Monopoly Distortions in Durability and Multi-Dimensional Quality

I show that Swan’s (1970) independence result requires a multiplicative interaction between durability and all other quality attributes. Because there is no compelling argument for a multiplicativity in quality, monopolists tend to distort durability, even with constant marginal costs. Distortions in durability and other quality aspects are aligned exactly when the marginal cost of quality do not increase too much with durability

Die Bodenseeregion - eine Wachstumsregion im Verborgenen

Die Bodenseeregion ist eine Grenzregion, in der eine vielfältige Zusammenarbeit zwischen den vier Anrainerstaaten Deutschland, Österreich, Schweiz und Liechtenstein stattfindet. Es handelt sich um eine Region ohne ein eigentliches städtisches Zentrum, die durch eine polyzentrische Siedlungsstruktur mit mehren Oberzentren geprägt ist. Trotz ihrer peripheren Lage zwischen den Metropolräumen hat sich die Region wirtschaftlich gesehen über lange Zeit sehr positiv entwickelt. Dies gilt vor allem für den produzierenden Sektor, der in der Region eine dominierende Rolle spielt und durch stark regional verankerte, aber global tätige Unternehmen geprägt ist. In der Außenwahrnehmung spiegelt sich dies aber nicht und wird die Region vor allem mit dem Tourismus in Verbindung gebracht, der aber ökonomisch mit einem Anteil von rd. 3% an der Wertschöpfung eine untergeordnete Rolle spielt. Eine gemeinsame Wirtschaftsförderpolitik für die Gesamtregion existiert bislang nicht. Zwar gibt es derzeit Ansätze für ein gemeinsames bodenseeweites Standortmarketing, inwieweit sich dieses aber aufgrund der unterschiedlichen Wirtschaftsförderungspolitik in den einzelnen Ländern durchsetzen kann, wird sich zeigen. Gemeinsam mit Fragen einer nachhaltigen Raumnutzung liegen hier die größten Herausforderungen für die künftige Entwicklung der Region.The Lake Constance region is a border region in which there are many diverse forms of cooperation between the four neighbouring countries of Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Liechtenstein. The region has no real urban centre but is characterised by a polycentric settlement structure with a number of major regional centres. Despite its peripheral location between metropolitan regions the area has displayed very positive economic development over a long period of time. This is particularly true for the manufacturing sector, which plays a dominating role in the region and is characterised by regionally rooted companies that are also globally active. External perceptions of the region do not reflect this situation but tend to associate the region with tourism, which with about 3% value added only plays a subsidiary role in economic terms. A joint economic promotion policy for the entire region does not yet exist but joint location marketing for the whole of the Lake Constance area is currently being introduced. However, owing to the different economic promotion policies of the individual countries, it is as yet unclear to what extent this initiative can be enforced. Together with questions related to the sustainable use of space this issue presents the greatest challenges for the future development of the region

Managing and monitoring sustainable regional devolopment in alpine regions

Alpine landscape always has been affected by human economic activities. Traffic economy, tourism economy and industrial structure dominated by small and medium-sized enterprises have been the drivers of economy development as well as of changes in the alpine landscape throughout the last century. There have been tremendous influences of economic activities on special areas but also on the alpine landscape in general. For years numerous regions have been subjected to a strong structural change. Globalisation leads to an acceleration of this structural change. Also, globalisation leads to a fast transition of companies, branches and economies. This transformation is determined by the conversion of the core elements of economic activities, single companies. Companies and branches of the alpine economy have been affected heavily by this transformation process due to several reasons (former regulation, decline of transport costs, etc.). The regions try to influence the negative effects of this structural change in various ways. The results of their efforts are very different. Some regions manage to improve their economic situation whereas others get worse. It is an open question, which structural and procedural factors are responsible for these differences. There could be a gap between wishful thinking in policy making /development of regional strategies and the possibilities of economic development. All participation processes and works on regional strategies have to be based on a sound understanding of the possibilities to influence the economic development. Regional development has tremendously changed in the past few years. So, the question arises how regions are going to organise and manage their sustainable development in the long run. Therefore, appropriate management tools have to be designed. However the central question of the paper is, how regions manage to remain as attractive living spaces. If we knew, what strategies regions should apply and how they should change their strategies in the light of the growing influence of globalisation, we could be able to develop tools for future regional development, that could take the demands of sustainability better into account. Therefore, the paper focuses on the following four areas: - The long-term changes of the (economic) situation in peripheral regions of the Alps. What have been the most important sources of income/net value creation in the last years? How have factors like income, branches and work force developed? How has the created income and value been distributed to different branches and population groups - The effects of globalisation on relevant branches for peripheral regions (e.g. Tourism, agriculture and forestry, building and industry). Which effects of globalisation have been the most influential ones? What external effects have to be expected in alpine regions through these economic trends? - Evaluation of the regional strategies to cope with economic structural changes. It will be promising to examine the Regional Development Schemes. - Development of a management system for sustainable regional development in peripheral regions, which should be applicable as a standardized tool.

Removing subordinate species in a biodiversity experiment to mimic observational field studies

Background: Positive effects of plant species richness on community biomass in biodiversity experiments are often stronger than those from observational field studies. This may be because experiments are initiated with randomly assembled species compositions whereas field communities have experienced filtering. Methods: We compared aboveground biomass production of randomly assembled communities of 2–16 species (controls) with experimentally filtered communities from which subordinate species were removed, resulting in removal communities of 1–8 species. Results: Removal communities had (1) 12.6% higher biomass than control communities from which they were derived, that is, with double species richness and (2) 32.0% higher biomass than control communities of equal richness. These differences were maintained along the richness gradient. The increased productivity of removal communities was paralleled by increased species evenness and complementarity. Conclusions: Result (1) indicates that subordinate species can reduce community biomass production, suggesting a possible explanation for why the most diverse field communities sometimes do not have the highest productivity. Result (2) suggests that if a community of S species has been derived by filtering from a pool of 2S randomly chosen species it is more productive than a community derived from a pool of S randomly chosen species without filtering

Advanced Materials Technologies / 3D Printing of Hierarchical Porous Silica and -Quartz

The ability to macroscopically shape highly porous oxide materials while concomitantly tailoring the porous network structure as desired by simple and environmentally friendly processes is of great importance in many fields. Here, a purely aqueous printing process toward deliberately shaped, hierarchically organized amorphous silica and the corresponding polycrystalline quartz analogues based on a direct ink writing process (DIW) is presented. The key to success is the careful development of the solgel ink, which is based on an acidic aqueous sol of a glycolated silane and structuredirecting agents. The resulting 3D (DIW) printed silica consists of a macroporous network of struts comprising hexagonally arranged mesopores on a 2D hexagonal lattice. Together with a printed porous superstructure on the millimeter scale, welldefined pore sizes and shapes on at least three hierarchy levels can thus be fabricated. The introduction of devitrifying agents in the printed green part and subsequent heat treatment allows for the transformation of the silica structure into polycrystalline quartz. While small pores (micro and mesopores below 10 nm) are lost, the printed morphology and the macroporous network of struts is preserved during crystallization.1605N20(VLID)266643

Consistent Effects of Biodiversity on Ecosystem Functioning Under Varying Density and Evenness

Biodiversity experiments typically vary only species richness and composition, yet the generality of their results relies on consistent effects of these factors even under varying starting conditions of density and evenness. We tested this assumption in a factorial species richness x density x evenness experiment using a pool of 60 common grassland species divided into four functional groups (grasses, legumes, tall herbs and short herbs). Richness varied from 1, 2, 4, 8 to 16 species, total planting density was 1,000 or 2,000 seeds/m2, and species were sown in even or uneven proportions, where one functional group was made dominant. Aboveground plant biomass increased linearly with the logarithm of species richness in all density and evenness treatments during all three years of the experiment. This was due to a convergence of realized density and evenness within species richness levels, although functional groups which were initially made dominant retained their dominance. Between species richness levels, realized density increased, and realized evenness decreased with species richness. Thus, more individuals could coexist if they belonged to different species. Within species richness levels, higher biomass values were correlated with lower density, suggesting an underlying thinning process. However, communities with low realized evenness also had low biomass values; thus high biomass did not result from species dominance. So-called complementarity and selection effects were similar across density and evenness treatments, indicating that the mechanisms underpinning the biodiversity effects were not altered. Species richness was the dominant driver of aboveground biomass, irrespective of variations in total densities and species abundance distributions at the start of the experiment; rejecting the hypothesis that initial differences in species abundance distributions might lead to different "stable states” in community structure or biomass. Thus, results from previous biodiversity experiments that only manipulated species richness and composition should be quite robust and broadly generalizabl

