Educational Characteristics of Learner Autonomy

According to many scholars, learner autonomy is a direction in higher professional education, which contributes to the formation of students’ independence as the primary personality trait that helps build their educational process without outside interference. The research goal was to identify the characteristics of the concepts of “independence,” “learner autonomy,” and “autonomous educational activity,” and their relationship to each other. We obtained the following results: independence is a personality trait, which is formed in the process of carrying out activities with a gradual transition from external management to selfmanagement. Learner autonomy is the highest level of a person’s independence, manifested in the readiness to create their educational product. From our point of view, autonomous educational activity is a technology of formation of readiness for further continuous professional education based on the obtained skills of independent goal setting and ways of achieving it. The study allowed us to more accurately define these concepts, which contributes to the scholarly literature and the possibility of further research on learner autonomy

Quality Problems in Vocational Tourism Education

We consider the quality of vocational tourism education in terms of world trends of tourism industry development. We identify and describe the quality problems of vocational tourism education in detail from interested focus groups using empirical and theoretical methods. We also note that there is insufficient attention to the development and improvement of vocational tourism education in the world by UNESCO, a low level of scientific research in terms of assessment, and the absence of quality monitoring mechanisms of vocational tourism education level. We analyze the definition of “sustainable tourism” to ensure the quality of the tourism experience in three aspects: environmental, socio-cultural, and economic. As a result, we formulated the definition of vocational tourism education, considering modern business approaches to quality assessment. Besides, we offer innovative ways of partnership and cooperation in providing quality training for the tourism and hospitality industry at the international and national levels

Observation of a narrow baryon resonance with positive strangeness formed in K+K^+Xe collisions

The charge-exchange reaction K^+ Xe --> K^0 p Xe' is investigated using the data of the DIANA experiment. The distribution of the pK^0 effective mass shows a prominent enhancement near 1538 MeV formed by \sim 80 events above the background, whose width is consistent with being entirely due to the experimental resolution. Under the selections based on a simulation of K^+Xe collisions, the statistical significance of the signal reaches 5.5\sigma. We interpret this observation as strong evidence for formation of a pentaquark baryon with positive strangeness, \Theta^+(uudd\bar{s}), in the charge-exchange reaction K^+ n --> K^0 p on a bound neutron. The mass of the \Theta^+ baryon is measured as m(\Theta^+) = 1538+-2 MeV. Using the ratio between the numbers of resonant and non-resonant charge-exchange events in the peak region, the intrinsic width of this baryon resonance is determined as \Gamma(\Theta^+) = 0.34+-0.10 MeV.Comment: 19 pages, 8 figure

Observation of a baryon resonance with positive strangeness in K+ collisions with Xe nuclei

The status of our investigation of low-energy $K^+$Xe collisions in the Xenon bubble chamber DIANA is reported. In the charge-exchange reaction $K^+Xe \to K^0 p Xe'$ the spectrum of $K^0 p$ effective mass shows a resonant enhancement with $M = 1539 \pm 2$ MeV/c$^2$ and $\Gamma \le 9 MeV/c$^2$. The statistical significance of the enhancement is near$4.4\sigma$. The mass and width of the observed resonance are consistent with expectations for the lightest member of the anti-decuplet of exotic pentaquark baryons, as predicted in the framework of the chiral soliton model.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figure

PSR B0329+54: Statistics of Substructure Discovered within the Scattering Disk on RadioAstron Baselines of up to 235,000 km

We discovered fine-scale structure within the scattering disk of PSR B0329+54 in observations with the RadioAstron ground-space radio interferometer. Here, we describe this phenomenon, characterize it with averages and correlation functions, and interpret it as the result of decorrelation of the impulse-response function of interstellar scattering between the widely-separated antennas. This instrument included the 10-m Space Radio Telescope, the 110-m Green Bank Telescope, the 14x25-m Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope, and the 64-m Kalyazin Radio Telescope. The observations were performed at 324 MHz, on baselines of up to 235,000 km in November 2012 and January 2014. In the delay domain, on long baselines the interferometric visibility consists of many discrete spikes within a limited range of delays. On short baselines it consists of a sharp spike surrounded by lower spikes. The average envelope of correlations of the visibility function show two exponential scales, with characteristic delays of $\tau_1=4.1\pm 0.3\ \mu{\rm s}$ and $\tau_2=23\pm 3\ \mu{\rm s}$, indicating the presence of two scales of scattering in the interstellar medium. These two scales are present in the pulse-broadening function. The longer scale contains 0.38 times the scattered power of the shorter one. We suggest that the longer tail arises from highly-scattered paths, possibly from anisotropic scattering or from substructure at large angles.Comment: 15 pages, 6 figures, 3 tables; accepted by Astrophysical journa

Accuracy of Kinovea Software in Estimating Body Segment Movements During Falls Captured on Standard Video: Effects of Fall Direction, Camera Perspective and Video Calibration Technique

Falls are a major cause of unintentional injuries. Understanding the movements of the body during falls is important to the design of fall prevention and management strategies, including exercise programs, mobility aids, fall detectors, protective gear, and safer environments. Video footage of real-life falls is increasingly available, and may be used with digitization software to extract kinematic features of falls. We examined the validity of this approach by conducting laboratory falling experiments, and comparing linear and angular positions and velocities measured from 3D motion capture to estimates from Kinovea 2D digitization software based on standard surveillance video (30 Hz, 640x480 pixels). We also examined how Kinovea accuracy depended on fall direction, camera angle, filtering cut-off frequency, and calibration technique. For a camera oriented perpendicular to the plane of the fall (90 degrees), Kinovea position data filtered at 10 Hz, and video calibration using a 2D grid, mean root mean square errors were 0.050 m or 9% of the signal amplitude and 0.22 m/s (7%) for vertical position and velocity, and 0.035 m (6%) and 0.16 m/s (7%) for horizontal position and velocity. Errors in angular measures averaged over 2-fold higher in sideways than forward or backward falls, due to out-of-plane movement of the knees and elbows. Errors in horizontal velocity were 2.5-fold higher for a 30 than 90 degree camera angle, and 1.6-fold higher for calibration using participants’ height (1D) instead of a 2D grid. When compared to 10 Hz, filtering at 3 Hz caused velocity errors to increase 1.4-fold. Our results demonstrate that Kinovea can be applied to 30 Hz video to measure linear positions and velocities to within 9% accuracy. Lower accuracy was observed for angular kinematics of the upper and lower limb in sideways falls, and for horizontal measures from 30 degree cameras or 1D height-based calibration

Detection of Five New RRATs at 111 MHz

Results of 111-MHz monitoring observations carried out on the Big Scanning Antenna of the Pushchino Radio Astronomy Observatory during September 1-28, 2015 are presented. Fifty-four pulsating sources were detected at declinations $-9^o < \delta < +42^o$. Forty-seven of these are known pulsars, five are new sources, and two are previously discovered transients. Estimates of the peak flux densities and dispersion measures are presented or all these sources.Comment: published in Astronomy Report, translated by Yandex translator with correction of scientific lexis, 8 pages, 2 figures, 3 table