Digital Commons Network^™

Dermot Healy's Endless Quest For The Absolute, Eamon Maher

Articles

No abstract provided.

Liberal Constitutionalism And Economic Inequality, Rosalind Dixon, Julie Suk

Articles

Economic inequality is rising in democracies across the world and poses a clear threat to both the stability and legitimacy of liberal constitutional models. Can liberal constitutionalism respond to this threat? Or are there inherent limits to the liberal model that prevent an effective response? This Essay explores these questions by surveying the range of possible structural and rights-based constitutional responses to economic inequality, as well as possible obstacles to these responsesincluding problems of definition, leveling up versus down, unintended or counterproductive consequences, and institutional path dependence.

High‐Frequency Trading And The New Stock Market: Sense And Nonsense, Merritt B. Fox, Lawrence R. Glosten, Gabriel V. Rauterberg

Articles

The stock market has been transformed during the last 25 years. Human suppliers of liquidity like the NASDAQ dealers and NYSE specialists have been replaced by algorithmic market making; stocks that once traded on a single venue now trade across twelve exchanges and a multitude of alternative trading systems. New venues like dark pools, and new participants like high‐frequency traders, have emerged to take on prominent roles. This new market has had more than its share of controversy and regulatory scrutiny, particularly in the wake of Michael Lewis’s bestseller Flash Boys. In this article, the authors analyze five of the …

Socialising Economic Development In Ireland: Social Enterprise An Untapped Resource, Gerard Joseph Doyle

Articles

The chapter provides a comprehensive explanatory framework outlining why social enterprises have been underutilised by policy-makers in Ireland. The Irish State has afforded social enterprise a narrow role in realising the State’s social and economic objectives. It is incumbent upon community organisations to demand that the State has a change of policy direction towards social enterprise, where its current residual role is replaced by a more central role in economic development. The chapter provides an analysis of the factors which led to the growth of the credit union movement in Ireland. Lessons from the development of Ireland’s credit union movement …

Cleaner Fuels For Ships Provide Public Health Benefits With Climate Tradeoffs, Mikhail Sofiev, James J. Winebrake, Lasse Johansson, Edward W. Carr, Marje Prank, Joana Soares, Julius Vira, Jukka-Pekka Jalkanen, James J. Corbett

Articles

We evaluate public health and climate impacts of low-sulphur fuels in global shipping. Using high-resolution emissions inventories, integrated atmospheric models, and health risk functions, we assess ship-related PM 2.5 pollution impacts in 2020 with and without the use of low-sulphur fuels. Cleaner marine fuels will reduce ship-related premature mortality and morbidity by 34 and 54%, respectively, representing a ~ 2.6% global reduction in PM 2.5 cardiovascular and lung cancer deaths and a ~3.6% global reduction in childhood asthma. Despite these reductions, low-sulphur marine fuels will still account for ~250k deaths and ~6.4 M childhood asthma cases annually, and more stringent …

A Fully Integrated Rssi And An Ultra-Low Power Sar Adc For 5.8 Ghz Dsrc Etc Transceiver, Meijuan Zhang, Ruifeng Liu, Yuanzhi Zhang, Wenshen Wang, Huimin Liu, Chao Lu

Articles

This study presents a monolithic received signal strength indicator (RSSI) and an ultra-low power SAR ADC for 5.8 GHz DSRC transceiver in China electronic toll collection systems. In order to meet the stringent requirement of wide input range for the transceiver, two RSSIs collaborate with auxiliary ADC circuits to provide the digitalized received signal strength to the digital baseband of a transceiver. The RSSI design achieves fast transient response and low power consumption with a small die area by using internal active low-pass filters instead of external passive ones. The proposed design has been fabricated using a 0.13 μm 2P6M …

Innovative Contracting For Pharmaceuticals And Medicaid’S Best-Price Rule, Nicholas Bagley

Articles

In recent years, drug manufacturers and private payers have expressed interest in novel pricing models that more closely link a drug’s price to its value. Indication-based pricing, outcome-based pricing, drug licenses, and drug mortgages have all been discussed as alternatives to paying strictly for volume. Manufacturers and payers have complained, however, that Medicaid’s “best-price rule” inhibits their ability to enter into these newpricing arrangements. This article examines the best-price rule and assesses to what extent, if any, it might frustrate the goal of paying for value. We conclude that the best-price rule is not as serious a problem as it …

Towards A Digital Earth: Using Archetypes To Enable Knowledge Interoperability Within Geo-Observational Sensor Systems Design, Paul Stacey, Damon Berry

Articles

Earth System Science (ESS) observational data are often inadequately semantically enriched by geo-observational information systems in order to capture the true meaning of the associated data sets. Data models underpinning these information systems are often too rigid in their data representation to allow for the ever-changing and evolving nature of ESS domain concepts. This impoverished approach to observational data representation reduces the ability of multi-disciplinary practitioners to share information in a computable way.

