Green Public Procurements (GPP) as an Instrument of Implementation of Sustainable Development. Analysis of the Experience of the Łódź Region Local Government

This paper discusses the situation on the Polish green public procurements (GPP) market, with special emphasis on the results of a GPPinfoNET project realised in the Łódź region. The identification of the main barriers hindering the application of GPP in the Polish practice is the departure point to formulating recommendations concerning organisational and legal changes which would make it possible to increase the share of GPP in the Polish economic practice. Implementation of green public procurement is considered as an important element of sustainable development.W artykule przedmiotem analizy jest sytuacja na polskim rynku zielonych zamówień publicznych, ze szczególnym uwzględnieniem efektów projektu GPPinfoNET realizowanego w regionie łódzkim. Punktem wyjścia do sformułowania rekomendacji dotyczących zmian organizacyjnych i prawnych służących popularyzacji ZZP jest identyfikacja głównych barier hamujących stosowanie takich zamówień w polskiej praktyce gospodarczej. Wdrażanie zielonych zamówień publicznych jest traktowane jako ważny element realizacji zrównoważonego rozwoju

A dimensionality reduction method to select the most representative daylight illuminance distributions

One challenge when evaluating daylight distribution is dealing with the large amount of temporal and spatial data, visualisations and variability in illuminances that are assessed in buildings. Using a dimensionality reduction method based on principal component analysis, we identified the most representative annual daylight distributions. We modelled a rectangular room containing an analysis grid of 3200 illuminance sensor points and simulated 3285 different temporal daylight conditions using an annual occupancy schedule ranging from 08:00 to 17:00 with one-hour sampling intervals in two locations: Singapore and Oakland, California. Our approach explained 98 % of the illuminance variability with three daylight distributions in Singapore, and 92 % using six in Oakland, California. Our dimensionality reduction strategy was also generalised using a complex building geometry showing the utility of the method. We think this approach can be used to provide a more efficient and reliable method to analyse daylight performance in building practice

Regulation of positive-strand RNA virus replication: The emerging role of phosphorylation.

Protein phosphorylation is a reversible post-translational modification that plays a fundamental role in the regulation of many cellular processes. Phosphorylation can modulate protein properties such as enzymatic activity, stability, subcellular localization or interaction with binding partners. The importance of phosphorylation of the replication proteins of negative-strand RNA viruses has previously been documented but recent evidence suggests that replication of positive-strand RNA viruses - the largest class of viruses, including significant human, animal and plant pathogens - may also be regulated by phosphorylation events. The objective of this review is to summarize current knowledge regarding the various regulatory roles played by phosphorylation of nonstructural viral proteins in the replication of positive-strand RNA viruses

A Case-study based on French Resources for the Semantic Analysis of Sentences in Coq

Projet en cours; article soumis à un workshop.This paper presents an approach devoted to the formalization of sentence frames in the Coq system. Then, we instanci-ate these frames for performing a semantic analysis of simple sentences. We rely on a hierarchy of types for type-checking the conceptual well-formedness of sentences. To do so, we investigate how to exploit the particular features of the Coq type system for encoding the syntax-semantics interface and then we show how to combine it with large resources for french language : our hierarchy of type is based on the freely available french wordnet named WOLF; our lexicon can be easily extended using the dictionary of french verbs developed by Dubois and Dubois-Charlier

A Case-study for the Semantic Analysis of Sentences in Coq

This paper presents a case-study devoted to the formaliza-tion of sentence frames in the Coq system. Therefore, we instanciate these frames for performing a semantic analysis of simple sentences. In particular, we rely on a hierarchy of types for type-checking the conceptual well-formedness of sentences. To do so, we investigate how to exploit the particular features of the Coq type system in order to take advantage of this elegant unifying framework for encoding the syntax-semantics interface and then we show how to improve our approach for combining it with linguistic resources distributed

The Influence of Selected Socio-Economic Factors on Migration Balance, Including Particular Analysis for Voivodeship of Lodz

