Communist China\u27s Trade Treaties and Agreements (1949-1964)

Utilizing material gathered by extensive research, the author examines Communist China\u27s trade treaties and agreements, with some emphasis upon their economic and political implications. Also, he analyzes the Communist Chinese use of establishment provisions and national and most-favored-nation treatment. The author has selected the period from 1949 to 1964 due to the existence of an official collection of treaties compiled by the Peking government for this period. Although the collection has not been available since 1964, the authors examination of secondary official source materials has revealed no significant change in the regime\u27s attitude, and therefore, the materials contained in the official collection are considered representative of the present attitudes of the People\u27s Republic of China

A Dynamic model to study the influence of alpine ski boot characteristics on heel retention force

A dynamic model representing an alpine ski boot under a forward leaning load was successfully developed. This model was based on the equations of motion for the defined system. The intent of this model was to provide an initial, first order investigation of the effect of variations in boot design. Specifically, it evaluated the influence of certain boot characteristics on the vertical heel force on the boot when it is captured in a conventional toe-heel ski binding. Boot stiffness, sole length, functional boot height, and initial forward lean angle were the chosen characteristics. Functional boot height refers to a distance along the upper shaft of the boot. This distance is defined from the pivot point between the upper shaft and the lower base to a single loading point which is assumed to represent the concentration of the skier\u27s forward load. The initial forward lean angle is the angle formed by the center-line of the boot shaft and a vertical axis when the boot is in the unloaded condition. This model considered the stiffness discontinuity which occurs if an increasing input force is applied even after the boot shaft is flexed forward far enough to a position that contacts the boot\u27s built-in safety hard stop. As expected, greater heel forces were predicted for situations when the shaft was forced against the hard stop. With respect to two of the characteristics, boot stiffness and initial forward lean angle, the results from the model suggested that very different phenomena occur to the heel force depending if it is examined before or after this discontinuity. For the first condition, which is the situation before the discontinuity, individual variation of either of these parameters caused distinctly different values in the heel force. But for the second condition, or situation after the discontinuity, variation of these parameters had no effect on the heel force. In fact, the force converged to the same value over time. In contrast, variation of either of the two other parameters, sole length and functional boot height, caused distinctly different values in heel force during either condition. The model found that if the range of the boot shaft motion was limited to within the first condition, then boot stiffness was the predominate parameter influencing the heel force. If the motion and loading went beyond this case, into the second condition range, then functional boot height became the most influential. In addition to the model development, an exhaustive review of previous research was conducted on topics that pertained to alpine ski boot parameters and injuries to the lower extremities of the alpine skier. Research of particular interest was the efforts to characterize boot stiffness. Of particular note were the works by Walkhoff and Baumann (1987), Bonjour and Delouche (1989), and the long-term endeavor by a working group under the jurisdiction of the International Organization for Standards (ISO/TC83/SC3/WG14 1983 - 1993)

Position of phonetic components may influence how written words are processed in the brain: Evidence from Chinese phonetic compound pronunciation

Previous studies have shown a right-visual-field (RVF)/left-hemisphere (LH) advantage in Chinese phonetic compound pronunciation. Here, we contrast the processing of two phonetic compound types: a dominant structure in which a semantic component appears on the left and a phonetic component on the right (SP characters), and a minority structure with the opposite arrangement (PS characters). We show that this RVF/LH advantage was observed only in SP character pronunciation, but not in PS character pronunciation. This result suggests that SP character processing is more LH lateralized than is PS character processing and is consistent with corresponding ERP N170 data. This effect may be due to the dominance of SP characters in the lexicon, which makes readers opt to obtain phonological information from the right of the characters. This study thus shows that the overall information distribution of word components in the lexicon may influence how written words are processed in the brain. Supplemental materials for this article may be downloaded from http://cabn.psychonomic-journals.org/content/supplemental. © 2010 The Psychonomic Society, Inc.postprin

Can experience with different types of writing system modulate holistic processing in speech perception?

Conference Theme: Mind, Technology, and SocietyHolistic processing (HP) is an expertise marker in visual perception; nevertheless, it can be modulated by writing experience (Tso, Au, & Hsiao, 2014). We have recently found that HP also indicates expertise in Cantonese speech perception (Liu & Hsiao, 2014). Nevertheless, Cantonese has a logographic writing system where one syllable corresponds to one character, whereas in alphabetic languages, each syllable can be decomposed into phonemes that correspond to letters. This distinction between logographic and alphabetic languages may also modulate HP effects in speech perception. Here we tested HP effects through the composite paradigm with Korean syllables. In contrast to Cantonese speech perception, native Korean speakers were less holistic than novices in Korean syllable perception. Thus, experience with an alphabetic language may promote analytic processing of its spoken syllables. Similar to visual perception, our results suggest that HP as an expertise marker in speech perception depends on the listeners’ learning experience.postprin

Efficient orthogonal control of tunnel couplings in a quantum dot array

Electrostatically-defined semiconductor quantum dot arrays offer a promising platform for quantum computation and quantum simulation. However, crosstalk of gate voltages to dot potentials and inter-dot tunnel couplings complicates the tuning of the device parameters. To date, crosstalk to the dot potentials is routinely and efficiently compensated using so-called virtual gates, which are specific linear combinations of physical gate voltages. However, due to exponential dependence of tunnel couplings on gate voltages, crosstalk to the tunnel barriers is currently compensated through a slow iterative process. In this work, we show that the crosstalk on tunnel barriers can be efficiently characterized and compensated for, using the fact that the same exponential dependence applies to all gates. We demonstrate efficient calibration of crosstalk in a quadruple quantum dot array and define a set of virtual barrier gates, with which we show orthogonal control of all inter-dot tunnel couplings. Our method marks a key step forward in the scalability of the tuning process of large-scale quantum dot arrays.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figure

