Is Dealing with Climate Change a Corporation’s Responsibility? A Social Contract Perspective

In this paper, we argue that individuals – as members of society – play an important role in the expectations of whether or not companies are responsible for addressing environmental issues, and whether or not governments should regulate them. From this perspective of corporate social responsibility as a social contract we report the results of a survey of 1066 individuals. The aim of the survey was to assess participants’ belief in anthropogenic climate change, free-market ideology, and beliefs around who is responsible for dealing with climate change. Results showed that both climate change views and free market ideology have a strong effect on beliefs that companies are responsible for dealing with climate change and on support for regulatory policy to that end. Furthermore, we found that free market ideology is a barrier in the support of corporate regulatory policy. The implications of these findings for research, policy, and practice are discussed

Affective state influences retrieval-induced forgetting for integrated knowledge

Selectively testing parts of learned materials can impair later memory for nontested materials. Research has shown that such retrieval-induced forgetting occurs for low-integrated materials but may be prevented for high-integrated materials. However, previous research has neglected one factor that is ubiquitous in real-life testing: affective stat

Cluster J Mycobacteriophages: Intron Splicing in Capsid and Tail Genes

Bacteriophages isolated on Mycobacterium smegmatis mc2155 represent many distinct genomes sharing little or no DNA sequence similarity. The genomes are architecturally mosaic and are replete with genes of unknown function. A new group of genomes sharing substantial nucleotide sequences constitute Cluster J. The six mycobacteriophages forming Cluster J are morphologically members of the Siphoviridae, but have unusually long genomes ranging from 106.3 to 117 kbp. Reconstruction of the capsid by cryo-electron microscopy of mycobacteriophage BAKA reveals an icosahedral structure with a triangulation number of 13. All six phages are temperate and homoimmune, and prophage establishment involves integration into a tRNA-Leu gene not previously identified as a mycobacterial attB site for phage integration. The Cluster J genomes provide two examples of intron splicing within the virion structural genes, one in a major capsid subunit gene, and one in a tail gene. These genomes also contain numerous free-standing HNH homing endonuclease, and comparative analysis reveals how these could contribute to genome mosaicism. The unusual Cluster J genomes provide new insights into phage genome architecture, gene function, capsid structure, gene mobility, intron splicing, and evolution. © 2013 Pope et al

Spatially Resolved On-Chip Picosecond Pulse Detection Using Graphene

We present an on-chip time domain terahertz (TD-THz) system in which picosecond pulses are generated in low-temperature-grown gallium arsenide (LT-GaAs) and detected in graphene. The detected pulses were found to vary in amplitude, full width at half maximum (FWHM), and DC offset when sampled optically at different locations along a 50-μm-long graphene photoconductive (PC) detector. The results demonstrate the importance of detection location and switch design in graphene-based on-chip PC detectors

Aménagement en courbes de niveau et conservation du carbone

Dans la région Mali-sud, au climat semi-aride, la culture sur billons suivant les courbes de niveau permet d'arrêter l'érosion et surtout d'augmenter l'infiltration de l'eau de pluie, ce qui permet l'augmentation de la croissance des plantes cultivées et des arbres associés aux cultures. Il en résulte des effets sur l'ensemble du cycle du carbone. Les teneurs en carbone du sol sableux ferrugineux tropicaux diminuent rapidement sous culture, jusqu'à environ 0,2 à 0,4% dans l'horizon superficiel (0-20 cm). Pendant le même temps, les rendements peuvent rester stables ou augmenter si les modestes apports d'engrais sont suffisants pour corriger les carences en phosphore et fournir un peu de N et K aux cultures. Les rendements moyens, par exemple 10 à 20 q/ha de maïs, sont comparables à ceux qui étaient obtenus en Europe au début du 20ème siècle, quand l'utilisation des engrais a commencé. L'érosion contribue à diminuer encore plus les teneurs en carbone, dans certaines parties de la toposéquence. L'arrêt de l'érosion permet d'éviter ces pertes. Par contre, la production de biomasse par les cultures est augmentée: environ 50% pour le mil, le sorgho et le maïs pendant les années peu pluvieuses. Le carbone est recyclé dans le milieu suivant les voies habituelles: l'alimentation humaine (grains), l'alimentation des animaux (résidus, pailles, adventices), les termites, le fumier, les usages domestiques, le feu. Le parc arboré (karité et autres espèces) profite de l'eau conservée grâce aux courbes de niveau et il s'accroît par la croissance des arbres en place et par la régénération de jeunes arbres. Il en résulte d'une part, un accroissement de la masse ligneuse et d'autre part une augmentation des teneurs en carbone du sol dans les parties du champ couvertes par ces arbres (apports organiques et ombrage). Les courbes de niveau sont marquées par des ados couverts d'une végétation permanente (#Andropogon gayanus#, etc.) qui couvrent 2 à 4% de la surface des champs, avec des teneurs en carbone du sol comparables à celles qu'on trouve sous végétation naturelle. L'effet de l'aménagement sur le stockage du carbone se manifeste donc dans différentes situations (les cultures, des ados enherbés, les arbres, le sol sous les arbres, etc.) et suivant des cycles variables (l'année pour les cultures et les feuilles des arbres, quelques années pour le carbone du sol, quelques dizaines d'années pour le bois). (Résumé d'auteur