GU81, a VEGFR2 antagonist peptoid, enhances the anti-tumor activity of doxorubicin in the murine MMTV-PyMT transgenic model of breast cancer

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) is a primary stimulant of angiogenesis under physiological and pathological conditions. Anti-VEGF therapy is a clinically proven strategy for the treatment of a variety of cancers including colon, breast, lung, and renal cell carcinoma. Since VEGFR2 is the dominant angiogenic signaling receptor, it has become an important target in the development of novel anti-angiogenic therapies. We have reported previously the development of an antagonistic VEGFR2 peptoid (GU40C4) that has promising anti-angiogenic activity <it>in vitro </it>and <it>in vivo</it>.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>In the current study, we utilize a derivative of GU40C4, termed GU81 in therapy studies. GU81 was tested alone or in combination with doxorubicin for <it>in vivo </it>efficacy in the MMTV-PyMT transgenic model of breast cancer.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The derivative GU81 has increased <it>in vitro </it>efficacy compared to GU40C4. Single agent therapy (doxorubicin or GU81 alone) had no effect on tumor weight, histology, tumor fat content, or tumor growth index. However, GU81 is able to significantly to reduce total vascular area as a single agent. GU81 used in combination with doxorubicin significantly reduced tumor weight and growth index compared to all other treatment groups. Furthermore, treatment with combination therapy significantly arrested tumor progression at the premalignant stage, resulting in increased tumor fat content. Interestingly, treatment with GU81 alone increased tumor-VEGF levels and macrophage infiltration, an effect that was abrogated when used in combination with doxorubicin.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This study demonstrates the VEGFR2 antagonist peptoid, GU81, enhances the anti-tumor activity of doxorubicin in spontaneous murine MMTV-PyMT breast tumors.</p

Refractory anaphylaxis: Data from the European Anaphylaxis Registry

Refractory anaphylaxis (unresponsive to treatment with at least two doses of minimum 300 μg adrenaline) is a rare and often fatal hypersensitivity reaction. Comprehensive data on its definition, prevalence, and risk factors are missing. Using the data from the European Anaphylaxis Registry (11,596 cases in total) we identified refractory anaphylaxis cases (n = 42) and analyzed these in comparison to a control group of severe anaphylaxis cases (n = 4,820). The data show that drugs more frequently elicited refractory anaphylaxis (50% of cases, p < 0.0001) compared to other severe anaphylaxis cases (19.7%). Cases elicited by insects (n = 8) were more often due to bees than wasps in refractory cases (62.5 vs. 19.4%, p = 0.009). The refractory cases occurred mostly in a perioperative setting (45.2 vs. 9.05, p < 0.0001). Intramuscular adrenaline (as a first line therapy) was administered in 16.7% of refractory cases, whereas in 83.3% of cases it was applied intravenously (significantly more often than in severe anaphylaxis cases: 12.3%, p < 0.0001). Second line treatment options (e.g., vasopression with dopamine, methylene blue, glucagon) were not used at all for the treatment of refractory cases. The mortality rate in refractory anaphylaxis was significantly higher (26.2%) than in severe cases (0.353%, p < 0.0001). Refractory anaphylaxis is associated with drug-induced anaphylaxis in particular if allergens are given intravenously. Although physicians frequently use adrenaline in cases of perioperative anaphylaxis, not all patients are responding to treatment. Whether a delay in recognition of anaphylaxis is responsible for the refractory case or whether these cases are due to an overflow with mast cell activating substances—requires further studies. Reasons for the low use of second-line medication (i.e., methylene blue or dopamine) in refractory cases are unknown, but their use might improve the outcome of severe refractory anaphylaxis cases