Anti-dumping duties and the Byrd amendment.

The Byrd amendment to US anti-dumping law distributes the revenue from anti-dumping duties imposed on foreign firms to the domestic firms that lodged the complaint of dumping. When the government sets its anti-dumping duty to maximise a welfare function that attaches greater weight to the profits of the domestic industry than to consumer surplus or tax revenue, it is shown that the Byrd amendment will lead to lower duties and higher welfare if the weight on the profits of the domestic industry is sufficiently large. Also, the Byrd amendment makes it less likely that the anti-dumping duty will be prohibitive.Anti dumping; Research; Law; Firms; Domestic; Dumping; Welfare; Industry;

Optimal Conditions for Kinetic Study of Succinate Dehydrogenase in Rat Liver

Succinate dehydrogenase (SDH) commonly is assayed as a marker enzyme for mitochondrial activity. The literature presents numerous conditions for conducting this assay due to the fact that, it has been difficult to get sufficient reduction of the acceptor dye, 2,3,5-triphenyl-2H-tetrazolium chloride (TTC). This study was undertaken to optimize the SDH-catalyzed reduction of TTC dye by evaluation of a greater range of molor ratios of TTC to succinate and by further evaluation of additives reported as beneficial. Improvement in enzyme specific activity was achieved by liver perfusion via the left cardiac ventricle with homogenizing solution. Increase in TTC from 1 to 10 mM and further increase to 20 mM resulted in major improvement in color production. The greatest improvement in apparent activity was achieved by addition of 1 mM phenozine methosulfate, a hydrogen transfer mediator. Use of CaCI₂. EDTA, Triton X-100, NaN₃ and KCN was not beneficial. The above modifications of the SDH assay resulted in greater sensitivity, the conduct of a greater number of assays with less tissue and the sacrifice of fewer animals

BrdU Pulse Labelling In Vivo to Characterise Cell Proliferation during Regeneration and Repair following Injury to the Airway Wall in Sheep

The response of S-phase cells labelled with bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU) in sheep airways undergoing repair in response to endobronchial brush biopsy was investigated in this study. Separate sites within the airway tree of anaesthetised sheep were biopsied at intervals prior to pulse labelling with BrdU, which was administered one hour prior to euthanasia. Both brushed and spatially disparate unbrushed (control) sites were carefully mapped, dissected, and processed to facilitate histological analysis of BrdU labelling. Our study indicated that the number and location of BrdU-labelled cells varied according to the age of the repairing injury. There was little evidence of cell proliferation in either control airway tissues or airway tissues examined six hours after injury. However, by days 1 and 3, BrdU-labelled cells were increased in number in the airway wall, both at the damaged site and in the regions flanking either side of the injury. Thereafter, cell proliferative activity largely declined by day 7 after injury, when consistent evidence of remodelling in the airway wall could be appreciated. This study successfully demonstrated the effectiveness of in vivo pulse labelling in tracking cell proliferation during repair which has a potential value in exploring the therapeutic utility of stem cell approaches in relevant lung disease models

Bailouts in a common market: a strategic approach

Governments in the EU grant Rescue and Restructure Subsidies to bail out ailing firms. In an international asymmetric Cournot duopoly we study effects of such subsidies on market structure and welfare. We adopt a common market setting, where consumers from the two countries form one market. We show that the subsidy is positive also when it fails to prevent the exit. The reason is a strategic effect, which forces the more efficient firm to make additional cost-reducing effort. When the exit is prevented, allocative and productive efficiencies are lower and the only gaining player is the rescued firm

Instantonic dyons of Yang-Mills--Chern-Simons models in d=2n+1 dimensions, n>2

We investigate finite energy solutions of Yang-Mills--Chern-Simons systems in odd spacetime dimensions, d=2n+1, with n>2. This can be carried out systematically for all n, but the cases n=3,4 corresponding to a 7,8 dimensional spacetime are treated concretely. These are static and spherically symmetric configurations, defined in a flat Minkowski background. The value of the electric charge is fixed by the Chern-Simons coupling constant.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figure

The Partonic Nature of Instantons

In both Yang-Mills theories and sigma models, instantons are endowed with degrees of freedom associated to their scale size and orientation. It has long been conjectured that these degrees of freedom have a dual interpretation as the positions of partonic constituents of the instanton. These conjectures are usually framed in d=3+1 and d=1+1 dimensions respectively where the partons are supposed to be responsible for confinement and other strong coupling phenomena. We revisit this partonic interpretation of instantons in the context of d=4+1 and d=2+1 dimensions. Here the instantons are particle-like solitons and the theories are non-renormalizable. We present an explicit and calculable model in d=2+1 dimensions where the single soliton in the CP^N sigma-model can be shown to be a multi-particle state whose partons are identified with the ultra-violet degrees of freedom which render the theory well-defined at high energies. We introduce a number of methods which reveal the partons inside the soliton, including deforming the sigma model and a dual version of the Bogomolnyi equations. We conjecture that partons inside Yang-Mills instantons hold the key to understanding the ultra-violet completion of five-dimensional gauge theories.Comment: 28 pages. v3: extra references and comments. Mathematica notebooks for the figures can be downloaded from http://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/dt281/parton.htm

Local lung responses following endobronchial elastase and lipopolysaccharide instillation in sheep

Chronic lipopolysaccharide (LPS) exposure may contribute to the pathogenesis of a number of lung diseases including COPD and emphysema. We sought to develop a large- animal model of emphysema using repeated LPS administration into sheep lung segments. An experimental protocol was designed to facilitate comparisons with elastase-treated and control segments within the same lung of individual sheep. Histopathologic evaluation of segments treated with LPS demonstrated low-grade inflammation characterized by an increase in the number of intra-alveolar macrophages and lymphocytes. Treated segments demonstrated a significant reduction in airspace surface area (ASA), an increase in percent disrupted alveolar attachments and the distance between normal alveolar attachments, and a reduction in the number of normal alveolar attachments surrounding nonrespiratory bronchioles. Coefficient of variation of individual ASA measurements in elastase-treated segments was indicative of a heterogeneous parenchymal response, in contrast to that associated with chronic LPS treatment. Our results demonstrate that chronic LPS treatment of individual lung segments in sheep induces microscopic emphysema qualitatively and quantitatively consistent with both accepted pathologic definitions of this condition and with that produced by airway instillation of elastolytic enzymes. Development of this phenotype is associated with evidence of downregulated activation of transforming growth factor beta