6,230 research outputs found
Simulating the Global Environment: The British Government’s Response to 'the Limits to Growth'
‘No Solution to the Immediate Crisis’: The Uncertain Political Economy of Energy Conservation in 1970s Britain
This article traces one aspect of Britain's approach to the political economy of energy conservation. It focuses on the forecasting work of Royal Dutch Shell and the deliberations of the Heath government. In the late 1960s, the oil major Shell predicted that oil-producing states would impose an embargo on oil-consuming states. Energy conservation policies would be necessary. In tracing the reception of Shell's ‘crisis’ scenario and its proposed resolution, this article details how these ideas were received by Edward Heath's Conservative government, particularly its ‘think-tank’, the Central Policy Review Staff. In the short term, interventionist policies were proposed so as to demonstrate Britain's ability to operate without ever-increasing oil consumption, while in the long term the idea was that the energy-saving capacities of a freely-operating market could address the problem. The article recounts the confusion these proposed conservation policies provoked, and how the second idea gradually coalesced and ultimately outlasted the Heath government, providing one justification for the eventual privatisation of Britain's formerly nationalised energy industries
Thermal expansion of the spin-1/2 Heisenberg-chain compound Cu(CHN)(NO)
Compounds containing magnetic subsystems representing simple model spin
systems with weak magnetic coupling constants are ideal candidates to test
theoretical predictions for the generic behavior close to quantum phase
transitions. We present measurements of the thermal expansion and
magnetostriction of the spin-1/2-chain compound copper pyrazine dinitrate
Cu(CHN)(NO). Of particular interest is the low-temperature
thermal expansion close to the saturation field ,
which defines a quantum phase transition from the gapless Luttinger liquid
state to the fully saturated state with a finite excitation gap. We observe a
sign change of the thermal expansion for the different ground states, and at
the quantum critical point the low-temperature expansion approaches a
divergence. Thus, our data agree very well with the expected
quantum critical behaviour.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures; to appear in the proceedings of the ICM 09 held
in Karlsruhe, German
Price Formation under Small Numbers Competition: Evidence from Land Auctions in Singapore
This paper examines the price formation process under small numbers competition using data from Singapore land auctions. The theory predicts that bid prices are less than the zero-profit asset value in these first-price sealed-bid auctions. The model also shows that expected sales price increases with the number of bidders both because each bidder has an incentive to offer a higher price and because of a greater likelihood that a high-value bidder is present. The empirical estimates are consistent with auction theory and show that the standard land attributes are reflected in auction prices as expected. Working Paper No. 04-0
Understanding evidence-based thermal care in the low birth weight neonate: Part 1: An overview of principles and current practice
Neonates are at a high risk of temperature loss. Those born at less than 30 weeks' gestation should be placed in a plastic bag or wrapped immediately at birth, drying the head and putting on a hat, while maintaining routine precautions, such as warming the delivery room, pre-warming surfaces and eliminating draughts. Environmental humidity greater than 50 per cent is required, with up to 85 per cent for extreme prematurity, subject to individual assessment. Using regular or, ideally, continuous monitoring, the child's central (core) body temperature should be maintained at 36.7-37.3 degrees C with a core-peripheral difference, if measured, of 0.5-1 degrees C. Stabilised newborns can be transferred from an incubator into an unheated bassinet or open cot at an optimum weight of > 1.6kg, however individual assessment of each neonate is essential before transferring out of the incubator. In the absence of sufficient research, fully evidence-based recommendations cannot be made and individual unit protocols should be followed with careful clinical judgement. In resource-limited settings--in developing countries around the globe, for example--staff should be trained in simple resuscitation techniques, with keeping newborns warm as a key objective.Peer reviewedFinal Accepted Versio
b anti-b Higgs production at the LHC: Yukawa corrections and the leading Landau singularity
At tree-level Higgs production in association with a b-quark pair proceeds
through the small Yukawa bottom coupling in the Standard Model. Even in the
limit where this coupling vanishes, electroweak one-loop effects, through the
top-Higgs Yukawa coupling in particular, can still trigger this reaction. This
contribution is small for Higgs masses around 120GeV but it quickly picks up
for higher Higgs masses especially because the one-loop amplitude develops a
leading Landau singularity and new thresholds open up. These effects can be
viewed as the production of a pair of top quarks which rescatter to give rise
to Higgs production through WW fusion. We study the leading Landau singularity
in detail. Since this singularity is not integrable when the one-loop amplitude
