\u3cem\u3eBeyond Therapy\u3c/em\u3e: A Dramaturgical Look at Christopher Durang\u27s Absurdist Play

This research notebook (also known as a dramaturgy notebook) was created as a class project for an advanced Theatre History course. We were asked to choose one play to study throughout the semester with the ultimate goal of creating a dramaturgy notebook that would be usable for a production team were we to produce our show of choice. Having a great interest in Christopher Durang and his work, I chose to study Beyond Therapy. We were asked specifically to write a biography on our chosen playwright, a historical context essay, an essay about themes present in the show, and an essay commenting on published criticisms on various performances of the show. Beyond that, we were also asked to write two supplements that might be found in a dramaturgy notebook. For this portion of the assignment I chose to write a press release covering the fictional Linfield production, and to create a question and answer section culminating in some interview questions published on Durang’s website. While the notebook as a whole serves to provide context for a production team, each section of the notebook has its own stand-alone function. In 2014, this research was presented at the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival (Region VII) in Boise, Idaho and was awarded first runner-up in the dramaturgy category

Satellite Power Systems (SPS) Space Transportation Workshop Summary

Space transportation requirements are major elements in the technical and economic realization of the entire SPS concept. First, steps in enhancing the shuttle include the Titan based liquid boost module (LBM) and liquid propellant boosters (LPB) to replace the present solid rocket boosters (SRB). The next choice between new ballistic or winged boosters must still be made; as well as the choice between series (staged) and parallel operation. Entirely new vehicles of large size are required before the economic and environmental problems of the prototype, or even demonstration, SPS can be resolved. Social impacts such as noise, and atmospheric pollution, locally and in the ionosphere, must be fully addressed. Although rather advanced technology and well developed operational management is required to properly target the average cost of gross cargo payloads into LEO at 30 $(1979)/kg for the construction of the initial SPS, the further goal for repetitive construction of 30 to 60 SPS at 15$ (1979)/kg for all operational payloads require the use of very advanced, long lived vehicles with a sophisticated operational organization using off shore, equatorial launch sites

Philanthropy and the Third Sector in Mexico: The Enabling Environment and Its Limitations

Why is Mexico's third sector underdeveloped? Despite the importance of this question, there is no persuasive answer. The usual mono-causal explanations –such as historical trajectory or lack of civic culture– are inadequate. A better way to address this question is applying the concept of an enabling environment for civil society. This encompasses empowering legal and fiscal frameworks, an effective accountability system, adequate institutional capacity of organizations, and availability of resources. The article offers an assessment of where Mexico stands in relation to these five components and argues that on each count they are unfavorable and/or underdeveloped. In addition, the author argues for including a sixth element: the cultural context for philanthropy and civil society. Based on original survey results, he demonstrates that key values and habits inhibit efforts to strengthen civil society and must be taken into account in any effort to understand or change the status quo. The article concludes with a reflection on how Mexican civil society can begin to change its unfavorable context, beginning with the need for stronger mechanisms for greater accountability on the part of organizations

A high accuracy Leray-deconvolution model of turbulence and its limiting behavior

In 1934 J. Leray proposed a regularization of the Navier-Stokes equations whose limits were weak solutions of the NSE. Recently, a modification of the Leray model, called the Leray-alpha model, has atracted study for turbulent flow simulation. One common drawback of Leray type regularizations is their low accuracy. Increasing the accuracy of a simulation based on a Leray regularization requires cutting the averaging radius, i.e., remeshing and resolving on finer meshes. This report analyzes a family of Leray type models of arbitrarily high orders of accuracy for fixed averaging radius. We establish the basic theory of the entire family including limiting behavior as the averaging radius decreases to zero, (a simple extension of results known for the Leray model). We also give a more technically interesting result on the limit as the order of the models increases with fixed averaging radius. Because of this property, increasing accuracy of the model is potentially cheaper than decreasing the averaging radius (or meshwidth) and high order models are doubly interesting

A review of recent developments in flight test techniques at the Ames Research Center, Dryden Flight Research Facility

New flight test techniques in use at Ames Dryden are reviewed. The use of the pilot in combination with ground and airborne computational capabilities to maximize data return is discussed, including the remotely piloted research vehicle technique for high-risk testing, the remotely augmented vehicle technique for handling qualities research, and use of ground computed flight director information to fly unique profiles such as constant Reynolds number profiles through the transonic flight regime. Techniques used for checkout and design verification of systems-oriented aircraft are discussed, including descriptions of the various simulations, iron bird setups, and vehicle tests. Some newly developed techniques to support the aeronautical research disciplines are discussed, including a new approach to position-error determination, and the use of a large skin friction balance for the measurement of drag caused by various excrescencies

A Statistical Analysis of RNA Folding Algorithms Through Thermodynamic Parameter Perturbation

Computational RNA secondary structure prediction is rather well established. However, such prediction algorithms always depend on a large number of experimentally measured parameters. Here, we study how sensitive structure prediction algorithms are to changes in these parameters. We find that already for changes corresponding to the actual experimental error to which these parameters have been determined 30% of the structure are falsly predicted and the ground state structure is preserved under parameter perturbation in only 5% of all cases. We establish that base pairing probabilities calculated in a thermal ensemble are a viable though not perfect measure for the reliability of the prediction of individual structure elements. A new measure of stability using parameter perturbation is proposed, and its limitations discussed.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures, 1 table submitted to Nucleic Acids Researc

A neural model of border-ownership from kinetic occlusion

Camouflaged animals that have very similar textures to their surroundings are difficult to detect when stationary. However, when an animal moves, humans readily see a figure at a different depth than the background. How do humans perceive a figure breaking camouflage, even though the texture of the figure and its background may be statistically identical in luminance? We present a model that demonstrates how the primate visual system performs figure–ground segregation in extreme cases of breaking camouflage based on motion alone. Border-ownership signals develop as an emergent property in model V2 units whose receptive fields are nearby kinetically defined borders that separate the figure and background. Model simulations support border-ownership as a general mechanism by which the visual system performs figure–ground segregation, despite whether figure–ground boundaries are defined by luminance or motion contrast. The gradient of motion- and luminance-related border-ownership signals explains the perceived depth ordering of the foreground and background surfaces. Our model predicts that V2 neurons, which are sensitive to kinetic edges, are selective to border-ownership (magnocellular B cells). A distinct population of model V2 neurons is selective to border-ownership in figures defined by luminance contrast (parvocellular B cells). B cells in model V2 receive feedback from neurons in V4 and MT with larger receptive fields to bias border-ownership signals toward the figure. We predict that neurons in V4 and MT sensitive to kinetically defined figures play a crucial role in determining whether the foreground surface accretes, deletes, or produces a shearing motion with respect to the background.This work was supported in part by CELEST (NSF SBE-0354378 and OMA-0835976), the Office of Naval Research (ONR N00014-11-1-0535) and Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR FA9550-12-1-0436). (NSF SBE-0354378 - CELEST; OMA-0835976 - CELEST; ONR N00014-11-1-0535 - Office of Naval Research; AFOSR FA9550-12-1-0436 - Air Force Office of Scientific Research)Published versio