Fuse and switch functions combined within a single housing

Fuswitch provides both switch and fuse functions within a single housing. A mercury capillary is used to alternately vaporize and condense the mercury within a reservoir. The housing is impervious to mercury and the fuse portion of the device operates on the principle of the self-healing mercury fuse

Progress in electrochemical storage for battery systems

Efforts to improve electrochemical systems for space use relate to: (1) improvement of conventional systems; (2) development of fuel cells to practical power systems; and (3) a search for new systems that provide gains in energy density but offer comparable life and performance as conventional systems. Improvements in sealed conventional systems resulted in the areas of materials, charge control methods, cell operations and battery control, and specific process controls required during cell manufacture. Fuel-cell systems have been developed for spacecraft but the use of these power plants is limited. For present and planned flights, nickel-cadmium, silver-zinc, and silver-cadmium systems will be used. Improvements in nickel-cadmium batteries have been applied in medical and commercial areas

Stellar Variability in the Globular Cluster Terzan 5

We present the results of a search for variability in and near the core of the metal-rich, obscured globular cluster Terzan 5, using NICMOS on HST. This extreme cluster has approximately solar metallicity and a central density that places it in the upper few percent of all clusters. It is estimated to have the highest interaction rate of any galactic globular cluster. The large extinction towards Terzan 5 and the severe stellar crowding near the cluster center present a substantial observational challenge. Using time series analysis we discovered two variable stars in this cluster. The first is a RRab Lyrae variable with a period of ~0.61 days, a longer period than that of field stars with similar high metallicities. This period is, however, shorter than the average periods of RR Lyraes found in the metal-rich globular clusters NGC 6441, NGC 6388 and 47 Tuc. The second variable is a blue star with a 7-hour period sinusoidal variation and a likely orbital period of 14 hours. This star is probably an eclipsing blue straggler, or (less likely) the infrared counterpart to the low mass X-ray binary known in Terzan 5. Due to the extreme crowding and overlapping Airy profile of the IR PSF, we fall short of our original goal of detecting CVs via Palpha emission and detecting variable infrared emission from the location of the binary MSP in Terzan 5.Comment: 17 pages including 12 figures. Accepted for publication in Ap

Cabozantinib in hepatocellular carcinoma: results of a phase 2 placebo-controlled randomized discontinuation study.

BackgroundCabozantinib, an orally bioavailable inhibitor of tyrosine kinases including MET, AXL, and VEGF receptors, was assessed in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) as part of a phase 2 randomized discontinuation trial with nine tumor-type cohorts.Patients and methodsEligible patients had Child-Pugh A liver function and ≤1 prior systemic anticancer regimen, completed ≥4 weeks before study entry. The cabozantinib starting dose was 100 mg daily. After an initial 12-week cabozantinib treatment period, patients with stable disease (SD) per Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors (RECIST) version 1.0 were randomized to cabozantinib or placebo. The primary endpoint of the lead-in stage was objective response rate (ORR) at week 12, and the primary endpoint of the randomized stage was progression-free survival (PFS).ResultsAmong the 41 HCC patients enrolled, the week 12 ORR was 5%, with 2 patients achieving a confirmed partial response (PR). The week 12 disease control rate (PR or SD) was 66% (Asian subgroup: 73%). Of patients with ≥1 post-baseline scan, 78% had tumor regression, with no apparent relationship to prior sorafenib therapy. Alpha-fetoprotein (AFP) response (>50% reduction from baseline) occurred in 9 of the 26 (35%) patients with elevated baseline AFP and ≥1 post-baseline measurement. Twenty-two patients with SD at week 12 were randomized. Median PFS after randomization was 2.5 months with cabozantinib and 1.4 months with placebo, although this difference was not statistically significant. Median PFS and overall survival from Day 1 in all patients were 5.2 and 11.5 months, respectively. The most common grade 3/4 adverse events, regardless of attribution, were diarrhea (20%), hand-foot syndrome (15%), and thrombocytopenia (15%). Dose reductions were utilized in 59% of patients.ConclusionsCabozantinib has clinical activity in HCC patients, including objective tumor responses, disease stabilization, and reductions in AFP. Adverse events were managed with dose reductions.Trial registration numberNCT00940225

Inflationary models with a flat potential enforced by non-abelian discrete gauge symmetries

Non-abelian discrete gauge symmetries can provide the inflaton with a flat potential even when one takes into account gravitational strength effects. The discreteness of the symmetries also provide special field values where inflation can end via a hybrid type mechanism. An interesting feature of this method is that it can naturally lead to extremely flat potentials and so, in principle, to inflation at unusually low energy scales. Two examples of effective field theories with this mechanism are given, one with a hybrid exit and one with a mutated hybrid exit. They include an explicit example in which the single field consistency condition is violated.Comment: 24 pages, uses revtex.sty, submitted to PRD (Nov. 1999) Final version to appear in PRD. Background information on supergravity expande

Paraphyletic species no more - genomic data resolve a Pleistocene radiation and validate morphological species of the Melanoplus scudderi complex (Insecta: Orthoptera)

