GSP+ and Human Rights::Is the EU's Approach the Right One?

Among the purposes of the EU’s GSP+ programme is to link human rights to trade incentives, with the idea of using such incentives to promote developing countries’ adoption of the values found in core human rights treaties. With the re-renewal of the GSP (and GSP+) programmes to take effect in January 2014, it is fruitful to examine their efficacy and consistency with WTO law. In this article, I argue the GSP+ programme is not only ineffective in obtaining an improvement in human rights conditions for the vast majority of the world’s population, but it is also incompatible with WTO law. A stick-based regime where human rights abuses are linked to trade sanctions is a better way to proceed. After outlining the GSP+ system, and its linkage of human rights and trade, I analyse its efficacy and WTO consistency. Having shown that it is ineffective and contrary to WTO law, I argue that trade sanctions based on a PPM distinction and/or GATT XX(a) may be the appropriate means of linking trade and human rights. The article ends with some concluding remarks on the need for the careful design of such a system.

Free radical-mediated lipid peroxidation and systemic nitric oxide bioavailability:implications for postexercise hemodynamics

The metabolic vasodilator mediating postexercise hypotension (PEH) is poorly understood. Recent evidence suggests an exercise-induced reliance on pro-oxidant-stimulated vasodilation in normotensive young human subjects, but the role in the prehypertensive state is not known.

On the progenitor of the type IIP SN 2013ej in M74

We use natural seeing imaging of SN 2013ej in M74 to identify a progenitor candidate in archival Hubble Space Telescope (HST) + Advanced Camera for Survey images. We find a source coincident with the supernova (SN) in the F814W filter within the total 75 mas (~3 pc astrometric uncertainty; however, the position of the progenitor candidate in contemporaneous F435W and F555W filters is significantly offset. We conclude that the 'progenitor candidate' is in fact two physically unrelated sources; a blue source which is likely unrelated to the SN, and a red source which we suggest exploded as SN 2013ej. Deep images with the same instrument on board HST taken when the SN has faded (in approximately two year's time) will allow us to accurately characterize the unrelated neighbouring source and hence determine the intrinsic flux of the progenitor in three filters.We suggest that the F814W flux is dominated by the progenitor of SN 2013ej, and assuming a bolometric correction appropriate to an M-type supergiant, we estimate that the mass of the progenitor of SN 2013ej was between 8 and 15.5M⊙. 

Regulation of c-SRC activity and function by the adapter protein CAS

SRC family kinases play essential roles in a variety of cellular functions, including proliferation, survival, differentiation, and apoptosis. The activities of these kinases are regulated by intramolecular interactions and by heterologous binding partners that modulate the transition between active and inactive structural conformations. p130(CAS) (CAS) binds directly to both the SH2 and SH3 domains of c-SRC and therefore has the potential to structurally alter and activate this kinase. In this report, we demonstrate that overexpression of full-length CAS in COS-1 cells induces c-SRC-dependent tyrosine phosphorylation of multiple endogenous cellular proteins. A carboxy-terminal fragment of CAS (CAS-CT), which contains the c-SRC binding site, was sufficient to induce c-SRC-dependent protein tyrosine kinase activity, as measured by tyrosine phosphorylation of cortactin, paxillin, and, to a lesser extent, focal adhesion kinase. A single amino acid substitution located in the binding site for the SRC SH3 domain of CAS-CT disrupted CAS-CT's interaction with c-SRC and inhibited its ability to induce tyrosine phosphorylation of cortactin and paxillin. Murine C3H10T1/2 fibroblasts that expressed elevated levels of tyrosine phosphorylated CAS and c-SRC-CAS complexes exhibited an enhanced ability to form colonies in soft agar and to proliferate in the absence of serum or growth factors. CAS-CT fully substituted for CAS in mediating growth in soft agar but was less effective in promoting serum-independent growth. These data suggest that CAS plays an important role in regulating specific signaling pathways governing cell growth and/or survival, in part through its ability to interact with and modulate the activity of c-SRC.

Bogeymen, lunatics and fanatics: collective actions and the private enforcement of European competition law

The European desire to ensure that bearers of EU rights are adequately compensated for any infringement of these rights, particularly in cases where the harm is widely diffused, and perhaps not even noticed by those affected by it, collides with another desire: to avoid the perceived excesses of an American-style system of class actions. The excesses of these American class actions are in European discourse presented as a sort of bogeyman, which is a source of irrational fear, often presented by parental or other authority figures. But when looked at critically, the bogeyman disappears. In this paper, I examine the European (and UK) proposals for collective action. I compare them to the American regime. The flaws and purported excesses of the American regime, I argue, are exaggerated. A close, objective examination of the American regime shows this. I conclude that it is not the mythical bogeyman of a US class action that is the barrier to effective collective redress; rather, the barriers to effective, wide-ranging group actions lie within European legal culture and traditions, particularly those mandating individual control over litigation.