21,530 research outputs found
Has inventory volatility returned? A look at the current cycle
The massive liquidation of inventories during the 2001 recession contrasts sharply with the more moderate inventory movements observed in recent decades. While the rundown might be seen as evidence that firms are not managing their inventories as effectively as some economists have claimed, a careful analysis of inventory behavior in 2001 suggests that during much of the recession, firms were successfully regulating their inventories to avoid a large buildup of excess stock.Inventories ; Recessions
Fast rate estimation of an unitary operation in SU(d)
We give an explicit procedure based on entangled input states for estimating
a operation with rate of convergence when sending
particles through the device. We prove that this rate is optimal. We also
evaluate the constant such that the asymptotic risk is . However
other strategies might yield a better const ant .Comment: 8 pages, 1 figure Rewritten version, accepted for publication in
Phys. Rev. A. The introduction is richer, the "tool section" on group
representations has been suppressed, and a section proving that the 1/N^2
rate is optimum has been adde
Predictor Aided Tracking in a System with Time Delay - Performance Involving Flat Surface, Roll, and Pitch Conditions
Predictor aided human tracking performance with time delay control under flat surface, roll, pitch, and roll and pitch condition
Cross-modal cue effects in motion processing
The everyday environment brings to our sensory systems competing inputs from different modalities. The ability to filter these multisensory inputs in order to identify and efficiently utilize useful spatial cues is necessary to detect and process the relevant information. In the present study, we investigate how feature-based attention affects the detection of motion across sensory modalities. We were interested to determine how subjects use intramodal, cross-modal auditory, and combined audiovisual motion cues to attend to specific visual motion signals. The results showed that in most cases, both the visual and the auditory cues enhance feature-based orienting to a transparent visual motion pattern presented among distractor motion patterns. Whereas previous studies have shown cross-modal effects of spatial attention, our results demonstrate a spread of cross-modal feature-based attention cues, which have been matched for the detection threshold of the visual target. These effects were very robust in comparisons of the effects of valid vs. invalid cues, as well as in comparisons between cued and uncued valid trials. The effect of intramodal visual, cross-modal auditory, and bimodal cues also increased as a function of motion-cue salience. Our results suggest that orienting to visual motion patterns among distracters can be facilitated not only by intramodal priors, but also by feature-based cross-modal information from the auditory system.First author draf
Network constraints on learnability of probabilistic motor sequences
Human learners are adept at grasping the complex relationships underlying
incoming sequential input. In the present work, we formalize complex
relationships as graph structures derived from temporal associations in motor
sequences. Next, we explore the extent to which learners are sensitive to key
variations in the topological properties inherent to those graph structures.
Participants performed a probabilistic motor sequence task in which the order
of button presses was determined by the traversal of graphs with modular,
lattice-like, or random organization. Graph nodes each represented a unique
button press and edges represented a transition between button presses. Results
indicate that learning, indexed here by participants' response times, was
strongly mediated by the graph's meso-scale organization, with modular graphs
being associated with shorter response times than random and lattice graphs.
Moreover, variations in a node's number of connections (degree) and a node's
role in mediating long-distance communication (betweenness centrality) impacted
graph learning, even after accounting for level of practice on that node. These
results demonstrate that the graph architecture underlying temporal sequences
of stimuli fundamentally constrains learning, and moreover that tools from
network science provide a valuable framework for assessing how learners encode
complex, temporally structured information.Comment: 29 pages, 4 figure
Chaotic motion of space charge wavefronts in semiconductors under time-independent voltage bias
A standard drift-diffusion model of space charge wave propagation in
semiconductors has been studied numerically and analytically under dc voltage
bias. For sufficiently long samples, appropriate contact resistivity and
applied voltage - such that the sample is biased in a regime of negative
differential resistance - we find chaos in the propagation of nonlinear fronts
(charge monopoles of alternating sign) of electric field. The chaos is always
low-dimensional, but has a complex spatial structure; this behavior can be
interpreted using a finite dimensional asymptotic model in which the front
(charge monopole) positions and the electrical current are the only dynamical
variables.Comment: 12 pages, 8 figure
A DMRG Study of Low-Energy Excitations and Low-Temperature Properties of Alternating Spin Systems
We use the density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) method to study the
ground and low-lying excited states of three kinds of uniform and dimerized
alternating spin chains. The DMRG procedure is also employed to obtain
low-temperature thermodynamic properties of these systems. We consider a 2N
site system with spins and alternating from site to site and
interacting via a Heisenberg antiferromagnetic exchange. The three systems
studied correspond to being equal to and
; all of them have very similar properties. The ground state is found
to be ferrimagnetic with total spin . We find that there is
a gapless excitation to a state with spin , and a gapped excitation to
a state with spin . Surprisingly, the correlation length in the ground
state is found to be very small for this gapless system. The DMRG analysis
shows that the chain is susceptible to a conditional spin-Peierls instability.
Furthermore, our studies of the magnetization, magnetic susceptibility
and specific heat show strong magnetic-field dependences. The product
shows a minimum as a function of temperature T at low magnetic fields; the
minimum vanishes at high magnetic fields. This low-field behavior is in
agreement with earlier experimental observations. The specific heat shows a
maximum as a function of temperature, and the height of the maximum increases
sharply at high magnetic fields. Although all the three systems show
qualitatively similar behavior, there are some notable quantitative differences
between the systems in which the site spin difference, , is large
and small respectively.Comment: 16 LaTeX pages, 13 postscript figure
The geography of strain: organizational resilience as a function of intergroup relations
Organizational resilience is an organization’s ability to absorb strain and preserve or
improve functioning, despite the presence of adversity. In existing scholarship there is
the implicit assumption that organizations experience and respond holistically to acute
forms of adversity. We challenge this assumption by theorizing about how adversity can
create differential strain, affecting parts of an organization rather than the whole. We
argue that relations among those parts fundamentally shape organizational resilience.
We develop a theoretical model that maps how the differentiated emergence of strain in
focal parts of an organization triggers the movements of adjoining parts to provide or
withhold resources necessary for the focal parts to adapt effectively. Drawing on core
principles of theories about intergroup relations, we theorize about three specific
pathways—integration, disavowal, and reclamation—by which responses of adjoining
parts to focal part strain shape organizational resilience. We further theorize about
influences on whether and when adjoining parts are likely to select different pathways.
The resulting theory reveals how the social processes among parts of organizations
influence member responses to adversity and, ultimately, organizational resilience. We
conclude by noting the implications for organizational resilience theory, research, and
practice.Accepted manuscrip
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