Does Competition Encourage Credit Provision? Evidence from African Trade Credit Relationships

Previous work has claimed that monopoly power facilitates the provision of credit, since monopolists are better able to enforce payment. Here, we argue that if relationship-specific investments are required by borrowers to establish creditworthiness, monopoly power may reduce credit provision because hold up problems ex post will deter borrowers from investing in establishing creditworthiness. Empirically, we examine the relationship between monopoly power and credit provision, using data on the supply relationships of firms in five African countries. Consistent with the upfront investment story, we find that monopoly power is negatively associated with credit provision, and that this correlation is stronger in older supplier relationships. Because the data include several observations per firm, we are able to utilize firm fixed-effects, thus netting out unobserved firm characteristics that may have been driving results in earlier studies.

Analysis of the Implementation of the NRC with Respect to Statelessness in Assam

On 31st August 2019, the final version of the National Register of Citizens was published. It was meant to be a seamless solution to the so-called ‘immigration problem’ that the people of Assam have been facing for the last few decades. The demand for such a Register, therefore, dates back to the Assam Agitation. An undoubtedly sizable task, it has now drawn criticism on several grounds. The most common criticism being that it has successfully rendered 1.9 million people in Assam stateless. A stateless person is one who belongs to no particular ‘nation’ or ‘state’. This is an issue that requires urgent attention as it has resulted in the violation of human rights and deprivation of basic resources. This research paper attempts to examine whether the Register has successfully addressed the aforementioned problem. In order to do so, the researcher has examined the procedural aspects of drafting the Register and its subsequent implementation. Further, the paper explores the after effects of the implementation of such a Register, while attempting to arrive at solutions to resolve the various issues created via such an implementation

ANALYSIS ON SUICIDAL IDEATION AMONG ADOLESCENTS (12-17 YEARS) IN THE USA

Suicide is one of the leading health concerns in United States among adolescents and the presence of suicidal ideation (SI) is quite high, with ~20-30% of adolescents reporting it at some point. Though we have seen growth and development in the prevention of suicide, there is limited research on the ability to identify the adolescents which might be at risk for SI. The objective behind the project is to identify adolescents with SI using machine learning. The project shows statistics from different articles on adolescents in the U.S. For this study, adolescent data was taken from NSDUH 2018. Moreover, detailed associations between demographics, mental health features, etc. and SI were conducted. From the analysis we saw that functional impairment during MDE on social life, family relationships, schoolwork and home chores play an important role in identifying SI among adolescents. Moreover, machine learning algorithm was implemented to predict SI (accuracy score ~65-70%). This paper also shows the importance of each feature on the prediction of SI among adolescents. In future work these features could be used to develop an application which will predict SI among adolescents. This screening tool could be potentially utilized by healthcare professionals to screen adolescents during patient encounters. In the future more data could be combined from different years and countries, including the social media information as well

Utilization of mononuclear trivalent lanthanide complexes for the assembly of heteronuclear (d-f) metal complexes

Lanthanides are known for their distinctive magnetic properties and have been utilized for the design of multinuclear single-molecule magnets. Mononuclear trivalent lanthanide complexes were prepared from the reaction of tripodal amido ligands [P(CH2NHArR)3] and Ln[N(SiMe 3)2] (ArR = C6H5, 3,5-Me 2 and 3,5-(CF3)2 and Ln = Y, Tb, Dy, Ho, Er, Tm and Yb) in the presence of THF. These mononuclear lanthanide complexes were then further utilized for the syntheses of d-f heteronuclear compounds, using various transition metal complexes such as Pt(cyclooctadiene)Me 2, Ni(acetylacetonate)2 and Co-porphyrin. Mononuclear trivalent lanthanide complexes, prepared using 2-methyl anthranilate, contained a rigid chelate ring with six proton environments. The 31 p{1H} NMR spectra demonstrated a through-space interaction between the minor lobe of phosphine lone pair and the yttrium metal. Binding of a paramagnetic cobalt metal complex to the unbound phosphine lone pair provided heterodinuclear d-f metal complexes. The EPR spectra and the magnetic study of heterodinuclear complexes indicated the through-space antiferromagnetic coupling between unpaired electrons of gadolinium and cobalt centers. Magnetic anisotropy of lanthanide complexes with more than C2 symmetry can be easily measured by their NMR shifts due to the presence of dipolar contribution. According to Bleaney, temperature dependence of the magnetic anisotropy of lanthanide complexes should be proportional to T–2 and the crystal field parameter (α 20).[special characters omitted] McGarvey later expanded the temperature dependence of the anisotropy by including a term that is proportional to T–3 and other crystal field parameters (equation 2).[special characters omitted] From our calculations, we demonstrated the dependence of higher terms (\u3eT–2) for the calculation of magnetic anisotropy near room temperature. These higher terms showed the contribution of 20-90% of the T–2 term. Estimation of crystal field parameters (related with magnetic properties) generally requires low temperature optical spectroscopy or a SQUID magnetometer. Our trivalent mononuclear lanthanide complexes have C3 symmetry, which required 6 crystal field parameters, B20, B40, B60, B43, B63 and B66. Here, we utilized variable temperature NMR spectra to calculate the set of crystal field parameters. A best set of crystal-field parameters were then obtained by comparing experimental and theoretical magnetic anisotropies. In the future, these parameters can be further utilized for the electronic structure of lanthanide complexes

Feasibility study of a solar water pumping system

Solar photovoltaic (SPV) water pumping systems have the potential to provide clean drinking water to millions of unserved people around the world. The abundant solar energy resource and groundwater availability in the Pacific Island Countries (PICs) can be combined to make much needed potable water available to remote island communities in these countries. This paper looks at the feasibility of using a SPV pumping system in one of the villages in the Fiji Islands

Where the endoplasmic reticulum and the mitochondrion tie the knot: The mitochondria-associated membrane (MAM)

AbstractMore than a billion years ago, bacterial precursors of mitochondria became endosymbionts in what we call eukaryotic cells today. The true significance of the word “endosymbiont” has only become clear to cell biologists with the discovery that the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) superorganelle dedicates a special domain for the metabolic interaction with mitochondria. This domain, identified in all eukaryotic cell systems from yeast to man and called the mitochondria-associated membrane (MAM), has a distinct proteome, specific tethers on the cytosolic face and regulatory proteins in the ER lumen of the ER. The MAM has distinct biochemical properties and appears as ER tubules closely apposed to mitochondria on electron micrographs. The functions of the MAM range from lipid metabolism and calcium signaling to inflammasome formation. Consistent with these functions, the MAM is enriched in lipid metabolism enzymes and calcium handling proteins. During cellular stress situations, like an altered cellular redox state, the MAM alters its set of regulatory proteins and thus alters MAM functions. Notably, this set prominently comprises ER chaperones and oxidoreductases that connect protein synthesis and folding inside the ER to mitochondrial metabolism. Moreover, ER membranes associated with mitochondria also accommodate parts of the machinery that determines mitochondrial membrane dynamics and connect mitochondria to the cytoskeleton. Together, these exciting findings demonstrate that the physiological interactions between the ER and mitochondria are so bilateral that we are tempted to compare their relationship to the one of a married couple: distinct, but inseparable and certainly dependent on each other. In this paradigm, the MAM stands for the intracellular location where the two organelles tie the knot. Resembling “real life”, the happy marriage between the two organelles prevents the onset of diseases that are characterized by disrupted metabolism and decreased lifespan, including neurodegeneration and cancer. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Mitochondrial dynamics and physiology