Endemism and cryptogenesis in 'segmented' mites: A review of Australian Alicorhagiidae, Terpnacaridae, Oehserchestidae and Grandjeanicidae (Acari : sarcoptiformes)

Endeostigmata are early derivative acariform mites, fossils of which are known from the Devonian. Extant species bear numerous plesiomorphies, the most striking being remnant opisthosomal segmentation. Also, many are all-female parthenogens with broad geographical distributions. Many of the species reported in the present study may represent clones of ancient Gondwana species. Before the present study only a handful of endeostigmatans had been reported from Australia. A key to the families of Endeostigmata is provided in the present paper, along with a review of the Australian fauna of the families Alicorhagiidae (new record), Grandjeanicidae (new record), Oehserchestidae (new record), and Terpnacaridae. Terpnacarus gibbosus (Womersley) is redescribed. A report of the first records of the cosmopolitan parthenogens Alicorhagia usitata Theron et al., Alycosmesis palmata (Oudemans), Stigmalychus veretrum Theron et al., Terpnacarus carolinaensis Theron, and Oehserchestes arboriger (Theron) in Australia is provided, along with a description of the new species Grandjeanicus theroni (Grandjeanicidae). Terpnacarus variolus Shiba and T. glebulentus Theron are junior synonyms of T. gibbosus.

Aggregated personality, climate and demographic factors as predictors of departmental shrinkage

The present study investigated how demographic, personality, and climate variables act to predict departmental theft. Participants in the current field survey were 153 employees from 17 departments across two stores. The results of confirmatory factor analyses supported the construct validity of the Big Five Inventory (John, Donahue, & Kentle, 1991) and the Occupational Climate Questionnaire (Furnham & Gunter, 1997) in UK work settings. The results of regression analysis indicate that the variability in departmental theft is accountable in terms of a linear combination of demographic, personality, and climate factors. We concluded that an expanded theoretical perspective (utilizing demographic, personality, and climate variables) explained more variance than might otherwise be expected from any single perspective. Indeed, climate, personality, and demographic variables operated legitimately at the departmental level. Finally, we explained aggregated personality as a form of social interaction which is the by-product of individual differences.

Social insect genomes exhibit dramatic evolution in gene composition and regulation while preserving regulatory features linked to sociality.

Genomes of eusocial insects code for dramatic examples of phenotypic plasticity and social organization. We compared the genomes of seven ants, the honeybee, and various solitary insects to examine whether eusocial lineages share distinct features of genomic organization. Each ant lineage contains ∼4000 novel genes, but only 64 of these genes are conserved among all seven ants. Many gene families have been expanded in ants, notably those involved in chemical communication (e.g., desaturases and odorant receptors). Alignment of the ant genomes revealed reduced purifying selection compared with Drosophila without significantly reduced synteny. Correspondingly, ant genomes exhibit dramatic divergence of noncoding regulatory elements; however, extant conserved regions are enriched for novel noncoding RNAs and transcription factor-binding sites. Comparison of orthologous gene promoters between eusocial and solitary species revealed significant regulatory evolution in both cis (e.g., Creb) and trans (e.g., fork head) for nearly 2000 genes, many of which exhibit phenotypic plasticity. Our results emphasize that genomic changes can occur remarkably fast in ants, because two recently diverged leaf-cutter ant species exhibit faster accumulation of species-specific genes and greater divergence in regulatory elements compared with other ants or Drosophila. Thus, while the "socio-genomes" of ants and the honeybee are broadly characterized by a pervasive pattern of divergence in gene composition and regulation, they preserve lineage-specific regulatory features linked to eusociality. We propose that changes in gene regulation played a key role in the origins of insect eusociality, whereas changes in gene composition were more relevant for lineage-specific eusocial adaptations.

Traveller Focus Week - improving health and wellbeing

Members of the Traveller community and their support organisations joined the Public Health Agency and the Health and Social Care Board at an event in Dungannon to mark Traveller Focus Week (5 - 11 December) by sharing the progress made, and celebrating good practice in meeting the health and wellbeing needs of Travellers.These needs were identified in the 'All Ireland Traveller Health Study' by University College Dublin in June 2010. It estimated that there are 3,905 Travellers living in 1,562 families in Northern Ireland, and the stark findings include that when compared with the life expectancy of the general population, male Travellers lose 15 years of life and females lose 11 years.The report made a number of recommendations, including:prioritising mother and children's health; enhanced preventative work for respiratory and cardiovascular disease, as well as better risk detection and management of the disease; development of primary care interventions which involve Travellers engaging with other Travellers in health improvement;engagement of men and young men in improving health and wellbeing and access to healthcare.Speaking at the event, Mary Black, Assistant Director of Public Health (Health and Social Wellbeing Improvement) PHA, said: "The Public Health Agency works in partnership to promote health and wellbeing and reduce health inequalities."This event with the Travellers Health and Wellbeing Forum was an important opportunity to look at progress against agreed priorities and share good practice across Northen Ireland and the successful work of the Forum. One such example is the recruitment of Travellers into employment as health workers developed by the Belfast Health and Social Care Trust and part-funded by the PHA. Other areas are also considering work placements and all of this developing practice will help inform future partnerships with employers and help break down the real prejudice that can be experienced by Travellers."We also heard about the progress Travellers have made in their own right, and their views about how the Travelling community is fully engaged and participates in the future development of the Forum and programmes that aim to improve health and wellbeing and contribute to a more equal society."Mark Donahue, Equality Officer, An Munia Tober (a Traveller support organisation), added "The event was a great success in terms of highlighting the main health issues for Travellers, which came out of the All Ireland Traveller Health Study. I was heartened to see a great turn out by the Traveller community from all over Northern Ireland and also by the interest and commitment of so many public agencies and other organisations to work together to improve Traveller health."The event, at 'Breakthru' in Dungannon, also brought together representatives from the five health and social care trusts, Cooperation and Working Together (CAWT), Housing and key voluntary sector organisations, all involved in delivering the recommendations from the 'All Ireland Traveller Health Study'.

Circulating prolactin and in situ breast cancer risk in the European EPIC cohort: a case-control study.

INTRODUCTION The relationship between circulating prolactin and invasive breast cancer has been investigated previously, but the association between prolactin levels and in situ breast cancer risk has received less attention. METHODS We analysed the relationship between pre-diagnostic prolactin levels and the risk of in situ breast cancer overall, and by menopausal status and use of postmenopausal hormone therapy (HT) at blood donation. Conditional logistic regression was used to assess this association in a case-control study nested within the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition (EPIC) cohort, including 307 in situ breast cancer cases and their matched control subjects. RESULTS We found a significant positive association between higher circulating prolactin levels and risk of in situ breast cancer among all women [pre-and postmenopausal combined, ORlog2 = 1.35 (95%CI 1.04-1.76), Ptrend = 0.03]. No statistically significant heterogeneity was found between prolactin levels and in situ cancer risk by menopausal status (Phet = 0.98) or baseline HT use (Phet = 0.20), although the observed association was more pronounced among postmenopausal women using HT compared to non-users (Ptrend = 0.06 vs Ptrend = 0.35). In subgroup analyses, the observed positive association was strongest in women diagnosed with in situ breast tumors <4 years compared to ≥4 years after blood donation (Ptrend = 0.01 vs Ptrend = 0.63; Phet = 0.04) and among nulliparous women compared to parous women (Ptrend = 0.03 vs Ptrend = 0.15; Phet = 0.07). CONCLUSIONS Our data extends prior research linking prolactin and invasive breast cancer to the outcome of in situ breast tumours and shows that higher circulating prolactin is associated with increased risk of in situ breast cancer.

