663 research outputs found
The Moderating Effect of Family-Ownership on Firm Performance: An Examination of Entrepreneurial Orientation and Social Capital
Within the small business literature, a number of recent studies have examined the importance of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) and the development of social capital (SC) as each contributes to a firm's performance. While it is generally accepted in previous studies that each of these constructs positively affects firm performance, relatively less attention has been paid to potential moderating factors that can affect these relationships. The purpose of our research is to address one such moderator, family ownership. Using structural equation modeling (SEM) to test the moderating effect of family ownership on the relationships among entrepreneurial orientation, social capital, and firm performance, our results show that the effects of EO and SC vary depending upon whether the firm is family-owned or non-family owned. Implications of these findings and future research directions are provided
Progress toward BLISS, the background-limited infrared-submillimeter spectrograph for SPICA
We are developing the Background-Limited Infrared-Submillimeter Spectrograph (BLISS) for SPICA to provide a breakthrough capability for far-IR survey spectroscopy. The 3.2-meter, actively-cooled (T<6K) SPICA telescope allows mid-IR to submm observations which are limited only by the natural backgrounds, and BLISS is designed to operate near this fundamental limit. BLISS-SPICA provide a line sensitivity of 10-20 W m-2 , thereby enabling spectroscopy of dust-obscured galaxies at all epochs back to the first billion years after the Big Bang (redshift 6), and study of all stages of planet formation in circumstellar disks.
BLISS covers the 35-430 micron waveband at moderate resolving power (300<R<700) in six grating spec trometer bands, each coupling at least two 2 sky positions simultaneously. The instrument is cooled with an on-board refrigerator to 50 mK for optimal sensitivity. The detector package in the goal implementation is 4200 silicon-nitride micro-mesh leg-isolated bolometers with superconducting transition-edge-sensed (TES) thermistors, read out with a cryogenic time-domain multiplexer. The instrument is designed to fit within the stringent SPICA resource allocations for mass and heat lift, and to mitigate the impact of cosmic rays. We report on this design and our progress in prototyping and validating the BLISS spectrometers and prototype cooler. A companion paper in Conference 8452 (A. Beyer et al.) discusses in greater detail the progress in the BLISS TES bolometer development
High resolution CMB power spectrum from the complete ACBAR data set
In this paper, we present results from the complete set of cosmic microwave
background (CMB) radiation temperature anisotropy observations made with the
Arcminute Cosmology Bolometer Array Receiver (ACBAR) operating at 150 GHz. We
include new data from the final 2005 observing season, expanding the number of
detector-hours by 210% and the sky coverage by 490% over that used for the
previous ACBAR release. As a result, the band-power uncertainties have been
reduced by more than a factor of two on angular scales encompassing the third
to fifth acoustic peaks as well as the damping tail of the CMB power spectrum.
The calibration uncertainty has been reduced from 6% to 2.1% in temperature
through a direct comparison of the CMB anisotropy measured by ACBAR with that
of the dipole-calibrated WMAP5 experiment. The measured power spectrum is
consistent with a spatially flat, LambdaCDM cosmological model. We include the
effects of weak lensing in the power spectrum model computations and find that
this significantly improves the fits of the models to the combined ACBAR+WMAP5
power spectrum. The preferred strength of the lensing is consistent with
theoretical expectations. On fine angular scales, there is weak evidence (1.1
sigma) for excess power above the level expected from primary anisotropies. We
expect any excess power to be dominated by the combination of emission from
dusty protogalaxies and the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect (SZE). However, the
excess observed by ACBAR is significantly smaller than the excess power at ell
> 2000 reported by the CBI experiment operating at 30 GHz. Therefore, while it
is unlikely that the CBI excess has a primordial origin; the combined ACBAR and
CBI results are consistent with the source of the CBI excess being either the
SZE or radio source contamination.Comment: Submitted to ApJ; Changed to apply a WMAP5-based calibration. The
cosmological parameter estimation has been updated to include WMAP
Joint Elastic Side-Scattering Lidar and Raman Lidar Measurements of Aerosol Optical Properties in South East Colorado
We describe an experiment, located in south-east Colorado, USA, that measured
aerosol optical depth profiles using two Lidar techniques. Two independent
detectors measured scattered light from a vertical UV laser beam. One detector,
located at the laser site, measured light via the inelastic Raman
backscattering process. This is a common method used in atmospheric science for
measuring aerosol optical depth profiles. The other detector, located
approximately 40km distant, viewed the laser beam from the side. This detector
featured a 3.5m2 mirror and measured elastically scattered light in a bistatic
Lidar configuration following the method used at the Pierre Auger cosmic ray
observatory. The goal of this experiment was to assess and improve methods to
measure atmospheric clarity, specifically aerosol optical depth profiles, for
cosmic ray UV fluorescence detectors that use the atmosphere as a giant
calorimeter. The experiment collected data from September 2010 to July 2011
under varying conditions of aerosol loading. We describe the instruments and
techniques and compare the aerosol optical depth profiles measured by the Raman
and bistatic Lidar detectors.Comment: 34 pages, 16 figure
ACBAR: The Arcminute Cosmology Bolometer Array Receiver
We describe the Arcminute Cosmology Bolometer Array Receiver (ACBAR); a
multifrequency millimeter-wave receiver designed for observations of the Cosmic
Microwave Background (CMB) and the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect in clusters of
galaxies. The ACBAR focal plane consists of a 16-pixel, background-limited, 240
mK bolometer array that can be configured to observe simultaneously at 150,
220, 280, and 350 GHz. With 4-5' FWHM Gaussian beam sizes and a 3 degree
azimuth chop, ACBAR is sensitive to a wide range of angular scales. ACBAR was
installed on the 2 m Viper telescope at the South Pole in January 2001. We
describe the design of the instrument and its performance during the 2001 and
2002 observing seasons.Comment: 59 pages, 16 figures -- updated to reflect version published in ApJ
Analysis of US child care safety regulations.
