Strategic Philanthropy Integrating Investments In Asset Building: A Framework for Impact

Despite philanthropy's commitments to improve family economic security, stability, and growth, a lack of cross-sector collaboration limits the impacts including constrained public resources and siloed programmatic services. A new approach to address these challenges is the development of a framework that can more effectively tie together and shape the disparate policies, investment structures, practices, and stakeholders to leverage resources and impacts. The strategic framework of asset development helps to create an effective, integrated, and sustainable system, enabling families to move through safety nets into financial security and opportunity. Asset building integration shifts investment goals from remedying deficiencies to building on strengths by increasing capability, access, and opportunity. It enables foundations to integrate and expand the scope, scale, and long-term impact of their work, shifting the focus from families' vulnerabilities to their opportunities for success. This paper provides compelling evidence about how funders are applying this strategic approach to effect greater social and economic impact

Public debates driven by incomplete scientific data: the cases of evolution theory, global warming and H1N1 pandemic influenza

Public debates driven by incomplete scientific data where nobody can claim absolute certainty, due to current state of scientific knowledge, are studied. The cases of evolution theory, global warming and H1N1 pandemic influenza are investigated. The first two are of controversial impact while the third is more neutral and resolved. To adopt a cautious balanced attitude based on clear but inconclusive data appears to be a lose-out strategy. In contrast overstating arguments with wrong claims which cannot be scientifically refuted appear to be necessary but not sufficient to eventually win a public debate. The underlying key mechanism of these puzzling and unfortunate conclusions are identified using the Galam sequential probabilistic model of opinion dynamics. It reveals that the existence of inflexible agents and their respective proportions are the instrumental parameters to determine the faith of incomplete scientific data public debates. Acting on one's own inflexible proportion modifies the topology of the flow diagram, which in turn can make irrelevant initial supports. On the contrary focusing on open-minded agents may be useless given some topologies. When the evidence is not as strong as claimed, the inflexibles rather than the data are found to drive the opinion of the population. The results shed a new but disturbing light on designing adequate strategies to win a public debate.Comment: 31 pages, 7 figure

A National Survey to Characterize Industrial Hemp (Cannabis sativa L.) Production Challenges Under Protected Cultivation

A nationwide internet survey (n = 134) was conducted to establish the current status of industrial hemp (IH; Cannabis sativa L.) cultivation and characterize protected culture production challenges in the United States. Of the total participants, 65.7% (n = 88) of the subjects reported current production of IH. These participants were asked to identify all production systems and included growing IH indoors (e.g., shipping containers, buildings or warehouses; 15.9%), in greenhouses (29.5%), in hoop houses or high tunnels (15.9%), or in outdoor fields in-ground (62.5%). Of the respondents who identified as growing under protected culture (e.g., indoors, greenhouses, and hoop houses/ high tunnels), most grew IH in soilless substrate and provided mineral nutrition, electrical lighting, and monitored plant health. Participants reported the most important production challenges of IH cultivation were at or post-harvest and included drying, harvesting and handling, processing, and CBD oil enhancement; several key production challenges including insect pest management strategies and environmental growing conditions; and variety/cultivar evaluations. Furthermore, respondents reported that the most important economic topic or challenge was return on investment. Results characterize current cultivation practices of IH, identify knowledge gaps, and prioritize education and research areas for the successful production and marketing of IH

Are Consumers Willing to Pay More for Biodegradable Containers Than for Plastic Ones? Evidence from Hypothetical Conjoint Analysis and Nonhypothetical Experimental Auctions

This study used and compared hypothetical conjoint analysis and nonhypothetical experimental auctions to elicit floral customers’ willingness to pay for biodegradable plant containers. The results of the study show that participants were willing to pay a price premium for biodegradable containers, but the premium is not the same for different types of containers. This article also shows the mixed ordered probit model generates more accurate results when analyzing the conjoint analysis Internet survey data than the ordered probit model.biodegradable, willingness to pay, marketing, carbon footprint, waste composition, green industry, nursery crops, floriculture crops, Agribusiness, Agricultural and Food Policy, Environmental Economics and Policy, Financial Economics, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Marketing, Public Economics, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies, D12, Q13,

Imaging the Neutrophil Phagosome and Cytoplasm Using a Ratiometric pH Indicator.

Neutrophils are crucial to host innate defense and, consequently, constitute an important area of medical research. The phagosome, the intracellular compartment where the killing and digestion of engulfed particles take place, is the main arena for neutrophil pathogen killing that requires tight regulation. Phagosomal pH is one aspect that is carefully controlled, in turn regulating antimicrobial protease activity. Many fluorescent pH-sensitive dyes have been used to visualize the phagosomal environment. S-1 has several advantages over other pH-sensitive dyes, including its dual emission spectra, its resistance to photo-bleaching, and its high pKa. Using this method, we have demonstrated that the neutrophil phagosome is unusually alkaline in comparison to other phagocytes. By using different biochemical conjugations of the dye, the phagosome can be delineated from the cytoplasm so that changes in the size and shape of the phagosome can be assessed. This allows for further monitoring of ionic movement

Seeking attention: An eye tracking study of in-store merchandise displays

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to elucidate the role that visual measures of attention to product and information and price display signage have on purchase intention. The authors assessed the effect of visual attention to the product, information or price sign on purchase intention, as measured by likelihood to buy. Design/methodology/approach – The authors used eye–tracking technology to collect data from Australian and US garden centre customers, who viewed eight plant displays in which the signs had been altered to show either price or supplemental information (16 images total). The authors compared the role of visual attention to price and information sign, and the role of visual attention to the product when either sign was present on likelihood to buy. Findings – Overall, providing product information on a sign without price elicited higher likelihood to buy than providing a sign with price. The authors found a positive relationship between visual attention to price on the display sign and likelihood to buy, but an inverse relationship between visual attention to information and likelihood to buy. Research limitations/implications – An understanding of the attention–capturing power of merchandise display elements, especially signs, has practical significance. The findings will assist retailers in creating more effective and efficient display signage content, for example, featuring the product information more prominently than the price. The study was conducted on a minimally packaged product, live plants, which may reduce the ability to generalize findings to other product types. Practical implications – The findings will assist retailers in creating more effective and efficient display signage content. The study used only one product category (plants) which may reduce the ability to generalize findings to other product types. Originality/value – The study is one of the first to use eye–tracking in a macro–level, holistic investigation of the attention–capturing value of display signage information and its relationship to likelihood to buy. Researchers, for the first time, now have the ability to empirically test the degree to which attention and decision–making are linked

Exendin-4 analogs in insulinoma theranostics

Contains fulltext : 209104.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)Insulinomas, neuroendocrine tumors arising from pancreatic beta cells, often show overexpression of the glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor. Therefore, imaging with glucagon-like peptide analog exendin-4 can be used for diagnosis and preoperative localization. This review presents an overview of the development and clinical implementation of exendin-based tracers for nuclear imaging, and the potential use of exendin-4 based tracers for optical imaging and therapeutic applications such as peptide receptor radionuclide therapy or targeted photodynamic therapy

Comparative analysis of cancer cell responses to targeted radionuclide therapy (TRT) and external beam radiotherapy (EBRT)

The vast majority of our knowledge regarding cancer radiobiology and the activation of radioresistance mechanisms emerged from studies using external beam radiation therapy (EBRT). Yet, less is known about the cancer response to internal targeted radionuclide therapy (TRT). Our comparative phosphoproteomics analyzed cellular responses to TRT with lutetium-177-labeled minigastrin analogue [$^{177}$Lu]Lu-PP-F11N (β-emitter) and EBRT (ɣ-rays) in CCKBR-positive cancer cells. Activation of DNA damage response by p53 was induced by both types of radiotherapy, whereas TRT robustly increased activation of signaling pathways including epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs) or integrin receptor. Inhibition of EGFR or integrin signaling sensitized cancer cells to radiolabeled minigastrin. In vivo, EGFR inhibitor erlotinib increased therapeutic response to [$^{177}$Lu]Lu-PP-F11N and median survival of A431/CCKBR-tumor bearing nude mice. In summary, our study explores a complex scenario of cancer responses to different types of irradiation and pinpoints the radiosensitizing strategy, based on the targeting survival pathways, which are activated by TRT