Native Spanish-Speaking Children Reading in English: Toward a Model of Comprehension.

A structural equation model of second language (L2; English) reading comprehension was tested on a sample of 135 Spanish-speaking 4th-grade English-language learners (ELLs). The model included 2 levels: decoding and oral language. English decoding measures included alphabetic knowledge and fluency. English oral language measures included vocabulary knowledge and listening comprehension. The model had reasonable goodness of fit. Decoding skills played a less predictive role than oral language proficiency. L2 listening comprehension made an independent, proximal contribution to L2 reading comprehension, whereas L2 vocabulary knowledge assumed both proximal and distal relationships with L2 reading comprehension. Results suggest that, given adequate L2 decoding ability, L2 vocabulary knowledge is crucial for improved English reading comprehension outcomes for Spanish-speaking ELLs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Better or worse? The role of solar photovoltaic (PV) systems in sustainable development: Case studies of remote atoll communities in Kiribati

The Republic of Kiribati, formerly known as the Gilbert Islands, is a Micronesian (One of the three groups of islands in the Pacific. The eight territories that make up Micronesia are Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Republic of Kiribati, Republic of the Marshall Islands, Republic of Nauru, Republic of Palau, Territory of Guam and Territory of Wake Island. The other two groups of islands in the Pacific are Melanesia and Polynesia) country in the Pacific. The energy sources utilised in Kiribati include petroleum products, biomass, solar energy and wind power. Solar energy was introduced in Kiribati in the early 1980s (Wade H. Survey of RESCO projects – prepared for OPRET, Fiji Department of Energy, 2003; p. 36). Currently, it makes a very insignificant (less than 1%) contribution to the total annual primary energy supply (South Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP). Pacific Islands Renewable Energy Project (PIREP) – Pacific Regional Energy Assessment (PREA) 2004. Kiribati national report, Vol. 5, 2005). Solar energy in Kiribati is used mostly in the form of solar photovoltaic (PV) technologies for the provision of lighting and electricity.This study examines the role of PV technologies in the sustainable development process in Kiribati, with particular reference to remote atoll communities. Initial results from on-site surveys carried out are reported in this paper. These surveys have sought to identify the reasons why people use or do not use PV systems.     

MODELING OF SUPERPLASTIC FORMING PROCESS FOR ALUMINUM ALLOYS WITH STRAIN HARDENING EFFECT

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Multicore compilation strategies and challenges

To overcome challenges stemming from high power densities and thermal hot spots in microprocessors, multicore computing platforms have emerged as the ubiquitous computing platform from servers down through embedded systems. Unfortunately, providing multiple cores does not directly translate into increased performance or better energy efficiency for most applications. The burden is placed on software developers and tools to find and exploit coarse-grain parallelism to effectively make use of the abundance of computing resources provided by these systems. Concurrent applications are much more complex to develop than their single-threaded ancestors, thus software development tools will be critical to help programmers create both high performance and correct software. This article provides an overview of parallelism and compiler technology to help the community understand the software development challenges and opportunities for multicore signal processors.     

Feasibility of a neutron detector-dosemeter based on single-event upsets in dynamic random-access memories

In an attempt to investigate the effect of radiation quality, dose and specific repair pathways on correct and erroneous rejoining of DNA double strand breaks (DSBs), an assay was applied that allows the identification and quantification of incorrectly rejoined DSB ends produced by ionising radiation. While substantial misrejoining occurs in mammalian cells after high acute irradiation doses, decreasing misrejoining frequencies were observed in dose fractionation experiments with X rays. In line with this finding, continuous irradiation with gamma rays at low dose rate leads to no detectable misrejoining. This indicates that the probability for a DSB to be misrejoined decreases drastically when DSBs are separated in time and space. The same dose fractionation approach was applied to determine DSB misrejoining after alpha particle exposure. In contrast to the results with X rays, there was no significant decrease in DSB misrejoining with increasing fractionation. This suggests that DSB misrejoining after alpha irradiation is not significantly affected by a separation of particle tracks. To identify the enzymatic pathways that are involved in DSB misrejoining, cell lines deficient in non-homologous end-joining (NHEJ) were examined. After high X ray doses, DSB misrejoining is considerably reduced in NHEJ mutants. Low dose rate experiments show elevated DSB misrejoining in NHEJ mutants compared with wild-type cells. The authors propose that NHEJ serves as an efficient pathway for rejoining correct break ends in situations of separated breaks but generates genomic rearrangements if DSBs are close in time and space.