Drastic change of the electrical resistivity related to the novel magnetic phase transition in α-Sm2S3

Magnetization and electrical resistivity of α-Sm2S3 have been investigated by using single crystals. The temperature dependence of the magnetization; M(T), demonstrates a magnetic transition at around T = 4.5 K. The M(T) shows abrupt rise below 5K with decreasing temperature in the low magnetic filed of H = 100 Oe. Zero-field-cooled M(T) shows a sudden decrease with marking a maximum at 4.5 K, while field-cooled M(T) keeps steady rising around this temperature. The magnetization M(H) in the magnetic field along the c-axis shows a ferromagnetic hysteresis at the lower temperature than TC = 4.5 K, although its magnitude is much smaller than the value for the full Sm3+ moment. The resistivity ρ(T) indicates a double peak having the maxima at T = 4.65 and 3.3 K in no magnetic field. The ratio of ρ(4.65 K) to ρ(6.0 K) is extremely large as it exceeds 100. The double peak diminishes rapidly with increasing magnetic field. The negative giant magneto-resistance effect having the magneto-resistance ratio of −99 % at H = 10 kOe has been observed at T = 4.5 K

Appraising the vexed question of absolute immunity on state executives under Nigerian law

Absolute immunity conferred on State Executives is covered by section 308 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) which provides immunity from trials in civil and criminal matters, except in electoral matters on the President and his Vice, the Governors of the States and their Deputies. The sole justification for this is that these State Executives should enjoy absolute immunity to enable them to perform official duties without distractions. However, recent conducts of some State Executives have rekindled the need to amend section 308 by depriving them immunity from criminal prosecution as practiced in the United States while still in office. In the long run, the author concludes by supporting this view absolutely

A prototype mobile money implementation in Nigeria

Researchers have shown that majority of the populace in the developing nations are rural dwellers that do not have access to basic financial services and are poor. This class of people are peasant farmers and petty traders who rely mostly on remittances from their wards and relations in major cities and abroad to meet their financial obligations at home. The methods of remittances are encumbered with challenges. Mobile money is a tool that allows individuals to make financial transactions using mobile cell phones. Nigeria is one of the fastest growing telecoms nations of the world and the adoption of mobile money will help a great deal to solve the problems associated with remittances. In this paper, we present a short messages services (SMS) and unstructured supplementary service data (USSD) implementation of mobile money implementation in Nigeria modelled using Django and Python as the programming language, MySQL as the data store and Apache hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) as the Web server. The system made comparative analysis with M-PESA implementation in Kenya: the first mobile money implantation in Africa. Furthermore, the system was tested among a selected few of the populace to evaluate the usability of the design. Findings revealed that the prototype implementation is user-friendly and can be used by all without many problems except for the illiterate populace; hence, the need to have a combined bank and agent-based implementation. This approach will help with time to reduce the number of unbanked populace, which is currently at 80%

Successful non-native speech perception is linked to frequency following response phase consistency

Some people who attempt to learn a second language in adulthood meet with greater success than others. The causes driving these individual differences in second language learning skill continue to be debated. In particular, it remains controversial whether robust auditory perception can provide an advantage for non-native speech perception. Here, we tested English speech perception in native Japanese speakers through the use of frequency following responses, the evoked gamma band response, and behavioral measurements. Participants whose neural responses featured less timing jitter from trial to trial performed better on perception of English consonants than participants with more variable neural timing. Moreover, this neural metric predicted consonant perception to a greater extent than did age of arrival and length of residence in the UK, and neural jitter predicted independent variance in consonant perception after these demographic variables were accounted for. Thus, difficulties with auditory perception may be one source of problems learning second languages in adulthood