4,841 research outputs found
Advanced flight deck/crew station simulator functional requirements
This report documents a study of flight deck/crew system research facility requirements for investigating issues involved with developing systems, and procedures for interfacing transport aircraft with air traffic control systems planned for 1985 to 2000. Crew system needs of NASA, the U.S. Air Force, and industry were investigated and reported. A matrix of these is included, as are recommended functional requirements and design criteria for simulation facilities in which to conduct this research. Methods of exploiting the commonality and similarity in facilities are identified, and plans for exploiting this in order to reduce implementation costs and allow efficient transfer of experiments from one facility to another are presented
Open access to novel dual flow chamber technology for in vitro cell mechanotransduction, toxicity and pharamacokinetic studies
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>A major stumbling block for researchers developing experimental models of mechanotransduction is the control of experimental variables, in particular the transmission of the mechanical forces at the cellular level. A previous evaluation of state of the art commercial perfusion chambers showed that flow regimes, applied to impart a defined mechanical stimulus to cells, are poorly controlled and that data from studies in which different chambers are utilized can not be compared, even if the target stress regimes are comparable.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>This study provides a novel chamber design to provide both physiologically-based flow regimes, improvements in control of experimental variables, as well as ease of use compared to commercial chambers. This novel design achieves controlled stresses through five gasket designs and both single- and dual-flow regimes.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The imparted shear stress within the gasket geometry is well controlled. Fifty percent of the entire area of the 10 × 21 mm universal gasket (Gasket I, designed to impart constant magnitude shear stresses in the center of the chamber where outcome measures are taken), is exposed to target stresses. In the 8 mm diameter circular area at the center of the chamber (where outcome measures are made), over 92% of the area is exposed to the target stress (± 2.5%). In addition, other gasket geometries provide specific gradients of stress that vary with distance from the chamber inlet. Bench-top testing of the novel chamber prototype shows improvements, in the ease of use as well as in performance, compared to the other commercial chambers. The design of the chamber eliminates flow deviations due to leakage and bubbles and allows actual flow profiles to better conform with those predicted in computational models.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The novel flow chamber design provides predictable and well defined mechanical forces at the surface of a cell monolayer, showing improvement over previously tested commercial chambers. The predictability of the imparted stress improves both experiment repeatability as well as the accuracy of inter-study comparisons. Carefully controlling the stresses on cells is critical in effectively mimicking <it>in vivo </it>situations. Overall, the improved perfusion flow chamber provides the needed resolution, standardization and <it>in vitro </it>model analogous to <it>in vivo </it>conditions to make the step towards greater use in research and the opportunity to enter the diagnostic and therapeutic market.</p
Confronting Institutional Discrimination in a Color-Blind World
This article builds on the scholarship on color-blind ideology by examining discourse challenging two cases of institutional discrimination (the criminalization of unauthorized immigrants and sports teams’ use of Native American symbolism). Our research questions are first, what general options do anti-racists have for navigating norms of color-blindness in the public sphere? Second, how does context influence how people confront institutional discrimination? Based on an ethnographic content analysis of 165 letters to the editor published in American newspapers, we find that opponents of institutional discrimination have the choice of addressing one of four laminations. In each lamination, authors acknowledge framings of racial discrimination that are unacknowledged in previous ones. In the abstraction lamination, authors do not recognize race and ethnicity. In the pigmentation lamination, authors identify race and ethnicity, but not discrimination. Authors in the discrimination lamination acknowledge the practice is harmful to a particular racial or ethnic group, and the contextualization lamination lends added dimensionality to the discourse. A comparison of the laminations of pro-immigrant and anti-mascot letters demonstrates varying willingness to acknowledge racial discrimination. Namely, the pro-immigrant discourse was more color-blind than anti-mascot criticism. We consider the potential causes of these findings and offer suggestions for future research in the conclusio
K-Rational D-Brane Crystals
In this paper the problem of constructing spacetime from string theory is
addressed in the context of D-brane physics. It is suggested that the knowledge
of discrete configurations of D-branes is sufficient to reconstruct the motivic
building blocks of certain Calabi-Yau varieties. The collections of D-branes
involved have algebraic base points, leading to the notion of K-arithmetic
D-crystals for algebraic number fields K. This idea can be tested for D0-branes
in the framework of toroidal compactifications via the conjectures of Birch and
Swinnerton-Dyer. For the special class of D0-crystals of Heegner type these
conjectures can be interpreted as formulae that relate the canonical Neron-Tate
height of the base points of the D-crystals to special values of the motivic
L-function at the central point. In simple cases the knowledge of the
D-crystals of Heegner type suffices to uniquely determine the geometry.Comment: 36 page
Heating mechanisms in radio frequency driven ultracold plasmas
Several mechanisms by which an external electromagnetic field influences the
temperature of a plasma are studied analytically and specialized to the system
of an ultracold plasma (UCP) driven by a uniform radio frequency (RF) field.
