3,821 research outputs found
The 2D/3D dynamics of wall-bounded low-Rm magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) turbulence
No full textWith this experimental study, we give evidence that the dynamics of low-Rm MHD turbulence depends on the diffusion length l_z, which corresponds to the distance over which the Lorentz force is able to diffuse momentum before it is balanced by inertia
Triangular Constellations in Flows
No full textParticles advected on the surface of a fluid can exhibit fractal clustering. The local structure of a fractal set is described by its dimension , which is the exponent of a power-law relating the mass in a ball to its radius : . It is desirable to characterise the {\em shapes} of constellations of points sampling a fractal measure, as well as their masses. The simplest example is the distribution of shapes of triangles formed by triplets of points, which we investigate for fractals generated by chaotic dynamical systems. The most significant parameter describing the triangle shape is the ratio of its area to the radius of gyration squared. We show that the probability density of has a phase transition: is independent of and approximately uniform below a critical flow compressibility , which we estimate. For the distribution appears to be described by two power laws: when , and when
The Response of Firms to Eligibility Thresholds : Evidence from the Japanese Value-Added Tax
No full textIt is common to defi ne benefi t eligibility for small business policies by restrictions on the fi rm size. This paper investigates the incentives for a large fi rm to masquerade as many small fi rms by separately incorporating business segments, focusing on the case of the Japanese value-added tax. The paper fi nds that the masquerading was pervasive and took place quickly after the introduction of tax incentives. Tax avoidance caused 3.4 per cent of the overall revenue drain in 1990, thus reducing horizontal equity, but the effi ciency consequence would not have been severe. This study suggests that the masquerading by fi rms may be commonplace in other settings.Tax avoidance, Business group, Value-added tax, Firm size distribution
Three Essays on the Economics of Information Systems.
No full textMy dissertation contains three studies centering on the question: how to motivate people to share high quality information on online information aggregation systems, also known as social computing systems? I take a social scientific approach to identify the strategic behavior of individuals in information systems, and analyze how non-monetary incentive schemes motivate information provision.
In my first study, I use statistical modeling to infer users' information provision strategies from their actions. Information system users' strategies for contribution (e.g., I only contribute if others have contributed a certain amount) are often not directly observable, but identifying their strategies is useful in system design. With my co-authors, Jeffrey MacKie-Mason and Paul Resnick, I constructed a maximum likelihood model with simultaneous equations to estimate strategic feedback reciprocation (i.e., I only provide feedback if you give me feedback first) among the traders on eBay. We found about 23% of the traders strategically reciprocate feedback.
In my second study, I focus on truthful provision of information in information markets --- markets in which the participants trade bets about future events. The resulting market price reflects an aggregated prediction for the event. Theory predicts that when traders' private information is substitutable --- contains similar information --- they profit most by trading honestly. But when traders' private information is complementary --- contains exclusively different information --- traders are better off bluffing, i.e., first trading dishonestly to mislead others and later profiting from others' mistakes. Using human-subject experiments, my co-author Rahul Sami and I found traders indeed bluff more in markets with complements than in markets with substitutes.
In my third study, I use game theory to analyze two non-monetary mechanisms for motivating information provision: the minimum threshold mechanism (MTM), under which one can access the public goods if she contributes more than a threshold, and the ratio mechanism (RM), under which a user consumes at most an amount proportional to her contribution level. I found whenever RM can achieve the social optimum, MTM can achieve the same. Furthermore, if RM implements a no-exclusion equilibrium, the same outcome can always be implemented by MTM.PhDInformationUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/78798/1/ljian_1.pd
Exact two-dimensionalization of low-magnetic-Reynolds-number flows subject to a strong magnetic field
No full textWe investigate the behavior of flows, including turbulent flows, driven by a horizontal body-force and subject to a vertical magnetic field, with the following question in mind: for very strong applied magnetic field, is the flow mostly two-dimensional, with remaining weak three-dimensional fluctuations, or does it become exactly 2D, with no dependence along the vertical? We restrict attention to low-magnetic-Reynolds number (Rm) flow. Because liquid metals have low magnetic Prandtl number, such low- flows can have a kinetic Reynolds number as large as one million and therefore be strongly turbulent. We first focus on the quasi-static approximation, i.e. the asymptotic limit of vanishing magnetic Reynolds number Rm << 1: we prove that the flow becomes exactly 2D asymptotically in time, regardless of the initial condition and provided the interaction parameter N is larger than a threshold value. We call this property absolute two-dimensionalization: the attractor of the system is necessarily a (possibly turbulent) 2D flow. We then consider the full-magnetohydrodynamic equations and we prove that, for low enough Rm and large enough N, the flow becomes exactly two-dimensional in the long-time limit provided the initial vertically-dependent perturbations are infinitesimal. We call this phenomenon linear two-dimensionalization: the (possibly turbulent) 2D flow is an attractor of the dynamics, but it is not necessarily the only attractor of the system. Some 3D attractors may also exist and be attained for strong enough initial 3D perturbations. These results shed some light on the existence of a dissipative anomaly for magnetohydrodynamic flows subject to a strong external magnetic field
