On managerial risk-taking incentives when compensation may be hedged against

We consider a continuous time principal-agent model where the principal/firm compensates an agent/manager who controls the output’s exposure to risk and its expected return. Both the firm and the manager have exponential utility and can trade in a frictionless market. When the firm observes the manager’s choice of effort and volatility, there is an optimal contract that induces the manager to not hedge. In a two factor specification of the model where an index and a bond are traded, the optimal contract is linear in output and the log return of the index. We also consider a manager who receives exogenous share or option compensation and illustrate how risk taking depends on the relative size of the systematic and firm-specific risk premia of the output and index. Whilst in most cases, options induce greater risk taking than shares, we find that there are also situations under which the hedging manager may take less risk than the non-hedging manager.     

Chemical vapor functionalization: a continuous production process for functionalized ZnO nanoparticles

The continuous functionalization of nanoparticles in the gas-phase directly after their generation, chemical vapor functionalization, is studied with ZnO and 1-hexanol as a model system using two reactors in series. In the first reactor ZnO nanoparticles are synthesized in the gas-phase from diethylzinc and oxygen at 1,073 K with grain sizes of 13 nm as determined by Rietveld refinement of X-ray diffractograms. The second reactor, connected at the exit of the first reactor and kept at lower temperatures (573, 673, and 773 K), is used as a functionalization chamber. At the connection point of the two reactors, the vapor of 1-hexanol is injected to react with the surface of ZnO nanoparticles in the gas phase. The process has been analyzed by quadrupole mass spectrometry to obtain information about optimal conditions for functionalization. Dynamic light scattering data show that the functionalized particles have substantially improved colloidal dispersibility with hydrodynamic diameters of 60 nm. Diffuse reflectance fourier transform infrared spectra and ¹H nuclear magnetic resonance spectra are consistent with 1-hexanol adsorbed at the particle surface acting as a functionalizing agent. The agglomerate size is substantially reduced owing to chemical vapor functionalization.     

Novel protecting groups in carbohydrate chemistry

Protecting groups play a pivotal role in carbohydrate chemistry. This review describes a selection of protecting groups and protecting group strategies that have been introduced since the beginning of this century.     

Multigrid convergence acceleration for implicit and explicit solution of Euler equations on unstructured grids

The multigrid method is one of the most efficient techniques for convergence acceleration of iterative methods. In this method, a grid coarsening algorithm is required. Here, an agglomeration scheme is introduced, which is applicable in both cell‐center and cell‐vertex 2 and 3D discretizations. A new implicit formulation is presented, which results in better computation efficiency, when added to the multigrid scheme. A few simple procedures are also proposed and applied to provide even higher convergence acceleration. The Euler equations are solved on an unstructured grid around standard transonic configurations to validate the algorithm and to assess its superiority to conventional explicit agglomeration schemes. The scheme is applied to 2 and 3D test cases using both cell‐center and cell‐vertex discretizations. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Phthalocyanine-boronates: a synthon for the preparation of molecular assemblies

Covalently linked phthalocyanine-phthalocyanine (Pc-Pc) heterodimers and Pc-Pc triad phthalocyanines connected through phenyl-phenyl (C-C) linkages are prepared using phthalocyanine-boronate (Suzuki Pc-synthon) and palladium catalyst.