Middlemen, Non-Profits, and Poverty

In many markets in developing countries, especially in remote areas, middlemen are thought to earn excessive profits. Non-profits come in to counter what is seen as middlemen's market power, and rich country consumers pay a "fair-trade" premium for products marketed by such non-profits. This paper provides answers to the following five questions. How exactly do middlemen and non-profits divide up the market? How do the price mark up and price pass-through differ between middleman and non-profits? What is the impact of non-profits entry on the wellbeing of the poor? Should the government subsidize the entry of non-profits, or the entry of middlemen? Should wealthy consumers in the North pay a premium for fair trade products, or should they support fair trade non-profits directly?Middlemen, Non-profits, Poverty, Market Access, Food Security and Poverty, International Development, Productivity Analysis, F15, I32, L3,

Environmental dependence of 8um luminosity functions of galaxies at z~0.8: Comparison between RXJ1716.4+6708 and the AKARI NEP deep field

We aim to reveal environmental dependence of infrared luminosity functions (IR LFs) of galaxies at z~0.8 using the AKARI satellite. We construct restframe 8um IR LFs in the cluster region RXJ1716.4+6708 at z=0.81, and compare them with a blank field using the AKARI North Ecliptic Pole deep field data at the same redshift. AKARI's wide field of view (10'x10') is suitable to investigate wide range of galaxy environments. AKARI's 15um filter is advantageous here since it directly probes restframe 8um at z~0.8, without relying on a large extrapolation based on a SED fit, which was the largest uncertainty in previous work. We have found that cluster IR LFs at restframe 8um have a factor of 2.4 smaller L^* and a steeper faint-end slope than that of the field. Confirming this trend, we also found that faint-end slopes of the cluster LFs becomes flatter and flatter with decreasing local galaxy density. These changes in LFs cannot be explained by a simple infall of field galaxy population into a cluster. Physics that can preferentially suppress IR luminous galaxies in high density regions is required to explain the observed results.Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A AKARI special issu

Burgers Turbulence with Large-scale Forcing

Burgers turbulence supported by white-in-time random forcing at low wavenumbers is studied analytically and by computer simulation. It is concluded that the probability density Q of velocity gradient displays four asymptotic regimes at very large Reynolds number: (A) a region of large positive gradient where Q decays rapidly (reduction of gradient by stretching); (B) an intermediate region of negative gradient where Q falls off as the inverse third power of gradient (transient inviscid steepening of negative gradient); (C) an outer power-law region of negative gradient where Q falls off as the reciprocal of gradient (shoulders of mature shocks); (D) a final region of large gradient where Q decays very rapidly (interior of mature shocks). The probability density of velocity difference across an interval r, divided by r, lies on Q throughout regions A and B and into the middle of C, for small enough inertial-range r.Comment: Revtex (8 pages) with 11 postscript figures (separate file

Polarized Parton Densities

In this talk we summarize main results of a recent determination of the polarized deeply inelastic parton distributions to NLO from the world data. In the analysis the LO and NLO parton densities and their $1\sigma$ statistical errors were derived and parameterized. The strong coupling constant $\alpha_s(M_Z^2)$ is determined $\alpha_s(M_Z^2) = 0.113 \pm 0.004 {\rm (stat.)} \pm~0.004 {\rm (fac.)} +0.008/-0.005 {\rm (ren.)}$ Comparisons of the low moments of the parton densities with recent lattice results are given. A detailed error-analysis of the gluon density is performed.Comment: 3 pages LATEX, 1 style file, 1 eps file, to appear in the Proceedings of PANIC '02, Osaka, Ocrober 200

Requirement of the FATC domain of protein kinase Tel1 for localization to DNA ends and target protein recognition

Two large phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase-related protein kinases (PIKKs), ATM and ATR, play a central role in the DNA damage response pathway. PIKKs contain a highly conserved extreme C-terminus called the FRAP-ATM-TRRAP-C-terminal (FATC) domain. In budding yeast, ATM and ATR correspond to Tel1 and Mec1, respectively. In this study, we characterized functions of the FATC domain of Tel1 by introducing substitution or truncation mutations. One substitution mutation, termed tel1-21, and a truncation mutation, called tel1- Î"C, did not significantly affect the expression level. The tel1-21 mutation impaired the cellular response to DNA damage and conferred moderate telomere maintenance defect. In contrast, the tel1-Î"C mutation behaved like a null mutation, conferring defects in both DNA damage response and telomere maintenance. Tel1-21 protein localized to DNA ends as effectively as wild-type Tel1 protein, whereas Tel1-Î"C protein failed. Introduction of a hyperactive TEL1-hy mutation suppressed the tel1-21 mutation but not the tel1-Î"C mutation. In vitro analyses revealed that both Tel1-21 and Tel1-Î"C proteins undergo efficient autophosphorylation but exhibit decreased kinase activities toward the exogenous substrate protein, Rad53. Our results show that the FATC domain of Tel1 mediates localization to DNA ends and contributes to phosphorylation of target proteins. © 2015 Ogi, Goto, Ghosh, et al

Electric Control of Spin Helicity in a Magnetic Ferroelectric

Magnetic ferroelectrics or multiferroics, which are currently extensively explored, may provide a good arena to realize a novel magnetoelectric function. Here we demonstrate the genuine electric control of the spiral magnetic structure in one of such magnetic ferroelectrics, TbMnO3. A spin-polarized neutron scattering experiment clearly shows that the spin helicity, clockwise or counter-clockwise, is controlled by the direction of spontaneous polarization and hence by the polarity of the small cooling electric field.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure