A ricardian analysis of the impact of climate change on permanent crops in a mediterranean region

This is the first study which explores the impact of climate change in Sicily, a small Mediterranean region of Southern Europe. According to research, Mediterranean area has shown large climate shifts in the last century and it has been identified as one of the most prominent “Hot-Spots” in future climate change projections. Since agriculture is an economic activity which strongly depends on climate setting and is particularly responsive to climate changes, it is important to understand how such changes may affect agricultural profitability in the Mediterranean region. The aim of the present study is to assess the expected impact of climate change on permanent crops cultivated in Sicilian region (Southern Italy). By using data from Farm Accountancy Data Network and Ensembles climatic projections for 2021-2050 period, we showed that the impact of climate change is prominent in this region. However, crops respond to climatic variations in a different manner, highlighting that unlike the strong reduction in profitability of grapevine and citrus tree, the predicted average Net Revenue of olive tree is almost the same as in the reference period (1961-1990)

Triplet Production by Linearly Polarized Photons

The process of electron-positron pair production by linearly polarized photons is used as a polarimeter to perform mobile measurement of linear photon polarization. In the limit of high photon energies, omega, the distributions of the recoil-electron momentum and azimuthal angle do not depend on the photon energy in the laboratory frame. We calculate the power corrections of order m/omega to the above distributions and estimate the deviation from the asymptotic result for various values of omega.Comment: LaTeX2e, 13 pages, 5 figure files (eps), submitted to Phys. Rev.

Urban consumers\u2019 attitudes and willingness to pay for functional foods in Iran: A case of dietary sugar

Growing concerns for the incidence of incurable diseases and high costs of health care have attracted consumers to functional foods in the world. These foods are characterized with health improvement, lower risk of disease incidence and less health hazards. The present work examined consumers' attitude and willingness to pay for dietary sugar in Rasht city, Iran. The studied sample included 125 citizens of Rasht in spring and summer of 2016 whose size was determined by Mitchell and Carson approach. Results of contingent valuation method on the basis of one-and-one-half-bound choice model revealed that the descriptive variable of bid had negative, statistically significant impact on the acceptance of bid by participants. In addition, the descriptive variables of respondent's age, educational level, family size, monthly income of the family, record of diabetes in family, healthy purchase attitude, and attitude towards the benefits of dietary sugar had positive, significant influence on bid acceptance. Participants expressed their willingness to pay 35.59% extra for dietary sugar as compared to conventional sugar

How Organizational Resources and Managerial Features Affect Business Performance: An Analysis in the Greek Wine Industry

Despite the growing interest of the wine industry in quality and environmental certifications and the influence of these standards on positioning in international markets, scholarly research has paid proportionally limited attention to the link between winery export intensity and the adoption of internationally recognized standards. This study aims to analyze which factors make an organizational model performant, and to verify the impact of the adoption of third-party certifications on the export performance by using the resource-based view (RBV) theory as a theoretical lens. Findings show that younger wineries are more oriented towards the adoption of voluntary quality and environmental certifications, and they achieve the best economic performance, expressed in terms of overall turnover on the market. On the contrary, the better export performance is achieved by the largest group of wineries, which make the greatest effort in promotion and advertising activities and sell their products through intermediaries, while showing a low adoption of certifications. Our results have a number of theoretical and practical implications

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Injury-experienced satellite cells retain long-term enhanced regenerative capacity

Background: Inflammatory memory or trained immunity is a recently described process in immune and non-immune tissue resident cells, whereby previous exposure to inflammation mediators leads to a faster and stronger responses upon secondary challenge. Whether previous muscle injury is associated with altered responses to subsequent injury by satellite cells (SCs), the muscle stem cells, is not known. Methods: We used a mouse model of repeated muscle injury, in which intramuscular cardiotoxin (CTX) injections were administered 50 days apart in order to allow for full recovery of the injured muscle before the second injury. The effect of prior injury on the phenotype, proliferation and regenerative potential of satellite cells following a second injury was examined in vitro and in vivo by immunohistochemistry, RT-qPCR and histological analysis. Results: We show that SCs isolated from muscle at 50 days post-injury (injury-experienced SCs (ieSCs)) enter the cell cycle faster and form bigger myotubes when cultured in vitro, compared to control SCs isolated from uninjured contralateral muscle. Injury-experienced SCs were characterized by the activation of the mTORC 1 signaling pathway, suggesting they are poised to activate sooner following a second injury. Consequently, upon second injury, SCs accumulate in greater numbers in muscle at 3 and 10 days after injury. These changes in SC phenotype and behavior were associated with accelerated muscle regeneration, as evidenced by an earlier appearance of bigger fibers and increased number of myonuclei per fiber at day 10 after the second injury. Conclusions: Overall, we show that skeletal muscle injury has a lasting effect on SC function priming them to respond faster to a subsequent injury. The ieSCs have long-term enhanced regenerative properties that contribute to accelerated regeneration following a secondary challenge

