5,867 research outputs found
Entrepreneurial Motivation
Recent research on entrepreneurship has focused largely on macro-level environmental forces. Although researchers adopting this focus have rightly criticized much of the existing empirical research on the role of human motivation in entrepreneurship, we believe that the development of entrepreneurship theory requires consideration of the motivations of people making entrepreneurial decisions. To provide a road map for researchers interested in this area, we discuss the major motivations that prior researchers have suggested should influence the entrepreneurial process, as well as suggest some motivations that are less commonly studied in this area. In addition to outlining the major reasons for exploring these motivations, we identify the major weaknesses that have limited the predictive power of previous research on this topic. We offer explicit solutions for future research to adopt to overcome these problems
Advanced Stirling Convertor (ASC) Development for NASA RPS
Sunpower's Advanced Stirling Convertor (ASC) initiated development under contract to the NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) and after a series of successful demonstrations, the ASC began transitioning from a technology development project to flight development project. The ASC has very high power conversion efficiency making it attractive for future Radioisotope Power Systems (RPS) in order to make best use of the low plutonium-238 fuel inventory in the U.S. In recent years, the ASC became part of the NASA-Department of Energy Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator (ASRG) Integrated Project. Sunpower held two parallel contracts to produce ASC convertors, one with the Department of Energy/Lockheed Martin to produce the ASC-F flight convertors, and one with NASA GRC for the production of ASC-E3 engineering units, the initial units of which served as production pathfinders. The integrated ASC technical team successfully overcame various technical challenges that led to the completion and delivery of the first two pairs of flight-like ASC-E3 by 2013. However, in late Fall 2013, the DOE initiated termination of the Lockheed Martin ASRG flight development contract driven primarily by budget constraints. NASA continues to recognize the importance of high efficiency ASC power conversion for RPS and continues investment in the technology including the continuation of ASC-E3 production at Sunpower and the assembly of the ASRG Engineering Unit #2. This paper provides a summary of ASC technical accomplishments, overview of tests at GRC, plans for continued ASC production at Sunpower, and status of Stirling technology development
Advanced Stirling Convertor Development for NASA Radioisotope Power Systems
Sunpower Inc.'s Advanced Stirling Convertor (ASC) initiated development under contract to the NASA Glenn Research Center and after a series of successful demonstrations, the ASC began transitioning from a technology development project to a flight development project. The ASC has very high power conversion efficiency making it attractive for future Radioisotope Power Systems (RPS) in order to make best use of the low plutonium-238 fuel inventory in the United States. In recent years, the ASC became part of the NASA and Department of Energy (DOE) Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator (ASRG) Integrated Project. Sunpower held two parallel contracts to produce ASCs, one with the DOE and Lockheed Martin to produce the ASC-F flight convertors, and one with NASA Glenn for the production of ASC-E3 engineering units, the initial units of which served as production pathfinders. The integrated ASC technical team successfully overcame various technical challenges that led to the completion and delivery of the first two pairs of flightlike ASC-E3 by 2013. However, in late fall 2013, the DOE initiated termination of the Lockheed Martin ASRG flight development contract driven primarily by budget constraints. NASA continues to recognize the importance of high-efficiency ASC power conversion for RPS and continues investment in the technology including the continuation of ASC-E3 production at Sunpower and the assembly of the ASRG Engineering Unit #2. This paper provides a summary of ASC technical accomplishments, overview of tests at Glenn, plans for continued ASC production at Sunpower, and status of Stirling technology development
Advanced Stirling Convertor (ASC) Technology Maturation
The Advanced Stirling Convertor (ASC) development effort was initiated by NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) with contractor Sunpower Inc. to develop high efficiency thermal-to-electric power conversion technology for NASA Radioisotope Power Systems. Early successful performance demonstrations led to the expansion of the project as well as adoption of the technology by the Department of Energy (DOE) and system integration contractor Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company as part of the Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator (ASRG) flight project. The ASRG integrates a pair of ASCs to convert the heat from a pair of General Purpose Heat Source (GPHS) modules into electrical power. The expanded NASA ASC effort included development of several generations of ASC prototypes or Engineering Units to help prepare the ASC technology and Sunpower for flight implementation. Sunpower later had two parallel contracts allowing the last of the NASA Engineering Units called ASC-E3 to serve as pathfinders for the ASC-F flight convertors being built for DOE. The ASC-E3 convertors utilized the ASC-F flight specifications and were built using the ASC-F design and process documentation. Shortly after the first ASC-F Pair achieved initial operation, due to budget constraints, the DOE ASRG flight development contract was terminated. NASA continues to invest in the development of Stirling RPS technology including continued production of the ASC-E3 convertors, seven of which have been delivered with one additional unit in production. Starting in FY2015, Stirling Convertor Technology Maturation has been reorganized as an element of the RPS Stirling Cycle Technology Development (SCTD) Project and long-term plans for continued Stirling technology advancement are in reformulation. This paper provides a status on the ASC project, an overview of advancements made in the design and production of the ASC at Sunpower, and a summary of acceptance tests, reliability tests, and tactical tests at NASA GRC that demonstrate the capabilities of the ASC
Old Bulloch Personalities (Supplement to No. 6)
This supplement to Southern Folkways Journal Review: Number 6 contains three articles by Smith Callaway Banks on Civil War personalities Captain William W. Williams, J.S. Cone Camp, and Garrett Williams. These are followed by an interview by Scott Collins with Daisy Davis Trapnell about Portal City Cemetery and by a list of Statesboro High School graduates and faculty complied by Camilla Akins Lanier.https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/bchs-pubs/1026/thumbnail.jp
Unitary designs and codes
A unitary design is a collection of unitary matrices that approximate the
entire unitary group, much like a spherical design approximates the entire unit
sphere. In this paper, we use irreducible representations of the unitary group
to find a general lower bound on the size of a unitary t-design in U(d), for
any d and t. We also introduce the notion of a unitary code - a subset of U(d)
in which the trace inner product of any pair of matrices is restricted to only
a small number of distinct values - and give an upper bound for the size of a
code of degree s in U(d) for any d and s. These bounds can be strengthened when
the particular inner product values that occur in the code or design are known.
Finally, we describe some constructions of designs: we give an upper bound on
the size of the smallest weighted unitary t-design in U(d), and we catalogue
some t-designs that arise from finite groups.Comment: 25 pages, no figure
Spontaneous Clearance of Vertically Acquired Hepatitis C Infection:Implications for Testing and Treatment
Overall vertical transmission of HCV, transmission net of clearance, and timing of transmission
Spitzer and z' Secondary Eclipse Observations of the Highly Irradiated Transiting Brown Dwarf KELT-1b
We present secondary eclipse observations of the highly irradiated transiting
brown dwarf KELT-1b. These observations represent the first constraints on the
atmospheric dynamics of a highly irradiated brown dwarf, and the atmospheres of
irradiated giant planets at high surface gravity. Using the Spitzer Space
Telescope, we measure secondary eclipse depths of 0.195+/-0.010% at 3.6um and
0.200+/-0.012% at 4.5um. We also find tentative evidence for the secondary
eclipse in the z' band with a depth of 0.049+/-0.023%. These measured eclipse
depths are most consistent with an atmosphere model in which there is a strong
substellar hotspot, implying that heat redistribution in the atmosphere of
KELT-1b is low. While models with a more mild hotspot or even with dayside heat
redistribution are only marginally disfavored, models with complete heat
redistribution are strongly ruled out. The eclipse depths also prefer an
atmosphere with no TiO inversion layer, although a model with TiO inversion is
permitted in the dayside heat redistribution case, and we consider the
possibility of a day-night TiO cold trap in this object. For the first time, we
compare the IRAC colors of brown dwarfs and hot Jupiters as a function of
effective temperature. Importantly, our measurements reveal that KELT-1b has a
[3.6]-[4.5] color of 0.07+/-0.11, identical to that of isolated brown dwarfs of
similarly high temperature. In contrast, hot Jupiters generally show redder
[3.6]-[4.5] colors of ~0.4, with a very large range from ~0 to ~1. Evidently,
despite being more similar to hot Jupiters than to isolated brown dwarfs in
terms of external forcing of the atmosphere by stellar insolation, KELT-1b has
an atmosphere most like that of other brown dwarfs. This suggests that surface
gravity is very important in controlling the atmospheric systems of substellar
mass bodies.Comment: 14 pages, 3 tables, 11 figures. Accepted by ApJ. Updated to reflect
the accepted versio
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