Custodial Symmetry Violation in Scalar Extensions of the Standard Model

The new measurement of the W boson mass from the CDF collaboration shows a significant tension with the Standard Model prediction, which evidences violation of custodial symmetry in the scalar sector. We study the scalar extensions of the Standard Model, which can be categorized into two classes, scalar sector with custodial symmetry (Georgi-Machacek model and its generalizations) and scalar sector without custodial symmetry, and explore how these extensions fit to the electroweak precision data and the CDF new $m_W$ . The favored oblique parameters are coming from either the large mass splitting in the multiplet via the loop contribution or the large vacuum expectation value which breaks custodial symmetry at the tree level. In particular, we find that $\mathcal{O}(100)$ GeV new particles are allowed in the scalar extension scenarios.Comment: 24 pages, 4 figure

Complete EFT Operator Bases for Dark Matter and Weakly-Interacting Light Particle

The standard model can be extended to include weakly-interacting light particle (WILP): real or complex singlet scalar, Majorana or Dirac neutral fermion, neutral or hidden-charged vector boson, etc. Imposing the $Z_2$ symmetry, these particles can be lifted as the weakly-interacting massive particle (WIMP), the candidate of dark matter. Instead, imposing the shift symmetry on the scalar components gives rise to the axion-like particle, dark photon, etc. Utilizing these light degree of freedom along with the standard model particles and imposing different symmetries, we construct the complete and independent sets of effective operators up to dimension eight with the Young tensor technique, consistent with counting from the Hilbert series.Comment: 109 pages. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:2305.1677

Review of advanced road materials, structures, equipment, and detection technologies

As a vital and integral component of transportation infrastructure, pavement has a direct and tangible impact on socio-economic sustainability. In recent years, an influx of groundbreaking and state-of-the-art materials, structures, equipment, and detection technologies related to road engineering have continually and progressively emerged, reshaping the landscape of pavement systems. There is a pressing and growing need for a timely summarization of the current research status and a clear identification of future research directions in these advanced and evolving technologies. Therefore, Journal of Road Engineering has undertaken the significant initiative of introducing a comprehensive review paper with the overarching theme of “advanced road materials, structures, equipment, and detection technologies”. This extensive and insightful review meticulously gathers and synthesizes research findings from 39 distinguished scholars, all of whom are affiliated with 19 renowned universities or research institutions specializing in the diverse and multidimensional field of highway engineering. It covers the current state and anticipates future development directions in the four major and interconnected domains of road engineering: advanced road materials, advanced road structures and performance evaluation, advanced road construction equipment and technology, and advanced road detection and assessment technologies

Meta-analysis Followed by Replication Identifies Loci in or near CDKN1B, TET3, CD80, DRAM1, and ARID5B as Associated with Systemic Lupus Erythematosus in Asians

Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is a prototype autoimmune disease with a strong genetic involvement and ethnic differences. Susceptibility genes identified so far only explain a small portion of the genetic heritability of SLE, suggesting that many more loci are yet to be uncovered for this disease. In this study, we performed a meta-analysis of genome-wide association studies on SLE in Chinese Han populations and followed up the findings by replication in four additional Asian cohorts with a total of 5,365 cases and 10,054 corresponding controls. We identified genetic variants in or near CDKN1B, TET3, CD80, DRAM1, and ARID5B as associated with the disease. These findings point to potential roles of cell-cycle regulation, autophagy, and DNA demethylation in SLE pathogenesis. For the region involving TET3 and that involving CDKN1B, multiple independent SNPs were identified, highlighting a phenomenon that might partially explain the missing heritability of complex diseases

