Status of the current parabolic dish technology

Vu-graphs are presented that show that point focus distributed receiver distributed generation systems are cost competitive with current utilities. System cost caveats and typical power module costs are described. Major problems inhibiting commercialization of the parabolic dish technology were reviewed

Tuning Knobs for the NLC Final Focus

Compensation of optics errors at the Interaction Point (IP) is essential for maintaining maximum luminosity at the NLC. Several correction systems (knobs) using the Final Focus sextupoles have been designed to provide orthogonal compensation of linear and the second order optics aberrations at IP. Tuning effects of these knobs on the 250 GeV beam were verified using tracking simulations.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Formal executable descriptions of biological systems

The similarities between systems of living entities and systems of concurrent processes may support biological experiments in silico. Process calculi offer a formal framework to describe biological systems, as well as to analyse their behaviour, both from a qualitative and a quantitative point of view. A couple of little examples help us in showing how this can be done. We mainly focus our attention on the qualitative and quantitative aspects of the considered biological systems, and briefly illustrate which kinds of analysis are possible. We use a known stochastic calculus for the first example. We then present some statistics collected by repeatedly running the specification, that turn out to agree with those obtained by experiments in vivo. Our second example motivates a richer calculus. Its stochastic extension requires a non trivial machinery to faithfully reflect the real dynamic behaviour of biological systems

Compensation and Incentives in Medical Networks with Gate-keeping and Case Management

New approaches in health care, such as e.g. Integrated Delivery Systems, affect the role and tasks of medical suppliers. More and more, medical suppliers are incorporated into the process of guiding patients to medical specialists and hospitals and thus managing the course of disease. In this context, the role of medical gate-keepers and case managers may provide opportunities for undesirable behavior (from the network's point of view). Therefore, compensation-induced incentives for gatekeepers and case managers are in the main focus of the paper. Different health care payment systems and the impact of financial and non-financial incentives on case managers and gate-keepers in medical networks are analyzed. Another focus is laid on medical suppliers that are not involved in managing diseases and guiding patients. Due to their smaller margin of actions and possibilities to take advantage of it, reimbursement should emphasize different aspects than for case managers

Orbital fluctuations and strong correlations in quantum dots

In this lecture note we focus our attention to quantum dot systems where exotic strongly correlated behavior develops due to the presence of orbital or charge degrees of freedom. After giving a concise overview of the theory of transport and Kondo effect through a single electron transistor, we discuss how SU(4) Kondo effect develops in dots having orbitally degenerate states and in double dot systems, and then study the singlet-triplet transition in lateral quantum dots. Charge fluctuations and Matveev's mapping to the two-channel Kondo model in the vicinity of charge degeneracy point are also discussed.Comment: Lecture note to appear in Philosophical Magazin