Aeronautical mobile TDMA/MCTDMA system

A multiple carrier Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) system capable of supporting voice, stream data, and packet data traffic between aircraft and ground terminals is presented. Demand assignment permits efficient resource sharing for voice and stream data. The bandwidth efficiency of uncoded A Quadrature Phase Shift Keying (AQPSK) is 1 bps/Hz. High time efficiency (approximately equals 83 percent) is achieved through the use of symbol synchronous TDMA. Demodulation is achieved without loop hang-up while requiring only a 16 symbol preamble each burst. A concatenated coding system provides reliable transmission under multipath conditions

An Economic Analysis of Fluid Milk Processing in Alaska

Alaskan fluid milk is processed for market by a two-firm industry. In Delta Junction, the Northern Lights Dairy obtains milk from two producers and services an Interior market from Delta to Fairbanks. In Anchorage , Matanuska Maid (M-M) obtains milk from II producers and markets its products largely in southcentral Alaska and , to a less extent, in Fairbanks. Direct competition between the two is minimal. The principal source of competition is preprocessed fluid milk shipped in from Puget Sound

Input-Output Tables for Alaska's Economy: A First Look

The specific objectives of this publication are to: ( 1) present a first look in specific detail at the input-output tables of the Alaskan economy, thereby examining Alaskan interindustry interactions and dependencies; and (2) indicate, via relevant examples, how the information contained in these typical input-out tables can be used by private and public policymakers.Geographic isolation, a subarctic climate, large size, and a regionally diverse landscape make Alaska a unique part of the United States. The factors that make Alaska so unique also contribute to her present lack of industrial and agricultural production, which requires shipment into the state of most of the goods necessary for life. In filling the need for such goods, the state of Washington has been, and continues to be, the principal marketing and transportation center for Alaska-associated trade

Resource allocation in a university environment : a test of the Ruefli, Freeland, and Davis goal programming decomposition algorithms / BEBR No. 735

Bibliography: p. 20-22

Alaska-Washington Trade Profile: Waterborne Commerce

The overall purpose of this study was to establish a profile of Alaska-Washington waterborne movements, emphasizing commodity and port components that determine the needs of a physical distribution system. Specific objectives of the report are : 1. To determine Washington's share of the total Alaska-bound, waterborne traffic. 2. To present selected Washington-to-Alaska, waterborne movements by commodity and destination ports. 3. To present selected Alaska-to-Washington, waterborne movements by commodity and origination ports. 4. To determine implications of the trade profile with regard to future transportation and marketing needs. It should be noted that there are sizable noncommodity trade flows between the regions, i.e., labor, capital, and services that are not in this data base. This report contains only data on major commodity grouping and principal ports in Alaska. Additional information is on file at the Agricultural Experiment Station, University of Alaska, and at the Department of Agricultural Economics, Washington State University

Controlled Environment Agriculture: A Pilot Project

The controlled-environment agricultural (CEA) project discussed in this report was first conceived for the Wildwood Air Force Station in Kenai, Alaska, in 1972. The region contained high unemployment and a U.S. Air Force Station that had just closed. The Kenai Native Association, Inc. (KNA), was to take possession of the Air Force Station through land transfers associated with the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act, and this corporation was interested in expanding business and employment opportunities for local people. The University of Alaska Agricultural Experiment Station (AES) contacted KNA to determine if it had a facility which might be adaptable for use in a research and development program in controlled- 1 environment agriculture. It was determined that such a facility was available. Subsequently, AES and KNA contacted the General Electric Company (GE) in Syracuse, New York, to determine its interest in such a project. GE had extensive background in lighting technology and environmental control systems and the engineering capability to develop a total system for CEA production. It was agreed that GE would provide technological expertise and AES would provide horticultural and economic expertise for the growing and marketing of a variety of salad crops. KNA would manage the project, employ the nontechnical people, and provide the building. The Wildwood site was selected because it contained two buildings which were thought to be well suited for CEA production. One building would provide sufficient inside space for a 1/4-acre pilot production plant, nine small research modules , a laboratory , offices, a training area, and space for preparing the crop for shipping. A second building near the first contained three diesel generators which were to be converted to natural gas to provide power for the production facility.The Controlled Environment Agriculture Project at Wildwood Village, Kenai, Alaska, spanned a period of five years. During that time, three agencies: Kenai Native Association, Inc.; General Electric Company; and University of Alaska Agricultural Experiment Station , were responsible for the management, research, and production activities. Many persons from these agencies who participated in all phases of the project are acknowledged for their participation and support. This report summarizes work began in 1972 and concluded in 1977 on controlled-environment agriculture in facilities located at Wildwood Village, Kenai, Alaska, managed by the Kenai Native Association , Inc. The authors wish to express their appreciation to all those who have participated in the preparation of this bulletin. Particular acknowledgment is given to: Dr. Gerald Carlson, U.S .D.A., Beltsville, Maryland; Dr. Donald Dinkel, University of Alaska, Agricultural Experiment Station; Dr. Delbert Hemphill, Oregon State University ; John Monfor, Kenai Native Association, Inc.; Dr. Eion Scott, General Electric Company; and Dr. Norman Whittlesey, Washington State University, who thoroughly reviewed the contract document

