The"resource curse"in MENA ? political transitions, resource wealth, economic shocks, and conflict risk

The recent political upheavals in the Middle East and North Africa region have exposed growing concerns about conflict risk, political stability, and reform prospects across its societies. Given the prevalence of oil and gas resource endowments in the region, which a voluminous literature suggests can be associated with adverse development consequences, this paper examines the interplay between their associated rents and political economy trajectories. The contribution of the paper is threefold: first, to examine the quantitative evidence of violent conflict in the region since 1960; second, to provide a nuanced review of the regional case study literature on the relationship between resource endowments, political stability, and conflict risk; and third, to assess how prospective political transitions have implications for the World Bank Group's work in the region on public sector management and private sector development. The authors find that resources and regimes have intersected to provide stability and limited violent conflict in the region, but that these development patterns have yielded a set of policy choices and development patterns that are proving increasingly brittle and unsustainable. A major institutional challenge for reforms will be to consolidate a requisite degree of inter-temporal credibility and stability in these regimes, while expanding inclusiveness in state-society relations.Environmental Economics&Policies,Post Conflict Reconstruction,Economic Theory&Research,Labor Policies,Emerging Markets

Police Bias in the Enforcement of Drug Crimes: Evidence from Low Priority Laws

We consider the impact of adoption of a low priority initiative in some jurisdictions within Los Angeles County on police behavior. Low priority initiatives instruct police to make the enforcement of low level marijuana possession offenses their ``lowest priority.\u27\u27 Using detailed data from the Los Angeles County Sheriff\u27s Department and a difference-in differences strategy, we show that the mandate resulted in a lower arrest rate for misdemeanor marijuana possession in adopting areas. However, the lower relative arrest rate is driven by a spike in the arrest rate in areas not affected by the mandate rather than a reduction in adopting areas

Three Dimensional Quantitative Structure-Activity Relationships of Sulfonamides Binding Monoclonal Antibody by Comparative Molecular Field Analysis

The three-dimensional quantitative structure-activity relationship (3D-QSAR) model of sulfonamide analogs binding a monoclonal antibody (MabSMR) produced against sulfamerazine, was carried out by comparative molecular field analysis (CoMFA). The affinities of MabSMR, expressed as Log10IC50, for 17 sulfonamide analogs were determined by competitive fluorescence polarization immunoassay (FPIA). Removal of two outliers from the initial set of 17 sulfonamide analogs improved the predictability of the models. The 3D-QSAR model of 15 sulfonamides resulted in q2cv values of 0.600, and r2 values of 0.995, respectively. This novel study combining FPIA with CoMFA demonstrates that multidisciplinary research can be used as a useful tool to investigate antigen-antibody interactions and provide information required for design of novel haptens, which may result in new antibodies with properties already optimized by an antibody-based immunoassay

Disordered eating and internalizing symptoms in preadolescence

Objectives Research has demonstrated links between disordered eating, anxiety, and depression in adults and adolescents but there is limited research investigating these associations in preadolescence. The current study examined the associations between disordered eating, anxiety, and depression during preadolescence, as well as the role of gender in moderating these associations. Method Two hundred and thirteen children (M = 10.3 years; 51.2% male) reported levels of disordered eating (ChEAT) and anxiety and depression symptoms (RCADS‐25). Results Regression analyses support an association between disordered eating and both anxiety and depression in preadolescence. Overall, there were no significant differences between boys and girls when the main effect was examined, which differs from research in adolescents. Discussion These findings highlight the importance of early detection for disordered eating behaviors and attitudes, as well as anxiety and depression in both boys and girls during preadolescence. Longitudinal research examining these associations is vital to help understand the trajectories of these problems, but also the gender differences in disordered eating that emerge during adolescence. Transdiagnostic interventions targeting several co‐occurring problems, such as disordered eating, anxiety, and depression might be effective for preventing the development of eating disorders in the long term

Investigation of Antigen-Antibody Interactions of Sulfonamides with a Monoclonal Antibody in a Fluorescence Polarization Immunoassay Using 3D-QSAR Models