Molecular analysis of a novel gene cluster encoding an insect toxin in plant-associated strains of Pseudomonas fluorescens

Pseudomonas fluorescens CHA0 and the related strain Pf-5 are well-characterized representatives of rhizosphere bacteria that have the capacity to protect crop plants from fungal root diseases, mainly by releasing a variety of exoproducts that are toxic to plant pathogenic fungi. Here, we report that the two plant-beneficial pseudomonads also exhibit potent insecticidal activity. Anti-insect activity is linked to a novel genomic locus encoding a large protein toxin termed Fit (for P. fluorescensinsecticidal toxin) that is related to the insect toxin Mcf (Makes caterpillars floppy) of the entomopathogen Photorhabdus luminescens, a mutualist of insect-invading nematodes. When injected into the haemocoel, even low doses of P. fluorescens CHA0 or Pf-5 killed larvae of the tobacco hornworm Manduca sexta and the greater wax moth Galleria mellonella. In contrast, mutants of CHA0 or Pf-5 with deletions in the Fit toxin gene were significantly less virulent to the larvae. When expressed from an inducible promoter in a non-toxic Escherichia coli host, the Fit toxin gene was sufficient to render the bacterium toxic to both insect hosts. Our findings establish the Fit gene products of P. fluorescens CHA0 and Pf-5 as potent insect toxins that define previously unappreciated anti-insect properties of these plant-colonizing bacteria

Recueil de lettres et de pièces originales, et de copies de pièces indiquées comme telles dans le dépouillement qui suit.

