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Peripheral Regions (peripheral + regions)
Selected AbstractsFluctuating Rounds of Inward Investment in Peripheral Regions: Semiconductors in the North East of EnglandECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY, Issue 1 2007Stuart Dawley Abstract: This article extends economic geography research on foreign direct investment episodes by developing a historically grounded understanding of the socio-institutional relations that shape and constrain different rounds of (dis)investment by multinational enterprises (MNEs) within a host region. Sensitive to the roles of contextuality, path dependency, and contingency, it argues that the temporal and spatial dynamics of volatile MNE (dis)investment are best tackled using a conceptual framework that accords a full and active role to the agency of the firm and its interrelations with the geographically variable socioinstitutional contexts that produce, regulate, and mediate investment decisions. The framework is used to interpret the brief but fluctuating history of the semiconductor fabrication industry in North Tyneside in the old industrial region of North East England. Within each investment episode, the empirical findings reveal the pivotal power and agency of the corporation in shaping and connecting processes across a variety of scales, places, and times. Contrasting corporate strategies illustrate the dynamic and contingent ways in which home and host national institutional contexts matter in mediating and regulating MNE investment decisions. [source] Innovation and Regional Growth in the Enlarged Europe: The Role of Local Innovative Capabilities, Peripherality, and EducationGROWTH AND CHANGE, Issue 4 2005RICCARDO CRESCENZI ABSTRACT In this paper, a formal model for the relationship between innovation and growth in European Union regions is developed drawing upon the theoretical contribution of the systems of innovation approach. The model combines the analytical approach of the regional growth models with the insights of the systemic approach. The cross-sectional analysis, covering all the Enlarged Europe (EU-25) regions (for which data are available), shows that regional innovative activities (for which a specific measure is developed) play a significant role in determining differential regional growth patterns. Furthermore, the model sheds light on how geographical accessibility and human capital accumulation, by shaping the regional system of innovation, interact (in a statistically significant way) with local innovative activities, thus allowing them to be more (or less) effectively translated into economic growth. The paper shows that an increase in innovative effort is not necessarily likely to produce the same effect in all EU-25 regions. Indeed, the empirical analysis suggests that in order to allow innovative efforts in peripheral regions to be as productive as in core areas, they need to be complemented by huge investments in human capital. [source] From R&D to Innovation and Economic Growth in the EUGROWTH AND CHANGE, Issue 4 2004Beńat Bilbao-Osorio ABSTRACT Over the last two decades many European governments have pursued ambitious research and development (R&D) policies with the aim of fostering innovation and economic growth in peripheral regions of Europe. The question is whether these policies are paying off. Arguments such as the need to reach a minimum threshold of research, the existence of important distance decay effects in the diffusion of technological spillovers, the presence of increasing returns to scale in R&D investments, or the unavailability of the necessary socio-economic conditions in these regions to generate innovation seem to cast doubts about the possible returns of these sort of policies. This paper addresses this question. A two-step analysis is used in order to first identify the impact of R&D investment of the private, public, and higher education sectors on innovation (measured as the number of patent applications per million population). The influence of innovation and innovation growth on economic growth is then addressed. The results indicate that R&D investment, as a whole, and higher education R&D investment in peripheral regions of the EU, in particular, are positively associated with innovation. The existence and strength of this association are, however, contingent upon region-specific socio-economic characteristics, which affect the capacity of each region to transform R&D investment into innovation and, eventually, innovation into economic growth. [source] At Peace but Insecure The Paradoxes of Post-Soviet LifeIDS BULLETIN, Issue 2 2001Thomas Lines Summaries This article examines the forms of insecurity which have developed in the societies of the Commonwealth of Independent States since the USSR broke up in 1991. That huge political upheaval was remarkable for the lack of overt conflict that accompanied it: restricted wars in a few peripheral regions and only isolated episodes of political violence and social unrest elsewhere. Yet most citizens of these twelve countries have seen the manifold security of their lives under the Soviet Union vanish. Exposed often for the first time to crime, they have also lost secure entitlements to employment, housing, education, health care and old-age pensions, as well as cheap utilities and housing. For many people the overriding sense has been one of loss, as even the political security gained with the reduction in repression is compromised by the instability of the USSR's weak successor states. The article examines the paradox of a situation of pervasive human insecurity in a region which so far has remained largely at peace. [source] Stimulus