Savings-Investment Nexus: Experience of Major SAARC Economies based on the basic version of the Feldstein-Horioka Specification

This research has been designed to figure out the significance of the long run relation between domestic savings and gross capital formation along with approximating the extent of impact of savings on investment for the five chief SAARC economies with a view to comment on the status of the savings-investment nexus, utilizing the basic version of F-H specification. It has covered thirty-eight annual observations (1976-2013) and deployed the sophisticated panel cointegration approach as well as several alternative panel long-run association estimation techniques.  It is believed that this study is the first one on that specific issue for these South Asian economies deploying such a protracted data set and incorporating alternative panel estimation methods. The results derived from the battery of sophisticated panel unit root tests have portrayed that for the pool of these developing economies, both the macro variables, savings and investment rates are non-stationary series. The residual-based panel cointegration tests have provided significant evidence suggesting that there is one cointegrating relationship between savings and investment rates. Finally, all the estimates of the savings-retention coefficient to quantify the contribution of domestic savings to gross capital accumulation deploying several alternatives of panel estimation techniques have detected moderate contributions ranging between 0.50-0.60. The magnitude of the estimated coefficients is less than those reported by numerous research works on the developed economies but completely synchronizes with those, represented by the plethora of studies on many developing economies. Cross-sectional dependence among these SAARC economies is also duly considered for the analyses. The derived moderate savings-retention ratio also signifies a reasonable extent of capital mobility within the region as well. Keywords: Feldstein-Horioka Paradox, Panel Data, South Asi

DESIGN OF REAL-TIME FUZZY LOGIC PSS BASED ON PMUs FOR DAMPING LOW FREQUENCY OSCILLATIONS

Poorly damped low frequency oscillations is one of the main problems threatening safe and stable operation of the interconnected power systems and reducing the capability of transmission the power. The generator's excitation system has been supplemented with the Power System Stabilizer (PSS) in order to improve the damping of these low oscillations. In the latest smart power grids, the Phasor Measurement Units (PMUs) become a fundamental element in the monitoring, protection and control applications as PMU signals are more accurate than the conventional measurement units and real time GPS stamped. In this study, Fuzzy Power System Stabilizer (FPSS) has been designed and its performance in damping inter-are oscillations compared with the conventional PSS (CPSS) based on the simulation with MATLAB/Simulink model. The results of the simulation with the Simulink model proved that the performance of the designed FPSS in damping inter-area oscillation is better than the CPSS. One of the main features of fuzzy controller is that it doesn't require mathematical modeling as it is designed based on the time-domain and the operator experience while, in contrast, the conventional PSS requires to be designed in the frequency domain. Real Time Digital Simulator (RTDS) has been used to develop the real-time models of the test systems. The time-domain simulations with the RTDS model when the system subjected to the large disturbance (three-phase to ground fault) have been performed to show that the designed FPSS improved the damping of the oscillations effectively. The simulation results have been verified by modal analysis

Feldstein-Horioka Paradox – The Case of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation

Empirically, the positive association between domestic savings and capital formation is well recognized in research works where the extent of contribution of domestic savings to domestic investments varies among the courtiers. Considering both the significance of Feldstein-Horioka Paradox and the gradual rise in global importance for the South Asian nations from political and economic contexts, this research paper has been designed to trace out the impact of domestic savings, foreign aid, dynamism in capital mobility over time and the extent of trade openness on domestic capital formation for the 8 SAARC economies with a view to comment on the status of the Feldstein-Horioka puzzle. We have covered 34 annual observations for the time span 1980-2013 and installed several alternative static linear panel estimation techniques (POLS, FEM, REM) with a slight modification of the specification used by Isaksson (2001). Empirically, apart from foreign aid, all the other regressors have been found to be significant. The results also demonstrate that during the timeframe both gross savings and trade openness have positively affected domestic investments, which is absolutely in line with the previous research works. Moreover, it is also evident that foreign aid hasn’t contributed well in capital accumulation in this region and gradual financial liberalization along with other initiatives has made the global capital more accessible to the economies. JEL Classification: F21, F30, F35 Keywords: Feldstein-Horioka Paradox, Panel Data, South Asi

