The Effect of Site-Specific Spectral Densities on the High-Dimensional Exciton-Vibrational Dynamics in the FMO Complex

The coupled exciton-vibrational dynamics of a three-site model of the FMO complex is investigated using the Multi-layer Multi-configuration Time-dependent Hartree (ML-MCTDH) approach. Emphasis is put on the effect of the spectral density on the exciton state populations as well as on the vibrational and vibronic non-equilibrium excitations. Models which use either a single or site-specific spectral densities are contrasted to a spectral density adapted from experiment. For the transfer efficiency, the total integrated Huang-Rhys factor is found to be more important than details of the spectral distributions. However, the latter are relevant for the obtained non-equilibrium vibrational and vibronic distributions and thus influence the actual pattern of population relaxation.Comment: revised versio

Competitiveness of Arabian gulf ports from shipping lines’ perspectives: Case of Sohar port in Oman

Purpose: The purpose of this article is to investigate the factors that encourage shipping lines to use port of Sohar, in Oman. Some selected factors were used to assess to what extent it affects the port choice from shipping lines companies’ perspective. These factors include infrastructure, hinterland, connectivity and port’s dues. Design/methodology/approach: for this study both quantitative and qualitative methodologies were used. Self-administered questionnaire used for collecting quantitative data while interviews were used to collect qualitative data. Secondary data was collected by reviewing academic literature and recent relevant articles and reports. Findings: Port of Sohar has a better opportunity to be the gateway of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) States and all Cargo could have dropped in the port and transferred to other GCC States by road, rail and other transportation modes. This opportunity is gained by the strategic location of Sohar Port outside of the Strait of Hormuz. It can be concluded that port competitiveness can be improved through strategic location, improved hinterland conditions, port facilities, services cost, volume of cargo, connectivity to other ports and dwell time factor. Research limitations: The research was limited mainly by conducting it only at the port of Sohar because surrounding ports are too far away and it should involve more ports to gain comparative results. Limited number of stakeholders as Port Authority, Oman International Container Terminal (OICT) and shipping lines companies and agents is another limitation. Practical implications: The port can improve its competitive advantages and focus on the investigated factors. The government can also continue in working in the three big infrastructural projects; the new express roads, Sohar Airport and rail network connections with other GCC networks. Originality/value: the study used specific factors that expected to contribute to the shipping lines companies’ selection of ports in the gulf region. This could help the port to identify their competitive advantage and how they can use these competencies to improve their competitiveness in relation to other ports in the region.Peer Reviewe

Politics, terrorism and the news media: a case study of Saudi Arabia (2006-2007).

With the enormous development of communications and the transmission of national news to all parts of the world in seconds, it has become important to consider the treatment of national crises in the media and the challenges that may be encountered in the production of news during such crises. This is especially important in relation to the transnational problem of terrorism. This study chooses to examine the ways in which the Saudi Arabian national media have treated terrorism news between the period 2006-2007, given the complex position of Saudi Arabia in relation to Islamist terrorism. Therefore, it will focus its theoretical part on examining the political, economic, ideological and social factors that may affect the shaping of news production, and on terrorism news in particular. Then, it will move on to studying the different theories of news framing, and the framing of terrorism news. Then, the empirical part will be focused on content analysis of different news-related stories of terrorism, taken from different Saudi sources, based on Iyengar's theory of news coverage, as well as our own set of categories in order to reveal a deeper explanation of news coverage of terrorism in the Saudi media. This importance of this study comes from the fact that very few studies have focused on examining the performance of the Saudi news media in the rise of terrorism. We hope that this study can help Arab Gulf media in testing and improving the performance of their news media coverage, especially now that incidents like terrorism and the Arab Spring have shown wide public discontent towards the efficiency of news coverage during such events. We also hope that the results of the empirical part can help in shaping a new policy that provides a better vision and framework for news production, as most of the media organisations in this part of the world are state-owned and their methods of news production have arguably not reflected public needs

Keynote Address by Mohamed Bin Dhaen Al Hamli

Klimaveränderung; Umweltabkommen; Emissionshandel; Außenpolitik; EU-Staaten; OPEC-Staaten

The effect of hydrogen on the magnetic properties of FeV superlattice

The electronic and magnetic structures of a hydrogenated and hydrogen free superlattice of 3 iron monolayers and 9 vanadium monolayers are studied using the first principle full-potential augmented-plane-wave method as implemented in WIEN2k package. The volume, the total energy and the magnetic moments of the system are studied versus the hydrogen positions at the octahedral sites within the superlattice and also versus the filling of the vanadium octahedral location by hydrogen atoms. It is found that the hydrogen locations at the interior of vanadium layer are energetically more favourable. The local Fe magnetic moment and the average magnetic moment per supercell are found to increase as the H position moves towards the Fe-V interface. On the other hand, the average magnetic moment per supercell is found to initially decrease up to filling by 3 H atoms and then increases afterwards. To our knowledge, this is the first reporting on the increase in the computed magnetic moment with hydrogenation. These trends of magnetic moments are attributed to the volume changes resulting from hydrogenation and not to electronic hydrogen-metal interaction.Comment: 13 pages, 5 figures and 2 table