Applying the Concept of Flexicurity in the Republic of Croatia

U radu se analiziraju mogućnost i razina primjene koncepta fleksigurnosti u Republici Hrvatskoj. Fleksigurnost je model koordiniranih politika tržišta rada i socijalnih politika koji zagovara mogućnost lakog zapošljavanja i otpuštanja. Ovaj način modernizacije europskog socijalnog okvira u prošlom je desetljeću predstavljao glavni model reforme ekonomske i socijalne politike u Europskoj uniji, a njegova se načela i danas primjenjuju. Rad prikazuje glavna obilježja fleksigurnosti i fleksibilnosti te komponenti fleksigurnosti, logiku njihova djelovanja, principe implementacije, kao i mogućnosti procjene utvrđivanjem najrelevantnijih pokazatelja. U radu se analizira i kretanje dosadašnjih politika i nastojanja Republike Hrvatske po pojedinim komponentama fleksigurnosti te ih se uspoređuje s drugim zemljama, odabranim na temelju različitih stupnjeva i smjerova razvoja tržišta rada.The paper analyzes the possibilities of applying the concept of flexicurity in the Republic of Croatia. Flexicurity is a model of coordinated labor and social policies that advocate easier employment and dismissal. This way of modernizing the European social model has been the flagship initiative of economic and social policy reforms in the European Union during the past decade and these principles still apply. The paper presents the main features of flexibility and flexicurity, the components of flexicurity, intervention logic, implementation principles and impact assessment options by identifying the most relevant indicators. Additionally, it analyzes the progress of the current policies and efforts in the Republic of Croatia with regard to the individual components of flexicurity in comparison to other countries that are in different stages and have different objectives of labor market development

Charmed mesons in nuclear matter

We obtain the properties of charmed mesons in dense matter using a coupled-channel approach which accounts for Pauli blocking effects and meson self-energies in a self-consistent manner. We study the behaviour of dynamically-generated baryonic resonances together with the open-charm meson spectral functions in this dense nuclear environment. We discuss the implications of the in-medium properties of open-charm mesons on the $D_{s0}(2317)$ and the predicted X(3700) scalar resonances, and on the formation of $D$-mesic nuclei.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures, 1 table, to appear in Proceedings of XIII International Conference on Hadron Spectroscopy, November 29 - December 4, 2009, Florida State Universit

Applying the Concept of Flexicurity in the Republic of Croatia

U radu se analiziraju mogućnost i razina primjene koncepta fleksigurnosti u Republici Hrvatskoj. Fleksigurnost je model koordiniranih politika tržišta rada i socijalnih politika koji zagovara mogućnost lakog zapošljavanja i otpuštanja. Ovaj način modernizacije europskog socijalnog okvira u prošlom je desetljeću predstavljao glavni model reforme ekonomske i socijalne politike u Europskoj uniji, a njegova se načela i danas primjenjuju. Rad prikazuje glavna obilježja fleksigurnosti i fleksibilnosti te komponenti fleksigurnosti, logiku njihova djelovanja, principe implementacije, kao i mogućnosti procjene utvrđivanjem najrelevantnijih pokazatelja. U radu se analizira i kretanje dosadašnjih politika i nastojanja Republike Hrvatske po pojedinim komponentama fleksigurnosti te ih se uspoređuje s drugim zemljama, odabranim na temelju različitih stupnjeva i smjerova razvoja tržišta rada.The paper analyzes the possibilities of applying the concept of flexicurity in the Republic of Croatia. Flexicurity is a model of coordinated labor and social policies that advocate easier employment and dismissal. This way of modernizing the European social model has been the flagship initiative of economic and social policy reforms in the European Union during the past decade and these principles still apply. The paper presents the main features of flexibility and flexicurity, the components of flexicurity, intervention logic, implementation principles and impact assessment options by identifying the most relevant indicators. Additionally, it analyzes the progress of the current policies and efforts in the Republic of Croatia with regard to the individual components of flexicurity in comparison to other countries that are in different stages and have different objectives of labor market development