Heating through collisional absorption is reviewed and applied to UCPs.
Furthermore, it is shown that the RF field modifies the three body
recombination process by ionizing electrons from intermediate high-lying
Rydberg states and upshifting the continuum threshold, resulting in a
suppression of three body recombination. Heating through collisionless
absorption associated with the finite plasma size is calculated in detail,
revealing a temperature threshold below which collisionless absorption is
ineffective.Comment: 14 pages, 7 figure
A Meinardus theorem with multiple singularities
Meinardus proved a general theorem about the asymptotics of the number of
weighted partitions, when the Dirichlet generating function for weights has a
single pole on the positive real axis. Continuing \cite{GSE}, we derive
asymptotics for the numbers of three basic types of decomposable combinatorial
structures (or, equivalently, ideal gas models in statistical mechanics) of
size , when their Dirichlet generating functions have multiple simple poles
on the positive real axis. Examples to which our theorem applies include ones
related to vector partitions and quantum field theory. Our asymptotic formula
for the number of weighted partitions disproves the belief accepted in the
physics literature that the main term in the asymptotics is determined by the
rightmost pole.Comment: 26 pages. This version incorporates the following two changes implied
by referee's remarks: (i) We made changes in the proof of Proposition 1; (ii)
We provided an explanation to the argument for the local limit theorem. The
paper is tentatively accepted by "Communications in Mathematical Physics"
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Modelling gravity on a hyper-cubic lattice
We present an elegant and simple dynamical model of symmetric, non-degenerate
(n x n) matrices of fixed signature defined on a n-dimensional hyper-cubic
lattice with nearest-neighbor interactions. We show how this model is related
to General Relativity, and discuss multiple ways in which it can be useful for
studying gravity, both classical and quantum. In particular, we show that the
dynamics of the model when all matrices are close to the identity corresponds
exactly to a finite-difference discretization of weak-field gravity in harmonic
gauge. We also show that the action which defines the full dynamics of the
model corresponds to the Einstein-Hilbert action to leading order in the
lattice spacing, and use this observation to define a lattice analogue of the
Ricci scalar and Einstein tensor. Finally, we perform a mean-field analysis of
the statistical mechanics of this model.Comment: 5 page
Spectral signature of short attosecond pulse trains
We report experimental measurements of high-order harmonic spectra generated
in Ar using a carrier-envelope-offset (CEO) stabilized 12 fs, 800nm laser field
and a fraction (less than 10%) of its second harmonic. Additional spectral
peaks are observed between the harmonic peaks, which are due to interferences
between multiple pulses in the train. The position of these peaks varies with
the CEO and their number is directly related to the number of pulses in the
train. An analytical model, as well as numerical simulations, support our
interpretation
Determining the effects of cattle grazing treatments on Yosemite toads (Anaxyrus [=Bufo] canorus) in montane meadows.
Amphibians are experiencing a precipitous global decline, and population stability on public lands with multiple uses is a key concern for managers. In the Sierra Nevada Mountains (California, USA), managers have specifically identified livestock grazing as an activity that may negatively affect Yosemite toads due to the potential overlap of grazing with toad habitat. Grazing exclusion from Yosemite toad breeding and rearing areas and/or entire meadows have been proposed as possible management actions to alleviate the possible impact of cattle on this species. The primary objective of this study was to determine if different fencing treatments affect Yosemite toad populations. We specifically examined the effect of three fencing treatments on Yosemite toad breeding pool occupancy, tadpoles, and young of the year (YOY). Our hypothesis was that over the course of treatment implementation (2006 through 2010), Yosemite toad breeding pool occupancy and early life stage densities would increase within two fencing treatments relative to actively grazed meadows due to beneficial changes to habitat quality in the absence of grazing. Our results did not support our hypothesis, and showed no benefit to Yosemite toad presence or early life stages in fenced or partially fenced meadows compared to standard USDA Forest Service grazing levels. We found substantial Yosemite toad variation by both meadow and year. This variation was influenced by meadow wetness, with water table depth significant in both the tadpole and YOY models
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