3,219 research outputs found
Security and human rights in the Balkans, Russia and Ukraine
The article presents a review of the problem about the security and human rights in the Balkans, Russia and Ukraine. The moderndemocratic countries have adopted the French model which has been historically imposed. In this model, personal security has been regarded as supreme value guaranteed by the state. The legal defi nition adopted in Bulgaria, Russia and Ukraine deviates from that line and goes another direction where “national security” is regarded as alternative to the “human rights” category
Does distributed leadership have a place in destination management organisations? A policy-makers perspective
Within an increasingly networked environment and recent transitions in the landscape of funding for destination management organisations (DMOs) and destinations, pooling knowledge and resources may well be seen as a prerequisite to ensuring the long-term sustainability of reshaped, yet financially constrained DMOs facing severe challenges to deliver value to destinations, visitors and member organisations. Distributed Leadership (DL) is a recent paradigm gaining momentum in destination research as a promising response to these challenges. Building on the scarce literature on DL in a DMO context, this paper provides a policy-makers’ perspective into the place of DL in reshaped DMOs and DMOs undergoing transformation and explores current challenges and opportunities to the enactment and practice of DL. The underpinned investigation used in-depth, semi-structured interviews with policy-makers from VisitEngland following an interview agenda based on the DMO Leadership Cycle. Policy-makers within VisitEngland saw a multitude of opportunities for DMOs with regards to DL, but equally, they emphasised challenges acting as barriers to realising the potential benefits of introducing a DL model to DMOs as a response to uncertainty in the funding landscape
Ionospheric quasi-static electric field anomalies during seismic activity in August–September 1981
The paper proposes new results, analyses and information for the plate tectonic situation in the processing of INTERCOSMOS-BULGARIA-1300 satellite data about anomalies of the quasi-static electric field in the upper ionosphere over activated earthquake source regions at different latitudes. The earthquake catalogue is made on the basis of information from the United State Geological Survey (USGS) website. The disturbances in ionospheric quasi-static electric fields are recorded by IESP-1 instrument aboard the INTERCOSMOS-BULGARIA-1300 satellite and they are compared with significant seismic events from the period 14 August–20 September 1981 in magnetically very quiet, quiet and medium quiet days. The main tectonic characteristics of the seismically activated territories are also taken in account. The main goal of the above research work is to enlarge the research of possible connections between anomalous vertical electric field penetrations into the ionosphere and the earthquake manifestations, also to propose tectonic arguments for the observed phenomena. The studies are represented in four main blocks: (i) previous studies of similar problems, (ii) selection of satellite, seismic and plate tectonic data, (iii) data processing with new specialized software and observations of the quasi-static electric field and (iiii) summary, comparison of new with previous results in our studies and conclusion. We establish the high informativity of the vertical component <i>Ez</i> of the quasi-static electric field in the upper ionosphere according observations by INTERCOSMOS-BULGARIA-1300 that are placed above considerably activated earthquake sources. This component shows an increase of about 2–10 mV/m above sources, situated on mobile structures of the plates. The paper discusses the observed effects. It is represented also a statistical study of ionospheric effects 5–15 days before and 5–15 days after the earthquakes with magnitude M 4.8–7.9
History Matching with Subset Simulation
Computational cost often hinders the calibration of complex computer models. In this context, history matching (HM) is becoming a widespread calibration strategy, with applications in many disciplines. HM uses a statistical approximation, also known as an emulator, to the model output, in order to mitigate computational cost. The process starts with an observation of a physical system. It then produces progressively more accurate emulators to determine a non-implausible domain: a subset of the input space that provides a good agreement between the model output and the data, conditional on the model structure, the sources of uncertainty, and an implausibility measure. In HM, it is essential to generate samples from the nonimplausible domain, in order to run the model and train the emulator until a stopping condition is met. However, this sampling can be very challenging, since the nonimplausible domain can become orders of magnitude smaller than the original input space very quickly. This paper proposes a solution to this problem using subset simulation, a rare event sampling technique that works efficiently in high dimensions. The proposed approach is demonstrated via calibration and robust design examples from the field of aerospace engineering
Measurements of Anisotropy in the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation at 0.5 Degree Angular Scales Near the Star Gamma Ursae Minoris
We present results from a four frequency observation of a 6 x 0.6 degree
strip of the sky centered near the star Gamma Ursae Minoris during the fourth
flight of the Millimeter-wave Anisotropy eXperiment (MAX). The observation was
made with a 1.4 degree peak-to-peak sinusoidal chop in all bands. The FWHM beam
sizes were 0.55 +/- 0.05 degrees at 3.5 cm-1 and 0.75 +/-0.05 degrees at 6, 9,
and 14 cm-1. During this observation significant correlated structure was
observed at 3.5, 6 and 9 cm-1 with amplitudes similar to those observed in the
GUM region during the second and third flights of MAX. The frequency spectrum
is consistent with CMB and inconsistent with thermal emission from interstellar
dust. The extrapolated amplitudes of synchrotron and free-free emission are too
small to account for the amplitude of the observed structure. If all of the
structure is attributed to CMB anisotropy with a Gaussian autocorrelation
function and a coherence angle of 25', then the most probable values of
DeltaT/TCMB in the 3.5, 6, and 9 cm-1 bands are 4.3 (+2.7, -1.6) x 10-5, 2.8
(+4.3, -1.1) x 10-5, and 3.5 (+3.0, -1.6) x 10-5 (95% confidence upper and
lower limits), respectively.Comment: 16 pages, postscrip
Measurements of Anisotropy in the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation at Degree Angular Scales Near the Stars Sigma Hercules and Iota Draconis
We present results from two four-frequency observations centered near the
stars Sigma Hercules and Iota Draconis during the fourth flight of the
Millimeter-wave Anisotropy eXperiment (MAX). The observations were made of 6 x
0.6-degree strips of the sky with 1.4-degree peak to peak sinusoidal chop in
all bands. The FWHM beam sizes were 0.55+/-0.05 degrees at 3.5 cm-1 and a
0.75+/-0.05 degrees at 6, 9, and 14 cm-1. Significant correlated structures
were observed at 3.5, 6 and 9 cm-1. The spectra of these signals are
inconsistent with thermal emission from known interstellar dust populations.
The extrapolated amplitudes of synchrotron and free-free emission are too small
to account for the amplitude of the observed structures. If the observed
structures are attributed to CMB anisotropy with a Gaussian autocorrelation
function and a coherence angle of 25', then the most probable values are
DT/TCMB = (3.1 +1.7-1.3) x 10^-5 for the Sigma Hercules scan, and DT/TCMB =
(3.3 +/- 1.1) x 10^-5 for the Iota Draconis scan (95% confidence upper and
lower limits). Finally a comparison of all six MAX scans is presented.Comment: 13 pages, postscript file, 2 figure
MUSCLE ACTIVITY OF THE TRUNK AND UPPER LIMBS IN RACE WALKING
Race walking requires high technical mastery of competitors based on biomechanical laws. These, in turn,
are the basis of high sports results and effective techniques. Research in this direction mainly focuses on
the work of the lower extremities. From this point of view, this study aims to determine the muscle activity
of selected muscles on the upper body during race walking. The method of study is surface
electromyography of the following muscles: m. Erector spinae longissimus; m. Rectus abdominis; m.
Obliquus externus abdominis; m. Musculus trapezius (middle part); m. Pectoralis major; m. Lattissimus
dorsi; m. Deltoideus anterior & m. Deltoideus posterior) front and back heads. Results: The most significant
activation for the persons studied to exhibit m. Trapezius transversalis (65,49%) m. Latissimus dorsi
(49,41%) and m. Deltoideus posterior (47,91%). Conclusions: the competitors' different technical skills
differentiate some muscle activities, which will inevitably lead to different biomechanical expediency of
the movements; The main direction in work should be to the muscles along the back of the trunk: Trapezius
Transversalis, M. Latissimus dorsi, and m. Deltoideus posterior
Interstellar dust in the BOOMERanG maps
Interstellar dust (ISD) emission is present in the mm-wave maps obtained by the BOOMERanG experiment at intermediate and high Galactic latitudes. We find that, while being sub-dominant at the lower frequencies (90,150, 240 GHz), thermal emission from ISD is dominant at 410 GHz, and is well correlated with the IRAS map at 100 µm. We find also that the angular power spectrum of ISD fluctuations at 410 GHz is a power law, and its level is negligible with respect to the angular power spectrum of the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) at 90 and 150 GHz
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