New experimental model of exposure to environmental tobacco smoke

PURPOSE: To describe a new model to passive smoking for rodents. METHODS: Twenty rats were distributed into two study groups (N=10): control group (CG), that was not exposed to tobacco smoke and used as normal standard for biochemical and histological analysis; Experimental Group (EG), that Animals were exposed to the passive smoking; Euthanasia was performed after 14 days of exposure. The serum level of nicotine and histological analysis were performed. RESULTS: There was a statistical difference on the nicotine serum levels between Experimental and Control group, with level of 286 ±23 nanograma/mL in the EG and undetectable on CG (p<0.01). The histological study suggested the model efficacy producing alveolar destruction and emphysema in the EG compared with the insignificant lesions in the CG's lung. CONCLUSION: The model of exposure to environmental tobacco smoke for rodents induced easily the changes related to secondhand smoke.

A new experimental model of cigarette smoke-induced emphysema in Wistar rats

Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES)

New markov chain based methods for single and cross-domain sentiment classification

Nowadays communication is switching from a centralized scenario, where communication media like newspapers, radio, TV programs produce information and people are just consumers, to a completely different decentralized scenario, where everyone is potentially an information producer through the use of social networks, blogs, forums that allow a real-time worldwide information exchange. These new instruments, as a result of their widespread diffusion, have started playing an important socio-economic role. They are the most used communication media and, as a consequence, they constitute the main source of information enterprises, political parties and other organizations can rely on. Analyzing data stored in servers all over the world is feasible by means of Text Mining techniques like Sentiment Analysis, which aims to extract opinions from huge amount of unstructured texts. This could lead to determine, for instance, the user satisfaction degree about products, services, politicians and so on. In this context, this dissertation presents new Document Sentiment Classification methods based on the mathematical theory of Markov Chains. All these approaches bank on a Markov Chain based model, which is language independent and whose killing features are simplicity and generality, which make it interesting with respect to previous sophisticated techniques. Every discussed technique has been tested in both Single-Domain and Cross-Domain Sentiment Classification areas, comparing performance with those of other two previous works. The performed analysis shows that some of the examined algorithms produce results comparable with the best methods in literature, with reference to both single-domain and cross-domain tasks, in $2$-classes (i.e. positive and negative) Document Sentiment Classification. However, there is still room for improvement, because this work also shows the way to walk in order to enhance performance, that is, a good novel feature selection process would be enough to outperform the state of the art. Furthermore, since some of the proposed approaches show promising results in $2$-classes Single-Domain Sentiment Classification, another future work will regard validating these results also in tasks with more than $2$ classes.

A new rabbit model for the study of early brain injury after subarachnoid hemorrhage.

Pathophysiological disturbances during subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH) and within the first few days thereafter are responsible for significant brain damage. Early brain injury (EBI) after SAH has become the focus of current research activities. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate whether a novel rabbit SAH model provokes EBI by means of neuronal degeneration, brain tissue death, and apoptosis in cerebral vascular endothelial cells.

Clinical and biochemical description of a novel CYP21A2 gene mutation 962_963insA using a new 3D model for the P450c21 protein

OBJECTIVE: A severely virilized 46, XX newborn girl was referred to our center for evaluation and treatment of congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) because of highly elevated 17alpha-hydroxyprogesterone levels at newborn screening; biochemical tests confirmed the diagnosis of salt-wasting CAH. Genetic analysis revealed that the girl was compound heterozygote for a previously reported Q318X mutation in exon 8 and a novel insertion of an adenine between nucleotides 962 and 963 in exon 4 of the CYP21A2 gene. This 962_963insA mutation created a frameshift leading to a stop codon at amino acid 161 of the P450c21 protein. AIM AND METHODS: To better understand structure-function relationships of mutant P450c21 proteins, we performed multiple sequence alignments of P450c21 with three mammalian P450s (P450 2C8, 2C9 and 2B4) with known structures as well as with human P450c17. Comparative molecular modeling of human P450c21 was then performed by MODELLER using the X-ray crystal structure of rabbit P450 2B4 as a template. RESULTS: The new three dimensional model of human P450c21 and the sequence alignment were found to be helpful in predicting the role of various amino acids in P450c21, especially those involved in heme binding and interaction with P450 oxidoreductase, the obligate electron donor. CONCLUSION: Our model will help in analyzing the genotype-phenotype relationship of P450c21 mutations which have not been tested for their functional activity in an in vitro assay.

Monetary Policy, Exchange Rate Overshooting, and Endogenous Physical Capital

We develop an open economy macroeconomic model with real capital accumulation and microeconomic foundations. We show that expansionary monetary policy causes exchange rate overshooting, not once, but potentially twice; the secondary repercussion comes through the reaction of firms to changed asset prices and the firms' decisions to invest in real capital. The model sheds further light on the volatility of real and nominal exchange rates, and it suggests that changes in corporate sector profitability may affect exchange rates through international portfolio diversification in corporate securities.

The Making of Optimal and Consistent Policy: An Implementation Theory Framework for Monetary Policy

This paper shows that optimal policy and consistent policy outcomes require the use of control-theory and game-theory solution techniques. While optimal policy and consistent policy often produce different outcomes even in a one-period model, we analyze consistent policy and its outcome in a simple model, finding that the cause of the inconsistency with optimal policy traces to inconsistent targets in the social loss function. As a result, the social loss function cannot serve as a direct loss function for the central bank. Accordingly, we employ implementation theory to design a central bank loss function (mechanism design) with consistent targets, while the social loss function serves as a social welfare criterion. That is, with the correct mechanism design for the central bank loss function, optimal policy and consistent policy become identical. In other words, optimal policy proves implementable (consistent).

