Dual dimension of modules over normalizing extensions

It has been argued that the use of ICTs can provide disadvantaged communities with access to information and thereby enable them to enhance their quality of life. This paper attempts to analyze the use of the ICTs from the perspective of the target beneficiaries (i.e. farmers). It reports on the results of an action research intervention in Bangladesh. The first phase of the fieldwork was designed to identify agricultural information needs. An intervention enabled farmers’ groups to have access to the services offered by two telecentres in Bangladesh through mobile telephony technology. Evidence from interviews, focus group discussions, diary notes and personal observation suggests that the telecentre projects had limited impacts in terms of meeting some crucial agricultural information needs. Mobile telephony, computers and internet connectivity have the potential to deliver the information. However, the information content and the applications need to be developed through a bottom up approach in order to achieve the objectives of meeting the information needs of farmers

Therapeutic Implications of GIPC1 Silencing in Cancer

GIPC1 is a cytoplasmic scaffold protein that interacts with numerous receptor signaling complexes, and emerging evidence suggests that it plays a role in tumorigenesis. GIPC1 is highly expressed in a number of human malignancies, including breast, ovarian, gastric, and pancreatic cancers. Suppression of GIPC1 in human pancreatic cancer cells inhibits in vivo tumor growth in immunodeficient mice. To better understand GIPC1 function, we suppressed its expression in human breast and colorectal cancer cell lines and human mammary epithelial cells (HMECs) and assayed both gene expression and cellular phenotype. Suppression of GIPC1 promotes apoptosis in MCF-7, MDA-MD231, SKBR-3, SW480, and SW620 cells and impairs anchorage-independent colony formation of HMECs. These observations indicate GIPC1 plays an essential role in oncogenic transformation, and its expression is necessary for the survival of human breast and colorectal cancer cells. Additionally, a GIPC1 knock-down gene signature was used to interrogate publically available breast and ovarian cancer microarray datasets. This GIPC1 signature statistically correlates with a number of breast and ovarian cancer phenotypes and clinical outcomes, including patient survival. Taken together, these data indicate that GIPC1 inhibition may represent a new target for therapeutic development for the treatment of human cancers

Schumpeter, Hegel and the vision of development

This paper suggests that the intellectual origins of the vision underlying Schumpeter's evolving theory of economic development can in significant measure be traced to Hegel. Like Hegel, Schumpeter identified two essential moments in history--the preservation of the existing order or 'circular flow', on the one hand, and its destruction and replacement by a new order or 'development', on the other. Like Hegel, Schumpeter saw change being effected by individuals who grasped what was essentially new and developing in the particular historical circumstances of their own age. Copyright 2006, Oxford University Press.

Accumulation of knowledge and accumulation of capital in early 'theories' of growth and development

This paper argues that prior to Adam Smith economic progress was largely conceived as being based on the accumulation of knowledge. The development by Turgot and Smith of a concept of capital that subsumed other factors contributing to development led their followers to focus on capital to the neglect of the independent role of knowledge. The paper demonstrates that this paradigmatic shift was identified and challenged by Bentham, Hodgskin and Rae who argued for the independent role of innovation but without lasting impact. Copyright The Author 2009. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Cambridge Political Economy Society. All rights reserved., Oxford University Press.