Renewable Energy Resources Impact on Clean Electrical Power by developing the North-West England Hydro Resource Model.

This paper describes the development of a sequential decision support system to promote hydroelectric power in North-West England. The system, composed of integrated models, addresses barriers to the installation of hydroelectric power schemes. Information is linked through an economic assessment which identifies different turbine options, assesses their suitability for location and demand; and combines the different types of information in a way that supports decision making. The system is structured into five components: the hydrological resource is modelled using Low Flows 2000, the turbine options are identified from hydrological, environmental and demand requirements; and the consequences of different solutions will be fed into other components so that the environmental impacts and public acceptability can be assessed and valued. A preliminary case study is presented on an old gunpowder works to illustrate how the resource model may be employed. Historical architectural structures, power uptake and educational instruction of hydro power technology are considered

Big Data and Analysis of Data Transfers for International Research Networks Using NetSage

Modern science is increasingly data-driven and collaborative in nature. Many scientific disciplines, including genomics, high-energy physics, astronomy, and atmospheric science, produce petabytes of data that must be shared with collaborators all over the world. The National Science Foundation-supported International Research Network Connection (IRNC) links have been essential to enabling this collaboration, but as data sharing has increased, so has the amount of information being collected to understand network performance. New capabilities to measure and analyze the performance of international wide-area networks are essential to ensure end-users are able to take full advantage of such infrastructure for their big data applications. NetSage is a project to develop a unified, open, privacy-aware network measurement, and visualization service to address the needs of monitoring today's high-speed international research networks. NetSage collects data on both backbone links and exchange points, which can be as much as 1Tb per month. This puts a significant strain on hardware, not only in terms storage needs to hold multi-year historical data, but also in terms of processor and memory needs to analyze the data to understand network behaviors. This paper addresses the basic NetSage architecture, its current data collection and archiving approach, and details the constraints of dealing with this big data problem of handling vast amounts of monitoring data, while providing useful, extensible visualization to end users

Fronto-striatal cognitive deficits at different stages of Parkinson's disease

Groups of patients with idiopathic Parkinson's disease, either medicated or unmedicated, were compared with matched groups of normal controls on a computerized battery previously shown to be sensitive to frontal lobe dysfunction, including tests of planning, spatial working memory and attentional set-shifting. In a series of problems based on the 'Tower of London' test, medicated patients with Parkinson's disease were shown to be impaired in the amount of time spent thinking about (planning) the solution to each problem. Additionally, an impairment in terms of the accuracy of the solution produced on this test was only evident in those patients with more severe clinical symptoms and was accompanied by deficits in an associated test of spatial short-term memory. Medicated patients with both mild and severe clinical symptoms were also impaired on a related test of spatial working memory. In contrast, a group of patients who were unmedicated and 'early in the course' of the disease were unimpaired in all three of these tests. However, all three Parkinson's disease groups were impaired in the test of attentional set-shifting ability, although unimpaired in a test of pattern recognition which is insensitive to frontal lobe damage. These data are compared with those previously published from a group of young neurosurgical patients with localized excisions of the frontal lobes and are discussed in terms of the specific nature of the cognitive deficit at different stages of Parkinson's disease

Fractional S-branes on a Spacetime Orbifold

Unstable D-branes are central objects in string theory, and exist also in time-dependent backgrounds. In this paper we take first steps to studying brane decay in spacetime orbifolds. As a concrete model we focus on the R^{1,d}/Z_2 orbifold. We point out that on a spacetime orbifold there exist two kinds of S-branes, fractional S-branes in addition to the usual ones. We investigate their construction in the open string and closed string boundary state approach. As an application of these constructions, we consider a scenario where an unstable brane nucleates at the origin of time of a spacetime, its initial energy then converting into energy flux in the form of closed strings. The dual open string description allows for a well-defined description of this process even if it originates at a singular origin of the spacetime.Comment: 22 pages, 6 eps figure

A Comment on Zero-brane Quantum Mechanics

We consider low energy, non-relativistic scattering of two Dirichlet zero-branes as an exercise in quantum mechanics. For weak string coupling and sufficiently small velocity, the dynamics is governed by an effective U(2) gauge theory in 0+1 dimensions. At low energies, D-brane scattering can reliably probe distances much shorter than the string scale. The only length scale in the quantum mechanics problem is the eleven dimensional Planck length. This provides evidence for the role of scales shorter than the string length in the weakly coupled dynamics of type IIA strings.Comment: 9 pages, harvmac, improved treatment of 2+1 proble

