Energy transfer in volume-reflecting heat shields

An approximate analytic solution is provided for the unsteady radiative heating of a highly scattering medium under constant heat flux boundary conditions. The accuracy of the method in representing the reflectance, radiative flux, and radiative flux divergence of the materials was also explored, as was the influence of anistropic scattering on these parameters

Heat shield Patent

Compact heat shielding for interplanetary space vehicle

Radiative transfer in highly scattering materials - numerical solution and evaluation of approximate analytic solutions

Numerical solutions for radiative transport in a class of anisotropically scattering materials are presented. Conditions for convergence and divergence of the iterative method are given and supported by computed results. The relation of two flux theories to the equation of radiative transfer for isotropic scattering is discussed. The adequacy of the two flux approach for the reflectance, radiative flux and radiative flux divergence of highly scattering media is evaluated with respect to solutions of the radiative transfer equation

Description and validation of a novel real-time RT-PCR enterovirus assay

Journal ArticleEnteroviruses are a leading cause of aseptic meningitis in adult and pediatric populations. We describe the development of a real-time RT-PCR assay that amplifies a small target in the 5' nontranslated region upstream of the classical Rotbart enterovirus amplicon. The assay includes an RNA internal control and incorporates modified nucleotide chemistry

The Stagnation-point Boundary Layer with Suction and Injection in Equilibrium Dissociating Air

Stagnation point boundary layer with suction and injection in equilibrium dissociating ai

Hope for resurrecting a functionally extinct parrot or squandered social capital? Landholder attitudes towards the Orange-bellied Parrot (Neophema chrysogaster) in Victoria, Australia

In early 2010, after 27 years of recovery effort, the orange-bellied parrot (OBP; Neophema chrysogaster) was expected to be extinct in the wild within a few years. Shortly before the imminent wild extinction became evident, we surveyed landholders (114 responses of 783 surveys delivered) in part of the main non-breeding area, according to three classes of modelled habitat suitability (\u27high\u27, \u27medium\u27, and \u27low\u27). Predictions of the habitat models appear to correlate with landholder perceptions of the presence of OBP habitat on private land, thus the models appear a tractable way to identify key stakeholders worthy of priority consultation in relation to habitat works. Landholders were sympathetic to wetlands and birds, including OBPs (89.4% were aware of OBPs). Most indicated that they would be upset if the OBP went extinct and agreed that critical habitat should be protected; 80.7% were prepared to consider changes to the way they managed their land to benefit the species, and sought more information on how they could do so (64.0%). This study suggests that the habitat model usefully identified key stakeholders and the OBP enjoyed high awareness, concern, and engagement among many stakeholders, shortly before the species was considered functionally extinct. The maintenance of landholder support is likely to be critical if future attempts are made to reintroduce the species to the wild

Neutralizing monoclonal antibodies define two different functional sites in human interleukin-4

Human interleukin-4 (IL-4) is a small four-helix-bundle protein which is essential for organizing defense reactions against macroparasites, in particular helminths. Human IL-4 also appears to exert a pathophysiological role during various IgE-mediated allergic diseases. Seven different monoclonal antibodies neutralizing the activity of human IL-4 were studied in order to identify functionally important epitopes. A collection of 41 purified IL-4 variants was used to analyse how defined amino acid replacements affect binding affinity for each individual mAb. Specific amino acid positions could be assigned to four different epitopes. mAbs recognizing epitopes on helix A and/or C interfered with IL-4 receptor binding and thus inhibited IL-4 function. However, other mAbs also inhibiting IL-4 function recognized an epitope on helix D of IL-4 and did not inhibit IL-4 binding to the receptor protein. One mAb, recognizing N-terminal and C-terminal residues, partially competed for binding to the receptor. The results of these mAb epitope analyses confirm and extend previous data on the functional consequences of the amino acid replacements which showed that amino acid residues in helices A and C of IL-4 provide a binding site for the cloned IL-4 receptor and that a signalling site in helix D interacts with a further receptor protein

Mental health of staff working in intensive care during COVID-19

BACKGROUND: Staff working in intensive care units (ICUs) have faced significant challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic which have the potential to adversely affect their mental health. AIMS: To identify the rates of probable mental health disorder in staff working in ICUs in nine English hospitals during June and July 2020. METHODS: An anonymized brief web-based survey comprising standardized questionnaires examining depression, anxiety symptoms, symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), well-being and alcohol use was administered to staff. RESULTS: Seven hundred and nine participants completed the surveys comprising 291 (41%) doctors, 344 (49%) nurses and 74 (10%) other healthcare staff. Over half (59%) reported good well-being; however, 45% met the threshold for probable clinical significance on at least one of the following measures: severe depression (6%), PTSD (40%), severe anxiety (11%) or problem drinking (7%). Thirteen per cent of respondents reported frequent thoughts of being better off dead, or of hurting themselves in the past 2 weeks. Within the sample used in this study, we found that doctors reported better mental health than nurses across a range of measures. CONCLUSIONS: We found substantial rates of probable mental health disorders, and thoughts of self-harm, amongst ICU staff; these difficulties were especially prevalent in nurses. Whilst further work is needed to better understand the real level of clinical need amongst ICU staff, these results indicate the need for a national strategy to protect the mental health, and decrease the risk of functional impairment, of ICU staff whilst they carry out their essential work during COVID-19

Overview of the Langley subsonic research effort on SCR configuration

Recent advances achieved in the subsonic aerodynamics of low aspect ratio, highly swept wing designs are summarized. The most significant of these advances was the development of leading edge deflection concepts which effectively reduce leading edge flow separation. The improved flow attachment results in substantial improvements in low speed performance, significant delay of longitudinal pitch up, increased trailing edge flap effectiveness, and increased lateral control capability. Various additional theoretical and/or experimental studies are considered which, in conjunction with the leading edge deflection studies, form the basis for future subsonic research effort

The Stable Entropy Hypothesis and Entropy-Aware Decoding: An Analysis and Algorithm for Robust Natural Language Generation

State-of-the-art language generation models can degenerate when applied to open-ended generation problems such as text completion, story generation, or dialog modeling. This degeneration usually shows up in the form of incoherence, lack of vocabulary diversity, and self-repetition or copying from the context. In this paper, we postulate that ``human-like'' generations usually lie in a narrow and nearly flat entropy band, and violation of these entropy bounds correlates with degenerate behavior. Our experiments show that this stable narrow entropy zone exists across models, tasks, and domains and confirm the hypothesis that violations of this zone correlate with degeneration. We then use this insight to propose an entropy-aware decoding algorithm that respects these entropy bounds resulting in less degenerate, more contextual, and "human-like" language generation in open-ended text generation settings