BACKGROUND The Competing Values Framework (CVF) has been widely used in health services research to assess organizational culture as a predictor of quality improvement implementation, employee and patient satisfaction, and team functioning, among other outcomes. CVF instruments generally are presented as well-validated with reliable aggregated subscales. However, only one study in the health se...

A distributed feedback laser is fabricated in Er3+-doped photonic crystal fibre. Preferential single-mode lasing is obtained with no special consideration of polarisation issues. The results demonstrate practical implementation of a multi-photon writing process for complex structures in these optical fibres. No hydrogen loading and no germanium are involved.

Studies on the growth of small cracks have led to the observation that fatigue life of many engineering materials is primarily “crack growth” from micro-structural features, such as inclusion particles, voids, slip-bands or from manufacturing defects. This paper reviews the capabilities of a plasticity-induced crack-closure model to predict fatigue lives of metallic materials using “small-crack...

This paper summarizes the test results of an extensive research program sponsored by the US Transportation Research Board of the National Research Council to examine the behavior of high-strength concrete rectangular columns subjected to concentric and eccentric loading conditions. The variables considered in this investigation were concrete strength ranging from 7.9 ksi (55 MPa) to 16.5 ksi (1...

To analyse the performance of mushroom-shaped fibrillar adhesive microstructure, its behaviour was studied during different stages of attachment-loading-detachment cycle. Visualizing the evolutions of real contact area of single microfibres, it is shown that the mushroom-shaped geometry of contact elements promotes fast and simple generation of reliable adhesion. The mushroom-shaped geometry se...

Damping characterizes the energy dissipation capacity of materials and structures, and it is affected by several external factors such as vibrating frequency, stress history, temperature, and stress amplitude. This study investigates the relationship between the damping and the stress amplitude of environment-friendly recycled aggregate concrete (RAC). First, a function model of a member's loss...

SUMMARY An analyttcal study has been made of the effect of such parameters as wing loading, aspect ratio, tbmst-we&t ratlo, and number of engmes, on the takeoff performance of fIxed Wang aircraft. Expressions are derived for the takeoff lift coefficients which give the shortest takeoff distance, the hlgbest takeaff wng loadmg, and climb condlhons Just meeting the anwwthmess requrements. Example...

Through harvesting of the increased Stokes shift of CdS QDs via Cu-doping, the concentration-quenching or aggregation-quenching of CdS QDs was largely alleviated. A dually-enriched strategy with both polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) twisting and SiO2 loading was developed for generating a highly luminescent doped-dots (d-dots) assembly for improved cell imaging.

In this paper, the conformal mapping method was adopted to solve the problem of an infinite plate containing a central lip-shaped crack subjected to remote biaxial loading. A kind of leaf-shaped configuration was also constructed in order to solve the problem. The analytical result showed that the singularity order of the stress field at the tip of a lip-shaped crack remains −1/2, despite the d...