The Advanced Photoinjector Experiment (APEX) at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory is dedicated to the development of a high-brightness high-repetition rate (MHz-class) electron injector for x-ray free-electron laser (FEL) and other applications where high repetition rates and high brightness are simultaneously required. The injector is based on a new concept rf gun utilizing a normal-conducting (NC) cavity resonating in the VHF band at 186 MHz, and operating in continuous wave (cw) mode in conjunction with high quantum efficiency photocathodes capable of delivering the required charge at MHz repetition rates with available laser technology. The APEX activities are staged in three phases. In phase 0, the NC cw gun is built and tested to demonstrate the major milestones to validate the gun design and performance. Also, starting in phase 0 and continuing in phase I, different photocathodes are tested at the gun energy and at full repetition rate for validating candidate materials to operate in a high-repetition rate FEL. In phase II, a room-temperature pulsed linac is added for accelerating the beam at several tens of MeV to reduce space charge effects and allow the measurement of the brightness of the beam from the gun when integrated in an injector scheme. The installation of the phase 0 beam line and the commissioning of the VHF gun are completed, phase I components are under fabrication, and initial design and specification of components and layout for phase II are under way. This paper presents the phase 0 commissioning results with emphasis on the experimental milestones that have successfully demonstrated the APEX gun capability of operating at the required performance.

This paper describes the Patient Record Manager and the Workflow toolset of the wireless-based e-health system Ward-In-Hand, developed inside an IST European project and currently in use within three hospital wards: Italy, Spain and Germany. The lack of homogeneity in the healthcare organisations required a suitable implementation of WorkFlow automation tools to create and manage the execution of the caregiving processes, customising them to local ward needs. Solutions for this problem, as well as the integration of the workflow organiser, to be used by individual health professional during daily activity, with the Patient record Manager are discussed

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The first step in making sure that R&D spending is productive is to be sure it is going in the same direction as the overall business strategy. Simple enough to say but not always so simple to do. Chris Pappas suggests that the corporate strategy process often focuses on financial factors and market share and neglects technology as a key resource to be planned. With competitive success as well as productivity and profitability becoming more directly tied to technology development, it is time to give technology a more important place in the corporate strategy process. Using the example of an actual firm, Pappas shows that the key to achieving a sustainable competitive advantage lies in formulating the right technology strategy and integrating it into the corporate planning process. His article includes a useful framework for analysis and planning.

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