Effectiveness of Introductory Information and Communication Technology Module and its Implication on Academic Performance: A Study on Medical Entrants

Literacy in Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is vital in current medical education and practice to; better prepare future physicians for the changing behaviours of the patients and diseases, improve the quality of interventions and health care delivery, find information and change medical teaching practices. A descriptive study was designed to evaluate the effectiveness of the introductory ICT course and find out the factors affecting ICT literacy in medical entrants. A self-administered questionnaire was administered after receiving the informed consent of the students of the first and second batches of Faculty of Medicine, Wayamba University of Sri Lanka. ICT literacy was evaluated by administering a theory and practical based examination. A pre-course examination was held to a selected sub-sample in order to evaluate the effectiveness of the introductory course. Out of the consented students (n=126), 71.4% were females. All the students owned at least one IT equipment and browsed the internet daily. Having school ICT facility (p=0.001) and parental knowledge on ICT (p=0.04) have affected to the ICT literacy of the students while the external courses have not affected at all. The interaction between ICT evaluation marks and academic results are strongly significant. There was a significant improvement in ICT literacy of the students after conducting an introductory ICT course (p=0.001). It is required to increase ICT facilities at school levels and improve the quality of the introductory ICT courses in order to create skillful professionals who can challenge the changing behaviours of the future world. Keywords: Medical Entrants, Information and Communication Technology, Introductory Course, Medical Educatio

FIRST SEARCHES FOR OPTICAL COUNTERPARTS TO GRAVITATIONAL-WAVE CANDIDATE EVENTS

During the LIGO and Virgo joint science runs in 2009-2010, gravitational wave (GW) data from three interferometer detectors were analyzed within minutes to select GW candidate events and infer their apparent sky positions. Target coordinates were transmitted to several telescopes for follow-up observations aimed at the detection of an associated optical transient. Images were obtained for eight such GW candidates. We present the methods used to analyze the image data as well as the transient search results. No optical transient was identified with a convincing association with any of these candidates, and none of the GW triggers showed strong evidence for being astrophysical in nature. We compare the sensitivities of these observations to several model light curves from possible sources of interest, and discuss prospects for future joint GW-optical observations of this type

Planck 2018 results. X. Constraints on inflation

We report on the implications for cosmic inflation of the 2018 Release of the Planck CMB anisotropy measurements. The results are fully consistent with the two previous Planck cosmological releases, but have smaller uncertainties thanks to improvements in the characterization of polarization at low and high multipoles. Planck temperature, polarization, and lensing data determine the spectral index of scalar perturbations to be $n_\mathrm{s}=0.9649\pm 0.0042$ at 68% CL and show no evidence for a scale dependence of $n_\mathrm{s}.$ Spatial flatness is confirmed at a precision of 0.4% at 95% CL with the combination with BAO data. The Planck 95% CL upper limit on the tensor-to-scalar ratio, $r_{0.002}<0.10$, is further tightened by combining with the BICEP2/Keck Array BK15 data to obtain $r_{0.002}<0.056$. In the framework of single-field inflationary models with Einstein gravity, these results imply that: (a) slow-roll models with a concave potential, $V" (\phi) < 0,$ are increasingly favoured by the data; and (b) two different methods for reconstructing the inflaton potential find no evidence for dynamics beyond slow roll. Non-parametric reconstructions of the primordial power spectrum consistently confirm a pure power law. A complementary analysis also finds no evidence for theoretically motivated parameterized features in the Planck power spectrum, a result further strengthened for certain oscillatory models by a new combined analysis that includes Planck bispectrum data. The new Planck polarization data provide a stringent test of the adiabaticity of the initial conditions. The polarization data also provide improved constraints on inflationary models that predict a small statistically anisotropic quadrupolar modulation of the primordial fluctuations. However, the polarization data do not confirm physical models for a scale-dependent dipolar modulation