Lectio praecursoria: Environmental policy evaluation concepts exemplified in the context of the European Unions strategy for better regulation

Lectio praecursoria 3.2.2006 Tampereen yliopisto

Prioritizing: The strategy of the powerful ?

Previous research has shown that power increases focus on the main goal when distractor information is present. As a result, high-power people have been described as goal-focused. In real life, one typically wants to pursue multiple goals at the same time. There is a lack of research on how power affects how people deal with situations in which multiple important goals are present. To address this question, 158 participants were primed with high or low power or assigned to a control condition, and were asked to perform a dual-goal task with three difficulty levels. We hypothesized and found that high-power primed people prioritize when confronted with a multiple-goal situation. More specifically, when task demands were relatively low, power had no effect; participants generally pursued multiple goals in parallel. However, when task demands were high, the participants in the high-power condition focused on a single goal whereas participants in the low-power condition continued using a dualtask strategy. This study extends existing power theories and research in the domain of goal pursuit.

From the Olympic dream to a down to earth approach: Lausanne's sports events hosting strategy

In the context of globalized competition among territories, cities, regions and countries have to find new ways to be attractive to companies, investors, tourists and residents. In that perspective, major sports events (such as the Olympic Games or the FIFA World Cup) are often seen as a lever for territorial development. Based on that idea, many sports events hosting strategies have emerged in the 1980s and 1990s. However, the growing competition in the sports events' market and the gigantism of those major events, forced some territories to turn to smaller events. This necessary resize of their strategy raises the question of their capacity to meet the initial objectives, which aim usually at developing the economy and promoting the image of the host destination. This essay sketches out the evolution of a sports events hosting strategy in a city that does not have the resources (either financial, human or in terms of infrastructures) to attract major international sports events. The challenges they have to face and a possible solution based on the event portfolio perspective are discussed through the article.

Strategy Formulation and Implementation Case of High Tech Instruments

The strategy process is a method for strategy formulation and implementation. The strategy process is commonly used especially within bigger companies. It is important to link the strategy formulation and implementation. The objective of this thesis has been to find out improvement areas for the case company’s strategy process. The theoretical framework based on literature emphasizes on strategy process as a method for strategy formulation and implementation. The theoretical framework, several mainly ad hoc interviews and author’s observation were used as tools to analyze the case company’s strategy process. The hierarchy in between the various corporate levels provides the foundation to formulate and implement the strategies. These strategies include the corporate and strategic business area level strategies. The recommendations to improve the case company’s strategy process were formulated at corporate and strategic business area levels. These recommendations were formulated based on research and experience gained throughout the work. The role of strategic projects to implement the strategies more efficiently and organizational control over distribution were found as potential improvement areas. The resource allocation prioritizing towards the most important strategic projects was also an important improvement area.

Stress oxydant chez l'enfant prématuré : causes, biomarqueurs et possibilités thérapeutiques [Oxidative stress after preterm birth: Origins, biomarkers, and possible therapeutic approaches].

The survival of preterm babies has increased over the last few decades. However, disorders associated with preterm birth, known as oxygen radical diseases of neonatology, such as retinopathy, bronchopulmonary dysplasia, periventricular leukomalacia, and necrotizing enterocolitis are severe complications related to oxidative stress, which can be defined by an imbalance between oxidative reactive species production and antioxidant defenses. Oxidative stress causes lipid, protein, and DNA damage. Preterm infants have decreased antioxidant defenses in response to oxidative challenges, because the physiologic increase of antioxidant capacity occurs at the end of gestation in preparation for the transition to extrauterine life. Therefore, preterm infants are more sensitive to neonatal oxidative stress, notably when supplemental oxygen is being delivered. Furthermore, despite recent advances in the management of neonatal respiratory distress syndrome, controversies persist concerning the oxygenation saturation targets that should be used in caring for preterm babies. Identification of adequate biomarkers of oxidative stress in preterm infants such as 8-iso-prostaglandin F2α, and adduction of malondialdehyde to hemoglobin is important to promote specific therapeutic approaches. At present, no therapeutic strategy has been validated as prevention or treatment against oxidative stress. Breastfeeding should be considered as the main measure to improve the antioxidant status of preterm infants. In the last few years, melatonin has emerged as a protective molecule against oxidative stress, with antioxidant and free-radical scavenger roles, in experimental and preliminary human studies, giving hope that it can be used in preterm infants in the near future.

Time-Varying Benefits of International Diversification for Finnish Investor: Country-Specific Strategy Concentrating on Emerging Markets

The main objective of this study is to investigate whether the Finnish investors’ country-specific strategy concentrating on emerging markets provides diversification benefits. We also analyze whether the benefits of international diversification has been diminished after periods of high volatility caused by different market crisis. The objective is investigated with three methods: Correlation coefficients, rolling correlations added with OLS trend-lines and Box’s M statistic. All the empirical tests are analyzed and calculated with logarithmic returns of weekly time series data from Friday closing values between January 1995 and December 2007. The number of weekly observations is 678. The data type is total return indices of different countries. Data is collected from DataStream and provided by Datastream Financial. Countries investigated are Finland, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, India, Mexico, Poland, Russia, South Africa, South Korea, Thailand and Turkey. The current data is quoted both in U.S. Dollars and local currencies. The empirical results of this thesis show that the correlation coefficients are time-varying across Finland and 12 emerging market countries. Although the correlations have risen from 1995 to 2007, there can be found sub-periods where the correlation has declined from earlier period. The results also indicate that a Finnish investor constructing a portfolio of emerging market countries cannot rely on the correlation coefficients estimated from historical data because of the instability of correlation matrices.

