How a President Bernie Sanders Could Take on Wall Street

If Bernie Sanders wins the presidency, he’ll confront numerous obstacles to his agenda. To overcome those obstacles, we need a strategy to take on capital, especially Wall Street — and we need to start thinking about that strategy right now

The association between county political inclination and obesity: Results from the 2012 presidential election in the United States.

ObjectiveWe examined whether stable, county-level, voter preferences were significantly associated with county-level obesity prevalence using data from the 2012 US Presidential election. County voting preference for the 2012 Republican Party presidential candidate was used as a proxy for voter endorsement of personal responsibility approaches to reducing population obesity risk versus approaches featuring government-sponsored, multi-sectoral efforts like those recommended by the Centers for Disease Control Centers for Disease Control (CDC, 2009).MethodCartographic visualization and spatial analysis were used to evaluate the geographic clustering of obesity prevalence rates by county, and county-level support for the Republican Party candidate in the 2012 U.S. presidential election. The spatial analysis informed the spatial econometric approach employed to model the relationship between political preferences and other covariates with obesity prevalence.ResultsAfter controlling for poverty rate, percent African American and Latino populations, educational attainment, and spatial autocorrelation in the error term, we found that higher county-level obesity prevalence rates were associated with higher levels of support for the 2012 Republican Party presidential candidate.ConclusionFuture public health efforts to understand and reduce obesity risk may benefit from increased surveillance of this and similar linkages between political preferences and health risks

Quantifying mixing using magnetic resonance imaging.

Mixing is a unit operation that combines two or more components into a homogeneous mixture. This work involves mixing two viscous liquid streams using an in-line static mixer. The mixer is a split-and-recombine design that employs shear and extensional flow to increase the interfacial contact between the components. A prototype split-and-recombine (SAR) mixer was constructed by aligning a series of thin laser-cut Poly (methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) plates held in place in a PVC pipe. Mixing in this device is illustrated in the photograph in Fig. 1. Red dye was added to a portion of the test fluid and used as the minor component being mixed into the major (undyed) component. At the inlet of the mixer, the injected layer of tracer fluid is split into two layers as it flows through the mixing section. On each subsequent mixing section, the number of horizontal layers is duplicated. Ultimately, the single stream of dye is uniformly dispersed throughout the cross section of the device. Using a non-Newtonian test fluid of 0.2% Carbopol and a doped tracer fluid of similar composition, mixing in the unit is visualized using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). MRI is a very powerful experimental probe of molecular chemical and physical environment as well as sample structure on the length scales from microns to centimeters. This sensitivity has resulted in broad application of these techniques to characterize physical, chemical and/or biological properties of materials ranging from humans to foods to porous media (1, 2). The equipment and conditions used here are suitable for imaging liquids containing substantial amounts of NMR mobile (1)H such as ordinary water and organic liquids including oils. Traditionally MRI has utilized super conducting magnets which are not suitable for industrial environments and not portable within a laboratory (Fig. 2). Recent advances in magnet technology have permitted the construction of large volume industrially compatible magnets suitable for imaging process flows. Here, MRI provides spatially resolved component concentrations at different axial locations during the mixing process. This work documents real-time mixing of highly viscous fluids via distributive mixing with an application to personal care products

Towards using NMR to screen for spoiled tomatoes stored in 1,000 L, aseptically sealed, metal-lined totes.

Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy is used to track factory relevant tomato paste spoilage. It was found that spoilage in tomato paste test samples leads to longer spin lattice relaxation times T1 using a conventional low magnetic field NMR system. The increase in T1 value for contaminated samples over a five day room temperature exposure period prompted the work to be extended to the study of industry standard, 1,000 L, non-ferrous, metal-lined totes. NMR signals and T1 values were recovered from a large format container with a single-sided NMR sensor. The results of this work suggest that a handheld NMR device can be used to study tomato paste spoilage in factory process environments

Non-thermal X-ray Emission: An Alternative to Cluster Cooling Flows?

We report the results of experiments aimed at reducing the major problem with cooling flow models of rich cluster X-ray sources: the fact that most of the cooled gas or its products have not been found. Here we show that much of the X-ray emission usually attributed to cooling flows can, in fact, be modeled by a power-law component which is indicative of a source(s) other than thermal bremsstrahlung from the intracluster medium. We find that adequate simultaneous fits to ROSAT PSPCB and ASCA GIS/SIS spectra of the central regions of ten clusters are obtained for two-component models that include a thermal plasma component that is attributable to hot intracluster gas and a power-law component that is likely generated by compact sources and/or extended non-thermal emission. For five of the clusters that purportedly have massive cooling flows, the best-fit models have power-law components that contribute $\sim$ 30 % of the total flux (0.14 - 10.0 keV) within the central 3 arcminutes. Because cooling flow mass deposition rates are inferred from X-ray fluxes, our finding opens the possibility of significantly reducing cooling rates.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figures, emulateapj style. Accepted for publication in Ap

Analysis of the Detection of Organophosphate Pesticides in Aqueous Solutions Using Polymer-Coated Single IDT Sensors

The single interdigital transducer (IDT) device was investigated as a micro-chemical sensor for the detection of organophosphates compounds in aqueous solutions. The compounds of interest are: parathion, parathion-methyl, and paraoxon. The polymers used as a partially-selective coating for the direct detection of these compounds are 2,2\u27-diallylbisphenol A- 1,1,3,3,5,5-hexamethyltrisiloxane (BPA-HMTS) and polyepichlorohydrin (PECH). BPA-HMTS is synthesized here at Marquette University. The measurement of interest for the single IDT is the change radiation resistance. The radiation resistance represents the energy stored in the propagating acoustic wave. As analyte absorbs into the polymer coating, changes in the film\u27s properties will undergo resulting in a change in the radiation resistance i.e the acoustic wave properties. The film\u27s properties changing include: added mass, viscoelastic properties, thickness, and dielectric properties. These properties will contribute to an overall change in the radiation resistance. A linear change in the radiation resistance is expected to occur for increasing concentrations of an organophosphate. The experimental results indicate that BPA-HMTS shows greater sensitivity towards the organophosphates than PECH. Both polymers showed greatest to lowest sensitivity to parathion, parathion-methyl, and paraoxon respectively. Thicker films tested for both polymers, 0.75μm thick, show a higher response due to a more pronounced effect of mass loading than the thinner films tested, 0.50μm. The response times for BPA-HMTS were much faster than for PECH. Both films showed fastest to slowest response time to paraoxon, parathion-methyl, and parathion respectively. The sensor is tested for reproducibility for the polymer BP-HMTS. A sensor array consisting of separately tested devices from this work as well as work done by a previous student is utilized to increase the selectivity of the three organophosphates. Radial plots are performed for each organophosphate and concentration using the change in radiation resistance, response time, and frequency shift for both BPA-HMTS and PECH at 0.50μm as input parameters. These plots yield unique recognition patterns for each organophosphate that can be used to distinguish one from another

Increasing Employee Engagement and Satisfaction Through Positive Interventions for Human Flourishing

Approximately four out of five employees globally are either disengaged or actively disengaged at work. Recent data shows a rapid drop in engagement in the leadership and management sector of organizations. This literature review explores the efficacy of Positive Psychology Interventions (PPIs) designed to increase the state-like constructs of Positive Emotions and Psychological Capital (PsyCap), a construct combining Hope, Efficacy, Resilience, and Optimism). Results from multiple studies show small to medium effect sizes for Positive Emotion and PsyCap Interventions for increasing employee engagement, productivity, job satisfaction, commitment to the organization, organizational citizenship behavior and reductions in stress, absenteeism, and intention to leave the organization. Individuals low in targeted state-like traits pre-intervention experience greater growth than individuals high in the state-like traits. Brief, online, self-directed interventions were effective and longer, in-person, group interventions showed greater benefit. No negative side effects were discovered. Limitations are discussed and an appendix of evidence-based interventions is provided. PPIs targeting Positive Emotions and PsyCap are a scalable, cost-effective strategy to increase employee engagement and satisfaction at the workplace