Acting Autonomously or Mimicking the State and Peers? A Panel Tobit Analysis of Financial Dependence and Aid Allocation by Swiss NGOs

NGO aid is still widely believed to be superior to official aid (ODA). However, the incentives of NGOs to excel and target aid to the poor and deserving are increasingly disputed. We contribute to the emerging literature on the allocation of NGO aid by performing panel Tobit estimations for Swiss NGOs. The analysis offers new insights in two major regards: First, we cover the allocation of both self-financed and officially co-financed aid for a large panel of NGOs and recipient countries. Second, by classifying each NGO according to its financing structure, we address the unresolved question of whether financial dependence on the government impairs the targeting of NGO aid. It turns out that NGOs mimic the state as well as NGO peers. Officially refinanced NGOs are more inclined to imitate the allocation of ODA. However, the degree of financial dependence does not affect the poverty orientation of NGO aid and the incentives of NGOs to engage in easier environments. The allocation of self-financed aid differs in several respects from the allocation of officially co-financed aid, including the role of financial dependence for imitating the state and herding among NGOs

Acting Autonomously or Mimicking the State and Peers? A Panel Tobit Analysis of Financial Dependence and Aid Allocation by Swiss NGOs

NGO aid is still widely believed to be superior to official aid (ODA). However, the incentives of NGOs to excel and target aid to the poor and deserving are increasingly disputed. We contribute to the emerging literature on the allocation of NGO aid by performing panel Tobit estimations for Swiss NGOs. The analysis offers new insights in two major regards: First, we cover the allocation of both self-financed and officially co-financed aid for a large panel of NGOs and recipient countries. Second, by classifying each NGO according to its financing structure, we address the unresolved question of whether financial dependence on the government impairs the targeting of NGO aid. It turns out that NGOs mimic the state as well as NGO peers. Officially refinanced NGOs are more inclined to imitate the allocation of ODA. However, the degree of financial dependence does not affect the poverty orientation of NGO aid and the incentives of NGOs to engage in easier environments. The allocation of self-financed aid differs in several respects from the allocation of officially co-financed aid, including the role of financial dependence for imitating the state and herding among NGOs

Process Combination of VPP-LED and Vacuum Die Casting for Producing Complex Ceramic 3D-MID

Future developments lead to increasing demands on mechatronic integrated devices (MID). Therefore, ceramics have to be used as substrate material and conductor tracks have to be located in the interior of components to be sufficiently protected. A process combination of vat photopolymerization (VPP-LED) and vacuum die casting is investigated for realizing such structures. First, optimized process parameters are derived by studying the filling behavior of straight capillaries. Subsequently, the results are transferred to complex additively manufactured substrates to derive design guidelines

Anisotropic a posteriori error estimate for the virtual element method

We derive an anisotropic a posteriori error estimate for the adaptive conforming virtual element approximation of a paradigmatic two-dimensional elliptic problem. In particular, we introduce a quasi-interpolant operator and exploit its approximation results to prove the reliability of the error indicator. We design and implement the corresponding adaptive polygonal anisotropic algorithm. Several numerical tests assess the superiority of the proposed algorithm in comparison with standard polygonal isotropic mesh refinement schemes

Novel matching lens and spherical ionizer for a cesium sputter ion source

The beam optics of a multi-sample sputter ion source, based on the NECMCSNICS, has been modified to accommodate cathode voltages higher than 5 kV and dispenses with the nominal extractor. The cathode voltage in Cs sputter sources plays the role of the classical extractor accomplishing the acceleration of beam particles from eV to keV energy, minimizing space charge effects and interactions between the beam and residual gas. The higher the cathode voltage, the smaller are these contributions to the emittance growth. The higher cathode voltage also raises the Child’s law limit on the Cs current resulting in substantially increased output. The incidental focusing role of the extractor is reallocated to a deceleration Einzel lens and the velocity change needed to match to the pre-acceleration tube goes to a new electrode at the tube entrance. All electrodes are large enough to ensure that the beam fills less than 30% of the aperture to minimize aberrations. The improvements are applicable to sputter sources generally

Three-centre cluster structure in 11C and 11B

Studies of the 16O(9Be,alpha 7Be)14C, 7Li(9Be,alpha 7Li)5He and 7Li(9Be,alpha alpha t)5He reactions at E(beam)=70 and 55 MeV have been performed using resonant particle spectroscopy techniques. The 11C excited states decaying into alpha+7Be(gs) are observed between 8.5 and 13.5 MeV. The alpha+7Li(gs), alpha+7Li*(4.652 MeV) and t+8Be(gs) decays of 11B excited states between 9 and 19 MeV are observed. The decay processes are used to indicate the possible three-centre 2alpha+3He (2alpha+3H) cluster structure of observed states. This cluster structure is more prominent in the positive-parity states, where two rotational bands with large deformations are suggested. Excitations of some of the observed T=1/2 resonances coincide with the energies of previously measured T=3/2 isobaric analogs of the 11Be states,indicating that these states may have mixed isospin.Comment: Contribution for the proceedings of the NUSTAR'05: NUclear STructure, Astrophysics and Reactions, University of Surrey, Guildford, UK; accepted for publication in Journal of Physics

An open source software for analysis of dynamic contrast enhanced magnetic resonance images: UMMPerfusion revisited

Background: Perfusion imaging has become an important image based tool to derive the physiological information in various applications, like tumor diagnostics and therapy, stroke, (cardio-) vascular diseases, or functional assessment of organs. However, even after 20 years of intense research in this field, perfusion imaging still remains a research tool without a broad clinical usage. One problem is the lack of standardization in technical aspects which have to be considered for successful quantitative evaluation; the second problem is a lack of tools that allow a direct integration into the diagnostic workflow in radiology. Results: Five compartment models, namely, a one compartment model (1CP), a two compartment exchange (2CXM), a two compartment uptake model (2CUM), a two compartment filtration model (2FM) and eventually the extended Toft’s model (ETM) were implemented as plugin for the DICOM workstation OsiriX. Moreover, the plugin has a clean graphical user interface and provides means for quality management during the perfusion data analysis. Based on reference test data, the implementation was validated against a reference implementation. No differences were found in the calculated parameters. Conclusion: We developed open source software to analyse DCE-MRI perfusion data. The software is designed as plugin for the DICOM Workstation OsiriX. It features a clean GUI and provides a simple workflow for data analysis while it could also be seen as a toolbox providing an implementation of several recent compartment models to be applied in research tasks. Integration into the infrastructure of a radiology department is given via OsiriX. Results can be saved automatically and reports generated automatically during data analysis ensure certain quality control