J-hook latching device

Described here is a latching device for latching two items together that has a housing and a shaft mounted to one item such that rotation of the shaft by a sprocket causes the shaft to move longitudinally up and down. The shaft has one end extending beyond the housing with an alignment cone attached to this end for engaging a receptor on the other item. A latch mounted to a shaft by a traveling nut provides a pivot point for the latch so that rotation of the shaft causes the pivot point of the latch to translate along the longitudinal axis of the shaft. Camming surfaces and a camming spring are used for rotating the latch so that the latch will engage and disengage a receptor on the other item

U.S. Military Veterans’ Attitudes and Perceptions of Mental Healthcare

The purpose of this research project is to measure whether U.S. military veterans experience any stigma related to mental healthcare and if this is associated with age, length of service, and military branch. U.S. military veterans are a high-risk group for developing mental illnesses. It is believed social stigma and personal attitudes, perceptions and beliefs of mental healthcare may influence whether a veteran will pursue mental healthcare. This cross-sectional study was conducted as an online survey via Qualtrics resulting in 75 total responses. 21 responses were excluded from the analysis due to incompletion or failure to pass the consciousness-awareness test question. The survey included a general demographics questionnaire following a brief mental health history and mental healthcare experience of the respondent. The end of the survey presented 9 reflective statements where the respondent’s answer on a 5-point scale of “strongly agree” to “strongly disagree” would reflect either positive or negative attitudes towards mental healthcare. 13.6% of respondents agreed with statements which described negative attitudes and perceptions of mental healthcare and 76.4% of respondents agreed with statements which described positive attitudes and perceptions of mental healthcare; 10.1% of respondents were indifferent. No statistically significant correlations were found between the variables presented in the research question

Connection space reduction mechanism

A connector assembly comprised of two halves, each respectively including a shell type connector subassembly, one being an active half and the other being a passive half is described. The active half includes an alignment cusp that causes a coupling motion in response to coming in contact with the outer portion of the other half, which causes the respective connectors within the two subassemblies to move toward each other into coupling relationship at twice the rate at which the two subassemblies come together. Both halves are adapted to rotate about and translate along respective mutually orthogonal axes to facilitate an interconnection

The Instrument Test Dewar (ITD): Testing satellite instruments at 1.5 K

The Instrument Test Dewar (ITD) is a cryogenic facility designed and built to test Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) satellite instruments at 1.5 K. The facility provides a high vacuum and thermal environment with payload thermal, electrical and optical interfaces. There are two concentric vacuum spaces which are not hermitically sealed. The instrument vacuum space is 81.28 cm by 243.84 cm and is cooled by an LHe shroud. The guard vacuum space surrounds an LN2 shroud. There are two separate cryosorption pumping systems and a mechanical LHe pumping system. The data acquisition systems provide payload and housekeeping data. There have been various problems with the facility, and changes and improvements have been made to assure optimum test conditions. COBE instrument testing has been completed on structural, thermal model hardware and the protoflight units

The connector space reduction mechanism

The Connector Space Reduction Mechanism (CSRM) is a simple device that can reduce the number of electromechanical devices on the Payload Interface Adapter/Station Interface Adapter (PIA/SIA) from 4 to 1. The device uses simplicity to attack the heart of the connector mating problem for large interfaces. The CSRM allows blind mate connector mating with minimal alignment required over short distances. This eliminates potential interface binding problems and connector damage. The CSRM is compatible with G and H connectors and Moog Rotary Shutoff fluid couplings. The CSRM can be used also with less forgiving connectors, as was demonstrated in the lab. The CSRM is NASA-Goddard exclusive design with patent applied for. The CSRM is the correct mechanism for the PIA/SIA interface as well as other similar berthing interfaces

The Hidden College: Noncredit Education in the United States

Provides an overview of the growing enrollment in noncredit programs, and outlines the need to incorporate them better with credit-bearing courses to offer new options for learning, as well as to include them in discussions about higher education policy

Forecasting the United States gross domestic product with a neural network

Forecasting the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the United States is one of many estimates to predict the economic health of the country. Current forecasting techniques use consensus estimates of experts, econometric models, or other statistical methods. Relatively little research has been devoted to how artificial neural networks may improve these forecasts, however. This paper describes how a neural network using leading economic indicator data predicted annual GDP percentage changes one year into thefiiture more accurately than competing techniques over a ten-year period

Brainwriting in virtual legislative sessions

Many studies have demonstrated the efficiency and effectiveness of using group support systems in large, face-to-face meetings known as legislative sessions. However, few have investigated how individual participants or sub-groups in different rooms linked via a computer network, forming a virtual group, may use the systems. An experiment using two sizes of virtual groups (8 and 16 participants) showed that participants were satisfied with the meeting process. In addition, there were no significant differences in five process and outcome variables between the two sizes of groups, indicating that an upper limit on the size of the virtual groups had not been reached

A neural network to predict civilian unemployment rates

Forecasting national unemployment is one of the most important problems of modern economies, and most researchers have relied upon statistical techniques with their stringent data assumptions and low accuracy rates to predict changes in this macroeconomic data. This paper describes how a neural network using leading economic indicator data can help to predict civilian unemployment rates. Results show that the neural network provides superior estimates of rates one month into the future compared to multi-linear regression and two naive forecasting techniques