Indirect estimation of elliptical stable distributions

We present an indirect estimation approach for elliptical stable distributions which relies on the use of a multivariate t distribution as auxiliary model. This distribution is also elliptical and we show that its parameters have a one-to-one relationship with those of the elliptical stable, therefore making the proposed indirect approach especially suitable.Standard asymptotic properties are also shown and we analyze the finite sample behavior of the estimators via a comprehensive Monte Carlo study. An application to 27 emerging markets stock indexes concludes the paper.stable, elliptical, high dimension, multivariate, indirect inference

Noise properties of nanoscale YBCO Josephson junctions

We present electric noise measurements of nanoscale biepitaxial YBa2Cu3O(7-x) (YBCO) Josephson junctions fabricated by two different lithographic methods. The first (conventional) technique defines the junctions directly by ion milling etching through an amorphous carbon mask. The second (soft patterning) method makes use of the phase competition between the superconducting YBCO (Y123) and the insulating Y2BaCuO5 (Y211) phase at the grain boundary interface on MgO (110) substrates. The voltage noise properties of the two methods are compared in this study. For all junctions (having a thickness of 100 nm and widths of 250-500 nm) we see a significant amount of individual charge traps. We have extracted an approximate value for the effective area of the charge traps from the noise data. From the noise measurements we infer that the soft patterned junctions with a grain boundary (GB) interface manifesting a large c-axis tunneling component have a uniform barrier and a SIS like behavior. The noise properties of soft patterned junctions having a GB interface dominated by transport parallel to the ab-planes are in accordance with a resonant tunneling barrier model. The conventionally patterned junctions, instead, have suppressed superconducting transport channels with an area much less than the nominal junction area. These findings are important for the implementation of nanosized Josephson junctions in quantum circuits.Comment: 11 Pages, 10 figure

The Migratory Bird Treaty Act: Steel Shot Versus Lead Shot For Hunting Migratory Waterfowl

This comment discusses the merits of the regulations prohibiting the use of lead shot for the hunting of waterfowl. The evolution of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act is examined along with the advantages of hunting as a tool for effective wildlife conservation. The controversy of lead poisoned waterfowl is also discussed, and a more effective conservation measure than steel shot is proposed

An ERP study of low and high relevance semantic features

It is believed that the N400 elicited by concepts belonging to Living is larger than N400 to Non-living. This is considered as evidence that concepts are organized, in the brain, on the basis of categories. We conducted a feature-verification experiment where Living and Non-living concepts were matched for relevance of semantic features. Relevance is a measure of the contribution of semantic features to the “core” meaning of a concept. We found that when relevance is low the N400 is large. In addition, we found that when the two categories of Living and Non-living are equated for relevance the seemingly category effect at behavioral and neural level disappeared. In sum, N400 is sensitive, rather than to categories, to semantic features, thus showing that previously reported effects of semantic categories may arise as a consequence of the differing relevance of concepts belonging to Living and Non-living categories

Soft nanostructuring of YBCO Josephson Junctions by phase separation

We have developed a new method to fabricate biepitaxial YBa2Cu3O(7-x) (YBCO) Josephson junctions at the nanoscale, allowing junctions widths down to 100 nm and simultaneously avoiding the typical damage in grain boundary interfaces due to conventional patterning procedures. By using the competition between the superconducting YBCO and the insulating Y2BaCuO5 phases during film growth, we formed nanometer sized grain boundary junctions in the insulating Y2BaCuO5 matrix as confirmed by high resolution transmission electron microscopy. Electrical transport measurements give clear indications that we are close to probing the intrinsic properties of the grain boundaries.Comment: 16 pages, 6 figure

The Type 45 Daring-Class Destroyer

In 1998, the British government led by Prime Minister Tony Blair released the Strategic Defence Review (SDR), in which it identified a requirement for twelve state-of-the-art warships for the Royal Navy (RN) to be configured for antiair warfare.1 This new naval platform was conceived as a replacement for the Type 42 destroyers, which had first entered service in 1978; its development was initially associated with the Anglo-French-Italian Horizon project that had replaced the NATO Frigate Replacement, from which Britain withdrew in 1989. That vision, however, had a very short shelf life. Some months after the SDR’s release, Britain withdrew from the Horizon project and launched an indigenous Type 45 destroyer program. Production of the first ship, HMS Daring, began in 2003

FEATURE TYPE EFFECTS IN SEMANTIC MEMORY: AN EVENT RELATED POTENTIALS STUDY

It is believed that the N400 elicited by concepts belonging to Living is larger than N400 to Objects. This is considered as evidence that concepts are organized, in the brain, on the basis of categories. Similarly, differential N400 to sensory and non-sensory semantic features was taken as evidence for a neural organisation of conceptual memory based on semantic features. We conducted a feature-verification experiment where Living and Non-Living concepts are described by sensory and non-sensory features were matched for age-of-acquisition, typicality and familiarity and for relevance of semantic features. Relevance is a measure of the contribution of semantic features to the “core” meaning of a concept. We found that when Relevance is low then N400 is larger. In addition, we found that when the two categories of Living and Non-Living concepts are matched for relevance the seemingly category effect at the neural level disappeared. Also no difference between sensory and non-sensory descriptions was detected when relevance was matched. In sum, N400 does not differ between categories or feature types. Previously reported effects of semantic categories and feature type may have arisen as a consequence of the differing Relevance of concepts belonging to Living and Non-Living categories

On SRv6 Security

SRv6 is a routing architecture that can provide hybrid cooperation between a centralized network controller and network nodes: IPv6 routers maintain the multi-hop ECMP-aware segments, whereas the controller, responsible for the Traffic Engineering policy, combines them to form a source-routed path through the network. Since the state of the flow is defined at the ingress to the network and then is contained in a specific packet header, called Segment Routing Header (SRH), the importance of such a header itself is vital. Motivated by the increasing success and widespread deployment of such approaches and technologies, this paper introduces the context and discusses some of the issues tied to possible tampering with the Segment Routing Header content. Finally, some details of an experimental testbed aimed at evaluating the above issues are provided