General dental practitioners' knowledge and opinions of snoring and sleep-related breathing disorders

Aims: There is increasing recognition that sleep disturbances can affect lifestyle, economy and health. General dental practitioners (GDPs) can play a vital role in helping to identify at-risk patients through screening as well as aid in the management of these conditions. The aim of this study was to assess the knowledge of UK-based GDPs in relation to sleep-related breathing disorders (SRBDs). / Material and methods: A questionnaire was developed to assess GDPs' knowledge of SRBDs and their current practice in relation to the management of SRBDs, and identify the factors associated with improved knowledge and management. A volunteer sample was recruited from social media platforms and conference attendees. / Results: In total, 152 GDPs completed the questionnaire; 101 (66% [95% CI 59%,74%]) agreed that GDPs should ask their patients about sleep disorders, while only 82 (54% [95% CI 46%,62%]) confirmed that they actually asked their patients about the problem. On a 22-point knowledge scale, the mean score was 12.93 (95%CI 12.23, 13.63). Postgraduate education (F = 5.47; p = 0.001), increasing age (r = 0.23; p = 0.005) and GDP workplace (F = 4.98; p = 0.008) contributed to a higher knowledge score. GDPs were strongly in favour of having more information (N = 141; 93% [95% CI 87%,97%]). / Conclusion: Although GDPs' knowledge of SRBDs was better than anticipated, they clearly felt a need for further information and training. There is a compelling case to include this subject in the undergraduate dental curriculum

On the Z_2 Monopole of Spin(10) Gauge Theories

An "expanded" description is introduced to examine the spinor-monopole identification proposed by Strassler for four-dimensional $\cal N$ = 1 supersymmetric Spin(10) gauge theories with matter in F vector and N spinor representations. It is shown that a Z_2 monopole in the "expanded" theory is associated with massive spinors of the Spin(10) theory. For N=2, two spinor case, we confirm this identification by matching the transformation properties of the two theories under SU(2) flavor symmetry. However, for N $\ge$ 3, the transformation properties are not matched between the spinors and the monopole. This disagreement might be due to the fact that the SU(N) flavor symmetry of the Spin(10) theory is partially realized as an SU(2) symmetry in the "expanded" theory.Comment: 16 pages, LaTex, no figur

The non-abelian D-brane effective action through order α′4\alpha'{}^4

Requiring the existence of certain BPS solutions to the equations of motion, we determine the bosonic part of the non-abelian D-brane effective action through order $\alpha'{}^4$. We also propose an economic organizational principle for the effective action.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figures, JHEP styl

Use of Placebo in Supplementation Studies-Vitamin D Research Illustrates an Ethical Quandary.

History has shown that without explicit and enforced guidelines, even well-intentioned researchers can fail to adequately examine the ethical pros and cons of study design choices. One area in which consensus does not yet exist is the use of placebo groups in vitamin supplementation studies. As a prime example, we focus on vitamin D research. We aim to provide an overview of the ethical issues in placebo-controlled studies and guide future discussion about the ethical use of placebo groups. Research in the field of vitamin D shows variation in how placebo groups are used. We outline four types of control groups in use: active-control, placebo-control with restrictions on supplementation, placebo-control without supplementation restrictions, and placebo-control with rescue repletion therapy. The first two types highlight discrete ethical issues: active-control trials limit the ability to detect a difference; placebo-control trials that restrict supplementation potentially place subjects at risk of undue harm. The final two, placebo-control without supplementation restrictions or with rescue repletion therapy, offer potential solutions to these ethical challenges. Building on this, guidelines should be established and enforced on the use of placebo in supplementation studies. Furthermore, the field of vitamin D research has the potential to set an example worthy of emulation

More on Chiral-Nonchiral Dual Pairs

Expanding upon earlier work of Pouliot and Strassler, we construct chiral magnetic duals to nonchiral supersymmetric electric theories based upon SO(7), SO(8) and SO(9) gauge groups with various numbers of vector and spinor matter superfields. Anomalies are matched and gauge invariant operators are mapped within each dual pair. Renormalization group flows along flat directions are also examined. We find that confining phase quantum constraints in the electric theories are recovered from semiclassical equations of motion in their magnetic counterparts when the dual gauge groups are completely Higgsed.Comment: 25 pages, harvmac and tables macros, 1 figur