General self-efficacy scale (GSE). Outcomes measurement tool: attitudes & feelings - self-efficacy.

The ten-item General Self-Efficacy Scale is correlated to emotion, optimism and work satisfaction. Negative coefficients were found for depression, stress, health complaints, burnout, and anxiety

Fluid Induced Particle Size Segregation in Sheared Granular Assemblies

We perform a two-dimensional molecular-dynamics study of a model for sheared bidisperse granular systems under conditions of simple shear and Poiseuille flow. We propose a mechanism for particle-size segregation based on the observation that segregation occurs if the viscous length scale introduced by a liquid in the system is smaller than of the order of the particle size. We show that the ratio of shear rate to viscosity must be small if one wants to find size segregation. In this case the particles in the system arrange themselves in bands of big and small particles oriented along the direction of the flow. Similarly, in Poiseuille flow we find the formation of particle bands. Here, in addition, the variety of time scales in the flow leads to an aggregation of particles in the zones of low shear rate and can suppress size segregation in these regions. The results have been verified against simulations using a full Navier-Stokes description for the liquid.Comment: 11 pages, REVTEX format, ps figures compressed uuencoded separately or by e-mail from [email protected]. A postscript version of the paper will be available from http://www.ica1.uni-stuttgart.de/local/WWW/papers/papers.htm

Late Quaternary evolution of gravel deposits in Tromper Wiek, South-western Baltic Sea

The Late Quaternary history of the Baltic Sea is marked by a complex sequence of glacial, lacustrine and marine phases (late Pleistocene, Baltic Ice Lake, Yoldia Lake, Ancylus Lake, Littorina Sea). Boomer data, acquired in October 2004, permitted to improve the knowledge of the late Quaternary geological evolution of Tromper Wiek, a semienclosed bay, located in the north-eastern part of Rügen Island. The sedimentary deposits can be subdivided in 6 seismic units (U1 to U6). The upper part of the lowest unit (U1) corresponds to Pleistocene till. Channels incise the top of this till (surface S2), probably created during the first drainage of the Baltic Sea during the Late Glacial. Subsequent channel filling (U2) occurred in two phases beginning with chaotic deposits, probably fluviatile of origin, followed by graded deposits. This filling was stopped by an erosive period with the formation of surface S3, showing channels at the same location as S2. The facies of the channel filling (U3 and U4), during a second phase, is similar to the first one, but resembles a prograding sediment body, intercalated between the two units in the shallower part. U3 shows a bar-shaped deposit at its top. The facies of U4 is very similar to a barrier/back-barrier facies similar to the facies of unit U5, partly composed of gravel. The deposits of U6 correspond to the post-Littorina Sea deposits. The presence of gravel is linked to coastal cliffs, in which chalk layers, pushed up by glaciers, alternate with sections of till and meltwater deposits and with submarine outcrops of till. Gravel deposits are present in unit U5. They are strongly linked to the presence of a barrier. Four of the six units show a barrier facies (U2, U3, U4 and U5); gravel deposits could be present inside all of these units and would represent a larger deposit than estimated previously

Soliton trains in Bose-Fermi mixtures

We theoretically consider the formation of bright solitons in a mixture of Bose and Fermi degenerate gases. While we assume the forces between atoms in a pure Bose component to be effectively repulsive, their character can be changed from repulsive to attractive in the presence of fermions provided the Bose and Fermi gases attract each other strongly enough. In such a regime the Bose component becomes a gas of effectively attractive atoms. Hence, generating bright solitons in the bosonic gas is possible. Indeed, after a sudden increase of the strength of attraction between bosons and fermions (realized by using a Feshbach resonance technique or by firm radial squeezing of both samples) soliton trains appear in the Bose-Fermi mixture.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Measuring transient reaction rates from nonstationary catalysts

Up to now, methods for measuring rates of reactions on catalysts required long measurement times involving signal averaging over many experiments. This imposed a requirement that the catalyst return to its original state at the end of each experiment—a complete reversibility requirement. For real catalysts, fulfilling the reversibility requirement is often impossible—catalysts under reaction conditions may change their chemical composition and structure as they become activated or while they are being poisoned through use. It is therefore desirable to develop high-speed methods where transient rates can be quickly measured while catalysts are changing. In this work, we present velocity-resolved kinetics using high-repetition-rate pulsed laser ionization and high-speed ion imaging detection. The reaction is initiated by a single molecular beam pulse incident at the surface, and the product formation rate is observed by a sequence of pulses produced by a high-repetition-rate laser. Ion imaging provides the desorbing product flux (reaction rate) as a function of reaction time for each laser pulse. We demonstrate the principle of this approach by rate measurements on two simple reactions: CO desorption from and CO oxidation on the 332 facet of Pd. This approach overcomes the time-consuming scanning of the delay between CO and laser pulses needed in past experiments and delivers a data acquisition rate that is 10–1000 times higher. We are able to record kinetic traces of CO2 formation while a CO beam titrates oxygen atoms from an O-saturated surface. This approach also allows measurements of reaction rates under diffusion-controlled conditions

Influences on the diet quality of pre-school children:importance of maternal psychological characteristics

OBJECTIVE: To test the hypothesis that maternal psychological profiles relate to children's quality of diet. DESIGN: Cross-sectional study. Mothers provided information on their health-related psychological factors and aspects of their child's mealtime environment. Children's diet quality was assessed using an FFQ from which weekly intakes of foods and a diet Z-score were calculated. A high score described children with a better quality diet. Cluster analysis was performed to assess grouping of mothers based on psychological factors. Mealtime characteristics, describing how often children ate while sitting at a table or in front of the television, their frequency of takeaway food consumption, maternal covert control and food security, and children's quality of diet were examined, according to mothers' cluster membership. SUBJECTS: Mother-child pairs (n 324) in the Southampton Initiative for Health. Children were aged 2-5 years. SETTING: Hampshire, UK. RESULTS: Two main clusters were identified. Mothers in cluster 1 had significantly higher scores for all psychological factors than mothers in cluster 2 (all P < 0.001). Clusters were termed 'more resilient' and 'less resilient', respectively. Children of mothers in the less resilient cluster ate meals sitting at a table less often (P = 0.03) and watched more television (P = 0.01). These children had significantly poorer-quality diets (β = -0.61, 95% CI -0.82, -0.40, P ≤ 0.001). This association was attenuated, but remained significant after controlling for confounding factors that included maternal education and home/mealtime characteristics (P = 0.006). CONCLUSIONS: The study suggests that mothers should be offered psychological support as part of interventions to improve children's quality of diet