Object oriented techniques typically employed to model data in a complex domain (with evolving domain concepts) can unnecessarily exclude domain specialists from the design process, invariably leading …

Secrecy And Randomness: Encoding Cloud Data Locally Using A One-Time Pad, Paul Tobin, Lee Edward Tobin, Mick Mckeever, Jonathan Blackledge

Articles

There is no secrecy without randomness, and we address poor cloud security using an analogue chaotic onetime pad encryption system to achieve perfect secrecy. Local encoding returns control to the client and makes stored cloud data unreadable to an adversary. Most cloud service providers encode client data using public encryption algorithms, but ultimately businesses and organisations are responsible for encoding data locally before uploading to the Cloud. As recommended by the Cloud Security Alliance, companies employing authentication and local encryption will reduce or eliminate, EU fines for late data breach discoveries when the EU implements the new general data protection …

Partisan Balance With Bite, Daniel Hemel, Brian D. Feinstein

Articles

No abstract provided.

Economic Analysis In Labor Regulation, Hiba Hafiz

Articles

No abstract provided.

''It’S A Win-Win Situation” – Intergenerational Learning In Preschool And Elder Care Settings: An Irish Perspective, Carmel Gallagher, Anne Fitzpatrick

Articles

This paper explores the level and sustainability of intergenerational practice in early years and elder care settings in Ireland. The paper is based on a small-scale research study involving interviews with sta in ve organizations and builds on ndings from previous research conducted for the TOY project (http://www.toyproject.net). The paper examines the pedagogies involved as well as the community context of intergenerational practice in early years and elder care settings. The ndings highlight that sustainable intergenerational practice is facilitated by strong pedagogies that support active and relational learning across the life course and by being embedded in robust community networks.

Memories Of Television In Ireland: Separating Media History From Nation State, Edward Brennan

Articles

This article emerges from a broader project that explores the history of television in Ireland using audience life story interviews. It argues that a dominant narrative persists in the history of television in the Republic of Ireland. Based in institutional sources this narrative is ideologically narrow although it tells a story of cultural liberation. A key example of its ideological limitation lies in the way that Irish people’s experience of British television transmissions has been forgotten. The reason for this lies in historical methods rather than conscious bias. Nevertheless, historical methods themselves can promote limited visons of reality that promote …

The Run Of Ourselves: Shame, Guilt And Confession In Post-Celtic Tiger Irish Media, Marcus Free, Clare Scully

Articles

This article examines the emergence of the themes of shame and guilt in Irish print and broadcast media in the wake of Ireland’s 2008 economic collapse. It considers how the potential search for explanation of the crisis as a manifestation of unregulated banking and development sectors was displaced onto a confessional discursive pattern in which emphasis was placed on rampant borrowing and consumption as reflective of collective narcissism and acquisitive greed. Hence the logic that ‘hubris’ led inevitably to a national fall from grace and the corresponding resurgence of postcolonial shame; and the interplay between cultural nationalist and neoliberal discourses …

Interculturalism In Higher Education In Ireland: An Analysis From A Strategy, Policy And Practice Perspective, Brid Ni Chonaill

Articles

Education is instrumental in preparing students to participate in increasingly diverse Irish, European and global societies, with higher education having a part to play in the process. Issues around migration and cultural diversity have gained less attention in the higher education sector in Ireland than at primary and post primary level with a few notable exceptions. Higher education is regarded as having a “critical role” to play in terms of “enriching Ireland’s cultural life, nurturing our understanding of our own national identity and that of other cultures and belief systems” [1]. Influenced by developments at European Union level, the approach …

In League? Destination Marketing Organisations And Football Clubs In The Virtual Space, Gerard Dunne, David Proctor, Sheila Flanagan

Articles

Logic dictates that Destination Marketing Organisations (DMOs), while representing many stakeholders, should leverage a location’s most visible assets to enhance the attractiveness of the destination at any given opportunity. This study examines the manner and extent to which four major European football franchises are mentioned and promoted on the official digital marketing platforms of their respective cities; Amsterdam, Barcelona, Manchester and Munich. A tailor made content analysis tool is used to conduct a systematic investigation of the virtual platforms over which the DMOs of these cities exert a modicum of control. The content of these platforms is scrutinised from three …

Discursive Constructions Of Professional Identity In Policy And Regulatory Discourse, Gerard Fealy, Josephine Mary Hegarty, Martin Mcnamara, Mary Casey, Denise O'Leary, Catriona Kennedy, Pauline O’Reilly, Rhona O’Connell, Anne-Marie Brady, Emma Nicholson

Articles

Aim

To examine and describe disciplinary discourses conducted through professional policy and regulatory documents in nursing and midwifery in Ireland.

