Space In Chains

"Kasischke's verses walk that perfect Plathian line between the everyday...and the eternal." --Time Magazine

The incredible story of spaceflight before the establishment of NASA. NASA's history is a familiar story, one that typically peaks with Neil Armstrong taking his small step on the Moon in 1969. But America's space agency wasn't created in a vacuum. It was assembled from pre-existing parts, drawing together some of the best minds the non-Soviet world had to offer. In the 1930s, rockets were all the rage in Germany, the focus both of scientists hoping to fly into space and of the German armed forces, looking to circumvent the restrictions of the Treaty of Versailles. One of the key figures in this period was Wernher von Braun, an engineer who designed the rockets that became the devastating V-2. As the war came to its chaotic conclusion, von Braun escaped from the ruins of Nazi Germany, and was taken to America where he began developing missiles for the US Army. Meanwhile, the US Air Force was looking ahead to a time when men would fly in space, and test pilots like Neil Armstrong were flying cutting-edge, rocket-powered aircraft in the thin upper atmosphere. Breaking the Chains of Gravity tells the story of America's nascent space program, its scientific advances, its personalities and the rivalries it caused between the various arms of the US military. At this point getting a man in space became a national imperative, leading to the creation of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, otherwise known as NASA.

This book provides an in-depth exploration of the complexities surrounding supply chain globalization, de-globalization, and the prospective re-globalization. It not only presents the interplay of these phenomena but also navigates their root causes through the lens of organizational, economic and political theories. The analysis spans across multiple fields, enabling readers to grasp the full breadth and depth of the dynamics at play. In this book, you'll delve into the intricacies of global sourcing and production. These discussions will help you understand the layers of complexities inherent in managing global supply chains. You'll explore the risks and uncertainties associated with international supply chain operations, gaining insight into building resilient and adaptive systems capable of thriving amidst constant change. You'll also learn about the sustainability challenges emerging within the global supply chain environment. How can firms ensure that their supply chains remain economically viable, socially responsible, and environmentally friendly? These and other topics find their discussions in the pages of this book. This book offers considerable value for various readers. Students at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels can gain essential understanding of concepts and phenomena related to supply chain globalization. Operational managers can find practical implications and strategies for managing their global supply chains amidst an unpredictable international trade environment. Finally, the book doesn't only focus on the present. It forecasts potential future developments and proposes new research directions in the fields of supply chain management, strategic management, and international business. Thus, it's also an indispensable resource for scholars seeking fresh perspectives and avenues for exploration.

New up-to-date edition of this influential classic on Markov chains in general state spaces. Proofs are rigorous and concise, the range of applications is broad and knowledgeable, and key ideas are accessible to practitioners with limited mathematical background. New commentary by Sean Meyn, including updated references, reflects developments since 1996.

Markov Chains and Stochastic Stability is part of the Communications and Control Engineering Series (CCES) edited by Professors B.W. Dickinson, E.D. Sontag, M. Thoma, A. Fettweis, J.L. Massey and J.W. Modestino. The area of Markov chain theory and application has matured over the past 20 years into something more accessible and complete. It is of increasing interest and importance. This publication deals with the action of Markov chains on general state spaces. It discusses the theories and the use to be gained, concentrating on the areas of engineering, operations research and control theory. Throughout, the theme of stochastic stability and the search for practical methods of verifying such stability, provide a new and powerful technique. This does not only affect applications but also the development of the theory itself. The impact of the theory on specific models is discussed in detail, in order to provide examples as well as to demonstrate the importance of these models. Markov Chains and Stochastic Stability can be used as a textbook on applied Markov chain theory, provided that one concentrates on the main aspects only. It is also of benefit to graduate students with a standard background in countable space stochastic models. Finally, the book can serve as a research resource and active tool for practitioners.

The package of Gromov’s pseudo-holomorphic curves is a major tool in global symplectic geometry and its applications, including mirror symmetry and Hamiltonian dynamics. The Kuranishi structure was introduced by two of the authors of the present volume in the mid-1990s to apply this machinery on general symplectic manifolds without assuming any specific restrictions. It was further amplified by this book’s authors in their monograph Lagrangian Intersection Floer Theory and in many other publications of theirs and others. Answering popular demand, the authors now present the current book, in which they provide a detailed, self-contained explanation of the theory of Kuranishi structures. Part I discusses the theory on a single space equipped with Kuranishi structure, called a K-space, and its relevant basic package. First, the definition of a K-space and maps to the standard manifold are provided. Definitions are given for fiber products, differential forms, partitions of unity, and the notion of CF-perturbations on the K-space. Then, using CF-perturbations, the authors define the integration on K-space and the push-forward of differential forms, and generalize Stokes' formula and Fubini's theorem in this framework. Also, “virtual fundamental class” is defined, and its cobordism invariance is proved. Part II discusses the (compatible) system of K-spaces and the process of going from “geometry” to “homological algebra”. Thorough explanations of the extension of given perturbations on the boundary to the interior are presented. Also explained is the process of taking the “homotopy limit” needed to handle a system of infinitely many moduli spaces. Having in mind the future application of these chain level constructions beyond those already known, an axiomatic approach is taken by listing the properties of the system of the relevant moduli spaces and then a self-contained account of the construction of the associated algebraic structures is given. This axiomatic approach makes the exposition contained here independent of previously published construction of relevant structures.

With the first edition out of print, we decided to arrange for republi cation of Denumerrible Markov Ohains with additional bibliographic material. The new edition contains a section Additional Notes that indicates some of the developments in Markov chain theory over the last ten years. As in the first edition and for the same reasons, we have resisted the temptation to follow the theory in directions that deal with uncountable state spaces or continuous time. A section entitled Additional References complements the Additional Notes. J. W. Pitman pointed out an error in Theorem 9-53 of the first edition, which we have corrected. More detail about the correction appears in the Additional Notes. Aside from this change, we have left intact the text of the first eleven chapters. The second edition contains a twelfth chapter, written by David Griffeath, on Markov random fields. We are grateful to Ted Cox for his help in preparing this material. Notes for the chapter appear in the section Additional Notes. J.G.K., J.L.S., A.W.K.

A clear explanation of what an explosive Markov chain does after it passes through all available states in finite time.