Search

ABSTRACTInterest rates underpin almost every instrument/transaction in conventional financial markets. Valuation of the instruments in relation to interest rates remains meaningful only if cashcan be attributed a worth of its own (which is generally assumed to accumulate over time). The relevant concepts such as the stochastic short rate and the conventional numéraire (i.e. the money market account) not only become restrictive when one attempts to build more realistic models in quantitative finance, but also – as we demonstrate in this work – their application has de-stabilizing effects on asset valuations. This paper presents a detailed critique of the conventional numéraire and proposes an asset-backed stable numéraire for sustainable valuation of assets and/or transactions. In particular, we demonstrate how some of the key benchmarks of a sustainable footprint may be used as a numéraire currency. We also unveil the implicit assumption underlying the common practice of straightforward factorization in conventional relative pricing to be false.

Inhomogeneous multidimensional cosmological models with a higher-dimensional space-time manifold $$M = \overline {M_0 }$$ 0i=1nMi(n≥ 1) are in stigated under dimensional reduction to a D0-dimensional effective non-minimally coupled σ-model which generalizes the familiar Brans–Dicke model. The general form of the Einstein frame representation of multidimensional solutions known in the Brans–Dicke frame is given with respect to cosmic synchronous time. As an example, the transformation is demonstrated explicitly for the generalized Kasner solutions where it is shown that solutions in the Einstein frame show no inflation of the external space although they can undergo deflation after the cosmic synchronous time inversion.

The enzyme porphobilinogen synthase (PBGS) catalyses the formation of porphobilinogen (PBG) from two molecules of 5-aminolevulinic acid (ALA). It has been claimed that the PBGS from Rhodobacter spheroidesis able to form a mixed pyrrole, from one molecule of 5-aminolevulinic acid and one molecule of levulinic acid. The chemical synthesis of this mixed pyrrole allowed to show, that the compound formed from 5-aminolevulinic acid and levulinic acid with PBGS from R. spheroideshas not the proposed structure. The putative enzyme catalysed formation of the mixed pyrrole had been used as an argument for the postulated mechanism of PBGS. In view of our results this line of arguments has to bee re-evaluated.

Space-times which allow a slicing into homogeneous spatial hypersurfaces generalize the usual Bianchi models. One knows already that in these models the Bianchi type may change with time. Here we show which of the changes really appear. To this end we characterize the topological space whose points are the 3-dimensional oriented homogeneous Riemannian manifolds; locally isometric manifolds are considered as identical.

Secondary magnesium-oxygen batteries hold great promise for cheap and dense energy storage as needed in automobiles and portable devices. The presented study contains a cathode catalyst comparison for magnesium oxygen batteries in the electrolyte Mg(ClO4)2 / DMSO. Platinum shows an outstanding performance and is subsequently investigated. A discharged electrode was measured by means of XR diffractometry, IR spectroscopy, and XP spectroscopy. Electrolyte decomposition was detected, but also large amounts of deposited magnesium and oxygen, suggesting an MgOxspecies. The limitations of the used methods will be discussed and conclusions for improvement and future work are drawn, mainly the switch from porous, commercially used battery electrodes to more simple, flat metal electrodes.