Clusters of galaxies and variation of the fine structure constant

We propose a new method to probe for variations in the fine structure constant alpha using clusters of galaxies, opening up a window on a new redshift range for such constraints. Hot clusters shine in the X-ray mainly due to bremsstrahlung, while they leave an imprint on the CMB frequency spectrum through the Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect. These two physical processes can be characterized by the integrated Comptonization parameter Y_SZ DA^2 and its X-ray counterpart, the Y_X parameter. The ratio of these two quantities is expected to be constant from numerical simulations and current observations. We show that this fact can be exploited to constrain alpha, as the ratio of the two parameters depends on the fine structure constant as alpha^{3.5}. We determine current constraints from a combination of Planck SZ and XMM-Newton data, testing different models of variation of alpha. When fitting for a constant value of alpha, we find that current constraints are at the 1% level, comparable with current CMB constraints. We discuss strategies for further improving these constraints by almost an order of magnitude.Comment: 7 pages, 3 figure

Patents and Research Tools in a Schumpeterian Growth Model with Sequential Innovation

In the standard quality-ladder growth models, R&D firms undertake independent innovation processes to discover ideas whose value immediately transfers into tradeable applications. Here the standard multisector neo-Schumpeterian growth theory is extended by decomposing product innovation into a two-stage uncertain research activity. I compare the general equilibrium innovative performance of an economy where early-stages scientific results are patentable with the general equilibrium innovative performance with unpatentable basic ideas freely disseminated by public research institutions (universities). I show that the widely documented increasing complexity experienced in applied R&D magnifies the public basic R&D inefficiencies and suggests the patentability of research tools.

Privatization of Knowledge: Did the U.S. Get It Right? (New Version).

To foster innovation and growth should basic research be publicly or privately funded? This paper studies the impact of the gradual shift in the U.S. patent system towards the patentability and commercialization of the basic R&D undertaken by universities. We see this movement as making universities becoming responsive to "market" forces. Prior to 1980, universities undertook research using an exogenous stock of researchers that were motivated by "curiosity." After 1980, universities patent their research and behave as private firms. This move, in a context of two-stage inventions (basic and applied research) has an a priori ambiguous effect on innovation and welfare. We build a Schumpeterian model and match it to the data to assess this important turning point.R&D and Growth; Sequential Innovation; Basic Research; Patent Laws.

Upstream Innovation Protection: Common Law Evolution and the Dynamics of Wage Inequality

What is the most innovation-enhancing level of patent protection for the new ideas generated within the framework of multi-stage sequential innovation? How does increasing early innovation appropriability affect basic research, applied research, education, and wage inequality? What does the common law system imply on the macroeconomic responses to institutional change? We show how the jurisprudential changes in intellectual property rights witnessed in the US after 1980 can be related to the well-known increase in wage inequality and in education attainments. A Schumpeterian general equilibrium approach is followed.Basic and Applied R&D, Sequential Innovation, Skill Premium, Inequality and Education, Research Exemption, Common Law

Privatization of Knowledge: Did the U.S. Get It Right?

Brilliant ideas are key to economic growth. They often emerge from scientific discoveries with no immediate commercial value - so rewards may not be aligned to effort. Should basic research be publicly or privately funded? And, to foster innovation and growth, what kinds of discovery should be protected? Post 1980, the US intellectual property institutions facilitated the patentability of basic research. The European and other patenting regimes are slowly changing in the same direction, also encouraged by TRIPs. Did the US choose the better path? We build a Schumpeterian model to re-assess this important turning point.R&D and Growth, Sequential Innovation, Research Tools, Patent Laws, Kremer Mechanism

Changing the Research Patenting Regime: Schumpeterian Explanation

Starting in the early 1980s, the U.S. patent regime experienced major changes that allowed the patenting of numerous scientific findings lacking in current commercial applications. We assess the rationality of these changes in the legal and institutional environment for science and technology policy. In order to model these changes in the incentives for the commercialization of new ideas, we extend the standard multisector Schumpeterian growth theory by decomposing the product innovation into a two-stage uncertain research activity. This analytical structure, beside suggesting new sources of market and non-market failures, allows us to compare the general equilibrium innovative performance of an economy where early-stage scientific results are patentable with the general equilibrium innovative performance of an economic system where these earlystage results are unpatentable and freely disseminated by public research institutions such as the universities. If researchers are unguided by the invisible hand they risk to invent redundant half-ideas, but public universities are better at internalizing research externalities. When scientists can patent their research, monopolistic research firms restrict entry in the applied R&D. This makes a regime choice a priori controversial and dependent on the exogenous data on technologies. We calibrate the model to the US data and show that in the 70s, a relatively higher applied R&D complexity magnified the public basic R&D inefficiencies and justified the patentability of basic scientific findings.R&D and Growth, Vertical Innovation, Sequential Innovation, Research Tools.

Science-Based R&D in Schumpeterian Growth

Firm success is often associated with the development of better products. Private firms undertake applied R&D seeking market advantage, by capitalizing on the freely accessible results of basic research. But unpatentable basic research often fails to address applied R&D open problems. What is the role of the incentives in improving the innovative performance of an economy by matching partially motivated public researchers to their mission? Sometimes government funded research projects are mission-directed, yet in many cases the public sector academics indulge in carrier-driven research. An innovation system where, as in the US, also basic research is driven by patents, implicitly sets an ex-post incentive to the researchers guided by invisible hand. For a public innovation system - like the European one - designing an incentive scheme to motivate public researchers is of key importance for fostering the performance of the economic system. This paper extends the Schumpeterian multisector growth model with vertical innovation by highlighting a link between the degree of "targetness" of public research and aggregate innovation. A positive effect of social capital is also proved.Sequential Innovation, Research Tools, Basic Research, Knowledge Management, Social Capital.

Upstream innovation protection: common law evolution and the dynamics of wage inequality

The incentives to conduct basic or applied research play a central role for economic growth, and this question has not been explored in much detail so far. How does increasing early innovation appropriability affect basic research, applied research, education, and wage inequality? In the US, what does the common law system imply on the macroeconomic responses to institutional change? This paper analyzes the macroeconomic effects of patent protection by incorporating a two-stage cumulative innovation structure into a quality-ladder growth model with skill acquisition. We consider three issues (a) the over-protection vs. the under-protection of intellectual property rights; (b) the evolution of jurisprudence shaping the bargaining power of the upstream innovators; and (c) the implications of strengthening patent protection on wage inequality and growth. We show analytically and numerically how the jurisprudential changes in intellectual property rights witnessed in the US after 1980 can be related to the well-known changes in wage inequality and in education attainments. Basic research patents may have grown disproportionately due increasing jurisdictional protection, eventually compromising applied innovation, education, and growth. By simulations, we show that the dynamic general equilibrium interations may mislead the econometric assessment of the temporary vs persistent effects IPR policy.Basic and Applied R&D; Two-Stage Sequential Innovation; Skill Premium; Inequality and Education; Common Law.

Analisi oceanografica di rotte migratorie post-riproduttive di tartaruga liuto (Dermochelys coriacea)

