When do Thick Venture Capital Markets Foster Innovation? An Evolutionary Analysis

In this paper we examine the trade off between different effects of the availability of venture capital on the speed of technological progress in an industry. We consider an evolutionary industry simulation model based on Nelson and Winter (1982) where R&D efforts of an incumbent firm generate technological know-how embodied in key R&D employees, who might use this know-how to found a spinoff of the incumbent. Venture capital is needed to finance a spinoff, and therefore the expected profits from founding a spinoff depend on how easily venture capital can be acquired. Accordingly, thick venture capital markets might have two opposing effects. First, incentives of firms to invest in R&D might be reduced and, second, if spinoff formation results in technological spillovers between the parent firm and the spinoffs, the generation of spinoff firms might positively influence the future efficiency of the incumbent's innovation efforts. We study how this tradeoff influences the effect of venture capital on the innovation expenditures, speed of technological change and the evolution of industry concentration in several scenarios with different industry characteristics.Venture Capital, Technological Progress, R&D Effort, Spinoff, Industry Evolution

The use of activity-based approach as methodological basis of prospective social workers' training to sustainable development of social groups in Ukraine

The article shows the relevance of activity-based approach usage as methodological basis of prospective social workers' training to sustainable development of social groups. It is proved that future experts' training in this direction is important both for Ukraine and other countries. There have been revealed the types of activities (cognitive, creative, value-oriented, communicative), which provide the development of personality and social groups' subjectivity, their formation as the subjects of life and responsible social subjects that is essentail condition and indicator of their sustainable development. It has been emphasized that activity-based approach is the basis for the development of the technology of prospective social workers' training to sustainable development of social groups, which provides organization and management of this process as well as ensures gradual moving of prospective social workers to the level of self-management. There also has been substantiated necessity of the subjective and action approach usage (as important complement to activity one) which implementation ensures the development of subjective readiness of various social groups' representatives to individual and joint socially valuable actions that is essentail indicator of their sustainable development

Wasser- und Sumpfpflanzen-Funde im nördlichen Sachsen-Anhalt

Es werden Funde von seltenen und gefährdeten Wasser- und Sumpfpflanzen in Fließgewässern, Auengewässern, Altwasserflachseen und Sekundärgewässern (Abgrabungsgewässer, Gräben, Teiche) im Norden von Sachsen-Anhalt dokumentiert. Für Armleuchteralgen-Funde haben Abgrabungsgewässer im Untersuchungsgebiet eine besondere Bedeutung. Wasser- und Sumpfpflanzen (13 Rote Liste-Arten) des Lebensraumtyps 3150 „Natürliche eutrophe Seen mit einer Vegetation des Magnopotamions oder Hydrocharitions“ zeigen in mehreren Gewässern eine gute Wasserqualität an.Remarks on records of rare and endangered water and swamp plants in running waters, in floodplain waters, shallow oxbow lakes and artificial water bodies (mining waters, ditches, ponds) in the north of the federal state Saxony-Anhalt are given. For the records of stoneworts (Charales) mining waters are important. Water and swamp plants (13 species of the Red Data List) of the biotope type „Natural eutrophic lakes with Magnopotamion or Hydrocharition type vegetation: Natura 2000-Code 3150“ are good indicators of a good water quality

Strings, branes and twistons: topological analysis of phase defects in excitable media such as the heart

Several excitable systems, such as the heart, self-organize into complex spatio-temporal patterns that involve wave collisions, wave breaks, and rotating vortices, of which the dynamics are incompletely understood. Recently, conduction block lines in two-dimensional media were recognized as phase defects, on which quasi-particles can be defined. These particles also form bound states, one of which corresponds to the classical phase singularity. Here, we relate the quasi-particles to the structure of the dynamical attractor in state space and extend the framework to three spatial dimensions. We reveal that 3D excitable media are governed by phase defect surfaces, i.e. branes, and three flavors of topologically preserved curves, i.e. strings: heads, tails, and pivot curves. We identify previously coined twistons as points of co-dimension three at the crossing of a head curve and a pivot curve. Our framework predicts splitting and branching phase defect surfaces that can connect multiple classical filaments, thereby proposing a new mechanism for the origin, perpetuation, and control of complex excitation patterns, including cardiac fibrillation

Analysis of cardiac arrhythmia sources using Feynman diagrams

The contraction of the heart muscle is triggered by self-organizing electrical patterns. Abnormalities in these patterns lead to cardiac arrhythmias, a prominent cause of mortality worldwide. The targeted treatment or prevention of arrhythmias requires a thorough understanding of the interacting wavelets, vortices and conduction block sites within the excitation pattern. Currently, there is no conceptual framework that covers the elementary processes during arrhythmogenesis in detail, in particular the transient pivoting patterns observed in patients, which can be interleaved with periods of less fragmented waves. Here, we provide such a framework in terms of quasiparticles and Feynman diagrams, which were originally developed in theoretical physics. We identified three different quasiparticles in excitation patterns: heads, tails and pivots. In simulations and experiments, we show that these basic building blocks can combine into at least four different bound states. By representing their interactions as Feynman diagrams, the creation and annihilation of rotor pairs are shown to be sequences of dynamical creation, annihilation and recombination of the identified quasiparticles. Our results provide a new theoretical foundation for a more detailed theory, analysis and mechanistic insights of topological transitions in excitation patterns, to be applied within and beyond the context of cardiac electrophysiology

