A Porosity Test for Electrodeposits on Zinc-Base Die-Castings

A new method of determining the porosity of metal coatings on zinc-base die-castings has been developed. It uses a test solution consisting of ammonium chloride and potassium ferrocyanide. The ammonium chloride corrodes the zinc at the bottom of pores and keeps the zinc in solution; the ferrocyanide forms a white, insoluble compound with the dissolved zinc.

Irregularly shaped articles are first given a thin coat of shellac and are then completely immersed in the test solution; white spots grow on the sites of pores in the coating. For testing flat, cylindrical or conical surfaces, the solution may be applied by means of absorbent paper. The white compound shows up well on black paper; alternatively, if the compound is converted to suitably coloured salts (e.g., ferric, cupric), white paper can be used.     

Conceptual systems functioning as a mediating factor in the development of counseling skills.

Investigated the relationship between counseling systems stages and counselor effectiveness as measured by the Carkhuff Empathy Scale. 97 advanced undergraduate and graduate students taking their 1st interview skills course were rated for stage of conceptual functioning with the This I Believe Test. At the completion of training, audiotapes of actual counseling interviews were rated for level of empathic responding. Conceptual theory predicts that individuals at lower stages of conceptual functioning will not be as effective in responding empathically as those at higher levels of conceptional functioning after experiencing similar training programs. Results conform to theoretical expectations in that there were markedly significant differences between and among conceptual stage groups. (21 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Crame/spl acute/r-Rao and moment-entropy inequalities for Renyi entropy and generalized Fisher information

The moment-entropy inequality shows that a continuous random variable with given second moment and maximal Shannon entropy must be Gaussian. Stam's inequality shows that a continuous random variable with given Fisher information and minimal Shannon entropy must also be Gaussian. The Crame/spl acute/r-Rao inequality is a direct consequence of these two inequalities. In this paper, the inequalities above are extended to Renyi entropy, p/sup th/ moment, and generalized Fisher information. Generalized Gaussian random densities are introduced and shown to be the extremal densities for the new inequalities. An extension of the Crame/spl acute/r-Rao inequality is derived as a consequence of these moment and Fisher information inequalities.     

Information-theoretic inequalities for contoured probability distributions

We show that for a special class of probability distributions that we call contoured distributions, information-theoretic invariants and inequalities are equivalent to geometric invariants and inequalities of bodies in Euclidean space associated with the distributions. Using this, we obtain characterizations of contoured distributions with extremal Shannon and Renyi entropy. We also obtain a new reverse information-theoretic inequality for contoured distributions.