17,077 research outputs found
Evidence for selective executive function deficits in ecstasy/polydrug users
Previous research has suggested that the separate aspects of executive functioning are differentially affected by ecstasy use. Although the inhibition process appears to be unaffected by ecstasy use, it is unclear whether this is true of heavy users under conditions of high demand. Tasks loading on the updating process have been shown to be adversely affected by ecstasy use. However, it remains unclear whether the deficits observed reflect the executive aspects of the tasks or whether they are domain general in nature affecting both verbal and visuo-spatial updating. Fourteen heavy ecstasy users (mean total lifetime use 1000 tablets), 39 light ecstasy users (mean total lifetime use 150 tablets) and 28 non-users were tested on tasks loading on the inhibition executive process (random letter generation) and the updating component process (letter updating, visuo-spatial updating and computation span). Heavy users were not impaired in random letter generation even under conditions designed to be more demanding. Ecstasy-related deficits were observed on all updating measures and were statistically significant for two of the three measures. Following controls for various aspects of cannabis use, statistically significant ecstasy-related deficits were obtained on all three updating measures. It was concluded that the inhibition process is unaffected by ecstasy use even among heavy users. By way of contrast, the updating process appears to be impaired in ecstasy users with the deficit apparently domain general in nature
Encapsulation process sterilizes and preserves surgical instruments
Ethylene oxide is blended with an organic polymer to form a sterile material for encapsulating surgical instruments. The material does not bond to metal and can be easily removed when the instruments are needed
Process for preparing sterile solid propellants Patent
Using ethylene oxide in preparation of sterilized solid rocket propellants and encapsulating material
Real-time dynamic holographic image storage device
A real-time dynamic holographic image storage device uses four-wave mixing in a pair of photorefractive crystals. An oscillation is produced between the crystals which can be maintained indefinitely after the initial object beam is discontinued. The object beam produces an interference pattern in a first crystal to produce phase-conjugated object beam which is directed towards the second crystal. In the second crystal another interference pattern is created which produces a reconstructed object beam. The reconstructed object beam is directed back towards the first crystal. The interference patterns are produced by interaction of the object and phase-conjugated object beam with a read and write beam in each of the crystals. By manipulation of the ratio of the read and write beam intensities in at least one of the crystals, the phase-conjugate or reconstructed object beam output therefrom can be amplified to maintain stable oscillation between the two crystals
Velocity field distributions due to ideal line vortices
We evaluate numerically the velocity field distributions produced by a
bounded, two-dimensional fluid model consisting of a collection of parallel
ideal line vortices. We sample at many spatial points inside a rigid circular
boundary. We focus on ``nearest neighbor'' contributions that result from
vortices that fall (randomly) very close to the spatial points where the
velocity is being sampled. We confirm that these events lead to a non-Gaussian
high-velocity ``tail'' on an otherwise Gaussian distribution function for the
Eulerian velocity field. We also investigate the behavior of distributions that
do not have equilibrium mean-field probability distributions that are uniform
inside the circle, but instead correspond to both higher and lower mean-field
energies than those associated with the uniform vorticity distribution. We find
substantial differences between these and the uniform case.Comment: 21 pages, 9 figures. To be published in Physical Review E
(http://pre.aps.org/) in May 200
Plasma physics abstracts, 1 January 1966 through 31 December 1967
Bibliography containing 26 references with abstracts on plasma physics research, 1966-196
Alternative statistical-mechanical descriptions of decaying two-dimensional turbulence in terms of "patches" and "points"
Numerical and analytical studies of decaying, two-dimensional (2D)
Navier-Stokes (NS) turbulence at high Reynolds numbers are reported. The effort
is to determine computable distinctions between two different formulations of
maximum entropy predictions for the decayed, late-time state. Both formulations
define an entropy through a somewhat ad hoc discretization of vorticity to the
"particles" of which statistical mechanical methods are employed to define an
entropy, before passing to a mean-field limit. In one case, the particles are
delta-function parallel "line" vortices ("points" in two dimensions), and in
the other, they are finite-area, mutually-exclusive convected "patches" of
vorticity which in the limit of zero area become "points." We use
time-dependent, spectral-method direct numerical simulation of the
Navier-Stokes equations to see if initial conditions which should relax to
different late-time states under the two formulations actually do so.Comment: 21 pages, 24 figures: submitted to "Physics of Fluids
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