Balancing branding and sales - The content strategist dilemma

This research strives to examine the impact of online brand communication on the content strategy of a premium brand in the context of ETON e-commerce store. The secondary purpose of the study provides the insight as to why brand message affects brand content strategy through various communication modes. The research set forth brand perspective to create an in-depth understanding of the mechanisms behind the content strategy and its importance for delivering the desired brand value to the target audience. The methodology of the study includes an overall approach to research analysis structure is based on the customer journey of ETON visitors. Finally a multimodal analysis of the brand color palette, typography and imagery has enabled an in-depth examination of editorial aspects of the brand content strategy. This study clarifies the strong connection between content strategy practices and effective brand message although complex mechanisms behind effective brand communication require a deeper focus on online branding. Branding, e-commerce platform and editorial content strategy practices have devised the key aspects of the successful performance of an online store. The research results have challenged the existing practices of content strategy approach and pointed to a strong contextual relevance for successful online brand communication tactics. Consequently, the study outcome points at a high risk of failed content delivery and ineffective brand message in the absence of data drive approach and in-depth understanding of consumer needs

The Use of Activity-Based Approach as Methodological Basis of Prospective Social Workers' Training to Sustainable Development of Social Groups in Ukraine

Abstract. The article shows the relevance of activity-based approach usage as methodological basis of prospective social workers' training to sustainable development of social groups. It is proved that future experts' training in this direction is important both for Ukraine and other countries. There have been revealed the types of activities (cognitive, creative, value-oriented, communicative), which provide the development of personality and social groups' subjectivity, their formation as the subjects of life and responsible social subjects that is essentail condition and indicator of their sustainable development. It has been emphasized that activity-based approach is the basis for the development of the technology of prospective social workers' training to sustainable development of social groups, which provides organization and management of this process as well as ensures gradual moving of prospective social workers to the level of self-management. There also has been substantiated necessity of the subjective and action approach usage (as important complement to activity one) which implementation ensures the development of subjective readiness of various social groups' representatives to individual and joint socially valuable actions that is essentail indicator of their sustainable development

A Network-Agnostic and Cheat-Resistant Framework for Multiplayer Online Games

"Video games are kids' stuff" may be still in the minds of many people. But the video games industry is far beyond its infancy and has already grown into a multi-billion dollar business. The NPD Group reports that in 2007 the revenues generated in the U.S. with video game soft- and hardware for consoles and personal computers reached a total of 18.8 billion dollars, a 40 percent increase over 2006. According to PricewaterhouseCoopers, the global sales will even surpass those of the music industry within the next years. With the success of the Internet, online games are a constantly increasing part of these sales. According to DFC Intelligence, the worldwide online game market will grow to over 13 billion dollars in 2011. The probably most successful online game genre today is that of the so-called Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOGs). This kind of games provides vast virtual worlds, where thousands of players can meet and interact simultaneously. Most of these worlds are persistent, i.e. they may be online for years. They are hosted on Internet servers which are online 24/7 and players can join and leave the game whenever they like to. The persistence of the game world allows for long-term development of virtual avatars with individual characteristics and possessions. The leader of the MMOG market today is Blizzard Entertainment with the title World of Warcraft. In the beginning of 2008, World of Warcraft had 10 million subscribers (each paying up to 15 dollars per month) and a market share of 62 percent. Developing todays video games is a complex and cost-intensive task and multiplayer online functionality has a significant share in this. In 2008, the first video game hit the 100 million dollar mark for development costs. In addition to that, publishers of online games need to provide the necessary services to allow their customers to play the game over the Internet. Traditionally, most online games and nearly all MMOGs are built relying on the Client/Server architecture. The client software runs on the player's computers and shows only an audio-visual representation of the game world. It accepts commands issued by the player and transmits them to the server. Processing the commands and managing the state of the game is completely done on the server-side. Thus, to be able to handle hundreds or thousands of players simultaneously, large amounts of computing power and network bandwidth are required. Additionally, the service requires a large staff for server maintenance, software updates, billing and customer services. The provision of the World of Warcraft service did cost about 200 million dollars since its launch in November 2004. In addition to the effort of maintaining a multiplayer online game service after its launch there arises another challenge: keeping the game free of cheaters. A cheater may be defined as a user that performs an action that gives an advantage over his opponents that is considered unfair by the game developer. One must be aware that cheating is a major concern in multiplayer games as it seriously affects the game experience of honest players. Especially for subscription-based online games this is fatal, since customers will cancel their subscriptions if the experience doesn't meet their expectations. Game publishers usually do not hesitate to close the accounts of players that they believe to have cheated. For example, in 2006 Blizzard Entertainment announced in their forums that they have banned 59,000 players from World of Warcraft within a single month

Animal spirits. An economic theory of emotion

Kabus KD. Animal spirits. An economic theory of emotion. Bielefeld: Universität Bielefeld; 2016

Late migration of a Sideris buttoned device for occlusion of atrial septal defect

We describe a 17-year-old patient with an atrial septal defect who underwent device closure with a second generation Sideris buttoned device at 4 years of age. She presented 13 years after the procedure with the acute onset of chest discomfort, at which time a chest radiograph showed migration of the wire of the right atrial counter-occluder to the lateral aspect of the right atrial wall, with an associated right atrial perforation. The patient underwent uneventful surgical device retrieval and atrial septal defect closure. Late migration of a portion of the Sideris buttoned device can occur, suggesting the need for continued follow up, and a high index of suspicion for device failure should a patient become symptomatic. © 2006 Wiley-Liss, Inc.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/55845/1/20849_ftp.pd