Xylene

Presented for World Environmental Health Day, September 26, 2016 in Greenville, North Carolina

Volume renormalization for complete Einstein--K\"ahler metrics

For a strictly pseudoconvex domain in a complex manifold we define a renormalized volume with respect to the approximately Einstein complete K\"ahler metric of Fefferman. We compute the conformal anomaly in complex dimension two and apply the result to derive a renormalized Chern--Gauss--Bonnet formula. Relations between renormalized volume and the CR $Q$-curvature are also investigated.Comment: Minor corrections to the statements and proofs of the main theorem and corollary. Included the example of the Bergman metric on the ball. To appear in Differential Geometry and Its Application

Spin wave mediated non-reciprocal effects in antiferromagnets

By using an effective field theory for the electromagnetic interaction of spin waves, we show that, in certain antiferromagnets, the latter induce non-reciprocal effects in the microwave region, which should be observable in the second harmonic generation and produce gyrotropic birefringency. We calculate the various (non-linear) susceptibilities in terms of a few parameters the order of magnitude of which is under control.Comment: Latex file, 22p . Published versio

The mechanisms of airway narrowing in asthma

In healthy subjects Deep Inspiration (DI) transiently dilates the airways, while many asthmatics show bronchoconstriction by a mechanism which is incompletely understood.I investigated how the method of assessment affects the response. The response as measured by specific airway conductance (SGaw) appeared to contradict that measured by forced expiration. This led to the formulation of a novel hypothesis to explain the asthmatic bronchoconstrictor response: That the negative intra-thoracic pressure associated with DI may temporarily increase airway oedema and thus reduce lumenal diameter. This was tested by comparing the effects of non-forced with forced inspiration (through resistance). In the asthmatic group, forced inspiration produced significantly more bronchoconstriction. Airway hyperresponsivenessin asthma has been attributed to impaired ability of DI to stretch airway smooth muscle. The seminal study `confirming' this, I argue, is flawed. I have re-tested the hypothesis. The asthmatic response was significantly greater than the control response even when DI was prohibited. Asthmatic hyperresponsivenessis therefore not attributable entirely to an abnormal asthmatic response to DI. Many asthmatics display an apparent capacity for unlimited airway narrowing in response to bronchial challenge; most healthy subjects demonstrate a maximal (limited) response. The maximal response measured by a DI independent index represented a greater % change from baseline than the maximal established by a DI dependent index. This suggested some bronchoprotection resulting from DI but also the existence of a distinct mechanism which ultimately limited narrowing. I reasoned that the capacity for unlimited airway narrowing is most likely a function of smaller airways. I investigated indices of small airway function and found they predicted the ultimate response much earlier in challenge than FEV 1, suggesting a possible practical test of the capacity for unlimited narrowing. I postulate that the clearly established but limited relationship between the responses to DI and bronchial challenge may reflect the dependence of the response to DI on the degree of inflammation within the airway wall whereas the response to challenge may be determined by its overall thickness.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceNorthernYorkshire Regional Fellowship, NHS : Medical Research Council, Clinical Training FellowshipGBUnited Kingdo

Improved traceability in seafood supply chains is achievable by minimising vulnerable nodes in processing and distribution networks

Seafood is a globally traded commodity, often involving complex supply chains which have varying degrees of traceability. A robust traceability system for seafood supply chains enables the collection and communication of key information about catch and fisheries origins vital for assurance of the legality and sustainability of seafood products. End-to-end traceability is increasingly demanded by retailers, consumers, NGOs and regulatory bodies to ensure food safety, deter IUU fishing and verify sustainable and ethical credentials. Here, we map three UK seafood supply chains and evaluate traceability performance in: Dover sole landed in the south west of England, North-East Atlantic (NEA) mackerel landed at Peterhead, Scotland, and brown crab and European lobster, landed at Bridlington, England. Through a comparative analysis of traceability performance, this study suggests improvements to the technologies, processes, and systems for traceability in the seafood sector. The application of monitoring technologies and regulatory changes across the sector have increased traceability and potentially reduced instances of IUU fishing. While shorter supply chains are more likely to achieve end-to-end traceability, vulnerable nodes in processing and distribution networks may result in a loss of seafood traceability. While traceability systems may provide sustainability information on seafood, a high level of traceability performance does not necessarily equate to a sustainable source fishery. Encouragingly, while UK seafood supply chains are meeting minimum regulatory requirements for traceability, in the present study, many stakeholders have indicated ambitions towards traceability best practice in order to provide confidence and trust in the UK fishing industry

