Macroeconomic Effects of Inflation Targeting: Evidence from the Middle and High-Income Countries

By employing Propensity Score Matching analysis, this study aims first to show how inflation targeting affects macroeconomic indicators in middle and high-income countries, and second highlights whether the global financial crisis has created a change in the way that inflation targeting impacts on them. Results prove that adopting inflation targeting increases the real GDP and budget deficit, and decreases the current account deficit. However, its effect on inflation is puzzling. The high-income inflation targeters should be careful about implementing the strategy and inflation targeting should be accompanied by the fiscal policy either in middle or in high-income countries

An evolutionary approach for detecting communities in social networks

9th IEEE/ACM International Conference on Advances in Social Networks Analysis and Mining (2017 : Sydney; Australia)Rapid development and wide usage of social networking applications have enabled large amounts of valuable data which can be analyzed for various reasons by companies, governments, non-profit organizations such as UN. This paper presents an evolutionary approach for detecting communities in social networks. We formulated a genetic algorithm that does not require the number of communities as input and is able to detect communities effectively in a very fast way. The performance of the proposed method is compared to its counterparts in order to show that good results can be generated. Additionally, we have done experiments using Newman’s Spectral Clustering Method as a pre-processing step and it gave much better results. © 2017 Association for Computing Machinery.ACM SIGMOD,Gemalto,IEEE Computer Society,IEEE TCDE,Springer Natur

Renewable and non-renewable energy consumption and economic growth relationship revisited: Evidence from G7 countries

The aim of this study is to investigate the long-run and causal relationships between renewable and non-renewable energy consumption and economic growth by using classical and augmented production functions, and making a comparison between renewable and non-renewable energy sources in order to determine which type of energy consumption is more important for economic growth in G7 countries for 1980-2009 period. Autoregressive Distributed Lag approach to cointegration was employed for this purpose. Also, causality among energy consumption and economic growth was investigated by employing a recently developed causality test by Hatemi-J (2012). The long-run estimates showed that either renewable or non-renewable energy consumption matters for economic growth and augmented production function is more effective on explaining the considered relationship. On the other hand, although bidirectional causality is found for all countries in case of classical production function, mixed results are found for each country when the production function is augmented. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved

In vitro antimicrobial activity of calcium hydroxide mixed with different vehicles against Enterococcus faecalis and Candida albicans

WOS: 000268052600025PubMed ID: 19615665Objective. The purpose of this in vitro study was to investigate antimicrobial activity of calcium hydroxide (CH) in combination with glycerin, chlorhexidine gluconate (CHX), cetrimide, or distilled water against Enterococcus faecalis and Candida albicans. Study design. Standard holes in the cultivated agar plates were filled with one of the CH preparations and control agents. The zones of microbial inhibition were measured after incubation period. Results. The CH preparations with glycerin and CHX demonstrated more antifungal activity than CH preparations with cetrimide and distilled water. The CH-glycerin preparations had no effect against E. faecalis, and CH-CHX preparation was the most effective medication. Conclusion. Antimicrobial activity of CH may change with the type of the vehicle and against different microorganisms. Enterococcus faecalis was more resistant than C. albicans to CH preparations. (Oral Surg Oral Med Oral Pathol Oral Radiol Endod 2009; 108: 297-301

Boosting real-time recognition of hand posture and gesture for virtual mouse operations with segmentation

The design and implementation of polylogarithmically or polynomially bounded algorithms on faster processors has gained popularity and attracted the attention of both researchers and practitioners. The evolution in the computer hardware technology has boosted the development of real-time applications which are expected to respond within a strict time frame. One attractive sophisticated application, which requires real time response, is image capturing and recognition for effective human computer interaction. It is gaining popularity, especially after the development of hand held devices and touch screens. Real-time video processing response time is expressed by means of frame sequences; device dependent capability (20 frame/sec) designates real-time restrictions (a frame is needed to be processed within 50 ms). Video processing of virtual mouse operations requires real-time recognition, i.e., no delay in response can be tolerated. There are indeed several attempts to recognize hand gestures for different purposes. Sign language recognition stands out as the most popular one. However, virtual mouse operations may also be used in general by the majority of people in parallel for the proliferation of different applications on a variety of platforms such as tablet PCs, embedded devices, etc. One significant advantage of such systems fulfills the need for extra hardware system. To this end, we have developed a novel real-time virtual mouse application. Our system architecture recognizes defined postures and gestures. We have implemented, tested, and compared the performance of four methods, namely Chai (static), face (dynamic), regional (dynamic), and Duan. Further, various conditions, such as lighting, distinguishing skin color, and complex background have been considered and discussed. © 2015, Springer Science+Business Media New York

Antimicrobial activity of Sternbergia sicula and Sternbergia lutea

PubMed ID: 15752636n-Hexane, ethyl acetate, ethanolic and aqueous extracts of the bulbs and aerial parts of Sternbergia sicula and Sternbergia lutea were tested for their antimicrobial and antifungal activity. © 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.Fundamental Research Fund of Shandong University: 04/ECZ/03 Ege ÜniversitesiThe authors would like to express their gratitude to Prof. M. Ali Önür, Ege University, Faculty of Pharmacy, Department of Pharmacognosy, for his assistance in the collection and identification of the plant material. The financial support of the Ege University Research Fund (Project No. 04/ECZ/03) is gratefully acknowledged. -

Practical approach for detection and identification of OXA-10-derived ceftazidime-hydrolyzing extended-spectrum beta-lactamases

A practical approach to detect and identify ceftazidime-hydrolyzing extended-spectrum mutants of OXA-10 beta-lactamase is presented. Large numbers of bacteria were screened by colony hybridization, a 720-bp part of bla(OXA) was amplified by PCR from the hybridization-positive isolates, and the products were digested by PvuII and HaeIII

Line Identification of Atomic and Ionic Spectra of Holmium in the Visible Spectral Range. II. Spectrum of Ho II and Ho III

Fourier Transform spectra of Holmium (Ho) in the visible spectral range from 14,280 up to 25,000 cm(-1), or 400 to 700 nm have been investigated, with a focus on the ionic lines. More than 500 spectral lines were assigned to singly ionized Ho (Ho II), of which more than 400 were previously unknown. A further 21 lines were assigned to doubly ionized Ho (Ho III), 1 of which was not reported previously. From among these lines, 60 Ho II lines and 20 Ho III lines were classified. A complete list of more than 4000 Ho lines observed in the recorded spectrum is supplied, even if they remain unclassified

Line Identification of Atomic and Ionic Spectra of Holmium in the Near-UV. II. Spectra of HoII and HoIII

Fourier Transform spectra of holmium (Ho) in the UV spectral range from 31,530 to 25,000. cm(-1) (317 to 400 nm) have been investigated, particularly focusing on the ionic lines. The distinction between the different degrees of ionization (I, II, and III) is based on differences in signal-to-noise ratios from two Ho spectra, which have been measured with different buffer gases, i. e., neon and argon. Based on 106 known Ho II and 126 known Ho III energy levels, 97 lines could be classified as transitions of singly ionized Ho and 9 lines could be classified as transitions of doubly ionized Ho. Of the 97 Ho II lines, 6 have not been listed in the extant literature. Another 215 lines have been assigned to Ho II, though they could not be classified on the basis of the known energy levels