RFK, Day of Affirmation Speech and Human Rights in America

An examination of Robert Kennedy historic Day of Affirmation speech made forty years ago. Is the role he envisioned for the US to play in international affairs and in advancing the cause of freedom and social justice for all humanity relvant in a post-Iraq abu Gharaib world

Flexible Envelope Request Notation (FERN)

The following topics are presented in view graph form and include the following: scheduling application; the motivation for the Flexible Envelope Request Notation (FERN); characteristics of FERN; types of information needed in requests; where information is stored in requests; FERN structures; generic requests; resource availability for pooled resources; expressive notation; temporal constraints; time formats; changes to FERN; sample FERN requests; the temporal relationship between two steps; maximum activity length to limit step delays; alternative requests; the temporal relationship between two activities; and idle resource usage between steps

Catastrophic overturn of the Earth's mantle driven by multiple phase changes and internal heat generation

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/95636/1/grl6509.pd

A planning language for activity scheduling

Mission planning and scheduling of spacecraft operations are becoming more complex at NASA. Described here are a mission planning process; a robust, flexible planning language for spacecraft and payload operations; and a software scheduling system that generates schedules based on planning language inputs. The mission planning process often involves many people and organizations. Consequently, a planning language is needed to facilitate communication, to provide a standard interface, and to represent flexible requirements. The software scheduling system interprets the planning language and uses the resource, time duration, constraint, and alternative plan flexibilities to resolve scheduling conflicts

Induced compositional layering in a convecting fluid layer by an endothermic phase transition

An endothermic phase change in the presence of chemical heterogeneities can act as an efficient filter, such that heavy material is sequestered below the phase change and light material is trapped above the phase change. Due to the fact that the endothermic phase change damps thermal convection, it can act as a "trap door" for chemical heterogeneities. Ascending flows which are chemically dense will need more thermal buoyancy to rise through the transition than ascending flows whose composition is closer to the background composition. Likewise, descending flows which are chemically light need more thermal buoyancy to sink through the transition. The results of a suite of numerical calculations of two-dimensional, double diffusive convection in a fluid layer with an endothermic phase change suggests that, if the 670 km seismic discontinuity has a steep enough Clapeyron slope, compositional layering may be induced and dynamically maintained by the transition. Furthermore, these calculations also show that the phase change and compositional boundaries will approximately coincide.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/29856/1/0000204.pd

Effects of bracing in adolescents with idiopathic scoliosis

BACKGROUND: The role of bracing in patients with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis who are at risk for curve progression and eventual surgery is controversial. METHODS: We conducted a multicenter study that included patients with typical indications for bracing due to their age, skeletal immaturity, and degree of scoliosis. Both a randomized cohort and a preference cohort were enrolled. Of 242 patients included in the analysis, 116 were randomly assigned to bracing or observation, and 126 chose between bracing and observation. Patients in the bracing group were instructed to wear the brace at least 18 hours per day. The primary outcomes were curve progression to 50 degrees or more (treatment failure) and skeletal maturity without this degree of curve progression (treatment success). RESULTS: The trial was stopped early owing to the efficacy of bracing. In an analysis that included both the randomized and preference cohorts, the rate of treatment success was 72% after bracing, as compared with 48% after observation (propensity-score–adjusted odds ratio for treatment success, 1.93; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.08 to 3.46). In the intention-to-treat analysis, the rate of treatment success was 75% among patients randomly assigned to bracing, as compared with 42% among those randomly assigned to observation (odds ratio, 4.11; 95% CI, 1.85 to 9.16). There was a significant positive association between hours of brace wear and rate of treatment success (P CONCLUSIONS: Bracing significantly decreased the progression of high-risk curves to the threshold for surgery in patients with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis. The benefit increased with longer hours of brace wear. (Funded by the National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases and others; BRAIST ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT00448448opens in new tab.)</p