445 research outputs found
Developing Sustained Competitive Advantage: Business Process Reengineering versus Management of Information as a Resource
Information Technology induced Business Process Reengineering is being offered as a solution to organizations to achieve competitive advantage in an intensely competitive environment. However, just radical changes in business processes will not help an organization sustain competitive advantage as successful business process reengineering projects can be cloned by competing organizations, thereby negating the competitive advantage developed by any one organization. Instead, if an organization were to design and implement information systems for strategic management of information as a resource, then use of such systems can lead to sustainable competitive advantage. This paper presents the case for the use of an information system designed from the resource based perspective as a source of sustainablecompetitive advantage over business process reengineerin
SMA Imaging of the Maser Emission from the H30 Radio Recombination Line in MWC349A
We used the Submillimeter Array to map the angular distribution of the
H30 recombination line (231.9 GHz) in the circumstellar region of the
peculiar star MWC349A. The resolution was 1\farcs2, but because of high
signal-to-noise ratio we measured the positions of all maser components to
accuracies better than 0\farcs01, at a velocity resolution of . The
two strongest maser components (called high velocity components) at velocities
near -14 and are separated by 0\farcs048 \pm 0\farcs001 (60 AU)
along a position angle of 102 \pm 1\arcdeg. The distribution of maser
emission at velocities between and beyond these two strongest components were
also provided. The continuum emission lies at the center of the maser
distribution to within 10 mas. The masers appear to trace a nearly edge-on
rotating disk structure, reminiscent of the water masers in Keplerian rotation
in the nuclear accretion disk of the galaxy NGC4258. However, the maser
components in MWC349A do not follow a simple Keplerian kinematic prescription
with , but have a larger power law index. We explore the
possibility that the high velocity masers trace spiral density or shock waves.
We also emphasize caution in the interpretation of relative centroid maser
positions where the maser is not clearly resolved in position or velocity, and
we present simulations that illustrate the range of applicability of the
centroiding method.Comment: 23 pages with 9 figures (two of these figures are vertically aligned
as Figure 4) submitted to the Astrophysical Journa
In-vivo glenohumeral translation and ligament elongation during abduction and abduction with internal and external rotation
Study Design:
Basic Science. To investigate humeral head translations and glenohumeral ligament elongation with a dual fluoroscopic imaging system.
Background:
The glenohumeral ligaments are partially responsible for restraining the humeral head during the extremes of shoulder motion. However, in-vivo glenohumeral ligaments elongation patterns have yet to be determined. Therefore, the objectives of this study were to 1) quantify the in-vivo humeral head translations and glenohumeral ligament elongations during functional shoulder positions, 2) compare the inferred glenohumeral ligament functions with previous literature and 3) create a baseline data of healthy adult shoulder glenohumeral ligament lengths as controls for future studies.
Methods:
Five healthy adult shoulders were studied with a validated dual fluoroscopic imaging system (DFIS) and MR imaging technique. Humeral head translations and the superior, middle and inferior glenohumeral ligaments (SGHL, MGHL, IGHL) elongations were determined.
Results:
The humeral head center on average translated in a range of 6.0mm in the anterior-posterior direction and 2.5mm in the superior-inferior direction. The MGHL showed greater elongation over a broader range of shoulder motion than the SGHL. The anterior-band (AB)-IGHL showed maximum elongation at 90° abduction with maximum external rotation. The posterior-band (PB)-IGHL showed maximum elongation at 90° abduction with maximum internal rotation.
Discussion:
The results demonstrated that the humeral head translated statistically more in the anterior-posterior direction than the superior-inferior direction (p = 0.01), which supports the concept that glenohumeral kinematics are not ball-in-socket mechanics. The AB-IGHL elongation pattern makes it an important static structure to restrain anterior subluxation of the humeral head during the externally rotated cocking phase of throwing motion. These data suggest that in healthy adult shoulders the ligamentous structures of the glenohumeral joint are not fully elongated in many shoulder positions, but function as restraints at the extremes of glenohumeral motion. Clinically, these results may be helpful in restoring ligament anatomy during the treatment of anterior instability of the shoulder
Non-clasical Nucleation in Supercooled Nickel
The dynamics of homogeneous nucleation and growth of crystalline nickel from
the super-cooled melt is examined during rapid quenching using molecular
dynamics and a modified embedded atom method potential. The character of the
critical nuclei of the crystallization transition is examined using common
neighbor analysis and visualization. At nucleation the saddle point droplet
consists of randomly stacked planar structures with an in plane triangular
order. These results are consistent with previous theoretical results that
predict that the nucleation process in some metals is non-classical due to the
presence of long-range forces and a spinodal.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figure
The Submillimeter Polarization of Sgr A*
We report on the submillimeter properties of Sagittarius A* derived from
observations with the Submillimeter Array and its polarimeter. We find that the
spectrum of Sgr A* between 230 and 690 GHz is slightly decreasing when measured
simultaneously, indicating a transition to optically thin emission around
300-400 GHz. We also present very sensitive and well calibrated measurements of
the polarization of Sgr A* at 230 and 345 GHz. With these data we are able to
show for the first time that the polarization of Sgr A* varies on hour
timescales, as has been observed for the total intensity. On one night we find
variability that may arise from a polarized "blob" orbiting the black hole.
