The Use of Accounting Screens for Separating Winners from Losers Among the S&P 500 Stocks

This study uses accounting screens based on the Piotroski’s (2000) F-score and the derived MagicP formulae and finds that it is an effective investment strategy, which results in risk-adjusted outperformance of stocks with high book-to-market (BM) ratios over a market weighted benchmark portfolio and its subset of growth stocks. Unlike other studies that utilized similar tests on smaller firms, we examine the performance of large value stocks within the S&P 500 between 2007 and 2014 and find evidence of the value premium. The results were robust to the time period; in fact, the highest-ranked value stocks suffered less severely during the period of market correction

Belief-based action prediction in preverbal infants

Successful mindreading entails both the ability to think about what others know or believe, and to use this knowledge to generate predictions about how mental states will influence behavior. While previous studies have demonstrated that young infants are sensitive to others’ mental states, there continues to be much debate concerning how to characterize early theory of mind abilities. In the current study, we asked whether 6-month-old infants appreciate the causal role that beliefs play in action. Specifically, we tested whether infants generate action predictions that are appropriate given an agent’s current belief. We exploited a novel, neural indication of action prediction: motor cortex activation as measured by sensorimotor alpha suppression, to ask whether infants would generate differential predictions depending on an agent’s belief. After first verifying our paradigm and measure with a group of adult participants, we found that when an agent had a false belief that a ball was in the box, motor activity indicated that infants predicted she would reach for the box, but when the agent had a false belief that a ball was not in the box, infants did not predict that she would act. In both cases, infants based their predictions on what the agent, rather than the infant, believed to be the case, suggesting that by 6 months of age, infants can exploit their sensitivity to other minds for action prediction

Costs and benefits of orthographic inconsistency in reading:evidence from a cross-linguistic comparison

We compared reading acquisition in English and Italian children up to late primary school analyzing RTs and errors as a function of various psycholinguistic variables and changes due to experience. Our results show that reading becomes progressively more reliant on larger processing units with age, but that this is modulated by consistency of the language. In English, an inconsistent orthography, reliance on larger units occurs earlier on and it is demonstrated by faster RTs, a stronger effect of lexical variables and lack of length effect (by fifth grade). However, not all English children are able to master this mode of processing yielding larger inter-individual variability. In Italian, a consistent orthography, reliance on larger units occurs later and it is less pronounced. This is demonstrated by larger length effects which remain significant even in older children and by larger effects of a global factor (related to speed of orthographic decoding) explaining changes of performance across ages. Our results show the importance of considering not only overall performance, but inter-individual variability and variability between conditions when interpreting cross-linguistic differences

Role of sesquiterpenes in biogenic new particle formation

Biogenic vapors form new particles in the atmosphere, affecting global climate. The contributions of monoterpenes and isoprene to new particle formation (NPF) have been extensively studied. However, sesquiterpenes have received little attention despite a potentially important role due to their high molecular weight. Via chamber experiments performed under atmospheric conditions, we report biogenic NPF resulting from the oxidation of pure mixtures of β-caryophyllene, α-pinene, and isoprene, which produces oxygenated compounds over a wide range of volatilities. We find that a class of vapors termed ultralow-volatility organic compounds (ULVOCs) are highly efficient nucleators and quantitatively determine NPF efficiency. When compared with a mixture of isoprene and monoterpene alone, adding only 2% sesquiterpene increases the ULVOC yield and doubles the formation rate. Thus, sesquiterpene emissions need to be included in assessments of global aerosol concentrations in pristine climates where biogenic NPF is expected to be a major source of cloud condensation nuclei

Determining sectoral and regional sensitivity to climate and socio-economic change in Europe using impact response surfaces

Responses to future changes in climatic and socio-economic conditions can be expected to vary between sectors and regions, reflecting differential sensitivity to these highly uncertain factors. A sensitivity analysis was conducted using a suite of impact models (for health, agriculture, biodiversity, land use, floods and forestry) across Europe with respect to changes in key climate and socio-economic variables. Depending on the indicators, aggregated grid or indicative site results are reported for eight rectangular sub-regions that together span Europe from northern Finland to southern Spain and from western Ireland to the Baltic States and eastern Mediterranean, each plotted as scenario-neutral impact response surfaces (IRSs). These depict the modelled behaviour of an impact variable in response to changes in two key explanatory variables. To our knowledge, this is the first time the IRS approach has been applied to changes in socio-economic drivers and over such large regions. The British Isles region showed the smallest sensitivity to both temperature and precipitation, whereas Central Europe showed the strongest responses to temperature and Eastern Europe to precipitation. Across the regions, sensitivity to temperature was lowest for the two indicators of river discharge and highest for Norway spruce productivity. Sensitivity to precipitation was lowest for intensive agricultural land use, maize and potato yields and Scots pine productivity, and highest for Norway spruce productivity. Under future climate projections, North-eastern Europe showed increases in yields of all crops and productivity of all tree species, whereas Central and East Europe showed declines. River discharge indicators and forest productivity (except Holm oak) were projected to decline over southern European regions. Responses were more sensitive to socio-economic than to climate drivers for some impact indicators, as demonstrated for heat-related mortality, coastal flooding and land use

