Investigation into Alpha Particle Backgrounds in the MAJORANA DEMONSTRATOR

Questions about the neutrino’s mass and nature have developed into an important area of modern physics research. While neutrino oscillations have shown that neutrinos have non-zero mass, their absolute mass has yet to be determined. Additionally, since they possess no charge, it is possible that neutrinos are Majorana particles, meaning that they are indistinguishable from their antiparticle. The MAJORANA DEMONSTRATOR (MJD) aims to probe the neutrino’s absolute mass, and its Majorana nature by searching for neutrinoless double-beta decay (0υββ). Backgrounds from alpha particles potentially pose a problem to this experiment. Alpha particles are produced from elements in the 238-uranium (238U) and 232-thorium (232Th) decay chains, and although alpha particle energies are typically higher than the 0υββ Q-value, they can lose energy before entering the active mass of the detector, and deposit energy near the 0υββ Q-value. Initially, the dependence of alpha rates on detector geometry is explored. Then, two studies conducted on data collected by MJD are presented, one looking for correlations between observed alpha rates and detectors’ processing history and manufacturing date, and the other looking for alpha-alpha and beta-alpha coincidence events in the 238U and 232Th decay chains. No correlation is found between a detector’s processing history and its alpha rate, but a detector’s age shows a weak negative correlation with alpha rate, suggesting the decay of plated out radon progeny. Results of the coincidence study do not provide strong evidence of the presence of 232Th or 238U signatures in MJD data.Bachelor of Scienc

Campus-wide Coastal Hazards Resiliency Curriculum and Development of Hazard Mitigation Planning Curriculum

An area of the country so much at risk to coastal storms requires an educated populous to whom risk resilience comes naturally. Strengthening what UNO already offers in some of its graduate programs with similar interesting, logical instruction on resilience in many courses across the curriculum (called ‘teaching across the curriculum,’ like international issues are currently done) will build the human infrastructure to lead and support statewide storm mitigation. Given the widespread recognition of the importance of community and societal resilience in the context of natural hazard risk (or any risk), there is a strong need to begin systematically developing integrated social resilience curriculum in many of the university course offerings. The pinnacle outcome of this project is to produce community/regional leaders with strong professional capacities to create and support disaster resilience everywhere. The time and place could not be more perfect for such a program. The University, as the large public institution at “ground zero” of the Katrina/Rita catastrophe, offers a unique laboratory for the study of disaster resilience. In addition, UNO already has a foundation in place in the form of CHART and CUPA, faculty experts in disaster science, and a curricular core that can serve as a starting point for an instructional program

Campus-wide Coastal Hazards Resiliency Curriculum and Development of Hazard Mitigation Planning Curriculum

An area of the country so much at risk to coastal storms requires an educated populous to whom risk resilience comes naturally. Strengthening what UNO already offers in some of its graduate programs with similar interesting, logical instruction on resilience in many courses across the curriculum (called ‘teaching across the curriculum,’ like international issues are currently done) will build the human infrastructure to lead and support statewide storm mitigation. Given the widespread recognition of the importance of community and societal resilience in the context of natural hazard risk (or any risk), there is a strong need to begin systematically developing integrated social resilience curriculum in many of the university course offerings. The pinnacle outcome of this project is to produce community/regional leaders with strong professional capacities to create and support disaster resilience everywhere. The time and place could not be more perfect for such a program. The University, as the large public institution at “ground zero” of the Katrina/Rita catastrophe, offers a unique laboratory for the study of disaster resilience. In addition, UNO already has a foundation in place in the form of CHART and CUPA, faculty experts in disaster science, and a curricular core that can serve as a starting point for an instructional program

COPROLITES FROM CALVERT CLIFFS: MIOCENE FECAL PELLETS AND BURROWED CROCODILIAN DROPPINGS FROM THE CHESAPEAKE GROUP OF MARYLAND, U.S.A.

New finds of remarkable coprolites (fossilized feces) are here reported from the famous Miocene marine sediments of the Chesapeake Group exposed along Calvert Cliffs (Maryland, U.S.A.).  Although vertebrate coprolites have been described from these deposits, here we provide the first description of tiny invertebrate fecal pellets. Thus far, these fecal pellets have only been found in the upper Miocene (Tortonian) St. Marys Formation. The micro-coprolites represent the coprulid ichnospecies Coprulus oblongus. The fecal pellets are found in small clusters or strings of dozens to masses of many hundreds. Pellets range in size from approximately 0.4 – 2.0 mm wide by 1.0 – 5.0 mm long, and range in color from gray to brownish black. Their length/diameter ratio is always very nearly 2. These coprulids have been found in a variety of Miocene fossils/concretions including a uranoscopid neurocranium, naticid gastropod, bivalve shells, barnacle tests, and in pellet-backfilled sinuous burrows through sediment. Because the fecal pellets are often found in tiny spaces or spaces thought to be inaccessible to shelled invertebrates, the coprulids are attributed to small and soft-bodied polychaetes or other annelids. Some coprolites attributed to crocodilians from the lower-middle Miocene Calvert Formation were tunneled into, presumably the result of coprophagy, by some unknown kind of organism(s). These compound trace fossils are in the form of burrows that excavate the coprolites, the sides of which are sculptured by scratch/gouge marks

