Assessing the Evolution of GATT/WTO Structures Designed to Regulate the Growth and Functioning of Regional Trade Agreements (RTAs)

Regional Trade Agreements (RTA) are entered into by countries to provide more favourable trading terms amongst member countries. Certain countries in a particular region may decide to go into such agreements so that they can allow for more favourable trading terms other than the trade terms enjoyed under World Trade Organization (WTO). These RTAs emerged from the WTO as immediate aftermath of the Cancun failure, which led major players in the WTO system to suggested that in order to make progress, they would turn to the negotiation of regional trade agreements in lieu of pursuing talks in the WTO multilateral system. The WTO seeks to ensure that the RTAs are successful by putting in place some structures in the form of procedural systems to follow in order to adopt and implement the RTAs. Notable among these systems is the notification of the RTA by member countries to the WTO. Whether these systems are working towards the achievement of the RTA

The Role and Functions of the International Trade Organization (ITO) and the World Trade Organization (WTO): The Major Differences and Similarities

The International Trade Organization (ITO) and the World Trade Organization (WTO) are both trade organizations whose functions are geared towards regulating trade among nations. The ITO was proposed to be the international organization in charge of international trade regulation among nations even before the coming into being of the WTO. The ITO never had the chance to materialise due to the refusal of the United State

Packet Switched vs. Time Multiplexed FPGA Overlay Networks

Dedicated, spatially configured FPGA interconnect is efficient for applications that require high throughput connections between processing elements (PEs) but with a limited degree of PE interconnectivity (e.g. wiring up gates and datapaths). Applications which virtualize PEs may require a large number of distinct PE-to-PE connections (e.g. using one PE to simulate 100s of operators, each requiring input data from thousands of other operators), but with each connection having low throughput compared with the PE’s operating cycle time. In these highly interconnected conditions, dedicating spatial interconnect resources for all possible connections is costly and inefficient. Alternatively, we can time share physical network resources by virtualizing interconnect links, either by statically scheduling the sharing of resources prior to runtime or by dynamically negotiating resources at runtime. We explore the tradeoffs (e.g. area, route latency, route quality) between time-multiplexed and packet-switched networks overlayed on top of commodity FPGAs. We demonstrate modular and scalable networks which operate on a Xilinx XC2V6000-4 at 166MHz. For our applications, time-multiplexed, offline scheduling offers up to a 63% performance increase over online, packet-switched scheduling for equivalent topologies. When applying designs to equivalent area, packet-switching is up to 2× faster for small area designs while time-multiplexing is up to 5× faster for larger area designs. When limited to the capacity of a XC2V6000, if all communication is known, time-multiplexed routing outperforms packet-switching; however when the active set of links drops below 40% of the potential links, packet-switched routing can outperform time-multiplexing

Prognostic model to predict postoperative acute kidney injury in patients undergoing major gastrointestinal surgery based on a national prospective observational cohort study.

Background: Acute illness, existing co-morbidities and surgical stress response can all contribute to postoperative acute kidney injury (AKI) in patients undergoing major gastrointestinal surgery. The aim of this study was prospectively to develop a pragmatic prognostic model to stratify patients according to risk of developing AKI after major gastrointestinal surgery. Methods: This prospective multicentre cohort study included consecutive adults undergoing elective or emergency gastrointestinal resection, liver resection or stoma reversal in 2-week blocks over a continuous 3-month period. The primary outcome was the rate of AKI within 7 days of surgery. Bootstrap stability was used to select clinically plausible risk factors into the model. Internal model validation was carried out by bootstrap validation. Results: A total of 4544 patients were included across 173 centres in the UK and Ireland. The overall rate of AKI was 14·2 per cent (646 of 4544) and the 30-day mortality rate was 1·8 per cent (84 of 4544). Stage 1 AKI was significantly associated with 30-day mortality (unadjusted odds ratio 7·61, 95 per cent c.i. 4·49 to 12·90; P < 0·001), with increasing odds of death with each AKI stage. Six variables were selected for inclusion in the prognostic model: age, sex, ASA grade, preoperative estimated glomerular filtration rate, planned open surgery and preoperative use of either an angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor or an angiotensin receptor blocker. Internal validation demonstrated good model discrimination (c-statistic 0·65). Discussion: Following major gastrointestinal surgery, AKI occurred in one in seven patients. This preoperative prognostic model identified patients at high risk of postoperative AKI. Validation in an independent data set is required to ensure generalizability

For a Sociological Reconstruction: W.E.B. Du Bois, Stuart Hall and Segregated Sociology

Racism and intellectual segregation limit and divide the sociological tradition. The white sociological mainstream historically ignored the contribution of black sociologists and today it confers the discussion of racism to a specialist sub-field. Black sociologists by contrast have long been attentive to white sociology. Through a detailed discussion of the writings of W.E.B Du Bois and Stuart Hall and their respective dialogues with figures like Max Weber and C Wright Mills, an argument is made for a profound reconstruction of sociology at both the level of analysis and of form that changes the way sociology tells about racism and society as a whole