A QUALITATIVE INVESTIGATION INTO MAJOR DETERMINANTS OF MARKET SELECTION BY A MULTINATIONAL INSURANCE COMPANY

By using a case study approach, this study reviews the internationalisation process of an American multinational insurance company and explores the major determinants of market selection for the entry into the German insurance market. Findings from the in-depth interviews suggest that American insurance companies take a simplistic approach towards internationalisation and base their market selection upon only a limited number of economic factors. Managers should use these results to reflect upon their market selection approach and critically question themselves about to what extent their decision is actually warranted by solid economic factors. In addition, the exploratory approach allowed the emergence of new factors that have not been explored before in relation to the insurance sector. The cultural receptivity to insurance products seems to be a major determinant of market selection. Finally, the results shed light upon the applicability of the existing internationalisation theory to the insurance secto

Ray class invariants over imaginary quadratic fields

Let $K$ be an imaginary quadratic field of discriminant less than or equal to -7 and $K_{(N)}$ be its ray class field modulo $N$ for an integer $N$ greater than 1. We prove that singular values of certain Siegel functions generate $K_{(N)}$ over $K$ by extending the idea of our previous work. These generators are not only the simplest ones conjectured by Schertz, but also quite useful in the matter of computation of class polynomials. We indeed give an algorithm to find all conjugates of such generators by virtue of Gee and Stevenhagen

Acoustic measurements of cohesive sediment transport: Suspension to consolidation

This dissertation aims at utilizing the acoustic approach to measure cohesive sediment behaviors including (1) suspension, (2) settling, (3) deposition and (4) consolidation. The first two processes were attempted to interpret by means of backscattered signal analysis, while the last two processes were done by echo signal analysis. The acoustic instruments used in this study include Acoustic Doppler Velocimeter (ADV), Pulse Coherent Acoustic Doppler Profiler (PC-ADP) and Micro-Chirp system. Used sediments are pure kaolinite and in-situ sediments collected from Mai Po and Clay Bank. 5-MHz ADV was used to estimate the suspended sediment concentration (SSC) and settling velocity (ws). For a limited range of SSC, the time-averaged backscatter wave strength can be well correlated with the SSC. Backscattered signals would be sometimes too noisy due to high amplification ratio, high sampling rate and small sampling volume, and thus, a moving average was used to yield the instantaneous changes of SSC. The measurement of ws with Clay Bank sediment showed that turbulence can increase ws, up to one order larger than that for calm water. When turbulence is stronger than a limit, however, it contributes to the decrease in ws. For the measurement of SSC profile, the performance of 1.5 MHz PC-ADP was evaluated. Clay Bank sediment showed a higher correlation coefficient between range-corrected volume scattering (SSC) and backscattered signal within a limited SSC range (ca. \u3c 10 g/L). On the other hand, kaolinite showed a much smaller range of SSC for linear correlation. This different response might be attributed to the fact that the acoustic response is primarily controlled by the SSC and particle size in suspension at a given frequency. This study suggests that PC-ADP is a potential instrument to reveal the high-resolution (about 1.6 cm) SSC profiles near the bed, if the sediment is sufficiently large. Annular flume experiments with Mai Po sediment were conducted to address a debatable issue regarding the critical shear stress for deposition (tau cd). The direct observation from the flume bottom suggests that tau cd does exist, and that the deposition only occurs when the local bed shear stress (taub) is less than taucd. The changes of deposit length and SSC under the simulated tidal cycles demonstrate that deposition can happen only at tidal decelerating phases with a recognizable tau cd. This study further proves that both taub (a hydrodynamic parameter) and taucd (a sediment parameter) are the main controlling parameters for determining cohesive sediment deposition. A non-intrusive acoustic technique and a signal-processing protocol were developed to estimate the bulk density at consolidating sediment interface. Using high-frequency (300-700 KHz) Chirp acoustic waves, laboratory measurements were carried out in a consolidation tank filled with clay-water mixtures. Because the acoustic echo strength is proportional to the difference in acoustic impedance, and the sound speed in water is close to that in clay, the approximation of bulk density could be successfully presented. The acoustic wave reflectivity increased with increasing the bulk density at the water-sediment interface, which are well correlated with the consolidation status

Global gene expression during muscle hypertrophy induced by myostatin suppression and/or beta-adrenergic agonist

