Optimal firm size and patterns of returns to scale among the local exchange companies in the U.S. telecommunications industry are estimated for the years: 1975, 1978, 1981, 1984, 1987 and 1990. The independent companies display increasing returns to scale, while the Baby Bells display constant or decreasing returns to scale. The independent companies operate at a scale smaller than optimal size...

The term ‘new economy’ is used to refer to two distinct developments. The first is the increasing importance of pure services, particularly those related to information, and the corresponding decline in the importance of the goods-producing sector. The second is the liberalisation of product and labour market and the resulting decline of institutions like lifetime full employment. Although ther...

We consider giant gravitons as probes of a class of ten-dimensional solutions of type IIB supergravity which arise as lifts of solutions of U(1)3 gauged N = 2 supergravity in five-dimensions. Surprisingly it is possible to solve exactly for minimum energy configurations of these spherical D3-brane probes in the compact directions, even in backgrounds which preserve no supersymmetry. The branes ...

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A challenge is presented to the usual account of the development of the Manchester Baby which focuses on the contribution made to the project by the topologist M.H.A. (Max) Newman and other members of the Dept. of Mathematics. Based on an extensive re-examination of the primary source material, it is suggested that a very much more significant role was played by mathematicians than is allowed f...

We propose a correspondence between the physics of certain small charge black holes in AdSk × Sl and large charge black holes in AdSl × Sk. The curvature singularities of these solutions arise, following Myers and Tafjord, from a condensate of giant gravitons. When the number of condensed giants Ng is much greater than the number of background branes N , we propose that the system has an equiva...

Article history: Received 25 October 2011 Available online 4 November 2011 A meta-analysis of longitudinal studies was conducted to investigate stability and change in work values across the life span. Both rank-order stability and mean-level change were investigated using an integrative classification for intrinsic, extrinsic, social and status work values (Ross, Schwartz, & Surkis, 1999). Res...

Fossil bone collagen C dating and δC and δN isotopic measurements of the rodent Canariomys bravoi from Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain) were used to test two different hypotheses about the causes of extinctions of endemic vertebrates on islands, climate versus humans. For the Tenerife giant rat, we show that it survived the climatic change that occurred between the Middle and Late Holocene, but...

AI Technologies are applicable to Homeland Security, particularly in problems of analysis, discovery and prediction. We describe relevant AI techniques including Link Analysis, dynamic Decision Support and Agent Organization modeling, whereby anomalous activities may be detected and threats deterred. We also discuss application of techniques in local government and to security matters close to ...

The paper is devoted to linear and nonlinear optical properties of disordered clusters and nanocomposites. Linear and nonlinear optical polarizabilities of large disordered clusters, fractal clusters in particular, and susceptibilities of nanocomposites are found and calculated numerically. A spectral theory with dipole interaction is used to obtain quantitative results. Major properties of sys...