The Purposes and Accountability of the Corporation in Contemporary Society: Corporate Governance at a Crossroads

Little attention has been paid to how the governance structures of public corporations adapt to structural changes in the social, political, economic and legal environments in which they operate. Bradley et al chronicle the recent changes in the conduct of business enterprise and establish the necessary conditions for a system of corporate governance capable of accommodating these changes

Superior Facial Expression, But Not Identity Recognition, in Mirror-Touch Synesthesia

Simulation models of expression recognition contend that to understand another's facial expressions, individuals map the perceived expression onto the same sensorimotor representations that are active during the experience of the perceived emotion. To investigate this view, the present study examines facial expression and identity recognition abilities in a rare group of participants who show facilitated sensorimotor simulation (mirror-touch synesthetes). Mirror-touch synesthetes experience touch on their own body when observing touch to another person. These experiences have been linked to heightened sensorimotor simulation in the shared-touch network (brain regions active during the passive observation and experience of touch). Mirror-touch synesthetes outperformed nonsynesthetic participants on measures of facial expression recognition, but not on control measures of face memory or facial identity perception. These findings imply a role for sensorimotor simulation processes in the recognition of facial affect, but not facial identity

SPRINT SPECIFICITY FOR RUGBY AND SOCCER PLAYERS

It is well accepted that speed is a crucial factor for success in both rugby and soccer. It is less clear how to narrow down a definition of speed so that we are actually measuring the ability that is needed in a game situation. The principle of specificity indicates that the sprints that are used for training/diagnosis should mimic those that occur in a game situation. Brown (1999) reported that rugby players perform intensive efforts from 5 to 45 seconds in duration. It is not clear from this article what percentage of those efforts are sprints. Presumably some of the longer efforts would include scrummage, rucks and mauls. Docherty et al. (1988) examined results of a time analysis of international rugby games and reported that props average 22 sprints of 1.75 seconds and centers average 37 sprints of 2.3 seconds. In these times a player can travel from between 10 and 20 meters. It is clear that these shorts sprints are accelerations that do not reach the top speed of the athletes. It is common knowledge that sprinters reach their top speed well after 30 meters (Mero et al. 1992). If the distances covered by the players in a rugby game are typically under 30 meters than it is not ultimate maximum running speed of a rugby player that seems to be the critical factor, but rather acceleration, or maximum speeds at various short distances. Sayer (2000) reported that sprints performed during field sports are rarely over more than 30 meters and that most of the time players are covering less than 10 meters at a time. The analysis of rugby and soccer specific sprinting should take these factors into consideration. In addition to the distances, another important factor is direction. It has been reported (Gerisch et al. 1988) that in soccer linear sprints of up to 40 meters occur as well as non linear short sprints with turns of up to 180 degrees. Casual observation would indicate that nonlinear sprints also occur regularly during rugby games. It has also been reported (Frick et al. 1992) that sprint speed in soccer is typically tested using linear sprints between 10-40 meters. It was not clear to the authors of this paper how rugby speed is typically tested. References to both linear sprint testing and nonrinear sprint testing were found (Noakes and DuPlessis, 1996). One reason for the occurrence of nonlinear sprints in rugby and soccer is that in both rugby and soccer there are opponents from the other team that have to be avoided on the way towards the goal. To do this effectively the athlete needs the ability to either run extremely fast in a relatively straight line to run past the opposing player or to be able to change direction quickly and outmaneuver the opposing player. The ability to change directions quickly may not be the same ability as that of accelerating quickly in a straight 'iine or that of achieving a high maximum speed. Therefore purpose of this study was to: Develop nonlinear tests that include various cutting moves. To test rugby and soccer players over linear sprints and nonlinear sprints to see if the ability to accelerate over linear distances correlates well wit'h the ability to perform directional changes quickly

Nonlocal elastic metasurfaces: enabling broadband wave control via intentional nonlocality

While elastic metasurfaces offer a remarkable and very effective approach to the subwalength control of stress waves, their use in practical applications is severely hindered by intrinsically narrow band performance. This work introduces the concept of intentional nonlocality as a fundamental mechanism to design passive elastic metasurfaces capable of an exceptionally broadband operating range. The nonlocal behavior is achieved by exploiting nonlocal forces, conceptually akin to long-range interactions in nonlocal material microstructures, between subsets of resonant unit cells forming the metasurface. These long-range forces are obtained via carefully crafted flexible elements whose specific geometry and local dynamics are designed to create remarkably complex transfer functions between multiple units. The resulting nonlocal coupling forces enable achieving phase gradient profiles that are function of the wavenumber of the incident wave.The identification of relevant design parameters and the assessment of their impact on performance are explored via a combination of semi-analytical and numerical models. The nonlocal metasurface concept is tested, both numerically and experimentally, by embedding a total-internal-reflection design in a thin plate waveguide. Results confirm the feasibility of the intentionally nonlocal design concept and its ability to achieve a fully passive and broadband wave control

Teaching prescribing: just what the doctor ordered? A thematic analysis of the views of newly qualified doctors

Undergraduate medical education has been criticised for failing to adequately prepare doctors for the task of prescribing. Pharmacists have been shown to improve medication use in hospitals. This study aims to elicit the views of intern doctors on the challenges of prescribing, and to suggest changes in education to enhance prescribing practice and potential role of the pharmacist. Semi-structured, qualitative interviews were conducted with intern doctors in their first year post qualification in an Irish hospital. Data collection was conducted until no new themes emerged and thematic analysis was performed. Thirteen interviews took place. Interns described training in practical prescribing as limited and felt the curriculum failed to convey the reality of actual prescribing. Pharmacists were perceived to be a useful, but underutilised, information source in the prescribing process. They requested an earlier introduction, and repeated exposure, to prescribing, and suggested the involvement of peers and pharmacists in this teaching. Intern doctors reported difficulties in applying knowledge gained in medical school to clinical practice. New strategies are needed to enhance the clinical relevance of the medical curriculum by rethinking the learning outcomes regarding prescribing practice and the involvement of pharmacists in prescribing education

Prefrontal control of familiarity and recollection in working memory

Left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) is a critical neural substrate for the resolution of proactive interference (PI) in working memory. We hypothesized that left IFG achieves this by controlling the influence of familiarity- versus recollection-based information about memory probes. Consistent with this idea, we observed evidence for an early (200 msec)-peaking signal corresponding to memory probe familiarity and a late (500 msec)-resolving signal corresponding to full accrual of trial-related contextual ("recollection-based") information. Next, we applied brief trains of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) time locked to these mnemonic signals, to left IFG and to a control region. Only early rTMS of left IFG produced a modulation of the false alarm rate for high-PI probes. Additionally, the magnitude of this effect was predicted by individual differences in susceptibility to PI. These results suggest that left IFG-based control may bias the influence of familiarity- and recollection-based signals on recognition decisions