Potential Milk Production in the Point MacKenzie Area of Southcentral Alaska

Point MacKenzie is an area northwest of Anchorage directly across the Knik Arm of Cook Inlet (Figure 1 ). This area contains a substantial amount of latent agricultural land and discussion regarding its potential has been going on for some time. The catalyst which activated the recent planning process directed at Point MacKenzie was concern over potential loss of the southcentral Alaska dairy industry expressed on May 4, 1979, in a letter from Jack Flint, General Manager, Matanuska Maid, Inc., to Governor Jay Hammond: "It is my opinion that if we do not take immediate steps to stabilize this important phase of agriculture, [the dairy industry] will pass from the scene. I think that if it should occur, it would be a serious blow to the State of Alaska, economically and socially. I believe we should also realize that if the dairy industry should cease to exist within the state, it is going to be very difficult to re-establish it." Mr. Flint's letter and corresponding action by the Matanuska-Susitna Borough have directed planning processes of the State of Alaska toward Poinr Mac- Kenzie. The Alaska Agricultural Action Council, created by the 1979 state legislature to plan, recommend, and administer agricultural development projects on state lands in Alaska, held a meeting in the Matanuska Valley in September, 1979, and determined that an economic feasibility study, directed toward dairy production, should be undertaken for the Point MacKenzie area. This report is that feasibility study.The information presented in this bulletin is part of a report prepared for the Agricultural Action Council of the State of Alaska. The group was formed in 1979 by legislative action and is chaired by W. I. "Bob" Palmer, Special Projects Director, Office of the Governor. The purpose of the group is to plan and manage agricultural development projects within the state. The report on the feasibility of milk production in the Point MacKenzie Area presented to Governor Hammond through the Alaska Agricultural Action Council was prepared by the authors of this bulletin and Dr. Boyd Buxton, Agricultural Economist, U.S. D.A., stationed at the University of Minnesota at St. Paul and Dr. Paul Fuglestad, Agricultural Economist, U.S.D .A., stationed in Anchorage, Alaska, both of whom are acknowledged with gratitude. The authors also wish to thank Cathy Warren who reviewed extensively the tabular data

A Domain Specific Approach to High Performance Heterogeneous Computing

Users of heterogeneous computing systems face two problems: firstly, in understanding the trade-off relationships between the observable characteristics of their applications, such as latency and quality of the result, and secondly, how to exploit knowledge of these characteristics to allocate work to distributed computing platforms efficiently. A domain specific approach addresses both of these problems. By considering a subset of operations or functions, models of the observable characteristics or domain metrics may be formulated in advance, and populated at run-time for task instances. These metric models can then be used to express the allocation of work as a constrained integer program, which can be solved using heuristics, machine learning or Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) frameworks. These claims are illustrated using the example domain of derivatives pricing in computational finance, with the domain metrics of workload latency or makespan and pricing accuracy. For a large, varied workload of 128 Black-Scholes and Heston model-based option pricing tasks, running upon a diverse array of 16 Multicore CPUs, GPUs and FPGAs platforms, predictions made by models of both the makespan and accuracy are generally within 10% of the run-time performance. When these models are used as inputs to machine learning and MILP-based workload allocation approaches, a latency improvement of up to 24 and 270 times over the heuristic approach is seen.Comment: 14 pages, preprint draft, minor revisio

RECENT COST INCREASES: THEIR FUTURE IMPACTS ON AGRICULTURE

Demand and Price Analysis,

Who Uses External Business Advice?

This paper examines factors that influence the propensity of a firm to take up external business support using random effects nominal probit regression analysis to capture sector heterogeneity. The results suggest a strong positive association between the orientation of the firm towards growth and its propensity to seek external business advice. ‘Push’ factors, including the existence of recruitment difficulties, are identified as key triggers for the seeking of business advice. These findings demonstrate the value of using advanced econometric techniques to analyse business survey data, and provide valuable guidance to public policy organisations concerned with business development and competitiveness.Business advice, business support policy, multivariate probit analysis