World Equity Premium Based Risk Aversion Estimates

The equity premium puzzle holds that the coefficient of relative risk aversion estimated from the consumption based CAPM under power utility is excessively high. Moreover, estimates in the literature vary considerably across countries. We gauge the uncertainty pertaining to the country risk aversion estimates by means of jackknife resampling and pooling. The confidence band for the world risk aversion estimate from the pooled country data is much tighter and the pooled point estimate presents less of a puzzle than the individual country estimates.equity premium puzzle, jackknife, pooling

Comparison between the Torquato-Rintoul theory of the interface effect in composite media and elementary results

We show that the interface effect on the properties of composite media recently proposed by Torquato and Rintoul (TR) [Phys. Rev. Lett. 75, 4067 (1995)] is in fact elementary, and follows directly from taking the limit in the dipolar polarizability of a coated sphere: the TR ``critical values'' are simply those that make the dipolar polarizability vanish. Furthermore, the new bounds developed by TR either coincide with the Clausius-Mossotti (CM) relation or provide poor estimates. Finally, we show that the new bounds of TR do not agree particularly well with the original experimental data that they quote.Comment: 13 pages, Revtex, 8 Postscript figure

A novel fully human antitumour immunoRNase targeting ErbB2-positive tumours

BACKGROUND: ErbB2 is an attractive target for immunotherapy, as it is a tyrosine kinase receptor overexpressed on tumour cells of different origin, with a key role in the development of malignancy. Trastuzumab, the only humanised anti-ErbB2 antibody currently used in breast cancer with success, can engender cardiotoxicity and a high fraction of patients is resistant to Trastuzumab treatment. METHODS: A novel human immunoRNase, called anti-ErbB2 human compact antibody-RNase (Erb-hcAb-RNase), made up of the compact anti-ErbB2 antibody Erbicin-human-compact Antibody (Erb-hcAb) and human pancreatic RNase (HP-RNase), has been designed, expressed in mammalian cell cultures and purified. The immunoRNase was then characterised as an enzymatic protein, and tested for its biological actions in vitro and in vivo on ErbB2-positive tumour cells. RESULTS: Erb-hcAb-RNase retains the enzymatic activity of HP-RNase and specifically binds to ErbB2-positive cells with an affinity comparable with that of the parental Erb-hcAb. Moreover, this novel immunoRNase is endowed with an effective and selective antiproliferative action for ErbB2-positive tumour cells both in vitro and in vivo. Its antitumour activity is more potent than that of the parental Erb-hcAb as the novel immunoconjugate has acquired RNase-based cytotoxicity in addition to the inhibitory growth effects, antibody-dependent and complement-dependent cytotoxicity of Erb-hcAb. CONCLUSION: Erb-hcAb-RNase could be a promising candidate for the immunotherapy of ErbB2-positive tumours

Aging and hyponutrition; A challenge for the sustainability of the NHS: Conclusions of the 9th abbot-SENPE debate forum

La desnutrición es un problema común en todos los niveles de atención sanitaria, desde atención primaria a especializada y en centros de atención geriátrica. Su incidencia en los hospitales es del 40% y en las residencias de mayores supera el 60%. Esto último es de gran importancia, tienen una alta relación con el progresivo envejecimiento de la población europea, y es la mayor y más frecuente causa de discapacidad en la población anciana que vive en su domicilio o en instituciones. Países como Holanda, Dinamarca o el Reino Unido han desarrollado Planes Estratégicos Integrales para luchar contra la desnutrición desarrollando e implantando guías, estableciendo cribados obligatorios en los ingresos y altas hospitalarias, en las residencias en ancianos, etc. En nuestro país, en una acción conjunta de SENPE y la Fundación Abbott, estamos desarrollando un Plan Estratégico Integral (Proyecto + nutridos) en el que establecemos recomendaciones claras, precisas y validadas para efectuar cribaje nutricional tanto en pacientes hospitalizados, como en los institucionalizados y en los mayores ambulatorios. En este tema deben de ser tenidos en cuenta los aspectos sociales y financieros. La desnutrición es con mucha frecuencia deficientemente reconocida y tratada. Ello tiene un impacto negativo sobre los pacientes individuales en términos de morbilidad, mortalidad, independencia y calidad de vida, y sobre los sistemas de cuidado sanitario en términos de uso de recursos y costesHyponutrition is a common problem at all health care levels, from primary to specialized care, as well as in geriatric care. Its incidence in a hospital setting is 40% and 60% in nursing homes. This is very important, it is highly related with progressive aging of the European population, and is the biggest and most frequent cause of disability among the elderly population living at home or institutions. Countries such as Holland, Denmark, or the United Kingdom have developed Comprehensive Strategic Plans to fight against hyponutrition by developing and implementing guidelines, establishing mandatory screenings at the moment of hospital admission and discharge, at nursing homes, etc. In our country, a combined action of SENPE and Abbott Foundation is developing a Comprehensive Strategic Plan (+ nutridos Project) in which clear, precise, and validated recommendations are established to perform nutritional screening both in hospitalized patients and institutionalized and ambulatory elderly people. This issue has to take into account the social and financial aspects. Hyponutrition is many times insufficiently recognized and treated. This has a negative impact on the individual patient in terms of morbidity, mortality, independence, and quality of life, as well as on the health care systems in terms of use of health care resources and cost

