Did the goodwill accounting standard impose material economic consequences on Australian acquirers?

This research explores the empirical association between takeover bid premium and acquired (purchased) goodwill, and tests whether the strength of the association changes after the passage of approved accounting standard AASB 1013 in Australia in 1988. AASB 1013 mandated capitalization and amortization of acquired goodwill to the income statement over a maximum period of 20 years. We use regressions to assess how the association between bid premium and acquired goodwill varies in the pre-AASB and post-AASB 1013 periods after controlling for confounding factors. Our results show that reducing the variety of accounting policy options available to bidder management after an acquisition results in a systematic reduction in the strength of the association between premium and goodwill

On the synthesis and processing of high quality audio signals by parallel computers

This work concerns the application of new computer architectures to the creation and manipulation of high-quality audio bandwidth signals. The configuration of both the hardware and software in such systems falls under consideration in the three major sections which present increasing levels of algorithmic concurrency. In the first section, the programs which are described are distributed in identical copies across an array of processing elements; these programs run autonomously, generating data independently, but with control parameters peculiar to each copy: this type of concurrency is referred to as isonomic}The central section presents a structure which distributes tasks across an arbitrary network of processors; the flow of control in such a program is quasi- indeterminate, and controlled on a demand basis by the rate of completion of the slave tasks and their irregular interaction with the master. Whilst that interaction is, in principle, deterministic, it is also data-dependent; the dynamic nature of task allocation demands that no a priori knowledge of the rate of task completion be required. This type of concurrency is called dianomic? Finally, an architecture is described which will support a very high level of algorithmic concurrency. The programs which make efficient use of such a machine are designed not by considering flow of control, but by considering flow of data. Each atomic algorithmic unit is made as simple as possible, which results in the extensive distribution of a program over very many processing elements. Programs designed by considering only the optimum data exchange routes are said to exhibit systolic^ concurrency. Often neglected in the study of system design are those provisions necessary for practical implementations. It was intended to provide users with useful application programs in fulfilment of this study; the target group is electroacoustic composers, who use digital signal processing techniques in the context of musical composition. Some of the algorithms in use in this field are highly complex, often requiring a quantity of processing for each sample which exceeds that currently available even from very powerful computers. Consequently, applications tend to operate not in 'real-time' (where the output of a system responds to its input apparently instantaneously), but by the manipulation of sounds recorded digitally on a mass storage device. The first two sections adopt existing, public-domain software, and seek to increase its speed of execution significantly by parallel techniques, with the minimum compromise of functionality and ease of use. Those chosen are the general- purpose direct synthesis program CSOUND, from M.I.T., and a stand-alone phase vocoder system from the C.D.P..(^4) In each case, the desired aim is achieved: to increase speed of execution by two orders of magnitude over the systems currently in use by composers. This requires substantial restructuring of the programs, and careful consideration of the best computer architectures on which they are to run concurrently. The third section examines the rationale behind the use of computers in music, and begins with the implementation of a sophisticated electronic musical instrument capable of a degree of expression at least equal to its acoustic counterparts. It seems that the flexible control of such an instrument demands a greater computing resource than the sound synthesis part. A machine has been constructed with the intention of enabling the 'gestural capture' of performance information in real-time; the structure of this computer, which has one hundred and sixty high-performance microprocessors running in parallel, is expounded; and the systolic programming techniques required to take advantage of such an array are illustrated in the Occam programming language

Aboveground carbon stock potential of teak (tectona grandis) under different land use system in Balung plantation, Tawau Sabah

Assessment of aboveground carbon stock in different teak plantation systems was conducted in Balung River Plantation, Tawau, Sabah. The objective of this study is to determine the potential of teak as the main tree components to increase the above ground carbon stock in different land use system. The above ground carbon stock of agroforestry and mixed plantation system of teak (Tectona grandis) were compared with natural forest and monoculture plantation of the species. The agroforestry combinations investigated are agroforestry system 1, teak (18 years) with snake fruit (8 years) and agarwood (8 years); agroforestry system 2, teak (17 years) with coffee (14 years); and also mixed timber plantation system, teak (18 years) with agarwood (8 years); while 20 years teak monoculture plantation and natural forest reserve was set up as a control. A random systematic sampling method was used in conducting field inventory. The methodologies used include the measurement of height and diameter breast height (DBH) of trees within a 50 m x 50 m plot dimension (for plantation) and 30 m x 30 m (forest). Allometric equations were used to derive the field measured attributes into stand biomass while carbon stock was estimated as 50 percent from the total biomass. The result shows the accumulation of carbon stock goes in the following order: forest reserve (213.84 t C/ha) > mixed timber plantation (69.94 t C ha-1 ) > agroforestry system 2 (37.75 t C/ha) > agroforestry system 1 (37.34 t C/ha) > teak monoculture (34.53 t C/ha) witnessing the teak trees to increase the total aboveground carbon stock in agroforestry and mixed timber plantation system by more than 60 percent. This study suggested that teak has great potential in transforming a low biomass land use into a carbon-rich tree based systems

