Institutionelle Strukturen zur Verbesserung von Transparenz und Wirksamkeit von Subventionen

Die Forderung nach höherer Transparenz und besserer Wirkungsorientierung von Subventionen ist ein finanzpolitischer Evergreen, der mit der Schuldenbremse und der Forderung nach langfristiger Tragfähigkeit der Finanzpolitik, zusätzliche Dringlichkeit erhält. Die im Auftrag des Bundesministeriums der Finanzen durchgeführte Untersuchung fe 6/13 hat anhand der praktischen Erfahrungen in sechs Ländern – Dänemark, USA, Australien, Niederlanden, Schweiz und Vereinigtes Königreich – Anregungen zur Weiterentwicklung des Subventionsregimes des Bundes identifiziert und entwickelt. Diese Anregungen werden mit Blick auf die Besonderheiten der deutschen Subventionspolitik formuliert, die mit einem kurzen Stärken-Schwächen-Profil charakterisiert wird. Als besondere Stärke der deutschen Subventionspolitik wird dabei der alle zwei Jahre erstellte Subventionsbericht des Bundes hervorgehoben; an ihn knüpfen zentrale Weiterentwicklungsoptionen an. Folgende Module zur Weiterentwicklung der Subventionstransparenz und –kontrolle des Bundes entwickelt die Studie: I. Verbreiterung des Berichtsgegenstandes: Die Studie zeigt Wege, wie mehr Maßnahmen mit subventions- äquivalenten Charakter unter dem Rubrum „Förderungen und Transfers“ in die quantitative und qualitative Berichterstattung des Subventionsberichts einbezogen werden können. II. Ein neutraleres Image für Subventionen: Subventionskritik ist wichtig; die häufige Stigmatisierung von Finanzhilfen aber schadet der Finanzpolitik. Skizziert wird eine Regierungs-Kampagne „Meine Subvention“, die den Weg zu einem neutraleren Image eröffnet. III. Subventionsdatenbank: Eine Datenbank in Anlehnung das schweizerische Online-Verzeichnis der Bundeshilfen könnte die Subventionstransparenz merklich verbessern. IV. Rollierende Evaluationszyklen und Spending Reviews: Es werden drei Stufen für regelmäßige vollständige Evaluierungspflichten entworfen, wobei die oberste Stufe den Einstieg in Subventions-orientierte Spending Reviews markieren würde. V. Steuervergünstigungen systematisieren und dem Bundeshaushalt annähern: Steuervergünstigungen sind Substitute für direkte Staatsausgaben. Um beide so weit wie möglich gleich zu behandeln, entwirft der Bericht drei Stufen der Annäherung bzw. fiktiven Vollintegration von Steuervergünstigungen in den jährlichen Haushaltsprozess. VI. Nachhaltigkeitsprüfung durch den Subventionsbericht: Im Koalitionsvertrag der Bundesregierung ist vereinbart, dass der Subventionsbericht stärker überprüfen soll, ob die dargestellten Maßnahmen nachhaltig sind. Im Bericht werden umsetzbare Optionen für eine Nachhaltigkeitsüberprüfung von Subventionen entwickelt

The Global COVID-19 Observatory and Resource Center for Childhood Cancer: A response for the pediatric oncology community by SIOP and St. Jude Global

The COVID-19 pandemic quickly led to an abundance of publications and recommendations, despite a paucity of information on how COVID-19 affects children with cancer. This created a dire need for a trusted resource with curated information and a space for the pediatric oncology community to share experiences. The Global COVID-19 Observatory and Resource Center for Childhood Cancer was developed, launched, and maintained by the International Society of Pediatric Oncology and St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. The three components (Resource Library, Global Registry, and Collaboration Space) complement each other, establishing a mechanism to generate and transfer knowledge rapidly throughout the community.Fil: Moreira, Daniel C.. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Sniderman, Elizabeth. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Mukkada, Sheena. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Chantada, Guillermo Luis. Universidad Austral. Facultad de Ciencias Biomédicas. Instituto de Investigaciones en Medicina Traslacional. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. Instituto de Investigaciones en Medicina Traslacional; ArgentinaFil: Bhakta, Nickhill. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Foster, Whitney. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Avula, Meghana. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Homsi, Maysam R.. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Faughnan, Lane. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Happ, Brooke. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Andujar, Allyson. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Sonnenfelt, Jason. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Dalvi, Rashmi. Bombay Hospital And Medical Research Centre; IndiaFil: Frazier, A. Lindsay. No especifíca;Fil: Hessissen, Laila. Universite Mohammed V. Rabat; Otros paises de ÁfricaFil: Kearns, Pamela R.. No especifíca;Fil: Luna Fineman, Sandra. No especifíca;Fil: Moreno, Arturo. Hospital Universitario de Puebla; MéxicoFil: Saghir Khan, Muhammad. No especifíca;Fil: Sullivan, Michael. Royal Children's Hospital, Melbourne; AustraliaFil: Devidas, Meenakshi. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Santana, Victor. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Caniza, Miguela. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados UnidosFil: Pritchard Jones, Kathy. University College London; Estados UnidosFil: Rodriguez Galindo, Carlos. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital; Estados Unido

Reconstitution of Mammary Gland Development In Vitro: Requirement of c-met and c-erbB2 Signaling for Branching and Alveolar Morphogenesis

