Mobilizing youth in the 21st century: How digital media use fosters civic duty, information efficacy, and political participation

Youth turnout at European Parliamentary elections has been dwindling. This study investigates the impact of news media exposure on electoral participation of first time voters. Relying on a data set that combines content analysis of news stories about the EU (N = 769) and a multiple wave panel survey (N = 994), we analyze the impact of exposure to online and offline coverage of relevant topics on turn out across a period of 6 months. We find that exposure to news in offline media had no significant effect on participation, whereas exposure to relevant news in online media positively affected turnout

Cross road elections: Change in EU performance evaluations during the European Parliament elections 2014

The 2014 European Parliament (EP) elections were held after a period where public opinion about the EU changed significantly. In this paper we investigate evaluations of the performance of the European Union, as this dimension of EU attitudes is particularly relevant ahead of elections. We look at public opinion developments since 2009 and then zoom in on the role played by the news media in shaping public opinion about EU performance by linking citizens’ evaluations across time to the news media content they were exposed to. The article relies on original multiple wave survey panel data and a systematic media content analysis in the Netherlands. It shows how public opinion has changed, how it changes around EP elections, and how exposure to media coverage can help improve citizens’ evaluations of EU performance

Doubly resonant optical nanoantenna arrays for polarization resolved measurements of surface-enhanced Raman scattering

We report that rhomb-shaped metal nanoantenna arrays support multiple plasmonic resonances, making them favorable bio-sensing substrates. Besides the two localized plasmonic dipole modes associated with the two principle axes of the rhombi, the sample supports an additional grating-induced surface plasmon polariton resonance. The plasmonic properties of all modes are carefully studied by far-field measurements together with numerical and analytical calculations. The sample is then applied to surface-enhanced Raman scattering measurements. It is shown to be highly efficient since two plasmonic resonances of the structure were simultaneously tuned to coincide with the excitation and the emission wave- length in the SERS experiment. The analysis is completed by measuring the impact of the polarization angle on the SERS signal.Comment: 13 pages, 5 figure

The influence of shock pressure, pre-shock temperature, and host rock composition on the survival rate of endolithic microorganisms during impact ejection from Mars

Petrographic and biological analysis of shock recovery experiments confirms the possible life transport due to an impact from Mars to Earth

Deep Eyes: Binocular Depth-from-Focus on Focal Stack Pairs

Human visual system relies on both binocular stereo cues and monocular focusness cues to gain effective 3D perception. In computer vision, the two problems are traditionally solved in separate tracks. In this paper, we present a unified learning-based technique that simultaneously uses both types of cues for depth inference. Specifically, we use a pair of focal stacks as input to emulate human perception. We first construct a comprehensive focal stack training dataset synthesized by depth-guided light field rendering. We then construct three individual networks: a Focus-Net to extract depth from a single focal stack, a EDoF-Net to obtain the extended depth of field (EDoF) image from the focal stack, and a Stereo-Net to conduct stereo matching. We show how to integrate them into a unified BDfF-Net to obtain high-quality depth maps. Comprehensive experiments show that our approach outperforms the state-of-the-art in both accuracy and speed and effectively emulates human vision systems

Deformed two center shell model

A highly specialized two-center shell model has been developed accounting for the splitting of a deformed parent nucleus into two ellipsoidaly deformed fragments. The potential is based on deformed oscillator wells in direct correspondance with the shape change of the nuclear system. For the first time a potential responsible for the necking part between the fragments is introduced on potential theory basis. As a direct consequence, spin-orbit {\bf ls} and {\bf l$^2$} operators are calculated as shape dependent. Level scheme evolution along the fission path for pairs of ellipsoidaly deformed fragments is calculated. The Strutinsky method yields the shell corrections for different mass asymmetries from the superheavy nucleus $^{306}$122 and $^{252}$Cf all along the splitting process.Comment: 32 pages, 8 figure