Systematic Study of Two-Pion Production in NN Collisions -- from Single-Baryon to Di-Baryon Excitations

The two-pion production in nucleon-nucleon collisions has been studied by exclusive and kinematically complete experiments from threshold up to $T_p$ = 1.36 GeV at CELSIUS-WASA. At near-threshold energies the total and differential distributions for the $\pi^+\pi^-$ and $\pi^0\pi^0$ channels are dominated by Roper excitation and its decay into $N\sigma$ and $\Delta\pi$ channels. At beam energies $T_p >$ 1.1 GeV the $\Delta\Delta$ excitation governs the two-pion production process. In the $\pi^+\pi^+$ channel evidence is found for the excitation of a higher-lying I=3/2 resonance, favorably the $\Delta(1600)$. The isovector fusion processes leading to the deuteron and to quasi-stable $^2$He, respectively, %with the production of an isovector pion-pair exhibit no or only a modest ABC-effect, {\it i.e.} low-mass enhancement in the $\pi\pi$-invariant mass spectrum, and can be described by conventional $t$-channel $\Delta\Delta$ excitation. On the other hand, the isoscalar fusion process to the deuteron %with the production of an isoscalar pion-pair exhibits a dramatic ABC-effect correlated with a narrow resonance-like energy dependence in the total cross section with a width of only 50 MeV and situated at a mass 90 MeV below the $\Delta\Delta$ mass.Comment: Proceedings HADRON0

How to prolong labour market participation in the Republic of Croatia?

The paper analyses the labour market for older workers from the point of view of prolonging their participation in the labour market in the Republic of Croatia. Due to unfavourable demographic situations, longer life spans and the threats to pension insurance systems, there have been many initiatives, in a number of countries, in the last couple of decades that have the goal of facilitating longer working lives. The current analysis has shown that older workers in the Republic of Croatia, despite their economic activity being lower than that of other countries, do have the additional working capacity that can permit longer labour market participation, without compromising the employment of younger cohorts. It has also shown that the labour market of the Republic of Croatia is not well suited to older age groups and that those with higher education and financial security, those who generally have the most opportunities, have the best chances for longer labour market participation; while the odds are against longer labour market participation for those with lower education, socioeconomic status and health, even if they might sometimes be willing to participate in the labour market

Labour Market Services

Rad analizira usluge tržišta rada, kao jednu od intervencija politike tržišta rada. Ove usluge predstavljaju sve aktivnosti ureda za zapošljavanje i druge javno financirane usluge za tražitelje posla, što uključuje savjetovanje nezaposlenih, posredovanje između radnika i poslodavaca, informiranje, praćenje nezaposlenih i sankcioniranje u slučaju netraženja posla, a smatra se troškovno najučinkovitijom intervencijom tržišta rada. Iako je proteklih desetljeća glavni fokus politike tržišta rada bio na mjerama aktivne politike (poput usavršavanja ili subvencioniranog zapošljavanja), posljednjih godina, aktualiziranjem koncepta aktivacije, u prvi plan dolaze usluge tržišta rada. Ovaj rad prikazuje glavna obilježja, razvoj, prednosti i mane ove intervencije u Republici Hrvatskoj te mišljenje glavnih provoditelja ove intervencije, savjetnika za zapošljavanje Hrvatskoga zavoda za zapošljavanje.The paper analyzes labour market services, as one of the labor market interventions. Labour market services represent all activities of the public employment service and other publicly funded services for jobseekers, which include counseling the unemployed, mediation between workers and employers, informing, monitoring the unemployed and sanctioning in the case of non-compliance, and are considered to be the most cost-effective labour market intervention. Although in recent decades the main focus of labour market policy has been on measures of active labour market policy (such as training or employment incentives), in recent years, with the actualization of the activation concept, labour market services have taken their turn. This paper presents the main features, development, advantages and disadvantages of this intervention in the Republic of Croatia and the opinion of the main actors of this intervention, the Employment Advisors of the Croatian Employment Service

