Powerhouse Slope Behavior, Fort Peck Dam, Montana

Landslides occurred in the Bearpaw shale slope adjacent to the powerhouses at Fort Peck Dam in the geologic past. Excavation of the slope toe for construction of reservoir outlet works in 1934 initiated progressive sliding of colluvium which continued to 1974. The active slide area had an average movement rate of 4 ft/yr from 1944-1945 and average movement rates of 1-2 ft/yr from 1953-1971. These movements caused no distress to the powerhouses or other facilities. In 1974, the slope was stabilized by excavating 1.6 x 106 cu. yd. of material, resulting in a 1 on 6 overall slope. A field residual strength given by c\u27 = 0.1 ksf, Φ\u27 = 10° or c\u27 = 0, Φ\u27 = 11.5° for effective normal stresses of 3-4 ksf was calculated from the slides using 1950\u27s topography and groundwater levels

Perbedaan Stres Kerja Antar Shift Perawat Di Ruangan Gawat Darurat Medik Rsup Prof Dr. R. D. Kandou Manado

Shift kerja merupakan salah satu sumber dari stres bagi tenaga kerja, banyak keluhan akibat shift seperti gangguan tidur, selera makan menurun, gangguan pencernaan dan kelelahan. Stres kerja adalah ketidakmampuan individu dalam memenuhi tuntutan-tuntutan pekerjaannya sehingga ia merasa tidak nyaman dan tidak tenang Tujuan Penelitian ialah untuk mengetahui Perbedaan Stres Kerja Antar Shift Perawat di Ruangan Gawat Darurat Medik RSUP Prof. Dr. R. D. Kandou Manado. Desain penelitian menggunakan metode (survey) analitik dengan pendekatan cross sectional. Populasi penelitian adalah seluruh perawat pelaksana di Ruangan Gawat Darurat Medik. Jumlah sampel yakni 30 perawat dengan menggunakan teknik Total Sampling, instrument yang digunakan ialah kuesioner. Hasil penelitian tidak ada perbedaan stres kerja antara Shift pagi dengan Shift sore nilai r = 0,645 α ≥ 0,05, tidak ada perbedaan stres kerja antara Shift pagi dengan Shift malam nilai r = 0,486 α ≥ 0,05, dan tidak ada perbedaan Shift sore dengan Shift malam nilai r = 0,645 α ≥ 0,05 atau H0 Gagal ditolak. Kesimpulanya bahwa stres kerja perawat berada pada stres ringan yaitu 80.0%, maka dari itu agar perawat dapat mempertahankan pelayanan keperawatan secara optimal, perawat harus mengelola waktu sebaik mungkin dalam menjalankan shift yang sudah dijadwalkan

A mixture partial credit model for identifying latent classes responsible for differential item functioning

AIMS : Ideally, the item response probability to a quality of life (QoL) questionnaire should only depend on the respondents’ QoL level. If such a probability also depends on other characteristics such as ethnicity, gender or socioeconomic status, differential item functioning (DIF) may be present. Identifying DIF plays a key role in verifying measurement invariance when validating questionnaires. Moreover, being able to take into account DIF allows limiting measurement biases when analyzing patient-reported ouctomes (PRO) data. Several methodologies have been proposed for dealing with DIF, one of the most flexible and powerful being the IRT-based likelihood ratio test. With such a method, the covariate suspected to be responsible for DIF on a given item can be identified. For this purpose, nested models (with and without DIF) are compared: one constrained to be DIF-free for the suspected item, and one considering DIF by including interactions between the item parameter and the considered covariate. The best model is then chosen for analyzing data, allowing taking into account DIF if necessary. However, some problems can occur when covariates responsible for DIF are not well identified. Multiple covariates can be wrongly suspected, leading in multiple comparisons thus in type I error rate inflation. Moreover, the covariate truly responsible for DIF might not be identified because it is not a directly observed covariate but a latent variable. METHODS : We propose an adaptation of the IRT likelihood ratio test based on mixture partial credit models (PCM). With these models, items parameters are considered as fixed effects and both the latent trait to be analyzed (for example QoL) and the covariate responsible for DIF are considered as continuous and categorical latent variables, respectively. Latent classes can finally be constructed based on such categorical latent variables using individual posterior probabilities, and then described using observed data. RESULTS : We illustrate the properties of such likelihood ratio test based on mixture PCM using both simulated data and observed data from the Pays-de-la-Loire Workers Surveillance Program (France), and provide a MPlus based macro-program working under Stata for performing such a procedure. CONCLUSIONS : We believe that such program may facilitate the use of these methods by researchers.

