Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

'Kinetic Sculptures': A Centerpiece Project Integrated With Mathematics And Physics, Yevgeniya Zastavker, Jill Crisman, Mark Jeunnette, Burt Tilley

Yevgeniya V. Zastavker

An integrated set of courses, or Integrated Course Block (ICB), developed for incoming first-year students at the Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering, is presented. Bound by a common theme of `Kinetic Sculptures', the individual courses in this ICB are mathematics (single variable calculus and ordinary differential equations), physics (kinetics and dynamics of linear and rotational motion, thermodynamics and fluids), and an open-ended engineering project. The project part of the ICB allows students to explore the motion through the design of kinetic (moving) sculptures while utilizing the mathematics and physics concepts learned in the accompanying courses. This paper considers the …

Manufacturing On The Move? Beyond The High Dollar In The Debate About Making Things In Australia - The Case Of The Australian Surfboard Industry - Ausccer Discussion Paper No. 2012/2, Andrew Warren, Chris Gibson

Chris Gibson

In October 2011 surfboard manufacturer BASE abruptly closed its factory on the Gold Coast resulting in the direct loss of 50 jobs. A few days later, nearby D’Arcy Surfboards also announced it was shedding workers and downsizing from a state-of-the art purpose built factory into a backyard workshop. Each business exported surfboards internationally and employed some of Australia’s best known surfboard-makers. The troubles facing these workshops added to those brewing at the very same in Australia’s steel, aluminium, automotive and garment industries. With renewed public debate and media commentary on the future of manufacturing, we now face a crisis in …

Analytical Upstream Collocation Solution Of A Quadratically Forced Steady-State Convection-Diffusion Equation, Stephen Brill, Eric Smith

Stephen H. Brill

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present the analytical solution to the Hermite collocation discretization of a quadratically forced steady-state convection-diffusion equation in one spatial dimension with constant coefficients, defined on a uniform mesh, with Dirichlet boundary conditions. To improve the accuracy of the method “upstream weighting” of the convective term is used in an optimal way. The authors also provide a method to determine where the forcing function should be optimally sampled. Computational examples are given, which support and illustrate the theory of the optimal sampling of the convective and forcing term. Design/methodology/approach – The authors: …

Modeling The Spread Of Fault In Majority-Based Network Systems: Dynamic Monopolies In Triangular Grids, Sarah Spence Adams, Paul Booth, Denise Troxell, Luke Zinnen

Sarah Spence Adams

In a graph theoretical model of the spread of fault in distributed computing and communication networks, each element in the network is represented by a vertex of a graph where edges connect pairs of communicating elements, and each colored vertex corresponds to a faulty element at discrete time periods. Majority-based systems have been used to model the spread of fault to a certain vertex by checking for faults within a majority of its neighbors. Our focus is on irreversible majority processes wherein a vertex becomes permanently colored in a certain time period if at least half of its neighbors were …

Open Access To Stm Information: Trends, Models, And Strategies For Libraries (Review), Steven Van Tuyl

Steven I Van Tuyl

No abstract provided.

Statistical Methods Used In Gifted Education Journals, 2006-2010, Russell Warne, Maria Lazo, Tami Ramos, Nicola Ritter

Russell T Warne

This article describes the statistical methods used in quantitative and mixed methods articles between 2006 and 2010 in five gifted education research journals. Results indicate that the most commonly used statistical methods are means (85.9% of articles), standard deviations (77.8%), Pearson’s r (47.8%), χ2 (32.2%), ANOVA (30.7%), t tests (30.0%), and MANOVA (23.0%). Approximately half (53.3%) of the articles included reliability reports for the data at hand; Cronbach’s alpha was the most commonly reported measure of reliability (41.5%). Some discussions of best statistical practice and implications for the field of gifted education are included.

When Will America, World Make Sustainability A Priority?, John Dernbach

John C. Dernbach

No abstract provided.

