The return of the bursts: Thermonuclear flashes from Circinus X-1

We report the detection of 15 X-ray bursts with RXTE and Swift observations of the peculiar X-ray binary Circinus X-1 during its May 2010 X-ray re-brightening. These are the first X-ray bursts observed from the source after the initial discovery by Tennant and collaborators, twenty-five years ago. By studying their spectral evolution, we firmly identify nine of the bursts as type I (thermonuclear) X-ray bursts. We obtain an arcsecond location of the bursts that confirms once and for all the identification of Cir X-1 as a type I X-ray burst source, and therefore as a low magnetic field accreting neutron star. The first five bursts observed by RXTE are weak and show approximately symmetric light curves, without detectable signs of cooling along the burst decay. We discuss their possible nature. Finally, we explore a scenario to explain why Cir X-1 shows thermonuclear bursts now but not in the past, when it was extensively observed and accreting at a similar rate.Comment: Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. Tables 1 & 2 merged. Minor changes after referee's comments. 5 pages, 4 Figure

Dirac operators and the Very Strange Formula for Lie superalgebras

Using a super-affine version of Kostant's cubic Dirac operator, we prove a very strange formula for quadratic finite-dimensional Lie superalgebras with a reductive even subalgebra.Comment: Latex file, 25 pages. A few misprints corrected. To appear in the forthcoming volume "Advances in Lie Superalgebras", Springer INdAM Serie

Effect of substrate surface topography on forensic development of latent fingerprints with iron oxide powder suspension

This is a pre-print version of the article. The official published version can be accessed from the link below - Copyright @ 2010 Wiley-BlackwellLatent fingerprint deposition and effectiveness of detection are strongly affected by the surface on which prints are deposited. Material properties, surface roughness, morphology, chemistry and hydrophobicity can affect the usefulness or efficacy of forensic print development techniques. Established protocols outline appropriate techniques and sequences of processes for broad categories of operational surfaces. This study uses atomic force microscopy and scanning electron microscopy to investigate a series of surfaces classified as smooth, non-porous plastic. Latent prints developed with iron oxide powder suspension are analysed on a range of scales from macro to nano to help elucidate the interaction mechanisms between the latent fingerprint, development agent and underlying surface. Differences between surfaces have a strong effect, even within this single category. We show that both average roughness and topographical feature shape, characterised by skew, kurtosis and lay, are important factors to consider for the processing of latent fingerprints. Copyright (C) 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.This work is part-funded by the UK Home Office project 7088762

Euclidean TSP with few inner points in linear space

Given a set of $n$ points in the Euclidean plane, such that just $k$ points are strictly inside the convex hull of the whole set, we want to find the shortest tour visiting every point. The fastest known algorithm for the version when $k$ is significantly smaller than $n$, i.e., when there are just few inner points, works in $O(k^{11\sqrt{k}} k^{1.5} n^{3})$ time [Knauer and Spillner, WG 2006], but also requires space of order $k^{c\sqrt{k}}n^{2}$. The best linear space algorithm takes $O(k! k n)$ time [Deineko, Hoffmann, Okamoto, Woeginer, Oper. Res. Lett. 34(1), 106-110]. We construct a linear space $O(nk^2+k^{O(\sqrt{k})})$ time algorithm. The new insight is extending the known divide-and-conquer method based on planar separators with a matching-based argument to shrink the instance in every recursive call. This argument also shows that the problem admits a quadratic bikernel.Comment: under submissio

Interrogating narratives of heritage in place

In South Westland, New Zealand, despite the remoteness of its relatively intact and diverse geomorphic and biophysical systems, social and cultural values are significant. These values, however, are not recognised in its designation as a world heritage area. This paper uses narratives from different sources and an interrogative process, to reveal not only a range of approaches to heritage, expressed or implied by different stakeholder groups, but also the paradoxical nature of interrelationships among people, place and heritage. It allows tentative conclusions to be made about the significance of the lack of an explicit management strategy for the world heritage area as a whole, and about the need for heritage, whether regarded instrumentally as natural or cultural, to be reconceptualised as a cultural construct

Experiences in porting mini-applications to OpenACC and OpenMP on heterogeneous systems

This article studies mini-applications—Minisweep, GenASiS, GPP, and FF—that use computational methods commonly encountered in HPC. We have ported these applications to develop OpenACC and OpenMP versions, and evaluated their performance on Titan (Cray XK7 with K20x GPUs), Cori (Cray XC40 with Intel KNL), Summit (IBM AC922 with Volta GPUs), and Cori-GPU (Cray CS-Storm 500NX with Intel Skylake and Volta GPUs). Our goals are for these new ports to be useful to both application and compiler developers, to document and describe the lessons learned and the methodology to create optimized OpenMP and OpenACC versions, and to provide a description of possible migration paths between the two specifications. Cases where specific directives or code patterns result in improved performance for a given architecture are highlighted. We also include discussions of the functionality and maturity of the latest compilers available on the above platforms with respect to OpenACC or OpenMP implementations

The Harish-Chandra isomorphism for reductive symmetric superpairs

We consider symmetric pairs of Lie superalgebras which are strongly reductive and of even type, and introduce a graded Harish-Chandra homomorphism. We prove that its image is a certain explicit filtered subalgebra of the Weyl invariants on a Cartan subspace whose associated graded is the image of Chevalley's restriction map on symmetric invariants. This generalises results of Harish-Chandra and V. Kac, M. Gorelik.Comment: 43 pages; v2: substantially improved versio

Penerapan Hak Cuti Melahirkan Bagi Pekerja Perempuan di Sektor Formal

Background:The Policy for Women Labors in the Act No. 1 1951 states that women are not allowed to work 1,5 months before and after bearing a child. However, up to the present time, its implementation is not effective. Objective:This explorative research uses quantitative and qualitative approach which objective is to observe the knowledge, attitude and behavior of the woman labourers towards their right of child birth leave. Method of his research is also aimed at observing the employers in imlementing the child birth leave right of the woman labourers and the ralated constraints of the practices. The qualitiative samples consist of 300 respondens of the woman labourers and the qualitative samples consist of 18 employers “Depnaker” staff, 18 SPSI members and 15 woman labourers. Instruments for collecting data are questionaire and interviewguides. Qualitative data are analysed by using frequency distribution while qualitative data are analysed by using content analysis. Result:The research results shows that the knowledge and attitude of the woman labourers towards the rights of child birth leave are good enough. However in practice it is not well implemented as that in the regulation, because employers never give additional wages, such as pregnancy and childbirth allowances despite their agreement to implement it. Conclusion:Most employers are not consistent in implementing the right of child birth leave. It can be seen from the fact that the implementation is met only to each own company\u27s condition. Those who have had or are in the process of having PKB for example are more consistent than those who have not. Contraints of the implementation of childbirth leave are as follows: 1). Not all employers well comprehend the right of child births leave, 2). The surveillance and empowerment of Disnaker is not effective, 3) The law enforcement to the employers who break the rules is very weak, and 4). The role of SPSI in giving supervision is not yet significant