Managing telecommunications networks

The authors suggest that one must view the network itself as the customer's database, and make sure it is self-diagnosing, self-healing, and intelligent. The perspective that the network is the database means moving away from the feeling that no trouble means total health, towards more preemptive maintenance. With fiber, capacity as a limiting factor is no longer an issue; the creative work will be in developing network capabilities. Universities need to accept the challenge of developing the theory of software stability. A crazy quilt of multiple equipment vendors cannot produce an integrated, problem-solving network. But if a network is self-diagnosing, self-healing, and intelligent, the available staff can focus on the customer and seize opportunities to introduce new services     

Hydrogen etching for semiconductor materials in plasma doping experiments

The etching effects of hydrogen plasma for semiconductor materials including single crystalline silicon, polycrystalline silicon, silicon dioxide, and aluminum in plasma immersion ion implantation (PHI) doping experiments have been investigated. Etching can alter device structure and affect implant profile and dose. The effects of varying different PIII process parameters such as pulse potential, pulse repetition frequency, and substrate temperature are presented. The experimental data show that the spontaneous etching by hydrogen radicals enhanced by ion bombardment is responsible for the etching phenomena that occurs at the material surface. A model is used to calculate the retained implant dose and impurity profile when the etching effect is considered.     

Toe pulse reappearance time in prediction of aortofemoral bypass success

Cross-sectional echocardiography utilizing the apical and longitudinal right ventricular inflow tract views was used to investigate the tricuspid valve in 64 patients with mitral valve prolapse and 16 controls who had no angiographic or echocardiographic evidence of mitral valve prolapse. The tricuspid valve leaflets and their coaptation point in systole were found to be below (towards the right ventricular apex) the level of the tricuspid valve ring in systole in all controls. Tricuspid valve prolapse, defined as the leaflet(s) of the tricuspid valve lying above the tricuspid valve ring level within the right atrium, was seen in 31/64(48 percent) of patients with mitral valve prolapse. The right ventricular inflow tract view demonstrated tricuspid valve prolapse most readily compared to the apical view, and 29 of the 31 patients with tricuspid valve prolapse had prolapse of at least two leaflets of the tricuspid valve. The 31 patients with both mitral and tricuspid valve prolapse, when compared to the 33 patients with mitral valve prolapse alone, had more symptomatology and abnormal physical findings.     

The effect of stimulus significance on the electrodermal response in chronic schizophrenia.

Skin conductance reactivity (SCR) to stimuli made significant for half of each sample and kept innocuous for the other half was compared in schizophrenics, normals, and alcoholics. In every case, trials began with a 5-sec slide presenting 4 words and ended 15 sec later with a recorded auditory presentation of one of these words. For half of each sample, stimuli were made significant by requiring Ss to retain the visually given words so that, on hearing the subsequent spoken word, they could immediately repeat one of the words in the last-seen slide other than that just heard (report condition). The remaining Ss only had to sit still and do nothing (simple condition). As predicted, schizophrenics showed smaller, faster habituating SCRs than controls only in the simple condition and resembled controls when the same stimuli were made significant in the report condition. Words were slected a priori for delusional, alcoholic, and neutral content to see whether this would affect SCR. Posttest interviews indicated that the a priori selections were not successful in establishing differential significance, and SCR accordingly did not vary with content in any group. In all groups, introducing explicit significance increased SCR amplitude, slowed habituation, and heightened spontaneous fluctuation frequency to both visual and auditory stimuli, but did so most markedly to the auditory signals that were closer in time to the significance-creating report. (17 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Some basic observations on heat transfer and evaporation in the horizontal flash evaporator

This paper decribes a study of the heat, mass and momentum transport associated with vapor release in a horizontal stage of a flash evaporator. A scaled-down, well-controlled flash evaporator, which also allows good visual observation, has been designed, constructed and used in the experiments. In particular, temperature profiles in the stage have been measured to an accuracy of ±0.02°C and better.It has been determined that the subcritical flow in the flash stage consists of two principal regions: submerged sluice gate flow with the associated hydraulic jump overlayed by a backflow roller, followed by open channel flow. The flashing of NaCI solutions was accompanied by strong foaming, which has reduced the fractional non-equilibrium allowance by a factor of two or three, without impairing the purity of the distillate.     

Scientific rigor, scientific integrity: A comment on Sommer and Sommer.

Examines ethical issues raised in an article by R. Sommer and B. A. Sommer (see record 1984-10654-001) that questioned the validity of results reported by H. Barber and R. Heber (1973). Among these issues are criteria for establishing whether a particular study is sufficiently rigorous to be the basis of valid conclusions, the determination of whether or not reported data are truthful, and appropriate means of making such a determination. It is argued that optimum assessments of these questions involve the separation of questions of rigor from questions of integrity. (3 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)