Infrared sky noise study

The hardware and techniques to measure and compare sky noise at several sites were studied, and a device was developed that would maximize its output and minimize its output for modulation. The instrument and its functions are described. The nature of sky emissions and the fluctuation, gaseous sources of sky noise, and aerosol sources are discussed. It is concluded that sky noise really exists, and the spatial distribution of the sky noise sources are such that observed noise values are linear functions of chopping stroke

Defections From The Inner Circle: Social Exchange, Reciprocity, And The Diffusion Of Board Independence In Us Corporations

This study seeks to reconcile traditional sociological views of the corporate board as an instrument of elite cohesion with recent evidence of greater board activism and control over top management. We propose that CEO-directors may typically support fellow CEOs by impeding increased board control over management but that CEO-directors may also foster this change if they have experienced it in their own corporation. Drawing on social exchange theory, we develop and test the argument that these CEO-directors may experience a reversal in the basis for generalized social exchange with other top managers from one of deference and support to one of independence and control. Using data from a large sample of major U.S. corporations over a recent ten-year period, we show (1) how CEO-directors ''defect'' from the network of mutually supportive corporate leaders, (2) how defections have diffused across organizations and over time, and (3) how this has contributed to increased board control, as measured by changes in board structure, diversification strategy, and contingent compensation. We also provide evidence that a social exchange perspective can explain the diffusion of these changes better than more conventional perspectives on network diffusion that emphasize imitation or learning.Business Administratio

Director Reputation, Ceo-Board Power, And The Dynamics Of Board Interlocks

This study advances research on CEO-board relationships, interlocking directorates, and director reputation by examining how contests for intraorganizational power can affect interorganizational ties. We propose that powerful top managers seek to maintain their control by selecting and retaining board members with experience on other, passive boards and excluding individuals with experience on more active boards. We also propose that powerful boards similarly seek to maintain their control by favoring directors with a reputation for more actively monitoring management and avoiding directors with experience on passive boards. Hypotheses are tested longitudinally using CEO-board data taken from 491 of the largest U.S. corporations over a recent seven-year period. The findings suggest that variation in CEO-board power relationships across organizations has contributed to a segmentation of the corporate director network. We discuss how our perspective can reconcile contrary views and debates on whether increased board control has diffused across large U.S. corporations.(.)Managemen

The Other Pathway To The Boardroom: Interpersonal Influence Behavior As A Substitute For Elite Credentials And Majority Status In Obtaining Board Appointments

Using survey data on interpersonal influence behavior from a large sample of managers and chief executive officers (CEOs) at Forbes 500 companies, we examine how ingratiatory behavior directed at individuals who control access to board positions can provide an alternative pathway to the boardroom for managers who lack the social and educational credentials associated with the power elite. Findings show that top managers who engage in ingratiatory behavior toward their CEO, with ingratiation comprising flattery, opinion conformity, and favor-rendering, will be more likely to receive board appointments at other firms where their CEO serves as director and at boards to which the CEO is indirectly connected in the board interlock network. Further results suggest that interpersonal influence behavior substitutes to some degree for the advantages of an elite background or demographic majority status. Our findings help explain why norms of director deference to CEOs have persisted despite increased diversity in the corporate elite and have implications for research on corporate governance, social networks in the corporate elite, and for the sociological question of whether demographic minorities and individuals who lack privileged backgrounds have equal access to positions of leadership in large U.S. companies. Our study ultimately suggests that such individuals face a rather subtle and perhaps unexpected form of social discrimination, in that they must engage in a higher level of interpersonal influence behavior in order to have the same chance of obtaining a board appointment.Managemen

Cooperative Or Controlling? The Effects Of Ceo-Board Relations And The Content Of Interlocks On The Formation Of Joint Ventures

This study examines the influence of the social network of board interlocks on strategic alliance formation. Our theoretical framework suggests how board interlock ties to other firms can increase or decrease the likelihood of alliance formation, depending on the content of relationships between CEOs (chief executive officers) and outside directors. Results suggest that CEO-board relationships characterized by independent board control reduce the likelihood of alliance formation by prompting distrust between corporate leaders, while CEO-board cooperation in strategic decision making appears to promote alliance formation by enhancing trust. The findings also show how the effects of direct interlock ties are amplified further by third-party network ties.Business Administratio

