Symbolic and analytic techniques for resource analysis of Java bytecode

Recent work in resource analysis has translated the idea of amortised resource analysis to imperative languages using a program logic that allows mixing of assertions about heap shapes, in the tradition of separation logic, and assertions about consumable resources. Separately, polyhedral methods have been used to calculate bounds on numbers of iterations in loop-based programs. We are attempting to combine these ideas to deal with Java programs involving both data structures and loops, focusing on the bytecode level rather than on source code

Absorbable-susceptor joining of ceramic surfaces

An assembly of ceramic surfaces particularly refractory metal oxides and carbides, abutting a thin sheet of metal susceptor material are placed in a chamber of an enclosure containing inert gas. An RF coil is activated by power supply to melt the susceptor and adjacent zones of the ceramic. Reactive gas such as oxygen or a carbonizing gas is then fed to the chamber and reacts with the susceptor to form compounds which disperse and dissolve in the zones. On cooling, a strong joint is formed. The susceptor may contain inner perforations and outer perforations to aid in distribution of heat

A Natural Value Unit - Econophysics as Arbiter between Finance and Economics

Foreign exchange markets show that currency units (= accounting or nominal price units) are variables. Technical and economic progress evidence that the consumer baskets (= purchasing power units or real price units) are also variables. In contrast, all physical measurement units are constants and either defined in the SI (= metric) convention or based upon natural constants (= "natural" or Planck units). Econophysics can identify a constant natural value scale or vaue unit (natural numaraire) based upon Planck energy. In honour of the economist L. Walras, this "Planck value" could be called walras (Wal), thereby using the SI naming convention. One Wal can be shown to have a physiological and an economic interpretation in that it is equal to the annual minimal real cost of physiological life of a reference person at minimal activity. The price of one Wal in terms of any currency can be estimated by hedonic regression techniques used in inflation measurement (axiometry). This pilot research uses official disaggregated Swiss Producer and Consumer Price Index data and estimates the hedonic walras price (HWP), quoted in Swiss francs in 2003, and its inverse, the physical purchasing power (PhPP) of the Swiss franc in 2003.Comment: 19 pages, 1 table, Appendix with 2 tables, RevTex4, APFA5 200

Sorting by Foot: Consumable Travel-for Local Public Good and Equilibrium Stratification

This paper reexamine Tiebout’s hypothesis of endogenous sorting in a competitive spatial equilibrium setup with both income and preference heterogeneity. Agents decide endogenously the number of trips to consume a travel-for congestable local public good. We show that the equilibrium configuration may be completely segregated, incompletely segregated or completely integrated, depending crucially on the scale of local public good services, relative market rents and the underlying income/preference/local tax parameters. Segregated equilibrium may feature endogenous sorting purely by income or by both income and preferences. Multiple equilibria may arise when the equilibrium configuration is incompletely segregated.Endogenous Sorting, Integrated/Segregated Equilibrium, Income/Preference Heterogeneity

Development of dispersion strengthened tantalum base alloy Eighth quarterly progress report, 20 Aug. - 20 Nov. 1965

Phase identification and morphology studies of dispersion hardened tantalum base alloys for advanced space power use

Automated Additive Construction (AAC) for Earth and Space Using In-situ Resources

Using Automated Additive Construction (AAC), low-fidelity large-scale compressive structures can be produced out of a wide variety of materials found in the environment. Compressionintensive structures need not utilize materials that have tight specifications for internal force management, meaning that the production of the building materials do not require costly methods for their preparation. Where a certain degree of surface roughness can be tolerated, lower-fidelity numerical control of deposited materials can provide a low-cost means for automating building processes, which can be utilized in remote or extreme environments on Earth or in Space. For space missions where every kilogram of mass must be lifted out of Earth’s gravity well, the promise of using in-situ materials for the construction of outposts, facilities, and installations could prove to be enabling if significant reduction of payload mass can be achieved. In a 2015 workshop sponsored by the Keck nstitute for Space Studies, on the topic of Three Dimensional (3D) Additive Construction For Space Using In-situ Resources, was conducted with additive construction experts from around the globe in attendance. The workshop explored disparate efforts, methods, and technologies and established a proposed framework for the field of Additive Construction Using In-situ Resources. This paper defines the field of Automated Additive Construction Using In-situ Resources, describes the state-of-the-art for various methods, establishes a vision for future efforts, identifies gaps in current technologies, explores investment opportunities, and proposes potential technology demonstration missions for terrestrial, International Space Station (ISS), lunar, deep space zero-gravity, and Mars environments

Original Effective, Safe Technique of Obtaining Platelet Rich Plasma by Centrifugation of the Blood Plasma in Modified Syringe Containers

The aim: to develop, substantiate an effective and safe technology for producing PRP (platelet rich plasma). To quantify the substrate based on the recommended centrifugation protocols.Materials and methods: the effectiveness of the original harvesting protocol was evaluated by quantifying the number of platelets. The proposed technique is formed basing on the basic principles of double centrifugation of whole blood in test tubes with anticoagulant, separation with the release of a plasma layer with a high content of platelets.The centrifuging mode for quantifying the effectiveness of the substrate was selected according to recommendations based on a study confirming maximum efficiency (160g×10min + 250g×15min).For quantitative evaluation, blood was collected from 10 healthy volunteers (7 men, 3 women) with an average age of 26.0±2.6, and centrifuged in standard mode. Quantitative evaluation of platelets of whole blood and the obtained PRP substrate was carried out with a semi-automatic analyzer.Results: the proposed technique is based on the use as a container for centrifuging a syringe with a LuerLock design, which is hermetically sealed with a congruent plug, adapted by the external size of the centrifuge rotor bowl. Phase selection after centrifugation was performed by aspiration of the syringe contents after centrifugation is performed through a three-way valve. The substrate was obtained by repeated centrifugation of the contents, which allows obtaining a variable volume and platelet concentration in PRP. The amount of platelets (PLT) of whole blood is 227.0±57.0 thousand per ml. PLT PRP 945.0±279.0 thousand per ml.Conclusions: the proposed method of separation of whole blood with the release of the platelet rich plasma demonstrates high efficiency, which corresponds to the level of increasing the number of platelets in reducing the volume at the level of the best ready-made solutions.The equipment is economical and does not require highly specialized equipment and consumables. The proposed technique provides a wide choice to the performer in the received volume of the substrate

