A record current account deficit: causes and implications

The U.S. current account deficit was at a record level in 1999 and is expected to increase further in 2000. How large can this deficit get? Will an eventual adjustment in the deficit place the U.S. economy at risk? This article examines three arguments often put forth to explain the increase in the deficit--a consumption boom, the U.S. as a safe haven for short-term foreign capital and technological change affecting the U.S. economy. The authors find the strongest evidence in support of technological change and suggest why, under these conditions, an economic adjustment to the deficit need not to have as adverse an impact as some observes fear.Deficit financing ; Economic conditions - United States

Physicians Policing Physicians: The Development of Medical Staff Peer Review Law at California Hospitals

THE LAW GOVERNING medical staff peer review at California hospitals has changed dramatically over the last thirty years. The days when a hospital could make arbitrary credentialing decisions without affording physicians any recourse are long gone. Primarily as a result of appellate court decisions and legislation, there has been a steady movement toward the formalization of peer review. This article examines the development of peer review law at California hospitals.\u27 It also identifies a number of shortcomings in the current system and suggests solutions to these problems

The Germination and Early Development of Salt Cedar (Tamarix Gallica L.).

Salt Cedar (Tamarix gallica L.) is a phreatophyte which creates a mamor water conservation problem in the Southwest. This study, which is a portion of a study conducted by Fort Hays Kansas State College for the Bureau of Reclamation, was designed to determine various aspects of the life history of this species. The research consisted of studies in the campus greenhouse and at Cedar Bluff Reservoir about 30 miles southwest of Hays. Seed was collected weekly or hi-weekly from a windbreak just west of the college and at the reservoir from the middle of June until the last of September. A final collection vas made at the reservoir on November 10. The seed was stored at temperatures of -17 deg. C., 10 deg. C. and 25 to 30 deg C. Germination tests were conducted in petri dishes between damp blotter pads. In order to have plants available for study during the winter months, plants were transplanted to the greenhouse on August 14 and during late January. In addition, seeds were planted in 30-inch phytometers and flower pots of various sizes on February 23 and March 17. Growth measurements were made in the field and development of roots and shoots were studied under both field and greenhouse conditions. The cylindrical seeds averaged about 0.45 mm. long and 0.17 mm. in diameter. Each consisted of an embryo covered by a nearly transparent seed coat with numerous unicellular hairs about 2.12mm. long attached to the apex. Swelling of the seed of ten became evident within the first 12 hours of germination. After 24 hours the cotyledons were usually freed of the seed coat and had begun to separate. During the second day, emergence of the primary root was usually evident. Hair-like structures appeared in the hypocotyl region and the first leaf\u27 primordia developed during the first week. The germination rate of all seeds was 32.5 per cent and 19.6 per cent from the reservoir and windbreak, respectively. Germination averaged 57.1 per cent complete by the end of 24 hours and 98.0 per cent complete after 5 days. Highest viability vas from seed produced in August (51.4 per cent) followed by July (40.3), November (26.6), and June (19 .0). As the age of seeds increased, viability tended to decrease. The greatest loss in viability was during the third and fourth month following collection. Fluctuations in germination rate of seed from the reservoir and windbreak were quite similar. Seed stored at 10° C maintained higher viability than that stored at -17 deg C or 25 deg to 30 deg C. Root development appeared to be greatly dependent upon soil moisture conditions. The primary root averaged about 16 mm. long after 3 weeks. During the third week secondary root development often started. After 6 weeks the primary roots often reached a length of 35 mm. and by the end of 10 weeks some of the roots had reached the bottom of 30-inch phytometers. Roots were not found extending into the water table except where it had recently risen. However, adventitious roots developed on portions of plant stems covered water or moist soil. Early shoot development was limited mainly to the production of new scale-like leaves in an alternate arrangement. The cotyledons appeared to function in most cases between 5 and 7 weeks. At this age the plants were about 6 in. tall. Also the first buds, which later formed basal shoots, were formed in the axis of the older leaves. Young shoots often grew prostrate along the soil surface until they were 1 to 10 cm. long. During this t1llle they often reproduced by layering. Flowers are produced in racemose clusters that form panicles at or near the end of vegetative branches. There are usually about 20 flowers per inch of raceme length. A flower averages about 22 ovules, each of which is capable of developing into a seed. Several hundred thousand seeds may be produced on a large mature plant during a season. Seed is often produced during the first year

Organic fluorine as a polypeptide building element: in vivo expression of fluorinated peptides, proteins and proteomes

Dieser Beitrag ist mit Zustimmung des Rechteinhabers aufgrund einer (DFG geförderten) Allianz- bzw. Nationallizenz frei zugänglich.This publication is with permission of the rights owner freely accessible due to an Alliance licence and a national licence (funded by the DFG, German Research Foundation) respectively.Traditionally, the biological fluorination of complex biological systems like proteins is achieved through substitution of canonical amino acids or addition of fluorinated amino acids in the context of the standard genetic code. Ribosomal translation of monofluorinated amino acids into proteins often yields structures with minimal local changes in the interior but, on the same time, results in large global effects on characteristic features of the biopolymers (such as dramatically changed activity profile or folding stability). This is due to the novel and unique local interactions delivered by fluorine atoms such as (i) increase in the covalent radii (ii) changed polarities; (iii) changed hydrogen bond acceptor ability; (iv) altered water solubility as well as water ↔ organic solvent energy transfer. On the other hand, the biological incorporation of tri- or global fluorinated amino acids (such as trifluoroleucine, triflurovaline, and their hexafluoro counterparts, fluoromethionine and trifluoronorleucine etc.) represents still a challenge, as the natural structural scaffolds are optimized for hydrocarbon during evolution but not for fluorocarbon cores. Future work will be focused on the re-design of existing or de novo design of novel protein scaffolds capable of accommodating such building blocks into functional biologically active proteins and proteomes in the context of the viable cells

GINA - A Polarized Neutron Reflectometer at the Budapest Neutron Centre

The setup, capabilities and operation parameters of the neutron reflectometer GINA, the recently installed "Grazing Incidence Neutron Apparatus" at the Budapest Neutron Centre, are introduced. GINA, a dance-floor-type, constant-energy, angle-dispersive reflectometer is equipped with a 2D position-sensitive detector to study specular and off-specular scattering. Wavelength options between 3.2 and 5.7 {\AA} are available for unpolarized and polarized neutrons. Spin polarization and analysis are achieved by magnetized transmission supermirrors and radio-frequency adiabatic spin flippers. As a result of vertical focusing by the five-element (pyrolytic graphite) monochromator the reflected intensity from a 20x20 mm sample has doubled. GINA is dedicated to studies of magnetic films and heterostructures, but unpolarized options for non-magnetic films, membranes and other surfaces are also provided. Shortly after its startup, reflectivity values as low as 3x10-5 have been measured on the instrument. The facility is now open for the international user community, but its development is continuing mainly to establish new sample environment options, the spin analysis of off-specularly scattered radiation and further decrease of the background

Probing molecular free energy landscapes by periodic loading

Single molecule pulling experiments provide information about interactions in biomolecules that cannot be obtained by any other method. However, the reconstruction of the molecule's free energy profile from the experimental data is still a challenge, in particular for the unstable barrier regions. We propose a new method for obtaining the full profile by introducing a periodic ramp and using Jarzynski's identity for obtaining equilibrium quantities from non-equilibrium data. Our simulated experiments show that this method delivers significant more accurate data than previous methods, under the constraint of equal experimental effort.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure