Is innovation always beneficial? A meta-analysis of the relationship between innovation and performance in SMEs

The performance implications of innovation in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have attracted considerable interest among academics and practitioners. However, empirical research on the innovation–performance relationship in SMEs shows controversial results. This meta-analysis synthesizes empirical findings in order to obtain evidence whether and especially under which circumstances smaller, resource-scarce firms benefit from innovation. We find that innovation–performance relationship is context dependent. Factors such as the age of the firm, the type of innovation, and the cultural context affect the impact of innovation on firm performance to a large extent

Interacting Dark Sector and Precision Cosmology

We consider a recently proposed model in which dark matter interacts with a thermal background of dark radiation. Dark radiation consists of relativistic degrees of freedom which allow larger values of the expansion rate of the universe today to be consistent with CMB data ($H_0$-problem). Scattering between dark matter and radiation suppresses the matter power spectrum at small scales and can explain the apparent discrepancies between $\Lambda$CDM predictions of the matter power spectrum and direct measurements of Large Scale Structure LSS ($\sigma_8$-problem). We go beyond previous work in two ways: 1. we enlarge the parameter space of our previous model and allow for an arbitrary fraction of the dark matter to be interacting and 2. we update the data sets used in our fits, most importantly we include LSS data with full $k$-dependence to explore the sensitivity of current data to the shape of the matter power spectrum. We find that LSS data prefer models with overall suppressed matter clustering due to dark matter - dark radiation interactions over $\Lambda$CDM at 3-4 $\sigma$. However recent weak lensing measurements of the power spectrum are not yet precise enough to clearly distinguish two limits of the model with different predicted shapes for the linear matter power spectrum. In two Appendices we give a derivation of the coupled dark matter and dark radiation perturbation equations from the Boltzmann equation in order to clarify a confusion in the recent literature, and we derive analytic approximations to the solutions of the perturbation equations in the two physically interesting limits of all dark matter weakly interacting or a small fraction of dark matter strongly interacting.Comment: 29 pages + 2 Appendices; published versio

Doped carrier formulation and mean-field theory of the tt't''J model

In the generalized-tJ model the effect of the large local Coulomb repulsion is accounted for by restricting the Hilbert space to states with at most one electron per site. In this case the electronic system can be viewed in terms of holes hopping in a lattice of correlated spins, where holes are the carriers doped into the half-filled Mott insulator. To explicitly capture the interplay between the hole dynamics and local spin correlations we derive a new formulation of the generalized-tJ model where doped carrier operators are used instead of the original electron operators. This ``doped carrier'' formulation provides a new starting point to address doped spin systems and we use it to develop a new, fully fermionic, mean-field description of doped Mott insulators This mean-field approach reveals a new mechanism for superconductivity, namely spinon-dopon mixing, and we apply it to the tt't''J model as of interest to high-temperature superconductors. In particular, we use model parameters borrowed from band calculations and from fitting ARPES data to obtain a mean-field phase diagram that reproduces semi-quantitatively that of hole and electron doped cuprates. The mean-field approach hereby presented accounts for the local antiferromagnetic and d-wave superconducting correlations which, we show, provide a rational for the role of t' and t'' in strengthening superconductivity as expected by experiments and other theoretical approaches. As we discuss how t, t' and t'' affect the phase diagram, we also comment on possible scenarios to understand the differences between as-grown and oxygen reduced electron doped samples.Comment: 17 pages, 2 figures. Homepage http://dao.mit.edu/~wen

Spin susceptibility and the pi-excitation in underdoped cuprates

The dynamical spin susceptibility chi'' at wave vector (pi, pi) and the spectrum pi'' of the spin-triplet particle--particle excitation with center of mass momentum (pi, pi) (pi-excitation) are considered in the slave-boson formulation of the t--J-model. Propagators are calculated in a diagrammatic t-matrix approximation in the d-wave superconducting state for a wide doping range. The resulting spectra chi'' and pi'' both show a resonance at a doping dependent energy, in qualitative agreement with recent numerical cluster calculations. In underdoped systems, the peak position is comparable to that found in neutron scattering experiments. The peak in chi'' as well as pi'' is at low doping entirely caused by spin fluctuations, whereas the triplet particle--particle channel does not contribute as a collective mode.Comment: 3 pages, 4 eps-figures included, uses revtex, eps

Wick's Theorem and a New Perturbation Theory Around the Atomic Limit of Strongly Correlated Electron Systems

A new type of perturbation expansion in the mixing $V$ of localized orbitals with a conduction-electron band in the $U\to\infty$ Anderson model is presented. It is built on Feynman diagrams obeying standard rules. The local correlations of the unperturbed system (the atomic limit) are included exactly, no auxiliary particles are introduced. As a test, an infinite-order ladder-type resummation is analytically treated in the Kondo regime, recovering the correct energy scale. An extension to the Anderson-lattice model is obtained via an effective-site approximation through a cumulant expansion in $V$ on the lattice. Relation to treatments in infinite spatial dimensions are indicated.Comment: selfextracting postscript file containing entire paper (10 pages) including 3 figures, in case of trouble contact author for LaTeX-source or hard copies (prep0994

