7,339 research outputs found
The Track Record on Takings Legislation: Lessons from Democracy\u27s Laboratories
This report by the Georgetown Environmental Law & Policy Institute, entitled The Track Record on Takings Legislation: Lessons from Democracy\u27s Laboratories, examines the experiences of Florida, Oregon, and several other states with legislation implementing the property rights agenda. The report is the first comprehensive effort to systematically identify and evaluate the on-the-ground consequences of so-called takings compensation laws. The major findings of the report are that the takings agenda has undermined community protections by forcing a roll back of existing legal rules and/or by exerting a chilling effect on new legislative activity, special interests such as developers and timber companies have been the primary beneficiaries of takings legislation, the takings laws have fomented and exacerbated neighbor-neighbor conflicts over land use issues, the takings agenda has conferred large windfalls on certain owners either in the form of taxpayer-funded awards or special exemptions from the rules that apply to the rest of the community, and the property rights agenda has undermined the democratic process. Contrary to a common argument made by proponents of this type of legislation, requiring the government to pay to regulate does not lead government officials to make a more nuanced appraisal of the costs and benefits of regulations, apparently because the salience of fiscal costs to government officials far outweighs the relatively more diffuse political benefits of community and homeowner protection
A new approach for efficient simulation of Coulomb interactions in ionic fluids
We propose a simplified version of local molecular field (LMF) theory to
treat Coulomb interactions in simulations of ionic fluids. LMF theory relies on
splitting the Coulomb potential into a short-ranged part that combines with
other short-ranged core interactions and is simulated explicitly. The averaged
effects of the remaining long-ranged part are taken into account through a
self-consistently determined effective external field. The theory contains an
adjustable length parameter sigma that specifies the cut-off distance for the
short-ranged interaction. This can be chosen to minimize the errors resulting
from the mean-field treatment of the complementary long-ranged part. Here we
suggest that in many cases an accurate approximation to the effective field can
be obtained directly from the equilibrium charge density given by the Debye
theory of screening, thus eliminating the need for a self-consistent treatment.
In the limit sigma -> 0, this assumption reduces to the classical Debye
approximation. We examine the numerical performance of this approximation for a
simple model of a symmetric ionic mixture. Our results for thermodynamic and
structural properties of uniform ionic mixtures agree well with similar results
of Ewald simulations of the full ionic system. In addition we have used the
simplified theory in a grand-canonical simulation of a nonuniform ionic mixture
where an ion has been fixed at the origin. Simulations using short-ranged
truncations of the Coulomb interactions alone do not satisfy the exact
condition of complete screening of the fixed ion, but this condition is
recovered when the effective field is taken into account. We argue that this
simplified approach can also be used in the simulations of more complex
nonuniform systems.Comment: To be published in Journal of Chemical Physic
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Generation of Lamprey Monoclonal Antibodies (Lampribodies) Using the Phage Display System.
The variable lymphocyte receptors (VLRs) consist of leucine rich repeats (LRRs) and comprise the humoral antibodies produced by lampreys and hagfishes. The diversity of the molecules is generated by stepwise genomic rearrangements of LRR cassettes dispersed throughout the VLRB locus. Previously, target-specific monovalent VLRB antibodies were isolated from sea lamprey larvae after immunization with model antigens. Further, the cloned VLR cDNAs from activated lamprey leukocytes were transfected into human cell lines or yeast to select best binders. Here, we expand on the overall utility of the VLRB technology by introducing it into a filamentous phage display system. We first tested the efficacy of isolating phage into which known VLRB molecules were cloned after a series of dilutions. These experiments showed that targeted VLRB clones could easily be recovered even after extensive dilutions (1 to 109). We further utilized the system to isolate target-specific "lampribodies" from phage display libraries from immunized animals and observed an amplification of binders with relative high affinities by competitive binding. The lampribodies can be individually purified and ostensibly utilized for applications for which conventional monoclonal antibodies are employed
The Digital Engine Model: Lead Generation Through Applied DCM Strategies
Digital Content Marketing (DCM) has become a primary tool for marketers in driving lead generation in today’s digital marketing world. Leading brands are creating and curating content in order to develop brand equity, connecting content to brand story and narrative. And while strong theoretical models of content marketing have been discussed in the marketing literature, like Hollebeek and Macky (2019), there is a dearth of understanding about the application and direct impact of organic digital content strategies on marketing directives. This paper investigates an applied model, called The Digital Engine, which provides instruction on proper digital content marketing instruction and then measures the impact of this instruction through a live 8-week campaign across 221 active websites. Results indicate that the Digital Engine instruction not only provides applicable understanding but that the applied methodology provides significant impact in driving users through various methods of brand acquisition and retention through to the website where created and curated content lead website users to complete call-to-action forms. Most importantly, completion of these online forms produces serviceable leads to the sales team, whereby supporting the overarching aim of all DCM strategies, lead generation
Density fluctuations and the structure of a nonuniform hard sphere fluid
We derive an exact equation for density changes induced by a general external
field that corrects the hydrostatic approximation where the local value of the
field is adsorbed into a modified chemical potential. Using linear response
theory to relate density changes self-consistently in different regions of
space, we arrive at an integral equation for a hard sphere fluid that is exact
in the limit of a slowly varying field or at low density and reduces to the
accurate Percus-Yevick equation for a hard core field. This and related
equations give accurate results for a wide variety of fields
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B-cell development in rainbow trout : a molecular/cellular based approach
Currently little is known about the mechanisms and locations of
lymphocyte development in teleosts. In this study several aspects of the
underlying factors which govern B lymphocyte development in trout
were investigated which included: the isolation and characterization of
immunoglobulin heavy chain (IgH) genes, the recombination activating
genes 1 and 2 (RAG1 and RAG2) and the use of cellular markers to
identify tissues harboring precursor B-cells.
Immunoglobulin heavy chains are part of the structural
components which make up antibody molecules produced by B-cells.
We isolated various full-length IgH cDNA clones, some of which
contained the secreted while others contained the membrane bound
form of IgH. Upon characterization of the membrane bound forms,
typical features common to all IgH cDNAs were found including a
leader peptide, a variable region and constant domain containing
transmembrane (TM) segments as well. Further sequence analysis of
this region revealed that the TM domains were spliced directly to the
CH3 domains which results in the loss of the entire CH4 region. Our
results support previous observations of unusual splicing events in fish
IgH genes.
RAG1 and -2 in mammals have been shown to be essential for
carrying out V (D) J recombination of lymphocyte receptors and are
found to be expressed within primary lymphoid tissues and precursor
lymphocytes. We isolated the RAG locus from a rainbow trout genomic
library and characterized their conservation and expression.
Overall the complete amino acid sequences of RAG1 and RAG2
displayed 78% and 75% similarity when compared to RAG genes from
higher vertebrates thus demonstrating the highly conserved nature of
these genes. Tissue specific expression of both genes was primarily
associated with the thymus and pronephros in both juvenile and adult
trout. Based upon these observation we conclude that the thymus and
pronephros likely serve as the tissue sites for V (D) J recombination in
trout and are thus primary lymphoid organs.
Finally we addressed the question as to where B-cell
lymphopoiesis occurs in trout. Our results using both
immunofluorescence and confocal microscopy putatively demonstrate
that the thymus harbors precursor B-cells and thus alludes to a dual
function for both B and T-cell development in trout
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