This paper examines the association between individual managers and corporate reporting and operating decisions. To examine this question, I develop a dataset of 241 individual CEOs and CFOs, as well as audit committee chairs, covering the period of 1988 to 2009. Although audit committee chairs are tasked with monitoring insiders and not actually preparing the financial results, research suggests that each of these management groups could exert their individual "styles" on the reporting and operating decisions. Using this dataset, I find that each of these groups significantly influence accounting- and non-accounting-based corporate decisions. Also, I examine whether the influence of these individuals is impacted by characteristics of the corporation's operating environment. Using individual proxies for managerial discretion and job demands, as well as developing index measures for each of these constructs, I find that the influence of these particular managers is not impacted by the amount of discretion they have or their perceived job demands. Last, I find evidence that observable demographic measures explain some of the managers' decisions. These results add to the literature concerning the importance of individual managers to corporate decisions because they suggest that managers besides the CFO can significantly influence reporting and operating decisions, and the influence of these managers extends beyond accrual-based techniques to include real activities management decisions.

Submitted by André Chamelete null (andre_ecco@hotmail.com) on 2016-02-12T14:02:00Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Dissertação de Mestrado - FINAL.pdf: 663322 bytes, checksum: 5ca648d67a3a798d08f9c68653ac3ca2 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Sandra Manzano de Almeida (smanzano@marilia.unesp.br) on 2016-02-12T17:20:57Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 chamelete_a_me_sjrp.pdf: 663322 bytes, checksum: 5ca648d67a3a798d08f9c68653ac3ca2 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2016-02-12T17:20:57Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 chamelete_a_me_sjrp.pdf: 663322 bytes, checksum: 5ca648d67a3a798d08f9c68653ac3ca2 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-01-25 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) / O BaP é um contaminante ambiental capaz de causar inflamação e desregulação de vias celulares. Pela ação da CYP1a1 e CYP1b1, é convertido a metabólitos mais reativos. A literatura mostra que o BaP aumenta a expressão de algumas citocinas próinflamatórias, como a IL-1, porém, são bem contraditórios os relatos sobre o efeito do BaP no cFOS, o qual apresenta papel importante na proliferação, na formação de tumores e, possivelmente, na inflamação. O objetivo deste estudo foi de elucidar a participação do receptor purinérgico P2X7 sobre a expressão dos genes IL-1 e cFOS, durante exposição ao BaP. Foi empregado as técnicas de qPCR para quantificação de expressão gênica, e testes de correlação e regressão entre IL-1 e cFOS. A exposição ao BaP induziu a expressão dos dois genes, além das enzimas do seu metabolismo. Quando bloqueado o receptor P2X7, além de uma menor indução das CYPs, os níveis de IL-1 e cFOS caíram abaixo dos níveis controle, sugerindo a participação do P2X7. Os testes de correlação e regressão mostraram uma relação forte direta entre IL-1 e cFOS, reforçando o papel do cFOS na inflamação. / BaP is an environmental contaminant capable to cause inflammation and impair cellular pathways. CYP1a1 and CYP1b1 convert it to more reactive metabolites. Studies show that BaP enhances some proinflammatory citokines expression, like IL-1, yet reports about BaP affecting cFOS, which plays important role in proliferation, tumor formation and inflammation, are controversial. This work aimed to elucidate whether P2X7 purinergic receptor plays a role in IL-1 and cFOS expression during BaP exposure. We applied qPCR techniques to quantify gene expression, correlation and regression assays. Our results showed that BaP raised both IL-1 and cFOS genes expression, besides CYPs ones. Morevoer, when blocking P2X7 receptor, IL-1 and cFOS expression dropped under normal levels, which suggest P2X7 participation, in addition to a smaller enzymes induction. Correlation and regression assays exhibited a strong straight relationship between IL-1 and cFOS expression, reinforcing the role of cFOS in inflammation.

