Cheeger's energy on the Harmonic Sierpinski Gasket

Koskela and Zhou have proven that, on the harmonic Sierpinski gasket with Kusuoka's measure, the "natural" Dirichlet form coincides with Cheeger's energy. We give a different proof of this result, which uses the properties of the Lyapounov exponent of the gasket

Decays of the f0(1370) scalar glueball candidate in pp Central Exclusive Production (CEP) and in antiproton annihilations at rest

Decays into two charged pions of the f0(1370) are the main source of an isolated structure localized between 1.2 and 1.5 GeV in the two charged pions mass spectrum measured in pp Central Exclusive Production (CEP) at 200 GeV at very low four momentum transfer ltl by the STAR experiment. These data confirm in the two charged pions decay channel the existence of the f0(1370) as an isolated well identified structure previously observed in K+K-, KsKs, 4 charged pions, two charged and two neutral pions and 4 neutral pions decays measured in antiproton annihilations at rest. The ensemble of these data point at a high gluon content of the f0(1370). CEP interactions at higher energies favour production of 0++ and 2++ mesons. Selection of events with lower ltl at both proton vertices suppresses 2++ structures. LHC runs dedicated to pp CEP measurements at low ltl could then provide a unique source of all the low energy scalars. This would make it clear if and where scalar gluonium is resident and the nature (composition in terms of quarks, antiquarks and gluons) of f0(500), f0(980), f0(1370), f0(1500) and f0(1710).Comment: 8 pages, 5 figures, presented at QCD@Work-International Workshop on QCD Theory and Experiment, 25-28 June 2018, Matera, Italy (to be published in Proceedings). arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1809.0449

Why do scientists create academic spin-offs? The influence of the context

The aim of this work is to examine the nature of academic spin-offs in a specific context: the Emilia-Romagna region (Italy). More specifically we investigate the individual reasons as to explain why scientists create academic spin-offs and how the creation process unfolds. Most economics and management literature on the topic considers the technological characteristics of such a choice, although recently the individual motivations behind the creation of such ventures have been investigated. However, less attention has been paid to the social and contextual dimensions of the matter. This study relates contextual characteristics to individual motivation. In particular it is argued that the funding constraints of the Italian academic environment, the low level of demand for doctorate holders within the Italian public and private sectors and the presence of favourable supporting policy tools in the region analysed, play a fundamental role in shaping the individual motivation of scientists in choosing this option. By way of a multiple case study research this work provides evidence that the academic spin-off in Emilia-Romagna is, for young scientists, a way to escape the bottlenecks of the Italian academic system allowing them to work in their field of expertise. This paper builds on the research regarding individual reasoning underlying personal decisions to create an academic spin-off and the need to analyse the phenomenon in relation to its context. Finally some policy implications are put forth

Innovation Diffusion and the Evolution of Regional Disparities

An important part of modern theory on regional disparities identifies in the innovative activities the source of competitive advantage and, consequently, of the observed differences in economic development. However, since differently from a standard physical factor of production, knowledge can be used in many different places and many productions at the same time, innovation is the basic but not the only feature of the process: an essential role is also played by imitation, the acquisition of external knowledge through devoted efforts, and diffusion, the non costly acquisition of external knowledge. If, for example, the diffusion of technology were instantaneous and not protected by any form of patenting, the physical place in which innovation takes place would be irrelevant. Since knowledge is instead 'sticky', the innovative region get an advantage, but the extent of this advantage still depends on the easiness of diffusion. This mechanism of knowledge creation and diffusion has been affected by two important changes: the first one is the ‘technological revolution’, as some scholars called the process that, in the past century, changed innovation from being the outcome of initiatives of single entrepreneurs, to the outcome of specifically designed R&D departments of the firms; this has determined an increase in the innovation pace. The second change is the recent fast development of new means of communications, called ICTs, which have made easier, faster and cheaper the transfer of blueprinted knowledge across places. This is determining an increase in the speed of diffusion of knowledge, even if, in order to use it, it is always necessary to have people able to understand and implement it. This article investigates the effect that the interaction between the creation and the diffusion of technology brings on regional disparities. We will show that an increase in the pace of innovation, as the one that took place in the XXth century, can engender regional income disparities; we will also show that if, afterwards, the speed of diffusion also increases enough, these disparities can fade out. We will not, at this stage, guess which effect will prevail. To analyse the problem, we will first build a simple model with technological disparities as the source of income disparities and a set up aimed at representing all knowledge flows. The basic model will then be used in two different ways for the study of innovation and diffusion mechanisms. We will show that the most important variable to determine if income disparities exist is the ratio between the speed of diffusion and the speed of innovation. In particular, when this ratio is low, the most likely prediction is an equilibrium with both technological and income disparities. For intermediate values, technological disparities will exist, but will not be large enough to generate income disparities; for higher values, there will not be technological disparities anymore and, consequently, no income disparities.

The Public Sector Premium and the Gender Gap in Latin America: Evidence from the 1980s and 1990s

This paper exploits a rich collection of household surveys to investigate the wage differential between the public and private sectors in 17 Latin American countries during the 1980s and 1990s. The paper also studies how the sector of employment affects the gender wage gap. The paper finds very small premia for male workers and large and significant premia for female workers. The paper also finds that, on average, Latin American women earn 30 percent less than men with similar skills and that approximately one third of this gender gap results from lack of access to formal sector employment.

Marrying in the Cathedral: a Framework for the Analysis of Corporate Governance

The firm can be seen as a centralization of market transactions and as a decentralization of a public ordering which allows the management of joint liabilities. The paper advances the view that the main reason for the firm’s existence is the unification and the internalization of liabilities. From this perspective, Coase's and Fuller's contributions to the theory of the firm can be married within the architecture of Calabresi's Cathedral. Because of specific (dis)investments, fundamental transformations from competition to managed bilateral monopoly take place either in the public or the private sphere and provide an explanation for the ultimate nature of the firm