Strong Concentration Research Articles

Impact of industry clusters on the performance of Russian private companies: Inter-industry analysis

This paper discovers the sustainability of agglomeration externalities and robustness issues for Russian private real sector companies between 2011 to 2018. Agglomeration effects are measured with the Ellison—Glaeser index (industry is supposed to be clustered in certain region(s) if the EG value is high). Firms’ sales margin was chosen as the main performance characteristic (dependent variable). The sample was divided into six aggregated groups (agriculture, mining, manufacturing, transport, IT, services). For each of them, sustainability and robustness of the concentration effect were checked using OLS estimates obtained for each year. Companies, located in and out of the cluster were studied separately. Strong, sustainable, and positive concentration effects were found for the agricultural, mining and transport industries. Sustainable negative agglomeration effects appear for the manufacturing and service industries. For IT companies located inside the industry cluster the agglomeration effect appeared to be negative and for those outside it — positive.

Impact of urbanization on ecosystem health in Chinese urban agglomerations

With rapid economic growth, urbanization has interfered with regional ecosystems and seriously threatens ecosystem health (EH) in urban agglomerations (UAs) in China. Exploring the impact of urbanization on the EH of UAs in China can provide insights into formulating new policies regarding EH protection and high-quality development. However, investigations on this issue are primarily concentrated on single UAs, and only a few have been conducted on all UAs in China. Therefore, this study measured the urbanization and EH of 19 UAs in China in 2000, 2010, and 2020, and explored the impact of urbanization on EH using Getis-Ord Gi* and multiscale spatial regression models. The results indicated that EH presented a moderate growth trend, with mean values of EH increasing from 0.72 to 0.73 during the study period. The EH of UAs in northern China was significantly lower than that in southern China. Global Moran’s I values of EH changes between 2000 and 2010 and between 2010 and 2020 were 0.511 and 0.283, respectively; the Z-scores were 47.308 and 26.377, respectively (p = 0.001), thus indicating that EH changes in China’s UAs had strong spatial concentrations. Moreover, cold spots of EH changes primarily appeared in UAs in southeast China, whereas hot spots were mostly distributed in northwest China. Furthermore, on a global scale, the proportion of construction land and population density had a negative impact on EH, and the regression coefficients in 2020 were −0.637 and −0.276, respectively; GDP density had a positive effect, and its regression coefficient in 2020 was 0.051. However, the impact of urbanization on EH greatly varied at the local scale. These results provide a scientific reference basis to coordinate construction land expansion, economy, population, and EH, and provide support for the formulation of high-quality development policies for UAs in China.

Posting of workers and the border of the labour market

Drawing on research conducted by the authors in the frame of the POSTING.STAT research project, this article explores the legal fiction that posted workers do not, at any time, ‘gain access’ to the labour market of a host State where they are in fact (temporarily) working. Hence, it analyses following question: at what point and under which circumstances are posted workers considered as working in a given Member State? To do so, it considers the use of the concept of ‘labour market’ across the case law of the Court of Justice concerning posting workers, to identify the constitutive elements of the implicit definition adopted by the Court. This analysis is compared with economic/statistical assumptions applied when measuring employment in a country. From a statistical point of view, the labour market appears to be demarcated by the place of establishment of the employer, thus excluding work (i.e., services) carried out through non-established employers. Consequently, cross-border labour mobility through the freedom to provide services does not fall within these boundaries and means that posted workers are counted in the employment statistics of their Member State of origin. The approach to posted workers in the labour market of the host State is therefore not only a legal, but also a statistical/economic, fiction. Based on an empirical reality that shows a strong concentration of posted workers in certain sectors, Member States or regions, we argue that courts and legislators, and also national statistical offices, should reconsider this approach.

