Housing Construction Cycles and Interest Rates

Housing investment is one of the most cyclical components of GDP. Much of that cyclicality stems from the sector’s sensitivity to interest rates, but it is also possible that construction lags generate intrinsic cyclicality in this sector. Although the housing sector is generally considered to be more interest-sensitive than the economy as a whole, the degree of this sensitivity seems to vary between countries and through time. In this paper, we model the housing markets in Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada using a structural three-stage least-squares system. We document the variations in the housing sector’s cyclicality and sensitivity to movements in interest rates, and attempt to determine the underlying causes of these differences.cycles; housing construction; interest rates

Phenotypic Plasticity of Japanese Medaka Gill in Response to Changing Salinities

Japanese medaka (Oryzais latipes) are euryhaline fish, meaning they are capable of surviving in a variety of salinities from fresh water to seawater. The ability to maintain an internal osmotic concentration stems from the phenotypic plasticity of the osmoregulatory organs, the gill, kidney, intestine, and integument. The gill is the main site of osmotic and ionic regulation in fish due to the three-dimensional structure, the direct contact with the outside environment, and the composition of the gill cells. Fish gills are multifunctional as they regulate water movement, acid/base exchange, nitrogenous waste excretion, and ion fluctuations. In freshwater environments, fish are challenged with a passive osmotic gain and ion loss. While the reverse is true in seawater, with passive ion gain and osmotic water loss. Salinity changes and the endocrine system drive regulation of cell type composition and activity. This dissertation focuses on the Japanese medaka, osmotic regulation patterns in response to salinity fluctuations. Investigation into regulatory patterns of gill aquaporins and claudins were measured in response to exposure to freshwater, seawater, and ion poor water. Hormone in vitro experiments were conducted to understand the effects of prolactin and cortisol on the regulation of aquaporin 1 and aquaporin 3 in the gill. Function and regulation of claudin 30c within the gill in response to salinity was investigated and preliminary experiments for a loss of function study was conducted. Aquaporin 3 was significantly increased in initial ion poor water exposure. Hormone studies demonstrated the stimulatory effect of prolactin on aquaporin 3, both alone and in combination with cortisol. Aquaporin 1 remained constitutively expressed in all salinities and under hormone exposure. Claudin 30C mRNA was significantly increased in response to ion poor water conditions, and protein expression significantly decreased in seawater versus fresh water. Localization studies showed claudin 30C in the tight junctions of hatchling medaka skin. The work performed in this thesis shows the regulatory patterns of osmoregulatory proteins in medaka, which will aid functional studies within other vertebrate system, as well as show that medaka are a suitable knock down model

Moving Ahead Amid Fiscal Challenges: A Look at Medicaid Spending, Coverage and Policy Trends

Examines fiscal year 2011 trends in state efforts to control Medicaid spending, reform payment and delivery systems, and prepare for healthcare reform implementation, as well as projections in spending and enrollment growth for fiscal year 2012

Pedagogical Education Practices in Communication Sciences and Disorders PhD Programs: A Pilot Study

The purpose of this study was two-fold: (1) to ascertain how research doctoral programs in Communication Sciences and Disorders (CSD) characterize their own efforts to educate research doctoral students about teaching at the college/university level; and (2) whether and how programs introduce the “scholarship of teaching and learning” (SoTL) to PhD students. PhD program directors (N=69) were emailed a survey for descriptions of university teaching instruction and SoTL activities, with a 27.5% return rate (n=19). Quantitative and qualitative analyses were used. Identified themes included, “course or seminar”, “experiential” and “required”. One hundred per cent of respondents offer teaching experiences and 58% require student participation. Sixty-three per cent offer a teaching course while 42% require the course. It is unclear from the current data whether CSD PhD students are exposed to SoTL. Given the robust, cross-disciplinary literature on teaching and learning, the time may be right for a discussion on including teaching education and SoTL in CSD PhD programs

