Statistics Norway from cell offices to open landscape. A survey from Department of Administration

The Statistics Norway (SN) office relocation survey was conducted from February 4th to 15th, 2013 and covered all administration department employees who regularly work in Oslo. The survey aimed at investigating employees’ satisfaction with the current physical environment of the office and their preferences to open and cell offices. The total number of respondents was 62 of which 42 returned the questionnaires. The survey shows that a majority of the administration staff were satisfied with the current physical environment of the office and their preference is towards cell office design. Key findings include: Almost half of the respondents travel between 30 and 59 minutes to reach the office from where they stay 65 percent of the respondents arrive at office before 08:30 am to have enough concentration, to get off early from work and to avoid traffic during normal hours 95 percent of the respondents agreed that they can communicate effectively in the current offices 75 percent of the respondents do not consider their job to be rather unpleasant More females believe that open offices encourages communication 27 percent of the respondents agreed that closed offices limit knowledge sharing and 24 percent were not sure 87 percent of the respondents preferred cell office to other types of office design 61 percent of the respondents do not know the type of office they will occupy after relocation 51 percent of the respondents were neutral on their satisfaction with the role of the trade unions in the preparation of office relocation 39 percent of the respondents disagreed that they are looking forward to working in the new offices 42 percent were not looking forward to working at the new location 58 percent of the respondents were aged 50 and above More than 60 percent of the respondents have been working at SN for 10 or more year

A comparison of full-spectrum and complex-symbol combining techniques for the Galileo S-band mission

Full-spectrum combining (FSC) and complex-symbol combining (CSC) are two antenna-arraying techniques being considered for the Galileo spacecraft's upcoming encounter with Jupiter. This article describes the performance of these techniques in terms of symbol signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) degradation and symbol SNR loss. It is shown that both degradation and loss are approximately equal at low values of symbol SNR but diverge at high SNR values. For the Galileo S-band (2.2 to 2.3 GHz) mission, degradation provides a good estimate of performance as the symbol SNR is typically below -5 dB. For the following arrays - two 70-m antennas, one 70-m and one 34-m antenna, one 70-m and two 34-m antennas, and one 70-m and three 34-m antennas - it is shown that FSC has less degradation than CSC when the subcarrier and symbol window-loop bandwidth products are above 3.0, 10.0, 8.5, and 8.2 mHz at the symbol rate of 200 sym/sec, and above 1.2, 4.5, 4.0, and 3.5 mHz at a symbol rate of 400 sym/sec, respectively. Moreover, for an array of four 34-m antennas, FSC has less degradation than CSC when the subcarrier and symbol window-loop bandwidth products are above 0.32 mHz at the symbol rate of 50 sym/sec and above 0.8 mHz at the symbol rate of 25 sym/sec

Health financing at district level in Malawi: an analysis of the distribution of funds at two points in time.

There is growing attention to tracking country level resource flows to health, but limited evidence on the sub-national allocation of funds. We examined district health financing in Malawi in 2006 and 2011, and equity in the allocation of funding, together with the association between financing and under five and neonatal mortality. We explored the process for receiving and allocating different funding sources at district level. We obtained domestic and external financing data from the Integrated Financial Management Information System (2006-11) and AidData (2000-12) databases. Out-of-pocket payment data came from two rounds of integrated household budget surveys (2005; 2010). Mortality data came from the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (2006) and Demographic and Health Survey (2010). We described district level health funding by source, ran correlations between funding and outcomes and generated concentration curves and indices. 41 semi-structured interviews were conducted at the national level and in 10 districts with finance and health managers. Per capita spending from all sources varied substantially across districts and doubled between 2006 and 2011 from 7181 Kwacha to 15 312 Kwacha. In 2011, external funding accounted for 74% of funds, with domestic funding accounting for 19% of expenditure, and out of pocket (OOP) funding accounting for 7%. All funding sources were concentrated among wealthier districts, with OOP being the most pro-rich, followed by domestic expenditure and external funding. Districts with higher levels of domestic and external funding had lower levels of post-neonatal mortality, and those with higher levels of out-of-pocket payments had higher levels of 1-59 month mortality in 2006. There was no association between changes in financing and outcomes. Districts reported delayed receipt of lower-than-budgeted funds, forcing them to scale-down activities and rely on external funding. Governments need to track how resources are allocated sub-nationally to maximize equity and ensure allocations are commensurate to health need

Residual and suppressed-carrier arraying techniques for deep-space communications

Three techniques that use carrier information from multiple antennas to enhance carrier acquisition and tracking are presented. These techniques in combination with baseband combining are analyzed and simulated for residual and suppressed-carrier modulation. It is shown that the carrier arraying using a single carrier loop technique can acquire and track the carrier even when any single antenna in the array cannot do so by itself. The carrier aiding and carrier arraying using multiple carrier loop techniques, on the other hand, are shown to lock on the carrier only when one of the array elements has sufficient margin to acquire the carrier on its own

