Atomic polarizability plays an essential role in topics ranging from van der Waals interactions, state lifetimes, and indices of refraction, to next generation atomic clocks and atomic parity non-conservation experiments. Polarizability measurements, such as the ones described in this thesis, provide valuable input to these subjects and serve as benchmark tests for sophisticated atomic structure calculations. We measured the static polarizability of potassium and rubidium with record precision and 0.5% uncertainty using a Mach-Zehnder atom interferometer with an electric-field gradient. To support future precision measurements of polarizability, we developed a new atom beam velocity measurement technique called phase choppers. Using phase choppers, we demonstrated measurements of mean atom beam velocity with an uncertainty of 0.1%. We also developed a new way to probe atomic structure: a measurement of a zero-crossing of the dynamic polarizability of potassium, known as a magic-zero wavelength. We measured the first magic-zero wavelength of potassium with 1.5 pm uncertainty and established a new benchmark measurement for the ratio of the D1 and D2 line strengths. Finally, we propose the use of a resonant photoionization detector for measurements of strontium polarizability, and the use of contrast interferometry for measurements of alkali dimer tensor polarizabilities.

The aim of this study is to explore to what extent and how different jazz programs on the college level include repertoire memorization in their curriculums. By repertoire memorization I mean the study and memorization of a certain amount of standard jazz repertoire, which include songs from the so-called great American songbook and tunes by jazz composers that are commonly played by jazz musicians around the world.  Whether the schools include repertoire memorization in their official curriculum or course descriptions or leave the subject to the discretion of the individual instructors is explored. Methods for teaching the subject, methods of assessing the students’ memorization, and views of different jazz department heads regarding the importance of the subject are also investigated. A sociocultural perspective is adopted in the study to see if academia attempts to address or perhaps recreate some of the sociocultural contexts that jazz learning existed in before jazz was included in music conservatories and universities. Eleven jazz programs and one jazz educator were asked to be a part of the study and of those, four schools responded. The data was collected in email correspondence with the four different department heads that were from the United States, Finland and Sweden (two schools). The results showed that the programs in Finland and the United States placed great importance on the subject and use required repertoire lists that the students were tested on. One of the Swedish programs had suggested repertoire lists for students without formal testing and the other Swedish program left the subject up to the individual instructors although the subject did seem to be encouraged. One unexpected observation from the repertoire lists used from the schools in Finland and the United States was that there were a surprisingly large number of songs that were not in common to both lists.

The primary purpose of this study is to provide a transcription for solo organ of Virgil Thomson's Symphony on a Hymn Tune. The study is two-fold: first, to explore the early life and career of Thomson with a focused view on how his organ and composition studies influenced the composition of Symphony on a Hymn Tune; and second, to present an original transcription of the work in a performing score for solo organ. In addition to the final score, the study provides an analytical overview along with a description of methodology used to create the transcription, and a discussion of issues encountered by the performing organist in playing the transcription. Discussions encompass organ registration, tempi, manual suggestions, articulation, phrase markings, and dynamic expression. Musical examples both from the author's transcription and Virgil Thomson's organ works are included as necessary. Two appendices are included. Appendix 1 presents the specifications for the Aeolian Skinner organ of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, on which the transcription was originally performed. Appendix 2 itemizes the registration lists used for the original performance of the organ transcription.

Mo Yan has become a well-known writer for his legendary style of novels within the past two decades. In 1988, the Chinese film, Red Sorghum, adapted from Mo Yan¡¦s novel, won the Golden Bear Prize in the 38th Berlin International Film Festival. Therefore, not only the film but also the original novel drew a lot of international attention. Mo Yan presents his charisma in multiple aspects of his novels due to his unique personal experience. First, he applied many colloquial materials as elements of folk literature in his novels. For instance, proverbs, legends, and ballads are commonly quoted in his writings. In addition, during his voluntary military service, he did have the experience to take part in composing a piece of Cat Tune, also known as Maoqiang, a local traditional Chinese Opera in Shandong Province. Second, Mo Yan has a spontaneous talent for story telling mainly passed down from his grandparents, the Chinese classic Zhanghuiti-Style Novels, and the translated literatures of world masterpieces. Third, his belief in insisting on writing as the general populace rather than writing for it has made him a spokesperson of the common people even though this is quite against others¡¦ points-of-view. This thesis aims to verify what those components of folklore in Mo Yan¡¦s novels are and whether they are highly agree with his belief or not. The whole text is divided into five chapters and emphasizes on analyzing the materials of folklore listed in categories. In addition, an introduction to Literature of the New Era is included.

Master of Music / Department of Music / Frank C. Tracz / This document is based on the preparation, rehearsal, and performance of selected pieces for the Graduate Conducting Recital of Darren S. Brooks. The pieces examined in the theoretical and historical analysis for this report are Brasiliana by Joao Guilherme Ripper, Irish Tune from County Derry by Percy Grainger and arranged by Frank Erickson, and Celtic Hymns and Dances by Eric Ewazen. This document also contains rehearsal plans and procedures for the preparation of the literature. The recital was performed on March 12, 2008 in McCain Auditorium on the campus of Kansas State University, and was performed by the members of the Kansas State University Symphony Band.

