An evaluation of policies for fiscal and external sustainability during the recent Greek economic crisis

The scope of this note is to point out that high growth rates must be accompanied by current account surpluses financing the internal debt service as a necessary and sufficient condition for a debt-reduction strategy. The recipe is applied in the case of Greece which, looking back at the pre-crisis period, has been experiencing substantial consumptionled growth following extensive foreign borrowing.peer-reviewe

A doublet microlens array for imaging micron-sized objects

We present a high-numerical aperture, doublet microlens array for imaging micron-sized objects. The proposed doublet architecture consists of glass microspheres trapped on a predefined array of silicon microholes and covered with a thin polymer layer. A standard silicon microfabrication process and a novel fluidic assembly technique were combined to obtain an array of 56 µm diameter microlenses with a numerical aperture of ~0.5. Using such an array, we demonstrated brightfield and fluorescent image formation of objects directly on a CCD sensor without the use of intermediate lenses. The proposed technology is a significant advancement toward the unmet need of inexpensive, miniaturized optical modules which can be further integrated with lab-on-chip microfluidic devices and photonic chips for a variety of high-end imaging/detection applications.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/90795/1/0960-1317_21_10_105024.pd

Geometry-material coordination for passive adaptive solar morphing envelopes

The cost-intensive and mechanical complexity natures of the adaptive facades of the past decades drifted designers and researchers’ interest towards passive material-based actuation systems. Architectural applications using the latter showed, however, a few limitations restricting the output possibility space to options that rely entirely on one material’s phase characteristic. This study aims to investigate the potential of expanding a shape memory alloy-actuated facade’s output from one that is limited and hardly controllable in the case of entirely passive actuation to one that can produce a specific desired performative target. This is explored through coordinating between geometry movement connections of an adaptive component of four integrated shape memory alloys, which work on tailoring the geometry-material-climate relations of the responsive system. The research findings suggest that the integration of geometry, material, and their connections in the design of a SMA solar morphing envelope lead to the development of a wider range of behavioural system outputs. The variety instilled through these added dimensions promoted diversity and adaptability of output for a flexible range of responses and higher performative gains

An evaluation of policies for fiscal and external sustainability during the recent Greek economic crisis

The scope of this note is to point out that high growth rates must be accompanied by current account surpluses financing the internal debt service as a necessary and sufficient condition for a debt-reduction strategy. The recipe is applied in the case of Greece which, looking back at the pre-crisis period, has been experiencing substantial consumptionled growth following extensive foreign borrowing.peer-reviewe

Neighbourhood Shading Impacts on Passive Adaptive Façade Collective Behaviour

The past decade witnessed a shift in adaptive facades from energy-intensive complex systems to material-based actuated facades. The latter, however, were only developed with limited control in shape memory alloy applications, and more generally designed as independent components. The perception of the component within a system as a self-regulating entity was shown to widen the behavioural response and intelligence of an adaptive system in several projects. On the other hand, its range of impact and integration as a design factor were not targeted at full breadth in the literature. The study’s objective was to investigate the incorporation of neighbourhood shading behaviour of a shape memory alloy-actuated façade component on the entire system. Based on a designed adaptive component, the research identifies the shading impact on the actuators’ incident solar radiation as well as its hourly and seasonal range, and thus encourages a better prediction of collective behaviour

Observed Structure and Characteristics of Cold Pools over Tropical Oceans using Vector Wind Retrievals and WRF Simulations

No abstract availabl

Chinese heritage tourists to heritage sites: what are the effects of heritage motivation and perceived authenticity on satisfaction?

Much of the literature on authenticity is Western-centric, while little work addresses the concept in the Asian environment. The literature relating to authenticity from Asian tourists’ point of view is even underdeveloped. This study therefore aims to fill the knowledge gap by investigating Chinese tourists’ perspective of authenticity. It also examines tourists’ perceived authenticity as a multi-dimensional construct in a consumer-based model, the relationship with heritage motivation and tourist satisfaction. Findings indicate that Chinese tourists’ perceptions of authenticity are closely related to objective and constructive authenticity. The study demonstrates that heritage motivation has a significant positive influence on perceived authenticity and that perceived authenticity has a strong ability to predict tourist satisfaction

Understanding participation through a data-driven approach

Participatory models of urban regeneration have been increasingly integrated in local agendas. Yet there is still a need for evaluation methodologies of those models and their impact. This paper presents a data-driven and computational methodology to measure the impact of the BIP/ZIP Program in Lisbon. Using qualitative coding, data integration, unsupervised machine learning models for data clustering and interactive visualization dashboards the study aims to explore the large and complex dataset of the projects of the BIP/ZIP program and identify correlation patterns between their areas of implementation, the networks of project partners and the identified activities of the projects. The proposed methodology is a first step towards the development of a generalizable evaluation framework for participatory models and aims to inform the further development of similar participatory models of urban regeneration.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio