Melt infiltration casting of bulk metallic-glass matrix composites

The authors describe a technique for melt infiltration casting of composites with a metallic-glass matrix. We made rods 5 cm in length and 7 mm in diameter. The samples were reinforced by continuous metal wires, tungsten powder, or silicon carbide particulate preforms. The most easily processed composites were those reinforced with tungsten and carbon steel continuous wire reinforcement. The Zr41.2Ti13.8Cu12.5Ni10.0Be22.5 matrix was quenched to a glass after infiltrating the reinforcement. We analyzed the microstructure of the composites by x-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy. The measured porosity was less than 3% and the matrix was about 97% amorphous material

Design and development of a water vapor electrolysis unit

Design and development of water vapor electrolysis unit for oxygen productio

School-Based Agricultural Education Students’ Attitudes and Beliefs toward International Agricultural Concepts

The purpose of this study was to determine the attitudes and beliefs of school-based agriculture education (SBAE) students toward international agricultural concepts. This study builds on several previous studies (Conner, Greer, & Stripling, 2017; Elliot & Yanik, 2002; Heinert, Lavery, & Roberts, 2014; Radhakrishna, Leite, & Domer, 2003). To explore new geographic regions of the United States, two states, one from the Midwest and one from the Northwest, were purposively identified. A 46-item instrument that measures attitudes, beliefs, understanding, and instruction in relation to international agriculture developed by Radhakrishna et al. (2003) was administered to students in three schools representing both rural and urban areas. A total of 133 surveys were returned, for a 55.2% response rate. Overall, students held positive attitudes and beliefs toward international agricultural concepts. Students expressed a need to understand basic geography in relation to international agricultural concepts, and students strongly agreed to concepts and information necessary to understand international agricultural concepts. When historical data were synthesized with data from this study, mean scores from all five studies across all four constructs were consistently high. Future research should focus on how students develop their attitudes and beliefs about international agriculture

Corporate Culture and Its Connection with External and Internal Public Relations

The main aim of this article is to present the influence of corporate culture on company's stakeholders. This paper signalises the tendency in corporate communication with its internal and external publics. It is focused on two issues: corporate social responsibility and employer branding. Those two categories are consequences of corporate culture model.Głównym celem artykułu jest zaprezentowanie wpływu jaki wywiera charakter kultury korporacyjnej na związanych z przedsiębiorstwem interesariuszy (stakeholders). W artykule zasygnalizowane zostały główne tendencje wyznaczające charakter komunikacji między organizacją a jej wewnętrznym i zewnętrznym otoczeniem. Tekst koncentruje się na dwóch kwestiach: społecznej odpowiedzialności przedsiębiorstwa (corporate social responsibilty) i budowanie wizerunku pracodawcy (employer branding), które zaprezentowane zostały jako efekty określonego modelu kultury organizacyjnej

Monitoring Water Quality Changes in a Forested Freshwater Wetland Threatened By Salinity

2014 S.C. Water Resources Conference - Informing Strategic Water Planning to Address Natural Resource, Community and Economic Challenge

Socioeconomic status as a moderator between social cognitions and physical activity: Systematic review and meta-analysis based on the Theory of Planned Behavior

Background: Health inequalities are to a substantial degree due to socioeconomic status (SES) related differences in health behaviors such as physical activity. However, little is known about the role SES plays in the self-regulation of physical activity. Purpose: This systematic review with meta-analysis examines whether a comprehensive set of indicators of SES (income, education, occupational status) impacts on the behavioral self-regulation by moderating the relationships between social cognitions in the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) and physical activity. Methods: A systematic literature search identified 94 studies from 83 articles that provided information on sample SES and correlations between TPB variables and physical activity. Random-effects meta-analyses were used to pool correlations corrected for sampling and measurement error. Random-effects meta-regression was used to examine moderating effects of study-level SES on these correlations. Results: Education moderated the relationship between intentions and physical activity, such that studies with better educated samples reported stronger intention-physical activity relationships. Conclusions: These results suggest that education might play a major role in the self-regulation of physical activity, with better educated samples more likely to translate intentions into behavior. This can both help to explain heterogeneity in the relation between intentions and physical activity as well as support the development of more effective interventions targeting intentions and physical activity

Comparing urban and wildland bear densities with a DNA-based capture-mark-recapture approach

California’s black bear (Ursus americanus) population has tripled over the last 3 decades, causing an increased incidence of human–bear conflicts, many of which now occur in urban areas. Consequently, it is imperative that bear managers have the ability to monitor population parameters in both wildland and urban environments to help manage bears. Capture-mark-recapture (CMR) methods using uniquely typed genetic samples (DNA) collected via hair-snares have been widely used to monitor bears in wildland areas. However, we are unaware of researchers applying this technique to bears occupying urban areas. We implemented a multi-year DNA-based CMR study to compare bear densities between an urban area and a nearby wildland area. We deployed hair-snares for 6 weekly capture occasions during June and July, 2011 and 2012. We uniquely typed DNA from snared hair follicles using 14 microsatellite loci and 2 sexing loci. We coupled unique identification with robust-design closed-capture models and model averaging in Program MARK to estimate abundance. We identified 41 and 62 individual bears on the urban and wildland study areas, with average densities of 3.8 and 1.8 bears/10 km2,respectively. Our data support the hypothesis that bears can occur at greater densities in urban areas. Based on these results, we recommend using DNA-based CMR methods to monitor populations of bears in urban areas, but we suggest increasing the density of sampling locations to account for greater bear densities. Furthermore, we contend that DNA-based CMR can also estimate survival, recruitment, rate of population change (λ), and identify movement patterns by incorporating additional survey years