One Market, One Money, One Price?

The introduction of the euro was intended to integrate markets within Europe further, after the implementation of the 1992 Single Market Project. We examine the extent to which this objective has been achieved, by examining the degree of price dispersion between countries in the euro zone, compared to a control group of EU countries outside the euro zone. We also establish the role of exchange rate risk in hampering arbitrage by estimating the euro effect for subgroups within the euro zone, utilizing differences among EU countries in participation in the Exchange Rate Mechanism. Our results, in contrast with previous empirical research, suggest robustly that the euro has had a significant integrating effect.

One Market, One Money, One Price?

The introduction of the euro was intended to integrate markets within Europe further, after the implementation of the 1992 Single Market Project. We examine the extent to which this objective has been achieved, by examining the degree of price dispersion between countries in the euro zone, compared to a control group of EU countries outside the euro zone. We also establish the role of exchange rate risk in hampering arbitrage by estimating the euro effect for subgroups within the euro zone, utilizing differences among EU countries in participation in the Exchange Rate Mechanism. Our results, in contrast with previous empirical research, suggest robustly that the euro has had a significant integrating effect

One Market, One Money, One Price?

The introduction of the euro was intended to integrate markets within Europe further, after the implementation of the 1992 Single Market Project. We examine the extent to which this objective has been achieved, by examining the degree of price dispersion between countries in the euro zone, compared to a control group of EU countries outside the euro zone. We also establish the role of exchange rate risk in hampering arbitrage by estimating the euro effect for subgroups within the euro zone, utilizing differences among EU countries in participation in the Exchange Rate Mechanism. Our results, in contrast with previous empirical research, suggest robustly that the euro has had a significant integrating effect

Rossiter-McLaughlin Observations of 55 Cnc e

We present Rossiter-McLaughlin observations of the transiting super-Earth 55 Cnc e collected during six transit events between January 2012 and November 2013 with HARPS and HARPS-N. We detect no radial-velocity signal above 35 cm/s (3-sigma) and confine the stellar v sin i to 0.2 +/- 0.5 km/s. The star appears to be a very slow rotator, producing a very low amplitude Rossiter-McLaughlin effect. Given such a low amplitude, the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect of 55 Cnc e is undetected in our data, and any spin-orbit angle of the system remains possible. We also performed Doppler tomography and reach a similar conclusion. Our results offer a glimpse of the capacity of future instrumentation to study low amplitude Rossiter-McLaughlin effects produced by super-Earths.Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ Letter

Methylation of H2AR29 is a novel repressive PRMT6 target

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Covalent histone modifications are central to all DNA-dependent processes. Modifications of histones H3 and H4 are becoming well characterised, but knowledge of how H2A modifications regulate chromatin dynamics and gene expression is still very limited.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>To understand the function of H2A modifications, we performed a systematic analysis of the histone H2A methylation status. We identified and functionally characterised two new methylation sites in H2A: R11 (H2AR11) and R29 (H2AR29). Using an unbiased biochemical approach in combination with candidate assays we showed that protein arginine methyltransferase (PRMT) 1 and PRMT6 are unique in their ability to catalyse these modifications. Importantly we found that H2AR29me2 is specifically enriched at genes repressed by PRMT6, implicating H2AR29me2 in transcriptional repression.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Our data establishes R11 and R29 as new arginine methylation sites in H2A. We identified the specific modifying enzymes involved, and uncovered a novel functional role of H2AR29me2 in gene silencing <it>in vivo</it>. Thus this work reveals novel insights into the function of H2A methylation and in the mechanisms of PRMT6-mediated transcriptional repression.</p

Quantum computing with antiferromagnetic spin clusters

We show that a wide range of spin clusters with antiferromagnetic intracluster exchange interaction allows one to define a qubit. For these spin cluster qubits, initialization, quantum gate operation, and readout are possible using the same techniques as for single spins. Quantum gate operation for the spin cluster qubit does not require control over the intracluster exchange interaction. Electric and magnetic fields necessary to effect quantum gates need only be controlled on the length scale of the spin cluster rather than the scale for a single spin. Here, we calculate the energy gap separating the logical qubit states from the next excited state and the matrix elements which determine quantum gate operation times. We discuss spin cluster qubits formed by one- and two-dimensional arrays of s=1/2 spins as well as clusters formed by spins s>1/2. We illustrate the advantages of spin cluster qubits for various suggested implementations of spin qubits and analyze the scaling of decoherence time with spin cluster size.Comment: 15 pages, 7 figures; minor change

One Market, One Money, One Price?

The introduction of the euro was intended to integrate markets within Europe further, after the implementation of the 1992 Single Market Project. We examine the extent to which this objective has been achieved, by examining the degree of price dispersion between countries in the euro zone, compared to a control group of EU countries outside the euro zone. We also establish the role of exchange rate risk in hampering arbitrage by estimating the euro effect for subgroups within the euro zone, utilizing differences among EU countries in participation in the Exchange Rate Mechanism. Our results, in contrast with previous empirical research, suggest robustly that the euro has had a significant integrating effect.