Using bald eagles to indicate the health of the Great Lakes' environment

The bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) is one of the most studied birds of North America, and a great amount of natural life‐history information, including the response of various stressors on the eagles' ability to reproduce, are well known. In Michigan, the eagle has been chosen to track the trends of bioaccumulative compounds of concern across watersheds in the state. The state has been divided into major watersheds, and 20% of these are surveyed each year. A control area in northern Minnesota, Voyageurs National Park, is also sampled annually. We report here on the methods used, the preliminary results of the 1999 field season, and how differences in mercury concentrations varied over a 10‐year period. Mercury in feathers of nestling eagles declined over time only in Lakes Michigan and Huron, but have not decreased among other subpopulations in Michigan. Concentrations of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and 4,4′‐DDE in blood plasma from nestling eagles have declined over time for most subpopulations; however, they remain greater for breeding areas associated with the Great Lakes' food web. Sea eagles of the genus Haliaeetus are a good sentinel species to track trends in bioaccumulative compounds in aquatic systems.     

Three-phase flash and distillation

A mixed K-value model allows existing computer programs for the simulation of vapor-liquid equilibrium stages to be used for three-phase vapor-liquid-liquid systems. The mixed K-value model has been implemented with a minimum effort into the Badger General Material Balance flow-sheeting program. Good convergence has been obtained with the mixed K-value model for a number of systems. A comparison is made with published literature [1, 2], showing excellent results with this generally applicable and easy-to-use method.     

Formulation for Reliable Analysis of Structural Frames

Structural engineers use design codes formulated to consider uncertainty for both reinforced concrete and structural steel design. For a simple one-bay structural steel frame, we survey typical uncertainties and compute an interval solution for displacements and forces. The naive solutions have large over-estimations, so we explore the Mullen-Muhanna assembly strategy, scaling, and constraint propagation to achieve tight enclosures of the true ranges for displacements and forces in a fraction of the CPU time typically used for simulations. That we compute tight enclosures, even for large parameter uncertainties used in practice, suggests the promise of interval methods for much larger structures.     

AN ASSESSMENT OF CRACK CLOSURE AND THE EXTENT OF THE SHORT CRACK REGIME IN Q1N (HY80) STEEL

Abstract— The paper addresses some aspects of the differences in fatigue crack growth rate behaviour and threshold values obtained for long through-cracks, short through-cracks and surface cracks. Attention is focused on plasticity induced closure in the wake behind the growing crack tip. For long cracks at high K _max, closure is found to depend in a linear manner on K _max, i.e. K _op, increases with the size of the monotonic plastic zone. Closure increases at low δ K and this is primarily a consequence of the load shedding procedure. If short through-cracks are prepared by machining specimens containing long cracks, a substantial part of the plastic wake is removed and this can produce marked effects on the closure contribution during subsequent growth. The length of crack "closed" in a long crack threshold test was found to be of the order of 1 mm. Cracks less than this length exhibited "short crack" behaviour: greater than this length, they behaved as "long cracks", with plastic wake effects apparently fully operative. Small surface cracks exhibit "long crack" behaviour at lengths as short as 0.2 mm and reasons for this are discussed.     

Integration framework for intelligent manufacturing processes

In this article, we describe a new approach to applying distributed artificial intelligence techniques to manufacturing processes. The construction of intelligent systems is one of the most important techniques among artificial intelligence research. Our goal is to develop an integrated intelligent system for real time manufacturing processes. An integrated intelligent system is a large knowledge integration environment that consists of several symbolic reasoning systems (expert systems) and numerical computation packages. These software programs are controlled by a meta-system which manages the selection, operation and communication of these programs. A meta-system can be implemented in different language environments and applied to many disciplines. This new architecture can serve as a universal configuration to develop high performance intelligent systems for many complicated industrial applications in real world domains.To whom all correspondence should be addressed.     

Kinetics of hydantoin formation

The reaction of lignite in a slagging gasifier produces reactants which in turn form 5,5-dimethylhydantoin (DMH) as a major constituent in the condensate water. Variations in plant operating conditions made it impossible to accurately study the kinetics of formation of DMH in the actual gasifier water, and thus a model system was chosen. The reaction of acetone cyanohydrin in the presence of excess ammonium carbonate at concentrations approaching those obtained in the condensate water were studied at 50,70, and 90 °C. Secondorder kinetics were obeyed, and the pseudo second-order rate constants at the respective temperatures were 1.86, 3.6, and 4.62 dm³ mol^{? 1} h^{? 1}. Independent variation of the concentration of either acetone, cyanide, ammonia or carbonate gave results consistent with the interpretation that the formation of DMH is first order in all reactants: rate of formation of DMH = k[acetone][HCN][NH₃][CO₂]. The pseudo second-order rate constant is a complex rate constant including several rapid equilibria. A mechanism consistent with the kinetic data is presented.     

Effect of catalysts on the reaction between a cycloaliphatic diisocyanate (H-MDI) and n-butanol

Kinetics of the reaction between bis(4-isocyanatocyclohexyl)methane, H-MDI, and n-butanol was studied in toluene at 100°C. Effects of various catalysts, such as Hg(CH₃COO)₂, Zn(CH₃COO)₂ · 2H₂O, SnCl₄ · 5H₂O, and dibutyltindilaurate on the reaction rate and kinetics were also investigated. Reactions were followed by determining the unreacted isocyanate as a function of reaction time, using the standard dibutylamine back titration method. All catalysts seem to be very effective in increasing of the rate of the reaction compared to the uncatalyzed system. Depending on the initial stoichiometric ratio of (NCO) and (OH) and the concentration of the catalyst used, it seems possible to have preferential catalysis of the primary reaction between (NCO) and (OH) over the side reactions.     

Clinical psychologists reflect on the usefulness of various components of graduate training.

Graduates of clinical training programs were surveyed to determine the degree to which they have found various graduate school experiences useful in their professional work. Samples of academic clinical psychologists and practicing clinical psychologists reported time allocation and preference for various professional activities, perceived usefulness of various theoretical orientations, and the influence on their current professional work of 19 different graduate training topics. Results suggest that where differences exist, academic clinical psychologists are generally more satisfied with Boulder-model-inspired scientific training than are clinical practitioners. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)