Time Zones As Cues For Coordination: Latitude, Longitude, And Letterman

Market productivity is often greater, and leisure and other household activities more enjoyable, when people perform them simultaneously. Beyond pointing out the positive externalities of synchronicity, economists have not attempted to identify exogenous determinants of timing. We develop a theory illustrating conditions under which synchronicity will vary and identify three factors — the amount of daylight, the timing of television programming, and differences in time zones — that can alter timing. Using the American Time Use Survey for 2003 and 2004, we first show that an exogenous shock to time in one area due to non-adherence to daylight-saving time leads its residents to alter their work schedules to continue coordinating their activities with those of people elsewhere. With time use data from Australia, we also demonstrate the same response to a similar shock there. We then show that both television timing and the benefits of coordinating across time zones in the U.S. generally affect the timing of market work and sleep, the two most time-consuming activities people undertake. While these impacts do not differ greatly by people's demographic characteristics,workers in industries where we would expect more coordination outside of their local areas are more responsive to the effects of time zones.banking, market discipline

Time Zones as Cues for Coordination: Latitude, Longitude, and Letterman

Market productivity is often greater, and leisure and other household activities more enjoyable, when people perform them simultaneously. Beyond pointing out the positive externalities of synchronicity, economists have not attempted to identify exogenous determinants of timing. We develop a theory illustrating conditions under which synchronicity will vary and identify three factors %u2014 the amount of daylight, the timing of television programming, and differences in time zones %u2014 that can alter timing. Using the American Time Use Survey for 2003 and 2004, we first show that an exogenous shock to time in one area due to non-adherence to daylight-saving time leads its residents to alter their work schedules to continue coordinating their activities with those of people elsewhere. With time use data from Australia, we also demonstrate the same response to a similar shock there. We then show that both television timing and the benefits of coordinating across time zones in the U.S. generally affect the timing of market work and sleep, the two most time-consuming activities people undertake. While these impacts do not differ greatly by people's demographic characteristics, workers in industries where we would expect more coordination outside of their local areas are more responsive to the effects of time zones.

Multilevel work-family interventions: Creating good-quality employment over the life course

Poor-quality jobs have significant costs for individual workers, their families, and the wider community. Drawing mainly on the Australian case, the authors' focus is on the structural challenges to work-life reconciliation and the multiple-level interventions necessary to create quality employment that supports workers to reconcile work and family over the life course. The authors argue that interventions are necessary in three domains: at the macrosocial and economic level, in the regulatory domain, and in the workplace domain. The nature and success of these interventions is also critical to gender equality and to responding to the changing gender and care composition of the workforce across OECD countries

Medical tourism and policy implications for health systems: a conceptual framework from a comparative study of Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia

Medical tourism is a growing phenomenon with policy implications for health systems, particularly of destination countries. Private actors and governments in Southeast Asia are promoting the medical tourist industry, but the potential impact on health systems, particularly in terms of equity in access and availability for local consumers, is unclear. This article presents a conceptual framework that outlines the policy implications of medical tourism's growth for health systems, drawing on the cases of Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia, three regional hubs for medical tourism, via an extensive review of academic and grey literature. Variables for further analysis of the potential impact of medical tourism on health systems are also identified. The framework can provide a basis for empirical, in country studies weighing the benefits and disadvantages of medical tourism for health systems. The policy implications described are of particular relevance for policymakers and industry practitioners in other Southeast Asian countries with similar health systems where governments have expressed interest in facilitating the growth of the medical tourist industry. This article calls for a universal definition of medical tourism and medical tourists to be enunciated, as well as concerted data collection efforts, to be undertaken prior to any meaningful empirical analysis of medical tourism's impact on health systems

Bulk-edge correspondence and long range hopping in the topological plasmonic chain

The existence of topologically protected edge modes is often cited as a highly desirable trait of topological insulators. However, these edge states are not always present. A realistic physical treatment of long-range hopping in a one-dimensional dipolar system can break the symmetry that protects the edge modes without affecting the bulk topological number, leading to a breakdown in bulk-edge correspondence (BEC). Hence, it is important to gain a better understanding of where and how this occurs, as well as how to measure it. Here we examine the behaviour of the bulk and edge modes in a dimerised chain of metallic nanoparticles and in a simpler non-Hermitian next-nearest-neighbour model to provide some insights into the phenomena of bulk-edge breakdown. We construct BEC phase diagrams for the simpler case and use these ideas to devise a measure of symmetry-breaking for the plasmonic system based on its bulk properties. This provides a parameter regime in which BEC is preserved in the topological plasmonic chain, as well as a framework for assessing this phenomenon in other systems

BacillOndex: An Integrated Data Resource for Systems and Synthetic Biology

BacillOndex is an extension of the Ondex data integration system, providing a semantically annotated, integrated knowledge base for the model Gram-positive bacterium Bacillus subtilis. This application allows a user to mine a variety of B. subtilis data sources, and analyse the resulting integrated dataset, which contains data about genes, gene products and their interactions. The data can be analysed either manually, by browsing using Ondex, or computationally via a Web services interface. We describe the process of creating a BacillOndex instance, and describe the use of the system for the analysis of single nucleotide polymorphisms in B. subtilis Marburg. The Marburg strain is the progenitor of the widely-used laboratory strain B. subtilis 168. We identified 27 SNPs with predictable phenotypic effects, including genetic traits for known phenotypes. We conclude that BacillOndex is a valuable tool for the systems-level investigation of, and hypothesis generation about, this important biotechnology workhorse. Such understanding contributes to our ability to construct synthetic genetic circuits in this organism

Companion planting to attract pollinators increases the yield and quality of strawberry fruit in gardens and allotments

1. Global pollinator declines have led to concern that crop yields might fall as a result of a pollination deficit. Companion planting is a traditional practice thought to increase yield of insect pollinated crops by planting a co-flowering species next to the crop. 2. Using a combination of conventional researcher-led experiments and observational citizen scientist data, we tested the effectiveness of bee-friendly borage (Borago officinalis) as a companion plant to strawberry (Fragaria x ananassa). Insect visitors to the ‘Test’ (strawberry + borage) versus ‘Control’ (strawberry only) plants were observed, and strawberry fruit collected. Strawberries collected during the researcher-led experiment were also subject to fruit measurements and assessments of market quality. 3. Companion plants were found to significantly increase both yield and market quality of strawberries, suggesting an increase in insect pollination per plant. Test strawberries companion planted with borage produced an average of 35% more fruits, and 32% increased yield by weight. Test strawberry plants produced significantly more fruit of higher aesthetic quality when assessed by Marketing Standards for Strawberries. 4. Although there was no significant difference in the overall insect visits, when broken down by broad insect group there were significantly more flies visiting the test strawberries than controls. 5. These results could have implications for both gardeners and commercial growers. As consumers prefer a cosmetically perfect fruit, the production of fruit with increased aesthetics aids food waste reduction