Forecasting local currency bond risk premia of emerging markets: The role of cross-country macrofinancial linkages

In this paper, we forecast local currency debt of five major emerging market countries (Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, South Africa, and Turkey) over the period January 2010 to January 2019 (with an in-sample period: March 2005 to December 2009). We exploit information from a large set of economic and financial time series to assess the importance not only of “own-country” factors (derived from principal component and partial least squares approaches), but also create “global” predictors by combining the country-specific variables across the five emerging economies. We find that, while information on own-country factors can outperform the historical average model, global factors tend to produce not only greater statistical and economic gains, but also enhance market timing ability of investors, especially when we use the target variable (bond premium) approach under the partial least squares method to extract our factors. Our results have important implications not only for fund managers but also for policymakers.     

Electronic Medical Records (EMR) and Nurses in Turkish Hospitals

Electronic medical records (EMR) are generally used by nurses in hospitals. However, studies investigating views on and evaluations of EMR by nurses are limited in Turkey and in other countries around the world. In this study, nurses’ views on EMR systems were investigated in terms of “Nursing care management”, “Order entry”, “Information Management”, “Information quality”, “Service quality”, “Impact of EMR system on clinical care”. The purpose of this study was to investigate the views/perceptions on EMR used by nurses working at hospital clinics in Turkey. The research questions were: (a) What are nurses’ perceptions on EMR? (b) Were there relationships among nurses’ perceptions on EMR? (c) Were there differences among nurses’ perceptions on EMR according to hospitals in Turkey. This study is composed of field research conducted using questionnaires. To prepare the data-measuring instrument, the literature on EMR was reviewed. A Likert scale type was used in this questionnaire. The study was planned and conducted on nurses working at inpatient care units at four Turkish hospitals. At the end of this study, the questionnaire had been conducted on 517 nurses. Total response rate is 66.70 %. We found that the Information quality of EMR, impact of EMR system on clinical care and service quality were high level. Information quality has the highest mean score. EMR system is an important system for nurses’ hospital has the highest mean score in this study. Nurses feel about impact of EMR system on clinical care that generally ‘EMR system’s usefulness’, ‘improving quality of information due to EMR system’, ‘improving quality of nurses’ work’, ‘improving quality of information due to EMR system’. All of the six subscales of EMR were positively correlated with each other. This study revealed that there are significant differences among the mean scores for six subscales according to the ownership of hospitals. EMR systems were not well integrated into their workflow. In addition, half of all respondents had not been trained in using EMR systems. This study will added to evaluation views and assessments of nurses about EMR literature. The results will assist in determining “Information quality”, “Service quality”, of EMR, and “Impact of EMR system on clinical for nurses in Turkish health system”. This survey suggests that nurses favor the use of an EMR and suggests opportunities for EMR enhancement.     

最小相位系统的自适应鲁棒镇定

对一类ＭＩＭＯ最小相位系统，提出了一种适应鲁棒镇定的新策略，控制目的是通过一具固定结构的反馈控制器和一反馈增益自适应调节器而实现的，论文证明了，闭环的自适应控制系统的状态向量渐近趋于零，反馈增益趋近于某一常数。     

RNA interference screen for human genes associated with West Nile virus infection

West Nile virus (WNV), and related flaviviruses such as tick-borne encephalitis, Japanese encephalitis, yellow fever and dengue viruses, constitute a significant global human health problem. However, our understanding of the molecular interaction of such flaviviruses with mammalian host cells is limited. WNV encodes only 10 proteins, implying that it may use many cellular proteins for infection. WNV enters the cytoplasm through pH-dependent endocytosis, undergoes cycles of translation and replication, assembles progeny virions in association with endoplasmic reticulum, and exits along the secretory pathway. RNA interference (RNAi) presents a powerful forward genetics approach to dissect virus-host cell interactions. Here we report the identification of 305 host proteins that affect WNV infection, using a human-genome-wide RNAi screen. Functional clustering of the genes revealed a complex dependence of this virus on host cell physiology, requiring a wide variety of molecules and cellular pathways for successful infection. We further demonstrate a requirement for the ubiquitin ligase CBLL1 in WNV internalization, a post-entry role for the endoplasmic-reticulum-associated degradation pathway in viral infection, and the monocarboxylic acid transporter MCT4 as a viral replication resistance factor. By extending this study to dengue virus, we show that flaviviruses have both overlapping and unique interaction strategies with host cells. This study provides a comprehensive molecular portrait of WNV-human cell interactions that forms a model for understanding single plus-stranded RNA virus infection, and reveals potential antiviral targets.     

