Analytical Model for the Optical Functions of Indium Gallium Nitride with Application to Thin Film Solar Photovoltaic Cells

This paper presents the preliminary results of optical characterization using spectroscopic ellipsometry of wurtzite indium gallium nitride (InxGa1-xN) thin films with medium indium content (0.38<x<0.68) that were deposited on silicon dioxide using plasma-enhanced evaporation. A Kramers-Kronig consistent parametric analytical model using Gaussian oscillators to describe the absorption spectra has been developed to extract the real and imaginary components of the dielectric function ({\epsilon}1, {\epsilon}2) of InxGa1-xN films. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) images are presented to examine film microstructure and verify film thicknesses determined from ellipsometry modelling. This fitting procedure, model, and parameters can be employed in the future to extract physical parameters from ellipsometric data from other InxGa1-xN films

The Reaction of Stock Prices to Unanticipated Changes in Money

This paper investigates the short-run effect of unexpected changes in the weekly money stock on common stock prices. Survey data on money market participants' forecasts of money changes are employed to construct the measure of unanticipated movements in the money stock. The results indicate that an unexpected increase in money depresses stock prices and, consistent with the efficient markets hypothesis, only the unexpected part of the weekly money announcement causes stock price fluctuations. The October 1979 change in Federal Reserve operating procedures appears to have made stock prices somewhat more sensitive to large money surprises.

Firm Characteristics, Unanticipated Inflation, and Stock Returns

This paper re-examines the effects of nominal contracts on the relationship between unanticipated inflation and individual stock's rate of return. This study differs in three main ways from previous research. First, announced inflation data are used to examine the effects of unanticipated inflation. Second, a different specification is used to obtain more efficient estimates. Third, additional nominal contracts are considered. The empirical results indicate that time-varying firm characteristics related to inflation predominately determine the effect of unanticipated inflation on a stock's rate of return. A firm's debt-equity ratio appears to be particularly important in determining the response.

Three-leg correlations in the two component spanning tree on the upper half-plane

We present a detailed asymptotic analysis of correlation functions for the two component spanning tree on the two-dimensional lattice when one component contains three paths connecting vicinities of two fixed lattice sites at large distance $s$ apart. We extend the known result for correlations on the plane to the case of the upper half-plane with closed and open boundary conditions. We found asymptotics of correlations for distance $r$ from the boundary to one of the fixed lattice sites for the cases $r\gg s \gg 1$ and $s \gg r \gg 1$.Comment: 16 pages, 5 figure

Violence, power and participation: Building citizenship in contexts of chronic violence.

YesThis paper is about civil society participation in two contexts of chronic violence: Colombia and Guatemala. It explores the extent to which civil society organisations can build citizenship in such contexts and simultaneously address violence. It argues that civil society organisations can play a vital role in building citizenship and confronting violent actors and acts of violence. However, in order to address chronic, perpetuating violence and interrupt its transmission through time and space, it is important to clarify the relationship between power and violence. Conventional forms of dominating power correlate with violence. Loss of such power or a bid to gain it can lead to violence, particularly where social constructions of masculinity are affirmed by such behaviour. The paper asks whether the promotion of non-dominating forms of power are needed if we are to tackle the damaging effects on human relationships and progress of willingness to inflict direct physical hurt on the Other. Non-dominating forms of power focus on enhancing everyone¿s power potential and capacity for action and promoting communication. If non-violence and non-dominating power gradually become the social norm, this might enhance citizenship and participation in ways that tackle other forms of violence, such as structural violence

BioMEMS Wireless Pressure Sensor

A design and manufacture of a wireless pressure sensor was proposed as a future tool for use in biological monitoring. This device is designed to acquire pressure changes through a change in capacitance. This is accomplished using a large circular parallel plate capacitor separated by a micron of air. The upper and lower plates are connected together via a large planar inductor on the opposite end of the device. The inductor and capacitor in a parallel form a resonant circuit with resonant frequency equal to one over the square root of inductance times capacitance. The resonant frequency can be dependent on both the inductance and capacitance changes. Since the inductance is fixed, the resonant frequency should change with respect to the capacitance. The capacitance will change as the pressure changes and therefore pressure can be measured through frequency. In the process of manufacturing this device, many unforeseen problems arose resulting in structural and design failures. These problems along with their discovered solutions will be addressed

