Democratic Accountability and the Relative Obstacles to Foreign Investment

This paper considers the relationship between democratic accountability in de- veloping countries and the policies they use to attract foreign direct investment (FDI). We isolate two policy areas that governments of developing countries use to attract FDI: the tax burden on firms and the regulatory standards within which they operate. Countries that maintain high business taxes can only attract FDI by offering a less regulated business environment, which may have associated po- litical costs. The extent to which democratic accountability constrains leaders in their tax/regulatory policy choices is our main line of analysis. The novelty of the paper is that it endogenously determines policy choices within a political economy framework that recognizes the trade-offs between attracting FDI and maintaining political control. Examination of firm-level survey data from foreign firms operating in eastern Europe and central Asian economies confirms our model's main conclusion: regulation is seen to be a relatively larger obstacle to doing business in countries with greater democratic accountability. --

Punks Listen

Design of collection of essays by punk musicians, promoters, managers, journalists, artists and designers, all proceeds to Red Cross Ukraine, published by Hope Publications, Dublin, July 2022

Cooperative Carbon Dioxide Adsorption in Alcoholamine- and Alkoxyalkylamine-Functionalized Metal-Organic Frameworks.

A series of structurally diverse alcoholamine- and alkoxyalkylamine-functionalized variants of the metal-organic framework Mg2 (dobpdc) are shown to adsorb CO2 selectively via cooperative chain-forming mechanisms. Solid-state NMR spectra and optimized structures obtained from van der Waals-corrected density functional theory calculations indicate that the adsorption profiles can be attributed to the formation of carbamic acid or ammonium carbamate chains that are stabilized by hydrogen bonding interactions within the framework pores. These findings significantly expand the scope of chemical functionalities that can be utilized to design cooperative CO2 adsorbents, providing further means of optimizing these powerful materials for energy-efficient CO2 separations

Post-Pandemic Cities: An Urban Lexicon of Accelerations/Decelerations

COVID-19 has stimulated renewed societal and academic debate about the future of cities and urban life. Future visons have veered from the ‘death of the city’ to visual renderings and limited experiments with 15-minute neighbourhoods. Within this context, we as a diverse group of urban scholars sought to examine the emergent ‘post’-COVID city through the production of an urban lexicon that investigates its socio-material contours. The urban lexicon makes three contributions. First, to explore how the pandemic has accelerated certain processes and agendas while at the same time, other processes, priorities and sites have been decelerated and put on hold. Second, to utilise this framing to examine the impacts of the pandemic on how cities are governed, on how urban geographies are managed and lived, and with how care emerged as a vital urban resource. Third, to tease out what might be temporary intensifications and what may become configurational in a variety of urban domains, including governance, platforming, density, crowds, technosolutionism, dwelling, respatialisation, reconcentration, care, improvisation, and atmosphere. The urban lexicon proposes a vocabulary for delineating, describing, and understanding some of the key aspects of the emergent post-pandemic city

WindCube: A CubeSat Thermospheric Wind Instrument Utilizing Fabry-Pérot Interferometry

WindCube is a 6U CubeSat mission selected for implementation through NASA’s HFORT program. Starting in 2022 and following ~36 months of development, integration and testing, the spacecraft will operate for ~12 months in low earth orbit to study the influence of thermospheric winds on the earth’s ionosphere. Its scientific payload is a limb viewing Fabry Pérot Interferometer (étalon) specially designed to fit into a 10cm x 10cm cross-sectional assembly. WindCube will make global maps of wind speed derived from the doppler shifted emission of the 630.0nm oxygen line (1D \u3e 3P), at altitudes near 250km. Projected performance includes wind speed retrievals every 10 seconds with an accuracy of 5m/s, a vertical resolution of 63km, and a horizontal resolution of 100km. We present an overview of the mission design and observation plan for WindCube as well as a top-level description of the payload design

Cooperative Electronic and Structural Regulation in a Bioinspired Allosteric Photoredox Catalyst

