Religious attitudes and home bias: theory and evidence from a pilot study

This paper examines the relationship between religion and home bias. We propose a simple theoretical framework that suggests that countries interacting via their representative individuals might show a certain degree of religion-driven international altruism that in turn affects trade. We test these predictions exploiting data from a survey on religious attitudes and individuals' preferences over consumption of home-produced versus foreign goods that we designed and carried out in 15 different countries. We find evidence that religious openness and home bias are negatively correlated. This appears to provide some support to the hypothesis that religious openness, through trust and altruism, may have a pro-trade effect.

A Gaussian Integral Filter with Multivariate Laplace Process Noise

This paper introduces the concept of the Gaussian integral filter (GIF), the limit of the Gaussian sum filter (GSF) for when the number of mixands tends to infinity. The GIF is obtained via a combination of GSF, quadrature, and interpolation. While it is a very general concept, in this paper the GIF is used to represent multiviariate Laplace (ML) distributions defining the process noise when tracking a maneuvering target. The filter is first applied to a linear three-dimensional toy problem, and then to a maneuvering target tracking problem in Earth orbit. For the more complex maneuvering target tracking problem, the filter requires only 1.4 times the computational resources of an unscented Kalman filter (UKF), while having errors up to 11 times smaller. For the same problem, the UKF slowly diverges.Comment: IEEE International Conference on Information Fusion, Charleston, SC, U.S.A., June 27-30, 202

Modeling Normal and Pathological Ear Cartilage in vitro Using Somatic Stem Cells in Three-Dimensional Culture

Microtia (underdeveloped ear) is a rare congenital dysmorphology affecting the development of the outer ear. Although human microtic cartilage has not been fully characterized, chondrogenic cells derived from this tissue have been proposed as a suitable source for autologous auricular reconstruction. The aim of this study was to further characterize native microtic cartilage and investigate the properties of cartilage stem/progenitor cells (CSPCs) derived from it. Two-dimensional (2D) systems are most commonly used to assess the chondrogenic potential of somatic stem cells in vitro, but limit cell interactions and differentiation. Hence here we investigated the behavior of microtic CSPCs in three-dimensional spheroid cultures. Remarkable similarities between human microtic cartilages from five patients, as compared to normal cartilage, were observed notwithstanding possibly different etiologies of the disease. Native microtic cartilage displayed poorly defined perichondrium and hyper-cellularity, an immature phenotype that resembled that of the normal developing human auricular cartilage we studied in parallel. Crucially, our analysis of microtic ears revealed for the first time that, unlike normal cartilage, microtic cartilages are vascularized. Importantly, CSPCs isolated from human microtic and normal ear cartilages were found to recapitulate many characteristics of pathological and healthy tissues, respectively, when allowed to differentiate as spheroids, but not in monolayer cultures. Noteworthily, starting from initially homogeneous cell pellets, CSPC spheroids spontaneously underwent a maturation process in culture, and formed two regions (inner and outer region) separated by a boundary, with distinct cell types that differed in chondrogenic commitment as indicated by expression of chondrogenic markers. Compared to normal ear-derived spheroids, microtic spheroids were asymmetric, hyper-cellularized and the inner and outer regions did not develop properly. Hence, their organization resembled that of native microtic cartilage. Together, our results identify novel features of microtic ears and highlight the importance of 3D self-organizing in vitro systems for better understanding somatic stem cell behavior and disease modeling. Our observations of ear-derived chondrogenic stem cell behavior have implications for choice of cells for tissue engineered reconstructive purposes and for modeling the etiopathogenesis of microtia

The Contribution of Cognitive Factors to Compulsive Buying Behaviour: Insights from Shopping Habit Changes during the COVID-19 Pandemic

The last decade has seen an increase in compulsive behaviours among young adults worldwide, particularly in 2020, during restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Importantly, even if shopping is an ordinary activity in everyday life, it can become a compulsive behaviour for certain individuals. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of working memory and decision-making style in compulsive behaviour. A total of 105 participants (65 F, 40 M) were recruited online from May 2020 to December 2020. They completed a series of questionnaires to measure shopping compulsive behaviour, decision-making styles, deficits in working memory and online shopping habits. The results show that during the COVID-19 pandemic, people spent much more time shopping online, made more purchases and spent more money than prior to the pandemic. Moreover, both higher working memory deficits and spontaneous decision-making style predicted a greater tendency to engage in compulsive buying. These results suggest the need to develop specific training programs to improve cognitive aspects related to compulsive shopping behaviour

Comparison between BNP values measured in capillary blood samples with a POCT method and those measured in plasma venous samples with an automated platform

Letter to the Editor. Our data suggest that it is possible to measure BNP in fresh finger-stick samples of capillary whole blood with an acceptable reproducibility, and within 10 – 20 min to obtain results close correlated to those measured by the automated platform in plasma blood samples collected from a vein. The measurement of BNP in fresh finger-stick samples of capillary whole blood with this POCT method is in particular indicated for the management of HF patients at home and for the BNP assay in neonates and children

GPS Digital Nudge to Limit Road Crashes in Non-Expert Drivers

Many automotive industries are developing technologies to assist human drivers in sug-gesting wiser choices to improve drivers’ behaviour. The technology that makes use of this modality is defined as a “digital nudge”. An example of a digital nudge is the GPS that is installed on smart-phones. Some studies have demonstrated that the use of GPS negatively affects environmental learning because of the transformation of some spatial skills. The main purpose of this study was to investigate the use of the GPS nudge and its relationship with spatial ability, together with its function in supporting the driving behaviour of non-expert drivers, in order to reduce the number of road crashes. A total of 88 non-expert drivers (M age = 21 years) filled in questionnaires and carried out tasks to measure spatial abilities, sense of direction, driver behaviour, and six different real-life driving scenarios. The results reveal that the higher the spatial skills are, the greater the GPS use is, and that drivers who use GPS improve their sense of direction. Moreover, people with high visuospatial abilities use GPS more extensively. Finally, young drivers do not consider the GPS aid to be useful when they have no time pressure. The results are discussed by taking into account the familiarity-and-spatial-ability model

Hemoglobin is present as a canonical \u3b12\u3b22 tetramer in dopaminergic neurons

Hemoglobin is the oxygen carrier in blood erythrocytes. Oxygen coordination is mediated by \u3b12\u3b22 tetrameric structure via binding of the ligand to the heme iron atom. This structure is essential for hemoglobin function in the blood. In the last few years, expression of hemoglobin has been found in atypical sites, including the brain. Transcripts for \u3b1 and \u3b2 chains of hemoglobin as well as hemoglobin immunoreactivity have been shown in mesencephalic A9 dopaminergic neurons, whose selective degeneration leads to Parkinson's disease. To gain further insights into the roles of hemoglobin in the brain, we examined its quaternary structure in dopaminergic neurons in vitro and in vivo. Our results indicate that (i) in mouse dopaminergic cell line stably over-expressing \u3b1 and \u3b2 chains, hemoglobin exists as an \u3b12\u3b22 tetramer; (ii) similarly to the over-expressed protein, endogenous hemoglobin forms a tetramer of 64kDa; (iii) hemoglobin also forms high molecular weight insoluble aggregates; and (iv) endogenous hemoglobin retains its tetrameric structure in mouse mesencephalon in vivo. In conclusion, these results suggest that neuronal hemoglobin may be endowed with some of the biochemical activities and biological function associated to its role in erythroid cells. This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Oxygen Binding and Sensing Proteins. \ua9 2013 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved