105 research outputs found
Arithmetic Spacetime Geometry from String Theory
An arithmetic framework to string compactification is described. The approach
is exemplified by formulating a strategy that allows to construct geometric
compactifications from exactly solvable theories at . It is shown that the
conformal field theoretic characters can be derived from the geometry of
spacetime, and that the geometry is uniquely determined by the two-dimensional
field theory on the world sheet. The modular forms that appear in these
constructions admit complex multiplication, and allow an interpretation as
generalized McKay-Thompson series associated to the Mathieu and Conway groups.
This leads to a string motivated notion of arithmetic moonshine.Comment: 36 page
Wave Number of Maximal Growth in Viscous Magnetic Fluids of Arbitrary Depth
An analytical method within the frame of linear stability theory is presented
for the normal field instability in magnetic fluids. It allows to calculate the
maximal growth rate and the corresponding wave number for any combination of
thickness and viscosity of the fluid. Applying this method to magnetic fluids
of finite depth, these results are quantitatively compared to the wave number
of the transient pattern observed experimentally after a jump--like increase of
the field. The wave number grows linearly with increasing induction where the
theoretical and the experimental data agree well. Thereby a long-standing
controversy about the behaviour of the wave number above the critical magnetic
field is tackled.Comment: 19 pages, 15 figures, RevTex; revised version with a new figure and
references added. submitted to Phys Rev
A Digital Repository and Execution Platform for Interactive Scholarly Publications in Neuroscience
The CARMEN Virtual Laboratory (VL) is a cloud-based platform which allows neuroscientists to store, share, develop, execute, reproduce and publicise their work. This paper describes new functionality in the CARMEN VL: an interactive publications repository. This new facility allows users to link data and software to publications. This enables other users to examine data and software associated with the publication and execute the associated software within the VL using the same data as the authors used in the publication. The cloud-based architecture and SaaS (Software as a Service) framework allows vast data sets to be uploaded and analysed using software services. Thus, this new interactive publications facility allows others to build on research results through reuse. This aligns with recent developments by funding agencies, institutions, and publishers with a move to open access research. Open access provides reproducibility and verification of research resources and results. Publications and their associated data and software will be assured of long-term preservation and curation in the repository. Further, analysing research data and the evaluations described in publications frequently requires a number of execution stages many of which are iterative. The VL provides a scientific workflow environment to combine software services into a processing tree. These workflows can also be associated with publications and executed by users. The VL also provides a secure environment where users can decide the access rights for each resource to ensure copyright and privacy restrictions are met
Politicising government engagement with corporate social responsibility: âCSRâ as an empty signifier
Governments are widely viewed by academics and practitioners (and society more generally) as the key societal actors who are capable of compelling businesses to practice corporate social responsibility (CSR). Arguably, such government involvement could be seen as a technocratic device for encouraging ethical business behaviour. In this paper, we offer a more politicised interpretation of government engagement with CSR where âCSRâ is not a desired form of business conduct but an element of discourse that governments can deploy in structuring their relationships with other social actors. We build our argument through a historical analysis of government CSR discourse in the Russian Federation. Laclau and Mouffe's (Hegemony and socialist strategy: Towards a radical democratic politics,Verso Books, London, 1985) social theory of hegemony underpins our research. We find that âCSRâ in the Russian governmentâs discourse served to legitimise its power over large businesses. Using this case, we contribute to wider academic debates by providing fresh empirical evidence that allows the development of critical evaluation tools in relation to governmentsâ engagement with âCSRâ. We find that governments are capable of hijacking CSR for their own self-interested gain. We close the paper by reflecting on the merit of exploring the case of the Russian Federation. As a ânon-coreâ, non-western exemplar, it provides a useful âmirrorâ with which to reflect on the more widely used test-bed of Western industrial democracies when scrutinising CSR. Based on our findings, we invite other scholars to adopt a more critical, politicised stance when researching the role of governments in relation to CSR in other parts of the world
Synthesising Corporate Responsibility on Organisational and Societal Levels of Analysis: An Integrative Perspective