Fungicide effects on N2-fixing bacteria and N2-fixation in chickpea

Non-Peer ReviewedFungicide application in field crops have unexpected non-target effects on the agroecosystem. Molecular methods (polymerase chain reaction – denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis and cloning technology) were used to test the effects of four fungicide application programs targeting Ascochyta blight (Ascochyta rabiei) on the N2-fixing bacterial communities associated with two chickpea cultivars, and on chickpea nodulation. Treatments were replicated four times in complete blocks in the field, in 2008 and 2009. Results showed the richness of the N2-fixing bacterial communities did not change significantly (P > 0.05, data didn’t shown) with fungicide application, but different intensities of fungicide application selected different dominant N2-fixing taxa, as revealed by Correspondence Analysis (CA) of DNA sequences. Genotypes of chickpea cultivars significantly affected both the richness and composition of the N2-fixing bacterial communities, as revealed by results of CA. Both fungicide and crop genotype affected nodulation scores of chickpea based on ANOVA results (P < 0.001 for nodulation scores test and P = 0.04 for fixed N test), reflecting impacts on nitrogen fixation. Redundancy analysis (RDA) also revealed significant relationships (P = 0.014) among fixed nitrogen, nodulation scores and identified rhizosphere N2-fixing bacteria. Based on these results, we conclude that both the foliar fungicide applications and chickpea genotype can affect the composition and function of N2-fixing bacterial community in chickpea field

Fungicide application effects on diversity components of chickpea rhizospheric bacterial community

Non-Peer ReviewedMolecular (polymerase chain reaction – denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis) methods and correspondent analysis have been used in order to test changes of the diversity of bacterial communities in chickpea rhizospheric soil under different cultivars and fungicide treatments. Results showed that chickpea genotypes influence their microbial environment differently. Besides, fungicide applications could negatively affect the diversity of dominant bacterial DNA sequences, and this effect increased with the number of fungicide application on chickpea aerial parts

A study of fungal biodiversity in the root of durum wheat, chickpea, and pea in agro-ecosystems of Saskatchewan

Non-Peer Reviewe

Pulse-wheat rotation: pulse crops effects on wheat endophytic bacteria, and feedback on wheat yield

Non-Peer ReviewedCrop rotation is a common cultivation strategy and the legacy of a previous crop on biotic soil properties could feedback on the productivity of the following crop due to the mutual influence existing between plants and their biological environment. Polymerase chain reaction and 454 GS FLX pyrosequencing of amplicons were used in this study to determine the effects of genotype and termination time of previous pulse crops on the productivity and endophytic bacterial community colonizing the roots of durum wheat. In 2008-09, when chickpea plants (late maturing plant) were terminated as early as yellow pea (In July), all three genotypes of chickpea passed a sol biota to durum wheat that formed endophytic bacterial community which was similar to that formed following yellow pea, an early maturing plant. These four endophytic bacterial communities were different from those formed in wheat roots following late-terminated chickpea crops. Additionally, late terminated pulse crops (September) led to the formation of endophytic bacterial communities highly dominated by Firmicutes. These communities were less diverse than those formed after early-terminated pulse crops, which were dominated by Actinobacteria. High durum wheat yield was associated with the production of fewer heads m-2 and with the abundance of endophytic Actinobacteria and Acidobacteria. In contrast, low grain yield was associated with the abundance of endophytic Firmicutes. The effect of termination time was weak in 2009-2010, which was probably overridden by the extremely high amount of precipitation received during this period. The results demonstrate an important biotic legacy of crop termination time in agro-ecosystems, by influencing the endophytic bacterial colonization on the following crop. Environmental conditions appear as a key factor for the expression of this effect of crop termination time in agroecosystems

The development of a position-sensitive CZT detector with orthogonal co-planar anode strips

We report on the simulation, construction, and performance of prototype CdZnTe imaging detectors with orthogonal coplanar anode strips. These detectors employ a novel electrode geometry with non-collecting anode strips in one dimension and collecting anode pixels, interconnected in rows, in the orthogonal direction. These detectors retain the spectroscopic and detection efficiency advantages of single carrier (electron) sensing devices as well as the principal advantage of conventional strip detectors with orthogonal anode and cathode strips, i.e. an N×N array of imaging pixels are with only 2N electronic channels. Charge signals induced on the various electrodes of a prototype detector with 8×8 unit cells (1×1×5 mm3)are compared to the simulations. Results of position and energy resolution measurements are presented and discussed

Analog processing of signals from a CZT strip detector with orthogonal coplanar anodes

We present the requirements, design, and performance of an analog circuit for processing the non-collecting anode strip signals from a cadmium zinc telluride (CZT) strip detector with orthogonal coplanar anodes. Detector signal simulations and measurements with a prototype are used to define the range of signal characteristics as a function of location of the gamma interaction in the detector. The signals from the non- collecting anode strip electrodes are used to define two of the three spatial coordinates including the depth of interaction, the z dimension. Analog signal processing options are discussed. A circuit to process the signals from the non- collecting anode strips and extract from them the depth of interaction is described. The circuit employs a time-over- threshold (TOT) measurement. The performance of the detector prototype with a preliminary version of this circuit is presented, and future development work is outlined