Phototube tests in the MiniBooNE experiment

The MiniBooNE neutrino oscillation experiment at Fermilab uses 1520 8-inch PMTs: 1197 PMTs are Hamamatsu model R1408 and the rest are model R5912. All of the PMTs were tested to qualify for inclusion in the detector, sorted according to their charge and time resolutions and dark rates. Seven PMTs underwent additional low light level tests. The relative detection efficiency as a function of incident angle for seven additional PMTs was measured. Procedures and results are presented.Comment: 4 pages, 7 figures. Presented at Beaune 2005: 4th International Conference on New Developments in Photodetection, Beaune, France, 19-24 June 200

Ofcom should count the Greens as a major party

Ofcom’s consultation on their draft list of ‘major parties’ for the 2015 election contained one particularly controversial omission: the Green Party of England and Wales (including the Scottish Green Party for the purposes of the consultation). In this post, Andrew Fleming examines Ofcom’s application of their own criteria in making this decision, and then considers some other factors overlooked in Ofcom’s analysis

Cape Town suburb highlights the good and bad of gentrification

LSE alumnus, Andrew Fleming is a Senior Researcher at the Cape Town Partnership in South Africa. In this post, he recounts how gentrification is changing the face of one of Cape Town’s oldest suburbs

The Last of the Great Auks: Oral History and Ritual Killings at St Kilda

The story of the killing of the ‘last’ great auk (Pinguinus impennis) in Britain, apparently put to death as a witch at Stac an Armin in the St Kilda archipelago c. 1840, is well known. However, other accounts claim that an auk was killed on the main island, Hirta, having been condemned to death by the celebrated men’s ‘parliament’. The historical veracity of three differing stories, which recount discreditable deeds in a deeply Christian community, is evaluated; it seems that fewest difficulties are raised if two great auks were killed, one on Hirta and the other on Stac an Armin. It is argued that this kind of avicide was a ‘ritual’ killing, to be understood in its historical context. The auk-killing probably took place in the mid to late 1840s, after the St Kilda minister had departed in the wake of the Disruption of 1843 - a particularly unsettling time within this small island community. A possible sighting of a pair of great auks on Soay (St Kilda) in 1890 is also briefly discussed

Military Influence on Middle Eastern Democratization Following the Arab Spring

Despite experiencing countless wars, sectarian extremism, imperialism, and authoritarian rule, very few events have impacted the Middle East more significantly than the Arab Spring. Starting in 2010, the Arab Spring marked a turning point in which the people of numerous Arabic states collectively gathered to protest and combat the oppressive regimes that had controlled the region for decades. The Spring was indicative of the strong, recurring ambitions for revolution and regime change across the Middle East, presenting the Arab nations with an opportunity to reform their states from within. For some Middle Eastern states, the Arab Spring served as a catalyst for revolutions that overthrew authoritarian regimes and replaced them with governments that valued individual freedoms and sovereignty. Other states, however, chose not to pursue democratic goals after the Spring, often creating worse conditions than before. Although the Arab Spring was started with intentions of freeing the people of the Middle East from the regimes they existed under, the revolution simply failed within certain states. In this paper, a formal analysis will be conducted of two Middle Eastern states that felt entirely different effects from the Arab Spring: Egypt and Tunisia. From this analysis, a proposal will be formulated regarding how military status influenced Tunisia’s maintenance of a functional democracy, while Egypt fell victim to a coup and subsequent authoritarian rule following the Arab Spring

Freedom from Equality: Democratic Education and the Failure of the NCLB

Deeply rooted societal concerns about what role democratic ideals should play within systems of education, and how much sway the federal government should hold over educational institutions, have been at the forefront of American educational policy for decades. These questions have more recently been brought into the limelight once again within the context of the implementation of charter schools and the controversial No Child Left Behind act, and its subsequent failure. The expressed goal of this paper is to provide an examination of what philosophies and ideals of so-called democratic education are have played major roles in developing the discourse surrounding, and the implementation of, US federal policy in K-12 education. Through a brief survey of the philosophical writings which have largely informed US policy, an analysis of these writings within the context of the rise of American charter schools and the NCLB, and a reflection on the common problems that such philosophies are fraught with, this paper seeks to provide some hope for transforming future models of American education for the better. Specifically, this study aims at forging a more nuanced understanding of the underlining beliefs that have driven recent educational legislation, and how democratic education has further marginalized low-income and traditionally underrepresented students

Older Men Working it Out A strong face of ageing and disability

This hermeneutical study interprets and describes the phenomena of ageing and living with disability. The lived experiences of 14 older men and the horizon of this researcher developed an understanding of what it is like for men to grow old and, for some, to live with the effects of a major disability. The study is grounded in the philosophical hermeneutics of Gadamer and framed in the context of embodiment, masculinity, and narrative. I conducted multiple in-depth interviews with older men aged from 67 to 83 years of age. Seven of the participants had experienced a stroke and I was able to explore the phenomenon of disability with them. Through thematic and narrative analyses of the textual data interpretations were developed that identified common meanings and understandings of the phenomena of ageing and disability. These themes and narratives reveal that the men's understandings are at odds with conventional negative views of ageing and disability. These older men are 'alive and kicking', they voice counternarratives to the dominant construction of ageing as decline and weakness, and have succeeded in remaking the lifeworld after stroke. Overall I have come to understand an overarching meaning of older men 'working it out' as illustrative of a strong face of ageing and disability. Older men seek out opportunities to participate actively in community life and, despite the challenges of ageing and disability, lead significant and meaningful lives. These findings challenge and extend our limited understandings of men's experiences of ageing and living with disability. This interpretation offers gendered directions for policy development, clinical practice, and future research

Aircraft Thermal Management using Loop Heat Pipes

The objective of this thesis was to determine the feasibility of using loop heat pipes to dissipate waste heat from power electronics to the skin of a fighter aircraft and examine the performance characteristics of a titanium-water loop heat pipe under stationary and elevated acceleration fields. In the past, it has been found that the boundary condition at the condenser can be a controlling factor in the overall performance of this type of thermal management scheme. Therefore, the heat transfer removed from the aircraft skin has been determined by modeling the wing as a flat plate at zero-incidence as a function of the following parameters: airspeed: 0.8 ≤ Ma∞ ≤ 1.4; altitude: 0 ≤ H ≤ 22 km; wall temperature: 105 ≤ Tw ≤ 135°C. In addition, the effects of the variable properties of air have been taken into account. Heat transfer due to thermal radiation has been neglected in this analysis due to the low skin temperatures and high airspeeds up to Ma∞ = 1.4. It was observed that flight speed and altitude have a significant effect on the heat transfer abilities from the skin to ambient, with heat rejection becoming more difficult with increasing Mach number or decreasing altitude. An experiment has been developed to examine operating characteristics of a titanium-water loop heat pipe (LHP) under stationary and elevated acceleration fields. The LHP was mounted on a 2.44 m diameter centrifuge table on edge with heat applied to the evaporator via a mica heater and heat rejected using a high-temperature polyalphaolefin coolant loop. The LHP was tested under the following parametric ranges: heat load at the evaporator: 100 ≤ Qin ≤ 600 W; heat load at the compensation chamber: 0 ≤ Qcc ≤ 50 W; radial acceleration: 0 ≤ ar ≤ 10 g. For stationary operation (az = 1.0 g, ar = 0 g), the LHP evaporative heat transfer coefficient decreased monotonically, thermal resistance decreased to a minimum then increased, and wall superheat increased monotonically. Heat input to the compensation chamber was found to increase the evaporative heat transfer coefficient and decrease thermal resistance for Qin = 500 W. Flow reversal in the LHP was found for some cases, which was likely due to vapor bubble formation in the primary wick. Operating the LHP in an elevated acceleration environment (az = 1.0 g, ar \u3e 0 g) revealed dry-out conditions from Qin = 100 to 400 W and varying accelerations and the ability for the LHP to reprime after an acceleration event that induced dry-out. Evaporative heat transfer coefficient and thermal resistance was found not to be significantly dependent on radial acceleration. However, wall superheat was found to increase slightly with radial acceleration

Positive Psychology Three Good Things in Life and Measuring Happiness, Positive and Negative Affectivity, Optimism/Hope, and Well-Being

Positive psychology is the study of human strength, resilience, and optimal human functioning. The goal of positive psychology is to make people happier by understanding and building positive emotion, gratification and meaning. The constructs of happiness, hope, optimism, well-being, resilience and flow are examined in how they relate to positive psychology. The three good things in life exercise was implemented with participants and participants completed pre and posttest measurements on happiness, positive and negative affect, hope/optimism, and well-being. The three good things in life exercise consisted of having participants journal each night for one-week three things that went well that day and why. The results suggest that the three good things in life exercise may increase happiness and optimism/hope. Results also showed that the satisfaction with life scale scores remained the same, a decrease in positive affect scores, and increased negative affect scores. Overall, the changes in the mean scores were small. Implications for the results and further study are elaborated on. The positive psychology field can benefit from further study to examine where its developments can be implemented successfully and where it can be further enriched