The effect of sepsis on cerebral microvascular blood flow

Background: Sepsis is a dysregulated host response to infection that affects 18 000 000 people worldwide, and over 325 000 000 dollars are spent treating sepsis in Canada every year. One of the symptoms of severe sepsis is an altered mental state, which is accompanied with a measured decrease in oxygen levels in the skeletal muscle microvasculature. It is hypothesized that his altered mental state is due to a lack of oxygenated blood reaching the brain. Hypothesis: After the onset of sepsis, microvascular cerebral blood flow and oxygen levels in the blood will decrease. Onset of decreased blood flow in the brain is expected to occur later than in skeletal muscle. Methods: Data will be collected rom Sprague Dawley rats. Rats will undergo a sepsis inducing procedure, and one of the right leg muscles will be exposed. Data will be collected from this muscle via intravital video microscopy, and from the left leg and the brain via near infrared spectroscopy. Results: Expected results include a decrease in microvascular blood flow in both legs and the brain, with a later onset of decreased flow in the brain compared to the leg. Discussion: It is known that sepsis causes changes in skeletal muscle microvasculature. If we see these same changes in the cerebral microvasculature, it may be an indication that there isn\u27t enough oxygen reaching the brain. This could be a cause of a decreased mental state, and would be worth further exploration

What is the appropriate diagnostic evaluation of fibroids?

Although transvaginal sonography (TVS) has inconsistent sensitivity (0.21-1.00) and specificity (0.53-1.00), its cost-efficiency and noninvasiveness make it the best initial test for ruling in fibroid disease (strength of recommendation [SOR]: B, based on expert opinion, a systematic review, and prospective studies). Sonohysterography (SHG) and hysteroscopy have superior sensitivity, specificity, and more discriminating positive and negative likelihood ratios for diagnosing fibroids than does TVS (SOR: B, systematic review). SHG is less painful, less invasive, and more cost-effective than hysteroscopy (SOR: B; single, prospective comparative study and cost comparison). Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) had comparable precision to TVS in a single study, but it is too expensive to be a good initial test for fibroids (SOR: C, expert opinion and an uncontrolled prospective study). One study reported a strong correlation between ultrasound and bimanual examination (SOR: C, retrospective case review)

Effects of Task Language on English and Spanish Bilinguals\u27 Speech Perception Study

Variability across speakers and across languages makes speech perception a surprisingly complex task, as there are not exact numerical values you can memorize to determine what speech sound someone is intending at any given time without understanding the speaker context. For example, one acoustic cue is voice onset time (VOT), a measure for the length of different stop consonants. In English, voiced stop consonants like /b/ have short VOTs (around 0ms) and voiceless stop consonants like /p/ have longer VOTs (around 40ms). In Spanish, the same sounds are shifted in VOT, such that /b/ is pre-voiced with a VOT around -40ms and /p/ has a VOT around 0ms. Thus an English voiced phoneme and a Spanish voiceless phoneme actually have identical VOTs. This is especially relevant for bilingual speakers, who need to know the rules for phoneme pronunciation in multiple languages. The specific goal of our research project was to investigate how bilingual English-Spanish speakers shift their perceived VOT boundary based on language context. Researcher interacted with participants in either all English or all Spanish, and then participants completed an experiment where they were asked what they heard for a variety of pairs of words/non-words that exist in English and/or Spanish (e.g., basta/pasta where both are words in Spanish but only pasta is a word in English). We hope the results of this project will give us more insight into how bilingual individuals switch between languages and how task-switching affects even their basic perception of sounds

Continental breakup and UHP rock exhumation in action: GPS results from the Woodlark Rift, Papua New Guinea

We show results from a network of campaign Global Positioning System (GPS) sites in the Woodlark Rift, southeastern Papua New Guinea, in a transition from seafloor spreading to continental rifting. GPS velocities indicate anticlockwise rotation (at 2–2.7°/Myr, relative to Australia) of crustal blocks north of the rift, producing 10–15 mm/yr of extension in the continental rift, increasing to 20–40 mm/yr of seafloor spreading at the Woodlark Spreading Center. Extension in the continental rift is distributed among multiple structures. These data demonstrate that low-angle normal faults in the continents, such as the Mai'iu Fault, can slip at high rates nearing 10 mm/yr. Extensional deformation observed in the D'Entrecasteaux Islands, the site of the world's only actively exhuming Ultra-High Pressure (UHP) rock terrane, supports the idea that extensional processes play a critical role in UHP rock exhumation. GPS data do not require significant interseismic coupling on faults in the region, suggesting that much of the deformation may be aseismic. Westward transfer of deformation from the Woodlark Spreading Center to the main plate boundary fault in the continental rift (the Mai'iu fault) is accommodated by clockwise rotation of a tectonic block beneath Goodenough Bay, and by dextral strike slip on transfer faults within (and surrounding) Normanby Island. Contemporary extension rates in the Woodlark Spreading Center are 30–50% slower than those from seafloor spreading-derived magnetic anomalies. The 0.5 Ma to present seafloor spreading estimates for the Woodlark Basin may be overestimated, and a reevaluation of these data in the context of the GPS rates is warranted