Sasakian quiver gauge theories and instantons on cones over lens 5-spaces

We consider SU(3)-equivariant dimensional reduction of Yang-Mills theory over certain cyclic orbifolds of the 5-sphere which are Sasaki-Einstein manifolds. We obtain new quiver gauge theories extending those induced via reduction over the leaf spaces of the characteristic foliation of the Sasaki-Einstein structure, which are projective planes. We describe the Higgs branches of these quiver gauge theories as moduli spaces of spherically symmetric instantons which are SU(3)-equivariant solutions to the Hermitian Yang-Mills equations on the associated Calabi-Yau cones, and further compare them to moduli spaces of translationally-invariant instantons on the cones. We provide an explicit unified construction of these moduli spaces as K\"ahler quotients and show that they have the same cyclic orbifold singularities as the cones over the lens 5-spaces.Comment: v2: 54 pages, accepted for publication in Nuclear Physics

California\u27s Domestic Partnership Law: Incremental Progress or Dramatic Social Change?

Effective January 1, 2005, the California Domestic Partner Rights and Responsibilities Act of 2003 (CDPRRA) replaced the Domestic Partnership Act of 1999, vesting registered domestic partners with new rights and a court termination procedure similar to divorce. Does the new statute legalize gay marriage? Are domestic partners eligible for spousal support? Are the registration and termination procedures voluntary? Does the Unruh Civil Rights Act now require businesses and private organizations to include gay members? The article reviews the new law and analyzes how three recent court decisions resolve these controversial issues

The Future of Compensation Professionals: According to Your Colleagues

As Bob Dylan sang, “The times they are a changing.” With opportunities to be more involved in major business decisions, compensation professionals have been asked to solve more difficult problems and face more difficult challenges. In turn, the profession needs to be able to step out of the comfort zone and be ready to seize these opportunities. From a survey of compensation professionals, it has become clear they feel their roles in the organization’s strategic business plans are growing. Only time will tell if compensation professionals’ perceptions will become reality. In May 2005, the authors conducted a survey to find out what compensation professionals think about the future of the profession. From two groups of compensation and HR professionals who had compensation responsibility — Chicago Compensation Association (CCA) members and a sample of WorldatWork members — there were 200 survey respondents