Slowing the stork : better health for women through family planning

Each year 500,000 women die from causes related to pregnancy - 99 percent of them in developing countries. While many of those pregnancies are unwanted and could have been prevented by family planning, only a minority of developing country couples use effective contraceptive methods. For some women, pregnancy represents a major health risk. Others, of lower risk, do not want any more children. This paper discusses the factors which determine women's use of contraceptives, and how family planning programs reach the large numbers of women at risk from further pregnancies. The most successful family planning policies offer women a variety of contraceptive methods tailored to specific age groups and educational levels. Much program experience suggests that family planning is one of, if not the most cost-effective means of averting maternal deaths. The savings generated by family planning services could be invested in saving the lives and health of women who do want to have more children.Health Monitoring&Evaluation,Adolescent Health,Reproductive Health,Early Child and Children's Health,Gender and Health

Internal convective cooling systems for hypersonic aircraft

Parametric studies were conducted to investigate the relative merits of construction materials, coolants, and cooled panel concepts for internal convective cooling systems applied to airframe structures of hydrogen-fueled hypersonic aircraft. These parametric studies were then used as a means of comparing various cooled structural arrangements for a hypersonic transport and a hypersonic research airplane. The cooled airplane studies emphasized weight aspects as related to the choice of materials, structural arrangements, structural temperatures, and matching of the cooling system heat load to the available hydrogen fuel-flow heat sink. Consideration was given to reliability and to fatigue and fracture aspects, as well. Even when auxiliary thermal protection system items such as heat shielding, insulation, and excess hydrogen for cooling are considered the more attractive actively cooled airframe concepts indicated potential payload increases of from 40 percent to over 100 percent for the hypersonic transport as compared to the results of previous studies of the same vehicle configuration with an uncooled airframe

Interplay of Spin and Orbital Angular Momentum in the Proton

We derive the consequences of the Myhrer-Thomas explanation of the proton spin problem for the distribution of orbital angular momentum on the valence and sea quarks. After QCD evolution these results are found to be in very good agreement with both recent lattice QCD calculations and the experimental constraints from Hermes and JLab

Spin and orbital angular momentum of the proton

Since the announcement of the proton spin crisis by the European Muon Collaboration there has been considerable progress in unravelling the distribution of spin and orbital angular momentum within the proton. We review the current status of the problem, showing that not only have strong upper limits have been placed on the amount of polarized glue in the proton but that the experimental determination of the spin content has become much more precise. It is now clear that the origin of the discrepancy between experiment and the naive expectation of the fraction of spin carried by the quarks and anti-quarks in the proton lies in the non-perturbative structure of the proton. We explain how the features expected in a modern, relativistic and chirally symmetric description of nucleon structure naturally explain the current data. The consequences of this explanation for the presence of orbital angular momentum on quarks and gluons is reviewed and comparison made with recent results from lattice QCD and experimental data.Comment: Lectures at Aligarh University (4th DAE-BRNS Workshop on Hadron Physics, Feb 18-21, 200

Optimal Capacity Decisions in a Developing Fishery

The problem of estimating optimal fishing capacity for a developing fishery is discussed, using the methods of Bayesian decision analysis. The results obtained indicate that quite good decisions can often be made on the basis of limited prior information as to fish stock productivity, particularly if a conservative approach allowing for subsequent increases in capacity is employed.Environmental Economics and Policy, International Development, International Relations/Trade, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Calculating Kaon Fragmentation Functions from NJL-Jet Model

The Nambu--Jona-Lasinio (NJL) - Jet model provides a sound framework for calculating the fragmentation functions in an effective chiral quark theory, where the momentum and isospin sum rules are satisfied without the introduction of ad hoc parameters. Earlier studies of the pion fragmentation functions using the NJL model within this framework showed qualitative agreement with the empirical parameterizations. Here we extend the NJL-Jet model by including the strange quark. The corrections to the pion fragmentation functions and corresponding kaon fragmentation functions are calculated using the elementary quark to quark-meson fragmentation functions from NJL. The results for the kaon fragmentation functions exhibit a qualitative agreement with the empirical parameterizations, while the unfavored strange quark fragmentation to pions is shown to be of the same order of magnitude as the unfavored light quark's. The results of these studies are expected to provide important guidance for the analysis of a large variety of semi-inclusive data.Comment: 9 pages, 14 figure

EFFECT OF RECREATIONAL TRAIL TRAFFIC LEVEL ON EASTERN RED-BACKED SALAMANDER (PLETHODON CINEREUS) RELATIVE ABUNDANCE

The effects of roads and trails on terrestrial salamanders, primarily plethodontids, can be important. The abundance of terrestrial salamanders often increases with distance from roads. Less is known about the effects of recreational or hiking trails on terrestrial salamanders than is known about the effects of roads. We explored how low and high traffic trails in a suburban biological reserve affect the relative abundance of Eastern Red-backed Salamanders (Plethodon cinereus). We found more salamanders under cover objects next to low traffic trails compared to either high traffic trails or wooded areas without trails. At wooded sites, we found only striped morphs whereas at high traffic sites we found only unstriped morphs. Low traffic sites included a range of color morph frequencies. The proportion of females found in each site did not differ, nor did the mean size of the salamanders. Our results suggest that the impact of recreational walking trails needs to be examined more closely to see how and why the distributions of P. cinereus, and potentially other woodland salamanders, are affected and what trail characteristics are important in driving the apparent effects. Such information will contribute to the design and maintenance of walking trails in natural areas that minimize effects on terrestrial salamanders, and likely other organisms