The principle of reducing information rents in the discriminatory price auction system.

<p>The principle of reducing information rents in the discriminatory price auction system.</p

Line chart of opportunity costs for participating in the PES in Sunan County.

<p>Near the lower opportunity cost, the slope of this line is less than that near the higher opportunity cost.</p

Green Auctions and Reduction of Information Rents in Payments for Environmental Services: An Experimental Investigation in Sunan County, Northwestern China

<div><p>Reducing information rents is an important task for government agencies wishing to purchase maximal environmental services with limited budgets. This paper reports on several green auction options for reducing information rents and improving the performance of the “Grain for Green” Payments for environmental services (PES) program implemented in northwestern China. In r experimental auctions and investigations, door-to-door interviews were conducted and bidding envelopes and survey questionnaires were used to determine the offers and the foregone profits of the participants. Three scenarios are analyzed in this paper: a uniform price auction, a discriminatory price auction, and an opportunity-cost system. The results show that compared to the uniform price auction system, the other auction systems can increase the cost-effectiveness of conservation contracting. Competitive bidding can reveal true opportunity costs and can reduce information rents extracted from the government by farmers using private information. The demographics and average bids of these auction types were also analyzed. “Perfect information” in the opportunity-cost offer system has the best performance but is very hard to implement in reality. The results of this research show that the auction is a valuable tool for purchasing conservation contracts in northwestern China, but that in the future, the performance of these auctions should be studied with relaxed model assumptions.</p></div

The performance of optimal bid according the model under different uncertainties.

<p>The performance of optimal bid according the model under different uncertainties.</p

Characteristics of the PES program under different payment schemes.

<p>Characteristics of the PES program under different payment schemes.</p

The maximum and the minimum accepted prices under different uncertainties.

<p>The maximum and the minimum accepted prices under different uncertainties.</p

Line chart of the auction bids and opportunity costs for participating in the PES in Sunan County.

<p>Line chart of the auction bids and opportunity costs for participating in the PES in Sunan County.</p

The estimated results of linear regression.

<p>The estimated results of linear regression.</p

Influence of Helicobacter pylori culture supernatant on the ecological balance of a dual-species oral biofilm

<div><p>Abstract Dental caries is a chronic progressive disease occurring in the tooth hard tissue due to multiple factors, in which bacteria are the initial cause. Both Streptococcus mutans and Streptococcus sanguinis are main members of oral biofilm. Helicobacter pylori may also be detected in dental plaque, playing an important role in the development of dental caries. Objective The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of H. pylori culture supernatant on S. mutans and S. sanguinis dual-species biofilm and to evaluate its potential ability on affecting dental health. Material and methods The effect of H. pylori supernatant on single-species and dual-species biofilm was measured by colony forming units counting and fluorescence in situ hybridization (FISH) assay, respectively. The effect of H. pylori supernatant on S. mutans and S. sanguinis extracellular polysaccharides (EPS) production was measured by both confocal laser scanning microscopy observation and anthrone-sulfuric acid method. The effect of H. pylori supernatant on S. mutans gene expression was measured by quantitative real-time PCR (qRT-PCR) assays. Results H. pylori supernatant could inhibit both S. mutans and S. sanguinis biofilm formation and EPS production. S. sanguinis inhibition rate was significantly higher than that of S. mutans. Finally, S. mutans bacteriocin and acidogenicity related genes expression were affected by H. pylori culture supernatant. Conclusion Our results showed that H. pylori could destroy the balance between S. mutans and S. sanguinis in oral biofilm, creating an advantageous environment for S. mutans, which became the dominant bacteria, promoting the formation and development of dental caries.</p></div

Comparison of structurally conserved motifs of ECD HER2 with the epitope of trastuzumab.

<p>A: The location of F1, F2 and F3 in the tube worm representation of the HER2-trastuzumab complex. HER2 is colored dark brown and trastuzumab is in chain form: light chain in bright purple and heavy chain in blue. The structurally conserved motifs (F1, F2 and F3) are highlighted in yellow. B: Enlarged view of binding interface between ECD HER2 and trastuzumab. Trastuzumab is shown in grey, with a space-fill protein backbone and side chains style. The numbers indicted in the figure show the three loop regions (highlighted in yellow) mediating the interaction with trastuzumab. F2 is shown in light green and F3 is in bright purple. The overlapped residues between F2, F3 and interaction loops are P557 and E558 (F2, on loop 1 (P557-D561)), D570, P571, P572 and F573 (F3, on loop 2 (D570-F573)), K593, F594, P595, D596, E597 and E598 (F3, on loop 3 (K593-P603)). According to the crystal structure of HER2-trastuzumab complex <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0106448#pone.0106448-Cho1" target="_blank">[33]</a>, there are eight residues invisible in the F3 region. The numbers shown in the figure are consistent with PDB data rather than sequential numbering for HER2 residues.</p