A qualitative analysis of strengths and liabilities of former journalists in public relations roles

Since the birth of the public relations industry, journalists have filled much of its ranks. Following the introduction of James Grunig's general theory of two-way symmetrical public relations, various corollaries have questioned how well the background, training and worldviews of journalism prepare a public relations practitioner for the role of strategic communications manager prized by Grunig's theory. This project surveyed public relations managers at a broad cross-section of largely for-profit companies, most of them USheadquartered, on the skills, abilities and limitations former journalists bring to the profession and in particular to strategic communications roles and responsibilities. Writing, storypitching and analysis were the most appreciated skills and abilities even for strategic roles, qualities that some corollaries to Grunig's theory have tended to relegate to with technical rather than strategic functions in public relations. However, some managers expressed concerns over transfer of certain journalistic worldviews, or at least aspects they attributed to news backgrounds, traits that they saw as complicating former journalists' adaptation to a corporate world

Objective 1: Extend Life, Improve Performance, and Maintain Safety of the Current Fleet Implementation Plan

Nuclear power has reliably and economically contributed almost 20% of electrical generation in the United States over the past two decades. It remains the single largest contributor (more than 70%) of non-greenhouse-gas-emitting electric power generation in the United States. By the year 2030, domestic demand for electrical energy is expected to grow to levels of 16 to 36% higher than 2007 levels. At the same time, most currently operating nuclear power plants will begin reaching the end of their 60 year operating licenses. Figure E 1 shows projected nuclear energy contribution to the domestic generating capacity. If current operating nuclear power plants do not operate beyond 60 years, the total fraction of generated electrical energy from nuclear power will begin to decline—even with the expected addition of new nuclear generating capacity. The oldest commercial plants in the United States reached their 40th anniversary in 2009. The U.S. Department of Energy Office of Nuclear Energy’s Research and Development (R&D) Roadmap has organized its activities in accordance with four objectives that ensure nuclear energy remains a compelling and viable energy option for the United States. The objectives are as follows: (1) develop technologies and other solutions that can improve the reliability, sustain the safety, and extend the life of the current reactors; (2) develop improvements in the affordability of new reactors to enable nuclear energy to help meet the Administration’s energy security and climate change goals; (3) develop sustainable nuclear fuel cycles; and (4) understand and minimize risks of nuclear proliferation and terrorism. The Light Water Reactor Sustainability (LWRS) Program is the primary programmatic activity that addresses Objective 1. This document describes how Objective 1 and the LWRS Program will be implemented. The existing U.S. nuclear fleet has a remarkable safety and performance record and today accounts for 70% of the low greenhouse gas emitting domestic electricity production. Extending the operating lifetimes of current plants beyond 60 years and, where possible, making further improvements in their productivity will generate early benefits from research, development, and demonstration investments in nuclear power. DOE’s role in Objective 1 is to partner with industry and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in appropriate ways to support and conduct the long-term research needed to inform major component refurbishment and replacement strategies, performance enhancements, plant license extensions, and age-related regulatory oversight decisions. The DOE research, development, and demonstration role will focus on aging phenomena and issues that require long-term research and are generic to reactor type. Cost-shared demonstration activities will be conducted when appropriate

Mechanical and fracture behaviors of cellulose-based multilayer laminate

Cellulose nanomaterials (CNs) have become attracting recently as a result of renewable and sustainable sources, superior mechanical properties, lightweight and the potential to be produced at industrial size quantities. In this study, two types of CNs, cellulose nanofibrils (CNF) and cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs), were used to fabricate multilayer laminate with various types of polymer, such as poly(vinyl butyral) resin (PVB) and poly(styrene-block-ethylene/butylene-block-styrene) (SEBS). In CNF laminate system, laminate had lower Young’s modulus (E) and ultimate tensile strength (sT ) but higher strain of failure (ef) in comparison with neat CNF film properties, especially using PVB as interlayer. The improvement of ef of CNF/polymer laminate resulted in more energy was dissipated (work of fracture) during breaking laminate, which was also approved by observing facture surface of laminate where initiating high density of cracks in shear direction as comparison to the smooth fracture section of neat CNF films. In CNC laminate system, most properties (E, sT, and work of fracture) of the laminate were decreased. However, in CNC/maleated SEBS system, the ef was increased almost 50% as increasing the volume fraction of polymer. In addition, the stress–strain curves of CNC/maleated SEBS laminate presented multiple breaking steps which represented that cracks propagating through the laminate were delayed by maleated SEBS interlayer polymer

Development of NASA's Accident Precursor Analysis Process Through Application on the Space Shuttle Orbiter

Accident Precursor Analysis (APA) serves as the bridge between existing risk modeling activities, which are often based on historical or generic failure statistics, and system anomalies, which provide crucial information about the failure mechanisms that are actually operative in the system. APA docs more than simply track experience: it systematically evaluates experience, looking for under-appreciated risks that may warrant changes to design or operational practice. This paper presents the pilot application of the NASA APA process to Space Shuttle Orbiter systems. In this effort, the working sessions conducted at Johnson Space Center (JSC) piloted the APA process developed by Information Systems Laboratories (ISL) over the last two years under the auspices of NASA's Office of Safety & Mission Assurance, with the assistance of the Safety & Mission Assurance (S&MA) Shuttle & Exploration Analysis Branch. This process is built around facilitated working sessions involving diverse system experts. One important aspect of this particular APA process is its focus on understanding the physical mechanism responsible for an operational anomaly, followed by evaluation of the risk significance of the observed anomaly as well as consideration of generalizations of the underlying mechanism to other contexts. Model completeness will probably always be an issue, but this process tries to leverage operating experience to the extent possible in order to address completeness issues before a catastrophe occurs

Strength improvement of cement pastes with cellulose -nanocrystals via short circuit diffusion

The influence of cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) addition on the performance of cement paste is investigated. Our mechanical tests show an increase in the flexural strength of ~30% with only 0.2% volume of the as-received CNCs with respect to cement. However, the strength decreases at the high concentration region due to the agglomeration of CNCs. The ultrasonication is performed to disperse the CNCs and a maximum strength improvement of up to 50% is achieved. The relationship between the dispersion of CNCs and the strength of the cement paste is examined with rheological measurements. Isothermal calorimetry and thermogravimetric analysis show that the degree of hydration (DOH) of the cement paste is increased when CNCs are used. The first mechanism that explains the increased hydration is the steric stabilization, which is supported by rheological, heat flow rate measurements, microscopic imaging, and nanoindentation. A second mechanism is proposed as short circuit diffusion (SCD) to explain the increased hydration. SCD appears to increase cement hydration by increasing the transport of water from outside the hydration product shell (i.e., through the high density CSH) on a cement grain to the unhydrated cement cores. The DOH and flexural strength are measured for cement pastes with water reducing agent and CNC to verify this theory. Our results indicate that SCD is more dominant than steric stabilization