Do asset price fluctuations constitute a risk to growth in the major industrialised countries?

Asset price fluctuations give grounds for concern in the major industrialised countries. But to what extent do they affect economic growth? The answer to this question partly depends on households’ levels of debt and the structure of their financial wealth. We shall first summarise the different wealth effect estimates. This analysis shows that the impact of asset price fluctuations is more pronounced in the United States and the United Kingdom than in euro area countries. Asset price fluctuations in the United States appear to have an even greater impact on euro area growth than changes in household wealth within the euro area. Overall, outside of the United States and the United Kingdom, wealth effects are fairly limited, despite the existence of spillover effects transmitted through international trade and/or financial markets. Furthermore, these findings seem to be consistent with those obtained using other quantitative approaches that analyse the co-movements between business and financial cycles. They also conclude that, apart from in the United States, a high degree of dependence between economic growth and asset price fluctuations in the short term cannot be identified. We shall then provide an international comparison of the financial position of households (United States, Japan, United Kingdom, Germany, France and Italy). This analysis points to a certain degree of heterogeneity. In particular, the financial vulnerability of US and UK households, which have a larger appetite for debt and risky assets, is greater than that of households of the major euro area countries. In this context, it is not surprising that the shocks affecting asset prices have a more marked effect on household consumption and growth in the United States and the United Kingdom than in the major euro area countries or in Japan.

Investigation of Graded La2NiO4+ Cathodes to Improve SOFC Electrochemical Performance

Mixed ionic and electronic conducting MIEC oxides are promising materials for use as cathodes in solid oxide fuel cells SOFCs due to their enhanced electrocatalytic activity compared with electronic conducting oxides. In this paper, the MIEC oxide La2NiO4+ was prepared by the sol-gel route. Graded cathodes were deposited onto yttria-stabilized zirconia YSZ pellets by dip-coating, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy studies were performed to characterize the symmetrical cell performance. By adapting the slurries, cathode layers with different porosities and thicknesses were obtained. A ceria gadolinium oxide CGO barrier layer was introduced, avoiding insulating La2Zr2O7 phase formation and thus reducing resistance polarization of the cathode. A systematic correlation between microstructure, composition, and electrochemical performance of these cathodes has been performed. An improvement of the electrochemical performance has been demonstrated, and a reduction in the area specific resistance ASR by a factor of 4.5 has been achieved with a compact interlayer of La2NiO4+ between the dense electrolyte and the porous La2NiO4+ cathode layer. The lowest observed ASR of 0.11 cm2 at 800°C was obtained from a symmetrical cell composed of a YSZ electrolyte, a CGO interlayer, an intermediate compact La2NiO4+ layer, a porous La2NiO4+ electrode layer, and a current collection layer of platinum paste

Continuous macroscopic limit of a discrete stochastic model for interaction of living cells

In the development of multiscale biological models it is crucial to establish a connection between discrete microscopic or mesoscopic stochastic models and macroscopic continuous descriptions based on cellular density. In this paper a continuous limit of a two-dimensional Cellular Potts Model (CPM) with excluded volume is derived, describing cells moving in a medium and reacting to each other through both direct contact and long range chemotaxis. The continuous macroscopic model is obtained as a Fokker-Planck equation describing evolution of the cell probability density function. All coefficients of the general macroscopic model are derived from parameters of the CPM and a very good agreement is demonstrated between CPM Monte Carlo simulations and numerical solution of the macroscopic model. It is also shown that in the absence of contact cell-cell interactions, the obtained model reduces to the classical macroscopic Keller-Segel model. General multiscale approach is demonstrated by simulating spongy bone formation from loosely packed mesenchyme via the intramembranous route suggesting that self-organizing physical mechanisms can account for this developmental process.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

The Non-thermal Radio Jet Toward the NGC 2264 Star Formation Region

We report sensitive VLA 3.6 cm radio observations toward the head of the Cone nebula in NGC 2264, made in 2006. The purpose of these observations was to study a non-thermal radio jet recently discovered, that appears to emanate from the head of the Cone nebula. The jet is highly polarized, with well-defined knots, and one-sided. The comparison of our images with 1995 archive data indicates no evidence of proper motions nor polarization changes. We find reliable flux density variations in only one knot, which we tentatively identify as the core of a quasar or radio galaxy. An extragalactic location seems to be the best explanation for this jet.Comment: 12 pages, 5 figure

Preparation of Ni–YSZ thin and thick films on metallic interconnects as cell supports. Applications as anode for SOFC

