1,589 research outputs found
A study of commuter airline economics
Variables are defined and cost relationships developed that describe the direct and indirect operating costs of commuter airlines. The study focused on costs for new aircraft and new aircraft technology when applied to the commuter airline industry. With proper judgement and selection of input variables, the operating costs model was shown to be capable of providing economic insight into other commuter airline system evaluations
The case for joined-up research on carbon emissions from the building stock: adding value to household and building energy datasets
To reach UK objectives for reducing carbon emissions, it is argued that joined-up research on energy use in buildings is essential to develop and support government policy initiatives. The performance based approach introduced in Part-L of the 2006 Building Regulations has further underlined the role of coordinated research to monitor their effectiveness and provide feedback for subsequent revisions. Unfortunately, differences in dwelling classifications systems used in major household surveys currently hinder much of the supporting analysis that might improve SAP and other energy models. The Carbon Reduction in Buildings project has begun a process of integrating or organising existing building energy datasets into a coherent structure for the domestic sector. In addition, it is proposed to archive these for researchers via a building data repository that would facilitate joined-up research more widely
Effectiveness of computer-based auditory training in improving the perception of noise-vocoded speech
Five experiments were designed to evaluate the effectiveness of âhigh-variabilityâ lexical training in improving the ability of normal-hearing subjects to perceive noise-vocoded speech that had been spectrally shifted to simulate tonotopic misalignment. Two approaches to training were implemented. One training approach required subjects to recognize isolated words, while the other training approach required subjects to recognize words in sentences. Both approaches to training improved the ability to identify words in sentences. Improvements following a single session (lasting 1â2 h) of auditory training ranged between 7 and 12 %pts and were significantly larger than improvements following a visual control task that was matched with the auditory training task in terms of the response demands. An additional three sessions of word- and sentence-based training led to further improvements, with the average overall improvement ranging from 13 to 18 %pts. When a tonotopic misalignment of 3 mm rather than 6 mm was simulated, training with several talkers led to greater generalization to new talkers than training with a single talker. The results confirm that computer-based lexical training can help overcome the effects of spectral distortions in speech, and they suggest that training materials are most effective when several talkers are included
Milton Keynes Park Revisited: changes in internal temperatures
27-30 April 2006 The Carbon Reduction in Buildings project has undertaken a pilot longitudinal survey based on a study of 160 âlow-energyâ homes in 1989 in Milton Keynes Energy Park. In that study, a sub-sample of 29 dwellings was monitored on an hourly basis for internal temperature for the living room and main bedroom over 2 years. The follow up study has been in progress since 2005 and consists of 15 dwellings from the original detailed survey. Findings include that under an average daily external temperature of 5 ÂșC, internal temperatures were predicted from regression analysis to be 20.1ÂșC (95%CI:19.7, 20.5) for the living room in 2005 and 19.5 ÂșC (95 %CI:19.1, 19.9) for the bedroom. This was not significantly different from the 1990 baseline study, except for main bedroom evening temperatures (6pm-11pm) which were found to have decreased by -1.3°C (95%CI -2.4, 0.08; p-value 0.04). This may be indicative of higher ventilation rates since almost all participants in 2005 reported opening bedroom windows through winter
How useful are building energy models for policy? A UK perspective
Energy demand models are central to the efforts of
many governments to reduce carbon emissions from
buildings. The lack of empirical research to ensure
the appropriate use of predictions from the models
has implications for building regulations and
evaluating policy initiatives. We present three recent
examples from the UK that highlight challenges: the
discovery of a heat by-pass in party walls, trends in
household gas consumption and the impact of
condensing boilers, and inter-model variation in the
non-domestic sector. We emphasise and contrast the
approach of health sciences to support policy, and
suggest that a far more systematic and integrated
approach between empirical research, model
development, and policy evaluation is needed
Addendum: OneâSpeed Neutron Transport in Two Adjacent HalfâSpaces
The interface current for the problem of two halfâspaces with a constant source in one halfâspace is obtained in closed form.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/70010/2/JMAPAQ-5-12-1804-1.pd
METHODS OF CALCULATION OF MSW STRUCTURES
The paper reviews the existing methods for the solution of structures supporting propaga-
tion of magnetostatic waves. Due to the fact that these are mostly multilayered structures
the mostly used numerical techniques for their calculation are the method of the surface
permeability, finite element method and the boundary element method. Because each
of them is more or less suitable in special cases, the advantages of each are discussed
and pointed out in the paper. The general magnetic anisotropy formulation has been
introduced into boundary element method
OneâSpeed Neutron Transport in Two Adjacent HalfâSpaces
Using Case's method for solving the oneâspeed transport equation with isotropic scattering, the Milne problem solution, the solution for a constant source in one halfâspace, and the Green's function solution are obtained for two adjacent halfâspaces. These problems have been solved previously by other methods. Here the derivations are greatly simplified by using Case's method.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/71048/2/JMAPAQ-5-5-668-1.pd
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