Abstract Background & Problem: Many family firms face a change in ownership in the near future. Acquisitions of family firms can therefore be a solution for the change in ownership. Due to special family firm characteristics, acquisitions of such companies can be complicated. Previous research shows that accountants and CFOs have a positive effect on the firm’s survival and growth. However, the CFOs’ roles in family business acquisitions have not been studied before.    Purpose: The purpose of this research is to explore what roles accountants and CFOs have in acquisitions of family firms.   Method: The base of this study is an abductive research approach with a qualitative research strategy. The main method was semi-structured interviews that was complemented with a document study of official documents from websites.    Conclusion: The empirical findings and analysis revealed that the CFOs in family firm acquisitions are important, but the CFOs’ roles in acquirer and acquiree differ. The CFOs in the selling family business is more of a bean counter in the process and provide material. The CFOs in the acquiring group is more of a business partner, conducting analyses and are involved in strategic decisions. The process of acquiring family firms is a special situation for the CFOs in the acquiring group since they need to adapt to the family firms’ informal culture.

Orientador: Célia Regina Nogueira / Resumo: O tecido ósseo é extremamente complexo e regulado por fatores sistêmicos e locais, apresentando considerável atividade metabólica que envolve a remoção do osso mineralizado pelos osteoclastos, seguida pela formação da matriz óssea pelos osteoblastos. A associação de triiodotironina (T3) e estrógeno (E2) pode levar a uma resposta complexa à atividade do tecido ósseo sendo que o T3 possui efeito tanto sobre a reabsorção como na formação óssea e o E2, em baixo nível, pode levar a osteoporose e no estado normal garante a supressão de citocinas, a partir do sistema RANKL, OPG e c-Fos, que participam ativamente no remodelamento ósseo. Dessa forma, muitos estudos têm sido realizados com o objetivo de verificar a ação hormonal sobre o metabolismo ósseo. Entre essas pesquisas, têm sido isoladas células-tronco mesenquimais (CTMs) a partir do tecido adiposo humano e diferenciadas em osteoblastos. Baseado nisso, o objetivo do nosso trabalho foi avaliar o efeito do T3 e E2 nas concentrações infrafisiológica (T3I/ 10-10M e E2I/ 10-9M); fisiológicas (T3F/10-9M e E2F/10-8M) e suprafisiológicas (T3S/10-8M) separadamente e em diferentes associações de T3I (T3I+E2I e T3I+E2F); T3F (T3F+E2I e T3F+E2F) e T3S (T3S+E2I e T3S + E2F) e diferentes associações de E2I (E2I+T3I e E2I+T3F e E2I+T3S); E2F (E2F+T3I e E2F+T3F e E2F+T3S) sobre a expressão gênica e proteica de RANKL, OPG e c-FOS. Quando associados, a maioria desses hormônios aumentou os níveis gênicos da célula estudada. Em c... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: Bone tissue is extremely complex and is regulated by systemic and local factors, presenting a considerable metabolic activity involving the removal of mineralized bone by osteoclasts in balance with the formation of bone matrix by osteoblasts. The association of triiodothyronine (T3) and estrogen (E2) may lead the activity of bone tissue to complex responses, due to T3 effects on both bone formation and reabsorption, and E2 being able to lead to osteoporosis when at low levels, or, at normal levels, maintain the suppression of the cytokines RANKL, OPG, and c-FOS, which take part actively on bone remodeling. To date, many studies have been done to verify hormone actions on bone metabolism. Among them, mesenchymal stem cells (MSC) have been isolated from human adipose tissue and differentiated into osteoblasts. The aim of our study was to evaluate the effect of both T3 and E2 on RANKL, OPG, and c-FOS gene and protein expression, at infra- (T3I, 10-10M; E2I, 10-9M), physiological (T3F, 10-9M; E2F, 10-8M) supra- (T3S, 10-8M) and doses. Cells were treated with hormones separately or in all possible combinations of T3 and E2 doses. The majority of associated treatments increased gene expression levels of all genes. We can state that the doses included in this study, of both hormones, efficiently increase the expression of the analyzed genes, especially when associated. / Doutor

Cette thèse étudie l'évolution des carrières, des rôles et de l’influence des Directeurs Financiers au regard du processus de financiarisation en France. En analysant la financiarisation et les Directeurs Financiers à travers une approche institutionnaliste, cette recherche présente leurs relations réciproques depuis les années 1980. Alors que le processus de financiarisation a influencé l'évolution de la profession de Directeur Financier, ces derniers ont de leur côté contribué à la financiarisation de différentes manières. Au moyen d'une approche méthodologique mixte, basée sur 1 040 Curriculum Vitae de Directeurs Financiers et 58 entretiens, cette thèse offre une étude approfondie et à grande échelle de l'évolution des Directeurs Financiers au regard du processus de financiarisation en France. / This dissertation investigates the evolution of the Chief Financial Officers’ (CFO) backgrounds, roles and agencies along with the financialization process in France. By studying financialization and CFOs from an institutional perspective, it presents their reciprocal relationships since the 1980s. While the financialization process has influenced the evolution of the CFO profession, CFOs also have various repercussions on financialization. Thanks to 1,040 resumes of CFOs and 58 interviews analyzed through a multiphase mixed method, this dissertation offers both a large scale and an in-depth study of the evolution of the CFOs along with the financialization process.

