Cross-country evidence for social dimensions of urban water consumption during droughts

A systematic literature review is carried out to understand the social dimensions driving the adoption of water saving behaviors in urban households. Salient aspects of the problem correspond to price elasticity of water demand, citizens’ awareness of water value and water conservation intentions, the management of which is generally tackled through water price and non-price approaches. However, the evidence falls short to explain the social drivers and inhibitors of stable water consumption reductions. After reviewing 65 papers documenting research conducted in North America, Australia, United Kingdom, Middle East, Mexico, China and Japan, a series of categories of analysis drawn from the literature are introduced as the social factors that influence water conservation reduction. Although the brink of the state of the art mentions the existence of an intention – behavior gap, sustainability requires further aspirations than short-term water consumption reduction by households. The long-term challenges of sustainability require the understanding of intention – behavior – stable reduction gaps. Further research is needed to fill this double gap. Understanding the determinants and insights behind the dissipation (or stabilization) of water consumption reductions through time are certainly rich areas of analysis for the social sciences

Interface modes of two-dimensional composite structures

The surface modes of a composite consisting of aligned metallic wires with square cross sections are investigated, on the basis of photonic band structure calculations. The effective long-wavelength dielectric response function is computed, as a function of the filling fraction. The dependence of the optical absorption on the shape of the wires and the polarization of light is discussed, and the effect of sharp corners analyzed. The effect of the interaction between the wires on the localization of surface plasmons is also addressed.Comment: 12 pages, 4 figures, to appear in Surf. Sc

George Enescu; a 3ª sonata para piano e violino Op. 25 e o carácter popular romeno

Estudo sobre as características e particularidades da escrita para violino desenvolvida por George Enescu. Como complemento necessário, são apresentados dados sobre a vida do compositor e violinista George Enescu, abordando a sua formação e consequente carreira, a evolução da sua linguagem musical como intérprete e compositor e a elaboração em retrospetiva da sua obra dividida em duas categorias: música clássica tradicional e música sob influência do folclore romeno. Análise estilística e interpretativa da sonata nº 3 para piano e violino, a influência de raiz no folclore romeno e as suas implicações técnicas para o executante-intérprete.A study of the characteristics and specificity of the musical language for the violin developed by George Enescu. For contextualization purposes, some information on George Enescu’s life is provided, focusing on his academic background and consequent career as a composer and violinist, as well as delving into the development of his musical language as an interpreter and composer by compiling a synthesis of his compositional works, sorted into two categories: western classical music and music influenced by the Romanian folklore. A stylistic and interpretative analysis of the 3rd Sonata for Piano and Violin, its Romanian folkloric influences and the technical implications for the performer

Tall tales from de Sitter space II: Field theory dualities

We consider the evolution of massive scalar fields in (asymptotically) de Sitter spacetimes of arbitrary dimension. Through the proposed dS/CFT correspondence, our analysis points to the existence of new nonlocal dualities for the Euclidean conformal field theory. A massless conformally coupled scalar field provides an example where the analysis is easily explicitly extended to 'tall' background spacetimes.Comment: 31 pages, 2 figure

Looking for magnetic monopoles at LHC with diphoton events

Magnetic monopoles have been a subject of interest since Dirac established the relation between the existence of monopoles and charge quantization. The intense experimental search carried thus far has not met with success. The Large Hadron Collider is reaching energies never achieved before allowing the search for exotic particles in the TeV mass range. In a continuing effort to discover these rare particles we propose here other ways to detect them. We study the observability of monopoles and monopolium, a monopole-antimonopole bound state, at the Large Hadron Collider in the $\gamma \gamma$ channel for monopole masses in the range 500-1000 GeV. We conclude that LHC is an ideal machine to discover monopoles with masses below 1 TeV at present running energies and with 5 fb$^{-1}$ of integrated luminosity.Comment: This manuscript contains information appeared in Looking for magnetic monopoles at LHC, arXiv:1104.0218 [hep-ph] and Monopolium detection at the LHC.,arXiv:1107.3684 [hep-ph] by the same authors, rewritten for joint publication in The European Physica Journal Plus. 26 pages, 22 figure

On the Behavior of the Effective QCD Coupling alpha_tau(s) at Low Scales

The hadronic decays of the tau lepton can be used to determine the effective charge alpha_tau(m^2_tau') for a hypothetical tau-lepton with mass in the range 0 < m_tau' < m_tau. This definition provides a fundamental definition of the QCD coupling at low mass scales. We study the behavior of alpha_tau at low mass scales directly from first principles and without any renormalization-scheme dependence by looking at the experimental data from the OPAL Collaboration. The results are consistent with the freezing of the physical coupling at mass scales s = m^2_tau' of order 1 GeV^2 with a magnitude alpha_tau ~ 0.9 +/- 0.1.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figures, submitted to Physical Review D, added references, some text added, no results nor figures change

Gravitational Coupling and Dynamical Reduction of The Cosmological Constant

We introduce a dynamical model to reduce a large cosmological constant to a sufficiently small value. The basic ingredient in this model is a distinction which has been made between the two unit systems used in cosmology and particle physics. We have used a conformal invariant gravitational model to define a particular conformal frame in terms of large scale properties of the universe. It is then argued that the contributions of mass scales in particle physics to the vacuum energy density should be considered in a different conformal frame. In this manner, a decaying mechanism is presented in which the conformal factor appears as a dynamical field and plays a key role to relax a large effective cosmological constant. Moreover, we argue that this model also provides a possible explanation for the coincidence problem.Comment: To appear in GR

Monopolium production from photon fusion at the Large Hadron Collider

Magnetic monopoles have attracted the attention of physicists since the founding of the electromagnetic theory. Their search has been a constant endeavor which was intensified when Dirac established the relation between the existence of monopoles and charge quantization. However, these searches have been unsuccessful. We have recently proposed that monopolium, a monopole-antimonopole bound state, so strongly bound that it has a relatively small mass, could be easier to find and become an indirect but clear signature for the existence of magnetic monopoles. In here we extend our previous analysis for its production to two photon fusion at LHC energies

Monopolium: the key to monopoles

Dirac showed that the existence of one magnetic pole in the universe could offer an explanation for the discrete nature of the electric charge. Magnetic poles appear naturally in most Grand Unified Theories. Their discovery would be of greatest importance for particle physics and cosmology. The intense experimental search carried thus far has not met with success. Moreover, if the monopoles are very massive their production is outside the range of present day facilities. A way out of this impasse would be if the monopoles bind to form monopolium, a monopole- antimonopole bound state, which is so strongly bound, that it has a relatively small mass. Under these circumstances it could be produced with present day facilities and the existence of monopoles could be indirectly proven. We study the feasibility of detecting monopolium in present and future accelerators