The Decay of Wall Bounded MHD Turbulence at Low RM
No full textWe have developed a new spectral method to simulate flows with very fine boundary layers present. We apply it to calculate the evolution of freely decaying MHD turbulence between isolating walls. By comparison them with results obtained in fully periodic domain we quantify the influence of the channel walls on the character of freely decaying MHD turbulence
The spectrum of mutations in erythrokeratodermias - Novel and de novo mutations in GJB3
No full textIntercellular channels in skin are a complex and functionally diverse system formed by at least eight connexins (Cx). Our recent molecular studies implicating Cx defects in inherited skin disorders emphasize the critical role of this signaling pathway in epidermal differentiation. Erythrokeratodermia variabilis (EKV) is an autosomal dominant genodermatosis with a striking phenotype characterized by the independent occurrence of transient localized erythema and hyperkeratosis. The disease maps to 1p34-p35, and recently we identified the causative gene GJB3 encoding Cx31. We have now investigated GJB3 in two families and three sporadic cases with EKV, and report three new heterozygous mutations. In a sporadic case, we detected a mutation leading to substitution of a conserved phenylalanine (F137L) in the third transmembrane domain, which likely interferes with the proper assembly or gating properties of connexons. In another family, all three affected individuals carried two distinct mutations on the same GJB3 allele. However, only a de novo heterozygous missense mutation replacing arginine 42 with proline (R42P) co-segregated with the disease, while a 12 bp deletion predicted to eliminate four amino acid residues in the variable carboxy terminal domain of Cx31 was also found in clinically unaffected relatives but not in 90 unaffected controls. Including the previously published mutations, in tote, five different missense mutations have now been detected in 6 out of 17 families investigated by our laboratory, all of which presumably affect the cytoplasmic amino terminal and transmembrane domains of Cx31. In contrast, two mutations linked to progressive high-tone hearing impairment were located in the second extracellular domain, suggesting that the character and position of Cx mutations determine their phenotypic expression in different tissues. However, the phenotypic spectrum of GJB3 mutations seems not to include progressive symmetric erythrokeratodermia, another dominant genodermatosis with overlapping features, since no mutations were found in six unrelated families tested
A basis of a certain module for the hyperalgebra and some applications
No full textIn the hyperalgebra of the -th Frobenius kernel of the algebraic group , we construct a basis of the
-module generated by a certain element which was given by the
author before. As its applications, we also prove some results on the
-modules and the algebra .Comment: 30 page
Borromini tuscolano
No full textLa pubblicazione propone, in versione ampliata e aggiornata, la chiave di lettura già avanzata dall’autore alcuni anni or sono in relazione all’intervento seicentesco voluto dalla famiglia Falconieri sulla più antica delle Ville Tuscolane, la Rufina, ritenendone valida la consolidata attribuzione al Borromini.
Nel volume viene data un’ampia dimostrazione dell’efficacia dell’interazione “documenti storici-rilievo architettonico”, nella ricostruzione delle fasi evolutive di una fabbrica e di come questo momento d’analisi, ove insufficientemente approfondito, possa indurre a considerazioni erronee.
Infatti, l’ipotesi diffusa in vari contributi sull’argomento riguardo alla forma dell’originario Casino della Rufina – e in particolare alla posizione della loggia verso Roma – è suffragata soltanto da incisioni d’epoca e non è mai stata scientificamente comprovata dal riscontro di un rilievo, né dal confronto attento con la pianta del nucleo originario della fabbrica conservata nelle Carte Strozzi presso l’Archivio di Stato di Firenze, ignorata o considerata – con una certa superficialità – come inattendibile.
L’ipotesi qui sostenuta valuta la “logica” dell’addizione alla Villa Rufina basandosi su considerazioni relative sia ai vari documenti iconografici sia all’attendibilità di ciascuno; il tutto è inoltre riferito al completo rilevamento dell’opera nel suo stato attuale.
Discutendo ipotesi diverse (anche attributive) emerse nel frattempo e sviluppando le considerazioni precedentemente avanzate grazie anche a un nuovo apparato iconografico che vede sfruttate le potenzialità della modellazione 3D applicate ai criteri del rilievo filologico, il lavoro tende a ribadire l’efficacia di tale metodo d’indagine, basato sul rilievo delle attuali condizioni dell’opera in associazione all’imprescindibile analisi storico-documentale.
