1,613 research outputs found
Military spending and economic growth in China: a regime-switching analysis
This article has been made available through the Brunel Open Access Publishing Fund.This article investigates the impact of military spending changes on economic growth in China over the period 1953 to 2010. Using two-state Markov-switching specifications, the results suggest that the relationship between military spending changes and economic growth is state dependent. Specifically, the results show that military spending changes affect the economic growth negatively during a slower growth-higher variance state, while positively within a faster growth-lower variance one. It is also demonstrated that military spending changes contain information about the growth transition probabilities. As a policy tool, the results indicate that increases in military spending can be detrimental to growth during slower growth-higher growth volatility periods. © 2014 © 2014 The Author(s). Published by Taylor & Francis
3M cod possible technical measures: spatial / temporal closures
In 2019, the NAFO Commission requested the NAFO Scientific Council (SC) advice on possible technical
measures to protect and improve the productivity of the 3M stock of Atlantic cod, Gadus morhua. The objective
of this paper is to study possible protection measures related to the temporal and spatial closures of fishing
activity.
Analysis of historical maturity data indicates that the spawning time of 3M cod occurs during the first quarter
of the year and that it is when 65% of the annual cod catch is made. The catch per unit of effort (CPUE) has
generally higher values in this season than in the rest of the year and the mean length of caught cod in that
season is generally above the length at maturity (L50). During this first quarter, trawl fishery activities are
concentrated in a small area at the Southwest of the fishing ground, but, as our data comes from the fishery, we
cannot conclude that this is the only spawning area as we have not information about cod activity in the rest of
the area in that season.
For all these reasons, it is concluded that a spawning closure of Flemish Cap cod fishery during the first quarter
of the year may be a suitable measure to protect and improve the productivity of 3M cod stock
Grazing intensity as a strategy to mitigate methane in native grassland.
Ruminants, thank to symbiotic microorganisms, are particularly efficient in transforming vegetal fiber to protein destined to human feeding.Coordenador: Roberto Giolo de Almeida. II SIGEE
Variational Worldline Approximation for the Relativistic Two-Body Bound State in a Scalar Model
We use the worldline representation of field theory together with a
variational approximation to determine the lowest bound state in the scalar
Wick-Cutkosky model where two equal-mass constituents interact via the exchange
of mesons. Self-energy and vertex corrections are included approximately in a
consistent way as well as crossed diagrams. Only vacuum-polarization effects of
the heavy particles are neglected. In a path integral description of an
appropriate current-current correlator an effective, retarded action is
obtained by integrating out the meson field. As in the polaron problem we
employ a quadratic trial action with variational functions to describe
retardation and binding effects through multiple meson exchange.The variational
equations for these functions are derived, discussed qualitatively and solved
numerically. We compare our results with the ones from traditional approaches
based on the Bethe-Salpeter equation and find an enhanced binding contrary to
some claims in the literature. For weak coupling this is worked out
analytically and compared with results from effective field theories. However,
the well-known instability of the model, which usually is ignored, now appears
at smaller coupling constants than in the one-body case and even when
self-energy and vertex corrections are turned off. This induced instability is
investigated analytically and the width of the bound state above the critical
coupling is estimated.Comment: 62 pages, 7 figures, FBS style, published versio
Tritordeum breads are well tolerated with preference over gluten-free breads in non-celiac wheat-sensitive patients and its consumption induce changes in gut bacteria
BACKGROUND
The ingestion of wheat and other cereals are related to several gut disorders. The specific components responsible for non-celiac wheat-sensitivity (NCWS) may include gluten and other compounds. Tritordeum is a new cereal derived from crossing durum wheat with a wild barley species, which differs from bread wheat in its gluten composition. In the present work, we examined the response of NCWS patients to tritordeum bread Gastrointestinal symptoms as well as tritordeum acceptability, gluten immunogenic peptides excretion, and the composition and structure of the intestinal microbiota were evaluated.
RESULTS
Gastrointestinal symptoms of the subjects showed no significant change between the gluten-free bread and the tritordeum bread. Participating subjects rated tritordeum bread higher than the gluten-free bread. Analysis of the bacterial gut microbiota indicated that tritordeum consumption does not alter the global structure and composition of the intestinal microbiota, and only a few changes in some butyrate-producing bacteria were observed.
