Unitary Systems Research Articles

The Problem-Oriented Approach to Improving National Human Rights Action Plans

By conducting a textual analysis of the National Human Rights Action Plans of 39 countries, this study revealed that these plans are faced with at least 14 significant problems in the ‘pre-phase’ and the four phases of planning — these are the preparatory phase; development phase; implementation phase; and assessment phase. The problems include: non-compliance; tardiness; lack of a baseline study; ideological orientation; non-correspondence; lack of comprehensiveness; lack of coordination; supporting the status quo; lack of a time frame; lack of transparency; lack of accountability; lack of resources; lack of monitoring mechanism; and lack of evaluation mechanism. These problems are best addressed by attempting to remove or mitigate their root causes. In this regard, this study explored three important root causes of the problems: the lack of political will; the lack of stakeholder awareness; and the traditional concept of planning. This suggested building three response strategies including: a shift from unitary systems of government to more horizontally-organized systems of networked governance; raising awareness of such plans; and a strategic move towards the modern concept of planning. By directing corrective measures at root causes, it is hoped that the likelihood of recurrence of problems will be minimized.

Swiss popular initiative for a single health insurer… once again!

The article describes a recent Swiss popular initiative, aiming to replace the current system of statutory health insurance run by 61 competing private insurers with a new system run by a single public insurer. Despite the rejection of the initiative by 62% of voters in late September 2014, the campaign and ballot results are interesting because they show the importance of (effective) public communication in shaping the outcome of a popular ballot. The relevance of the Swiss case goes beyond the peculiarities of its federalism and direct democracy and might be useful for other countries debating the pros and cons of national unitary health insurance systems versus models using multiple insurers.After this electoral ballot, the project to establish a public sickness fund in Switzerland seems definitely stopped, at least for the next decade. Insurers, who opposed the initiative, have effectively fed the “fear of change” of the population and have stressed the good outcomes of the Swiss healthcare system.However, the political pressure favoured by the popular initiative opened a “windows of opportunity” and led the federal Parliament to pass a stricter regulation of health insurers, improving in this way the current system.

Three Topics at the Periphery of Corporate Governance: Business Rescues and Wrongful Trading, Supervisory Law for Financial Institutions and the Perspective on Islamic Financial Institutions

In this paper three specific areas and their impact of corporate governance are analysed. The first part of the article questions the adequacy of current obligations under German law to inform shareholders of a financial crisis. The risk that directors and other managers will make risky decisions because of a desire to avoid insolvency and the rules governing corporate conduct in situations of insolvency or near-insolvency in Germany are considered and contrasted with the English approach. The approach to supervision of financial institutions, and the potential for these rules to apply to companies other than financial institutions, are considered. The current rules for financial institutions in Germany, and the ways in which the managements and auditing of such companies differs from the norm are analysed. The potential for Islamic law to have an effect on the management of corporations forms the subject matter of the final part of this article. The role of Sharia Supervisory Boards (SSB) in the German unitary and two-tier systems, and the proper classification of such boards are thoroughly explored. The possible consequences for SSBs and the corporations that use them under the German laws on Corporate Governance are considered. The article concludes with a summary outlining the ways in which Corporate Governance affects the areas covered; business rescue laws, supervisory laws for financial institutions, and Islamic Financial Institutions.

Construction Process of Unitary Systems Using LMI Based Approach

A modified principle of unitary systems construction for continuous-time linear strictly proper MIMO systems is presented in the paper. The problem addressed is reformulated as design of an equivalent system fault transfer function matrix, implying the asymptotic properties of desired unitary fault system. Presented in the sense of the second Lyapunov method, an associated structure of linear matrix inequalities with built-in the prescribed constraint is outlined to possess the emplacement of singular values of the unitary system. The proposed design conditions are verified by the numerical illustrative example.

Motivations and roles for sub–national governmental participation in managing climate change

States and regions provide flexibility and innovation in managing climate change. This is exemplified by energy conservation, transportation, forestry, land use, regional planning, waste management policies and programmes to promote lifestyle changes. Problematically, however, sub–national government roles vary considerably among countries, depending on the division of authority between central government and regions. For example, in federal systems such as the USA, states can serve as policy 'laboratories'. This may be less true in unitary systems. We explore sources of this variation and its significance for understanding sub–national climate change activities.

BAPO as an alternative photoinitiator for the radical polymerization of dental resins

ObjectivesThis study evaluated the performance of phenylbis (2,4,6-trimethylbenzoyl)-phosphine oxide (BAPO) as an alternative photoinitiator in the polymerization kinetics (PK), flexural strength (σ) and elastic modulus (E) of a model dental resin. MethodsA monomer mixture based on Bis-GMA and TEGDMA was used as model dental resin. Initially a screening was performed to evaluate BAPO concentrations (0.125, 0.25, 0.50, 1, 2, and 4mol%). Photoinitiator systems were formed with the combination of camphorquinone (CQ), ethyl-dimethylamino benzoate (EDAB), diphenyliodonium hexafluorophosphate (DPIHFP), and BAPO. Groups with unitary photoinitiator systems (BAPO and CQ), binary (BAPO+EDAB, BAPO+DPIHFP and CQ+EDAB), ternary (BAPO+CQ+EDAB, BAPO+CQ+DPIHFP, BAPO+EDAB+DPIHFP and CQ+EDAB+DPIHFP) and quaternary (BAPO+CQ+EDAB+DPIHFP) were formulated for evaluation. Real-time Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy was used to investigate the PK and test mini-bending to evaluate σ and E. ResultsWhen only CQ was used, a slow polymerization reaction was observed and a lower monomer conversion. When only BAPO was used as photoinitiator an increase in the polymerization rate was observed and conversion was higher than CQ+EDAB. The ternary system (BAPO+EDAB+DPIHFP) showed the highest polymerization and conversion rate, in short photo-activation time. SignificanceBAPO it is a potential photoinitiator for the photopolymerization of dental materials.

Identifiability of open quantum systems

We provide a general framework for the identification of open quantum systems. By looking at the input-output behavior, we try to identify the system inside a black box in which some Markovian time evolution takes place. Due to the generally irreversible nature of the dynamics, it is difficult to assure full controllability over the system. Still, we show that the system is identifiable up to similarity under a certain rank condition. The framework also covers situations relevant to standard quantum process tomography, where we do not have enough control over the system but have a tomographically complete set of initial states and observables. Remarkably, the similarity cannot in general be reduced to unitarity even for unitary systems, and the spectra of Hamiltonians are not identifiable without additional knowledge.

Recasting Leadership Reform in Australian Local Government: A Typology from Political Theory

ABSTRACTChanges to elected leadership in Australian local government have seen greater authority assigned to mayors in several jurisdictions. A Discussion Paper recently released under the auspices of the Australian Centre for Excellence in Local Government (ACELG) has recommended further reforms, arguing inter alia that mayors ought to enjoy a personal mandate and a stronger strategic role. This paper places these suggested reforms into context by developing a typology of local government leadership from political theory. We argue that this quadrilateral typology provides a critical portrait of recommendations for stronger leadership which, in this instance, have been transposed from two unitary systems of government (England and New Zealand) to the Australian federal system, without due consideration of the literature examining stronger mayoral roles. It is argued that caution should be exercised when redrafting legislation governing mayoral authority, a process presently underway in New South Wales (NSW).

Evaluating the performance of fault detection and diagnostics protocols applied to air-cooled unitary air-conditioning equipment

Fault detection and diagnostics tools are increasingly being applied to air-cooled unitary air-conditioning systems. However, it is not known how well these tools work because there is no standard method of measuring or evaluating the performance of fault detection and diagnostics. This article describes the common faults to which fault detection and diagnostics is applied in unitary systems and proposes a method of evaluating the performance of fault detection and diagnostics protocols. The method involves feeding measurement data through a candidate protocol and collecting and organizing the responses based upon the fault's impacts on performance. A library of faulted and unfaulted measurement data has been built and is described. Standard definitions are proposed for several pertinent terms and quantities. A case study is used to demonstrate the evaluation method, using a publicly available fault detection and diagnostics protocol that is evaluated using the complete library of data. This protocol is found to perform poorly.

Can the Income Tax Be Saved?: The Promise and Pitfalls of Unitary Formulary Apportionment

Most developed nations raise a substantial portion of their revenues through the imposition of corporate and individual income taxes. But recent economic developments, and particularly the increasing globalization of capital markets, has made enforcement of national income taxes increasingly difficult. A primary cause of these difficulties lies in countries' failure to devise effective methods of taxing the domestic income of foreign corporations. All too often, such income ends up taxed no where. Not surprisingly and all too successfully, taxpayers strive to arrange their affairs so that their income becomes such no where income. It is hard to see how the corporate, and perhaps even the individual income tax can survive as an effective revenue raising device unless and until countries devise an effective method of taxing the domestic income of foreign corporations. Increasingly, academics and EU bureaucrats have come to believe that the solution to the problem of nontaxation of international income lies in replacing the current arm's length, separate entity based taxing regimes, which rely on transfer prices and source rules to determine the amount of income earned by and taxed in the hands of domestic operating entities, with unitary formulary taxing regimes similar to those used by some states of the United States. This paper examines the prospects for success of formulary taxing regimes by looking at the experiences of the States of the United State, which have operated such regimes, as well as the experience of the United States, in its operation of the subpart F regime. It concludes that many taxpayers will avoid the reach of unitary formulary tax systems by rearranging their business practices, thus reducing the gains expected from the adoption of unitary formulary tax regimes.

Interaction for the trapped fermi gas from a unitary transformation of the exact two-body spectrum

We study systems of few two-component fermions interacting in a Harmonic Oscillator trap. The fermion-fermion interaction is generated in a finite basis with a unitary transformation of the exact two-body spectrum given by the Busch formula. The few-body Schrodinger equation is solved with the formalism of the No-Core Shell Model. We present results for a system of three fermions interacting at unitarity as well as for finite values of the S-wave scattering length a 2 and effective range r 2. Unitary systems with four and five fermions are also considered. We show that the many-body energies obtained in this approach are in excellent agreement with exact solutions for the three-body problem, and results obtained by other methods in the other cases.

Variations in grading practice – subjects matter

This article aims to explore the relevance and importance of school subjects in teachers’ grading practices, as teachers themselves see it. The study is based on material from 41 semi-structured interviews, with teachers of five subjects, at four lower and two upper secondary schools in Norway. The findings suggest that the school subject does matter when teachers assign final grades to their students. The study also indicates that different subjects involve different challenges or obstacles in fulfilling government recommendations and regulations for grading. A four-part model is developed that summarises the subject differences found in teachers’ approaches to grading, and which allows different subjects to be mapped relative to one another. These findings seem to support arguments that more recognition should be given to differences between school subjects, and the influence of contextual dimensions in grading practices. This is particularly relevant in implementing system-wide changes such as the creation of unitary systems for the measurement of student learning outcomes.

Exact pre‐scheduling SINR analysis for per‐user unitary rate control systems

The exact probability density function (PDF) of the pre-scheduling signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio (SINR) for per-user unitary rate control (PU2RC) systems is derived. A main contribution is proposing a novel dimension-reducing-type function to resolve the key problem, i.e. within a multi-dimensional complex space, to obtain the PDF of a unit isotropic vector's maximum projection on vectors of an orthonormal basis. Even if PU2RC systems are only considered, the proposed function is quite useful for the analysis of other orthogonal beams-based MIMO systems as well. Monte Carlo simulations validate the analysis results.

Metropolitan Governance in the Federalist Americas: Strategies for Equitable and Integrated Development, edited by Peter K. Spink, Peter M. Ward, and Robert H. Wilson.

This book takes on the ambitious task of examining what the authors call the “effectiveness of governance systems” in the large metropolitan areas of the federalist Americas: Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, the United States, and Venezuela. Although sharing federal constitutions, the nature of federalism differs significantly in these countries, as the authors acknowledge. Canada, the United States, and Brazil offer more decentralized systems, whereas Mexico, Argentina, and Venezuela have more centralized features. These features provide for interesting comparisons as the authors examine metropolitan government and governance features in each. The central question being pursued, as the authors state it, is whether “current and emerging initiatives and structures of governance are capable of meeting the challenges of collective life in these large and complex metropolitan areas” (p. 3) as represented by the countries studied. An examination of metropolitan governance and its effectiveness in federal systems is particularly relevant, the authors argue, because in federal systems lower levels of government typically have more constitutional autonomy than in unitary systems. It is in federal systems, consequently, that subnational governments may engage more formally and more readily in intergovernmental collaborative relationships and where such arrangements may be created offering viable and effective governance opportunities. Key to their analysis is the extent of democratization (citizen involvement) and decentralization (governance capacity) found to exist among the metropolitan areas included in their study. And, as the authors put it, their concern is not only with how citizens are engaged in the governance process, but whether such processes are actually improving the lives of citizens. Thus, their central research questions becomes, “whether the current and emerging initiatives and structures of governance are capable of meeting the challenges of collective life in these large and complex metropolitan areas” (p. 34).