BACKGROUND: With 1.9 million US children cared for in organized group child care, the safety of these children is a public health concern. In the absence of federal policy, each state has developed its own day care safety regulations.
METHODS: After creating a set of 36 criteria from three sets of national guidelines, we assessed the safety regulations of 45 states. With a mailed survey of state day care regulatory personnel, we examined the processes of formulating and implementing safety policy in 47 states.
RESULTS: For 24 of the 36 items, more than half the states' regulations were below the criteria or failed to mention the topic. Most notable is the inattention to playground safety, choking hazards, and firearms.
CONCLUSION: The uneven quality of regulations may be a reflection of a regulatory process that is fragmented, with many different groups sharing authority and with limited involvement of injury prevention specialists
Design and construction of a carbon fiber gondola for the SPIDER balloon-borne telescope
We introduce the light-weight carbon fiber and aluminum gondola designed for
the SPIDER balloon-borne telescope. SPIDER is designed to measure the
polarization of the Cosmic Microwave Background radiation with unprecedented
sensitivity and control of systematics in search of the imprint of inflation: a
period of exponential expansion in the early Universe. The requirements of this
balloon-borne instrument put tight constrains on the mass budget of the
payload. The SPIDER gondola is designed to house the experiment and guarantee
its operational and structural integrity during its balloon-borne flight, while
using less than 10% of the total mass of the payload. We present a construction
method for the gondola based on carbon fiber reinforced polymer tubes with
aluminum inserts and aluminum multi-tube joints. We describe the validation of
the model through Finite Element Analysis and mechanical tests.Comment: 16 pages, 11 figures. Presented at SPIE Ground-based and Airborne
Telescopes V, June 23, 2014. To be published in Proceedings of SPIE Volume
914
SPIDER: a balloon-borne CMB polarimeter for large angular scales
We describe SPIDER, a balloon-borne instrument to map the polarization of the
millimeter-wave sky with degree angular resolution. Spider consists of six
monochromatic refracting telescopes, each illuminating a focal plane of
large-format antenna-coupled bolometer arrays. A total of 2,624 superconducting
transition-edge sensors are distributed among three observing bands centered at
90, 150, and 280 GHz. A cold half-wave plate at the aperture of each telescope
modulates the polarization of incoming light to control systematics. Spider's
first flight will be a 20-30-day Antarctic balloon campaign in December 2011.
This flight will map \sim8% of the sky to achieve unprecedented sensitivity to
the polarization signature of the gravitational wave background predicted by
inflationary cosmology. The Spider mission will also serve as a proving ground
for these detector technologies in preparation for a future satellite mission.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figures; as published in the conference proceedings for
SPIE Millimeter, Submillimeter, and Far-Infrared Detectors and
Instrumentation for Astronomy V (2010
Spider Optimization: Probing the Systematics of a Large Scale B-Mode Experiment
Spider is a long-duration, balloon-borne polarimeter designed to measure
large scale Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) polarization with very high
sensitivity and control of systematics. The instrument will map over half the
sky with degree angular resolution in I, Q and U Stokes parameters, in four
frequency bands from 96 to 275 GHz. Spider's ultimate goal is to detect the
primordial gravity wave signal imprinted on the CMB B-mode polarization. One of
the challenges in achieving this goal is the minimization of the contamination
of B-modes by systematic effects. This paper explores a number of instrument
systematics and observing strategies in order to optimize B-mode sensitivity.
This is done by injecting realistic-amplitude, time-varying systematics in a
set of simulated time-streams. Tests of the impact of detector noise
characteristics, pointing jitter, payload pendulations, polarization angle
offsets, beam systematics and receiver gain drifts are shown. Spider's default
observing strategy is to spin continuously in azimuth, with polarization
modulation achieved by either a rapidly spinning half-wave plate or a rapidly
spinning gondola and a slowly stepped half-wave plate. Although the latter is
more susceptible to systematics, results shown here indicate that either mode
of operation can be used by Spider.Comment: 15 pages, 12 figs, version with full resolution figs available here
http://www.astro.caltech.edu/~lgg/spider_front.ht
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