Attraverso il medesimo impianto scientifico procedurale è inoltre sviluppata la ricostruzione filologica del fronte settentrionale, basata anche su documentazione fotografica d’epoca parzialmente inedita. Si intende così offrire un iniziale – seppur parziale – contributo alla rilettura dell’ultima fase (quella novecentesca) che ha contrassegnato la fabbrica, vedendola già alterata ai primi del XX secolo, quindi compromessa dagli eventi bellici e infine trasformata dalle operazioni di restauro/ripristino del complesso, che hanno riproposto solo parzialmente e in modo generico la precedente morfologia del manufatto.This publication proposes, in an expanded and updated version, the key that the Author had already advanced in an earlier essay which was published ten years ago, concerning the 17th century intervention on the Villa Rufina: the first one of the Ville Tuscolane (summer residences for the papal circle that rose, in the late Renaissance, on the hills at the south of Rome). The Authors assumes also to be valid the well-established attribution of this work to Francesco Borromini.
In this volume a wide demonstration is offered of the efficacy, for the aim of a reliable reconstruction of the evolutionary phases of a certain building, of the interaction between the historical documents and the architectural survey, showing also how this time of analysis can lead to incorrect or misleading considerations, when it is not carried out enough deeply.
In the second phase (the expansion of the 17th century) which characterized all the Ville Tuscolane, the Rufina, at the time owned by the Falconieri (family), was the subject of an extensive renewal. With this intervention the first bulding that had initiated the “modern rediscovery” of building activity in these places (being, in fact, the originator of the Complex) was considerably transformed with regard to its material structure, appearance and relationship with the environment. For the devising of the general plan, it is commonly ascribed to Francesco Borromini, on the basis more of archive documents than of its style.
If the decoration of the Villa has been extensively and reliably studied, the same cannot be said about the transformations that the old building underwent, especially with regard to the lost loggia towards Rome. The hypothesis that has gradually taken root, about the location of this lodge, in the various papers published on the subject, is in fact supported only by some engravings of the time (in which the Villa is depicted in a pseudo-perspectival view and only as an element amongst the many others of the Complex). It has never been scientifically proved by the check of a survey, or by a careful comparison with the plan of the original nucleus of the original factory map stored in the “Carte Strozzi” at the State Archives of Florence, that has been ignored or considered – with some superficiality – as unreliable.
The hypothesis the Author suggested since the previous essay, evaluates the “logic” of the addition Borromini made to the Villa Rufina detaching itself from these assumptions and basing itself on some specific considerations concerning the iconographic documents that have been published over the years in various contributions, evaluating the reliability of each of them. These considerations were also related to a comprehensive survey of the work in its current state, as the so far published surveys are partial or were carried out on the structure as extensively damaged by the war.
In the volume are also discussed several different hypotheses that emerged in the meantime, also on the allocation of the project, as the attribution to Borromini – which in the past had seen ups and downs, from the header of the engraving by Alessandro Specchi to the evidences provided by Paolo Portoghesi and by Angela Negro, taken from the Falconieri-Carpegna archive – has recently been the subject of a new attempt of denial.
Developing the considerations already advanced before, and using a new display of subsidiary iconography that sees the exploitation of the potential of 3d modeling when applied to the criteria of the philological surveying, this study aims at a confirmation of the effectiveness of this method of investigation, which is based on a survey of the work in its positive state in conjunction with an unavoidable historical-documentary analysis.
On the basis of this same scientific procedural system, taking as well in account many historical photographic documents, so far unpublished, is also developed a philological reconstruction of the northern front, that is proposed in the last chapter. The aim is to provide a first – although partial – contribution to the re-reading of the last phase (the 20th century), which marked the building, that had already been altered in the early years of the 20th century, then compromised by the war and finally transformed by the restoration and rehabilitation of the complex, which reconstructed the pre-existing morphology only in a partial and general way
Convective Ripening and Rainfall
No full textThis paper discusses the evolution of the droplet size distribution for a liquid-in-gas aerosol contained in a Rayleigh-B\'enard cell. It introduces a non-collisional model for broadening the droplet size distribution, termed \lq convective ripening'. The paper also considers the initiation of rainfall from ice-free cumulus clouds. It is argued that while collisional mechanisms cannot explain the production of rain from clouds with water droplet diameters of , the non-collisional convective ripening mechanism gives a much faster route to increasing the size of the small fraction of droplets that grow into raindrops
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