Background

A key tenet of discourse theory is that group identities are constructed in public discourses and these discursively constructed identities become social realities. Professional identities can be extracted from both the explicit and latent content of discourse. Studies of nursing's disciplinary discourse have drawn attention to a dominant discourse that confers nursing with particular identities, which privilege the relational and affective aspects of nursing and, in the process, marginalize scientific knowledge and the technical and body work of nursing. …

Unpacking Action Research And Implementation Science: Implications For Nursing, Mary Casey, Denise O'Leary, David Coghlan

Articles

Aim

The aim of this study was to unpack the key concepts of action research and implementation science thereby enabling appropriate use of these methods in nursing.

Background

A key issue in action research is not so much the methodology employed to gather data/evidence but who decides the research agenda and who benefits from it. Implementation science is a way to ensure that evidence is translated into practice. The question arises as to how action research and implementation may be understood in relation to one another in nursing.

Design

Discussion Paper

Data sources

This discussion paper is based on our …

Muddy Waters: Refining The Way Forward For The “Sustainability Science” Of Socio-Hydrogeology, Paul Hynds, Shane Regan, Luisa Andrade, Simon Mooney, Kevin O'Malley, Stephanie Dipelino, Jean O'Dwyer

Articles

The trouble with groundwater is that despite its critical importance to global water supplies, it frequently attracts insufficient management attention relative to more visible surface water sources, irrespective of regional climate, socioeconomic profile, and regulatory environment. To this end, the recently defined sub-discipline of "socio-hydrogeology", an extension of socio-hydrology, seeks to translate and exchange knowledge with and between non-expert end-users, in addition to involving non-expert opinion and experience in hydrogeological investigations, thus emphasising a "bottom-up" methodology. It is widely acknowledged that issues pertaining to groundwater quality, groundwater quantity, climate change, and a poor general awareness and understanding of groundwater occurrence …

Versatile Soliton Emission From A Ws2 Mode-Locked Fiber Laser, Bo Guo, Shi Li, Ya-Xian Fan, Pengfei Wang

Articles

Recently, few-layer tungsten disulfide (WS2), as a shining 2D material, has been discovered to possess both the saturable absorption ability and large nonlinear refractive index. Here, we demonstrate versatile soliton pulses in a passively mode-locked fiber laser with a WS2-deposited microfiber. The few-layer WS2 is prepared by the liquid-phase exfoliation method and transferred onto a microfiber by the optical deposition method. Study found, the WS2-deposited microfiber can operate simultaneously as a mode-locker and a high-nonlinear device. In experiment, by further inserting the WS2 device into the fiber laser, besides the dual-wavelength soliton, noise-like soliton pulse, conventional soliton and its harmonic …

Fabrication And Characterization Of A Magnetized Metal-Encapsulated Fbg Sensor For Structural Health Monitoring, Sagar Jinachandran, Huijun Li, Jiangtao Xi, B. Gangadhara Prusty, Yuliya Semenova, Gerald Farrell, Ginu Rajan

Articles

A novel means of metal packaging of a fiber Bragg grating (FBG) sensor using stainless steel and tin, together with high temperature resistant samarium cobalt (SmCo) magnet is proposed in this paper. The inclusion of high temperaturecapable SmCo magnets enable the metal packaging of the FBG sensor with magnetic capabilities. This packaged sensor can be placed in direct contact with the substrate structures such as iron pipelines and other ferromagnetic components without any adhesives, making them easily detachable and reusable. This is a significant improvement compared with other commercial fiber optic sensors which are, surface attached using epoxies or welded …

The Development Of Seals Committees, Linda Jellum

Articles

No abstract provided.

Optimal Issuer Disclosure Of Opinions, Wendy Gerwick Couture

Articles

This Article adds to the scholarly literature about the optimal level of disclosure by issuers of securities by proposing a new theoretical framework that encompasses not only the choice between silence and disclosure, which has been widely discussed, but also the subsidiary decision between disclosure as an opinion and as a statement of fact, which has been ignored. This framework informs the Securities and Exchange Commission’s ongoing review of mandatory disclosure rules and contextualizes the potential impacts of the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Omnicare, Inc. v. Laborers District Council Construction Industry Pension Fund,1 which clarified that differential liability standards …

Ethics Of Using Artificial Intelligence To Augment Drafting Legal Documents, David Hricik