Enhancement of heat transfer considering Joule heating and variable conductivity in magneto Maxwell nanofluid

The heat conversation medium temperately regulates the heat exploitation effectiveness of solar energy. Nanofluids, a kind of functioning fluids with extraordinary thermal conductivity and strong light concentration, have been scrutinized and functionalized to progress the exploitation of solar energy. In recent times the current progress examines the nanofluids with the consideration of thermal sources as it can raise the heat transportation amount. Here, the purpose is to explore the thermal properties of Joule heating and thermal conductivity in magnetite Maxwell nanofluid. The concept of heat sink/source and chemical reaction are also studied. The achieved ordinary differential equations have been solved via homotopic algorithm. The enactment of functioning variables is examined. For Eckert number and variable conductivity factors, the Maxwell temperature field has analogous tendencies. The fluid concentration inflates for thermophoretic factor; however, slows down for the Brownian motion factor. The Brownian and thermophoretic factors decay for Nusselt number. Additionally, the excellent results have been achieved accompanied with possible existing prose precisely.

Ca doping effect on the performance of La1−xCaxNiO3/CeO2-derived dual function materials for CO2 capture and hydrogenation to methane

CO2 valorization in form of synthetic natural gas is a convenient way to store large amounts of intermittent energy produced from renewable sources for long periods of time. Here reported research addresses the development of novel dual function materials (DFMs) for the utilization of CO2 from simulated post-combustion effluent by cyclic adsorption and in-situ methanation. These DFMs, obtained after the controlled reduction of 20% La1−xCaxNiO3/CeO2-type precursors (with x = 0–0.5), are widely characterized before and after catalytic tests. XRD diffractograms, H2-TPD experiments and STEM-EDS images denote that Ca-doping shows low influence on materials composition, slight detrimental effect on textural properties and no influence on Ni, La and Ce distribution. Meanwhile, the concentration of Ca-based species increases as long as La3+ substitution by Ca2+ increases, which leads to a progressively promotion of medium and, especially, strong basic sites concentration (CO2-TPD). As a result, the 20% La0.5Ca0.5NiO3/CeO2-derived DFM almost doubles (188.8 µmol g−1) the CH4 production of the 20% LaNiO3/CeO2-derived DFM (96.5 µmol g−1) at high temperatures. Indeed, this novel DFM enhances the methanation capacity of the conventional 15% Ni-15% CaO/Al2O3 DFM (143.0 µmol CH4 g−1), with higher stability during long-term experiments and adaptability under variable feed compositions, which further support the applicability of these novel DFMs. Thus, Ca doping emerges as an effective way of tailoring CO2 adsorption and in-situ hydrogenation to CH4 efficiency of 20% LaNiO3/CeO2-derived DFMs.

Pembelajaran Tari Siwar Menggunakan Metode Drill pada Kegiatan Ekstrakurikuler di Mts Negeri 1 Lahat

Education cannot be separated from the teaching and learning process between teachers and students in a school institution, which plays an active role in providing education to students. This research if focused on extracurricular activities in school, Lahat district itself not only has a lot of diversity in dance, but also includes an area dubbed the student city because of the many schools that were established there, so the researchers chose to develop the art of dance, one of which is the Siwar dance throught extracurricular activities at school. Therefore, of couse, there are difficulties that often arise inlearning the siwar dance in extracurriculler activities, including students finding it difficult to understand the movements when demonstrastrating the dance using the siwar directly,because it takes strong concentration to establish the siwar on the fingers.With this the writer aimed to describe about Siwar Dance Lesson on Extracurricular Activity in MTS Negeri 1 Lahat by using Drill method. With qualitativedescriptive as the research method and withobservation,interviewsalso documentation as collectingdata. The result shown that the extracurricular activity in MTS Negeri 1 Lahat run well so it created achievements and becoming the sample for another extracurricular activity. The benefit of this research is to share the knowladge especially in educationand as references for the next researcher.

Transition metal dichalcogenide nanospheres for high-refractive-index nanophotonics and biomedical theranostics

Recent developments in the area of resonant dielectric nanostructures have created attractive opportunities for concentrating and manipulating light at the nanoscale and the establishment of the new exciting field of all-dielectric nanophotonics. Transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDCs) with nanopatterned surfaces are especially promising for these tasks. Still, the fabrication of these structures requires sophisticated lithographic processes, drastically complicating application prospects. To bridge this gap and broaden the application scope of TMDC nanomaterials, we report here femtosecond laser-ablative fabrication of water-dispersed spherical TMDC (MoS2 and WS2) nanoparticles (NPs) of variable size (5 to 250 nm). Such NPs demonstrate exciting optical and electronic properties inherited from TMDC crystals, due to preserved crystalline structure, which offers a unique combination of pronounced excitonic response and high refractive index value, making possible a strong concentration of electromagnetic field in the NPs. Furthermore, such NPs offer additional tunability due to hybridization between the Mie and excitonic resonances. Such properties bring to life a number of nontrivial effects, including enhanced photoabsorption and photothermal conversion. As an illustration, we demonstrate that the NPs exhibit a very strong photothermal response, much exceeding that of conventional dielectric nanoresonators based on Si. Being in a mobile colloidal state and exhibiting superior optical properties compared to other dielectric resonant structures, the synthesized TMDC NPs offer opportunities for the development of next-generation nanophotonic and nanotheranostic platforms, including photothermal therapy and multimodal bioimaging.

The effect of interurban movements on the spatial distribution of population

Understanding how interurban movements can modify the spatial distribution of the population is important for transport planning but is also a fundamental ingredient for epidemic modeling. We illustrate this on vacation trips for all transportation modes in China during the Lunar New Year and compare the results for 2019 with the ones for 2020 where travel bans were applied for mitigating the spread of a novel coronavirus (COVID-19). We first show that inter-urban travel flows are broadly distributed and display both large temporal and spatial fluctuations, making their modeling very difficult. When flows are larger, they appear to be more dispersed over a larger number of origins and destinations, creating de facto hubs that can spread an epidemic at a large scale. These movements quickly induce (in about a week for this case) a very strong population concentration in a small set of cities. We characterize quantitatively the return to the initial distribution by defining a pendular ratio which allows us to show that this dynamics is in general very slow and even stopped for the 2020 Lunar New Year due to travel restrictions. Travel restrictions obviously limit the spread of the diseases between different cities, but have thus the counter-effect of keeping high concentration in a small set of cities, a priori favoring intra-city spread, unless individual contacts are strongly limited. These results shed some light on the statistics of interurban movements and how they modify the national distribution of populations, a crucial ingredient for devising effective control strategies at a national level.

Controlling the Mobility of Ionic Liquids in the Nanopores of MOFs by Adjusting the Pore Size: From Conduction Collapse by Mutual Pore Blocking to Unhindered Ion Transport.

Ionic liquids (ILs) in nanoporous confinement are the core of many supercapacitors and batteries, where the mobility of the nanoconfined ILs is crucial. Here, by combining experiments based on impedance spectroscopy with molecular dynamics simulations, the mobility of a prototype IL in the nanopores of an isoreticular metal-organic framework (MOF)-series with different pore sizes is explored, where an external electric field is applied. It has been found that the conduction behavior changes tremendously depend on the pore size. For small-pore apertures, the IL cations and anions cannot pass the pore window simultaneously, causing the ions to mutually block the pores. This results in a strong concentration dependence of the ionic conduction, where the conduction drops by two orders of magnitude when filling the pores. For large-pore MOFs, the mutual hindrance of the ions in the pores is small, causing only a small concentration dependence. The cutoff between the large-pore and small-pore behavior is approximately the size of a cation-anion-dimer and increasing the pore diameter by only 0.2nm changes the conduction behavior fundamentally. This study shows that the pore aperture size has a substantial effect on the mobility of ions in nanoporous confinement and has to be carefully optimized for realizing highly-mobile nanoconfined ILs.

Short men in poor lands: The agrarian workers from southwestern Spain in anthropometric perspective

With a sample of heights of almost 60,000 men, born between 1855 and 1979 and recruited between 1876 and 2000, our work analyzes the nutritional gap between the agrarian and non-agrarian population in Extremadura, a Spanish region located among the poorest ones in Europe. The analysis reveals that this difference is not only statistically significant, but also tends to increase as the average stature of the active population grows. Among the causes of the agrarian height penalty, our article focuses mainly on the economic differences. However, the research also insists on the roots of these differences, especially those linked to the adverse physical conditions of the territory, the dynamics of the Christian conquest in the Middle Ages and the strong and persistent concentration of land ownership in the region. In short, this paper concludes that the anthropometric gap between agrarian and non-agrarian workers is due not only to economic causes, but also to geographical, historical and institutional reasons.

From Heron of Alexandria to Amazon’s Alexa: a stylized history of AI and its impact on business models, organization and work

This paper explores the development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and its impact on business models, organization and work. First, we provide a stylized history of AI highlighting the technological, organizational and market-related factors fostering its diffusion and transformative potential. We show how AI evolved from being a scientific field to a mostly corporate-dominated field characterized by strong concentration of technological and economic power. Second, we analyze the consequences of AI adoption for business models, organization and work. Our discussion contributes to show how the development and diffusion of this technological domain gives new strength to the lean-production paradigm - in both manufacturing and service sectors - by contributing to the establishment of the new ‘digital Taylorism’.

Rotation of Low-mass Stars in Upper Centaurus–Lupus and Lower Centaurus–Crux with TESS

We present stellar rotation rates derived from Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) light curves for stars in Upper Centaurus–Lupus (UCL; ∼136 pc, ∼16 Myr) and Lower Centaurus–Crux (LCC; ∼115 pc, ∼17 Myr). We find spot-modulated periods (P) for ∼90% of members. The range of light-curve and periodogram shapes echoes that found for other clusters with K2, but fewer multiperiod stars may be an indication of the different noise characteristics of TESS, or a result of the source selection methods here. The distribution of P as a function of color as a proxy for mass fits nicely in between that for both older and younger clusters observed by K2, with fast rotators being found among both the highest and lowest masses probed here, and a well-organized distribution of M-star rotation rates. About 13% of the stars have an infrared excess, suggesting a circumstellar disk; this is well matched to expectations, given the age of the stars. There is an obvious pileup of disked M stars at P ∼ 2 days, and the pileup may move to shorter P as the mass decreases. There is also a strong concentration of disk-free M stars at P ∼ 2 days, hinting that perhaps these stars have recently freed themselves from their disks. Exploring the rotation rates of stars in UCL/LCC has the potential to help us understand the beginning of the end of the influence of disks on rotation, and the timescale on which stars respond to unlocking.

UJI AKTIVITAS ANTIFUNGI EKSTRAK ANGGUR LAUT (Caulerpa sp.) ASAL PULAU GESER KABUPATEN SERAM BAGIAN TIMUR TERHADAP FUNGI Candida albicans

Sea Grape (Caulerpa sp.) is a group of seaweed which is a macroalgae belonging to the Caulerpaceae family . Sea Grape very potential as a new antifungal drug because it contains secondary metabolites of saponins and flavonoids that can inhibit the growth of the fungus Candida albicans . The purpose of this study was to determine the content of secondary metabolites present in sea grapes and antifungal activity test of sea grapes (Caulerpa sp.) which was extracted using 70% ethanol as a solvent against the fungus Candida albicans. The antifungal activity was tested using the disc diffusion method with several concentrations of 5%, 10%, 25%, 50%, 85, 130%, 185%, and 250%, ketoconazole as a positive control and aquadest as a negative control. The results showed that the extraction of sea grapes contains secondary metabolites, namely: Saponins, Flavonoids, Tannins and Steroids capable of inhibiting the growth of the fungus Candida albicans, at a concentration of 25% with an inhibition zone diameter of 12.5 mm, 50% diameter of the inhibition zone 14.5 mm, 130% the diameter of the inhibition zone is 17.5 mm, 185% the diameter of the inhibition zone is 19 mm and 250% with the diameter of the inhibition zone is 22mm. The test results showed that the effective and very strong concentration of inhibiting the growth of Candida albicans was at a concentration of 250% with an inhibition zone of 22 mm.

