3,708 research outputs found
An Empirical Study of the Relationship Between Consumer and Producer Price Index: A Unit Root Test and Test of Cointegration
Policy makers have been long concerned about finding early indicators of inflation, a continuous rise in aggregate price level measured by the consumer price index (CPI). One of these indicators, which has been a target of many studies and has been supported by the production chain view, is the producer price index (PPI). The production chain view suggests that higher PPI will be passed to consumers through higher prices of finished goods. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between these two indexes using a unit root test and test of cointegration which are becoming more popular in time series analyses
Scheduling the installation of the LHC injection lines
The installation of the two Large Hadron Collider (LHC) injection lines has to fit within tight milestones of the LHC project and of CERN's accelerator activity in general. For instance, the transfer line from the Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) to LHC point 8 (to fill the anti-clockwise LHC ring) should be tested with beam before the end of 2004 since the SPS will not run in 2005. It will first serve during the LHC sector test in 2006. Time constraints are also very strong on the installation of the transfer line from the SPS to LHC point 2 (for the clockwise LHC ring): its tunnel is the sole access for the LHC cryo-magnets and a large part of the beam line can only be installed once practically all LHC cryo-magnets are in place. Of course, the line must be operational when the LHC starts. This paper presents the various constraints and how they are taken into account for the logistics and installation planning of the LHC injection lines
An Investigation into the Preferred Learning Styles of Accounting, Management, Marketing, and General Business Majors
A New Method for ISOCAM Data Reduction - I. Application to the European Large Area ISO Survey Southern Field: Method and Results
We have developed a new data reduction technique for ISOCAM LW data and have
applied it to the European Large Area ISO Survey (ELAIS) LW3 (15 micron)
observations in the southern hemisphere (S1). This method, known as LARI
technique and based on the assumption of the existence of two different time
scales in ISOCAM transients (accounting either for fast or slow detector
response), was particularly designed for the detection of faint sources. In the
ELAIS S1 field we obtained a catalogue of 462 15 micron sources with
signal-to-noise ratio >= 5 and flux densities in the range 0.45 - 150 mJy
(filling the whole flux range between the Deep ISOCAM Surveys and the IRAS
Faint Source Survey). The completeness at different flux levels and the
photometric accuracy of this catalogue have been tested with simulations. Here
we present a detailed description of the method and discuss the results
obtained by its application to the S1 LW3 data.Comment: 20 pages, LaTeX, MNRAS style, 20 postscript figures, full catalogue
not yet available at http://boas5.bo.astro.it/~elais/catalogues/. Accepted
for publication in MNRA
Optimal quantization for the pricing of swing options
In this paper, we investigate a numerical algorithm for the pricing of swing
options, relying on the so-called optimal quantization method. The numerical
procedure is described in details and numerous simulations are provided to
assert its efficiency. In particular, we carry out a comparison with the
Longstaff-Schwartz algorithm.Comment: 27
Entanglement Capacity of Nonlocal Hamiltonians : A Geometric Approach
We develop a geometric approach to quantify the capability of creating
entanglement for a general physical interaction acting on two qubits. We use
the entanglement measure proposed by us for -qubit pure states (PRA
\textbf{77}, 062334 (2008)). Our procedure reproduces the earlier results (PRL
\textbf{87}, 137901 (2001)). The geometric method has the distinct advantage
that it gives an experimental way to monitor the process of optimizing
entanglement production.Comment: 8 pages, 1 figure
Psychosocial determinants of dental service utilization among adults: Results from a population-based survey (Urban HEART-2) in Tehran, Iran
Objectives: To evaluate the association between dental service utilization and mental health in an adult population in the context of the socioeconomic status of the participants. Subjects and Methods: Multi-stage cluster random sampling was performed in Tehran, Iran, in 2011. Data were collected on dental service utilization, barriers of dental visit, self-perceived oral health, mental health, age, gender, education, and wealth status. The complex sample analysis method in SPSS and the survey data analysis menu in STATA were employed for statistical evaluation. Results: Of 20,320 participants, 25-36 suffered from disorders in at least one of the domains of somatization, anxiety, social dysfunction, and depression. Only 56 of the participants visited a dentist at least once during the last year. The main barriers to a dental visit were "no perceived need" and "high costs." Females, the richest participants, subjects aged 25-64-year-old, and those with poor self-perceived oral health, mental health disorders, and higher education had more visits. The participants who perceived the need but did not visit a dentist due to some reasons mostly comprised females, those aged 25-44-year-old, those with a poor perceived oral health, disordered people in all domains of mental health, and poorer participants. Conclusion: Dental service utilization was influenced by socioeconomic factors and the mental health status of the adult population after controlling for multiple confounders. Reducing financial hardship and providing health education on the importance of preventive visits may decrease barriers to regular visits in countries with developing oral health systems. © 2015 European Journal of Dentistry
Knowledge and information needs of informal caregivers in palliative care : a qualitative systematic review
Objectives: To review current understanding of the knowledge and information needs
of informal caregivers in palliative settings. Data sources: Seven electronic databases
were searched for the period January 1994–November 2006: Medline, CINAHL, PsychINFO,
Embase, Ovid, Zetoc and Pubmed using a meta-search engine (Metalib®).
Key journals and reference lists of selected papers were hand searched. Review methods:
Included studies were peer-reviewed journal articles presenting original research.
Given a variety of approaches to palliative care research, a validated systematic review
methodology for assessing disparate evidence was used in order to assign scores to
different aspects of each study (introduction and aims, method and data, sampling,
data analysis, ethics and bias, findings/results, transferability/generalizability, implications
and usefulness). Analysis was assisted by abstraction of key details of study into
a table. Results: Thirty-four studies were included from eight different countries. The
evidence was strongest in relation to pain management, where inadequacies in caregiver
knowledge and the importance of education were emphasized. The significance
of effective communication and information sharing between patient, caregiver and
service provider was also emphasized. The evidence for other caregiver knowledge
and information needs, for example in relation to welfare and social support was
weaker. There was limited literature on non-cancer conditions and the care-giving
information needs of black and minority ethnic populations. Overall, the evidence
base was predominantly descriptive and dominated by small-scale studies, limiting
generalizability. Conclusions: As palliative care shifts into patients’ homes, a more rigorously
researched evidence base devoted to understanding caregivers knowledge
and information needs is required. Research design needs to move beyond the current
focus on dyads to incorporate the complex, three-way interactions between patients,
service providers and caregivers in end-of-life care setting
Ferromagnetic resonance in -Co magnetic composites
We investigate the electromagnetic properties of assemblies of nanoscale
-cobalt crystals with size range between 5 nm to 35 nm, embedded in a
polystyrene (PS) matrix, at microwave (1-12 GHz) frequencies. We investigate
the samples by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) imaging, demonstrating
that the particles aggregate and form chains and clusters. By using a broadband
coaxial-line method, we extract the magnetic permeability in the frequency
range from 1 to 12 GHz, and we study the shift of the ferromagnetic resonance
with respect to an externally applied magnetic field. We find that the
zero-magnetic field ferromagnetic resonant peak shifts towards higher
frequencies at finite magnetic fields, and the magnitude of complex
permeability is reduced. At fields larger than 2.5 kOe the resonant frequency
changes linearly with the applied magnetic field, demonstrating the transition
to a state in which the nanoparticles become dynamically decoupled. In this
regime, the particles inside clusters can be treated as non-interacting, and
the peak position can be predicted from Kittel's ferromagnetic resonance theory
for non-interacting uniaxial spherical particles combined with the
Landau-Lifshitz-Gilbert (LLG) equation. In contrast, at low magnetic fields
this magnetic order breaks down and the resonant frequency in zero magnetic
field reaches a saturation value reflecting the interparticle interactions as
resulting from aggregation. Our results show that the electromagnetic
properties of these composite materials can be tuned by external magnetic
fields and by changes in the aggregation structure.Comment: 14 pages, 13 figure
Characterization and Modeling of Non-Uniform Charge Collection in CVD Diamond Pixel Detectors
A pixel detector with a CVD diamond sensor has been studied in a 180 GeV/c
pion beam. The charge collection properties of the diamond sensor were studied
as a function of the track position, which was measured with a silicon
microstrip telescope. Non-uniformities were observed on a length scale
comparable to the diamond crystallites size. In some regions of the sensor, the
charge drift appears to have a component parallel to the sensor surface (i.e.,
normal to the applied electric field) resulting in systematic residuals between
the track position and the hits position as large as 40 m. A numerical
simulation of the charge drift in polycrystalline diamond was developed to
compute the signal induced on the electrodes by the electrons and holes
released by the passing particles. The simulation takes into account the
crystallite structure, non-uniform trapping across the sensor, diffusion and
polarization effects. It is in qualitative agreement with the data. Additional
lateral electric field components result from the non-uniform trapping of
charges in the bulk. These provide a good explanation for the large residuals
observed.Comment: Accepted by Nucl. Instr. and Met
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