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2005

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Mercury Contamination Of Channel And Floodplain Sediments In Wilson Creek Watershed, Southwest Missouri, Willard E. Rodgers Ii Jan 2005

Mercury Contamination Of Channel And Floodplain Sediments In Wilson Creek Watershed, Southwest Missouri, Willard E. Rodgers Ii

Graduate Theses/Dissertations

Mercury (Hg) is a pollutant affecting aquatic environments and human health world wide. Sediments in urban streams can store Hg from historical industrial waste releases in channel and floodplain deposits. Subsequent erosion of these deposits can remobilize sediment-bound Hg impacting downstream receiving waters. This study describes the distribution of Hg in floodplain and channel sediments of Wilson Creek and its tributaries using geochemical sediment analysis and cesium-137 dating. The upper Wilson Creek watershed drains the southern two-thirds of Springfield, Missouri. Results indicate that Hg concentrations in overbank and active channel sediments along the entire stream length are elevated above the …

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Games People Play: Identity And Relationships In An Online Role-Playing Game, Jennifer Bortle Jan 2005

Games People Play: Identity And Relationships In An Online Role-Playing Game, Jennifer Bortle

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The following is a study of online relationships and identity formation in Everquest, a multiplayer online role-playing game. Using a phenomenological and reflexive approach, the study seeks to explicate the attractions of this type of online forum, which draws hundreds of thousands of players who spend many hours each week playing the game. Three Everquest players' experiences are considered in light of literature from mainstream psychological, social constructionist, psychodynamic, and cyborg theory, with special focus on the players' reports of the dialogue between player and character, and of the nature of their relationships in Everquest. Subjects participated in a non-directive, …

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Migraine: An Existential Phenomenological Study, Jodie Eckenrod Jan 2005

Migraine: An Existential Phenomenological Study, Jodie Eckenrod

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examined the structure of the migraine headache experience. Three adult participants were asked to give a written answer to the question: "Please describe a time you experienced a migraine headache. Please explain what was happening before the headache, during the headache and how it was resolved." The participants were then asked for an audio taped interview with the researcher, the purpose of which was to further explore unclear areas in the written response. The written response and audio taped interview comprised the data sets for phenomenological analysis. From the data from the three participants, a general narrative of …

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Questioning The Rhetorical Eclipse Of Philosophical Leisure: Ad Colloquium Conferendum, Annette M. Holba Jan 2005

Questioning The Rhetorical Eclipse Of Philosophical Leisure: Ad Colloquium Conferendum, Annette M. Holba

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Human communication in our postmodern era has degenerated into phatic communication. Phatic communication, appropriate in some circumstances, used unreflectively limits the ability for the development of healthy, idea-laden conversation. The phatic nature of communication represents a loss of human interest in human communication. Philosophical leisure can help to recapture the element of human interest in conversation, which recuperates an over-abundance of phaticity in human communication. Recuperation of communication occurs when ideas drive conversation. Philosophical leisure can help human beings to find substance for those ideas. This study considers how philosophical leisure can enrich human communication.

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New York City Police Officers' Experiences Of The September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks: An Existential Psychological Study, Cecile S. Irvine Jan 2005

New York City Police Officers' Experiences Of The September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attacks: An Existential Psychological Study, Cecile S. Irvine

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The police officers of the NYPD who responded to the scene of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001 faced a sudden and large-scale catastrophe that caused the deaths of many innocent civilians and threatened their own lives. The present study examines the lived meanings of this experience for three police officers who survived the collapse of the Twin Towers while acting in the performance of their duty. Although a great deal of research has been conducted in the field of psychological trauma, the existential meaning of traumatic events for those that live through them …

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Continuity In The Absence Of Declarative Memory In Patients With Moderate Dementia Of The Alzheimer's Type, Scott Frederick Kaper Jan 2005

Continuity In The Absence Of Declarative Memory In Patients With Moderate Dementia Of The Alzheimer's Type, Scott Frederick Kaper

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Objective: The standard paradigm of research into dementia of the Alzheimer's type (DAT) has yielded little in the way of effective patient treatment. Recent neuroscientific advances into the understanding of implicit memory have opened up new possibilities of patient care. The ontology developed within the existentialphenomenological (EP) tradition provided the best foundation for further research in this direction, toward restoring moderately impaired DAT patients to Erikson's last normative stage of development, gerotranscendence. Drawing from the EP tradition, the idea of continuity was developed for this research. Continuity is composed of four domains: postural modality, discourse, and the patient's focal relationships …