Contient : 1 Lettre de « GUILLAUME DE NASSAU [prince D'ORANGE]... à monsieur Des Pruneaulx, ambassadeur de monseigneur le duc d'Anjou,... Escript à Gand, ce XIIIe janvier 1578 » ; 2 « Articles pour entrer en accord entre les deputez de monseigneur le duc d'Alençon et les depputez de messieurs des Estatz generaux des Pays Bas » ; 3 « Coppie de lettre de la reine d'Angleterre, ELIZAETH, escripte à messieurs les Estats generaux des Pays as assemblez en la ville d'Anvers, sur le subject de Moneigneur, fils de France, duc d'Alençon » ; 4 Lettre de M. DE « LA NOUE,... à monsieur... Des Prueaux, ambassadeur de Son Altesse es Pays Bas... De La ere, le 26 de janvier » ; 5 « Instruction de monseigneur... FRANÇOYS [duc 'ALENÇON] aux Srs de La Rochepot et Des Pruneaux,... nvoyés de sa part vers les Srs des Estats generaulx, rince d'Orenge et comte de Lalaing, et autres seineurs des Pays Bas... Faict à Angers, le XXVIIIe jour de mars, l'an mil V.C. soixante dix huit » ; 6 « Coppie de lettre de messieurs les Estats generaux, escrite aux deputez de monseigneur le duc d'Alençon » ; 7 Lettre du Sr « DU PLESSIS,... à monsieur... Des Pruneaux,... De Amiens, ce 25e avril 1578 » ; 8 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur Des Pruneaux,... Escrit à Bourgueil, le XXVIe jour d'avril 578 » ; 9 Lettre de « GUILLAUME DE NASSAU [prince D'ORANGE]... à monsieur... Des Pruneaux,... De Anvers, ce 26 d'apvril 1578 » ; 10 Lettre des « bourgmestres, eschevins et conseil de a ville de Bruxelles... à messieurs les Srs de Mondochet, de La Rochepot et Des Pruneaux, deputez de Son Alteze... De Bruxelles, ce XXVIIe d'apvril XV.C.LXXVIII » ; 11 Lettre de « PHILIPPES DE LA LAING,... à messieurs... le La Rochepot et Des Pruneaux, ambassadeurs de monseigneur le duc d'Anjou,... De Mons, le VIe jour de may 1578 ». Copie ; 12 « Coppie de la lettre des Estats generaulx du Pays Bas à messieurs de Rochepot, Des Pruneaulx et de Mont-Boulcet, ambassadeurs de monseigneur le duc d'Alençon,... D'Anvers, ce deuxiesme de may 1578 » ; 13 Copie de lettre des « Estats generaus des Païs Bas... à messieurs le conte de la Laing, baron Descornaix, grand bailly de Haynault, baron de Frezin,... D'Anvers, ce Vme jour de may 1578 » ; 14 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur Des Pruneaulx,... Escrit à Bourgueil, le XIe jour de may 1578 » ; 15 « Coppie de la lettre de messieurs les Estats generaux des Pays Bas, envoyée à monseigneur le duc d'Alençon,... D'Anvers, ce 20e jour de may 1578 » ; 16 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monsieur Des Pruneaux,... Escrit à Baujé, le XXIIIe jour de may 1578 » ; 17 « Coppie de la lettre de monseigneur le duc envoyée à messieurs ses ambassadeurs... Escrit à La Flesche, le XXVIme jour de may 1578 » ; 18 Lettre du Sr DE « LA ROCHEPOT,... à messieurs... Des Pruneaux et de Mondoucet, conseillers et chambellans ordinaires de Monseigneur... Ce VIe jour de juing 1578 » ; 19 « Coppie de lettre escrite de la main de monseigneur le duc D'ALENÇON à monsieur de La Rochepot,... Escrit à Alençon, le dixiesme jour de juin mil cinq cens soixante et dix huict » ; 20 Lettre du Sr DE « LA ROCHEPOT,... à messieurs Des Pruneaux et de Mondoucet,... A Folleville, ce XIe juing 1578 » ; 21 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur Des Pruneaulx,... Escrit à Alençon, le XIIIe jour de juing 1578 » ; 22 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur Des Pruneaulx,... Escript à Alençon, ce XXe jour de juing 1578 » ; 23 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à messrs de La Rochepot, Des Pruneaulx et Montdoucet,... Escrit à Alençon, le XXe jour de juing 1578 » ; 24 Réclamation des députés du duc d'Alençon, « messieurs DES PRUNEAULX et DE MONDOULCET,... le XXe jour de juing 1578 », sur l'arrestation d'un laquais et d'un postillon ; 25 Lettre de « CHARLOTTE DE BOURBON [princesse D'ORANGE]... à monsieur... Des Pruneaux,... D'Anvers, le XXIIIIe de juin 1578 » ; 26 Lettre du Sr DE « LA ROCHEPOT,... à messieurs... Des Pruneaux et de Mondoucet,... A Vignacourt, le XXVIe jour de juin 1578 » ; 27 Lettre de « GUILLAUME DE NASSAU [prince D'ORANGE]... à monsieur... de Pruneaulx,... En Anvers, ce 26e jung 1578 » ; 28 Lettre du Sr « D'AMBOYSE,... à monsieur... Des Pruneaus,... Ce XXIXe jour de juing 1578 » ; 29 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur Des Pruneaux,... Escrit à Alençon, le XXIXe jour de juing 1578 » ; 30 Deux lettres du Sr « DE MONDOUCET,... à monseigneur [le duc d'Alençon]... D'Amiens, le XVIme juillet 1578 » ; 31 Lettre de « GUILLAUME DE NASSAU [prince D'ORANGE]... à monsieur... Des Pruneaux,... Escript à Dendermonde, ce 17e juillet 1578 » ; 32 Lettre de « CHARLOTTE DE BOURBON [princesse D'ORANGE]... à monsieur... Des Pruneaux,... D'Anve[rs], ce XVIIe de juillet 1578 » ; 33 Lettre du Sr « DE THERON,... à monsieur... Des Pruneaulx,... De