Efficiency Properties of Rational Expectations Equilibria with Asymmetric Information

We analyze the welfare properties of rational expectations equilibria (REE) in economies with asymmetrically informed agents and incomplete markets. We ask whether a planner can improve upon an equilibrium allocation, using an individually rational and incentive compatible mechanism, and subject to the same asset constraints as agents. For an REE that reveals any information at all, the planner can generically bring about an interim Pareto improvement even conditional on the information that is available to agents in equilibrium. He can do so by altering prices while keeping their informational content fixed. Furthermore, for any partially revealing equilibrium, the planner can generically effect an ex post Pareto improvement by providing more information to agents, while controlling for price effects.

Empirical Formulation of Highway Traffic Flow Prediction Objective Function Based on Network Topology

Accurate Highway road predictions are necessary for timely decision making by the transport authorities. In this paper, we propose a traffic flow objective function for a highway road prediction model. The bi-directional flow function of individual roads is reported considering the net inflows and outflows by a topological breakdown of the highway network. Further, we optimise and compare the proposed objective function for constraints involved using stacked long short-term memory (LSTM) based recurrent neural network machine learning model considering different loss functions and training optimisation strategies. Finally, we report the best fitting machine learning model parameters for the proposed flow objective function for better prediction accuracy.Peer reviewe

Value of Information in Competitive Economies with Incomplete Markets

A substantial literature addresses the negative effect on welfare of the release of information in a competitive market economy. We show that the value of information in this setting is typically positive if asset markets are sufficiently incomplete. More specifically, for any competitive equilibrium of a generic economy, we can find a finer information structure such that an allocation that is resource feasible and measurable with respect to this information ex-post Pareto dominates the given equilibrium allocation.Competitive Equilibrium, Incomplete Markets, Value of Information.

Value of Information in Competitive Economies with Incomplete Markets

We study the value of information in a competitive economy in which agents trade in asset markets to reallocate risk. We characterize the kinds of information that allow a welfare improvement when portfolios can be freely reallocated. We then compare competitive equilibria before and after a change in information. We show that generically, if markets are sufficiently incomplete, the welfare effects are completely arbitrary: there typically exist changes in information that make all agents better off, or all agents worse off.Equilibrium, Incomplete Markets, Value of Information

Metal Nanoparticles Immobilized on Basic Supports as Catalysts for Hydrogenation and Dehydrogenation Reactions of Relevance to Cleaner Fossil Fuels and Alternative Sources of Energy

We developed a series of catalysts, composed of metal nanoparticles immobilized on basic supports for the hydrogenation of heteroaromatics of relevance to cleaner fossil fuels and biodiesel, and for the dehydrogenation of heteroaromatics of relevance to hydrogen storage in organic liquids. Our catalyst design involves nanostructured catalysts composed of metal particles immobilized on basic supports capable of ionic mechanism that may avoid catalyst poisoning and enhance catalytic activity. We prepared a new catalyst composed of Pd nanoparticles immobilized on MgO by NaBH4 reduction of Na2PdCl4 in methanol in the presence of the support. TEM measurements revealed well-dispersed 1.7 nm Pd particles attached to MgO, also characterized by XPS, XRD and hydrogen pulse chemisorption measurements. The new catalyst is efficient for the hydrogenation of the heterocyclic ring of quinolines, as well as for the mild reduction of a variety of alkenes representative of fuel components, and the partial saturation of biodiesel. In the second part, we switched our attention to ruthenium nanoparticles, with the aim of achieving higher activity and broader reactivity, supported on functionalized carbon nanotubes, of higher surface area. Our second catalyst was prepared by first attaching pyridine groups to the surface of the nanotubes, and then depositing the metal particles by NaBH4 reduction of RuCl3.3H2O. TEM, XRD and XPS analysis indicate the presence of 1.7 nm Ru(0) particles attached mainly to the surface of the nanotubes. The Ru/py-CNTs results in an unprecedentedly high activity for the selective hydrogenation of N-heteroaromatic compounds, with respect to other reported systems. The activity of this catalyst was extended also to plain aromatic compounds under mild conditions and to the challenging S-heteroaromatics under more forcing conditions. Lastly, we evaluated the efficacy of the catalyst for the dehydrogenation of 1,2,3,4-tetrahydroquinoline, which was achieved with reasonable turnover frequencies under moderate conditions. The hydrogenation/dehydrogenation reactions thus establish a cyclic process of possible utility in hydrogen storage in organic liquids. We screened other substrate pairs that may be adequate for hydrogen storage, by computational study of the thermodynamics of dehydrogenation, which allowed us to identify other N-heterocycles that may prove useful in future studies

Project resilience: a conceptual framework

Resilience is a novel but promising concept in project management studies. Resilience thinking can help projects maintain their performance through flexible, systemic and context-specific approaches once faced with disruptive events. That said, the main goal of this paper is to advance an interdisciplinary understanding of project resilience by proposing a definition and a conceptual framework of this concept. To achieve this article\u27s objectives the literature on project risk management is first reviewed to identify current research effort and limitations of dealing with disruptions. Consecutively, the concept of resilience in its broader applicability is explored where two dimensions are sieved; awareness and adaptive capacity. The literature on the new concept of project resilience is also scrutinized where its novel nature, the lack of scientific studies to conceptualize it, and its significance to project management are demonstrated. These facts helped propose a definition and a conceptual framework of project resilience, where a set of relationships are instigated, which constitute a base line to perform further disquisitions to assess their validity. Implications for future contributions advocate conceptual exchanges with more advanced research fields (e.g. organizational resilience). These exchanges can assist in the development of indicators to evaluate the ability of projects to deal with disruptive events and enhance their resilience

