1,027 research outputs found
Working Relationships Among Supervisors and Interns in Virtual Internships
Requiring experience to get a job is a familiar adage because employers want to know that new hires can not only work but can relate with others in a specific environment. This qualitative, multi-method, interpretive study explored the virtual internship as an option to the in-person internship that also enables employers and students to work with others anywhere in the world.
Intern supervisors and student interns experiencing virtual internships were invited to share the breadth of their experiences in an online survey. Analysis of survey data provided interview topics and a prioritized list of candidates who might provide the richest and deepest account of their experiences during ensuing interviews. Interpretative phenomenological analysis was applied to survey and interview data to deduce how participants related during internships.
The principal contribution of this study is realizing that virtual internships are a meeting of cultures, the academic and working worlds, that student interns and supervisors may have differing perceptions about the internship and each other that needs reconciling to avoid conflict and to fulfill individual interests. A close working relationship is not required for easily definable work. When it is required, participants must take efforts to understand each other’s perspective, recognize they are not their role but are individuals, and that their relationship is part of a larger working community. It is incumbent therefore that they develop a relationship that works for all concerned, regardless of whether they are in-person or communicating via technology
Content bias in the cultural evolution of house finch song
We used three years of house finch, Haemorhous mexicanus, song recordings spanning four decades in the introduced eastern range to assess how individual level cultural transmission mechanisms drive population level changes in birdsong. First, we developed an agent-based model (available as a new R package called ‘TransmissionBias’) that simulates the cultural transmission of house finch song given different parameters related to transmission biases, or biases in social learning that modify the probability of adoption of particular cultural variants. Next, we used approximate Bayesian computation and machine learning to estimate what parameter values likely generated the temporal changes in diversity in our observed data. We found evidence that strong content bias, likely targeted towards syllable complexity, plays a central role in the cultural evolution of house finch song in the New York metropolitan area. Frequency and demonstrator biases appear to be neutral or absent. Additionally, we estimated that house finch song is transmitted with extremely high fidelity. Future studies can use our simulation framework to better understand how cultural transmission and population declines influence song diversity in wild populations.Methods - Recording - Song Analysis and Clustering - Simulation and Generative Inference - Logistic Regression Results Discussio
Fermionic Molecular Dynamics for nuclear dynamics and thermodynamics
A new Fermionic Molecular Dynamics (FMD) model based on a Skyrme functional
is proposed in this paper. After introducing the basic formalism, some first
applications to nuclear structure and nuclear thermodynamics are presentedComment: 5 pages, Proceedings of the French-Japanese Symposium, September
2008. To be published in Int. J. of Mod. Phys.
The long journey from the giant-monopole resonance to the nuclear-matter incompressibility
Differences in the density dependence of the symmetry energy predicted by
nonrelativistic and relativistic models are suggested, at least in part, as the
culprit for the discrepancy in the values of the compression modulus of
symmetric nuclear matter extracted from the energy of the giant monopole
resonance in 208Pb. ``Best-fit'' relativistic models, with stiffer symmetry
energies than Skyrme interactions, consistently predict higher compression
moduli than nonrelativistic approaches. Relativistic models with compression
moduli in the physically acceptable range of K=200-300 MeV are used to compute
the distribution of isoscalar monopole strength in 208Pb. When the symmetry
energy is artificially softened in one of these models, in an attempt to
simulate the symmetry energy of Skyrme interactions, a lower value for the
compression modulus is indeed obtained. It is concluded that the proposed
measurement of the neutron skin in 208Pb, aimed at constraining the density
dependence of the symmetry energy and recently correlated to the structure of
neutron stars, will also become instrumental in the determination of the
compression modulus of nuclear matter.Comment: 9 pages with 2 (eps) figure
Dynamic PRA: an Overview of New Algorithms to Generate, Analyze and Visualize Data
State of the art PRA methods, i.e. Dynamic PRA
(DPRA) methodologies, largely employ system
simulator codes to accurately model system dynamics.
