An Overview of the Kauffman Firm Survey: Results From 2009 Business Activities

Highlights findings from longitudinal data on new businesses' performance since 2004 as well as new firms founded in 2009, including trends in customer payment problems and loan denials, financial injections, and sources of comparative advantage

Casting a Wide Net: Online Activities of Small and New Businesses in the United States

Examines trends in businesses' use of Web sites and e-mail, online sales, and outcomes of such online activities by industry, age and size of firm, and owners' race/ethnicity, gender, location, and education

An Overview of the Kauffman Firm Survey: Results From 2010 Business Activities

Examines longitudinal data on new businesses' survival and performance since 2004 as well as new firms founded in 2010, including trends in slow or lost sales, predictability of business conditions, credit availability, and product or service innovation

Financial Development and the Distributional Effects of Monetary Policy Do the distributional consequences of monetary policy depend on the extent of financial development? Should optimal monetary policy vary across countries? In order to answer these questions, we develop a monetary growth production model with heterogeneous agents. In our economy, optimal policy needs to weigh the effects of policy across two groups — capital owners and individuals who hold liquid assets. While banks help limit the exposure to inflation, there are limits because money alleviates the frictions of private information and limited communication. In this environment, we compare two economies that are identical in every aspect except for their level of financial development. In a country with limited financial development, a stock market is absent. In the other, an equity market is active. In either economy, inflation adversely affects capital formation and output. Individuals who hold liquid assets are always adversely affected by inflation, but the attitude of capital owners depends on the level of financial development. In particular, in the presence of a stock market, the impact of inflation on the welfare of capital owners is non-monotonic. Nevertheless, optimal monetary policy is always more conservative at higher levels of financial development.

Financial Development, Friedman Rule, Monetary Policy, Stock Market

Activation and Modification of Slpr-Mediated JNK Signaling

Human diseases such as spina bifida are caused by a failure in cell morphogenesis and tissue fusion. Dorsal closure in the Drosophila embryo is a model for these tissue closure processes where proper Jun N-terminal Kinase (JNK) signaling is necessary. JNK activity is required in the leading edge cells of the epithelial layer to modulate the cytoskeleton and cell shape, allowing the epidermis to close on the dorsal side of the embryo. The mixed lineage kinase (MLK), Slipper (Slpr), is the JNKKK which is responsible for activation of the pathway during dorsal closure. The pathway components that regulate Slpr, as well as upstream activation signals, are not yet identified. We have examined the involvement of the Ste20-like kinase Misshapen (Msn) to act as the JNKKKK in the JNK pathway during dorsal closure through a direct interaction between Msn and Slpr. By observing phenotypes of recombinant and heterozygous mutants of slpr and msn, we have examined the genetic interactions. Also, by using a non-biased screen, we have investigated unknown regulators of the Slpr-mediated JNK pathway which have an effect on dorsal closure. These techniques have begun to identify regulatory interactions of molecules within the JNK pathway, and have narrowed down regions of chromosome two which may contain new modifiers further regulating JNK signaling, in order to provide a robust and highly regulated tissue closure event

An Overview of the Kauffman Firm Survey: Results From the 2004-2007 Data

Based on surveys conducted over four years, provides an overview of trends among U.S. firms established in 2004 and the business and owner characteristics associated with survival and growth, including level of innovation, structure, and financing

An Overview of the Kauffman Firm Survey: Results From the 2004-2008 Data

Presents findings from longitudinal data on new businesses founded in 2004, including financing structure; products, services, and innovations; and characteristics of the owners. Examines indicators of growth and survival and effects of the recession

Neutron capture production rates of cosmogenic 60Co, 59Ni and 36Cl in stony meteorites

Results for neutron flux calculations in stony meteoroids (of various radii and compositions) and production rates for Cl-36, Ni-59, and Co-60 are reported. The Ni-59/Co-60 ratio is nearly constant with depth in most meteorites: this effect is consistent with the neutron flux and capture cross section properties. The shape of the neutron flux energy spectrum, varies little with depth in a meteorite. The size of the parent meteorite can be determined from one of its fragments, using the Ni-59/Co-60 ratios, if the parent meteorite was less than 75 g/cm(2) in radius. If the parent meteorite was larger, a lower limit on the size of the parent meteorite can be determined from a fragment. In C3 chondrites this is not possible. In stony meteorites with R less than 50 g/cm(2) the calculated Co-60 production rates (mass less than 4 kg), are below 1 atom/min g-Co. The highest Co-60 production rates occur in stony meteorites with radius about 250 g/cm(2) (1.4 m across). In meteorites with radii greater than 400 g/cm(2), the maximum Co-60 production rate occurs at a depth of about 175 g/cm(2) in L-chondrite, 125 g/cm(2) in C3 chrondrite, and 190 g/cm(2) in aubrites

Development of a novel equine influenza virus live-attenuated vaccine

H3N8 equine influenza virus (EIV) is an important and significant respiratory pathogen of horses. EIV is enzootic in Europe and North America, mainly due to the suboptimal efficacy of current vaccines. We describe, for the first time, the generation of a temperature sensitive (ts) H3N8 EIV live-attenuated influenza vaccine (LAIV) using reverse-genetics approaches. Our EIV LAIV was attenuated (att) in vivo and able to induce, upon a single intranasal administration, protection against H3N8 EIV wild-type (WT) challenge in both a mouse model and the natural host, the horse. Notably, since our EIV LAIV was generated using reverse genetics, the vaccine can be easily updated against drifting or emerging strains of EIV using the safety backbone of our EIV LAIV as master donor virus (MDV). These results demonstrate the feasibility of implementing a novel EIV LAIV approach for the prevention and control of currently circulating H3N8 EIVs in horse populations

Surface chemistry of selected lunar regions

A completely new analysis has been carried out on the data from the Apollo 15 and 16 gamma ray spectrometer experiments. The components of the continuum background have been estimated. The elements Th, K, Fe and Mg give useful results; results for Ti are significant only for a few high Ti regions. Errors are given, and the results are checked by other methods. Concentrations are reported for about sixty lunar regions; the ground track has been subdivided in various ways. The borders of the maria seem well-defined chemically, while the distribution of KREEP is broad. This wide distribution requires emplacement of KREEP before the era of mare formation. Its high concentration in western mare soils seems to require major vertical mixing