Novel Superconducting Tunneling Structures

Contains description of one research project.Joint Services Electronics Program Contract DAAL03-89-C-000

Educational Interpreter Services for Hearing-Impaired Students: Provider and Consumer Disagreements

Thirteen supervisors of educational programs for hearing-impaired students completed an assessment designed to determine the need for educational interpreters in a midwestern state and how well it was being met. The results suggested that the trend toward the integration of hearing-impaired students in to regular programs continues and that, with the higher incidence of integration, there is an associated unmet need for educational interpreters. Nine supervisors, 24 teachers, 27 interpreters and 18 hearing-impaired college students rated the characteristics and skills of interpreters which they perceived to be most important. Significant differences existed between and within groups in the characteristics and skills perceived important to educational interpreting (p\u3c .05). Major differences existed between the skills and characteristics cited as most important by hearing-impaired persons and those cited by teachers and interpreters

Effects of radiotransmitters on fecal glucocorticoid metabolite levels of three-toed box turtles in captivity

The increased use of radio-telemetry for studying movement, resource selection, and population demographics in reptiles necessitates closer examination of the assumption that radiotransmitter attachment does not bias study results. We determined the effects of radiotransmitter attachment on fecal glucocorticoid metabolite levels of wild three-toed box turtles (Terrapene carolina triunguis) in captivity. During May 2002 we captured 11 adult three-toed box turtles in central Missouri. We housed turtles in individual pens in a semi-natural outdoor setting. We radio-tagged 6 turtles, and the remaining 5 turtles served as controls. We captured and handled all turtles similarly during treatments. We collected feces daily prior to attachment (14 June–05 July 2002), while transmitters were attached (06 July–02 August 2002), and after transmitters were removed (03 August–24 August 2002). We conducted a standard assay validation and found that the assay accurately and precisely quantified fecal glucocorticoid metabolites of box turtles. We did not find a significant effect of radiotransmitter attachment on fecal glucocorticoid metabolite levels of three-toed box turtles (F1, 9 =0.404, P=0.541). Fecal glucocorticoid metabolite levels of control and treatment turtles increased significantly during the study (F2,166=7.874, P= 0.001), but there was no treatment:period interaction (F2,166 = 0.856, P = 0.427). Additionally, we did not find a significant relationship between glucocorticoid metabolite levels and time in captivity (r2=0.01, F1,179=2.89, P=0.091) or maximum daily temperature (r2\u3c0.01, F1,179=0.301, P=0.584). Our results suggested that radiotransmitter attachment did not significantly increase fecal glucocorticoid metabolite levels in adult three-toed box turtles; however, we conducted our study in captivity and sample sizes were small. Thus, more research is needed to assess potential effects of radiotransmitters on turtles in the wild. We believe this study is the first to validate the use of fecal glucocorticoid metabolite measures for reptiles, which might prove useful in other research studies

Novel Superconducting Tunneling Structures

Contains a description of one research project.Joint Services Electronics Program Contract DAAL03-89-C-000

Separating Proactive Conservation from Species Listing Decisions

Proactive Conservation is a paradigm of natural resource management in the United States that encourages voluntary, collaborative efforts to restore species before they need to be protected through government regulations. This paradigm is widely used to conserve at-risk species today, and when used in conjunction with the Policy for Evaluation of Conservation Efforts (PECE), it allows for successful conservation actions to preclude listing of species under the Endangered Species Act (ESA). Despite the popularity of this paradigm, and recent flagship examples of its use (e.g., greater sage grouse, Centrocercus urophasianus), critical assessments of the outcomes of Proactive Conservation are lacking from the standpoint of species status and recovery metrics. Here, we provide such an evaluation, using the New England cottontail (Sylvilagus transitionalis), heralded as a success of Proactive Conservation efforts in the northeastern United States, as a case study. We review the history and current status of the species, based on the state of the science, in the context of the Conservation Initiative, and the 2015 PECE decision not to the list the species under the ESA. In addition to the impacts of the PECE decision on the New England cottontail conservation specifically, our review also evaluates the benefits and limits of the Proactive Conservation paradigm more broadly, and we make recommendations for its role in relation to ESA implementation for the future of at-risk species management. We find that the status and assurances for recovery under the PECE policy, presented at the time of the New England cottontail listing decision, were overly optimistic, and the status of the species has worsened in subsequent years. We suggest that use of PECE to avoid listing may occur because of the perception of the ESA as a punitive law and a misconception that it is a failure, although very few listed species have gone extinct. Redefining recovery to decouple it from delisting and instead link it to probability of persistence under recommended conservation measures would remove some of the stigma of listing, and it would strengthen the role of Species Status Assessments in endangered species conservation

