Monitoring Leverage

We discuss how leverage can be monitored for institutions, individuals, and assets. While traditionally the interest rate has been regarded as the important feature of a loan, we argue that leverage is sometimes even more important. Monitoring leverage provides information about how risk builds up during booms as leverage rises and how crises start when leverage on new loans sharply declines. Leverage data is also a crucial input for crisis management and lending facilities. Leverage at the asset level can be monitored by down payments or margin requirement or and haircuts, giving a model-free measure that can be observed directly, in contrast to other measures of systemic risk that require complex estimation. Asset leverage is a fundamental measure of systemic risk and so is important in itself, but it is also the building block out of which measures of institutional leverage and household leverage can be most accurately and informatively constructed.Leverage, Loan to value, Margins, Haircuts, Monitor, Regulate, Leverage on new loans, Asset leverage, Investor leverage

Midwest Plan Service

The Midwest Plan Service coordinates the specialties of experts at a nmber of Midwestern Universities. The manager of the service describes its uses and extent

Monitoring Leverage

We discuss how leverage can be monitored for institutions, individuals, and assets. While traditionally the interest rate has been regarded as the important feature of a loan, we argue that leverage is sometimes even more important. Monitoring leverage provides information about how risk builds up during booms as leverage rises and how crises start when leverage on new loans sharply declines. Leverage data is also a crucial input for crisis management and lending facilities. Leverage at the asset level can be monitored by down payments or margin requirement or and haircuts, giving a model-free measure that can be observed directly, in contrast to other measures of systemic risk that require complex estimation. Asset leverage is a fundamental measure of systemic risk and so is important in itself, but it is also the building block out of which measures of institutional leverage and household leverage can be most accurately and informatively constructed

Heating Central Farrowing Houses

As hog producers spread out farrowings over the year, interest is increasing inmethods of heating central farrowing houses. Some methods have been sucessful, while others haven\u27t. Here are some of the factors to consider

Resveratrol given intraperitoneally does not inhibit the growth of high-risk t(4;11) acute lymphoblastic leukemia cells in a NOD/SCID mouse model.

The efficacy of resveratrol as a preventive agent against the growth of t(4;11) acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) was evaluated in NOD.CB17-Prkdcscid/J mice engrafted with the human t(4;11) ALL SEM cell line. SEM cells were injected into the tail vein and engraftment was monitored by flow cytometry. Once engraftment was observed, mice were injected intraperitoneally with resveratrol (10 mg/kg body weight) dissolved in dimethylsulfoxide (DMSO) or DMSO alone (control) every other day, or vincristine (0.5 mg/kg body weight) 3 times per week for 4 weeks (n=16 per group). Comparisons of the percent of human leukemia cells in blood and survival curves showed resveratrol did not inhibit progression of the disease. Liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry analyses of mouse sera showed resveratrol was rapidly metabolized to glucuronidated and sulfated forms 1 h post-injection, with low to no resveratrol or metabolites observed in sera by 24-48 h. These data indicate that in contrast to findings in in vitro models, parenterally administered resveratrol does not have potential as a preventive agent against high risk t(4;11) ALL

The Inhalation Characteristics of Patients When They Use Different Dry Powder Inhalers

Background: The characteristics of each inhalation maneuver when patients use dry powder inhalers (DPIs) are important, because they control the quality of the emitted dose. Methods: We have measured the inhalation profiles of asthmatic children [CHILD; n=16, mean forced expiratory volume in 1 sec (FEV1) 79% predicted], asthmatic adults (ADULT; n=53, mean predicted FEV1 72%), and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD; n=29, mean predicted FEV1 42%) patients when they inhaled through an Aerolizer, Diskus, Turbuhaler, and Easyhaler using their “real-life” DPI inhalation technique. These are low-, medium-, medium/high-, and high-resistance DPIs, respectively. The inhalation flow against time was recorded to provide the peak inhalation flow (PIF; in L/min), the maximum pressure change (ΔP; in kPa), acceleration rates (ACCEL; in kPa/sec), time to maximum inhalation, the length of each inhalation (in sec), and the inhalation volume (IV; in liters) of each inhalation maneuver. Results: PIF, ΔP, and ACCEL values were consistent with the order of the inhaler's resistance. For each device, the inhalation characteristics were in the order ADULT>COPD>CHILD for PIF, ΔP, and ACCEL (p4 L and ΔP >4 kPa. Conclusion: The large variability of these inhalation characteristics and their range highlights that if inhalation profiles were used with compendial in vitro dose emission measurements, then the results would provide useful information about the dose patients inhale during routine use. The inhalation characteristics highlight that adults with asthma have greater inspiratory capacity than patients with COPD, whereas children with asthma have the lowest. The significance of the inhaled volume to empty doses from each device requires investigation

Acute Hypercapnia/Ischemia Alters the Esterification of Arachidonic Acid and Docosahexaenoic Acid Epoxide Metabolites in Rat Brain Neutral Lipids.

