Probability distributions for economic surplus changes: the case of technical change in the Australian wool industry

Mullen, Alston and Wohlgenant (1989) (MAW) examined the distribution of the benefits of technical change in the Australian wool industry. Their conclusions are revisited by examining the probability distributions of changes in the welfare measures, given uncertainty about their model parameters. Subjective probability distributions are specified for the parameters and correlations among some of the parameters are imposed. Hierarchical distributions are also used to model diverse views about the specification of the subjective distributions. A sensitivity elasticity is defined through the estimation of a response surface to measure the sensitivity of the estimated research benefits to individual parameters. MAW’s conclusions are found to be robust under the stochastic approach to sensitivity analysis demonstrated in this article.Livestock Production/Industries,

Particle formation and interaction

A wide variety of experiments can be conducted on the Space Station that involve the physics of small particles of planetary significance. Processes of interest include nucleation and condensation of particles from a gas, aggregation of small particles into larger ones, and low velocity collisions of particles. All of these processes could be investigated with a general purpose facility on the Space Station. The microgravity environment would be necessary to perform many experiments, as they generally require that particles be suspended for periods substantially longer than are practical at 1 g. Only experiments relevant to planetary processes will be discussed in detail here, but it is important to stress that a particle facility will be useful to a wide variety of scientific disciplines, and can be used to address many scientific problems

Hydrodynamics of liquid helium II

Observations have been made of the behaviour of a fine quartz fibre, weighted at its lower end and suspended inside a short, horizontal tunnel in which counterblow of the normal and superfluid components of liquid helium II can be produced by a heater. Section I of this thesis is an introduction to the hydrodynamic of liquid helium II. In section II the interaction with such a fibre of quantized vortex lines in the superfluid is discussed, and the effect of a short heat pulse on the fibre when it is carrying superfluid circulation in calculated approximately. The different responses of the fibre to turbulence in the normal fluid and in the superfluid are contrasted. In section III, after a description of the apparatus and the experimental method, measurements, deduced from the response to heat pulses, of the circulation about the fibre from 1.3°K to2.1°K are reported. At all temperatures circulations of the expected order from magnitude are observed to grow and decay with time. At 1.3°K apparent circulations of up to about 1/5 quantum occur. In undisturbed helium the largest circulations are more stable than other values, persisting for up to five minutes. Measurement of the same circulation both by the heat-pulse method and by the deflection of the fibre in a steady heat current suggests that the large, persistent circulations may in fact be equal to one quantum. The sense of the observed circulations about the fibre at 1.3°K is strongly biased, this bias being probably associated with the heater geometry. In small heat current no change in the bins or persistence of circulation can be detected, but in currents above 11/2-3 mW/cm², depending on the heater, the circulation about the fibre is both more variable and of the opposite bias to that in undisturbed helium. This behaviour continues for 100 sec or more after the heat current has been switched off. At higher temperatures there are indications that the behaviour might be similar if it were possible for the helium to region its undisturbed condition after being stirred up by turbulent heat currents. In fact this seems other to be impossible, or to require many hundreds of seconds, and the situation is therefore rather confused. In still higher heat currents measurement of superfluid circulation by heat pulses is impossible because the fibre is continuously agitated in a random way. From measurements of the rms deflections of the bob on the end of the fibre a critical heat current for the onset of such turbulence is found at 1.3°K. At higher temperatures the sensitivity is too low for the transition itself, if any, to be detected, but an upper limit to the critical heat current is given. At 1.3°K and 2.1°K the rms deflection increases monotonically with increasing heat currents, but at intermediate temperatures it is variable, because the bob is often hardly agitated for long periods during apparently supercritical heat currents. This is called quiescent behaviour. When a supercritical heat current is a delay before agitation of the fibre begins. The delay time, which is often not very well defined, has been measured as a function of the heat current. When the current is switched off the agitation of the bob decoys in a few seconds, but at 1.3°K the circulation about the fibre is small and variable for 100 sec or more, until the persistence and bias characteristic of undisturbed helium regained. These results are discussed in section IV

Low-Mach-number turbulence in interstellar gas revealed by radio polarization gradients

The interstellar medium of the Milky Way is multi-phase, magnetized and turbulent. Turbulence in the interstellar medium produces a global cascade of random gas motions, spanning scales ranging from 100 parsecs to 1000 kilometres. Fundamental parameters of interstellar turbulence such as the sonic Mach number (the speed of sound) have been difficult to determine because observations have lacked the sensitivity and resolution to directly image the small-scale structure associated with turbulent motion. Observations of linear polarization and Faraday rotation in radio emission from the Milky Way have identified unusual polarized structures that often have no counterparts in the total radiation intensity or at other wavelengths, and whose physical significance has been unclear. Here we report that the gradient of the Stokes vector (Q,U), where Q and U are parameters describing the polarization state of radiation, provides an image of magnetized turbulence in diffuse ionized gas, manifested as a complex filamentary web of discontinuities in gas density and magnetic field. Through comparison with simulations, we demonstrate that turbulence in the warm ionized medium has a relatively low sonic Mach number, M_s <~ 2. The development of statistical tools for the analysis of polarization gradients will allow accurate determinations of the Mach number, Reynolds number and magnetic field strength in interstellar turbulence over a wide range of conditions.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures, published in Nature on 13 Oct 201

Persistent Entrainment in Non-linear Neural Networks With Memory

We investigate the dynamics of a non-linear network with noise, periodic forcing and delayed feedback. Our model reveals that there exist forcing regimes—called persistent entrainment regimes—in which the system displays oscillatory responses that outlast the termination of the forcing. Our analysis shows that in presence of delays, periodic forcing can selectively excite components of an infinite reservoir of intrinsic modes and hence display a wide range of damped frequencies. Mean-field and linear stability analysis allows a characterization of the magnitude and duration of these persistent oscillations, as well as their dependence on noise intensity and time delay. These results provide new perspectives on the control of non-linear delayed system using periodic forcing

The Application of a Hypothesis-driven Strategy to the Sensitive Detection and Location of Acetylated Lysine Residues

The application of a hypothesis-driven method for the sensitive determination of lysine acetylation sites on enzymatically digested proteins is described. Comparative sensitivity tests were carried out using serial dilution of an acetylated bovine serum albumin (AcBSA) digest to assess the performance of a multiple reaction monitoring (MRM)–based approach as compared to a more conventional precursor scanning (PS) method. Both methods were capable of selectively detecting an acetylated peptide at the low femtomole level when spiked into a background of 500 fmol six-protein tryptic digest. The MRM approach was roughly tenfold more sensitive than precursor scanning with one acetylated peptide detected and sequenced at the level of 2 fmol on-column. The technique was subsequently applied to a gel-derived sample of cytokeratin-8 (CK8) shown to contain acetylated lysine residues by Western blot analysis. The strategy applied herein, termed MRM-initiated detection and sequencing (MIDAS), resulted in the facile identification of novel sites of acetylation on this protein

Synthesis of bis(ethylenedithio)tetrathiafulvalene (BEDT-TTF) derivatives functionalised with two, four or eight hydroxyl groups

Short synthetic routes to a range of BEDT-TTF derivatives functionalised with two, four or eight hydroxyl groups are reported, of interest because of their potential for introducing hydrogen bonding between donor and anion into their radical cation salts. The cycloaddition of 1,3-dithiole-2,4,5-trithione with alkenes to construct 5,6-dihydro-1,3-dithiolo[4,5-b]1,4-dithiin-2-thiones is a key step, with homo- or hetero-coupling procedures and O-deprotection completing the syntheses. The first synthesis of a single diastereomer of tetrakis(hydroxymethyl)BEDT-TTF, the cis, trans product, was achieved by careful choice of O-protecting groups to facilitate separation of homo- and hetero-coupled products. Cyclisation of the trithione with enantiopure 1R,2R,5R,6R-bis(O,O-isopropylidene)hex-3-ene-1,2,5,6-tetrol (from D-mannitol) gave two separable diastereomeric thiones, which can be transformed to enantiomeric BEDT-TTF derivatives with four or eight hydroxyl groups

The impact of streetlights on an aquatic invasive species: artificial light at night alters signal crayfish behaviour

Artificial light at night (ALAN) can significantly alter the behaviour, communication and orientation of animals, and will potentially interact with other stressors to affect biodiversity. Invasive, non-native species are one of the largest threats to freshwater biodiversity; however, the impact of ALAN on such species is unknown. This study assessed the effects of ALAN at ecologically relevant levels on the behaviour of a globally widespread invasive species, the signal crayfish (Pacifastacus leniusculus). In experimental aquaria, crayfish were exposed to periods of daylight, control (<0.1 lx) and street-lit nights to test two hypotheses: (1) signal crayfish under natural conditions are nocturnal animals, spending more time in shelter during the day, whilst active and interacting during the night, and (2) ALAN reduces crayfish activity and intraspecific interactions, whilst increasing their propensity to use shelter. Our results confirm that signal crayfish are largely nocturnal, showing peak activity and interaction levels during control nights, whilst taking refuge during daylight hours. When exposed to short-term simulated light pollution from a streetlight at night however, activity and interactions with conspecifics were significantly reduced compared to control nights, whilst time spent in shelters increased. By altering crayfish behaviour, ALAN may change the ecosystem impacts of invasive crayfish in the wild. This study is the first to show an impact of ALAN on the behaviour of an invasive, non-native species, and provides information for the management of invasive crayfish in areas where ALAN is prevalent