The purpose of this study is to implement Plant the Seed, a garden-based nutrition education program designed to reconnect children with locally grown food, food environments of the past and present, and the benefits of eating seasonal foods. The pilot study investigates environmental context and theory variables known to influence healthy food choice behavior. Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) provided a framework for the program's curriculum and evaluation. The target audience is middle school students. Plant the Seed is a two-part program. In Part 1 (classroom), students participate in practical, interactive activities based on specific educational objectives that target theory mediators. In Part 2 (field trip), students rotate through the community farm, kitchen herb garden and historic kitchen to engage in hands-on program activities. Pretest/posttest evaluation compared control and intervention students from two schools measured program effectiveness. Intervention school students (n = 16) improved behavioral intention (3.40 vs 3.53, P = 0.34), historical social norm (3.40 vs 3.79, P = 0.03), and outcome expectations (3.91 vs 4.19, P = 0.03). No change in variables among control students (n = 10). Plant the Seed had a positive impact on factors associated with healthy eating behavior. This program demonstrates how to effectively engage community resources, to promote the development and implementation of gardening environments that create hands-on opportunities for children to become directly connected to local food production, to learn about the environmental benefits of eating locally grown foods and to allow children to have access to a positive, sustainable food environment. Plant the Seed can serve as a model for future theory and garden-based nutrition intervention programs.

We report on a fabrication process that uses SOI substrates and micromachining techniques to form wide-IF SIS mixer devices that have suspended metal beam leads for rf grounding. The mixers are formed on thin 25 m membranes of Si, and are designed to operate in the 200-300 GHz band. Potential applications are in tropospheric chemistry, where increased sensitivity detectors and wide-IF bandwidth receivers are desired. They will also be useful in astrophysics to monitor absorption lines for CO at 230 GHz to study distant, highly redshifted galaxies by reducing scan times. Aside from a description of the fabrication process, electrical measurements of these Nb/ Al-AlN x / Nb trilayer devices will also be presented. Since device quality is sensitive to thermal excursions, the new beam lead process appears to be compatible with conventional SIS device fabrication technology.

We report the use of low-energy nitrogen ion beams to form ultra-thin (<2 nm) layers of AlNx to act as tunnel barriers in Nb/Al–AlNx/Nb Josephson junctions. We fabricated reproducible, high-quality devices with independent control of the ion energy and dose, enabling exploration of a wide parameter space. Critical current density Jc ranged from 550 to 9400 A/cm2 with subgap-to-normal resistance ratios from 50 to 12.6. The spatial variation of ion-current density was roughly correlated with Jc over a large-area on a Si substrate. The junctions were stable on annealing up to temperatures of at least 200 °C. This technique could be applied to form other metal nitrides at room temperature for device applications where a high degree of control is desired.

No abstract

No abstract