Lessons Learned, Lessons Lost: Immigration Enforcement\u27s Failed Experiment with Penal Severity

This article traces the evolution of “get tough” sentencing and corrections policies that were touted as the solution to a criminal justice system widely viewed as “broken” in the mid-1970s. It draws parallels to the adoption some twenty years later of harsh, punitive policies in the immigration enforcement system to address perceptions that it is similarly “broken,” policies that have embraced the theories, objectives and tools of criminal punishment, and caused the two systems to converge. In discussing the myriad of harms that have resulted from the convergence of these two systems, and the criminal justice system’s recent shift away from severity and toward harm reduction, this article suggests that the criminal justice system has been more proactive in compensating for its excesses than the immigration enforcement system and discusses the reasons why

Protein crystal growth tray assembly

A protein crystal growth tray assembly includes a tray that has a plurality of individual crystal growth chambers. Each chamber has a movable pedestal which carries a protein crystal growth compartment at an upper end. The several pedestals for each tray assembly are ganged together for concurrent movement so that the solutions in the various pedestal growth compartments can be separated from the solutions in the tray's growth chambers until the experiment is to be activated

Residential Real Estate Purchase Decisions in Australia: Is it More Than Location?

This study investigates the factors that prospective buyers consider when purchasing residential property in Queensland, Australia. A drop-off survey is used, with 376 property buyers and a response rate of 62.7 percent. Affordability, maintenance and interior design, and a good neighbourhood are considered as most important. Of least importance are the affluence and quality of the area, water, views and roads, and features, such as a pool or air-conditioning. Therefore, location is important in the sense of neighbourhood and community, rather than prestige. Affordability should receive more attention in the literature and real estate marketing. Different market segments consider a number of factors when purchasing residential property. Since the factors vary according to the purpose (live in or investment) and the property type (house or unit), these variables provide a basis for identifying market segments. Agents can use the findings to better understand buyers. Researchers can further analyse buyer considerations and property characteristics to condense a large number of factors into a small number of coherent dimensions. The study may be limited by its focus on a geographical section of the Australian real estate market and some difficulties in identifying and operationalising property characteristics.Purchase; Investment; Australia; Residential; Buyer preferences

Blurring the Boundaries Between Immigration and Crime Control After September 11th

Although the escalating criminalization of immigration law has been examined at length, the social control dimension of this phenomenon has gone relatively understudied. This Article attempts to remedy this deficiency by tracing the relationship between criminal punishment and immigration law, demonstrating that the War on Terror has further blurred these distinctions and exposing the social control function that pervades immigration law enforcement after September 11th prioritized counterterrorism. In doing so, the author draws upon the work of Daniel Kanstroom, Michael Welch, Jonathan Simon and Malcolm Feeley

Hollow fiber clinostat for simulating microgravity in cell culture

A clinostat for simulating microgravity on cell systems carried in a fiber fixedly mounted in a rotatable culture vessel is disclosed. The clinostat is rotated horizontally along its longitudinal axis to simulate microgravity or vertically as a control response. Cells are injected into the fiber and the ends of the fiber are sealed and secured to spaced end pieces of a fiber holder assembly which consists of the end pieces, a hollow fiber, a culture vessel, and a tension spring with three alignment pins. The tension spring is positioned around the culture vessel with its ends abutting the end pieces for alignment of the spring. After the fiber is secured, the spring is decompressed to maintain tension on the fiber while it is being rotated. This assures that the fiber remains aligned along the axis of rotation. The fiber assembly is placed in the culture vessel and culture medium is added. The culture vessel is then inserted into the rotatable portion of the clinostat and subjected to rotate at selected rpms. The internal diameter of the hollow fiber determines the distance the cells are from the axis of rotation

On the null-controllability of the heat equation in unbounded domains

We make two remarks about the null-controllability of the heat equation with Dirichlet condition in unbounded domains. Firstly, we give a geometric necessary condition (for interior null-controllability in the Euclidean setting)which implies that one can not go infinitely far away from the control region without tending to the boundary (if any), but also applies when the distance to the control region is bounded. The proof builds on heat kernel estimates. Secondly, we describe a class of null-controllable heat equations on unbounded product domains. Elementary examples include an infinite strip in the plane controlled from one boundary and an infinite rod controlled from an internal infinite rod. The proof combines earlier results on compact manifolds with a new lemma saying that the null-controllability of an abstract control system and its null-controllability cost are not changed by taking its tensor product with a system generated by a non-positive self-adjoint operator.Comment: References [CdMZ01, dTZ00] added, abstract modifie

