On discrimination and the status of immigrants in the Hong Kong labour market

This paper studies the extent of discrimination against mainland Chinese immigrants in the Hong Kong labour market and provides a quantitative assessment of the source of wage differentials between local born Hong Kong residents and Chinese immigrants. Using the 2001 Hong Kong Population Census data, we find strong evidence of a wage gap between locals and post-1980 Chinese immigrants. There is also clear evidence that discrimination accounts for a substantial proportion of the wage gap between the two groups. Furthermore, our findings suggest that while the overall wage gap may shrink with the immigrants' duration of residence in Hong Kong, the percentage of the wage gap due to discrimination does not change very much after the immediate post-immigration period.discrimination

A High-Low Model of Daily Stock Price Ranges

We observe that daily highs and lows of stock prices do not diverge over time and, hence, adopt the cointegration concept and the related vector error correction model (VECM) to model the daily high, the daily low, and the associated daily range data. The in-sample results attest the importance of incorporating high-low interactions in modeling the range variable. In evaluating the out-of-sample forecast performance using both mean-squared forecast error and direction of change criteria, it is found that the VECM-based low and high forecasts offer some advantages over some alternative forecasts. The VECM-based range forecasts, on the other hand, do not always dominate –the forecast rankings depend on the choice of evaluation criterion and the variables being forecasted.daily high, daily low, VECM model, forecast performance, implied volatility

Local field distribution near corrugated interfaces: Green's function formulation

We have developed a Green's function formalism to compute the local field distribution near an interface separating two media of different dielectric constants. The Maxwell's equations are converted into a surface integral equation; thus it greatly simplifies the solutions and yields accurate results for interfaces of arbitrary shape. The integral equation is solved and the local field distribution is obtained for a periodic interface.Comment: Presented at the Conference on Computational Physics (CCP2000), held at Gold Coast, Australia from 3 - 8, December 2000. To be published in Proceedings of CCP200

Relaxation of surface charge on rotating dielectric spheres: Implications on dynamic electrorheological effects

We have examined the effect of an oscillatory rotation of a polarized dielectric particle. The rotational motion leads to a re-distribution of the polarization charge on the surface of the particle. We show that the time averaged steady-state dipole moment is along the field direction, but its magnitude is reduced by a factor which depends on the angular velocity of rotation. As a result, the rotational motion of the particle reduces the electrorheological effect. We further assume that the relaxation of polarized charge is arised from a finite conductivity of the particle or host medium. We calculate the relaxation time based on the Maxwell-Wagner theory, suitably generalized to include the rotational motion. Analytic expressions for the reduction factor and the relaxation time are given and their dependence on the angular velocity of rotation will be discussed.Comment: Accepted for publications by Phys. Rev.

Effects of organic carbon supply rates on mobility of previously bioreduced uranium in a contaminated sediment

Bioreduction-based strategies for remediating uranium (U)-contaminated sediments face the challenge of maintaining the reduced status of U for long times. Because groundwater influxes continuously bring in oxidizing terminal electron acceptors (O{sub 2}, NO{sub 3}{sup -}), it is necessary to continue supplying organic carbon (OC) to maintain the reducing environment after U bioreduction is achieved. We tested the influence of OC supply rates on mobility of previously microbial reduced uranium U(IV) in contaminated sediments. We found that high degrees of U mobilization occurred when OC supply rates were high, and when the sediment still contained abundant Fe(III). Although 900 days with low levels of OC supply minimized U mobilization, the sediment redox potential increased with time as did extractable U(VI) fractions. Molecular analyses of total microbial activity demonstrated a positive correlation with OC supply and analyses of Geobacteraceae activity (RT-qPCR of 16S rRNA) indicated continued activity even when the effluent Fe(II) became undetectable. These data support our earlier hypothesis on the mechanism responsible for re-oxidation of microbial reduced U(IV) under reducing conditions; that microbial respiration caused increased (bi)carbonate concentrations and formation of stable uranyl carbonate complexes, thereby shifted U(IV)/U(VI) equilibrium to more reducing potentials. The data also suggested that low OC concentrations could not sustain the reducing condition of the sediment for much longer time

Real-time x-ray absorption spectroscopy of uranium, iron, and manganese in contaminated sediments during bioreduction

The oxidation status of uranium in sediments is important because the solubility of this toxic and radioactive element is much greater for U(VI) than for U(IV) species. Thus, redox manipulation to promote precipitation of UO{sub 2} is receiving interest as a method to remediate U-contaminated sediments. Presence of Fe and Mn oxides in sediments at much higher concentrations than U requires understanding of their redox status as well. This study was conducted to determine changes in oxidation states of U, Fe, and Mn in U-contaminated sediments from Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Oxidation states of these elements were measured in real-time and nondestructively using X-ray absorption spectroscopy, on sediment columns supplied with synthetic groundwater containing organic carbon (OC, 0, 3, 10, 30 and 100 mM OC as lactate) for over 400 days. In sediments supplied with OC {ge} 30 mM, 80% of the U was reduced to U(IV), with transient reoxidation at about 150 days. Mn(III,IV) oxides were completely reduced to Mn(II) in sediments infused with OC {ge} 3 mM. However, Fe remained largely unreduced in all sediment columns, showing that Fe(III) can persist as an electron acceptor in reducing sediments over long times. This result in combination with the complete reduction of all other potential electron acceptors supports the hypothesis that the reactive Fe(III) fraction was responsible for reoxidizing U(IV)

Thermodynamics of Gauss-Bonnet black holes revisited

We investigate the Gauss-Bonnet black hole in five dimensional anti-de Sitter spacetimes (GBAdS). We analyze all thermodynamic quantities of the GBAdS, which is characterized by the Gauss-Bonnet coupling $c$ and mass $M$, comparing with those of the Born-Infeld-AdS (BIAdS), Reissner-Norstr\"om-AdS black holes (RNAdS), Schwarzschild-AdS (SAdS), and BTZ black holes. For $c<0$ we cannot obtain the black hole with positively definite thermodynamic quantities of mass, temperature, and entropy because the entropy does not satisfy the area-law. On the other hand, for $c>0$, we find the BIAdS-like black hole, showing that the coupling $c$ plays the role of pseudo-charge. Importantly, we could not obtain the SAdS in the limits of $c\to 0$, which means that the GBAdS is basically different from the SAdS. In addition, we clarify the connections between thermodynamic and dynamical stability. Finally, we also conjecture that if a black hole is big and thus globally stable, its quasinormal modes may take analytic expressions.Comment: 22 pages, 8 figures, version to appear in EPJ

Anisotropic flow of charged hadrons, pions and (anti-)protons measured at high transverse momentum in Pb-Pb collisions at sNN=2.76\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}}=2.76 TeV

The elliptic, $v_2$, triangular, $v_3$, and quadrangular, $v_4$, azimuthal anisotropic flow coefficients are measured for unidentified charged particles, pions and (anti-)protons in Pb-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}} = 2.76$ TeV with the ALICE detector at the Large Hadron Collider. Results obtained with the event plane and four-particle cumulant methods are reported for the pseudo-rapidity range $|\eta|<0.8$ at different collision centralities and as a function of transverse momentum, $p_{\rm T}$, out to $p_{\rm T}=20$ GeV/$c$. The observed non-zero elliptic and triangular flow depends only weakly on transverse momentum for $p_{\rm T}>8$ GeV/$c$. The small $p_{\rm T}$ dependence of the difference between elliptic flow results obtained from the event plane and four-particle cumulant methods suggests a common origin of flow fluctuations up to $p_{\rm T}=8$ GeV/$c$. The magnitude of the (anti-)proton elliptic and triangular flow is larger than that of pions out to at least $p_{\rm T}=8$ GeV/$c$ indicating that the particle type dependence persists out to high $p_{\rm T}$.Comment: 16 pages, 5 captioned figures, authors from page 11, published version, figures at http://aliceinfo.cern.ch/ArtSubmission/node/186

Centrality dependence of charged particle production at large transverse momentum in Pb-Pb collisions at sNN=2.76\sqrt{s_{\rm{NN}}} = 2.76 TeV

The inclusive transverse momentum ($p_{\rm T}$) distributions of primary charged particles are measured in the pseudo-rapidity range $|\eta|<0.8$ as a function of event centrality in Pb-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm{NN}}}=2.76$ TeV with ALICE at the LHC. The data are presented in the $p_{\rm T}$ range $0.15<p_{\rm T}<50$ GeV/$c$ for nine centrality intervals from 70-80% to 0-5%. The Pb-Pb spectra are presented in terms of the nuclear modification factor $R_{\rm{AA}}$ using a pp reference spectrum measured at the same collision energy. We observe that the suppression of high-$p_{\rm T}$ particles strongly depends on event centrality. In central collisions (0-5%) the yield is most suppressed with $R_{\rm{AA}}\approx0.13$ at $p_{\rm T}=6$-7 GeV/$c$. Above $p_{\rm T}=7$ GeV/$c$, there is a significant rise in the nuclear modification factor, which reaches $R_{\rm{AA}} \approx0.4$ for $p_{\rm T}>30$ GeV/$c$. In peripheral collisions (70-80%), the suppression is weaker with $R_{\rm{AA}} \approx 0.7$ almost independently of $p_{\rm T}$. The measured nuclear modification factors are compared to other measurements and model calculations.Comment: 17 pages, 4 captioned figures, 2 tables, authors from page 12, published version, figures at http://aliceinfo.cern.ch/ArtSubmission/node/284

Two-pion Bose-Einstein correlations in central Pb-Pb collisions at sNN\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}} = 2.76 TeV

The first measurement of two-pion Bose-Einstein correlations in central Pb-Pb collisions at $\sqrt{s_{\rm NN}} = 2.76$ TeV at the Large Hadron Collider is presented. We observe a growing trend with energy now not only for the longitudinal and the outward but also for the sideward pion source radius. The pion homogeneity volume and the decoupling time are significantly larger than those measured at RHIC.Comment: 17 pages, 5 captioned figures, 1 table, authors from page 12, published version, figures at http://aliceinfo.cern.ch/ArtSubmission/node/388