To increase diversity of enzymes and proteins, cells mix and match exonic and intronic regions retained in mature mRNAs by alternative splicing. An estimated 94% of all multi-exon genes express one or more alternatively spliced transcripts generating proteins with similar or modified functions. Cyclooxygenase is a signaling enzyme that catalyzes the rate-limiting step in the synthesis of diverse bioactive lipids termed prostaglandins. Prostaglandins are involved in myriad physiological and pathopysiological processes including vasoregulation, stomach mucosal maintenance, parturition, pain, fever, inflammation, neoplasia and angiogenesis and are inhibited by aspirin-like drugs known as NSAIDs. In 2002 an alternatively spliced, intron-1 retaining variant of COX-1 was cloned from canine brain tissue. This new variant, termed COX-3 or COX-1b, is an enzymatically active prostaglandin synthase expressed at relatively high levels in a tissue and cell type dependant manner in all species examined. In humans and most rodent species intron-1 is 94 and 98 nucleotides long respectively. Retention of the intron in these species introduces a frameshift and is predicted to result in translation of a very small 8-16kD protein with little similarity to either 72kD COX-1 or COX-2, calling into question the role of this variant. In this dissertation, I present my results from cloning and ectopically expressing a complete and accurate COX-3 cDNA from both rat and human. I confirmed that COX-3 mRNA encodes multiple large molecular weight cyclooxygenase-like proteins in the same reading frame as COX-1. Translation of these proteins relies on several recoding mechanisms including cap-independent translation initiation, alternative start site selection, and ribosomal frameshifting. Using siRNA and Western blotting I have identified some of these proteins in tissues and cells. Two COX-3 encoded proteins are active prostaglandin synthase enzymes with activities similar to COX-1 and represent novel targets of NSAIDs. Other COX-3 proteins have unknown function, but their size and cellular location suggest potential roles as diverse as cytosolic enzymes and nuclear factors.

Les récits de Teixeira de Sousa (1919-2006) s’inscrivent dans une historicité envisagée en fonction des caractéristiques de Claridade et Certeza, deux mouvements représentatifs du réalisme capverdien qui prônaient l’affirmation de l’identité nationale et la (re)découverte de la réalité capverdienne. L’on doit ajouter encore le legs des positions esthétiques d’essence idéologique et politique du néoréalisme portugais. L’analyse textuelle, fondée sur des récits brefs et deux trilogies romanesques, objet de cette thèse, interroge la portée des figurations réalistes dans la représentation de phénomènes sociohistoriques et culturels et leur interaction avec deux microcosmes insulaires distincts, pris à des époques coloniales et postcoloniales différentes : d’abord l’univers de la trilogie sur l’île de Fogo, illustré par la désagrégation de la classe dominante, les déséquilibres sociaux, les courants migratoires et les traits identitaires. Ensuite, la représentation du contexte urbain de l’île de São Vicente, articulée aux réalités portuaire et maritime, à la diversité ethnique et culturelle, à l’émergence de la souveraineté nationale, à la création littéraire, et globalement à l’essence humaine. Cette étude se penche aussi sur le plan de l’énonciation réaliste et néoréaliste, d’où ressortent, d’une part, quelques particularités des modalités discursives récurrentes chez l’auteur, d’autre part, le recours à différents registres de langage, nuancés par des tonalités diversifiées. / The narratives by Teixeira de Sousa (1919-2006) are part of the Claridade and Certeza movements, particularly in what concerns their proposed reading of historicity. These two movements clearly exemplify Realism in Cape Verde, and they voice national identity and the (re) discovery of Cape Verdean reality. One should note as well the presence of an aesthetics affiliated to the political and ideological positions of Portuguese Neo-realism. The focus of this dissertation is the analysis of Teixeira de Sousa’s narratives (short stories and two trilogies of novels). We elaborate on the extension of the above-referred topics for the representation of socio-historical and cultural phenomena as well as on their interaction with two insular microcosms in different colonial and postcolonial periods. In the first trilogy we refer to the universe of Fogo island; the decadence of the ruling class, the social differences, migration, identity. In the second case, we discuss the urban reality of the island of S. Vicente, framed by the sea, the docks, and the ethnic and cultural diversity. We also consider the emergence of national sovereignty, literary creation, and human essence in general in these writings. This dissertation deals as well with the discussion of realist and neorealist enunciation, through the author’s particular style.

