Whether Events After the Filing of an Initial Complaint May Cure an Article III Standing Defect: The D.C. Circuit’s Approach

On December 7, 2018, in Scahill v. District of Columbia, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit held that a plaintiff may cure an Article III standing defect through an amended pleading alleging facts that arose after the filing of the original complaint. In so doing, the D.C. Circuit joined an expanding plurality of the federal appellate courts in rejecting the alternative approach that requires a plaintiff lacking standing at the outset of a lawsuit to file a new lawsuit when events subsequent to filing the original complaint have corrected any standing deficiency. This Comment assesses the D.C. Circuit’s decision and argues that the inefficient and needlessly formalistic approach of a shrinking minority of the circuits, which Scahill discards, ought to be abandoned entirely

Optimal Survey Strategies and Predicted Planet Yields for the Korean Microlensing Telescope Network

The Korean Microlensing Telescope Network (KMTNet) will consist of three 1.6m telescopes each with a 4 deg^{2} field of view (FoV) and will be dedicated to monitoring the Galactic Bulge to detect exoplanets via gravitational microlensing. KMTNet's combination of aperture size, FoV, cadence, and longitudinal coverage will provide a unique opportunity to probe exoplanet demographics in an unbiased way. Here we present simulations that optimize the observing strategy for, and predict the planetary yields of, KMTNet. We find preferences for four target fields located in the central Bulge and an exposure time of t_{exp} = 120s, leading to the detection of ~2,200 microlensing events per year. We estimate the planet detection rates for planets with mass and separation across the ranges 0.1 <= M_{p}/M_{Earth} <= 1000 and 0.4 <= a/AU <= 16, respectively. Normalizing these rates to the cool-planet mass function of Cassan (2012), we predict KMTNet will be approximately uniformly sensitive to planets with mass 5 <= M_{p}/M_{Earth} <= 1000 and will detect ~20 planets per year per dex in mass across that range. For lower-mass planets with mass 0.1 <= M_{p}/M_{Earth} < 5, we predict KMTNet will detect ~10 planets per year. We also compute the yields KMTNet will obtain for free-floating planets (FFPs) and predict KMTNet will detect ~1 Earth-mass FFP per year, assuming an underlying population of one such planet per star in the Galaxy. Lastly, we investigate the dependence of these detection rates on the number of observatories, the photometric precision limit, and optimistic assumptions regarding seeing, throughput, and flux measurement uncertainties.Comment: 29 pages, 31 figures, submitted to ApJ. For a brief video explaining the key results of this paper, please visit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5rWVjiO26

Zdrowizm. O nierównym traktowaniu w stosunkach pracy ze względu na tzw. zdrowy styl życia

Activities being part of the so-called healthy lifestyle have been steadily becoming more and more popular in Poland. Staying fit, taking care of weight, attractive appearance, appropriate diet or non-smoking are now very often considered determinants of one’s life and may even be a ground for social stigma. At the same time, employers have realized the importance of relations between employees’ health and their lifestyles on the one side and safety and productivity of the employees on the other, as well as business image of employer’s undertakings. Both these trends cross in employment milieu and they may result in employers defining their job requirements by referrals to healthy lifestyle. The article claims that circumstances pertaining to healthy lifestyle and appearance may constitute valid differentiating criteria in employment relations provided that they are objectively grounded in the nature and manner of employee’s duties and that they rest under employee’s control.Praktyki składające się na zdrowy styl życia znajdują w Polsce coraz większą społeczną aprobatę. Aktywność fizyczna, dbanie o wagę, zdrowy wygląd, dieta czy niepalenie papierosów stają się wyznacznikami stylu życia i źródłem społecznej stygmatyzacji. Równocześnie wzrasta zainteresowanie pracodawców związkiem między zdrowiem pracowników, ich stylem życia i stosowanymi przez nich praktykami zdrowotnymi a bezpieczeństwem i produktywnością pracowników oraz renomą przedsiębiorcy. Dynamika obu tych fenomenów krzyżuje się w stosunkach pracy i może oznaczać definiowanie przez pracodawców wymagań co do stanowisk pracy poprzez ich odniesienie do kryteriów związanych z tzw. zdrowym stylem życia. W artykule wskazano, że takie kryteria odnoszące się do zdrowia i wyglądu mogą zostać uznane za dozwolone kryteria różnicujące przy podejmowaniu przez pracodawcę rozstrzygnięć dotyczących zatrudnienia pod warunkiem, że są one obiektywnie uzasadnione charakterem obowiązków i sposobem ich wykonywania, a do tego stopień spełnienia tych kryteriów pozostaje zależny od pracownika

