bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
In vivo and ex vivo inhibitory effects of loratadine on histamine release in patients with allergic rhinitis
Authors: Miadonna A. , Cottini M. , Milazzo N. , Tosi D. , Danzig M. , Tedeschi A. 
Published: May 2007

Background The aim of this study was to evaluate the in vivo and ex vivo effects of the H.‐antagonist loratadine on histamine release. Methods The study was designed as a double‐blind, crossover trial. Ten patients with allergic rhinitis due to Dermatophagoides pteronyssinus were treated with loratadine (10 mg daily p.o.) and with placebo for 1 week, with a 2‐week interval between the two treatments. Nasal lavages with saline solution were done before and after challenge with the relevant allergen at the end of treatments with loratadine and placebo. Venous blood was taken after treatments, and basophil histamine release induced by anti‐IgE (10 μg/ml), N‐formyl‐methionyl‐leucyl‐phenylalanine (fMLP, 1 μM). and Ca2+ ionophore A23187 (1 μM) was evaluated by ati automated fluorometric method. Results Treatment with loratadine attenuated early antigen‐tnduced nasal obstruction, rhinorrhea. and itching. Nasal symptoms were accompanied by a significant histamine release in the nasal lavages collected 5 min after stimulation when the patients received placebo (median 4 ng/ml, range 1‐28; P<0.05). After treatment with loratadine, histamine release in the 5‐min postchallenge lavages was almost abrogated (median 0.5 ng/ml, range 0‐3; P<0.01 vs placebo). Median anti‐IgE‐induced histamine release from basophils was 41.9% (range 27.8‐79.2) after placebo and 30.0% (range 1.7‐73.3, P < 0.05) after loratadine. Active treatment exerted an inhibitory effect also on basophil histamine release induced by fMLP and Ca2+ ionophore A23187. Conclusions Treatment for 1 week with loratadine reduces allergen‐mduced nasal symptoms and inhibits in vivo and ex vivo histamine release in patients with allergic rhinitis.
Effects of various vacuum cleaners on the airborne content of major cat allergen (Fel d 1)
Authors: de Blay F. , Spirlet F. , Gries P. , Casel S. , Ott M. , Pauli G. 
Published: May 2007

Background It has been shown that a vacuum cleaner (VC) can increase airborne cat allergen levels. This study aimed to compare the degree of leakage of airborne Fel d 1 levels among five different VCs, both under laboratory conditions and in an apartment with cats. Methods Three of the VCs were marketed as antiallergic: a HEPA filter VC (VC A), a water impingement and HEPA filter VC (VC B), and a foam fabric filter VC (VC C). The other two were standard VCs: VC D and VC E. VCs were tested in a 20 m', airtight, experimental room and in a 53 m2* living room in an apartment with three cats. Air was sampled with a glass‐fiber filter and an impinger at 20 1/min for 30 min before, during, and after vacuuming. Airborne Fel d 1 was measured with a two‐site monoclonal ELISA assay. Results In the experimental room, no airborne Fel d 1 level was measured before using the VCs. After introducing a dust sample containing Fel d 1 in the VCs. we found that VCs A, B, and E did not provoke any increase in airborne Fel d I. In contrast, VCs C and D significantly increased airborne Fel d 1 levels (GM: 4.9 and 5.3 ng/m, respectively). In the apartment, all VCs induced an increase in airborne Fel d 1, which was carried by particles greater than 5 nm. However, VCs C and D provoked significantly greater increases in airborne Fel d 1 than VCs A, B, and E (P=0.0001). Conclusions Our results suggest that:

The two VCs with leakage in the experimental room had greater leakages in the apartment.
In the apartment with cats, all VCs provoked increases in airborne Fel d 1, primarily carried by large particles.
Given the increased marketing of “antiallergic” VCs, further studies are needed to standardize methods for testing airborne allergen leakage by VCs.
Associations of glutathione S‐transferase P1, M1, and environmental tobacco smoke with wheezing illness in school children
Authors: Lee Y.‐L. , Lee Y.‐C. , Guo Y. L. 
Published: May 2007

Background:  Polymorphisms at the glutathione S‐transferase (GST) were associated with asthma‐related phenotypes. We hypothesized that the GSTP1 and GSTM1 genotypes could modify the effects of household environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) on childhood wheezing illness.Methods:  We conducted a case‐control study comprised of 216 lifetime wheezing children and 185 nonwheezing controls, all of whom were selected from 2524 fourth‐ to ninth‐grade school children in southern Taiwan.Results:  Homozygous GSTP1 Ile‐105 was significantly associated with current wheezing (OR = 1.78, 95% CI 1.04–3.12), but insignificantly associated with ever wheezing (OR = 1.26, 95% CI 0.82–1.94). The risks of ever or current wheezing on GSTM1 null genotype were positive but not statistically significant. Although household ETS exposure was not associated with wheezing illness, after excluding subjects having in utero ETS or active smoking habits, the adverse effects of household ETS exposure differed significantly by GSTP1‐105 genotypes. In children without any ETS exposure at home, GSTP1 Ile‐105 homozygosity was significantly related to increased risks for both ever wheezing (OR = 2.29, 95% CI 1.17–4.49) and current wheezing (OR = 4.86, 95% CI 1.86–12.70). In children with household ETS exposure, the risks of wheezing illness did not increase for those carrying two GSTP1 Ile‐105 alleles. Children carrying any GSTP1 Val‐105 allele were at a significantly greater risk of both ever and current wheezing when exposed to ETS, with a clear dose‐response relationship to the number of smokers at home.Conclusion:  Household ETS exposure is a modifiable cause of wheezing illness in a genetically susceptible subpopulation.
Baseline cholesterol is associated with the response to antiviral therapy in chronic hepatitis C
Authors: Economou Michael , Milionis Haralampos , Filis Spyridon , Baltayiannis Gerasimos , Christou Leonidas , Elisaf Moses , Tsianos Epameinondas 
Published: May 2007

