Polyether-polyester graft copolymer

Described is a polyether graft polymer having improved solvent resistance and crystalline thermally reversible crosslinks. The copolymer is prepared by a novel process of anionic copolymerization. These polymers exhibit good solvent resistance and are well suited for aircraft parts. Previous aromatic polyethers, also known as polyphenylene oxides, have certain deficiencies which detract from their usefulness. These commercial polymers are often soluble in common solvents including the halocarbon and aromatic hydrocarbon types of paint thinners and removers. This limitation prevents the use of these polyethers in structural articles requiring frequent painting. In addition, the most popular commercially available polyether is a very high melting plastic. This makes it considerably more difficult to fabricate finished parts from this material. These problems are solved by providing an aromatic polyether graft copolymer with improved solvent resistance and crystalline thermally reversible crosslinks. The graft copolymer is formed by converting the carboxyl groups of a carboxylated polyphenylene oxide polymer to ionic carbonyl groups in a suitable solvent, reacting pivalolactone with the dissolved polymer, and adding acid to the solution to produce the graft copolymer

Constructivist and Ecological Rationality in Economics

When we leave our closet, and engage in the common affairs of life, (reason's) conclusions seem to vanish, like the phantoms of the night on the appearance of the morning; and 'tis difficult for us to retain even that conviction, which we had attained with difficulty (Hume, 1739/, p 507). we must constantly adjust our lives, our thoughts and our emotions, in order to live simultaneously within different kinds of orders according to different rules. If we were to apply the unmodified, uncurbed rules (of caring intervention to do visible 'good') of the small band or troop, or our families to the (extended order of cooperation through markets), as our instincts and sentimental yearnings often make us wish to do, we would destroy it. Yet if we were to always apply the (noncooperative) rules of the extended order to our more intimate groupings, we would crush them. (Hayek, 1988, p 18). (Italics are his, parenthetical reductions are mine).behavioral economics; experimental economics

Rise of Kp Total Cross Section and Universality

The increase of the measured hadronic total cross sections at the highest energies is empirically described by squared log of center-of-mass energy sqrt s as sigma(tot)= B (log s)2, consistent with the energy dependence of the Froissart unitarity bound. The coefficient B is argued to have a universal value, but this is not proved directly from QCD. In the previous tests of this universality, the p(pbar)p, pi p, and K p forward scatterings were analyzed independently and found to be consistent with B(pp) = B(pip) = B(Kp), although the determined value of B(Kp) had large uncertainty. In the present work, we have further analyzed forward Kp scattering to obtain a more exact value of B(Kp). Making use of continuous moment sum rules(CMSR) we have fully exploited the information of low-energy scattering data to predict the high-energy behavior of the amplitude hrough duality. The estimation of B(Kp) is improved remarkably, and our result strongly supports the universality of B.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figure

Integration of overseas-trained doctors into the Australian medical workforce

The document attached has been archived with permission from the editor of the Medical Journal of Australia. An external link to the publisher’s copy is included. See page 7 of PDF for this item.Linsey S Hart, Jane Vernon-Robert

FAIRNESS AND SHORT RUN PRICE ADJUSTMENT IN POSTED OFFER MARKETS

Questionnaire studies show that perceptions of fairness cause people to resist price increases following abrupt changes in conditions with no cost justification. We examine this hypothesis in posted-offer markets extending previous work. Consistent with the hypothesis, in the profit disclosure (fairness) treatment prices are initially below those in the cost and the no disclosure treatments. Over time prices converge in all treatments to the competitive surplus maximizing equilibrium. Fairness is thus interpreted as being a result of expectations that are not sustainable. Expectations adapt as the market converges to the predicted competitive equilibrium.

Gross domestic product and its components in recessions

The recent economic crisis – already deservedly labeled the ‘great recession’ – continues to plague the health of the economy as a whole and has motivated us to probe its characteristic features and compare it to the typical economic downturn. Events during the boom and crash have been sharply delineated, progressing from (1) an unprecedented housing price bubble from 1997 to 2006, (2) rapid house price decline beginning early in 2007, (3) freezing of credit markets in August 2007, (4) rapid declines in equities prices and economic output by the middle of 2008, and (5) deterioration of the financial system in 2008 and an aggressive and unprecedented Federal Reserve intervention in the fall of 2008. This sequence of events has provided a fresh perspective with which to examine past economic cycles, and, we believe, is likely to change how economists, policy makers, investors, and others think about monetary policy, housing cycles, and business cycles. We find that eleven of the most recent fourteen economic downturns in the U.S. – from the great depression that began in 1929 to the great recession starting in late 2007 – were led by declines in housing investment. In these eleven downturns, housing investment declined before any other major component of GDP and its total decline before and during the recession was larger in percentage terms than the decline in any other major sector. In the 1945 recession – one of the three recessions in which housing was not implicated – national defense expenditures fell while all major components of private expenditure rose. The other two – in 1937-38 and 2001 – resulted primarily from declines in non-residential fixed investment that preceded and exceeded declines in any other major component of GDP. Figure 1 shows the percentage of GDP contributed by housing expenditures over the past 81 years. Although housing is not a large component of GDP – which may explain its limited role in accounts of recessions – it is volatile, it has declined before almost every recession, it has rarely declined substantially without a recession following soon afterward, and the extent of its decline emerges as a good predictor of the depth and duration of the recession that follows.2 In addition to its role as a leading indicator, and its volatility over the business cycle, housing investment has recovered faster than any other sector of the economy in every recession since 1921, with the single exception of the 1980 recession, which lasted only 12 months.

Exploring modality switching effects in negated sentences: further evidence for grounded representations

Theories of embodied cognition (e.g., Perceptual Symbol Systems Theory; Barsalou, 1999, 2009) suggest that modality specific simulations underlie the representation of concepts. Supporting evidence comes from modality switch costs: participants are slower to verify a property in one modality (e.g., auditory, BLENDER-loud) after verifying a property in a different modality (e.g., gustatory, CRANBERRIES-tart) compared to the same modality (e.g., LEAVES-rustling, Pecher et al., 2003). Similarly, modality switching costs lead to a modulation of the N400 effect in event-related potentials (ERPs; Collins et al., 2011; Hald et al., 2011). This effect of modality switching has also been shown to interact with the veracity of the sentence (Hald et al., 2011). The current ERP study further explores the role of modality match/mismatch on the processing of veracity as well as negation (sentences containing “not”). Our results indicate a modulation in the ERP based on modality and veracity, plus an interaction. The evidence supports the idea that modality specific simulations occur during language processing, and furthermore suggest that these simulations alter the processing of negation

Isotropic thin-walled pressure vessel experiment

The objectives are: (1) to investigate the stress and strain distributions on the surface of a thin walled cylinder subject to internal pressure and/or axial load; and (2) to relate stress and strain distributions to material properties and cylinder geometry. The experiment, supplies, and procedure are presented