The Role of Tumor and Tumor Microenvironment on Breast Cancer-Associated Adipocyte Plasticity

Cancer-associated cachexia is a condition defined by a sustained net-negative energy imbalance. Although the different types of adipose tissue – white, beige, and brown – have been implicated in contributing to cancer-associated cachexia, the mechanisms of these maladaptive changes and their impact on whole-body energy expenditure have not been fully elucidated. Using breast cancer as our model, we demonstrate white adipose tissue browning in murine and human breast cancer; furthermore, we demonstrate that this effect is extremely localized and takes place early in tumor progression. We utilized in vitro cell culture techniques and demonstrate that cancer secreted factors and cross-talk with white adipocytes decrease expression of classic white adipose tissue-related genes. We also demonstrate in murine and human culture models that cancer secreted factors reduce white adipocyte lipid droplet size, and cross-talk between cancer cells and adipocytes results in an increase in lipolysis-related gene expression. Interestingly, our results strongly suggest that in mice, neither cancer secreted factors nor cross talk with adipocytes can induce white adipose tissue browning, indicate that this process likely occurs independently of direct cancer interactions with local white adipocytes. We demonstrate that interleukin 6, a cytokine with previous implications in white adipose tissue browning, induces interleukin 6-mediated signaling; however, that signaling alone is not enough to directly induce white adipose tissue browning. We present preliminary data suggesting that immune cell population shifts within the white adipose tissue of mice with breast cancer tumors may be source of white adipose tissue browning. We show that the Virginia Commonwealth University Health System has an identifiable population of patients with cancer with what we hypothesize as maladaptive thermogenic adipose tissue activity, and discuss ongoing experiments aimed at understanding the implications of these changes on whole body energy expenditure in human patients. Lastly, in a case of autoimmune diabetes mellitus in the setting of an extra-adrenal paraganglioma, we demonstrate that the interaction between cancer and whole-body metabolism is multifaceted. Together, these experiments demonstrate that adipose tissue plasticity occurs in breast cancer (and other cancers), and that different drivers for individual changes exist within the tumor microenvironment. We predict that further exploration of the exact mechanisms and translational implications will provide useful information to lead to new therapeutic treatments for patients with cancer-associated cachexia

Refined conformal spectra in the dimer model

Working with Lieb's transfer matrix for the dimer model, we point out that the full set of dimer configurations may be partitioned into disjoint subsets (sectors) closed under the action of the transfer matrix. These sectors are labelled by an integer or half-integer quantum number we call the variation index. In the continuum scaling limit, each sector gives rise to a representation of the Virasoro algebra. We determine the corresponding conformal partition functions and their finitizations, and observe an intriguing link to the Ramond and Neveu-Schwarz sectors of the critical dense polymer model as described by a conformal field theory with central charge c=-2.Comment: 44 page

A case of lactic acidosis complicating assessment and management of asthma.

RIGHTS : This article is licensed under the BioMed Central licence at http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/license which is similar to the 'Creative Commons Attribution Licence'. In brief you may : copy, distribute, and display the work; make derivative works; or make commercial use of the work - under the following conditions: the original author must be given credit; for any reuse or distribution, it must be made clear to others what the license terms of this work are.INTRODUCTION: Lactic acidosis often occurs in severely unwell patients presenting to Accident and Emergency. It is commonly associated with either hypoxia or decreased tissue perfusion secondary due to cardiovascular collapse or sepsis. CASE PRESENTATION: We present a case of severe lactic acidosis in the presence of normal tissue perfusion and oxygenation in a 31-year-old patient with poorly-controlled asthma. Acidosis promptly reversed on discontinuation of inhaled beta-agonists. CONCLUSION: Lactic acidosis secondary to inhaled beta-agonist administration may be a common scenario which can be misinterpreted very easily and can confuse the clinical picture. Further studies will be needed to establish the exact aetiology of this lactic acid production