589 research outputs found
Happiness on Tap: Piped Water Adoption in Urban Morocco
We study the demand for household water connections in urban Morocco, and the effect of such connections on household welfare. In the northern city of Tangiers, among homeowners without a private connection to the city’s water grid, a random subset was offered a simplified procedure to purchase a household connection on credit (at a zero percent interest rate). Take-up was high, at 69%. Because all households in our sample had access to the water grid through free public taps (often located fairly close to their homes), household connections did not lead to any improvement in the quality of the water households consumed; and despite significant increase in the quantity of water consumed, we find no change in the incidence of waterborne illnesses. Nevertheless, we find that households are willing to pay a substantial amount of money to have a private tap at home. Being connected generates important time gains, which are used for leisure and social activities, rather than productive activities. Because water is often a source of tension between households, household connections improve social integration and reduce conflict. Overall, within 6 months, self-reported well-being improved substantially among households in the treatment group, despite the financial cost of the connection. Our results suggest that facilitating access to credit for households to finance lump sum quality-of-life investments can significantly increase welfare, even if those investments do not result in income or health gains
The Origin of Intraspecific Variation of Virulence in an Eukaryotic Immune Suppressive Parasite
Occurrence of intraspecific variation in parasite virulence, a prerequisite for coevolution of hosts and parasites, has largely been reported. However, surprisingly little is known of the molecular bases of this variation in eukaryotic parasites, with the exception of the antigenic variation used by immune-evading parasites of mammals. The present work aims to address this question in immune suppressive eukaryotic parasites. In Leptopilina boulardi, a parasitic wasp of Drosophila melanogaster, well-defined virulent and avirulent strains have been characterized. The success of virulent females is due to a major immune suppressive factor, LbGAP, a RacGAP protein present in the venom and injected into the host at oviposition. Here, we show that an homologous protein, named LbGAPy, is present in the venom of the avirulent strain. We then question whether the difference in virulence between strains originates from qualitative or quantitative differences in LbGAP and LbGAPy proteins. Results show that the recombinant LbGAPy protein has an in vitro GAP activity equivalent to that of recombinant LbGAP and similarly targets Drosophila Rac1 and Rac2 GTPases. In contrast, a much higher level of both mRNA and protein is found in venom-producing tissues of virulent parasitoids. The F1 offspring between virulent and avirulent strains show an intermediate level of LbGAP in their venom but a full success of parasitism. Interestingly, they express almost exclusively the virulent LbGAP allele in venom-producing tissues. Altogether, our results demonstrate that the major virulence factor in the wasp L. boulardi differs only quantitatively between virulent and avirulent strains, and suggest the existence of a threshold effect of this molecule on parasitoid virulence. We propose that regulation of gene expression might be a major mechanism at the origin of intraspecific variation of virulence in immune suppressive eukaryotic parasites. Understanding this variation would improve our knowledge of the mechanisms of transcriptional evolution currently under active investigation
Chemosensory Profile of South Tyrolean Pinot Blanc Wines: A Multivariate Regression Approach
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Phenomenological model for the remanent magnetization of dilute quasi-one-dimensional antiferromagnets
We present a phenomenological model for the remanent magnetization at low
temperatures in the quasi-one-dimensional dilute antiferromagnets
CH_{3}NH_{3}Mn_{1-x}Cd_{x} Cl_{3}\cdot 2H_{2}O and
(CH_{3})_{2}NH_{2}Mn_{1-x}Cd_{x}Cl_{3}\cdot 2H_{2}O. The model assumes the
existence of uncompensated magnetic moments induced in the odd-sized segments
generated along the Mn(^{2+}) chains upon dilution. These moments are further
assumed to correlate ferromagnetically after removal of a cooling field. Using
a (mean-field) linear-chain approximation and reasonable set of model
parameters, we are able to reproduce the approximate linear temperature
dependence observed for the remanent magnetization in the real compounds.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures; final version to appear in Physical Review
Magnon dispersion and thermodynamics in CsNiF_3
We present an accurate transfer matrix renormalization group calculation of
the thermodynamics in a quantum spin-1 planar ferromagnetic chain. We also
calculate the field dependence of the magnon gap and confirm the accuracy of
the magnon dispersion derived earlier through an 1/n expansion. We are thus
