Long Memory in Import and Export Price Inflation and Persistence of Shocks to the Terms of Trade

Long memory models have been successfully used to investigate the dynamic time-series behavior of inflation rates based on the CPI and WPI. However, almost no attention has been paid to import and export price inflation, nor to the terms of trade which they make up. This article investigates the dynamics of the terms of trade by focusing first on the time-series characteristics of these price series. It tests for long memory in export and import price inflation series and estimates the fractional differencing parameter using a number of approaches. To give a better idea of the degree of persistence of each series, estimates of the impulse responses are computed which take into account possible fractional integration. The dynamic behavior in changes in the terms of trade is then related to the long memory behavior of the import and export price inflation series. In a sample of eleven economies for which data is available, evidence of long memory in import and export price inflation occurs in about half the cases. Granger (1980) points out that the natural occurrence of long memory may be attributed to aggregation in macroeconomic series. Our analysis provides evidence of an alternative explanation, namely that long-memory may result from the differencing of a linear relationship between non-cointegrating variables. Specifically, the results from our analysis of eleven economies reveal that shocks to the terms of trade will persist if the constituent price inflation series are not cointegratedlong memory, terms of trade, imported inflation

ESTIMATING GENDER DIFFERENCES IN AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTIVITY: BIASES DUE TO OMISSION OF GENDER-INFLUENCED VARIABLES AND ENDOGENEITY OF REGRESSORS

This study evaluates managerial differences between men and women and assesses the degree of bias introduced by omission of gender-influenced variables and ignoring the endogeneity of farmer characteristics and input levels. The results also give insight to improving research methods for isolating the gender impact on productivity.Labor and Human Capital, Productivity Analysis,

Lymphocytoma in a Cow

On March 7, 1950, the office of the ambulatory clinic was called to treat a Holstein-Friesian heifer which had considerable swelling and redness about the eyes

How can the benefits of housing regeneration programs be sustained?

Formal exit strategies from social housing regeneration programs assist an estate to become a community by involving local tenants, developing leadership capacity and establishing community-run successor organisations

Sulfate Reduction in Sediments Produces High Levels of Chromophoric Dissolved Organic Matter

Sulfate reduction plays an important role in altering dissolved organic matter (DOM) in estuarine and coastal sediments, although its role in the production of optically active chromophoric DOM (CDOM) and a subset of fluorescent DOM (FDOM) has not been previously investigated in detail. Freshwater sediment slurries were incubated anaerobically with added sulfate and acetate to promote sulfate-reducing bacteria. Ultraviolet visible (UV-Vis) absorbance and 3-dimensional excitation emission matrix (EEM) fluorescence spectra were measured over a five weeks anaerobic dark incubation period. Parallel Factor Analysis (PARAFAC) of FDOM determined components that increased significantly during dark and anaerobic incubation matching three components previously considered of terrestrially-derived or humic-like origin published in the OpenFluor database. The observed FDOM increase was strongly correlated (R2 = 0.96) with the reduction of sulfate. These results show a direct experimental link between sulfate reduction and FDOM production, which impacts our understanding of coastal FDOM sources and early sediment diagenesis. As 3D fluorescence techniques are commonly applied to diverse systems, these results provide increasing support that FDOM can have many diverse sources not consistently captured by common classifications such as “humic-like” fluorescence

Finite-Sample Optimality of Tests in a Structural Equation

No abstract.

The scanning electron microscope as an accelerator for the undergraduate advanced physics laboratory

Few universities or colleges have an accelerator for use with advanced physics laboratories, but many of these institutions have a scanning electron microscope (SEM) on site, often in the biology department. As an accelerator for the undergraduate, advanced physics laboratory, the SEM is an excellent substitute for an ion accelerator. Although there are no nuclear physics experiments that can be performed with a typical 30 kV SEM, there is an opportunity for experimental work on accelerator physics, atomic physics, electron‐solid interactions, and the basics of modern e‐beam lithography.National Science Foundation (U.S.) (Grant 0823778

Development of a protocol for maintaining viability while shipping organoid-derived retinal tissue.

Retinal organoid technology enables generation of an inexhaustible supply of three-dimensional retinal tissue from human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs) for regenerative medicine applications. The high similarity of organoid-derived retinal tissue and transplantable human fetal retina provides an opportunity for evaluating and modeling retinal tissue replacement strategies in relevant animal models in the effort to develop a functional retinal patch to restore vision in patients with profound blindness caused by retinal degeneration. Because of the complexity of this very promising approach requiring specialized stem cell and grafting techniques, the tasks of retinal tissue derivation and transplantation are frequently split between geographically distant teams. Delivery of delicate and perishable neural tissue such as retina to the surgical sites requires a reliable shipping protocol and also controlled temperature conditions with damage-reporting mechanisms in place to prevent transplantation of tissue damaged in transit into expensive animal models. We have developed a robust overnight tissue shipping protocol providing reliable temperature control, live monitoring of the shipment conditions and physical location of the package, and damage reporting at the time of delivery. This allows for shipping of viable (transplantation-competent) hPSC-derived retinal tissue over large distances, thus enabling stem cell and surgical teams from different parts of the country to work together and maximize successful engraftment of organoid-derived retinal tissue. Although this protocol was developed for preclinical in vivo studies in animal models, it is potentially translatable for clinical transplantation in the future and will contribute to developing clinical protocols for restoring vision in patients with retinal degeneration