Organisation, motivations and case studies of Japanese direct investment in real estate 1985-94

Between 1985 and 1994 there was a remarkable rise and decline in Japanese real estate investment abroad which has been little documented or analysed, despite its economic scale and political impact. This paper is a further exploration of the nature and causes of this form of investment, following on from a broader study of its determinants in Pacific Economic Paper No. 271 of September 1997. It provides supporting evidence, through an examination of the organisation and motivations of investors, for the hypothesis that Japanese investors in real estate were predominantly influenced by the financial environment in Japan after the mid 1980s, rather than by more strategic factors such as their firm-specific advantages. According to traditional industrial organisation theory, FDI (foreign direct investment) is associated with investor control over assets and an active managerial role by investors. Hence, the purpose of FDI is to pursue a strategic international expansion by a firm, based on its specific proprietary advantages over local firms (Dunning 1981; 1993). Notably, Hymer (1976) categorised active investment as type II if it involved both control and management; alternatively, inactive investment, without control, is categorised as type I in nature. Evidence is provided that the corporate and financial organisational structure of Japanese real estate FDI did not exhibit type II features to any significant extent. It is argued that the organisational and corporate strengths of Japanese firms explain little of the pattern of real estate FDI over the 10 years in review. The paper concludes that Japanese real estate investment appears to be an exception to the traditional firm-specific model of FDI

The political economy of key currencies : implications of the Yen's rising importance as a world currency

The international monetary system is not a traditional area of study in international relations and is often discussed using a 'scientific-economic' approach, which assumes that the system is politically neutral. Instead this paper takes a 'pol' tical economic' approach (Johnson, 1971) and argues that the acceptance of a national currency as the dominant medium of exchange for international trade and finance creates a web of economic and political interdependence between the state which issues the 'key' currency and the rest of the world. Moreover the key currency state achieves a measure of monetary hegemony which can have significant costs and benefits both for itself and for other states which accept its currency in international transactions

Introduction, dispersal and naturalisation of the Manila clam Ruditapes philippinarum in British estuaries, 1980-2010

The introduction of the Manila clam into British coastal waters in the 1980s was contested by conservation agencies. While recognizing the value of the clam for aquaculture, the government decided that it posed no invasive risk, as British sea temperatures would prevent naturalization. This proved incorrect. Here we establish the pattern of introduction and spread of the species over the first 30 years of its presence in Britain. We report archival research on the sequence of licensed introductions and examine their relationship in time and space to the appearance of wild populations as revealed in the literature and by field surveys. By 2010 the species had naturalized in at least 11 estuaries in southern England. These included estuaries with no history of licensed introduction. In these cases activities such as storage of catch before market or deliberate unlicensed introduction represent the probable mechanisms of dispersal. In any event naturalization is not an inevitable consequence of introduction and the chances of establishment over the period in question were finely balanced. Consequently in Britain the species is not currently aggressively invasive and appears not to present significant risk to indigenous diversity or ecosystem function. However it is likely to gradually continue its spread should sea surface temperatures rise as predicted

Cerebrospinal Fluid Cytokines and Neurodegeneration-Associated Proteins in Parkinson's Disease.

INTRODUCTION: Immune markers are altered in Parkinson's disease (PD), but relationships between cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and plasma cytokines and associations with neurodegeneration-associated proteins remain unclear. METHODS: CSF and plasma samples and demographic/clinical measures were obtained from 35 PD patients. CSF samples were analyzed for cytokines (together with plasma) and for α-synuclein, amyloid β(1-42) peptide, total tau, and phospho(Thr231)-tau. RESULTS: There were no CSF-plasma cytokine correlations. Interleukin (IL)-8 was higher and interferon-γ, IL-10, and tumor necrosis factor-α were lower in CSF versus plasma. In CSF, total tau correlated positively with IL-8 and IL-1β, whereas α-synuclein correlated positively with amyloid β(1-42) and negatively with semantic fluency (a known marker of PD dementia risk). DISCUSSION: CSF and peripheral cytokine profiles in PD are not closely related. Associations between CSF IL-8 and IL-1β and tau suggest that CSF inflammatory changes may relate to tau pathology within PD. CSF α-synuclein/amyloid β may reflect the risk of developing PD dementia. © 2020 The Authors. Movement Disorders published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc. on behalf of International Parkinson and Movement Disorder Society.Funding for this work was provided by the Rosetrees Trust (M369-F1), Addenbrooke’s Charitable Trust (PF15/CWG) and the NIHR Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre Dementia and Neurodegeneration Theme (146281). RSW was supported by a Fellowship from Addenbrooke’s Charitable Trust (RG77199). SFM was supported by the Transeuro EU FP7 grant (242003) and is now an NIHR Academic Clinical Fellow (ACF-2015-23-501). DPB is supported by a Wellcome Trust Clinical Research Career Development Fellowship. RAB is an NIHR Senior Investigator (NF-SI-0616-10011) and is supported by the Wellcome Trust-MRC Cambridge Stem Cell Institute. CHWG holds a RCUK/UKRI Research Innovation Fellowship awarded by the Medical Research Council (MR/R007446/1) and receives support from the Cambridge Centre for Parkinson-Plus

Radar Sounding of the Medusae Fossae Formation Mars: Equatorial Ice or Dry, Low-Density Deposits?

The equatorial Medusae Fossae Formation (MFF) is enigmatic and perhaps among the youngest geologic deposits on Mars. They are thought to be composed of volcanic ash, eolian sediments, or an ice-rich material analogous to polar layered deposits. The Mars Advanced Radar for Subsurface and Ionospheric Sounding (MARSIS) instrument aboard the Mars Express Spacecraft has detected nadir echoes offset in time-delay from the surface return in orbits over MFF material. These echoes are interpreted to be from the subsurface interface between the MFF material and the underlying terrain. The delay time between the MFF surface and subsurface echoes is consistent with massive deposits emplaced on generally planar lowlands materials with a real dielectric constant of ∼2.9 ± 0.4. The real dielectric constant and the estimated dielectric losses are consistent with a substantial component of water ice. However, an anomalously low-density, ice-poor material cannot be ruled out. If ice-rich, the MFF must have a higher percentage of dust and sand than polar layered deposits. The volume of water in an ice-rich MFF deposit would be comparable to that of the south polar layered deposits