Advertising as a Signal of Quality, A New Explanation

The present article provides a unified explanation for several phenomena related to advertising by firms. (i) Advertising without repeat purchase of the product, (ii) advertising from established brands, or post-introductory, (iii) simultaneous advertising from low and high quality firms, (iv) its persistence and pro-cyclicality. The explanation is original because it rests upon oligopolistic interaction. The analysis hinges upon two fundamental results. The rst is that advertising allows separation when a signal via prices only does not. The second is that purely dissipative advertising can be used to strategically deter entry. Hence, a link is established between entry deterrence and signaling

Cell instructive Liquid Crystalline Networks for myotube formation

Development of biological tissues in vitro is not a trivial task and requires the correct maturation of the selected cell line. To this aim, many attempts were done mainly by mimicking the biological environment using micro/nanopatterned or stimulated scaffolds. However, the obtainment of functional tissues in vitro is still far from being achieved. In contrast with the standard methods, we here present an easy approach for the maturation of myotubes toward the reproduction of muscular tissue. By using liquid crystalline networks with different stiffness and molecular alignment, we demonstrate how the material itself can give favorable interactions with myoblasts helping a correct differentiation. Electrophysiological studies demonstrate that myotubes obtained on these polymers have more adult-like morphology and better functional features with respect to those cultured on standard supports. The study opens to a platform for the differentiation of other cell lines in a simple and scalable way

Green Consumers, Greenwashing and the Misperception of Environmental Quality

In this paper we analyse a setup where consumers are heterogeneous in the perception of environmental quality. The equilibrium is verified in a setting with horizontal and vertical (green) differentiation. Profits are increasing in the misperception of quality, while, the investment in green quality decreases the more the goods are substitutes. We further consider the introduction of either an emission tax or an environmental standard. The former rises the investment in environmental quality due to the higher cost of production, whereas in equilibrium quality always improves after the introduction of the latter. We show that an optimal environmental standard is an effective regulatory instrument against greenwashing and that the efficacy of the interventions is conditioned to the damage distribution and the aggregate level of emission

Relying on the information of others : debt rescheduling with multiple lenders

Can debt rescheduling be affected by the multiplicity of lenders in loan arrangements? Do lenders efficiently react to information? We show that the precision of information plays an essential role. Foreclosing by one lender is disruptive and may have irreversible consequences. A lender can therefore rationally reschedule his loan if he expects that other lenders may receive more precise information. We develop a Bayesian game where signals are randomly distributed to lenders and rescheduling occurs even when all lenders receive bad news. This is ex post inefficient, but we show that it may be a second-best outcome given the non-sharing of private information. Our results bear a similarity with herding phenomena in financial markets, although players do not move sequentiall