Juxtaposing BTE and ATE – on the role of the European insurance industry in funding civil litigation

One of the ways in which legal services are financed, and indeed shaped, is through private insurance arrangement. Two contrasting types of legal expenses insurance contracts (LEI) seem to dominate in Europe: before the event (BTE) and after the event (ATE) legal expenses insurance. Notwithstanding institutional differences between different legal systems, BTE and ATE insurance arrangements may be instrumental if government policy is geared towards strengthening a market-oriented system of financing access to justice for individuals and business. At the same time, emphasizing the role of a private industry as a keeper of the gates to justice raises issues of accountability and transparency, not readily reconcilable with demands of competition. Moreover, multiple actors (clients, lawyers, courts, insurers) are involved, causing behavioural dynamics which are not easily predicted or influenced. Against this background, this paper looks into BTE and ATE arrangements by analysing the particularities of BTE and ATE arrangements currently available in some European jurisdictions and by painting a picture of their respective markets and legal contexts. This allows for some reflection on the performance of BTE and ATE providers as both financiers and keepers. Two issues emerge from the analysis that are worthy of some further reflection. Firstly, there is the problematic long-term sustainability of some ATE products. Secondly, the challenges faced by policymakers that would like to nudge consumers into voluntarily taking out BTE LEI

Penilaian Kinerja Keuangan Koperasi di Kabupaten Pelalawan

This paper describe development and financial performance of cooperative in District Pelalawan among 2007 - 2008. Studies on primary and secondary cooperative in 12 sub-districts. Method in this stady use performance measuring of productivity, efficiency, growth, liquidity, and solvability of cooperative. Productivity of cooperative in Pelalawan was highly but efficiency still low. Profit and income were highly, even liquidity of cooperative very high, and solvability was good

Search for stop and higgsino production using diphoton Higgs boson decays

Results are presented of a search for a "natural" supersymmetry scenario with gauge mediated symmetry breaking. It is assumed that only the supersymmetric partners of the top-quark (stop) and the Higgs boson (higgsino) are accessible. Events are examined in which there are two photons forming a Higgs boson candidate, and at least two b-quark jets. In 19.7 inverse femtobarns of proton-proton collision data at sqrt(s) = 8 TeV, recorded in the CMS experiment, no evidence of a signal is found and lower limits at the 95% confidence level are set, excluding the stop mass below 360 to 410 GeV, depending on the higgsino mass

Search for anomalous production of events with three or more leptons in pp collisions at √s = 8TeV

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published articles title, journal citation, and DOI.A search for physics beyond the standard model in events with at least three leptons is presented. The data sample, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 19.5fb-1 of proton-proton collisions with center-of-mass energy s=8TeV, was collected by the CMS experiment at the LHC during 2012. The data are divided into exclusive categories based on the number of leptons and their flavor, the presence or absence of an opposite-sign, same-flavor lepton pair (OSSF), the invariant mass of the OSSF pair, the presence or absence of a tagged bottom-quark jet, the number of identified hadronically decaying τ leptons, and the magnitude of the missing transverse energy and of the scalar sum of jet transverse momenta. The numbers of observed events are found to be consistent with the expected numbers from standard model processes, and limits are placed on new-physics scenarios that yield multilepton final states. In particular, scenarios that predict Higgs boson production in the context of supersymmetric decay chains are examined. We also place a 95% confidence level upper limit of 1.3% on the branching fraction for the decay of a top quark to a charm quark and a Higgs boson (t→cH), which translates to a bound on the left- and right-handed top-charm flavor-violating Higgs Yukawa couplings, λtcH and λctH, respectively, of |λtcH|2+|λctH|2<0.21

Cyfrowy ekosystem przedsiębiorczości tradycyjnych przedsiębiorstw – studium przypadku

