Suggested hurricane operational scenario for GOES I-M

Improvements in tropical cyclone forecasts require optimum use of remote sensing capabilities, because conventional data sources cannot provide the necessary spatial and temporal data density over tropical and subtropical oceanic regions. In 1989, the first of a series of geostationary weather satellites, GOES 1-M, will be launched with the capability for simultaneous imaging and sounding. Careful scheduling of the GOES 1-M will enable measurements of both the wind and mass fields over the entire tropical cyclone activity area. The document briefly describes the GOES 1-M imager and sounder, surveys the data needs for hurricane forecasting, discusses how geostationary satellite observations help to meet them, and proposes a GOES 1-M schedule of observations and hurricane relevant derived products

How linear features alter predator movement and the functional\ud response

In areas of oil and gas exploration, seismic lines have been reported to alter the movement patterns of wolves (Canis lupus). We developed a mechanistic first passage time model, based on an anisotropic elliptic partial differential equation, and used this to explore how wolf movement responses to seismic lines influence the encounter rate of the wolves with their prey. The model was parametrized using 5 min GPS location data. These data showed that wolves travelled faster on seismic lines and had a higher probability of staying on a seismic line once they were on it. We simulated wolf movement on a range of seismic line densities and drew implications for the rate of predator–prey interactions as described by the functional response. The functional response exhibited a more than linear increase with respect to prey density (type III) as well as interactions with seismic line density. Encounter rates were significantly higher in landscapes with high seismic line density and were most pronounced at low prey densities. This suggests that prey at low population densities are at higher risk in environments with a high seismic line density unless they learn to avoid them

Many-Body Electrostatic Forces Between Colloidal Particles at Vanishing Ionic Strength

Electrostatic forces between small groups of colloidal particles are measured using blinking optical tweezers. When the electrostatic screening length is significantly larger than the particle radius, forces are found to be non-pairwise additive. Both pair and multi-particle forces are well described by the linearized Poisson-Boltzmann equation with constant potential boundary conditions. These findings may play an important role in understanding the structure and stability of a wide variety of systems, from micron-sized particles in oil to aqueous nanocolloids.Comment: 5 pages 2 figure

Chevron\u27s Domain

The Supreme Court\u27s decision in Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Counsel, Inc. dramatically expanded the circumstances in which courts must defer to agency interpretations of statutes. The idea that deference on questions of law is sometimes required was not new. Prior to Chevron, however, courts were said to have such a duty only when Congress expressly delegates authority to an agency to define a statutory term or prescribe a method of executing a statutory provision. Outside this narrow context, whether courts would defer to an agency\u27s legal interpretation depended upon multiple factors that courts evaluated in light of the circumstances of each case. In other words, deference was not mandatory, but was grounded in the exercise of judicial discretion. Chevron expanded the sphere of mandatory deference through one simple shift in doctrine: It posited that courts have a duty to defer to reasonable agency interpretations not only when Congress expressly delegates interpretative authority to an agency, but also when Congress is silent or leaves ambiguity in a statute that an agency is charged with administering. The Court in Chevron blandly referred to such gaps and ambiguities as implied delegations of interpretative authority and treated these implied delegations as equivalent to express delegations. Chevron\u27s equation of gaps and ambiguities with express delegations turned the doctrine of mandatory deference, formerly an isolated pocket of administrative law doctrine, into a ubiquitous formula governing court-agency relations. With this one small doctrinal shift, the Court effected a fundamental transformation in the relationship between courts and agencies under administrative law

Making Coasean Property More Coasean

In his pioneering work on transaction costs, Ronald Coase presupposed a picture of property as a bundle of government-prescribed use rights. Not only is this picture not essential to Coase’s purpose, but its limitations emerge when we apply Coase’s central insights to analyze the structure of property itself. This leads to the Coase corollary: in a world of zero transaction costs, the nature of property does not matter to allocative efficiency. However, as with the Coase theorem, the real implication is for our world of positive transaction costs: we need to subject the notion of property to a comparative institutional analysis. Because transaction costs are positive, property is initially defined in terms of things, uses are grouped under exclusion rights, and in rem rights are widely employed. A more thoroughly Coasean approach points back to a picture of property more like the traditional one furnished by the law

The Property/Contract Interface

This Article explores the distinction between in personam contract rights and in rem property rights. It presents a functional explanation for why the legal system utilizes these two modalities of rights, grounded in the pattern of information costs associated with each modality. To test this theory, the Article examines four legal institutions that fall along the property/contract interface – bailments, landlord-tenant law, security interests, and trusts – in order to determine how the legal doctrine varies as the underlying situation shifts from in personam, to in rem, to certain relations intermediate between these poles. With respect to each institution, we generally find that in personam relations are governed by flexible default rules; in rem relations are governed by bright-line rules that impose immutable and standardized obligations; intermediate relations, as befits their intermediate level of information costs, feature a type and degree of standardization beyond pure contract but short of pure property

Optimal Standardization in the Law of Property: The \u3ci\u3eNumerus Clausus\u3c/i\u3e Principle

A central difference between contract and property concerns the freedom to customize legally enforceable interests. The law of contract recognizes no inherent limitations on the nature or the duration of the interests that can be the subject of a legally binding contract. Certain types of promises – such as promises to commit a crime – are declared unenforceable as a matter of public policy. But outside these relatively narrow areas of proscription and requirements such as definiteness and (maybe) consideration, there is a potentially infinite range of promises that the law will honor. The parties to a contract are free to be as whimsical or fanciful as they like in describing the promise to be performed, the consideration to be given in return for the promise, and the duration of the agreement. The law of property is very different in this respect. Generally speaking, the law will enforce as property only those interests that conform to a limited number of standard forms. As it is stated in a leading English case, incidents of a novel kind cannot be devised and attached to property at the fancy or caprice of any owner. With respect to interests in land, for example, the basic forms are the fee simple, the defeasible fee simple, the life estate, and the lease. When parties wish to transfer property in land, they must specify which legal form they are using – fee simple, lease, and so forth. If they fail to be clear about which legal interest they are conveying, or if they attempt to customize a new type of interest, the courts will generally recast the conveyance as creating one of the recognized forms. Of course, the law freely allows customization of the more physical, tangible dimensions of ownership rights. Property comes in all sorts of shapes and sizes. But with respect to the legal dimensions of property, the law generally insists on strict standardization. Every common-law lawyer is schooled in the understanding that property rights exist in a fixed number of forms. The principle is acknowledged – at least by implication – in the catalogue of estates or forms of ownership familiar to anyone who has survived a first-year property course in an American law school. The principle, however, is by no means limited to estates in land and future interests; it is also reflected in other areas of property law, including landlord-tenant, easements and servitudes, and intellectual property. Nor is the principle confined to common-law countries; to the contrary, it appears to be a universal feature of all modem property systems. In the common law, the principle that property rights must conform to certain standardized forms has no name. In the civil law, which recognizes the doctrine explicitly, it is called the numerus clausus – the number is closed. We adopt this term for purposes of our discussion here, which focuses primarily on the common law