Mobile website or an app? Looking ahead to strategic mobile library development in Higher Education.

With more and more users accessing library websites via smartphones, what is the best mobile platform to facilitate access to the diverse collections? Ros Pan and Josh Clark report back from an extensive study into library website development. They conclude that at present time, the best strategic solution is a hybrid approach where a platform-independent web app is created that can be used on any mobile device

Gender inclusion activities in entrepreneurship ecosystems: The case of St. Louis, MO and Boston, MA

Women-owned businesses have an economic impact of nearly $3 trillion in the U.S. Despite the tremendous opportunity for economic growth they present, women entrepreneurs lag behind their male counterparts in terms of number of start-ups and scaling of businesses. To understand how and why this may be taking shape, we focus on the role of entrepreneur support organizations (ESOs) or those organizations that act as intermediaries between the resources of a local ecosystem and entrepreneurs. All organizations that have as their proverbial mission to serve, support or partner with entrepreneurs can be categorized as ESOs. Given their role as decision makers, gatekeepers and resource providers, such organizations have the power and capacity to determine who is granted the opportunity to access and benefit from the very networks, mentors, programs and funding that increase entrepreneurs’ odds for success. Through extensive interviews and observations over the course of 2013 to 2016, we compare and contrast the entrepreneurship ecosystems in St. Louis, MO and Boston, MA to understand differences in gender inclusion efforts at ESOs. We focus specifically on cultural cognitive frames, social normative ‘rules’, and regulatory forces as exerting institutional pressures on ESOs in the specific communities in which they are embedded. Our qualitative approach yields in-depth insights as to the mechanisms and dynamics of inclusion and exclusion in the St. Louis and Boston ecosystems by way of ESOs and their practices. Findings indicate that ESOs in the emerging St. Louis ecosystem engage in inclusion efforts through institutional pressures exerted at the grassroots level by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs. These efforts seem to have yielded positive results in that women’s business ownership has increased by 16% in a span of five years between 2007 and 2012, going from 28% to 44%. In comparison, women’s business ownership has stayed around 30%, in Boston between 2007 and 2012, which is a much more established ecosystem. Our findings indicate that inclusion efforts driven mainly by top-down regulatory forces may not be as effective in changing the gender gap in entrepreneurship ecosystems. We expand on these differences and outline steps for ESOs and policy makers to build inclusive ecosystems in their cities

This patient is not breathing properly: is this COPD, heart failure, or neither?

© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. Introduction: Heart failure (HF) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) are two common, heterogeneous, long-term illnesses which cause significant morbidity and mortality. Although they both present with breathlessness, they are treated differently. Treatment of COPD focuses mainly on relieving short-term breathlessness, whilst treatment of HF has focused on long term morbidity and mortality. Areas covered: In this review, we aim to highlight the diagnostic challenges in distinguishing COPD from HF. We also explore the implications of their overlap, and the use of biomarkers and treatments for HF in patients with COPD to improve long-term outcomes. Expert commentary: Cardiovascular morbidity and mortality amongst patients with COPD is substantial. Approaches which identify patients with COPD at highest cardiovascular risk may therefore be helpful. A trial targeting those patients with COPD and raised natriuretic peptide levels might be the way to test whether cardiovascular medication has anything to offer the respiratory patient

Experimental Evidence for a Spin-Polarized Ground State in the \nu=5/2 Fractional Quantum Hall Effect

We study the \nu=5/2 even-denominator fractional quantum Hall effect (FQHE) over a wide range of magnetic (B) field in a heterojunction insulated gate field-effect transistor (HIGFET). The electron density can be tuned from n=0 to 7.6 \times 10^{11} cm^{-2} with a peak mobility \mu = 5.5 \times 10^6 cm^2/Vs. The \nu=5/2 state shows a strong minimum in diagonal resistance and a developing Hall plateau at magnetic fields as high as 12.6T. The strength of the energy gap varies smoothly with B-field. We interpret these observations as strong evidence for a spin-polarized ground state at \nu=5/2.Comment: new references adde

Empirical distributions of Chinese stock returns at different microscopic timescales

We study the distributions of event-time returns and clock-time returns at different microscopic timescales using ultra-high-frequency data extracted from the limit-order books of 23 stocks traded in the Chinese stock market in 2003. We find that the returns at the one-trade timescale obey the inverse cubic law. For larger timescales (2-32 trades and 1-5 minutes), the returns follow the Student distribution with power-law tails. With the decrease of timescale, the tail becomes fatter, which is consistent with the vibrational theory.Comment: 14 Elsart page including 2 tables and 3 figure

Rhodium(II)-catalyzed stereocontrolled synthesis of dihydrofuran-3-imines from 1-Tosyl-1,2,3-triazoles

Rhodium(II) acetate catalyzes the denitrogenative transformation of 5-substituted and 4,5-disubstituted 1-sulfonyl-1,2,3-triazoles with pendent allyl and propargyl ether motifs to oxonium ylides that undergo [2,3]-sigmatropic rearrangement to give substituted dihydrofuran-3-imines in high yield and diastereoselectivity

Generalized measurements by linear elements

I give a first characterization of the class of generalized measurements that can be exactly realized on a pair of qudits encoded in indistinguishable particles, by using only linear elements and particle detectors. Two immediate results follow from this characterization. (i) The Schmidt number of each POVM element cannot exceed the number of initial particles. This rules out any possibility of performing perfect Bell-measurements for qudits. (ii) The maximum probability of performing a generalized incomplete Bell-measurement is 1/2.Comment: 4 pages. Submitted to Phys. Rev.

Grazing Alters Ecosystem Functioning and C:N:P Stoichiometry of Grasslands along a Regional Precipitation

Grasslands have experienced dramatic shifts in structure and functioning driven primarily by human disturbances and global climate change. The long-term grazing has resulted in widespread declines in biodiversity and ecosystem functioning and services. This is triggered by the direct and indirect effects of grazing and often mediated by the complex interactions between vegetation and environmental. Thus, it is critical to obtain a better understanding of how grazing, abiotic factors and biotic–abiotic interactions influence key properties of ecosystem functioning and sustainability and thereby provide guideline for improving grassland management practices in the Eurasian steppe. While abundant evidence demonstrates that heavy grazing alters the ecosystem structure and function of grass- lands, research on how grazing specifically affects ecosystem functioning and stoichiometry on broad scales is scarce because of a lack of adequate ungrazed reference sites. We examined the effects of grazing on ecosystem functioning and C:N:P stoichiometry along the 700 km China–Mongolia transect (CMT) using consistent methods. The CMT, which covers a wide range of biotic and abiotic conditions, enables us to observe the total effects of multiple mechanisms that probably operate simultaneously but vary in their relative strengths across regions. The key research questions we are trying to address are: 1) How has grazing affected ecosystem functioning (i.e. species richness, above- and below-ground biomass and litter biomass) and C:N:P stoichiometry of grasslands along the regional precipitation gradient during the last 50 years? 2) How do the responses of plant and soil C, N and P pools and stoichiometry to grazing differ among community types? 3) What is the relative importance of plant functional group (PFG) composition and species plasticity in influencing ecosystem functioning and stoichiometry