Bricks and urbanism in the Indus Valley rise and decline

The Indus Civilization, often denoted by its major city Harappa, spanned almost two millennia from 3200 to 1300 BC. Its tradition reaches back to 7000 BC: a 5000 year long expansion of villages and towns, of trading activity, and of technological advancements culminates between 2600 and 1900 BC in the build-up of large cities, writing, and political authority; it emerges as one of the first great civilizations in history. During the ensuing 600 years, however, key technologies fall out of use, urban centers are depopulated, and people emigrate from former core settlement areas. Although many different hypotheses have been put forward to explain this deurbanization, a conclusive causal chain has not yet been established. We here combine literature estimates on brick typology, and on urban area for individual cities. In the context of the existing extensive data on Harappan artifact find sites and put in their chronological context, the combined narratives told by bricks, cities, and spatial extent can provide a new point of departure for discussing the possible reasons for the mysterious "decline".Comment: 11 pages, 3 figures, Supplementary Material. Submitted to PLOS On

Economic Policies and the Impact of Natural Disasters on Economic Growth: A Threshold Regression Approach

This paper investigates the impact of natural disasters on the long-term macroeconomic performance of a country. More specifically, we want to see whether the impact of natural disasters on economic growth is uniform across countries or it is differentiated according to the macroeconomic policy environment and other structural characteristics of the countries at hand. In order to test this empirically we use the Threshold Regression (TR) approach of Hansen (2000) and data from 90 countries over the period of 1970 to 2001. Our analysis reveals several interesting patterns such as: countries with higher per capita income, higher government spending, higher degree of openness to trade, less fiscal imbalances and greater financial stability are better able to withstand the disaster shock and further prevent its impact on long-term economic growth.Natural Disasters, Economic Policies, Economic Growth, Threshold Regression

The Long-run and Short-run Impact of Exchange Rate Devaluation on Pakistan's Trade Performance

In estimating trade elasticities for Pakistan, most previous researchers have employed non-stationary data and OLS or 2SLS techniques. In this paper we use Johansen’s cointegration methodology to re-investigate the long-run trade elasticities and existence of the Marshall-Lerner condition. Using quarterly data, the trade performance with Pakistan’s ten major trading partners is empirically tested. Moreover, we also investigate the short-run exchange rate dynamics by constructing an error-corrrection model to trace the j-curve.

Ransomware and reputation

open access articleRansomware is a particular form of cyber-attack in which a victim loses access to either his electronic device or files unless he pays a ransom to criminals. A criminal’s ability to make money from ransomware critically depends on victims believing that the criminal will honour ransom payments. In this paper we explore the extent to which a criminal can build trust through reputation. We demonstrate that there are situations in which it is optimal for the criminal to always return the files and situations in which it is not. We argue that the ability to build reputation will depend on how victims distinguish between different ransomware strands. If ransomware is to survive as a long term revenue source for criminals then they need to find ways of building a good reputation

Experimental investigation on interply friction properties of thermoset prepreg systems

A comprehensive novel investigation into the characterisation of interply friction behaviour of thermoset prepregs for high-volume manufacturing (HVM) was conducted. High interply slipping rate and normal pressure typically used for HVM present challenges when preforming carbon fibre reinforced plastics (CFRP). The study involved multiple reinforcement architectures (woven and unidirectional (UD) with the same rapid-cure resin system) which were characterised using a bespoke interply friction test rig used to simulate processing conditions representative to press forming and double diaphragm forming. Under prescribed conditions, woven and UD prepregs exhibit significantly different frictional behaviour. Results demonstrated the UD material obeys a hydrodynamic lubrication mode. For the woven material, a rate-dependent friction behaviour was found at low normal pressure. At higher normal pressure however, the woven material exhibited a friction behaviour similar to that of a dry reinforcement and significant tow displacement was observed. Post-characterisation analysis of test-specimens showed significant resin migration towards the outer edges of the plies, leaving a relatively resin-starved contact interface. The findings generate new knowledge on interply friction properties of thermoset prepreg for HVM applications, yet reveal a lack of understanding of the influence of tow tensions as well as the pre-impregnation level for a range of processing conditions

Peringkat Daerah Rawan Pangan Berdasarkan Data Spasial Di Provinsi Aceh1 (Analise of Food Insecurity Base on Spatial in Nanggroe Aceh Darussalam Province)

Tujuan penelitian ini dalah untuk mengelompokkan daerah rawan pangan dan memetakanwilayah rawan pangan tingkat kabupaten/kota di Provinsi Aceh, mengidentifikasi karakteristik danfaktor-faktor penyebab rawan pangan pada setiap wilayah. Penelitian dilaksanakan di ProvinsiAceh yang meliputi 23 kabupaten/kota selama 8 bulan. Penelitian menggunakan metode survey,analisis secara deskriptif terhadap data sekunder yang meliputi : data pertanian, kesehatan, dan sosialekonomi. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan ada dua tingkatan wilayah rawan pangan di Provinsi Acehyaitu; tingkat kerawanan pangan sedang (21,7%), dan tingkat kerawanan tinggi (78,3%).Jumlah Kabupaten/kota dengan kategori kerawanan pangan tinggi lebih dari 3 kali lipatdibandingkan dengan daerah tingkat kerawanan sedang

Impact of Celebrity Endorsement on Customer’s Purchase Intention: Evidence from University Students of Karachi

The research objective is to investigate the relationship between the celebrity endorsed in advertisement and the customers buying behavior, and how do the celebrity’s physical attractiveness, expertise, trustworthiness and its attitude to word the brand and its advertisement can influence the purchase intension of customer. As celebrity endorsement is the latest marketing strategy to make the advertisement more attractive and effective for the organization. The collected data of 100 people was analyzed by regression in SPSS .which will help to analyze the hypothesis, that celebrity endorsements really have impact on customer purchase intension, if it has impact so how much the impact is savior. Further study can be conducted by increasing the demographic population and research horizon which may give a different result or a different direction which will be helpful for advertisement industry. Keywords: Celebrity Endorsement, Customer Behavior, Brand Perception, Purchase Intention, Celebrity endorsed ad

Work Family Conflict and Organizational Citizenship Behavior in Bank Employees

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of work family conflict on organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) of employees. The study was conducted on the banks employees of Peshawar and data was collected from the employees of the banks. Results of the study showed the significant effect of work family conflict on organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). Keywords: Work family conflict, organizational citizenship behavior (OCB