Innovation activity of corporations in emerging economies

The paper considers macro parameters of corporation innovation activity in the BRICS countries. The authors determine transnational corporation behavior strategies in the context of creating and transferring new knowledge, where developed countries (the USA, European countries and Japan) play an important role and take a leading position in this process. Companies from emerging economies focus on using and adopting innovations. The reason for this is that knowledge "is coded" specifically, consequently the participants of its exchange have to be in similar intellectual space. Nevertheless, the market-leading corporations from the BRICS countries join the world chains of innovation creation, building their networks to satisfy their branches needs concerning technological decisions and personnel trainin

Activity of State-owned Enterprises: How to Evaluate their Effectiveness?

We show that economic well-being is determined by various factors. But at the same time objective attributes don’t always affect the subjective measure of personal well-being. However the formation of stable macroeconomic environment is a core condition of a social development. Modern society claims to increase the number of state functions related to human wellbeing, economic growth, national defense capability etc. Such expansion has to be evaluated. In this paper, we define some approaches to the performance evaluation of the state institutions of development. We analyze the activity of State Corporation Deposit Insurance Agency in the context of the human wellbeing in Russia

Information warfare technologies in political discourse

We attempt to examine the technology of "information warfare" in this paper. The dominant theme of the paper is that the outcome of the information warfare is important not only for the future of a state itself but for the future of the world balance of forces. The main task of geopolitical actors in information warfare is to introduce ideas corresponding to their interests into mass consciousness. All participants of political conflicts have common features in technologies of Information warfare. The information anomie is the indicator of the great geopolitical actors’ personified interests on the stage of "information warfare" - the process resulted in destroying the communicative line: report-information understanding and disrupting the social order in society. In this paper authors describe the following Information Warfare technologies: "Political volcano" technology; "SPIN" technology; "Widening media resource" technology; "specific gravity" technology; "Cold War 2.0" technology and Information cleaningup technology. It is assumed that in the future there will be new instructions on applying technologies of information warfare. To impart perspective to the paper we consider examples, opinions and trends

Productivity, biochemical composition and nutritional value of trigonella foenum-graecum green mass depending on seeding rates

The article gives a description of a new culture for the southeast of Western Siberia, which can become one of the valuable sources of obtaining high-quality feed. The nutritional and energy value, biochemical composition in terms of the content of organic substances and mineral elements (calcium and phosphorus) of the dry mass are considered. The yield of green mass, the elements of its structure are shown. The research results indicate that Trigonella foenum-graecum grown in the conditions of the southeast of Western Siberia has a high nutritional and energy value of green mass. Reliable differences in the yield of green mass were revealed on average depending on the seeding rates. The maximum crop yield was obtained when sowing at a rate of 2 million/ha. The seeding rate of 3 million/ha ensured the maximum nutritional value of the dry matter

Phylodynamic characteristics of the LMP-1 gene of the Epstein–Barr virus isolated in the Nizhny Novgorod region

Introduction. Epstein–Barr virus (EBV) is one of the most common herpesviruses and has a pronounced genetic polymorphism. The study of the phylodynamic characteristics of the virus is an important aspect of the study of evolutionary changes in the LMP-1 gene and their consequences. The aim of the work was a philodynamic analysis of EBV isolates from Nizhny Novgorod region based on the C-terminal fragment of the LMP-1 gene. Materials and methods. The study included 158 EBV isolates obtained from blood leukocytes and saliva of children aged 1–17 years with a diagnosis of infectious mononucleosis caused by EBV (n = 68) and apparently healthy children of comparable sex and age (n = 29). LMP-1 genovariants were obtained using the Sanger sequencing method. Comparative analysis of amino acid sequences was performed using the MEGA X program. Philodynamic analysis of the obtained nucleotide sequences and isolates deposited in GenBank was carried out using the BEAST v. 1.10.4 software package. Recombination analysis was performed using the Simplot program. Results. 158 nucleotide sequences of the C-terminal fragment of the LMP-1 gene from Nizhny Novgorod region EBV isolates were obtained and deposited in the GenBank database. The circulation time of the nearest common ancestor for the modified B95-8 genovariants with G212S + E328Q + S366T and NC mutations with the D250N substitution has been established dating back to 1994 and 1923. The rate of evolution of these genovariants was the highest and amounted to 1.298 × 10–4 and 7.868 × 10–4 nucleotide substitutions/site/year. Recombinations were detected in the Nizhny Novgorod region sequences Med-, B95-8, China 1 with mutations G212S, G212S, E214Q, respectively. Conclusion. For the first time, a phylodynamic characterization of Nizhny Novgorod region isolates and LMP-1 EBV genovariants isolated in various regions of the world is given. The data obtained expand the existing understanding of the circulation of EBV LMP-1 genovariants in the territory of the European part of Russia

Methodological approaches to differential detection of EBV1/EBV2 and HHV6A/HHV6B in saliva

Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) and human herpesviruses 6A and 6B (HHV6A and HHV6B) are ubiquitous, infecting all social groups. In Russia, information on the genetic heterogeneity of EBV, even at the level of the main types (EBV1 and EBV2), as well as HHV6A and HHV6B, their prevalence and clinical significance are limited to isolated publications. Plasma and blood leukocytes were mainly investigated. Saliva is the main factor in the transmission and spread of EBV and HHV6A/B infections, an affordable, inexpensive, non-invasive material for detecting viral DNA. The aim of this work is to improve the methodological base for differential detection of HHV6A/HHV6B and the main types of EBV in saliva. The material of the study was the unstimulated mixed saliva of children aged 1-17 years with acute infectious mononucleosis (n=22) and no clinical symptoms of this disease (n=26), as well as conditionally healthy adults (n=9). Samples were collected once and dynamically (daily for 14 days). The quantitative detection of EBV and HHV6A/В DNA was carried out by the method of polymerase chain reaction (PCR) in real time. For differential detection of EBV1/EBV2 and HHV6A/HHV6В, an optimized one-round PCR variant with electrophoretic detection of amplification products in agarose gel was used. As a result, the detection rate of EBV, HHV6A/В and EBV+HHV6A/В DNA in acute infectious mononucleosis was 95%, 91% and 86%, among conventionally healthy children - 69%, 85% and 61.5%, respectively. It was found that among children of the Nizhny Novgorod region, only EBV1 and HHV6B predominate in saliva. According to the results of 14-day dynamic monitoring of saliva virus secretion in healthy virus carriers (adults and children), it was shown that a single EBV DNA study does not allow to reliably assess the infection of individuals or the intensity of EBV secretion. In this case, HHV6A/B is characterized by a more constant and uniform release. The methodological approach optimized in this work makes it possible to separately detect EBV1/EBV2 and HHV6A/HHV6B using a single laboratory protocol, and in combination with an additional stage of saliva sample preparation increases the diagnostic sensitivity of PCR analysis, minimizes the proportion of discordant and false negative results. Such an integrated approach can be applied for diagnostic, epidemiological and research purposes

Luxembourg Parkinson’s study -comprehensive baseline analysis of Parkinson’s disease and atypical parkinsonism

BackgroundDeep phenotyping of Parkinson’s disease (PD) is essential to investigate this fastest-growing neurodegenerative disorder. Since 2015, over 800 individuals with PD and atypical parkinsonism along with more than 800 control subjects have been recruited in the frame of the observational, monocentric, nation-wide, longitudinal-prospective Luxembourg Parkinson’s study.ObjectiveTo profile the baseline dataset and to explore risk factors, comorbidities and clinical profiles associated with PD, atypical parkinsonism and controls.MethodsEpidemiological and clinical characteristics of all 1,648 participants divided in disease and control groups were investigated. Then, a cross-sectional group comparison was performed between the three largest groups: PD, progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP) and controls. Subsequently, multiple linear and logistic regression models were fitted adjusting for confounders.ResultsThe mean (SD) age at onset (AAO) of PD was 62.3 (11.8) years with 15% early onset (AAO < 50 years), mean disease duration 4.90 (5.16) years, male sex 66.5% and mean MDS-UPDRS III 35.2 (16.3). For PSP, the respective values were: 67.6 (8.2) years, all PSP with AAO > 50 years, 2.80 (2.62) years, 62.7% and 53.3 (19.5). The highest frequency of hyposmia was detected in PD followed by PSP and controls (72.9%; 53.2%; 14.7%), challenging the use of hyposmia as discriminating feature in PD vs. PSP. Alcohol abstinence was significantly higher in PD than controls (17.6 vs. 12.9%, p = 0.003).ConclusionLuxembourg Parkinson’s study constitutes a valuable resource to strengthen the understanding of complex traits in the aforementioned neurodegenerative disorders. It corroborated several previously observed clinical profiles, and provided insight on frequency of hyposmia in PSP and dietary habits, such as alcohol abstinence in PD.Clinical trial registration: clinicaltrials.gov, NCT05266872

Age at onset as stratifier in idiopathic Parkinson’s disease – effect of ageing and polygenic risk score on clinical phenotypes

Several phenotypic differences observed in Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients have been linked to age at onset (AAO). We endeavoured to find out whether these differences are due to the ageing process itself by using a combined dataset of idiopathic PD (n = 430) and healthy controls (HC; n = 556) excluding carriers of known PD-linked genetic mutations in both groups. We found several significant effects of AAO on motor and non-motor symptoms in PD, but when comparing the effects of age on these symptoms with HC (using age at assessment, AAA), only positive associations of AAA with burden of motor symptoms and cognitive impairment were significantly different between PD vs HC. Furthermore, we explored a potential effect of polygenic risk score (PRS) on clinical phenotype and identified a significant inverse correlation of AAO and PRS in PD. No significant association between PRS and severity of clinical symptoms was found. We conclude that the observed non-motor phenotypic differences in PD based on AAO are largely driven by the ageing process itself and not by a specific profile of neurodegeneration linked to AAO in the idiopathic PD patients

Activity of state-owned enterprises: how to evaluate their effectiveness?

We show that economic well-being is determined by various factors. But at the same time objective attributes don’t always affect the subjective measure of personal well-being. However the formation of stable macroeconomic environment is a core condition of a social development. Modern society claims to increase the number of state functions related to human wellbeing, economic growth, national defense capability etc. Such expansion has to be evaluated. In this paper, we define some approaches to the performance evaluation of the state institutions of development. We analyze the activity of State Corporation Deposit Insurance Agency in the context of the human wellbeing in Russia

Productivity, biochemical composition and nutritional value of trigonella foenum-graecum green mass depending on seeding rates

The article gives a description of a new culture for the southeast of Western Siberia, which can become one of the valuable sources of obtaining high-quality feed. The nutritional and energy value, biochemical composition in terms of the content of organic substances and mineral elements (calcium and phosphorus) of the dry mass are considered. The yield of green mass, the elements of its structure are shown. The research results indicate that Trigonella foenum-graecum grown in the conditions of the southeast of Western Siberia has a high nutritional and energy value of green mass. Reliable differences in the yield of green mass were revealed on average depending on the seeding rates. The maximum crop yield was obtained when sowing at a rate of 2 million/ha. The seeding rate of 3 million/ha ensured the maximum nutritional value of the dry matter