Return enhancing, cash-rich or simply empire-building? An empirical investigation of corporate real estate holdings

No, we find no evidence for a return-enhancing role for corporate real estate holdings, which is consistent with the previous literature. Instead, our study based on a sample of U.S. listed corporations suggests that corporate real estate holdings are a form of managerial “empire building”. Corporations with weaker corporate governance and a lower degree of financial constraint tend to have higher real estate holdings, whereas higher real estate holdings are associated with lower returns to shareholders. The impact of corporate governance on corporate real estate holdings seems to be stronger in manufacturing-related industries. Implications and future research directions are discussed

Return enhancing, cash-rich or simply empire-building? An empirical investigation of corporate real estate holdings

No, we find no evidence for a return-enhancing role for corporate real estate holdings, which is consistent with the previous literature. Instead, our study based on a sample of U.S. listed corporations suggests that corporate real estate holdings are a form of managerial “empire building”. Corporations with weaker corporate governance and a lower degree of financial constraint tend to have higher real estate holdings, whereas higher real estate holdings are associated with lower returns to shareholders. The impact of corporate governance on corporate real estate holdings seems to be stronger in manufacturing-related industries. Implications and future research directions are discussed

Intellectual property rights, technical progress and the volatility of economic growth

In this note, we analyze the effects of intellectual property rights on the volatility of economic growth. Our analysis is motivated by the observation that the strengthening of patent protection and the increase in R&D in the US coincide with a reduction in growth volatility beginning in the mid 1980’s. To analyze this phenomenon, we develop an R&D-based growth model with aggregate uncertainty in the innovation process and apply the model to ask whether increasing patent strength and R&D can lead to a significant reduction in growth volatility. We find a small but non-negligible effect that explains no less than 10% of the observed reduction in growth volatility in the US

How competitive, cooperative, and collaborative gamification impacts student learning and engagement

Gamification is an increasingly popular approach to engage learners in educational contexts. Although many studies have examined the effects of gamification in comparison to a non-gamification approach, less attention has been paid to the impact of different ways of implementing gamification on students’ learning and engagement. In this study, we performed a quasi-experiment on the competitive, cooperative, and collaborative types of gamification among secondary school students who learn English as a foreign language. The quantitative results indicate students in the competitive condition significantly outperformed their peers in the cooperative condition on a reading-related skill (morphological awareness), word reading, and reading comprehension. They also had higher gains in morphological awareness than students in the collaborative condition, although these two groups showed similar improvement in far-transfer measures (i.e., word reading and reading comprehension). Concerning engagement, qualitative data collected from interviews suggested gamification contributed to students’ behavioural, emotional, and cognitive engagement. The qualitative data also reflected the possible reasons for the quantitative results. We conclude that cooperative and collaborative gamification should be designed carefully and take various factors into account (e.g., establishing shared goals and rewards, emphasising individual and collective contributions, and collaboration training) to ensure that the gamification approach does not hinder student learning

Direct and indirect control of the initiation of meiotic recombination by DNA damage checkpoint mechanisms in budding yeast

Meiotic recombination plays an essential role in the proper segregation of chromosomes at meiosis I in many sexually reproducing organisms. Meiotic recombination is initiated by the scheduled formation of genome-wide DNA double-strand breaks (DSBs). The timing of DSB formation is strictly controlled because unscheduled DSB formation is detrimental to genome integrity. Here, we investigated the role of DNA damage checkpoint mechanisms in the control of meiotic DSB formation using budding yeast. By using recombination defective mutants in which meiotic DSBs are not repaired, the effect of DNA damage checkpoint mutations on DSB formation was evaluated. The Tel1 (ATM) pathway mainly responds to unresected DSB ends, thus the sae2 mutant background in which DSB ends remain intact was employed. On the other hand, the Mec1 (ATR) pathway is primarily used when DSB ends are resected, thus the rad51 dmc1 double mutant background was employed in which highly resected DSBs accumulate. In order to separate the effect caused by unscheduled cell cycle progression, which is often associated with DNA damage checkpoint defects, we also employed the ndt80 mutation which permanently arrests the meiotic cell cycle at prophase I. In the absence of Tel1, DSB formation was reduced in larger chromosomes (IV, VII, II and XI) whereas no significant reduction was found in smaller chromosomes (III and VI). On the other hand, the absence of Rad17 (a critical component of the ATR pathway) lead to an increase in DSB formation (chromosomes VII and II were tested). We propose that, within prophase I, the Tel1 pathway facilitates DSB formation, especially in bigger chromosomes, while the Mec1 pathway negatively regulates DSB formation. We also identified prophase I exit, which is under the control of the DNA damage checkpoint machinery, to be a critical event associated with down-regulating meiotic DSB formation

