Technology prospects and the cross-section of stock returns

In an economy with time-varying investment opportunities, the changes in technology prospects affect aggregate consumption and individual firm's future dividends, and lead to systematic technology risk. We construct a technology factor to track the changes in technology prospects measured by U.S. patent shocks, and find that this factor explains the growth of aggregate consumption, helps to price important stock portfolios, and carries significant risk premium. Our empirical results suggest the existence of technology risk in the cross-section of stock returns. © 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.preprin

Proteomic and Metabolomic Profiling in Soft Tissue Sarcomas.

OPINION STATEMENT: Advances in proteomic and metabolomic technologies have accelerated our understanding of multiple aspects of cancer biology across distinct tumour types. Here we review the current state-of-the-art in the use of proteomics and metabolomics in soft tissue sarcomas. We highlight the utility of these Omics-based methodologies to identify new drug targets, synthetic lethal interactions, candidate therapeutics and novel biomarkers to facilitate patient stratification. Due to the unbiased and global nature of these profiling methods to assess the levels of protein expression, post-translational modifications such as phosphorylation and glycosylation as well as key metabolites, many of these findings have broad applications not just in specific histotypes but across multiple STS subtypes. Specific examples of proteomic and metabolomic findings that have led to the development of early phase clinical trials of investigational agents will be discussed. While promising, the use of these technologies in the study of sarcoma is still limited, and there is a need for further research in this area. In particular, it would be important to integrate these approaches with other Omics strategies such as genomics and epigenomics as well as implement these tools alongside clinical trials in order to maximize the impact of these tools on our biological understanding and treatment of this group of rare diseases of unmet need

Managed Bumblebees Outperform Honeybees in Increasing Peach Fruit Set in China: Different Limiting Processes with Different Pollinators

© 2015 Zhang et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ The file attached is the published version of the article

Rare epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutations in non-small cell lung cancer.

Epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) mutations are the second most common oncogenic driver event in non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC). Classical activating mutations (exon 19 deletions and the L858R point mutation) comprise the vast majority of EGFR mutations and are well defined as strong predictors for good clinical response to EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitors (EGFRi). However, low frequency mutations including point mutations, deletions, insertions and duplications occur within exons 18-25 of the EGFR gene in NSCLC and are associated with poorer responses to EGFRi. Despite an increased uptake of more sensitive detection methods to identify rare EGFR mutations in patients, our understanding of the biology of these rare EGFR mutations is poor compared to classical mutations. In particular, clinical data focused on these mutations is lacking due to their rarity and challenges in trial recruitment, resulting in an absence of effective treatment strategies for many low frequency EGFR mutations. In this review, we describe the structural and mechanistic features of rare EGFR mutations in NSCLC and discuss the preclinical and clinical evidence for EGFRi response for individual rare EGFR mutations. We also discuss EGFRi sensitivity for complex EGFR mutations, and conclude by offering a perspective on the outstanding questions and future steps required to make advances in the treatment of NSCLC patients that harbour rare EGFR mutations

Mycorrhizal symbiosis enhances Phalaenopsis orchid’s growth and resistance to Erwinia chrysanthemi

Phalaenopsis is the most important potted orchid genus in the world. However, the low seedling survival rate, long vegetative growth period and disease outbreak are problems in production. Orchid micorrhizal fungi (OMF) are their obligate partners in orchid physiology. Orchids use their symbionts to gain access to organic and mineral nutrients by increasing nutrient absorption and translocation to plants under natural conditions. The benefit of orchid mycorrhizal symbiosis using Phalaenopsis as model plants was conducted. We inoculated in vitro grown plantlets of Doritaenopsis Taisuco Wonder ‘King Car Butterfly KC1111’ and Phalaenopsis Tai Lin Redangel ‘V31‘ with two OMF isolates, Ceratobasidium sp. AG-A (R02) and Rizoctonia solani AG-6 (R04). The effects of OMFs on orchid plant growth and Erwinia soft rot progression were examined after two months of ex vitro growth. The results showed that the presence of OMFs in Phalaenopsis roots significantly increased the growth and soft rot resistance of plants. Selectivity of cultivar type to different OMF was also observed. The relevance of this findings and future work are discussed.Key words: Phalaenopsis, orchid micorrhizal fungi, orchid, cultivar type

Early re-brightenings in GRB afterglows as signatures of low-to-high density boundary

The association of long gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) with star forming regions and the idea of massive stars as progenitors of GRBs are widely accepted. Because of their short lifetimes, it is very likely that massive stars are still embedded in dense molecular clouds when they give birth to GRBs. Stellar winds from GRB progenitors can create low-density bubbles with sizes and densities strongly depending on the initial ambient density. A boundary between the bubble and the dense molecular cloud must exist with the density at the boundary increasing from that of the bubble to that of the outer cloud. We have calculated the lightcurves of the afterglows in such environments with three regions: the stellar wind region, the boundary, and the molecular cloud. We show that the interaction between the cylindrical jet and the density boundary can result in a re-brightening of the afterglow occurring as early as ∼1 day after the GRB. We compare our models with the optical afterglows of GRB 970508, GRB 000301C, and GRB 030226. We find that the values of our model parameters, including the radius of the wind bubble, the densities in the bubble and in the outer molecular cloud are within typical ranges. © 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.postprin

Extreme Food-Plant Specialisation in Megabombus Bumblebees as a Product of Long Tongues Combined with Short Nesting Seasons

© 2015 Huang et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ The attached file is the published version of the article

Tropomyosin receptor kinase inhibitors in the management of sarcomas.

Purpose of review Genetic aberrations resulting in tropomyosin receptor kinase (TRK) fusion proteins can drive oncogenesis and are postulated to occur in up to 1% of solid tumours. However, TRK fusions in adult sarcomas are rare and there is a significant challenge in identifying patients with sarcomas harbouring TRK fusions in the clinical setting. Despite a recent European Society of Medical Oncology consensus article regarding screening of tumours for TRK fusions, economical and practical limitations present a barrier to widespread screening of sarcomas.Recent findings Larotrectinib and entrectinib are pan-TRK inhibitors which have both received FDA approval for the management of solid tumours harbouring NTRK fusions. Initial results of a number of clinical trials have demonstrated promising efficacy and safety data, including dramatic and durable responses in patients with sarcomas. As such, TRK inhibitors represent a promising treatment option in a small cohort of adult sarcoma patients, where currently treatment options are limited. The emergence of acquired resistance is a concern associated with TRK inhibitor therapy and a number of second-generation agents targeting TRK kinase mutations driving acquired resistance have entered early-phase clinical trials.Summary With the growing appreciation of the implications of TRK fusions, this review will summarize the emerging clinical trial data of TRK inhibitors in sarcomas. Although in their infancy, clinical trial results are encouraging, and as further results and analyses are released, we will have a greater understanding of their impact on clinical practice and the management of patients with sarcomas

The role of the nature of the noise in the thermal conductance of mechanical systems

Focussing on a paradigmatic small system consisting of two coupled damped oscillators, we survey the role of the L\'evy-It\^o nature of the noise in the thermal conductance. For white noises, we prove that the L\'evy-It\^o composition (Lebesgue measure) of the noise is irrelevant for the thermal conductance of a non-equilibrium linearly coupled chain, which signals the independence between mechanical and thermodynamical properties. On the other hand, for the non-linearly coupled case, the two types of properties mix and the explicit definition of the noise plays a central role.Comment: 9 pages, 2 figures. To be published in Physical Review