The pgip family in soybean and three other legume species: evidence for a birth-and-death model of evolution

Polygalacturonase-inhibiting proteins (PGIPs) are leucine-rich repeat (LRR) plant cell wall glycoproteins involved in plant immunity. They are typically encoded by gene families with a small number of gene copies whose evolutionary origin has been poorly investigated. Here we report the complete characterization of the full complement of the pgip family in soybean (Glycine max [L.] Merr.) and the characterization of the genomic region surrounding the pgip family in four legume species. Results: BAC clone and genome sequence analyses showed that the soybean genome contains two pgip loci. Each locus is composed of three clustered genes that are induced following infection with the fungal pathogen Sclerotinia sclerotiorum (Lib.) de Bary, and remnant sequences of pgip genes. The analyzed homeologous soybean genomic regions (about 126 Kb) that include the pgip loci are strongly conserved and this conservation extends also to the genomes of the legume species Phaseolus vulgaris L., Medicago truncatula Gaertn. and Cicer arietinum L., each containing a single pgip locus. Maximum likelihood-based gene trees suggest that the genes within the pgip clusters have independently undergone tandem duplication in each species. Conclusions: The paleopolyploid soybean genome contains two pgip loci comprised in large and highly conserved duplicated regions, which are also conserved in bean, M. truncatula and C. arietinum. The genomic features of these legume pgip families suggest that the forces driving the evolution of pgip genes follow the birth-and-death model, similar to that proposed for the evolution of resistance (R) genes of NBS-LRR-type

Impairment of the autophagic flux in astrocytes intoxicated by trimethyltin

Autophagy is a lysosomal catabolic route for protein aggregates and damaged organelles which in different stress conditions, such as starvation, generally improves cell survival. An impairment of this degradation pathway has been reported to occur in many neurodegenerative processes. Trimethyltin (TMT) is a potent neurotoxin present as an environmental contaminant causing tremors, seizures and learning impairment in intoxicated subjects. The present data show that in rat primary astrocytes autophagic vesicles (AVs) appeared after few hours of TMT treatment. The analysis of the autophagic flux in TMT-treated astrocytes was consistent with a block of the late stages of autophagy and was accompanied by a progressive accumulation of the microtubule associated protein light chain 3 (LC3) and of p62/SQSTM1. Interestingly, an increased immunoreactivity for p62/SQSTM1 was also observed in hippocampal astrocytes detected in brain slices of TMT-intoxicated rats. The time-lapse recordings of AVs in EGFP-mCherry-LC3B transfected astrocytes demonstrated a reduced mobility of autophagosomes after TMT exposure respect to control cells. The observed block of the autophagic flux cannot be overcome by known autophagy inducers such as rapamycin or 0.5mM lithium. Although ineffective when used at 0.5mM, lithium at higher concentrations (2mM) was able to protect astrocyte cultures from TMT toxicity. This effect correlated well with its ability to determine the phosphorylation/inactivation of glycogen kinase synthase-3β (GSK-3β)

PARISROC, a Photomultiplier Array Integrated Read Out Chip

PARISROC is a complete read out chip, in AMS SiGe 0.35 !m technology, for photomultipliers array. It allows triggerless acquisition for next generation neutrino experiments and it belongs to an R&D program funded by the French national agency for research (ANR) called PMm2: ?Innovative electronics for photodetectors array used in High Energy Physics and Astroparticles? (ref.ANR-06-BLAN-0186). The ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit) integrates 16 independent and auto triggered channels with variable gain and provides charge and time measurement by a Wilkinson ADC (Analog to Digital Converter) and a 24-bit Counter. The charge measurement should be performed from 1 up to 300 photo- electrons (p.e.) with a good linearity. The time measurement allowed to a coarse time with a 24-bit counter at 10 MHz and a fine time on a 100ns ramp to achieve a resolution of 1 ns. The ASIC sends out only the relevant data through network cables to the central data storage. This paper describes the front-end electronics ASIC called PARISROC.Comment: IEEE Nuclear Science Symposium an Medical Imaging Conference (2009 NSS/MIC

Lagrangian phase transitions in nonequilibrium thermodynamic systems

In previous papers we have introduced a natural nonequilibrium free energy by considering the functional describing the large fluctuations of stationary nonequilibrium states. While in equilibrium this functional is always convex, in nonequilibrium this is not necessarily the case. We show that in nonequilibrium a new type of singularities can appear that are interpreted as phase transitions. In particular, this phenomenon occurs for the one-dimensional boundary driven weakly asymmetric exclusion process when the drift due to the external field is opposite to the one due to the external reservoirs, and strong enough.Comment: 10 pages, 2 figure