FORMALITY OF FINANCIAL SOURCES AND FIRM GROWTH: EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE FROM BRAZILIAN SMES 1990-2005

This article investigates the impact of financial sources on firm growth in Brazil. In particular underlying objectives of this paper is to answer the questions, does external or internal and formal or informal financial sources affects differently on firm performance?, and does financial institutional development support firm performance? Empirical results reveal that internal finance maintains positive relation with firm growth. Growth positively relates to the formal financial institutions while it is found insignificant to informal institutions. Furthermore, analysis strengthens the view that developed financial system is a very imperative factor for firm's growth in less developed countries.Formal finance, Informal finance, Firm growth, Financial reforms.

Comparative analysis between MERRA and updated MEPDG climate database in the state of Tennessee

The Mechanistic-Empirical Pavement Design Guide (MEPDG) addresses climate effects on pavement design in a comprehensive way, which allows for investigating the effect of climate inputs on pavement performance. However, it requires detailed climate inputs, which might not be available for most of the state DOT. The Updated AASHTOWare climate database encompasses twelve stations in the state of Tennessee, which might not well represent all climatic regions in the state of Tennessee. This study compares and evaluates the performance of pavements in Tennessee using Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA) and the updated AASHTOWare databases as a source of MEPDG climate data inputs. A comparative analysis between these two climate data sources using eight LTPP sites in Tennessee was conducted. It was found that using MERRA as a climate data source for the state of Tennessee will offer better geographic coverage and therefore more precise distress predictions are expected

MIS 301 Basics of Information Technology

Course syllabus for MIS 301 Basics of Information Technology Course description: Provides an introduction to the use of computers in business data processing including introductory concepts of computer technology. Includes hands-on experience with various microcomputer software packages, focusing on student use of electronic spreadsheet, word-processing, database, and presentation software

Mycotoxins detection in grains and nuts using LC - MS/MS

Mycotoxins are natural toxins produced by fungus. These toxins are food and feed contaminants inducing diverse toxicological effects on human and animal health that may affect different organs. These adverse effects may be hepatotoxic, nephrotoxic and neurotoxic; these effects may be acute or chronic implying that even traces amount of mycotoxins, may accumulate over time and become problematic. The occurrence of mycotoxins in food and feed are thus an issue of critical importance and is of main concern worldwide. Among the efforts that are being made to limits mycotoxins occurrence in food are the laws and regulations on their permissible limits. For instance, the permissible limits of Aflatoxins in peanuts are 4 ng/g for total aflatoxins and 2 ng/g for aflatoxin B1. These limits and regulations are based on human risk assessment studies, data about the occurrence of mycotoxins in various commodities, and the availability of sensitive and accurate analytical methods for their determination. In this work we developed a rapid, selective, sensitive, accurate and validated method for the simultaneous quantification of aflatoxins using LC-ESI-MS/MS. The developed method was applied on different sample matrices; peanuts (n = 45), lentils (n = 10), beans (n = 3), and wheat (n =2). The first ever reported data on the occurrence and levels of aflatoxins in peanuts in Greater Cairo are presented. The results presented here show that the investigated peanuts samples from 5 different regions in Greater Cairo contain mean concentrations of total aflatoxin ranging from 16.69 to 101.93 ng/g which are 4 to 25.5 times higher than the permissible limits set by the European Union and FDA

Mystery of the Moon\u27s Origin

The dominant theory of the moon’s origin is the Giant Impact Hypothesis, which states that the moon formed when a Mars-sized object - named Theia - impacted the proto-Earth early in the solar system’s formation, with the resulting material contributing to the formation of the Moon. Using models of planetary development and the solar system’s formation, we attempt to answer where the impactor - Theia - might have originated from. We conclude that the Asteroid belt is a likely location for Theia’s formation, and we find that the parameters associated with this point of origin may help advance other models of the Moon’s formation

Dispersion measure variations in pulsar observations with LOFAR

I present an analysis of the dispersion measure (DM) variations for 68 pulsars. The observations were taken using six International LOFAR Stations in Europe over the period of 3.5 years (between June 2014 and November 2017) at the centre frequency of 150 MHz with 80 MHz of bandwidth. During this time each pulsar was observed on weekly basis resulting in an average of 160 observations per source. I show that, the variations of the DM measurements show various trends along the span of the observation: increasing or decreasing, and in some cases more changes from one trend to another. I perform the structure function analysis for each of observed pulsar included in the study, in order to check if the DM variations follow the Kolmogorov power spectrum which describes the turbulence structure of the interstellar medium (ISM). I find that for a number of pulsars results show consistency with the Kolmogorov distribution (e.g. PSRs J1913−0440 and J2157+4017) while other sources show significant difference (e.g. PSRs J0108+6608 and J0614+2229). I also obtain the DM derivatives (i.e. dDM/dt) for each pulsar, in order to examine the correlation between the DM and its derivative. The result of this correlation shows a best-fit with a square-root dependence of 0.6±0.2, which is comparable with the result that was previously obtained by Hobbs et al. (2004), who shows a dependence of square-root between the DM and its derivative; with a gradient of 0.57±0.09. Also, one of the major results of this study that, thanks to the timing analysis, allowed me to produce a new timing solution for three pulsars: PSRs J0613+3731, J0815+4611 and J1740+27. This study concludes in that: i) the DM variations can be used to understand the general properties of the ISM ii) the low-frequency observations can enable us to study the dispersion effect on pulsar signals, which can be very useful for the effort of the pulsar timing array (PTA) project iii) IISM studies using pulsar timing is a powerful technique requiring careful approach to data reduction and analysis due to characteristic of the pulsars