Assessing the Economic Impacts of Incorporating Romania's Agricultural and Food Sectors into EU's Customs Union: an Applied General Equilibrium Approach

Joining the European Union club implies, among many other policy changes, full integration of Romania's economy into EU's customs union. This is expected to have significant implications for domestic farmers and food processors. The paper constructs a single-country Applied General Equilibrium (AGE) model to investigate the impact of tariff border adjustments on changes in relative prices, production and trade patterns associated with fifteen local agro-food activities. Moreover, the modelling work identifies those agro-food sectors that have the potential to benefit the most from EU enlargement in terms of output effects given that Romanian producers are capable of fully responding to the incentives provided with integration. These mainly include (bovine) live animals and meat products, sugar, and cereal grains. Agro-food trade with EU intensifies in particular for those commodities for which trade restrictions are still substantial prior to accession. However, the magnitude of changes is relatively small due to the weak integration of domestic agro-food sectors into international trade structures. The AGE model also predicts static welfare gains of 0.65 percent of GDP equivalent variation. These seem to be more associated with better access to EU markets and increased export prices, and less with the preferential unilateral elimination of tariffs or their adjustment to EU's external levels. The model assumptions are highly theoretical and the model structure does not reflect with fidelity the workings of an economy in transition. Nonetheless, it does represent a solid base upon which further improvements could be added and structural transitional issues could be attached to more accurately predict potential outcomes.EU enlargement, Customs union, Agriculture, Romania, AGE modelling

Multimorbidity: a challenge and opportunity for the dental profession

Multimorbidity (the coexistence of two or more chronic conditions) is common, is likely to be on the increase and has a major impact on quality of life, increased risk of mortality, and significant financial costs to the health and social care system. Multimorbidity is strongly associated with increasing age and is also directly linked to socioeconomic status. A substantial body of scientific evidence has shown an association between specific oral diseases and a range of other health conditions. Less is known, however, about the inter-relationships between oral diseases and multiple other health conditions. As multimorbidity is increasingly becoming the norm, rather than the exception, a profound shift is now needed in the training of oral health professionals, and the practice and delivery of dental care. A more integrated and coordinated approach to training and care is needed, which will require radical system-level reform and redesign of how health and dental services are commissioned, delivered and financed. Truly multidisciplinary teamwork requires system reform to facilitate effective joint working. The pattern of disease in society is changing and the dental profession needs to respond accordingly

The Effects of Cinnamon Supplementation on Plasma Lipid Concentrations: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Background: Cinnamon is a rich botanical source of polyphenols, whose positive effects on blood lipid concentrations have been hypothesized, but have not been conclusively studied. Objective: To systematically review and evaluate the effect of administration of cinnamon on blood lipid concentrations. Methods: We assessed 13 RCTs with 750 participants investigating the effect of cinnamon supplementation on blood lipid concentrations. A meta-analysis was performed using randomeffect models, with weighted mean differences (with 95% CI) for endpoints calculated using a random-effects model. Results: No statistically significant effect of cinnamon was observed on blood LDL-C (WMD: - 0.16 mmol/L [-6.19 mg/dL], 95% CI: -0.35, 0.03 [-13.53, 1.16], p = 0.10) and HDL-C (WMD: 0.05 mmol/L [1.92 mg/dL], 95% CI: -0.03, 0.12 [-0.03, 4.64], p = 0.21) concentrations. However, a statistically significant reduction in blood triglycerides (WMD: -0.27 mmol/L [- 23.91 mg/dL], 95% CI: -0.39, -0.14 [-34.54, -12.40], p < 0.01) and total cholesterol concentrations (WMD: -0.36 mmol/L [-13.92 mg/dL], 95% CI: -0.63, -0.09 [-24.36, -3.48], p < 0.01) was observed. HDL-C was significantly elevated following the omission of one study (WMD: 0.04 mmol/L [1.54 mg/dL], 95% CI: 0.03, 0.06 [1.16, 2.32], p < 0.01) during our sensitivity analysis. A meta-regression analysis was conducted and no significant association was found between changes in lipid parameters and cinnamon dose. In contrast, changes in blood levels of total cholesterol (slope: 0.09; 95% CI: 0.02, 0.16; p < 0.01), LDL-C (slope: 0.05; 95% CI: 0.001, 0.10; p = 0.05) and triglycerides (slope: 0.06; 95% CI: 0.04, 0.09; p < 0.01) were significantly and positively associated with the duration of supplementation. No statistically significant association was found between blood HDL-C changes and duration of supplementation. Conclusion: Cinnamon supplementation significantly reduced blood triglycerides and total cholesterol concentrations without any significant effect on LDL-C and HDL-C

