7,988 research outputs found
The Problem of Legitimacy in the European Polity. Is Democratization the Answer?
The authors discuss potential sources of legitimacy of the EU, i. e. of the normative bindingness of its decisions. After rejecting the views that such legitimacy is either not needed, not feasible, or provided for already, they focus upon the corrosive impact of the EU upon democratic legitimacy within member states. Brussels-based 'governance' is essentially uncontested and can hardly provide for the legitimacy that results from the interplay between government and opposition within nation states. The problem boils down to achieving legitimacy in the absence of the political community of a 'demos'. The paper outlines a solution to this problem that relies on the apparently oxymoronic model of a 'republican empire' - a political community, that is, which is held together not by the bonds of some presumed sameness, but, to the contrary, by the shared contractual recognition of the dissimilarity of its constituent parts from which legitimacy can flow.democracy; legitimacy; diversity/homogeneity; governance; democratization
Can brachytherapy errors and accidents be identified by using online in vivo time-resolved luminescence dosimetry?
Curvature estimates for Weingarten hypersurfaces in Riemannian manifolds
We prove curvature estimates for general curvature functions. As an
application we show the existence of closed, strictly convex hypersurfaces with
prescribed curvature , where the defining cone of is \C_+. is only
assumed to be monotone, symmetric, homogeneous of degree 1, concave and of
class C^{m,\al}, .Comment: 9 pages, v2:final version, to be publishe
Conformal Theory of M2, D3, M5 and `D1+D5' Branes
The bosonic actions for M2, D3 and M5 branes in their own d-dimensional
near-horizon background are given in a manifestly SO(p+1,2) x SO(d-p-1)
invariant form (p=2,3,5). These symmetries result from a breakdown of ISO(d,2)
(with d=10 for D3 and d=11 for M2 and M5) symmetry by the Wess-Zumino term and
constraints. The new brane actions, reduce after gauge-fixing and solving
constraints to (p+1) dimensional interacting field theories with a non-linearly
realized SO(p+1,2) conformal invariance. We also present an interacting
two-dimensional conformal field theory on a D-string in the near-horizon
geometry of a D1+D5 configuration.Comment: 32 pages, two figures, Latex. A version to appear in JHEP. A comment
is added on infinite dimensional Kac-Moody type symmetry of D1+D5 system
observed by Brandt, Gomis, Sim'o
An increase in under hydrostatic pressure in the superconducting doped topological insulator NbBiSe
We report an unexpected positive hydrostatic pressure derivative of the
superconducting transition temperature in the doped topological insulator \NBS
via SQUID magnetometry in pressures up to 0.6 GPa. This result is contrary
to reports on the homologues \CBS and \SBS where smooth suppression of is
observed. Our results are consistent with recent Ginzburg-Landau theory
predictions of a pressure-induced enhancement of in the nematic
multicomponent state proposed to explain observations of rotational
symmetry breaking in doped BiSe superconductors.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure
Prediction Optimal Classification of Business Phases
Linear Discriminant Analysis (LDA) performs well for classification of business phases – even though the premises of an LDA are not met. As the variables are highly correlated there are numerical as well as interpretational shortcomings. By transforming the classification
problem to a regression setting both problems can be addressed by a computer-intensive prediction oriented method which also improves the classification performance
RnaseIII and T4 Polynucleotide Kinase Sequence Biases and Solutions During RNA-Seq Library Construction
Background: RNA-seq is a next generation sequencing method with a wide range of applications including single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) detection, splice junction identification, and gene expression level measurement. However, the RNA-seq sequence data can be biased during library constructions resulting in incorrect data for SNP, splice junction, and gene expression studies. Here, we developed new library preparation methods to limit such biases. Results: A whole transcriptome library prepared for the SOLiD system displayed numerous read duplications (pile-ups) and gaps in known exons. The pile-ups and gaps of the whole transcriptome library caused a loss of SNP and splice junction information and reduced the quality of gene expression results. Further, we found clear sequence biases for both 5' and 3' end reads in the whole transcriptome library. To remove this bias, RNaseIII fragmentation was replaced with heat fragmentation. For adaptor ligation, T4 Polynucleotide Kinase (T4PNK) was used following heat fragmentation. However, its kinase and phosphatase activities introduced additional sequence biases. To minimize them, we used OptiKinase before T4PNK. Our study further revealed the specific target sequences of RNaseIII and T4PNK. Conclusions: Our results suggest that the heat fragmentation removed the RNaseIII sequence bias and significantly reduced the pile-ups and gaps. OptiKinase minimized the T4PNK sequence biases and removed most of the remaining pile-ups and gaps, thus maximizing the quality of RNA-seq data.National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA) AA12404, AA019382, AA020926, AA016648National Institutes of Health (NIH) R01 GM088344Waggoner Center for Alcohol and Addiction Researc
The Role of Exercise-Induced Myokines in Muscle Homeostasis and the Defense against Chronic Diseases
Chronic inflammation is involved in the pathogenesis of insulin resistance, atherosclerosis, neurodegeneration, and tumour growth. Regular exercise offers protection against type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, colon cancer, breast cancer, and dementia. Evidence suggests that the protective effect of exercise may to some extent be ascribed to the antiinflammatory effect of regular exercise. Here we suggest that exercise may exert its anti-inflammatory effect via a reduction in visceral fat mass and/or by induction of an anti-inflammatory environment with each bout of exercise. According to our theory, such effects may in part be mediated via muscle-derived peptides, so-called “myokines”. Contracting skeletal muscles release myokines with endocrine effects, mediating direct anti-inflammatory effects, and/or specific effects on visceral fat. Other myokines work locally within the muscle and exert their effects on signalling pathways involved in fat oxidation and glucose uptake. By mediating anti-inflammatory effects in the muscle itself, myokines may also counteract TNF-driven insulin resistance. In conclusion, exercise-induced myokines appear to be involved in mediating both systemic as well as local anti-inflammatory effects
Microscopic calculation of the phonon dynamics of SrRuO compared with LaCuO
The phonon dynamics of the low-temperature superconductor SrRuO
is calculated quantitatively in linear response theory and compared with the
structurally isomorphic high-temperature superconductor LaCuO. Our
calculation corrects for a typical deficit of LDA-based calculations which
always predict a too large electronic -dispersion insufficient to
describe the c-axis response in the real materials. With a more realistic
computation of the electronic band structure the frequency and wavevector
dependent irreducible polarization part of the density response function is
determined and used for adiabatic and nonadiabatic phonon calculations. Our
analysis for SrRuO reveals important differences from the lattice
dynamics of - and -doped cuprates. Consistent with experimental evidence
from inelastic neutron scattering the anomalous doping related softening of the
strongly coupling high-frequency oxygen bond-stretching modes (OBSM) which is
generic for the cuprate superconductors is largely suppressed or completely
absent, respectively, depending on the actual value of the on-site Coulomb
repulsion of the Ru4d orbitals. Also the presence of a characteristic
-mode with a very steep dispersion coupling strongly with the
electrons is missing in SrRuO. Moreover, we evaluate the
possibility of a phonon-plasmon scenario for SrRuO which has been
shown recently to be realistic for LaCuO. In contrast to
LaCuO in SrRuO the very low lying plasmons are
overdamped along the c-axis.Comment: 30 pages, 16 figures, 4 tables, 33 reference
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