529 research outputs found
Tribunal Reform in New Zealand
In November 2006 the New Zealand Law Commission and the Ministry of Justice launched a
joint programme of tribunal reform in New Zealand. The aim of the project was to
ârecommend a structure for existing tribunals as well as a framework for the establishment of
tribunals in the futureâ. As I write this, the whisper from the Beehive suggests that the change
in government means that the tribunal reform project is to be put on ice. This is a disappointing
development but it should not surprise us. Although the tribunal system in New Zealand has
been ripe for reform almost since the first tribunal was established, successive attempts to
introduce coherence to the âsystemâ have foundered in the difficult waters of the legislative
process. From their humble (and relatively late) beginnings in 1908, New Zealand's system of
tribunals now occupies a significant (perhaps even pre-eminent) position in New Zealand's
system of justice, particularly in the field of Administrative Law. Despite this, tribunals remain
a largely forgotten element of the wider legal system. Few student texts give much mentioned
of them and they remain very much an academic and political backwater. It should be no
surprise then that, given their astonishingly low profile in New Zealand, tribunals remain
largely un-loved, unnoticed and un-reformed institutions. This paper from which it comes aims
to at least partially fill the lacuna in New Zealand's legal literature by examining the current
system in the light of the Law Commission's proposals
Soil conservation attitudes and practices among Saskatchewan farmers
Non-Peer ReviewedDuring the past few years, environmental protection and resource conservation have become important goals of society. Concomitant with this is an interest in ensuring that our agricultural production systems are both sustainable, and having minimal negative impacts on the environment. As research and extension personnel initiate programs to assist in soil conservation and sustainable agriculture, it is necessary to have a good idea of what the commonly held attitudes are among farmers, and some statistics about current management practices. To this end, we initiated a survey of Saskatchewan farmers
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Understanding the economic influence of the dyeing industry in Pompeii through the application of experimental archaeology and thermodynamics
YesThe influence of the dyeing industry in Pompeii on the local economy has been under discussion since the publication by Moeller in 1976. Since no absolute answer has emerged, the question was re-examined using two additional methods, experimental archaeology and the principles of thermodynamics.
A full-scale replica of a dyeing apparatus from Pompeii was constructed and used to simulate repeated dye runs, and so determine operating parameters such as the times involved to heat and cool a vat and the consumables needed. This first replica also allowed a better understanding of how the apparatus was actually used. Thermodynamic principles, which were applied to understand the successes and failures within the experimental work, suggested that the vat operated in a predictable way and enabled the operational mechanics of the vat to be established.
It is now possible to use both the experimental results and the thermodynamic modelling to determine not just the consumables used, but also the working environment needed for the vat to operate, allowing an understanding of the limitations to dyeing and to workers. Issues of practicality such as storage of consumables and disposal of exhaust gases may now be thoroughly examined.
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Eventually it will be possible to determine the operating parameters of each of the dye vats, the quantities of consumables involved and the amount that could be produced. This should help answer the question as to the significance of the dye industry in Pompeii to the local economy
Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA): testing galaxy formation models through the most massive galaxies in the Universe
We have analysed the growth of Brightest Group Galaxies and Brightest Cluster Galaxies (BGGs/BCGs) over the last 3 billion years using a large sample of 883 galaxies from the Galaxy And Mass Assembly survey. By comparing the stellar mass of BGGs and BCGs in groups and clusters of similar dynamical masses, we find no significant growth between redshift z = 0.27 and 0.09. We also examine the number of BGGs/BCGs that have line emission, finding that approximately 65 per cent of BGGs/BCGs show HÎą in emission. From the galaxies where the necessary spectroscopic lines were accurately recovered (54 per cent of the sample), we find that half of this (i.e. 27 per cent of the sample) harbour ongoing star formation with rates up to 10âMâ yrâ1, and the other half (i.e. 27 per cent of the sample) have an active nucleus (AGN) at the centre. BGGs are more likely to have ongoing star formation, while BCGs show a higher fraction of AGN activity. By examining the position of the BGGs/BCGs with respect to their host dark matter halo, we find that around 13 per cent of them do not lie at the centre of the dark matter halo. This could be an indicator of recent clusterâcluster mergers. We conclude that BGGs and BCGs acquired their stellar mass rapidly at higher redshifts as predicted by semi-analytic models, mildly slowing down at low redshifts
The SAMI Galaxy Survey: Spatially resolving the environmental quenching of star formation in GAMA galaxies
We use data from the Sydney-AAO Multi-Object Integral Field Spectrograph (SAMI) Galaxy Survey and the Galaxy And Mass Assembly (GAMA) survey to investigate the spatially-resolved signatures of the environmental quenching of star formation in galaxies. Using dust-corrected measurements of the distribution of HÎą emission we measure the radial profiles of star formation in a sample of 201âstar-forming galaxies covering three orders of magnitude in stellar mass (MâMâ; 108.1-1010.95âMâ) and in 5th nearest neighbour local environment density (ÎŁ5; 10â1.3- 102.1âMpcâ2). We show that star formation rate gradients in galaxies are steeper in dense (log10(ÎŁ5/Mpc2) > 0.5) environments by 0.58 Âą 0.29âdexâreâ1 in galaxies with stellar masses in the range 1010 1.0). These lines of evidence strongly suggest that with increasing local environment density the star formation in galaxies is suppressed, and that this starts in their outskirts such that quenching occurs in an outside-in fashion in dense environments and is not instantaneous
Search for the standard model Higgs boson decaying into two photons in pp collisions at sqrt(s)=7 TeV
A search for a Higgs boson decaying into two photons is described. The
analysis is performed using a dataset recorded by the CMS experiment at the LHC
from pp collisions at a centre-of-mass energy of 7 TeV, which corresponds to an
integrated luminosity of 4.8 inverse femtobarns. Limits are set on the cross
section of the standard model Higgs boson decaying to two photons. The expected
exclusion limit at 95% confidence level is between 1.4 and 2.4 times the
standard model cross section in the mass range between 110 and 150 GeV. The
analysis of the data excludes, at 95% confidence level, the standard model
Higgs boson decaying into two photons in the mass range 128 to 132 GeV. The
largest excess of events above the expected standard model background is
observed for a Higgs boson mass hypothesis of 124 GeV with a local significance
of 3.1 sigma. The global significance of observing an excess with a local
significance greater than 3.1 sigma anywhere in the search range 110-150 GeV is
estimated to be 1.8 sigma. More data are required to ascertain the origin of
this excess.Comment: Submitted to Physics Letters
Measurement of the Lambda(b) cross section and the anti-Lambda(b) to Lambda(b) ratio with Lambda(b) to J/Psi Lambda decays in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV
The Lambda(b) differential production cross section and the cross section
ratio anti-Lambda(b)/Lambda(b) are measured as functions of transverse momentum
pt(Lambda(b)) and rapidity abs(y(Lambda(b))) in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7
TeV using data collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC. The measurements are
based on Lambda(b) decays reconstructed in the exclusive final state J/Psi
Lambda, with the subsequent decays J/Psi to an opposite-sign muon pair and
Lambda to proton pion, using a data sample corresponding to an integrated
luminosity of 1.9 inverse femtobarns. The product of the cross section times
the branching ratio for Lambda(b) to J/Psi Lambda versus pt(Lambda(b)) falls
faster than that of b mesons. The measured value of the cross section times the
branching ratio for pt(Lambda(b)) > 10 GeV and abs(y(Lambda(b))) < 2.0 is 1.06
+/- 0.06 +/- 0.12 nb, and the integrated cross section ratio for
anti-Lambda(b)/Lambda(b) is 1.02 +/- 0.07 +/- 0.09, where the uncertainties are
statistical and systematic, respectively.Comment: Submitted to Physics Letters
Search for new physics in events with opposite-sign leptons, jets, and missing transverse energy in pp collisions at sqrt(s) = 7 TeV
A search is presented for physics beyond the standard model (BSM) in final
states with a pair of opposite-sign isolated leptons accompanied by jets and
missing transverse energy. The search uses LHC data recorded at a
center-of-mass energy sqrt(s) = 7 TeV with the CMS detector, corresponding to
an integrated luminosity of approximately 5 inverse femtobarns. Two
complementary search strategies are employed. The first probes models with a
specific dilepton production mechanism that leads to a characteristic kinematic
edge in the dilepton mass distribution. The second strategy probes models of
dilepton production with heavy, colored objects that decay to final states
including invisible particles, leading to very large hadronic activity and
missing transverse energy. No evidence for an event yield in excess of the
standard model expectations is found. Upper limits on the BSM contributions to
the signal regions are deduced from the results, which are used to exclude a
region of the parameter space of the constrained minimal supersymmetric
extension of the standard model. Additional information related to detector
efficiencies and response is provided to allow testing specific models of BSM
physics not considered in this paper.Comment: Replaced with published version. Added journal reference and DO
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