4,851 research outputs found
Do sovereign wealth funds mitigate authoritarian rule?: a statistical analysis of sovereign wealth funds and the resource curse.
The famous oil baron\u27 John Paul Getty once defined his secret to success in three parts, Rise early, work hard, strike oil. This recipe, however, has not lead to political and economic success for oil-reliant, emerging market states. Rather than experiencing a resource blessing, these states have been plagued by a resource curse. This project introduces and tests my theory that sovereign wealth funds offer an exit to the resource curse and pathway back to the resource blessing. This theory is based on two observations I noticed during previous research on the subject: states with sovereign wealth funds boost occupational specialization and government transparency. Since both of these factors are believed to be necessary for democratization, then states with sovereign wealth funds should be less authoritarian. My findings suggest that the political transparency claim is true and that sovereign wealth funds do increase occupational specialization. However, the findings also suggest that occupational specialization is no longer a causal mechanism of the resource curse
Light Dark Matter Detection Prospects at Neutrino Experiments
We consider the prospects for the detection of relatively light dark matter
through direct annihilation to neutrinos. We specifically focus on the
detection possibilities of water Cherenkov and liquid scintillator neutrino
detection devices. We find in particular that liquid scintillator detectors may
potentially provide excellent detection prospects for dark matter in the 4-10
GeV mass range. These experiments can provide excellent corroborative checks of
the DAMA/LIBRA annual modulation signal, but may yield results for low mass
dark matter in any case. We identify important tests of the ratio of electron
to muon neutrino events (and neutrino versus anti-neutrino events), which
discriminate against background atmospheric neutrinos. In addition, the
fraction of events which arise from muon neutrinos or anti-neutrinos (
and ) can potentially yield information about the branching
fractions of hypothetical dark matter annihilations into different neutrino
flavors. These results apply to neutrinos from secondary and tertiary decays as
well, but will suffer from decreased detectability.Comment: 13 pages, 2 figures, pdflatex, references, one figure and comments on
electron neutrino bounds and on spin-dependent scattering limits added.
Figures updated
Receptor-Induced Thiolate Couples Env Activation to Retrovirus Fusion and Infection
According to current models of retrovirus infection, receptor binding to the surface subunit (SU) of the envelope glycoprotein (Env) triggers a conformational change in the transmembrane subunit (TM) that mediates virus fusion to cell membranes. To understand how this occurs, we investigated the role of the receptor Tva in avian leukosis virus-A (ALV-A) infection. We find that Tva binding induced the formation of a reactive thiolate on Cys38 (Cys38-S−) in SU. Both chemical and genetic inactivation of Cys38-S− completely abrogated ALV fusion and infection. Remarkably, Cys38-S− does not mediate isomerization of the SU-TM disulfide bond and is not required for Tva-induced activation of TM, including pre-hairpin association with membranes and low pH assembly of helical bundles. These findings indicate that, contrary to current models, receptor activation of TM is not sufficient for ALV fusion and infection and that formation of a reactive thiolate is an additional receptor-dependent step
Dark Matter Detection With Electron Neutrinos in Liquid Scintillation Detectors
We consider the prospects for liquid scintillation experiments (with a focus
on KamLAND) to detect the flux of electron neutrinos arising from dark matter
annihilation in the core of the sun. We show that, with data already taken,
KamLAND can provide the greatest sensitivity to the dark matter-proton
spin-dependent scattering cross-section for dark matter lighter than 20 GeV. It
is also possible to probe the dark matter-nucleon spin-independent scattering
cross-section for isospin-violating dark matter lighter than 10 GeV. KamLAND
can thus potentially confirm the dark matter interpretation of the DAMA and
CoGeNT signals, utilizing data already taken.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, PDFLaTeX; v2: references added, figures updated,
more detailed comparison of liquid scintillation and water Cerenkov detectors
(journal version
Assessing Social Learning Outcomes Through Participatory Mind Mapping
