Enterprise credit, household credit and growth: New evidence from 126 countries

E-print/Working paper (2016)

This paper attempts to distinguish the effects of household and enterprise credit on economic growth. To do so, I create a new, hand-collected database covering 143 countries over the period 1995-2014 ... [more ▼]

This paper attempts to distinguish the effects of household and enterprise credit on economic growth. To do so, I create a new, hand-collected database covering 143 countries over the period 1995-2014 (126 countries are employed for econometric analysis). Estimation results confirm recent evidence documenting the absence of the effect of total credit to growth. Findings also show that household credit has a negative effect on growth, but I fail to provide robust support for a positive effect of business credit. [less ▲]

Rebondissements d’un demi-siècle de production et de consommation alimentaires. De la subsistance à la ‘sufficience’ et à la ‘locavoracité’

Conference given outside the academic context (2016)

A multimodal conversation analytic approach to investigate a joint problem solving task.

Presentation (2016, November 15)

In our paper, we will demonstrate how a multimodal conversation analytic approach can shed light on the complex phenomenon of joint problem solving in a Mathematics classroom. Through a fine-grained video ... [more ▼]

In our paper, we will demonstrate how a multimodal conversation analytic approach can shed light on the complex phenomenon of joint problem solving in a Mathematics classroom. Through a fine-grained video based single case analysis (Mondada, 2013; Arend et al., 2014), we will show how three children collaboratively solve mathematical problems by mobilizing various resources. They address each other by talking, gazing, gesturing, changing body position as well as by manipulating artefacts. Multimodal conversation analysis allows us to investigate the ongoing organisation of the children’s problem solving activity in its temporal and sequential unfolding as well as to study the multimodally embodied multiparty utterances in their mutual responsiveness (Streeck et al, 2011). Favouring an interactional approach interested in the coordinated achievement of activity (Arend & Sunnen, 2016), we consider that the progress and the outcome of the problem solving activity emerge in situ from the children’s interactions. By relying on multimodal CA, we may point out how the children achieve mutual understanding while accomplishing a task in a Mathematics lesson. Our paper seeks to make a contribution to investigate group-based classroom activities (Mercer et al, 2004) as well as to sensitise teachers to the high complexity of mutually accomplished classroom tasks. Arend, B., Sunnen, P. (2016). Dialogic Classroom Talk - Rethinking ‘Messy’ Classroom Interaction. Proceedings of the 10th EAPRIL (European Association for Practitioner Research on Improving Learning in Education and Professional Practice) conference, 424-434. Arend, B., Sunnen, P., Fixmer, P., Sujbert, M. (2014). Perspectives do matter – Expanding Multimodal Interaction Analysis with Joint Screen. Classroom Discourse, Special Issue Multimodality, 5(1), 38-50. Mondada, L. (2013). The conversation Analytic Approach to Data Collection. In J. Sidnell, & T. Stivers (eds.), The Handbook of Conversation Analysis (32-56). Oxford: Wiley Blackwell. Mercer, N., Dawes, R., Wegerif, R., Sams, C. (2004). Reasoning as a scientist: ways of helping children to use language to learn science. British Educational Research Journal, 30, (3), 367-385. Streeck, J., Goodwin, C. & LeBaron, C. (eds.) (2011). Embodied Interaction, Language and Body in the Material World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [less ▲]

Post-deposition treatment of Cu2ZnSnSe4 with alkalis

in Thin Solid Films (2016), 633

Low temperature post-deposition treatment of Cu2ZnSnSe4 with NaF and KF significantly improved the solar cell efficiency (from 6.4% to 7.8% and 7.7% on average, respectively) due to enhanced fill factor ... [more ▼]

Low temperature post-deposition treatment of Cu2ZnSnSe4 with NaF and KF significantly improved the solar cell efficiency (from 6.4% to 7.8% and 7.7% on average, respectively) due to enhanced fill factor (from 0.58 to 0.61 and 0.62), open-circuit voltage (Voc) (from 314 mV to 337 mV and 325 mV) and short-circuit current density (from 35.3 mA⋅cm −2 to 38.3 mA⋅cm −2 and 38.6 mA⋅cm −2). Voc improvement was higher for solar cells with NaF treatment due to an increase in radiative efficiency at room temperature and shallower defect activation energy as determined by photoluminescence (PL) and temperature dependent admittance spectroscopy, respectively. In the case of KF treatment, red-shift of the PL, higher band tail density of state and donor activation energy deeper in the band gap were limiting further improvement of the Voc compared to NaF treatment. [less ▲]

Demo Abstract: Human Mobility Profiling Using Privacy-Friendly Wi-Fi and Activity Traces

in Proceedings of the 14th ACM Conference on Embedded Networked Sensor Systems (SenSys 2016) (2016, November 14)

Human mobility is one of the key topics to be considered in the networks of the future, both by industrial and research communities that are already focused on multidisciplinary applications and user ... [more ▼]

