RESULTS OF A QUALITATIVE SURVEY ABOUT THE AP-PLICATION OF BUSINESS INFORMATION SYSTEMS IN GERMAN CRAFT ENTERPRISES - FIRST FINDINGS OF AN ONGOING RESEARCH PROJECT

The present study shows the current status of a preliminary study about the use of business infor-mation systems (BIS) based on five exemplarily selected case studies in German craft enterprises. The question of whether similarities and differences concerning the application of information and com-munication technologies (ICT) exist in practice. For this purpose, exemplary case demonstrating the scope and usage of organizational ICT in various crafts are presented. The case studies are based on a survey of CEOs and IT managers of selected craft enterprises. Based on the results of the survey, hypotheses about the use of information technologies were derived. Based on these hypotheses, inter-dependencies of craft enterprises are presented and justified regarding the use of BIS, the actuality of the hardware, the requirements to branch-specific IT solutions, the measures taken toward data pro-tection and data security and the visibility on the Internet. As a result of the preliminary study it can be stated that a widely heterogeneous IT landscape as well as good IT competence can be found in the enterprises involved

Observational Challenges for the Standard FLRW Model

We summarise some of the main observational challenges for the standard Friedmann-Lemaitre-Robertson-Walker cosmological model and describe how results recently presented in the parallel session `Large--scale Structure and Statistics' (DE3) at the `Fourteenth Marcel Grossman Meeting on General Relativity' are related to these challenges.Comment: 17 pages; references added. Matches published version in Int. J. Mod. Phys. D; Report on Parallel Session DE3 of MG1

Critical Exponents of the Superconducting Phase Transition

We study the critical exponents of the superconducting phase transition in the context of renormalization group theory starting from a dual formulation of the Ginzburg-Landau theory. The dual formulation describes a loop gas of Abrikosov flux tubes which proliferate when the critical temperature is approached from below. In contrast to the Ginzburg-Landau theory, it has a spontaneously broken global symmetry and possesses an infrared stable fixed point. The exponents coincide with those of a superfluid with reversed temperature axis.Comment: Postscript file. For related work see www adress http://www.physik.fu-berlin.de/kleiner_re.html in our homepage http://www.physik.fu-berlin.de/kleinert.htm

Dual description of the superconducting phase transition

The dual approach to the Ginzburg-Landau theory of a Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer superconductor is reviewed. The dual theory describes a grand canonical ensemble of fluctuating closed magnetic vortices, of arbitrary length and shape, which interact with a massive vector field representing the local magnetic induction. When the critical temperature is approached from below, the magnetic vortices proliferate. This is signaled by the disorder field, which describes the loop gas, developing a non-zero expectation value in the normal conducting phase. It thereby breaks a {\it global} U(1) symmetry. The ensuing Goldstone field is the magnetic scalar potential. The superconducting-to-normal phase transition is studied by applying renormalization group theory to the dual formulation. In the regime of a second-order transition, the critical exponents are given by those of a superfluid with a reversed temperature axis.Comment: Latex + Postscript file

Normative Intercorrelations Between EEG Microstate Characteristics.

EEG microstates are brief, recurring periods of stable brain activity that reflect the activation of large-scale neural networks. The temporal characteristics of these microstates, including their average duration, number of occurrences, and percentage contribution have been shown to serve as biomarkers of mental and neurological disorders. However, little is known about how microstate characteristics of prototypical network types relate to each other. Normative intercorrelations among these parameters are necessary to help researchers better understand the functions and interactions of underlying networks, interpret and relate results, and generate new hypotheses. Here, we present a systematic analysis of intercorrelations between EEG microstate characteristics in a large sample representative of western working populations (n = 583). Notably, we find that microstate duration is a general characteristic that varies across microstate types. Further, microstate A and B show mutual reinforcement, indicating a relationship between auditory and visual sensory processing at rest. Microstate C appears to play a special role, as it is associated with longer durations of all other microstate types and increased global field power, suggesting a relationship of these parameters with the anterior default mode network. All findings could be confirmed using independent EEG recordings from a retest-session (n = 542)

On convex lower-level black-box constraints in bilevel optimization with an application to gas market models with chance constraints

Bilevel optimization is an increasingly important tool to model hierarchical decision making. However, the ability of modeling such settings makes bilevel problems hard to solve in theory and practice. In this paper, we add on the general difficulty of this class of problems by further incorporating convex black-box constraints in the lower level. For this setup, we develop a cutting-plane algorithm that computes approximate bilevel-feasible points. We apply this method to a bilevel model of the European gas market in which we use a joint chance constraint to model uncertain loads. Since the chance constraint is not available in closed form, this fits into the black-box setting studied before. For the applied model, we use further problem-specific insights to derive bounds on the objective value of the bilevel problem. By doing so, we are able to show that we solve the application problem to approximate global optimality. In our numerical case study we are thus able to evaluate the welfare sensitivity in dependence of the achieved safety level of uncertain load coverage

On the Reliability of the EEG Microstate Approach.

EEG microstates represent functional brain networks observable in resting EEG recordings that remain stable for 40-120ms before rapidly switching into another network. It is assumed that microstate characteristics (i.e., durations, occurrences, percentage coverage, and transitions) may serve as neural markers of mental and neurological disorders and psychosocial traits. However, robust data on their retest-reliability are needed to provide the basis for this assumption. Furthermore, researchers currently use different methodological approaches that need to be compared regarding their consistency and suitability to produce reliable results. Based on an extensive dataset largely representative of western societies (2 days with two resting EEG measures each; day one: n = 583; day two: n = 542) we found good to excellent short-term retest-reliability of microstate durations, occurrences, and coverages (average ICCs = 0.874-0.920). There was good overall long-term retest-reliability of these microstate characteristics (average ICCs = 0.671-0.852), even when the interval between measures was longer than half a year, supporting the longstanding notion that microstate durations, occurrences, and coverages represent stable neural traits. Findings were robust across different EEG systems (64 vs. 30 electrodes), recording lengths (3 vs. 2 min), and cognitive states (before vs. after experiment). However, we found poor retest-reliability of transitions. There was good to excellent consistency of microstate characteristics across clustering procedures (except for transitions), and both procedures produced reliable results. Grand-mean fitting yielded more reliable results compared to individual fitting. Overall, these findings provide robust evidence for the reliability of the microstate approach

A path integral approach to the dynamics of a random chain with rigid constraints

In this work the dynamics of a freely jointed random chain which fluctuates at constant temperature in some viscous medium is studied. The chain is regarded as a system of small particles which perform a brownian motion and are subjected to rigid constraints which forbid the breaking of the chain. For simplicity, all interactions among the particles have been switched off and the number of dimensions has been limited to two. The problem of describing the fluctuations of the chain in the limit in which it becomes a continuous system is solved using a path integral approach, in which the constraints are imposed with the insertion in the path integral of suitable Dirac delta functions. It is shown that the probability distribution of the possible conformations in which the fluctuating chain can be found during its evolution in time coincides with the partition function of a field theory which is a generalization of the nonlinear sigma model in two dimensions. Both the probability distribution and the generating functional of the correlation functions of the positions of the beads are computed explicitly in a semiclassical approximation for a ring-shaped chain.Comment: 36 pages, 2 figures, LaTeX + REVTeX4 + graphicx, minor changes in the text, reference adde