SENSOR ARRAY ABLE TO DETECT AND RECOGNISE CHEMICAL WARFARE AGENTS

In this paper we studied a device based on array of six different sensors with surface acoustic wave for detections and recognition of three chemical warfare agents (chloropicrin, soman and lewisite). The sensors are “delay line” type with a center frequency of 69.4 MHz. It presents an original algorithm to identify the nature and concentration of gas from a finite range of possible gases. Numerical program developed to implement this algorithm, provides to operators all the particulars of gas and an indicator of credibility of the results provided as a measure of the degree of disturbance of the signals received from sensors.SAW, chemical warfare agent, array of sensors, algorithm

Towards Using Probabilistic Models to Design Software Systems with Inherent Uncertainty

The adoption of machine learning (ML) components in software systems raises new engineering challenges. In particular, the inherent uncertainty regarding functional suitability and the operation environment makes architecture evaluation and trade-off analysis difficult. We propose a software architecture evaluation method called Modeling Uncertainty During Design (MUDD) that explicitly models the uncertainty associated to ML components and evaluates how it propagates through a system. The method supports reasoning over how architectural patterns can mitigate uncertainty and enables comparison of different architectures focused on the interplay between ML and classical software components. While our approach is domain-agnostic and suitable for any system where uncertainty plays a central role, we demonstrate our approach using as example a perception system for autonomous driving.Comment: Published at the European Conference on Software Architecture (ECSA

Optimal control for halo orbit missions

This paper addresses the computation of the required trajectory correction maneuvers (TCM) for a halo orbit space mission to compensate for the launch velocity errors introduced by inaccuracies of the launch vehicle. By combiningdynamical systems theory with optimal control techniques, we produce a portrait of the complex landscape of the trajectory design space. This approach enables parametric studies not available to mission designers a few years ago, such as how the magnitude of the errors and the timingof the first TCM affect the correction ΔV. The impetus for combiningdynamical systems theory and optimal control in this problem arises from design issues for the Genesis Discovery mission being developed for NASA by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Dephasing of a Qubit due to Quantum and Classical Noise

The qubit (or a system of two quantum dots) has become a standard paradigm for studying quantum information processes. Our focus is Decoherence due to interaction of the qubit with its environment, leading to noise. We consider quantum noise generated by a dissipative quantum bath. A detailed comparative study with the results for a classical noise source such as generated by a telegraph process, enables us to set limits on the applicability of this process vis a vis its quantum counterpart, as well as lend handle on the parameters that can be tuned for analyzing decoherence. Both Ohmic and non-Ohmic dissipations are treated and appropriate limits are analyzed for facilitating comparison with the telegraph process.Comment: 12 pages, 8 figure

Interaction between static holes in a quantum dimer model on the kagome lattice

A quantum dimer model (QDM) on the kagome lattice with an extensive ground-state entropy was recently introduced [Phys. Rev. B 67, 214413 (2003)]. The ground-state energy of this QDM in presence of one and two static holes is investigated by means of exact diagonalizations on lattices containing up to 144 kagome sites. The interaction energy between the holes (at distances up to 7 lattice spacings) is evaluated and the results show no indication of confinement at large hole separations.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figures. IOP style files included. To appear in J. Phys.: Condens. Matter, Proceedings of the HFM2003 conference, Grenobl

Flexible Commissioning: A prevention and access focused approach in Yorkshire and the Humber

No abstract available