Neti, neti : the Search for the Ultimate Principle in the Vedic Upaniṣads

This thesis explores the teachings of the ancient Indian texts known as the Vedic Upaniṣads in relation to ultimate reality. Compiled into their quasi-canonical forms between approximately 700 BCE and the early years of the Common Era, the Vedic Upaniṣads were interpreted by a number of later Indian philosophical schools as promoting a single, consistent worldview with regard to the entity, power, or principle which creates, animates, supports and sustains all of existence (which I refer to in this thesis as the ‘ultimate principle’). However, those schools offer competing theories about what that worldview might be, what that ultimate principle might be called, and the nature of its relationship (if any) with the material world, on the one hand, and the divine, on the other. As has been widely acknowledged in more recent exegesis, the Vedic Upaniṣads in fact present a variety of teachings about this ultimate principle - in Signe Cohen’s words a ‘rich tapestry of complex and occasionally contradictory ideas’. The question which this presents, and which I address in this thesis, is whether, rather than either seeking an elusive and illusory consistency, or dismissing the teachings of the Vedic Upaniṣads as simply an inconsistent anthology, we can detect any patterns in the presentation of these complex and contradictory ideas. In this thesis, I will explore certain specific themes in the development of the Vedic Upaniṣads’ teachings about the ultimate principle, and will argue that, if we read the Vedic Upaniṣads closely with an eye to how teachings about the ultimate principle progress, both within individual Upaniṣads and by reading the Vedic Upaniṣads inter- textually, it is possible to identify certain important trends and directions of enquiry into the nature and identity of the ultimate principle. In many cases, these trends highlight the questions which the Vedic Upaniṣads ask about the ultimate principle more than the answers which they provide. In addition, I will suggest that, in places, the editorial processes which brought the Vedic Upaniṣads into their quasi-canonical forms may have been, at least in part, a deliberate attempt to highlight their strands of enquiry into the ultimate principle, so that, as a result, we can fairly say that, while the Vedic Upaniṣads undoubtedly do not present uniform dogma, they nevertheless show a degree of structure in their search for the ultimate principle

Centaurus A: multiple outbursts or bursting bubble?

We present new radio observations of the brighter region of the northern lobe (the Northern Middle Lobe, NML) of Centaurus A obtained at 20 cm with the Australia Telescope Compact Array. The angular resolutions are ~50 and ~130 arcsec, therefore much higher than for the previously available radio images of this region. The most interesting feature detected is a large-scale jet that connects the inner radio lobe and the NML and that is imaged for the first time. The NML itself appears as diffuse emission with a relatively bright ridge on the eastern side. The radio morphology of Centaurus A and, in particular, its NML could be the result of a precessing jet that has undergone a strong interaction with the environment at least in the northern side. The very big drop in intensity between the inner jet and the large-scale jet can be explained with a sequence of bursts of activity at different epochs in the life of the source. Alternatively (or additionally) a ``bursting bubble'' model is proposed which could also explain the good collimation of the large-scale jet. In this model, the plasma accumulated in the inner lobe would be able to ``burst'' out only through one nozzle that would be the region where the large-scale jet forms. From the comparison between the radio emission and the regions of ionized gas we find that the inner optical filament falls about 2 arcmin (~2 kpc) away from the large-scale radio jet. Thus, this filament does not seem to have experienced a direct interaction with the radio plasma. The outer filaments appear to be, in projection, closer to the radio emission, arguing for a direct interaction with the radio jet. However, also in this case a more complicated interaction than assumed so far has to be occuring.Comment: To appear in MNRAS; 11 pages, LateX, 7 figures. Fig 1 is available at http://www.ira.bo.cnr.it/~rmorgant/Centaurus

Improved traceability in seafood supply chains is achievable by minimising vulnerable nodes in processing and distribution networks

