509 research outputs found
Narrative for Expanding Visibility to Non-Black Students through Enrollment Management Practices for Historically Black Colleges and Universities
As the U.S. is growing more diverse, at historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) like VSU, non-Black students are considered underrepresented. Current declining enrollment numbers at VSU have become problematic, creating a budgetary shortfall that has impacted student facilities, programs, and services. In response, VSU is striving to increase student enrollment through strategic enrollment management. This study examines how VSU can expand its visibility with non-Black, domestic students in high schools, and community colleges. Further, this study adds to the understanding of enrollment management strategies at an HBCU, as administrators, faculty and other stakeholders collaborate to provide an inclusive environment for students of all backgrounds. This study also provides knowledge regarding the impact of enrollment management strategies to recruit non-Black students to VSU
Integrin-linked kinase regulates melanosome trafficking and melanin transfer in melanocytes
Melanosomes are melanin-containing organelles that provide pigmentation and protection from solar UV radiation to the skin. In melanocytes, melanosomes mature and traffic to dendritic tips, where they are transferred to adjacent epidermal keratinocytes through pathways that involve microtubule networks and the actin cytoskeleton. However, the role of scaffold proteins in these processes is poorly understood. Integrin-linked kinase (ILK) is a scaffold protein that regulates microtubule stability and F-actin dynamics. Here we show that ILK is necessary for normal trafficking of melanosomes along microtubule tracks. In the absence of ILK, immature melanosomes are not retained in perinuclear regions, and mature melanosome trafficking along microtubule tracks is impaired. These deficits can be attenuated by microtubule stabilization. Microtubules are also necessary for the formation of dendrites in melanocytes, and Ilk inactivation reduces melanocyte dendricity. Activation of glycogen synthase kinase-3 (GSK-3) interferes with microtubule assembly. Significantly, inhibition of GSK-3 activity or exogenous expression of the GSK-3 substrate collapsin response mediator protein 2 (CRMP2) in ILK-deficient melanocytes restored dendricity. ILK is also required for normal melanin transfer, and GSK-3 inhibition in melanocytes partially restored melanin transfer to neighboring keratinocytes. Thus, our work shows that ILK is a central modulator of melanosome movements in primary epidermal melanocytes and identifies ILK and GSK-3 as important modulators of melanin transfer to keratinocytes, a key process for epidermal UV photoprotection
Multi-color Cavity Metrology
Long baseline laser interferometers used for gravitational wave detection
have proven to be very complicated to control. In order to have sufficient
sensitivity to astrophysical gravitational waves, a set of multiple coupled
optical cavities comprising the interferometer must be brought into resonance
with the laser field. A set of multi-input, multi-output servos then lock these
cavities into place via feedback control. This procedure, known as lock
acquisition, has proven to be a vexing problem and has reduced greatly the
reliability and duty factor of the past generation of laser interferometers. In
this article, we describe a technique for bringing the interferometer from an
uncontrolled state into resonance by using harmonically related external fields
to provide a deterministic hierarchical control. This technique reduces the
effect of the external seismic disturbances by four orders of magnitude and
promises to greatly enhance the stability and reliability of the current
generation of gravitational wave detector. The possibility for using
multi-color techniques to overcome current quantum and thermal noise limits is
also discussed
Effects of a Legitimate Authority's Justification of Inequality on the Mobilization of Revolutionary Coalitions
The authors explore revolutionary coalition formation in equitable situations. They posited that actors would form such coalitions if the equitable relations were threatened. Results of an experimental test of that idea were not confirmatory. The authors attributed the outcomes to an unintended factor of inferred authorization
Local-Oscillator Noise Coupling in Balanced Homodyne Readout for Advanced Gravitational Wave Detectors
The second generation of interferometric gravitational wave detectors are
quickly approaching their design sensitivity. For the first time these
detectors will become limited by quantum back-action noise. Several back-action
evasion techniques have been proposed to further increase the detector
sensitivity. Since most proposals rely on a flexible readout of the full
amplitude- and phase-quadrature space of the output light field, balanced
homodyne detection is generally expected to replace the currently used DC
readout. Up to now, little investigation has been undertaken into how balanced
homodyne detection can be successfully transferred from its ubiquitous
application in table-top quantum optics experiments to large-scale
interferometers with suspended optics. Here we derive implementation
requirements with respect to local oscillator noise couplings and highlight
potential issues with the example of the Glasgow Sagnac Speed Meter experiment,
as well as for a future upgrade to the Advanced LIGO detectors.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figure
Prospects for detecting gravitational waves at 5 Hz with ground-based detectors
We propose an upgrade to Advanced LIGO (aLIGO), named LIGO-LF, that focuses
on improving the sensitivity in the 5-30 Hz low-frequency band, and we explore
the upgrade's astrophysical applications. We present a comprehensive study of
the detector's technical noises and show that with technologies currently under
development, such as interferometrically sensed seismometers and
balanced-homodyne readout, LIGO-LF can reach the fundamental limits set by
quantum and thermal noises down to 5 Hz. These technologies are also directly
applicable to the future generation of detectors. We go on to consider this
upgrade's implications for the astrophysical output of an aLIGO-like detector.