Radiation Dose Distributions In Three Dimensions From Tomographic Optical Density Scanning Of Polymer Gels: Ii. Optical Properties Of The Bang Polymer Gel, Yevgeniya Zastavker, Marek Maryanski, John Gore

Yevgeniya V. Zastavker

A newly developed method of radiation dosimetry makes use of the optical properties of polymer gels. The dose-response mechanism relies on the production of light-scattering polymer micro-particles in the gel at each site of radiation absorption. The scattering produces an attenuation of transmitted light intensity that is directly related to the dose and independent of dose rate. For the BANG polymer gel (bis, acrylamide, nitrogen, and gelatin) the shape of the dose-response curve depends on the fraction of the cross-linking monomer in the initial mixture and on the wavelength of light. At 500 nm the attenuation coefficient (μ) increases by …

Dynamical Signature Of The Mott-Hubbard Transition In Ni(S,Se)(2), Yevgeniya Zastavker, Anke Husmann, Deborah Jin, Thomas Rosenbaum, X Yao, J Honig

Yevgeniya V. Zastavker

The transition metal chalcogenide Ni(S,Se)2 is one of the few highly correlated, Mott-Hubbard systems without a strong first-order structural distortion that normally cuts off the critical behavior at the metal-insulator transition. The zero-temperature (T) transition was tuned with pressure, and significant deviations were found near the quantum critical point from the usual T1/2 behavior of the conductivity characteristic of electron-electron interactions in the presence of disorder. The transport data for pressure and temperature below 1 kelvin could be collapsed onto a universal scaling curve.

Arctic To Outback: Indigenous Rights, Conservation And Tourism, Michael Adams

Michael Adams

Internationally, there has been significant growth in conservation landscapes as a land tenure, since the specific creation of the concept of a “national park” at Yellowstone, USA, in 1872. “Protected areas”, as an umbrella designation for national parks, nature reserves and other forms of conservation landscape, now occupy nearly 13% of the world’s terrestrial area (Chape, Spalding and Jenkins 2008). The early North American, Australian and many other national park systems, while focusing on conservation, explicitly embraced tourism (Boyd and Butler, 2000). However, in the decades since World War II, recreational use of national parks has increased enormously, creating entire …

First Nations And The Politics Of Indigeneity: Australian Perspectives On Indigenous Peoples, Resource Management And Global Rights, R. Lawrence, Michael Adams

Michael Adams

No abstract provided.

Bushfire And Everyday Life: Examining The Awareness-Action 'Gap' In Changing Rural Landscapes, Christine Eriksen, Nicholas Gill

Christine Eriksen

In this paper we use the notion of 'everyday life' to critically examine an apparent 'gap' between bushfire risk awareness and preparedness amongst diverse landholders in rural landscapes affected by amenity-led in-migration in southeast Australia. Landholders were found to bring their own agency to bushfire preparedness in the relationships between everyday procedures, dilemmas, and tradeoffs. Consequently, regardless of landholders' awareness levels, attitudes towards bushfire and natural resource management influence if, how, and to what extent landowners prepare for bushfires. We argue that not only is the 'gap' complex but also paradoxical in that it is both evident in, and constituted …

Indigenous Environmental Knowledge, Christine Eriksen, Michael Adams

Christine Eriksen

No abstract provided.

Water Places: Cultural, Social And More-Than-Human Geographies Of Nature, Leah Gibbs

Leah Maree Gibbs

Cultural, social and more-than-human approaches to nature research are largely held apart in the discipline of human geography. In this paper I argue that these three approaches can be brought together to good effect. The paper presents a situated account of 'water places' in inland Australia-namely the artesian bores, boredrains and boredrain wetlands of the Birdsville Track-in order to demonstrate that together, these three approaches can reveal the complex interactions that form particular places, and comprise a more-than-human world. This account explores the layers of interaction that have formed these water places, including their insertion into the landscape through drilling, …

Learning From The South: Common Challenges And Solutions For Small-Scale Farming, L C Stringer, C Twyman, Leah Gibbs

Leah Maree Gibbs

Small-scale farmers all over the world face a number of common biophysical and socio-economic challenges. In this paper we draw on data from a workshop held in the UK in 2005, to assess whether experiences in addressing these challenges, as gained in the global South, may be used to inform solutions to similar challenges in the UK. In doing so, we contribute to a growing body of literature that seeks to challenge predominantly North-South flows of knowledge and resources. We first identify specific common challenges faced by small-scale farmers in the global North and South. We then compare the different …

