Pandemic inflation: a menace to tame for developing countries?

India and other developing countries are currently faced with the twin challenges of economic revival in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, and increasing inflation. Moreover, global economic recovery might prove to be detrimental for a developing country’s economy, contrary to popular narrative. Anand B. and Shreya Gulati argue that in the face of such challenges, these countries need to walk a tightrope between accommodative and tight monetary policy

Communicating with Constituents in 140 Characters or Less:

This paper affords an opportunity to study the early adoption, implementation and performance of an emerging technology by analyzing which members of Congress have been early adopters and extensive users of Twitter, and which have attracted the most followers. Our research questions and measures draw from the diffusion of innovation literature and early studies of online politics. Three multivariate analyses reveal that two motivators of adoption, party (Republican) and campaign resources are also drivers leading to extensive usage, but the other two, an urban constituency and the member’s own age do not. Instead, a large vote share in the last election joins party and funding in explaining high usage. The latter two plus high influential power differentiate between members with large and small numbers of followers. Collectively, these findings suggest that at this early developmental stage, Twitter is not a game changer, but an additional communications medium. They also underscore the contribution of diffusion of innovation literature to understanding how these interrelationships change depending upon whether we are examining adoption, implementation or performance

Explaining Facebook Support in the 2008 Congressional Election Cycle

This study investigates what explains the level of support candidates generate on Facebook and what strategic assessments campaigns are making about this community of (potential) supporters. Based on data collected about 814 major party candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives in 2008, it appears that the Facebook community responds to the same array of factors in the larger political environment as the general public when registering its collective judgments about candidate viability through Facebook support. Results of the multiple regression analyses show that the amount of campaign contributions raised is the most important variable explaining Facebook support, especially for challengers and open seat candidates. In addition, Democrats have more supporters than Republicans, and incumbents more than challengers or candidates for open seats. A competitive race increases supporter numbers for non-incumbents. When Congressional districts have with a high percentage of college educated citizens it increases candidates’ supporters, but a high percentage of young citizens diminishes their numbers. Finally, candidates who have active Facebook pages, either because of their own updating of content or as a result of postings by current supporters, generate more new supporters as a result. Campaigns that do not engage in an activity that is relatively common and easy to do (video uploads)are penalized in Facebook supporter numbers. Degree of effort works in reverse for user generated activities: candidates who have more low effort wall posts generate more Facebook supporters; those with more high effort fan photo postings do not end up with significantly more supporters

Proposed Model for Degradation of Gunn Diodes as Observed from Study of the I-V Characteristics

The effect of heat treatment on the functional Gunn diodes has been investigated in the temperature range of 200-300°C. The influence of electricfield during heat treatment has also been studied. The simple variations in I-V characteristics with annealing time have been utilized to interpret the contact behaviour

Correlations of record events as a test for heavy-tailed distributions

A record is an entry in a time series that is larger or smaller than all previous entries. If the time series consists of independent, identically distributed random variables with a superimposed linear trend, record events are positively (negatively) correlated when the tail of the distribution is heavier (lighter) than exponential. Here we use these correlations to detect heavy-tailed behavior in small sets of independent random variables. The method consists of converting random subsets of the data into time series with a tunable linear drift and computing the resulting record correlations.Comment: Revised version, to appear in Physical Review Letter

A rare case of isoniazid induced sideroblastic anemia

Sideroblastic anemia is a rare cause of anemia. Most of it accounts for the genetic cause, while drug induced is still uncommon. Our patient, a 20 year old female, is a known case of right frontal tuberculoma on ATT presented with complaints of generalized weakness and loss of appetite. On evaluation, she was found to have severe anemia and bone marrow studies confirmed it to be sideroblastic anemia. On revisiting the history, it was noted that she was not taking pyridoxine supplements as advised along with antitubercular drugs. Our patient is one among the few documented cases of Isoniazid induced sideroblastic anemia.This case needs attention because it is a preventable cause of anemia and the clinicians need to be aware about the compliance of the patient with the supplementary drugs.

Distribution Fits for Various Parameters in the Florida Public Hurricane Loss Model

The purpose of this study is to re-analyze the atmospheric science component of the Florida Public Hurricane Loss Model v. 5.0, in order to investigate if the distributional fits used for the model parameters could be improved upon. We consider alternate fits for annual hurricane occurrence, radius of maximum winds and the pressure profile parameter

Rapid cell extraction in aqueous two-phase microdroplet systems

Distinguishing specific cells is an essential technique in cell research and clinical diagnostics. We report a novel method to passively isolate and extract cells in a microfluidic device. We utilise a droplet-based microfluidic system to generate an aqueous two phase system in which aqueous droplets consist of two phases in the form of a double emulsion. Specifically, we generate PEG droplets that completely encapsulate DEX droplets within a microfluidic channel. Target cells can be introduced directly into the droplets and driven to partition to the more favourable phase, whilst still being contained within the aqueous droplet. Human T lymphoma cells, with diameters in the range of 10–15 μm, are chosen as a model cell line to demonstrate the partitioning