The photometric observation of the quasi-simultaneous mutual eclipse and occultation between Europa and Ganymede on 22 August 2021

Mutual events (MEs) are eclipses and occultations among planetary natural satellites. Most of the time, eclipses and occultations occur separately. However, the same satellite pair will exhibit an eclipse and an occultation quasi-simultaneously under particular orbital configurations. This kind of rare event is termed as a quasi-simultaneous mutual event (QSME). During the 2021 campaign of mutual events of jovian satellites, we observed a QSME between Europa and Ganymede. The present study aims to describe and study the event in detail. We observed the QSME with a CCD camera attached to a 300-mm telescope at the Hong Kong Space Museum Sai Kung iObservatory. We obtained the combined flux of Europa and Ganymede from aperture photometry. A geometric model was developed to explain the light curve observed. Our results are compared with theoretical predictions (O-C). We found that our simple geometric model can explain the QSME fairly accurately, and the QSME light curve is a superposition of the light curves of an eclipse and an occultation. Notably, the observed flux drops are within 2.6% of the theoretical predictions. The size of the event central time O-Cs ranges from -14.4 to 43.2 s. Both O-Cs of flux drop and timing are comparable to other studies adopting more complicated models. Given the event rarity, model simplicity and accuracy, we encourage more observations and analysis on QSMEs to improve Solar System ephemerides.Comment: 23 pages, 5 appendixes, 16 figures, 7 table

The association of RANTES polymorphism with severe acute respiratory syndrome in Hong Kong and Beijing Chinese

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Chemokines play important roles in inflammation and antiviral action. We examined whether polymorphisms of <it>RANTES, IP-10 </it>and <it>Mig </it>affect the susceptibility to and outcome of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS).</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We tested the polymorphisms of <it>RANTES, IP-10 </it>and <it>Mig </it>for their associations with SARS in 495 Hong Kong Chinese SARS patients and 578 controls. Then we tried to confirm the results in 356 Beijing Chinese SARS patients and 367 controls.</p> <p>Results</p> <p><it>RANTES </it>-28 G allele was associated with SARS susceptibility in Hong Kong Chinese (<it>P </it>< 0.0001, OR = 2.80, 95%CI:2.11–3.71). Individuals with <it>RANTES </it>-28 CG and GG genotypes had a 3.28-fold (95%CI:2.32–4.64) and 3.06-fold (95%CI:1.47–6.39) increased risk of developing SARS respectively (<it>P </it>< 0.0001). This -28 G allele conferred risk of death in a gene-dosage dependent manner (<it>P </it>= 0.014) with CG and GG individuals having a 2.12-fold (95% CI: 1.11–4.06) and 4.01-fold (95% CI: 1.30–12.4) increased risk. For the replication of <it>RANTES </it>data in Beijing Chinese, the -28 G allele was not associated with susceptibility to SARS. However, -28 CG (OR = 4.27, 95%CI:1.64–11.1) and GG (OR = 3.34, 95%CI:0.37–30.7) were associated with admission to intensive care units or death due to SARS (<it>P </it>= 0.011).</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p><it>RANTES </it>-28 G allele plays a role in the pathogenesis of SARS.</p