Wielrennen in Limburg in de eerste helft van de twintigste eeuw. Een 'volkssport' tussen rijk, provincie en lokaal initiatief

Limburg, the southern-most province of the Netherlands, prides itself in being more devoted to cycling as a sport than any other Dutch province, surpassed perhaps only by Noord-Brabant. And indeed, earlier research has shown that a remarkably high number of road races were organised in Limburg since the 1950s. This paper traces the beginning of the provincial enthusiasm for road racing back to the 1930s, when the provincial government, despite the national ban on road racing, increasingly allowed races on provincial and local roads. Using sources from provincial and local archives and historic newspapers, the paper investigates the character and origins of the accommodating provincial road racing regime. In the end, the presence of hills, the internationalisation of competitive cycling, the established tourist trade in the region, the strong concentration of workers in the Limburgian mining districts, and the economic crisis of the 1930s all come together in explaining the rise of Limburg as a road cycling region. During the war, road racing did not decline: the new regime in The Hague at least partly spoke in favour of road racing, while the provincial government came to be led by NSB frontman Max de Marchant et d’Ansembourg, who had organised cycling races in the 1930s himself. The paper thus traces the first instance of Limburg’s favourable provincial policies towards cycling as sport and leisure activity, which established a tradition that lasts until today.

Quantitative parameters of bacterial RNA polymerase open-complex formation, stabilization and disruption on aconsensus promoter.

Transcription initiation is the first step in gene expression, and is therefore strongly regulated in all domains of life. The RNA polymerase (RNAP) first associates with the initiation factor n}{}sigma to form a holoenzyme, which binds, bends and opens the promoter in a succession of reversible states. These states are critical for transcription regulation, but remain poorly understood. Here, we addressed the mechanism of open complex formation by monitoring its assembly/disassembly kinetics on individual consensus lacUV5 promoters using high-throughput single-molecule magnetic tweezers. We probed the key protein–DNA interactions governing the open-complex formation and dissociation pathway by modulating the dynamics at different concentrations of monovalent salts and varying temperatures. Consistent with ensemble studies, we observed that RNAP-promoter open (RPO) complex is a stable, slowly reversible state that is preceded by a kinetically significant open intermediate (RPI), from which the holoenzyme dissociates. A strong anion concentration and type dependence indicates that the RPO stabilization may involve sequence-independent interactions between the DNA and the holoenzyme, driven by a non-Coulombic effect consistent with the non-template DNA strand interacting with n}{}sigma and the RNAP n}{}beta subunit. The temperature dependence provides the energy scale of open-complex formation and further supports the existence of additional intermediates.

Theoretical study of non-Newtonian micropolar nanofluid flow over an exponentially stretching surface with free stream velocity

The computational analysis of the second-order micropolar stagnation point flow of nanofluid over an exponentially permeable stretching sheet is considered. The freestream velocity with the thermal slip effects is taken into account in this analysis. This model is developed on the basis of flow assumptions and reduced into partial differential equations before applying the boundary layer approximations. The governing equations as a mathematical model are simplified with the help of suitable transformations. The differential system is further solved by using the bvp4c. Both graphs and tables are used to report observations. The skin friction and Nusselt number are reported for both weak and strong concentrations. The magnitude of skin friction is noticed greater for strong concentration in comparison with weak concentration. Subject to couple stress, the values of skin friction are relatively high for the case of weak concentration in comparison with strong concentration. Micropolar profile admit the direct relation toward micropolar parameter and micro-gyration parameter. Both Sherwood number and Nusselt number admits higher values for strong concentration as compared to weak concentration.

Further disentangling the motivational processes underlying benzodiazepine hyperphagia

