Total Factor Productivity Growth and Output Growth in Indian Electronics Industry in the Liberalization Era: An Empirical Examination

This paper analyses the efficiency and productivity growth of Electronics industry, which is considered one of the vibrant and rapidly growing manufacturing industry sub-sectors of India in the liberalization era since 1991. The main objective of the paper is to examine the extent and growth of Total Factor Productivity (TFP) and its components namely, Technical Efficiency Change (TEC) and Technological Progress (TP) and its contribution to total output growth. In this study, the electronics industry is broadly classified into communication equipments, computer hardware, consumer electronics and other electronics, with the purpose of performing a comparative analysis of productivity growth for each of these sub-sectors for the time period 1993-2004. The paper found that the sub-sectors have improved in terms of economies of scale and contribution of capital.The change in technical efficiency and technological progress moved in reverse directions. Three of the four industry witnessed growth in the output primarily due to TFPG and the contribution of input growth to output growth had been negative/negligible, except for Computer hardware where contribution from both input growth and TFPG to output growth were prominent. The paper explored the possible reasons that addressed the issue of low technical efficiency and technological progress in the industry.

Detection of sugar-lectin interactions by multivalent dendritic sugar functionalized single-walled carbon nanotubes

We show that single walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) decorated with sugar functionalized poly (propyl ether imine) (PETIM) dendrimer is a very sensitive platform to quantitatively detect carbohydrate recognizing proteins, namely, lectins. The changes in electrical conductivity of SWNT in field effect transistor device due to carbohydrate-protein interactions form the basis of present study. The mannose sugar attached PETIM dendrimers undergo charge-transfer interactions with the SWNTs. The changes in the conductance of the dendritic sugar functionalized SWNT after addition of lectins in varying concentrations were found to follow the Langmuir type isotherm, giving the concanavalin A (Con A)-mannose affinity constant to be 8.5 x 10(6) M-1. The increase in the device conductance observed after adding 10 nM of Con A is same as after adding 20 mu M of a non-specific lectin peanut agglutinin, showing the high specificity of the Con A-mannose interactions. The specificity of sugar-lectin interactions was characterized further by observing significant shifts in Raman modes of the SWNTs. (C) 2012 American Institute of Physics. http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4739793]

2,3-Unsaturated enoses. A Pummerer rearrangement route to sugar vinyl sulfides and synthesis of 3-deoxy-3-alkyl/arylsulfinyl pyranosides

A Pummerer rearrangement of 2,3-dideoxy-3-alkyl/arylsulfinyl-arabino-hexopyranosides is reported. Treatment of sulfinyl-arabino-hexopyranoside derivatives, obtained through oxidation of the corresponding thio-derivatives, with trifluoroacetic anhydride (TFAA)/pyridine led to a facile formation of 2,3-dideoxy-3-alkyl/arylthio-hex-2-enopyranosides. Upon conversion of sugar vinyl sulfides to vinyl sulfoxides, conjugate addition reactions were conducted with alkoxides, to afford 3-deoxy-3-alkyl/arylsulfinyl pyranosides, in the manno-configuration exclusively. Whereas the conjugate addition reaction did not proceed with ether protecting groups, ester protecting groups and free hydroxyl groups in the sugar vinyl sulfoxide permitted the reaction. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

GFT projection NMR for efficient H-1/C-13 sugar spin system identification in nucleic acids

A newly implemented G-matrix Fourier transform (GFT) (4,3)D HC(C)CH experiment is presented in conjunction with (4,3)D HCCH to efficiently identify H-1/C-13 sugar spin systems in C-13 labeled nucleic acids. This experiment enables rapid collection of highly resolved relay 4D HC(C)CH spectral information, that is, shift correlations of C-13-H-1 groups separated by two carbon bonds. For RNA, (4,3)D HC(C)CH takes advantage of the comparably favorable 1'- and 3'-CH signal dispersion for complete spin system identification including 5'-CH. The (4,3)D HC(C)CH/HCCH based strategy is exemplified for the 30-nucleotide 3'-untranslated region of the pre-mRNA of human U1A protein.

Costs and benefits of the presence of leopards to the sport-hunting industry and local communities in Niassa national reserve, mozambique

Sport hunting is often proposed as a tool to support the conservation of large carnivores. However, it is challenging to provide tangible economic benefits from this activity as an incentive for local people to conserve carnivores. We assessed economic gains from sport hunting and poaching of leopards (Panthera pardus), costs of leopard depredation of livestock, and attitudes of people toward leopards in Niassa National Reserve, Mozambique. We sent questionnaires to hunting concessionaires (n = 8) to investigate the economic value of and the relative importance of leopards relative to other key trophy-hunted species. We asked villagers (n = 158) the number of and prices for leopards poached in the reserve and the number of goats depredated by leopard. Leopards were the mainstay of the hunting industry; a single animal was worth approximately U.S.$24,000. Most safari revenues are retained at national and international levels, but poached leopard are illegally traded locally for small amounts ($83). Leopards depredated 11 goats over 2 years in 2 of 4 surveyed villages resulting in losses of $440 to 6 households. People in these households had negative attitudes toward leopards. Although leopard sport hunting generates larger gross revenues than poaching, illegal hunting provides higher economic benefits for households involved in the activity. Sport-hunting revenues did not compensate for the economic losses of livestock at the household level. On the basis of our results, we propose that poaching be reduced by increasing the costs of apprehension and that the economic benefits from leopard sport hunting be used to improve community livelihoods and provide incentives not to poach.

beta gamma-fused turn structures in sugar amino acid (SAA) containing cyclic tetrapeptides with alpha 3 delta architecture

The current manuscript describes conformational analysis of 15-membered cyclic tetrapeptides (CTPs), with alpha 3 delta architecture, containing sugar amino acids (SAA) having variation in the stereocenter at C5 carbon. Conformational analyses of both the series, in protected and deprotected forms, were carried out in DMSO-d(6) using various NMR techniques, supported by restrained MD calculations. It was intriguing to notice that the alpha 3 delta macrocycles got stabilized by both 10-membered beta-turn as well as a seven-membered gamma-turn, fused within the same macrocycle. The presence of fused sub-structures within a 15-membered macrocycle is rare to see. Also, the stereocenter variation at C5 did not affect the fused turn structures and exhibited similar conformations in both the series. The design becomes highly advantageous as fused reverse turn structures are occurring in the cyclic structure with minimalistic size macrocycle and this can be applied to develop suitable pharmacophores in the drug development process. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.