Ph.D. University of Hawaii at Manoa 2011.Includes bibliographical references.Skeletal muscle growth is important for animal agriculture, particularly for meat-producing animals, and for human health as well. A better understanding of the mechanisms regulating skeletal muscle growth is expected to contribute to improving the efficiency of meat animal production and alleviating human suffereings caused by muscle atrorphic conditions. Currently, two molecules have been shown to have dramatic effects on skeletal muscle mass: myostatin and β-adrenergic agonists. Myostatin (Mstn), a member of the TGF-β superfamily proteins, acts as a potent negative regulator of skeletal muscle growth. Suppression of Mstn by varying means has shown to increase skeletal muscle mass of animals. Administration of β-adrenergic agonist (BAA) such as clenbuterol (CL) induces dramatic increase in skeletal muscle mass or inhibits muscle atrophy. Although there have been numerous demonstrations of the muscle growth--promoting effect of BAA administration or Mstn suppression, the effect of a combination of BAA administration and Mstn inhibition on skeletal muscle growth has not been investigated. Similarly, very little is known about the molecular signaling pathways leading to muscle hypertrophy induced by the two stimuli and the genes that are commonly regulated by both Mstn and BAA administration. Therefore, the objectives of this study were 1) to investigate the combined effect of Mstn-suppression and BAA administration on skeletal muscle growth, 2) to examine the role of the Akt/mTOR pathway in the two muscle hypertrophic models, 3) to examine global changes in gene expression in skeletal muscle undergoing hypertrophy induced by chronic suppression of Mstn or BAA administration , and 4) to compare the changes in gene expression between these two muscle hypertrophic models. We used a transgenic mouse strain that overexpresses the Mstn-prodomain (Mstn-pro) and exhibits a significant increase in skeletal muscle mass regardless of age and sex. Clenbuterol (CL) was used as a BAA compound. Heterozygous Mstn-pro and wild-type littermates were produced and were given 0 or 20 ppm of CL in their drinking water. Phosphorylation of molecules involved in the Akt/mTOR pathway was examined by using the Western blot analysis. RNA samples of the gastrocnemius muscle in each group were subjected to microarray analysis using the Affymetrix GeneChip Mouse 430-2.0 platform. CL increased body and muscle mass of male and female mice in both genotypes, indincating that the muscle-hypertrophic effect of CL is additive to the effect of Mstn suppression. Levels of phosphorylated muscle 4E-BP1 and p70S6k, two downstream effectors of the mTOR pathway, were higher in Mstn-pro mice than in wild type mice. Levels of phosphorylated muscle Akt, an upstream effector of the mTOR pathway, were also higher in Mstn-pro mice than in wild type mice, indicating that the Akt/mTOR anabolic pathway is involved in the regulation of muscle mass by Mstn. CL increased the phosphorylation of Akt, 4E-BP1 and p70S6k in both genotypes, resulting in the highest phosphorylation levels of Akt, 4E-BP1 and p70S6k in CL-fed Mstn-pro mice. This result suggests that like Mstn, BAA also regulates muscle hypertrophy through the Akt/mTOR pathway, and the pathways of Mstn and CL signaling converge to the Akt/mTOR anabolic pathway to regulate skeletal muscle hypertrophy. Microarray analysis of global gene expression showed that Mstn suppression and CL administration induced significant changes in the mRNA abundance of various genes associated with muscle contraction, initiation of translation, transcription, and muscle hypertrophic signal pathway, suggesting that increased protein synthesis is partly responsible for the hypetrophy induced by Mstn and CL. Additionally, the alteration of Igf2 obsderved in Mstn suppressed mice, and the alterations of eIF4e, Acvr2b, FoxO and PTEN observed in mice treated with CL indicate that the pathways of Mstn and CL signaling converge to the Akt/mTOR anabolic pathway to regulate skeletal muscle hypertrophy

Metabolic Benefits of Plant-based N-3 Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids on Brown Thermogenesis

There are two essential fatty acids for humans, a-linolenic acid (ALA) and linoleic acid (LA), which should be taken from foods to maintain health. Once incorporated into cells, ALA and LA, which are omega-3 poly unsaturated fatty acid (n-3 PUFA) and n-6 PUFA respectively, undergo elongation and desaturation to generate longer and more unsaturated fatty acids influencing inflammation and immunological responses. Numerous studies showed a dietary reduction of n-6/n-3 PUFA ratio improves cardiovascular health, inflammation, and insulin resistance. Fish oil, the main resource for n-3 PUFA, is shown to increase these health benefits. In our lab, we investigated the efficacy of ALA-enriched butter (n3Bu) as an alternative to fish oil for n-3 PUFA. n3Bu-fed mice showed increased bioconversion of ALA to long-chain n-3 PUFA (LC n-3 PUFA) and attenuated high fat (HF) diet-induced insulin resistance and inflammation. Besides, these health benefits, n-3 PUFA is shown to improve obesity and its related diseases by regulating lipid metabolism in both white adipose tissue (WAT) and brown adipose tissue (BAT). Fish oil abundant with n-3 PUFA promotes BAT formation and increases its thermogenic activity in cold acclimation. However, the impact of ALA-enriched agricultural products on the BAT function is unknown. In this study, we investigated the effect of ALA-biofortified butter (n3Bu) on lipid metabolism and thermogenic functions in BAT. Intake of n3Bu significantly reduced the whitening of BAT and increased the thermogenesis in response to acute-cold treatment. Consumption of n3Bu promoted bioconversion of LC n-3 PUFA, fatty acid elongation and desaturation, and mitochondrial biogenesis. Taken together, our results support that ALA-biofortified butter is a novel source of n-3 PUFA that potentiates the BAT thermogenic function. Advisor: Sathish Kumar Nataraja