Project management under uncertainty

Morris' (1986) analysis of the factors affecting project success and failure is considered in relation to the psychology of judgement under uncertainty. A model is proposed whereby project managers may identify the specific circumstances in which human decision-making is prone to systematic error, and hence may apply a number of de-biasing techniques

Determination of impact sensitivity of materials at high pressures

Compact device is used to determine impact sensitivity of material in static, high pressure, gaseous environment. It can also be instrumented to monitor and record pressure, temperature, and striker impact force. Device is used in conjunction with commercially available liquid oxygen impact tester which provides impact energy

Travel choices in Scotland - the effect of local accessibility on non-work travel

Accessibility features prominently in the developing transport policies of both the United Kingdom Government and the devolved Scottish Executive which aim to promote social inclusion in particular and the integration of transport and land use planning more generally. It follows that a detailed understanding of the relationship between accessibility, personal mobility and travel behaviour is critical to the successful implementation of these policies. This paper presents the results of a disaggregate, multi-variate analysis of the Scottish Household Survey (SHS) dataset and attempts to unravel the complex relationship between socio-economical circumstance, geographical access to local services and public transport and revealed non-work travel choices. The socio-economical and geographical diversity of Scotland offers an excellent opportunity to undertake an analysis of this nature. The SHS is a continuous, cross-sectional survey funded by the Scottish Executive and undertaken by face-to-face interview based on a sample of the general population in private residences in Scotland. It seeks to provide information on the composition, characteristics and behaviour of Scottish households. The survey collects information in two parts - firstly the highest income householder provides household level data including household composition and income, key attributes of household members, transport resources available to the household including access to public transport; secondly a randomly selected adult from the household provides information on inter alia personal travel (including the completion of a one-day travel diary on the previous day) and personal views on transport, the neighbourhood and local services. The dataset analysed in this paper was collected between 1999 and 2003 and contains over 75,000 surveyed households and over 49,000 completed travel diaries. Two other variables were matched with the residential location of SHS respondents and added to the dataset; namely, an index representing proximity to local services at electoral ward level derived in the Scottish Indices of Deprivation 2003 study and a locational classification for each respondent which captures settlement size and wider regional accessibility. The primary focus of the analysis presented in this paper is an examination of the extent to which the quality of local access to services affects distance travelled for non-work purposes. Within this analysis individual and household socio-economical circumstance, available transport resources (both car ownership and local access to public transport) and the wider regional geographical context are also taken into account. It is hypothesised that good local access is negatively associated with distance travelled and that there also exists the possibility of significant interaction between local access and socio-economical circumstance and available transport resources. Regression models are developed for non-work travel which test the statistical significance of these explanatory variables. The results of the analysis reported here will add to the existing evidence base on the relationship between accessibility and travel choice. Its conclusions are expected to inform the development of strategies to enhance social inclusion and reduce overall travel which are tailored to socio-economical and geographical circumstance

Do we really drive as we feel?

Learning to drive has been conceptualised as a series of stages which take the learner from mastery of the basic mechanics of driving, through anticipation of other road user's behaviour, to the development of a driving style consistent with the skill achieved in the first two stages (Parker & Stradling, 2002). Deery (1999) suggests that hazard perception is one of the main skills to be acquired in the second stage and that this skill is poorly developed in the inexperienced (and usually young) driver

An Examination of Backgrounds to Early-Run Minimum-Bias Events in ATLAS at the LHC

The initial parts of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) run will be a source of critical information - about the ATLAS detector and about the physics of $pp$ collisions at $sqrt{s} = 14$ TeV, including parton distribution evolution and the cross-sections of $sigma_{pp}$. The accelerator itself will be the source of some detector interest, as we have a first look at what have so far been speculations on the quality of the vacuum in the experimental insertion, and the cleanliness of the beam from the accelerator. The shakedown period, with its low beam squeeze, low luminosity, and undemanding trigger menus, will be of great interest, avoiding the pileup and radiation levels that will arrive with higher luminosity -- making it an important opportunity to investigate minimum-bias events in relative isolation. For the short lifetime of the Minimum Bias Trigger Scintillators (MBTS), which are expected to fail within a few months of running, they will aid in discriminating the minimum bias signal of inelastic non-single-diffractive $pp$ collisions. Using single- or double-coincidence signatures, the MBTS system and other trigger and analysis strategies attempt to avoid triggering on otherwise empty bunch crossings and eliminate the effects of beam-gas collisions and beam-halo effects which would lead these spurious triggers that would reduce the general minimum-bias trigger efficiency. An examination of the effects of beam halo and beam -gas interactions on the minimum-bias trigger response is made. The signatures of the beam halo and beam gas are examined from the standard ATLAS tracking reconstruction

Exploratory study into the effect of abdominal mass loading on airways resistance and ventilatory failure

Objective We hypothesised that the airway resistance during tidal breathing would correlate with a particular pattern of increasing obesity, particularly when supine, and would differ between participants with and without ventilatory failure. Methods In our cross-sectional cohort study, 72 morbidly obese patients (40 males, 32 females, mean body mass index (BMI) 47.2) had measurements of both airways resistance (by impulse oscillometry (IOS)) and adiposity (by dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA)). Results All measures of airways resistance increased in the supine position: total airways resistance (R5) +37% (p<0.0005); large airways resistance (R20) +29% (p<0.0005); and small airways resistance (R5–R20) +52% (p<0.0005). BMI was correlated with seated R5, seated R5–R20, supine R5 and supine R5–R20 (r=0.33 p<0.006, r=0.32 p<0.004, r=0.30 p<0.02 and r=0.36 p<0.04, respectively). Visceral adipose tissue mass was correlated with supine R5–20 (r=0.46 p<0.05). Supine measures of total airways resistance (R5) and large airways resistance (R20) differed between those with and without ventilatory failure, as did mean weight and BMI. Conclusions Our study identifies a potentially detrimental effect of the supine posture on tidal breathing airways resistance in obese patients. This change is correlated most with visceral adipose tissue mass and the small airways. We were able to demonstrate that supine increases in airways resistance during tidal breathing, within obese patients, are different between those with and without ventilatory failure

Early Initiation of Oral Antihypertensives Reduces Intensive Care Unit Stay and Hospital Cost for Patients with Hypertensive Intracerebral Hemorrhage.

