Klimapolitik ohne Standortnachteile

In the absence of a broad international agreement, national climate policies are less efficient, due to carbon leakage, and more costly, due to causing unemployment and a loss of competitiveness on international markets. As, in many countries, a substantial fraction of emissions results from the production of intermediate goods, such as electricity or transportation services, we investigate whether the above negative side-effects can be addressed by a policy mix that (partially) contains the effects of climate policy to the intermediate goods sector. We use a four-sector general equilibrium model to study a policy mix that consists of taxing emissions and subsidizing the intermediate good. We show that such containment is a second-best approach to combat carbon leakage and to maintain a favorable international market position. Also, it can help to reduce climate-policy-induced unemployment.

Environmental Policy à la Carte: Letting Firms Choose their Regulation

Environmental policy often has to be devised under informational constraints, like uncertainty and asymmetric information. We consider an environmental policy that aims at reducing the welfare losses caused by asymmetric information while being sufficiently simple for implementation. In this policy, firms can choose between being regulated with an emission tax or a permit market. This serves as a screening device; the firms reveal private information by choosing an instrument. We show that such a menu of policy options improves upon conventional environmental policy. Furthermore, the optimal policy is simple and thus easily implementable. The approach is also theoretically interesting, because the simultaneous use of price- and quantity-based instruments induces an asymmetry into the pricesversus- quantities decision compared to Weitzman’s criterion. Especially, there can be an optimal pooling equilibrium where all firms choose the tax, but it is never optimal that all firms participate in permit trading.Environmental Policy, Asymmetric Information, Screening, Uncertainty, Prices-versus-Quantities

Risk Management as a Tool for Sustainability

Although risk and uncertainty are inevitable aspects of the sustainability problem, they are often neglected in the sustainability discourse, especially in the economic analysis of sustainable development. We argue that this deprives the sustainability discourse of interesting connections to risk management. We show that defining sustainability as the obligation to limit the risk of harming future individuals provides a framework in which tools from risk management, like mean-variance analysis, can be employed to analyze planning decisions and to calculate a risk-minimizing policy mix. Furthermore, we discuss whether such a notion of sustainability can be an ethically tenable sustainability concept and how a positive probability of harming future individuals might be defende

Sustainability and its relation to efficiency under uncertainty

Evaluating the long-run consequences of present actions, as in the context of sustainability, requires information about the actions' outcomes and about future preferences that is often uncertain. We analyze a risk-based criterion of sustainability and a corresponding efficiency concept that cover these uncertainties. We derive several properties of these criteria and formally characterize the trade-off between sustainability and efficiency. Furthermore, we show that maximizing the probability of ex post efficiency under a sustainability constraint provides an interesting choice rule and that, for a special case, this rule is connected to portfolio theor

Charakterystyka zagospodarowania ziemi obszaru doliny Pilicy w okolicach wsi Wielkopole

Artykuł pochodzi z książki pt. "Zagospodarowanie dolin rzecznych”Materiały Ogólnopolskiej Konferencji Studenckich Kół Naukowych Geografów „Zagospodarowanie dolin rzecznych” Łódź, 27-29 października 2006 r.Minister Nauki i Szkolnictwa Wyższego, Dziekan Wydziału Nauk Geograficznych Uniwersytetu Łódzkieg

Efectos del tostado por convección y microondas sobre las propiedades físico-químicas de granos de cacao y de manteca de cacao extraída de ellos

The cocoa beans of the Ivory Coast variety were convectively and microwave roasted. The effects of roasting conditions on the principal physicochemical attributes (water and fat contents, total and volatile acidity) of roasted cocoa beans and the properties of fat extracted from this material (acidity, saponification index, iodine index, peroxide value, light refraction coefficient, polar fraction content, and Fatty Acid profile, absorbancy of 1 and 10% solution in hexane) were examined. The characteristics of roasted and raw cocoa beans and their lipid fractions were compared. Results of analyses showed that convective roasting for 35 min at 135°C, air flow rate 1.0mxs-1 and relative humidity RH of 0.45% caused the least advanced changes in fat quality while microwave roasting promoted oxidation of lipids although the quality of roasted cocoa beans was the best.Granos de cacao de la variedad Costa de Marfil se han sometido a tostado mediante convección y microondas. Se ha estudiado el efecto de las condiciones de tostado sobre los atributos físico-químicos principales (contenido de agua y grasa, acidez total y volátil) del cacao en grano tostado y las propiedades de la grasa extraída de este material (Acidez, índice de saponificación, índice de peróxidos, índice de yodo, índice de refracción, contenido de fracción polar, perfil de ácidos grasos, absorbancia de una solución al 10% en hexano). Se han comparado las características de los granos de cacao tostados y crudos y sus fracciones lipídicas. Los resultados de los análisis mostraron que el tostado mediante convección durante 35 minutos a 135°C, con un caudal de aire de 1,0 m s-1 y HR de 0,45 causó los menores cambios en la calidad de grasa mientras que el tostado mediante microondas promovió en mayor medida la oxidación de los lípidos aunque la calidad de los granos de cacao tostado fue mejor