Carrierless amplitude and phase (CAP) modulation is generally regarded as a bandwidth efficient two-dimensional (2-D) passband line code. It is closely related to the pulse amplitude modulation (PAM) and quadrature amplitude modulation (QAM) schemes. CAP has been proposed for various digital subscriber loop (DSL) systems over unshielded twisted pairs of copper wires. In this thesis, our main focus is on the minimum mean-square error (MMSE) performance of the ideal (i.e., infinite length) linear and non-linear (decision feedback) CAP receivers/equalisers in the presence of additive, coloured Gaussian noise, and/or data-like cross-talks. An in-depth analysis is given on the performance of both receiver structures. In the case of the linear receiver, one possible view of the overall CAP transceiver system which includes both data and cross-talk transmission paths is that it is a linear multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) system. Accordingly, the existing MMSE results for a general MIMO system are applicable also to CAP systems. However, up to date, this approach was shown to be unsuccessful in the sense that the derived MMSE expressions are too complex and offer little insights. In our analysis, in order to find a more incisive MMSE expression, we reconsider the problem of minimisation of the MSEs at slicers. By exploiting the Hilbert transform pair relationship between the impulse responses of the inphase and quadrature transmit shaping filters, we are able to obtain an elegant and more meaningful MMSE expression, as well as the corresponding transfer functions of the optimum linear receive filters. In the case of the nonlinear, or decision feedback equaliser (DFE), receiver, we start our analysis with the receiver structure of a generic multidimensional (>/= 3) CAP-type system. / This receiver consists of a bank of analog receive filters, the number of which equals the dimension of the CAP line code, and a matrix of cross-connected, infinite-length, baud-spaced feedback filters. It is shown that the optimum filters and the corresponding MMSE of the DFE receiver require the factorisation of a discrete-time channel spectral matrix. This mathematically intractable step can be avoided, however, when the DFE results are specialised to a standard 2-D CAP system where we are able to again exploit the Hilbert transform pair relationship to derive a further and more useful MMSE expression. Three sets of numerical studies are given on the MMSE performance of the CAP receivers. In the first set of studies. we model the sum of all crosstalks as an additive, Gaussian noise source and select three test transmission channels over which we compare the MMSE performance of the linear and DFE receiver structures. In the second set of studies, we compare the performance of the two receiver structures, but in a data-like cross-talk environment. The results demonstrate the importance of NEXT equalisation in the design of CAP receivers operating in a NEXT dominant environment. In the final set of studies which follows from the second set of studies, we investigate the relationship between the MMSE performance of the DFE receiver and system parameters which include excess bandwidth, data rate, CAP scheme. and relative phase between the received signal and the NEXT signal. The results show that data-like cross-talks can be effectively suppressed by using a large excess bandwidth (alpha > 1 in the case of a RC transmit shaping filter) alone. / The relative phase also affect; the receiver performance. but to a lesser degree. In addition to the MMSE performance analysis. implementation issues of an adaptive linear CAP receiver are also considered. We propose a novel linear receiver by appending two fixed analog filters to the front-end of the existing adaptive linear receiver using fractionally-spaced equalisers (FSE). We show that if the analog filters are matched to the transmit shaping filters, then inphase and quadrature finite-length FSEs in the proposed receiver have the same NINISE solution. We further propose a modified least-mean-square (LMS) algorithm which takes advantage of this feature. The convergence analysis of the proposed LMS algorithm is also given. We show that the modified LMS algorithm converges approximately twice as fast as the standard LMS algorithm, given the same misadjustment, or alternatively, it halves the misadjustment, given the same initial convergence rate.

