Emergency Messaging to General Public via Public Wireless Networks

Warnings to the broad population in an emergency situation, irrespective of location and condition, is a public policy responsibility. Public wireless networks offer now the opportunity to deliver emergency warnings in this way with explanations, because in many countries the mobile penetration rates are higher than any other access form .The paper summarizes the analysis of the selection process between Short messaging services (SMS) and Cell Broadcast messaging in the context of Denmark based on end user requirements and stakeholder roles. It demonstrates the many technical, cost-benefit and other trade-offs needed in supporting the population now with a dependable and wide-spread technology.SMS;cell broadcast (CB);emergency warnings;public wireless networks

Eigenmodes of fractal drums: A numerical student experiment

``Can one hear the shape of a drum?'' was a question posed (and made famous) by mathematician Mark Kac in the mid-1960s. It addresses whether a deeper connection exists between the resonance modes (eigenmodes) of a drum and its shape. Here we propose a numerical experiment, suitable for advanced undergraduate physics students, on the calculation of the eigenmodes of a square Koch fractal drum, for which experimental results do exist. This exercise is designed to develop the students' understanding of the vibrations of fractal drums, their eigenmodes, and potentially their integrated density of states. The students calculate the lowest order eigenmodes of the fractal drum, visualize these modes, and study their symmetry properties. As an extension, the students may investigate the integrated density of states of the fractal drum and compare their findings to the Weyl-Berry conjecture.Comment: Latex, 9 pages, 5 figure

Vitality and nature in psychiatric spaces: Challenges and prospects for ‘healing architecture’ in the design of inpatient mental health environments

Historically, nature has been considered central to healing and recovery in institutional mental health settings, with inpatient spaces designed to mirror the restorative forces nature may afford. Within contemporary healthcare architecture, the discourse surrounding nature’s role has once again become prominent, especially in the concept of ‘healing architecture’. While the literature on ‘healing architecture’ primarily considers how to connect recovery to nature through interventions in the built environment, less interest has been directed towards how nature is configured in design processes and what implications that has for the everyday experiences of patients and staff. In this paper we consider the design and implementation of one particular psychiatric hospital in Denmark to show that the ‘nature’ brought into this healthcare space can be experienced as anything but ‘natural’ and may reduce rather than enhance a felt sense of ‘vitality’ amongst patients. Based on our analysis, we end the paper by suggesting four principles for future healthcare design

Fear and its implications for stock markets

The value of stocks, indices and other assets, are examples of stochastic processes with unpredictable dynamics. In this paper, we discuss asymmetries in short term price movements that can not be associated with a long term positive trend. These empirical asymmetries predict that stock index drops are more common on a relatively short time scale than the corresponding raises. We present several empirical examples of such asymmetries. Furthermore, a simple model featuring occasional short periods of synchronized dropping prices for all stocks constituting the index is introduced with the aim of explaining these facts. The collective negative price movements are imagined triggered by external factors in our society, as well as internal to the economy, that create fear of the future among investors. This is parameterized by a ``fear factor'' defining the frequency of synchronized events. It is demonstrated that such a simple fear factor model can reproduce several empirical facts concerning index asymmetries. It is also pointed out that in its simplest form, the model has certain shortcomings.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures. Submitted to the Proceedings of Applications of Physics in Financial Analysis 5, Turin 200

Substrate influence on the plasmonic response of clusters of spherical nanoparticles

The plasmonic response of nanoparticles is exploited in many subfields of science and engineering to enhance optical signals associated with probes of nanoscale and subnanoscale entities. We develop a numerical algorithm based on previous theoretical work that addresses the influence of a substrate on the plasmonic response of collections of nanoparticles of spherical shape. Our method is a real space approach within the quasi-static limit that can be applied to a wide range of structures. We illustrate the role of the substrate through numerical calculations that explore single nanospheres and nanosphere dimers fabricated from either a Drude model metal or from silver on dielectric substrates, and from dielectric spheres on silver substrates.Comment: 12 pages, 13 figure

Synchronization Model for Stock Market Asymmetry

The waiting time needed for a stock market index to undergo a given percentage change in its value is found to have an up-down asymmetry, which, surprisingly, is not observed for the individual stocks composing that index. To explain this, we introduce a market model consisting of randomly fluctuating stocks that occasionally synchronize their short term draw-downs. These synchronous events are parameterized by a ``fear factor'', that reflects the occurrence of dramatic external events which affect the financial market.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Design of one-dimensional Lambertian diffusers of light

We describe a method for designing a one-dimensional random surface that acts as a Lambertian diffuser. The method is tested by means of rigorous computer simulations and is shown to yield the desired scattering pattern.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure

Emergency Messaging to General Public via Public Wireless Networks

Warnings to the broad population in an emergency situation, irrespective of location and condition, is a public policy responsibility. Public wireless networks offer now the opportunity to deliver emergency warnings in this way with explanations, because in many countries the mobile penetration rates are higher than any other access form .The paper summarizes the analysis of the selection process between Short messaging services (SMS) and Cell Broadcast messaging in the context of Denmark based on end user requirements and stakeholder roles. It demonstrates the many technical, cost-benefit and other trade-offs needed in supporting the population now with a dependable and wide-spread technology

Single scattering of polarized light by correlated surface and volume disorder

We study light scattering by systems combining randomly rough surface and volume dielectric fluctuations. We introduce a general model including correlations between surface and volume disorders, and we study the scattering properties within a single scattering approach. We identify different regimes of surface and volume dominated scattering depending on length scales characterizing the surface and volume disorders. For uncorrelated disorders, we discuss the polarization response of each source of disorder, and show how polarimetric measurements can be used to separate the surface and volume contributions in the total measured diffusely scattered intensity. For correlated systems, we identify two configurations of volume disorder which, respectively, couple weakly or strongly to surface scattering via surface-volume cross-correlations. We illustrate these effects on different configurations exhibiting interference patterns in the diffusely scattered intensity, which may be of interest for the characterization of complex systems or for the design of optical components by engineering the degree of surface-volume correlations.Comment: 25 pages, 22 figure