In the brain, approximately 90% of oxylipins are esterified to lipids. However, the significance of this esterification process is not known. In the present study, we (1) validated an aminopropyl solid phase extraction (SPE) method for separating esterified lipids using 100 and 500 mg columns and (2) applied the method to quantify the distribution of esterified oxylipins within phospholipids (PL) and neutral lipids (NL) (i.e. triacylglycerol and cholesteryl ester) in rats subjected to head-focused microwave fixation (controls) or CO2 -induced hypercapnia/ischemia. We hypothesized that oxylipin esterification into these lipid pools will be altered following CO2 -induced hypercapnia/ischemia. Lipids were extracted from control (n = 8) and CO2 -asphyxiated (n = 8) rat brains and separated on aminopropyl cartridges to yield PL and NL. The separated lipid fractions were hydrolyzed, purified with hydrophobic-lipophilic-balanced SPE columns, and analyzed with ultra-high-pressure liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry. Method validation showed that the 500 mg (vs 100 mg) aminopropyl columns yielded acceptable separation and recovery of esterified fatty acid epoxides but not other oxylipins. Two epoxides of arachidonic acid (ARA) were significantly increased, and three epoxides of docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) were significantly decreased in brain NL of CO2 -asphyxiated rats compared to controls subjected to head-focused microwave fixation. PL-bound fatty acid epoxides were highly variable and did not differ significantly between the groups. This study demonstrates that hypercapnia/ischemia alters the concentration of ARA and DHA epoxides within NL, reflecting an active turnover process regulating brain fatty acid epoxide concentrations

Recent study brings good news about the soybean aphid

Increased activity of bean leaf beetles and soybean aphids in Iowa soybean fields has challenged many of us over the last five years. Not just because of the sap feeding and leaf defoliation that can cause significant yield loss but also because we are dealing with another yield robber that we often can\u27t see. Iowa soybean fields can be infected with bean pod mottle and soybean {m}osaic viruses that are transmitted by bean leaf beetles and soybean aphids, respectively. The challenge that we are dealing with is, first of all, we can\u27t always see that we have a virus in soybean, and yield loss caused by viruses can occur even when symptoms are not apparent

Altitude, latitude and climate zone as determinants of mountain hare (Lepus timidus) coat colour change

Local adaptation to annually changing environments has evolved in numerous species. Seasonal coat colour change is an adaptation that has evolved in multiple mammal and bird species occupying areas that experience seasonal snow cover. It has a critical impact on fitness as predation risk may increase when an individual is mismatched against its habitat's background colour. In this paper, we investigate the correlation between landscape covariates and moult timing in a native winter-adapted herbivore, the mountain hare (Lepus timidus), throughout Norway. Data was collected between 2011 and 2019 at 678 camera trap locations deployed across an environmental gradient. Based on this data, we created a Bayesian multinomial logistic regression model that quantified the correlations between landscape covariates and coat colour phenology and analysed among season and year moult timing variation. Our results demonstrate that mountain hare moult timing is strongly correlated with altitude and latitude with hares that live at higher latitudes and altitudes keeping their winter white coats for longer than their conspecifics that inhabit lower latitudes and altitudes. Moult timing was also weakly correlated with climate zone with hares that live in coastal climates keeping their winter white coats for longer than hares that live in continental climates. We found evidence of some among year moult timing variation in spring, but not in autumn. We conclude that mountain hare moult timing has adapted to local environmental conditions throughout Norway

Return to the workforce following first hospitalization for heart failure: a Danish nationwide cohort study

Background: Return to work is important financially, as a marker of functional status and for self-esteem in patients developing chronic illness. We examined return to work after first heart failure (HF) hospitalization. Methods: By individual-level linkage of nationwide Danish registries, we identified 21455 patients of working age (18-60 years) with a first HF hospitalization in the period of 1997-2012. Of these 11880 (55%) were in the workforce prior to HF hospitalization and comprised the study population. We applied logistic regression to estimate odds ratios (OR) for associations between age, sex, length of hospital stay, level of education, income, comorbidity and return to work. Results: One year after first HF hospitalization, 8040 (67.7%) returned to the workforce, 2981 (25.1%) did not, 805 (6.7%) died and 54 (0.5%) emigrated. Predictors of return to work included younger age (18-30 vs. 51-60 years, OR 3.12; 95% CI 2.42-4.03), male sex (OR 1.22 [1.18-1.34]) and level of education (long-higher vs. basic school OR 2.06 [1.63-2.60]). Conversely, hospital stay >7 days (OR 0.56 [0.51-0.62]) and comorbidity including history of stroke (OR 0.55 [0.45-0.69]), chronic kidney disease (OR 0.46 [0.36-0.59]), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (OR 0.62 [0.52-0.75]), diabetes (OR 0.76 [0.68-0.85]) and cancer (OR 0.49 [0.40-0.61]) were all significantly associated with lower chance of return to work. Conclusions: Patients in the workforce prior to HF hospitalization had low mortality but high risk of detachment from the workforce one year later. Young age, male sex, and higher level of education were predictors of return to work