Constitution, laws and regulations of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.

http://www.archive.org/details/constitutionlaws00ameriala

By-paths to forgotten folks; stories of real life in Baptist home mission fields, by Coe Hayne. Ed. by the Department of missionary education, Board of education of the Northern Baptist convention.

http://www.archive.org/details/bypathstoforgott00haynrich

The Spanish pioneers and the California missions.

http://www.archive.org/details/spanishpioneersa009682mbp

A California pilgrimage : by one of the pilgrims / Amelia Woodward Truesdell.

http://www.archive.org/details/californiapilgri00truerich

The Franciscan missions of California. Illustrated with photos. by Karl Obert.

http://www.archive.org/details/franciscanmissio027190mbp

First ten annual reports of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions : with other documents of the Board.

http://www.archive.org/details/firsttenannualre00amerrich

Memorial volume of the first fifty years of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions

http://www.archive.org/details/memorialvolumeof00andeiala

California life illustrated / by William Taylor, of the California Conference.

http://www.archive.org/details/calilifeillustrated00taylrich

Seventy-five years in the Madura Mission : a history of the mission in South India under the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A. / by John S. Chandler.

http://www.archive.org/details/75yearsmadurami00chanuoft

Effect of solder volume on joint shape with variable chip-to-board contact pad ratio

The objective of this paper is to investigate the effect of the pad size ratio between the chip and board end of a solder joint on the shape of that solder joint in combination with the solder volume available. The shape of the solder joint is correlated to its reliability and thus of importance. For low density chip bond pad applications Flip Chip (FC) manufacturing costs can be kept down by using larger size board pads suitable for solder application. By using “Surface Evolver” software package the solder joint shapes associated with different size/shape solder preforms and chip/board pad ratios are predicted. In this case a so called Flip-Chip Over Hole (FCOH) assembly format has been used. Assembly trials involved the deposition of lead-free 99.3Sn0.7Cu solder on the board side, followed by reflow, an underfill process and back die encapsulation. During the assembly work pad off-sets occurred that have been taken into account for the Surface Evolver solder joint shape prediction and accurately matched the real assembly. Overall, good correlation was found between the simulated solder joint shape and the actual fabricated solder joint shapes. Solder preforms were found to exhibit better control over the solder volume. Reflow simulation of commercially available solder preform volumes suggests that for a fixed stand-off height and chip-board pad ratio, the solder volume value and the surface tension determines the shape of the joint.

Investment funds: What next?

Investment funds provide a low cost method of sharing in the rewards from capitalism. Recently “alternative investments” such as hedge funds have grown rapidly and the trading strategies open to hedge funds are now becoming available to mutual funds and even to ordinary retail investors. In this paper we analyze problems in assessing fund performance and the prospects for investment fund sectors. Choosing genuine outperformers among top funds requires a careful assessment of non-normality, order statistics and the possibility of false discoveries. The risk adjusted performance of the average hedge fund over the last 10-15 is actually not that impressive, although the “top” funds do appear to have statistically significant positive alphas.

Investment incentives and valuation of power sector infrastructure assets with increasing interconnection, intermittency and decarbonisation

This dissertation applies a variety of quantitative methods to electricity and carbon market data, utility company accounts data, capital and operating costs to analyse some of the challenges associated with investment in energy assets. In particular, three distinct research topics are analysed within this general theme: the efficiency of interconnector trading, the optimal sizing of intermittent wind facilities and the impact of carbon pricing on the cost of capital for investors are researched in successive sections.

