Guns on College Campuses: A Clash of Perspectives

Campus safety is an ongoing concern at colleges and universities nationwide. The escalation of gun violence in society has prompted many politicians to propose concealed carry legislation that would permit guns on campuses. The academy is grappling with this contentious issue as constituents both on and off campus advocate either for gun bans or for concealed carry policies in the name of campus safety. This paper explores the second amendment context of this issue, reviews the pros and cons of permitting guns on campus, and discusses several violence prevention strategies that higher education institutions can utilize

Continuous arterial spin labeling (CASL) in the monkey brain at high magnetic field using a three-coil approach

CASL experiments in the monkey brain were performed at 4.7 T and 7 T using a separate labeling coil. Increased sensitivity and SNR were achieved by a custom-made three-coil setup and high magnetic field with its increased T1. We report the development and optimization of the setup and first experiments in the monkey (macaca mulatta). Parameters for continuous labeling (label power, label duration, post label delay) were optimized to measure gray matter rCBF and fCBF changes, reporting excellent multi-slice coverage at high resolution of 0.75 – 1 mm in-plane

Perfusion-based functional imaging in the monkey brain at 7T: investigations of CASL parameters

Perfusion-based imaging in the monkey primary visual cortex was performed at 7 T applying continuous arterial spin labeling (CASL). Increased perfusion sensitivity and SNR at high magnetic field (due to larger T1) was further optimized using a custom-made three-coil setup with a separate neck labeling coil. We investigated the labeling parameters to obtain relative fCBF changes in the anaesthetized monkey. We report excellent functional activation of striate cortex at high resolution of 0.75x0.9mm2 in-plane. Interestingly, the optimal parameter set for obtaining highest signal changes of rCBF are different from the reported values for imaging gray matter CBF

Keyword-Based Delegable Proofs of Storage

Cloud users (clients) with limited storage capacity at their end can outsource bulk data to the cloud storage server. A client can later access her data by downloading the required data files. However, a large fraction of the data files the client outsources to the server is often archival in nature that the client uses for backup purposes and accesses less frequently. An untrusted server can thus delete some of these archival data files in order to save some space (and allocate the same to other clients) without being detected by the client (data owner). Proofs of storage enable the client to audit her data files uploaded to the server in order to ensure the integrity of those files. In this work, we introduce one type of (selective) proofs of storage that we call keyword-based delegable proofs of storage, where the client wants to audit all her data files containing a specific keyword (e.g., "important"). Moreover, it satisfies the notion of public verifiability where the client can delegate the auditing task to a third-party auditor who audits the set of files corresponding to the keyword on behalf of the client. We formally define the security of a keyword-based delegable proof-of-storage protocol. We construct such a protocol based on an existing proof-of-storage scheme and analyze the security of our protocol. We argue that the techniques we use can be applied atop any existing publicly verifiable proof-of-storage scheme for static data. Finally, we discuss the efficiency of our construction.Comment: A preliminary version of this work has been published in International Conference on Information Security Practice and Experience (ISPEC 2018

Picosecond Laser Pulse Irradiation of Crystalline Silicon

Morphology changes introduced by picosecond laser pulses at λ = 532 nm and 355 nm in (111) and (100) silicon samples are studied by means of optical and high-voltage electron microscopy. Depending on energy fluence, orientation and wavelength, amorphous or highly defective regions may be created. From an analysis of damage thresholds and damage depth distributions it is concluded that melting and energy confinement precedes the formation of the structural changes

Reengineered helmet coil for human brain studies at 3 tesla

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Functional brain mapping by blood oxygenation level-dependent contrast magnetic resonance imaging. A comparison of signal characteristics with a biophysical model

It recently has been demonstrated that magnetic resonance imaging can be used to map changes in brain hemodynamics produced by human mental operations. One method under development relies on blood oxygenation level-dependent (BOLD) contrast: a change in the signal strength of brain water protons produced by the paramagnetic effects of venous blood deoxyhemoglobin. Here we discuss the basic quantitative features of the observed BOLD-based signal changes, including the signal amplitude and its magnetic field dependence and dynamic effects such as a pronounced oscillatory pattern that is induced in the signal from primary visual cortex during photic stimulation experiments. The observed features are compared with the results of Monte Carlo simulations of water proton intravoxel phase dispersion produced by local field gradients generated by paramagnetic deoxyhemoglobin in nearby venous blood vessels. The simulations suggest that the effect of water molecule diffusion is strong for the case of blood capillaries, but, for larger venous blood vessels, water diffusion is not an important determinant of deoxyhemoglobin-induced signal dephasing. We provide an expression for the apparent in-plane relaxation rate constant (R2*) in terms of the main magnetic field strength, the degree of the oxygenation of the venous blood, the venous blood volume fraction in the tissue, and the size of the blood vessel

Effect of CO2 on the Processing of Y-Ba-Cu-O Superconductors

The superconducting properties of YBa2Cu3O6+x reacted with various known ratios of O2/CO2 gas mixtures during sintering at different temperatures were studied. Jc was found to decrease drastically upon reaction with CO2, becoming zero at certain CO2 activities. The stability region for the 123 superconductor, as a function of CO2 activity and temperature, was empirically formulated as follows: log pCO2 \u3c (−45,000)/T + 33.4. The grain boundaries in sintered samples with Jc = 0 were investigated with HRTEM in conjunction with EDS. Two distinct types of grain boundaries were observed. Approximately 10% of the grain boundaries were wet by a thin layer of a second phase, deduced to be BaCuO2. The remaining boundaries were sharp grain boundaries. The grain structure near the sharp grain boundaries was tetragonal. These two types of grain boundaries are thought to be responsible for Jc being zero