本研究旨在探討資本支出變數是否具有增額資訊內涵，並以台灣股票市場進行實證研究。首先測試盈餘資訊內涵，之後於盈餘／股價關係模武中加入資本支出變數，以多元迴歸分析方法測試資本支出變數是否具有增額資訊內涵？此外，考慮公司規模、風險、經濟成長等ERC決定因素及不同企業生命週期階段，對資本支出反應係數之影響。 另外就股票報酬之衡量方法分別採原始報酬、五月制累積異常報酬、曆年制累積異常報酬及測試期間考慮公司規模之累積異常報酬進行測試，以觀察其結果有無差異。另就相關文獻、理論根據，操弄自變數（資本支出）之衡量方法，以從各種層面來驗證資本支出變數是否具有增額資訊內涵。實證結果顯示： 一、盈餘具有資訊內涵： （一）無論採何種股票報酬衡量方法，盈餘與股票報酬成顯著正相關，證實盈餘資訊具有資訊內涵。 （二）在計算累積異常報酬時，採調整公司規模之累積異常報酬，比五月制與曆年制基礎，更與盈餘具有關聯性，證實計算累積異常報酬時，測試期間之取決，應考慮公司規模之不同。 （三）採原始報酬(ROI)時，得到最佳之盈餘資訊內涵結果。 二、資本支出具有增額資訊內涵： （一）資本支出變數採未預期資本支出(UCAP)時，市場對未預期資本支出增加有負面之看法。 （二）資本支出變數採資本支出金額(CAP)時，市場對資本支出增加有正面之看法。認為較高資本支出水準將顯示管理當局擁有較有利的資訊，而股市對此有利的資訊將有正面之反應。 （三）資本支出變數採(CAP%-INDCAP%)時，其反應係數為正，顯示一般而言，公司的資本支出變動百分比，較產業資本支出變動百分比高（低）時，可視為一項正（負）的股票評價訊息。 三、盈餘反應係數決定因素對資本支出增額資訊內涵之影響 （一）公司規模對資本支出反應係數(CRC)之影響因變數採ROI下，大公司組未預期資木支出變數對股票報酬之反應係數大於不公司組者，支持盈餘品質假說，亦即大公司之盈餘品質較佳，使得盈餘（資本支出）資訊較受投資人所信賴與利用，故大公司之會計資訊具有較多的資訊內涵。 （二）考慮公司風險、經濟成長對資本支出反應係數之影響公司風險因素與CRC負相關，顯示當公司風險較高（低）時，於特定未預期資本支出下，將產生較低（高）之未來盈餘及股利淨現值。另發現公司經濟成長機會與CRC正相關，顯示具有較佳的未來盈餘潛力係來自於具有較佳成長機會與資本支出之增加所致。另加入公司風險、經濟成長因素後，提高對股票報酬之解釋能力。 四、不同企業生命週期階段對資本支出增額資訊內涵之影響 （一）以企業年齡劃分企業生命週期階段時，其實證結果與預期相反。可能因企業進行多角化經營而再吹成長，則企業成立久不代表屬衰退期。故企業年齡不適宜作為劃分企業生命週期階段之標準。 （二）以營收成長率劃分企業生命週期階段時，股價對於資本支出之反應由成長期至衰退期逐漸遞減，且成長期之資本支出反應係數為正，衰退期之資本支出反應係數為負，均與預期相符。 五、總結 本研究證實盈餘及資本支出具有資訊內涵。因此，投資人除參考損益表之盈餘資訊外，亦可自現金流量表中獲知資本支出訊息，同時再與產業情形進行比較，並考慮企業之規模、風險性、成長性及所處的生命週期階段等，如此將提高與股票報酬之關聯性。