Articles

Skynet is not and may never be self-aware, but machines are al-ready doing legal research, drafting legal documents, negotiating disputes such as traffic tickets and divorce schedules, and even drafting patent applications. Machines learn from us, and each other, to augment the ability of lawyers to represent clients—and even to replace lawyers completely. While it also threatens lawyers’ jobs, the exponential increase in the capacity of machines to transmit, store, and process data presents the opportunity for lawyers to use these services to provide better, cheaper, or faster legal representation to clients. By way of familiar example, instead of determining …

Temporal Variability And Geographical Origins Of Airborne Pollen Grains Concentrations From 2015 To 2018 At Saclay, France, Roland Sarda Esteve, Dominique Baisnee, Benjamin Guinot, David O'Connor, Jean-Eudes Petit, John Sodeau, Jean-Pierre Besancenot, Michel Thibaudon, Valérie Gros

Articles

The study of the origin and dispersion processes associated with airborne pollen grains are important to understand due to their impacts on health. In this context, a Hirst-type spore trap was utilized over the period 2015–2018 to monitor ambient pollen grains at Saclay, France, a receptor site influenced by both clean air masses originating from the Atlantic Ocean and polluted air masses under anticyclonic conditions. The objective of this work was to use ZeFir (a user-friendly, software tool recently-developed to investigate the geographical origin and point sources of atmospheric pollution) as a method to analyse total and allergenic airborne pollen …

High Sensitivity Temperature Sensor Based On Singlemode-No-Core- Singlemode Fibre Structure And Alcohol, Ke Tiana, Gerald Farrell, Xianfan Wang, Yifan Xin, Yanqiu Du, Wenlei Yang, Haidong Liang, Elfed Lewis, Pengfei Wang

Articles

A high sensitivity temperature sensor based on a singlemode-no-core-singlemode (SNCS) fibre structure and surrounded with alcohol within a silica capillary is described. In this investigation, no-core fibre (NCF) is used as the multimode waveguide and alcohol is chosen as the temperature sensitive medium. By packaging the alcohol solution with a short length of NCF enclosed within a silica capillary, the surrounding temperature can be detected by monitoring the variations of transmission loss at a specific wavelength. The theoretical analysis predicts this temperature sensor can provide high sensitivity, and the experimental results support this. The maximum temperature sensitivity of the sample …

Reactive Oxygen Species And Nitric Oxide Signaling In Bystander Cells, Kishore Kumar Jella, Roisin Moriarty, Brendan Mcclean, Hugh Byrne, Fiona Lyng

Articles

It is now well accepted that radiation induced bystander effects can occur in cells exposed to media from irradiated cells. The aim of this study was to follow the bystander cells in real time following addition of media from irradiated cells and to determine the effect of inhibiting these signals. A human keratinocyte cell line, HaCaT cells, was irradiated (0.005, 0.05 and 0.5 Gy) with γ irradiation, conditioned medium was harvested after one hour and added to recipient bystander cells. Reactive oxygen species, nitric oxide, Glutathione levels, caspase activation, cytotoxicity and cell viability was measured after the addition of irradiated …

Microdisk Resonator With Negative Thermal Optical Coefficient Polymer For Refractive Index Sensing With Thermal Stability, Tao Ma, Jinhui Yuan, Feng Li, Lei Sun, Zhe Kang, Binbin Yan, Qiang Wu, Xinzhu Sang, Heng Liu, Fang Wang, Bo Wu, Chongxiu Yu, Gerald Farrell

Articles

In this paper, we propose a microdisk resonator with negative thermal optical coefficient (TOC) polymer for refractive index (RI) sensing with thermal stability. The transmission characteristics and sensing performances by using quasi-TE01 and quasi-TM01 modes are simulated by a three-dimensional finite element method. The influences of the TOC, RI, and thickness of the polymer on the sensing performances are also investigated. The simulation results show that the RI sensitivity Sn and temperature sensitivity ST with different polymers are in the ranges of 25.1-26 nm/RIU and 67.3-75.2 pm/K for the quasi-TE01 mode, and 94.5-110.6 nm/RIU and 1.2-51.3 pm/K for the quasi-TM01 …

Civil War: A Board Game As Pedagogy And Critique, Hugh Mccabe

Articles

This paper describes the use of a board game, Civil War, as a learning experience in the context of a course on critical theory. Civil War was created by the Educational Games Company of Lebanon and is set during the 1975-1990 Lebanese civil war. The game functions both as a pedagogical instrument, in that players learn about the situation in Lebanon while playing the game, but also as a form of critique, in that its makers are clearly using it as a means of articulating their lived experiences and challenging the dominant narratives around the conflict. We suggest that the …

Giving Teeth To State Constitutions: Using History To Argue Utah's Constitution Affords Greater Protections To Criminal Defendants, Samuel P. Newton

Articles

No abstract provided.