Federal Circuit Patent Precedent: An Empirical Study of Institutional Authority and IP Ideology

In this paper, we aim to better understand the institutional authority of the Federal Circuit as a source of law as well as the influence of pro-patent and anti-patent ideological forces at play between the Supreme Court, Federal Circuit, and the district courts. Our specific focus is on the district courts and how they cite Federal Circuit precedent relative to Supreme Court precedent to support their decisions, whether they be pro-patent or anti-patent. Using a variety of citation approaches and statistical tests, we find that federal district courts treat the Federal Circuit as more authoritative (compared to the Supreme Court) on patent law, than they treat the regional circuits (compared to the Supreme Court) on copyright law. Second, the Federal Circuit\u27s precedent tends to be relied on more in pro-patent opinions than in anti-patent opinions. In addition, both of these effects are stronger in how the district courts use the precedent—i.e., how many times precedent is cited—than in what higher court precedent is used

High School Science Instructors Can Help with Elementary Science

Four years ago a number of questions were raised by the staff and administration at Spirit Lake. What is the nature of our science instruction at the elementary level? What capabilities do our staff have? What is needed to improve our elementary science program

A Physio-Chemical Analysis of the Headwaters of the Little Sioux River

The magnitude and seasonal variation of 11 selected physiochemical characteristics at four collection sites in the headwater region of the Little Sioux River are reported for a 12-month period from March 1969 through February 1970. Little variation was found between study sites for given sampling times

What Do I Do Now, Teacher?????

Fifteen years of science fairs has brought me into contact with excitement, danger, success, failure, and freakishness such as never could be known if the spontaneity and creativity of youth had not been challenged. The writer is not sure whether science fairs are necessary or not. Sometimes, after they are over, the justification for another is like hitting yourself on the head with a hammer because it feels so good when you stop. Let\u27s go back, readers, to some things in the past

This is What I Am!!

Getting to know science teachers about the state is somewhat of a problem for the teacher in smaller Iowa high schools. I suspect that this is a problem of communication rather than one of design by those of us in the less urban areas. When it was suggested that the Iowa Science Teachers\u27 Journal be an avenue for establishing contact I was at first reticent about telling of myself

The Secondary Science Teacher as an Elementary Science Consultant

Helping the elementary science program grow in the environment m which we find it in our Iowa schools should be the aim of every high school science teacher in our state

Feasibility study for a numerical aerodynamic simulation facility. Volume 1

A Numerical Aerodynamic Simulation Facility (NASF) was designed for the simulation of fluid flow around three-dimensional bodies, both in wind tunnel environments and in free space. The application of numerical simulation to this field of endeavor promised to yield economies in aerodynamic and aircraft body designs. A model for a NASF/FMP (Flow Model Processor) ensemble using a possible approach to meeting NASF goals is presented. The computer hardware and software are presented, along with the entire design and performance analysis and evaluation

Optimal jet radius in kinematic dijet reconstruction

Obtaining a good momentum reconstruction of a jet is a compromise between taking it large enough to catch the perturbative final-state radiation and small enough to avoid too much contamination from the underlying event and initial-state radiation. In this paper, we compute analytically the optimal jet radius for dijet reconstructions and study its scale dependence. We also compare our results with previous Monte-Carlo studies.Comment: 30 pages, 11 figures; minor corrections; published in JHE

Rhythm in the speech of a person with right hemisphere damage: Applying the pairwise variability index

Although several aspects of prosody have been studied in speakers with right hemisphere damage (RHD), rhythm remains largely uninvestigated. This study compares the rhythm of an Australian English speaker with right hemisphere damage (due to a stroke, but with no concomitant dysarthria) to that of a neurologically unimpaired individual. The speakers' rhythm is compared using the pairwise variability index (PVI) which allows for an acoustic characterization of rhythm by comparing the duration of successive vocalic and intervocalic intervals. A sample of speech from a structured interview between a speech and language therapist and each participant was analysed. Previous research has shown that speakers with RHD may have difficulties with intonation production, and therefore it was hypothesized that there may also be rhythmic disturbance. Results show that the neurologically normal control uses a similar rhythm to that reported for British English (there are no previous studies available for Australian English), whilst the speaker with RHD produces speech with a less strongly stress-timed rhythm. This finding was statistically significant for the intervocalic intervals measured (t(8) = 4.7, p < .01), and suggests that some aspects of prosody may be right lateralized for this speaker. The findings are discussed in relation to previous findings of dysprosody in RHD populations, and in relation to syllable-timed speech of people with other neurological conditions