We have established a cell culture system that reproduces morphogenic processes in the developing mammary gland. EpH4 mouse mammary epithelial cells cultured in matrigel form branched tubules in the presence of hepatocyte growth factor/scatter factor (HGF/SF), the ligand of the c-met tyrosine kinase receptor. In contrast, alveolar structures are formed in the presence of neuregulin, a ligand of c-erbB tyrosine kinase receptors. These distinct morphogenic responses can also be observed with selected human mammary carcinoma tissue in explant culture. HGF/SF-induced branching was abrogated by the PI3 kinase inhibitors wortmannin and LY294002. In contrast, neuregulin- induced alveolar morphogenesis was inhibited by the MAPK kinase inhibitor PD98059. The c-met–mediated response could also be evoked by transfection of a c-met specific substrate, Gab1, which can activate the PI3 kinase pathway. An activated hybrid receptor that contained the intracellular domain of c-erbB2 receptor suffices to induce alveolar morphogenesis, and was observed in the presence of tyrosine residues Y1028, Y1144, Y1201, and Y1226/27 in the substrate-binding domain of c-erbB2. Our data demonstrate that c-met and c-erbB2 signaling elicit distinct morphogenic programs in mammary epithelial cells: formation of branched tubules relies on a pathway involving PI3 kinase, whereas alveolar morphogenesis requires MAPK kinase

The Evolutionary Genetics and Emergence of Avian Influenza Viruses in Wild Birds

We surveyed the genetic diversity among avian influenza virus (AIV) in wild birds, comprising 167 complete viral genomes from 14 bird species sampled in four locations across the United States. These isolates represented 29 type A influenza virus hemagglutinin (HA) and neuraminidase (NA) subtype combinations, with up to 26% of isolates showing evidence of mixed subtype infection. Through a phylogenetic analysis of the largest data set of AIV genomes compiled to date, we were able to document a remarkably high rate of genome reassortment, with no clear pattern of gene segment association and occasional inter-hemisphere gene segment migration and reassortment. From this, we propose that AIV in wild birds forms transient “genome constellations,” continually reshuffled by reassortment, in contrast to the spread of a limited number of stable genome constellations that characterizes the evolution of mammalian-adapted influenza A viruses

JOI: Joint placement of IoT analytics operators and pub/sub message brokers in fog-centric IoT platforms

Internet of Things (IoT) systems are expected to generate a massive amount of data that needs to be processed. Given the large scale and geo-distributed nature of such systems, fog computing along with publish/subscribe (pub/sub) messaging has been proposed as possible solutions for coping with processing at scale. However, it is still unclear how practitioners can leverage the benefits of fog computing, e.g., how to optimally place data processing operators and pub/sub brokers. Moreover, current IoT systems typically rely on pub/sub brokers at the cloud, which might diminish the benefits offered by edge or fog processing as the communication between IoT operators has to be mediated by the brokers located in the cloud. To address this shortcoming, we propose to place the IoT application operators and the pub/sub brokers jointly on a network of nodes spanning from edge to the cloud considering various factors such as network topology or the locations of the IoT sensors and the consumers of the IoT applications. Different than the prior works, we specifically consider pub/sub brokers and their unique characteristics in the placement decision. First, we formulate the placement of operators and brokers jointly across edge, fog, and the cloud as a cost minimization problem. Next, we design two low-complexity heuristics. Our simulation results corroborate the argument that a placement in the cloud is usually a good option for IoT use cases, but also reveal the gap to the optimal solution in scenarios with heavier clustering of producers and consumers of sensor data. Studying the optimality gap shows that in such a setting heuristic solutions usually stay under a stretch factor of 2, with a worst case factor of 2.5 for a tabu-based solution and 2.85 for a greedy and a fixed placement in the cloud

Fault-impact models based on delay and packet loss for IEEE 802.11g

In this paper we derive fault-impact models for wireless network traffic as it could be used in the control traffic for smart grid nodes. We set up experiments using a testbed with 116 nodes which uses the protocol IEEE 802.11g. We develop models for packet loss, the length of consecutive packet loss or non-loss as well as for packet transmission time. The latter is a known challenge and we propose a sampling technique that benefits from the wireless as well as wired connections between the nodes in the testbed. The data obtained shows similarity with previous measurements. However, we progress the state of the art in two ways: we show measurements of packet transmission times and fit models to those and we provide some more detailed insight in the data. We find that with increasing link quality, the distributions of lossy and loss-free periods show major fluctuation. It is shown that in those cases, phase-type distributions can approximate the data better than traditional Gilbert models. In addition, the medium access time is also found to be approximated well with a PH distribution

PH-distributed fault models for mobile communication

In this paper we analyze the quality of wireless data transmission. We are primarily interested in the importance of the distance between sender and receiver when measuring data loss rate and the length of lossy and loss-free periods. The ultimate purpose of this type of study is to quantify the effects of mobility. We have sampled data and find that distance certainly is an important indicator but the loss rate of packets is also determined by other factors and does not always monotonically increase with the distance. We further find that while the distribution of the length of lossy periods mostly shows an exponential decay the distribution of the length of loss-free periods does not even always monotonically decrease. Both, the packet loss probability and the distribution of the length of loss-free periods can be well represented using probabilistic models. We fit simple Gilbert-Elliot models as well as phase-type distributions to the data using different fitting tools and provide loss models that can easily be used in simulation and testbed studies

Ultrasound-mediated blood–brain barrier opening increases cell-free DNA in a time-dependent manner

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