mTORC1 in the Paneth cell niche couples intestinal stem-cell function to calorie intake

How adult tissue stem and niche cells respond to the nutritional state of an organism is not well understood. Here we find that Paneth cells, a key constituent of the mammalian intestinal stem-cell (ISC) niche, augment stem-cell function in response to calorie restriction. Calorie restriction acts by reducing mechanistic target of rapamycin complex 1 (mTORC1) signalling in Paneth cells, and the ISC-enhancing effects of calorie restriction can be mimicked by rapamycin. Calorie intake regulates mTORC1 in Paneth cells, but not ISCs, and forced activation of mTORC1 in Paneth cells during calorie restriction abolishes the ISC-augmenting effects of the niche. Finally, increased expression of bone stromal antigen 1 (Bst1) in Paneth cells—an ectoenzyme that produces the paracrine factor cyclic ADP ribose—mediates the effects of calorie restriction and rapamycin on ISC function. Our findings establish that mTORC1 non-cell-autonomously regulates stem-cell self-renewal, and highlight a significant role of the mammalian intestinal niche in coupling stem-cell function to organismal physiology.     

The Lyme disease agent exploits a tick protein to infect the mammalian host

The Lyme disease agent, Borrelia burgdorferi, is maintained in a tick-mouse cycle. Here we show that B. burgdorferi usurps a tick salivary protein, Salp15 (ref. 3), to facilitate the infection of mice. The level of salp15 expression was selectively enhanced by the presence of B. burgdorferi in Ixodes scapularis, first indicating that spirochaetes might use Salp15 during transmission. Salp15 was then shown to adhere to the spirochaete, both in vitro and in vivo, and specifically interacted with B. burgdorferi outer surface protein C. The binding of Salp15 protected B. burgdorferi from antibody-mediated killing in vitro and provided spirochaetes with a marked advantage when they were inoculated into naive mice or animals previously infected with B. burgdorferi. Moreover, RNA interference-mediated repression of salp15 in I. scapularis drastically reduced the capacity of tick-borne spirochaetes to infect mice. These results show the capacity of a pathogen to use a secreted arthropod protein to help it colonize the mammalian host.     

无抗倾覆锚固件木结构剪力墙侧向变形计算

为了限制地震与风对建筑物造成的损坏,估算建筑物的侧向变形已成为建筑结构设计的重要内容.尽管有些国家的建筑规范中已给出了估算木结构剪力墙侧向变形的方法,但这些方法并不适用于无抗倾覆锚固件木结构剪力墙.在Forintek 钉节点试验结果的基础上,建议一个新的钉节点--侧向荷载-变形公式,并将美国<统一建筑规范>(Uniform Building Code)所采用的四项式变形公式进行了扩展,给出能进行无抗倾覆锚固件木结构剪力墙侧向变形计算的公式.计算预测值与试验结果对比较好.     

Pten dependence distinguishes haematopoietic stem cells from leukaemia-initiating cells

Recent advances have highlighted extensive phenotypic and functional similarities between normal stem cells and cancer stem cells. This raises the question of whether disease therapies can be developed that eliminate cancer stem cells without eliminating normal stem cells. Here we address this issue by conditionally deleting the Pten tumour suppressor gene in adult haematopoietic cells. This led to myeloproliferative disease within days and transplantable leukaemias within weeks. Pten deletion also promoted haematopoietic stem cell (HSC) proliferation. However, this led to HSC depletion via a cell-autonomous mechanism, preventing these cells from stably reconstituting irradiated mice. In contrast to leukaemia-initiating cells, HSCs were therefore unable to maintain themselves without Pten. These effects were mostly mediated by mTOR as they were inhibited by rapamycin. Rapamycin not only depleted leukaemia-initiating cells but also restored normal HSC function. Mechanistic differences between normal stem cells and cancer stem cells can thus be targeted to deplete cancer stem cells without damaging normal stem cells.