Resources available for enrichment of the curriculum in the Fiske Elementary School, Lexington, Massachusetts

Thesis (Ed.M.)--Boston Universit

The Gravity Signature of a Large Quaternary Depocentre off Southeastern Canada

New bathymetry, gravity and Pliocene - Quaternary sediment isopach maps have been compiled and gridded for the Scotian margin. A large positive gravity anomaly exists over the Laurentian Fan, which is the major Pliocene - Quaternary depocentre on the Scotian margin. This gravity anomaly is not related to deep structure but can be largely explained by considering the Pliocene-Quaternary sediments as isostatically uncompensated. This implies that the underlying continental margin lithosphère has had considerable strength for at least 3 Ma. Some residual anomalies not accounted for by Pliocene-Quaternary sediment thickness may represent thicker Miocene depocentres, but improved seismic and stratigraphie data are required to assess this possibility. The technique of gravity identification of major sediment depocentres is a useful reconnaissance tool in certain circumstances, such as where there is a topographic expression and the deposit is thick and of major areal extent.On a procédé à la compilation des cartes bathymétrique, de gravité marine et des cartes isopaques des sédiments pliocènes/quaternaires de la marge continentale de Scotian. Il existe une importante anomalie gravimetrique au-dessus du cône Laurentien, principale zone d'accumulation pliocène/quaternaire de la marge continentale de Scotian. L'anomalie gravimetrique n'est pas reliée à la tectonique de fond, mais peut en bonne partie s'expliquer si l'on considère que les sédiments pliocenes/ quaternaires n'ont subi aucune compensation isostatique. Ceci implique que la lithosphère de la marge continentale sous-jacente offre une grande résistance depuis au moins 3 Ma. Certaines anomalies résiduelles non imputables à l'épaisseur de la couverture sédimentaire pliocène/quaternaire pourraient être attribuées aux épaisses zones d'accumulation du Miocène; de meilleures connaissances de la sismicité et de la stratigraphie sont nécessaires pour confirmer cette hypothèse. La technique permettant de déterminer la gravité des zones de grande accumulation est un bon outil de reconnaissance en certains cas, c'est-à-dire lorsqu'il y a un relief d'importance et que le dépôt est épais et d'une grande superficie.Neue Karten der Tiefseelotung, der Tiefsee-Schwere und "isopache" Karten der Pliozân/Quaternàr-Sedimente wurden fur den Konti-nentalsaum von Nova Scotia kompiliert. Eine breite, positive Schwereanomalie besteht ûber dem laurentidischen Fâcher, welcher die Hauptablagerungszone im Pliozân-Quaternâr am Kontinentalsaum von Nova Scotia ist. Dièse Schwereanomalie beruht nicht auf der Tiefenstruktur, sondern kann weitgehend dadurch erklàrt werden, daB die Pliozàn-Quatemàr-Sedimente isostatisch nicht kompensiert waren. Dies bedeutet, dafî die Erdkruste des darunterliegenden Kon-tinentalsaums seit mindestens 3 Ma eine betràchtliche Widerstandsfàhigkeit aufweist. Einige Rest-Anomalien, die nicht auf die Dicke des Pliozàn-Quaternâr-Sediments zurùckgefùhrt werden kônnen, kônnten mit dickeren Ablagerungszonen aus dem Miozân erklàrt werden; doch um dièse Môglichkeit zu bestàtigen, sind verbesserte seismische und stratigraphische Messungen nôtig. DieTechnik, die Schwere von bedeutenden Sedimentablagerungs zonen zu bestimmen, ist unter bestimmten Voraussetzungen ein nùtzliches Erkennungs instrument, wie z.B. wenn ein wichtiges Relief vorhanden ist, und die Ablagerung dick und von grôBeren AusmaBen ist

Legal Aid Clients with General Assistance Problems: A Study of Housing Conditions

The Omaha Legal Aid Society contacted the Center for Applied Urban Research to help assess the housing conditions of clients who had applied for legal aid with a Douglas County general assistance (GA) problem within the past 18 months. Legal Aid wanted to know what proportion of these clients were living in housing that was below minimum health and decency standards

Reverse Auction Bidding- A Study of Industry Professionals

This research project into Reverse Auction Bidding is the first of the twenty studies completed to this time to use professional contractors. Previous case studies used students at Texas A&M University as the subjects of the research. Reverse Auction Bidding is a new form of bidding using the internet as the bidding mechanism. A purchaser requests bids through a web site, typically a commercial site. Invited bidders can respond under a standard set of timed conditions to the bidding documents on the web site. This TAMU based research program has a SQL Server based web site, which uses house slabs in Houston as a bidding game. This study of The Reverse Auction Bidding method used four individuals from a supply company as the subjects of the work. The methods remained essentially unchanged from the earlier case studies, except that an ASP.NET MVC4 website has been developed to improve the response time and to permit data analysis as the game is played. Each bidder has capacity to bid on three sites at any time, a bidder can purchase additional capacity from the bank to increase the number of allowed simultaneous bids. Each game lasts for twenty minutes, fifteen minutes of game play followed by a five minute break to simulate the work week. Each individual was given a personality test for the review of bidding performance with personality type. The conclusions were that the professional bidders were more competitive than subjects in prior studies, the bidder who made the most aggressive use of the bank loan performed best as has been consistently shown, but the personality results did not match prior findings. Further work with professionals is recommended

Eliciting and specifying requirements for highly interactive systems using activity theory

The processes of eliciting user requirements and formalising these into specifications are critical for the success of highly interactive systems. These processes are still poorly understood, partly because current methods are usually ad hoc and lack any theoretical basis. A number of researchers have used Activity Theory (AT) to refine these processes and have met with some success. To date, this approach has been more useful explaining the processes post hoc. This positional paper proposes an AT method for requirement elicitation and specification definition. The method is sufficiently prescriptive and well formed that it does not require any detailed understanding of AT

A set of dual promoter vectors for high throughput cloning, screening, and protein expression in eukaryotic and prokaryotic systems from a single plasmid

BACKGROUND: The ability to produce the same recombinant protein in both prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells offers many experimental opportunities. However, the cloning of the same gene into multiple plasmids is required, which is time consuming, laborious and still may not produce soluble, stable protein in sufficient quantities. We have developed a set of expression vectors that allows for ligation-independent cloning and rapid functional screening for protein expression in both E. coli and S. cerevisiae. RESULTS: A set of expression vectors was made that can express the same open reading frame in E. coli (via the T7 phage promoter) and in S. cerevisiae (via the CUP1 or MET25 promoter). These plasmids also contain the essential elements for replication and selection in both cell types and have several advantages: they allow for cloning of genes by homologous recombination in yeast, protein expression can be determined before plasmid isolation and sequencing, and a GST-fusion tag is added to aid in soluble expression and purification. We have also included a TEV recognition site that allows for the specific cleavage of the fusion proteins to yield native proteins. CONCLUSIONS: The dual promoter vectors can be used for rapid cloning, expression, and purification of target proteins from both prokaryotic and eukaryotic systems with the ability to study post-translation modifications

Sediment transport processes at the head of Halibut Canyon, Eastern Canada margin: An interplay between internal tides and dense shelf water cascading

European Geosciences Union General Assembly 2013, 7-12 April, Vienna, Austria.-- 1 pageTo investigate the processes by which sediment is transported through a submarine canyon incised in a glaciated margin, the bottom boundary layer quadrapod RALPH was deployed at 276-m depth in the West Halibut Canyon (off Newfoundland) during winter 2008–2009. Two main sediment transport processes were identified throughout the deployment. Firstly, periodic increases of near-bottom suspended-sediment concentrations (SSC) were recorded associated with the up-canyon propagation of the semidiurnal internal tidal bore along the canyon axis, carrying fine sediment particles resuspended from deeper canyon regions. The recorded SSC peaks, lasting less than 1 h, were observed sporadically and were linked to bottom intensified up-canyon flows (~ 40 cm s− 1) concomitant with sharp drops in temperature. Secondly, sediment transport was also observed during events of intensified down-canyon current velocities that occurred during periods of sustained heat loss from surface waters, but were not associated with large storm waves. High-resolution velocity profiles throughout the water column during these events revealed that the highest current speeds (~ 1 m s− 1) were centered several meters above the sea floor and corresponded to the region of maximum velocities of a gravity flow. Such flows had associated low SSC and cold water temperatures and are interpreted as dense shelf water cascading events channelized along the canyon axis. Sediment transport during these events was largely restricted to bedload and saltation, producing winnowing of sands and fine sediments around larger gravel particles. Analysis of historical hydrographic data suggests that such gravity flows are not related to the formation of coastal dense waters advected towards the outer shelf that reached the canyon head. Rather, the dense shelf waters appear to be generated around the outer shelf, where convection during winter is able to reach the sea floor and generate a pool of near-bottom dense water that cascades into the canyon during one or two tidal cycles. A similar transport mechanism is likely to occur in other submarine canyons along the eastern Canadian margin, as well in other canyoned margins where winter convection can reach the shelf-edgePeer Reviewe