A New Mode of Dispute Resolution for Hong Kong

AnalysisA novel form of dispute resolution, an alternative to litigation and arbitration, is about to be introduced in Hong Kong. The authors explain the characteristics of the new dispute resolution system, and identify a number of legal questions to which the new system gives rise. On balance, the authors conclude that the new dispute resolution system will not constitute an unacceptable ouster of the court's jurisdiction, and will provide an expeditious and useful alternative to existing mechanisms.published_or_final_versio

Three-terminal devices to examine single molecule conductance switching

We report electronic transport measurements of single-molecule transistor devices incorporating bipyridyl-dinitro oligophenylene-ethynylene dithiol (BPDN-DT), a molecule known to exhibit conductance switching in other measurement configurations. We observe hysteretic conductance switching in 8% of devices with measurable currents, and find that dependence of the switching properties on gate voltage is rare when compared to other single-molecule transistor devices. This suggests that polaron formation is unlikely to be responsible for switching in these devices. We discuss this and alternative switching mechanisms.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures. Supporting material available upon reques

Beef Cattle Instance Segmentation Using Fully Convolutional Neural Network

In this paper we present a novel instance segmentation algorithm that extends a fully convolutional network to learn to label objects separately without prediction of regions of interest. We trained the new algorithm on a challenging CCTV recording of beef cattle, as well as benchmark MS COCO and Pascal VOC datasets. Extensive experimentation showed that our approach outperforms the state-of-the-art solutions by up to 8% on our data

An algorithm to identify automorphisms which arise from self-induced interval exchange transformations

We give an algorithm to determine if the dynamical system generated by a positive automorphism of the free group can also be generated by a self-induced interval exchange transformation. The algorithm effectively yields the interval exchange transformation in case of success.Comment: 26 pages, 8 figures. v2: the article has been reorganized to make for a more linear read. A few paragraphs have been added for clarit

The introduction of the TMPG fails charge for U.S. Treasury securities

The TMPG fails charge for U.S. Treasury securities provides that a buyer of Treasury securities can claim monetary compensation from the seller if the seller fails to deliver the securities on a timely basis. The charge was introduced in May 2009 and replaced an existing market convention of simply postponing—without any explicit penalty and at an unchanged invoice price—a seller’s obligation to deliver Treasury securities if the seller fails to deliver the securities on a scheduled settlement date. This article explains how a proliferation of settlement fails following the insolvency of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. in September 2008 led the Treasury Market Practices Group (TMPG)—a group of market professionals committed to supporting the integrity and efficiency of the U.S. Treasury market—to promote a change in the existing market convention. The change—the introduction of the fails charge—was significant because it mitigated an important dysfunctionality in the secondary market for U.S. Treasury securities and because it stands as an example of the value of cooperation between the public and private sectors in responding to altered market conditions in a flexible, timely, and innovative fashion.Treasury bonds ; Government securities ; Clearing of securities ; Secondary markets

Alternative computational approaches to inference in the multinomial probit model

This research compares several approaches to inference in the multinomial probit model, based on two Monte Carlo experiments for a seven choice model. The methods compared are the simulated maximum likelihood estimator using the GHK recursive probability simulator, the method of simulated moments estimator using the GHK recursive simulator and kernel-smoothed frequency simulators, and posterior means using a Gibbs sampling-data augmentation algorithm. Overall, the Gibbs sampling algorithm has a slight edge, with the relative performance of MSM and SML based on the GHK simulator being difficult to evaluate. The MSM estimator with the kernel-smoothed frequency simulator is clearly inferior. © 1994

Where Are We Going? Parent-child television reality programmes in China

This article looks at the role of format television in the People’s Republic of China. It juxtaposes two key ideas: the ‘one format policy’ and the One Child Policy. Both are government restrictions intended to kerb reproduction. Formats provide a means for the reproduction of programming ideas, that is, they are generative. When formats ‘fit’ cultural understandings they can be remarkably successful, as with family oriented formats. Yet there is something unusual about China: in comparison to many international markets, China offers a unique demographic – those people born after 1978. The article examines a formatted programme called Where Are We Going, Dad? introduced into China from South Korea, which illustrates a subgenre known as the ‘parent-child caring’ (qinzi) format. The article shows how this genre has capitalised on the interest in the health and future well-being of the One Child in China, as well as spinning off its own formatted offspring

Are the distributions of Fast Radio Burst properties consistent with a cosmological population?

High time resolution radio surveys over the last few years have discovered a population of millisecond-duration transient bursts called Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs), which remain of unknown origin. FRBs exhibit dispersion consistent with propagation through a cold plasma and dispersion measures indicative of an origin at cosmological distances. In this paper we perform Monte Carlo simulations of a cosmological population of FRBs, based on assumptions consistent with observations of their energy distribution, their spatial density as a function of redshift and the properties of the interstellar and intergalactic media. We examine whether the dispersion measures, fluences, inferred redshifts, signal-to-noises and effective widths of known FRBs are consistent with a cosmological population. Statistical analyses indicate that at least 50 events at Parkes are required to distinguish between a constant co-moving FRB density, and a FRB density that evolves with redshift like the cosmological star formation rate density.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figures, 3 table