Quantifying the Endogeneity in Online Donations

Charitable crowdfunding provides a new channel for people and families suffering from unforeseen events, such as accidents, severe illness, and so on, to seek help from the public. Thus, finding the key determinants which drive the fundraising process of crowdfunding campaigns is of great importance, especially for those suffering. With a unique data set containing 210,907 crowdfunding projects covering a period from October 2015 to June 2020, from a famous charitable crowdfunding platform, specifically Qingsong Chou, we will reveal how many online donations are due to endogeneity, referring to the positive feedback process of attracting more people to donate through broadcasting campaigns in social networks by donors. For this aim, we calibrate three different Hawkes processes to the event data of online donations for each crowdfunding campaign on each day, which allows us to estimate the branching ratio, a measure of endogeneity. It is found that the online fundraising process works in a sub-critical state and nearly 70-90% of the online donations are endogenous. Furthermore, even though the fundraising amount, number of donations, and number of donors decrease rapidly after the crowdfunding project is created, the measure of endogeneity remains stable during the entire lifetime of crowdfunding projects. Our results not only deepen our understanding of online fundraising dynamics but also provide a quantitative framework to disentangle the endogenous and exogenous dynamics in complex systems.

Branching Ratio Method for Assessing Optically Thin Conditions in Laser-Induced Plasmas

The branching ratio method is usually used to evaluate the optical thinness conditions in laser-generated plasmas, which are important for the application of analytical methods such calibration free laser induced breakdown spectroscopy (CF-LIBS). In this communication, we warn on the possibility that in some circumstances, the branching-ratio method might give results close to the one characterizing optically thin plasma conditions, even in the presence of a substantial self-absorption for the transitions considered.

Concentration-dependent studies of Nd3+ -doped zinc phosphate glasses for NIR photoluminescence at 1.05 μm

Nd³⁺ -doped lead-free zinc phosphate glasses with the chemical compositions (60-x) NH₄ H₂ PO₄  + 20ZnO + 10BaF₂  + 10NaF + xNd₂ O₃ (where x = 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0 and 2.5 mol%) were prepared using a melt quenching technique. Vibrational bands were assigned and clearly elucidated by Raman spectral profiles for all the glass samples. Judd-Ofelt (J-O) intensity parameters (Ω_λ : λ = 2, 4, 6) were obtained from the spectral intensities of different absorption bands of Nd³⁺ ions. Radiative properties such as radiative transition probabilities (A_R ), radiative lifetimes (τ_R ) and branching ratios (β_R ) for different excited states were calculated using J-O parameters. The near infrared (NIR) photoluminescence spectra exhibited three emission bands (⁴ F_3/2 level to ⁴ I_13/2 , ⁴ I_11/2 and ⁴ I_9/2 states) for all the concentrations of Nd³⁺ ions. Various luminescence properties were studied by varying the Nd³⁺ concentration for the three spectral profiles. Fluorescence decay curves of the ⁴ F_3/2 level were recorded. The energy transfer mechanism that leads to quenching of the ⁴ F_3/2 state lifetimes was discussed at higher concentration of Nd³⁺ ions. These glasses are suggested as suitable hosts to produce efficient lasing action in NIR region at 1.05 μm.

Full rate constant matrix contraction method for obtaining branching ratio of unimolecular decomposition

The branching ratio of unimolecular decomposition can be evaluated by solving the rate equations. Recent advances in automated reaction path search methods have enabled efficient construction of the rate equations based on quantum chemical calculations. However, it is still difficult to solve the rate equations composed of hundreds or more elementary steps. This problem is especially serious when elementary steps that occur in highly different timescales coexist. In this article, we introduce an efficient approach to obtain the branching ratio from a given set of rate equations. It has been derived from a recently proposed rate constant matrix contraction (RCMC) method, and termed full-RCMC (f-RCMC). The f-RCMC gives the branching ratio without solving the rate equations. Its performance was tested numerically for unimolecular decomposition of C₃ H₅ and C₄ H₅ . Branching ratios obtained by the f-RCMC precisely reproduced the values obtained by numerically solving the rate equations. It took about 95 h to solve the rate equations of C₄ H₅ consisting of 234 elementary steps. In contrast, the f-RCMC gave the branching ratio in less than 1 s. The f-RCMC would thus be an efficient alternative of the conventional kinetic simulation approach. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Influence of crystal structure, ligand environment and morphology on Co L-edge XAS spectral characteristics in cobalt compounds