Book Review: "Resurrecting The Granary Of Rome: Environmental History And French Colonial Expansion In North Africa" By Diana K. Davis, Leah Gibbs

Leah Maree Gibbs

In this rigorously researched book, Davis argues that French colonisation of the Maghreb (the three North African countries of Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia) was motivated and rationalised by a ‘declensionist environmental narrative’; a narrative that attributed environmental decline to the land use practices of the ‘native’ people of North Africa. Davis begins by questioning the often unquestioned environmental history of North Africa: the ‘sad tale of deforestation and desertification that has spanned much of the past two millennia’. She asserts that this environmental history has been constructed and reworked over time by ‘French colonial scientists, administrators, military men and settlers’.

Contemporary Racism And Islamaphobia In Australia: Racialising Religion, Kevin Dunn, Natascha Klocker, Tanya Salabay

Natascha Klocker

Contemporary anti-Muslim sentiment in Australia is reproduced through a racialization that includes well rehearsed stereotypes of Islam, perceptions of threat and inferiority, as well as fantasies that the Other (in this case Australian Muslims) do not belong, or are absent. These are not old or colour-based racisms, but they do manifest certain characteristics that allow us to conceive a racialization process in relation to Muslims. Three sets of findings show how constructions of Islam are important means through which racism is reproduced. First, public opinion surveys reveal the extent of Islamaphobia in Australia and the links between threat perception and …

Governing Knowledge: Discourses And Tactics Of The European Union In Trade-Related Intellectual Property Negotiations, Daniel Robinson, Christopher Gibson

Chris Gibson

With global shifts in the format of international trade negotiations—frommultilateral to bilateral and regional fora—possibilities for the unequal exercise of power have amplified. At risk are the trade-related interests of “developing” economies, as well as public policy issues like access to medicines. In response we analyse some of the emerging governmental approaches currently being employed for trade-related intellectual property (IP) rules. Our concern is to provide a deeper understanding of the ways power is exercised internationally. Here, we explore the European Union (EU) approaches towards trade negotiations. Examining the role of the EU in IP-related trade negotiations, recent actions towards …

Nonautonomous Difference Equations: Open Problems And Conjectures, Saber Elaydi

Saber Elaydi

No abstract provided.

Computing Highly Accurate Or Exact P-Values Using Importance Sampling, Chris Lloyd

Chris J. Lloyd

Especially for discrete data, standard first order P-values can suffer from poor accuracy, even for quite large sample sizes. Moreover, different test statistics can give practically different results. There are several approaches to computing P-values which do not suffer these defects, such as parametric bootstrap P-values or the partially maximised P-values of Berger and Boos (1994).

Both these methods require computing the exact tail probability of the approximate P-value as a function of the nuisance parameter/s, known as the significance profile. For most practical problems, this is not computationally feasible. I develop an importance sampling approach to this problem. A …

Performance Characteristics Of Nanocrystalline Diamond Vacuum Field Emission Transistor Array, S Hsu, W Kang, J Davidson, J Huang, David Kerns

David V. Kerns

Nitrogen-incorporated nanocrystalline diamond (ND) vacuum field emission transistor (VFET) with self-aligned gate is fabricated by mold transfer microfabrication technique in conjunction with chemical vapor deposition (CVD) of nanocrystalline diamond on emitter cavity patterned on silicon-on-insulator (SOI) substrate. The fabricated ND-VFET demonstrates gate-controlled emission current with good signal amplification characteristics. The dc characteristics of the ND-VFET show well-defined cutoff, linear, and saturation regions with low gate turn-on voltage, high anode current, negligible gate intercepted current, and large dc voltage gain. The ac performance of the ND-VFET is measured, and the experimental data are analyzed using a modified small signal circuit model. …

Information-Based Data Prioritization In Distributed Tracking Systems, Randy Paffenroth, Nick Coult, James Knight, Woody Leed, Scott Danford, Aubrey Poore