Dental Anatomy Carving Computer-Assisted Instruction Program: An Assessment of Student Performance and Perceptions

The purpose of this study was to compare the performance of students exposed to two different instructional modalities for dental anatomy wax carving: CAI (computer-assisted instruction) using DVD technology, or traditional laboratory instruction. Students’ self-assessment scores were also compared to faculty scores, and students’ perceptions of their teaching modality were analyzed. Seventy-three first-year dental students (response rate 81 percent) participated in this randomized single blind trial, in which faculty graders were blinded to student group assignment. There were no statistical differences, as determined by the Wilcoxon non-parametric test and a t-test, between the faculty grades on the wax carving from the two teaching methods the students experienced. The student self-assessments revealed higher mean grades (3.0 for the DVD-only group and 3.1 for the traditional group) than the faculty actual mean grades (2.2 for both the DVD-only group and the traditional group) by almost one grade level on a 4.0 grade scale. Similar percentages of students in the traditional group had either favorable or unfavorable perceptions of their learning experience, while more students in the DVD-only group reported favorable perceptions. Students from both groups said they wanted more faculty feedback in the course. Based on these objective and subjective data, merging CAI and traditional laboratory teaching may best enhance student learning needs

Social/energy policy: an inquiry into the intersection of two policy domains with Australia’s national electricity market

The introduction of competition to electricity markets has been a priority of energy policy in Australia for over 20 years. Throughout this process, economic efficiency objectives have had explicit primacy over social or environmental objectives. Neoliberalism, or economic rationalism as it is often referred to in Australia, not only radically changed the provision of electricity from the 1990s but recast the provision of welfare services by transferring many services from provision by government to provision by ‘private welfare agencies’. Energy policy and social policy can therefore be seen to have been placed on similar paths towards market-based provision of service to households. Importantly this has shifted many frontline responsibilities away from governments to energy retailers and community sector organisations. The electricity market’s consumer safety net has been described as a shared responsibility between industry, governments and community sector organisations. This shared responsibility represents the intersection of energy policy and social policy in Australia akin to fuel poverty policies internationally. However, this intersection is ill-defined and not systemically governed. The key role of community sector organisations in particular is rarely formalised. This research represents the first attempt to develop a coordinated national policy framework for the consumer safety net of Australia’s National Electricity Market. The research question that this thesis seeks to answer is: • When considering a consumer safety net for consumers in a liberalised electricity market, what is an appropriate analytical framework for policy and practice that can be used by stakeholders to improve governance and consumer outcomes? • Subsequently, what priorities emerge from this framework that could be advanced through the policy cycle? In response, this thesis provides a comprehensive, structured review and analysis of the relationship between energy policy and social policy at a time when electricity pricing is undergoing significant changes in terms of structures (tariff reform) and upward pressure as a result of climate change policies and the development of a natural gas export industry. - 4 - The theory and practice of public policy analysis is summarised and guides the structure of the thesis. The research argues for a systematic approach based on the pursuit of 5 public policy outcomes that reflect the interaction between household energy bills and energy, climate and social policies: ● Stable and Efficient Pricing AND ● Informed and engaged consumers AND ● Energy consumed efficiently and productively AND ● Robust consumer protections AND ● All households have a capacity to pay their energy bills This thesis provides context in Chapters 1 and 2 then a chapter is dedicated to each of the five policy outcomes. In each case, the research and analysis is presented in four parts that represent key stages of a policy cycle, the way in which public policy evolves over time: a review of the current arrangements; analysis to identify key issues; empirical analysis and; policy formulation. Consequently, priority policy issues are identified, and recommendations made in the concluding chapter

Imitação ou colaboração? Marlowe e o cânone shakespeareano inicial

This article suggests that we can stylistically distinguish a dramatist working together with other (collaboration) from one employing another poet’s linguistic patterns (imitation). Considering conceptually that identity is cellular and systemic while imitation is selective and semiotic, we verify three sections of 1 Henry VI in which Shakespeare and Marlowe collaborated.Este artigo emprega estudos de atribuição de autoria para propor que é possíveldistinguir um dramaturgo trabalhando conjuntamente com outro (em colaboração) de um que emprega recursos linguísticos reconhecíveis de outro poeta (imitação). Partindo do pressuposto de que a identidade é celular e sistêmica enquanto a imitação é seletiva e semiótica, verifica-se três trechos de Henrique VI Parte I, na qual William Shakespeare e Christopher Marlowe trabalharam colaborativamente