Getting By With The Advice Of Their Friends: Ceos' Advice Networks And Firms' Strategic Responses To Poor Performance

This paper theorizes that relatively poor firm performance can prompt chief executive officers (CEOs) to seek more advice from executives of other firms who are their friends or similar to them and less advice from acquaintances or dissimilar others and suggests how and why this pattern of advice seeking could reduce firms' propensity to change corporate strategy in response to poor performance. We test our hypotheses with large-sample survey data on the identities of CEOs' advice contacts and archival data on firm performance and corporate strategy. The results confirm our hypotheses and show that executives' social network ties can influence firms' responses to economic adversity, in particular by inhibiting strategic change in response to relatively poor firm performance. Additional findings indicate that CEOs' advice seeking in response to low performance may ultimately have negative consequences for subsequent performance, suggesting how CEOs' social network ties could play an indirect role in organizational decline and downward spirals in firm performance.Business Administratio

Customization Or Conformity? An Institutional And Network Perspective On The Content And Consequences Of TQM Adoption

This study develops a theoretical framework that integrates institutional and network perspectives on the form and consequences of administrative innovations. Hypotheses are tested with survey and archival data on the implementation of total quality management (TQM) programs and the consequences for organizational efficiency and legitimacy in a sample of over 2,700 U.S. hospitals. The results show that early adopters customize TOM practices for efficiency gains, while later adopters gain legitimacy from adopting the normative form of TQM programs. The findings suggest that institutional factors moderate the role of network membership in affecting the form of administrative innovations adopted and provide strong evidence for the importance of institutional factors in determining how innovations are defined and implemented. We discuss implications for theory and research on institutional processes and network effects and for the literatures on innovation adoption and total quality management.(.)Business Administratio

Monodromy in the CMB: Gravity Waves and String Inflation

We present a simple mechanism for obtaining large-field inflation, and hence a gravitational wave signature, from string theory compactified on twisted tori. For Nil manifolds, we obtain a leading inflationary potential proportional to phi^(2/3) in terms of the canonically normalized field phi, yielding predictions for the tilt of the power spectrum and the tensor-to-scalar ratio, $n_s\approx 0.98$ and $r\approx 0.04$ with 60 e-foldings of inflation; we note also the possibility of a variant with a candidate inflaton potential proportional to phi^(2/5). The basic mechanism involved in extending the field range -- monodromy in D-branes as they move in circles on the manifold -- arises in a more general class of compactifications, though our methods for controlling the corrections to the slow-roll parameters require additional symmetries.Comment: 43 pages, latex. 4 figure

Method and apparatus for aligning a laser beam projector Patent

Laser beam projector for continuous, precise alignment between target, laser generator, and astronomical telescope during trackin

Wavefront sensing of atmospheric phase distortions at the Palomar 200-in. telescope and implications for adaptive optics

Major efforts in astronomical instrumentation are now being made to apply the techniques of adaptive optics to the correction of phase distortions induced by the turbulent atmosphere and by quasi-static aberrations in telescopes themselves. Despite decades of study, the problem of atmospheric turbulence is still only partially understood. We have obtained video-rate (30 Hz) imaging of stellar clusters and of single-star phase distortions over the pupil of the 200" Hale telescope on Palomar Mountain. These data show complex temporal and spatial behavior, with multiple components arising at a number of scale heights in the atmosphere; we hope to quantify this behavior to ensure the feasibility of adaptive optics at the Observatory. We have implemented different wavefront sensing techniques to measure aperture phase in wavefronts from single stars, including the classical Foucault test, which measures the local gradient of phase, and the recently-devised curvature sensing technique, which measures the second derivative of pupil phase and has formed the real-time wavefront sensor for some very productive astronomical adaptive optics. Our data, though not fast enough to capture all details of atmospheric phase fluctuations, provide important information regarding the capabilities that must be met by the adaptive optics system now being built for the 200" telescope by a team at the Jet Propulsion Lab. We describe our data acquisition techniques, initial results from efforts to characterize the properties of the turbulent atmosphere at Palomar Mountain, and future plans to extract additional quantitative parameters of use for adaptive optics performance predictions