Bruxelles, ce XXVe juillet 1578 » ; 34 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur de Bussy,... Escrit à Montz, le VIIe jour d'aoust 1578 » ; 35 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à mon cousin monseigneur le prince d'Orange,... Escrit à Montz, le VIIe jour d'aoust 1578 » ; 36 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à messrs des Estats generaulx des Païs Bas... Escrit à Montz, le VIIe jour d'aoust 1578 » ; 37 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à Haranger, mon secretaire ordinaire... Escrit à Montz, ce VIIe jour d'aoust 1578 » ; 38 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur Des Pruneaux,... Escrit à Montz, le IXe jour d'aoust 1578 » ; 39 Lettre du Sr DE « BELLIEVRE » à monseigneur le duc d'Alençon. « De Anvers, le XVIIe jour d'aoust 1578 » ; 40 « Coppie d'une promesse de monseigneur le duc D'ALENÇON,... faicte à monsieur le prince d'Orange,... Donné à Monts, ce dix huictiesme jour d'aoust mil cinq cens soixante dix huict » ; 41 Copies de deux lettres des États généraux des Pays-Bas au duc d'Alençon, des 19 et 27 août 1578 ; suivies des « articles apportez par monseigneur le duc d'Ascot » ; 42 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur de Frezin,... Escrit à Montz, ce XIXme jour d'aoust 1578 » ; 43 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à mon cousin monseigneur d'Horste,... Escrit à Montz, le XXIe jour d'aoust 1578 » ; 44 Instruction de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... pour le Sr Des Pruneaux,... Faict à Montz, le XXIme jour d'aoust, l'an mil cinq cens soixante dix huict » ; 45 Lettre du Sr « DEMAY,... à monsieur... Des Pruneaux,... De Paris, ce XXIIe aoust 1578 » ; 46 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur Des Pruneaux,... Escrit à Montz, le XXIIIIe jour d'aoust 1578 » ; 47 Autre Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur Des Pruneaux,... Escrit à Mons, le XXIIIe jour d'aoust 1578 » ; 48 Lettre du Sr « DUMESNIL,... à monsieur... Des Pruneaux,... De Monts, ce XXVe jour d'aoust 1578 au matin » ; 49 « Acte des Etas generaulx comme ilz ont reseu le premyer tretté fait aveques Monseigneur, siné et ratifié comme il devoit... le 26e d'aoust 1578 » ; 50 Promesse du Sr DE « SORBIES DES PRUNEAUX » au nom de François, duc d'Anjou et d'Alençon, pour une alliance avec les États des Pays-Bas. « Faict à Anvers, ce 28e jour d'aoust 1578 ». Copie ; 51 « Remonstrance aux trois Estats de Henaut », sur le traité avec le duc d'Alençon ; 52 « Doubles de lettres escrites par messrs des Estats à monseigneur le comte de Lalain et villes du Quesnoy et Landrecies, pour se mettre es mains de Son Altesse [le duc d'Alençon]... D'Anvers, le XXVIIIe d'aoust 1578 » ; 53 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... à monseigneur Des Pruneaux,... De Mons, le 11 septembre 1578 » ; 54 Lettre du Sr « MONLOUET,... à monsieur... Des Pruneaulx,... De Condé, ce XIe de janvier 1578 » ; 55 Deux « Lettres de messrs des Estats [des Pays-Bas], des VI et VIII septembre 1578 », adressées au duc d'Alençon. Copie ; 56 Lettre de « GUILLAUME DE NASSAU [prince D'ORANGE] à Son Altesse [le duc d'Alençon]... D'Anvers, le VIIIe de septembre 1578 » ; 57 « Lettre de messrs des Estatz, du XXVIe septembt 1578 », au duc d'Alençon. Copie ; 58 « Les Articles envoyés à Landrecies pour les fere metre entre les maynz de monseigneur » le duc d'Alençon, précédés d'une lettre des États au « magistrat et » « la commune de la ville de Landrechies... D'Anvers, le premier d'octobre 1578 ». Copie ; 59 « Lectres de messrs des Estats » au duc d'Alençon « des XIIe et XVIIe octobre 1578 ». Copie ; 60 Instruction de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... au Sr Des Pruneaux,... Faict le quatrieme jour de novembr M.V.C.LXXVIII » ; 61 « Advis utille et necessaire à tous les Estatz d Pays Bas et bons patriotz... pour monseigneur le prins [d'Orange]... De Tournay, ce IXe novembre 1578 » ; 62 « Responses que font les deputez des Estatz ge neraulx sur les poinctz à eulx representez et exibez pa le sommaire de la legation du sieur Des Pruneaulx conseiller... de monseigneur le duc d'Anjou... Le XXII novembre 1578 » ; 63 Copie de l'acte précédent, avec observations du duc d'Alençon. « A Mons, le premier jour de decembre mil cinq cens soixante dix » ; 64 « Copie de la lectre que les Etas escripvent à mon seigneur [le duc d'Alençon], du 25e novembre 1578 » ; 65 Lettre de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... Escrit à Mons, le XIIe jour de decembre 1578 » ; 66 « Double de lectre escritte » par le duc D'ALENÇON aux États généraux. « Escrit à Mons... decembre 1578 » ; 67 Cinq Lettres circulaires de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... A Mons, le XIIe jour de decembre 1578 » ; 68 Cinq Lettres circulaires de « FRANÇOYS [duc D'ALENÇON]... A Mons... decembre 1578 »

Exploring the Design Process and Components of an Elementary Literacy Guide in an Ontario School Board Initiative

The skill to identify and use best practices in literacy to promote achievement for students of all abilities cannot be underestimated by elementary educators. This qualitative case study investigates 1 year of a literacy initiative for primary and junior educators organized by a southern Ontario school board. The goals of the initiative were to design a literacy guide for teachers while building teacher capacity with literacy practices. Data were culled and analyzed from an examination of the guide, the meetings’ field notes and artifacts, as well as interviews with the educators at the end of the year. Several themes from the results emerged. The educators perceived the design process as unclear but the collaborative components were deemed valuable. The guide’s incompletion led to mixed reactions from the educators about the guide and its structure. Overall, the first year of the 3-year initiative acted as a catalyst for professional learning on literacy. The findings of this study accentuated the value of training educators to use empirical research to support their practices and professional knowledge. Also, the significance of promoting strong leadership with a comprehensive layout consisting of coherent tangible goals for professional development is highlighted.

Notes on PCA, Regularization, Sparsity and Support Vector Machines

We derive a new representation for a function as a linear combination of local correlation kernels at optimal sparse locations and discuss its relation to PCA, regularization, sparsity principles and Support Vector Machines. We first review previous results for the approximation of a function from discrete data (Girosi, 1998) in the context of Vapnik"s feature space and dual representation (Vapnik, 1995). We apply them to show 1) that a standard regularization functional with a stabilizer defined in terms of the correlation function induces a regression function in the span of the feature space of classical Principal Components and 2) that there exist a dual representations of the regression function in terms of a regularization network with a kernel equal to a generalized correlation function. We then describe the main observation of the paper: the dual representation in terms of the correlation function can be sparsified using the Support Vector Machines (Vapnik, 1982) technique and this operation is equivalent to sparsify a large dictionary of basis functions adapted to the task, using a variation of Basis Pursuit De-Noising (Chen, Donoho and Saunders, 1995; see also related work by Donahue and Geiger, 1994; Olshausen and Field, 1995; Lewicki and Sejnowski, 1998). In addition to extending the close relations between regularization, Support Vector Machines and sparsity, our work also illuminates and formalizes the LFA concept of Penev and Atick (1996). We discuss the relation between our results, which are about regression, and the different problem of pattern classification.

El trabajo en equipo en el Proceso Administrativo y de Compras en OPL Carga de Bucaramanga

El proceso administrativo y de compras de OPL Carga tiene algunas falencias entre ellas: fallas en la Comunicación entre el personal operativo, no se realizan llamadas internas usando con frecuencia el email, produciendo la saturación de solicitudes las cuales terminan sin ser resueltas en cuanto a roles se refiere, no hay enfoque de procesos en vista que no se tiene claras las tareas de cada cargo, adicionalmente no hay claridad en los subprocesos, perjudicando el proceso con el aumento de costos, pérdida de tiempo, las responsabilidades de los funcionario no todas las veces se ejecutan en el tiempo asignado, el liderazgo compartido presenta ambigüedades. Objetivos: Definir el trabajo en equipo en el proceso administrativo y de compras en OPL carga de Bucaramanga. La investigación que a realizar es de tipo descriptivo, busca descubrir las falencias o características que permiten diseñar y desarrollar un modelo de solución para los problemas del equipo de OPL Carga S.A.S. Materiales y métodos: La investigación efectuada es de tipo descriptivo, el objetivo es definir el modelo del trabajo en equipo y describir las falencias en el proceso administrativo y de compras en OPL carga de Bucaramanga, que permitan obtener un diagnóstico integral que conlleve a la implementación de estrategias de solución. Resultados: Se identificaron las falencias en los siguientes aspectos: Variable comunicación, rendimiento, destrezas complementarias, propósito significativo y meta específicas de los funcionarios en OPL carga sección administrativa. Conclusiones: El modelo de trabajo en equipo que OPL aplica es jerárquico, en el que se ofrece estabilidad, seguridad, se toman decisiones en forma piramidal, mediante la planeación de tareas, la colaboración, igualdad y respeto por los miembros, trabajando en pro de la solución de problemas. Se construyó un plano conceptual que permitió exponer la interpretación que la estudiante tiene de las teorías, investigaciones y antecedentes válidos para la comprensión del problema investigado. Área comunicacional: Coordinar acciones tendientes para que los funcionarios respondan a tiempo los emails atenientes a su trabajo. Área condiciones de trabajo: Clarificar y diseñar las reglas de comportamiento al interior de los equipos de trabajo que redunden en el mejoramiento del mismo y la búsqueda de soluciones oportunas. Área metas específicas: Procurar mediante auditorías el cumplimiento de las metas y objetivos propuestos por cada equipo de trabajo.

