Is Aid for Trade Effective? A Panel Quantile Regression Approach

This paper investigates whether Aid for Trade (AfT) leads to greater exports in recipient countries. Using panel data and panel quantile regression techniques, our results suggest that total AfT disbursements promote the export of goods and services, but is limited primarily to exporters above the .35 quantile of the conditional distribution of exports. When disaggregating by type of AfT, we find that aid to improve trade policy and regulation is not associated with higher exports. Aid to build productive capacity is effective for almost all quantiles of the export distribution but the 10th, with the effect being stronger at the higher tails of the conditional distribution. Aid used to build infrastructure is found to affect exports only at the 0.10 quantile. In contrast, aid disbursed for general budget support (an untargeted type of aid) is not associated with greater export levels irrespective of the quantile

Los Alamos National Laboratory and technology transfer

From its beginning in 1943, Los Alamos National Laboratory (Los Alamos) has traditionally used science and technology to fine creative, but practical solutions to complex problems. Los Alamos National Laboratory is operated by the University of California, under contact to the Department of Energy. We are a Government Owned-contractor Operated (GOCO) facility, and a Federally-funded research and Development Center (FFRDC). At Los Alamos, our mission is to apply science and engineering capabilities to problems of national security. Recently our mission has been broadened to include technology transfer to ensure the scientific and technical solutions are available to the marketplace. We are, in staff and technical capabilities, one of the worlds largest multidisciplinary, multiprogram laboratories. We conduct extensive research in energy, nuclear safeguards and security, biomedical science, conventional defense technologies, space science, computational science, environmental protection and cleanup, materials science, and other basic sciences. Since 1980, by a series of laws and executive orders, the resources of the federal laboratories have been made increasingly available to private industry via technology transfer efforts. Los Alamos National Laboratory uses a variety of technology transfer methods including laboratory visits, cooperative research, licensing, contract research, user facility access, personnel exchanges, consulting, publications, and workshops, seminars and briefings. We also use unique approaches, such as our negotiating teams, to ensure that transfer of our developed technology takes place in an open and competitive manner. During my presentation, I will discuss the overall process and some of the mechanism that we use at Los Alamos to transfer laboratory developed technology

Does Institutional Design Matter? A Study of Trade Effectiveness and PTA Flexibility/Rigidity

This article examines the trade effect of flexibility design features within preferential trading arrangements (PTAs). Using a gravity model of bilateral trade that incorporates multilateral trade resistance, we report three main results. First, unconstrained escape provisions undermine the effectiveness of PTAs when it comes to increasing trade. Second, adding some restrictions to these escape provisions more than offsets the negative effect of unconstrained escape, leading to more effective PTAs than those without escape options. Third, adding more restrictions beyond a certain point serves only to make PTAs less effective. Thus, both too much institutional flexibility and too much institutional rigidity reduces the ability of PTAs to promote trade. However, fitting these results to the descriptive data makes it appear that most PTAs would be even more trade effective if they included greater restrictions on the use of their escape provisions. Consequently, it appears that policymakers generally choose fewer escape restrictions than would be optimal in terms of trade performance

Epilithic and Endolithic Bacterial Communities in Limestone from a Maya Archaeological Site

Biodeterioration of archaeological sites and historic buildings is a major concern for conservators, archaeologists, and scientists involved in preservation of the world\u27s cultural heritage. The Maya archaeological sites in southern Mexico, some of the most important cultural artifacts in the Western Hemisphere, are constructed of limestone. High temperature and humidity have resulted in substantial microbial growth on stone surfaces at many of the sites. Despite the porous natureof limestone and the common occurrence of endolithic microorganisms in many habitats, little is known about the microbial flora living inside the stone. We found a large endolithic bacterial community in limestone from the interior of the Maya archaeological site Ek\u27 Balam. Analysis of 16S rDNA clones demonstrated disparate communities (endolithic: \u3e80% Actinobacteria, Acidobacteria, and Low GC Firmicutes; epilithic: \u3e50% Proteobacteria). The presence of differing epilithic and endolithic bacterial communities may be a significant factor for conservation of stone cultural heritage materials and quantitative prediction of carbonate weathering