Land Grant Application- Chamberlain, Moses (Norridgewock)

Land grant application submitted to the Maine Land Office on behalf of Moses Chamberlain for service in the Revolutionary War, by their widow Anne.https://digitalmaine.com/revolutionary_war_me_land_office/1170/thumbnail.jp

Managing Financial Reports of Commercial Banks

This paper investigates the extent to which banks alter the timing and magnitude of transactions such as asset sales, loan loss accruals, pension settlements and securities issues in response to primary capital, tax, and earnings goals. The authors hypothesize that each year bank managers face a cost minimization problem that encompasses the costs of deviating from primary capital, tax, and earnings goals, as well as the costs of exercising discretion over loan loss accruals, transactions such as asset sales, and securi-ties issues. The authors construct a system of five equations, one for the optimal level of each of the items over which the manager can exercise discretions to achieve the three goals. The authors find that loan charge-offs, loan loss provisions, and the decision to issue securities are jointly determined, apparently to manage primary capital ratios. The research suggests that pension settlement gains are determined independently of the other four decisions, and appear to be used to manage end-of-period earnings. Miscellaneous gains (losses) are used primarily to manage earnings; but weaker evidences suggests that they are also used to manage capital. The authors find broad support for the hypotheses that deviating from capital and earnings goals is costly, and that bank managers trade-off costly accrual and financing discretion to meet these goals. The policy implications of this recent research are intriguing. For example, mark-to-market rules that limit the manager's ability to strategically time gains from sales of securities may simply induce the manager to substitute an alternative form of discretion - delaying or accelerating charge-offs and loan loss provisions. The framework and evidence support the notion that accrual, investment, and financing decisions are not independent. In the context of contracting and monitoring motivations for accounting choices, this means that focusing solely on the accounting systems's role in mitigating these costs potentially omits important correlated factors.

Investigating the Recovery of Phosphate from Anaerobic Digester Liquor using Ion Exchange, and its subsequent Application as a Liquid Fertilizer

Currently, practices of mining phosphate rock are not sustainable and will likely lead to the depletion of global phosphate reserves in 50-100 years. One potential option to recycle phosphorus is through ion exchange. In this research, two anion exchange resins were used in jar tests to adsorb phosphate from anaerobic digester liquor. The loaded resins were then used in column regeneration experiments in which the phosphate anions were desorbed by a regenerant solution high in concentrations of chloride, hydroxide, or a combination of the two. The result was a phosphate solution that could potentially be used as a fertilizer, eliminating the issue of brine disposal. A life cycle analysis (LCA) was also performed for two local New Hampshire farms to assess the environmental repercussions of this phosphate recovery process. The FO36 phosphate selective resin was identified as a potential option for use in ion exchange due to its advantageous recovery of phosphate. The results of the LCA showed that the production of potassium hydroxide used for the regenerant had the most significant environmental impacts. The LCA also indicated that human toxicity and fossil fuel depletion were the categories of main concern for environmental repercussions. If implemented at full scale, this process would have the ability to capture phosphate before it is released into receiving waters, having the added benefit of preventing eutrophication of drinking water sources. In addition, this process would enable local farmers to buy less commercial fertilizers thus minimizing the global impacts from that industry. This system would be ideal for small communities and small local farms

Play-scripting: Testing a means of accounting for social value

Paper presented at Cultural Mapping: Debating Spaces and Places; the second annual Valletta 2018 International Conference on Cultural Relations in Europe and the Mediterranean

Peer observation of teaching: a decoupled process

This article details the findings of research into the academic teaching staff experience of peer observation of their teaching practice. Peer observation is commonly used as a tool to enhance a teacher's continuing professional development. Research participants acknowledged its ability to help develop their teaching practice, but they also reported that it could operate superficially as a tick box exercise, that its outcomes were frequently decoupled from formal staff development processes, and that its purpose and usefulness therefore seemed unclear. This article argues that the presence of decoupling reinforces the need to account for structural factors that can interact with peer observation of teaching to ensure it is a meaningful exercise for all teaching staff. It concludes that the published academic literature is perhaps guilty of overplaying the role of personal choice and individual tutor characteristics when addressing the complex issue that is staff disengagement with peer observation of teaching. © The Author(s) 2011

Onset of experimental severe cardiac fibrosis is mediated by overexpression of angiotensin-converting enzyme 2

Angiotensin-converting enzyme (ACE) 2 is a recently identified homologue of ACE. There is great interest in the therapeutic benefit for ACE2 overexpression in the heart. However, the role of ACE2 in the regulation of cardiac structure and function, as well as maintenance of systemic blood pressure, remains poorly understood. In cell culture, ACE2 overexpression led to markedly increased myocyte volume, assessed in primary rabbit myocytes. To assess ACE2 function in vivo, we used a recombinant adeno-associated virus 6 delivery system to provide 11-week overexpression of ACE2 in the myocardium of stroke-prone spontaneously hypertensive rats. ACE2, as well as the ACE inhibitor enalapril, significantly reduced systolic blood pressure. However, in the heart, ACE2 overexpression resulted in cardiac fibrosis, as assessed by histological analysis with concomitant deficits in ejection fraction and fractional shortening measured by echocardiography. Furthermore, global gene expression profiling demonstrated the activation of profibrotic pathways in the heart mediated by ACE2 gene delivery. This study demonstrates that sustained overexpression of ACE2 in the heart in vivo leads to the onset of severe fibrosis

Peer observation of teaching: A decoupled process

This article details the findings of research into the academic teaching staff experience of peer observation of their teaching practice. Peer observation is commonly used as a tool to enhance a teacher’s continuing professional development. Research participants acknowledged its ability to help develop their teaching practice, but they also reported that it could operate superficially as a tick box exercise, that its outcomes were frequently decoupled from formal staff development processes, and that its purpose and usefulness therefore seemed unclear. This article argues that the presence of decoupling reinforces the need to account for structural factors that can interact with peer observation of teaching to ensure it is a meaningful exercise for all teaching staff. It concludes that the published academic literature is perhaps guilty of overplaying the role of personal choice and individual tutor characteristics when addressing the complex issue that is staff disengagement with peer observation of teaching