As the most widely consumed drug around the globe, there is a vast array of contradicting research available on caffeine. One of the most debated and researched topics on caffeine is its effect on the brain. Meanwhile, the data on the neurological condition of migraine has information scattered throughout countless research articles and experiments. Although neither migraine or caffeine are completely understood by the medical world, this analysis attempts to give a more coherent understanding of the relationship between the two. This is done by first understanding the known and theorized mechanisms of caffeine as well as the pathologies of migraine. Discussions on channelopathies, current migraine medications, and case studies will be presented. After much background research, we hypothesized that caffeine could excite neurons at physiological concentrations to the point of activation. This was tested by targeting the transcription factor cFos using immunocytochemistry in vitro. The protein cFos was identified due to its rapid translation—just 15 minutes after stimuli—to indicate activation. In addition to a control culture, three different caffeine concentrations were tested on the neurons: 50 micromoles— average plasma level after 1-2 cups of coffee consumption, 100 micromoles—average plasma level after 5-6 cups of coffee also believed to be the therapeutic amount to defend against neurological diseases such as Alzheimers Disease, and 250 micromoles—the average plasma level considered to be toxic in humans. Indeed, we saw a 53.8% increase in cFos expression in the neurons as 100 micromolar of caffeine was added and exposed to the cell cultures for 24 hours. In order to ensure the results obtained in this study were physiologically relevant in vivo, known toxic levels were tested for in vitro neurotoxicity. It was found in vitro that at the non toxic plasma concentrations of 50 micromolar and 100 micromolar of caffeine did not display cellular death as tested by Trypan Blue viability testing, Crystal Violet morphologies, and fleurojade immunochemistry that tests for degeneration. Each of these experiments identified a significant death increase as the toxic level of 250 micromoles of caffeine were utilized. This allowed us to theorize that the activation of neurons found in these experiments due to caffeine exposure would apply the same effect in vivo.

The teneurin C-terminal associated peptides (TCAP) are a family of four predicted peptides that are expressed in all metazoans where the teneurins have been studied to date. Of the four peptides, TCAP-1 has been studied most extensively. In vitro, TCAP-1 increases neuronal proliferation and neurite outgrowth. In vivo, the peptide reduces CRF-induced behavioural responses in rats. Despite the large body of evidence indicating a strong biological role for TCAP-1, little is known about the chemistry and solubility of the peptide, or the signaling pathway(s) mediating these effects. The aim of this research was to appropriately solubilize the peptide and to develop detection assays for its study in greater detail. I have now established an appropriate formulation of TCAP-1 and developed an immunoassay to assess its concentrations in tissues and in circulation. Also, by examining a number of transcriptional response elements, I have found two assays for probing the signal transduction mechanisms of this peptide.

The teneurin C-terminal associated peptides (TCAP) are a family of four predicted peptides that are expressed in all metazoans where the teneurins have been studied to date. Of the four peptides, TCAP-1 has been studied most extensively. In vitro, TCAP-1 increases neuronal proliferation and neurite outgrowth. In vivo, the peptide reduces CRF-induced behavioural responses in rats. Despite the large body of evidence indicating a strong biological role for TCAP-1, little is known about the chemistry and solubility of the peptide, or the signaling pathway(s) mediating these effects. The aim of this research was to appropriately solubilize the peptide and to develop detection assays for its study in greater detail. I have now established an appropriate formulation of TCAP-1 and developed an immunoassay to assess its concentrations in tissues and in circulation. Also, by examining a number of transcriptional response elements, I have found two assays for probing the signal transduction mechanisms of this peptide.

