The Impact of Formal Strength and Conditioning on the Fitness of Law Enforcement Recruits: A Retrospective Cohort Study

International Journal of Exercise Science 13(4): 1615-1629, 2020. Research involving law enforcement populations has suggested better fitness could enhance job task performance and reduce injuries. Academy training should lead to improvements in recruit fitness. The aim of this study was to investigate the impact of a strength and conditioning program on fitness among law enforcement recruits. Twenty-six recruits (23 males, three females) completed a 27-week academy, which incorporated 3-4 physical training sessions per week. Fitness assessment occurred during pre- (week 0), mid- (week 14), and post-testing (week 27) time points. The fitness assessments included: vertical jump, one-minute push-ups, one-minute sit-ups, posterior chain strength measured by a leg/back dynamometer, grip strength, and aerobic fitness measured by the 20-m multistage shuttle run (MSR). A repeated measures ANOVA with Bonferroni post hoc tests determined any significant changes in fitness between time points, with alpha set at p \u3c .05. Due to the small sample size of females, statistical analysis was only conducted on male recruits. Overall, significant main effects (p \u3c .001) were observed in all fitness assessments except for grip strength. The results detailed general improvements in fitness. However, push-up and MSR scores decreased from mid- to post-test, while sit-ups did not change. Posterior chain strength and the vertical jump improved from mid- to post-test. The data indicated that the strength and conditioning program positively influenced the fitness of recruits. An increased focus on skill-specific work in the second-half of academy may have contributed to the plateaus in muscular endurance and aerobic fitness, and improvement of lower-body strength and power

Dust Morphology and Composition in FU Orionis Systems

FU Orionis stars are a small group of pre–main-sequence stars known for large-amplitude optical variability. These objects also exhibit multiwavelength phenomena suggestive of active accretion from a circumstellar disk. We present high spatial resolution mid-IR imaging and spectroscopy, submillimeter photometry, and 3–4 μm photometry of four FU Ori–class objects, RNO 1B and C, Z CMa, and Par 21, and one object classified as a pre–FU Ori star, V380 Ori. We resolve multiple IR sources and extended emission in the RNO 1B/C system, and we discuss in detail their association with disk activity and the source of the Infrared Astronomical Satellite far-IR and radio maser emission in this field. We derive dust temperatures and masses for all sources and discuss how dust composition and morphology is related to the evolutionary stage of these objects

The Micro-Arcsecond Metrology Testbed

The Micro-Arcsecond Metrology (MAM) testbed is a ground-based system of optical and electronic equipment for testing components, systems, and engineering concepts for the Space Interferometer Mission (SIM) and similar future missions, in which optical interferometers will be operated in outer space. In addition, the MAM testbed is of interest in its own right as a highly precise metrological system. The designs of the SIM interferometer and the MAM testbed reflect a requirement to measure both the position of the starlight central fringe and the change in the internal optical path of the interferometer with sufficient spatial resolution to generate astrometric data with angular resolution at the microarcsecond level. The internal path is to be measured by use of a small metrological laser beam of 1,319-nm wavelength, whereas the position of the starlight fringe is to be estimated by use of a charge-coupled-device (CCD) image detector sampling a large concentric annular beam. For the SIM to succeed, the optical path length determined from the interferometer fringes must be tracked by the metrological subsystem to within tens of picometers, through all operational motions of an interferometer delay line and siderostats. The purpose of the experiments performed on the MAM testbed is to demonstrate this agreement in a large-scale simulation that includes a substantial portion of the system in the planned configuration for operation in outer space. A major challenge in this endeavor is to align the metrological beam with the starlight beam in order to maintain consistency between the metrological and starlight subsystems at the system level. The MAM testbed includes an optical interferometer with a white light source, all major optical components of a stellar interferometer, and heterodyne metrological sensors. The aforementioned subsystems are installed in a large vacuum chamber in order to suppress atmospheric and thermal disturbances. The MAM is divided into two distinct subsystems: the test article (TA), which is the interferometer proper, and the inverse interferometer pseudo-star (IIPS), which synthesizes the light coming from a distant target star by providing spatially coherent wavefronts out of two mirrors, separated by the MAM baseline, that feed directly into two siderostats that are parts of the TA. The two feed mirrors of the IIPS are articulated (in translation and tilt) in order to simulate stars located at different orientations in space, while still illuminating the TA siderostats. The spectrum of the simulated starlight of the IIPS corresponds to that of a blackbody at a temperature of about 3,100 K

[Review] Cian Duffy (2014) My purpose was humbler, but also higher: Thomas De Quincey’s 'System of the heavens’, popular science and the sublime

Review of article: Duffy Cian, Romanticism, Volume 20 Issue 1, Page 1-14, ISSN 1354-991x Available Online Mar 201

SeaWiFS technical report series. Volume 23: SeaWiFS prelaunch radiometric calibration and spectral characterization

Based on the operating characteristics of the Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor (SeaWiFS), calibration equations have been developed that allow conversion of the counts from the radiometer into Earth-existing radiances. These radiances are the geophysical properties the instrument has been designed to measure. SeaWiFS uses bilinear gains to allow high sensitivity measurements of ocean-leaving radiances and low sensitivity measurements of radiances from clouds, which are much brighter than the ocean. The calculation of these bilinear gains is central to the calibration equations. Several other factors within these equations are also included. Among these are the spectral responses of the eight SeaWiFS bands. A band's spectral response includes the ability of the band to isolate a portion of the electromagnetic spectrum and the amount of light that lies outside of that region. The latter is termed out-of-band response. In the calibration procedure, some of the counts from the instrument are produced by radiance in the out-of-band region. The number of those counts for each band is a function of the spectral shape of the source. For the SeaWiFS calibration equations, the out-of-band responses are converted from those for the laboratory source into those for a source with the spectral shape of solar flux. The solar flux, unlike the laboratory calibration, approximates the spectral shape of the Earth-existing radiance from the oceans. This conversion modifies the results from the laboratory radiometric calibration by 1-4 percent, depending on the band. These and other factors in the SeaWiFS calibration equations are presented here, both for users of the SeaWiFS data set and for researchers making ground-based radiance measurements in support of Sea WiFS