Bioprinting and biomaterials for dental alveolar tissue regeneration

Three dimensional (3D) bioprinting is a powerful tool, that was recently applied to tissue engineering. This technique allows the precise deposition of cells encapsulated in supportive bioinks to fabricate complex scaffolds, which are used to repair targeted tissues. Here, we review the recent developments in the application of 3D bioprinting to dental tissue engineering. These tissues, including teeth, periodontal ligament, alveolar bones, and dental pulp, present cell types and mechanical properties with great heterogeneity, which is challenging to reproduce in vitro. After highlighting the different bioprinting methods used in regenerative dentistry, we reviewed the great variety of bioink formulations and their effects on cells, which have been established to support the development of these tissues. We discussed the different advances achieved in the fabrication of each dental tissue to provide an overview of the current state of the methods. We conclude with the remaining challenges and future needsThis work was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) KAKENHI (Grant Numbers 22K18936 and 21K04852); AMED (Grant Number JP21gm1310001); The JST Adaptable and Seamless Technology Transfer Program through Target-driven R&D (Grant Number JPMJTM22BD), CASIO SCIENCE PROMOTION FOUNDATION, and by the Research Center for Biomedical Engineering at Tokyo Medical and Dental University, Japan

A contactless electrical stimulator: application to fabricate functional skeletal muscle tissue

Engineered skeletal muscle tissues are ideal candidates for applications in drug screening systems, bio-actuators, and as implantable constructs in tissue engineering. Electrical field stimulation considerably improves the differentiation of muscle cells to muscle myofibers. Currently used electrical stimulators often use direct contact of electrodes with tissue constructs or their culture medium, which may cause hydrolysis of the culture medium, joule heating of the medium, contamination of the culture medium due to products of electrodes corrosion, and surface fouling of electrodes. Here, we used an interdigitated array of electrodes combined with an isolator coverslip as a contactless platform to electrically stimulate engineered muscle tissue, which eliminates the aforementioned problems. The effective stimulation of muscle myofibers using this device was demonstrated in terms of contractile activity and higher maturation as compared to muscle tissues without applying the electrical field. Due to the wide array of potential applications of electrical stimulation to two- and three-dimensional (2D and 3D) cell and tissue constructs, this device could be of great interest for a variety of biological applications as a tool to create noninvasive, safe, and highly reproducible electric fields.World Premier International Research Center Initiative (WPI

Hybrid hydrogels containing vertically aligned carbon nanotubes with anisotropic electrical conductivity for muscle myofiber fabrication

Biological scaffolds with tunable electrical and mechanical properties are of great interest in many different fields, such as regenerative medicine, biorobotics, and biosensing. In this study, dielectrophoresis (DEP) was used to vertically align carbon nanotubes (CNTs) within methacrylated gelatin (GelMA) hydrogels in a robust, simple, and rapid manner. GelMA-aligned CNT hydrogels showed anisotropic electrical conductivity and superior mechanical properties compared with pristine GelMA hydrogels and GelMA hydrogels containing randomly distributed CNTs. Skeletal muscle cells grown on vertically aligned CNTs in GelMA hydrogels yielded a higher number of functional myofibers than cells that were cultured on hydrogels with randomly distributed CNTs and horizontally aligned CNTs, as confirmed by the expression of myogenic genes and proteins. In addition, the myogenic gene and protein expression increased more profoundly after applying electrical stimulation along the direction of the aligned CNTs due to the anisotropic conductivity of the hybrid GelMA-vertically aligned CNT hydrogels. We believe that platform could attract great attention in other biomedical applications, such as biosensing, bioelectronics, and creating functional biomedical devices

Cell-laden alginate hydrogels for the treatment of diabetes

Diabetes mellitus is an ever-increasing medical condition that currently suffers 1 of 11 adults who may have lifelong commitment with insulin injections. Cell-laden hydrogels releasing insulin may provide the ultimate means of correcting diabetes. Here, we provide insights of this cell-based approach including latest preclinical and clinical progress both from academia and industry