Essays in Health Economics and Public Health Policy

This dissertation consists of three essays. In the first essay I study the effect of texting bans on fatal accidents on roadways. Since 2007, many states passed laws prohibiting text messaging while driving. Using vehicular fatality data from across the United States and standard difference-in-differences techniques, bans appear moderately successful at reducing single vehicle, single occupant accidents if they are universally applied and enforced as a primary offense. Bans enforced as secondary offences, however, have at best no effect on accidents. Any reduction in accidents following texting bans is short-lived, however, with accidents returning to near former levels within a few months. This is suggestive of drivers reacting to the announcement of the legislation only to return to old habits shortly afterward. The second chapter studies the effect of homeschooling on child health. Homeschooling, which is becoming increasingly popular in the United States, has received some attention by researchers, but there has been no study of the potential health benefits. Given that homeschooled children receive more close supervision and guidance from parents, and perhaps are less exposed to communicable illnesses, a benefit is possible. By adopting different identification strategies and using the Parent and Family Involvement (PFI) data from National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) for 2003 and 2007, I find that homeschooled children are healthier compared with their counterparts who go to public or private school. The effect is most pronounced for children between 8 to 12 years old. Finally, in the third essay, as a note, I study the effect of school shootings in the United States on private and public school enrollment. I find that school shootings are followed by a 10%t of school shootings in the United States on private and public school enrollment. The effects are most pronounced following shootings in nonurban areas, which is consistent with their more intense media coverage

Role of Membrane Transporters, P-Glycoprotein and Mrp1, in The Placental Transfer of Drugs With Special Reference to Saquinavir and Quetiapine

Drug transporting membrane proteins are expressed in various human tissues and blood-tissue barriers, regulating the transfer of drugs, toxins and endogenous compounds into or out of the cells. Various in vitro and animal experiments suggest that P-glycoprotein (P-gp) forms a functional barrier between maternal and fetal blood circulation in the placenta thereby protecting the fetus from exposure to xenobiotics during pregnancy. The multidrug resistance-associated protein 1 (MRP1) is a relatively less studied transporter protein in the human placenta. The aim of this study series was to study the role of placental transporters, apical P-gp and basal MRP1, using saquinavir as a probe drug, and to study transfer of quetiapine and the role of P-gp in its transfer in the dually perfused human placenta/cotyledon. Furthermore, two ABCB1 (encoding P-gp) polymorphisms (c.3435C>T, p.Ile1145Ile and c.2677G>T/A, p.Ala893Ser/Thr) were studied to determine their impact on P-gp protein expression level and on the transfer of the study drugs. Also, the influence of the P-gp protein expression level on the transfer of the study drugs was addressed. Because P-gp and MRP1 are ATP-dependent drug-efflux pumps, it was studied whether exogenous ATP is needed for the function of ATP-dependent transporter in the present experimental model. The present results indicated that the addition of exogenous ATP was not necessary for transporter function in the perfused human placental cotyledon. Saquinavir and quetiapine were both found to cross the human placenta; transplacental transfer (TPTAUC %) for saquinavir was <0.5% and for quetiapine 3.7%. Pharmacologic blocking of P-gp led to disruption of the blood-placental barrier (BPB) and increased the placental transfer of P-gp substrate, saquinavir, into the fetal circulation by 6- to 8-fold. In reversed perfusions P-gp, MRP1 and possibly OATP2B1 had a negligible role in the fetal-to-maternal transfer of saquinavir. The TPTAUC % of saquinavir was about 100-fold greater from the fetal side to the maternal side compared with the maternal-to-fetal transfer. P-gp activity is not likely to modify the placental transfer of quetiapine. Higher P-gp protein expression levels were associated with the variant allele 3435T, but no correlation was found between the TPTAUC % of saquinavir and placental P-gp protein expression. The present results indicate that P-gp activity drastically affects the fetal exposure to saquinavir, and suggest that pharmacological blockade of the P-gp activity during pregnancy may pose an increased risk for adverse fetal outcome. The blockade of P-gp activity could be used in purpose to obtain higher drug concentration to the fetal side, for example, in prevention (to decrease virus transfer to fetal side) or in treating sick fetus.Siirretty Doriast

Information acquisition with heterogeneous valuations

We study the market for a risky asset with heterogeneous valuations. Agents seek to learn about their own valuation by acquiring private information and making inferences from the equilibrium price. As agents of one type gather more information, they pull the equilibrium price closer to their valuation and further away from the valuations of other types. Thus they exert a negative learning externality on other types. This, in turn, implies that a lower cost of information for one type induces all agents to produce more information. When evaluating agents' welfare, the learning externality has to be offset against a gains from trade externality, since agents who learn less because their valuation is further away from the price also stand to profit more from trading. In equilibrium, agents' information acquisition decisions are clustered together more than is socially optimal