A Value Chain and Marketing of Iranian Cashmere

Iran together with Afghanistan is the third largest producer and exporter of cashmere in the world, after China and Mongolia. This paper assesses the status of cashmere marketing of Iran in order to evaluate sustainability, and to identify some constraints limiting the productivity and compa-tibility. In August to December 2011 structured questionnaires and interviews were used to compile information regarding market chains cashmere industry of Iran. Information compiled revealed that nearly all the cashmere was marketed by direct buying in Iran. The principle centers for the gathering and rough sorting raw cashmere in Iran were Baft, Sirjan, Mashad, and Birjand. The principle cashmere-importing countries of Iranian cashmere were China, England, Belgium and Italy. The price for Iranian cashmere has showed large fluctuations in the last forty years: it increased from 25 dollars in 1972 to 110 dollars in 1988 and decreased to 65 dollars in 2006 and again increased to 110 dollars in 2012. Given the present status of production and marketing there seems to be substantial scope to improve the value addition of Iranian cashmere. Key words: cashmere, production, marketing, export, value additio

Improved Detection Rates for Close Binaries Via Astrometric Observations of Gravitational Microlensing Events

In addition to constructing a Galactic matter mass function free from the bias induced by the hydrogen-burning limit, gravitational microlensing allows one to construct a mass function which is less affected by the problem of unresolved binaries (Gaudi & Gould). However, even with the method of microlensing, the photometric detection of binaries is limited to binary systems with relatively large separations of $b\gtrsim 0.4$ of their combined Einstein ring radius, and thus the mass function is still not totally free from the problem of unresolved binaries. In this paper, we show that by detecting distortions of the astrometric ellipse of a microlensing event with high precision instruments such as the {\it Space Interferometry Mission}, one can detect close binaries at a much higher rate than by the photometric method. We find that by astrometrically observing microlensing events, $\sim 50$ of binaries with separations of $0.1r_{\rm E}$ can be detected with the detection threshold of 3%. The proposed astrometric method is especially efficient at detecting very close binaries. With a detection threshold of 3% and a rate of 10%, one can astrometrically detect binaries with separations down to $\sim 0.01r_{\rm E}$.Comment: total 14 pages, including 5 Figures and no Table (For figure 1, please send a request mail to [email protected]), accepted to ApJ (Vol 525, 000), updated versio

Cashmere Quality of Iranian Goat Breeds

This paper assesses the cashmere quality in different Iranian cashmere goat breeds to determine the scope for improvement of fiber quality. In April 2009 midside cashmere samples were taken from a total of 168 male and female cashmere goats of 1, 2, 3, and 4 yr of age. The goats were randomly chosen from Raeini, Birjandi, and Nadoushan breeds respectively from Kerman, South Khorasan, and Yazd provinces. Cashmere yield (CY) was determined from the percentage of weight of dehaired cashmere to weight of shorn fibre. Cashmere fiber diameter was analyzed using a projection microscope instrument. A general linear model including sex and age as fixed effects and breed as random effect was used to analyze the data and measure the relationships between different cashmere characteristics and fleece attributes. The overall means ± standard deviations were for cashmere yield (CY) 51.4%±1.5%, mean fiber diameter (MFD) 18.7±0.2 µm, coefficient of variation of fiber diameter (CVFD) 19.1%±0.3% and staple length (SL) 42.8±1.6 mm. One year old goats had finer cashmere than older goats. CVFD were higher in males and CY and SL were higher in young animals. Iranian cashmere goat breeds have an excellent SL but are relatively coarse. Given the differences between goats there seems to be substantial scope to improve the commercial value of cashmere

Dynamics of parametric fluctuations induced by quasiparticle tunneling in superconducting flux qubits

We present experiments on the dynamics of a two-state parametric fluctuator in a superconducting flux qubit. In spectroscopic measurements, the fluctuator manifests itself as a doublet line. When the qubit is excited in resonance with one of the two doublet lines, the correlation of readout results exhibits an exponential time decay which provides a measure of the fluctuator transition rate. The rate increases with temperature in the interval 40 to 158 mK. Based on the magnitude of the transition rate and the doublet line splitting we conclude that the fluctuation is induced by quasiparticle tunneling. These results demonstrate the importance of considering quasiparticles as a source of decoherence in flux qubits.Comment: 12 pages, including supplementary informatio

Going Against the Grain of Optimism: Flour Fortification in Pakistan

Food fortification is a popular strategy for addressing ‘hidden hunger’, and staple foods are seen as promising, if unproven, vehicles for the delivery of essential micronutrients to poor people in developing countries. This article examines wheat flour fortification with iron in Pakistan as a case of technocratic optimism in the face of institutional constraints. An evaluative framework based on the analysis of entire value chains can provide a reality check on technocratic optimism. We find that poor people based their preferences for different types of flour on price as well as perceptions of nutritional value. Many of these flour types are not covered by fortification programmes. Fortification interventions, meanwhile, have attempted to leverage public–private partnerships in a segment of the wheat flour value chain which is beset with regulatory weakness. This article illustrates why technical interventions should support rather than ignore a broader agenda of reforms in food policy.Department for International Development (DFID

Evolution of the density parameter in the anisotropic DGP cosmology

Evolution of the density parameter in the anisotropic DGP braneworld model is studied. The role of shear and cross-over scale in the evolution of $\Omega_\rho$ is examined for both the branches of solution in the DGP model. The evolution is modified significantly compared to the FRW model and further it does not depend on the value of $\gamma$ alone. Behaviour of the cosmological density parameter $\Omega_\rho$ is unaltered in the late universe. The study of decceleration parameter shows that the entry of the universe into self accelerating phase is determined by the value of shear. We also obtain an estimate of the shear parameter $\frac{\Sigma}{H_0} \sim 1.68 \times 10^{-10}$, which is in agreement with the constraints obtained in the literature using data.Comment: To apper in Int.J.Mod.Phys.D, 14 pages, 6 figure

Quantum amplification effect in a horizon fluctuations

The appearance of a few unevenly- spaced bright flashes of light on top of Hawking radiation is the sign of the amplification effect in black hole horizon fluctuations. Previous studies on this problem suffer from the lack of considering all emitted photons in the theoretical spectroscopy of these fluctuations. In this paper, we include all of the physical transition weights and present a consistent intensity formula. This modifies a black hole radiation pattern.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure