The Long-Term Effects of the Printing Press in Sub-Saharan Africa

This article delves into the relationship between newspaper readership and civic attitudes, and its effect on economic development. To this end, we investigate the long-term consequences of the introduction of the printing press in the 19th century. In sub-Saharan Africa, Protestant missionaries were the first both to import the printing press technology and to allow the indigenous population to use it. We build a new geocoded dataset locating Protestant missions in 1903. This dataset includes, for each mission station, the geographic location and its characteristics, as well as the educational and health-related investments undertaken by the mission. We show that, within regions located close to missions, proximity to a printing press significantly increases newspaper readership today. We also document a strong association between proximity to a printing press and contemporary economic development. Our results are robust to a variety of identification strategies

In situ Fourier transform infrared reflection absortion spectroscopy study of adenine adsorption on gold electrodes in basic media

In situ Fourier transform infrared reflection absortion spectroscopy (FT-IRRAS) has been used in the external (SNIFTIRS method) and the internal (ATR-SEIRAS) reflection configurations to determine the pH influence, in the neutral and basic range, on the adsorption of adenine on Au(111) and gold nanofilm electrodes from D2O and H2O solutions. In D2O solutions, the main adsorbate band around 1640 cm−1,due to a ring stretching mode, shows different characteristics in the spectra collected at pH values at which the neutral and the basic adenine forms predominate in solution. The analysis of these differences, in comparison with the respective spectra of adenine in solution, permits us to conclude that both forms of adenine can adsorb chemically. The high sensitivity of the ATR-SEIRAS method has been used to analyze the contribution to the spectra of each form of adsorbed adenine as a function of the pH of the solution. The pKa2 obtained for the adsorbed species from this analysis is almost coincident with the pKa2 reported for adenine in solution, indicating that the coordination to the electrode and the second acid-base equilibrium involves different atoms of the adenine molecule. This result confirms the previously proposed adsorption model for adenine, implying the bonding of adenine to the electrode by the amine nitrogen (N10) and either the ring nitrogens N1 or N7, while the second acid-base equilibrium of adenine involves the ring nitrogen N9. Comparison of the 3400-3600 cm−1 region of the ATR-SEIRAS spectra of adenine obtained in H2O solutions at different pH values, which corresponds to the characteristic–OH stretching mode of the interfacial water molecules, permits us to discard the co-adsorption of water molecules in neutral and basic media, contrary to the case of adenine adsorption from acid media.Financial support from the Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology (CTQ2010-19823 and a FPU-grant to JAM), from the Junta de Andalucia (PAI FQM202) and University of Alicante

An Efficient Canonical Narrowing Implementation with Irreducibility and SMT Constraints for Generic Symbolic Protocol Analysis

Narrowing and unification are very useful tools for symbolic analysis of rewrite theories, and thus for any model that can be specified in that way. A very clear example of their application is the field of formal cryptographic protocol analysis, which is why narrowing and unification are used in tools such as Maude-NPA, Tamarin and Akiss. In this work we present the implementation of a canonical narrowing algorithm, which improves the standard narrowing algorithm, extended to be able to process rewrite theories with conditional rules. The conditions of the rules will contain SMT constraints, which will be carried throughout the execution of the algorithm to determine if the solutions have associated satisfiable or unsatisfiable constraints, and in the latter case, discard them.Comment: 41 pages, 7 tables, 1 algorithm, 9 example

The Long-Term Effects of the Printing Press in sub-Saharan Africa

This article investigates the long-term consequences of the printing press in the nineteenth century sub-Saharan Africa on social capital nowadays. Protestant missionaries were the first to import the printing press and to allow the indigenous population to use it. We build a new geocoded dataset locating Protestant missions in 1903. This dataset includes, for each mission station, the geographic location and its characteristics, as well as the printing-, educational-, and health-related investments undertaken by the mission. We show that, within regions close to missions, proximity to a printing press is associated with higher newspaper readership, trust, education, and political participation

Sex and the mission: the conflicting effects of early Christian missions on HIV in sub-Saharan Africa

This article investigates the long-term impact of historical missionary activity on HIV in sub-Saharan Africa. On the one hand, missionaries were the first to invest in modern medicine in the region. On the other hand, Christianity influenced sexual beliefs and behaviors that affect the risk of contagion. We build a new geocoded dataset locating Protestant and Catholic missions in the early 20th century, as well as the health facilities they invested in, that we combine with individual-level DHS data. With these data, we can address separately these two channels , within regions close to historical missionary settlements. First, we show that proximity to historical missionary health facilities decreases the likelihood of HIV; persistence in healthcare provision and safer sexual behaviors in the region explain this result. Second, we show that regions close to historical missionary settlements exhibit higher likelihood of HIV. This effect is driven by the Christian population in our sample. This suggests conversion to Christianity as a possible explanatory channel. Our findings are robust to alternative specifications addressing selection

Incidencia en la aplicación de la reforma tributaria para la devolución del 50% del Impuesto al Valor Agregado (IVA) pagado por sociedades que se dediquen exclusivamente a la producción de audiovisuales, producción de videos musicales, telenovelas, series, miniseries, reality shows, televisivas o en plataformas en internet, o producciones cinematográficas, que efectúen sus rodajes en la ciudad de Quito durante el año 2019, según Resolución No. NAC-DGERCGC19-00000036

