The shape of the term structure of credit default swap (CDS) spreads displays large variations over time and across firms. Consistent with the predictions of structural models of credit risk, we find that the slope of CDS spread term structure increases with firm leverage and volatility, but...

This paper shows that the formation and propagation of traffic oscillations in the absence of lane changes can be explained by the stochastic nature of drivers’ acceleration processes. By adding a white noise to drivers’ desired acceleration in free-flow, oscillations are produced that...

This paper explores whether educational attainment has a cognitive reserve capacity in elder life. Using pilot data from the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS), we examined the impact of education on cognitive abilities at old ages. OLS results showed that respondents who...

Waste activated sludge from a wastewater treatment plant is rich in polysaccharides and proteins and thus is a potential substrate for producing hydrogen. In this study, the hydrogen yield could be largely enhanced by using filtrates of waste sludge. The hydrogen yield was effectively increased...

In order to meet the requirements of data collection in field survey of forest fires, this paper designed and realized a data collection system for forest fire field survey based on mobile smart phones with Android system. This android intelligent mobile terminal application contains three main...

We find that the firm-level variance risk premium has a prominent explanatory power for credit spreads in the presence of market- and firm-level control variables established in the existing literature. Such predictability complements that of the leading state variable—the leverage ratio—and...

Carbon Dioxide-Enhanced Oil Recovery (CO2-EOR) has the potential for well blowouts that could cause casualties and environmental damage. To assess the consequence of such accidents, a reduced-scale field experiment of CO2 release was performed based on scaling rules instead of a full-size field...

We find that firm-level variance risk premium, estimated as the difference between option-implied and expected variances, has a prominent explanatory power for credit spreads in the presence of market- and firm-level risk control variables identified in the existing literature. Such a...

Every year several million hectares of forest and grassland in China are affected by wildfires. The majority of wildfires occur in the northern part of China, where grasslands and forests are ubiquitous. A critical step toward the protection of life, property, and natural resources from...

Map exploration is a fundamental problem in mobile robots. This paper presents a distributed algorithm that coordinates a team of autonomous mobile robots to explore an unknown environment. The proposed strategy is based on frontiers which are the regions on the boundary between open and...