"Economic Aid to Post-conflict Countries: A Methodological Critique of Collier and Hoeffler"

This paper retests the analysis of "Aid Policy and Growth in Post-Conflict Societies," by Paul Collier and Anke Hoeffler (October 2002 and forthcoming in European Economic Review). It finds that their data and analysis do not support their conclusions and policy recommendations on the optimal timing and amounts of aid. These conclusions depend on very few observations (13 for the period of peace-onset, 13 for years 4 to 7 when a growth spurt is said to make aid particularly effective, and 8 for the period when aid should taper off); are vulnerable to the same methodological misspecifications identified in the Burnside and Dollar approach on which this analysis is based; and are not grounded in any theoretical formulation about the special relation between aid and growth in post-conflict conditions. Conventional econometric procedures are often not followed; recoding the sample to exclude cases that are not civil wars reduces the effect of aid on growth in post-civil war countries to less than half of what they claim; and the difference with the relationship for "normal" countries becomes negligible (0.26 percentage points), although it depends on identification of the sample. Their claims on the poverty-efficiency of aid are assumed, not analysed. The confidentiality of their policy measure (CPIA) prevented testing the aid-policy relationship.Economic aid Post-conflict Methodology

Nitrogen starvation and nitrate or ammonium availability differently affect phenolic composition in green and purple basil

Basil (Ocimum basilicum L.) comprises green and purple cultivars, worldwide cultivated and appreciated for high contents of rosmarinic acid and anthocyanins, respectively. Although nitrogen (N) fertilization is needed for high yields, in basil it could have detrimental effects on the accumulation of phenolic compounds. In this study, plants of the cultivars 'Italiano Classico' (green) and 'Red Rubin' (purple) were grown in hydroponics and subjected to different nutritional treatments, consisting in N starvation, and nitrate (NO3 12) or ammonium (NH4+) nutrition. Plant growth and nutritional status, estimated by the contents of NO3 12, NH4+, and amino acids in roots and leaves, were evaluated and put in relation with quality traits of basil leaves, such as chlorophyll content, antioxidant capacity, total phenols, the activity of phenylalanine ammonia-lyase, and the concentrations of individual (poly)phenolic acids and flavonoids. This study reveals that N starvation, as well as the availability of the two inorganic N forms, differently affect the phenolic composition in the two cultivars. Compared to plants grown in NO3 12 availability, in NH4+ availability, green basil showed a higher content of (poly)phenolic acids, while in purple basil, an increase in the contents of anthocyanins was detected. Overall, the study suggests that the management of NH4+ supply could contribute to enhance crop quality in hydroponics, and provides new knowledge about the relationship between N nutrition and phenolic metabolism in basil

Insight into composition of bioactive phenolic compounds in leaves and flowers of green and purple basil

Basil (Ocimum basilicum L.) is a culinary, medicinal, and ornamental plant appreciated for its antioxidant properties, mainly attributed to high content of rosmarinic acid. This species also includes purple varieties, characterized by the accumulation of anthocyanins in leaves and flowers. In this work, we compared the main morphological characteristics, the antioxidant capacity and the chemical composition in leaves, flowers, and corollas of green (\u2018Italiano Classico\u2019) and purple (\u2018Red Rubin\u2019 and \u2018Dark Opal\u2019) basil varieties. The LC-ESI-MS/MS analysis of individual compounds allowed quantifying 17 (poly)phenolic acids and 18 flavonoids, differently accumulated in leaves and flowers of the three varieties. The study revealed that in addition to rosmarinic acid, basil contains several members of the salvianolic acid family, only scarcely descripted in this species, as well as, especially in flowers, simple phenolic acids, such as 4-hydroxybenzoic acid and salvianic acid A. Moreover, the study revealed that purple leaves mainly contain highly acylated anthocyanins, while purple flowers accumulate anthocyanins with low degree of decoration. Overall, this study provides new biochemical information about the presence of not yet characterized bioactive compounds in basil that could contribute to boosting the use of this crop and to gaining new knowledge about the roles of these compounds in plant physiology

