Valuing the Non-Market Impacts of Underground Coal Mining

This paper has been published in a peer-reviewed journal as: Gillespie, R. & M. E. Kragt (2012). "Accounting for nonmarket impacts in a benefit-cost analysis of underground coal mining in New South Wales, Australia." Journal of Benefit-Cost Analysis 3(2): article 4. DOI: 10.1515/2152-2812.1101Australia, benefit cost analysis, coal mining, choice experiments, natural resource management, non-market valuation, Environmental Economics and Policy, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy, D61, Q32, Q38, Q51,

Extracting New Physics from the CMB

We review how initial state effects generically yield an oscillatory component in the primordial power spectrum of inflationary density perturbations. These oscillatory corrections parametrize unknown new physics at a scale $M$ and are potentially observable if the ratio $H_{infl}/M$ is sufficiently large. We clarify to what extent present and future CMB data analysis can distinguish between the different proposals for initial state corrections.Comment: Invited talk by B. Greene at the XXII Texas Symposium on Relativistic Astrophysics, Stanford University, 13-17 December 2004, (TSRA04-0001), 8 pages, LaTeX, some references added, added paragraph at the end of section 2 and an extra note added after the conclusions regarding modifications to the large k power spectra deduced from galaxy survey

State of the World's Fathers: 2015

Fathers' involvement in their children's lives has been linked to higher cognitive development and school achievement, better mental health for boys and girls, and lower rates of delinquency in sons. Studies in multiple countries have shown that fathers' interaction is important for the development of empathy and social skills in sons and daughters.The SOWF report states that to achieve full gender equality and maximum wellbeing for children, we must move beyond rigid, limiting definitions of fatherhood and motherhood. This is not just a question of encouraging men to be nurturing and caring but rather an issue of social and economic justice. The report states that changes are needed in policies, in systems and institutions, among service providers, within programming and within data collection and analysis efforts. A lack of supportive policies such as paternity leave for new fathers helps cause an imbalance between mothers and fathers. This causes women to miss out on opportunities for work and income, children to miss out on having an involved father, and men to miss out on the positive benefits of involved fatherhood

Using NLP technology in CALL

This paper outlines the research and guiding research principles of the (I)CALL group at Dublin City University, Ireland. Our research activities include the development of (I)CALL systems targeted at a variety of user groups including advanced Romance language learners, intermediate to advanced German learners, primary and secondary school students as well as students with L1 learning disabilities requiring a variety of system types which cater to individual user needs and abilities. Suitable CL/NLP technology is incorporated where appropriate for the learner

Sensitive Radio Survey of Obscured Quasar Candidates

We study the radio properties of moderately obscured quasars over a range of redshifts to understand the role of radio activity in accretion using the Jansky Very Large Array (JVLA) at 6.0GHz and 1.4GHz. Our z~2.5 sample consists of optically-selected obscured quasar candidates, all of which are radio-quiet, with typical radio luminosities of $\nu L_{\nu}$[1.4 GHz] < $10^{40}$ erg s$^{-1}$. Only a single source is individually detected in our deep (rms~10 $\mu$Jy) exposures. This population would not be identified by radio-based selection methods used for distinguishing dusty star-forming galaxies and obscured active nuclei. In our pilot A-array study of z~0.5 radio-quiet quasars, we spatially resolve four of five objects on scales ~ 5 kpc and find they have steep spectral indices. Therefore, radio emission in these sources could be due to jet-driven or radiatively driven bubbles interacting with interstellar material on the scale of the host galaxy. Finally, we also study the population of ~ 200 faint (~40 $\mu$Jy - 40 mJy) radio sources observed over ~ 120 arcmin$^2$ of our data. 60% of these detections are matched in the SDSS and/or WISE and are, in roughly equal shares, active nuclei at a broad range of redshifts, passive galaxies with no other signs of nuclear activity and IR-bright but optically faint sources. Spectroscopically or photometrically confirmed star-forming galaxies constitute only a small minority of the matches. Such sensitive radio surveys allow us to address important questions of AGN evolution and evaluate the AGN contribution to the radio-quiet sky.Comment: 18 pages, submitted to MNRA

