The School Improvement Partnership Programme: Using Collaboration and Enquiry to tackle Educational Inequity

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Forever-Fit Summer Camp: The Impact of a 6-Week Summer Healthy Lifestyle Day Camp on Anthropometric, Cardiovascular, and Physical Fitness Measures in Youth With Obesity

Pediatric obesity is a public health concern with lifestyle intervention as the first-line treatment. Forever-Fit Summer Camp (FFSC) is a 6-week summer day program offering physical activity, nutrition education, and well-balanced meals to youth at low cost. The aim of the study was to assess the efficacy of this program that does not emphasize weight loss rather emphasizes healthy behaviors on body mass index, cardiovascular and physical fitness. Methods: The inclusion criteria were adolescents between 8 and 12 years and body mass index (BMI) ≥85th percentile. The data were collected at baseline and week 6 (wk-6) and was analyzed for 2013-2018 using paired-sample t tests. Results: The participants' (N = 179) average age was 10.6 ± 1.6 years with a majority of females (71%) and black race/ethnicity (70%). At wk-6, BMI and waist circumference decreased by 0.8 ± 0.7 kg/m2 and 1.0 ± 1.3 in, respectively. Resting heart rate, diastolic and systolic blood pressure decreased by 8.5 ± 11.0 bpm, 6.3 ± 8.8 mmHg, and 6.4 ± 10.1 mmHg, respectively. The number of pushups, curl-ups, and chair squats were higher by 5.8 ± 7.5, 6.7 ± 9.1, and 7.7 ± 8.5, respectively. Conclusion: The FFSC is efficacious for improving BMI, cardiovascular, and physical fitness in the short term. The effect of similar episodic efforts that implement healthy lifestyle modifications throughout the school year should be investigated

Analytic, Group-Theoretic Density Profiles for Confined, Correlated N-Body Systems

Confined quantum systems involving $N$ identical interacting particles are to be found in many areas of physics, including condensed matter, atomic and chemical physics. A beyond-mean-field perturbation method that is applicable, in principle, to weakly, intermediate, and strongly-interacting systems has been set forth by the authors in a previous series of papers. Dimensional perturbation theory was used, and in conjunction with group theory, an analytic beyond-mean-field correlated wave function at lowest order for a system under spherical confinement with a general two-body interaction was derived. In the present paper, we use this analytic wave function to derive the corresponding lowest-order, analytic density profile and apply it to the example of a Bose-Einstein condensate.Comment: 15 pages, 2 figures, accepted by Physics Review A. This document was submitted after responding to a reviewer's comment

Magnetic field structure of relativistic jets without current sheets

We present an analytical class of equilibrium solutions for the structure of relativistic sheared and rotating magnetized jets that contain no boundary current sheets. We demonstrate the overall dynamical stability of these solutions and, most importantly, a better numerical resistive stability than the commonly employed force-free structures which inevitably require the presence of dissipative surface currents. The jet is volumetrically confined by the external pressure, with no pressure gradient on the surface. We calculate the expected observed properties of such jets. Given the simplicity of these solution we suggest them as useful initial conditions for relativistic jet simulations.Comment: 13 pages, 13 figures, Accepted by MNRA

Current Status of Simulations

As the title suggests, the purpose of this chapter is to review the current status of numerical simulations of black hole accretion disks. This chapter focuses exclusively on global simulations of the accretion process within a few tens of gravitational radii of the black hole. Most of the simulations discussed are performed using general relativistic magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) schemes, although some mention is made of Newtonian radiation MHD simulations and smoothed particle hydrodynamics. The goal is to convey some of the exciting work that has been going on in the past few years and provide some speculation on future directions.Comment: 15 pages, 14 figures, to appear in the proceedings of the ISSI-Bern workshop on "The Physics of Accretion onto Black Holes" (8-12 October 2012

Super-critical Accretion Flows around Black Holes: Two-dimensional, Radiation-pressure-dominated Disks with Photon-trapping

The quasi-steady structure of super-critical accretion flows around a black hole is studied based on the two-dimensional radiation-hydrodynamical (2D-RHD) simulations. The super-critical flow is composed of two parts: the disk region and the outflow regions above and below the disk. Within the disk region the circular motion as well as the patchy density structure are observed, which is caused by Kelvin-Helmholtz instability and probably by convection. The mass-accretion rate decreases inward, roughly in proportion to the radius, and the remaining part of the disk material leaves the disk to form outflow because of strong radiation pressure force. We confirm that photon trapping plays an important role within the disk. Thus, matter can fall onto the black hole at a rate exceeding the Eddington rate. The emission is highly anisotropic and moderately collimated so that the apparent luminosity can exceed the Eddington luminosity by a factor of a few in the face-on view. The mass-accretion rate onto the black hole increases with increase of the absorption opacity (metalicity) of the accreting matter. This implies that the black hole tends to grow up faster in the metal rich regions as in starburst galaxies or star-forming regions.Comment: 16 pages, 12 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ (Volume 628, July 20, 2005 issue

The rarity of terrestrial gamma-ray flashes

We report on the first search for Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flashes (TGFs) from altitudes where they are thought to be produced. The Airborne Detector for Energetic Lightning Emissions (ADELE), an array of gamma-ray detectors, was flown near the tops of Florida thunderstorms in August/September 2009. The plane passed within 10 km horizontal distance of 1213 lightning discharges and only once detected a TGF. If these discharges had produced TGFs of the same intensity as those seen from space, every one should have been seen by ADELE. Separate and significant nondetections are established for intracloud lightning, negative cloud-to-ground lightning, and narrow bipolar events. We conclude that TGFs are not a primary triggering mechanism for lightning. We estimate the TGF-to-flash ratio to be on the order of 10^(−2) to 10^(−3) and show that TGF intensities cannot follow the well-known power-law distribution seen in earthquakes and solar flares, due to our limits on the presence of faint events

Bose-Einstein condensation in variable dimensionality

We introduce dimensional perturbation techniques to Bose-Einstein condensation of inhomogeneous alkali gases (BEC). The perturbation parameter is delta=1/kappa, where kappa depends on the effective dimensionality of the condensate and on the angular momentum quantum number. We derive a simple approximation that is more accurate and flexible than the N -> infinity Thomas-Fermi ground state approximation (TFA) of the Gross-Pitaevskii equation. The approximation presented here is well-suited for calculating properties of states in three dimensions and in low effective dimensionality, such as vortex states in a highly anisotropic trap