Precision determination of Vub

We review how to determine |Vub| from inclusive semileptonic B decay using combined cuts on the leptonic and hadronic invariant masses to eliminate the b -> c background. This leads to a determination of |Vub| with theoretical uncertainty at the 5 -10% level.Comment: 5 pages, Talk presented by C. W. Bauer at the International Europhysics Conference on High Energy Physics (HEP2001), Budapest, Hungary, July 12-18 200

A New Species of \u3ci\u3ePediobius\u3c/i\u3e (Hymenoptera: Eulophidae) Parasitizing \u3ci\u3eChyliza Apicalis\u3c/i\u3e (Diptera: Psilidae) in Ash Trees Attacked by \u3ci\u3eAgrilus Planipennis\u3c/i\u3e (Coleoptera: Buprestidae)

Pediobius chylizae, spec. nov. (Hymenoptera: Eulophidae), is described as new and illustrated. This parasitoid has been reared from the puparia of Chyliza apicalis Loew (Diptera: Psilidae) collected from under the bark of ash trees (Oleaceae: Fraxinus spp.) dying after attack by the emerald ash borer, Agrilus planipennis Fairmaire (Coleptera: Buprestidae), an invasive beetle from Asia. This species is compared with related species of Pediobius from the Holarctic Region

Supranational Bureaucrats' Attitudes to Organisational Change: Driven by Rational Calculation, Influenced by Formative Environments but Immune to EU Ideology

Growth in membership and intensifying responsibilities require much greater adaptability in organisational structures and administrative arrangements at international than at national levels. The ongoing transformation towards multilevel governance seems to empower international organisations and thus shines a new spotlight on international civil servants. We know little, however, about what motivates this growing class of bureaucratic elite. Against this background, this article explores the question as to how officials of the European Commission relate to the recent management modernisation within their institution (Kinnock reform). Competing explanatory approaches (opportunity, socialisation and EU ideology) are used to develop hypotheses about the relationship between Commission officials and their acceptance of or opposition to administrative reform. The main finding is that the individual attitudes of Commission officials towards administrative change can best be explained by the opportunity model, which emphasises the rational calculation of individual costs and benefits. This finding has implications for how scholars of governance may conceive of the behaviour of international bureaucrats and their impact on organisational change and policy-making at international level

Global analysis of inclusive B decays

In light of the large amount of new experimental data, we revisit the determination of V_{cb} and m_b from inclusive semileptonic and radiative B decays. We study shape variables to order lqcd^3/m_b^3 and alpha_s^2\beta_0, and include the order alpha_s, lqcd/m_b correction to the hadron mass spectrum in semileptonic decay, which improves the agreement with the data. We focus on the 1S and kinetic mass schemes for the b quark, with and without expanding m_b-m_c in HQET. We perform fits to all available data from BABAR, BELLE, CDF, CLEO, and DELPHI, discuss the theoretical uncertainties, and compare with earlier results. We find V_{cb} = (41.4 +- 0.6 +- 0.1) x 10^{-3} and m_b^{1S} = 4.68 +- 0.03 GeV, including our estimate of the theoretical uncertainty in the fit.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figures. Includes latest BELLE data on lepton and hadron moments. Electromagnetic correction was improperly included in previous versio

Annulment proceedings and multilevel judicial conflict

This open access book provides an exhaustive picture of the role that annulment conflicts play in the EU multilevel system. Based on a rich dataset of annulment actions since the 1960s and a number of in-depth case studies, it explores the political dimension of annulment litigation, which has become an increasingly relevant judicial tool in the struggle over policy content and decision-making competences. The book covers the motivations of actors to turn policy conflicts into annulment actions, the emergence of multilevel actors’ litigant configurations, the impact of actors’ constellations on success in court, as well as the impact of annulment actions on the multilevel policy conflicts they originate from

Infrared regulators and SCETII

We consider matching from SCETI, which includes ultrasoft and collinear particles, onto SCETII with soft and collinear particles at one loop. Keeping the external fermions off their mass shell does not regulate all IR divergences in both theories. We give a new prescription to regulate infrared divergences in SCET. Using this regulator, we show that soft and collinear modes in SCETII are sufficient to reproduce all the infrared divergences of SCETI. We explain the relationship between IR regulators and an additional mode proposed for SCETII.Comment: 9 pages. Added discussion about relationship between IR regulators and messenger mode

Current-induced spin torque resonance of magnetic insulators affected by field-like spin-orbit torques and out-of-plane magnetizations

The spin-torque ferromagnetic resonance (ST-FMR) in a bilayer system consisting of a magnetic insulator such as Y3Fe5O12 and a normal metal with spin-orbit interaction such as Pt is addressed theoretically. We model the ST-FMR for all magnetization directions and in the presence of field-like spin-orbit torques based on the drift-diffusion spin model and quantum mechanical boundary conditions. ST-FMR experiments may expose crucial information about the spin-orbit coupling between currents and magnetization in the bilayers.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figure

Hungry for power? Regional elites and the architecture of government

How can we better understand the architecture of government? Governmental structures are regularly altered by the dispersion of power upward and downward to supranational and subnational bodies. The preferences of citizens and élites in this regard are well documented at the national and EU levels. However, the preferences of regional élites remain somewhat of a black box. What are their preferences when it comes to the distribution of competences across the regional-national-EU triptych? This article pits three explanations against one another. They concern scale, identity, and institutional effects. These explanations are evaluated against a database containing information on over 1,300 regional élites in 68 regions and 12 countries. Overall, while scale and institutional logics do play a role, identity logics prevail. These findings support a strand of literature stressing the importance of community and attachment in shaping the structure of government beyond what scale and institutional logics predict.publishedVersio

Non-leaching antimicrobial surfaces through polydopamine bio-inspired coating of quaternary ammonium salts or an ultrashort antimicrobial lipopeptide.

Bacterial fouling on surfaces significantly increases the resistance of bacteria toward antibiotics, which leads to medical complications and a corresponding financial burden. Here, we report on a general and robust technique for facile modification of various surfaces with different antibacterial agents. Our approach in this study was inspired by the strong adhesion of mussel adhesion proteins (MAPs) to many types of surfaces, including metals, polymers, and inorganic materials. Thus, glass and polymeric slides were dip-coated with dopamine, as a MAP mimic, and the resulting surfaces were characterized. The reactivity of dopamine-coated surfaces toward nucleophilic addition was then confirmed by reacting them with fluorescent probes containing either a free amino or a free thiol group. Laser scanning confocal microscopy (LSCM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), confocal Raman microscopy, matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization-time of flight (MALDI-TOF) mass spectroscopy, and cyclic voltammetry studies collectively suggested that the probes had covalently attached to the surfaces. Fabrication of dopamine-coated surfaces with an antibacterial quaternary amine or an ultrashort lipopeptide analog generated surfaces that effectively kill Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureuscells on contact. Moreover, minimal leaching of the fabricated agent was detected after prolonged incubation. This technique could be further developed to a "paint-like" or self-assembling monolayer-like procedure for the preparation of antibacterial surfaces on various materials