A Uniformly Selected Sample of Low-mass Black Holes in Seyfert 1 Galaxies

We have conducted a systematic search of low-mass black holes (BHs) in active galactic nuclei (AGNs) with broad Halpha emission lines, aiming at building a homogeneous sample that is more complete than previous ones for fainter, less highly accreting sources. For this purpose, we developed a set of elaborate, automated selection procedures and applied it uniformly to the Fourth Data Release of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey. Special attention is given to AGN--galaxy spectral decomposition and emission-line deblending. We define a sample of 309 type 1 AGNs with BH masses in the range $8 \times 10^4$--$2 \times 10^6$ \msun (with a median of $1.2 \times 10^6$ solar mass), using the virial mass estimator based on the broad Halpha line. About half of our sample of low-mass BHs differs from that of Greene & Ho, with 61 of them discovered here for the first time. Our new sample picks up more AGNs with low accretion rates: the Eddington ratios of the present sample range from $<~0.01$ to ~1, with 30% below 0.1. This suggests that a significant fraction of low-mass BHs in the local Universe are accreting at low rates. The host galaxies of the low-mass BHs have luminosities similar to those of $L^*$ field galaxies, optical colors of Sbc spirals, and stellar spectral features consistent with a continuous star formation history with a mean stellar age of less than 1 Gyr.Comment: Accepted for publication in Ap

Towards Precision Supermassive Black Hole Masses using Megamaser Disks

Megamaser disks provide the most precise and accurate extragalactic supermassive black hole masses. Here we describe a search for megamasers in nearby galaxies using the Green Bank Telescope (GBT). We focus on galaxies where we believe that we can resolve the gravitational sphere of influence of the black hole and derive a stellar or gas dynamical measurement with optical or NIR observations. Since there are only a handful of super massive black holes (SMBH) that have direct black hole mass measurements from more than one method, even a single galaxy with a megamaser disk and a stellar dynamical black hole mass would provide necessary checks on the stellar dynamical methods. We targeted 87 objects from the Hobby-Eberly Telescope Massive Galaxy Survey, and detected no new maser disks. Most of the targeted objects are elliptical galaxies with typical stellar velocity dispersions of 250 km/s and distances within 130 Mpc. We discuss the implications of our non-detections, whether they imply a threshold X-ray luminosity required for masing, or possibly reflect the difficulty of maintaining a masing disk around much more massive (>10^8 Msun) black holes at low Eddington ratio. Given the power of maser disks at probing black hole accretion and demographics, we suggest that future maser searches should endeavour to remove remaining sample biases, in order to sort out the importance of these covariant effects.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figures, Apj, updated to match the accepted versio

Interaction Terms in Nonlinear Models

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/90179/1/hesr1314.pd

Magnetic penetration depth in electron-doped cuprates - evidence for gap nodes

The in-plane penetration depth \lambda(T) is measured in electron-doped single crystals Nd1.85Ce0.15CuO4-x (NCCO) and Pr1.85Ce0.15CuO4-x (PCCO) using a 11 MHz LC resonator. In NCCO, \lambda(T) exhibits a minimum at 3.8 K and a pronounced upturn down to 0.4 K due to the paramagnetic contribution of Nd3+ ions. The London penetration depth contribution is linear in T. The paramagnetic contribution is absent in PCCO, where \lambda(T)~T^2 at low temperatures. Our results indicate the presence of nodes in the superconducting gap, i.e., non s-wave symmetry of the order parameter in electron-doped cuprates.Comment: 2 pages Acrobat-3 optimized PDF. To be presented at M2S-HTSC-V

Pancreaticoduodenal transplantation in humans

Whole cadaveric pancreata were transplanted to the pelvic extraperitoneal location in four patients with diabetes who previously had undergone successful cadaveric renal transplantation. One graft was lost within a few hours from venous thrombosis but with patient survival. The other three are providing normal endocrine function after two and a half, 11 and 12 months. The exocrine pancreatic secretions were drained into the recipient jejunum through enteric anastomoses. Because mucosal slough of the graft and duodenum and jejunum in two patients caused a protein losing enteropathy and necessitated reoperations, we now do the pancreatic transplantation with only a blister of graft duodenum large enough for side-to-side enteroenterostomy. The spleen has been transplanted with the pancreas mainly for technical reasons, and this technique should have further trials in spite of the fact that delayed graft splenectomy became necessary in two recipients to treat graft induced hematologic complications