Sustainable refugee migration:a rethink towards a positive capability approach

A major challenge facing many countries around the world is how to sustainably address the issues of increased numbers of refugee migrants. The refugee migrant “issue” is often heavily political as a high density of migrants in local areas impacts communities (e.g., disrupting local employment, service and culture). Different migrants come with different “baggage” and needs which can be a significant draw on the hosting communities’ resources. This paper argues that sustainable long-term solutions to refugee migrants will require a rethink to the existing dominant models of containment and charity. The paper draws upon insights from a study of a large refugee camp in Jordan over a three-and-a-half-year period, and historical cases of refugee migration. The paper presents a sustainable model that develops long-term capability for the various stakeholder groups

Optical Transmittance of a Rice Leaf via Ray Tracing

Optical reflectance from a plant leaf increases in response to stress and disease. Previous studies at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock found that, while the reflectance from a rice leaf increased with increased salinity, reflectance changes could not be used to differentiate one stress or disease from another. The objective of this study is to characterize the angular distribution of optical transmittance for a healthy rice leaf using a ray tracing technique and assuming a three-media optical model. The ultimate goal is to relate this distribution to specific plant pathologies. Three rays are traced through the cross section of a healthy rice leaf by applying laws of geometric optics and considering air, cell wall, and chloroplast as media. The angular distribution of transmittance is calculated for each ray trace. Lei is defined as the length of irradiated upper epidermal surface leading to a continuous transmittance Tbi(0) at the bottom surface. The total transmittance is defined as the sum over i of Tbi(theta). Delta thetai is defined as the angle over which Tbi(theta) extends and (thetaj - thetai) is defined as the angular difference between the bisector of Delta thetai and the bisector of Delta thetaj. The probability density functions pdf(Delta theta) and pdf(thetaj -thetai) are defined and shown to have diagnostic potential

Optically-pumped dilute nitride spin-VCSEL

We report the first room temperature optical spin-injection of a dilute nitride 1300 nm vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser (VCSEL) under continuous-wave optical pumping. We also present a novel experimental protocol for the investigation of optical spin-injection with a fiber setup. The experimental results indicate that the VCSEL polarization can be controlled by the pump polarization, and the measured behavior is in excellent agreement with theoretical predictions using the spin flip model. The ability to control the polarization of a long-wavelength VCSEL at room temperature emitting at the wavelength of 1.3 μm opens up a new exciting research avenue for novel uses in disparate fields of technology ranging from spintronics to optical telecommunication networks. © 2012 Optical Society of America

Regional Influences on Chinese Medicine Education: Comparing Australia and Hong Kong

© 2016 Caragh Brosnan et al. High quality education programs are essential for preparing the next generation of Chinese medicine (CM) practitioners. Currently, training in CM occurs within differing health and education policy contexts. There has been little analysis of the factors influencing the form and status of CM education in different regions. Such a task is important for understanding how CM is evolving internationally and predicting future workforce characteristics. This paper compares the status of CM education in Australia and Hong Kong across a range of dimensions: historical and current positions in the national higher education system, regulatory context and relationship to the health system, and public and professional legitimacy. The analysis highlights the different ways in which CM education is developing in these settings, with Hong Kong providing somewhat greater access to clinical training opportunities for CM students. However, common trends and challenges shape CM education in both regions, including marginalisation from mainstream health professions, a small but established presence in universities, and an emphasis on biomedical research. Three factors stand out as significant for the evolution of CM education in Australia and Hong Kong and may have international implications: continuing biomedical dominance, increased competition between universities, and strengthened links with mainland China

K(892)* resonance production in Au+Au and p+p collisions at sqrt[sNN]=200GeV

The short-lived K(892)* resonance provides an efficient tool to probe properties of the hot and dense medium produced in relativistic heavy-ion collisions. We report measurements of K* in sqrt[sNN]=200GeV Au+Au and p+p collisions reconstructed via its hadronic decay channels K(892)*0-->K pi and K(892)*±-->K0S pi ± using the STAR detector at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven National Laboratory. The K*0 mass has been studied as a function of pT in minimum bias p+p and central Au+Au collisions. The K*pT spectra for minimum bias p+p interactions and for Au+Au collisions in different centralities are presented. The K*/K yield ratios for all centralities in Au+Au collisions are found to be significantly lower than the ratio in minimum bias p+p collisions, indicating the importance of hadronic interactions between chemical and kinetic freeze-outs. A significant nonzero K*0 elliptic flow (v2) is observed in Au+Au collisions and is compared to the K0S and Lambda v2. The nuclear modification factor of K* at intermediate pT is similar to that of K0S but different from Lambda . This establishes a baryon-meson effect over a mass effect in the particle production at intermediate pT (2<pT <= 4GeV/c)

Centrality and pseudorapidity dependence of charged hadron production at intermediate pT in Au+Au collisions at sqrt[sNN ]=130 GeV

We present STAR measurements of charged hadron production as a function of centrality in Au+Au collisions at sqrt[sNN ]=130 GeV . The measurements cover a phase space region of 0.2 pcutT , and studied the results in the framework of participant and binary scaling. No clear evidence is observed for participant scaling of charged hadron yield in the measured pT region. The relative importance of hard scattering processes is investigated through binary scaling fraction of particle production

Production of e+ e- pairs accompanied by nuclear dissociation in ultraperipheral heavy-ion collisions

We present data on e+ e- pair production accompanied by nuclear breakup in ultraperipheral gold-gold collisions at a center of mass energy of 200 GeV per nucleon pair. The nuclear breakup requirement selects events at small impact parameters, where higher-order diagrams for pair production should be enhanced. We compare the data with two calculations: one based on the equivalent photon approximation, and the other using lowest-order quantum electrodynamics (QED). The data distributions agree with both calculations, except that the pair transverse momentum spectrum disagrees with the equivalent photon approach. We set limits on higher-order contributions to the cross section

Lessons from crossing symmetry at large N

20 pages, v2: Assumptions stated more clearly, version published in JHEPWe consider the four-point correlator of the stress tensor multiplet in N=4 SYM. We construct all solutions consistent with crossing symmetry in the limit of large central charge c ~ N^2 and large g^2 N. While we find an infinite tower of solutions, we argue most of them are suppressed by an extra scale \Delta_{gap} and are consistent with the upper bounds for the scaling dimension of unprotected operators observed in the numerical superconformal bootstrap at large central charge. These solutions organize as a double expansion in 1/c and 1/\Delta_{gap}. Our solutions are valid to leading order in 1/c and to all orders in 1/\Delta_{gap} and reproduce, in particular, instanton corrections previously found. Furthermore, we find a connection between such upper bounds and positivity constraints arising from causality in flat space. Finally, we show that certain relations derived from causality constraints for scattering in AdS follow from crossing symmetry.Peer reviewe