On the Growth and Stability Effects of Habit Formation and Durability in Consumption

This paper shows that a unique balanced growth monetary equilibrium exists in a transactions-based monetary endogenous growth model with habit formation or durability in consumption. An increase in the nominal money growth rate reduces the long-run output growth rate, wherein habit formation enforces the effectiveness of monetary policy while durability in consumption reduces it. We also show that while habit formation destabilizes the macroeconomy by making the balanced growth equilibrium exhibit local indeterminacy, durability in consumption maintains saddle-path stability of the balanced growth equilibrium. We find that the mechanism through which habit formation and durability impose different effects on both the growth-effect of money and the macroeconomic stabilizing properties is such that habit formation and durability influence the elasticity of intertemporal substitution in consumption in opposite directions.Habit formation, Durability, Superneutrality, Indeterminacy

On the growth and velocity effects of money

We show that a one-sector AK model of endogenous growth with the most generalized cash-in-advance constraint is able to account for (i) the observed long-run negative relationship between the nominal growth rate of money and the income velocity of money, (ii) the empirically ambiguous effect of changing inflation on the economy's output growth, and (iii) the divergent growth experience of countries that start with similar macroeconomic conditions.

Interest Rate Rules, Target Policies, and Endogenous Economic Growth in an Open Economy

This paper sets up an endogenous growth model of an open economy in which the monetary authority implements a gradualist interest-rate rule with targets for inflation and economic growth. We show that, under a passive rule, a monetary equilibrium exists and is unique; moreover, the equilibrium is locally determinate. Under an active rule, the open economy either generates multiple equilibria or does not have any equilibrium. If equilibria exist, the high-growth equilibrium is locally determinate while the low-growth equilibrium is a source. Besides these, the stabilization and growth effects of alternative target policies are also explored in this study.Nominal interest rate rules, gradualism, endogenous economic growth

Metalation and Demetalation of Human Metallothionein Studied by Ion Mobility Mass Spectrometry

The mechanism of cadmium binding to intact human metallothionein-2A (MT) is investigated. We describe two complementary mass spectrometry (MS) strategies to study the metalation/demetalation mechanism: (i) chemical labeling combined with proteomics-based top-down or bottom-up approaches (ii) ion mobility-mass spectrometry (IM-MS). We presented here for the first time for direct identification of metal-binding sites on a partially-metalated intermediates by combing chemical modifications (N-ethylmaleimide (NEM)) and 2D MS-CID-IM-MS. These results provide conclusive evidence of specific binding of Cd^2+ to the α-domain and demetalation is the reverse order of metalation. Molecular-specific profiles for metal affinity and kinetic stability for each metalated intermediate provided by MS reveal that the reactivity of various CdiMT species is dependent on their metalation state and reaction is cooperative for both domains. These data suggest that the α-domain has greater thermodynamic/kinetic stability than does the β-domain. In addition, the alkylation on kinetically labile cysteins reveals that the α domain contains a weakly coordinated site at Cys33, which is located at the extreme N terminus of the α domain and might be related to the intra-domain cooperativity. Further, IM-MS and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations are used to follow metal-induced conformational changes, which reveal new insights into the mechanism for metalation of MT. IM data for the CdiMT (i = 0 − 7) ions reveal a diverse population of ion conformations. Upon metal-ion binding, the conformational diversity for apoMT and partially-metalated ions converges toward ordered, compact conformations as the number of bound Cd^2+ ions increase. We interpret this data as evidence of metal-dependent folding and increasing numbers of metal ions yield more compact ion structures. MD simulations provide additional information on conformation candidates of CdiMT (i = 0 − 7) that supports the convergence of distinct conformational populations upon metal binding. Integrating the IM-MS and MD data provides a global view that shows stepwise conformational transition of an ensemble as a function of metal ion bound. Furthermore, collisional activation was used to increase effective ion temperature (Teff) prior to entering and within the ion mobility analyzer, providing new insights about protein folding energy landscape