size and the variability of the threshold response in the central and peripheral visual fieldOPHTHALMIC AND PHYSIOLOGICAL OPTICS, Issue 6 2002L. S. Kim Purpose:, The investigation of the peripheral visual field has shown considerable interest for the investigation of field loss attributed to anticonvulsant therapy. The purpose was to determine the within-visit between-subject, the between-visit between-subject, and the between-location variability of the threshold response in the normal eye with increase in stimulus eccentricity out to 60° as a function of stimulus size. Methods:, Forty-eight normal subjects attended for a total of three visits (mean age = 49.5 years, SD = 18.9, range 22,84 years). At the first visit, one randomly assigned eye of each subject was examined with the Humphrey Field Analyzer 750 (Carl Zeiss, Jena, Germany) and the Full Threshold algorithm using Programs 30,2 and 60,4 and stimulus sizes III and V. The combination of stimulus size and of program, and the order of the combination within- and between-sessions, were randomized for each subject. The results of the first visit were considered as a familiarization period and were discarded. The protocol at the second and third visits was identical to that at the first visit for each subject. Results:, The ratio of the SD of the group mean sensitivity was determined at each stimulus location for stimulus size III compared with stimulus size V for Programs 30,2 and 60,4 at visit 3. The SDs were greater than unity for Program 30,2 (p < 0.0001) and for Program 60,4 (p < 0.0001) indicating greater variability for the size III stimulus. The SDs were also greater than unity for the central inner zone (p < 0.0001), central outer zone (p < 0.0001) and peripheral inner zone (p < 0.0001). The ratios in the peripheral outer zone were not quite greater than unity (p = 0.054). The ratios increased with increase in eccentricity by up to 2.7 times between 15° and 30° eccentricity and by up to 2.7 times between 30° and 60° eccentricity. The group mean ratio did not vary significantly between the two visits for Program 30,2 stimulus size III (p = 0.563), Program 60,4 stimulus size III (p = 0.935) and for Program 60,4 stimulus size V (p = 0.005). However, the group mean SD was lower at visit 3 compared with visit 2 for Program 30,2 stimulus size V (p = 0.0004). The SDs associated with the extreme peripheral locations in the superior and nasal fields were smaller for stimulus size III because the threshold was frequently attenuated by lid and facial contour. Conclusions:, Considerably narrower confidence limits for normality for the peripheral regions of Program 30,2 and for 60,4 are demonstrated with the use of Goldmann size V. [source] Why some regions will decline: A Canadian case study with thoughts on local development strategies,PAPERS IN REGIONAL SCIENCE, Issue 1 2006Mario Polčse Regional development; local development; periphery; location; economic decline Abstract., The authors present the case of five Canadian peripheral regions, which they argue are destined to decline. The explanation of the reasons why future decline (in absolute population and employment numbers) is inevitable constitutes the article's central focus. The authors suggest that regional decline will become an increasingly common occurrence in nations at the end of the demographic transition whose economic geographies display centre-periphery relationships. Such broad structural trends cannot be easily altered by public policy. The authors reflect on the implications of regional decline for the formulation of local economic development strategies. Local economic development strategies should not, they argue, be advanced as a means of arresting population and employment decline. To suggest that the regions studied in this article will decline because of a lack of social capital or insufficient number of local entrepreneurs, is not only misleading but may also be counterproductive. [source] The long-term effects of perinatal glucocorticoid exposure on the host defence system of the respiratory tractTHE JOURNAL OF PATHOLOGY, Issue 1 2006E Theogaraj Abstract Glucocorticoids are used to mature the fetal lung at times of threatened premature delivery. These drugs modify leukocyte profiles when administered in adulthood, but their effects on the mature host defence system following administration during the perinatal period are incompletely understood. In this study, the long-term effects of perinatal dexamethasone exposure on rodent host defence cells in the pulmonary airspaces, the perivascular compartment of the lung, and the blood were investigated. Rats were treated prenatally (gestational days 16,19) or neonatally (postnatal days 1,7) by inclusion of dexamethasone in the mothers' drinking water (1 µg/ml). The pups were then allowed to develop to adulthood (P60-80), at which time respiratory tissues were collected for light and electron microscopy and bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL), and blood for cell count and fluorescent activated cell-sorting (FACS) analysis. Prenatal treatment had no effect on any parameter examined. Following neonatal dexamethasone exposure, light microscopy of the lung tissue revealed a significant reduction in the number of cells in the perivascular space in both the central and the peripheral regions of the adult lung, but no differences in the number of cells in the airspaces. Neonatal dexamethasone exposure was also characterized by a significant reduction in the total number of white cells in the peripheral blood in adulthood and in particular, the number of lymphocytes relative to neutrophils was significantly reduced at maturity in these animals. The results show that neonatal, but not prenatal, dexamethasone exposure significantly alters the distribution of host defence cells in the blood and lung at maturity compared with control animals. The early neonatal period is characterized by the stress hyporesponsive period in the rat, when endogenous glucocorticoid levels are very low. Therefore, exogenous glucocorticoids administered during this time are likely to have marked ,programming' effects on glucocorticoid-sensitive tissues. Copyright © 2006 Pathological Society of Great Britain and Ireland. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Regional specialization of the Ganglion cell density in the retina of the Ostrich (Struthio camelus)ANIMAL SCIENCE JOURNAL, Issue 1 2010Mohammad L. RAHMAN ABSTRACT In this study, retinal whole-mount specimens were prepared and stained with 0.1% cresyl violet for the ganglion cell study in the Ostrich (Struthio camelus). The total number, distribution, and size of these cells were determined in different retinal regions. The mean total number of ganglion cells (three retinas) was 1 435 052 with an average density of 652 cells/mm2. The temporo , nasal area of the retina with high cell density were identified with the peak of 7525 cells/mm2 in the central area. The size of most ganglion cells ranged from 113,403 µm2, with smaller cells predominating along the temporo-nasal streak above the optic disc and larger cells comprising more of the peripheral regions. The average thickness of the retina was 196 µm. The central area was the thickest area (268.6 µm), whereas the peripheral area was the thinnest area. Thus, the specialization of ganglion cell densities, their sizes and the thickness of the retina support the notion that the conduction of visual information towards the brain from all regions of the retina is not uniform, and suggests that the temporo , nasal streak is the fine quality area for vision in ostriches. [source] TRANSFER OF FACIALLY INJURED ROAD TRAUMA VICTIMS AND ITS IMPACT ON TREATMENTANZ JOURNAL OF SURGERY, Issue 6 2005Martin Batstone Background: Road trauma is a common cause of severe facial injuries. The aim of the present study is to define patients involved, and determine the effect of their geographical origin on treatment and follow up. Methods: All patients over 14 years of age suffering facial injuries caused by road trauma presenting to the two study hospitals from 1994 to 1999 were identified and details were collected on demographic details and treatment. Results: Four hundred and nine patients met the inclusion criteria. The majority required hospital transfer. Young men were the most frequently injured group of patients. Patients from peripheral regions had significant delays in transfer and treatment. They were made fewer outpatient appointments but attended at the same frequency as patients from the immediate region of the study hospitals. Conclusions: To minimize delays the process of patient transfer needs to be streamlined and education of staff in peripheral hospitals undertaken regarding facial injuries. [source] 40Ar/39Ar Dating of Xuebaoding Granite in the Songpan-Garzę Orogenic Belt, Southwest China, and its Geological SignificanceACTA GEOLOGICA SINICA (ENGLISH EDITION), Issue 2 2010Yan LIU Abstract: Thus far, our understanding of the emplacement of Xuebaoding granite and the occurrence and evolution of the Songpan-Garzę Orogenic Belt has been complicated by differing age spectra results. Therefore, in this study, the 40Ar/39Ar and sensitive high resolution ion micro-probe (SHRIMP) U-Pb dating methods were both used and the results compared, particularly with respect to dating data for Pankou and Pukouling granites from Xuebaoding, to establish ages that are close to the real emplacements. The results of SHRIMP U-Pb dating for zircon showed a high amount of U, but a very low value for Th/U. The high U amount, coupled with characteristics of inclusions in zircons, indicates that Xuebaoding granites are not suitable for U-Pb dating. Therefore, muscovite in the same granite samples was selected for 40Ar/39Ar dating. The 40Ar/39Ar age spectrum obtained on bulk muscovite from Pukouling granite in the Xuebaoding, gave a plateau age of 200.1±1.2 Ma and an inverse isochron age of 200.6±1.2 Ma. The 40Ar/39Ar age spectrum obtained on bulk muscovite from Pankou granite in the Xuebaoding gave another plateau age of 193.4± 1.1 Ma and an inverse isochron age of 193.7±1.1 Ma. The 40Ar/39Ar intercept of 277.0±23.4 (2,) was very close to the air ratio, indicating that no apparent excess argon contamination was present These age dating spectra indicate that both granites were emplaced at 200.6±1.3 Ma and 193.7±1.1 Ma, respectively. Through comparison of both dating methods and their results, we can conclude that it is feasible that the muscovite in the granite bearing high U could be used for 40Ar/39Ar dating without extra Ar. Based on this evidence, as well as the geological characteristics of the Xuebaoding W-Sn-Be deposit and petrology of granites, it can be concluded that the material origin of the Xuebaoding W-Sn-Be deposit might partially originate from the Xuebaoding granite group emplacement at about 200 Ma. Moreover, compared with other granites and deposits distributed in various positions in the Songpan-Garzę Orogenic Belt, the Xuebaoding emplacement ages further show that the main rare metal deposits and granites in peripheral regions occurred earlier than those in the inner Songpan-Garzę. Therefore, 40Ar/39Ar dating of Xuebaoding granite will lay a solid foundation for studying the occurrence and evolution of granite and rare earth element deposits in the Songpan-Garzę Orogenic Belt. [source] | |||||||||||||