Cerebrovascular Casting of the Adult Mouse for 3D Imaging and Morphological Analysis

Vascular imaging is crucial in the clinical diagnosis and management of cerebrovascular diseases, such as brain arteriovenous malformations (BAVMs). Animal models are necessary for studying the etiopathology and potential therapies of cerebrovascular diseases. Imaging the vasculature in large animals is relatively easy. However, developing vessel imaging methods of murine brain disease models is desirable due to the cost and availability of genetically-modified mouse lines. Imaging the murine cerebral vascular tree is a challenge. In humans and larger animals, the gold standard for assessing the angioarchitecture at the macrovascular (conductance) level is x-ray catheter contrast-based angiography, a method not suited for small rodents

Relevance of the slowly-varying electron gas to atoms, molecules, and solids

Under a certain scaling, the electron densities of finite systems become both large and slowly-varying, so that the gradient expansions of the density functionals for the Kohn-Sham kinetic and exchange energies become asymptotically exact to order $\nabla^2$. Neutral atoms of large $Z$ scale similarly, but a cusp correction at the nucleus requires generalizing the gradient expansion for exchange, producing the wrong gradient coefficient in the slowly-varying limit. Meta-generalized gradient approximations (meta-GGA's) recover both the slowly-varying and large-$Z$ limits. GGA correlation energies of large-Z atoms are found to be accurate.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, submitted at PR

Time-course of metabolic and proteomic responses to different nitrate/ammonium availabilities in roots and leaves of maize

The availability of nitrate and ammonium significantly affects plant growth. Co-provision of both nutrients is generally the best nutritional condition, due to metabolic interactions not yet fully elucidated. In this study, maize grown in hydroponics was exposed to different nitrogen (N) availabilities, consisting of nitrate, ammonium and co-provision. Roots and leaves were analyzed after 6, 30, and 54 h by biochemical evaluations and proteomics. The ammonium-fed plants showed the lowest biomass accumulation and the lowest ratio of inorganic to organic N content, suggesting a metabolic need to assimilate ammonium that was not evident in plants grown in co-provision. The N sources differently affected the root proteome, inducing changes in abundance of proteins involved in N and carbon (C) metabolisms, cell water homeostasis, and cell wall metabolism. Notable among these changes was that some root enzymes, such as asparagine synthetase, phosphoenolpyruvate (PEP) carboxylase, and formate dehydrogenase showed a relevant upsurge only under the sole ammonium nutrition. However, the leaf proteome appeared mainly influenced by total N availability, showing changes in the abundance of several proteins involved in photosynthesis and in energy metabolism. Overall, the study provides novel information about the biochemical determinants involved in plant adaptation to different N mineral forms

Mineral nitrogen sources differently affect root glutamine synthetase isoforms and amino acid balance among organs in maize

Background Glutamine synthetase (GS) catalyzes the first step of nitrogen assimilation in plant cell. The main GS are classified as cytosolic GS1 and plastidial GS2, of which the functionality is variable according to the nitrogen sources, organs and developmental stages. In maize (Zea mays L.) one gene for GS2 and five genes for GS1 subunits are known, but their roles in root metabolism are not yet well defined. In this work, proteomic and biochemical approaches have been used to study root GS enzymes and nitrogen assimilation in maize plants re-supplied with nitrate, ammonium or both. Results The plant metabolic status highlighted the relevance of root system in maize nitrogen assimilation during both nitrate and ammonium nutrition. The analysis of root proteomes allowed a study to be made of the accumulation and phosphorylation of six GS proteins. Three forms of GS2 were identified, among which only the phosphorylated one showed an accumulation trend consistent with plastidial GS activity. Nitrogen availabilities enabled increments in root total GS synthetase activity, associated with different GS1 isoforms according to the nitrogen sources. Nitrate nutrition induced the specific accumulation of GS1-5 while ammonium led to up-accumulation of both GS1-1 and GS1-5, highlighting co-participation. Moreover, the changes in thermal sensitivity of root GS transferase activity suggested differential rearrangements of the native enzyme. The amino acid accumulation and composition in roots, xylem sap and leaves deeply changed in response to mineral sources. Glutamine showed the prevalent changes in all nitrogen nutritions. Besides, the ammonium nutrition was associated with an accumulation of asparagine and reducing sugars and a drop in glutamic acid level, significantly alleviated by the co-provision with nitrate. Conclusion This work provides new information about the multifaceted regulation of the GS enzyme in maize roots, indicating the involvement of specific isoenzymes/isoforms, post-translational events and biochemical factors. For the first time, the proteomic approach allowed to discriminate the individual contribution of the GS1 isoforms, highlighting the participation of GS1-5 in nitrate metabolism. Moreover, the results give new insights about the influence of amino acid metabolism in plant C/N balance

