Foreign direct investment and the political economy of protection

Trade Barriers;Foreign Investment

New class I methanol masers

We review properties of all known collisionally pumped (class I) methanol maser series based on observations with the Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA) and the Mopra radio telescope. Masers at 36, 84, 44 and 95 GHz are most widespread, while 9.9, 25, 23.4 and 104 GHz masers are much rarer, tracing the most energetic shocks. A survey of many southern masers at 36 and 44 GHz suggests that these two transitions are highly complementary. The 23.4 GHz maser is a new type of rare class I methanol maser, detected only in two high-mass star-forming regions, G357.97-0.16 and G343.12-0.06, and showing a behaviour similar to 9.9, 25 and 104 GHz masers. Interferometric positions suggest that shocks responsible for class I masers could arise from a range of phenomena, not merely an outflow scenario. For example, some masers might be caused by interaction of an expanding HII region with its surrounding molecular cloud. This has implications for evolutionary sequences incorporating class I methanol masers if they appear more than once during the evolution of the star-forming region. We also make predictions for candidate maser transitions at the ALMA frequency range.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures, to appear in proceedings for IAUS 287: Cosmic Masers - from OH to H

Cliophysics: Socio-political Reliability Theory, Polity Duration and African Political (In)stabilities

Quantification of historical sociological processes have recently gained attention among theoreticians in the effort of providing a solid theoretical understanding of the behaviors and regularities present in sociopolitical dynamics. Here we present a reliability theory of polity processes with emphases on individual political dynamics of African countries. We found that the structural properties of polity failure rates successfully capture the risk of political vulnerability and instabilities in which 87.50%, 75%, 71.43%, and 0% of the countries with monotonically increasing, unimodal, U-shaped and monotonically decreasing polity failure rates, respectively, have high level of state fragility indices. The quasi-U-shape relationship between average polity duration and regime types corroborates historical precedents and explains the stability of the autocracies and democracies.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, 1 tabl

High-velocity feature of the class I methanol maser in G309.38-0.13

The Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA) has been used to map class I methanol masers at 36 and 44 GHz in G309.38-0.13. Maser spots are found at nine locations in an area of 50''x30'', with both transitions reliably detected at only two locations. The brightest spot is associated with shocked gas traced by 4.5 micron emission. The data allowed us to make a serendipitous discovery of a high-velocity 36-GHz spectral feature, which is blue-shifted by about 30 km/s from the peak velocity at this frequency, but spatially located close to (within a few arcseconds of) the brightest maser spot. We interpret this as indicating an outflow parallel to the line of sight. Such a high velocity spread of maser features, which has not been previously reported in the class I methanol masers associated with a single molecular cloud, suggests that the outflow most likely interacts with a moving parcel of gas.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures, accepted by MNRAS Letter

A Review of Maser Polarization and Magnetic Fields

Through polarization observations masers are unique probes of the magnetic field in a variety of different astronomical objects, with the different maser species tracing different physical conditions. In recent years maser polarization observations have provided insights in the magnetic field strength and morphology in, among others, the envelopes around evolved stars, Planetary Nebulae (PNe), massive star forming regions and supernova remnants. More recently, maser observations have even been used to determine the magnetic field in megamaser galaxies. This review will present an overview of maser polarization observations and magnetic field determinations of the last several years and discuss the implications of the magnetic field measurements for several important fields of study, such as aspherical PNe creation and massive star formation.Comment: 10 pages, Review paper from IAU symposium 242 "Astrophysical Masers and their Environments

A bilateral shear layer between two parallel Couette flows

We consider a shear layer of a kind not previously studied to our knowledge. Contrary to the classical free shear layer, the width of the shear zone does not vary in the streamwise direction but rather exhibits a lateral variation. Based on some simplifying assumptions, an analytic solution has been derived for the new shear layer. These assumptions have been justified by a comparison with numerical solutions of the full Navier-Stokes equations, which accord with the analytical solution to better than 1% in the entire domain. An explicit formula is found for the width of the shear zone as a function of wall-normal coordinate. This width is independent of wall velocities in the laminar regime. Preliminary results for a co-current laminar-turbulent shear layer in the same geometry are also presented. Shear-layer instabilities were then developed and resulted in an unsteady mixing zone at the interface between the two co-current streams.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figures. Accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.