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Knowledge Management In Training In Hampton Roads, Virginia, Stephanie Mckinney Jan 2005

Knowledge Management In Training In Hampton Roads, Virginia, Stephanie Mckinney

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

To guide this study, the following research goals were developed: 1. Determine the number of Hampton Roads, Virginia businesses using knowledge management as an integral part of training; 2. Determine what types of knowledge management processes are currently being used; 3. Determine the importance of knowledge management as an area for current and future training

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Correlation Between Sol Scores And Personal Computer Ownership With Internet Access, Christy Yaple Jan 2005

Correlation Between Sol Scores And Personal Computer Ownership With Internet Access, Christy Yaple

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

This study was used to gain information about the success of underrepresented high school students with regard to SOL scores and having a personal computer with internet access. The following hypothesis was developed to guide this study: Magna Vista High School Educational Talent Search students having a personal computer with internet access will have a higher pass rate on Virginia Standards of Learning mathematics tests.

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Alternative High Schools On The Virginia Peninsula, Oliver Robertson Jan 2005

Alternative High Schools On The Virginia Peninsula, Oliver Robertson

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

To guide this study the following research goals were used: 1. Identify the number of seats in Peninsula alternative schools; 2. Identify the academic resources of those schools; 3. Identify the admittance criteria to those schools; 4. Identify the credit and degree the student receives at completion of those alternative schools; 5. Determine the future capacity of alternative high schools on the Virginia Peninsula.

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Effects Of Ph On Biomass Allocation In Acer Rubrum Seedlings, Marc C. Wingett Jan 2005

Effects Of Ph On Biomass Allocation In Acer Rubrum Seedlings, Marc C. Wingett

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

Through the analysis of the data collected from the uniform growing parameters across all control and treatment pottings, the following hypothesis was considered: 1. From a neutral pH of 7, there is a positive correlation between the lowered pH of precipitation and the above and below ground biomass allocation in Acer rubrum seedlings.

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Old Dominion University Department Of Human Resources Customer Satisfaction Study, September C. Sanderlin Jan 2005

Old Dominion University Department Of Human Resources Customer Satisfaction Study, September C. Sanderlin

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

The problem of this study was to evaluate the level of customer satisfaction with the services provided by the Old Dominion University Department of Human Resources. The following goals provided direction to this study: 1) What are the Department of Human Resources' baseline service levels? 2)How effectively does the Department of Human Resources meet its customer's human needs? 3) What products and services can the Department of Human Resources improve to better meet its customers' needs? 4) What is the overall level of customer satisfaction with the Department of Human Resources?

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Attitudes Of Potential Employers In Southwestern Virginia Toward Hiring Newly Licensed Physical Therapist Assistants Who Are Graduates Of The Wytheville Community College Physical Therapist Assistant Program, Julia S. Jackson King Jan 2005

Attitudes Of Potential Employers In Southwestern Virginia Toward Hiring Newly Licensed Physical Therapist Assistants Who Are Graduates Of The Wytheville Community College Physical Therapist Assistant Program, Julia S. Jackson King

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

The research goals included: 1. Did employers of physical therapist assistants feel positively toward graduates of the Wytheville Community College Physical Therapist Assistant program? 2. Would an employer prioritize a new graduate from Wytheville over a new graduate from any other program if all other applicable experience was equal? 3. What did employers identify as the strengths and weaknesses of the Wytheville program?

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Human Resources Managers And The Family Medical Leave Act, Rhonda Taylor Jan 2005

Human Resources Managers And The Family Medical Leave Act, Rhonda Taylor

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

The following objectives were established to answer the problem: 1. Determine the opinions of Human Resources Managers regarding employees' use of Family Medical Leave; 2. Determine whether employees are excessively using Family Medical Leave benefits; 3. Determine Human Resources Managers topics for training on Family Medical Leave practices.

