A Practical Edition of the Twenty-four Caprices for Solo Violin by Sir William Herschel

Sir William Herschel (1738–1822) was a prominent musician and composer in the 18th century England. He worked as a concert director in several cities. In addition, he was a master of various instruments, and an active solo performer. Herschel composed numerous orchestral and solo works. His music, however, is hardly known today. Many of his compositions remained unpublished, among them the Twenty-Four Caprices for Solo Violin. These caprices are one of the earliest technical studies for the instrument, which must be brought to the intermediate violin students’ and violin teachers’ attentions. The purpose of this study is to create a practical edition of the Twenty-Four Caprices for Solo Violin, and to make it available for violinists by publishing them. The dissertation will look into the performance practice of Hershel’s caprices. Based on a thorough research of the violin methods, the edition will provide fingerings, bowings, and practicing suggestions which are useful for students who wish to improve violin technique. The author of this study strongly believes that these neglected technical studies are extremely beneficial works for violinists, and they deserve to be made public

High school administrators' and teachers' perceptions of their educational action research skills

Educational action research has attracted significant attention from teacher-researchers and school administrators in recent years due to the method's effectiveness in teaching practices. Besides, educational action research skills are regarded as one of the essential aspects of doing action research. The present study aims to examine administrators' and teachers' perceptions of their educational action research skills; compare educational action research skills between the trained and the untrained groups and between the group that conducted the research and the group that did not. Quantitative research was used in this research. The study used the 11-item scale to survey 255 respondents (16 administrators and 239 teachers) from eleven high schools in Binh Duong province, Vietnam. The descriptive analysis was used to assess perceptions of high school administrators and teachers on their educational action research skills. Our results indicate that administrators and teachers assess their educational action research skills at very good. The trained group's educational action research skills are higher than the untrained group. Educational action research skills of the group conducted research are higher than the group that did not. The present findings provide more information on educational action research among administrators and teachers in Binh Duong province. Educational action research training programs, workshops, and educational policies should be implemented to reinforce and promote educational action research skills

tqix.pis: A toolbox for large-scale quantum simulation platforms

We introduce tqix.pis, a library of tqix for executing various algorithms in large-scale quantum simulation platforms. The program emulates basic functions of a quantum circuit, including initialization qubits, quantum gates, and measurements. It utilizes the collective processes in ensembles of two-level systems to reduce the dimension, and facilitates the simulation time with multi-core processors and Graphics Processing Units. The library is thus programmable for different large-scale quantum simulation platforms, such as trapped ions, ultracold atoms in optical lattices, Rydberg atom arrays in optical tweezers, and nitrogen-vacancy centers. It is applicable for examining spin squeezing, variational quantum squeezing, quantum phase transition, many-body quantum dynamics, and other quantum algorithms.Comment: 17 pages, 8 figure

Carbon-based Materials for Extracting Urea to Recycle Waste Water in Space Applications

Recovering water aboard spacecrafts is essential for space exploration. Bringing fresh water to outer space for crew members is an expensive process. Therefore, recycling waste water to usable water is necessary for long term space missions and applications. Previous experiments showed that urea, which is the main substance in urine, prematurely fouled the membrane used in the water treatment process. In this experiment we investigated different carbon-based materials to act as a urea pre-treatment step. A total of nine different materials were tested for the amount of urea they can adsorb. The adsorption rate will enable us to decide which material is best for the pre-treatment process. Out of nine adsorbents, three had good adsorption rate with over 90% of urea is adsorbed

High school administrators’ and teachers’ perspective of evaluation criteria for action research in the field of education

Action research becomes an appropriate and effective professional development method and strategy to promote inquiry knowledge and solve the problem that leads to action or change. Teachers participating in action research could gain a better insight into themselves as teachers, be motivated to continuous professional growth, and boost their self-confidence as professionals. The main objective here is to examine high-school administrators' and teachers' perceptions of the necessity of evaluation criteria for pedagogical action research. This research surveyed 255 respondents, including 16 administrators and 239 teachers from high-schools in Binh Duong province, Vietnam, with the 11-item questionnaire. The main finding indicated that all high-school administrators and teachers participating fully agree that novelty, effectiveness, and applicability are necessary criteria to evaluate quality of pedagogical action research in Vietnam. Our study contributes to the general discussion about necessary and appropriate criteria for evaluating the quality of pedagogical action research in Vietnam

Effects of full-fat high-oleic soybean meal in layer diets on nutrient digestibility and egg quality parameters of a white laying hen strain

This study was conducted to understand the impact of including full fat high-oleic soybean meal in layer hen diets on nutrient digestibility and added nutritional value in eggs. Forty-eight layers (∼36 wk old) were randomly assigned to one of 4 isonitrogenous (18.5% crude protein) treatment diets with 12 replicate birds per treatment in a 3-wk study. Treatments were 1) solvent extracted defatted soybean meal + corn diet, 2) dry extruded defatted soybean meal + corn, 3) full-fat soybean meal + corn, 4) high-oleic full-fat soybean meal + corn diet. Apparent ileal digestibility of crude fat (CF) and crude protein (CP) were determined using celite (∼2%) as an indigestible marker. Tibia strength and egg quality parameters (egg weight, shell strength, Haugh unit, shell color, and yolk color) were recorded during the study. Fatty acid profiles, including the monounsaturated fatty acid, oleic acid (C18:1, cis), in eggs and adipogenic tissue (liver, muscle, and fat pad) were measured using gas chromatography (GC-FID). Digestibility values of CF ranged from 71 to 84% and CP varied from 67 to 72% for treatment diets, with treatment mean values being no different (P \u3e 0.05) between treatment diets. No differences between treatment diets in tibia strength or egg quality parameters (egg weight, shell strength, and Haugh unit) were observed (P \u3e 0.05) except for yolk color. Similarly, there were no differences in the total lipids in egg yolk (P \u3e 0.05) between treatment diets. However, oleic acid percentage of total lipid in egg and tissue was significantly higher (P \u3c 0.001) in hens given the high-oleic full-fat soybean meal diet than in other treatment groups. No difference was observed in oleic acid percentage of total lipid in egg between the other 3 treatment diets (P \u3e 0.05). Overall, the results exhibited that the eggs and tissue of layer hens fed the full-fat high-oleic acid soybean meal diet were higher in oleic acid while the CF and CP digestibility remained similar to the digestibility of the other diets

Value of ultrasonography as a marker of early response to abatacept in patients with rheumatoid arthritis and an inadequate response to methotrexate: results from the APPRAISE study

Objectives: To study the responsiveness of a combined power Doppler and greyscale ultrasound (PDUS) score for assessing synovitis in biologic-naïve patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) starting abatacept plus methotrexate (MTX). Methods: In this open-label, multicentre, single-arm study, patients with RA (MTX inadequate responders) received intravenous abatacept (∼10 mg/kg) plus MTX for 24 weeks. A composite PDUS synovitis score, developed by the Outcome Measures in Rheumatology–European League Against Rheumatism (OMERACT–EULAR)-Ultrasound Task Force, was used to evaluate individual joints. The maximal score of each joint was added into a Global OMERACT–EULAR Synovitis Score (GLOESS) for bilateral metacarpophalangeal joints (MCPs) 2–5 (primary objective). The value of GLOESS containing other joint sets was explored, along with clinical efficacy. Results: Eighty-nine patients completed the 24-week treatment period. The earliest PDUS sign of improvement in synovitis was at week 1 (mean change in GLOESS (MCPs 2–5): −0.7 (95% CIs −1.2 to −0.1)), with continuous improvement to week 24. Early improvement was observed in the component scores (power Doppler signal at week 1, synovial hyperplasia at week 2, joint effusion at week 4). Comparable changes were observed for 22 paired joints and minimal joint subsets. Mean Disease Activity Score 28 (C reactive protein) was significantly reduced from weeks 1 to 24, reaching clinical meaningful improvement (change ≥1.2) at week 8. Conclusions: In this first international prospective study, the composite PDUS score is responsive to abatacept. GLOESS demonstrated the rapid onset of action of abatacept, regardless of the number of joints examined. Ultrasound is an objective tool to monitor patients with RA under treatment. Trial registration number: NCT00767325

Optimize production through reservoir rock compaction control

This paper presents compactional laboratory study based on the various controllable parameters such as wellbore angle, perforation shot density, perforation pattern, and flow rate to determine the effects of these parameters to compaction in order to help optimize production through compaction control. The study was conducted on local sandstone core sample. After the mechanical rock properties were determined, the scaled down models with various borehole angles, perforation shot densities, perforation patterns and flow rates were tested with Servo Controlled Compression Testing Machine (SCCTM) using two techniques; static and dynamic tests. The results show that compaction increases as borehole angle, production flow rate and shot density increase and as perforation pattern changes from spiral to inplane and finally inline. In addition, compaction increases slowly at low effective stress. However when effective stress reaches 30-60% of reservoir rock compressive strength, it increases approximately double and followed by the reduction of total oil recovery to 55-73% of the expected total oil recovery. These results show that it is possible to optimize production rate via minimizing compaction which could be achieved by controlling borehole angle, perforation shot density, perforation pattern and flow rate