The Detection of Outflows in the IR-Quiet Molecular Core NGC 6334 I(North)

We find strong evidence for outflows originating in the dense molecular core NGC 6334 I(North): a 1000 Msol molecular core distinguished by its lack of HII regions and mid-IR emission. New observations were obtained of the SiO 2-1 and 5-4 lines with the SEST 15-m telescope and the H2 (1-0) S(1) line with the ESO 2.2-m telescope. The line profiles of the SiO transitions show broad wings extending from -50 to 40 km/s, and spatial maps of the line wing emission exhibit a bipolar morphology with the peaks of the red and blue wing separated by 30". The estimated mass loss rate of the outflow is comparable to those for young intermediate to high-mass stars. The near-IR images show eight knots of H2 emission. Five of the knots form a linear chain which is displaced from the axis of the SiO outflow; these knots may trace shock excited gas along the path of a second, highly collimated outflow. We propose that I(N) is a rare example of a molecular core in an early stage of cluster formation.Comment: 4 pages, LaTeX, 3 ps figures, accepted by ApJ

Analytical and Numerical Verification of the Nernst Theorem for Metals

In view of the current discussion on the subject, an effort is made to show very accurately both analytically and numerically how the Drude dispersion model gives consistent results for the Casimir free energy at low temperatures. Specifically, for the free energy near T=0 we find the leading term to be proportional to T^2 and the next-to-leading term proportional to T^{5/2}. These terms give rise to zero Casimir entropy as T approaches zero, and is thus in accordance with Nernst's theorem.Comment: 19 pages latex, 3 figures. v4: Figures updated. This is the final version, accepted for publication in Physical Review

Mid-Infrared Imaging of NGC 6334 I

We present high-resolution (<0.5") mid-infrared Keck II images of individual sources in the central region of NGC 6334 I. We compare these images to images at a variety of other wavelengths from the near infrared to cm radio continuum and speculate on the nature of the NGC 6334 I sources. We assert that the cometary shape of the UCHII region here, NGC 6334 F, is due to a champagne-like flow from a source on the edge of a molecular clump and not a due to a bow shock caused by the supersonic motion of the UCHII region through the interstellar medium. The mid-infrared emission in concentrated into an arc of dust that define the boundary between the UCHII region and the molecular clump. This dust arc contains a majority of the masers in the region. We discuss the nature of the four near-infrared sources associated with IRS-I 1, and suggest that one of the sources, IRS1E, is responsible for the heating and ionizing of the UCHII region and the mid-infrared dust arc. Infrared source IRS-I 2, which has been thought to be a circumstellar disk associated with a linear distribution of methanol masers, is found not to be directly coincident with the masers and elongated at a much different position angle. IRS-I 3 is found to be a extended source of mid-infrared emission coming from a cluster of young dusty sources seen in the near-infrared.Comment: Accepted for publication by the Astrophysical Journal, 27 pages, 9 figure

The Norwegian Ombudsman for Children on child participation

The adoption in 1989 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) has seen a quantum leap in the recognition- and expansion of initiatives to uphold children’s participation rights. The Ombudsman for Children plays an important role in promoting children’s rights, thus stressing the importance of authorities taking children’s opinions and experiences into consideration when making decisions which affect them. This article examines how the staff at the Ombudsman for Children in Norway understand and experience child participation through expert meetings and expert groups, in which children are regarded as the experts. The findings suggest that the existence of a consultative approach, where children’s views influence decisions, depends on the effectiveness of the Ombudsman’s representative function. While there is evidence of the recent growth of platforms for children to express their views, the core elements of participation largely remain monopolized by adults. We argue that active participation should be deliberately promoted beyond adult-led realms, and extended to ordinary contexts in which children interact with the society