News framing effects on destination risk perception

News coverage of hazards is often commented to be of critical importance to individuals' perceived risk associated with tourist destinations. Despite the significance of this issue to the global tourism industry, the link between portrayals of hazards and audience reception is rarely studied in this context. This study adopted the framing theory to evaluate media effect on tourists' perceived risk of portrayals of terrorism and political instability incidents. This involved a survey-embedded experiment which manipulated potential elements of a news report concerning a hazard. The content of fictitious articles used in the experiment was created on the basis of extant risk perception theories. Results revealed that the use of risk amplifying frame and risk attenuating frame result in higher and lower ratings of risk respectively. Moreover, tourist psychographic characteristics were found to moderate the influence of news frames on perceived risk. Implications for tourism destination managers and marketers were discussed

Molecular understanding of the suppression of new-particle formation by isoprene

Nucleation of atmospheric vapours produces more than half of global cloud condensation nuclei and so has an important influence on climate. Recent studies show that monoterpene (C10H16) oxidation yields highly oxygenated products that can nucleate with or without sulfuric acid. Monoterpenes are emitted mainly by trees, frequently together with isoprene (C5H8), which has the highest global emission of all organic vapours. Previous studies have shown that isoprene suppresses new-particle formation from monoterpenes, but the cause of this suppression is under debate. Here, in experiments performed under atmospheric conditions in the CERN CLOUD chamber, we show that isoprene reduces the yield of highly oxygenated dimers with 19 or 20 carbon atoms - which drive particle nucleation and early growth - while increasing the production of dimers with 14 or 15 carbon atoms. The dimers (termed C-20 and C-15, respectively) are produced by termination reactions between pairs of peroxy radicals (RO2 center dot) arising from monoterpenes or isoprene. Compared with pure monoterpene conditions, isoprene reduces nucleation rates at 1.7 nm (depending on the isoprene = monoterpene ratio) and approximately halves particle growth rates between 1.3 and 3.2 nm. However, above 3.2 nm, C-15 dimers contribute to secondary organic aerosol, and the growth rates are unaffected by isoprene. We further show that increased hydroxyl radical (OH center dot) reduces particle formation in our chemical system rather than enhances it as previously proposed, since it increases isoprene-derived RO2 center dot radicals that reduce C-20 formation. RO2 center dot termination emerges as the critical step that determines the highly oxygenated organic molecule (HOM) distribution and the corresponding nucleation capability. Species that reduce the C-20 yield, such as NO, HO2 and as we show isoprene, can thus effectively reduce biogenic nucleation and early growth. Therefore the formation rate of organic aerosol in a particular region of the atmosphere under study will vary according to the precise ambient conditions.Peer reviewe

Fifth European Dirofilaria and Angiostrongylus Days (FiEDAD) 2016

Peer reviewe

Plasma lipid profiles discriminate bacterial from viral infection in febrile children

Fever is the most common reason that children present to Emergency Departments. Clinical signs and symptoms suggestive of bacterial infection are often non-specific, and there is no definitive test for the accurate diagnosis of infection. The 'omics' approaches to identifying biomarkers from the host-response to bacterial infection are promising. In this study, lipidomic analysis was carried out with plasma samples obtained from febrile children with confirmed bacterial infection (n = 20) and confirmed viral infection (n = 20). We show for the first time that bacterial and viral infection produces distinct profile in the host lipidome. Some species of glycerophosphoinositol, sphingomyelin, lysophosphatidylcholine and cholesterol sulfate were higher in the confirmed virus infected group, while some species of fatty acids, glycerophosphocholine, glycerophosphoserine, lactosylceramide and bilirubin were lower in the confirmed virus infected group when compared with confirmed bacterial infected group. A combination of three lipids achieved an area under the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve of 0.911 (95% CI 0.81 to 0.98). This pilot study demonstrates the potential of metabolic biomarkers to assist clinicians in distinguishing bacterial from viral infection in febrile children, to facilitate effective clinical management and to the limit inappropriate use of antibiotics