26 research outputs found
Dusty Plasma Correlation Function Experiment
Dust particles immersed within a plasma environment, such as those in
protostellar clouds, planetary rings or cometary environments, will acquire an
electric charge. If the ratio of the inter-particle potential energy to the
average kinetic energy is high enough the particles will form either a "liquid"
structure with short-range ordering or a crystalline structure with long range
ordering. Many experiments have been conducted over the past several years on
such colloidal plasmas to discover the nature of the crystals formed, but more
work is needed to fully understand these complex colloidal systems. Most
previous experiments have employed monodisperse spheres to form Coulomb
crystals. However, in nature (as well as in most plasma processing
environments) the distribution of particle sizes is more randomized and
disperse. This paper reports experiments which were carried out in a GEC rf
reference cell modified for use as a dusty plasma system, using varying sizes
of particles to determine the manner in which the correlation function depends
upon the overall dust grain size distribution. (The correlation function
determines the overall crystalline structure of the lattice.) Two dimensional
plasma crystals were formed of assorted glass spheres with specific size
distributions in an argon plasma. Using various optical techniques, the pair
correlation function was determined and compared to those calculated
numerically.Comment: 6 pages, Presented at COSPAR '0
Finite Coulomb Crystal Formation
Dust particles immersed within a plasma environment, such as those found in
planetary rings or comets, will acquire an electric charge. If the ratio of the
inter-particle potential energy to average kinetic energy is large enough the
particles will form either a "liquid" structure with short-range ordering or a
crystalline structure with long-range ordering. Since their discovery in
laboratory environments in 1994, such crystals have been the subject of a
variety of experimental, theoretical and numerical investigations. Most
numerical and theoretical investigations have examined infinite systems
assuming periodic boundary conditions. Since experimentally observed crystals
can be comprised of a few hundred particles, this often leads to discrepancies
between predicted theoretical results and experimental data. In addition,
recent studies have concentrated on the importance of random charge variations
between individual dust particles, but very little on the importance of size
variations between the grains. Such size variations naturally lead to
inter-grain charge variations which can easily become more important than those
due to random charge fluctuations (which are typically less than one percent).
Although such size variations can be largely eliminated experimentally by
introducing mono-dispersive particles, many laboratory systems and all
astrophysical environments contain significant size distributions. This study
utilizes a program to find the equilibrium positions of a dusty plasma system
as well as a modified Barnes-Hut code to model the dynamic behavior of such
systems. It is shown that in terms of inter-particle spacing and ordering,
finite systems are significantly different than infinite ones, particularly for
the most-highly ordered states.Comment: 6 pages, Presented at COSPAR '0
Linguistic theory, linguistic diversity and Whorfian economics
Languages vary greatly in their words, sounds and sentence structures. Linguistic theory has shown that many aspects of variation are superficial and may not reflect underlying formal similarities between languages, which are relevant to how humans learn and process language. In this chapter, I show both how languages can vary and how the surface variations can be manifestations of underlying similarities. Economists have sometimes adopted a ‘Whorfian’ view that differences in languages can cause differences in how their speakers think and behave. Psychological experiments have shown both support for this hypothesis and evidence against it. Specific arguments that language causes thought, which have been made in recent economics papers, are examined in the light of what linguistics tells us about superficial and underlying variatio
Language in international business: a review and agenda for future research
A fast growing number of studies demonstrates that language diversity influences almost all management decisions in modern multinational corporations. Whereas no doubt remains about the practical importance of language, the empirical investigation and theoretical conceptualization of its complex and multifaceted effects still presents a substantial challenge. To summarize and evaluate the current state of the literature in a coherent picture informing future research, we systematically review 264 articles on language in international business.
We scrutinize the geographic distributions of data, evaluate the field’s achievements to date in terms of theories and methodologies, and summarize core findings by individual, group, firm, and country levels of analysis. For each of these dimensions, we then put forward a future research agenda. We encourage scholars to transcend disciplinary boundaries and to draw on, integrate, and test a variety of theories from disciplines such as psychology, linguistics, and neuroscience to gain a more profound understanding of language in international business. We advocate more multi-level studies and cross-national research collaborations and suggest greater attention to potential new data sources and means of analysis
Two new apomictic Taraxacum microspecies of the section Erythrosperma from central Europe
Two new species, Taraxacum maricum and Taraxacum cristatum, of the section Erythrosperma from Central Europe are described in this paper. These species are similar to western European taxa, T. maricum to T. proximum, and T. cristatum is morphologically close to T. scanicum. Both new taxa are triploid apomictic microspecies. Specific characteristics, information on distribution and ecology and comparison with similar species are presented. Pictures and distribution maps of the new species are also included
Taraxacum scanicum Dahlst. group [section Erythrosperma] in Poland: chorology and seed and pollen morphology of the microspecies
The genus Taraxacum is taxonomically complicated due to apomixis. Therefore, there are significant differences in knowledge of regional Taraxacum-Floras among European countries. Similarly, some taxa are well characterised with well-known distribution, whereas some ones are known e.g. from a single locality. Taraxacum scanicum of section Erythrosperma is one of the most common microspecies of this section in Europe. Recently, this taxon was split into three microspecies. In this study we map the distribution of three described taxa of this group in Poland, i.e. T. scanicum s.s., T. prunicolor and T. cristatum. The survey showed that T. scanicum has a similar distribution as T. prunicolor in Poland. This is in contrast with the hitherto known distribution of both taxa. T. cristatum was found at a single locality that is quite distant from the distribution in southern central Europe. We also provide with new morphological characteristics of achenes and pollen for T. scanicum s.s. and T. prunicolor