Neutrinos produced by ultrahigh-energy photons at high red shift

Some of the proposed explanations for the origin of ultrahigh-energy cosmic rays invoke new sources of energetic photons (e.g., topological defects, relic particles, etc.). At high red shift, when the cosmic microwave background has a higher temperature but the radio background is low, the ultrahigh-energy photons can generate neutrinos through pair-production of muons and pions. Neutrinos produced at high red shift by slowly evolving sources can be detected. Rapidly evolving sources of photons can be ruled out based on the existing upper limit on the neutrino flux.Comment: 4 pages, revtex; to appear in Phys. Rev. Let

Immune Regulatory Neural Stem/Precursor Cells Protect from Central Nervous System Autoimmunity by Restraining Dendritic Cell Function

The systemic injection of neural stem/precursor cells (NPCs) provides remarkable amelioration of the clinico-pathological features of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE). This is dependent on the capacity of transplanted NPCs to engage concurrent mechanisms of action within specific microenvironments in vivo. Among a wide range of therapeutic actions alternative to cell replacement, neuroprotective and immune modulatory capacities of transplanted NPCs have been described. However, lacking is a detailed understanding of the mechanisms by which NPCs exert their therapeutic plasticity. This study was designed to identify the first candidate that exemplifies and sustains the immune modulatory capacity of transplanted NPCs.To achieve the exclusive targeting of the peripheral immune system, SJL mice with PLP-induced EAE were injected subcutaneously with NPCs and the treatment commenced prior to disease onset. NPC-injected EAE mice showed significant clinical improvement, as compared to controls. Exogenous NPCs lacking the expression of major neural antigens were reliably (and for long-term) found at the level of draining lymph nodes, while establishing sophisticated anatomical interactions with lymph node cells. Importantly, injected NPCs were never found in organs other than lymph nodes, including the brain and the spinal cord. Draining lymph nodes from transplanted mice showed focal up-regulation of major developmental stem cell regulators, such as BMP-4, Noggin and Sonic hedgehog. In lymph nodes, injected NPCs hampered the activation of myeloid dendritic cells (DCs) and steadily restrained the expansion of antigen-specific encephalitogenic T cells. Both ex vivo and in vitro experiments identified a novel highly NPC-specific–BMP-4-dependent–mechanism hindering the DC maturation.The study described herein, identifies the first member of the TGF β/BMP family of stem cell regulators as a novel tolerogenic factor released by NPCs. Full exploitation of this pathway as an efficient tool for vaccination therapy in autoimmune inflammatory conditions is underway

Increased Circulating T Cell Reactivity to GM1 Ganglioside in Patients with Guillain-Barre Syndrome

This study was performed to determine whether increased ganglioside-specific T cell reactivity can be detected in the peripheral blood of patients with Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS) and chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyradiculoneuropathy (CIDP). T cell responsiveness to the gangliosides GM1, GM3, GD1a, GD1b, GD3, GT1b, GQ1b and sulphatide was assessed in peripheral blood mononuclear cells from untreated GBS patients (57), CIDP patients (43), patients with other peripheral neuropathies (55) and healthy control subjects (74) in a standard 6-day proliferation assay. Increased T cell reactivity to GM1 occurred in GBS patients compared to healthy controls and patients with other neuropathies. There was increased reactivity to GM3 in GBS patients compared to patients with other neuropathies but not compared to healthy controls. The frequencies of increased T cell reactivity to GM1 and GM3 in CIDP patients were intermediate between those of GBS patients and controls. We suggest that T cell reactivity to gangliosides might play a contributory role in the pathogenesis of GBS and perhaps CIDP