Depression and 'crises of meaninglessness' in the political-economic theology of the money-God

The thesis starts with a historical analysis of the development of depression as a concept. Through this inquiry, the controversies behind the apparent consensus about depression’s etiology and treatment are illuminated, suggesting that the understanding of the climbing rates of depression in contemporary Western civilization is still up for grabs. That’s what the thesis sets out to investigate. In order to accomplish this aim, the study builds upon the classical accounts of Georg Simmel, Émile Durkheim and the more contemporary ideas of Dany-Robert Dufour, in dialogue with an array of supplementary theoretical sources. Navigating through this ‘sea’ of extraordinary and different theories, a new avenue of reflections arises, contributing for the sophistication of the questions made about the phenomenon of depression’s rates. The fundamental argument emerging from this theoretical undertaking is that ‘crises of meaninglessness’ that pervade the collective body of Western contemporary societies have, as one of its consequences, the expansion of depression rates. Meaninglessness in contemporary times is the primary object of investigation of the thesis. The concept, in the context of this study, is not understood as merely an effect of the historical decline of shared social norms due to processes of individualization. Rather, it is claimed, it originates from and is reinforced by the ‘political-economic theology of neo-liberalism’ which becomes virtually generalized in the West, erecting money as a God. The study concludes that by undermining culturally established values, ideals, institutions and principles that may block the dissemination of commodities this new transcendence has been challenging the task of signifying life, potentializing – among other subjective difficulties – the diffusion of depression.

Agglomeration effects in foreign direct investment and the pollution haven hypothesis

Does environmental regulation impair international competitiveness of pollution-intensive industries to the extent that they relocate to countries with less stringent regulation, turning those countries into "pollution havens"? We test this hypothesis using panel data on outward foreign direct investment (FDI) flows of various industries in the German manufacturing sector and account for several econometric issues that have been ignored in previous studies. Most importantly, we demonstrate that externalities associated with FDI agglomeration can bias estimates away from finding a pollution haven effect if omitted from the analysis. We include the stock of inward FDI as a proxy for agglomeration and employ a GMM estimator to control for endogenous time-varying determinants of FDI flows. Furthermore, we propose a difference estimator based on the least polluting industry to break the possible correlation between environmental regulatory stringency and unobservable attributes of FDI recipients in the cross-section. When accounting for these issues we find robust evidence of a pollution haven effect for the chemical industry. © 2008 Springer Science+Business Media B.V.

Cryptococcus gattii VGIII isolates causing infections in HIV/AIDS patients in Southern California: identification of the local environmental source as arboreal.

Ongoing Cryptococcus gattii outbreaks in the Western United States and Canada illustrate the impact of environmental reservoirs and both clonal and recombining propagation in driving emergence and expansion of microbial pathogens. C. gattii comprises four distinct molecular types: VGI, VGII, VGIII, and VGIV, with no evidence of nuclear genetic exchange, indicating these represent distinct species. C. gattii VGII isolates are causing the Pacific Northwest outbreak, whereas VGIII isolates frequently infect HIV/AIDS patients in Southern California. VGI, VGII, and VGIII have been isolated from patients and animals in the Western US, suggesting these molecular types occur in the environment. However, only two environmental isolates of C. gattii have ever been reported from California: CBS7750 (VGII) and WM161 (VGIII). The incongruence of frequent clinical presence and uncommon environmental isolation suggests an unknown C. gattii reservoir in California. Here we report frequent isolation of C. gattii VGIII MATα and MATa isolates and infrequent isolation of VGI MATα from environmental sources in Southern California. VGIII isolates were obtained from soil debris associated with tree species not previously reported as hosts from sites near residences of infected patients. These isolates are fertile under laboratory conditions, produce abundant spores, and are part of both locally and more distantly recombining populations. MLST and whole genome sequence analysis provide compelling evidence that these environmental isolates are the source of human infections. Isolates displayed wide-ranging virulence in macrophage and animal models. When clinical and environmental isolates with indistinguishable MLST profiles were compared, environmental isolates were less virulent. Taken together, our studies reveal an environmental source and risk of C. gattii to HIV/AIDS patients with implications for the >1,000,000 cryptococcal infections occurring annually for which the causative isolate is rarely assigned species status. Thus, the C. gattii global health burden could be more substantial than currently appreciated.