A satellite-based personal communication system for the 21st century

Interest in personal communications (PCOMM) has been stimulated by recent developments in satellite and terrestrial mobile communications. A personal access satellite system (PASS) concept was developed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) which has many attractive user features, including service diversity and a handheld terminal. Significant technical challenges addressed in formulating the PASS space and ground segments are discussed. PASS system concept and basic design features, high risk enabling technologies, an optimized multiple access scheme, alternative antenna coverage concepts, the use of non-geostationary orbits, user terminal radiation constraints, and user terminal frequency reference are covered

The Stakes in Bayh-Dole: Public Values Beyond the Pace of Innovation

Evaluation studies of the Bayh-Dole Act are generally concerned with the pace of innovation or the transgressions to the independence of research. While these concerns are important, I propose here to expand the range of public values considered in assessing Bayh-Dole and formulating future reforms. To this end, I first examine the changes in the terms of the Bayh-Dole debate and the drift in its design. Neoliberal ideas have had a definitive influence on U.S. innovation policy for the last thirty years, including legislation to strengthen patent protection. Moreover, the neoliberal policy agenda is articulated and justified in the interest of “competitiveness.” Rhetorically, this agenda equates competitiveness with economic growth and this with the public interest. Against that backdrop, I use Public Value Failure criteria to show that values such as political equality, transparency, and fairness in the distribution of the benefits of innovation, are worth considering to counter the “policy drift” of Bayh-Dole

Essays on Exchange Rate Risk

<p>This dissertation is a collection of papers with the unifying objective being to better understand crash risk in foreign exchange markets. I investigate how exposure to the risk of currency crashes is able to provide a unified rationalization of the returns of various sorted currency portfolios.</p><p>In the first chapter, I identify an aggregate global currency skewness risk factor, which I denote SKEW. Currency portfolios that have higher average excess returns covary more positively with this risk factor. They suffer losses in times when high interest rate investment currencies have a greater tendency to depreciate sharply as a group relative to low interest rate funding currencies. Consequently, they earn higher average excess returns as reward for exposure to this risk. I create three sets of sorted currency portfolios reflecting three distinct sources of variation in average excess currency returns. The first set sorts currencies based on interest rate differentials. The second set sorts currencies based on currency momentum. The third set sorts currencies based on currency undervaluedness relative to purchasing power power parity (PPP) implied exchange rates. I find that differences in exposure to the global currency skewness risk factor can explain the systematic variation in average excess currency returns within all three groups of portfolios much better than existing foreign exchange risk factors in the literature.</p><p>In the second chapter, I build on the first chapter by studying the extent to which currency crash risk is predictable or unpredictable and whether the pricing power of aggregate currency skewness, uncovered in the first chapter, is due to unpredictable or predictable crash risk. Focusing on currency crash risk proxied using realized currency skewness at both the individual currency level and at the aggregate level using the SKEW risk factor introduced in the first chapter, I investigate whether either form of crash risk is predictable using only past information about crash risk. In particular, I use past information on both individual currency level and aggregate level measures based on both lagged realized currency skewness and lagged option implied risk neutral skewness. I find evidence that there is not much predictability at the individual country level or at the aggregate level over the full sample period considered. However, there is some evidence of predictability at the aggregate level since 1999, and especially so when option implied risk neutral skewness measures are used. Additionally, I use the predictions of SKEW and conduct asset pricing similar to that in chapter 1 using predicted and unpredicted SKEW to see whether its pricing power comes from predictable or unpredictable components. I find evidence that it is unpredictable currency crash risk that is very important, as the asset pricing results are largely identical when either SKEW or SKEW forecast errors are used. and whether the pricing power of</p>Dissertatio

Separated and Trafficked Children: The Challenges for Child Protection Professionals

Unaccompanied asylum-seeking children are one of the most vulnerable groups of children and those who have been trafficked present with additional needs, posing new challenges for child protection professionals. Drawing on a research programme commissioned to inform policy and practice in Glasgow, this paper identifies issues emerging for practitioners working with separated children who have been trafficked. The commitment of frontline staff and increased multiagency working appear to be positive aspects of the work. Initial identification and assessment present a major challenge for reasons including cultural issues, the trauma and fear of children affecting engagement and the potential for ongoing contact with traffickers to compromise safeguarding. Trafficking is a particularly complex area of child protection work, made more problematic by the international dimensions to the trade and the absence of a clear definition and conceptual framework that can fully inform interventions and practice