In addition to their well-known anxiolytic functions, benzodiazepines produce hyperphagia. Previously, we reported that the benzodiazepine, chlordiazepoxide (CDP), increased consumption of both normally-preferred and normally-avoided taste stimuli during long-term (1 h) tests, primarily through changes in licking microstructure patterns associated with hedonic taste evaluation, whereas there was little effect on licking microstructure measures associated with post-ingestive feedback. In this study, we further examined the hedonic and motivational specificity of CDP effects on ingestive behavior. We tested brief access (15 s) licking responses for tastants spanning all taste qualities after treatment with either CDP (5 or 10 mg/kg) or the non-benzodiazepine anxiolytic, buspirone (1.5 or 3 mg/kg). A between-subjects, counterbalanced design compared the CDP or buspirone effects on licking responses for water and a range of weak to strong concentrations of NaCl, Q-HCl, citric acid, MSG, saccharin, and capsaicin under water-restricted (23 h) conditions; and sucrose, saccharin, and MSG under water-replete conditions. In a dose dependent manner, CDP increased licking for taste stimuli that were normally-avoided after saline treatment, with a notable exception observed for the trigeminal stimulus, capsaicin, which was not affected at any concentration or drug dose, suggesting a taste-specific effect of CDP on orosensory processing. Under water-replete conditions, CDP dose-dependently increased licking to normally-accepted concentrations of sucrose, saccharin, and MSG. There was no effect of either drug on licks for water under either water-restricted or water-replete conditions. Buspirone slowed oromotor coordination by increasing brief interlick intervals, but it did not affect licking for any concentrations of the tastants. Overall, these results indicate that benzodiazepines selectively enhance the hedonic acceptance of gustatory orosensory stimuli, independent of general anxiolytic or oromotor coordination effects, or physiological states such as thirst.

Apply a TADF emitter with twist configuration for high-performance green OLEDs

Due to the strong concentration quenching effect, the development of non-doped devices with excellent performance is limited. Herein, a novel thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) emitter which contain Spiro[anthracene-9(10H),9’-[9H]fluoren]-10-one (9-FAO) and 9,9-dimethyl-9,10-dihydroacridine (DMAC) was designed and synthesized. The compound shows TADF characteristics which can be observed by transient PL decay tests. By introducing DMAC into the para-position of the 9-FAO which has a highly twisted structure, the distance between the molecules increases to inhibit concentration quenching. The non-doped OLED device by using 2-(9, 9-dimethylacridin-10(9H)-yl)-10H-spiro[anthracene-9,9’- fluoren]-10-one (DMTO-DMAC) as emitter achieved a superior current efficiency of 35.6 cd A−1 and maximum external quantum efficiency of 11.3% with an emission peak at 516 nm. This work demonstrates the feasibility of increasing intermolecular distance to obtain highly efficient non-doped devices.

Mathematical modelling of boundary layer flow over a permeable and time-dependent shrinking sheet – A stability analysis

Micropolar fluid is one type of non-Newtonian fluid which consists of non-deformable spherical particles that suspended in viscous medium. In this paper, the problem of two-dimensional boundary layer flow over a permeable shrinking sheet with time dependent velocity in strong concentration micropolar fluid is studied theoretically. The mathematical model is governed by continuity, momentum and microrotation equations. Similarity variables are introduced so that, after performing the similarity transformation on the governing equations, the resulting system of nonlinear ordinary differential equations is then numerically solved using the program bvp4c in Matlab software. The effects of the micropolar material parameter, the unsteadiness parameter, the shrinking parameter and the mass suction parameter to the skin friction coefficient, velocity profiles and microrotation profiles are investigated. It is found that triple solutions exist for some values of the parameters that were considered. Based on the stability analysis that was performed, it showed that only two branches of solutions are categorized as stable, whereas one solution branch is unstable.

Bibliometric Studies on Renewable Energy—Poland Compared to Other EU Countries

The necessity to use renewable energy sources (RES), especially in EU countries, is becoming more and more urgent in the face of environmental degradation. It is reflected not only in technological solutions for obtaining energy from renewable sources, but also in scientific research supporting RES technology development. There are an increasing number of papers on renewable energy. The aim of the study was to compare research areas concerning renewable energy in Poland and other EU countries by analyzing scientific works. A selected collection of publications available in the Scopus scientific databases was selected as the subject of the study. After cleaning the data and elaborating the thesaurus, the analysis of the article content was conducted applying text processing methods. Conceptual maps of keywords and keyword co-occurrences were created, which enables arranging and classifying knowledge from the subject area. Research hotspots and the directions of science development in the field of renewable energy were identified. The computer program VOSviewer was used in the investigation. Lorenz curves and Gini coefficients were used to identify quite a strong concentration of RES articles in leading journals on the publication market.