The dragon awakens: innovation, competition, and transition in the energy strategy of the People’s Republic of China, 1949-2017

Based on a mix of original archival research and an extensive review of the contemporary peer reviewed literature, this article reviews the history of the People’s Republic of China’s national energy policies since 1949. We divide this history into six phases: Emergence (1949–1957), Socialist construction (1958–1965), Turbulence (1966–1978), Reform (1979–2000), Contestation (2001–2014), and transition (2015-present). Over the whole history of more than sixty years, China’s energy production and consumption grew at a surprising speed, while energy intensity exhibited early fluctuations and a subsequent gradual decrease after the turbulence phase. In tracing this history, the article offers new historical and policy insights into the world’s largest developing country and a theoretical contribution to the role of the state in shaping economy and society through energy policy. The article lastly offers an in-depth exploration of how command-and-control style administrative intervention and low levels of market liquidity have had a prophylactic effect on innovation and competition

Microstructural white-matter abnormalities and their relationship with cognitive dysfunction in obsessive-compulsive disorder

open5Background: In recent years, diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) studies have detected subtle microstructural abnormalities of white matter (WM) in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). However, findings have been inconsistent, and it is unclear whether WM abnormalities are related to cognitive processes. The aim of this study was to explore the relationship of WM alterations with cognitive variables in OCD in order to investigate the structural correlates of behaviorally relevant features of the disorder. Methods: We compared DTI-derived fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), and radial diffusivity (RD) measures between OCD patients (n = 16) and healthy controls (n = 18) using a whole-brain tract-based spatial statistics (TBSS) approach. We also explored the correlations of WM alterations with clinical and cognitive variables. Results: Patients with OCD demonstrated increases in MD in the bilateral posterior corona radiata; left anterior corona radiata; bilateral superior longitudinal fasciculus; genu, body, and splenium of the corpus callosum; and left posterior limb of the internal capsule. An increase in RD values was also found in some of the same tracts (right posterior corona radiata, right superior longitudinal fasciculus, left anterior corona radiata, and corpus callosum). Furthermore, increased MD value in the internal capsule was correlated with the percentage of errors made during a target detection task, which was greater in the OCD group overall. Conclusions: These findings indicate that OCD patients show greater diffusivity in several white-matter regions. The correlation between cognitive performance and diffusivity in the internal capsule suggests that microstructural WM alternations may have functional consequences for the disorder.openMagioncalda, P; Martino, M; Ely, B.A.; Inglese, M; Stern, E. R.Magioncalda, P; Martino, M; Ely, B. A.; Inglese, M; Stern, E. R

A symplectic proof of a theorem of Franks

A celebrated theorem in two-dimensional dynamics due to John Franks asserts that every area preserving homeomorphism of the sphere has either two or infinitely many periodic points. In this work we reprove Franks' theorem under the additional assumption that the map is smooth. Our proof uses only tools from symplectic topology and thus differs significantly from all previous proofs. A crucial role is played by the results of Ginzburg and Kerman concerning resonance relations for Hamiltonian diffeomorpisms.Comment: 15 pages. Minor changes. Final version to appear in Compositio Mathematic

Stratigraphic evidence of two historical tsunamis on the semi-arid coast of north-central Chile

On September 16, 2015, a Mw 8.3 earthquake struck the north-central Chile coast, triggering a tsunami observed along 500 km of coastline, between Huasco (28.5°S) and San Antonio (33.5°S). This tsunami provided a unique opportunity to examine the nature of tsunami deposits in a semi-arid, siliciclastic environment where stratigraphic and sedimentological records of past tsunamis are difficult to distinguish. To improve our ability to identify such evidence, we targeted one of the few low-energy, organic-rich depositional environments in north-central Chile: Pachingo marsh in Tongoy Bay (30.3°S).We found sedimentary evidence of the 2015 and one previous tsunami as tabular sand sheets. Both deposits are composed of poorly to moderately sorted, gray-brown, fine-to medium-grained sand and are distinct from underlying and overlying organic-rich silt. Both sand beds thin (from ∼20 cm to \u3c1 \u3ecm) and fine landward, and show normal grading. The older sand bed is thicker and extends over 125 m further inland than the 2015 tsunami deposit. To model the relative size of the tsunamis that deposited each sand bed, we employed tsunami flow inversion. Our results show that the older sand bed was produced by higher flow speeds and depths than those in 2015. Anthropogenic evidence along with 137Cs and 210Pb dating constrains the age of the older tsunami to the last ∼110 years. We suggest that the older sand bed was deposited by the large tsunami in 1922 CE sourced to the north of our study site. This deposit represents the first geologic evidence of a pre-2015 tsunami along the semi-arid north-central Chile coast and highlights the current and continuing tsunami hazard in the region