Il lavoro svolto riguarda l’analisi delle rotte di migrazione post-riproduttiva di 9 femmine di tartaruga liuto (Dermochelys coriacea) nidificanti sulla costa nord-orientale del Sudafrica. Tali rotte sono state registrate tra il 1996 e il 2003 equipaggiando gli animali con trasmettitori satellitari collegati al sistema franco-americano Argos. Le rotte si sviluppano intorno alla porzione meridionale del continente africano, su un’ampia area oceanica compresa tra il bacino Indiano sud-occidentale e quello Atlantico sud-orientale. Nello studio è stata analizzata la relazione tra i movimenti effettuati dagli animali e le correnti oceaniche superficiali prevalenti nelle aree attraversate. L’elaborazione di dati riguardanti l’altimetria della superficie marina acquisiti tramite tecniche di remote-sensing satellitare ci ha fornito informazioni attendibili sull’andamento di tali correnti. In particolare è stata posta attenzione sulla corrente di Agulhas (l'intensa corrente che corre lungo la costa orientale del Sud Africa) e i fenomeni ad essa associati. La sovrapposizione delle rotte delle tartarughe su immagini di anomalia altimetrica (SSHA) e di velocità geostrofica assoluta ha evidenziato qualitativamente la stretta corrispondenza tra i movimenti degli animali e l’andamento dei flussi di corrente e degli elementi di mesoscala incontrati dalle tartarughe. Il successivo impiego di un’analisi vettoriale ha consentito di valutare quantitativamente in quale misura l’azione delle correnti contribuisca agli spostamenti delle tartarughe seguite, consentendo una stima della deriva subita dagli animali. Per evidenziare il contributo della corrente al movimento registrato degli animali nei vari tratti della rotta, è stato appositamente elaborato un indice che tiene conto sia della differenza angolare tra la direzione della corrente e quella della rotta, che del rapporto tra i moduli dei vettori della corrente e del nuoto attivo della tartaruga. Per discriminare l’influenza della corrente dalla componente del moto attivo delle tartarughe, sono inoltre state valutate le differenze nella velocità di spostamento delle tartarughe durante le ore diurne e notturne. In questo modo è stata dimostrata una rilevante influenza delle correnti superficiali sui movimenti delle tartarughe liuto sudafricane. In particolare, tale influenza è risultata direttamente proporzionale all’intensità degli elementi circolatori presenti nelle regioni attraversate. La valutazione dell'attività notturna e diurna eseguita tramite l’analisi delle velocità non ha invece rilevato alcuna differenza significativa