Purpose: The paper aims to answer the question of how the digital entrepreneurial ecosystem (DEE) shapes the activities of companies from highly traditional industries. In particular, we want to identify different types of actors from the DEE and how they foster the entrepreneurial activities of very traditional companies with a high proportion of manual labor, as well as to identify the kinds of entrepreneurial activities fostered by the DEE. Methodology: This paper applies a case study method based on the analysis of highly traditional companies in the confectionery industry that cooperate through a digital platform to sell their products. The analysis is based on in-depth interviews with key informants from three companies in the confectionery industry, as well as with the provider of the digital platform, the IT supplier and a final B2B customer. Findings: The concept of DEE needs to be extended to include an analysis of two settings – digital and traditional – as both interfere with and influence entrepreneurial activities. Digital actors within the DEE play a key role in both the digital and the traditional entrepreneurial activities of highly traditional companies. Traditional actors, meanwhile, play a supporting role in the process. Additionally, the study determines the unique characteristics of the DEE, in which traditional companies are active. Originality: The paper develops the concept of the digital entrepreneurial ecosystem. The originality of the paper lies in the analysis of the DEE from the perspective of companies from a highly traditional industry. This is a novel approach towards the DEE that has not been proposed in the literature to date.Cel: celem artykułu jest odpowiedź na pytanie, w jaki sposób cyfrowy ekosystem przedsiębiorczości (CEP) kształtuje działalność przedsiębiorstw z branż wysoce tradycyjnych. W szczególności chcemy zidentyfikować aktorów składających się na CEP oraz sposób, w jaki wspierają oni przedsiębiorczość wysoce tradycyjnych przedsiębiorstw bazujących na dużym udziale pracy ręcznej. Ponadto wskazujemy typy aktywności przedsiębiorczych wspieranych przez CEP. Metodyka: w artykule zastosowano metodę studium przypadku opartą na analizie wysoce tradycyjnych przedsiębiorstw z branży cukierniczej, które współpracują za pośrednictwem platformy cyfrowej w celu sprzedaży swoich produktów. Analiza opiera się na wywiadach pogłębionych z kluczowymi informatorami z trzech przedsiębiorstw z branży cukierniczej, a także z dostawcą platformy cyfrowej, dostawcą IT oraz klientem końcowym B2B. Rezultat: badanie pokazuje, że koncepcję CEP należy rozszerzyć tak, aby obejmowała analizę dwóch środowisk – cyfrowego i tradycyjnego – ponieważ oba wpływają zarówno na siebie, jak i na działalność przedsiębiorczą aktorów. Aktorzy cyfrowi w CEP odgrywają kluczową rolę w cyfrowej i tradycyjnej działalności przedsiębiorczej wysoce tradycyjnych przedsiębiorstw. Natomiast tradycyjni aktorzy odgrywają w tym procesie drugoplanową rolę. Dodatkowo nasze wyniki określają autorską charakterystykę CEP, w której działają tradycyjne przedsiębiorstwa. Oryginalność: artykuł rozwija koncepcję cyfrowego ekosystemu przedsiębiorczości (CEP). Oryginalność artykułu polega na analizie CEP z perspektywy przedsiębiorstw z wysoce tradycyjnej branży. Jest to nowatorskie podejście do analizy CEP, które do tej pory nie było proponowane w literaturze przedmiotu

Differences in DNA Methylation and Functional Expression in Lactase Persistent and Non-persistent Individuals.

In humans the expression of lactase changes during post-natal development, leading to phenotypes known as lactase persistence and non-persistence. Polymorphisms within the lactase gene (LCT) enhancer, in particular the -13910C &gt; T, but also others, are linked to these phenotypes. We were interested in identifying dynamic mediators of LCT regulation, beyond the genotype at -13910C &gt; T. To this end, we investigated two levels of lactase regulation in human intestinal samples obtained from New England children and adolescents of mixed European ancestry: differential expression of transcriptional regulators of LCT, and variations in DNA methylation, and their relation to phenotype. Variations in expression of CDX2, POU2F1, GATA4, GATA6, and HNF1α did not correlate with phenotype. However, an epigenome-wide approach using the Illumina Infinium HM450 bead chip identified a differentially methylated position in the LCT promoter where methylation levels are associated with the genotype at -13910C &gt; T, the persistence/non-persistence phenotype and lactase enzymatic activity. DNA methylation levels at this promoter site and CpGs in the LCT enhancer are associated with genotype. Indeed, taken together they have a higher power to predict lactase phenotypes than the genotype alone

About olfactory expressions and their generating process

Abstract In humans the expression of lactase changes during post-natal development, leading to phenotypes known as lactase persistence and non-persistence. Polymorphisms within the lactase gene (LCT) enhancer, in particular the −13910C > T, but also others, are linked to these phenotypes. We were interested in identifying dynamic mediators of LCT regulation, beyond the genotype at −13910C > T. To this end, we investigated two levels of lactase regulation in human intestinal samples obtained from New England children and adolescents of mixed European ancestry: differential expression of transcriptional regulators of LCT, and variations in DNA methylation, and their relation to phenotype. Variations in expression of CDX2, POU2F1, GATA4, GATA6, and HNF1α did not correlate with phenotype. However, an epigenome-wide approach using the Illumina Infinium HM450 bead chip identified a differentially methylated position in the LCT promoter where methylation levels are associated with the genotype at −13910C > T, the persistence/non-persistence phenotype and lactase enzymatic activity. DNA methylation levels at this promoter site and CpGs in the LCT enhancer are associated with genotype. Indeed, taken together they have a higher power to predict lactase phenotypes than the genotype alone

Endogenous cortisol and conditioned placebo effects on pain - A randomized trial

Placebo effects can be induced by learning and conditioning processes, which in turn are influenced and modulated by glucocorticoids. Accordingly, previous research has shown that intervention-related associative learning can be modulated through exogenous as well as endogenous glucocorticoids. Thus, the aim of this study was to elucidate whether placebo effects induced by conditioning is modulated by daily fluctuations of endogenous cortisol levels in healthy male and female subjects. Overall 77 participants underwent a two-phased placebo conditioning paradigm for pain analgesia. Subjects were randomized in two groups, which underwent placebo preconditioning either in the morning (08:00-10:00, i.e. with high endogenous cortisol levels) or in the afternoon (16:00-18:00, i.e. with low endogenous cortisol levels). Placebo effects were assessed two days later at noontime (12:00-13:00), with possible differences between groups as an indicator of glucocorticoid modulation on the placebo learning. Results indicated a significant conditioned placebo-induced analgesia, resulting in a placebo effect of small to medium size. Cortisol levels on conditioning day significantly differed between groups and cortisol levels were similar during assessment of placebo effects. Groups did not differ in their mean reduction in pain sensation, thus the placebo effect was not affected by differences in cortisol levels during the conditioning of placebo effects. The present study does not indicate a moderation of placebo conditioning by endogenous glucocorticoid levels