<p>A synthetic pathway towards the cap-structure of 2,2,7-trimethylguanosine containing a methylene modified triphosphate bridge have been investigated. The modification to the triphosphate bridge is hoped to slow down cap degradation and give the connected  oligunucleotide an increased lifetime. This could result in an better understanding of nuclear transport of oligonucleotides and could thereby helping to develop new treatments for different diseases. The synthesis relies on a coupling reaction between the 2,2,7-trimethylguanosine 5’phosphate and 2’-<em>O</em>-methyladenosine with a 5’-pyrophosphate where the central oxygen has been replaced by a methylene group. The reaction pathway consists of 9 steps of which 8 steps have been successfully performed. The last step, which includes a coupling reaction, was attempted but without successful identification and isolation of the cap-structure, and will need further attention. The reaction has been performed in a milligram scale with various yields.</p> / Presentation utförd

<p>In this thesis some different modulation schemes for xDSL-techniques are compared. The investigated techniques are ADSL, G.lite, ADSL2, HDSL, SHDSL and VDSL. The modulation methods used are DMT, CAP and different versions of PAM. Several broadband techniques also use Trellis Coded Modulation (TCM) to increase the coding gain of the transmission. For each one of the different modulation methods the signal-to-noise ratio is calculated for generating a bit error rate probability of 10-7. This is the error rate that is demanded for several of the investigated standards. Comparison is also made of the transmission capacity of the channel and how sensitive the technique is for interference in a part of the frequency band. To compare the different modulation techniques, simulations of the modulations were made. The simulations were made with MatLab and Simulink. Unfortunately Simulink only supports one- and two-dimensional TCM. Therefore no good simulations of ADSL and ADSL2 with TCM were made, because those techniques use four-dimensional TCM.</p>

<p>Today, gender quotation in the Board of Directors has become an important political question that is being discussed not only in Sweden but in several other countries as well. However, research on gender diversity and, for that matter, other forms of diversity in the corporate world is not something new. Diversity in Board of Directors and Top Management Teams and how it affects firm performance have been the topic of many researches the last two decades. Nevertheless, there are still many unanswered questions in this field that need to be answered. The purpose of this dissertation is to study how diversity in BoDs and TMTs affect firm performance. We used five different diversity variables, tenure, age, education, nationality and gender in our research and we tested them separately to see how they each affect firm performance. Because there is limited previous research conducted on diversity in Sweden and on Swedish firms, this dissertation attempts to fill that gap.</p><p>This study is conducted on Swedish firms that are listed on large cap on Stockholm stock exchange. We used several ways to measure the five different diversity variables in both BoDs and TMTs. Firm performance was measured by using two well established measurements, Return on Equity and Return on Assets. We developed ten hypotheses to test how diversity affects firm performance; some diversity variables had positive effect on firm performance, while others had negative effect. The hypotheses are based on earlier research. There are mixed results from our study; seven out of ten hypotheses had to be rejected due to insignificant relationship between diversity and firm performance. Three hypotheses were rejected, even though they showed a significant relationship between diversity and firm performance, because the relationship was the opposite of our hypotheses. One reason for these results can be that there is low diversity in both BoDs and TMTs, and this makes it difficult to measure and establish a relationship between diversity and firm performance.</p>

<p>Från och med halvårsskiftet 2008 kommer samtliga börsnoterade företag i Sverige att omfattas av Svensk Kod för Bolagsstyrning (”Koden”). Syftet med uppsatsen är att undersöka hur styrelserna i börsbolag som ännu ej omfattas ser på effekterna av detta. Mer specifikt innebär detta hur man har uppfattat Koden och motiven bakom, vilka förväntningar det har på arbetssätt samt om man ser ett värde med den. För att göra detta genomfördes en enkätundersökning som gick ut till styrelseordföranden på Stockholmsbörsens Small Cap-lista. Vi fann att en stor del av de svarande redan idag valt att implementera Kodens reglementen. Vi fann även en allmän skepsis gentemot Koden. Skepsisen tycks bottna i en oro för ökade administrativa pålagor och försämrat styrelsearbete. Samtidigt uppvisas en låg grad av förståelse för de fördelar Koden sägs ha utifrån hur den är författad. Undersökningen påvisar att de som tillämpar Koden i hög grad är mer positiva till den än de som inte tillämpar den, samt att intresset för bolagsstyrningsrapporten är lågt. Fler undersökta bolag än väntat har redan idag i hög grad valt att implementera Koden, samtidigt som man uttrycker en allmän skepsis mot Koden. Vi tror framförallt detta bottnar i de ökade krav på väl fungerande Corporate Governance som ställs från institutionella ägare.</p>

