Central Interest (central + interest)

Distribution by Scientific Domains
Business, Economics, Finance and Accounting75%

Selected Abstracts

Regulated Quality Diffusion Revisited

INTERNATIONAL TRANSACTIONS IN OPERATIONAL RESEARCH, Issue 4 2001
Andreas J. Novak
In many manufacturing applications, the regulation of a quality process to attain a given target is of central interest. In a recent paper, Liu and Nam (1999) present a model of optimal quality regulation. The underlying quality process evolves due to regulation actions and superimposed random disturbances. Optimal regulation is sought as to minimize the regulation costs and the mean squared deviation from the desired target over a finite time horizon. Unfortunately the model is incorrectly analyzed in Liu and Nam (1999), and we therefore present the correct results in the following paper. [source]

IDENTIFICATION AND COMPARATIVE GENOMIC ANALYSIS OF SIGNALING AND REGULATORY COMPONENTS IN THE DIATOM THALASSIOSIRA PSEUDONANA,

JOURNAL OF PHYCOLOGY, Issue 3 2007
Anton Montsant
Diatoms are unicellular brown algae that likely arose from the endocytobiosis of a red alga into a single-celled heterotroph and that constitute an algal class of major importance in phytoplankton communities around the globe. The first whole-genome sequence from a diatom species, Thalassiosira pseudonana Hasle et Heimdal, was recently reported, and features that are central to diatom physiology and ecology, such as silicon and nitrogen metabolism, iron uptake, and carbon concentration mechanisms, were described. Following this initial study, the basic cellular systems controlling cell signaling, gene expression, cytoskeletal structures, and response to stress have been cataloged in an attempt to obtain a global view of the molecular foundations that sustain such an ecologically successful group of organisms. Comparative analysis with several microbial, plant, and metazoan complete genome sequences allowed the identification of putative membrane receptors, signaling proteins, and other components of central interest to diatom ecophysiology and evolution. Thalassiosira pseudonana likely perceives light through a novel phytochrome and several cryptochrome photoreceptors; it may lack the conserved RHO small-GTPase subfamily of cell-polarity regulators, despite undergoing polarized cell-wall synthesis; and it possesses an unusually large number of heat-shock transcription factors, which may indicate the central importance of transcriptional responses to environmental stress. The availability of the complete gene repertoire will permit a detailed biochemical and genetic analysis of how diatoms prosper in aquatic environments and will contribute to the understanding of eukaryotic evolution. [source]

Fiscal and Regulatory Competition: Theory and Evidence

PERSPEKTIVEN DER WIRTSCHAFTSPOLITIK, Issue 4 2002
Wallace E. Oates
This paper reviews first the theoretical literature and then the empirical studies of interjurisdictional competition among governments. Of central interest is the normative question of whether fiscal and regulatory competition promotes a more efficient functioning of the public sector or whether it is the source of distortions in the public and private sectors. This is a contentious issue; both the theoretical and empirical literature, while providing some rich insights into the potential impact of such competition, do not give us an unambiguous answer to the general normative question. The concluding section offers the author's thoughts on all this with a leaning towards the view that such competition is, on balance, efficiency,enhancing. [source]

Output Gaps In Real Time: How Reliable Are They?

THE ECONOMIC RECORD, Issue 252 2005
DAVID GRUEN
The output gap is of central interest to policymakers. Being unobservable, however, its estimation is prone to error, particularly in real time. Errors result from revisions to the data and unavoidable end-point problems associated with the econometric techniques used to estimate it. This is the first study of the seriousness of these problems for Australia. Over a 28-year period, we obtain real-time output-gap estimates which are unbiased and highly correlated with final estimates derived with the latest data and the benefit of hindsight. We conclude that reasonably reliable output gap estimates can be obtained in real time. [source]