Rapid speciation events, with taxa generated over a short time period, are among the most investigated biological phenomena. However, molecular systematics often reveals contradictory results compared with morphological/phenotypical diagnoses of species under scenarios of recent and rapid diversification. In this study, we used molecular data from an average of over 29- 000 loci per sample from RADseq to reconstruct the diversification history and delimit the species boundary in a short- winged grasshopper species complex (Melanoplus scudderi group), where Pleistocene diversification has been hypothesized to generate more than 20 putative species with distinct male genitalic shapes. We found that, based on a maximum likelihood molecular phylogeny, each morphological species indeed forms a monophyletic group, contrary to the result from a previous mitochondrial DNA sequence study. By dating the diversification events, the species complex is estimated to have diversified during the Late Pleistocene, supporting the recent radiation hypothesis. Furthermore, coalescent- based species delimitation analyses provide quantitative support for independent genetic lineages, which corresponds to the morphologically defined species. Our results also showed that male genitalic shape may not be predicted by evolutionary distance among species, not only indicating that this trait is labile, but also implying that selection may play a role in character divergence. Additionally, our findings suggest that the rapid speciation events in this flightless grasshopper complex might be primarily associated with the fragmentation of their grassland habitats during the Late Pleistocene. Collectively, our study highlights the importance of integrating multiple sources of information to delineate species, especially for a species complex that diversified rapidly, and whose divergence may be linked to ecological processes that create geographic isolation (i.e. fragmented habitats), as well as selection acting on characters with direct consequences for reproductive isolation (i.e. genitalic divergence).Genomic data validate morphological species designations in Melanoplus grasshoppers from the southeastern U.S.A.The difference in male genitalic shape, which is evolutionarily labile, can be a good diagnostic character to distinguish species of recent and rapid diversification origin.Fragmentation of grassland habitats in the Late Pleistocene might have facilitated rapid speciation events in the flightless Melanoplus grasshoppers.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/155980/1/syen12415-sup-0001-SupInfo.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/155980/2/syen12415_am.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/155980/3/syen12415.pd

Noncanonical quantum optics

Modification of the right-hand-side of canonical commutation relations (CCR) naturally occurs if one considers a harmonic oscillator with indefinite frequency. Quantization of electromagnetic field by means of such a non-CCR algebra naturally removes the infinite energy of vacuum but still results in a theory which is very similar to quantum electrodynamics. An analysis of perturbation theory shows that the non-canonical theory has an automatically built-in cut-off but requires charge/mass renormalization already at the nonrelativistic level. A simple rule allowing to compare perturbative predictions of canonical and non-canonical theories is given. The notion of a unique vacuum state is replaced by a set of different vacua. Multi-photon states are defined in the standard way but depend on the choice of vacuum. Making a simplified choice of the vacuum state we estimate corrections to atomic lifetimes, probabilities of multiphoton spontaneous and stimulated emission, and the Planck law. The results are practically identical to the standard ones. Two different candidates for a free-field Hamiltonian are compared.Comment: Completely rewritten version of quant-ph/0002003v2. There are overlaps between the papers, but sections on perturbative calculations show the same problem from different sides, therefore quant-ph/0002003v2 is not replace

Rank deficiency of Kalman error covariance matrices in linear time-varying system with deterministic evolution

We prove that for-linear, discrete, time-varying, deterministic system (perfect-model) with noisy outputs, the Riccati transformation in the Kalman filter asymptotically bounds the rank of the forecast and the analysis error covariance matrices to be less than or equal to the number of nonnegative Lyapunov exponents of the system. Further, the support of these error covariance matrices is shown to be confined to the space spanned by the unstable-neutral backward Lyapunov vectors, providing the theoretical justification for the methodology of the algorithms that perform assimilation only in the unstable-neutral subspace. The equivalent property of the autonomous system is investigated as a special case

Disciplining the Sex Ratio:Exploring the Governmentality of Female Feticide in India

The ‘girl child’ has attracted a considerable amount of attention in India as an object of policy addressing gender discrimination. This article examines the field of campaigns seeking to address female foeticide and positions the public discourse on the ‘girl child’ and sex selective abortion in India within a broad cultural backdrop of son preference. The article argues that anti-female foeticide campaigns exist within a disciplinary domain of female foeticide which both generates a discourse of saving the ‘girl child’ and also shows attempts to utilise both incentives and punitive measures in carving out a female foeticide carceral space

Use of MenACWY-CRM vaccine in children aged 2 through 23 months at increased risk for meningococcal disease: recommendations of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, 2013

During its October 2013 meeting, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) recommended use of a third meningococcal conjugate vaccine, MenACWY-CRM (Menveo, Novartis), as an additional option for vaccinating infants aged 2 through 23 months at increased risk for meningococcal disease. MenACWY-CRM is the first quadrivalent meningococcal conjugate vaccine licensed for use in children aged 2 through 8 months. MenACWY-D (Menactra, Sanofi Pasteur) is recommended for use in children aged 9 through 23 months who are at increased risk for meningococcal disease, and Hib-MenCY-TT (MenHibrix, GlaxoSmithKline) is recommended for use in children aged 6 weeks through 18 months at increased risk. This report summarizes information on MenACWY-CRM administration in infants and provides recommendations for vaccine use in infants aged 2 through 23 months who are at increased risk for meningococcal disease. Because the burden of meningococcal disease in infants is low in the United States and the majority of cases that do occur are caused by serogroup B, which is not included in any vaccine licensed in the United States, only those infants who are at increased risk for meningococcal disease are recommended to receive a meningococcal vaccine