Typically, these system simulator codes (e.g., RELAP5 )
are coupled with other codes (e.g., ADAPT,
RAVEN that monitor and control the simulation. The
latter codes, in particular, introduce both deterministic
(e.g., system control logic, operating procedures) and
stochastic (e.g., component failures, variable uncertainties)
elements into the simulation. A typical DPRA analysis is
performed by:
1. Sampling values of a set of parameters from the
uncertainty space of interest
2. Simulating the system behavior for that specific set of
parameter values
3. Analyzing the set of simulation runs
4. Visualizing the correlations between parameter values
and simulation outcome
Step 1 is typically performed by randomly sampling
from a given distribution (i.e., Monte-Carlo) or selecting
such parameter values as inputs from the user (i.e.,
Dynamic Event Tre
Asymptotic Normalization Coefficients for 13C+p->14N
The proton exchange reaction has been measured
at an incident energy of 162 MeV. Angular distributions were obtained for
proton transfer to the ground and low lying excited states in . Elastic
scattering of on also was measured out to the rainbow angle
region in order to find reliable optical model potentials. Asymptotic
normalization coefficients for the system have been
found for the ground state and the excited states at 2.313, 3.948, 5.106 and
5.834 MeV in . These asymptotic normalization coefficients will be used
in a determination of the S-factor for at solar
energies from a measurement of the proton transfer reaction
.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figure
Risk Informed Safety Margin Characterization Case Study: Selection of Electrical Equipment To Be Subjected to Environmental Qualification
In general, the margins-based safety case helps the decision-maker manage plant margins most effectively. It tells the plant decision-maker such things as what margin is present (at the plant level, at the functional level, at the barrier level, at the component level), and where margin is thin or perhaps just degrading. If the plant is safe, it tells the decision-maker why the plant is safe and where margin needs to be maintained, and perhaps where the plant can afford to relax
Application of Risk within Net Present Value Calculations for Government Projects
In January 2004, President Bush announced a new vision for space exploration. This included retirement of the current Space Shuttle fleet by 2010 and the development of new set of launch vehicles. The President's vision did not include significant increases in the NASA budget, so these development programs need to be cost conscious. Current trade study procedures address factors such as performance, reliability, safety, manufacturing, maintainability, operations, and costs. It would be desirable, however, to have increased insight into the cost factors behind each of the proposed system architectures. This paper reports on a set of component trade studies completed on the upper stage engine for the new launch vehicles. Increased insight into architecture costs was developed by including a Net Present Value (NPV) method and applying a set of associated risks to the base parametric cost data. The use of the NPV method along with the risks was found to add fidelity to the trade study and provide additional information to support the selection of a more robust design architecture
Tests of Transfer Reaction Determinations of Astrophysical S-Factors
The reaction has been used to determine
asymptotic normalization coefficients for transitions to the ground and first
excited states of . The coefficients provide the normalization for
the tails of the overlap functions for and allow us
to calculate the S-factors for at astrophysical
energies. The calculated S-factors are compared to measurements and found to be
in very good agreement. This provides the first test of this indirect method to
determine astrophysical direct capture rates using transfer reactions. In
addition, our results yield S(0) for capture to the ground and first excited
states in , without the uncertainty associated with extrapolation from
higher energies.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure
Exudative pharyngitis possibly due to Corynebacterium pseudodiphtheriticum, a new challenge in the differential diagnosis of diphtheria.
Corynebacterium pseudodiphtheriticum has rarely been reported to cause disease in humans, despite its common presence in the flora of the upper respiratory tract. We report here a case of exudative pharyngitis with pseudomembrane possibly caused by C. pseudodiphtheriticum in a 4-year-old girl. The case initially triggered clinical and laboratory suspicion of diphtheria. Because C. pseudodiphtheriticum can be easily confused with Corynebacterium diphtheriae in Gram stain, clarification of its role in the pathogenesis of exudative pharyngitis in otherwise healthy persons is of public health importance. Simple and rapid screening tests to differentiate C. pseudodiphtheriticum from C. diphtheriae should be performed to prevent unnecessary concern in the community and unnecessary outbreak control measures
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