A study of ASRS reports involving general aviation and weather encounters

Consideration is given to the nature and characteristics of problems involving dissemination of weather information, use of this information by pilots, its adequacy for the purpose intended, the ability of the air traffic control system to cope with weather related incidents, and the various aspects of pilot behavior, aircraft equipment, and NAVAIDS affecting flights in which weather figures. It is concluded from the study that skill and training deficiencies of general aviation pilots are not major factors in weather related occurrences, nor is lack of aircraft equipment. Major problem causes are identified with timely and easily interpreted weather information, judgement and attitude factors of pilots, and the functioning of the air traffic control system

Relaxation Design of Separable Tube Connectors

Design procedure to predict relaxation or time to leakage for separable tube connector

Low-cycle fatigue of Type 347 stainless steel and Hastelloy alloy X in hydrogen gas and in air at elevated temperatures

An investigation was conducted to assess the low-cycle fatigue resistance of two alloys, Type 347 stainless steel and Hastelloy Alloy X, that were under consideration for use in nuclear-powered rocket vehicles. Constant-amplitude, strain-controlled fatigue tests were conducted under compressive strain cycling at a constant strain rate of 0.001/sec and at total axial strain ranges of 1.5, 3.0, and 5.0 %, in both laboratory-air and low-pressure hydrogen-gas environments at temperatures from 538 to 871 C. Specimens were obtained from three heats of Type 347 stainless steel bar and two heats of Hastelloy Alloy X. The tensile properties of each heat were determined at 21, 538, 649, and 760 C. The continuous cycling fatigue resistance was determined for each heat at temperatures of 538, 760, and 871 C. The Type 347 stainless steel exhibited equal or superior fatigue resistance to the Hastelloy Alloy X at all conditions of this study

Effect of Magnetization Inhomogeneity on Magnetic Microtraps for Atoms

We report on the origin of fragmentation of ultracold atoms observed on a permanent magnetic film atom chip. A novel technique is used to characterize small spatial variations of the magnetic field near the film surface using radio frequency spectroscopy of the trapped atoms. Direct observations indicate the fragmentation is due to a corrugation of the magnetic potential caused by long range inhomogeneity in the film magnetization. A model which takes into account two-dimensional variations of the film magnetization is consistent with the observations.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

In the Interests of clients or commerce? Legal aid, supply, demand, and 'ethical indeterminacy' in criminal defence work

As a professional, a lawyer's first duty is to serve the client's best interests, before simple monetary gain. In criminal defence work, this duty has been questioned in the debate about the causes of growth in legal aid spending: is it driven by lawyers (suppliers) inducing unnecessary demand for their services or are they merely responding to increased demand? Research reported here found clear evidence of a change in the handling of cases in response to new payment structures, though in ways unexpected by the policy's proponents. The paper develops the concept of 'ethical indeterminacy' as a way of understanding how defence lawyers seek to reconcile the interests of commerce and clients. Ethical indeterminacy suggests that where different courses of action could each be said to benefit the client, the lawyer will tend to advise the client to decide in the lawyer's own interests. Ethical indeterminacy is mediated by a range of competing conceptions of 'quality' and 'need'. The paper goes on to question the very distinction between 'supply' and 'demand' in the provision of legal services

Quantum statistics of atoms in microstructures

This paper proposes groove-like potential structures for the observation of quantum information processing by trapped particles. As an illustration the effect of quantum statistics at a 50-50 beam splitter is investigated. For non-interacting particles we regain the results known from photon experiments, but we have found that particle interactions destroy the perfect bosonic correlations. Fermions avoid each other due to the exclusion principle and hence they are far less sensitive to particle interactions. For bosons, the behavior can be explained with simple analytic considerations which predict a certain amount of universality. This is verified by detailed numerical calculations.Comment: 18 pages incl. 13 figure

Rhythm in the speech of a person with right hemisphere damage: Applying the pairwise variability index

Although several aspects of prosody have been studied in speakers with right hemisphere damage (RHD), rhythm remains largely uninvestigated. This study compares the rhythm of an Australian English speaker with right hemisphere damage (due to a stroke, but with no concomitant dysarthria) to that of a neurologically unimpaired individual. The speakers' rhythm is compared using the pairwise variability index (PVI) which allows for an acoustic characterization of rhythm by comparing the duration of successive vocalic and intervocalic intervals. A sample of speech from a structured interview between a speech and language therapist and each participant was analysed. Previous research has shown that speakers with RHD may have difficulties with intonation production, and therefore it was hypothesized that there may also be rhythmic disturbance. Results show that the neurologically normal control uses a similar rhythm to that reported for British English (there are no previous studies available for Australian English), whilst the speaker with RHD produces speech with a less strongly stress-timed rhythm. This finding was statistically significant for the intervocalic intervals measured (t(8) = 4.7, p < .01), and suggests that some aspects of prosody may be right lateralized for this speaker. The findings are discussed in relation to previous findings of dysprosody in RHD populations, and in relation to syllable-timed speech of people with other neurological conditions

