‘They overworked us’

In this article, I describe the institutional humiliation experienced by volunteer nurses in Sierra Leone following the end of the Ebola epidemic. They had been promised formal employment with the Ministry of Health and Sanitation after working in the Ebola treatment units in the country, but were dismissed from the hospitals where they were volunteering and felt humiliated. I suggest that this maltreatment of volunteer nurses cannot be grasped through the existing categories and parameters used by global health policies nor through conventional moral theories that inform our understandings of global health. Instead, we need to attend to the harm inflicted upon the volunteer nurses’ sense of self-respect through institutionalized forms of subordination and misrecognition. Drawing on philosophical and anthropological works on recognition, I argue that we should pay attention to moral emotions as distinct objects of study to grasp how those who are humiliated register and validate the maltreatment they have undergone

The Cost of Food Self-Sufficiency and Agricultural Protection in South Korea

As part of its food security policy, South Korea has been pursuing food self-sufficiency using high tariffs and high administrative prices in key agricultural and food markets. Using a dual approach to trade and trade restrictiveness indices, we analyze the impact of these market distortions on welfare and trade volume. Then, we compute optimum distortions, which minimize the welfare cost of observed self-sufficiency and production objectives. We rationalize these optimum distortions to what could be claimed as legitimate protection under a "food security" (FS) box in World Trade Organization negotiations. FS-box protection is sensitive to changes in the definition and the extent of the FS objectives. We show that FS via production targets and reliance on imports would be more palatable to consumers and trade partners, while preserving rents to the farm sector.agricultural distortions, food security, Korea, protection, targeting, WTO negotiations, Food Security and Poverty,

Do Sensory Ad Appeals Influence Brand Attitude?

This article presents two studies that investigate whether or not sensory appeal preferences in advertisements affect brand attitude. Study 1 seeks to discover empirically whether self-referencing and positive affect mediate sensory appeals to influence consumers\u27 attitudes toward a brand, and whether such mediation effects differ across various ad formats. Study 2, a case approach, attempts to derive core sensory concepts through qualitative techniques as applied to an established specialty coffee brand. The results indicate that self-referencing and positive affect both have significant mediating effects between sensory appeal preferences and attitudes toward a coffee brand. Moreover, the finding that sensory preferences enhance ad effectiveness using particular delivery platforms sheds important insights on creative strategies for sensory ads. As a result of qualitative techniques that elicited metaphoric images regarding the specialty coffee brand, this research found that sight was the most influential sense. In the end, this paper discusses the implications concerning synaesthetic assumptions made and tested in this research as well as the broader applicability of the sensory approach to advertising effectiveness

Do Sensory Ad Appeals Influence Brand Attitude?

This article presents two studies that investigate whether or not sensory appeal preferences in advertisements affect brand attitude. Study 1 seeks to discover empirically whether self-referencing and positive affect mediate sensory appeals to influence consumers\u27 attitudes toward a brand, and whether such mediation effects differ across various ad formats. Study 2, a case approach, attempts to derive core sensory concepts through qualitative techniques as applied to an established specialty coffee brand. The results indicate that self-referencing and positive affect both have significant mediating effects between sensory appeal preferences and attitudes toward a coffee brand. Moreover, the finding that sensory preferences enhance ad effectiveness using particular delivery platforms sheds important insights on creative strategies for sensory ads. As a result of qualitative techniques that elicited metaphoric images regarding the specialty coffee brand, this research found that sight was the most influential sense. In the end, this paper discusses the implications concerning synaesthetic assumptions made and tested in this research as well as the broader applicability of the sensory approach to advertising effectiveness

Lessons from the landscape of six-dimensional supergravity theories

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Physics, 2012.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.Includes bibliographical references (p. 217-232).Comparing the set of supergravity theories allowed by low-energy consistency conditions with the set of string vacua provides useful insights into quantum gravity and string theory. In fact, such a "landscape analysis" for ten-dimensional supergravity theories was at the core of the exciting series of developments that is now referred to as the first superstring revolution. In this thesis, we discuss the lessons we learn about quantum supergravity and string theory by carrying out such an analysis for the space of six-dimensional supergravity theories with minimal supersymmetry. We first review six-dimensional supergravity theories and explain why the space of these theories is an ideal place to carry out the landscape analysis. We then describe how anomaly constraints bound the space of consistent theories, i.e., we map the space of theories T that satisfy known low-energy consistency conditions. We then go on to describe string constructions that give six-dimensional string vacua with minimal supersymmetry, i.e., we map the space of theories S c T that come from string vacua. Finally, we compare the space of theories T and S and explore its implications. We first find that there is a large discrepancy between T and S. Among the set T - S, we identify some theories that are potentially new string vacua, but also identify many theories that cannot be embedded in any known string vacua. These theories may potentially be ruled out by yet undiscovered low energy constraints. Understanding these theories is an important step in addressing the question of string universality in six dimensions. We also find some surprising equalities that hold for Calabi-Yau threefolds that follow from demanding that F-theory string vacua should be consistent.by Daniel Sung-Joon Park.Ph.D

Particulate counter electrode system for enhanced light harvesting in dye-sensitized solar cells

A particulate counter electrode with photo scattering and redox catalytic properties is applied to dye sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) in order to improve photo conversion efficiency and simplify the assembly process. Our particulate counter electrode acts as both a photo reflecting layer and a catalyst for reduction of electrolyte. The reflective and catalytic properties of the electrode are investigated through optical and electrochemical analysis, respectively. A short circuit current density enhancement is observed in the DSSCs without the need to add an additional reflecting layer to the electrode. This leads to a simplified assembly process. (C) 2013 Optical Society of Americ

Design and Implementation of an Omni-Directional Underwater Acoustic Micro-Modem Based on a Low-Power Micro-Controller Unit

For decades, underwater acoustic communication has been restricted to the point-to-point long distance applications such as deep sea probes and offshore oil fields. For this reason, previous acoustic modems were typically characterized by high data rates and long working ranges at the expense of large size and high power consumption. Recently, as the need for underwater wireless sensor networks (UWSNs) has increased, the research and development of compact and low-power consuming communication devices has become the focus. From the consideration that the requisites of acoustic modems for UWSNs are low power consumption, omni-directional beam pattern, low cost and so on, in this paper, we design and implement an omni-directional underwater acoustic micro-modem satisfying these requirements. In order to execute fast digital domain signal processing and support flexible interfaces with other peripherals, an ARM Cortex-M3 is embedded in the micro-modem. Also, for the realization of small and omni-directional properties, a spherical transducer having a resonant frequency of 70 kHz and a diameter of 34 mm is utilized for the implementation. Physical layer frame format and symbol structure for efficient packet-based underwater communication systems are also investigated. The developed acoustic micro-modem is verified analytically and experimentally in indoor and outdoor environments in terms of functionality and performance. Since the modem satisfies the requirements for use in UWSNs, it could be deployed in a wide range of applications requiring underwater acoustic communication