Short-lived brominated hydrocarbons – observations in the source regions and the tropical tropopause layer

We conducted measurements of the five important short-lived organic bromine species in the marine boundary layer (MBL). Measurements were made in the Northern Hemisphere mid-latitudes (Sylt Island, North Sea) in June 2009 and in the tropical Western Pacific during the TransBrom ship campaign in October 2009. For the one-week time series on Sylt Island, mean mixing ratios of CHBr3, CH2Br2, CHBr2Cl and CH2BrCl were 2.0, 1.1, 0.2, 0.1 ppt, respectively. We found maxima of 5.8 and 1.6 ppt for the two main components CHBr3 and CH2Br2. Along the cruise track in the Western Pacific (between 41° N and 13° S) we measured mean mixing ratios of 0.9, 0.9, 0.2, 0.1 and 0.1 ppt for CHBr3, CH2Br2, CHBrCl2, CHBr2Cl and CH2BrCl. Air samples with coastal influence showed considerably higher mixing ratios than the samples with open ocean origin. Correlation analyses of the two data sets yielded strong linear relationships between the mixing ratios of four of the five species (except for CH2BrCl). Using a combined data set from the two campaigns and a comparison with the results from two former studies, rough estimates of the molar emission ratios between the correlated substances were: 9/1/0.35/0.35 for CHBr3/CH2Br2/CHBrCl2/CHBr2Cl. Additional measurements were made in the tropical tropopause layer (TTL) above Teresina (Brazil, 5° S) in June 2008, using balloon-borne cryogenic whole air sampling technique. Near the level of zero clear-sky net radiative heating (LZRH) at 14.8 km about 2.25 ppt organic bromine was bound to the five short-lived species, making up 13% of total organic bromine (17.82 ppt). CH2Br2 (1.45 ppt) and CHBr3 (0.56 ppt) accounted for 90% of the budget of short-lived compounds in that region. Near the tropopause (at 17.5 km) organic bromine from these substances was reduced to 1.35 ppt, with 1.07 and 0.12 ppt attributed to CH2Br2 and CHBr3, respectively

Where is the pi particle?

We discuss the interplay of particle-particle and particle-hole spin-triplet channels in high-T_c superconductors using a quasiparticle dispersion motivated by angle-resolved photoemission. Within a generalized RPA, we find a well defined antibound state of two holes, the pi resonance of Demler and Zhang, as well as a bound state of a particle and a hole, the spin exciton. We show that the energy of the pi resonance always exceeds 2 Delta, twice the maximum d-wave gap, therefore the neutron resonance observed in the cuprates around energy Delta is most likely a spin exciton. At the same time, we speculate that the pi particle can exist at higher energies and might be observed in neutron scattering around 100 meV.Comment: RevTeX, 5 pages, 4 eps figure

Magnetic Collective Mode Dispersion in High Temperature Superconductors

Recent neutron scattering experiments in the superconducting state of YBCO have been interpreted in terms of a magnetic collective mode whose dispersion relative to the commensurate wavevector has a curvature opposite in sign to a conventional magnon dispersion. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate that simple linear response calculations are in support of a collective mode interpretation, and to explain why the dispersion has the curvature it does.Comment: 3 pages, revtex, 4 encapsulated postscript figure

Interlayer pair tunneling and gap anisotropy in YBa2_2Cu3_3O7−δ_{7-\delta}

Recent ARPES measurement observed a large $ab$-axis gap anisotropy, $\Delta(0,\pi)/\Delta(\pi,0)=1.5$, in clean YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{7-\delta}$. This indicates that some sub-dominant component may exist in the $d_{x^2-y^2}$-wave dominant gap. We propose that the interlayer pairing tunneling contribution can be determined through the investigation of the order parameter anisotropy. Their potentially observable features in transport and spin dynamics are also studied.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Predicting a Gapless Spin-1 Neutral Collective Mode branch for Graphite

Using the standard tight binding model of 2d graphite with short range electron repulsion, we find a gapless spin-1, neutral collective mode branch {\em below the particle-hole continuum} with energy vanishing linearly with momenta at the $\Gamma$ and $K$ points in the BZ. This spin-1 mode has a wide energy dispersion, 0 to $\sim 2 eV$ and is not Landau damped. The `Dirac cone spectrum' of electrons at the chemical potential of graphite generates our collective mode; so we call this `spin-1 zero sound' of the `Dirac sea'. Epithermal neutron scattering experiments, where graphite single crystals are often used as analyzers (an opportunity for `self-analysis'!), and spin polarized electron energy loss spectroscopy (SPEELS) can be used to confirm and study our collective mode.Comment: 4 pages of LaTex file, 3 eps figure file