Self-employment in an equilibrium model of the labor market

Self-employed workers account for between 8% and 30% of participants in the labor markets of OECD countries, Blanch ower (2004). This paper develops and estimates a general equilibrium model of the labor market that accounts for this sizable proportion. The model incorporates self-employed workers, some of whom hire paid employees in the market. Employment rates and earnings distributions are determined endogenously and are estimated to match their empirical counterparts. The model is estimated using the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS). The model is able to estimate nonpecuniary amenities associated with employment in di erent labor market states, accounting for both different employment dynamics within state and the misreporting of earnings by self-employed workers. Structural parameter estimates are then used to assess the impact of an increase in the generosity of unemployment benefits on the aggregate employment rate. Findings suggest that modeling the self-employed, some of whom hire paid employees implies that small increases in unemployment benefits leads to an expansion in aggregate employment

Thermal Properties of Graphene, Carbon Nanotubes and Nanostructured Carbon Materials

Recent years witnessed a rapid growth of interest of scientific and engineering communities to thermal properties of materials. Carbon allotropes and derivatives occupy a unique place in terms of their ability to conduct heat. The room-temperature thermal conductivity of carbon materials span an extraordinary large range - of over five orders of magnitude - from the lowest in amorphous carbons to the highest in graphene and carbon nanotubes. I review thermal and thermoelectric properties of carbon materials focusing on recent results for graphene, carbon nanotubes and nanostructured carbon materials with different degrees of disorder. A special attention is given to the unusual size dependence of heat conduction in two-dimensional crystals and, specifically, in graphene. I also describe prospects of applications of graphene and carbon materials for thermal management of electronics.Comment: Review Paper; 37 manuscript pages; 4 figures and 2 boxe

Integrating transposable elements in the 3D genome

Chromosome organisation is increasingly recognised as an essential component of genome regulation, cell fate and cell health. Within the realm of transposable elements (TEs) however, the spatial information of how genomes are folded is still only rarely integrated in experimental studies or accounted for in modelling. Whilst polymer physics is recognised as an important tool to understand the mechanisms of genome folding, in this commentary we discuss its potential applicability to aspects of TE biology. Based on recent works on the relationship between genome organisation and TE integration, we argue that existing polymer models may be extended to create a predictive framework for the study of TE integration patterns. We suggest that these models may offer orthogonal and generic insights into the integration profiles (or "topography") of TEs across organisms. In addition, we provide simple polymer physics arguments and preliminary molecular dynamics simulations of TEs inserting into heterogeneously flexible polymers. By considering this simple model, we show how polymer folding and local flexibility may generically affect TE integration patterns. The preliminary discussion reported in this commentary is aimed to lay the foundations for a large-scale analysis of TE integration dynamics and topography as a function of the three-dimensional host genome

Potential climatic transitions with profound impact on Europe

We discuss potential transitions of six climatic subsystems with large-scale impact on Europe, sometimes denoted as tipping elements. These are the ice sheets on Greenland and West Antarctica, the Atlantic thermohaline circulation, Arctic sea ice, Alpine glaciers and northern hemisphere stratospheric ozone. Each system is represented by co-authors actively publishing in the corresponding field. For each subsystem we summarize the mechanism of a potential transition in a warmer climate along with its impact on Europe and assess the likelihood for such a transition based on published scientific literature. As a summary, the ‘tipping’ potential for each system is provided as a function of global mean temperature increase which required some subjective interpretation of scientific facts by the authors and should be considered as a snapshot of our current understanding. <br/

Comparative Evaluation of Light-Trap Catches, Electric Motor Mosquito Catches and Human Biting Catches of Anopheles in the Three Gorges Reservoir

The mosquito sampling efficiency of light-trap catches and electric motor mosquito catches were compared with that of human biting catches in the Three Gorges Reservoir. There was consistency in the sampling efficiency between light-trap catches and human biting catches for Anopheles sinensis (r = 0.82, P<0.01) and light-trap catches were 1.52 (1.35–1.71) times that of human biting catches regardless of mosquito density (r = 0.33, P>0.01), while the correlation between electric motor mosquito catches and human biting catches was found to be not statistically significant (r = 0.43, P>0.01) and its sampling efficiency was below that of human biting catches. It is concluded that light-traps can be used as an alternative to human biting catches of Anopheles sinensis in the study area and is a promising tool for sampling malaria vector populations

Utilisation of an operative difficulty grading scale for laparoscopic cholecystectomy

Background A reliable system for grading operative difficulty of laparoscopic cholecystectomy would standardise description of findings and reporting of outcomes. The aim of this study was to validate a difficulty grading system (Nassar scale), testing its applicability and consistency in two large prospective datasets. Methods Patient and disease-related variables and 30-day outcomes were identified in two prospective cholecystectomy databases: the multi-centre prospective cohort of 8820 patients from the recent CholeS Study and the single-surgeon series containing 4089 patients. Operative data and patient outcomes were correlated with Nassar operative difficultly scale, using Kendall’s tau for dichotomous variables, or Jonckheere–Terpstra tests for continuous variables. A ROC curve analysis was performed, to quantify the predictive accuracy of the scale for each outcome, with continuous outcomes dichotomised, prior to analysis. Results A higher operative difficulty grade was consistently associated with worse outcomes for the patients in both the reference and CholeS cohorts. The median length of stay increased from 0 to 4 days, and the 30-day complication rate from 7.6 to 24.4% as the difficulty grade increased from 1 to 4/5 (both p < 0.001). In the CholeS cohort, a higher difficulty grade was found to be most strongly associated with conversion to open and 30-day mortality (AUROC = 0.903, 0.822, respectively). On multivariable analysis, the Nassar operative difficultly scale was found to be a significant independent predictor of operative duration, conversion to open surgery, 30-day complications and 30-day reintervention (all p < 0.001). Conclusion We have shown that an operative difficulty scale can standardise the description of operative findings by multiple grades of surgeons to facilitate audit, training assessment and research. It provides a tool for reporting operative findings, disease severity and technical difficulty and can be utilised in future research to reliably compare outcomes according to case mix and intra-operative difficulty

Evidence for the h_b(1P) meson in the decay Upsilon(3S) --> pi0 h_b(1P)

Using a sample of 122 million Upsilon(3S) events recorded with the BaBar detector at the PEP-II asymmetric-energy e+e- collider at SLAC, we search for the $h_b(1P)$ spin-singlet partner of the P-wave chi_{bJ}(1P) states in the sequential decay Upsilon(3S) --> pi0 h_b(1P), h_b(1P) --> gamma eta_b(1S). We observe an excess of events above background in the distribution of the recoil mass against the pi0 at mass 9902 +/- 4(stat.) +/- 2(syst.) MeV/c^2. The width of the observed signal is consistent with experimental resolution, and its significance is 3.1sigma, including systematic uncertainties. We obtain the value (4.3 +/- 1.1(stat.) +/- 0.9(syst.)) x 10^{-4} for the product branching fraction BF(Upsilon(3S)-->pi0 h_b) x BF(h_b-->gamma eta_b).Comment: 8 pages, 4 postscript figures, submitted to Phys. Rev. D (Rapid Communications

Gender and race influence metabolic benefits of fitness in children: a cross-sectional study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Increasing obesity and poor cardiovascular fitness (CVF) contribute to higher rates of type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) in children. While the relative contributions of fitness and body fat on development of insulin resistance (IR) in children and adolescents remains unresolved, gender- and race-specific differences likely exist in the degree to which CVF influences IR and risk for T2DM. Better understanding of how gender and race affect interactions between body fat, CVF, and metabolic health would be helpful in designing effective and targeted strategies to reduce obesity-associated disease risk. We evaluated whether metabolic benefits of fitness on reducing inflammation and insulin resistance (IR) are affected by gender and race.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>This cross-sectional study included 203 healthy children (mean age 12.2 y, 50% male, 46% non-Hispanic white (NHW), 54% racially diverse (RD)). Fasting insulin, glucose, hsCRP, and adiponectin were measured; race was self-reported; cardiovascular fitness (CVF) was evaluated by the Progressive Aerobic Cardiovascular Endurance Run. Associations between inflammation and gender, race, and CVF were evaluated using analysis of covariance. Multivariate regression analysis identified independent predictors of IR.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Fitness and inflammation were inversely related in both males and females (p < 0.01); this effect was marginally stronger in RD children (p = 0.06) and non-overweight males (p = 0.07). High BMI (p < 0.001), low fitness (p = 0.006), and (female) gender (p = 0.003) were independently associated with higher HOMA-IR. In males, BMI and fitness, but not race independently predicted HOMA-IR. In females, BMI and race, but not fitness independently predicted HOMA-IR.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>In middle school children, the beneficial effects of fitness vary based on gender and race. High CVF has an enhanced anti-inflammatory effect in male and RD children. While BMI is the strongest predictor of IR in the study group as a whole, fitness is a significant predictor of IR only in males, and race is a significant predictor of IR only in females.</p

One step closer to understanding the role of bacteria in diabetic foot ulcers: characterising the microbiome of ulcers

Background: The aim of this study was to characterise the microbiome of new and recurrent diabetic foot ulcers using 16S amplicon sequencing (16S AS), allowing the identification of a wider range of bacterial species that may be important in the development of chronicity in these debilitating wounds. Twenty patients not receiving antibiotics for the past three months were selected, with swabs taken from each individual for culture and 16S AS. DNA was isolated using a combination of bead beating and kit extraction. Samples were sequenced on the Illumina Hiseq 2500 platform. Results: Conventional laboratory culture showed positive growth from only 55 % of the patients, whereas 16S AS was positive for 75 % of the patients (41 unique genera, representing 82 different operational taxonomic units (OTU’s). S. aureus was isolated in 72 % of culture-positive samples, whereas the most commonly detected bacteria in all ulcers were Peptoniphilusspp., Anaerococcus spp. and Corynebacterium spp., with the addition of Staphylococcus spp. in new ulcers. The majority of OTU’s residing in both new and recurrent ulcers (over 67 %) were identified as facultative or strict anaerobic Gram-positive organisms. Principal component analysis (PCA) showed no difference in clustering between the two groups (new and recurrent ulcers). Conclusions: The abundance of anaerobic bacteria has important implications for treatment as it suggests that the microbiome of each ulcer “starts afresh” and that, although diverse, are not distinctly different from one another with respect to new or recurrent ulcers. Therefore, when considering antibiotic therapy the duration of current ulceration may be a more important consideration than a history of healed ulcer