A Comparison among the director networks in the main listed companies in France, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the literature on director interlocks by illustrating and analysing the interlocking directorships among the Italian, French, German, UK and US listed Blue Chips. The comparison of the five countries considered shows that two national models stand out. On the one hand a model made of a high number of companies linked to each other through a small number of shared directors who serve on several company boards at the time (France, Germany, and Italy). On the other hand, in the UK much fewer companies are connected to each other essentially through directors who have no more than two board positions at the time. A case in between is represented by the US, where a high number of companies are connected to each other just like Germany, France, and Italy. However, just like the UK, such connections are made through directors who tend to have just two board positions at the time, a sign that, differently from Italy, Germany, and France, the UK and US networks might not be functional to systemic collusion.corporate governance, interlocking directorships, antitrust, competition, social network analysis (SNA), exploratory data analysis (EDA), empirical corporate finance

Speech Analysis by Natural Language Processing Techniques: A Possible Tool for Very Early Detection of Cognitive Decline?

Background: The discovery of early, non-invasive biomarkers for the identification of “preclinical” or “pre-symptomatic” Alzheimer's disease and other dementias is a key issue in the field, especially for research purposes, the design of preventive clinical trials, and drafting population-based health care policies. Complex behaviors are natural candidates for this. In particular, recent studies have suggested that speech alterations might be one of the earliest signs of cognitive decline, frequently noticeable years before other cognitive deficits become apparent. Traditional neuropsychological language tests provide ambiguous results in this context. In contrast, the analysis of spoken language productions by Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques can pinpoint language modifications in potential patients. This interdisciplinary study aimed at using NLP to identify early linguistic signs of cognitive decline in a population of elderly individuals.Methods: We enrolled 96 participants (age range 50–75): 48 healthy controls (CG) and 48 cognitively impaired participants: 16 participants with single domain amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment (aMCI), 16 with multiple domain MCI (mdMCI) and 16 with early Dementia (eD). Each subject underwent a brief neuropsychological screening composed by MMSE, MoCA, GPCog, CDT, and verbal fluency (phonemic and semantic). The spontaneous speech during three tasks (describing a complex picture, a typical working day and recalling a last remembered dream) was then recorded, transcribed and annotated at various linguistic levels. A multidimensional parameter computation was performed by a quantitative analysis of spoken texts, computing rhythmic, acoustic, lexical, morpho-syntactic, and syntactic features.Results: Neuropsychological tests showed significant differences between controls and mdMCI, and between controls and eD participants; GPCog, MoCA, PF, and SF also discriminated between controls and aMCI. In the linguistic experiments, a number of features regarding lexical, acoustic and syntactic aspects were significant in differentiating between mdMCI, eD, and CG (non-parametric statistical analysis). Some features, mainly in the acoustic domain also discriminated between CG and aMCI.Conclusions: Linguistic features of spontaneous speech transcribed and analyzed by NLP techniques show significant differences between controls and pathological states (not only eD but also MCI) and seems to be a promising approach for the identification of preclinical stages of dementia. Long duration follow-up studies are needed to confirm this assumption

Eubiosis and dysbiosis: the two sides of the microbiota

The microbial ecosystem of the gastrointestinal tract is characterized by a great number of microbial species living in balance by adopting mutualistic strategies. The eubiosis/dysbiosis condition of the gut microbiota strongly influences our healthy and disease status. This review briefly describes microbiota composition and functions, to then focus on eubiosis and dysbiosis status: the two sides of the microbiot

A Comparison among the director networks in the main listed companies in France, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the literature on director interlocks by illustrating and analysing the interlocking directorships among the Italian, French, German, UK and US listed Blue Chips. The comparison of the five countries considered shows that two national models stand out. On the one hand a model made of a high number of companies linked to each other through a small number of shared directors who serve on several company boards at the time (France, Germany, and Italy). On the other hand, in the UK much fewer companies are connected to each other essentially through directors who have no more than two board positions at the time. A case in between is represented by the US, where a high number of companies are connected to each other just like Germany, France, and Italy. However, just like the UK, such connections are made through directors who tend to have just two board positions at the time, a sign that, differently from Italy, Germany, and France, the UK and US networks might not be functional to systemic collusion

A Comparison among the director networks in the main listed companies in France, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom.

The purpose of this paper is to contribute to the literature on director interlocks by illustrating and analysing the interlocking directorships among the Italian, French, German, UK and US listed Blue Chips. The comparison of the five countries considered shows that two national models stand out. On the one hand a model made of a high number of companies linked to each other through a small number of shared directors who serve on several company boards at the time (France, Germany, and Italy). On the other hand, in the UK much fewer companies are connected to each other essentially through directors who have no more than two board positions at the time. A case in between is represented by the US, where a high number of companies are connected to each other just like Germany, France, and Italy. However, just like the UK, such connections are made through directors who tend to have just two board positions at the time, a sign that, differently from Italy, Germany, and France, the UK and US networks might not be functional to systemic collusion

Mo1927 Mucosa-Associated Microbiota and Promoter Methylation Status of Genes Involved in Immune Response in Crohn's Disease Patients

N/