Globalization, Economic Freedom and Human Rights

Using the KOF Index of Globalization and two indices of economic freedom, we empirically analyze whether globalization and economic liberalization affect governments' respect for human rights using a panel of 106 countries over the 1981-2004 period. According to our results, physical integrity rights significantly and robustly increase with globalization and economic freedom, while empowerment rights are not robustly affected. Due to the lack of consensus about the appropriate level of empowerment rights as compared to the outright rejection of any violation of physical integrity rights, the global community is presumably less effective in promoting empowerment rights

Financial Liberalization, Growth, Productivity and Capital Accumulation: The Case of European Integration

In the present contribution, we concentrate on the process of financial liberalization in a specific context of European economic and monetary integration. We implement de facto and de jure measures of financial liberalization and find that formal aspects of financial openness generate a strongly positive impact on economic growth and its sources, productivity growth and capital accumulation. Moreover, there is evidence of a positive contribution to the process stemming from the EU membership, while no substantial effect comes from the euro adoption. Finally, we investigate the effects from financial integration on country groups within the EU

Increasing Water Consumption in Licensed Premises

This report summarises the outcomes of the Increasing Water Consumption in Licensed Premises workshop held on Thursday 6 November 2014. The Workshop was facilitated by the Designing Out Crime research centre (DOC) at the University of Technology, Sydney. DOC’s workshop methods are based on human-centred design principles, and research into how designers solve complex problems. The workshop asked participants to place themselves in the position of a patron and design ways of increasing water consumption in licensed premises

Buckling response of ferritic stainless steel columns at elevated temperatures

This paper presents a numerical study on the buckling behaviour of ferritic stainless steel columns in fire. Finite element models were developed and validated against existing test results to predict the elevated temperature non-linear response of ferritic stainless steel columns. A total of nine austenitic and three ferritic stainless steel column tests were replicated using the finite element analysis package ABAQUS. Parametric studies were performed to investigate the effects of variation of load level and global slenderness on the elevated temperature buckling response of ferritic stainless steel columns, and to extend the range of structural performance data. Both the experimental and numerical parametric study resultswere compared with the current design rules in EN 1993-1-2 (2005) and recent proposed modifications thereof by Ng and Gardner (2007), Uppfeldt et al. (2008) and Lopes et al. (2010).The European Community's Research Fund for Coal and Steel (RFCS) under grant agreement no. RFSR-CT-2010-00026, Structural Applications of Ferritic Stainless Steels

Directional gene flow and ecological separation in Yersinia enterocolitica

Yersinia enterocolitica is a common cause of food-borne gastroenteritis worldwide. Recent work defining the phylogeny of the genus Yersinia subdivided Y. enterocolitica into six distinct phylogroups. Here, we provide detailed analyses of the evolutionary processes leading to the emergence of these phylogroups. The dominant phylogroups isolated from human infections, PG3–5, show very little diversity at the sequence level, but do present marked patterns of gain and loss of functions, including those involved in pathogenicity and metabolism, including the acquisition of phylogroup-specific O-antigen loci. We tracked gene flow across the species in the core and accessory genome, and show that the non-pathogenic PG1 strains act as a reservoir for diversity, frequently acting as donors in recombination events. Analysis of the core and accessory genome also suggested that the different Y. enterocolitica phylogroups may be ecologically separated, in contrast to the long-held belief of common shared ecological niches across the Y. enterocolitica species

Improving the Justice System: Victims of Crime Workshop

This report showcases the outcomes of the Improving the Justice System: Victims of Crime workshop in June 2014. This one-day workshop brought together Government and non-Government organisations who work with, and represent victims of crime in NSW to create a clear program of reform for the system to better serve victims of crime

Reliability assessment of design rules for stainless steel structures

This paper presents a re-evaluation of the current partial resistance factors recommended in EN 1993-1-4 for the design of stainless steel elements. Material data from key stainless steel producers were collected and carefully analysed, and representative values of the over-strength and the coefficient of variation (COV) of the material yield strength and ultimate tensile strength, necessary for performing reliability analysis, were established. The EN 1990 Annex D First Order Reliability Method (FORM) was applied to a substantial pool of experimental results. At the cross-section level, stub column and in-plane bending test results were used to assess the γM0 partial resistance factor. At the member level, flexural buckling and lateral-torsional buckling test results were used to evaluate the γM1 partial resistance factor. It is revealed that the current recommended partial resistance factors in EN 1993-1-4 (γM0 = γM1 = 1.1) cannot generally be reduced, and in some cases, modified design resistance equations are required, if the current safety factors are to be maintained

Editorial: Interactions of Plants With Bacteria and Fungi: Molecular and Epigenetic Plasticity of the Host

Editorial on the Research Topic 'Interactions of Plants with Bacteria and Fungi: Molecular and Epigenetic Plasticity of the Host