Misstatement verifiability and managers’ earnings warning decisions

We examine whether the verifiability of misstatements in prior forward-looking earnings disclosures contributes to managers’ decisions to issue earnings warnings. Using securities class action lawsuits from 1996 to 2019 pertaining to forward-looking earnings disclosures, we find that earnings warnings are positively associated with the verifiability of misstatements in such disclosures. The results survive entropy balancing and firm-fixed effects to mitigate endogeneity concerns. The positive relation between earnings warnings and misstatement verifiability is more pronounced for firms 1) with a general counsel in the top management team and 2) that face higher ex-ante litigation risk, and less pronounced for firms whose managers engaged in insider selling during the class action lawsuit period. We also show that earnings warnings help to increase the likelihood of a lawsuit dismissal (i.e., lowering litigation costs) when the lawsuit involves misstatements that are more (rather than less) verifiable. Taken together, our findings suggest that managers issue earnings warnings when it helps to reduce litigation costs, consistent with the notion that managers can achieve a greater reduction in litigation costs by issuing earnings warnings.</p

GOChase-II: correcting semantic inconsistencies from Gene Ontology-based annotations for gene products

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The Gene Ontology (GO) provides a controlled vocabulary for describing genes and gene products. In spite of the undoubted importance of GO, several drawbacks associated with GO and GO-based annotations have been introduced. We identified three types of semantic inconsistencies in GO-based annotations; semantically redundant, biological-domain inconsistent and taxonomy inconsistent annotations.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>To determine the semantic inconsistencies in GO annotation, we used the hierarchical structure of GO graph and tree structure of NCBI taxonomy. Twenty seven biological databases were collected for finding semantic inconsistent annotation.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The distributions and possible causes of the semantic inconsistencies were investigated using twenty seven biological databases with GO-based annotations. We found that some evidence codes of annotation were associated with the inconsistencies. The numbers of gene products and species in a database that are related to the complexity of database management are also in correlation with the inconsistencies. Consequently, numerous annotation errors arise and are propagated throughout biological databases and GO-based high-level analyses. GOChase-II is developed to detect and correct both syntactic and semantic errors in GO-based annotations.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>We identified some inconsistencies in GO-based annotation and provided software, GOChase-II, for correcting these semantic inconsistencies in addition to the previous corrections for the syntactic errors by GOChase-I.</p

Guanabenz Acetate Induces Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress–Related Cell Death in Hepatocellular Carcinoma Cells

Background Development of chemotherapeutics for the treatment of advanced hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) has been lagging. Screening of candidate therapeutic agents by using patient-derived preclinical models may facilitate drug discovery for HCC patients. Methods Four primary cultured HCC cells from surgically resected tumor tissues and six HCC cell lines were used for high-throughput screening of 252 drugs from the Prestwick Chemical Library. The efficacy and mechanisms of action of the candidate anti-cancer drug were analyzed via cell viability, cell cycle assays, and western blotting. Results Guanabenz acetate, which has been used as an antihypertensive drug, was screened as a candidate anti-cancer agent for HCC through a drug sensitivity assay by using the primary cultured HCC cells and HCC cell lines. Guanabenz acetate reduced HCC cell viability through apoptosis and autophagy. This occurred via inhibition of growth arrest and DNA damage-inducible protein 34, increased phosphorylation of eukaryotic initiation factor 2α, increased activating transcription factor 4, and cell cycle arrest. Conclusions Guanabenz acetate induces endoplasmic reticulum stress–related cell death in HCC and may be repositioned as an anti-cancer therapeutic agent for HCC patients

Hepatocellular Carcinoma Arising in a Huge Hepatocellular Adenoma with Bone Marrow Metaplasia

Hepatocellular adenoma (HCA) is the most common type of benign liver tumor, and its major complication is malignant transformation to hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). Here, we report a case of HCC arising in HCA with bone marrow metaplasia in a 24-year-old Korean woman who presented with abdominal discomfort. A huge liver mass was found on abdominal ultrasonography. She underwent surgical hepatic resection, and the resected specimen was entirely involved by a 20-cm-sized tumor. Histological review revealed a well differentiated HCC arising from inflammatory HCA with β-catenin nuclear positivity and bone marrow metaplasia that contained hematopoietic cells. This case was unique because malignant transformation, inflammatory type HCA, β-catenin nuclear staining, and bone marrow metaplasia were simultaneously observed. Additionally, it should be noted that a large HCA with β-catenin activation can undergo malignant transformation and should be surgically resected in a timely manner

Studies on the mechanical stretchability of transparent conductive film based on graphene-metal nanowire structures

Transparent electrodes with superior flexibility and stretchability as well as good electrical and optical properties are required for applications in wearable electronics with comfort designs and high performances. Here, we present hybrid nanostructures as stretchable and transparent electrodes based on graphene and networks of metal nanowires, and investigate their optical, electrical, and mechanical properties. High electrical and optical characteristics, superb bendability (folded in half), excellent stretchability (10,000 times in stretching cycles with 100% in tensile strain toward a uniaxial direction and 30% in tensile strain toward a multi-axial direction), strong robustness against electrical breakdown and thermal oxidation were obtained through comprehensive study. We believe that these results suggest a substantial promise application in future electronicsopen1

Whole-genome resequencing of 292 pigeonpea accessions identifies genomic regions associated with domestication and agronomic traits

Pigeonpea (Cajanus cajan), a tropical grain legume with low input requirements, is expected to continue to have an important role in supplying food and nutritional security in developing countries in Asia, Africa and the tropical Americas. From whole-genome resequencing of 292 Cajanus accessions encompassing breeding lines, landraces and wild species, we characterize genome-wide variation. On the basis of a scan for selective sweeps, we find several genomic regions that were likely targets of domestication and breeding. Using genome-wide association analysis, we identify associations between several candidate genes and agronomically important traits. Candidate genes for these traits in pigeonpea have sequence similarity to genes functionally characterized in other plants for flowering time control, seed development and pod dehiscence. Our findings will allow acceleration of genetic gains for key traits to improve yield and sustainability in pigeonpea

GPGPU Task Scheduling Technique for Reducing the Performance Deviation of Multiple GPGPU Tasks in RPC-Based GPU Virtualization Environments

In remote procedure call (RPC)-based graphic processing unit (GPU) virtualization environments, GPU tasks requested by multiple-user virtual machines (VMs) are delivered to the VM owning the GPU and are processed in a multi-process form. However, because the thread executing the computing on general GPUs cannot arbitrarily stop the task or trigger context switching, GPU monopoly may be prolonged owing to a long-running general-purpose computing on graphics processing unit (GPGPU) task. Furthermore, when scheduling tasks on the GPU, the time for which each user VM uses the GPU is not considered. Thus, in cloud environments that must provide fair use of computing resources, equal use of GPUs between each user VM cannot be guaranteed. We propose a GPGPU task scheduling scheme based on thread division processing that supports GPU use evenly by multiple VMs that process GPGPU tasks in an RPC-based GPU virtualization environment. Our method divides the threads of the GPGPU task into several groups and controls the execution time of each thread group to prevent a specific GPGPU task from a long time monopolizing the GPU. The efficiency of the proposed technique is verified through an experiment in an environment where multiple VMs simultaneously perform GPGPU tasks