Autonomous aircraft flight control for constrained environments

The real-time indoor autonomous vehicle test environment (RAVEN) at MIT's Aerospace Controls Laboratory is home to a diverse fleet of aircraft, from a styrofoam and cellophane dragonfly to a set of quadrotor Draganflyer helicopters. The helicopters are used primarily for swarm and health management research. Alongside these machines is a set of more conventional aircraft designed to study autonomous aircraft flight control in constrained environments. The objectives of this work are to develop and validate flight control concepts for aggressive (aerobatic) maneuvers, and, in particular, to identify the sensor suites needed, and the likely limits of achievable performance. Our work is motivated by the future goals of flying micro (or nano) air vehicles in constrained (e.g., urban or indoors) environments

Urban and rural inequality in knowledge, attitude and practice on haze pollution episode in Klang Valley, Malaysia

Introduction: Transboundary haze occurred was primarily derived from seasonal forest fires which has highly been concerned of the health effect on the local community. As awareness of the source and dangers of smoke haze spread, Malaysian government increasingly came under pressure from the public and civil society at the national, state, and district level to address the haze issues. However, the knowledge, attitude, and practice (KAP) inequalities of urban and rural community could be a barrier in promoting awareness on haze. Objective: To determine the urban and rural inequality in KAP on haze. Methodology: A total of 400 urban and rural residents from Klang Valley was recruited to participate in this study. A validated survey form was used as the study instrument which composed of four parts: (1) Sociodemographic information, (2) Haze knowledge, (3) Attitude (concerns) during haze episodes, (4) Practices (protective behaviors) to prevent against the health effects of haze. Result: There were significant differences of KAP on transboundary haze among urban-rural population. Urban population has higher knowledge and protective behaviors on hazes; however, both the rural-urban residents presented moderate levels of concerns on hazes. Conclusion: It is necessary to provide timely information (knowledge and practices) on haze to rural residents, at the same time, improve the urban residents’ concerns (attitudes) over the haze phenomenon. This will help to raise the overall awareness level to transboundary haze by translating into a state of the resilient community

A modular family of phosphine-phosphoramidite ligands and their hydroformylation catalysts : steric tuning impacts upon the coordination geometry of trigonal bipyramidal complexes of type [Rh(H)(CO)2(P^P*)]

The authors thank the Eastman Chemical Company for funding.Four new phosphine-phosphoramidite bidentate ligands have been synthesised and studied in rhodium-catalysed hydroformylation. Variable temperature NMR studies have been used along with HPIR to investigate the coordination mode of the trigonal bipyramidal complexes formed from [Rh(acac)(CO)2], ligand and syngas. It was found that small changes to the ligand structure have a large effect on the geometry of the active catalytic species. The rhodium catalysts of these new ligands were found to give unusually high iso-selectivity in the hydroformylation of propene and 1-octene.PostprintPeer reviewe

Pointcatcher software:analysis of glacial time-lapse photography and integration with multi-temporal digital elevation models

Terrestrial time-lapse photography offers insight into glacial processes through high spatial and temporal resolution imagery. However, oblique camera views complicate measurement in geographic coordinates, and lead to reliance on specific imaging geometries or simplifying assumptions for calculating parameters such as ice velocity. We develop a novel approach that integrates time-lapse imagery with multi-temporal digital elevation models to derive full 3D coordinates for natural features tracked throughout a monoscopic image sequence. This enables daily independent measurement of horizontal (ice flow) and vertical (ice melt) velocities. By combining two terrestrial laser scanner surveys with a 73-day sequence from Sólheimajökull, Iceland, variations in horizontal ice velocity of ~10% were identified over timescales of ~25 days. An overall surface elevation decrease of ~3.0 m showed rate changes asynchronous with the horizontal velocity variations, demonstrating a temporal disconnect between the processes of ice surface lowering and mechanisms of glacier movement. Our software, ‘Pointcatcher’, is freely available for user-friendly interactive processing of general time-lapse sequences and includes Monte Carlo error analysis and uncertainty projection onto DEM surfaces. It is particularly suited for analysis of challenging oblique glacial imagery, and we discuss good features to track, both for correction of camera motion and for deriving ice velocities

Effect of Angiotensin II on the Left Ventricular Function in a Near-Term Fetal Sheep with Metabolic Acidemia

We tested the hypothesis that, in acute metabolic acidemia, the fetal left ventricle (LV) has the capacity to increase its contractility in response to angiotensin II infusion. Eleven ewes and their fetuses were instrumented at 127–138/145 days of gestation. The effect of angiotensin II on fetal LV function was assessed using intraventricular pressure catheter and tissue Doppler imaging (TDI). Angiotensin II increased fetal arterial blood pressure, whereas pH and pO2 decreased. The heart rate and systemic venous pressure were not affected significantly. The LV end-diastolic and end-systolic pressures, as well as dP/dtmax, increased. The TDI-derived LV longitudinal myocardial isovolumic contraction velocity and its acceleration and velocity during early filling were higher than those at baseline. The incidence of absent isovolumic relaxation velocity was greater during angiotensin II infusion. In summary, during acute metabolic acidemia, the fetal left ventricle could increase its contractility in response to inotropic stimulus even in the presence of increased afterload. The diastolic LV function parameters were altered by angiotensin II