22,982 research outputs found
CC201 Soybean Weed Control
CC201 discusses soybean weed control including methods and types of weed control
CC201 Soybean Weed Control
CC201 discusses soybean weed control including methods and types of weed control
Electrovac -waves
New exact solutions of the Einstein-Maxwell field equations that describe
-waves are presented
Swearing as a response to pain: A cross-cultural comparison of British and Japanese participants
Background and aims: Research suggests swearing can moderate pain perception. The present study assessed whether changes in pain perception due to swearing reflect a "scripting" effect by comparing swearing as a response to pain in native English and Japanese speakers. Cognitive psychology denotes a 'script' to be a sequence of learnt behaviours expected for given situations. Japanese participants were included as they rarely, if ever, swear as a response to pain and therefore do not possess an available script for swearing in the context of pain. It was hypothesised that Japanese participants would demonstrate less tolerance and more sensitivity to pain than English participants, and - due to a lack of an available script of swearing in response to pain - that Japanese participants would not experience swearword mediated hypoalgesia. Methods: Fifty-six native English (mean age = 23 years) and 39 Japanese (mean age = 21) speakers completed a cold-pressor task whilst repeating either a swear on control word. A 2 (culture; Japanese, British). ×. 2 (word; swear; non-swear) design explored whether Japanese participants showed the same increase in pain tolerance and experienced similar levels of perceived pain when a swearing intervention was used as British participants. Pain tolerance was assessed by the number of seconds participants could endure of cold-pressor exposure and self-report pain measurements. Levels of perceived pain were assessed using a 120-mm horizontal visual analogue scale anchored by descriptors in the participant's native language of "no pain" (left) and "terrible pain" (right). The participant was asked to mark a 10. mm vertical line to indicate overall pain intensity. The score was measured from the zero anchor to the participant's mark. Results: Japanese participants reported higher levels of pain (p <. 0.005) and displayed lower pain tolerance than British participants (p <. 0.05). Pain tolerance increased in swearers regardless of cultural background (p <. 0.001) and no interaction was found between word group and culture (p = 0.96), thereby suggesting that swearing had no differential effect related to the cultural group of the participant. Conclusions: The results replicate previous findings that swearing increases pain tolerance and that individuals from an Asian ethnic background experience greater levels of perceived pain than those from a Caucasian ethnic background. However, these results do not support the idea of pain perception modification due to a "scripting" effect. This is evidenced as swearword mediated hypoalgesia occurs irrespective of participant cultural background. Rather, it is suggested that modulation of pain perception may occur through activation of descending inhibitory neural pain mechanisms. Implications: As swearing can increase pain tolerance in both Japanese and British people, it may be suggested that swearword mediated hypoalgesia is a universal phenomenon that transcends socio-cultural learnt behaviours. Furthermore, swearing could be encouraged as an intervention to help people cope with acute painful stimuli
Dipole anisotropies of IRAS galaxies and the contribution of a large-scale local void
Recent observations of dipole anisotropies show that the velocity of the
Local Group (\Vec v_{\rm G}) induced by the clustering of IRAS galax ies has
an amplitude and direction similar to those of the velocity of Cosmic Microwave
Background dipole anisotropy (\Vec v_{\rm CMB}), but the difference | \Vec
v_{\rm G} - \Vec v_{\rm CMB} | is still km/s, which is about 28% of
|\Vec v_{\rm CMB} |. Here we consider the possibility that the origin of this
difference comes from a hypothetical large-scale local void, with which we can
account for the accelerating behavior of type Ia supernovae due to the spatial
inhomogeneity of the Hubble constant without dark energies and derive the
constraint to the model parameters of the local void. It is found as a result
that the distance between the Local Group and the center of the void must be
Mpc, whose accurate value depends on the background model
parameters.Comment: 13 pages, 1 figure, to be published in ApJ 584, No.2 (2003
Contributions to the Nearby Stars (NStars) Project: Spectroscopy of Stars Earlier than M0 within 40 parsecs: The Northern Sample I
We have embarked on a project, under the aegis of the Nearby Stars (NStars)/
Space Interferometry Mission Preparatory Science Program to obtain spectra,
spectral types, and, where feasible, basic physical parameters for the 3600
dwarf and giant stars earlier than M0 within 40 parsecs of the sun. In this
paper we report on the results of this project for the first 664 stars in the
northern hemisphere. These results include precise, homogeneous spectral types,
basic physical parameters (including the effective temperature, surface gravity
and the overall metallicity, [M/H]) and measures of the chromospheric activity
of our program stars. Observed and derived data presented in this paper are
also available on the project's website at http://stellar.phys.appstate.edu/
The Dipole Anisotropy of the First All-Sky X-ray Cluster Sample
We combine the recently published CIZA galaxy cluster catalogue with the
XBACs cluster sample to produce the first all-sky catalogue of X-ray clusters
in order to examine the origins of the Local Group's peculiar velocity without
the use of reconstruction methods to fill the traditional Zone of Avoidance.
The advantages of this approach are (i) X-ray emitting clusters tend to trace
the deepest potential wells and therefore have the greatest effect on the
dynamics of the Local Group and (ii) our all-sky sample provides data for
nearly a quarter of the sky that is largely incomplete in optical cluster
catalogues. We find that the direction of the Local Group's peculiar velocity
is well aligned with the CMB as early as the Great Attractor region 40 h^-1 Mpc
away, but that the amplitude of its dipole motion is largely set between 140
and 160 h^-1 Mpc. Unlike previous studies using galaxy samples, we find that
without Virgo included, roughly ~70% of our dipole signal comes from mass
concentrations at large distances (>60 h^-1 Mpc) and does not flatten,
indicating isotropy in the cluster distribution, until at least 160 h^-1 Mpc.
We also present a detailed discussion of our dipole profile, linking observed
features to the structures and superclusters that produce them. We find that
most of the dipole signal can be attributed to the Shapley supercluster
centered at about 150 h^-1 Mpc and a handful of very massive individual
clusters, some of which are newly discovered and lie well in the Zone of
Avoidance.Comment: 15 Pages, 9 Figures. Accepted by Ap
Perturbations with angular momentum of Robinson-Trautman spacetimes
We study the possible asymptotically flat perturbations of Robinson-Trautman
spacetimes. We differentiate between algebraically special perturbations and
general perturbations. The equations that determine physically realistic
spacetimes with angular momentum are presented.Comment: 23 pages, no figure
A classification of spherically symmetric spacetimes
A complete classification of locally spherically symmetric four-dimensional
Lorentzian spacetimes is given in terms of their local conformal symmetries.
The general solution is given in terms of canonical metric types and the
associated conformal Lie algebras. The analysis is based upon the local
conformal decomposition into 2+2 reducible spacetimes and the Petrov type. A
variety of physically meaningful example spacetimes are discussed
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