Herein, we report the first allosteric photoredox catalyst regulated via constructively coupled structural and electronic control. While often synergistically exploited in nature, these two types of control mechanisms have only been applied independently in the vast majority of allosteric enzyme mimics and receptors in the literature. By embedding a model of photosystem II in a supramolecular coordination complex that responds to chloride as an allosteric effector, we show that distance and electronic control of light harvesting can be married to maximize allosteric regulation of catalytic activity. This biomimetic system is composed of a Bodipy photoantenna, which is capable of transferring excited-state energy to a photoredox pair, wherein the excitation energy is used to generate a catalytically active charge-separated state. The structural aspect of allosteric regulation is achieved by toggling the coordination chemistry of an antenna-functionalized hemilabile ligand via partial displacement from a RhI structual node using chloride. In doing so, the distance between the antenna and the central photoredox catalyst is increased, lowering the inherent efficiency of through-space energy transfer. At the same time, coordination of chloride lowers both the charge of the Rh^I node and the reduction potential of the Rh^(II/I) couple, to the extent that electronic quenching of the antenna excited state is possible via photoinduced electron transfer from the metal center. Compared to a previously developed system that operates solely via electronic regulation, the present system demonstrates that coupling electronic and structural approaches to allosteric regulation gives rise to improved switching ratios between catalytically active and inactive states. Contributions from both structural and electronic control mechanisms are probed via nuclear magnetic resonance, X-ray diffraction, electrochemical, spectroelectrochemical, and transient absorption studies. Overall, this work establishes that intertwined electronic and structural regulatory mechanisms can be borrowed from nature to build stimuli-responsive inorganic materials with potential applications in sensing, catalysis, and photonic devices

Allogeneic Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation Improves Outcome in Myelodysplastic Syndrome Across High-Risk Genetic Subgroups:Genetic Analysis of the Blood and Marrow Transplant Clinical Trials Network 1102 Study

PURPOSE:Allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) in patients with myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) improves overall survival (OS). We evaluated the impact of MDS genetics on the benefit of HCT in a biological assignment (donor v no donor) study.METHODS:We performed targeted sequencing in 309 patients age 50-75 years with International Prognostic Scoring System (IPSS) intermediate-2 or high-risk MDS, enrolled in the Blood and Marrow Transplant Clinical Trials Network 1102 study and assessed the association of gene mutations with OS. Patients with TP53 mutations were classified as TP53multihit if two alleles were altered (via point mutation, deletion, or copy-neutral loss of heterozygosity).RESULTS:The distribution of gene mutations was similar in the donor and no donor arms, with TP53 (28% v 29%; P =.89), ASXL1 (23% v 29%; P =.37), and SRSF2 (16% v 16%; P =.99) being most common. OS in patients with a TP53 mutation was worse compared with patients without TP53 mutation (21% ± 5% [SE] v 52% ± 4% at 3 years; P &lt;.001). Among those with a TP53 mutation, OS was similar between TP53single versus TP53multihit (22% ± 8% v 20% ± 6% at 3 years; P =.31). Considering HCT as a time-dependent covariate, patients with a TP53 mutation who underwent HCT had improved OS compared with non-HCT treatment (OS at 3 years: 23% ± 7% v 11% ± 7%; P =.04), associated with a hazard ratio of 3.89; 95% CI, 1.87 to 8.12; P &lt;.001 after adjustment for covariates. OS among patients with molecular IPSS (IPSS-M) very high risk without a TP53 mutation was significantly improved if they had a donor (68% ± 10% v 0% ± 12% at 3 years; P =.001).CONCLUSION:HCT improved OS compared with non-HCT treatment in patients with TP53 mutations irrespective of TP53 allelic status. Patients with IPSS-M very high risk without a TP53 mutation had favorable outcomes when a donor was available.</p

The Chandra High Energy Transmission Grating: Design, Fabrication, Ground Calibration and Five Years in Flight

Details of the design, fabrication, ground and flight calibration of the High Energy Transmission Grating, HETG, on the Chandra X-ray Observatory are presented after five years of flight experience. Specifics include the theory of phased transmission gratings as applied to the HETG, the Rowland design of the spectrometer, details of the grating fabrication techniques, and the results of ground testing and calibration of the HETG. For nearly six years the HETG has operated essentially as designed, although it has presented some subtle flight calibration effects.Comment: 34 pages (including 30 figures), accepted for publication in PAS