Anonymity, efficiency wages and technological progress

Although the industrial revolution is often characterized as the culmination of a process of commercialisation, the precise nature of such a link remains unclear. This paper provides an analysis of one such link: the role of commercialisation in raising wages as impersonal labour market transactions replace personalized customary relations. In the presence of an aggregate capital externality, we show that the resulting shift in relative factor prices will, under certain conditions, lead to higher capital-intensity in the production technology and hence, a faster rate of technological progress. We provide historical evidence using European data to show that England was among the most urbanized and the highest wage countries at the onset of the industrial revolution. The model highlights the effects of changes in the availability of information, typical of a modernising country, on efficiency wages and technological progress

Commercialisation, factor prices and technological progress in the transition to modern economic growth

We provide a model of the links between commercialisation and technological progress, which is consistent with the historical evidence and places market relations at the heart of the industrial revolution. First, commercialisation raised wages as a growing reliance on impersonal labour market transactions in place of customary relations with a high degree of monitoring led to the adoption of efficiency wages. Second, commercialisation lowered interest rates as a growing reliance on impersonal capital market transactions in place of active investor involvement in investment projects led investors to allow borrowers to keep a larger share of the profits. Third, the resulting rise in the wage/cost of capital ratio led to the adoption of a more capital-intensive technology. Fourth, this led to a faster rate of technological progress through greater learning by doing on the capital intensive production technology. Fifth, the rate of technological progress was raised further by the patent system, which allowed the commercialisation of property rights in innovations embodied in machinery

Beauty, Femininity, and Gothic Monstrosity in Select Fiction by Joyce Carol Oates, Ramona Lofton, and Lois-Ann Yamanaka

The present study examines the normative and repressive cultural discourses on beauty and femininity and their effects on women’s psyche with the help of select works of contemporary American fiction. It seeks to establish that the violence and oppression resulting from hegemonic discourses on feminine beauty attain Gothic characteristics, in that they produce horrific effects on the minds and bodies of women. In order to establish how Gothic horror is a ubiquitous presence in the lives women who are in thrall to the beauty myth, this study takes into consideration select works of fiction by contemporary American women writers which narrate the experiences of women across various classes and ethnicities. Accordingly, it begins with an analysis of the violence inherent in the beauty myth, as espoused by third wave feminists like Naomi Wolf, Susan Bordo, and Susan Faludi; and with the help of contemporary Gothic theories seeks to demonstrate how the myth gives rise to the self-loathing, obsession, and violence that often borders on the uncanny. The study examines these postulations through the works of American women writers such as Joyce Carol Oates’s My Sister, My Love: The Intimate Story of Skyler Rampike (2008) that portrays white American women’s enslavement to the beauty myth. It then explores the writings of African American women novelists and offers a close reading of Ramona Lofton aka Sapphire’s Push (1996) to establish how the beauty myth acts as a double-bind in the lives of black women who very often suffer psychic and physical violence and are socially ostracized due to the natural physical characteristics of their race. The study finally examines the trappings of the beauty myth and the violence of assimilation in the lives of American women belonging to other ethnicities such as Japanese, Indian, and Mexican and presents a detailed analysis of Lois-Ann Yamanaka’s Wild Meat and the Bully Burgers (1996) which depicts how colored women struggle to live upto America’s dominant cultural discourses on beauty and femininity. In conclusion, the study, through an analysis of American women’s repression under the nation’s capitalistic and patriarchal discourses on ideals of womanhood and beauty, seeks to establish how the lives of such women are subject to Gothic violence and horror

Uniform Water Distribution From Low Pressure Rotating Sprinklers

Population of India has probably crossed 1150 million marks by the end of 2007 (Survey of Indian Agriculture 2007). The estimated requirement of food grains by 2020 will be 307.75 million tonnes to meet the balanced diet norms prescribed by Indian Council of Medical Research. In 2007, the production of food grains was only 212.62 million tonnes. The gap of 95.13 million tonnes has to be narrowed down by adopting modern scientific approaches for efficient management of scarce land and water resources at a sustainable manner.Sprinkler irrigation is one of the modern scientific approaches which is becoming more and more popular in India in regions of water scarcity where available water is insufficient to irrigate the command area by surface irrigation. Uniformity of water distribution at four different nozzle pressures and three different spacing was studied for both plastic and brass type of sprinklers. The deviation of uniformity coefficient of plastic sprinklers from that of brass sprinklers was found to be from 0 to 2 %. It was also observed that optimum uniformity of water distribution was obtained at a nozzle pressure of 2.0 kgf/cm2 in normal windy condition. The uniformity of water distribution decreased with the increase of nozzle pressure beyond 2.0 kgf/cm2 for small and medium size nozzles.Comparison was made among different sprinklers and lateral spacing of 6.1 m x 6.1 m, 6.1 m x 12.2 m and 12.2 m x 12.2 m. It was observed that the spacing of 6.1 m x 6.1 m gives better distribution for low pressure sprinklers for all combinations of nozzle pressures and sizes. It was recommended to operate the low pressure sprinklers at a sprinkler and lateral spacing of 30 % of the spray diameter. It was also observed that the effect of wind velocity on uniformity of water distribution was less for wind velocities below 4 km/h and moderate for wind velocity below 7 km/h and the distribution pattern gets distorted at high wind velocity of 15 km/h

Phase Separation and the Phase Diagram in Cuprates Superconductors

We show that the main features of the cuprates superconductors phase diagram can be derived considering the disorder as a key property of these materials. Our basic point is that the high pseudogap line is an onset of phase separation which generates compounds made up of regions with distinct doping levels. We calculate how this continuous temperature dependent phase separation process occurs in high critical temperature superconductors (HTSC) using the Cahn-Hilliard approach, originally applied to study alloys. Since the level of phase separation varies for different cuprates, it is possible that different systems with average doping level pm exhibit different degrees of charge and spin segregation. Calculations on inhomogeneous charge distributions in form of stripes in finite clusters performed by the Bogoliubov-deGennes superconducting approach yield good agreement to the pseudogap temperature T*(pm), the onset of local pairing amplitudes with phase locked and concomitantly, how they develop at low temperatures into the superconducting phase at Tc(pm) by percolation.Comment: 9 pages, 9 figures. Submitted to Phys. Rev.

Evaluation of Novel Imidazotetrazine Analogues Designed to Overcome Temozolomide Resistance and Glioblastoma Regrowth

The cellular responses to two new temozolomide (TMZ) analogues, DP68 and DP86, acting against glioblastoma multi- forme (GBM) cell lines and primary culture models are reported. Dose–response analysis of cultured GBM cells revealed that DP68 is more potent than DP86 and TMZ and that DP68 was effective even in cell lines resistant to TMZ. On the basis of a serial neurosphere assay, DP68 inhibits repop- ulation of these cultures at low concentrations. The efficacy of these compounds was independent of MGMT and MMR func- tions. DP68-induced interstrand DNA cross-links were dem- onstrated with H2O2-treated cells. Furthermore, DP68 induced a distinct cell–cycle arrest with accumulation of cells in S phase that is not observed for TMZ. Consistent with this biologic response, DP68 induces a strong DNA damage response, including phosphorylation of ATM, Chk1 and Chk2 kinases, KAP1, and histone variant H2AX. Suppression of FANCD2 expression or ATR expression/kinase activity enhanced anti- glioblastoma effects of DP68. Initial pharmacokinetic analysis revealed rapid elimination of these drugs from serum. Collec- tively, these data demonstrate that DP68 is a novel and potent antiglioblastoma compound that circumvents TMZ resistance, likely as a result of its independence from MGMT and mismatch repair and its capacity to cross-link strands of DN

Performance Study of Diesel Engine by using Mahua Methyl Ester (biodiesel) and its Blends with Diesel Fuel

The results of the performance of a compression ignition engine (direct injected, 4-stroke 2-cylinder engine) by using mahua methyl ester from non-edible vegetable oil (Madhuca indica) and its blends with diesel fuel have been presented in this paper. Short-term engine performance tests were conducted using four different blends of mahua methyl ester oil with diesel fuel from 20% to 100% by volume at three fuel temperatures (30, 50 and 700-C) and at two injection pressures (17640 kPa and 24010 kPa). The engine performance parameters studied were power output, brake specific fuel consumption (BSFC), brake thermal efficiency (BThE) and exhaust gas temperature (ExGT) by using diesel fuel alone and the above mentioned blend fuels. The performance of engine with blend fuel (20% mahua methyl ester and 80% diesel) was found to be better than the other blend fuels. But the values of power output, BSFC, BThE and ExGT in case of blend fuel B20 (20% mahua methyl ester and 80% diesel) were observed to be respectively 3% more, 9% more, 12%more and 0.5% less than the diesel fuel at 700-C temperature and 24010 kPa pressure. The mahua methyl ester (blends of B20) can be used as an alternative diesel fuel replacement with little sacrifice in brake specific fuel consumption

Neutrino Mixing and Neutrino Telescopes

Measuring flux ratios of ultra-high energy neutrinos is an alternative method to determine the neutrino mixing angles and the CP phase delta. We conduct a systematic analysis of the neutrino mixing probabilities and of various flux ratios measurable at neutrino telescopes. The considered cases are neutrinos from pion, neutron and muon-damped sources. Explicit formulae in case of mu-tau symmetry and its special case tri-bimaximal mixing are obtained, and the leading corrections due to non-zero theta_{13} and non-maximal theta_{23} are given. The first order correction is universal as it appears in basically all ratios. We study in detail its dependence on theta_{13}, theta_{23} and the CP phase, finding that the dependence on theta_{23} is strongest. The flavor compositions for the considered neutrino sources are evaluated in terms of this correction. A measurement of a flux ratio is a clean measurement of the universal correction (and therefore of theta_{13}, theta_{23} and delta) if the zeroth order ratio does not depend on theta_{12}. This favors pion sources over the other cases, which in turn are good candidates to probe theta_{12}. The only situations in which the universal correction does not appear are certain ratios in case of a neutron and muon-damped source, which depend mainly on theta_{12} and receive only quadratic corrections from the other parameters. We further show that there are only two independent neutrino oscillation probabilities, give the allowed ranges of the considered flux ratios and of all probabilities, and show that none of the latter can be zero or one.Comment: 29 pages, 8 figures. Minor changes, to appear in JCA

Lepton Flavor Violating Z Decays in the Zee Model

We calculate lepton flavor violating (LFV) Z decays Z \to {{e_i^\pm}}e_j^\mp (i, j = e, \mu, \tau ; i\neq j) in the Zee model keeping in view the radiative leptonic decays e_i\to e_j\gamma (i = \mu, \tau ; j = e, \mu ; i\neq j), \mu decay and anomalous muon magnetic moment (\mu AMM). We investigate three different cases of Zee f_{ij} coupling (A) f_{e\mu}^2 = f_{\mu\tau}^2= f_{\tau e}^2, (B) f_{e\mu}^2 \gg f_{\tau e}^2 \gg f_{\mu\tau}^2, and (C) f_{\mu\tau}^2 \gg f_{e\mu}^2 \gg f_{\tau e}^2 subject to the neutrino phenomenology. Interestingly, we find that, although the case (C) satisfies the large excess value of \mu AMM, however, it is unable to explain the solar neutrino experimental result, whereas the case (B) satisfies the bi-maximal neutrino mixing scenario, but confronts with the result of \mu AMM experiment. We also find that among all the three cases, only the case (C) gives rise to largest contribution to the ratio B(Z\to e^\pm\tau^\mp)/B(Z\to \mu^\pm \mu^\mp) \simeq {10}^{-8} which is still two order less than the accessible value to be probed by the future linear colliders, whereas for the other two cases, this ratio is too low to be observed even in the near future for all possible LFV Z decay modes.Comment: 12 pages, RevTex, 2 figures, 3 Tables, typos corrected, reference added, version to appear in Phys. Rev.