9,380 research outputs found
Winning in the long run: a quantified approach to the drivers of sustainable financial value on real estate: Working Paper 2
This working paper describes the first empirical study measuring the impact of sustainability characteristics on the financial performance of European office and retail properties. The authors present the project, the issue and the approach of their ongoing search for a �Green Alpha�. In a joint effort, university experts at Danube University Krems are in cooperation with Kingston University London tackling a robust analysis on hard data from real properties of institutional investment portfolios in the United Kingdom, France, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland and Austria. Their first
results are expected by the end of 2010
Surface water floods in Switzerland: what insurance claim records tell us about the damage in space and time
Surface water floods (SWFs) have received increasing attention in the recent
years. Nevertheless, we still know relatively little about where, when and
why such floods occur and cause damage, largely due to a lack of data but
to some degree also because of terminological ambiguities. Therefore, in a
preparatory step, we summarize related terms and identify the need for
unequivocal terminology across disciplines and international boundaries in
order to bring the science together. Thereafter, we introduce a large
(n = 63 117), long (10–33 years) and representative
(48 % of all Swiss buildings covered) data set of spatially explicit
Swiss insurance flood claims. Based on registered flood damage to buildings,
the main aims of this study are twofold: First, we introduce a method to
differentiate damage caused by SWFs and fluvial floods based on the
geographical location of each damaged object in relation to flood hazard maps
and the hydrological network. Second, we analyze the data with respect to
their spatial and temporal distributions aimed at quantitatively answering
the fundamental questions of how relevant SWF damage really is, as well as
where and when it occurs in space and time.
This study reveals that SWFs are responsible for at least 45 % of the
flood damage to buildings and 23 % of the associated direct tangible
losses, whereas lower losses per claim are responsible for the lower loss
share. The Swiss lowlands are affected more heavily by SWFs than the alpine
regions. At the same time, the results show that the damage claims and
associated losses are not evenly distributed within each region either.
Damage caused by SWFs occurs by far most frequently in summer in almost all
regions. The normalized SWF damage of all regions shows no significant upward
trend between 1993 and 2013. We conclude that SWFs are in fact a highly
relevant process in Switzerland that should receive similar attention like
fluvial flood hazards. Moreover, as SWF damage almost always coincides with
fluvial flood damage, we suggest considering SWFs, like fluvial floods, as integrated processes of
our catchments
Permissive Controller Synthesis for Probabilistic Systems
We propose novel controller synthesis techniques for probabilistic systems
modelled using stochastic two-player games: one player acts as a controller,
the second represents its environment, and probability is used to capture
uncertainty arising due to, for example, unreliable sensors or faulty system
components. Our aim is to generate robust controllers that are resilient to
unexpected system changes at runtime, and flexible enough to be adapted if
additional constraints need to be imposed. We develop a permissive controller
synthesis framework, which generates multi-strategies for the controller,
offering a choice of control actions to take at each time step. We formalise
the notion of permissivity using penalties, which are incurred each time a
possible control action is disallowed by a multi-strategy. Permissive
controller synthesis aims to generate a multi-strategy that minimises these
penalties, whilst guaranteeing the satisfaction of a specified system property.
We establish several key results about the optimality of multi-strategies and
the complexity of synthesising them. Then, we develop methods to perform
permissive controller synthesis using mixed integer linear programming and
illustrate their effectiveness on a selection of case studies
Measurement of CP asymmetry in decays
We report on measurements of the time-dependent CP violating observables in decays using a dataset corresponding to 1.0 fb of pp collisions recorded with the LHCb detector. We find the CP violating observables , , , , , where the uncertainties are statistical and systematic, respectively. Using these observables together with a recent measurement of the mixing phase leads to the first extraction of the CKM angle from decays, finding = (115) modulo 180 at 68% CL, where the error contains both statistical and systematic uncertainties
Evidence for exotic hadron contributions to decays
A full amplitude analysis of decays is performed with a data sample acquired with the LHCb detector from 7 and 8 TeV collisions, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 3 fb. A significantly better description of the data is achieved when, in addition to the previously observed nucleon excitations , either the and states, previously observed in decays, or the state, previously reported in decays, or all three, are included in the amplitude models. The data support a model containing all three exotic states, with a significance of more than three standard deviations. Within uncertainties, the data are consistent with the and production rates expected from their previous observation taking account of Cabibbo suppression
Study of B0(s)→K0Sh+h′− decays with first observation of B0s→K0SK±π∓ and B0s→K0Sπ+π−
A search for charmless three-body decays of B 0 and B0s mesons with a K0S meson in the final state is performed using the pp collision data, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.0 fb−1, collected at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV recorded by the LHCb experiment. Branching fractions of the B0(s)→K0Sh+h′− decay modes (h (′) = π, K), relative to the well measured B0→K0Sπ+π− decay, are obtained. First observation of the decay modes B0s→K0SK±π∓ and B0s→K0Sπ+π− and confirmation of the decay B0→K0SK±π∓ are reported. The following relative branching fraction measurements or limits are obtained B(B0→K0SK±π∓)B(B0→K0Sπ+π−)=0.128±0.017(stat.)±0.009(syst.), B(B0→K0SK+K−)B(B0→K0Sπ+π−)=0.385±0.031(stat.)±0.023(syst.), B(B0s→K0Sπ+π−)B(B0→K0Sπ+π−)=0.29±0.06(stat.)±0.03(syst.)±0.02(fs/fd), B(B0s→K0SK±π∓)B(B0→K0Sπ+π−)=1.48±0.12(stat.)±0.08(syst.)±0.12(fs/fd)B(B0s→K0SK+K−)B(B0→K0Sπ+π−)∈[0.004;0.068]at90%CL
Search for CP violation in the decay D+→π−π+π+
A search for CP violation in the phase space of the decay D+→π−π+π+D+→π−π+π+ is reported using pp collision data, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.0 fb−1, collected by the LHCb experiment at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV. The Dalitz plot distributions for 3.1×1063.1×106D+D+ and D−D− candidates are compared with binned and unbinned model-independent techniques. No evidence for CP violation is found
Measurement of the forward energy flow in pp collisions at s√=7 TeV
The energy flow created in pp collisions at TeX is studied within the pseudorapidity range 1.9<η<4.9 with data collected by the LHCb experiment. The measurements are performed for inclusive minimum-bias interactions, hard scattering processes and events with an enhanced or suppressed diffractive contribution. The results are compared to predictions given by Pythia-based and cosmic-ray event generators, which provide different models of soft hadronic interactions
First measurement of time-dependent CP violation in Bs -> K+K- decays
Direct and mixing-induced CP-violating asymmetries in B0s→K+K− decays are measured for the first time using a data sample of pp collisions, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 1.0 fb−1, collected with the LHCb detector at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV. The results are C KK  = 0.14 ± 0.11 ± 0.03 and S KK  = 0.30 ± 0.12 ± 0.04, where the first uncertainties are statistical and the second systematic. The corresponding quantities are also determined for B 0 → π + π − decays to be C ππ  = −0.38 ± 0.15 ± 0.02 and S ππ  = −0.71 ± 0.13 ± 0.02, in good agreement with existing measurements
Observation of the decay
The decay is observed in collision data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 3 fb recorded by the LHCb detector at centre-of-mass energies of 7 TeV and 8 TeV. This is the first observation of this decay channel, with a statistical significance of 15 standard deviations. The mass of the meson is measured to be MeV/c. The branching fraction ratio is measured to be 0.0115\,\pm\, 0.0012\, ^{+0.0005}_{-0.0009}. In both cases, the first uncertainty is statistical and the second is systematic. No evidence for non-resonant or decays is found
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