Letter from Karl Shapiro to Hubert Creekmore (23 September 1953)

Shapiro writes on Poetry letterhead from Chicago, Illinois, to Creekmore in Jackson, Mississippi, regarding a poetry reading and speaking opportunity. Includes envelope.https://egrove.olemiss.edu/creekmore/1169/thumbnail.jp

El escritor judío en Estados Unidos

Durante la escritura de los capítulos de este libro, y de su eventual lectura en forma de conferencias, cobré consciencia de la desagradable necesidad de definir mi judaísmo ante el lector. ¿Qué tiene que ver el hecho de que yo sea judío con la crítica literaria? Bastante, según parece. El mero hecho de tener que defenderme frente al superficial antisemitismo de Pound o el profundo racismo de Eliot constituyen, desde ya, una posición. Y, en la medida en que tengo una posición, esta tiene nece..

Uniform cross phase modulation for nonclassical radiation pulses

We propose a scheme to achieve a uniform cross phase modulation (XPM) for two nonclassical light pulses and study its application for quantum non-demolition measurements of the photon number in a pulse and for controlled phase gates in quantum information. We analyze the scheme by quantizing a common phenomenological model for classical XPM. Our analysis first treats the ideal case of equal cross-phase modulation and pure unitary dynamics. This establishes the groundwork for more complicated studies of non-unitary dynamics and difference in phase shifts between the two pulses where decohering effects severely affect the performance of the scheme.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figures. To appear in J. Opt. Soc. Am.

The Black Hole in NGC 3379: A Comparison of Gas and Stellar Dynamical Mass Measurements with HST and Integral-Field Data

We combine Hubble Space Telescope spectroscopy and ground-based integral-field data from the SAURON and OASIS instruments to study the central black hole in the nearby elliptical galaxy NGC 3379. From these data, we obtain kinematics of both the stars and the nuclear gaseous component. Axisymmetric three-integral models of the stellar kinematics find a black hole of mass 1.4 (+2.6 / -1.0) x 10^8 M_sun (3 sigma errors). These models also probe the velocity distribution in the immediate vicinity of the black hole and reveal a nearly isotropic velocity distribution throughout the galaxy and down to the black hole sphere of influence R_BH. The morphology of the nuclear gas disc suggests that it is not in the equatorial plane; however the core of NGC 3379 is nearly spherical. Inclined thin-disc models of the gas find a nominal black hole of mass 2.0 (+/- 0.1) x 10^8 M_sun (3 sigma errors), but the model is a poor fit to the kinematics. The data are better fit by introducing a twist in the gas kinematics (with the black hole mass assumed to be 2.0 x 10^8 M_sun), although the constraints on the nature and shape of this perturbation are insufficient for more detailed modelling. Given the apparent regularity of the gas disc's appearance, the presence of such strong non-circular motion indicates that caution must be used when measuring black hole masses with gas dynamical methods alone.Comment: 22 pages, 19 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRAS. A version with full resolution figures is available at http://astro.berkeley.edu/~shapiro/Papers/shapiro2006_N3379.pd

Male frequent attenders of general practice and their help seeking preferences

Background: Low rates of health service usage by men are commonly linked to masculine values and traditional male gender roles. However, not all men conform to these stereotypical notions of masculinity, with some men choosing to attend health services on a frequent basis, for a variety of different reasons. This study draws upon the accounts of male frequent attenders of the General Practitioner's (GP) surgery, examining their help-seeking preferences and their reasons for choosing services within general practice over other sources of support. Methods: The study extends thematic analysis of interview data from the Self Care in Primary Care study (SCinPC), a large scale multi-method evaluation study of a self care programme delivered to frequent attenders of general practice. Data were collected from 34 semi-structured interviews conducted with men prior to their exposure to the intervention. Results: The ages of interviewed men ranged from 16 to 72 years, and 91% of the sample (n= 31) stated that they had a current health condition. The thematic analysis exposed diverse perspectives within male help-seeking preferences and the decision-making behind men's choice of services. The study also draws attention to the large variation in men's knowledge of available health services, particularly alternatives to general practice. Furthermore, the data revealed some men's lack of confidence in existing alternatives to general practice. Conclusions: The study highlights the complex nature of male help-seeking preferences, and provides evidence that there should be no 'one size fits all' approach to male service provision. It also provides impetus for conducting further studies into this under researched area of interest. © 2011 WPMH GmbH

Trace ideal criteria for embeddings and composition operators on model spaces

Let $K_\theta$ be a model space generated by an inner function $\theta$. We study the Schatten class membership of embeddings $I : K_\theta \to L^2(\mu)$, $\mu$ a positive measure, and of composition operators $C_\phi:K_\theta\to H^2(\mathbb D)$ with a holomprphic function $\phi:\mathbb D\rightarrow \mathbb D$. In the case of one-component inner functions $\theta$ we show that the problem can be reduced to the study of natural extensions of $I$ and $C_\phi$ to the Hardy-Smirnov space $E^2(D)$ in some domain $D\supset \mathbb D$. In particular, we obtain a characterization of Schatten membership of $C_\phi$ in terms of Nevanlinna counting function. By example this characterization does not hold true for general $\phi$.Comment: 20 page

Gravitational waves from eccentric compact binaries: Reduction in signal-to-noise ratio due to nonoptimal signal processing

Inspiraling compact binaries have been identified as one of the most promising sources of gravitational waves for interferometric detectors. Most of these binaries are expected to have circularized by the time their gravitational waves enter the instrument's frequency band. However, the possibility that some of the binaries might still possess a significant eccentricity is not excluded. We imagine a situation in which eccentric signals are received by the detector but not explicitly searched for in the data analysis, which uses exclusively circular waveforms as matched filters. We ascertain the likelihood that these filters, though not optimal, will nevertheless be successful at capturing the eccentric signals. We do this by computing the loss in signal-to-noise ratio incurred when searching for eccentric signals with those nonoptimal filters. We show that for a binary system of a given total mass, this loss increases with increasing eccentricity. We show also that for a given eccentricity, the loss decreases as the total mass is increased.Comment: 14 pages, 4 figures, ReVTeX; minor changes made after referee's comment

The WiggleZ Dark Energy Survey: measuring the cosmic expansion history using the Alcock-Paczynski test and distant supernovae

Astronomical observations suggest that today's Universe is dominated by a dark energy of unknown physical origin. One of the most notable consequences in many models is that dark energy should cause the expansion of the Universe to accelerate: but the expansion rate as a function of time has proven very difficult to measure directly. We present a new determination of the cosmic expansion history by combining distant supernovae observations with a geometrical analysis of large-scale galaxy clustering within the WiggleZ Dark Energy Survey, using the Alcock-Paczynski test to measure the distortion of standard spheres. Our result constitutes a robust and non-parametric measurement of the Hubble expansion rate as a function of time, which we measure with 10-15% precision in four bins within the redshift range 0.1 < z < 0.9. We demonstrate that the cosmic expansion is accelerating, in a manner independent of the parameterization of the cosmological model (although assuming cosmic homogeneity in our data analysis). Furthermore, we find that this expansion history is consistent with a cosmological-constant dark energy.Comment: 13 pages, 7 figures, accepted for publication by MNRA