Control rod monitoring of advanced gas-cooled reactors

The UK’s fleet of Advanced Gas Cooled Reactors (AGR) are approaching, and have in some cases exceeded, their original design lives. Continued operation is under enhanced safety cases based on monitoring, inspection and component condition assessment of the core and related systems. This paper presents an analysis of the regulating control rods of an AGR, which are used to manage the power and reactivity of the core. Current manual analyses attempt to detect possible restrictions in the motion of the rods due to degradation of the graphite core, however the development of an automated intelligent analysis of the control rod data provides a repeatable and auditable method of analyzing the data. It is shown, by means of an example data set, that despite some limitations in the scope of the recorded data, it is possible to estimate the performance of the rods and present this information to the engineer in a way that more easily indicates abnormal behavior than existing analyses. It is also noted that though this work was initially conceived as a method of detecting restrictions in the motion of the regulating control rods, the results are potentially more useful is characterizing control rod performance and has potential application in predictive maintenance

MEAT-GOAT MARKET ANALYSIS: A PILOT STUDY OF THE SOMALI MARKET IN COLUMBUS, OH

This case study focuses on meat goat marketing involving one distinct immigrant group residing in one area of Columbus, Ohio: the Somalis. There are about 20,000-25,000 Somalis living in Columbus, the second largest concentration of Somalian immigrants in the U.S. after Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota. It is estimated that Columbus Somalis consume the meat from about 14,000 goats each year. The objective of this pilot study is to analyze the meat goat marketing and consumption patterns of the Somali immigrant population of Columbus, Ohio. Understanding gained in the Somali meat market will assist in determining the feasibility of establishing a more structured marketing system, including the possible need for a processing plant dedicated to goat meat. The Southern Ohio Meat Goat Task Force is a group of meat-goat producers, marketers, OSU extension professionals, and Ohio Cooperative Development Center staff members that are working with the meat-goat industry to assess and develop goat production, processing, and meat marketing in Ohio. Tours of several retail shops within the Somali community were conducted to further understand the preferences of the Somali population. Interviews were conducted with a slaughter-plant manager in nearby Detroit, Michigan, the current major supplier of fresh goat meat to the Columbus market. During January and March 2003, two focus-group sessions were organized and conducted by task force members with Somali consumers, entrepreneurs, and retail grocery owners. Significant results and discussion presented in detail within this research report include: Somalia's prefer fresh over frozen goat meat, pricing is a key determinant in meat choices for Somali consumers, goat meat and lamb meat are somewhat substitutable in Somali diets, Somalis will substitute halal chicken and beef if lamb and goat meat is not available, lean grass-fed carcass is preferred to a grain-fed goat, Somalis eat goat meat 1-2 times a day year-round, most people feeding families buy a whole carcass, and only a slight preference was indicated between the halal and kosher slaughter practices.Agribusiness,

Model-Based System Engineering and Software System Safety Workshop

The G-48 System Safety Committee sponsored a Model-Based System Engineering (MBSE) and Software System Safety (SSS) workshop, hosted by A-P-T Research, Inc. (APT) in Huntsville, Alabama, on May 2-3, 2017. The idea of this workshop evolved at the 34th International System Safety Conference (ISSC) in Orlando, Florida, during presentations and a paper by Barry Hendrix, which noted that the MBSE needs to include more system safety and software system safety processes. An action recorded under urgent-need topics by International System Safety Society (ISSS) Fellow Dave West at the G-48 meeting in Orlando resulted in volunteers to host and coordinate the workshop. The MBSE SSS workshop consisted of a panel of seven subject matter experts. Approximately 40 attendees were present and more than 70 people viewed the workshop via a NASA live video streaming feed. The MBSE SSS panel consisted of Barry Hendrix, APT; Dr. Fayssal Safie, APT; Dr. Donna Havrisik, Government Agency System Engineering; Josh McNeil, AMRDEC Software Engineering Directorate (SED); David Arterburn, University of Alabama Huntsville; Joe Hale, NASA; and Paul Gill, NASA. Many attendees were from local Redstone Arsenal agencies, such as AMCOM, PEO Missiles & Space, and the Missile Defense Agency. Several contractors from companies within Cummings Research Park also attended. Special out-of-town guests included Peggy Rogers, U.S. Navy Software System Safety Technical Review Panel (SSTRP); Bob McAlister, U.S. Air Force; and Lynece Pfledderer, Lockheed Martin (LM), along with five other LM attendees from Texas, Florida and Connecticut

Impact of the Ability to Divide Attention on Reading Performance in Glaucoma

PURPOSE: To determine if the ability to divide attention affects the relationship between glaucoma-related vision loss and reading speed. METHODS: Better eye mean deviation (MD), contrast sensitivity (CS), and better-eye distance visual acuity (VA) were measured in 28 participants with glaucoma and 21 controls. Reading speeds were assessed using MNRead, IRest, and sustained silent reading tests (words per minute, wpm). The ability to divide attention was measured using the Brief Test of Attention (BTA; scored 0-10). Multivariable linear regression models were used to determine the relationship between visual factors and reading speeds. Effect modification by BTA score (low BTA: 0.1 for all). CONCLUSIONS: Decreased ability to divide attention, indicated by lower BTA scores, is associated with slower reading speeds in glaucoma with reduced CS and VF defects

Roll On, Mississippi, Roll On

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Safety Case Workshop

In January 2013, a two-day Safety Case Workshop was conducted in Huntsville, Alabama under the sponsorship of the SAE International G-48 System Safety Committee and A-P-T Research, Inc. (APT). Attendees from industry, government and academia participated, with several making formal presentations on various safety methods. Industry focus is turning to international pursuits, which involve a broader understanding of different approaches to ensuring safety. The United States has typically used a process-based approach in managing system safety programs, but there is a current movement to use the evidence-based Safety Case approach to validate the safety of systems. At the conclusion of the workshop, participants reached the consensus view that the Safety Case approach merits being accepted among the best world-wide system safety practices

A Design Guide for Open Online Courses

This guide is a comprehensive summary of how we went about creating Citizen Maths, an open online maths course and service. The guide shares our design principles and the techniques we used to put them into practice. Our aim is to provide – with the appropriate ‘translation’ – a resource that will be useful to to other teams who are developing online education initiatives

Charting Coordination Needs in Large-Scale Agile Organisations with Boundary Objects and Methodological Islands

Large-scale system development companies are increasingly adopting agile methods. While this adoption may improve lead-times, such companies need to balance two trade-offs: (i) the need to have a uniform, consistent development method on system level with the need for specialised methods for teams in different disciplines (e.g., hardware, software, mechanics, sales, support); (ii) the need for comprehensive documentation on system level with the need to have lightweight documentation enabling iterative and agile work. With specialised methods for teams, isolated teams work within larger ecosystems of plan-driven culture, i.e., teams become agile “islands”. At the boundaries, these teams share knowledge which needs to be managed well for a correct system to be developed. While it is useful to support diverse and specialised methods, it is important to understand which islands are repeatedly encountered, the reasons or factors triggering their existence, and how best to handle coordination between them. Based on a multiple case study, this work presents a catalogue of islands and the boundary objects between them. We believe this work will be beneficial to practitioners aiming to understand their ecosystems and researchers addressing communication and coordination challenges in large-scale development

CICE Magazine, No. 4

My Culture is Not Fun, My Culture is Sacred: Two Native Hawaiian students reflect on their experiences at Puget Sound Pasover and Campus Seders: What is Passover? Learn more about Passover and campus Seders inside.https://soundideas.pugetsound.edu/cicemagazine/1003/thumbnail.jp

BSP implementation of the 2017 classification of periodontal diseases: a practice retrospective

Introduction The new world classification of periodontal diseases and conditions was developed in 2017. The British Society of Periodontology and Implant Dentistry (BSP) implemented the classification in a series of papers published in the British Dental Journal in January 2019. Aims and objectives This study aimed to investigate if the BSP implementation was workable in general dental practice and to reveal if any lessons were learnt from its regular use two years following its release. Materials and methods This was a cross-sectional, retrospective, non-intervention analysis of a patient population (n = 891) drawn from a complete list of a private dental surgeon. Diagnostic and demographic data were drawn from the patient records, collated and analysed using SPSS Statistics v26. Results Diagnoses derived from the new classification were identified for 92% of subjects, indicating a high level of implementation. In total, 20.9% of subjects were diagnosed with periodontitis, and of these, 57% were unstable, 39% stable and 4% in remission. The mean bleeding on probing score across the cohort was 7.7%. Moreover, 76% of the non-periodontitis patients were diagnosed with 'clinical gingival health', 23% with localised gingivitis and 1% with generalised gingivitis. Conclusion The new classification has been found to be readily implemented in a general practice setting. Use of the new classification allows for close monitoring of periodontal status, and as a result, close monitoring of the effectiveness of pathways of care