Innovation-Specific Patent Protection and Growth

In this thesis, I am undertaking the analysis of the effects of increasing intellectual property rights on the reallocation of different kinds of research and development within an endogenous growth framework. This thesis’ approach considers the innovation process as sequential and cumulative in nature and studies the effects of different property rights regimes on a country’s innovative performance. In particular, by explicitly modelling basic and applied research and development (R&D) within a general equilibrium framework, I try to overtake the existing growth theory, which usually aggregates all sources of R&D and innovation, neglecting intermediate inventive steps. My approach is certainly inspired by the current Schumpeterian growth theory (see Aghion and Howitt, 1998 and 2009), which envisages new products and processes arising from Poisson processes, whose arrival rates depend on private and public R&D. However, unlike the previous Schumpeterian models, in most of the chapters of this thesis, creative destruction itself is modelled as a two-stage processes, or more precisely, as a sequence of investment decisions in R&D, whose result is a probability to invent (basic research) or to innovate (applied research). Hence, the first step, "basic research", creates a research tool which is by itself not profitable, but has the potential to become the basis for the second step innovation. The second step is a marketable product which increases consumers' utility and, through the grant of a patent, generates the monopolistic rent for the second step innovator, i.e. the manufacturer of the new product. This is a natural and simple way to explicitly model basic and applied research, yet it entails non-trivial technical complications in the models along with strong policy implications. Chapter 2 tries to answer the following research question: in order to foster innovation and growth should basic research be publicly or privately funded? This chapter studies the impact of the shift in the U.S. patent system towards the patentability and commercialization of the basic R&D undertaken by universities. Such a shift rendered the U.S. universities more responsive to "market" forces. Prior to 1980, universities undertook research employing researchers motivated by "curiosity." After 1980, universities patent their research and behave as private firms. This move, in a context of two-stage inventions (basic and applied research) has an a priori ambiguous effect on innovation and welfare. Chapter 2 builds a Schumpeterian model and matches it to the data to evaluate this important turning point. iii Chapter 3 extends the model presented by Chapter 2 by introducing Kremer’s (1998) mechanism for inducing innovation by means of auctions for new patents. Such patent buy-outs are run by the public sector in order to reward innovators and freely disseminate most of the new basic research findings. My work is the first attempt to use Kremer’s idea to address the issue of the patentability of basic research and the financing of early innovation. The same Chapter 3 also quantitatively analyses the impact of the so called “research exemption” of patented basic knowledge. Under the research exemption doctrine, if the second innovator is successful in developing a saleable product or process, then he or she can patent it and yet infringe another patent. The key question that modern economies' innovation systems have been facing in the past few decades is: how should basic research be funded in view of maximizing the efficiency of the innovation system as a whole? In other words, is it possible to conceive the privatization of a country's basic knowledge and an efficient system of incentives to basic research? The study presented by Chapter 4 provides a quantitative assessment on the effects of the US patent reforms that, at the beginning of the Eighties, brought to the patentability of research tools, often invented by the university-led research activity. In particular, Chapter 4 re-examines the policy scenarios and the comparisons presented throughout Chapter 2 and Chapter 3 in order to try to provide these two with a robust empirical support. In the first scenario, only the public sector institutions undertake basic research, rendering all results publicly available for firms, racing to find patentable applications. In the second scenario, important for assessing the post-1980 reforms in the US system of innovation, basic research itself is privatized, and hence patented by private firms. The most important question for the political economy of basic research is which system is most conducive to innovation and growth. The public system permits more idea dissemination, but may not give basic researchers enough incentives to focus their research on the directions most needed by the private developers downstream. The private system optimally channels basic research, but, by allowing the patentability of ideas upstream, precludes free entry into applied R&D. This generates conflicting effects, and the policy conclusions depend on the value of all the relevant parameters in the economy. In Chapter 4, I estimated the most important of these parameters with the US data immediately preceding the major reorganization of university and basic research in the 80s, and I simulated the two scenarios. The resulting simulations show that public R&D system, prevailing at that time, was indeed outperforming every privatized alternative scenario. iv Since the incentives to conduct basic or applied research play a central role for economic growth, Chapter 5 tries to answer the following research question: how does increasing early innovation appropriability affect basic research, applied research, education, and wage inequality? Chapter 5 analyses the macroeconomic effects of patent protection by incorporating a two-stage cumulative innovation structure into a quality-ladder growth model with skill acquisition. It focuses on two issues (a) the over-protection vs. the under-protection of intellectual property rights in basic research; (b) the evolution of jurisprudence shaping the bargaining power of the upstream innovators. It shows that the dynamic general equilibrium interactions may seriously mislead the empirical assessment of the growth effects of IPR policy: stronger protection of upstream innovation always looks bad in the short- and possibly medium-run. In a common law system an explicit dynamic macroeconomic analysis is appropriate; hence I have incorporated the mathematical modelling of the evolution of the common law into the rational expectations of the agents. This major modification allows me to schematically replicate the evolution of the skill premium, education, and strengthening of intellectual property rights (IPR) happened in the US during the Eighties and Nineties of the XX century. Chapter 5 also provides a simple "rule of thumb" indicator of the basic researcher bargaining power and 5 shows that IPR evolution can be introduced into a fully rational expectation framework. This helps explaining the well-known dynamics of the skill premium and education in the US, that motivated well-known theories of skill biased technical change and directed technical change (see Acemoglu 2008). Chapter 6, finally, draws inspiration from an important recent empirical literature on competition and productivity in the service sectors (see Nicoletti and Scarpetta, 2003; Alesina et al., 2005; Griffith et al., 2006; Aghion et al., 2006) to build a theoretical framework to predict whether innovation is hampered by the lack of completion in the non-manufacturing sectors. In this final chapter, I have built a simple model of process innovation where the provision of essential services (intermediate inputs, for example financial services or transports) for the production of the final good is subject to sectorial regulation, which shapes the market structure of the intermediate sector as a non-competitive one. The structure adopted in this chapter allows examining the effects on the economy of the presence of two different monopolized tasks: the intermediate service provision and the use of the innovation. The ultimate purpose is to show how the lack of competition in an intermediate essential sector, like the service sector, is actually able to depress productivity growth in the final sector