Manipulation of qubits in non-orthogonal collective storage modes

We present an analysis of transfer of quantum information between the collective spin degrees of freedom of a large ensemble of two-level systems and a single central qubit. The coupling between the central qubit and the individual ensemble members may be varied and thus provides access to more than a single storage mode. Means to store and manipulate several independent qubits are derived for the case where the variation in coupling strengths does not allow addressing of orthogonal modes of the ensemble. While our procedures and analysis may apply to a number of different physical systems, for concreteness, we study the transfer of quantum states between a single electron spin and an ensemble of nuclear spins in a quantum dot

Towards sustainable health care systems: Strategies in health insurance schemes in France, Germany, Japan and the Netherlands ; a comparative study

In all four countries health care expenditures grow while the revenue remains at the same level or even shrinks in many cases. Due to medical progress, ageing and many other factors the gap is widening over time. The pay-as-you-go approach is running against limits either with rising employer and employee contribution rates as is the case in the so-called Bismarck-Systems or with higher taxes in the so-called Beveridge-systems. There are differences regarding the solutions of each country to tackle the described challenge and they might be able to learn from each other if they are compared. Therefore the study compares the health care systems of France, Germany, Japan and the Netherlands. Due to the complexity of the different institutional settings it seems necessary to select certain criteria in order to make a comparison at all possible. The comparison is divided into three different sections. The institutional and organizational framework as first section compares the general organization of social health insurance in all four countries. It comprises the benefit structure, the enrolment, ownership issues and other criteria. The second section focuses on the funding of social health insurance comparing the different approaches according to criteria like contribution rates, contribution assessment bases, burden of contributions and others. The final section analyses different strategies in the provision and purchasing of health services in the four countries. Next to other hospital ownership infrastructure characteristics play an important role in this section. In the last part of the study certain lessons are drawn from the comparison of the four countries. Furthermore certain developments are described which can be anticipated for the future of social health insurance systems. -- Sowohl die demographische Entwicklung als auch vielfältige medizinische und medizinisch-technische Fortschritte führten in den letzten Jahren zu starken Ausgabensteigerungen in den sozialen Krankenversicherungssystemen. Neben Deutschland sind von dieser Entwicklung auch andere Länder mit sozialen Krankenversicherungssystemen betroffen. Die vorliegende Studie nimmt einen systematischen Vergleich zwischen verschiedenen Ländern vor, deren Gesundheitssystem auf einer sozialen Krankenversicherung aufbaut: Deutschland, Frankreich, Japan und die Niederlande. Anhand definierter Kriterien werden die unterschiedlichen Ausprägungsformen im Hinblick auf den organisatorischen und institutionellen Rahmen, die Mittelaufbringung sowie die Leistungserbringung bzw. die Mittelverwendung der einzelnen Länder verglichen. Anschließend werden mögliche Handlungsstrategien aus dem Vergleich abgeleitet, um den zukünftigen Herausforderungen zu begegnen und eine nachhaltige Entwicklung der sozialen Krankenversicherungssysteme sicherzustellen. Abschließend werden bestimmte Entwicklungen beschrieben, die für die sozialen Krankenversicherungssysteme antizipiert werden können.

Managing pharmaceutical regulation in Germany: Overview and economic assessment

Rising costs in pharmaceutical expenditure have become a major concern for policy makers in Germany over the last years. Therefore the pharmaceutical market in Germany has been increasingly targeted by different kinds of regulations, focussing both on the supply and the demand side, using price, volume and spending controls. Specific regulations include price reductions, reference pricing, pharmacy rebate for sickness funds, increasing co-payments, an aut-idem substitution, parallel imports, negative list, guidelines, and finally spending caps for pharmaceutical expenditure per physicians association. Although it is difficult to attribute certain effects to single measures, some measures like reference pricing and physician spending caps are more effective and long-lasting than others. Although highly disputed among physicians, the spending caps applied between 1993 and 2001 have limited pharmaceutical expenditure for an entire decade. However, while some measures do effectively control expenditures, their effect on allocative efficiency may be negative. -- Steigende Ausgaben für Arzneimittel stellen zunehmend ein Problem für Entscheidungsträger in Politik und Selbstverwaltung dar. Daher war der Arzneimittelmarkt in den letzten Jahren Ziel verschiedener Regulierungsformen, die sowohl auf der Angebotsseite als auch auf der Nachfrageseite ansetzen und sowohl Instrumente zur Preis, Mengen als auch Ausgabenregulierung nutzen. Sie umfassen dabei insbesondere Preisrabatte, Festbeträge, Zuzahlungen, Aut-idem substitution, Parallelimporte, Negativlisten, Leitlinien and Arzneimittelbudgets. Obwohl es schwierig ist, bestimmte Wirkungen monokausal auf einzelne Maßnahmen zu zurückzuführen, kann festgestellt werden, dass Arzneimittelbudgets und Festpreise nachhaltiger und effektiver als andere Regulierungsformen sind. Obwohl Arzneimittelbudgets bei niedergelassenen Ärzten sehr umstritten sind, waren sie hauptverantwortlich für die Begrenzung der Arzneimittelausgaben zwischen 1993 und 2001. Daneben existieren einige Regulierungsformen die zwar die Arzneimittel-ausgaben wirksam senken, deren allokative Effizienz jedoch insgesamt eher negativ ist.

Organizational Change and Reference-Dependent Preferences

Reference-dependent preferences can explain several puzzling observations about organizational change. We introduce a dynamic model in which a loss-neutral firm bargains with loss-averse workers over organizational change and wages. We show that change is often stagnant or slow for long periods followed by a sudden boost in productivity during a crisis. Moreover, it accounts for the fact that different firms in the same industry often have significant productivity differences. The model also demonstrates the importance of expectation management even if all parties have rational expectations. Social preferences explain why it may be optimal to divide a firm into separate entities

Limited utility of qPCR-based detection of tumor-specific circulating mRNAs in whole blood from clear cell renal cell carcinoma patients

BACKGROUND: RNA sequencing data is providing abundant information about the levels of dysregulation of genes in various tumors. These data, as well as data based on older microarray technologies have enabled the identification of many genes which are upregulated in clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) compared to matched normal tissue. Here we use RNA sequencing data in order to construct a panel of highly overexpressed genes in ccRCC so as to evaluate their RNA levels in whole blood and determine any diagnostic potential of these levels for renal cell carcinoma patients. METHODS: A bioinformatics analysis with Python was performed using TCGA, GEO and other databases to identify genes which are upregulated in ccRCC while being absent in the blood of healthy individuals. Quantitative Real Time PCR (RT-qPCR) was subsequently used to measure the levels of candidate genes in whole blood (PAX gene) of 16 ccRCC patients versus 11 healthy individuals. PCR results were processed in qBase and GraphPadPrism and statistics was done with Mann-Whitney U test. RESULTS: While most analyzed genes were either undetectable or did not show any dysregulated expression, two genes, CDK18 and CCND1, were paradoxically downregulated in the blood of ccRCC patients compared to healthy controls. Furthermore, LOX showed a tendency towards upregulation in metastatic ccRCC samples compared to non-metastatic. CONCLUSIONS: This analysis illustrates the difficulty of detecting tumor regulated genes in blood and the possible influence of interference from expression in blood cells even for genes conditionally absent in normal blood. Testing in plasma samples indicated that tumor specific mRNAs were not detectable. While CDK18, CCND1 and LOX mRNAs might carry biomarker potential, this would require validation in an independent, larger patient cohort

How Do Firms Form Expectations of Aggregate Growth? New Evidence from a Large-scale Business Survey

Expectations are highly relevant for macroeconomic dynamics. Yet, the empirical evidence about properties of corporate macroeconomic expectations is scarce. Using new survey data on quantitative growth expectations of firms in Germany, we show that expectations are highly dispersed. The degree of dispersion depends on firm size and on how important the general economy is for the business of firms, supporting theories of rational inattention. Firms seem to extrapolate from local economic conditions and business experiences to aggregate growth expectations. Differences in growth expectations are associated with di erences in firms' Investment and labor demand.Not Reviewe