Kafala. O sytuacji prawnej pracowników migrujących w państwach Zatoki Perskiej

In Polish reviews, both legal and devoted to Islam studies, the analysis of legal institutions in Arab states is still a rare phenomenon. In the meantime, the Gulf region, apart from dynamic economic growth and expanding influence in spheres of culture, media, sports or transport, has become in the last five decades a destination of one of the most numerous working migrations in history. Next to extraction of oil and gas, migrant workers are now the backbone of economies of the states forming Gulf Cooperation Council. In order to manage the influx of migrants these countries have created a system of legal regulation called, in Arab language, kafala. It is a web of labour law, citizenship law and foreigners law covering different aspects of rights and obligation of working migrants in the Gulf states. The system however has been for many years castigated by international community as suppressing human rights and employees’ dignity. The author describes historical circumstances leading to the current shape of kafala and indicates distinct features of this system in the Gulf states. An analysis of kafala from the perspective of both traditional Islam law, sharia, and international covenants, is being presented. In the conclusion the author states that kafala system in its today’s version is compatible with neither Muslim law, nor the international treaties.W polskiej literaturze prawniczej i orientalistycznej analiza wybranych zagadnień prawnych państw arabskich jest ciągle zjawiskiem rzadkim. Tymczasem rejon Zatoki Perskiej, poza dynamicznym rozwojem ekonomicznym i rosnącym globalnym wpływem w zakresie kultury, mediów, sportu czy transportu, jest od półwiecza celem jednych z najliczniejszych w historii migracji zarobkowych. Obok wydobycia ropy naftowej i gazu ziemnego pracownicy przyjezdni stanowią motor napędowy systemów gospodarczych państw zrzeszonych w Radzie Współpracy Zatoki. W celu zarządzania pracownikami migrującymi kraje te stosują system regulacji prawnych, określanych zbiorczo w języku arabskim jako kafala. Jest to zbiór przepisów z zakresu prawa pracy, prawa o obywatelstwie i prawa o cudzoziemcach odnoszący się do praw i obowiązków cudzoziemców przyjeżdzających w rejon Zatoki Perskiej w celach zarobkowych. System ten od lat poddawany jest krytyce ze strony organizacji międzynarodowych jako naruszający ludzką godność i prawa człowieka. Autor opisuje historyczne uwarunkowania systemu kafala i wskazuje jego charakterystyczne cechy w poszczególnych państwach Rady Współpracy Zatoki. W tekście dokonano analizy regulacji kafali z punktu widzenia tradycyjnego prawa muzułmańskiego, czyli szariatu, oraz z perspektywy konwencji międzynarodowych odnoszących się do pracowników migrujących. W podsumowaniu autor dochodzi do wniosku, że system kafala w swojej obecnej postaci jest nie do pogodzenia zarówno z prawem islamu, jak i ze źródłami prawa międzynarodowego

Irradiation induced reactions in carbon nanomaterials in transmission electron microscopy

Aberration corrected transmission electron microscopy is a powerful tool for the structural characterisation of materials at the atomic scale, but the passage of high velocity electrons through the material can often induce structural changes via the transfer of large amounts of energy from the beam. The work in this thesis theoretically considers the nature of this transfer of energy and its impact upon the material being studied. The computational modelling of molecular species encapsulated inside carbon nanotubes and their response to electron irradiation is compared to results from TEM experiments, and used to explain the experimental observations. The high rate of destruction of C-H bonds under the beam is quantified, and its implications for TEM studies of organic materials considered. An effective solution for mitigating this rate of destruction is found, applied to a model system, and then confirmed experimentally. Using the considerations of stability under the beam, two experimentally witnessed reactions are investigated in detail, and careful comparison to intermediate structures observed in TEM allows full reaction mechanisms to be proposed. The dynamic motion of atomic defects in irradiated graphene is considered with the aid of a large library of experimental TEM images. A novel defect structure is observed, and is seen to undergo structural rearrangements on a quicker time-scale than accessible to TEM imaging. This species enables the very quick migration of defect structures across the graphene lattice, and is attributed to a trivacancy structure. The rates of beam induced reactions are considered in the framework of chemical kinetics, and a method for extracting kinetic parameters of a reaction from the statistics of a large number of TEM observations of it occurring is developed. This is used to obtain the first cross-sections for the formation and healing of the irradiation induced Stone-Wales bond rotation, and the first experimental activation energy for its healing. The latter agrees well with a theoretically predicted mechanism of catalysis, while the former demonstrates that the widely assumed process of direct knock-on damage cannot be responsible for the beam induced reaction. An alternative mechanism is proposed, resulting from the electronic excitation of the defect

The effects of encapsulation on damage to molecules by electron radiation

Encapsulation of materials imaged by high resolution transmission electron microscopy presents a promising route to the reduction of sample degradation, both independently and in combination with other traditional solutions to controlling radiation damage. In bulk crystals, the main effect of encapsulation (or coating) is the elimination of diffusion routes of beam-induced radical species, enhancing recombination rates and acting to limit overall damage. Moving from bulk to low dimensional materials has significant effects on the nature of damage under the electron beam. We consider the major changes in mechanisms of damage of low dimensional materials by separating the effects of dimensional reduction from the effects of encapsulation. An effect of confinement is discussed using a model example of coronene molecules encapsulated inside single walled carbon nanotubes as determined from molecular dynamics simulations calculating the threshold energy required for hydrogen atom dissociation. The same model system is used to estimate the rate at which the nanotube can dissipate excess thermal energy above room temperature by acting as a thermal sink

NASA ExoPAG Study Analysis Group 11: Preparing for the WFIRST Microlensing Survey

NASA's proposed WFIRST-AFTA mission will discover thousands of exoplanets with separations from the habitable zone out to unbound planets, using the technique of gravitational microlensing. The Study Analysis Group 11 of the NASA Exoplanet Program Analysis Group was convened to explore scientific programs that can be undertaken now, and in the years leading up to WFIRST's launch, in order to maximize the mission's scientific return and to reduce technical and scientific risk. This report presents those findings, which include suggested precursor Hubble Space Telescope observations, a ground-based, NIR microlensing survey, and other programs to develop and deepen community scientific expertise prior to the mission.Comment: 35 pages, 5 Figures. A brief overview of the findings is presented in the Executive Summary (2 pages