A three-dimensional quantitative structure-activity relationship (3D-QSAR) model of sulfonamide analogs binding a monoclonal antibody (MAbSMR) produced against sulfamerazine was carried out by Distance Comparison (DISCOtech), comparative molecular field analysis (CoMFA), and comparative molecular similarity indices analysis (CoMSIA). The affinities of the MAbSMR, expressed as Log10IC50, for 17 sulfonamide analogs were determined by competitive fluorescence polarization immunoassay (FPIA). The results demonstrated that the proposed pharmacophore model containing two hydrogen-bond acceptors, two hydrogen-bond donors and two hydrophobic centers characterized the structural features of the sulfonamides necessary for MAbSMR binding. Removal of two outliers from the initial set of 17 sulfonamide analogs improved the predictability of the models. The 3D-QSAR models of 15 sulfonamides based on CoMFA and CoMSIA resulted in q2 cv values of 0.600 and 0.523, and r2 values of 0.995 and 0.994, respectively, which indicates that both methods have significant predictive capability. Connolly surface analysis, which mainly focused on steric force fields, was performed to complement the results from CoMFA and CoMSIA. This novel study combining FPIA with pharmacophore modeling demonstrates that multidisciplinary research is useful for investigating antigen-antibody interactions and also may provide information required for the design of new haptens

Pressure Correction in Density Functional Theory Calculations

First-principles calculations based on density functional theory have been widely used in studies of the structural, thermoelastic, rheological, and electronic properties of earth-forming materials. The exchange-correlation term, however, is implemented based on various approximations, and this is believed to be the main reason for discrepancies between experiments and theoretical predictions. In this work, by using periclase MgO as a prototype system we examine the discrepancies in pressure and Kohn-Sham energy that are due to the choice of the exchange-correlation functional. For instance, we choose local density approximation and generalized gradient approximation. We perform extensive first-principles calculations at various temperatures and volumes and find that the exchange-correlation-based discrepancies in Kohn-Sham energy and pressure should be independent of temperature. This implies that the physical quantities, such as the equation of states, heat capacity, and the Gr\"{u}neisen parameter, estimated by a particular choice of exchange-correlation functional can easily be transformed into those estimated by another exchange-correlation functional. Our findings may be helpful in providing useful constraints on mineral properties %at thermodynamic conditions compatible to deep Earth. at deep Earth thermodynamic conditions

Motion vectors and deep neural networks for video camera traps

Commercial camera traps are usually triggered by a Passive Infra-Red (PIR) motion sensor necessitating a delay between triggering and the image being captured. This often seriously limits the ability to record images of small and fast moving animals. It also results in many “empty” images, e.g., owing to moving foliage against a background of different temperature. In this paper we detail a new triggering mechanism based solely on the camera sensor. This is intended for use by citizen scientists and for deployment on an affordable, compact, low-power Raspberry Pi computer (RPi). Our system introduces a video frame filtering pipeline consisting of movement and image-based processing. This makes use of Machine Learning (ML) feasible on a live camera stream on an RPi. We describe our free and open-source software implementation of the system; introduce a suitable ecology efficiency measure that mediates between specificity and recall; provide ground-truth for a video clip collection from camera traps; and evaluate the effectiveness of our system thoroughly. Overall, our video camera trap turns out to be robust and effective

Population pulsation resonances of excitons in monolayer MoSe2 with sub 1 {\mu}eV linewidth

Monolayer transition metal dichalcogenides, a new class of atomically thin semiconductors, possess optically coupled 2D valley excitons. The nature of exciton relaxation in these systems is currently poorly understood. Here, we investigate exciton relaxation in monolayer MoSe2 using polarization-resolved coherent nonlinear optical spectroscopy with high spectral resolution. We report strikingly narrow population pulsation resonances with two different characteristic linewidths of 1 {\mu}eV and <0.2 {\mu}eV at low-temperature. These linewidths are more than three orders of magnitude narrower than the photoluminescence and absorption linewidth, and indicate that a component of the exciton relaxation dynamics occurs on timescales longer than 1 ns. The ultra-narrow resonance (<0.2 {\mu}eV) emerges with increasing excitation intensity, and implies the existence of a long-lived state whose lifetime exceeds 6 ns.Comment: (PRL, in press