Dysmenorrhoea among Hong Kong university students: prevalence, impact, and management

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Activation of p53/miR-34a Tumor Suppressor Axis by Chinese Herbal Formula JP-1 in A549 Lung Adenocarcinoma Cells

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death worldwide; the most common pathologic type is lung adenocarcinoma (LADC). In spite of the recent progress in targeted therapy, most LADC patients eventually expired due to the inevitable recurrence and drug resistance. New complementary agent with evidence-based molecular mechanism is urgently needed. MiR-34a is an important p53 downstream tumor suppressor, which regulates apoptosis, cell-cycle, EMT (epithelial mesenchymal transition), and so forth. Its expression is deficient in many types of cancers including LADC. Here, we show that a Chinese herbal formula JP-1 activates p53/miR-34a axis in A549 human LADC cells (p53 wild-type). Treatment with JP-1 induces p53 and its downstream p21 and BAX proteins as well as the miR-34a, resulting in growth inhibition, colony formation reduction, migration repression, and apoptosis induction. Accordingly, the decreases of miR-34a downstream targets such as CDK6, SIRT1, c-Myc, survivin, Snail, and AXL were observed. Moreover, JP-1 activates AMPKα and reduces mTOR activity, implying its inhibitory effect on the energy-sensitive protein synthesis and cell proliferation signaling. Our results show that JP-1 activates p53/miR-34a tumor suppressor axis and decreases proteins related to proliferation, apoptosis resistance, and metastasis, suggesting its potential as a complementary medicine for LADC treatment

Anticipated Environmental Policy and Transitional Dynamics in an Endogenous Growth Model

This paper makes a new attempt toinvestigate how an anticipatedenvironmental policy governs the transitionaldynamics of an economy when pollutionexternality is taken into account. Themodeling strategy we use is an AK technologyendogenous growth framework with an endogenousleisure-labor choice. It is found that, unlikeinelastic labor supply framework, a rise inpublic abatement expenditure will stimulate thebalanced economic growth rate. It is alsofound that public abatement technology plays animportant role in determining the transitionaladjustment of the economic growth rate inresponse to a pre-announced environmentalpolicy. Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 2003endogenous growth, elastic labor supply, pollution, public abatement,

TERRORIST THREATS AND TRANSITIONAL DYNAMICS IN AN OVERLAPPING GENERATIONS MODEL

This paper incorporates the nature of terrorist threats into the Yarri (1965)-Blanchard (1985) model and uses it to discuss the transitional dynamics of consumption in response to an anticipated terrorist attack. It is shown that if the terrorist attack is pre-announced (and hence anticipated) and the public is fully informed, short-term consumption may misadjust from its long-term level. Before the terrorist attacks actually take place, households may be motivated to increase (rather than decrease) their consumption as a temporary response. This result may explain the temporary phenomenon of the increased consumption of certain types of goods in the period following September 11.Security spending, Terrorist threats, Overlapping generations model, Transitional dynamics,

Growth, welfare and transitional dynamics in an endogenously growing economy with abatement labor

This paper sets up a simple endogenous growth model that highlights the importance of the endogenous labor-leisure choice and the allocation between production labor and abatement labor. We show that, in contrast to the common notion (e.g. [Bovenberg, A.L., Smulders, S., 1996. Transitional impacts of environmental policy in an endogenous growth model. International Economic Review 37, 861-893] and [Bovenberg, A.L., de Mooij, R.A., 1997. Environmental tax reform and endogenous growth. Journal of Public Economics 63, 207-237]), the existence of an environmental production externality is a sufficient (but not necessary) condition for environmental policies to stimulate economic growth if the labor-leisure choice is endogenously determined. In particular, since there are complementarities between public abatement and private abatement, the public abatement expenditure will have a more powerful enhancing effect on economic growth when it is accompanied by more efficient private abatement. This result also leads to a corollary to the effect that it is easier to achieve double dividends in terms of enhancing both growth and welfare if the endogenous labor-leisure choice is taken into account. In our dynamic analysis, we show that if public abatement is substantially large, dynamic indeterminacy may occur despite the absence of a positive labor externality and interestingly, this is more likely to be the case when abatement labor plays a more significant role. Besides, the transitional effects of an increase in public abatement are also investigated.Abatement labor Environmental externality Public abatement Double dividends

Ecological pollution stress on benthic infauna macroinfaunal community at the Mai Po and Inner Deep Bay Ramsar Site in Hong Kong

Abstract in http://www.rmz-mg.com/letniki/rmz52/rmz52_0324-0389.pd

AN ENDOGENOUS GROWTH MODEL OF CAPITAL AND ARMS ACCUMULATION

This paper attempts to examine the effect of an anticipated foreign military threat on the steady-state growth rate and the transitional behavior of the economy. The modeling strategy follows the Sandler and Hartley (1995) and Dunne et al. (2005) viewpoints to emphasize the role of national defense in affecting growth from the perspective of both the demand and the supply sides. We thus combine the public capital version of endogenous growth with a framework of competitive arms accumulation. It is found that the key factor determining the steady state and the transitional effects of a rise in the foreign military threat on the home weapon-capital ratio, the consumption-capital ratio, and the rate of economic growth, is the degree of relative risk aversion.Anticipated foreign military threat, Endogenous growth, Capital and arms accumulation,