Intellectual Property and Biodiversity: When and Where are Property Rights Important?

An important issue in the life sciences industries concerns the nature of the incentive mechanism that should govern the production of innovation within this R&D sector. We look at the specific problem of coordinating the supply of inputs across very different agents - North and South - that must each supply inputs in order to generate innovations from the industry. The current arrangement in this industry provides for a single property right at “end of the pipeline”, i.e. where marketing of the innovation occurs. This property rights scenario raises two problems, one of efficiency and one of equity. The key question asked here pertains to the number and placement of property rights that should be instituted to address this property rights failure. Should one establish new property rights in traditional knowledge alone; property rights in genetic information alone; or in both? We demonstrate that in a world in which traditional knowledge and genetic information are complements in the production of R&D, a resolution of the property rights failure in genetic information also may resolve the allocation failure in traditional knowledge even in the absence of a distinct property right. The reason is that traditional knowledge of the nature of private information is comparable to a trade secret. Traditional knowledge holders may use this informational advantage to improve their benefit by capturing some informational rent. A new property right is important to enable bargaining and coordination to occur across the industry, but a single property right is probably sufficient to enable coordination between the two agents.Biodiversity Prospecting, Traditional Knowledge, Genetic Resources, Intellectual Property Rights, Sequential R&D

Dictators Walking the Mogadishu Line: How Men Become Monsters and Monsters Become Men

History offers many examples of dictators who worsened their behavior significantly over time (like Zimbabwe’s Mugabe) as well as dictators who displayed remarkable improvements (like Rawlings of Ghana). We show that such mutations can result from rational behavior when the dictator’s flow use of repression is complementary to his stock of wrongdoings: past wrongdoings then perpetuate further wrongdoings and the dictator can unintentionally get trapped in a repressive steady state where he himself suffers from ex-post regret. This then begs the question why such a dictator would ever choose to do wrong in the first place. We show that this can be explained from the dictator’s uncertainty over his degree of impunity in relation to wrongdoing, which induces him to experiment along this dimension. This produces a setting where any individual rising to power can end up as either a moderate leader, or as a dreaded tyrant. Since derailment is accidental and accompanied by ex-post regret, increasing accountability can be in the interest of both the public and the dictator.Economic Research Southern AfricaThis is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Oxford University Press via https://doi.org/10.1596/1813-9450-777

Genomic investigations of unexplained acute hepatitis in children

Since its first identification in Scotland, over 1,000 cases of unexplained paediatric hepatitis in children have been reported worldwide, including 278 cases in the UK1. Here we report an investigation of 38 cases, 66 age-matched immunocompetent controls and 21 immunocompromised comparator participants, using a combination of genomic, transcriptomic, proteomic and immunohistochemical methods. We detected high levels of adeno-associated virus 2 (AAV2) DNA in the liver, blood, plasma or stool from 27 of 28 cases. We found low levels of adenovirus (HAdV) and human herpesvirus 6B (HHV-6B) in 23 of 31 and 16 of 23, respectively, of the cases tested. By contrast, AAV2 was infrequently detected and at low titre in the blood or the liver from control children with HAdV, even when profoundly immunosuppressed. AAV2, HAdV and HHV-6 phylogeny excluded the emergence of novel strains in cases. Histological analyses of explanted livers showed enrichment for T cells and B lineage cells. Proteomic comparison of liver tissue from cases and healthy controls identified increased expression of HLA class 2, immunoglobulin variable regions and complement proteins. HAdV and AAV2 proteins were not detected in the livers. Instead, we identified AAV2 DNA complexes reflecting both HAdV-mediated and HHV-6B-mediated replication. We hypothesize that high levels of abnormal AAV2 replication products aided by HAdV and, in severe cases, HHV-6B may have triggered immune-mediated hepatic disease in genetically and immunologically predisposed children

The value of conserving genetic resources for R&D: A survey

The value of genetic resources for R&D is placed within the framework of discussions concerning sustainability. We assess the extent to which society is able to invest now in order to prepare for future risks and uncertainties in the arrival of biological problems. Each of the approaches to valuation is discussed within this setting. Weitzman's approach to measurement is seen to be one that considers society's current objectives and information to be little relevant to future risks and uncertainties. Sedjo, Simpson and Reids' search-theoretic perspective is seen to reduce future uncertainties to highly tractable and known problems. Goeschl and Swanson's bio-technological approach also constrains the problem to be one without any real uncertainty, and focuses on the need to maintain genetic resources in order to maintain control over the problem. Kassar and Lasserre place uncertainty at the core of the problem, and assess the extent to which additional value is added by this feature. In sum all of the approaches to the problem evince a pessimism regarding the capacity of future technological change automatically to resolve these problems. Given this, the value of genetic resources depends on beliefs concerning the ability of current objectives to anticipate future risks and uncertainties.Biodiversity Genetic resources Risk and uncertainty Technology change

On the looting of nations

Natural resource curse, Economic growth, Dictatorship, Looting, Odious debt, O11, O13, O16,

On the Looting of Nations

We develop a dynamic discrete choice model of a self-interested and unchecked ruler making decisions regarding the development of a resource rich country. Resource wealth serves as collateral and facilitates the acquisition of loans. The ruler makes the recursive choice of either staying in power to live off the productivity of the country while facing the risk of being ousted, or looting the country's riches by liquefying the natural assets through external lending. We show that 1) unstructured lending from international credit markets can enhance the ruler's ability to liquefy assets, and create incentives to loot the country's wealth; and 2) an enhanced likelihood of looting reduces tenures (greater political instability), increases indebtedness, reduces investment, and diminishes growth. We test these predictions using a treatment effects model and nd strong empirical evidence that instability caused by unsound lending to unchecked rulers of resource rich countries may result in slow economic growth

Downstream signaling pathways in mouse adipose tissues following acute in vivo administration of fibroblast growth factor 21.

FGF21 is a novel secreted protein with robust anti-diabetic, anti-obesity, and anti-atherogenic activities in preclinical species. In the current study, we investigated the signal transduction pathways downstream of FGF21 following acute administration of the growth factor to mice. Focusing on adipose tissues, we identified FGF21-mediated downstream signaling events and target engagement biomarkers. Specifically, RNA profiling of adipose tissues and phosphoproteomic profiling of adipocytes, following FGF21 treatment revealed several specific changes in gene expression and post-translational modifications, specifically phosphorylation, in several relevant proteins. Affymetrix microarray analysis of white adipose tissues isolated from both C57BL/6 (fed either regular chow or HFD) and db/db mice identified over 150 robust potential RNA transcripts and over 50 potential secreted proteins that were changed greater than 1.5 fold by FGF21 acutely. Phosphoprofiling analysis identified over 130 phosphoproteins that were modulated greater than 1.5 fold by FGF21 in 3T3-L1 adipocytes. Bioinformatic analysis of the combined gene and phosphoprotein profiling data identified a number of known metabolic pathways such as glucose uptake, insulin receptor signaling, Erk/Mapk signaling cascades, and lipid metabolism. Moreover, a number of novel events with hitherto unknown links to FGF21 signaling were observed at both the transcription and protein phosphorylation levels following treatment. We conclude that such a combined "omics" approach can be used not only to identify robust biomarkers for novel therapeutics but can also enhance our understanding of downstream signaling pathways; in the example presented here, novel FGF21-mediated signaling events in adipose tissue have been revealed that warrant further investigation