Edging toward ‘reasonably’ good corporate governance

Over four decades, research and policy have created layers of understandings in the quest for “good” corporate governance. The corporate excesses of the 1970s sparked a search for market mechanisms and disclosure to empower shareholders. The UK-focused problems of the 1990s prompted board-centric, structural approaches, while the fall of Enron and many other companies in the early 2000s heightened emphasis on director independence and professionalism. With the financial crisis of 2007-09, however, came a turn in some policy approaches and in academic literature seeking a different way forward. This paper explores those four phases and the discourse each develops and then links each to assumptions about accountability and cognition. After the financial crisis came pointers n policy and practice away from narrow, rationalist prescriptions and toward what the philosopher Stephen Toulmin calls “reasonableness”. Acknowledging that heightens awareness of complexity and interdependence in corporate governance practice. The paper then articulates a research agenda concerning what “reasonable” corporate governance might entail

Additional file 2 of A robust and efficient automatic method to segment maize FASGA stained stem cross section images to accurately quantify histological profile

Additional file 2. The workflow presented in this article also works on images of lower quality. A: example of poor quality image used as input to the workflow and B: associated output image

Milkability assessment of Tsigai, Improved Valachian, Lacaune and F1Crossbred ewes (Tsigai × Lacaune, Improved Valachian × Lacaune) throughout lactation

This paper aimed to compare the milking ability of ewes from pure European breeds (Tsigai, Improved Valachian, Lacaune, and their crosses) on the basis of their milk flow kinetics during machine milking throughout lactation. Ewes of the Tsigai (TS, n = 13), Improved Valachian (IV, n = 12), Lacaune (LC, n = 12), TS x LC (50%, n = 12) and IV x LC (50%, n = 12) on their 1-3 lactation were used. The ewes were in their 74 +/- 12 d of lactation at the beginning of the experiment. Milk flow data of each ewe were recorded during one evening milking in the middle of four successive months (May, June, July, and August). Milk flow was recorded by means of an automatic collecting jar equipped with an electronic milk meter device working in every 1-s intervals. The milk flow curves were classified into three types: 1 peak (1P), 2 peaks (2P) and plateau (PL). The highest values of repeatability of parameters were found for stripped milk yield (SMY), maximum milk flow, latency time and milk yield at 30s (over 0.52). The lowest values were recorded for machine milking time (MMT), machine milk yield (MMY) and time to reach maximum milk flow (<0.33). Month of lactation significantly influenced most of the milkability data except latency time and time to maximum flow rate. The effect of genotype showed highly significant influence on most of the analyzed parameters. The lowest total milk yield (TMY) and MMY were measured in pure TS (0.348 +/- 0.021 and 0.266 +/- 0.0211, respectively) and IV breeds (0.320 +/- 0.0221 and 0.259 +/- 0.0211, respectively) as compared with Lacaune (0.524 +/- 0.0221 and 0.360 +/- 0.0211, respectively). The highest TMY and MMY were measured in ewes with PL milk flow types and the lowest in ewes with 1P. Ewes with 1P showed clearly shorter MMT and higher percentage of SMY as compared to PL and 2P though SMY did not differ among groups. Interaction of milk flow type and stage of lactation influenced TMY and MMY, maximum milk flow, milk yield in 30s of milking and MMT. A clear effect of milk flow type on TMY and MMY was observed each month