Randy C. Paffenroth

Effective multi-sensor, multi-target, distributed composite tracking requires the management of limited network bandwidth. In this paper we derive from first principles a value of information for measurements that can be used to sort the measurements in order from most to least valuable. We show the information metric must account for the models and filters used by the composite tracking system. We describe how this value of information can be used to optimize bandwidth utilization and illustrate its effectiveness using simulations that involve lossy and latent network models

Chandra Spatially Resolved Spectroscopic Study And Multiwavelength Imaging Of The Supernova Remnant 3c 397 (G41.1-0.3), S Safi-Harb, G Dubner, Robert Petre, Stephen Holt, P Durouchoux

Stephen Holt

We present a Chandra observation of the supernova remnant (SNR) 3C 397 (G41.1-0.3) obtained with the Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer (ACIS-S). Previous studies of this SNR have shown that the remnant harbors a central X-ray "hot spot'' suggestive of a compact object associated with 3C 397. With the Chandra data, we can rule out the nature of the hot spot as a pulsar or a pulsar wind nebula and put an upper limit on the flux of a hidden compact object of F-X(0.5-10 keV) similar to6 x 10(13) ergs cm(-2) s(-1). We found two point sources in the observed Chandra …

The X-Ray Observatory Suzaku, Kazuhisa Mitsuda, Mark Bautz, Hajime Inoue, Richard Kelley, Katsuji Koyama, Hideyo Kunieda, Kazuo Makishima, Yoshiaki Ogawara, Robert Petre, Tadayuki Takahashi, Hiroshi Tsunemi, Nicholas White, Naohisa Anabuki, Lorella Angelini, Keith Arnaud, Hisamitsu Awaki, Aya Bamba, Kevin Boyce, Gregory Brown, Kai-Wing Chan, Jean Cottam, Tadayasu Dotani, John Doty, Ken Ebisawa, Yuichiro Ezoe, Andrew Fabian, Enectali Figueroa, Ryuichi Fujimoto, Yasushi Fukazawa, Tae Furusho, Akihiro Furuzawa, Keith Gendreau, Richard Griffiths, Yoshito Haba, Kenji Hamaguchi, Ilana Harrus, Gunther Hasinger, Isamu Hatsukade, Kiyoshi Hayashida, Patrick Henry, Junko Hiraga, Stephen Holt, Ann Hornschemeier, John Hughes, Una Hwang, Manabu Ishida, Yoshitaka Ishisaki, Naoki Isobe, Masayuki Itoh, Naoko Iyomoto, Steven Kahn, Tuneyoshi Kamae, Hideaki Katagiri, Jun Kataoka, Haruyoshi Katayama, Nobuyuki Kawai, Caroline Kilbourne, Kenzo Kinugasa, Steve Kissel, Shunji Kitamoto, Mitsuhiro Kohama, Takayoshi Kohmura, Motohide Kokubun, Taro Kotani, Jun'ichi Kotoku, Aya Kubota, Greg Madejski, Yoshitomo Maeda, Fumiyoshi Makino, Alex Markowitz, Chiho Matsumoto, Hironori Matsumoto, Masaru Matsuoka, Kyoko Matsushita, Dan Mccammon, Tatehiko Mihara, Kazutami Misaki, Emi Miyata, Tsunefumi Mizuno, Koji Mori, Hideyuki Mori, Mikio Morii, Harvey Moseley, Koji Mukai, Hiroshi Murakami, Toshio Murakami, Richard Mushotzky, Fumiaki Nagase, Masaaki Namiki, Hitoshi Negoro, Kazuhiro Nakazawa, John Nousek, Takashi Okajima, Yasushi Ogasaka, Takaya Ohashi, Tai Oshima, Naomi Ota, Masanobu Ozaki, Hideki Ozawa, Arvind Parmar, William Pence, Scott Porter, James Reeves, George Ricker, Ikuya Sakurai, Wilton Sanders, Atsushi Senda, Peter Serlemitsos, Ryo Shibata, Yang Soong, Randall Smith, Motoko Suzuki, Andrew Szymkowiak, Hiromitsu Takahashi, Toru Tamagawa, Keisuke Tamura, Takayuki Tamura, Yasuo Tanaka, Makoto Tashiro, Yuzuru Tawara, Yukikatsu Terada, Yuichi Terashima, Hiroshi Tomida, Ken'ichi Torii, Yohko Tsuboi, Masahiro Tsujimoto, Takeshi Tsuru, Martin Turner, Yoshihiro Ueda, Shiro Ueno, Masaru Ueno, Shin'ichiro Uno, Yuji Urata, Shin Watanabe, Norimasa Yamamoto, Kazutaka Yamaoka, Noriko Yamasaki, Koujun Yamashita, Makoto Yamauchi, Shigeo Yamauchi, Tahir Yaqoob, Daisuke Yonetoku, Atsumasa Yoshida