Manipulating ultracold atoms with a reconfigurable nanomagnetic system of domain walls

The divide between the realms of atomic-scale quantum particles and lithographically-defined nanostructures is rapidly being bridged. Hybrid quantum systems comprising ultracold gas-phase atoms and substrate-bound devices already offer exciting prospects for quantum sensors, quantum information and quantum control. Ideally, such devices should be scalable, versatile and support quantum interactions with long coherence times. Fulfilling these criteria is extremely challenging as it demands a stable and tractable interface between two disparate regimes. Here we demonstrate an architecture for atomic control based on domain walls (DWs) in planar magnetic nanowires that provides a tunable atomic interaction, manifested experimentally as the reflection of ultracold atoms from a nanowire array. We exploit the magnetic reconfigurability of the nanowires to quickly and remotely tune the interaction with high reliability. This proof-of-principle study shows the practicability of more elaborate atom chips based on magnetic nanowires being used to perform atom optics on the nanometre scale.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

A validation study of a commercial wearable device to automatically detect and estimate sleep

The aims of this study were to: (1) compare actigraphy (ACTICAL) and a commercially available sleep wearable (i.e., WHOOP) under two functionalities (i.e., sleep auto-detection (WHOOP-AUTO) and manual adjustment of sleep (WHOOP-MANUAL)) for two-stage categorisation of sleep (sleep or wake) against polysomnography, and; (2) compare WHOOP-AUTO and WHOOP-MANUAL for four-stage categorisation of sleep (wake, light sleep, slow wave sleep (SWS), or rapid eye movement sleep (REM)) against polysomnography. Six healthy adults (male: n = 3; female: n = 3; age: 23.0 ± 2.2 yr) participated in the nine-night protocol. Fifty-four sleeps assessed by ACTICAL, WHOOP-AUTO and WHOOP-MANUAL were compared to polysomnography using difference testing, Bland–Altman comparisons, and 30-s epoch-by-epoch comparisons. Compared to polysomnography, ACTICAL overestimated total sleep time (37.6 min) and underestimated wake (−37.6 min); WHOOP-AUTO underestimated SWS (−15.5 min); and WHOOP-MANUAL underestimated wake (−16.7 min). For ACTICAL, sensitivity for sleep, specificity for wake and overall agreement were 98%, 60% and 89%, respectively. For WHOOP-AUTO, sensitivity for sleep, wake, and agreement for two-stage and four-stage categorisation of sleep were 90%, 60%, 86% and 63%, respectively. For WHOOP-MANUAL, sensitivity for sleep, wake, and agreement for two-stage and four-stage categorisation of sleep were 97%, 45%, 90% and 62%, respectively. WHOOP-AUTO and WHOOP-MANUAL have a similar sensitivity and specificity to actigraphy for two-stage categorisation of sleep and can be used as a practical alternative to polysomnography for two-stage categorisation of sleep and four-stage categorisation of sleep

Prostate radiation in non-metastatic castrate refractory prostate cancer provides an interesting insight into biology of prostate cancer

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The natural history of non-metastatic castrate refractory prostate cancer is unknown and treatment options are limited. We present a retrospective review of 13 patients with locally advanced or high risk prostate cancer, initially treated with hormone monotherapy and then treated with prostate radiation after becoming castration refractory.</p> <p>Findings</p> <p>Median PSA response following prostate radiation was 67.4%. Median time to biochemical progression following radiotherapy was 15 months and to detection of metastatic disease was 18.5 months. Median survival from castration resistance (to date of death or November 2011) was 60 months, with median survival from RT 42 months.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Prostate radiation appears to be beneficial even in patients with potential micrometastatic disease, which supports the hypothesis that the primary tumour is important in the progression of prostate cancer. These results are an interesting addition to the literature on the biology of prostate cancer especially as this data is unlikely to be available in the future due to combined prostate radiation and androgen deprivation therapy now being the standard of care.</p