The Theory of Money

Fiat money(1) is a creation of both the state and society. Its value is supported by expectations which are conditioned by the dynamics of trust in government, the socio-economic structure and by outside events such as wars, plagues or political unrest. The micro-management of a dynamic economy is not far removed in difficulty from the micro-management of the weather. However, money and the financial institutions and instruments of a modern economy provide the means to influence expectations and bound behavior.(2) Paper money emerges as a virtual commodity. The dynamics of the economy permits it to serve as an imaginary gold.Although it is an abstraction, it is meaningful to talk about its quantity. Closely related to but basically different from fiat money is credit.(3) Credit, unlike fiat money is not a virtual commodity but a two party contract. The fact that it is a two party contract set in a dynamic context implies that there are chances that the economy may reach a state where a debtor is unable to meet his or her obligations. When this happens the laws and customs of the society must provide default, bankruptcy and reorganization rules. These rules are usually denominated in terms of fiat and socio-economic penalties such as the confiscation of assets, garnishing of salary or time in debtors' prison. Thus the value of paper gold is determined in two ways by the dynamics of the system. First by acceptance in trade, based on the expectation that it will remain valuable and second by its role in the discharge of debts where failure to repay has unpleasant consequences. When taxes are present a third valuation appears in the penalties for failure to pay taxes. The control of the fiat money supply together with rules on the granting of credit and the bankruptcy, default and reorganization rules,in essence, provide lower and upper bounds for the price level in the economy. They also determine the innovation rate of the economy. An innovation may be regarded as an economic mutation; the less costly failure is, the more likely an innovation will be risked. The rates of interest for loans combined with the harshness of the bankruptcy and reorganization laws help to determine the rate of innovation in a society. Government controls only one among many interest rates. A host of institutional details involving risk and transactions cost determine the others. The velocity of both money and credit may vary. Even though velocity may vary, human decision-making takes a finite amount of time. This implies that velocity will remain bounded. Beyond some speed of circulation expectations will degenerate and the economy will break down. In order to appreciate the intrinsic dynamics of a high information and communication mass economy at least three agents must be distinguished. They are the highly visible government; other largely visible legal persons, such as banks and corporations and real persons. Their differences are characterized by their relative power and the size of their communication networks. The contrast between a market economy and a state economy is not a clean contrast. The distinctions are on a continuum. Among modern democratic market economies the size of the government sector is roughly anywhere from 15% to 50% of the economy. Thus the control description of virtually any modern economy is of one extremely large and visible player; at most a few hundred large corporate entities of reasonably high visibility and a mass of small agents known by and in direct communication with only a few others. The reconciliation of a dynamics oriented macro-economics with an equilibrium oriented micro-economics lies in the understanding that the economy is embedded in the polity and society. The institutions, customs and laws are the carriers of process and provide bounds to process. They limit the dynamics.The role of macroeconomic policy is to bound the dynamics of an evolving society. Individual behavior is local and necessarily myopic. Myopic local optimization is consistent with global evolution. An elementary understanding of history and the decision and game theory proliferation of strategies is enough to indicate that the search for a unique or even stationary economic dynamics is an essay in futility.In contrast the search for the correct carriers and bounds on process is feasible.The monetary structure provides the sufficient loose coupling to permit mass independent behavior to take place even somewhat chaotically within institutional bounds.(4) 1. I use the term fiat or abstract paper money interchangeably to stand for a government supplied means of payment of no intrinsic worth. 2. Phrasing this somewhat more technically they provide the bounds on the state space. A state space is the set of all feasible states which can be achieved by the system. 3. Credit such as bank credit from a well known bank may be referred to as "inside money" in the sense that it is a contract between two legal persons in the economy other than the government. Yet the bank credit, because of the visibility and reputation of the bank, may serve as a substitute in transactions for fiat money. 4. Technically the institutions and the monetary and financial structure fully define the state space, but do not describe the dynamics. There is a robust collection of local individual rules of behavior which are all sufficient to provide the dynamic support of expectations that money will be accepted as having value. The control system may be sufficient to guide or at least limit the overall macroeconomic behavior without necessarily providing for a precise or unique dynamics. Money is the only financial instrument without an offsetting instrument. This nonsymmetry appears to be critical in the introduction of time into the model of the economy.Money, macro-economics, strategic market games, general disequilibrium, bankruptcy

Efficiency, Profitability and Quality of Banking Services

This paper develops a general framework for combining strategic benchmarking with efficiency benchmarking of the services offered by bank branches. In particular, the service-profit chain is cast as a cascade of efficiency benchmarking models. Three models-based on Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA)-are developed in order to implement the framework in the practical setting of a bank's branches: an operational efficiency mode, a quality efficiency model and a profitability efficiency model. The use of the models is illustrated using data for the branches of a commercial Bank. Empirical results indicate that superior insights can be obtained by analyzing operations, service quality, and profitability simultaneously than the information obtained from benchmarking studies of these three dimensions separately. Some relations between operational efficiency and profitability, and between operational efficiency and service quality are investigated. This paper was presented at the Financial Institutions Center's conference on Performance of Financial Institutions, May 8-10, 1997.