Effect of MWNTs on the Electrochemical Reduction Processes of Bi3+, HTeO 2 + , and Their Mixtures

The effect of multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) on the electrochemical behaviors of the Bi and Te unitary systems and the Bi–Te binary system was investigated by means of cyclic voltammetry (CV) and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS). Energy-dispersive x-ray spectroscopy (EDS) and x-ray diffraction (XRD) analyses of the deposits were also conducted to confirm the analysis of the reduction processes. The results show that, when MWNTs were added into each solution, the shape and number of peaks on each voltammogram remained unchanged, but the reduction peaks all shifted positively, and the peak current of each reduction peak increased slightly. The variation trends of the Nyquist plots in each system did not change with the addition of MWNTs. However, the same process occurred at more positive potentials, and the radius of the semicircle decreased at the same potentials compared with blank solutions. All these results indicate that addition of MWNTs into these electrolytes did not change the electrochemical reduction mechanisms of Bi3+, HTeO 2 + , and their mixtures, but let the reduction processes of Bi3+, HTeO 2 + , and their mixtures become easier. The results reveal that the presence of MWNTs can promote electrodeposition of Bi x Te y compound.

A self-validation method for regression models of unitary HVAC equipment based on manufacturers' data

Regression models of various types are often used to predict the performance of unitary HVAC systems. Models must be validated before they can be used with any confidence. This article describes a self-validation method for regression models based on the widely-available manufacturer's performance data. The self-validation method also uses the manufacturer's data, thus avoiding the problem of scarce or expensive laboratory test validation data. It is derived based on the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus. In this method, the discrete manufacturer's data are studied within the context of the continuous domain, so that the partial derivatives of the regression models derived from the manufacturer's data are approximated for each independent variable. The derivative of a regression model is said to be effectively validated when all of its partial derivatives are valid, and then the quality of the regression model can be further evaluated for its intended use. The self-validation method was implemented to validate models of unitary HVAC equipment that were developed with Generic Rating-Data-Based modeling, and it showed that self-validation using the manufacturer's data is consistent with laboratory data based validation.

An analytical approach for treating unitary quantum systems with initial mixed states

Mixed states are important in quantum optics since they frequently appear in decoherence problems. When one of the components of the system is initially prepared in a mixed state and the mathematical closed form of the evolution operator of the system is not available, one cannot deduce the density matrix. We present an analytical approach to accurately solve this problem. We exploit the fact that any mixed state can be expressed in terms of the phase state. The approach can be applied on the condition that Schrödinger’s equation of the system is solvable for any arbitrary initial state. We verify the validity of the approach for two examples, namely, the Jaynes–Cummings model and the two-qubit problem. Our results are in good agreement with the available results in the literature. This approach opens new perspectives for treating complicated systems and may impact other applications in quantum theory.

Female Citizenship in the Middle East: Comparing family law reform in Morocco, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon

This article explores the relationship between type of court system, parliamentary reform, and expanded female citizenship in four Arab states between 1990 and 2010. I argue that female citizens have acquired wider civil rights through parliament in relatively homogenous states with unitary court systems than in multireligious states with dual court systems. In Egypt and Morocco, unitary courts curbed clerical judicial authority over family law and weakened the resilience of conservative religious authorities. In these states, renewed pressures for reform after 1990 yielded strengthened female civil rights. In Syria and Lebanon, dual courts safeguard the judicial autonomy of clerics and enable them to resist pressures for family law reform more forcefully. In these states, little changed because the interests of political and religious authorities converge in ways that bolster group-based citizenship and constrain the civil rights of female citizens.

Influence of Electrodeposition Potential on the Properties of CuIn5S8 Spinel Thin Films

Ternary CuIn5S8 spinel thin films were deposited on indium tin oxide (ITO)-coated glass substrates using a one-step electrodeposition method. A new procedure for the deposition of CuIn5S8 samples is reported. Prior to the deposition, a cyclic voltammetric study was performed in unitary (Cu, S, In) systems, binaries (Cu-S, In-S) systems, and ternary Cu-In-S system. The influence of various deposition potentials on structural, morphological, optical and electrical properties of samples was investigated. Based on these studies, X-ray diffraction patterns show that CuIn5S8 cubic spinel phase was the main constituent of the deposited layers at applied potential of −1 V (vs. Ag/AgCl). From (AFM) analysis, it was found that the surface morphology, grain size roughness and thickness were strongly affected by varying the deposition potentials. At −1 V (vs. Ag/AgCl) an optical band-gap of approximately 1.54 eV for this material was determined by optical transmission spectroscopy. At potentials more negative than −0.8 V (vs. Ag/AgCl) the film is converted to n-type and exhibits lower resistivity.

Operator-valued frame generators for group-like unitary systems

In this paper, we investigate operator-valued frames with the structure of group-like unitary system. We show the commutant of the group-like unitary system can be characterized in terms of analysis operators associated with all the operator-valued Bessel generators and give some sufficient and necessary conditions to describe when an operator-valued frame generator admits a Parseval dual.