able to examine the validity of a number of previous calculations and further
analyze a wide range of experiments on CsNiF_3 concerning the magnon
dispersion, magnetization, susceptibility, and specific heat. Although it is
not possible to account for all data with a single set of parameters, the
overall qualitative agreement is good and the remaining discrepancies may
reflect departure from ideal quasi-one-dimensional model behavior. Finally, we
present some indirect evidence to the effect that the popular interpretation of
the excess specific heat in terms of sine-Gordon solitons may not be
appropriate.Comment: 9 pages 10 figure
Elastic optical interface with variable baudrate: Architecture and proof-of-concept
Varying the symbol rate is an alternative or complementary approach to varying the modulation format or the channel spacing to turn optical networks into elastic networks. We propose to allocate just-enough bandwidth for each optical connection by adjusting the symbol rate such that the penalty originating from long cascades of optical filters is contained. This helps reduce overprovisioning for lightpaths where full capacity is not needed, by (i) eliminating unnecessary regenerators and (ii) reducing the power consumption of terminals, when the clock rate of electronics is reduced along with the baudrate. We propose a novel architecture for an elastic optical interface by combining a variable bitrate transceiver, paired with an elastic aggregation stage, with software-defined control. We then report a real-Time field-programmable-gate-Array-based prototype that delivers flexible transport frames to be sent with a polarization-division multiplexed quadrature phase-shift keying modulation format. We interconnect this prototype with a commercial optical transport network switch and a centralized controller. We demonstrate fast and hitless reconfiguration of the interface and measure the reconfiguration time of hardware logic ( < 450 μs), as well as end-To-end control and the data plane ( < 0.9 s)
Nonlinear excitations in CsNiF3 in magnetic fields perpendicular to the easy plane
Experimental and numerical studies of the magnetic field dependence of the
specific heat and magnetization of single crystals of CsNiF3 have been
performed at 2.4 K, 2.9 K, and 4.2 K in magnetic fields up to 9 T oriented
perpendicular to the easy plane. The experimental results confirm the presence
of the theoretically predicted double peak structure in the specific heat
arising from the formation of nonlinear spin modes. The demagnetizing effects
are found to be negligible, and the overall agreement between the data and
numerical predictions is better than reported for the case when the magnetic
field was oriented in the easy plane. Demagnetizing effects might play a role
in generating the difference observed between theory and experiment in previous
work analyzing the excess specific heat using the sine-Gordon model.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.
Magnetization steps in a diluted Heisenberg antiferromagnetic chain: Theory and experiments on TMMC:Cd
A theory for the equilibrium low-temperature magnetization M of a diluted
Heisenberg antiferromagnetic chain is presented. The magnetization curve, M
versus B, is calculated using the exact contributions of finite chains with 1
to 5 spins, and the "rise and ramp approximation" for longer chains. Some
non-equilibrium effects that occur in a rapidly changing B, are also
considered. Specific non-equilibrium models based on earlier treatments of the
phonon bottleneck, and of spin flips associated with cross relaxation and with
level crossings, are discussed. Magnetization data on powders of TMMC diluted
with cadmium [i.e., (CH_3)_4NMn_xCd_(1-x)Cl_3, with 0.16<=x<=0.50 were measured
at 0.55 K in 18 T superconducting magnets. The field B_1 at the first MST from
pairs is used to determine the NN exchange constant, J, which changes from -5.9
K to -6.5 K as x increases from 0.16 to 0.50. The magnetization curves obtained
in the superconducting magnets are compared with simulations based on the
equilibrium theory. Data for the differential susceptibility, dM/dB, were taken
in pulsed magnetic fields (7.4 ms duration) up to 50 T, with the powder samples
in a 1.5 K liquid-helium bath. Non-equilibrium effects, which became more
severe as x decreased, were observed. The non-equilibrium effects are
tentatively interpreted using the "Inadequate Heat Flow Scenario," or to
cross-relaxation, and crossings of energy levels, including those of excited
states.Comment: 16 pages, 14 figure
Phase diagrams of spin ladders with ferromagnetic legs
The low-temperature properties of the spin S=1/2 ladder with anisotropic
ferromagnetic legs are studied using the continuum limit bosonization approach.
The weak-coupling ground state phase diagram of the model is obtained for a
wide range of coupling constants and several unconventional gapless
''spin-liquid'' phases are shown to exist for ferromagnetic coupling. The
behavior of the ladder system in the vicinity of the ferromagnetic instability
point is discussed in detail.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figure
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