Numerical Study of Body Shape and Wing Flexibility in Fluid Structure Interaction

We discuss the equilibrium configurations of fibers clamped to an ellipsoidal body and immersed in a flow ranging between 0-50 cm/s. Experimental and numerical results are presented and the effects of flow speed, body shape, and orientation of the fibers upon the equilibrium configuration are investigated. Our investigations reveal that the orientation of the fibers, the length of the length fibers, as well as, the shape of the body has a significant impact upon the bending and drag experienced by the ellipsoid-fiber system. We note that (i) less eccentric bodies experience greater drag forces and increased bending of the attached fibers, (ii) the fibers oriented with the flow experienced less drag and bending than the fibers oriented perpendicular to the flow, (iii) the longer fibers bend significantly more than the shorter ones, and (iv) the longer fibers display oscillatory or flapping motion at much lower flow speeds than their shorter counterparts. The simulations also reveal that the drag on the fiber is noticeably affected by the size of the basal body. Drag exponents (or Vogel exponents) are also computed and seen to deviate slightly from previous results

China\u27s rise, Russia\u27s fall : policy choice or system difference

This paper outlines the major policy differences between the post-Stalinist reform in the former USSR and China (Section 1). It then briefly presents the dramatic contrast in outcomes in the two cases (Section 2). The usual explanation is to suggest that the two systems had radically different starting points, with large differences in their respective capacities for \u27catching up, forging ahead and falling behind\u27, to use the terminology of Abramowitz (1986). China\u27s \u27success.\u27 is seen as mainly due to \u27special\u27 factors such as the strength of its historical traditions of \u27capitalism\u27 and the advantages enjoyed on account of the impact of Hong Kong and Taiwan. The USSR\u27s failure is seen largely in terms of its \u27special\u27 problems such as the greater strength of nationalism or the more conservative nature of the communist party. Section 3 is the main-focus of this paper. It examines this proposition in detail. It concludes that despite some important differences the two systems in fundamental respects possessed large \u27catch-up\u27 possibilities. Indeed, it is far from obvious that China overall possessed greater \u27catch up\u27 possibilities than the USSR. The contrast in outcomes was largely caused by differences in policies selected. This applies both to economic policy and to the wider question of the relationship between political and economic reform

Independence Day for the “Old Lady? A Natural Experiment on the Implications of Central Bank Independence

Central bank independence is widely thought be a sine qua non of a credible commitment to price stability. The surprise decision by the UK government to grant operational independence to the Bank of England in 1997 affords us a natural experiment with which to gauge the impact on the yield curve from the adoption of central bank independence. We document the extent to which the decision to grant independence was ‘news?and illustrate that the reduction in medium and long term nominal interest rates was some 50 basis points, which we show to be consistent with a sharp increase in policymaker’s aversion to inflation deviations from target. We suggest therefore central bank independence represents one of the clearest signals available to elected politicians about their preferences on the control of inflation.Central bank independence; preferences; yield curve.

Evaluating the genetic progress of wheat in NSW, 1992-2009

Intellectual Property Regimes (IPRs) have been justified on the basis that they promote innovation, but it is not always clear that they do so. Empirical studies of IPRs in an Australian context have been limited. Plant variety protection is one form of IPR. The passing of the Australian Plant Breeder’s Rights Act of 1994 has been followed by significant commercialisation of the wheat breeding industry. The purpose of this paper is to consider whether this commercialisation has benefited wheat productivity through varietal improvement. We estimate a linear crop production function, using a random effects Hausman Taylor estimator to evaluate differences in genetic contributions to productivity between public and private wheat varieties commercially released in NSW over the period 1992-2009 using crop varietal data. Results from the Hausman Taylor estimator show that private varieties, on average, have outperformed public varieties over the period, suggesting that Plant Breeder’s Rights has promoted productive innovation in wheat. However, when we consider the best performing genetics of the varieties, public varieties have, in some years, outperformed privately bred varieties.genetic change, technical change, innovation, wheat breeding, intellectual property, Crop Production/Industries, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies,

Unions in common cause: the New Zealand Federation of Labour 1937–88

Unions in Common Cause is the first detailed study of the history of the New Zealand Federation of Labour (1937-88). Based on a conference held in 2007, this book includes chapters by four of our leading labour historians and contributions by past and present activists. It is richly illustrated. The FOL’s enduring legacy was to create a national voice for workers, a central organisation to represent their collective interests. In bad times, as well as good, that voice has continued to be heard.NZ Work & Labour Market Institute at Auckland University of Technology, the Labour History Project, the NZ Council of Trade Unions, the NZ Amalgamated Engineering Printing & Manufacturing Union, the NZ Dairy Workers Union Te Runanga Wai U, the Maritime Union of NZ, the NZ Meat Workers & Related Trades Union, the National Distribution Union, the Rail & Maritime Transport Union and the Service & Food Workers Union Nga Ringa Tot

Lagrangian Data-Driven Reduced Order Modeling of Finite Time Lyapunov Exponents

There are two main strategies for improving the projection-based reduced order model (ROM) accuracy: (i) improving the ROM, i.e., adding new terms to the standard ROM; and (ii) improving the ROM basis, i.e., constructing ROM bases that yield more accurate ROMs. In this paper, we use the latter. We propose new Lagrangian inner products that we use together with Eulerian and Lagrangian data to construct new Lagrangian ROMs. We show that the new Lagrangian ROMs are orders of magnitude more accurate than the standard Eulerian ROMs, i.e., ROMs that use standard Eulerian inner product and data to construct the ROM basis. Specifically, for the quasi-geostrophic equations, we show that the new Lagrangian ROMs are more accurate than the standard Eulerian ROMs in approximating not only Lagrangian fields (e.g., the finite time Lyapunov exponent (FTLE)), but also Eulerian fields (e.g., the streamfunction). We emphasize that the new Lagrangian ROMs do not employ any closure modeling to model the effect of discarded modes (which is standard procedure for low-dimensional ROMs of complex nonlinear systems). Thus, the dramatic increase in the new Lagrangian ROMs' accuracy is entirely due to the novel Lagrangian inner products used to build the Lagrangian ROM basis