Complexity, Collective Effects and Modelling of Ecosystems: formation, function and stability

We discuss the relevance of studying ecology within the framework of Complexity Science from a statistical mechanics approach. Ecology is concerned with understanding how systems level properties emerge out of the multitude of interactions amongst large numbers of components, leading to ecosystems that possess the prototypical characteristics of complex systems. We argue that statistical mechanics is at present the best methodology available to obtain a quantitative description of complex systems, and that ecology is in urgent need of ``integrative'' approaches that are quantitative and non-stationary. We describe examples where combining statistical mechanics and ecology has led to improved ecological modelling and, at the same time, broadened the scope of statistical mechanics.Comment: 11 pages and 1 figur

Bright Lines, Black Bodies: The \u3cem\u3eFlorence\u3c/em\u3e Strip Search Case and its Dire Repercussions

Part I is a brief history of Search and Seizure law, focusing on seismic doctrinal shifts that occurred from the 1950s to the present. As a framework for the important cases, the Founders’ concerns about abuse of governmental authority are discussed, as well as the rights protected by the Fourth Amendment. Various governmental programs will also be presented, such as the War on Drugs and its call for a large-scale federal anti-drug policy, first initiated by President Richard Nixon in 1969. Part II is a description of the central reasoning presented in Florence v. Board of Chosen Freeholders, including the majority opinion written by Justice Kennedy and also the concurring and dissenting opinions. Part III will be a discussion of the four major cases that the Supreme Court relied upon in Florence: Bell v. Wolfish, Hudson v. Palmer, Turner v. Safley, and Atwater v. Lago Vista. Part IV presents four major points that emerge from Albert Florence’s predicament and the Florence decision. First, Florence’s arrest and detention was predicated on law enforcement’s overreliance on information databases, which in this case contained inaccurate information. Second, strip searches degrade those subjected to them and, in the vast majority of cases, are simply unnecessary. Indeed, the bodily submission, surveillance, and inspection entailed in strip searches eerily resembles previous rituals of coercive, discriminatory race-making, especially those associated with slave markets. Third, Justice Kennedy’s endorsement of categorical rules and “bright line” tests as constitutional guides for law enforcement practice puts far too much discretionary power in the hands of law enforcement and invites abuse of authority. Ironically, in recent Fourth Amendment decisions involving searches of automobile occupants, the Court has criticized and limited the application of bright line rules due to similar concerns about abuse of police authority. Fourth, the Florence decision and categorical strip searches both exemplify policies informed by fear, which oscillate between depictions of inflammatory dangerousness and super villains, like Timothy McVeigh, and hyper-vigilant, risk management. The paper concludes with a discussion of the possible repercussions and legacy of Florence on future Fourth Amendment litigation involving jails and prisons

Sex & Surveillance: Gender, Privacy & the Sexualization of Power in Prison

In prison, surveillance is power and power is sexualized. Sex and surveillance, therefore, are profoundly linked. Whereas numerous penal scholars from Bentham to Foucault have theorized the force inherent in the visual monitoring of prisoners, the sexualization of power and the relationship between sex and surveillance is more academically obscure. This article criticizes the failure of federal courts to consider the strong and complex relationship between sex and surveillance in analyzing the constitutionality of prison searches, specifically, cross-gender searches. The analysis proceeds in four parts. Part One introduces the issues posed by sex and surveillance. Part Two describes the sexually predacious prisoner subculture that frames the issue of cross-gender searches and demonstrates how the current doctrine participates in the allocation of power within prison without admitting it. Part Three presents the doctrinal background for cross-gender search cases. It traces the precedents that eroded the basic notion of prisoner privacy and charts the parallel ascendance of sex-based concerns in the regulation of prisons. It also demonstrates that the constitutional doctrine of cross-gender searches is in disarray and that the confusion within the doctrine centers on visual surveillance of male prisoners by female guards in “contact” positions. Part Four examines Johnson v. Phelan, one of the few judicial opinions to draw attention to the realities of prison life in its discussion of visual surveillance. This section credits Judge Richard Posner\u27\u27s dissent for recognizing the limitations of privacy-based judicial approaches to cross-gender search cases, but criticizes it for blaming the doctrinal inadequacies on those who promote the entry of women into the field of corrections. Finally, this article concludes that judges need to take a new approach to prisoner privacy claims and look beyond traditional sex and power stereotypes