Background/objectiveIntravenous nicardipine infusion is effective for rapid blood pressure control. However, its use requires hemodynamic monitoring in the intensive care unit (ICU) and is associated with high hospital cost. This study aimed to examine the effect of early versus late initiation of oral antihypertensives on ICU length of stay (LOS) and cost of hospitalization in patients with hypertensive intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH).MethodsThis is a single-center retrospective study of patients with hypertensive ICH treated with nicardipine infusion from January 1, 2013, to December 31, 2017. Patients were dichotomized into study and control groups, based on receiving oral antihypertensives within 24&nbsp;h versus after 24&nbsp;h of emergency department arrival. Baseline characteristics, duration of nicardipine infusion, LOS in the ICU and hospital, functional outcome at discharge, and hospital cost were compared between the two groups using univariate and multivariate analysis.ResultsA total of 90 patients in the study group and 76 in the control group were identified. There was no significant difference in demographics, past medical history, and initial SBP between the two groups. After adjusting for confounding factors with multivariate regression models, early initiation of oral antihypertensives was associated with significant reductions in duration of nicardipine infusion (55.5 ± 60.1 vs 121.6 ± 141.3&nbsp;h, p &lt;0.005), nicardipine cost ($14,207 vs$29,299, p &lt; 0.01), ICU LOS (2 vs 5&nbsp;days, p &lt; 0.005), and cost of hospitalization ($24,564 vs$47,366, p &lt; 0.01). There was no significant difference in adversary renal events, favorable outcomes, and mortality between the two groups.ConclusionsEarly initiation of oral antihypertensives is safe and may have a significant financial impact on patients with hypertensive ICH

Column ratio mapping: a processing technique for atomic resolution high angle annular dark field(HAADF) images

An image processing technique is presented for atomic resolution high-angle annular dark-field (HAADF) images that have been acquired using scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM). This technique is termed column ratio mapping and involves the automated process of measuring atomic column intensity ratios in high-resolution HAADF images. This technique was developed to provide a fuller analysis of HAADF images than the usual method of drawing single intensity line profiles across a few areas of interest. For instance, column ratio mapping reveals the compositional distribution across the whole HAADF image and allows a statistical analysis and an estimation of errors. This has proven to be a very valuable technique as it can provide a more detailed assessment of the sharpness of interfacial structures from HAADF images. The technique of column ratio mapping is described in terms of a [1 1 0]-oriented zinc-blende structured AlAs/GaAs superlattice using the 1 Å-scale resolution capability of the aberration-corrected SuperSTEM 1 instrument

The effects of simulated obstructive apnea and hypopnea on arrhythmic potential in healthy subjects

Preliminary evidence supports an association between OSA and cardiac dysrhythmias. Negative intrathoracic pressure, as occurring during OSA, may provoke cardiac dysrhythmias. Thus, we aimed to study the acute effects of simulated apnea and hypopnea on arrhythmic potential and measures of cardiac repolarization [QTC and T peak to T end intervals ( $$T_{\text{p}} T_{{{\text{e}}_{\text{c}} }}$$ )] in humans. In 41 healthy volunteers, ECG was continuously recorded prior, during and after simulated obstructive hypopnea (inspiration through a threshold load), simulated apnea (Mueller maneuver), end-expiratory central apnea and normal breathing in randomized order. The number of subjects with premature beats was significantly higher during inspiration through a threshold load (n=7), and the Mueller maneuver (n=7) compared to normal breathing (n=0) (p=0.008 for all comparisons), but not during end-expiratory central apnea (n=3, p=0.125). Inspiration through a threshold load was associated with a non-significant mean (SD) increase of the QTC interval [+5.4 (22.4)ms, 95%CI −1.7 to +12.4ms, p=0.168] and a significant increase of the $$T_{\text{p}} T_{{{\text{e}}_{\text{c}} }}$$ interval [+3.7 (8.9)ms, 95%CI +0.9 to +6.6ms, p=0.010]. The Mueller maneuver induced a significant increase of the QTC interval [+8.3 (23.4)ms, 95%CI 0.9 to +15.6ms, p=0.035] and the $$T_{\text{p}} T_{{{\text{e}}_{\text{c}} }}$$ interval (+4.2 (8.2)ms, 95%CI +1.6 to +6.8ms, p=0.002). There were no significant changes of the QTC and $$T_{\text{p}} T_{{{\text{e}}_{\text{c}} }}$$ intervals during central end-expiratory apnea. These data indicate that simulated obstructive apnea and hypopnea are associated with an increase of premature beats and prolongation of QTC and $$T_{\text{p}} T_{{{\text{e}}_{\text{c}} }}$$ intervals. Therefore, negative intrathoracic pressure changes may be a contributory mechanism for the association between OSA and cardiac dysrhythmia