Market research and complementary advertising under asymmetric information

We consider whether market research can always increase a seller's sales under bilateral asymmetric information. If a monopoly seller provides a high quality object, market research cannot increase sales even when the cost is sufficiently low. A low quality seller, on the other hand, can likely benefit from market research. However, this research has shown that market research alone does not improve sales and that advertising complements market research. Thus the high quality seller can increase sales by using both methods. The availability of advertising and market research to both types of seller results in disappearance of information asymmetry and efficient trade.

Sequential Internet Auctions with Different Ending Rules

Two ending rules, a soft close and a hard close, exist in Internet auctions. In hard close auctions, each auction ends with a fixed deadline determined by a seller. In soft close auctions, the end time automatically extends if at least one bid is submitted in the last few minutes, so each buyer has an opportunity to reply to other buyers' bids. The reserve prices set by the seller in hard close auctions are higher than the reserve prices in soft close auctions. The result is consistent with data of DS Lite auctions in Yahoo! Japan.

Expanding application of digital pathology in Japan - from education, telepathology to autodiagnosis

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Digital pathology, i.e., applications of digital information technologies to pathology practice, has been expanding in the recent decades and the mode of pathology diagnostic practice is changing with enhanced precision. In the present study the changing processes of digital pathology in Japan were investigated and trends to future were discussed.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The changing status of digital pathology was investigated through reviewing the records of annual meetings of the Japanese Research Society of Telepathology and Pathology Informatics (JRST-PI) and of the Japanese pathology related medical and informatics journals. The results of the Japanese questionnaire survey conducted in 2008-2009 on telepathology and virtual slide were also reviewed. In addition effectiveness of an experimental automatic pathology diagnostic aid system using computer artificial intelligence was investigated by checking its rate of correct diagnosis for given prostate carcinoma digital images.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Telepathology played a central role in the development of digital pathology in Japan. Both macroscopic and microscopic pathology digital images were routinely generated and used for diagnostic purposes in major hospitals. Virtual slide (VS) digital images were used first for education then for conference, consultation and also gradually for routine diagnosis and telepathology. The experimental automatic diagnostic aid system achieved the rate of correct diagnosis around 95% for prostate carcinoma and its use for automatic mapping of cancerous areas in a given tissue image was successful.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>Advance in the digital information technologies gave revolutionary impacts on pathology education, conference, consultation, diagnosis, telepathology and also on pathology diagnostic procedures in Japan. The future will be bright for pathologists by the advanced digital pathology but we should pay attention to make the technologies and their effects under our control.</p

From Despised Enemy to Wronged American: Images of the Japanese American Internment, 1942-1992

This thesis attempts to elucidate the popular image of the World War II Japanese American internment in postwar America. It examines how the internment was described in the print press, high school history textbooks, and motion pictures between the early 1940s and the early 1990s, and explains when, why, and how the description changed. The popular image of the internment was transformed from “justifiable relocation of despised enemies” to “unjustifiable incarceration of wronged American citizens.” Despite earlier studies on the internment, which often suggest this dramatic shift occurred in the late 1980s, this thesis demonstrates that the shift actually took place in the mid 1950s and the early 1960s. Although the image of Japanese Americans as hateful enemies dominated the wartime print media, it dissipated quickly after the end of the war and never became prevalent in the postwar era. The counter image of them as wronged citizens emerged in the midst of the war, and swiftly replaced the negative image within a decade after the war. From then on, the internment has always been depicted as a grave injustice and a tragic mistake. Therefore, at least at the level of the popular image, the American public’s critical attitude toward the internment and their sympathy for Japanese Americans were obvious three decades before the passage of the Civil Liberties Act of 1988, which mandated a formal apology by the president and monetary compensation to surviving ex-internees. This transition of Japanese American image seems attributable to a series of reversals of longstanding legal discrimination against Asian Americans in the late 1940s and the early 1950s, as well as to the enactment of the Japanese American Claims Act of 1948. These legal changes presumably raised the image of ex-internees. Furthermore, Japanese Americans’ wartime good behavior contributed to the development of their own image as wronged citizens

Electron acceleration with improved Stochastic Differential Equation method: cutoff shape of electron distribution in test-particle limit

We develop a method of stochastic differential equation to simulate electron acceleration at astrophysical shocks. Our method is based on It\^{o}'s stochastic differential equations coupled with a particle splitting, employing a skew Brownian motion where an asymmetric shock crossing probability is considered. Using this code, we perform simulations of electron acceleration at stationary plane parallel shock with various parameter sets, and studied how the cutoff shape, which is characterized by cutoff shape parameter $a$, changes with the momentum dependence of the diffusion coefficient $\beta$. In the age-limited cases, we reproduce previous results of other authors, $a\approx2\beta$. In the cooling-limited cases, the analytical expectation $a\approx\beta+1$ is roughly reproduced although we recognize deviations to some extent. In the case of escape-limited acceleration, numerical result fits analytical stationary solution well, but deviates from the previous asymptotic analytical formula $a\approx\beta$.Comment: corrected typos, 10 pages, 4 figures, 2 tables, JHEAp in pres