The electronic structure of a material plays an important role in its functionality for different applications which can be probed using synchrotron-based spectroscopy techniques. Here, various cobalt-based compounds, differing in crystal structure, ligands surrounding the central metal ion and morphology, have been studied by soft X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) at the Co L-edge in order to measure the effect of these parameters on the electronic structure. A careful qualitative analysis of the spectral branching ratio and relative intensities of the L3 and L2 peaks provide useful insight into the electronic properties of compounds such as CoO/Co(OH)2, CoCl2.6H2O/CoF2.4H2O, CoCl2/CoF2, Co3O4 (bulk/nano/micro). For further detailed analysis of the XAS spectra, quantitative analysis has been performed by fitting the spectral profile with simulated spectra for a number of cobalt compounds using crystal field atomic multiplet calculations.

Nonadiabatic Quantum Dynamics Predissociation of H2O(+)(B̃ (2)B2)

A quantum-mechanical study of the predissociation of H2O(+) (B̃ (2)B2) is carried out by using wave packet propagations on ab initio potential energy surfaces connected by nonadiabatic couplings. The simulations show that within the first 30 fs 80% of the initial wave packet is transferred from the B̃ (2)B2 to the à (2)A1 electronic state through a conical intersection. A much slower transfer (in the ps time scale) from the à(2)A1 to the X̃ (2)B1 state due to a Renner-Teller coupling determines the fragmentation branching ratios, which are in accordance with the experimental measurements.

A Signature of Roaming Dynamics in the Thermal Decomposition of Ethyl Nitrite: Chirped-Pulse Rotational Spectroscopy and Kinetic Modeling

Chirped-pulse (CP) Fourier transform rotational spectroscopy is uniquely suited for near-universal quantitative detection and structural characterization of mixtures that contain multiple molecular and radical species. In this work, we employ CP spectroscopy to measure product branching and extract information about the reaction mechanism, guided by kinetic modeling. Pyrolysis of ethyl nitrite, CH3CH2ONO, is studied in a Chen type flash pyrolysis reactor at temperatures of 1000-1800 K. The branching between HNO, CH2O, and CH3CHO products is measured and compared to the kinetic models generated by the Reaction Mechanism Generator software. We find that roaming CH3CH2ONO → CH3CHO + HNO plays an important role in the thermal decomposition of ethyl nitrite, with its rate, at 1000 K, comparable to that of the radical elimination channel CH3CH2ONO → CH3CH2O + NO. HNO is a signature of roaming in this system.

Branching Ratio between Proton Transfer and Electron Transfer Channels of a Bidirectional Proton-Coupled Electron Transfer

Rigorous quantum dynamical study of concerted proton-coupled electron transfer (PCET) on the time scale of a few femtoseconds (fs) has been rarely reported. Herein, a time-dependent quantum wavepacket propagation method was applied to the dynamics of the charge-transfer excited electronic state of FHCl corresponding to F(+)HCl(-). The dynamics corresponds to a bidirectional PCET with two dissociation channels: the electron transfer (ET, generating FH+Cl) and proton transfer (PT, generating F+HCl) paths. The calculated branching ratio (Cl/F), 0.78, implies a surprising fact: PT prevails over ET. A detailed analysis of the proton movement and electron readjustment suggests that the proton movement starts ∼3 fs earlier than the electron movement, and the electron readjustment is triggered by the initial movement of the proton. The branching ratio drastically inverts to 1.24 because of a reduced nonadiabatic effect in the isotope-substituted system, FDCl.

Secondary γ Transitions in (159) Gd After Neutron Capture at Isolated Resonances

The (158)Gd(n,γ)(159)Gd reaction was studied at 12 isolated neutron resonances by the TOF method at the IBR-30 Fast Pulse Reactor at JINR Dubna. Totally 15 secondary γ transitions in (159)Gd were recorded in the range from 450 keV to 750 keV. Of these, six previously unseen transitions were placed on the established (159)Gd level scheme. The depopulation of strongly populated levels at 507.7 keV and 558.2 keV (the head and the first excited members of band 1/2(-) [521]) was observed for the first time. It was shown that the observed 507.7 keV γ line, masked by the annihilation peak, originates from an unresolved doublet of transitions from the 507.7 keV level to the ground state and from the 558.2 keV level to the level at 50.7 keV. The 507.7 keV level decays exclusively to the ground state, while the 558.2 keV level decays via two transitions with a branching ratio that agrees well with the prediction according to Alaga's rule.