In this work, we propose the preparation of a duplex anodic layer composed of both a thin (100 nm) and a thick film (10 lm) with Ni–YSZ material. The support of this anode is a metallic substrate, which is the interconnect of the SOFC unit cell. The metallic support limits the temperature of thermal treatment at 800 C to keep a good interconnect mechanical behaviour and to reduce corrosion. We have chosen to elaborate anodic coatings by sol–gel route coupled with dip-coating process, which are low cost techniques and allow working with moderate temperatures. Thin films are obtained by dipping interconnect substrate into a sol, and thick films into an optimized slurry. After thermal treatment at only 800 C, anodic coatings are adherent and homogeneous. Thin films have compact microstructures that confer ceramic protective barrier on metal surface. Further coatings of 10 lm thick are porous and constitute the active anodic material

High-Temperature-Induced Defects in Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) Anther and Pollen Development Are Associated with Reduced Expression of B-Class Floral Patterning Genes

Citation: Muller, F., Xu, J. M., Kristensen, L., Wolters-Arts, M., de Groot, P. F. M., Jansma, S. Y., . . . Rieu, I. (2016). High-Temperature-Induced Defects in Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) Anther and Pollen Development Are Associated with Reduced Expression of B-Class Floral Patterning Genes. Plos One, 11(12), 14. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0167614Sexual reproduction is a critical process in the life-cycle of plants and very sensitive to environmental perturbations. To better understand the effect of high temperature on plant reproduction, we cultivated tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) plants in continuous mild heat. Under this condition we observed a simultaneous reduction in pollen viability and appearance of anthers with pistil-like structures, while in a more thermotolerant genotype, both traits were improved. Ectopic expression of two pistil-specific genes, TRANSMITTING TISSUE SPECIFIC and TOMATO AGAMOUS LIKE11, in the anthers confirmed that the anthers had gained partial pistil identity. Concomitantly, expression of the B-class genes TOMATO APETALA3, TOMATO MADS BOX GENE6 (TM6) and LePISTILLATA was reduced in anthers under continuous mild heat. Plants in which TM6 was partially silenced reacted hypersensitively to temperature elevation with regard to the frequency of pistilloid anthers, pollen viability and pollen quantity. Taken together, these results suggest that high-temperature induced down-regulation of tomato B-class genes contributes to anther deformations and reduced male fertility. Improving our understanding of how temperature perturbs the molecular mechanisms of anther and pollen development will be important in the view of maintaining agricultural output under current climate changes

OH main line masers in the M82 starburst

A study of the distribution of OH gas in the central region of the nearby active starburst galaxy M82 has confirmed two previously known bright masers and revealed several new main line masers. Three of these are seen only at 1665 MHz, one is detected only at 1667 MHz, while the rest are detected in both lines. Observations covering both the 1665 and 1667 MHz lines, conducted with both the Very Large Array (VLA) and the Multi-Element Radio Linked Interferometer Network (MERLIN), have been used to accurately measure the positions and velocities of these features. This has allowed a comparison with catalogued continuum features in the starburst such as HII regions and supernova remnants, as well as known water and satellite line OH masers. Most of the main line masers appear to be associated with known HII regions although the two detected only at 1665 MHz are seen along the same line of sight as known supernova remnants.Comment: MNRAS accepted. 16 pages, 13 figure

Phase Transition in Liquid Drop Fragmentation

A liquid droplet is fragmented by a sudden pressurized-gas blow, and the resulting droplets, adhered to the window of a flatbed scanner, are counted and sized by computerized means. The use of a scanner plus image recognition software enables us to automatically count and size up to tens of thousands of tiny droplets with a smallest detectable volume of approximately 0.02 nl. Upon varying the gas pressure, a critical value is found where the size-distribution becomes a pure power-law, a fact that is indicative of a phase transition. Away from this transition, the resulting size distributions are well described by Fisher's model at coexistence. It is found that the sign of the surface correction term changes sign, and the apparent power-law exponent tau has a steep minimum, at criticality, as previously reported in Nuclear Multifragmentation studies [1,2]. We argue that the observed transition is not percolative, and introduce the concept of dominance in order to characterize it. The dominance probability is found to go to zero sharply at the transition. Simple arguments suggest that the correlation length exponent is nu=1/2. The sizes of the largest and average fragments, on the other hand, do not go to zero but behave in a way that appears to be consistent with recent predictions of Ashurst and Holian [3,4].Comment: 10 pages, 11 figures. LaTeX (revtex4) with psfig/epsfi