The New Zealand emissions trading scheme (NZ ETS) is one of the first national-level GHG trading schemes outside Europe. It is also unique in its design and comprehensive sectoral coverage, including forestry. This paper provides an ex-post-assessment of market behavior in the NZ ETS in its first phase (2008-2012). Findings are based on quantitative evidence on prices and units, as well as qualita

We introduce a new solution concept to problems with externalities, which is the first in the literature to take into account economic, regulatory and physical stability aspects of network problems in the very same model. A new class of cooperative games is defined where the worth of a coalition depends on the behavior of other players and on the state of nature as well. We allow for coalitions to

BACKGROUND: In a retrospective study on node-negative breast cancer, a prognostic index consisting of a proliferation factor, S-phase fraction (SPF), progesterone receptor status (PR), and tumour size identified one-third of patients as high risk, with a sixfold increased risk of breast cancer death. This prospective multicenter cohort study was set up to validate the index. PATIENTS AND METHODS:

Matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) degrade extracellular matrix proteins and play important roles in development and tissue repair. They have also been shown to have both protective and pathogenic effects in atherosclerosis, and experimental studies have suggested that MMP-12 contributes to plaque growth and destabilization. The objective of this study was to investigate the associations between cir

Free-living organisms are exposed to a wide range of stressors, all of which can disrupt components of stress-related and detoxification physiology. The subsequent accumulation of somatic damage is widely believed to play a major role in the evolution of senescence. Organisms have evolved sophisticated physiological regulatory mechanisms to maintain homeostasis in response to environmental perturb

Objectives We investigated the association between occupational exposure to endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDC) and the risk of uveal melanoma using international data of a case control study from nine European countries. Methods After exclusion of proxy interviews, 280 cases and 3084 control subjects were included in the final analysis. Information on possible exposure to EDC was derived from 27

A number of minimal problems of structure from motion for cameras with radial distortion have recently been studied and solved in some cases. These problems are known to be numerically very challenging and in several cases there were no practical algorithms yielding solutions in floating point arithmetic. We make some crucial observations concerning the floating point implementation of Gröbner bas

Aims. Oxidation of LDL in the extracellular matrix of the arterial wall results in formation of malondialdehyde (MDA) that modifies surrounding matrix proteins. This is associated with activation of an immune response against modified extracellular matrix proteins present in atherosclerotic plaques. Clinical studies have revealed an inverse association between antibodies to MDA-modified fibronecti

Recent literature has highlighted the creation of multiple equivalences as an important factor underpinning the rise of market-based mechanisms for environmental regulation. Extending these insights into the field of renewable energy policy, this article focuses on one example of this trend – namely the principle of technology neutrality as applied under the Flemish tradable green certificate sche

The Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS) is a global measure of life satisfaction (LS). The objective of this study was to evaluate the psychometric properties (data completeness, scaling assumptions, targeting and reliability) of the SWLS in a sample of people with Parkinson's disease (PD).

Objectives: Socio-economic and occupational factors may contribute to risk of immune-mediated disorders. The importance of these factors in giant cell arteritis (GCA) is unknown. This is the first nationwide study with the aim of investigating possible associations between socio-economic status (SES)/occupation and hospitalization for GCA. Method: A nationwide database was constructed by linking S

INTRODUCTION: The indication for breast reduction in a public welfare or an insurance paid setting depends on the severity of the subjective symptoms and the clinical evaluation. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the use of breast volume as an objective criterion to establish the indication for breast reduction surgery, thus establishing a standard decision basis that can be shared by surg

Naturally evolving Voronoi discretisation of two-dimensional plane domains renders representative microstructures that turn out to be useful for the modelling and simulation of polycrystalline materials. Hybrid finite element approaches are employed on such polygonal discretisations to solve, for instance, mechanical and electromechanical problems within a finite element context. In view of solvin

Wild and managed bees are well documented as effective pollinators of global crops of economic importance. However, the contributions by pollinators other than bees have been little explored despite their potential to contribute to crop production and stability in the face of environmental change. Non-bee pollinators include flies, beetles, moths, butterflies, wasps, ants, birds, and bats, among o

We present the results of a weakly modeled burst search for gravitational waves from mergers of nonspinning intermediate mass black holes in the total mass range 100-450 M-circle dot and with the component mass ratios between 1: and 4:1. The search was conducted on data collected by the LIGO and Virgo detectors between November of 2005 and October of 2007. No plausible signals were observed by the

Seeded free electron lasers theoretically have the intensity, tunability, and resolution required for multiphoton spectroscopy of atomic and molecular species. Using the seeded free electron laser FERMI and a novel detection scheme, we have revealed the two-photon excitation spectra of dipole-forbidden doubly excited states in helium. The spectral profiles of the lowest (-1,0)^{+1} ^{1}S^{e} and (

It has become increasingly clear that several age-associated pathologies associate with mutations in the mitochondrial genome. Experimental modeling of such events has revealed that acquisition of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) damage can impair respiratory function and, as a consequence, can lead to widespread decline in cellular function. This includes premature aging syndromes. By taking advantage o