522 research outputs found
Solar and Stellar Activity: Diagnostics and Indices
We summarize the fifty-year concerted effort to place the "activity" of the
Sun in the context of the stars. As a working definition of solar activity in
the context of stars, we adopt those globally-observable variations on time
scales below thermal time scales, of ~ 100,000 yr for the convection zone. So
defined, activity is dominated by magnetic-field evolution, including the
22-year Hale cycle, the typical time it takes for the quasi-periodic reversal
in which the global magnetic-field takes place. This is accompanied by sunspot
variations with 11 year periods, known since the time of Schwabe, as well as
faster variations due to rotation of active regions and flaring. "Diagnostics
and indices" are terms given to the indirect signatures of varying magnetic-
fields, including the photometric (broad-band) variations associated with the
sunspot cycle, and variations of the accompanying heated plasma in higher
layers of stellar atmospheres seen at special optical wavelengths, and UV and
X-ray wavelengths. Our attention is also focussed on the theme of the Symposium
by examining evidence for deep and extended minima of stars, and placing the
70-year long solar Maunder Minimum into a stellar context.Comment: Invited keynote paper for IAU Symposium No 286, 2012. Comparative
Magnetic Minima: Characterizing quiet times in the Sun and star
The Emerging 'Post-Doha' Agenda and the New Regionalism in the Asia-Pacific
This paper considers emerging commercial policy challenges facing the Asia-Pacific region in light of the impasse reached at the Eighth World Trade Organization (WTO) Ministerial Meeting in December 2011. It underscores that, while marginal liberalization of trade barriers under the Doha Development Agenda may not be forthcoming in the short- or even medium-term, the WTO has been successful in erecting a rules-based system of global governance and continues to be extremely important to the future health of the international trading system. Nevertheless, one can expect the current trend toward bilateral and regional free-trade areas (FTAs) will continue, particularly since it is easier to make progress toward "deep integration" in a smaller group of like-minded countries than in the context of the general WTO membership. This paper considers how the FTA trend is developing in the Asia-Pacific region and what its prospects are in the future. It stresses that regional - as opposed to bilateral - arrangements will be essential to the region for economic (e.g., supporting regional production networks) as well as diplomatic-political goals. This "new regionalism" which has been supported by Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), will lead to significant reductions in the costs associated with bilateral FTAs (e.g., lower costs associated with rules of origin, improved utilization rates) and has many advantages over "noodle-bowl" bilateralism
Decomposing the misery index: A dynamic approach
YesThe misery index (the unweighted sum of unemployment and inflation
rates) was probably the first attempt to develop a single statistic to measure the level
of a population’s economic malaise. In this letter, we develop a dynamic approach to
decompose the misery index using two basic relations of modern macroeconomics:
the expectations-augmented Phillips curve and Okun’s law. Our reformulation of the
misery index is closer in spirit to Okun’s idea. However, we are able to offer an improved
version of the index, mainly based on output and unemployment. Specifically,
this new Okun’s index measures the level of economic discomfort as a function of
three key factors: (1) the misery index in the previous period; (2) the output gap in
growth rate terms; and (3) cyclical unemployment. This dynamic approach differs
substantially from the standard one utilised to develop the misery index, and allow
us to obtain an index with five main interesting features: (1) it focuses on output,
unemployment and inflation; (2) it considers only objective variables; (3) it allows
a distinction
between short-run and long-run phenomena; (4) it places more
importance
on output and unemployment rather than inflation; and (5) it weights
recessions
more than expansions
The Ruble between the Hammer and the Anvil: Oil Prices and Economic Sanctions
The exchange rate fluctuations strongly affect the Russian economy, given its heavy dependence on foreign trade and investment. Since January 2014, the Ruble lost 50% of its value against the US Dollar. The fall of the currency started with the conflict between Russia and Ukraine. The impact of the conflict on Russia may have been amplified by sanctions imposed by Western countries. However, as Russia is heavily dependent on exports of natural resources, the oil price decline starting in Summer 2014 could be another factor behind the deterioration. By using high frequency data on nominal exchange and interest rates, oil prices, actual and unanticipated sanctions, we provide evidence on the driving forces of the Ruble exchange rate. The analysis is based on cointegrated VAR models, where fundamental long-run relationships are implicitly embedded. The results indicate that the bulk of the depreciation can be related to the decline of oil prices. In addition, unanticipated sanctions matter for the conditional volatility of the variables involved
THE ROLE OF DEVELOPING COUNTRIES IN GLOBAL ECONOMIC GOVERNANCE
The paper reviews critically the arguments concerning greater voice for developing countries in global governance. It supports the arguments for greater voice but argues that greater voice brings with it greater responsibilities in terms of the actions and commitments from developing countries. The two main illustrations are the multilateral trade negotiations in the WTO and the negotiations concerning climate change in the UN. In both case, it is argued, developing countries must assume greater responsibilities if these negotiations are to be concluded. This can be done in a way which yields net benefits to the developing countries themselves
Conceptualising the right to data protection in an era of Big Data
In 2009, with the enactment of the Lisbon Treaty, the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union entered into force. Under Article 8 of the Charter, for the first time, a stand-alone fundamental right to data protection was declared. The creation of this right, standing as a distinct right to the right to privacy, is undoubtedly significant, and it is unique to the European legal order, being absent from other international human rights instruments. This commentary examines the parameters of this new right to data protection, asking what are the principles underpinning the right. It argues that the right reflects some key values inherent in the European legal order, namely: privacy, transparency, autonomy and nondiscrimination. It also analyses some of the challenges in implementing this right in an era of ubiquitous veillance practices and Big Data
Direct and Interactive Effects of Enemies and Mutualists on Plant Performance: A Meta-Analysis
Plants engage in multiple, simultaneous interactions with other species; some (enemies) reduce and others (mutualists) enhance plant performance. Moreover, effects of different species may not be independent of one another; for example, enemies may compete, reducing their negative impact on a plant. The magnitudes of positive and negative effects, as well as the frequency of interactive effects and whether they tend to enhance or depress plant performance, have never been comprehensively assessed across the many published studies on plant–enemy and plant–mutualist interactions. We performed a meta-analysis of experiments in which two enemies, two mutualists, or an enemy and a mutualist were manipulated factorially. Specifically, we performed a factorial meta-analysis using the log response ratio. We found that the magnitude of (negative) enemy effects was greater than that of (positive) mutualist effects in isolation, but in the presence of other species, the two effects were of comparable magnitude. Hence studies evaluating single-species effects of mutualists may underestimate the true effects found in natural settings, where multiple interactions are the norm and indirect effects are possible. Enemies did not on average influence the effects on plant performance of other enemies, nor did mutualists influence the effects of mutualists. However, these averages mask significant and large, but positive or negative, interactions in individual studies. In contrast, mutualists ameliorated the negative effects of enemies in a manner that benefited plants; this overall effect was driven by interactions between pathogens and belowground mutualists (bacteria and mycorrhizal fungi). The high frequency of significant interactive effects suggests a widespread potential for diffuse rather than pairwise coevolutionary interactions between plants and their enemies and mutualists. Pollinators and mycorrhizal fungi enhanced plant performance more than did bacterial mutualists. In the greenhouse (but not the field), pathogens reduced plant performance more than did herbivores, pathogens were more damaging to herbaceous than to woody plants, and herbivores were more damaging to crop than to non-crop plants (suggesting evolutionary change in plants or herbivores following crop domestication). We discuss how observed differences in effect size might be confounded with methodological differences among studies
Stellar structure and compact objects before 1940: Towards relativistic astrophysics
Since the mid-1920s, different strands of research used stars as "physics
laboratories" for investigating the nature of matter under extreme densities
and pressures, impossible to realize on Earth. To trace this process this paper
is following the evolution of the concept of a dense core in stars, which was
important both for an understanding of stellar evolution and as a testing
ground for the fast-evolving field of nuclear physics. In spite of the divide
between physicists and astrophysicists, some key actors working in the
cross-fertilized soil of overlapping but different scientific cultures
formulated models and tentative theories that gradually evolved into more
realistic and structured astrophysical objects. These investigations culminated
in the first contact with general relativity in 1939, when J. Robert
Oppenheimer and his students George Volkoff and Hartland Snyder systematically
applied the theory to the dense core of a collapsing neutron star. This
pioneering application of Einstein's theory to an astrophysical compact object
can be regarded as a milestone in the path eventually leading to the emergence
of relativistic astrophysics in the early 1960s.Comment: 83 pages, 4 figures, submitted to the European Physical Journal
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