Negotiating Domestic and International Pressures: France and Germany on Refugees

Accompanying the increase in refugee numbers is the rise in anti-refugee sentiments. This phenomenon is most prominent in Europe, a region that has come under a lot of attention due to its proximity to refugee-producing nations, and the popularity of European countries amongst asylum seekers. Based on Amnesty International\u27s Refugee Welcome Index, the German population is the most welcoming towards refugees amongst the European countries surveyed, and France is the least welcoming nation with the exception of Turkey and Russia. An analysis of refugee and asylum application trends from 1990-2015 revealed that not only was there a difference in sentiments towards refugees, but the trends experienced by both countries were also different, explained by their own unique historical experiences as a nation. These experiences also provide legitimizing narratives for both countries, as well as the European Union (EU), to play a leading role in today\u27s refugee crisis. Based on Robert Putnam\u27s theory of the two-level game, I ran regressions for France and Germany where the refugee population scaled to total population in the country was the dependent variable and the independent variables were some measures of domestic and international pressures, i.e. popularity of anti-immigrant parties at the federal and regional levels, government spending on social welfare, voter turnout in the countries for EU Parliament elections, and proportion of asylum applications received by the two countries. In the individual time series regressions, a mix of domestic and international factors were significant for both Germany and France. However, in my panel data regression that combined data for both countries, only my measures of domestic factors retained their significance. Therefore, variations in the policies pursued by the governments of France and Germany, and their public opinions can be explained by the different domestic pressures faced by the governments. The paper concludes by studying the increasing support for nationalist anti-immigrant parties in both countries, and conjectures that these troubling trends suggest that France and Germany will not be as welcoming towards refugees in the future. Given the important role that they play as the anchors of the EU, the survival of the supranational institution is then questioned

Editing by leucyl-trna synthetase: Discrimination of norvaline and isoleucine

Aminoacyl tRNA-synthetases (AARS) are housekeeping enzymes that are tasked with accurate synthesis of aminoacylated tRNA for protein synthesis and other cellular functions. The specificity of amino acid attachment challenges the AARSs that need to distinguish between structurally similar amino acids. In such cases, AARSs have developed editing mechanisms to circumvent the issue of misaminoacylation. Leucyl-tRNA synthetase (LeuRS), for instance selectively edits misactivated and mischarged non-leucine amino acids via pre-transfer editing of misactivated adenylates in the synthetic site or by hydrolyzing mischarged amino acids in the CP1 editing domain. The enzyme’s dependence between the two editing mechanisms can shift based on the origin from which the AARS is derived, the amino acid that is targeted for editing, or presence of a mutation in the enzyme. In the absence of the CP1 domain, E. coli LeuRS (LeuRS-ΔCP1) maintains fidelity by clearing non-leucine aminoacyl-adenylates in the enzyme’s synthetic site. The intact tRNA 3’-terminal adenosine (A76) residue is a prerequisite for aminoacylation. Leveraging A76 essentiality tRNA analogues were designed to investigate amino acid dependent specificity of editing by LeuRS. The tRNA analogues were synthesized by addition of a modified adenosine triphosphate to an in vitro transcribed E. coli tRNALeuUAA using the CCA-adding enzyme from E. coli. Incorporation of unchargeable tRNA analogues stimulated ATP hydrolysis by wild type LeuRS in the presence of norvaline. In contrast, pre-transfer editing occurs independent of the tRNA for LeuRS-ΔCP1, which lacks the CP1 domain. Therefore it is hypothesized that the CP1 domain of LeuRS plays a critical role for tRNA-dependent pre-transfer editing

Sequential Reattempt of Telecloning

The task of a telecloning protocol is to send an arbitrary qubit possessed by a sender to multiple receivers. Instead of performing Bell measurement at the sender's node, if one applies unsharp measurement, we show that the shared state can be recycled for further telecloning protocol. Specifically, in case of a single sender and two receivers, the maximal attempting number, which is defined as the maximum number of rounds used by the channel to obtain quantum advantage in the fidelity, turns out to be three both for optimal and nonoptimal shared states for telecloning while the maximal number reduces to two in case of three receivers. Although the original telecloning with quantum advantage being possible for arbitrary numbers of receivers, we report that the recycling of resources is not possible in telecloning involving a single sender and more than three receivers, thereby demonstrating a no-go theorem. We also connect the maximal achievable fidelities in each round with the bipartite entanglement content of the reduced state between the sender and one of the receivers as well as with the monogamy score of entanglement.Comment: v1: 12 pages, 5 figures; v2: 13 pages, 5 figures; close to the publish versio

Understanding the Implications of Under-Reporting, Vaccine Efficiency and Social Behavior On the Post-Pandemic Spread Using Physics informed Neural Networks: a Case Study of China

In late 2019, the emergence of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, led to the implementation of stringent measures forming the zero-COVID policy aimed at eliminating transmission. Zero-COVID policy basically aimed at completely eliminating the transmission of COVID-19. However, the relaxation of this policy in late 2022 reportedly resulted in a rapid surge of COVID-19 cases. The aim of this work is to investigate the factors contributing to this outbreak using a new SEIR-type epidemic model with time-dependent level of immunity. Our model incorporates a time-dependent level of immunity considering vaccine doses administered and time-post-vaccination dependent vaccine efficacy. We find that vaccine efficacy plays a significant role in determining the outbreak size and maximum number of daily infected. Additionally, our model considers under-reporting in daily cases and deaths, revealing their combined effects on the outbreak magnitude. We also introduce a novel Physics Informed Neural Networks (PINNs) approach which is extremely useful in estimating critical parameters and helps in evaluating the predictive capability of our model

BIOCONVERSION OF HEMICELLULOSE HYDROLYSATE OF SWEET SORGHUM BAGASSE TO ETHANOL BY USING PICHIA STIPITIS NCIM 3497 AND DEBARYOMYCES HANSENII SP.

Production of ethanol from concentrated D-xylose solutions and hemicellulose hydrolysate of sweet sorghum bagasse was achieved by using Pichia stipitis NCIM 3497 and an isolated yeast Debaryomyces hansenii sp. These yeasts were capable of producing ethanol from solutions containing 800 g/L D-xylose, and the optimum sugar concentration was found to be 150 g/L at pH 4, 30oC, with a production time of 72 hours. These yeasts were capable of utilizing multiple sugars. Hemicellulose hydrolysates of sweet sorghum bagasse were obtained by dilute acid hydrolysis and autohydrolysis including steam explosion treatment. The hydrolysate was treated by an over-liming process for detoxification and pH adjustment. Ethanol yield from hemicellulose hydrolysate was found to be higher than that of synthetic medium containing D-xylose. These yeasts can be used in production of ethanol from concentrated hemicellulose hydrolysates containing high pentose sugars obtained while treating lignocellulosic biomass at high substrate concentrations