Capabilities and applications of the Program to Optimize Simulated Trajectories (POST). Program summary document

The capabilities and applications of the three-degree-of-freedom (3DOF) version and the six-degree-of-freedom (6DOF) version of the Program to Optimize Simulated Trajectories (POST) are summarized. The document supplements the detailed program manuals by providing additional information that motivates and clarifies basic capabilities, input procedures, applications and computer requirements of these programs. The information will enable prospective users to evaluate the programs, and to determine if they are applicable to their problems. Enough information is given to enable managerial personnel to evaluate the capabilities of the programs and describes the POST structure, formulation, input and output procedures, sample cases, and computer requirements. The report also provides answers to basic questions concerning planet and vehicle modeling, simulation accuracy, optimization capabilities, and general input rules. Several sample cases are presented

A New Medicare End-of-Life Benefit for Nursing Home Residents

A new Medicare benefit is needed to support end-of-life care for those spending their final days in a nursing home, say the authors of this article. Arguing that the current hospice benefit is a poor fit with the nursing home setting, the authors recommend a new benefit that would enable nursing home residents to receive individualized palliative and psychosocial services in addition to rehabilitative services

Simulation studies of air transport operational problems

An experimental evaluation of the monitored approach procedure for conducting low visibility instrument approaches is described. Four airline crews each flew 16 approaches using the monitored procedure and 16 using a modified standard procedure in a DC-10 simulator under various conditions of visibility, wind shear and turbulence, and radar vectoring scenarios. In terms of system measures of aircrew performance, no major differences were found. Pilot opinion data indicate that there are some desirable characteristics of the monitored procedure, particularly with reference to the increased role of the flight engineer in conducting low visibility approaches. Rationale for developing approach procedures is discussed

Concept design and alternate arrangements of orbiter mid-deck habitability features

The evaluations and recommendations for habitability features in the space shuttle orbiter mid-deck are summarized. The orbiter mission plans, the mid-deck dimensions and baseline arrangements along with crew compliments and typical activities were defined. Female and male anthropometric data based on zero-g operations were also defined. Evaluations of baseline and alternate feasible concepts provided several recommendations which are discussed

The four-fermion interaction in D=2,3,4: a nonperturbative treatment

A new nonperturbative approach is used to investigate the Gross-Neveu model of four fermion interaction in the space-time dimensions 2, 3 and 4, the number $N$ of inner degrees of freedom being a fixed integer. The spontaneous symmetry breaking is shown to exist in $D=2,3$ and the running coupling constant is calculated. The four dimensional theory seems to be trivial.Comment: a minor correction: one more acknowledgement is added. Latex 2.09 file, 15 pages, no figures, accepted for publication to Int.J.Mod.Phys.