A search for rapidly pulsating hot subdwarf stars in the GALEX survey

NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) provided near- and far-UV observations for approximately 77 percent of the sky over a ten-year period; however, the data reduction pipeline initially only released single NUV and FUV images to the community. The recently released Python module gPhoton changes this, allowing calibrated time-series aperture photometry to be extracted easily from the raw GALEX data set. Here we use gPhoton to generate light curves for all hot subdwarf B (sdB) stars that were observed by GALEX, with the intention of identifying short-period, p-mode pulsations. We find that the spacecraft's short visit durations, uneven gaps between visits, and dither pattern make the detection of hot subdwarf pulsations difficult. Nonetheless, we detect UV variations in four previously known pulsating targets and report their UV pulsation amplitudes and frequencies. Additionally, we find that several other sdB targets not previously known to vary show promising signals in their periodograms. Using optical follow-up photometry with the Skynet Robotic Telescope Network, we confirm p-mode pulsations in one of these targets, LAMOST J082517.99+113106.3, and report it as the most recent addition to the sdBVr class of variable stars.Comment: 11 Pages, 8 Figures, Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journa

Ram pressure stripping of the cool core of the Ophiuchus Cluster

(abridged) We report results from a Chandra study of the central regions of the nearby, X-ray bright, Ophiuchus Cluster (z = 0.03), the second-brightest cluster in the sky. Our study reveals a dramatic, close-up view of the stripping and potential destruction of a cool core within a rich cluster. The X-ray emission from the Ophiuchus Cluster core exhibits a comet-like morphology extending to the north, driven by merging activity, indicative of ram-pressure stripping caused by rapid motion through the ambient cluster gas. A cold front at the southern edge implies a velocity of 1000$\pm$200 km/s (M~0.6). The X-ray emission from the cluster core is sharply peaked. As previously noted, the peak is offset by 4 arcsec (~2 kpc) from the optical center of the associated cD galaxy, indicating that ram pressure has slowed the core, allowing the relatively collisionless stars and dark matter to carry on ahead. The cluster exhibits the strongest central temperature gradient of any massive cluster observed to date: the temperature rises from 0.7 keV within 1 kpc of the brightness peak, to 10 keV by 30 kpc. A strong metallicity gradient is also observed within the same region. This supports a picture in which the outer parts of the cool core have been stripped by ram-pressure due to its rapid motion. The cooling time of the innermost gas is very short, ~5$\times10^7$ yrs. Within the central 10 kpc radius, multiple small-scale fronts and a complex thermodynamic structure are observed, indicating significant motions. Beyond the central 50 kpc, and out to a radius ~150 kpc, the cluster appears relatively isothermal and has near constant metallicity. The exception is a large, coherent ridge of enhanced metallicity observed to trail the cool core, and which is likely to have been stripped from it.Comment: Accepted to MNRAS. 11 pages, 9 figure

GDR Feeding of the Highly-Deformed Band in 42Ca

The gamma-ray spectra from the decay of the GDR in the compound nucleus reaction 18O+28Si at bombarding energy of 105 MeV have been measured in an experiment using the EUROBALL IV and HECTOR arrays. The obtained experimental GDR strength function is highly fragmented, with a low energy (10 MeV) component, indicating a presence of a large deformation and Coriolis effects. In addition, the preferential feeding of the highly-deformed band in 42Ca by this GDR low energy component is observed.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures, Proceedings of the Zakopane2004 Symposium, to be published in Acta Phys. Pol. B36 (2005

Feedback under the microscope II: heating, gas uplift, and mixing in the nearest cluster core

Using a combination of deep 574ks Chandra data, XMM-Newton high-resolution spectra, and optical Halpha+NII images, we study the nature and spatial distribution of the multiphase plasma in M87. Our results provide direct observational evidence of `radio mode' AGN feedback in action, stripping the central galaxy of its lowest entropy gas and preventing star-formation. This low entropy gas was entrained with and uplifted by the buoyantly rising relativistic plasma, forming long "arms". These arms are likely oriented within 15-30 degrees of our line-of-sight. The mass of the uplifted gas in the arms is comparable to the gas mass in the approximately spherically symmetric 3.8 kpc core, demonstrating that the AGN has a profound effect on its immediate surroundings. The coolest X-ray emitting gas in M87 has a temperature of ~0.5 keV and is spatially coincident with Halpha+NII nebulae, forming a multiphase medium where the cooler gas phases are arranged in magnetized filaments. We place strong upper limits of 0.06 Msun/yr on the amount of plasma cooling radiatively from 0.5 keV and show that a uniform, volume-averaged heating mechanism could not be preventing the cool gas from further cooling. All of the bright Halpha filaments appear in the downstream region of the <3 Myr old shock front, at smaller radii than ~0.6'. We suggest that shocks induce shearing around the filaments, thereby promoting mixing of the cold gas with the ambient hot ICM via instabilities. By bringing hot thermal particles into contact with the cool, line-emitting gas, mixing can supply the power and ionizing particles needed to explain the observed optical spectra. Mixing of the coolest X-ray emitting plasma with the cold optical line emitting filamentary gas promotes efficient conduction between the two phases, allowing non-radiative cooling which could explain the lack of X-ray gas with temperatures under 0.5 keV.Comment: to appear in MNRA