Multimuons events and primary composition

Nucleon decay detectors at large depths offers now a total area larger than 1000 sq m to registrate muons of energy exceeding 1 TeV. Near complete high energy muon families are detected in those arrays. An extensive 3D Monte-Carlo simulation was conducted in view to understand the spatial distribution of those events and the possible link with elementary act or primary composition. As pion or kaon parents have a very small decay probability at so high energy, multimuon phenomena occurs at high altitude where the atmospheric density is small after the most energetic collisions

Profitability and Long-term Survival of Community Banks: Evidence from Texas

This study examines the impact of distance among competing bank locations on market their pricing behavior. A general spatial autoregressive model that nests both spatial autoregressive and spatial error models is used to examine the impact of distance on pricing behavior of 686 non-metro banks in Texas. Results show that non-metro banks exercise market power in pricing their products. An increase in spatial competition may reduce profitability and challenge long term survival of small community based financial institutions.Financial Economics,

Market Power in Non-Metro Banking

Banks in non-metropolitan areas compete in a spatially-differentiated environment. This paper estimates a structural model of the supply and demand of banking services in which pricing power depends on the distance between rival banks. A spatial econometric model finds that approximately 38.0% of economic surplus derives from spatial market power.Financial Economics,

Retail and Wholesale Market Power in Organic Foods

The demand for organic fresh fruits and vegetable continues to grow at a rate far higher than the rest of the produce industry. The cost of meeting organic certification standards, however, has meant that supply has been slow to adjust. With limited supply, we hypothesize that organic suppliers enjoy more market power in bargaining over their share of the retail-production cost margin for fresh apples. We test this hypothesis using a random parameters, generalized extreme value demand model (mixed logit) combined with a structural model of retail and wholesale pricing that allows conduct to vary by product attributes (organic or non-organic) and time. We find that organic growers do indeed earn a larger share of the total margin than non-organic growers, but this vertical market power is eroding over time as market supply adjusts.organics, market power, mixed logit, game theory, non-linear pricing., Industrial Organization, C35, D12, D43, L13, L41, Q13.,

Hysterisis in Food Safety Investments

Concerns regarding the safety and integrity of the fresh produce supply chain are becoming all too common in the media. In 2006, an outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 from farms in Central California sickened almost two hundred people and lead to the deaths of three. Estimated costs to the industry ranged from $100 per month to$200 million until spinach sales returned to normal. By some accounts, the spinach industry has yet to recover and may not for years to come. The incident, however, has lead to a host of initiatives from industry officials, legislators and fresh produce retailers to ensure the safety of fresh produce. The necessary technology and best practices knowledge exists, yet some growers have not made the investment required to ensure that such outbreaks do not happen again in the future.Agribusiness, Agricultural and Food Policy, Farm Management, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Industrial Organization,

A novel intermediate in the interaction of thiosemicarbazide with sheep liver serine hydroxymethyltransferase

An unusual intermediate bound to the enzyme was detected in the interaction of thiosemicarbazide with sheep liver serine hydroxymethyltransferase. This intermediate had absorbance maxima at 464 and 440 nm. Such spectra are characteristic of resonance stabilized intermediates detected in the interaction of substrates and quasisubstrates with pyridoxal phosphate enzymes. An intermediate of this kind has not been detected in the interaction of thiosemicarbazide with other pyridoxal phosphate enzymes. This intermediate was generated slowly (t½ = 4 min) following the addition of thiosemicarbazide (200 μM) to sheep liver serine hydroxymethyltransferase (5μM). It was bound to the enzyme as evidenced by circular dichroic bands at 464 and 440 nm and the inability to be removed upon Centricon filtration. The kinetics of interaction revealed that thiosemicarbazide was a slow binding reversible inhibitor in this phase with a kon of 11 M-1 s-1 and a koff of 5 s-1. The intermediate was converted very slowly (k = 4 × 10-5 s-1) to the final products, namely the apoenzyme and the thiosemicarbazone of pyridoxal phosphate. A minimal kinetic mechanism involving the initial conversion to the intermediate absorbing at longer wavelengths and the conversion of this intermediate to the finalp roduct, as well as, the formation of pyridoxal phosphate-thiosemicarbazone directly by an alternate pathway is proposed

Let's Twist Again: General Metrics of G(2) Holonomy from Gauged Supergravity

We construct all complete metrics of cohomogeneity one G(2) holonomy with S^3 x S^3 principal orbits from gauged supergravity. Our approach rests on a generalization of the twisting procedure used in this framework. It corresponds to a non-trivial embedding of the special Lagrangian three-cycle wrapped by the D6-branes in the lower dimensional supergravity. There are constraints that neatly reduce the general ansatz to a six functions one. Within this approach, the Hitchin system and the flop transformation are nicely realized in eight dimensional gauged supergravity.Comment: 31 pages, latex; v2: minor changes, references adde

Inkjet printed and folded LTE antenna for vehicular application

A multi-band antenna suitable for Long-term Evolution (LTE) is inkjet-printed, and then folded around a cylindrical form. The plastic cylinder is also printed using additive manufacturing techniques, as a separate process. The antenna is based on a planar wideband monopole radiator concept with an additional resonator for the LTE700 frequency band. The aim is to study the potential of low-cost additive manufacturing (AM) techniques for the development of vehicular antennas. Two antennas have been fabricated, one on paper substrate, and a second on polyethylene terephthalate (PET) substrate. The one on paper is tested as a planar monopole antenna on a large ground plane. The one printed on PET is shaped onto the cylindrical form. The main aim is to investigate the use of low-cost inkjet printing techniques for the fabrication of disposable vehicular antennas that can be upgraded regularly. The antennas successfully operate at all LTE and mobile frequency bands. Finite different time domain simulations compare well with measurements

Production of b(b)over-bar at forward rapidity in p plus p collisions at root s=510 GeV

The cross section of bottom quark-antiquark (b (b) over bar) production in p + p collisions at root s = 510 GeV is measured with the PHENIX detector at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. The results are based on the yield of high mass, like-sign muon pairs measured within the PHENIX muon arm acceptance (1.2 mu +/-mu +/-)/dy = 0.16 +/- 0.01 (stat) +/- 0.02 (syst) +/- 0.02 (global) nb for like-sign muons in the rapidity and p(T) ranges 1.2 1 GeV/c, and dimuon mass of 5-10 GeV/c(2). The extrapolated total cross section at this energy for b (b) over bar production is 13.1 +/- 0.6 (stat) +/- 1.5 (syst) +/- 2.7 (global) mu b. The total cross section is compared to a perturbative quantum chromodynamics calculation and is consistent within uncertainties. The azimuthal opening angle between muon pairs from b (b) over bar decays and their p(T) distributions are compared to distributions generated using PS PYTHIA6, which includes next-to-leading order processes. The azimuthal correlations and pair p(T) distribution are not very well described by PYTHIA calculations, but are still consistent within uncertainties. Flavor creation and flavor excitation subprocesses are favored over gluon splitting.Peer reviewe