Degradation of mRNA is a highly regulated step important for proper gene expression. Degradation of eukaryotic mRNA is initiated by shortening of the 3’ end located poly(A) tail. Poly(A)-specific ribonuclease (PARN) is an oligomeric enzyme that degrades the poly(A) tail with high processivity. A unique property of PARN is its ability to interact not only with the poly(A) tail but also with the 5’ end located mRNA cap structure. A regulatory role in protein synthesis has been proposed for PARN based on its ability to bind the cap that is required for efficient initiation of eukaryotic mRNA translation. Here we have investigated how the cap structure influences PARN activity and how PARN binds the cap. We show that the cap activates PARN and enhances the processivity of PARN. Further we show that the cap binding complex (CBC) inhibits PARN activity through a protein-protein interaction. To investigate the cap binding property of PARN, we identified the cap binding site at the molecular level using site-directed mutagenesis and fluorescence spectroscopy. We identified tryptophan 475, located within the RNA recognition motif (RRM) of PARN, as crucial for cap binding. A crystal structure of PARN bound to cap revealed that cap binding is mediated by the nuclease domain and the RRM of PARN. Tryptophan 475 binds the inverted 7-Me-guanosine residue through a stacking interaction. Involvement of the nuclease domain in cap binding suggests that the cap site and the active site overlap. Mutational analysis showed that indeed amino acids involved in cap binding are crucial for hydrolytic activity of PARN. Taken together, we show that PARN is an allosteric enzyme that is activated by the cap structure and that the allosteric cap binding site in one PARN subunit corresponds to the active site in the other PARN subunit.

Since the global budget system carried out by National Health Insurance Bureau in 2003, hospital autonomy management practiced in 2003 as well as reviews carried by specialized doctors system established, local hospitals have faced critical impacts. The fluctuating point reimbursement was applied, it not only restrains the reimbursement received by the hospitals, but also causes management difficulties for local hospital as the fluctuating points shrink year by year. The number of western medical hospitals is decreasing. The number in 2000 was 575, but now only 500 local hospitals operate in Taiwan. For survival, local hospitals have to establish sound financial system in order to deal with changing national health insurance policies. On the other hand, they are encouraged to use strategy management theories to promote the competitiveness for local hospitals to well control their expenditures and create their income. The study has analyzed the statistical data from Statistical Office, Department of Health and National Health Insurance Bureau and integrated related literatures to understand the management strategies and responses of local hospitals under national health insurance policies and the economic, demographic and political environment. Results of the study will be provided for reference. Beside statistic data and literatures, strategy management concepts and theories were also adopted to clarify current policies of health insurance, reimbursement system and the situation of local hospitals to probe into the difficulties and possible solutions. Local hospitals were chosen to be the study subjects, and through SWOT Analysis, Poter¡¦s Five Force Analysis, Blue Sea Strategy and the findings from literature review, we found that (1)the financial gap of health insurance has transferred to medical organizations, especially local hospitals; (2)under global budget system, local hospitals have to increase income and decrease expenditures by transformation, running pay business or joint outpatient service; ¡]3¡^cost management is critical for local hospitals to establish internal strength; (4) referring to blue sea strategy to develop distinguished business and differential products can create niche for local hospitals to break through the bottleneck.