The paper presents an analysis of human migration and its main economic and social factors in Polish voivodeships. The main reason of migration is based on differences in the standards of living in different locations. Important factors indicating difference are unemployment rates, average gross wages, housing conditions and access to education. This paper also presents description of econometric model – estimation results confirm correlation between migration balance and socioeconomic factors

Gauge fixing in higher derivative field theories

Higher Derivative (HD) Field Theories can be transformed into second order equivalent theories with a direct particle interpretation. In a simple model involving abelian gauge symmetries we examine the fate of the possible gauge fixings throughout this process. This example is a useful test bed for HD theories of gravity and provides a nice intuitive interpretation of the "third ghost" occurring there and in HD gauge theories when a HD gauge fixing is adopted.Comment: 16 pages, Latex,( Preprint imaff 93/10

The Universality of Einstein Equations

It is shown that for a wide class of analytic Lagrangians which depend only on the scalar curvature of a metric and a connection, the application of the so--called ``Palatini formalism'', i.e., treating the metric and the connection as independent variables, leads to ``universal'' equations. If the dimension $n$ of space--time is greater than two these universal equations are Einstein equations for a generic Lagrangian and are suitably replaced by other universal equations at bifurcation points. We show that bifurcations take place in particular for conformally invariant Lagrangians $L=R^{n/2} \sqrt g$ and prove that their solutions are conformally equivalent to solutions of Einstein equations. For 2--dimensional space--time we find instead that the universal equation is always the equation of constant scalar curvature; the connection in this case is a Weyl connection, containing the Levi--Civita connection of the metric and an additional vectorfield ensuing from conformal invariance. As an example, we investigate in detail some polynomial Lagrangians and discuss their bifurcations.Comment: 15 pages, LaTeX, (Extended Version), TO-JLL-P1/9

Non-Trivial Vacua in Higher-Derivative Gravitation

A discussion of an extended class of higher-derivative classical theories of gravity is presented. A procedure is given for exhibiting the new propagating degrees of freedom, at the full non-linear level, by transforming the higher-derivative action to a canonical second-order form. For general fourth-order theories, described by actions which are general functions of the scalar curvature, the Ricci tensor and the full Riemann tensor, it is shown that the higher-derivative theories may have multiple stable vacua. The vacua are shown to be, in general, non-trivial, corresponding to deSitter or anti-deSitter solutions of the original theory. It is also shown that around any vacuum the elementary excitations remain the massless graviton, a massive scalar field and a massive ghost-like spin-two field. The analysis is extended to actions which are arbitrary functions of terms of the form $\nabla^{2k}R$, and it is shown that such theories also have a non-trivial vacuum structure.Comment: 25 pages, LaTeX2e with AMS-LaTeX 1.2, 7 eps figure

Nonlinear massive spin-two field generated by higher derivative gravity

We present a systematic exposition of the Lagrangian field theory for the massive spin-two field generated in higher-derivative gravity. It has been noticed by various authors that this nonlinear field overcomes the well known inconsistency of the theory for a linear massive spin-two field interacting with Einstein's gravity. Starting from a Lagrangian quadratically depending on the Ricci tensor of the metric, we explore the two possible second-order pictures usually called "(Helmholtz-)Jordan frame" and "Einstein frame". In spite of their mathematical equivalence, the two frames have different structural properties: in Einstein frame, the spin-two field is minimally coupled to gravity, while in the other frame it is necessarily coupled to the curvature, without a separate kinetic term. We prove that the theory admits a unique and linearly stable ground state solution, and that the equations of motion are consistent, showing that these results can be obtained independently in either frame. The full equations of motion and the energy-momentum tensor for the spin--two field in Einstein frame are given, and a simple but nontrivial exact solution to these equations is found. The comparison of the energy-momentum tensors for the spin-two field in the two frames suggests that the Einstein frame is physically more acceptable. We point out that the energy-momentum tensor generated by the Lagrangian of the linearized theory is unrelated to the corresponding tensor of the full theory. It is then argued that the ghost-like nature of the nonlinear spin-two field, found long ago in the linear approximation, may not be so harmful to classical stability issues, as has been expected