Violating conformal invariance: Two-dimensional clusters grafted to wedges, cones, and branch points of Riemann surfaces

We present simulations of 2-d site animals on square and triangular lattices in non-trivial geomeLattice animals are one of the few critical models in statistical mechanics violating conformal invariance. We present here simulations of 2-d site animals on square and triangular lattices in non-trivial geometries. The simulations are done with the newly developed PERM algorithm which gives very precise estimates of the partition sum, yielding precise values for the entropic exponent $\theta$ ($Z_N \sim \mu^N N^{-\theta}$). In particular, we studied animals grafted to the tips of wedges with a wide range of angles $\alpha$, to the tips of cones (wedges with the sides glued together), and to branching points of Riemann surfaces. The latter can either have $k$ sheets and no boundary, generalizing in this way cones to angles $\alpha > 360$ degrees, or can have boundaries, generalizing wedges. We find conformal invariance behavior, $\theta \sim 1/\alpha$, only for small angles ($\alpha \ll 2\pi$), while $\theta \approx const -\alpha/2\pi$ for $\alpha \gg 2\pi$. These scalings hold both for wedges and cones. A heuristic (non-conformal) argument for the behavior at large $\alpha$ is given, and comparison is made with critical percolation.Comment: 4 pages, includes 3 figure

Unraveling the Infrared Transient VVV-WIT-06: The Case for the Origin as a Classical Nova

Indexación: Scopus.E.Y.H. acknowledges the support provided by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. AST-1613472 and by the Florida Space Grant Consortium. L.G. acknowledges support from the FINCA visitor programme. The research work at the Physical Research Laboratory is funded by the Department of Space, Government of India. Facility: Magellan: Baade(FIRE).The enigmatic near-infrared transient VVV-WIT-06 underwent a large-amplitude eruption of unclear origin in 2013 July. Based on its light curve properties and late-time post-outburst spectra, various possibilities have been proposed in the literature for the origin of the object, namely a Type I supernova, a classical nova (CN), or a violent stellar merger event. We show that, of these possibilities, an origin in a CN outburst convincingly explains the observed properties of VVV-WIT-06. We estimate that the absolute K-band magnitude of the nova at maximum was M k = -8.2 ±0.5, its distance d = 13.35 ±2.18 kpc, and the extinction A v = 15.0 ±0.55 mag. © 2018. The American Astronomical Society. All rights reserved.https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/1538-4357/aae5d

A Study on Knowledge Sharing in Vietnamese Organizations

Knowledge sharing is very much a sign for the atmosphere of social interactions in the organizations, it depends on the quality of the conversation, formally or informally. In other words, for more effective knowledge sharing, communication competence is required in order to have appropriate conversation. During the past decades, most theories of communication competence have been developed on the basis of “western” conceptualization. This empirical research is conducted in order to study the organizational communication competence in a non-western country, Vietnam, and the effect of such competence to the employees’ knowledge sharing behavior respectively. Base on the data collected from 11 organizations, the effects of three culture dimensions, namely individualism, power distance, and uncertainty avoidance to the communication competence were statistically analyzed; then, stemming from the certain level of communication competence, the behavior of organizational members towards knowledge sharing was explaine

Applying Complexity Theory to Solve Hospitality Contrarian Case Conundrums: Illuminating Happy-Low and Unhappy-High Performing Frontline Service Employees

Purpose: This paper aims to advance a configural asymmetric theory of the complex antecedents to hospitality employee happiness-at-work and managers’ assessments of employees’ quality of work performance. The study transcends variable and case-level analyses to go beyond prior statistical findings of small-to-medium effect sizes of happiness–performance relationships; the study here identifies antecedent paths involving high-versus-low happy employees associating with high-versus-low managers’ assessments of these employees’ performances. Design/methodology/approach: The study merges data from surveys of employees (n = 247) and surveys completed by their managers (n = 43) and by using qualitative comparative analysis via the software program, fsQCA.com. The study analyzes data from Janfusan Fancyworld, the largest (in revenues and number of employees) tourism business group in Taiwan; Janfusan Fancyworld includes tourist hotels, amusement parks, restaurants and additional firms in related service sectors. Findings: The findings support the four tenets of configural analysis and theory construction: recognize equifinality of different solutions for the same outcome, test for asymmetric solutions, test for causal asymmetric outcomes for very high versus very low happiness and work performance and embrace complexity.Research limitations/implications: Additional research in other firms and additional countries is necessary to confirm the usefulness of examining algorithms for predicting very high (low) happiness and very high (low) quality of work performance. The implications are substantial that configural theory and research will resolve perplexing happiness–performance conundrums. Practical implications: The study provides useful case-level algorithms involving employees’ demographic characteristics and their assessments of work facet-specifics which are useful for explaining very high happiness-at-work and high quality of work performance (as assessed by managers) – as well as algorithms explaining very low happiness and very low quality of work performance. Originality/value: The study is the first to propose and test the tenets of configural theory in the context of hospitality frontline service employees’ happiness-at-work and managers’ assessments of these employees’ quality of work performances