Protein extraction from grape tissues by two-dimensional electrophoresis

At the onset of proteomic studies protein samples have to be accurately separated by two dimensional electrophoresis (2-DE); subsequently polypeptides are identified. Grape tissues, in particular roots, can be very problematic due to their hardness and to the high content of compounds that interfere in classical protein extraction. We have used a phenol-based extraction method in the presence of a protease inhibitor and Polyvinylpolypyrrolidone (PVPP). In this paper we demonstrate that this extraction method gives satisfactory and reproducible protein separation allowing the identification of some proteins by matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry (MALDI-TOF-MS).

Physical Activity Classification for Elderly People in Free-Living Conditions

Physical activity is strongly linked with mental and physical health in the elderly population and accurate monitoring of activities of daily living (ADLs) can help improve quality of life and well-being. This study presents and validates an inertial sensors-based physical activity classification system developed with older adults as the target population. The dataset was collected in free-living conditions without placing constraints on the way and order of performing ADLs. Four sensor locations (chest, lower back, wrist, and thigh) were explored to obtain the optimal number and combination of sensors by finding the best tradeoff between the system's performance and wearability. Several feature selection techniques were implemented on the feature set obtained from acceleration and angular velocity signals to classify four major ADLs (sitting, standing, walking, and lying). A support vector machine was used for the classification of the ADLs. The findings show the potential of different solutions (single sensor or multisensor) to correctly classify the ADLs of older people in free-living conditions. Considering a minimal set-up of a single sensor, the sensor worn at the L5 achieved the best performance. A two-sensor solution (L5 + thigh) achieved a better performance with respect to a single-sensor solution. By contrast, considering more than two sensors did not provide further improvements. Finally, we evaluated the computational cost of different solutions and it was shown that a feature selection step can reduce the computational cost of the system and increase the system performance in most cases. This can be helpful for real-time applications.<br/

Analysis of host- and strain-dependent cell death responses during infectious salmon anemia virus infection in vitro

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Infectious salmon anemia virus (ISAV) is an aquatic orthomyxovirus and the causative agent of infectious salmon anemia (ISA), a disease of great importance in the Atlantic salmon farming industry. <it>In vitro</it>, ISAV infection causes cytophatic effect (CPE) in cell lines from Atlantic salmon, leading to rounding and finally detachment of the cells from the substratum. In this study, we investigated the mode of cell death during <it>in vitro </it>ISAV infection in different Atlantic salmon cell lines, using four ISAV strains causing different mortality <it>in vivo</it>.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The results show that caspase 3/7 activity increased during the course of infection in ASK and SHK-1 cells, infected cells showed increased surface expression of phosphatidylserine and increased PI uptake, compared to mock infected cells; and morphological alterations of the mitochondria were observed. Expression analysis of immune relevant genes revealed no correlation between in vivo mortality and expression, but good correlation in expression of interferon genes.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Results from this study indicate that there is both strain and cell type dependent differences in the virus-host interaction during ISAV infection. This is important to bear in mind when extrapolating <it>in vitro </it>findings to the <it>in vivo </it>situation.</p