1,259 research outputs found
Institutional Investors, Corporate Ownership, and Corporate Governance: Global Perspectives
Institutional investors, Corporate ownership, Corporate governance
The earthâs core: an approach from first principles
The Earthâs core is largely composed of iron (Fe), alloyed with less dense elements such as
sulphur, silicon and/or oxygen. The phase relations and physical properties of both solid and
liquid Fe-alloys are therefore of great geophysical importance. As a result, over the past fifty
years the properties of Fe and its alloys have been extensively studied experimentally.
However, achieving the extreme pressures (up to 360 GPa) and temperatures (~6000K) found
in the core provide a major experimental challenge, and it is not surprising that there are still
considerable discrepancies in the results obtained by using different experimental techniques.
In the past fifteen years quantum mechanical techniques have been applied to predict the
properties of Fe. Here we review the progress that has been made in the use of first principles
methods to study Fe and its alloys, and as a result of these studies we conclude: (i) that pure
Fe adopts an hexagonal close packed structure under core conditions and melts at ~6200 K at
360 GPa, (ii) that thermodynamic equilibrium and observed seismic data are satisfied by a
liquid Fe alloy outer core with a composition of ~10 mole% S (or Si) and 8 mole% O
crystallising at ~ 5500 K to give an Fe alloy inner core with ~8 mole% S (or Si) and 0.2 mole
% O, and (iii) that with such concentrations of S (or Si), an Fe alloy might adopt a body
centred cubic structure in all or part of the inner core. In the future the roles of Ni, C, H and
K in the core need to be studied, and techniques to predict the transport and rheological
properties of Fe alloys need to be developed
Going Overboard? On Busy Directors and Firm Value
Abstract The literature disagrees on the link between so-called busy boards (where many independent directors hold multiple board seats) and firm performance. Some argue that busyness certifies a directorâs ability and that such directors are value enhancing. Others argue that âover-boardedâ directors are ineffective and detract from firm value. We find evidence that (1) the disparate results in prior work stem from differences in both sample composition and empirical design, (2) on balance the results suggest a negative association between board busyness and firm performance, and (3) the inclusion of firm fixed effects dramatically affects the conclusions drawn from, and the explanatory power of, multivariate analyses. We also explore alternative empirical definitions of what constitutes a busy director and find that commonly used proxies for busyness perform well relative to more complex alternatives. Highlights âş The disparate busy director findings result from different samples and methodology. âş Including firm fixed effects results in a constant negative relation. âş The common busy director definition is as informative as more intense alternatives
Microgravity cursor control device evaluation for Space Station Freedom workstations
This research addressed direct manipulation interface (curser-controlled device) usability in microgravity. The data discussed are from KC-135 flights. This included pointing and dragging movements over a variety of angles and distances. Detailed error and completion time data provided researchers with information regarding cursor control shape, selection button arrangement, sensitivity, selection modes, and considerations for future research
Telepresence for space: The state of the concept
The purpose here is to examine the concept of telepresence critically. To accomplish this goal, first, the assumptions that underlie telepresence and its applications are examined, and second, the issues raised by that examination are discussed. Also, these assumptions and issues are used as a means of shifting the focus in telepresence from development to user-based research. The most basic assumption of telepresence is that the information being provided to the human must be displayed in a natural fashion, i.e., the information should be displayed to the same human sensory modalities, and in the same fashion, as if the person where actually at the remote site. A further fundamental assumption for the functional use of telepresence is that a sense of being present in the work environment will produce superior performance. In other words, that sense of being there would allow the human operator of a distant machine to take greater advantage of his or her considerable perceptual, cognitive, and motor capabilities in the performance of a task than would more limited task-related feedback. Finally, a third fundamental assumption of functional telepresence is that the distant machine under the operator's control must substantially resemble a human in dexterity
The space station: Human factors and productivity
Human factor researchers and engineers are making inputs into the early stages of the design of the Space Station to improve both the quality of life and work on-orbit. Effective integration of the human factors information related to various Intravehicular Activity (IVA), Extravehicular Activity (EVA), and teletobotics systems during the Space Station design will result in increased productivity, increased flexibility of the Space Stations systems, lower cost of operations, improved reliability, and increased safety for the crew onboard the Space Station. The major features of productivity examined include the cognitive and physical effort involved in work, the accuracy of worker output and ability to maintain performance at a high level of accuracy, the speed and temporal efficiency with which a worker performs, crewmember satisfaction with their work environment, and the relation between performance and cost
Low-energy quantum dynamics of atoms at defects. Interstitial oxygen in silicon
The problem of the low-energy highly-anharmonic quantum dynamics of isolated
impurities in solids is addressed by using path-integral Monte Carlo
simulations. Interstitial oxygen in silicon is studied as a prototypical
example showing such a behavior. The assignment of a "geometry" to the defect
is discussed. Depending on the potential (or on the impurity mass), there is a
"classical" regime, where the maximum probability-density for the oxygen
nucleus is at the potential minimum. There is another regime, associated to
highly anharmonic potentials, where this is not the case. Both regimes are
separated by a sharp transition. Also, the decoupling of the many-nuclei
problem into a one-body Hamiltonian to describe the low-energy dynamics is
studied. The adiabatic potential obtained from the relaxation of all the other
degrees of freedom at each value of the coordinate associated to the low-energy
motion, gives the best approximation to the full many-nuclei problem.Comment: RevTeX, 6 pages plus 4 figures (all the figures were not accesible
before
Melting curve and Hugoniot of molybdenum up to 400 GPa by ab initio simulations
We report ab initio calculations of the melting curve and Hugoniot of
molybdenum for the pressure range 0-400 GPa, using density functional theory
(DFT) in the projector augmented wave (PAW) implementation. We use the
``reference coexistence'' technique to overcome uncertainties inherent in
earlier DFT calculations of the melting curve of Mo. Our calculated melting
curve agrees well with experiment at ambient pressure and is consistent with
shock data at high pressure, but does not agree with the high pressure melting
curve from static compression experiments. Our calculated P(V) and T(P)
Hugoniot relations agree well with shock measurements. We use calculations of
phonon dispersion relations as a function of pressure to eliminate some
possible interpretations of the solid-solid phase transition observed in shock
experiments on Mo.Comment: 8 pages, 6 figure
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