El tema tratado en la presente investigación pretende analizar la incidencia que se da con la implementación de nuevos incentivos económicos, de acuerdo a la Ley Orgánica de Cultura según el art. 26, en la misma se establece la creación de tácticas que impulsen el avance de la cultura. Para tal efecto se pretende conocer la reacción del sector de la producción audiovisual que tiene el derecho de solicitar la devolución del 50% de Impuesto al valor agregado en la ciudad de Quito en el transcurso del periodo 2019. Por ello se hace necesario el acercamiento a empresas legalmente constituidas en la Superintendencia de Compañías bajo este ramo, mediante encuestas que permitan evidenciar los efectos de esta reforma. Las conclusiones derivadas de este trabajo de campo aseguran que el sector productivo audiovisual necesita dar mayor importancia a esta reforma y aprovechar los beneficios que el Gobierno otorga.The subject addressed in this research aims to analyze the impact that take place with the implementation of new economic stimulus, according to article the 26 of the Organic Law of Culture, which provides the creation of strategies that promote the development of the cultural field. For this purpose, it is intended to know the reaction of the audiovisual production sector that has the right to request the return of 50% Value Added Tax (VAT) in the city of Quito throughout the period. Therefore, it is necessary to approach companies, legally registered in the Superintendence of Companies under this branch, through surveys that allow us to prove the effects of this reform. The conclusions derived from this research, show that the audiovisual productive sector needs to give greater importance and take advantage of the benefits that the government grants. Keywords Audiovisual production, Value Added Tax (VAT) refunds, taxes

OBI: A computational tool for the analysis and systematization of the positive selection in proteins

There are multiple tools for positive selection analysis, including vaccine design and detection of variants of circulating drug-resistant pathogens in population selection. However, applying these tools to analyze a large number of protein families or as part of a comprehensive phylogenomics pipeline could be challenging. Since many standard bioinformatics tools are only available as executables, integrating them into complex Bioinformatics pipelines may not be possible. We have developed OBI, an open-source tool aimed to facilitate positive selection analysis on a large scale. It can be used as a stand-alone command-line app that can be easily installed and used as a Conda package. Some advantages of using OBI are: • It speeds up the analysis by automating the entire process • It allows multiple starting points and customization for the analysis • It allows the retrieval and linkage of structural and evolutive data for a protein through We hope to provide with OBI a solution for reliably speeding up large-scale protein evolutionary and structural analysis.Fil: Calvento, Julián H.. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencia y Tecnología; ArgentinaFil: Bulgarelli, Franco Leonardo. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencia y Tecnología; ArgentinaFil: Velez Rueda, Ana Julia. Universidad Nacional de Quilmes. Departamento de Ciencia y Tecnología; Argentina. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentin

Biologically significant residual persistence of brodifacoum in reptiles following invasive rodent eradication, Galapagos Islands, Ecuador

Rat eradication resulted in prolonged presence of the anticoagulant rodenticide brodifacoum in exposed lizards, likely significantly contributing to the deaths of secondarily exposed raptors up to at least 773 days after bait application

Sex and the Mission: The Conflicting Effects of Early Christian Investments on the HIV Epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa

This article investigates the long-term historical impact of missionary activity on the prevalence of HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa. On the one hand, missionaries were among the first to invest in modern medicine in a number of countries. On the other hand, Christianity influenced sexual beliefs and behaviors. We build a new geocoded dataset locating Protestant and Catholic missions in the early 20th century, as well as their health investments. Using a number of different empirical strategies to address selection in missionary locations and into health investments, we show that missionary presence has conflicting effects on HIV today. Regions close to historical mission stations exhibit higher HIV prevalence. This negative impact is robust to multiple specifications accounting for urbanization, and we provide evidence that it is specific to STDs. Less knowledge about condom use is a likely channel. On the contrary, among regions historically close to missionary settlements, proximity to a mission with a health investment is associated with lower HIV prevalence nowadays. Safer sexual behaviors around these missions are a possible explanatory channel

Sex and the Mission: The Conflicting Effects of Early Christian Investments on the HIV Epidemic in sub-Saharan Africa

This article investigates the long-term historical impact of missionary activity on the prevalence of HIV/AIDS in sub-Saharan Africa. On the one hand, missionaries were among the first to invest in modern medicine in a number of countries. On the other hand, Christianity influenced sexual beliefs and behaviors. We build a new geocoded dataset locating Protestant and Catholic missions in the early 20th century, as well as their health investments. Using a number of different empirical strategies to address selection in missionary locations and into health investments, we show that missionary presence has conflicting effects on HIV today. Regions close to historical mission stations exhibit higher HIV prevalence. This negative impact is robust to multiple specifications accounting for urbanization, and we provide evidence that it is specific to STDs. Less knowledge about condom use is a likely channel. On the contrary, among regions historically close to missionary settlements, proximity to a mission with a health investment is associated with lower HIV prevalence nowadays. Safer sexual behaviors around these missions are a possible explanatory channel