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Gender And Programming Language Preferences Of Computer Programming Students At Moraine Valley Community College, Dawn Patitucci Jan 2005

Gender And Programming Language Preferences Of Computer Programming Students At Moraine Valley Community College, Dawn Patitucci

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

The objectives of this study were to answer the following questions: 1. Are female programming students more likely to pursue study in certain programming languages than in other languages? 2. Are females more or less likely to pursue study in multiple programming languages than males? 3. As compared with the percentage of females working as computer programmers nationwide, are females over- or under-represented in certain language tracks at Moraine Valley Community College? 4. Which language(s) might be useful in attracting more females to computer programming and software development?

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Determining The Benefits Of Seeking Phlebotomy Program Approval From The National Accrediting Agency For Clinical Laboratory Sciences, Frankie Harris-Lyne Jan 2005

Determining The Benefits Of Seeking Phlebotomy Program Approval From The National Accrediting Agency For Clinical Laboratory Sciences, Frankie Harris-Lyne

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

The goals of this study were to answer the following questions: Do approved programs provide access to data not available for non-approved programs? Does a change from a non-approved program to an approved program change the curriculum model? Is it financially feasible for the college to seek program approval status? Does an approved program increase credibility in recruitment? Does graduation from an approved program allow students to enter the workforce more efficiently than graduates of non-approved programs?

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Student Reaction To The Use Of Classroom Performance And Personal Response Systems In College Level Courses, Edmund A. Donato Jan 2005

Student Reaction To The Use Of Classroom Performance And Personal Response Systems In College Level Courses, Edmund A. Donato

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

The goals of this study were established to determine: 1. How do students perceive the effectiveness of the Classroom Performance System and Personal Response Systems in engaging them in the learning process? 2. How do students perceive the effectiveness of the Classroom Performance System and Personal Response Systems in aiding educators with evaluating their learning?

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Effects Of Technology Education On Middle School Language Arts (Reading) Achievement, Mark A. Bolt Jan 2005

Effects Of Technology Education On Middle School Language Arts (Reading) Achievement, Mark A. Bolt

OTS Master's Level Projects & Papers

The purpose of this study was to compare eighth grade students at Rachel Carson Middle School who took eighth grade Technology Education and the effect it had on student achievement on the reading section of the Virginia English Standards of Learning test.

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The Role Of The Pseudomonas Aeruginosa 1244 Pilin Glycan In Virulence, Jennifer Roguskie Jan 2005

The Role Of The Pseudomonas Aeruginosa 1244 Pilin Glycan In Virulence, Jennifer Roguskie

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The pili of P. aeruginosa 1244 are involved in a post-translational modification in which an acidic carbohydrate moiety structurally similar to the lipopolysaccahride (LPS) O-antigen is covalently attached to the pilin protein. It has been shown that this associated glycan is evenly distributed over the entire surface of the pilus. Because of its prime location along the pilus, experiments were conducted to determine if the pilin glycan contributed to the virulence of P. aeruginosa. Initial studies involved the assessment of LD50 values to demonstrate that acquisition of the exoU gene increased the virulence of PA1244. Interestingly, the LD50 studies suggested …

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Healing Violence In South Africa: A Textual Reading Of Kentridge's 'Drawings For Projection', Vanessa Thompson Jan 2005

Healing Violence In South Africa: A Textual Reading Of Kentridge's 'Drawings For Projection', Vanessa Thompson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

While the literature appears to understand trauma and violence as experienced singularly, and as effecting intrapsychic changes or reactions, latterly there has been a recognition that this understanding of the term 'trauma' may not be adequate to describe violence suffered over a prolonged period of time. Further, psychology tends to avert our attention from healing by attending to symptomatology. In South Africa, during the apartheid years (1948-1994), violence was constituted by an extraordinary threat to ongoing being and was informed by a totalitarian prejudice. Creative texts, unlike traumatic texts, show how many artists have worked with South African traumas in …

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The Self-Reported Multicultural Sports Counseling Competencies Among Professional School Counselors And Play It Smart Academic Coaches, Taunya Tinsley Jan 2005

The Self-Reported Multicultural Sports Counseling Competencies Among Professional School Counselors And Play It Smart Academic Coaches, Taunya Tinsley

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study compared the self-reported multicultural sports counseling competencies of professional school counselors and Play It Smart academic coaches. Specifically, the study explored the differences in multicultural awareness, multicultural counseling knowledge, multicultural counseling skills, and the multicultural counseling relationship among professionals who provide counseling services to high school student athletes. Defining culture inclusively allows the extension of the definition of multicultural counseling to include the student athlete population. This study compared the multicultural sports counseling competencies of professional school counselors and academic coaches affiliated with high schools throughout the United States that utilize the National Football Foundation's Play It Smart …

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Generic And Professional Health Care Beliefs, Expressions And Practices Of Syrian Muslims Living In The Midwestern United States, Hiba Wehbe-Alamah Jan 2005

Generic And Professional Health Care Beliefs, Expressions And Practices Of Syrian Muslims Living In The Midwestern United States, Hiba Wehbe-Alamah

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this ethnonursing study was to discover the generic and professional health care beliefs, expressions, and practices of Syrian Muslims living in the Midwestern United States and to describe the influence of worldview, cultural context, and social structure, such as technological, religious, political, educational, and economical factors on their folk care beliefs and practices. Leininger's Culture Care Theory was used as an orientational framework for this study. Ten key and twenty general informants participated in this study. Several qualitative enablers were used to assist with the collection and analysis of data. QSR NUD*IST 4, a qualitative research software …

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P2p And The Future Of Private Copying, Peter K. Yu Jan 2005

P2p And The Future Of Private Copying, Peter K. Yu

Faculty Scholarship

Since the beginning of the P2P file-sharing controversy, commentators have discussed the radical expansion of copyright law, the industry's controversial enforcement tactics, the need for new legislative and business models, the changing social norms, and the evolving interplay of politics and market conditions. Although these discussions have delved into the many aspects of the controversy, none of them presents a big picture of the issues or explains how they fit within the larger file-sharing debate.

Using a holistic approach, this Article brings together existing scholarship while offering some thoughts on the future of private copying. The Article does not seek …

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The Trust And Distrust Of Intellectual Property Rights, Peter K. Yu Jan 2005

The Trust And Distrust Of Intellectual Property Rights, Peter K. Yu

Faculty Scholarship

In the past, intellectual property issues were considered complex, obscure, and highly technical; they were only of interest and concern to intellectual property attorneys, legal scholars, technology developers, and rightsholders. Thanks to the Internet and new communications technologies, however, intellectual property has now begun to play a more significant role in society.

In December 2003, the first phase of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) was held in Geneva. While the conference affirmed the importance of intellectual property rights and free access to information and knowledge, the resulting Declaration of Principles and Plan of Action fail to address …

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Shadow Detection By Combined Photometric Invariants For Improved Foreground Segmentation, Filiz Bunyak, Ilker Ersoy, S. R. Subramanya Jan 2005

Shadow Detection By Combined Photometric Invariants For Improved Foreground Segmentation, Filiz Bunyak, Ilker Ersoy, S. R. Subramanya

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Detection and tracking of moving objects are the essential steps of many video understanding applications such as traffic monitoring, video surveillance and visual event recognition. Moving object detection process segments the scene into foreground (moving) and background regions. Moving cast shadows cause serious problems in this process because they can easily be misclassified as foreground. This misclassification may lead to drastic changes in the shapes of objects or merging of multiple objects. in this paper, we present a method to detect moving cast shadows to improve the performance of moving object detection. the foreground regions are processed in terms of …

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Signaling And Precedent In Federal District Court Opinions, Andrew P. Morriss, Michael Heise, Gregory C. Sisk Jan 2005

Signaling And Precedent In Federal District Court Opinions, Andrew P. Morriss, Michael Heise, Gregory C. Sisk

Faculty Scholarship

Standard economic analysis of judicial behavior, at least with respect to federal judges, has to some extent foundered on the apparent success of the Constitution's framers in designing an institution where almost the whole thrust of the rules governing compensation and other terms and conditions of judicial employment is to divorce judicial action from incentives. That is, the structure takes away the carrots and sticks and the different benefits and costs associated with different behaviors which inform human action in an economic model. Nonetheless, our earlier empirical work, as well as work by others, found significant associations between promotion potential …

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Upper Limits On Gravitational Wave Bursts In Ligo’S Second Science Run, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, W. G. Anderson, Mario C. Diaz, Wm. R. Johnston, Soumya Mohanty, Soma Mukherjee, Cristina V. Torres Jan 2005

Upper Limits On Gravitational Wave Bursts In Ligo’S Second Science Run, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, W. G. Anderson, Mario C. Diaz, Wm. R. Johnston, Soumya Mohanty, Soma Mukherjee, Cristina V. Torres

