“Mediation-Only” Filings in the Delaware Court of Chancery: Can New Value Be Added by One of America’s Business Courts?

The following Essay by Vice Chancellor Leo Strine of the Delaware Court of Chancery advocates the enactment of legislation that authorizes the Court of Chancery to handle mediation-only cases. Such cases would be filed solely to invoke the aid of a Chancellor to mediate a business dispute between parties. By advocating this innovative dispute resolution option, the Essay embraces a new dimension of the American judicial role that allows American businesses to more efficiently solve complicated business controversies. The mediation-only device was conceived in 2001 by members of the Delaware judiciary, including Vice Chancellor Strine, in consultation with members of the Delaware Bar and the Administration of Delaware Governor Ruth Ann Minner. After this Essay was widely circulated to certain constituencies and presented at a symposium sponsored by the Duke Law Journal and the Institute for Law and Economic Policy (ILEP), legislation that contained the mediation-only device was drafted. In June 2003, with the full support of the Court of Chancery, Delaware Governor Minner secured passage of the legislation from Delaware\u27s General Assembly. The mediation-only device was enacted into law as 346 and 347 of Title 10 of the Delaware Code. To the Editors\u27 knowledge, this legislation is the first of its kind adopted in the United States

The Rate-Making Process in Property and Casualty Insurance—Goals, Technics, and Limits

A lateral boundary treatment using summation-by-parts operators and simultaneous approximation terms is introduced. The method, that we refer to as the multiple penalty technique, is similar to Davies relaxation and have similar areas of application. The method is proven, by energy methods, to be stable. We show how to apply this technique on the linearized Euler equations in two space dimensions, and that it reduces the errors in the computational domain

Experimental investigations of ageing of commercial BEV Li-ion batteries

The rapid development of lithium-ion batteries has enabled changes in widespread applications ranging from portable electronics to electric vehicles and\ua0large scale grid energy storage. However, battery ageing remain a challenge in\ua0all these applications, and this thesis seeks to contribute to the understanding\ua0of Li-ion battery degradation.In the compiled works, results from extensive testing on discharge current\ua0frequency, variation in SOC level and temperature are reported for cells with\ua0mixed material negative electrodes (Graphite/ SiOx ). Unexpected trends where\ua0cycling in low SOC causes more rapid degradation than cycling in high SOC are observed. The capacity retention after 1200 FCE was 84.7% for cells cycled\ua0in 5-15% SOC, whereas for cells cycled in 45-55% SOC the capacity retention\ua0after 1200 FCE was 94.7%. This dependency is shown to be stronger than\ua0the temperature dependency for mixed material negative electrodes. It is also\ua0demonstrated that dynamic current profiles affect the capacity retention with\ua0a strong correlation for frequencies below 100 mHz.The ageing processes involved are analysed using various in situ electrochemical characterisation techniques and post-mortem investigations. The\ua0strong SOC dependency is shown to be largely attributed to ageing of SiOx\ua0in mixed material electrodes, with LAMSiOx contributing to a loss of 7% ofoverall capacity in 5-15% SOC cycling, compared to only 3% in 85-95% SOC\ua0cycling. For 0-50% SOC cycling in 45\ub0C temperature, capacity retention ofSiOx had dropped to ∼ 25 % of initial capacity, whereas graphite capacity was\ua0still in excess of 90% of initial capacity

Low Frequency influence on degradation of commercial Li-ion battery

The Tesla model 3 has rapidly become one of the most popular electric vehicles (EV), being the best selling EV in 2020 and the second best selling in 2021. In this paper the ageing implications of varying time scales in usage of the battery are investigated for the 2170 cells used in the Tesla model 3. It is shown that dynamic usage in the range of approximately 0.01 to 0.1 Hz has a statistically significant impact on ageing, while dynamic usage in range 0.1 to 1 Hz does not show significant impact on ageing. Furthermore the individual electrode ageing is investigated by non-invasive electrochemical techniques, revealing the profound impact on ageing from Si addition to the negative electrode, where it is shown that substantial part of the ageing comes from loss of Si in the negative electrode

An automatic method for optimizing Venturi shape in cavitation flows

In order to lower the energy consumption of the fibrillation stage for the pulp and paper industry, a new technology need to be innovated and developed. The current research work deals with a new innovative concept based on creating cavitation in the pulp flow. A venturi nozzle is designed and optimized, where hydrodynamic cavitation is achieved by the so called Venturi effect. This paper focuses on the development of an automatic method for venturi shape optimization. The process of cavitation is hard to control and can cause high mechanical wear, therefore an optimization study of the venturi shape is performed with two main objectives. Firstly, to achieve cavitation that is sustained for as long as possible downstream and secondly to avoid cavitation at the walls. The developed method is a type of two-level optimization based on neural networks and evolutionary optimization. A number of simulations are executed and the optimization is then performed on a solver approximation instead of the real solver, which considerably reduces computation time. The obtained results show the optimal venturi configuration and the relative importance of each shape parameter. The optimal configuration is a clear improvement of the baseline configuration and an improvement also compared to all of the tested samples, thereby validating the optimization method

Norden, reframed

This paper calls for Norden to be understood as a metaframe. Related formulations like “Nordic art” or “Nordic welfare” function as mesoframes. These trigger multiple framing devices. A cache of related framing devices constitutes a framing archive. Framing devices work best when operating unobtrusively such that inclusions, exclusions and inconsistencies are condoned or naturalised. Their artifice, however, becomes apparent whenever a frame is questioned. Questioning or criticising a frame gives rise to a framing dispute. The theoretical justification for these typologies is provided at the outset. This schema is then applied to a select range of empirical examples drawn largely from the disciplinary frames (Ernst 1996) of art history and museum studies. Despite this specificity it is envisaged that the general principles set out below can and will be used to address a variety of devices, disputes and archives in Norden and beyond

Hormone replacement therapy before breast cancer diagnosis significantly reduces the overall death rate compared with never-use among 984 breast cancer patients

Nine hundred and eighty-four breast cancer patients were interviewed regarding exogenous hormonal use. This represents a random sample of breast cancer patients in Southern Sweden referred to the Department of Oncology at Lund for treatment between 1978 and 1997 (excluding 1980 and 1981) with a 100% follow-up. Ever-use of hormone replacement therapy (HRT) prior to diagnosis was significantly associated with a longer overall survival in women with their breast cancer diagnosed at ages 45 and above, relative risk (RR) of dying 0.73 (95% confidence interval (CI) 0.62-0.87; P = 0.0005). Ever use of HRT prior to breast cancer diagnosis was significantly positively associated with overall longer survival after adjustment for T-stage, N-stage, M-stage, year of diagnosis and age at diagnosis, RR of dying 0.78 (95% CI 0.65-0.93; P = 0.006). Hormone replacement therapy use and oestrogen receptor positivity were independently significantly associated with overall longer survival, P = 0.005 and P < 0.0001, respectively, in one model. HRT use and progesterone receptor positivity were also independently significantly associated with longer overall survival, P = 0.003 and P = 0.0003, respectively, in another model. The mode of diagnosis was known in 705 women. Mammography screening was not more common among HRT users compared with never-users, where this information was available. Both mammography screening and HRT use were independently associated with longer survival, P = 0.002 and P = 0.038 respectively