2,454 research outputs found
Bacterial symbiosis in arthropods and the control of disease transmission.
Bacterial symbionts may be used as vehicles for expressing foreign genes in arthropods. Expression of selected genes can render an arthropod incapable of transmitting a second microorganism that is pathogenic for humans and is an alternative approach to the control of arthropod-borne diseases. We discuss the rationale for this alternative approach, its potential applications and limitations, and the regulatory concerns that may arise from its use in interrupting disease transmission in humans and animals
Capitalism and natural rights: Marx, Locke and the moral justification of capitalism: inaugural lecture delivered at Rhodes University
Inaugural lecture delivered at Rhodes UniversityRhodes University Libraries (Digitisation)ONE of the commonplaces among political philosophers and theorists is the contempt with which Marx regarded Natural Rights theory. In 1843 he wrote that "the so-called rights of man, the droit de l'homme as distinct from the droit du citoyen, are nothing but the rights of a member of civil society, that is the rights of egoistic man, of man separated from other men and from the community." And again "the real man is recognised only in the shape of the egoistic individual, the true man is recognised only in the shape of the abstract citoyen."1 Marx saw Natural Rights as means for the justification of capitalism, and so, as justifying inequalities of wealth and property-ownership. And of course it is true that many writers, in supporting Natural Rights, have stressed, as Stuart Brown expresses it, that "They are the rights of a man to the protection of what is in his interest. The moral interests of one man may differ radically from those of another. Different men may have radically different needs and capacities. And these differences, in conjunction with unavoidable differences in opportunity, produce differences in estate. "2 Expressions of this kind make clear the point of Marx's critique. I wish tonight to argue and to attempt to establish two main theses. The first is that, despite Marx's expressed attitudes to Natural Rights, his own theory of capitalism cannot easily be disentangled from Natural Rights theory, and, if my argument is right, it in fact depends upon it. Secondly, I shall try to show, through an examination of the theories of John Locke, that if Natural Rights theory is to be taken seriously, it is at odds with the very capitalist theory which it is generally taken to support, and that Natural Rights cannot therefore provide an adequate under-pinning of capitalism, at least not without generating self-contradictions within the theory of Natural Rights. If the arguments which I shall present are right, I shall hope to have established what might be termed two paradoxes
QCD as a Quantum Link Model
QCD is constructed as a lattice gauge theory in which the elements of the
link matrices are represented by non-commuting operators acting in a Hilbert
space. The resulting quantum link model for QCD is formulated with a fifth
Euclidean dimension, whose extent resembles the inverse gauge coupling of the
resulting four-dimensional theory after dimensional reduction. The inclusion of
quarks is natural in Shamir's variant of Kaplan's fermion method, which does
not require fine-tuning to approach the chiral limit. A rishon representation
in terms of fermionic constituents of the gluons is derived and the quantum
link Hamiltonian for QCD with a U(N) gauge symmetry is expressed in terms of
glueball, meson and constituent quark operators. The new formulation of QCD is
promising both from an analytic and from a computational point of view.Comment: 27 pages, including three figures. ordinary LaTeX; Submitted to Nucl.
Phys.
Ultrafast supercontinuum spectroscopy of carrier multiplication and biexcitonic effects in excited states of PbS quantum dots
We examine the multiple exciton population dynamics in PbS quantum dots by
ultrafast spectrally-resolved supercontinuum transient absorption (SC-TA). We
simultaneously probe the first three excitonic transitions over a broad
spectral range. Transient spectra show the presence of first order bleach of
absorption for the 1S_h-1S_e transition and second order bleach along with
photoinduced absorption band for 1P_h-1P_e transition. We also report evidence
of the one-photon forbidden 1S_{h,e}-1P_{h,e} transition. We examine signatures
of carrier multiplication (multiexcitons for the single absorbed photon) from
analysis of the first and second order bleaches, in the limit of low absorbed
photon numbers (~ 10^-2), at pump energies from two to four times the
semiconductor band gap. The multiexciton generation efficiency is discussed
both in terms of a broadband global fit and the ratio between early- to
long-time transient absorption signals.. Analysis of population dynamics shows
that the bleach peak due to the biexciton population is red-shifted respect the
single exciton one, indicating a positive binding energy.Comment: 16 pages, 5 figure
Continuous-Time Quantum Monte Carlo Algorithm for the Lattice Polaron
An efficient continuous-time path-integral Quantum Monte Carlo algorithm for
the lattice polaron is presented. It is based on Feynman's integration of
phonons and subsequent simulation of the resulting single-particle
self-interacting system. The method is free from the finite-size and
finite-time-step errors and works in any dimensionality and for any range of
electron-phonon interaction. The ground-state energy and effective mass of the
polaron are calculated for several models. The polaron spectrum can be measured
directly by Monte Carlo, which is of general interest.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, published versio
Exact, Complete, and Universal Continuous-Time Worldline Monte Carlo Approach to the Statistics of Discrete Quantum Systems
We show how the worldline quantum Monte Carlo procedure, which usually relies
on an artificial time discretization, can be formulated directly in continuous
time, rendering the scheme exact. For an arbitrary system with discrete Hilbert
space, none of the configuration update procedures contain small parameters. We
find that the most effective update strategy involves the motion of worldline
discontinuities (both in space and time), i.e., the evaluation of the Green's
function. Being based on local updates only, our method nevertheless allows one
to work with the grand canonical ensemble and non-zero winding numbers, and to
calculate any dynamic correlation function as easily as expectation values of,
e.g., total energy. The principles found for the update in continuous time
generalize to any continuous variables in the space of discrete virtual
transitions, and in principle also make it possible to simulate continuous
systems exactly.Comment: revtex, 14 pages, 6 figures, published version (modified and
extended
Test-retest measurement invariance of the nine-item Internet Gaming Disorder Scale in two countries: a preliminary longitudinal study
The reliable longitudinal assessment of Internet Gaming Disorder (IGD) behaviors is viewed by many as a pivotal clinical and research priority. The present study is the first to examine the test-retest measurement invariance of IGD ratings, as assessed using the short-form nine-item Internet Gaming Disorder Scale (IGDS9-SF) over an approximate period of 3 months, across two normative national samples. Differences referring to the mode of the data collection (faceto-face [FtF] vs. online) were also considered. Two sequences of successive multiple group confirmatory factor analyses (CFAs) were calculated to longitudinally assess the psychometric properties of the IGDS9-SF using emergent adults, gamers from (i) the United States of America (USA; N = 120, 18–29 years, Meanage = 22.35, 51.6% male) assessed online and; and (ii) Australia (N = 61, 18–31 years, Meanage = 23.02, 75.4% male) assessed FtF. Configural invariance was established across both samples, and metric and scalar invariances were supported for the USA sample. Interestingly, only partial metric (factor loadings for Items 2 and 3 non-invariant) and partial scalar invariance (i.e., all thresholds of Items 1 and 2, and thresholds 1, 3, for Items 4, 6, 8, and 9 non-invariant) were established for the Australian sample. Findings are discussed in the light of using IGDS9-SF to assess and monitor IGD behaviors over time in both in clinical and non-clinical settings
Beam-Breakup Instability Theory for Energy Recovery Linacs
Here we will derive the general theory of the beam-breakup instability in
recirculating linear accelerators, in which the bunches do not have to be at
the same RF phase during each recirculation turn. This is important for the
description of energy recovery linacs (ERLs) where bunches are recirculated at
a decelerating phase of the RF wave and for other recirculator arrangements
where different RF phases are of an advantage. Furthermore it can be used for
the analysis of phase errors of recirculated bunches. It is shown how the
threshold current for a given linac can be computed and a remarkable agreement
with tracking data is demonstrated. The general formulas are then analyzed for
several analytically solvable cases, which show: (a) Why different higher order
modes (HOM) in one cavity do not couple so that the most dangerous modes can be
considered individually. (b) How different HOM frequencies have to be in order
to consider them separately. (c) That no optics can cause the HOMs of two
cavities to cancel. (d) How an optics can avoid the addition of the
instabilities of two cavities. (e) How a HOM in a multiple-turn recirculator
interferes with itself. Furthermore, a simple method to compute the orbit
deviations produced by cavity misalignments has also been introduced. It is
shown that the BBU instability always occurs before the orbit excursion becomes
very large.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figure
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