Bioinformatics: A Way Forward to Explore “Plant Omics”

Bioinformatics, a computer-assisted science aiming at managing a huge volume of genomic data, is an emerging discipline that combines the power of computers, mathematical algorithms, and statistical concepts to solve multiple genetic/biological puzzles. This science has progressed parallel to the evolution of genome-sequencing tools, for example, the next-generation sequencing technologies, that resulted in arranging and analyzing the genome-sequencing information of large genomes. Synergism of “plant omics” and bioinformatics set a firm foundation for deducing ancestral karyotype of multiple plant families, predicting genes, etc. Second, the huge genomic data can be assembled to acquire maximum information from a voluminous “omics” data. The science of bioinformatics is handicapped due to lack of appropriate computational procedures in assembling sequencing reads of the homologs occurring in complex genomes like cotton (2n = 4x = 52), wheat (2n = 6x = 42), etc., and shortage of multidisciplinary-oriented trained manpower. In addition, the rapid expansion of sequencing data restricts the potential of acquisitioning, storing, distributing, and analyzing the genomic information. In future, inventions of high-tech computational tools and skills together with improved biological expertise would provide better insight into the genomes, and this information would be helpful in sustaining crop productivities on this planet

Distributed Beamforming with Wirelessly Powered Relay Nodes

This paper studies a system where a set of $N$ relay nodes harvest energy from the signal received from a source to later utilize it when forwarding the source's data to a destination node via distributed beamforming. To this end, we derive (approximate) analytical expressions for the mean SNR at destination node when relays employ: i) time-switching based energy harvesting policy, ii) power-splitting based energy harvesting policy. The obtained results facilitate the study of the interplay between the energy harvesting parameters and the synchronization error, and their combined impact on mean SNR. Simulation results indicate that i) the derived approximate expressions are very accurate even for small $N$ (e.g., $N=15$), ii) time-switching policy by the relays outperforms power-splitting policy by at least $3$ dB.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures, accepted for presentation at IEEE VTC 2017 Spring conferenc

Channel Impulse Response-based Distributed Physical Layer Authentication

In this preliminary work, we study the problem of {\it distributed} authentication in wireless networks. Specifically, we consider a system where multiple Bob (sensor) nodes listen to a channel and report their {\it correlated} measurements to a Fusion Center (FC) which makes the ultimate authentication decision. For the feature-based authentication at the FC, channel impulse response has been utilized as the device fingerprint. Additionally, the {\it correlated} measurements by the Bob nodes allow us to invoke Compressed sensing to significantly reduce the reporting overhead to the FC. Numerical results show that: i) the detection performance of the FC is superior to that of a single Bob-node, ii) compressed sensing leads to at least $20\%$ overhead reduction on the reporting channel at the expense of a small ($<1$ dB) SNR margin to achieve the same detection performance.Comment: 6 pages, 5 figures, accepted for presentation at IEEE VTC 2017 Sprin

Decoherence Effects in a Three-Level System under Gaussian Process

When subjected to a classical fluctuating field characterized by a Gaussian process, we examine the {purity} and coherence protection in a three-level quantum system. This symmetry of the three-level system is examined when the local random field is investigated further in the noiseless and noisy regimes. In~particular, we consider fractional Gaussian, Gaussian, Ornstein--Uhlenbeck, and~power law noisy regimes. We show that the destructive nature of the Ornstein--Uhlenbeck noise toward the symmetry of the qutrit to preserve encoded {purity and coherence} remains large. Our findings suggest that properly adjusting the noisy parameters to specifically provided values can facilitate optimal extended {purity and coherence} survival. Non-vanishing terms appear in the final density matrix of the single qutrit system, indicating that it is in a strong coherence regime. Because~of all of the Gaussian noises, monotonic decay with no revivals has been observed in the single qutrit system. In~terms of coherence and information preservation, we find that the current qutrit system outperforms systems with multiple qubits or qutrits using purity and von Neumann entropy. A~comparison of noisy and noiseless situations shows that the fluctuating nature of the local random fields is ultimately lost when influenced using the classical Gaussian noise