Regional variations in the diffusion of triggered seismicity

[1] We determine the spatiotemporal characteristics of interearthquake triggering in the International Seismological Centre catalogue on regional and global scales. We pose a null hypothesis of spatially clustered, temporally random seismicity, and determine a residual pair correlation function for triggered events against this background. We compare results from the eastern Mediterranean, 25 Flinn-Engdahl seismic regions, and the global data set. The null hypothesis cannot be rejected for distances greater than 150 km, providing an upper limit to triggering distances that can be distinguished from temporally uncorrelated seismicity in the stacked data at present. Correlation lengths L andmean distances between triggered events hri are on the order of 10–50 km, but can be as high as 100 km in subduction zones. These values are not strongly affected by magnitude threshold, but are comparable to seismogenic thicknesses, implying a strong thermal control on correlation lengths. The temporal evolution of L and hri is well fitted by a power law, with an exponent H 0.1 ± 0.05. This is much lower than the value H = 0.5 expected for Gaussian diffusion in a homogenous medium. We observe clear regional variations in L, hri and H that appear to depend on tectonic setting. A detectable transition to a more rapid diffusion regime occurs in some cases at times greater than 100–200 days, possibly due to viscoelastic processes in the ductile lower crust

An efficient algorithm for the parallel solution of high-dimensional differential equations

The study of high-dimensional differential equations is challenging and difficult due to the analytical and computational intractability. Here, we improve the speed of waveform relaxation (WR), a method to simulate high-dimensional differential-algebraic equations. This new method termed adaptive waveform relaxation (AWR) is tested on a communication network example. Further we propose different heuristics for computing graph partitions tailored to adaptive waveform relaxation. We find that AWR coupled with appropriate graph partitioning methods provides a speedup by a factor between 3 and 16

Les conflits d’intérêts en médecine : un exemple vétérinaire

Étude de cas / Case studyEn santé, des professionnels peuvent se trouver à risque d’abuser de leurs prérogatives en négligeant les intérêts de leurs clients. Un conflit d’intérêts peut survenir notamment lorsque le praticien privilégie un intérêt secondaire, tel que son propre gain financier, au détriment d’un intérêt primaire ou d’une responsabilité professionnelle, comme l’intérêt du patient. Cette étude de cas, inspirée d’une histoire réelle en médecine vétérinaire, illustre le problème éthique par lequel des interventions de haute technicité utilisées en pratique s’avèrent fortement conseillées, même si elles ne sont pas nécessairement dans le meilleur intérêt du client.In health care, professionals may find themselves at risk of abusing their powers by neglecting the interests of their clients. In particular, a conflict of interest can arise when the practitioner focuses on a secondary interest, such as his own financial gain, at the expense of a primary interest or professional responsibility, such as the interest of the patient. This case study, inspired by a true story in veterinary medicine, illustrates the ethical problem by which high-tech interventions are used in practice, even if their use is not necessarily in the client’s best interest

Un regard incontournable sur les conflits d’intérêts dans la pratique médicale

Compte-rendu / ReviewDans son livre : Conflicts of Interest and the Future of Medicine: The United States, France and Japan, Mark A. Rodwin aborde la question des conflits d’intérêts (CI) des médecins en comparant les systèmes de soins de santé de ces trois pays. Son analyse perspicace lui permet de proposer des pistes de solutions s’appliquant aux principales situations de CI rencontrées dans la pratique médicale.In his book: Conflicts of Interest and the Future of Medicine: The United States, France and Japan, Mark A. Rodwin discusses the conflicts of interest (COI) of physicians by comparing the healthcare systems of these three countries. His insightful analysis allows him to propose possible solutions applicable to major COI situations encountered in medical practice

InPact — the indium phosphide specialists

AbstractSince the management buy-out in 1995, InPact has changed dramatically and for the better. Sales have more than doubled, and the staff has grown from 11 to 25. Today, InPact claims to be the leading sourcer of INP wafers outside Japan. We owe this growing success to the customers world-wide — who have been steadily putting more trust into our products; to our technical partners; and to our staff dedicated to providing high quality and first class service to all of our customers