Consumer Expertise or Credit Risk? An empirical analysis of mortgage pricing

Loan mortgage interest rates are usually the result of a bank-customer negotiation process. Credit risk, consumer cross-buying potential, bundling, financial market competition and other features affecting the bargaining power of the parties could affect price. We argue that, since mortgage loan is a complex product, consumer expertise could be a relevant factor for mortgage pricing. Using data on mortgage loan prices for a sample of 1055 households for the year 2005 (Bank of Spain Survey of Household Finances, EFF-2005), and including credit risk, costs, potential capacity of the consumer to generate future business and bank competition variables, the regression results indicate that consumer expertise-related metrics are highly significant as predictors of mortgage loan prices. Other factors such as credit risk and consumer cross-buying potential do not have such a significant impact on mortgage prices. Our empirical results are affected by the credit conditions prior to the financial crisis and could shed some light on this issue.

Ca2+ Influx and Tyrosine Kinases Trigger Bordetella Adenylate Cyclase Toxin (ACT) Endocytosis. Cell Physiology and Expression of the CD11b/CD18 Integrin Major Determinants of the Entry Route

Humans infected with Bordetella pertussis, the whooping cough bacterium, show evidences of impaired host defenses. This pathogenic bacterium produces a unique adenylate cyclase toxin (ACT) which enters human phagocytes and catalyzes the unregulated formation of cAMP, hampering important bactericidal functions of these immune cells that eventually cause cell death by apoptosis and/or necrosis. Additionally, ACT permeabilizes cells through pore formation in the target cell membrane. Recently, we demonstrated that ACT is internalised into macrophages together with other membrane components, such as the integrin CD11b/CD18 (CR3), its receptor in these immune cells, and GM1. The goal of this study was to determine whether ACT uptake is restricted to receptor-bearing macrophages or on the contrary may also take place into cells devoid of receptor and gain more insights on the signalling involved. Here, we show that ACT is rapidly eliminated from the cell membrane of either CR3-positive as negative cells, though through different entry routes, which depends in part, on the target cell physiology and characteristics. ACT-induced Ca2+ influx and activation of non-receptor Tyr kinases into the target cell appear to be common master denominators in the different endocytic strategies activated by this toxin. Very importantly, we show that, upon incubation with ACT, target cells are capable of repairing the cell membrane, which suggests the mounting of an anti-toxin cell repair-response, very likely involving the toxin elimination from the cell surface.

RCeveierwamide and ceramide 1-phosphate in health and disease

Sphingolipids are essential components of cell membranes, and many of them regulate vital cell functions. In particular, ceramide plays crucial roles in cell signaling processes. Two major actions of ceramides are the promotion of cell cycle arrest and the induction of apoptosis. Phosphorylation of ceramide produces ceramide 1-phosphate (C1P), which has opposite effects to ceramide. C1P is mitogenic and has prosurvival properties. In addition, C1P is an important mediator of inflammatory responses, an action that takes place through stimulation of cytosolic phospholipase A2, and the subsequent release of arachidonic acid and prostaglandin formation. All of the former actions are thought to be mediated by intracellularly generated C1P. However, the recent observation that C1P stimulates macrophage chemotaxis implicates specific plasma membrane receptors that are coupled to Gi proteins. Hence, it can be concluded that C1P has dual actions in cells, as it can act as an intracellular second messenger to promote cell survival, or as an extracellular receptor agonist to stimulate cell migration.

Looking for safe harbor in a crowded sea: Coastal space use conflict and marine renewable energy development

Technological advances in the marine renewable energy industry and increased clarity about the leasing and licensing process are fostering development proposals in both state and federal waters. The ocean is becoming more industrialized and competition among all marine space users is developing (Buck et al. 2004). More spatial competition can lead to conflict between ocean users themselves, and to tensions that spill over to include other stakeholders and the general public (McGrath 2004). Such conflict can wind up in litigation, which is costly and takes agency time and financial resources away from other priorities. As proposals for marine renewable energy developments are evaluated, too often decision-makers lack the tools and information to properly account for the cumulative effects and the tradeoffs associated with alternative human uses of the ocean. This paper highlights the nature of marine space conflicts associated with marine renewable energy literature highlights key issues for the growth of the marine renewable energy sector in the United States. (PDF contains 4 pages)

Oceans and human health: Sentinel habitats and sentinel species

The health of the oceans and people are inextricably linked. For many years we focused research and policy on anthropogenic impacts to oceans and coasts. Recently we have started to think about how the health of the oceans affects us. In response to the Oceans and Human Health Act of 2004, a NOAA initiative was created to explore the “One Health” of the oceans and coasts. The Center of Excellence in Oceans and Human Health at Hollings Marine Laboratory (HML) is one of three Centers dedicated to understanding the connections and forecasting changes in ocean and coastal health and human health. The Center at HML is developing new tools and approaches, including sentinel habitats and sentinel species, to evaluate linkages between ecological process and human health and wellbeing. The results provide environmental and public health managers, policy-makers and communities forecasts and assessments to improve ecosystem-based management that protects health and mitigates risks for the oceans, coasts and people.(PDF contains 4 pages)

Community sense and response systems

The proliferation of smartphones and other internet-enabled, sensor-equipped consumer devices enables us to sense and act upon the physical environment in unprecedented ways. This thesis considers Community Sense-and-Response (CSR) systems, a new class of web application for acting on sensory data gathered from participants' personal smart devices. The thesis describes how rare events can be reliably detected using a decentralized anomaly detection architecture that performs client-side anomaly detection and server-side event detection. After analyzing this decentralized anomaly detection approach, the thesis describes how weak but spatially structured events can be detected, despite significant noise, when the events have a sparse representation in an alternative basis. Finally, the thesis describes how the statistical models needed for client-side anomaly detection may be learned efficiently, using limited space, via coresets.

The Caltech Community Seismic Network (CSN) is a prototypical example of a CSR system that harnesses accelerometers in volunteers' smartphones and consumer electronics. Using CSN, this thesis presents the systems and algorithmic techniques to design, build and evaluate a scalable network for real-time awareness of spatial phenomena such as dangerous earthquakes.

Decarbonising urban transportation

18 p.

Human muscle spindles act as forward sensory models.

Modern theories of motor control incorporate forward models that combine sensory information and motor commands to predict future sensory states. Such models circumvent unavoidable neural delays associated with on-line feedback control. Here we show that signals in human muscle spindle afferents during unconstrained wrist and finger movements predict future kinematic states of their parent muscle. Specifically, we show that the discharges of type Ia afferents are best correlated with the velocity of length changes in their parent muscles approximately 100-160 ms in the future and that their discharges vary depending on motor sequences in a way that cannot be explained by the state of their parent muscle alone. We therefore conclude that muscle spindles can act as "forward sensory models": they are affected both by the current state of their parent muscle and by efferent (fusimotor) control, and their discharges represent future kinematic states. If this conjecture is correct, then sensorimotor learning implies learning how to control not only the skeletal muscles but also the fusimotor system.