is squared, we regulate the cross section by taking into account the width of
the internal top and W particles. This requires that we extend the usual box
one-loop function to the case of imaginary masses. We show how this can be
implemented analytically in our case. We study in some detail the cross section
at the LHC as a function of the Higgs mass and show how some distributions can
be drastically affected compared to the tree-level result.Comment: 48 pages, 20 figures. Phys.Rev.D accepted version. Conclusions
unchanged, minor changes and references adde
Catholics in a changing Scotland: the Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh, 1878-1965
Between 1878 and 1965, the Catholic Church in Scotland changed from a small,
reclusive and relatively unassertive community to become a force to be reckoned with in
social and political terms. The thesis (the first to be based on a thorough examination of the
episcopal correspondence of St Andrews and Edinburgh 1878-1965 held in the Scottish
Catholic Archives, Edinburgh), argues that this change was caused by the combination of
two momentous but unexpected and unconnected events in the 1850s and after — first, the
arrival in Scotland of large numbers of economic migrants from Ireland (most of them
Catholics) and second, the conversion (through the influence of John Henry Newman) of
influential members of the Scottish aristocracy. The former were mainly confined to what is
today the geographically small but very densely populated province of Glasgow, the latter, to
the geographically more extensive province of St Andrews and Edinburgh, where Irish
migrants, much fewer in numbers, integrated more successfully. While Irish migration has
been extensively studied by scholars, the conversion of the aristocracy has, with some
notable exceptions, remained unappreciated. The thesis contends that it was principally the
simultaneous impact of these two phenomena which accounted for the development of the
Catholic community in modern Scotland; that it was not only the critical mass of migrants
which gave the Catholic Church political leverage but also the networking skills and the
funds ofthe convert elites. Other changes in the Catholic Church were subsumed into this
larger picture: the role of the clergy was transformed from a pastoral one in 1886 to a
combative one in the 1930s and 1940s, while at the same time shifting vis-a-vis the laity
(who were themselves moving from subjugation to co-responsibility). The thesis, however,
deals not only with the secular clergy but also with the activities of religious orders — the
important national provincial Council of Fort Augustus (1886), for example, and the
consecration in 1929 of the dynamic Benedictine Abbot Andrew J. McDonald as Archbishop
of St Andrews and Edinburgh. By 1918, the virtual collapse of the Catholic school system
played into the hands of the government; the resulting financial compromise was mutually
beneficial but its price (while it affirmed the Catholic community by providing the
educational tools for better employment opportunities), was the loss of autonomy and
control. After a series of financial scandals in the 1880s and other examples of
mismanagement in the first two decades of the twentieth century, episcopal and parish
finances gradually recovered as stricter safeguards were imposed. Between the first and
second Vatican Councils a sea-change is visible, not only in the relationship between pope
and bishop but also between clergy and laity. The pressure of social and political events
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gradually transformed the hierarchical pyramid that was the Catholic Church of 1878 into
the more egalitarian model of the People of God as embraced in 1965 by the Second Vatican
Council
THREE NEW NEPENTHES FROM SULAWESI TENGAH
Three new high mountain forest taxa of Nepenthaceae are described from Central Sulawesi. The new species are Nepenthes glabratus, N. hamatus and N. infundibuliformis. Existing material at Herbarium Bogoriense indicated that all three are widespread in Central Sulawes
Towards Ecologically Sustainable Management of the Torres Strait Prawn Fishery. CRC Torres Strait Task T1.5 – Final Report
This publication, which is the final report to the Torres Strait Cooperative Research Centre, provides an overview of all the research that was conducted as part of the Torres Strait CRC Task 1.5 - Towards Ecologically Sustainable Management of the Torres Strait Prawn Fishery
The objectives of the task were:
To develop cost-effective protocols to monitor and quantify the bycatch and environmental impacts of commercial prawn trawling.
To monitor the status of target species using both fishery dependent and fishery independent data.
To develop biological reference points for target species and undertake management strategy evaluation, in particular a risk assessment of fishing at various levels of fishing mortality.
This report focuses on the second component of objective 1 and details a comparative analysis of bycatch samples collected from areas of the Torres Strait that were both closed and open to prawn trawl fishing. The report also reviews the research conducted in relation to objectives 2 and 3 which are detailed in a separate report, Stock Assessment of the Torres Strait Tiger Prawn Fishery (Penaeus esculentus)
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