New projects in particle physics

Recent results in the field of particle physics raise many questions on the elementary constituents of matter and their interactions. These cannot be answered, nor the latest theoretical predictions verified, without accelerators operating at higher energies. Pending world-wide collaboration for the construction of a gigantic accelerator, individual nations are engaged in an increasingly competitive race to construct such machines. The author describes the main assemblies under construction or currently planned in Western Europe, the USA and the USSR, and discusses the technical, financial, political, and, by no means least, human problems involved.     

Communication aids for the deaf

While the majority of those afflicted with deafness must still seek relief by conventional methods, new technological developments open up the possibility of aids of quite novel kinds. This article reviews the principal lines of research now being pursued.     

Fact and fantasy in chemical analysis

Chemical analysis is now so precise and sophisticated a science that it is difficult to appreciate that scarcely a century ago its deficiencies were a cause for public scandal. This article reviews some of the main causes for complaint and how they were remedied.     

Water-clocks and time measurement in classical antiquity

The water-clock was the first mechanical device for time measurement to be used by the Greeks. Previously they had relied on sundials, or observation of the phases of the moon or the position of the sun in the zodiac to locate points of time within the day, month or year; and by the mid-fifth century BC they had made some progress with the difficult calendar problems due to the fact that the solar day, the lunar month, and the solar year are not commensurable with each other in whole numbers.     

Structural aspects of controllability and observability—I. tensorial aggregation

The classical criteria for controllability and observability are given a tensorial formulation which is then extended into Boolean form directly related to a digraph interpretation of system structure. This is examined in detail with particular reference to group theoretic aspects, invariant properties under transformation, the term rank test and the existence of zero eigenvalues.Within this framework the structural design concepts of potential controllability and observability are presented in generalised terms.     

Structural aspects of controllability and Sobservability—II. digraph decomposition

The graph theoretic aspects of controllability and observability are examined and related to the tensorial formulation of Part I of the paper. Particular emphasis is given to the significance of the system digraph decomposition and the relevance of this to certain system algebraic properties of interest in control theory.