The personal wealth interests of politicians and government intervention in the economy

We examine whether there is a correlation between personal wealth interests of politicians and their decisions to intervene in the economy. We use the setting of the government’s support of financial institutions under the 2008 Emergency Economic Stabilization Act (ESSA). We find that the personal wealth interests of politicians are positively associated with voting in favour of the EESA

Firm-Level Exposure to Epidemic Diseases: Covid-19, SARS, and H1N1

Using tools described in our earlier work (Hassan et al., 2019, 2020), we develop text-based measures of the costs, benefits, and risks listed firms in the US and over 80 other countries associate with the spread of Covid-19 and other epidemic diseases. We identify which firms expect to gain or lose from an epidemic disease and which are most affected by the associated uncertainty as a disease spreads in a region or around the world. As Covid-19 spreads globally in the first quarter of 2020, we find that firms’ primary concerns relate to the collapse of demand, increased uncertainty, and disruption in supply chains. Other important concerns relate to capacity reductions, closures, and employee welfare. By contrast, financing concerns are mentioned relatively rarely. We also identify some firms that foresee opportunities in new or disrupted markets due to the spread of the disease. Finally, we find some evidence that firms that have experience with SARS or H1N1 have more positive expectations about their ability to deal with the coronavirus outbreak

The Power of the Street: Evidence from Egypt’s Arab Spring

Unprecedented street protests brought down Mubarak’s government and ushered in an era of competition between three rival political groups in Egypt. Using daily variation in the number of protesters, we document that more intense protests are associated with lower stock market valuations for firms connected to the group currently in power relative to non-connected firms, but have no impact on the relative valuations of firms connected to rival groups. These results suggest that street protests serve as a partial check on political rent-seeking. General discontent expressed on Twitter predicts protests but has no direct effect on valuations

Do common inherited beliefs and values influence CEO pay?

We use the ethnicity of CEOs across 31 countries as a proxy for their common inherited beliefs and values and find an ethnicity effect in CEO compensation. We find that the ethnicity effect in variable pay is not driven by the ethnicity effects in corporate policy decisions, and that changes in CEO compensation are significantly larger when CEOs are replaced with a person from a different ethnicity. Our estimated ethnicity effect capture the future time reference and religion of CEOs' ancestors. Finally, we find an ethnicity effect in performance-firing sensitivities (i.e., the sensitivity to being fired due to poor performance)

Firm-Level Political Risk: Measurement and Effects

We adapt simple tools from computational linguistics to construct a new measure of political risk faced by individual US firms: the share of their quarterly earnings conference calls that they devote to political risks. We validate our measure by showing it correctly identifies calls containing extensive conversations on risks that are political in nature, that it varies intuitively over time and across sectors, and that it correlates with the firm's actions and stock market volatility in a manner that is highly indicative of political risk. Firms exposed to political risk retrench hiring and investment and actively lobby and donate to politicians. These results continue to hold after controlling for news about the mean (as opposed to the variance) of political shocks. Interestingly, the vast majority of the variation in our measure is at the firm level rather than at the aggregate or sector level, in the sense that it is neither captured by the interaction of sector and time fixed effects, nor by heterogeneous exposure of individual firms to aggregate political risk. The dispersion of this firm-level political risk increases significantly at times with high aggregate political risk. Decomposing our measure of political risk by topic, we find that firms that devote more time to discussing risks associated with a given political topic tend to increase lobbying on that topic, but not on other topics, in the following quarter

Epidemiological, molecular characterization and antibiotic resistance of Salmonella enterica serovars isolated from chicken farms in Egypt