The Role of Hspa9 in Mouse Hematopoiesis and IL-7 Receptor Signaling

HSPA9 was previously identified as a candidate gene in a commonly deleted region (CDR) associated with myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS), a clonal hematopoietic stem cell disorder. Cytogenetic abnormalities occur in ~50% of MDS patients and an interstitial deletion or loss of chromosome 5 containing HSPA9 is the most common, occurring in up to 25% of patients. In order to understand the role of HSPA9 in hematopoiesis and disease development, we created an Hspa9 knockout mouse model. We characterized hematopoiesis of heterozygous mice (Hspa9+/-), which have a 50% reduction in Hspa9 expression, modeling the heterozygous loss of HSPA9 and 50% reduction in mRNA observed in MDS patients. Homozygous knockout of Hspa9 is embryonic lethal prior to fetal liver hematopoiesis, preventing further evaluation of hematopoiesis in Hspa9-/- mice. Analysis of stem, progenitor and mature stages of hematopoiesis up to 18 months of age identified no significant differences in Hspa9+/- mice compared to Hspa9+/+ littermates in vivo. However, as early as 2 months of age, Hspa9+/- mice have a significant reduction in CFU-PreB colony formation in vitro, indicating a B-cell progenitor defect. This reduction in colony formation is hematopoietic-cell intrinsic and likely due to a functional B-cell progenitor defect, since B-cell progenitor frequencies in Hspa9+/- mice are normal. Gene expression array analysis revealed a reduction in gene expression pathways associated with proliferation and activation of B-lymphocytes. Gene expression analysis of hematopoietic progenitor cells from MDS patients also identified B-cell signaling pathways as the most down-regulated pathways. IL-7 added exogenously to CFU-PreB cultures was able to partially rescue the reduction in Hspa9+/- CFU-PreB colony formation, further indicating dysfunctional IL-7 signaling in Hspa9+/- B-cells. To explore the contribution of Hspa9 to altered IL-7R signaling, we interrogated an IL-7 dependent cell line treated with an Hspa9 or non-targeting control siRNA. Knockdown of Hspa9 resulted in a significant growth defect in these cells and reduced Stat5 phosphorylation following IL-7 stimulation of cytokine-starved cells. Collectively, these data implicate Hspa9 in IL-7R signaling in B-cells. Further work will determine whether HSPA9 loss contributes to the reduction in B-cell progenitors and increased B-cell apoptosis observed in patients with MDS

Language as an Element of the Extended Phenotype: A Contribution to the Application of the Extended Phenotype Concept in Linguistic Research

This paper discusses evolutionary and neurobiological approaches to linguistic research. The role and significance of the co-evolution processes of language and the brain are highlighted. Thus language is regarded as a product of natural selection, shaped by the brain (but the influence is mutual). The author also indicates a possibility of applying the extended phenotype concept to the study of language. That original idea implies the perception of language as a neuromimesis-based phenotypic expression of the biological and cultural replicators outside the organism’s body.This paper discusses evolutionary and neurobiological approaches to linguistic research. The role and significance of the co-evolution processes of language and the brain are highlighted. Thus language is regarded as a product of natural selection, shaped by the brain (but the influence is mutual). The author also indicates a possibility of applying the extended phenotype concept to the study of language. That original idea implies the perception of language as a neuromimesis-based phenotypic expression of the biological and cultural replicators outside the organism’s body

Technological Diversity and Cost Uncertainty

In many industries, different technologies are used simultaneously for the production of a homogeneous good. Such diversification is socially beneficial, because it reduces the transmission of factor price volatility, like oil-price shocks, to consumer prices. Therefore, many countries have implemented policies aimed at increasing technological diversification. The question is whether such policies are necessary. We use a two-stage investment model to address this question in the setting of perfect competition and of a monopoly. We show that factor price uncertainty leads to diversification, if capital is not too expensive, and that this diversification is due to each firm investing in a diversified technology portfolio. An important implication of this form of diversification is that technological diversity is socially optimal, even in the case of a monopoly. Thus policy intervention is unnecessary and might even be detrimenta