Finally, we use the ensemble of observations to determine the rotation measure.
This represents the first statistically significant rotation measure
determination and the only one made without resorting to comparing position
angles measured at separate epochs. We find a rotation measure of
(-5.6+/-0.7)x10^5 rad/m^2, with no evidence for variability on inter-day
timescales at the level of the measurement error. The stability constrains
interday fluctuations in the accretion rate to 8%. The mean intrinsic
polarization position angle is 167+/-7 degrees and we detect variations of
31+18/-9 degrees. This separation of intrinsic polarization changes and
possible rotation measure fluctuations is now possible because of the frequency
coverage and sensitivity of our data. The observable rotation measure restricts
the accretion rate to the range 2x10^{-7} Msun/yr to 2x10^{-9} Msun/yr, if the
magnetic field is near equipartition and ordered.Comment: v2: Minor change to orbital calculation. Invited contribution to the
proceedings of the Galactic Center Workshop 200
Characterizing Magnetic Field Morphologies in Three Serpens Protostellar Cores with ALMA
With the aim of characterizing the dynamical processes involved in the formation of young protostars, we present high-angular-resolution ALMA dust polarization observations of the Class 0 protostellar cores Serpens SMM1, Emb 8(N), and Emb 8. With spatial resolutions ranging from 150 to 40 au at 870 μm, we find unexpectedly high values of the polarization fraction along the outflow cavity walls in Serpens Emb 8(N). We use 3 mm and 1 mm molecular tracers to investigate outflow and dense-gas properties and their correlation with the polarization. These observations allow us to investigate the physical processes involved in the radiative alignment torques (RATs) acting on dust grains along the outflow cavity walls, which experience irradiation from accretion processes and outflow shocks. The inner core of SMM1-a presents a polarization pattern with a poloidal magnetic field at the bases of the two lobes of the bipolar outflow. To the south of SMM1-a we see two polarized filaments, one of which seems to trace the redshifted outflow cavity wall. The other may be an accretion streamer of material infalling onto the central protostar. We propose that the polarized emission we see at millimeter wavelengths along the irradiated cavity walls can be reconciled with the expectations of RAT theory if the aligned grains present at <500 au scales in Class 0 envelopes have grown larger than the 0.1 μm size of dust grains in the interstellar medium. Our observations allow us to constrain the magnetic field morphologies of star-forming sources within the central cores, along the outflow cavity walls, and in possible accretion streamers
Stringent Limits on the Polarized Submillimeter Emission from Protoplanetary Disks
We present arcsecond-resolution Submillimeter Array (SMA) polarimetric
observations of the 880 um continuum emission from the protoplanetary disks
around two nearby stars, HD 163296 and TW Hydrae. Although previous
observations and theoretical work have suggested that a 2-3% polarization
fraction should be common for the millimeter continuum emission from such
disks, we detect no polarized continuum emission above a 3-sigma upper limit of
7 mJy in each arcsecond-scale beam, or <1% in integrated continuum emission. We
compare the SMA upper limits with the predictions from the exploratory Cho &
Lazarian (2007) model of polarized emission from T Tauri disks threaded by
toroidal magnetic fields, and rule out their fiducial model at the ~10-sigma
level. We explore some potential causes for this discrepancy, focusing on model
parameters that describe the shape, magnetic field alignment, and size
distribution of grains in the disk. We also investigate related effects like
the magnetic field strength and geometry, scattering off of large grains, and
the efficiency of grain alignment, including recent advances in grain alignment
theory, which are not considered in the fiducial model. We discuss the impact
each parameter would have on the data and determine that the suppression of
polarized emission plausibly arises from rounding of large grains, reduced
efficiency of grain alignment with the magnetic field, and/or some degree of
magnetic field tangling (perhaps due to turbulence). A poloidal magnetic field
geometry could also reduce the polarization signal, particularly for a face-on
viewing geometry like the TW Hya disk. The data provided here offer the most
stringent limits to date on the polarized millimeter-wavelength emission from
disks around young stars.Comment: 15 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in Ap
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