Background Salmonella is one of major causes of foodborne outbreaks globally. This study was conducted to estimate the prevalence, typing and antibiotic susceptibilities of Salmonella enterica serovars isolated from 41 broiler chicken farms located in Kafr El-Sheikh Province in Northern Egypt during 2014–2015. The clinical signs and mortalities were observed. Results In total 615 clinical samples were collected from broiler flocks from different organs (liver, intestinal content and gall bladder). Salmonella infection was identified in 17 (41%) broiler chicken flocks and 67 Salmonella isolates were collected. Recovered isolates were serotyped as 58 (86.6%) S. enterica serovar Typhimurium, 6 (9%) S. enterica serovar Enteritidis and 3 (4.5%) were non- typable. The significant high mortality rate was observed only in 1-week-old chicks. sopE gene was detected in 92.5% of the isolates which indicating their ability to infect humans. All S. enterica serovar Enteritidis isolates were susceptible to all tested antimicrobials. The phenotypically resistant S. enterica serovar Typhimurium isolates against ampicillin, tetracycline, sulphamethoxazole and chloramphenicol were harbouring BlaTEM, (tetA and tetC), (sul1 and sul3) and (cat1 and floR), respectively. The sensitivity rate of S. enterica serovar Typhimurium to gentamycin, trimethoprim/sulphamethoxazole and streptomycin were 100, 94.8, 89.7%, respectively. The silent streptomycin antimicrobial cassettes were detected in all Salmonella serovars. A class one integron (dfrA12, orfF and aadA2) was identified in three of S. enterica serovar Typhimurium strains. Conclusions To the best of our knowledge, this study considered first report discussing the prevalence, genotyping, antibiotic susceptibility and public health significance of S. enterica serovars in broilers farms of different ages in Delta Egypt. Further studies are mandatory to verify the location of some resistance genes that are within or associated with the class one integron

'Mutations in LAMB2 associate with albuminuria and Optic Nerve Hypoplasia with Hypopituitarism'

CONTEXT: Mutations in LAMB2, encoding the basement membrane protein, laminin β2, are associated with an autosomal recessive disorder characterized by congenital nephrotic syndrome, ocular abnormalities and neurodevelopmental delay (Pierson Syndrome). CASE DESCRIPTION: This report describes a twelve year old boy with short stature, visual impairment and developmental delay who presented with macroscopic haematuria and albuminuria. He had isolated growth hormone deficiency, optic nerve hypoplasia and a small anterior pituitary with corpus callosum dysgenesis on his cranial MRI, thereby supporting a diagnosis of optic nerve hypoplasia syndrome. Renal histopathology revealed focal segmental glomerulosclerosis. Using next generation sequencing on a targeted gene panel for steroid resistant nephrotic syndrome, compound heterozygous missense mutations were identified in LAMB2 [c.737G>A p.Arg246Gln, c.3982G>C p.Gly1328Arg]. Immunohistochemical analysis revealed reduced glomerular laminin β2 expression compared to control kidney and a thin basement membrane on electron microscopy. Laminin β2 is expressed during pituitary development and Lamb2-/- mice exhibit stunted growth, abnormal neural retinae and here, we show, abnormal parenchyma of the anterior pituitary gland. CONCLUSION: We propose that patients with genetically undefined optic nerve hypoplasia syndrome should be screened for albuminuria and if present, screened for mutations in LAMB2

Dietary Supplementation with Soluble Plantain Non-Starch Polysaccharides Inhibits Intestinal Invasion of Salmonella Typhimurium in the Chicken

Soluble fibres (non-starch polysaccharides, NSP) from edible plants but particularly plantain banana (Musa spp.), have been shown in vitro and ex vivo to prevent various enteric pathogens from adhering to, or translocating across, the human intestinal epithelium, a property that we have termed contrabiotic. Here we report that dietary plantain fibre prevents invasion of the chicken intestinal mucosa by Salmonella. In vivo experiments were performed with chicks fed from hatch on a pellet diet containing soluble plantain NSP (0 to 200 mg/d) and orally infected with S.Typhimurium 4/74 at 8 d of age. Birds were sacrificed 3, 6 and 10 d post-infection. Bacteria were enumerated from liver, spleen and caecal contents. In vitro studies were performed using chicken caecal crypts and porcine intestinal epithelial cells infected with Salmonella enterica serovars following pre-treatment separately with soluble plantain NSP and acidic or neutral polysaccharide fractions of plantain NSP, each compared with saline vehicle. Bacterial adherence and invasion were assessed by gentamicin protection assay. In vivo dietary supplementation with plantain NSP 50 mg/d reduced invasion by S.Typhimurium, as reflected by viable bacterial counts from splenic tissue, by 98.9% (95% CI, 98.1–99.7; P<0.0001). In vitro studies confirmed that plantain NSP (5–10 mg/ml) inhibited adhesion of S.Typhimurium 4/74 to a porcine epithelial cell-line (73% mean inhibition (95% CI, 64–81); P<0.001) and to primary chick caecal crypts (82% mean inhibition (95% CI, 75–90); P<0.001). Adherence inhibition was shown to be mediated via an effect on the epithelial cells and Ussing chamber experiments with ex-vivo human ileal mucosa showed that this effect was associated with increased short circuit current but no change in electrical resistance. The inhibitory activity of plantain NSP lay mainly within the acidic/pectic (homogalacturonan-rich) component. Supplementation of chick feed with plantain NSP was well tolerated and shows promise as a simple approach for reducing invasive salmonellosis