Dans le cadre du projet LIU, vise à augmenter la puissance des injecteurs du LHC, le CERN PS Booster (PSB) sera mis à jour avec un système d'injection d'échange de charge H- et son énergie d'injection sera portée de 50 MeV à 160 MeV pour obtenir la luminosité du faisceau nécessaire pour le LHC High-Luminosity Upgrade. Effets de charge d'espace comme pertes de faisceau et incrément d’émittance transversale à l'injection vont être les principales limites vers la réalisation de la haute luminosité souhaitée. Des études sur la dynamique du faisceau en présence de charge d'espace afin d'évaluer les performances du PSB après la mise à niveau ont été effectuées. La première partie du travail consiste de mesures dans la présente machine, pour étudier les effets de charge d'espace et son interaction avec les résonances et d'avoir un ensemble de données pour le code benchmarking. Le code choisi pour le suivi du faisceau en présence de charge d'espace est PTC-Orbit (et PyOrbit). Les études de convergence numériques nécessaires sont présentées conjointement avec les études de la comparaison des simulations avec les mesures dans la machine. Une fois évalué le code et ses limites, les prévisions pour l'injection dans le PSB à 160 MeV avec des poutres de luminosité élevé sont livrés en termes de pertes de faisceau et incrément d’émittance. Ces études comprennent l'optimisation du point de fonctionnement, la compensation des résonances et/ou la correction de chromaticité en tenant compte des erreurs magnétiques attendus dans la machine. / As part of the LHC Injector Upgrade Project, the CERN PS Booster (PSB) will be upgraded with a H- charge exchange injection system and its injection energy will be raised from 50 MeV to 160 MeV to obtain the beam brightness required for the LHC High-Luminosity Upgrade. Space charge effects like beam losses and transverse emittance blow-up at injection are expected to be the main limitations towards the achievement of the required high brightness. Studies of beam dynamics in presence of space charge in order to evaluate the performances of the PSB after the Upgrade have been performed. The first part of the work consists of measurements in the present machine, to study the effects of space charge and its interplay with resonances and to have a good set of data for code benchmarking. The code chosen for the beam tracking in presence of space charge is PTC-Orbit (and PyOrbit). Necessary numerical convergence studies are presented together with a benchmark with the PSB measurements. Once assessed the code and its limitations, predictions for the 160 MeV injection with high- brightness beams are delivered in terms of beam losses and emittance blow-up. These studies include the optimization of the working-point, resonance compensation and/or chromaticity correction taking into account the expected magnetic errors in the machine.

Keyphrases describe a document in a coherent and simple way, giving the prospective reader a way to quickly determine whether the document satisfies their information needs. The pervasion of huge amount of information on Web, with only a small amount of documents have keyphrases extracted, there is a definite need to discover automatic keyphrase extraction systems. Typically, a document written by human develops around one or more general concepts or sub-concepts. These concepts or sub-concepts should be structured and semantically related with each other, so that they can form the meaningful representation of a document. Considering the fact, the phrases or concepts in a document are related to each other, a new approach for keyphrase extraction is introduced that exploits the semantic relations in the document. For measuring the semantic relations between concepts or sub-concepts in the document, I present a comprehensive study aimed at using collaboratively constructed semantic resources like Wikipedia and its link structure. In particular, I introduce a graph-based keyphrase extraction system that exploits the semantic relations in the document and features such as term frequency. I evaluated the proposed system using novel measures and the results obtained compare favorably with previously published results on established benchmarks.

The Federal Government has placed stringent standards on the manufacturers of automobiles to control vehicle emissions. Few states standards have been set for used vehicles to insure the vehicle continues to meet this standard. Studies have shown that vehicles that are properly tuned are emitting less harmful pollutants from the exhaust. Additional studies are needed to determine if cars are being adequately turned to meet exhaust emissions. The study showed 93 per cent of the new 1971 model cars were not meeting the standard established by the Environmental Protection Agency. Eighty-seven per cent of the 1970 model cars and 83 per cent of the used 1971 model cars tested would not meet the same standards. There was a very low correlation between emission level and the mileage driven since the vehicle was tuned indicating a need for more emphasis on tune-ups and maintenance of automobiles to meet emission standards.

No description available.

Thesis (MScEng (Electrical and Electronic Engineering))--Stellenbosch University, 2008. / Automatic bird song recognition and transcription is a relatively new field. Reliable automatic recognition systems would be of great benefit to further research in ornithology and conservation, as well as commercially in the very large birdwatching subculture. This study investigated the use of Hidden Markov Models and duration modelling for bird call recognition. Through use of more accurate duration modelling, very promising results were achieved with feature vectors consisting of only pitch and volume. An accuracy of 51% was achieved for 47 calls from 39 birds, with the models typically trained from only one or two specimens. The ALS pitch tracking algorithm was adapted to bird song to extract the pitch. Bird song synthesis was employed to subjectively evaluate the features. Compounded Selfloop Duration Modelling was developed as an alternative duration modelling technique. For long durations, this technique can be more computationally efficient than Ferguson stacks. The application of approximate string matching to bird song was also briefly considered.