Essays on global outsourcing and innovation

This dissertation 'Essays on Global Outsourcing and Innovation' consists of three papers. The first and the second papers investigate two issues arising from global sourcing of multinational corporations. The third paper empirically studies whether U.S innovation is influenced by intellectual property rights protection in other countries. Chapter one is 'Cluster-based Economic Growth and Sourcing Behavior of Multinationals'. The paper considers the relationship between global sourcing of multinational enterprises and agglomeration effect of industrial clusters by extending an intra-industry heterogeneity North-South trade model (embedded with property-rights approach). We assume that there is only one cluster in each industry in the South and in the North. The actual scale of a cluster (measured by the number of firms which produce manufacturing goods in the cluster) is determined by the investment or outsourcing choice of multinationals or final goods producers. We investigate respectively the industries of high headquarter intensity and the industries of low headquarter intensity. In either case, multiple equilibria exist. When the headquarter intensity is very low, the multinationals do not produce intermediate goods internally. Normally firms with relatively low productivities find their suppliers in the North whereas firms with relatively high productivities outsource in the South. When the headquarter intensity is high enough, at most three organizational forms exist in equilibrium and no firms outsource in the South. Also, firms with low productivities will procure intermediate goods in the North, while firms which have high productivities will source the inputs from the South. In either case, we derive that in industries with higher wage rates, more varieties of goods are produced in the South, but not in the North. The reason is that the agglomeration effect of industrial clusters cancels out the effect of higher wage rates on production cost. Therefore, the development mode of cluster-based economic growth in the South is interpreted under our framework. Moreover, in the industries of low headquarter intensity, hollowing-out trend might take place; but in the industries of high headquarter intensity, more varieties of intermediate goods will still be produced in the North rather than in the South. Since the industrial scale of headquarter intensive sector in the South is not as large as that in the North, the paper suggests that high-tech industries of the South should be nurtured under self-reliance policy. Chapter two is 'Global Sourcing: Complete Contract and Imperfect Law Enforcement'. It assumes that the contract between a multinational corporation and its outside intermediate supplier is complete, while law enforcement is imperfect when the multinational breach the contract. We investigate the sorting pattern of the organizational forms of multinationals with different productivity. The pattern is described respectively when the law enforcement probability in the South is rather low or much stronger. When the probability of law enforcement in the South is low, at most three organizational forms exist in equilibrium. Firms with lower productivity integrate vertically in the North or in the South, but firms having the highest productivity will outsource their input suppliers in the South. When the probability of law enforcement in the South is high, there are four types of organizational choice of the final-goods producers. Normally, firms with the lowest productivity make internally the intermediate goods in the North whereas firms with highest productivity outsource the intermediate inputs in the South. Then we study the relative prevalence of different organizational modes. The fraction of firms choosing any particular organizational forms depends on the wage differential across countries, the degree of productivity dispersion in an industry, the probability of law enforcement in the South, the social penalty of breach of contracts, the headquarter intensity of the multinational corporation, the difference of fixed management costs and other factors. Specifically, weaker law enforcement in the South will attract more multinationals to source suppliers overseas and smaller social penalty has a similar effect on the choice of multinationals. Chapter three is 'Does IPR protection in Developing Countries Influence Technological Innovation in the U.S?' It uses patent data to empirically test the relationship between IPR protection in other countries and technological innovation in the U.S. The U.S government always urges developing countries to adopt a more stringent policy towards IPR protection. It often claims that weak protection in these countries would reduce the return of innovation of U.S companies and hamper their incentive towards innovation activity. This paper does a series of regressions and verifies that the U.S argument does not stand up. We use the data of patent application in 1967-1999 filed in the USPTO (categorized by six technological sectors) to stand for innovation in U.S companies. Dummies are utilized to reflect the policy shift in IPR protection in other countries during this period. Control variables such as per capita GDP, human capital investment, and the dummies of the TRIPS agreement and the CAFC are also included. Moreover, economic linkage strength between the U.S and other countries are considered by using interaction terms in the econometric model. The regression results do not support that the IPR reform in other countries have promoted innovation in the U.S. The setting up of the CAFC has not had obvious influence, either. We devise some robustness checks to challenge that conclusion. We examine the GDP effect, lagged response to IPR reform, and the effect of time trend etc, and find that the result is credible. However, this paper indicates that U.S innovation was facilitated through domestic policy transformation around the TRIPS which came into force in 1995

Performance Evaluation of Ultra-Thin Wearing Course with Different Polymer Modified Asphalt Binders

Ultra-thin wearing course (UTWC) as an asphalt overlay is widely used in pavement maintenance for extending pavement service life. Researchers focused on improving and evaluating its performance, yet few researchers compare the performance of typical UTWCs. Moreover, some traditional asphalt mixture tests are improper for UTWC due to the thicknesses of UTWC, which is thinner than the traditional asphalt overlay. This study further evaluated the advantages and disadvantages of typical UTWCs. A series of tests were conducted to compare the comprehensive performance of three typical UWTC products, including SMA-10, Novachip-B, and GT-10. Moreover, this study improved the rutting test to evaluate its rutting performance more accurately. Rutting specimens of 20 mm thick and 50 mm thick composite specimens (20 mm UTWC + 30 mm Portland cement concrete slabs) were prepared. Two types of PCC slabs were used, including unprocessed PCC slabs and PCC slabs with preset cracks. The test results showed that Novachip-B showed the best water stability and weakest raveling resistance, while GT-10 showed the best fatigue and anti-skid performance. The rutting performance of UTWCs was reduced because of the influence of preset cracks. The rutting depth of GT-10 was only 60–90% of that of others, showing the comprehensive performance of GT-10 was better than that of others. These results provide a significant reference for the research and application of UTWC