Evaluation of steroidomics by liquid chromatography hyphenated to mass spectrometry as a powerful analytical strategy for measuring human steroid perturbations.

This review presents the evolution of steroid analytical techniques, including gas chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry (GC-MS), immunoassay (IA) and targeted liquid chromatography coupled to mass spectrometry (LC-MS), and it evaluates the potential of extended steroid profiles by a metabolomics-based approach, namely steroidomics. Steroids regulate essential biological functions including growth and reproduction, and perturbations of the steroid homeostasis can generate serious physiological issues; therefore, specific and sensitive methods have been developed to measure steroid concentrations. GC-MS measuring several steroids simultaneously was considered the first historical standard method for analysis. Steroids were then quantified by immunoassay, allowing a higher throughput; however, major drawbacks included the measurement of a single compound instead of a panel and cross-reactivity reactions. Targeted LC-MS methods with selected reaction monitoring (SRM) were then introduced for quantifying a small steroid subset without the problems of cross-reactivity. The next step was the integration of metabolomic approaches in the context of steroid analyses. As metabolomics tends to identify and quantify all the metabolites (i.e., the metabolome) in a specific system, appropriate strategies were proposed for discovering new biomarkers. Steroidomics, defined as the untargeted analysis of the steroid content in a sample, was implemented in several fields, including doping analysis, clinical studies, in vivo or in vitro toxicology assays, and more. This review discusses the current analytical methods for assessing steroid changes and compares them to steroidomics. Steroids, their pathways, their implications in diseases and the biological matrices in which they are analysed will first be described. Then, the different analytical strategies will be presented with a focus on their ability to obtain relevant information on the steroid pattern. The future technical requirements for improving steroid analysis will also be presented.

The pseudo-high-risk prevention strategy

Key Messages: A fundamental failure of high-risk prevention strategies is their inability to prevent disease in the large part of the population at a relatively small average risk and from which most cases of diseases originate. The development of individual predictive medicine and the widening of high-risk categories for numerous (chronic) conditions lead to the application of pseudo-high-risk prevention strategies. Widening the criteria justifying individual preventive interventions and the related pseudo-high-risk strategies lead to treating, individually, ever healthier and larger strata of the population. The pseudo-high-risk prevention strategies raise similar problems compared with high-risk strategies, however on a larger scale and without any of the benefit of population-based strategies. Some 30 years ago, the strengths and weaknesses of population-based and high-risk prevention strategies were brilliantly delineated by Geoffrey Rose in several seminal publications (Table 1).1,2 His work had major implications not only for epidemiology and public health but also for clinical medicine. In particular, Rose demonstrated the fundamental failure of high-risk prevention strategies, that is, by missing a large number of preventable cases.

Price rivalry in airline markets: A study of a successful strategy of a network carrier against a low-cost carrier

Competition in airline markets may be tough. In this context, network carriers have two alternative strategies to compete with low-cost carriers. First, they may establish a low-cost subsidiary. Second, they may try to reduce costs using the main brand. This paper examines a successful strategy of the first type implemented by Iberia in the Spanish domestic market. Our analysis of data and the estimation of a pricing equation show that Iberia has been able to charge lower prices than rivals with its low-cost subsidiary. The pricing policy of the Spanish network carrier has been particularly aggressive in less dense routes and shorter routes.

Shadow on the Plant: A Strategy to Exit.

The light spectrum perceived by plants is affected by crowding, which results in the shade avoidance syndrome (SAS). Findings presented by Pedmale et al. bring cryptochromes to the forefront of SAS and elucidate a fascinating molecular crosstalk between photoreceptor systems operating in different wavebands.

Cardiovascular risk among hypertensive adolescents and the potential benefit of a screen-and-treat strategy.

To evaluate whether screening for hypertension should start early in life, information on the risk of diseases associated with the level of blood pressure in childhood or adolescence is needed. The study by Leiba et al. that is reported in the current issue of Pediatric Nephrology demonstrates convincingly that hypertensive adolescents are at higher risk of cardiovascular death than normotensive adolescents. Nevertheless, it can be shown that this excess risk is not sufficient to justify a screen-and-treat strategy. Since the large majority of cardiovascular deaths occur among normotensive adolescents, measures for primordial prevention of cardiovascular diseases could have a much larger impact at the population level.

Is there any influence of breastfeeding on the cerebral blood flow? A review of 256 healthy newborns

OBJECTIVE: To investigate whether breastfeeding influence the cerebral blood-flow velocity. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The present study included 256 healthy term neonates, all of them with appropriate weight for gestational age, 50.8% being female. Pulsatility index, resistance index and mean velocity were measured during breastfeeding or resting in the anterior cerebral artery, in the left middle cerebral artery, and in the right middle cerebral artery of the neonates between their first 10 and 48 hours of life. The data were analyzed by means of a paired t-test, Brieger's f-test for analysis of variance and linear regression, with p < 0.01 being accepted as statistically significant. RESULTS: Mean resistance index decreased as the mean velocity increased significantly during breastfeeding. Pulsatility index values decreased as much as the resistance index, but in the right middle cerebral artery it was not statistically significant. CONCLUSION: Breastfeeding influences the cerebral blood flow velocities.