The work reported in this thesis is divided in to two parts. In the first part, we report a closed-form bit error rate (BER) performance analysis of orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) on the uplink in the presence of carrier frequency offsets (CFOs) and/or timing offsets (TOs) of other users with respect to a desired user. We derive BER expressions using probability density function (pdf) and characteristic function approaches, for a Rician faded multi-cluster multi-path channel model that is typical of indoor ultrawideband channels and underwater acoustic channels. Numerical and simulation results show that the BER expressions derived accurately quantify the performance degradation due to non-zero CFOs and TOs. Ultrawideband channels in indoor/industrial environment and underwater acoustic channels are severely delay-spread channels, where the number of multipath components can be of the order of tens to hundreds. In the second part of the thesis, we report low complexity equalization algorithms for cyclic-prefixed single carrier (CPSC)systems that operate on such inter-symbol interference(ISI) channels characterized by large delay spreads. Both single-input single-output and multiple-input multiple-output(MIMO) systems are considered. For these systems, we propose a low complexity graph based equalization carried out in frequency domain. Because of the noise whitening effect that happens for large frame sizes and delay spreads in the frequency domain processing, improved performance compared to time domain processing is shown to be achieved. Since the graph based equalizer is a soft-input soft-output equalizer, iterative techniques(turbo-equalization) between detection and decoding are shown to yield good coded BER performance at low complexities in convolutional and LDPC coded systems. We also study joint decoding of LDPC code and equalization of MIMO-ISI channels using a joint factor graph.

Multiuser and cooperative orthogonal frequency division multiplexing(OFDM) systems are being actively researched and adopted in wireless standards, owing to their advantages of robustness to multipath fading, modularity, and ability to achieve high data rates. In OFDM based systems, perfect frequency and timing synchronization is essential to maintain orthogonality among the subcarriers at the receiver. In multiuser OFDM on the uplink, timing offsets (TOs) and/or carrier frequency offsets (CFOs) of different users, caused due to path delay differences between different users, Doppler and/or poor oscillator alignment, can destroy orthogonality among subcarriers at the receiver. This results in multiuser interference (MUI)and consequent performance degradation. In this thesis, we are concerned with the analysis and mitigation of the effect of large CFOs and TOs in multiuser OFDM systems, including uplink orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA),uplink single-carrier frequency division multiple access(SC-FDMA), and cooperative OFDM. Uplink OFDMA: In the first part of this thesis, we analytically quantify the effect of large CFOs and TOs on the signal-to-interference plus noise ratio(SINR) and uncoded bit error rate(BER) performance of uplink OFDMA on Rayleigh and Rician fading channels, and show analytical results to closely match with simulation results. Such an SINR/BER analysis for uplink OFDMA in the presence of both large CFOs as well as TOs has not been reported before. We also propose interference cancelling(IC) receivers to mitigate the performance degradation caused due to large CFOs and TOs of different users. SC-FDMA versus OFDMA: An issue with uplink OFDMA is its high peak-to-average power ratio(PAPR).Uplink SC-FDMA is proposed in the standards as a good low-PAPR alternative to uplink OFDMA; e.g., SC-FDMA has been adopted in the uplink of 3GPP LTE. A comparative investigation of uplink SC-FDMA and OFDMA from a sensitivity to large CFOs and TOs view point has not been reported in the literature. Consequently, in the second part of the thesis, we carry out a comparative study of the sensitivity of SC-FDMA and OFDMA schemes to large CFOs and TOs of different users on the uplink. Our results show that while SC-FDMA achieves better performance due to its inherent frequency diversity advantage compared to OFDMA in the case of perfect synchronization, its performance can get worse than that of OFDMA in the presence of large CFOs and TOs. We further show that use of low-complexity multistage IC techniques, with the knowledge of CFOs and TOs of different users at the receiver, can restore the performance advantage of SC-FDMA over OFDMA. Cooperative OFDM: Cooperative OFDM is becoming popular because of its ability to provide spatial diversity in systems where each node has only one antenna. In most studies on cooperative communications, perfect time synchronization among cooperating nodes is assumed. This implies that the transmissions from different cooperating nodes reach the destination receiver in orthogonal time slots. In practice, however, due to imperfect time synchronization, orthogonality among different nodes’ signals at the destination receiver can be lost, causing inter-symbol interference(ISI).In the third part of the thesis, we investigate cooperative OFDM communications using amplify-and-forward(AF) protocol at the relay, in the presence of imperfect timing synchronization. We derive analytical expressions for the ISI as function of timing offset for cooperative OFDM with AF protocol, and propose an IC receiver to mitigate the effects of timing offset induced ISI.