Stephen Holt

High-sensitivity wide-band X-ray spectroscopy is the key feature of the Suzaku X-ray observatory, launched on 2005 July 10. This paper summarizes the spacecraft, in-orbit performance, operations, and data processing that are related to observations. The scientific instruments, the high-throughput X-ray telescopes, X-ray CCD cameras, non-imaging hard X-ray detector are also described.

Oxygen Line Mapping Of Sn 1006 With Suzaku, Aya Bamba, Hiroya Yamaguchi, Katsuji Koyama, Junko Hiraga, Stephen Holt, John Hughes, Hideaki Katagiri, Jun Kataoka, Satoru Katsuda, Shunji Kitamoto, Motohide Kokubun, Hironori Matsumoto, Emi Miyata, Koji Mori, Hiroshi Nakajima, Masanobu Ozaki, Robert Petre, Akiko Sekiguchi, Tadayuki Takahashi, Takaaki Tanaka, Yukikatsu Terada, Hiroshi Tomida, Yohko Tsuboi, Masahiro Tsujimoto, Hiroshi Tsunemi, Yasunobu Uchiyama, Masaru Ueno, Shin Watanabe

Stephen Holt

SN1006 is one of the supernova remnants (SNRs) with relatively low-temperature electrons, considering the young age of just 1000 years. We carried out SN1006 mapping observations with the X-ray Imaging Spectrometers (XIS) and the Hard X-ray Detector (HXD) onboard Suzaku, the fifth Japanese X-ray satellite. Thanks to the excellent spectral resolution of XIS in the soft X-ray band, H-like and He-like oxygen emission lines were clearly detected, and we could make a map of the line intensity, and as well as a flux and the photon index of nonthermal component. We found that these parameters have spatial dependences from region …

Iron And Nickel Line Diagnostics For The Galactic Center Diffuse Emission, Katsuji Koyama, Yoshiaki Hyodo, Tatsuya Inui, Hiroshi Nakajima, Hironori Matsumoto, Takeshi Tsuru, Tadayuki Takahashi, Yoshitomo Maeda, Noriko Yamazaki, Hiroshi Murakami, Shigeo Yamauchi, Yohko Tsuboi, Atsushi Senda, Jun Kataoka, Hiromitsu Takahashi, Stephen Holt, Gregory Brown

Stephen Holt

We have observed the diffuse X-ray emission from the Galactic Center (GC) using the X-ray Imaging Spectrometer (XIS) on Suzaku. The high-energy resolution and the low-background orbit provided excellent spectra of the GC diffuse X-rays (GCDX). The XIS found many emission lines in the GCDX near the energy of K-shell transitions of iron and nickel. The most pronounced features are Fe I K alpha at 6.4 keV and K-shell absorption edge at 7.1 keV, which are from neutral and/or low ionization states of iron, and the K-shell lines at 6.7 keV and 6.9 keV from He-like (Fe XXV K alpha) …

A Chandra Observation Of The Diffuse Emission In The Face-On Spiral Ngc 6946, Eric Schlegel, Stephen Holt, Robert Petre

Stephen Holt

This paper describes the Chandra observation of the diffuse emission in the face-on spiral NGC 6946. Overlaid on optical and Halpha images, the diffuse emission follows the spiral structure of the galaxy. An overlay on a 6 cm polarized radio intensity map confirms the phase offset of the polarized emission. We then extract and fit the spectrum of the unresolved emission with several spectral models. All model fits show a consistent continuum thermal temperature with a mean value of 0.25 +/- 0..03 keV. Additional degrees of freedom are required to obtain a good fit, and any of several models satisfy …

