Importing inequality: immigration and the top 1 percent

In this paper we study the contribution of migrants to the rise in UK top incomes. Using administrative data on the universe of UK taxpayers we show migrants are over-represented at the top of the income distribution, with mi-grants twice as prevalent in the top 0.1% as anywhere in the bottom 97%. These high incomes are predominantly from labour, rather than capital, and migrants are concentrated in only a handful of industries, predominantly finance. Almost all (85%) of the growth in the UK top 1% income share over the past 20 years can be attributed to migration

Photonic Structures Optimization Using Highly Data-Efficient Deep Learning: Application To Nanofin And Annular Groove Phase Masks

Metasurfaces offer a flexible framework for the manipulation of light properties in the realm of thin film optics. Specifically, the polarization of light can be effectively controlled through the use of thin phase plates. This study aims to introduce a surrogate optimization framework for these devices. The framework is applied to develop two kinds of vortex phase masks (VPMs) tailored for application in astronomical high-contrast imaging. Computational intelligence techniques are exploited to optimize the geometric features of these devices. The large design space and computational limitations necessitate the use of surrogate models like partial least squares Kriging, radial basis functions, or neural networks. However, we demonstrate the inadequacy of these methods in modeling the performance of VPMs. To address the shortcomings of these methods, a data-efficient evolutionary optimization setup using a deep neural network as a highly accurate and efficient surrogate model is proposed. The optimization process in this study employs a robust particle swarm evolutionary optimization scheme, which operates on explicit geometric parameters of the photonic device. Through this approach, optimal designs are developed for two design candidates. In the most complex case, evolutionary optimization enables optimization of the design that would otherwise be impractical (requiring too much simulations). In both cases, the surrogate model improves the reliability and efficiency of the procedure, effectively reducing the required number of simulations by up to 75% compared to conventional optimization techniques

The action of Volterra integral operators with highly singular kernels on H\"older continuous, Lebesgue and Sobolev functions

For kernels $\nu$ which are positive and integrable we show that the operator $g\mapsto J_\nu g=\int_0^x \nu(x-s)g(s)ds$ on a finite time interval enjoys a regularizing effect when applied to H\"older continuous and Lebesgue functions and a "contractive" effect when applied to Sobolev functions. For H\"older continuous functions, we establish that the improvement of the regularity of the modulus of continuity is given by the integral of the kernel, namely by the factor $N(x)=\int_0^x \nu(s)ds$. For functions in Lebesgue spaces, we prove that an improvement always exists, and it can be expressed in terms of Orlicz integrability. Finally, for functions in Sobolev spaces, we show that the operator $J_\nu$ "shrinks" the norm of the argument by a factor that, as in the H\"older case, depends on the function $N$ (whereas no regularization result can be obtained). These results can be applied, for instance, to Abel kernels and to the Volterra function $\mathcal{I}(x) = \mu(x,0,-1) = \int_{0}^{\infty}x^{s-1}/\Gamma(s)\,ds$, the latter being relevant for instance in the analysis of the Schr\"odinger equation with concentrated nonlinearities in $\mathbb{R}^{2}$.Comment: 27 pages, 3 figure

Immigration and the top 1 percent

We study the contribution of migrants to the rise in UK top incomes. Using administrative data on the universe of UK taxpayers, we show migrants are over-represented at the top of the income distribution, with migrants twice as prevalent in the top 0.01% as anywhere in the bottom 97%. These high incomes are predominantly from labour, rather than capital, and migrants are concentrated in only a handful of industries, predominantly finance. Almost all (90%) of the observed growth in the UK top 1% income

Electromagnetic channel capacity for practical purposes

We give analytic upper bounds to the channel capacity C for transmission of classical information in electromagnetic channels (bosonic channels with thermal noise). In the practically relevant regimes of high noise and low transmissivity, by comparison with know lower bounds on C, our inequalities determine the value of the capacity up to corrections which are irrelevant for all practical purposes. Examples of such channels are radio communication, infrared or visible-wavelength free space channels. We also provide bounds to active channels that include amplification.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures. NB: the capacity bounds are constructed by generalizing to the multi-mode case the minimum-output entropy bounds of arXiv:quant-ph/0404005 [Phys. Rev. A 70, 032315 (2004)

Physiotherapist-led suprascapular nerve blocks for persistent shoulder pain: Evaluation of a new service in the UK.

INTRODUCTION: This service evaluation explored and reported findings from a new physiotherapist-led service offering suprascapular nerve blocks (SSNBs) to patients with persistent shoulder pain. METHODS: We collected data before the SSNB injection and at the 6-weeks and 6-month follow-up from consecutive patients with persistent shoulder pain being treated by physiotherapists or an anaesthetist. Outcomes were patient-reported pain (numerical rating scale [NRS 0 to 10]), patient-specific functional score (PSFS) and health-related quality of life [the EuroQol five dimensions questionnaire (EQ5D-5 L)]. Exploratory analyses compared baseline and follow-up scores within each clinician delivery group (physiotherapists, anaesthetist). RESULTS: Forty patients (mean age 57 years [standard deviation {SD} 12]; 63% female) received an SSNB from a physiotherapist, eight patients (mean age 59 years [SD 11]; female 88%) received an SSNB from an anaesthetist. At the 6-week follow-up, the physiotherapy group showed a mean reduction in pain (on the NRS): 2.2 (95% confidence interval [CI] 1.3 to 3.0) and an improvement in function (on the PSFS): -1.3 (95% CI -1.9 to -0.4). Similar changes were found in those treated by the anaesthetist (pain: 1.3 [95% CI -1.18 to 3.80]; function: -1.4 (95% CI -3.18 to 0.35]). Very small changes, that were not statistically significant, were found in EQ5D-5 L scores. At the 6-month follow-up, the mean reduction in pain (NRS) was maintained at 2.0 (95% CI 0.99 to 2.95) for the physiotherapy group. CONCLUSION: The results provide early, exploratory evidence that patients with persistent shoulder pain treated by physiotherapists using palpation-guided SSNBs achieve clinically important changes in pain and function in the short and medium term

Vortex phase masks of topological charge 4 and higher with diamond subwavelength gratings

High contrast imaging at small inner working angles can be achieved using a vector vortex coronagraph in the focal plane of the telescope providing a helical phase ramp with a singularity at its center. The form birefringence of full-diamond subwavelength gratings has proven to be well suited to manufacture such vortex phase masks for coronagraphic applications (Subwavelength Grating Vortex Coronagraph, SGVC). In the past years our group has developed and manufactured SGVCs of topological charge 2 (Annular Groove Phase Mask, AGPM) made of a concentric diamond subwavelength grating. For future applications including ELT-class telescopes in the near- to mid-infrared that will partly resolve nearby stars, it is however useful to increase the topological charge of the vortex. After shortly reviewing our previous attempts at optimizing the grating structure for SGVC of charge 4, we present the first laboratory results obtained with such devices. We then introduce and discuss more realistic simulations compared to prior studies using finite-difference time-domain methods. The quality of the simulation results obtained with the open source software MEEP for an AGPM is shown to be appropriate for developing and assessing the performance of future vortex phase masks. We therefore perform updated simulations for SGVC of charge 4 including various designs with straight and curved grating lines. We conclude with a perspective on the potential of metasurfaces and their applications to design novel vortex coronagraphs based on subwavelength structures.EPI

Manipulation of Cooper pair entanglement in hybrid topological Josephson junctions

In this work we investigate the supercurrent in a hybrid topological Josephson junction consisting of two planes of topological insulator (TI) in a specific configuration, which allows both local (LAR) and crossed (CAR) Andreev processes at the interfaces with two conventional s-wave superconductors. We describe the effects of gate voltage and magnetic flux controls applied to the edge states of each TI. In particular, we demonstrate that the voltage gating allows the manipulation of the entaglement symmetry of non-local Cooper pairs associated to the CAR process. We establish a connection between the Josephson current-phase relationship of the system and the action of the two external fields, finding that they selectively modify the LAR or the CAR contributions. Remarkably, we find that the critical current of the junction takes a very simple form which reflects the change in the symmetry occurred to the entangled state and allows to determine the microscopic parameters of the junction

Evidence for the Higgs-boson Yukawa coupling to tau leptons with the ATLAS detector

Results of a search for H → τ τ decays are presented, based on the full set of proton-proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS experiment at the LHC during 2011 and 2012. The data correspond to integrated luminosities of 4.5 fb−1 and 20.3 fb−1 at centre-of-mass energies of √s = 7 TeV and √s = 8 TeV respectively. All combinations of leptonic (τ → `νν¯ with ` = e, µ) and hadronic (τ → hadrons ν) tau decays are considered. An excess of events over the expected background from other Standard Model processes is found with an observed (expected) significance of 4.5 (3.4) standard deviations. This excess provides evidence for the direct coupling of the recently discovered Higgs boson to fermions. The measured signal strength, normalised to the Standard Model expectation, of µ = 1.43 +0.43 −0.37 is consistent with the predicted Yukawa coupling strength in the Standard Model