A study in the determination of quality/value relationships in rice (NRI Bulletin 55)

Econometric approaches to the valuation of a food product based on the implicit values of its individual quality attributes are a relatively recent development. Whilst such approaches have been used to explain and quantify consumer preferences at different market levels and in different countries, they offer considerable potential for storage enterprises. Armed with a knowledge of the financial significance of individual quality attribute changes over predicted storage periods, the enterprise can select a technology package which minimizes the most significant of those changes for a given commodity. A methodology for such an approach, based on a Natural Resources Institute case study in Indonesia, is described

3D acoustic-structure interaction of ultrasound in fluids for the manufacture of graded materials

Functionally graded materials engineered to meet specific requirements are being increasingly sought after for advanced engineering projects, yet the possibilities for their manufacture lag behind their design. The ability to control the porosity of a cellular material is one such method for adding functional gradients within materials. A novel technique using ultrasound to control the porosity in reacting polymers shows potential to effectively mass-manufacture porosity tailored polymeric foams. In this work the pressure field in a metastable polymer produced by multiple ultrasonic sources is modeled at distinct stages of the polymerisation reaction

Time-frequency detection algorithm for gravitational wave bursts

An efficient algorithm is presented for the identification of short bursts of gravitational radiation in the data from broad-band interferometric detectors. The algorithm consists of three steps: pixels of the time-frequency representation of the data that have power above a fixed threshold are first identified. Clusters of such pixels that conform to a set of rules on their size and their proximity to other clusters are formed, and a final threshold is applied on the power integrated over all pixels in such clusters. Formal arguments are given to support the conjecture that this algorithm is very efficient for a wide class of signals. A precise model for the false alarm rate of this algorithm is presented, and it is shown using a number of representative numerical simulations to be accurate at the 1% level for most values of the parameters, with maximal error around 10%.Comment: 26 pages, 15 figures, to appear in PR

The tan(beta) - M_H^\pm bound from inclusive semi-tauonic B-decays in the MSSM

We compute the O(alpha_s) SUSY-QCD corrections to the W and charged Higgs mediated inclusive semi-tauonic B-decay, B->tau antineutrino_tau X. Combining the SUSY contribution with the SM result obtained from the heavy quark effective field theory, plus ordinary QCD corrections, we find that the allowed region in the (tan(beta),M_H^\pm)-plane could be significantly modified by the short-distance supersymmetric effects. Since the sensitivity to the SUSY parameters other than mu (the higgsino mixing mass) is rather low, the following effective bound emerges for mu<0 at the 2 sigma level: tan(beta)~< 0.43 (M_H^\pm/GeV). Remarkably, for mu>0 there could be no bound at all. Finally, we provide a combined (tan(beta,M_H^\pm) exclusion plot using our B-meson results together with the recent data from top quark decays.Comment: 15 pages, LaTeX, 1 table and 3 figs included as a separate file, full postscript version avaliable at ftp://ftp.ifae.es/preprint/ft/uabft407.ps . New comments and references added. Accepted version in Phys. Lett.

Half-BPS quotients in M-theory: ADE with a twist

We classify Freund-Rubin backgrounds of eleven-dimensional supergravity of the form AdS_4 x X^7 which are at least half BPS; equivalently, smooth quotients of the round 7-sphere by finite subgroups of SO(8) which admit an (N>3)-dimensional subspace of Killing spinors. The classification is given in terms of pairs consisting of an ADE subgroup of SU(2) and an automorphism defining its embedding in SO(8). In particular we find novel half-BPS quotients associated with the subgroups of type D_n (for n>5), E_7 and E_8 and their outer automorphisms.Comment: 16 pages; V2: notational inconsistencies addressed, final version to be published in JHE

The position of graptolites within Lower Palaeozoic planktic ecosystems.

An integrated approach has been used to assess the palaeoecology of graptolites both as a discrete group and also as a part of the biota present within Ordovician and Silurian planktic realms. Study of the functional morphology of graptolites and comparisons with recent ecological analogues demonstrates that graptolites most probably filled a variety of niches as primary consumers, with modes of life related to the colony morphotype. Graptolite coloniality was extremely ordered, lacking any close morphological analogues in Recent faunas. To obtain maximum functional efficiency, graptolites would have needed varying degrees of coordinated automobility. A change in lifestyle related to ontogenetic changes was prevalent within many graptolite groups. Differing lifestyle was reflected by differing reproductive strategies, with synrhabdosomes most likely being a method for rapid asexual reproduction. Direct evidence in the form of graptolithophage 'coprolitic' bodies, as well as indirect evidence in the form of probable defensive adaptations, indicate that graptolites comprised a food item for a variety of predators. Graptolites were also hosts to a variety of parasitic organisms and provided an important nutrient source for scavenging organisms

Extragalactic Relativistic Jets and Nuclear Regions in Galaxies

Past years have brought an increasingly wider recognition of the ubiquity of relativistic outflows (jets) in galactic nuclei, which has turned jets into an effective tool for investigating the physics of nuclear regions in galaxies. A brief summary is given here of recent results from studies of jets and nuclear regions in several active galaxies with prominent outflows.Comment: 5 pages; contribution to ESO Astrophysical Symposia, "Relativistic Astrophysics and Cosmology", eds. B. Aschenbach, V. Burwitz, G. Hasinger, B. Leibundgut (Springer: Heidelberg 2006

Small bound for birational automorphism groups of algebraic varieties (with an Appendix by Yujiro Kawamata)

We give an effective upper bound of |Bir(X)| for the birational automorphism group of an irregular n-fold (with n = 3) of general type in terms of the volume V = V(X) under an ''albanese smoothness and simplicity'' condition. To be precise, |Bir(X)| < d_3 V^{10}. An optimum linear bound |Bir(X)|-1 < (1/3)(42)^3 V is obtained for those 3-folds with non-maximal albanese dimension. For all n > 2, a bound |Bir(X)| < d_n V^{10} is obtained when alb_X is generically finite, alb(X) is smooth and Alb(X) is simple.Comment: Mathematische Annalen, to appea

Aerosol-assisted fabrication of tin-doped indium oxide ceramic thin films from nanoparticle suspensions

Sn-doped In2O3 (ITO) thin films were fabricated on float glass substrates from a nanoparticle suspension using a new and inexpensive aerosol-assisted chemical transport (AACT) process. The influence of the solvent type, loading level and film deposition time on the structural, electrical and optical properties of the deposited thin films was investigated. In addition, the effect of post-deposition heat-treatment of ITO films on the film resistivity and transparency was investigated using microwave radiation and compared with more conventional radiant heat-treated films. The SEM images of the films prepared using a 30 min deposition time with 0.20% (wt/vol%) methanolic ITO suspension provided better surface coverage compared to the other deposition times investigated. The optimised ITO films were heat-treated after deposition by either conventional radiant or microwave assisted heating methods in order to improve the inter-particle connections and film adherence. The films heat-treated after deposition by microwave annealing exhibited an average transmittance of >85% in the visible region with a resistivity of 12 Ω cm and a carrier concentration of -3.7 x 1016 cm 3 , which was superior to films that were heat-treated using more conventional thermal processing (despite the shorter processing time for the microwave process). The resistivity of ITO films was further decreased to 6.0 x 10-2 Ω cm with increased carrier concentration of -8.0 x 1018 cm 3 when ethyl cellulose was added to the ITO suspension prior to the AACT deposition. The enhanced conductivity of this film is due to the improved particle-particle and particle-substrate connections as observed by SEM imaging