Evaluation of the Workplace Environment in the UK, and the Impact on Users’ Levels of Stimulation

The purpose of this study is to evaluate a number of recently completed workplaces in the UK. The first aim is to assess the impact of various aspects of the workplace environment on users’ levels of stimulation. The body of previous research undertaken into the workplace environment, identified the aspects to be investigated. Samples of employees from the sixteen businesses were surveyed to determine their perceptions of the workplaces. The results were entered into a regression analysis, and the most significant predictors of perceived stimulation identified. The data also revealed a dramatic reduction in staff arousal levels from mornings to afternoons. Thus, there is a second aim to determine whether changes to significant aspects of the workplace environment during the day can counteract the reduction in users’ stimulation. Two further workplaces were studied to enable changes to be made over a 12-week period. A sample of employees completed questionnaires, and semi-structured interviews revealed the reasons behind the results. It was found that provision of artwork, personal control of temperature and ventilation and regular breaks were the most significant contributions to increasing stimulation after lunch; while user choice of layout, and design and décor of workspaces and break areas, were the most significant aspects at design stage

Impact of generic alendronate cost on the cost-effectiveness of osteoporosis screening and treatment

Introduction: Since alendronate became available in generic form in the Unites States in 2008, its price has been decreasing. The objective of this study was to investigate the impact of alendronate cost on the cost-effectiveness of osteoporosis screening and treatment in postmenopausal women. Methods: Microsimulation cost-effectiveness model of osteoporosis screening and treatment for U.S. women age 65 and older. We assumed screening initiation at age 65 with central dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry (DXA), and alendronate treatment for individuals with osteoporosis; with a comparator of "no screening" and treatment only after fracture occurrence. We evaluated annual alendronate costs of $20 through$800; outcome measures included fractures; nursing home admission; medication adverse events; death; costs; quality-adjusted life-years (QALYs); and incremental cost-effectiveness ratios (ICERs) in 2010 U.S. dollars per QALY gained. A lifetime time horizon was used, and direct costs were included. Base-case and sensitivity analyses were performed. Results: Base-case analysis results showed that at annual alendronate costs of $200 or less, osteoporosis screening followed by treatment was cost-saving, resulting in lower total costs than no screening as well as more QALYs (10.6 additional quality-adjusted life-days). When assuming alendronate costs of$400 through $800, screening and treatment resulted in greater lifetime costs than no screening but was highly cost-effective, with ICERs ranging from$714 per QALY gained through $13,902 per QALY gained. Probabilistic sensitivity analyses revealed that the cost-effectiveness of osteoporosis screening followed by alendronate treatment was robust to joint input parameter estimate variation at a willingness-to-pay threshold of$50,000/QALY at all alendronate costs evaluated. Conclusions: Osteoporosis screening followed by alendronate treatment is effective and highly cost-effective for postmenopausal women across a range of alendronate costs, and may be cost-saving at annual alendronate costs of $200 or less. © 2012 Nayak et al

Wolbachia and DNA barcoding insects: patterns, potential and problems

Wolbachia is a genus of bacterial endosymbionts that impacts the breeding systems of their hosts. Wolbachia can confuse the patterns of mitochondrial variation, including DNA barcodes, because it influences the pathways through which mitochondria are inherited. We examined the extent to which these endosymbionts are detected in routine DNA barcoding, assessed their impact upon the insect sequence divergence and identification accuracy, and considered the variation present in Wolbachia COI. Using both standard PCR assays (Wolbachia surface coding protein – wsp), and bacterial COI fragments we found evidence of Wolbachia in insect total genomic extracts created for DNA barcoding library construction. When >2 million insect COI trace files were examined on the Barcode of Life Datasystem (BOLD) Wolbachia COI was present in 0.16% of the cases. It is possible to generate Wolbachia COI using standard insect primers; however, that amplicon was never confused with the COI of the host. Wolbachia alleles recovered were predominantly Supergroup A and were broadly distributed geographically and phylogenetically. We conclude that the presence of the Wolbachia DNA in total genomic extracts made from insects is unlikely to compromise the accuracy of the DNA barcode library; in fact, the ability to query this DNA library (the database and the extracts) for endosymbionts is one of the ancillary benefits of such a large scale endeavor – for which we provide several examples. It is our conclusion that regular assays for Wolbachia presence and type can, and should, be adopted by large scale insect barcoding initiatives. While COI is one of the five multi-locus sequence typing (MLST) genes used for categorizing Wolbachia, there is limited overlap with the eukaryotic DNA barcode region