This article presents a method for using mind mapping to assess social learning outcomes in collaborative environmental restoration and participatory natural resource management initiatives. Using mind mapping for preassessment and postassessment can reveal changes in individual and collective thinking about critical social and ecological issues. On the basis of results from four youth-based environmental restoration programs in Boulder, Colorado, and New York and Cattaraugus Territory, New York, we suggest that mind mapping can serve as an effective data collection strategy and as a method for analyzing cognitive change in environmental restoration programs and civic ecology more broadly
Tuning biexciton binding and anti-binding in core/shell quantum dots
We use a path integral quantum Monte Carlo method to simulate excitons and
biexcitons in core shell nanocrystals with Type-I, II and quasi-Type II band
alignments. Quantum Monte Carlo techniques allow for all quantum correlations
to be included when determining the thermal ground state, thus producing
accurate predictions of biexciton binding. These subtle quantum correlations
are found to cause the biexciton to be binding with Type-I carrier localization
and strongly anti-binding with Type-II carrier localization, in agreement with
experiment for both core shell nanocrystals and dot in rod nanocrystal
structures. Simple treatments based on perturbative approaches are shown to
miss this important transition in the biexciton binding. Understanding these
correlations offers prospects to engineer strong biexciton anti-binding which
is crucial to the design of nanocrystals for single exciton lasing
applications.Comment: 10 pages, 11 figure
Discovery of a Metal-Line Absorber Associated with a Local Dwarf Starburst Galaxy
We present optical and near-infrared images, H I 21 cm emission maps, optical
spectroscopy, and Hubble Space Telescope/Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph
ultraviolet spectroscopy of the QSO/galaxy pair SBS 1122+594/IC 691. The QSO
sight line lies at a position angle of 27 degrees from the minor axis of the
nearby dwarf starburst galaxy IC 691 (cz_gal = 1204+-3 km/s, L_B ~ 0.09 L*,
current star formation rate = 0.08-0.24 solar masses per year) and 33 kpc (6.6
arcmin) from its nucleus. We find that IC 691 has an H I mass of M_HI =
(3.6+-0.1) x 10^8 solar masses and a dynamical mass of M_dyn = (3.1+-0.5) x
10^10 solar masses. The UV spectrum of SBS 1122+594 shows a metal-line
(Ly-alpha + C IV) absorber near the redshift of IC 691 at cz_abs = 1110+-30
km/s. Since IC 691 is a dwarf starburst and the SBS 1122+594 sight line lies in
the expected location for an outflowing wind, we propose that the best model
for producing this metal-line absorber is a starburst wind from IC 691. We
place consistent metallicity limits on IC 691 ([Z/Zsun] ~ -0.7) and the
metal-line absorber ([Z/Zsun] < -0.3). We also find that the galaxy's escape
velocity at the absorber location is v_esc = 80+-10 km/s and derive a wind
velocity of v_w = 160+-50 km/s. Thus, the evidence suggests that IC 691
produces an unbound starburst wind that escapes from its gravitational
potential to transport metals and energy to the surrounding intergalactic
medium.Comment: 31 pages, 8 figures; AJ in press; a version with high resolution
figures can be downloaded from
http://casa.colorado.edu/~keeney/research/papers/IC691.pd
Molecular and Physiological Responses of Diatoms to Variable Levels of Irradiance and Nitrogen Availability: Growth of Skeletonema Costatum in Simulated Upwelling Conditions
Molecular mechanisms that drive metabolic acclimation to environmental shifts have been poorly characterized in phytoplankton. In this laboratory study. the response of light- and N-limited Skeletonema costatum cells to an increase in light and NO3 availability was examined. C assimilation was depressed relative to N assimilation early in enrichment, and the photosynthetic quotient (O2: CO2) increased, consistent with the shunting of reducing equivalents from CO2 fixation to NO3- reduction. The concomitant increase in dark respiration was consistent with the increased energetic demand associated with macromolecular synthesis. The accelerations of N-specific rates of NO3- uptake and nitrate reductase activity (NRA) over the first 24 h were comparable to observations for coastal upwelling systems. Increases in cell-specific rates of these processes, however, were confined to the first 8 h of enrichment. The abundance of 18S ribosomal ribonucleic acid (rRNA) increased immediately after the environmental shift, followed by increases in levels of NR-specific mRNA that coincided with the acceleration in NO3- assimilation. NRA, however, exhibited a diurnal rhythm that did not correspond to changes in NR protein abundance, suggesting that enzyme activity was also regulated by direct modulation of existing NR protein by light and NO3- availability
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