CONCLUSIONS
All the results derived from acceptability, biochemical and microbiological tests suggest that tritordeum may be tolerated by a sub-set of NCWS sufferers who do not require strict exclusion of gluten from their diet. (c) 2020 Society of Chemical Industry
Canopy structure characteristics of three native perennial grasses with potential for integrated systems.
A multi-analytical study of Bronze Age pottery from the UNESCO site of Al-Khutm (Bat, Oman)
The extensive investigation carried out in recent years at the UNESCO site of Al-Khutm (Ibri, Oman) has allowed to uncover the monumental remains of a tower dated back to the third millennium BC and to collect an abundant ceramic assemblage from the associated soil deposits. Eighteen selected pottery samples have been investigated using a multi-analytical approach including microfocus X-ray computed tomography, X-ray diffraction, optical microscopy and prompt gamma activation analysis to analyse the vessel-forming technique and to characterise their micro-structure, mineralogical and chemical composition to recognise possible local vs. non-local raw materials. The results provided new insights on ancient manufacturing processes and revealed that most of the vessels were locally produced exploiting raw materials from the surroundings of the site with the exception of a fragment of a black slipped jar. The chemical results suggest that the latter was imported from the Indus area in nowadays Pakistan. This evidence integrates our knowledge about the presence of this type of vessels in Oman and confirms the involvement of inland centres like Bat and Al-Khutm into a large-scale exchange system
The Bursty Star Formation Histories of Low-mass Galaxies at Revealed by Star Formation Rates Measured from H and FUV
We investigate the burstiness of star formation histories (SFHs) of galaxies
at by using the ratio of star formation rates (SFRs) measured from
H and FUV (1500 \AA) (H--to--FUV ratio). Our sample contains 164
galaxies down to stellar mass (M*) of in the CANDELS GOODS-N
region, where Team Keck Redshift Survey DEIMOS spectroscopy and HST/WFC3 F275W
images from CANDELS and Hubble Deep UV Legacy Survey are available. When the
{\it ratio} of H- and FUV-derived SFRs is measured, dust extinction
correction is negligible (except for very dusty galaxies) with the Calzetti
attenuation curve. The H--to--FUV ratio of our sample increases with M*
and SFR. The median ratio is 0.7 at M* (or SFR) and increases to 1 at M* (or SFR
). At M*, our median H--to--FUV
ratio is lower than that of local galaxies at the same M*, implying a redshift
evolution. Bursty SFH on a timescale of a few tens of megayears on galactic
scales provides a plausible explanation of our results, and the importance of
the burstiness increases as M* decreases. Due to sample selection effects, our
H--to--FUV ratio may be an upper limit of the true value of a complete
sample, which strengthens our conclusions. Other models, e.g., non-universal
initial mass function or stochastic star formation on star cluster scales, are
unable to plausibly explain our results.Comment: 13 pages, 8 figures. ApJ accepted. The main conclusions are not
changed. Major modifications include: (1) to be consistent with the
literature, now reporting H\beta--to--FUV ratio (rather than FUV--to--H\beta\
in the first version); (2) detailed discussions on dust extinction
correction; (3) new SF bustiness calculation; and (4) enriched discussions in
Introductio
Worker remittances and the global preconditions of ‘smart development’
With the growing environmental crisis affecting our globe, ideas to weigh economic or social progress by the ‘energy input’ necessary to achieve it are increasingly gaining acceptance. This question is intriguing and is being dealt with by a growing number of studies, focusing on the environmental price of human progress. Even more intriguing, however, is the question of which factors of social organization contribute to a responsible use of the resources of our planet to achieve a given social result (‘smart development’). In this essay, we present the first systematic study on how migration – or rather, more concretely, received worker remittances per GDP – helps the nations of our globe to enjoy social and economic progress at a relatively small environmental price. We look at the effects of migration on the balance sheets of societal accounting, based on the ‘ecological price’ of the combined performance of democracy, economic growth, gender equality, human development, research and development, and social cohesion. Feminism in power, economic freedom, population density, the UNDP education index as well as the receipt of worker remittances all significantly contribute towards a ‘smart overall development’, while high military expenditures and a high world economic openness are a bottleneck for ‘smart overall development’
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