# Tip: How to write a referee’s review of a journal manuscript

The critic

After earning your advanced degree (often even before), a journal editor might contact you to provide a technical review of a submitted manuscript. For guidance on how to do that, click here.

# Resource: Perfect triples, “nice” unit vectors, and “nice” orthogonal matrices

“NICE” lists:

Perfect Triangles

Have you ever noticed that textbooks often involve so-called 3-4-5 triangles? They do that to make the algebraic manipulations easier for students.  If the two legs of a right triangle are of length 3 and 4, then the hypotenuse (found from the Pythagorean theorem) has a length of 5, which is “nice” in the sense that it is an integer rather than an irrational square root that more typically comes from solving the Pythagorean theorem. As discussed in many elementary math sites (such as MakingMathematics.org), another example of a “nice” triangle is the 5-12-13 triangle, since $5^2+12^2=13^2$.

The external links in this posting contain a list of more of these so-called perfect triples of integers $\{a,b,c\}$ for which $a^2+b^2=c^2$. Perfect triples are also used to create “nice” 2D unit vectors whose components are each rational numbers (instead of involving irrational square roots from the normalization process). For example, the classic unit vector based on the 3-4-5 perfect triple is simply $\{\frac{3}{5},\frac{4}{5}\}$. Continue reading

# Research: Worn Ceramic-on-Ceramic Hip Implants Squeak Only When Dry Under Low Loads

Some ceramic-on-ceramic hip implants have been shown to squeak in vivo. While many researchers have investigated the squeaking phenomenon, the root cause is still debated. The most widely accepted hypotheses postulate that squeaking occurs as a result of edge-loading, stripe-wear, vibrations that are amplified by the femoral stem, dryness, or a combination of the foregoing. In our custom test apparatus to asses wear related squeaking, we found that even when both implants are severely worn, squeaking only occurs under dry conditions as shown in the attached video.

Ceramic-on-Ceramic Hip Implants Squeak Only When Dry

# Tip: Maintaining “AboutME” notes and marketing yourself to recruiters

Don’t wait until a few months before graduation to realize that your résumé is “lacking.”  While paid consultants,  like those at the University of Utah’s Alumni Career Services might help you create a visually appealing résumé, they can’t help you with the actual content. That’s up to you!

# Publications: Nonuniqueness and instability of classical formulations of nonassociative plasticity

A plot of the frequency-dependent wave propagation velocity for the case study problem with an overlocal plasticity model, with the elastic and local hardening wave speeds shown for reference (left). Stress histories using an overlocal plasticity model with a nonlocal length scale of 1m and a mesh resolution of 0.125m (right)

The following series of three articles (with common authors J. Burghardt and R. Brannon of the University of Utah) describes a state of insufficient experimental validation of conventional formulations of nonassociative plasticity (AKA nonassociated and non-normality).  This work provides a confirmation that such models theoretically admit negative net work in closed strain cycles, but this simple prediction has never been validated or disproved in the laboratory!