful implementation of a training, examination and certification system based on the revised STCW 78 Convention in Brazil. This includes analysis, initiating, preparing, documenting, training, examination, certification, monitoring and auditing. The importance of appropriate qualifications for examiners or assessors in maritime administration and the vital role of same in the successful implementation of a quality assurance system in a new examination and certification system is examined. A brief review is made of the maritime education, training, examination and certification system in certain developed countries, noting their advantages and disadvantages with a view to improving the Brazilian maritime examination and certification system in the future. There is a need not only for a supply of new seafarers onboard ships, but also a need for competent persons who meet the requirements of the revised STCW 78 Convention. In this regard, quality assurance is one of the most important factors for examination and certification for seafarers. A number of recommendations are made to improve and enhance the maritime examination and certification system for seafarers in Brazi

Fourth derivative gravity in the auxiliary fields representation and application to the black hole stability

We consider an auxiliary fields formulation for the general fourth-order gravity on an arbitrary curved background. The case of a Ricci-flat background is elaborated in full details and it is shown that there is an equivalence with the standard metric formulation. At the same time, using auxiliary fields helps to make perturbations to look simpler and the results more clear. As an application we reconsider the linear perturbations for the classical Schwarzschild solution. We also briefly discuss the relation to the effect of massive unphysical ghosts in the theory.Comment: 11 pages, no figure

Analysis of flux data sets

Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst, Reference number: 6818.Background: Non-negative linear combinations of elementary flux modes (EMs) describe all feasible reaction flux distributions for a given metabolic network under the quasi steady state assumption. However, only a small subset of EMs contribute to the physiological state of a given cell. Results: In this paper, a method is proposed that identifies the subset of EMs that best explain the physiological state captured in reaction flux data, referred to as principal EMs (PEMs), given a pre-specified universe of EM candidates. The method avoids the evaluation of all possible combinations of EMs by using a branch and bound approach which is computationally very efficient. The performance of the method is assessed using simulated and experimental data of Pichia pastoris and experimental fluxome data of Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The proposed method is benchmarked against principal component analysis (PCA), commonly used to study the structure of metabolic flux data sets. Conclusions: The overall results show that the proposed method is computationally very effective in identifying the subset of PEMs within a large set of EM candidates (cases with ~100 and ~1000 EMs were studied). In contrast to the principal components in PCA, the identified PEMs have a biological meaning enabling identification of the key active pathways in a cell as well as the conditions under which the pathways are activated. This method clearly outperforms PCA in the interpretability of flux data providing additional insights into the underlying regulatory mechanisms.publishersversionpublishe

Anomaly-induced effective action and Chern-Simons modification of general relativity

Recently it was shown that the quantum vacuum effects of massless chiral fermion field in curved space–time leads to the parity-violating Pontryagin density term, which appears in the trace anomaly with imaginary coefficient. In the present work the anomaly-induced effective action with the parity-violating term is derived. The result is similar to the Chern–Simons modified general relativity, which was extensively studied in the last decade, but with the kinetic terms for the scalar different from those considered previously in the literature. The parity-breaking term makes no effect on the zero-order cosmology, but it is expected to be relevant in the black hole solutions and in the cosmological perturbations, especially gravitational waves

Sport Aspects in Basketball Training of Children and Youth in Lithuania and Czech Republic

Title: Sport aspects in basketball training of children and youth in Lithuania and Czech republic Work aims: To find differences or common trakte in trainnig children and youth and to gain information needed to raise the duality of basketball as one. The search for welfare mistakes in development of Czech children. To get close to the Lithuanian training mock u pand aspects of physical education of players. Method: Method of questioning by form of applications (questions with available answers). Personal views and thoughts acquired from own experience in Czech schools and Czech teams in comparison and experinence in Lithuania on as exchange program in 2007. Results: With this diploma thesis we would like to contribute to work improvement with young people and try to bring my ideas closer to others slony with training philosphy and physical education. Based on basic guidelines to show or kontrast views of Czech and Lithuianian coaches who worked or work with young peopla and to find out where the differences if theraq are. To make Czech coaches understand Lithuanian view of basketball training. Keywords: basketball, children and youth, trainni