Mapping Cosmic Dawn and Reionization: Challenges and Synergies

Cosmic dawn and the Epoch of Reionization (EoR) are among the least explored observational eras in cosmology: a time at which the first galaxies and supermassive black holes formed and reionized the cold, neutral Universe of the post-recombination era. With current instruments, only a handful of the brightest galaxies and quasars from that time are detectable as individual objects, due to their extreme distances. Fortunately, a multitude of multi-wavelength intensity mapping measurements, ranging from the redshifted 21 cm background in the radio to the unresolved X-ray background, contain a plethora of synergistic information about this elusive era. The coming decade will likely see direct detections of inhomogenous reionization with CMB and 21 cm observations, and a slew of other probes covering overlapping areas and complementary physical processes will provide crucial additional information and cross-validation. To maximize scientific discovery and return on investment, coordinated survey planning and joint data analysis should be a high priority, closely coupled to computational models and theoretical predictions.Comment: 5 pages, 1 figure, submitted to the Astro2020 Decadal Survey Science White Paper cal

The Stellenbosch Consensus on the International Legal Obligation to Collaborate and Assist in Addressing Pandemics: Clarifying Article 44 of the International Health Regulations

The International Health Regulations (IHR), of which the World Health Organization is custodian, govern how countries collectively promote global health security, including prevention, detection, and response to potential global health emergencies such as the ongoing covid-19 pandemic. While Article 44 of this binding legal instrument requires countries to collaborate and assist each other in meeting their respective obligations, recent events demonstrate that the precise nature and scope of these legal obligations are ill-understood. A shared understanding of the level and type of collaboration legally required by the IHR is a necessary step in ensuring these obligations can be acted upon and fully realized, and in fostering global solidarity and resilience in the face of future pandemics. In this consensus statement, public international law scholars specializing in global health consider the legal meaning of Article 44 using the interpretive framework of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties

Rapid accelerations of Antarctic Peninsula outlet glaciers driven by surface melt

J.C.E. acknowledges a NERC independent research fellowship grant number NE/R014574/1. J.M.W. acknowledges financial contributions made by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (grant 866.15.201) and the Netherlands Earth System Science Center (NESSC).Atmospheric warming is increasing surface melting across the Antarctic Peninsula, with unknown impacts upon glacier dynamics at the ice-bed interface. Using high-resolution satellite-derived ice velocity data, optical satellite imagery and regional climate modelling, we show that drainage of surface meltwater to the bed of outlet glaciers on the Antarctic Peninsula occurs and triggers rapid ice flow accelerations (up to 100% greater than the annual mean). This provides a mechanism for this sector of the Antarctic Ice Sheet to respond rapidly to atmospheric warming. We infer that delivery of water to the bed transiently increases basal water pressure, enhancing basal motion, but efficient evacuation subsequently reduces water pressure causing ice deceleration. Currently, melt events are sporadic, so efficient subglacial drainage cannot be maintained, resulting in multiple short-lived (<6 day) ice flow perturbations. Future increases in meltwater could induce a shift to a glacier dynamic regime characterised by seasonal-scale hydrologically-driven ice flow variations.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Ernst Freund as Precursor of the Rational Study of Corporate Law

Gindis, David, Ernst Freund as Precursor of the Rational Study of Corporate Law (October 27, 2017). Journal of Institutional Economics, Forthcoming. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=2905547, doi: https://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2905547The rise of large business corporations in the late 19th century compelled many American observers to admit that the nature of the corporation had yet to be understood. Published in this context, Ernst Freund's little-known The Legal Nature of Corporations (1897) was an original attempt to come to terms with a new legal and economic reality. But it can also be described, to paraphrase Oliver Wendell Holmes, as the earliest example of the rational study of corporate law. The paper shows that Freund had the intuitions of an institutional economist, and engaged in what today would be called comparative institutional analysis. Remarkably, his argument that the corporate form secures property against insider defection and against outsiders anticipated recent work on entity shielding and capital lock-in, and can be read as an early contribution to what today would be called the theory of the firm.Peer reviewe