La participación de las ONG en Naciones Unidas y su contribución a la gobernanza global

El objetivo de este trabajo es analizar el fenómeno de la participación de las ONG en el marco de la Organización de Naciones Unidas (ONU) y las implicaciones del mismo en las dinámicas de la gobernanza global. Se explican los conceptos principales para el análisis y posteriormente se hace una revisión de los antecedentes que permitieron el desarrollo de dicho fenómeno dentro de la organización y fuera de ella. Luego se centra el análisis en la incidencia de las ONG en la ONU y para la gobernanza global; se concluye con una reflexión sobre lo que puede esperarse de esta incidencia para el futuro de la organización.

Does uncertainty cause inertia in decision making? An experimental study of the role of regret aversion and indecisiveness

Previous research has shown that often there is clear inertia in individual decision making---that is, a tendency for decision makers to choose a status quo option. I conduct a laboratory experiment to investigate two potential determinants of inertia in uncertain environments: (i) regret aversion and (ii) ambiguity-driven indecisiveness. I use a between-subjects design with varying conditions to identify the effects of these two mechanisms on choice behavior. In each condition, participants choose between two simple real gambles, one of which is the status quo option. I find that inertia is quite large and that both mechanisms are equally important.

Risk, ambiguity, and diversification

Attitudes toward risk influence the decision to diversify among uncertain options. Yet, because in most situations the options are ambiguous, attitudes toward ambiguity may also play an important role. I conduct a laboratory experiment to investigate the effect of ambiguity on the decision to diversify. I find that diversification is more prevalent and more persistent under ambiguity than under risk. Moreover, excess diversification under ambiguity is driven by participants who stick with a status quo gamble when diversification among gambles is not feasible. This behavioral pattern cannot be accommodated by major theories of choice under ambiguity.

Variables associated with nest survival of Golden-winged Warblers (Vermivora chrysoptera) among vegetation communities commonly used for nesting

Among shrubland- and young forest-nesting bird species in North America, Golden-winged Warblers (Vermivora chrysoptera) are one of the most rapidly declining partly because of limited nesting habitat. Creation and management of high quality vegetation communities used for nesting are needed to reduce declines. Thus, we examined whether common characteristics could be managed across much of the Golden-winged Warbler’s breeding range to increase daily survival rate (DSR) of nests. We monitored 388 nests on 62 sites throughout Minnesota, Wisconsin, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and West Virginia. We evaluated competing DSR models in spatial-temporal (dominant vegetation type, population segment, state, and year), intraseasonal (nest stage and time-within-season), and vegetation model suites. The best-supported DSR models among the three model suites suggested potential associations between daily survival rate of nests and state, time-within-season, percent grass and Rubus cover within 1 m of the nest, and distance to later successional forest edge. Overall, grass cover (negative association with DSR above 50%) and Rubus cover (DSR lowest at about 30%) within 1 m of the nest and distance to later successional forest edge (negative association with DSR) may represent common management targets across our states for increasing Golden-winged Warbler DSR, particularly in the Appalachian Mountains population segment. Context-specific adjustments to management strategies, such as in wetlands or areas of overlap with Blue-winged Warblers (Vermivora cyanoptera), may be necessary to increase DSR for Golden-winged Warblers.