Human mobility is one of the key topics to be considered in the networks of the future, both by industrial and research communities that are already focused on multidisciplinary applications and user-centric systems. If the rapid proliferation of networks and high-tech miniature sensors makes this reality possible, the ever-growing complexity of the metrics and parameters governing such systems raises serious issues in terms of privacy, security and computing capability. In this demonstration, we show a new system, able to estimate a user's mobility profile based on anonymized and lightweight smartphone data. In particular, this system is composed of (1) a web analytics platform, able to analyze multimodal sensing traces and improve our understanding of complex mobility patterns, and (2) a smartphone application, able to show a user's profile generated locally in the form of a spider graph. In particular, this application uses anonymized and privacy-friendly data and methods, obtained thanks to the combination of Wi-Fi traces, activity detection and graph theory, made available independent of any personal information. [less ▲]

Trumpland

Article for general public (2016)

Large-scale estimation of conditional copula quantile estimations of electric energy derivatives

Doctoral thesis (2016)

Arbeitszeitflexibilität in Luxemburg

E-print/Working paper (2016)

Männliche Arbeitnehmer weisen im Vergleich zu weiblichen Arbeitnehmern eine höhere Differenz zwischen vertraglich vereinbarter und faktischer Wochenarbeitszeit auf. Differenziert nach Berufsgruppen zeigt ... [more ▼]

Männliche Arbeitnehmer weisen im Vergleich zu weiblichen Arbeitnehmern eine höhere Differenz zwischen vertraglich vereinbarter und faktischer Wochenarbeitszeit auf. Differenziert nach Berufsgruppen zeigt sich, dass inbesondere Manager sowie Führungskräfte deutlich mehr arbeiten, als vertraglich festgelegt. Atypische Arbeitszeiten (nach 19 Uhr, nach 22 Uhr oder am Wochenende) treten dagegen insbesondere bei jüngeren Arbeitnehmern (bis 44 Jahre) häufiger auf. Auch zeigen sich hier große Unterschiede über die Berufsgruppen hinweg. Für die Mehrheit der Arbeitnehmer entspricht die vertraglich vereinbarte Stundenzahl ihren Wünschen. Jedoch ist bei den jüngeren Arbeitnehmern der Anteil der Personen, die sich einen Vertrag mit mehr bezahlten Stunden wünschen deutlich höher. Differenziert nach Berufsgruppen äußern vor allem Hilfsarbeitskräfte sowie Arbeitnehmer in Dienstleistungs- und Handwerksberufen den Wunsch mehr bezahlte Stunden zu arbeiten. Die Arbeitszeitbedingungen der Arbeitnehmer weisen auch Zusammenhänge mit erlebten Work-Life-Konflikten, Zeitdruck, Stress und Arbeitszufriedenheit auf. Die Arbeitszeitbedingungen sind außerdem assoziiert mit nächtlichen Schlafstunden sowie mit der Gefährdung durch Burnout. Arbeitnehmer, die 46 Stunden und mehr arbeiten, die häufig atypische Arbeitszeiten haben, oder deren faktische Arbeitszeit stark von der vertraglich vereinbarten Arbeitszeit abweicht, erleben stärker Work-Life-Konflikte, Zeitdruck sowie Stress, geben jedoch eine geringere Arbeitszufriedenheit an, schlafen weniger und weisen eher Burnout auf. [less ▲]

Conservation laws and symmetries in stochastic thermodynamics

in Physical Review. E ,Statistical, Nonlinear, and Soft Matter Physics (2016), 94(052117),

Phenomenological nonequilibrium thermodynamics describes how fluxes of conserved quantities, such as matter, energy, and charge, flow from outer reservoirs across a system and how they irreversibly ... [more ▼]

Phenomenological nonequilibrium thermodynamics describes how fluxes of conserved quantities, such as matter, energy, and charge, flow from outer reservoirs across a system and how they irreversibly degrade from one form to another. Stochastic thermodynamics is formulated in terms of probability fluxes circulating in the system’s configuration space. The consistency of the two frameworks is granted by the condition of local detailed balance, which specifies the amount of physical quantities exchanged with the reservoirs during single transitions between configurations. We demonstrate that the topology of the configuration space crucially determines the number of independent thermodynamic affinities (forces) that the reservoirs generate across the system and provides a general algorithm that produces the fundamental affinities and their conjugate currents contributing to the total dissipation, based on the interplay between macroscopic conservations laws for the currents and microscopic symmetries of the affinities. [less ▲]

Lifting the Franck-Condon blockade in driven quantum dots

in Physical Review. B, Condensed Matter (2016), 94

Electron-vibron coupling in quantum dots can lead to a strong suppression of the average current in the sequential tunneling regime. This effect is known as Franck-Condon blockade and can be traced back ... [more ▼]

Electron-vibron coupling in quantum dots can lead to a strong suppression of the average current in the sequential tunneling regime. This effect is known as Franck-Condon blockade and can be traced back to an overlap integral between vibron states with different electron numbers which becomes exponentially small for large electron-vibron coupling strength. Here, we investigate the effect of a time-dependent drive on this phenomenon, in particular the effect of an oscillatory gate voltage acting on the electronic dot level. We employ two different approaches: perturbation theory based on nonequilibrium Keldysh Green's functions and a master equation in Born-Markov approximation. In both cases, we find that the drive can lift the blockade by exciting vibrons. As a consequence, the relative change in average current grows exponentially with the drive strength. [less ▲]