This article develops an integrative perspective on corporate responsibility by synthesising competing perspectives on the responsibility of the corporation at the organisational and societal levels of analysis. We review three major corporate responsibility perspectives, which we refer to as economic, critical, and politico-ethical. We analyse the major potential uses and pitfalls of the perspectives, and integrate the debate on these two levels. Our synthesis concludes that when a society has a robust division of moral labour in place, the responsibility of a corporation may be economic (as suggested under the economic perspective) without jeopardising democracy and sustainability (as reported under the critical perspective). Moreover, the economic role of corporations neither signifies the absence of deliberative democratic mechanisms nor business practices extending beyond compliance (as called for under the politico-ethical perspective). The study underscores the value of integrating different perspectives and multiple levels of analysis to present comprehensive descriptions and prescriptions of the responsibility phenomenon
Justice and Corporate Governance: New Insights from Rawlsian Social Contract and Senâs Capabilities Approach
By considering what we identify as a problem inherent in the ânature of the firmââthe risk of abuse of authorityâwe propound the conception of a social contract theory of the firm which is truly Rawlsian in its inspiration. Hence, we link the social contract theory of the firm (justice at firmâs level) with the general theory of justice (justice at societyâs level). Through this path, we enter the debate about whether firms can be part of Rawlsian theory of justice showing that corporate governance principles enter the âbasic structure.â Finally, we concur with Senâs aim to broaden the realm of social justice beyond what he calls the âtranscendental institutional perfectionismâ of Rawlsâ theory. We maintain the contractarian approach to justice but introduce Senâs capability concept as an element of the constitutional and post-constitutional contract model of institutions with special reference to corporate governance. Accordingly, rights over primary goods and capabilities are (constitutionally) granted by the basic institutions of society, but many capabilities have to be turned into the functionings of many stakeholders through the operation of firms understood as post-constitutional institutional domains. The constitutional contract on the distribution of primary goods and capabilities should then shape the principles of corporate governance so that at post-constitutional level anyone may achieve her/his functionings in the corporate domain by exercising such capabilities. In the absence of such a condition, post-constitutional contracts would distort the process that descends from constitutional rights and capabilities toward social outcomes
The distribution of standard deviations applied to high throughput screening
High throughput screening (HTS) assesses compound libraries for âactivityâ using target assays. A subset of HTS data contains a large number of sample measurements replicated a small number of times providing an opportunity to introduce the distribution of standard deviations (DSD). Applying the DSD to some HTS data sets revealed signs of bias in some of the data and discovered a sub-population of compounds exhibiting high variability which may be difficult to screen. In the data examined, 21% of 1189 such compounds were pan-assay interference compounds. This proportion reached 57% for the most closely related compounds within the sub-population. Using the DSD, large HTS data sets can be modelled in many cases as two distributions: a large group of nearly normally distributed âinactiveâ compounds and a residual distribution of âactiveâ compounds. The latter were not normally distributed, overlapped inactive distributions â on both sides â, and were larger than typically assumed. As such, a large number of compounds are being misclassified as âinactiveâ or are invisible to current methods which could become the next generation of drugs. Although applied here to HTS, it is applicable to data sets with a large number of samples measured a small number of times
Model Order Reduction in Fluid Dynamics: Challenges and Perspectives
This chapter reviews techniques of model reduction of fluid dynamics systems. Fluid systems are known to be difficult to reduce efficiently due to several reasons. First of all, they exhibit strong nonlinearities â which are mainly related either to nonlinear convection terms and/or some geometric variability â that often cannot be treated by simple linearization. Additional difficulties arise when attempting model reduction of unsteady flows, especially when long-term transient behavior needs to be accurately predicted using reduced order models and more complex features, such as turbulence or multiphysics phenomena, have to be taken into consideration. We first discuss some general principles that apply to many parametric model order reduction problems, then we apply them on steady and unsteady viscous flows modelled by the incompressible Navier-Stokes equations. We address questions of inf-sup stability, certification through error estimation, computational issues and â in the unsteady case â long-time stability of the reduced model. Moreover, we provide an extensive list of literature references
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