Type III Secretion-Dependent Sensitivity of Escherichia coli O157 to Specific Ketolides

A subset of Gram negative bacterial pathogens use a type 3 secretion system (T3SS) to open up a conduit into eukaryotic cells in order to inject effector proteins. These modulate pathways to enhance bacterial colonization. In this study we screened established bioactive compounds for any that could repress T3SS expression in enterohemorrhagic Escherichia coli (EHEC) O157. The ketolides, telithromycin and subsequently solithromycin both demonstrated repressive effects on expression of the bacterial T3SS at sub-minimum inhibitory (sub-MIC) concentrations, leading to significant reductions in bacterial binding and actin-rich pedestal formation on epithelial cells. Pre-incubation of epithelial cells with solithromycin resulted in significantly less attachment of E. coli O157. Moreover, bacteria expressing the T3SS were more susceptible to solithromycin and there was significant preferential killing of E. coli O157 when added to epithelial cells pre-exposed to the ketolide. This killing was dependent on expression of the T3SS. Taken together, this research indicates that the ketolide may traffic back into the bacteria via the T3SS from accumulated levels in epithelial cells. Considering that neither ketolide induces the SOS response, non-toxic members of this class of antibiotic, such as solithromycin, should be considered for future testing and trials in relation to EHEC infections. These antibiotics may also have broader significance for treating other pathogenic bacteria, including intracellular bacteria, that express a T3SS.Fil: Fernández Brando, Romina Jimena. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Instituto de Medicina Experimental. Academia Nacional de Medicina de Buenos Aires. Instituto de Medicina Experimental; Argentina. University of Edinburgh; Reino UnidoFil: Yamaguchi, Nao. University of Edinburgh; Reino UnidoFil: Tahoun, Amin. University of Edinburgh; Reino Unido. Kafrelsheikh University; EgiptoFil: McAteer, Sean P.. University of Edinburgh; Reino UnidoFil: Gillespie, Trudi. University of Edinburgh; Reino UnidoFil: Wang, Dai. University of Edinburgh; Reino Unido. Xiamen University; ChinaFil: Argyle, Sally A.. University of Edinburgh; Reino UnidoFil: Palermo, Marina Sandra. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Instituto de Medicina Experimental. Academia Nacional de Medicina de Buenos Aires. Instituto de Medicina Experimental; ArgentinaFil: Gally, David L.. University of Edinburgh; Reino Unid

Enzymatic glyceride synthesis in a foam reactor

We report the results of our study on Rhizomucor miehei lipaseâ catalyzed lauric acidâ glycerol esterification in a foam reactor. A satisfactory yield of glyceride synthesis can be achieved with an unusually high initial water content (50% w/w). We found that product formation could be regulated by controlling foaming. Foaming was a function of the air flow rate, reaction temperature, pH value, ionic strength, and substrate molar ratio. Monolaurin and dilaurin, which constituted nearly 80% of the total yield, were the two dominant products in this reaction; trilaurin was also formed at the initial stages of the reaction. A study of pH and ionic strength effects on an independent basis revealed that they affect the interfacial mechanism in different manners. On varying the ratio of lauric acid and glycerol, only a slight change in the degree of conversion was detected and the consumption rate of fatty acid was approximately the same.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/141443/1/aocs0643.pd