Corporate governance practices in Fiji: An empirical investigation

This study investigates the nature and extent of compliance to the principle-based corporate governance initiatives by the listed companies in the South Pacific Stock Exchange (SPSE) in Fiji. Three important questions are addressed: (i) whether listed companies in Fiji have complied with the principle-based governance practices: (ii) did compliance with principle based recommendations lead to an improvement in the listed company‟s financial performance? and (iii) how the institutional factors have contributed towards corporate governance practices in Fiji? Panel data for the SPSE companies over the period 2008-2010 are analysed using ordinary least squares (OLS) regression. Tobin‟s Q, Return on Assets (ROA), Return on Equity (ROE) and Earnings Before Interest, Tax, Depreciation and Amortisation to Total Revenue (EBITDA2REV) metrics are used as dependent variables. Findings indicate that listed companies have adopted the Capital Market Development Authority‟s (CMDA) recommendations, establishing subcommittees for audit and remuneration, and having nonexecutive/ independent directors on the board. The result supports the view that the CMDA recommendations of board sub-committees (Audit and Remuneration) have had positive influence on company performance measured by Tobin‟s Q. The findings of this study give support to the principle-based corporate governance practices adopted in Fiji. The results of this study provide useful insights to both regulators and policy analysts (in Fiji and internationally) seeking to enhance both governance and firm performance in their own jurisdiction

A Survey on Fixed Divisors

In this article, we compile the work done by various mathematicians on the topic of the fixed divisor of a polynomial. This article explains most of the results concisely and is intended to be an exhaustive survey. We present the results on fixed divisors in various algebraic settings as well as the applications of fixed divisors to various algebraic and number theoretic problems. The work is presented in an orderly fashion so as to start from the simplest case of $\Z,$ progressively leading up to the case of Dedekind domains. We also ask a few open questions according to their context, which may give impetus to the reader to work further in this direction. We describe various bounds for fixed divisors as well as the connection of fixed divisors with different notions in the ring of integer-valued polynomials. Finally, we suggest how the generalization of the ring of integer-valued polynomials in the case of the ring of $n \times n$ matrices over $\Z$ (or Dedekind domain) could lead to the generalization of fixed divisors in that setting.Comment: Accepted for publication in Confluentes Mathematic

Effect of grain disorientation on early fatigue crack propagation in face-centred-cubic polycristals: A three-dimensional dislocation dynamics investigation

Three-dimensional dislocation dynamics simulations are used to study micro-crack interaction with the first micro-structural barrier in face-centred cubic bi-crystals loaded in high cycle fatigue conditions. In the examined configuration, we assumed that micro-crack transmission occurs due to surface relief growth in the secondary grain ahead of the primary crack. This indirect transmission mechanism is shown to strongly depend on grain-1/grain-2 disorientation. For instance, small grain disorientation induces plastic strain localisation ahead of the crack and faster transmission through the first barrier. Conversely, large grain-1/grain-2 disorientation induces plastic strain spreading similar to crack tip blunting yielding slower indirect transmission. A semi-analytical micro-model is developed based on the present simulation results and complementary experimental observations highlighting the original notion of first-barrier compliance. The model captures well known experimental trends including effects of: grain-size, grain disorientation and micro-crack retardation at the first barrier

Flooding attacks to internet threat monitors (ITM): Modeling and counter measures using botnet and honeypots

The Internet Threat Monitoring (ITM),is a globally scoped Internet monitoring system whose goal is to measure, detect, characterize, and track threats such as distribute denial of service(DDoS) attacks and worms. To block the monitoring system in the internet the attackers are targeted the ITM system. In this paper we address flooding attack against ITM system in which the attacker attempt to exhaust the network and ITM's resources, such as network bandwidth, computing power, or operating system data structures by sending the malicious traffic. We propose an information-theoretic frame work that models the flooding attacks using Botnet on ITM. Based on this model we generalize the flooding attacks and propose an effective attack detection using Honeypots

EFFECTIVE EVENT DERIVATION OF UNCERTAIN EVENTS IN RULE-BASED SYSTEMS

There is a growing need for systems that react automatically to events. While some events are generated externally and deliver data across distributed systems, others need to be derived by the system itself based on available information. Unpredictability of future events which influence the outcome of the present decisions but have not yet occurred and no one can predict what they will be like. In this process, it finds out the uncertain events using the rules. Here it uses the Event Instance Data for find out the efficient process. This performs the two mechanisms are select ability is for calculation of the exact probability space and sampling techniques. For this process it uses the efficient algorithms that are calculate selectable EID and Rule stamp algorithm. In this paper, we also emphasized the important role that event select ability plays in uncertain event derivation. We demonstrated not only that it plays a significant semantic role, but also, that the proper usage of select ability can significantly improve performance, and result in a framework that is much more suited to applications with a high event throughput. This system provides the better results and provides the efficient process

Synthesis and Characterization of Sugar Based Low Molecular Weight Gelators and the Preparation of Chiral Sulfinamides

Low molecular weight gelators (LMWGs) have received considerable attention in the field of chemistry from last few decades. These compounds form self-assembled fibrous networks like micelles, cylindrical, sheets, fibers, layers and so on. The fibrous network entraps the solvent and forms gel, because of the self-assembly phenomenon and their demonstrated potential uses in a variety of areas, ranging from environmental to medicinal applications. Sugars are good starting materials to synthesize the new class of LMWG\u27s, because these are different from some expensive materials, these are natural products. We have synthesized and characterized the LMGS\u27s based on D-glucose and D-glucosamine. D-glucosamine is the versatile starting material to make different peptoids and triazoles. Several series of compounds were synthesized using compounds 1-3 as starting material and studied the gelation behavior all the compounds. We have studied the self-assembling properties of a new class of tripeptoids, synthesized by one-pot Ugi reaction from simple starting materials. Among the focused library of tripeptoids synthesized, we found that several efficient low molecular weight organogelators were obtained for aqueous DMSO and ethanol mixtures. We have also synthesized and characterized a series of monosaccharide triazole derivatives. These compounds were synthesized from N-acetyl glucosamine and D-glucose via a Cu(I) catalyzed azide/alkyne cycloaddition reaction (CuAAc). The compounds have been screened for their gelation properties and several efficient low molecular weight organo/hydro gelators were obtained, among these compounds, five per-acetyl glucosamine derivatives and one peracetyl glucose derivative were able to form gels in water. These new molecules are expected to be useful in drug delivery and tissue engineering.* Asymmetric synthesis of chiral amines is a challenging in synthetic organic chemistry. The development of new catalysts for asymmetric organic transformations is a very important research goal in modern synthetic organic chemistry. We have synthesized a new class of chiral oxathiozinone from chiral amino phenol. From this synthesized chiral sulfinamides, ketimines followed by reducing the ketimines synthesized the highly hindered chiral amines