The Suzaku High Resolution X-Ray Spectrometer, Richard Kelley, Kazuhisa Mitsuda, Christine Allen, Petar Arsenovic, Michael Audley, Thomas Bialas, Kevin Boyce, Robert Boyle, Susan Breon, Gregory Brown, Jean Cottam, Michael Dipirro, Ryuichi Fujimoto, Tae Furusho, Keith Gendreau, Gene Gochar, Oscar Gonzalez, Masayuki Hirabayashi, Stephen Holt, Hajime Inoue, Manabu Ishida, Yoshitaka Ishisaki, Carol Jones, Ritva Keski-Kuha, Caroline Kilbourne, Dan Mccammon, Umeyo Morita, Harvey Moseley, Brent Mott, Katsuhiro Narasaki, Yoshiaki Ogawara, Takaya Ohashi, Naomi Ota, John Panek, Scott Porter, Aristides Serlemitsos, Peter Shirron, Gary Sneiderman, Andrew Szymkowiak, Yoh Takei, June Tveekrem, Stephen Volz, Mikio Yamamoto, Noriko Yamasaki

Stephen Holt

The X-Ray Spectrometer (XRS) has been designed to provide the Suzaku Observatory with non-dispersive, high-resolution X-ray spectroscopy. As designed, the instrument covers the energy range 0.3 to 12 keV, which encompasses the most diagnostically rich part of the X-ray band. The sensor consists of a 32-channel array of X-ray microcalorimeters, each with an energy resolution of about 6 eV. The very low temperature required for operation of the array (60 mK) is provided by a four-stage cooling system containing a single-stage adiabatic demagnetization refrigerator, a superfluid-helium cryostat, a solid-neon dewar, and a single-stage, Stirling-cycle cooler. The Suzaku/XRS is the first …

Suzaku Observations Of Tycho's Supernova Remnant, Toru Tamagawa, Asami Hayato, Satoshi Nakamura, Yukikatsu Terada, Aya Bamba, Junko Hiraga, John Hughes, Una Hwang, Jun Kataoka, Kenzo Kinugasa, Hideyo Kunieda, Takaaki Tanaka, Hiroshi Tsunemi, Masaru Ueno, Stephen Holt, Motohide Kokubun, Emi Miyata, Andrew Szymkowiak, Tadayuki Takahashi, Keisuke Tamura, Daisuke Ueno, Kazuo Makishima

Stephen Holt

Tycho's supernova remnant was observed by the XIS and HXD instruments onboard the Suzaku satellite on 2006 June 26-29 for 92 ks. The spectrum up to 30 keV was well fitted with a two-component model, consisting of a power-law with a photon index of 2.7 and a thermal bremsstrahlung model with a temperature of 4.7 keV. The former component can alternatively be modeled as synchrotron emission from a population of relativistic electrons with an estimated roll-off energy of around 1 keV. In the XIS spectra, in addition to the prominent Fe K alpha line (6.445 keV), we observed for the …

Suzaku Observations Of Diffuse X-Ray Emission From The Carina Nebula, Kenji Hamaguchi, Robert Petre, Hironori Matsumoto, Masahiro Tsujimoto, Stephen Holt, Yuichiro Ezoe, Hideki Ozawa, Yohko Tsuboi, Yang Soong, Shunji Kitamoto, Akiko Sekiguchi, Motohide Kokubun

Stephen Holt

We studied extended X-ray emission from the Carina Nebula taken with the Suzaku CCD camera XIS on 2005 August 29. The X-ray morphology, plasma temperature, and absorption to the plasma are consistent with the earlier Einstein results. The Suzaku spectra newly revealed emission lines from various species, including oxygen, but not from nitrogen. This result restricts the N/O ratio to be significantly low, compared with evolved massive stellar winds, suggesting that the diffuse emission originated in an old supernova remnant or a super shell produced by multiple supernova remnants. The X-ray spectra from the north and south of eta Car …