One-way diffraction grating

Matthew J. Lockyear, Alastair P. Hibbins, Kevin R. White, and J. Roy Sambles, Physical Review E, Vol. 74, article 056611 (2006). "Copyright © 2006 by the American Physical Society."Diffraction gratings are elementary tools for much of optics and spectroscopy. Here, at microwave frequencies, we provide a new perspective on these fundamental structures. A transmission diffraction grating is presented that has diffracted beams emanating from one surface only. It can thus function either as a transmission grating with no reflected orders (other than zero) or, in the reverse configuration, as a partially transmitting structure with diffracted orders in reflection only

M1 muscarinic receptors inhibit L-type Ca2+ current and M-current by divergent signal transduction cascades

Ion channels reside in a sea of phospholipids. During normal fluctuations in membrane potential and periods of modulation, lipids that directly associate with channel proteins influence gating by incompletely understood mechanisms. In one model, M(1)-muscarinic receptors (M(1)Rs) may inhibit both Ca(2+) (L- and N-) and K(+) (M-) currents by losing a putative interaction between channels and phosphatidylinositol-4,5-bisphosphate (PIP(2)). However, we found previously that M(1)R inhibition of N-current in superior cervical ganglion (SCG) neurons requires loss of PIP(2) and generation of a free fatty acid, probably arachidonic acid (AA) by phospholipase A(2) (PLA(2)). It is not known whether PLA(2) activity and AA also participate in L- and M-current modulation in SCG neurons. To test whether PLA(2) plays a similar role in M(1)R inhibition of L- and M-currents, we used several experimental approaches and found unanticipated divergent signaling. First, blocking resynthesis of PIP(2) minimized M-current recovery from inhibition, whereas L-current recovered normally. Second, L-current inhibition required group IVa PLA(2) [cytoplasmic PLA(2) (cPLA(2))], whereas M-current did not. Western blot and imaging studies confirmed acute activation of cPLA(2) by muscarinic stimulation. Third, in type IIa PLA(2) [secreted (sPLA(2))](-/-)/cPLA(2)(-/-) double-knock-out SCG neurons, muscarinic inhibition of L-current decreased. In contrast, M-current inhibition remained unaffected but recovery was impaired. Our results indicate that L-current is inhibited by a pathway previously shown to control M-current over-recovery after washout of muscarinic agonist. Our findings support a model of M(1)R-meditated channel modulation that broadens rather than restricts the roles of phospholipids and fatty acids in regulating ion channel activity

High-Temperature Gas-Cooled Reactor Technology Development Program: Annual progress report for period ending December 31, 1987

The High-Temperature Gas-Cooled Reactor (HTGR) Program being carried out under the US Department of Energy (DOE) continues to emphasize the development of modular high-temperature gas-cooled reactors (MHTGRs) possessing a high degree of inherent safety. The emphasis at this time is to develop the preliminary design of the reference MHTGR and to develop the associated technology base and licensing infrastructure in support of future reactor deployment. A longer-term objective is to realize the full high-temperature potential of HTGRs in gas turbine and high-temperature, process-heat applications. This document summarizes the activities of the HTGR Technology Development Program for the period ending December 31, 1987