An assessment of the progress of tidal power within the UK

The exploitation, for useful work, of the energy released by the rise and fall of the tides is not a new phenomenon. History records the existence of tide mills, particularly in England and France, many centuries ago. The conversion of the diurnal movement of the tides into electrical energy by the construction of barrages is, however, comparatively new, the first hard evidence of the technology appearing in the literature some seventy years ago. England, particularly the west coast of the country, has been identified as having very considerable tidal resources and this thesis reviews in detail the several tidal barrage schemes which have been proposed for a number of estuaries, including the Severn and the Mersey. The successful construction in the 1960’s of the 240MW tidal generation scheme on the Rance River in Northern France could perhaps have been expected to provide the impetus required for a tidal project to be agreed in this country. It remains a fact, however, that despite the information available from the successful implementation of the Rance scheme, the succession of Symposia held on the subject, the conclusions drawn by expert Committees, the research and development undertaken by specialist Companies, together with calls for action, no electricity generating barrage has been constructed, or even authorised, in this country. This thesis places on record the results of a detailed review of the extensive literature which now exists on the subject of tidal power. While so doing, it also attempts to provide insights into possible reasons why, despite environmental pressure for the control and reduction of emissions from fossil-fired power stations and public aversion to nuclear generated electricity, this country’s significant tidal resource of renewable green energy has not so far been tapped for electricity generation purposes

Alien Registration- Watson, Walter (Newport, Penobscot County)

https://digitalmaine.com/alien_docs/8075/thumbnail.jp

The versatility of a truss mounted mobile transporter for in-space construction

The Mobile Transporter (MT) evolution from early erectable structures assembly activities is detailed. The MT operational features which are required to support astronauts performing on-orbit structure construction or spacecraft assembly functions are presented and discussed. Use of the MT to perform a variety of assembly functions is presented. Estimated EVA assembly times for a precision segmented reflector approximately 20 m in diameter are presented. The EVA/MT technique under study for construction of the reflector (and the entire spacecraft) is illustrated. Finally, the current status of development activities and test results involving the MT and Space Station structural assembly are presented

Book Reviews

Reviews of the following books: Black Bangor: African Americans in a Maine Community, 1880-1950 by Maureen Elgersman Lee; Through a Howling Wilderness: Benedict Arnold\u27s March to Quebec, 1775 by Thomas A. Desjardin; Marsden Hartley: Race, Religion and Nation by Donna M. Cassidy; Saints and Strangers: New England in British North America by Joseph A. Confort

The general results of the RN4CAST survey in Italy

The issue of health workforce shortage and in particular of nurses, has been debated globally for almost three decades (Aiken & Mullinix 1987, Aiken et al. 1996, 2001, 2010), and has been exacerbated by the recent global financial crisis. The European RN4CAST project has shifted focus from considering only nursing workforce planning and workforce volumes to considering the impact of adequate nurse-patient ratios and work environment on patient safety and the quality of care (Sermeus et al. 2011)

Results of the ACCESS experiment

All basic EVA space construction tasks included in the experiment were accomplished on-orbit successfully, and the construction task time shows good correlation with neutral buoyancy data. However, the flight assembly times were slightly longer than the best times obtained in the water tank. This result was attributed by the EVA astronauts to the new, tighter tolerance truss hardware used on-orbit as opposed to the well-worn training hardware used in the neutral buoyancy and was, thus, not a space related phenomenon. The baseline experiment demonstrated that erectable structure can be assembled effectively by astronauts in EVA. The success of ACCESS confirmed the feasibility of EVA space assembly of erectable trusses and played a role in the decision to baseline the Space Station as a 5 meter erectable structure

A 60-meter erectable assembly concept for a control of flexible structures flight experiment

A flight experiment which proposes to use a 60-m deployable/retractable truss beam attached to the Space Shuttle to study dynamic characterization and control of flexible structures is being studied by NASA. The concept requires a relatively complex mechanism for deploying and retracting the truss on-orbit. Development of such a mechanism having a high degree of reliability will be expensive. An alternative method for constructing the truss is discussed requiring no new technology development or complex mechanisms and has already been demonstrated on-orbit. The alternative method proposes an erectable truss beam which can be assembled by two astronauts in EVA. The EVA crew would have to manually assemble the beam from 468 struts and 165 nodes, and install 7 instrumentation platforms with signal and power cabling. The predicted assembly time is 3 hr and 23 min. The structure would also have to be disassembled and restowed following testing, thus 2 EVA days would be required. To allow 25 hr for data collection (probably a bare minimum to accomplish meaningful tests), current Shuttle operations policy dictates a 9-day mission. The design, assembly procedure and issues associated with the alternative concept are discussed

Albumin concentrations are primarily determined by the body cell mass and the systemic inflammatory response in cancer patients with weight loss

The association between hypoalbuminemia and poor prognosis in patients with cancer is well recognized. However, the factors that contribute to the fall in albumin concentrations are not well understood. In the present study, we examined the relationship between circulating albumin concentrations, weight loss, the body cell mass (measured using total body potassium), and the presence of an inflammatory response (measured using C- reactive protein) in male patients (n=40) with advanced lung or gastrointestinal cancer. Albumin concentrations were significantly correlated with the percent ideal body weight (r=0.390, p lt 0.05), extent of reported weight loss (r=-0.492, p lt 0.01), percent predicted total body potassium (adjusted for age, height, and weight, r=0.686, p lt 0.001), and logo C-reactive protein concentrations (r=-0.545, p lt 0.001). On multiple regression analysis, the percent predicted total body potassium and log(10) C-reactive protein concentrations accounted for 63% of the variation in albumin concentrations (r(2) = 0.626, p lt 0.001). The interrelationship between albumin, body cell mass, and the inflammatory response is consistent with the concept that the presence of an ongoing inflammatory response contributes to the progressive loss of these vital protein components of the body and the subsequent death of patients with advanced cancer