Seafood is a globally traded commodity, often involving complex supply chains which have varying degrees of traceability. A robust traceability system for seafood supply chains enables the collection and communication of key information about catch and fisheries origins vital for assurance of the legality and sustainability of seafood products. End-to-end traceability is increasingly demanded by retailers, consumers, NGOs and regulatory bodies to ensure food safety, deter IUU fishing and verify sustainable and ethical credentials. Here, we map three UK seafood supply chains and evaluate traceability performance in: Dover sole landed in the south west of England, North-East Atlantic (NEA) mackerel landed at Peterhead, Scotland, and brown crab and European lobster, landed at Bridlington, England. Through a comparative analysis of traceability performance, this study suggests improvements to the technologies, processes, and systems for traceability in the seafood sector. The application of monitoring technologies and regulatory changes across the sector have increased traceability and potentially reduced instances of IUU fishing. While shorter supply chains are more likely to achieve end-to-end traceability, vulnerable nodes in processing and distribution networks may result in a loss of seafood traceability. While traceability systems may provide sustainability information on seafood, a high level of traceability performance does not necessarily equate to a sustainable source fishery. Encouragingly, while UK seafood supply chains are meeting minimum regulatory requirements for traceability, in the present study, many stakeholders have indicated ambitions towards traceability best practice in order to provide confidence and trust in the UK fishing industry

Corona virus, tariffs, trade wars and supply chain evolutionary design

Purpose Using the constructal law of physics this study aims to provide guidance to future scholarship on global supply chain management. Further, through two case studies the authors are developing, the authors report interview findings with two senior VPs from two multi-national corporations being disrupted by COVID-19. This study suggests how this and recent events will impact on the design of future global supply chains. Design/methodology/approach The authors apply the constructal law to explain the recent disruptions to the global supply chain orthodoxy. Two interviews are presented from case studies the authors are developing in the USA and UK – one a multi-national automobile parts supplier and the other is a earth-moving equipment manufacture. Specifically, this is an exploratory pathway work trying to make sense of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on supply chain scholarship. Findings Adopting the approach of Bejan, the authors believe that what is happening today with COVID-19 and other trade disruptions such as Brexit and the USA imposing tariffs is creating new obstacles that will redirect the future flow of supply chains. Research limitations/implications It is clear that the COVID-19 response introduced a bullwhip effect in the manufacturing sector on a scale never-before seen. For scholars, the authors would suggest there are four pathway topics going forward. These topics include: the future state of global sourcing, the unique nature of a combined “demand” and “supply shortage” bullwhip effect, the resurrection of lean and local production systems and the development of risk-recovery contingency strategies to deal with pandemics. Practical implications Supply chain managers tend to be iterative and focused on making small and subtle changes to their current system and way of thinking, very often seeking to optimize cost or negotiate better contracts with suppliers. In the current environment, however, such activities have proved to be of little consequence compared to the massive forces of economic disruption of the past three years. Organizations that have more tightly compressed supply chains are enjoying a significant benefit during the COVID-19 crisis and are no longer being held hostage to governments of another country. Social implications An implicit assumption in the press is that COVID-19 caught everyone by surprise, and that executives foolishly ignored the risks of outsourcing to China and are now paying the price. However, noted scholars and epidemiologists have been warning of the threats of pandemics since the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) virus. The pundits would further posit that in their pursuit of low-cost production, global corporations made naive assumptions that nothing could disrupt them. Both the firms the authors have interviewed had to close plants to protect their workforce. It was indicated in the cases the authors are developing that it is going to take manufacturers on average one month to recover from 4–6 days of disruption. These companies employ many thousands of people, and direct and ancillary workers are now temporarily laid off and face an uncertain future as/when they will recover back to normal production. Originality/value Using the constructal law of physics, the authors seek to provide guidance to future scholarship on global supply chain management. Further, through two case studies, the authors provide the first insight from two senior VPs from two leading multi-national corporations in their respective sectors being disrupted by COVID-19. This study is the first indication to how this and recent disruptive events will impact on the design of future global supply chains. Unlike the generic work, which has recently appeared in HBR and Forbes, it is grounded in real operational insight

Digital Transformation in the Automotive Supply Chain

In this paper, we begin the process of developing practice-based research problems and questions concerning supply chain digitalization in the automotive industry. Specifically, our focus is on understanding organizational conditions facilitating supply chain and production digitalisation and its role in performance improvement. Therefore, as a first step we organized a research workshop during last year’s Cambridge Center for International Manufacturing (CIM) Symposium with 30 executives representing multiple tiers of the automotive supply chain. The purpose was identifying key themes and patterns amongst these themes, which provides a basis for a practitioner-based, impact led research agenda. We presented the executives with ten digital scenarios developed by CIM, and recorded responses their responses to each scenario in a template of the ten scenarios. Using social network analysis (SNA) we then interrogated the qualitative data to identify: “inter-codal” patterns, linkages and relationships