Light intensity effect on UV cured FRP coupled composite pipe joints

In this study, 36 composite pipes were joined with an eight-layer chopped mat and woven fabric that was adhered with UV curing vinylester resin. The joined composite pipes were cured vertically with UV lamps at three different light intensities: 80, 35, and 15 m W/cm². The mechanical properties of the cured pipes were evaluated by conducting internal pressure testing and simply supported 4-point bending testing. The effect of UV light intensity on the internal pressure rating, the ultimate bending load, and stiffness was evaluated based on the test results. A finite element analysis, which considered the under-curing along the axial direction and radial direction, was conducted to validate the test results. There was a direct correlation observed between increased light intensity and increased residual mechanical properties such as internal pressure rating, stiffness and peak failure load. The mechanisms for variation in the system properties were found to be under-curing and non-uniform curing in the FRP joint resulting in a loss of ability to effectively transfer load from the pipe to the joint. Additional observed phenomenon was gravity leaching due to vertical curing. All mechanisms were simulated by the introduction of a sliding modulus technique in the conducted finite element analysis. FEA results agreed well with the observed failure modes.     

Pluralistic ignorance and college student perceptions of gender-specific alcohol norms.

Students' perceived norms and personal concern about alcohol use were examined in 4 (N=971) experiments. Men reported that same-sex peers were less concerned about campus alcohol practices than themselves or female students; women believed that they were more concerned about campus alcohol practices than both same- and opposite-sex peers (Experiments 1 and 2). Additional evidence suggested that students were not merely engaging in impression management. Men reported more social pressure to drink and greater embarrassment about expressing drinking-related concerns; women expected more severe consequences if they drank excessively (Experiment 3). A male student (vs female student) expressing concerns about alcohol was believed to experience greater difficulties fitting in (Experiment 4). Implications for peer influence and drug use intervention are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Modulation of Nicotine but Not Ethanol Preference by the Mouse Chrna4 A529T Polymorphism.

Available evidence indicates that common genes influence alcohol and tobacco abuse in humans. The studies reported here used mouse models to evaluate the hypothesis that genetically determined variability in the α4β2* nicotinic receptor modulates genetically determined variability in the intake of both nicotine and alcohol. Data obtained with inbred mouse strains suggested an association between a polymorphism in the mouse α4 nAChR subunit gene, Chrna4, and variability in nicotine and ethanol preference. These associations were assessed in F2 animals derived by crossing C57BL/6β2-/- mice and A/J mice. The results obtained by the authors indicate that the polymorphism in Chrna4 plays an important role in modulating variability in oral nicotine intake but is linked to a gene that regulates alcohol intake. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Diazepam impairs behavioral inhibition but not delay discounting or risk taking in healthy adults.

There are reports that diazepam can increase, decrease, or have no effect on measures of impulsive behavior, which may be related, in part, to differences among the tasks used to measure impulsivity. This study examined the effects of a relatively high dose of diazepam (20 mg) on 5 measures of impulsive behavior in healthy adult men and women. Volunteers (N = 18) participated in a 2-session double-blind randomized design in which they received 20 mg diazepam or placebo. One hour after ingesting the capsule, participants completed mood questionnaires and several impulsivity tasks to measure subtypes of impulsive behavior, including behavioral inhibition, delay and probability discounting, and risk taking. Diazepam impaired behavioral inhibition but had no effect on measures of discounting or risk taking. These results are discussed in the context of other recent findings suggesting that different behavioral indices of impulsivity are dissociable and governed by separate underlying mechanisms. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Classification of Battlefield Ground Vehicles Using Acoustic Features and Fuzzy Logic Rule-Based Classifiers

In this paper, we demonstrate, through the multicategory classification of battlefield ground vehicles using acoustic features, how it is straightforward to directly exploit the information inherent in a problem to determine the number of rules, and subsequently the architecture, of fuzzy logic rule-based classifiers (FLRBC). We propose three FLRBC architectures, one non-hierarchical and two hierarchical (HFLRBC), conduct experiments to evaluate the performances of these architectures, and compare them to a Bayesian classifier. Our experimental results show that: 1) for each classifier the performance in the adaptive mode that uses simple majority voting is much better than in the non-adaptive mode; 2) all FLRBCs perform substantially better than the Bayesian classifier; 3) interval type-2 (T2) FLRBCs perform better than their competing type-1 (T1) FLRBCs, although sometimes not by much; 4) the interval T2 nonhierarchical and HFLRBC-series architectures perform the best; and 5) all FLRBCs achieve higher than the acceptable 80% classification accuracy     

The Ventral Hippocampus Supports a Memory Representation of Context and Contextual Fear Conditioning: Implications for a Unitary Function of the Hippocampus.

The authors report that either inactivating the ventral hippocampus (VH) with muscimol prior to context preexposure or injecting anisomycin into the VH after preexposure significantly impaired rats' memory for context. Injecting anisomycin into the VH prior to contextual fear conditioning also greatly reduced long-term memory (48-hr retention test) but had no effect on short-term memory (1-hr retention test) for contextual fear. Together with other results, these data suggest that the memory for a novel context is distributed throughout the longitudinal extent of the hippocampus and that this representation helps to support contextual fear conditioning. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mass Transfer of Ozone in Semibatch Stirred Reactor

The mass transfer of ozone from the gaseous phase into the aqueous phase plays an important role in determining the efficiency of ozonation. In this study, a mass-transfer model has been developed to simultaneously predict concentrations of the dissolved and outlet gaseous ozone in a semibatch reactor. A model in which the liquid phase is described as well mixed and the gas phase is described as a plug-flow system was used to estimate the mass transfer of ozone in both laboratory and pilot reactors. The self-decomposition of ozone was also incorporated into the model. The mass-transfer coefficient was found to increase with increasing gas flow rate, temperature, and ionic strength in the solution. Using a sensitivity analysis, the partition coefficient α was found to be the most sensitive factor that affects the concentration profile of dissolved ozone. However, the outlet gaseous concentration of ozone is quite insensitive to all physical parameters investigated in this study.     

Assessing It/Business Alignment

Alignment is the perennial business chart-topper on top-ten lists of IT issues. What follows is a methodology developed by the author for assessing a company's alignment. Modeled after the Capability Maturity Model ® developed by Carnegie Mellon's Software Engineering Institute, but focused on a more strategic set of business practices, this tool has been successfully tested at more than 50 Global 2000 companies and is currently the subject of a benchmarking study sponsored by the Society for Information Management and the Conference Board. the primary objective of the assessment is to identify specific recommendations for improving the alignment of IT and the business.     

State–Trait Anger Theory and the utility of the Trait Anger Scale.

Eight studies present support for the state–trait anger theory. In Studies 1–3, high-anger participants reported (a) greater anger in many different provocations, in their most angering ongoing situations, and in daily life, (b) greater anger-related physiological arousal, (c) greater state anger and dysfunctional coping in response to a visualized provocation, and (d) greater use of suppression and outward negative expression of anger. Only heart rate in the visualized provocation did not support predictions. In Studies 4–5, high-anger individuals suffered more frequent and intense anger consequences. In Studies 6–8, trait anger had higher correlations with dimensions of anger than with other emotions, cognitions, and behaviors. Few gender differences were found across studies. Results were discussed in terms of state–trait theory, convergent and discriminant validity for the Trait Anger Scale, anger expression, gender, and the implications for counseling. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)