A single LIGO-LF can detect mergers of stellar-mass black holes (BHs) out to a
redshift of z~6 and would be sensitive to intermediate-mass black holes up to
2000 M_\odot. The detection rate of merging BHs will increase by a factor of 18
compared to aLIGO. Additionally, for a given source the chirp mass and total
mass can be constrained 2 times better than aLIGO and the effective spin 3-5
times better than aLIGO. Furthermore, LIGO-LF enables the localization of
coalescing binary neutron stars with an uncertainty solid angle 10 times
smaller than that of aLIGO at 30 Hz, and 4 times smaller when the entire signal
is used. LIGO-LF also significantly enhances the probability of detecting other
astrophysical phenomena including the tidal excitation of neutron star r-modes
and the gravitational memory effects.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figures, published in PR
Waveguide grating mirror in a fully suspended 10 meter Fabry-Perot cavity
We report on the first demonstration of a fully suspended 10m Fabry-Perot
cavity incorporating a waveguide grating as the coupling mirror. The cavity was
kept on resonance by reading out the length fluctuations via the
Pound-Drever-Hall method and employing feedback to the laser frequency. From
the achieved finesse of 790 the grating reflectivity was determined to exceed
99.2% at the laser wavelength of 1064\,nm, which is in good agreement with
rigorous simulations. Our waveguide grating design was based on tantala and
fused silica and included a ~20nm thin etch stop layer made of Al2O3 that
allowed us to define the grating depth accurately during the fabrication
process. Demonstrating stable operation of a waveguide grating featuring high
reflectivity in a suspended low-noise cavity, our work paves the way for the
potential application of waveguide gratings as mirrors in high-precision
interferometry, for instance in future gravitational wave observatories
Polynomials, Riemann surfaces, and reconstructing missing-energy events
We consider the problem of reconstructing energies, momenta, and masses in
collider events with missing energy, along with the complications introduced by
combinatorial ambiguities and measurement errors. Typically, one reconstructs
more than one value and we show how the wrong values may be correlated with the
right ones. The problem has a natural formulation in terms of the theory of
Riemann surfaces. We discuss examples including top quark decays in the
Standard Model (relevant for top quark mass measurements and tests of spin
correlation), cascade decays in models of new physics containing dark matter
candidates, decays of third-generation leptoquarks in composite models of
electroweak symmetry breaking, and Higgs boson decay into two tau leptons.Comment: 28 pages, 6 figures; version accepted for publication, with
discussion of Higgs to tau tau deca
Effects of static and dynamic higher-order optical modes in balanced homodyne readout for future gravitational waves detectors
With the recent detection of Gravitational waves (GW), marking the start of the new field of GW astronomy, the push for building more sensitive laser-interferometric gravitational wave detectors (GWD) has never been stronger. Balanced homodyne detection (BHD) allows for a quantum noise (QN) limited readout of arbitrary light field quadratures, and has therefore been suggested as a vital building block for upgrades to Advanced LIGO and third generation observatories. In terms of the practical implementation of BHD, we develop a full framework for analyzing the static optical high order modes (HOMs) occurring in the BHD paths related to the misalignment or mode matching at the input and output ports of the laser interferometer. We find the effects of HOMs on the quantum noise limited sensitivity is independent of the actual interferometer configuration, e.g. Michelson and Sagnac interferometers are effected in the same way. We show that misalignment of the output ports of the interferometer (output misalignment) only effects the high frequency part of the quantum noise limited sensitivity (detection noise). However, at low frequencies, HOMs reduce the interferometer response and the radiation pressure noise (back action noise) by the same amount and hence the quantum noise limited sensitivity is not negatively effected in that frequency range. We show that the misalignment of laser into the interferometer (input misalignment) produces the same effect as output misalignment and additionally decreases the power inside the interferometer. We also analyze dynamic HOM effects, such as beam jitter created by the suspended mirrors of the BHD. Our analyses can be directly applied to any BHD implementation in a future GWD. Moreover, we apply our analytical techniques to the example of the speed meter proof of concept experiment under construction in Glasgow. We find that for our experimental parameters, the performance of our seismic isolation system in the BHD paths is compatible with the design sensitivity of the experiment
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