Moral anger, but not moral disgust, responds to intentionality.

We propose that, when people judge moral situations, anger responds to the contextual cues of harm and intentionality. On the other hand, disgust responds uniquely to whether or not a bodily norm violation has occurred; its apparent response to harm and intent is entirely explained by the coactivation of anger. We manipulated intent, harm, and bodily norm violation (eating human flesh) within a vignette describing a scientific experiment. Participants then rated their anger, disgust, and moral judgment, as well as various appraisals. Anger responded independently of disgust to harm and intentionality, whereas disgust responded independently of anger only to whether or not the act violated the bodily norm of cannibalism. Theoretically relevant appraisals accounted for the effects of harm and intent on anger; however, appraisals of abnormality did not fully account for the effects of the manipulations on disgust. Our results show that anger and disgust are separately elicited by different cues in a moral situation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Electrical Conductance of Bolted Copper Joints for Cryogenic Applications

We present the results of electric contact resistance measurements at low temperatures on copper-to-copper bolted joints. Our accurate and systematic data display a rather small dispersion, and may be a useful tool for cryogenic applications like pulse-tubes, dilution refrigerators and nuclear refrigerators.     

Analysis of strain error sources in micro-beam Laue diffraction

Micro-beam Laue diffraction is an experimental method that allows the measurement of local lattice orientation and elastic strain within individual grains of engineering alloys, ceramics, and other polycrystalline materials. Unlike other analytical techniques, e.g. based on electron microscopy, it is not limited to surface characterisation or thin sections, but rather allows non-destructive measurements in the material bulk. This is of particular importance for in situ loading experiments where the mechanical response of a material volume (rather than just surface) is studied and it is vital that no perturbation/disturbance is introduced by the measurement technique. Whilst the technique allows lattice orientation to be determined to a high level of precision, accurate measurement of elastic strains and estimating the errors involved is a significant challenge. We propose a simulation-based approach to assess the elastic strain errors that arise from geometrical perturbations of the experimental setup. Using an empirical combination rule, the contributions of different geometrical uncertainties to the overall experimental strain error are estimated. This approach was applied to the micro-beam Laue diffraction setup at beamline BM32 at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF). Using a highly perfect germanium single crystal, the mechanical stability of the instrument was determined and hence the expected strain errors predicted. Comparison with the actual strain errors found in a silicon four-point beam bending test showed good agreement. The simulation-based error analysis approach makes it possible to understand the origins of the experimental strain errors and thus allows a directed improvement of the experimental geometry to maximise the benefit in terms of strain accuracy.     

Volatile flavour profile changes in selected field pea cultivars as affected by crop year and processing

The objectives of this study were to evaluate the effect of cultivar, crop year and processing (dry milling, cooking and dehulling) on volatile flavour compounds of field peas using an optimised headspace-solid phase microextraction gas chromatography–mass spectrometry method. Significant differences in area counts of volatile compounds were observed between the different cultivars as well as in area counts of volatile compounds of each cultivar grown in different crop years. Results showed significant reduction in total area counts (TAC) of volatile compounds after cooking and dehulling the seeds. Major differences between whole seeds, cooked and dehulled seeds were found in aldehydes, alcohols, and ketones. Cooked–dehulled peas had the least TAC (7.83E±05) of the volatile compounds compared to the milled-whole peas (6.36E±06), cooked-whole peas (2.00E±06) and milled–dehulled peas (4.33E±06). The results suggest that volatile flavour compounds of different field peas were affected by the cultivar, crop year as well as processing conditions.     

Dealing with a social externality – alcohol and health

Public awareness of illness resulting from the harmful consumption of alcohol is increasing. Public-health reaction has been to determine types of health problems, treatments and interventions. Work is continuing at international and national levels, supported by research leading to policy and cooperative public-health developments. The proportionality of the response by the alcoholic beverages industry has been questioned. The business risks are wide ranging principally due to a less than fully professional managerial response to existing concerns and pressure for more general interventions. The Australian wine industry response to this form of externality has been to meet regulatory requirements. It also cooperates with national market interventions, but as far as possible on a ‘self-regulatory’ basis. Their approach is similar to that taken by the international alcohol and tobacco industries consisting of a low-level contribution. The opportunity to create a more holistic strategy to improve both public-health and business outcomes is examined including identification of variables towards a cost–benefit analysis. The differentiated situation of ‘small and medium’ enterprises is considered. Failing any new initiatives, by the industry, more general interventions can be expected starting in 2013. Why would an industry ignore such risks?     

La validation du QSA et la prévalence des styles d'attachement adulte dans un échantillon francophone de Montréal.

Investigated the validation of the Attachment Style Questionnaire (ASQ) and the prevalence of the styles of adult attachment in a French-speaking sample of Montreal. The first part of the study showed that the presumed dimensions of the ASQ had little validity for a sample of 356 individuals between the ages of 14 and 44. Exploratory factor analysis of the ASQ for this sample instead revealed two factors: Avoidance of social relations and Preoccupation with being loved. The second part of the study showed that in the sample, which was somewhat biased toward low SES, prevalence of the autonomous attachment style was about 35% for individuals between the ages of 14 and 44. This is considerably lower than the prevalence generally found for parents and university students. The results support the notions of gender and age differences in the distribution of adult attachment styles. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sheet-like carbon particles with graphene structures obtained from a Bunsen flame

Carbon particle structures containing only a few graphene layers have been collected from a Bunsen (propane) diffusion flame in the low particle concentration pale yellow luminous regions close to the soot inception. These particles were sampled directly on transmission electron microscopy grids for structural and elemental analysis. They were found to be several hundreds of nanometers in size. Such large structures are not easily explained from gas-phase kinetic models, yet the sheets occurred relatively frequent in the images. Some pictures also showed interesting polygonal few-layered graphitic structures perpendicular to the graphene planes.     

Episodic memory and episodic future thinking in adults with autism.

The ability to remember past experiences (episodic memory) is thought to be related to the ability to imagine possible future experiences (episodic future thinking). Although previous research has established that individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) have diminished episodic memory, episodic future thinking has not previously been investigated within this population. In the present study, high-functioning adults with ASD were compared to closely matched typical adults on a task requiring participants to report a series of events that happened to them in the past and a series of events that might happen to them in the future. For each event described, participants completed two modified Memory Characteristics Questionnaire items to assess self-reported phenomenal qualities associated with remembering and imagining, including self-perspective and degree of autonoetic awareness. Participants also completed letter, category, and ideational fluency tasks. Results indicated that participants with ASD recalled/imagined significantly fewer specific events than did comparison participants and that participants with ASD demonstrated impaired episodic memory and episodic future thinking. In line with this finding, participants with ASD were less likely than comparison participants to report taking a field (first-person) perspective and were more likely to report taking an observer (third-person) perspective during retrieval of past events (but not during simulation of future events), highlighting that they were less likely to mentally reexperience past events from their own point of view. There were no group differences in self-reported levels of autonoetic awareness or fluency task performance. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Electroactivity of RuO2–IrO2 mixed nanocatalysts toward the oxygen evolution reaction in a water electrolyzer supplied by a solar profile

Pure crystalline ruthenium–iridium oxide materials were synthesized with high surface area by co-precipitation method in ethanol medium. Cyclic and linear scan voltammetries were then undertaken to evaluate the effect of mixing iridium and ruthenium oxides on the oxygen evolution reaction (OER). The activity of these anode catalysts was evidenced through the determination of their capacitances, surface charges and Tafel slopes. It was found that the Ru_0.9Ir_0.1O₂ catalyst presented catalytic properties close to those of RuO₂, in particular for low overpotentials. The proposed synthesis method was also shown to be suitable for recovering large catalyst amount for O₂ production in a large surface proton exchange membrane water electrolyzer (PEMWE). Polarization measurements were therefore performed in a single PEMWE cell and the durability of the catalytic materials was evaluated by supplying a solar power profile. The efficiency loss at 1 A cm⁻² and 80 °C was only 90 μV h⁻¹ for 1000 h under galvanodynamic operating conditions for Ru_0.9Ir_0.1O₂ as anode, while the cell voltage varied between 1.75 and 1.85 V.