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Publications

We perform a search for gravitational wave bursts using data from the second science run of the LIGO detectors, using a method based on a wavelet time-frequency decomposition. This search is sensitive to bursts of duration much less than a second and with frequency content in the 100–1100 Hz range. It features significant improvements in the instrument sensitivity and in the analysis pipeline with respect to the burst search previously reported by LIGO. Improvements in the search method allow exploring weaker signals, relative to the detector noise floor, while maintaining a low false alarm rate, O ( 0.1 ) μ …

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Search For Gravitational Waves From Primordial Black Hole Binary Coalescences In The Galactic Halo, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, Mario C. Diaz, Wm. R. Johnston, Soma Mukherjee, Soumya Mohanty, Cristina V. Torres Jan 2005

Search For Gravitational Waves From Primordial Black Hole Binary Coalescences In The Galactic Halo, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, Mario C. Diaz, Wm. R. Johnston, Soma Mukherjee, Soumya Mohanty, Cristina V. Torres

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Publications

We use data from the second science run of the LIGO gravitational-wave detectors to search for the gravitational waves from primordial black hole binary coalescence with component masses in the range 0.2–1.0M⊙. The analysis requires a signal to be found in the data from both LIGO observatories, according to a set of coincidence criteria. No inspiral signals were found. Assuming a spherical halo with core radius 5 kpc extending to 50 kpc containing nonspinning black holes with masses in the range 0.2–1.0M⊙, we place an observational upper limit on the rate of primordial black hole coalescence of 63 per year …

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Upper Limits On A Stochastic Background Of Gravitational Waves, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, Mario C. Diaz, Soma Mukherjee, Soumya Mohanty, Cristina V. Torres Jan 2005

Upper Limits On A Stochastic Background Of Gravitational Waves, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, Mario C. Diaz, Soma Mukherjee, Soumya Mohanty, Cristina V. Torres

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Publications

The Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory has performed a third science run with much improved sensitivities of all three interferometers. We present an analysis of approximately 200 hours of data acquired during this run, used to search for a stochastic background of gravitational radiation. We place upper bounds on the energy density stored as gravitational radiation for three different spectral power laws. For the flat spectrum, our limit of Ω0

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Upper Limits From The Ligo And Tama Detectors On The Rate Of Gravitational-Wave Bursts, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, W. G. Anderson, Mario C. Diaz, Wm. R. Johnston, Soumya Mohanty, Cristina V. Torres Jan 2005

Upper Limits From The Ligo And Tama Detectors On The Rate Of Gravitational-Wave Bursts, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, W. G. Anderson, Mario C. Diaz, Wm. R. Johnston, Soumya Mohanty, Cristina V. Torres

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Publications

We report on the first joint search for gravitational waves by the TAMA and LIGO collaborations. We looked for millisecond-duration unmodeled gravitational-wave bursts in 473 hr of coincident data collected during early 2003. No candidate signals were found. We set an upper limit of 0.12 events per day on the rate of detectable gravitational-wave bursts, at 90% confidence level. From software simulations, we estimate that our detector network was sensitive to bursts with root-sum-square strain amplitude above approximately 1–3×10−19  Hz−1/2 in the frequency band 700-2000 Hz. We describe the details of this collaborative search, with particular emphasis on its advantages …

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Limits On Gravitational-Wave Emission From Selected Pulsars Using Ligo Data, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, Mario C. Diaz, Wm. R. Johnston, Soumya Mohanty, Soma Mukherjee, Cristina V. Torres Jan 2005

Limits On Gravitational-Wave Emission From Selected Pulsars Using Ligo Data, B. P. Abbott, R. Abbott, Mario C. Diaz, Wm. R. Johnston, Soumya Mohanty, Soma Mukherjee, Cristina V. Torres

Physics & Astronomy Faculty Publications

We place direct upper limits on the amplitude of gravitational waves from 28 isolated radio pulsars by a coherent multidetector analysis of the data collected during the second science run of the LIGO interferometric detectors. These are the first direct upper limits for 26 of the 28 pulsars. We use coordinated radio observations for the first time to build radio-guided phase templates for the expected gravitational-wave signals. The unprecedented sensitivity of the detectors allows us to set strain upper limits as low as a few times 10−24. These strain limits translate into limits on the equatorial ellipticities of the pulsars, …

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