Consistent Targets and Optimal Monetary Policy: A Note

Kydland and Prescott (1977) develop a simple model of monetary policy making, where the central bank needs some commitment technique to achieve optimal monetary policy over time. Although not their main focus, they illustrate the difference between consistent and optimal policy in a sequential-decision one-period world. We employ the analytical method developed in Yuan and Miller (2005), whereby the government appoints a central bank with consistent targets or delegates consistent targets to the central bank. Thus, the central bank s welfare function differs from the social welfare function, which cause consistent policy to prove optimal.

Monetary Policy Under a Currency Board

The consensus view is that central banks under currency boards do not have tools for active monetary policy. In this paper, we analyze the foreign exchange fee as a monetary policy instrument that can be used by a central bank under a currency board. We develop a general equilibrium model showing that changes in this fee may have the same effects as a change in the monetary policy stance. Thus central banks under the currency board are shown to have an avenue to implement active monetary policy.

Monetary Policy Effects in Developing Countries with Minimum Wages

Using a Dynamic General Equilibrium (DGE) model, this study examines the effects of monetary policy in economies where minimum wages are bound. The findings show that the monetary-policy effect on a binding-minimum-wage economy is relatively small and quite persistent. This result suggests that these two characteristics of monetary policy in the minimum-wage model are rather different from those in the union-negotiation model which is often assumed to account for industrial economies.

Research review : searching for a new framework for Thailand's foreign policy in the post-cold war era

Thai foreign policy in the 1990s has been said to be contingent on the government in power, which changes between (or within) these groups and vacillates between pro-democratic reformists/principle-pursuers and the conservatives/profit-seekers. In these studies, Thailand’s Indochinese policy has often been referred to as a typical consequence of politics between the pragmatists and the reformists. However, whether or not domestic oppositional politics is the key determinant of foreign policy in the post-Cold War era still requires further examination, precisely because the model is now facing serious challenges between theory and reality. In this paper, I review the existing arguments concerning Thailand’s foreign policy in the post-Cold War Era and point out their limitations and questions for future study.

International Capital Flows and Monetary Policy Spillovers

This dissertation examines the drivers and implications of international capital flows. The overarching motivation is the observation that countries not at the centre of global financial markets are subject to considerable spillovers from centre countries, notably from their monetary policy. I present new empirical evidence on the determinants of the observed patterns of international capital flows and monetary policy spillovers, and study their effect on both financial markets and the real economy. In Chapter 2 I provide evidence on the determinants of a puzzling negative correlation observed between productivity growth and net capital inflows to developing and emerging market economies (EMEs) since 1980. By disaggregating net capital inflows into their gross components, I show that this negative correlation is explained by capital outflows related to purchases of very liquid assets from the fastest growing countries. My results suggest a desire for international portfolio diversification in liquid assets by fast growing countries is driving much of the original puzzle. In the reminder of my dissertation I pivot to study the foreign characteristics that drive international capital flows and monetary policy spillovers, with a particular focus on the role of unconventional monetary policy in the United States (U.S.). In Chapter 3 I show that a significant portion of the heterogeneity in EMEs' asset price adjustment following the quantitative easing operations by the Federal Reserve (the Fed) during 2008-2014 can be explained by the degree of bilateral capital market frictions between these countries and the U.S. This is true even after accounting for capital controls, exchange rate regimes, and domestic monetary policies. Chapter 4, co-authored with Michal Ksawery Popiel, studies unconventional monetary policy in a small open economy, looking specifically at the case of Canada since the global financial crisis. We quantify the effect Canadian unconventional monetary policy shocks had on the real economy, while carefully controlling for and quantifying spillovers from U.S. unconventional monetary policy. Our results indicate that the Bank of Canada's unconventional monetary policy increased Canadian output significantly from 2009-2010, but that spillovers from the Fed's policy were even more important for increasing Canadian output after 2008.

Fiscal policy, banks and the financial crisis. National Bank of Belgium Working Paper No. 234, October 2012

This paper studies the effectiveness of Euro Area (EA) fiscal policy, during the recent financial crisis, using an estimated New Keynesian model with a bank. A key dimension of policy in the crisis was massive government support for banks—that dimension has so far received little attention in the macroeconomics literature. We use the estimated model to analyze the effects of bank asset losses, of government support for banks, and other fiscal stimulus measures, in the EA. Our results suggest that support for banks had a stabilizing effect on EA output, consumption and investment. Increased government purchases helped to stabilize output, but crowded out consumption. Higher transfers to households had a positive impact on private consumption, but a negligible effect on output and investment. Banking shocks and increased government spending explain half of the rise in the public debt/GDP ratio since the onset of the crisis.

Monetary policy and risk taking. Bruegel Working Paper 2010/00, February 2010

We assess, through VAR evidence, the effects of monetary policy on banks’ risk exposure and find the presence of a risk-taking channel. A model combining fragile banks prone to risk mis-incentives and credit constrained firms, whose collateral fluctuations generate a balance sheet channel, is used to rationalize the evidence. A monetary expansion increases bank leverage. With two consequences: on the one side this exacerbates risk exposure; on the other, the risk spiral depresses output, therefore dampening the conventional amplification effect of the financial accelerator. Keywords: monetary policy, bank behavior, leverage, financial accelerator.

Foreign central banking: the instruments of monetary policy.

Mode of access: Internet.