3,231 research outputs found
Financial Performance of Dairy Cooperatives
Combined balance sheets and operating statements were used to develop benchmark financial ratios for dairy marketing cooperatives. Data from 291 cooperatives were summarized for five types of dairy cooperatives, then by three types and three size combinations. Both type and size of cooperative made differences in most of the 16 financial ratios calculated as well as in the common size balance sheets and operating statements.Finance, Dairy, Cooperatives, Milk, Ratios, Agribusiness,
Characteristic Functions Describing the Power Absorption Response of Periodic Structures to Partially Coherent Fields
Many new types of sensing or imaging surfaces are based on periodic thin
films. It is explained how the response of those surfaces to partially coherent
fields can be fully characterized by a set of functions in the wavenumber
spectrum domain. The theory is developed here for the case of 2D absorbers with
TE illumination and arbitrary material properties in the plane of the problem,
except for the resistivity which is assumed isotropic. Sum and difference
coordinates in both spatial and spectral domains are conveniently used to
represent the characteristic functions, which are specialized here to the case
of periodic structures. Those functions can be either computed or obtained
experimentally. Simulations rely on solvers based on periodic-boundary
conditions, while experiments correspond to Energy Absorption Interferometry
(EAI), already described in the literature. We derive rules for the convergence
of the representation versus the number of characteristic functions used, as
well as for the sampling to be considered in EAI experiments. Numerical
examples are given for the case of absorbing strips printed on a semi-infinite
substrate.Comment: Submitted to JOSA
Reviews, Reviewers, and Reviewing: The âTragedy of the Commonsâ in the Scientific Publication Process
Everybody wants to get a good review but not everybody is willing to give a good review. In my experience, this fact has resulted in a modern-day instance of âthe tragedy of the commonsâ in which everyone seeks a precious common resource (in this case, the scholarship of peer review in scientific publication) but everyone less widely provides it. Editors face an emerging review culture in which many qualified colleagues often seem too busy, too disinterested, or simply too inaccessible to engage with for peer review purposes, and which leads to issues that are, indeed, tragic in the practice of science
Measuring Consumer Motivations to Use Marketspace
Participation in electronic commerce requires the diffusion of new technologies and techniques among the intended new electronic customers. This paper utilizes the theoretical perspective of uses and gratifications to develop measures of consumer motivations for access and use of the Internet, which is an important diffusion issue that precedes the decision to engage in electronic commerce. Motivations for the use of new commercial technology are the underlying factors that ultimately lead to the acceptance and subsequent diffusion of new commercial practices in consumer markets. Produced with the cooperation of America Online and HotWired, this research reports the results of a measure development study for three key measures that assess consumer adoption and use of commercial Internet services: Internet process motivations, Internet content motivations and Internet social motivations
Rejoined and Regenerated: Response to Responses to âReviews, Reviewers, and Reviewing: The âTragedy of the Commonsâ in the Scientific Publication Processâ
The joy of writing critiques about the editorial process is doubly enhanced when engaged in debates such as this one wherein I find the most fascinating views, points, and counterpoints in correspondence to my own. I am simply pleased to say that the sterling colleagues who have chosen to respond to and rejoin my initial essays are highly skilled and insightful editors in their own right, and we all benefit from the colloquy that ensues in such discussions about how to improve peer reviews in our field of science
Characterization of Power Absorption Response of Periodic 3D Structures to Partially Coherent Fields
In many applications of absorbing structures it is important to understand
their spatial response to incident fields, for example in thermal solar panels,
bolometric imaging and controlling radiative heat transfer. In practice, the
illuminating field often originates from thermal sources and is only spatially
partially coherent when reaching the absorbing device. In this paper, we
present a method to fully characterize the way a structure can absorb such
partially coherent fields. The method is presented for any 3D material and
accounts for the partial coherence and partial polarization of the incident
light. This characterization can be achieved numerically using simulation
results or experimentally using the Energy Absorption Interferometry (EAI) that
has been described previously in the literature. The absorbing structure is
characterized through a set of absorbing functions, onto which any partially
coherent field can be projected. This set is compact for any structure of
finite extent and the absorbing function discrete for periodic structures
Architectural Sampling: the Integration and Manipulation of Meaning
This thesis is an investigation into the appropriation and assimilation of meaning by examining the relationship between the technique and meaning of the musical sample and meaning and memory in architecture. As a previously recorded sound integrated into a new work, the sample has a dual identity as both detail and artifact. It is a detail of two or more wholes: an original condition and the new condition, and an artifact from the context of the work from which it was taken. In architectural design, each recognizable form and spatial arrangement is a sample from a prototype with its own context and history. Each time a known form or spatial arrangement is sampled meaning is communicated from the prototype to the new work. The decontextualization of the sample, its manipulation and recontextualization into a new work provides the architect a means for reinterpretation and reinvention. Through an exploration of the use of the sample in music, art and architecture this thesis shows how sampling can alter the meaning of the physical environment
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