AbstractBackground:  Hepatitis C virus (HCV) partially interacts with low‐density lipoprotein (LDL) receptors, suggesting a role for lipids in regulating HCV clearance. Our aim was to study if baseline lipids can discriminate responders from non‐responders among patients with HCV infection.Methods:  A total of 109 HCV patients were studied. Laboratory measurements included serum lipids, aminotransferases and viral load, as well as HCV genotype determinations.Results:  Responders (n = 53) had significantly higher serum baseline levels of total cholesterol, LDL cholesterol and apolipoprotein B compared to non‐responders (n = 56). Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that a 10 mg/dL increase in total cholesterol was associated with 3.02 higher odds of responding to treatment (95% CI 1.74–5.32, P < 0.001), while a 10 mg/dL increase in apolipoprotein B levels was associated with 1.81 higher odds of responding to treatment (95% CI 1.37–2.54, P < 0.001), after adjustment for age, sex, body mass index (BMI), smoking habits, baseline viral load, liver histology and administration of pegylated interferon. An inverse association between BMI and response to treatment was also evident (adjusted odds ratio 0.73, 95% CI 0.55–0.96; P = 0.03).Conclusion:  Baseline serum total cholesterol levels and BMI could be helpful in discriminating responders to antiviral therapy among patients with HCV infection.
FIKTIVER ZENTRALISMUS IN DEN GROSSUNTERNEHMUNGEN*
Authors: Bahrdt Hans Paul 
Published: May 2007

SUMMARY Fictitious Centralism in large enterprises. In order that each of the threads of an increasingly complicated business enterprise may be kept in hand, they are all actually made to converge at the highest level. But this centralisation is fictitious; for, in reality, it leads to an overburdening of the man at the top, who is thus rendered incapable of performing his proper function—namely, to take decisions. Instead, he becomes the weakest link in the routine.Imperfect delegation, i. e., the delegation of matters for treatment without simultaneous surrender of competence, condemns those in the middle grade to subaltern standing, in which they too are unable to take any decision or assume the responsibility that goes with the taking of decisions. The typical result is that nobody decides, that—to exaggerate slightly—the life of an industrial concern is controlled not by definite volition but by the law of cause and effect.Imperfect delegation is one of the causes of the hypertrophy and sluggishness of the internal bureaucracy of business concerns. The fact of clinging to theoretical powers which in reality are not exercised has, for instance, the result that the modern forms of accounting practice not only fail to give the internal life of a big enterprise the elasticity and commerciality which they quite well could have given it, but, instead, lead to a multiplication of bureaucratic processes.The negative effects of the fictitious centralism which distinguishes the industrial system from the great organisations of the past (e. g. the ancient polis and the feudal state, both of which tended to delegate too many rather than too few functions) are certainly well known, yet it seems impossible to overcome it. This fact is only to be explained in the light of the history of ideas (“Geistesgeschichte”). From his predecessor, the capitalistic entrepreneur, the present‐day manager has taken over the automatic equation of what he does with work, and the consequent justification of his social position in his own eyes and those of society. This attitude, which was alien to most of the leading groups in history, prevents him from extricating himself from the vicious circle which he has got into as the result of fictitious centralism.
ENTWICKLUNGSTENDENZEN DER MODERNEN ÖKONOMISCHEN THEORIE*
Authors: Peter Hans 
Published: May 2007

SUMMARY Lines of Development of Modern Economic Theory. The economic happenings in human society are so complicated and manifold that it is not possible to establish a comprehensive theory. Theorists in economics have always been obliged, in the first place, to deduce simple processes from a few fundamental phenomena. They have to take progressively more and more phenomena into consideration in their models, if they want to provide practitioners—whether economic policy‐makers or enterprisers—with a set of instruments serving to explain the causal nexus underlying the economic phenomena of society. It is dangerous to set up a theoretical model—say, the traditional model of a market with perfect competition—as a goal for economic policy, if the said model is not accessible to genuine value judgements. Furthermore, a large group of models will not, without reservation, lend themselves to the drawing of inferences for economic policy, because, owing to the axioms upon which they are based, they are not able to show those connections in the development of the economic processus of society which are brought about by technical improvements, growth of population, changes in consumer habits, etc.While in the twenties and thirties a growing accumulation of factual material without any theoretical interpretation confronted an abundance of theoretical models without empirical substance, developments in economic theory—especially in macro‐economics—during the last fifteen years or so, and developments in practical research, as practised in, say, the U. S. A., the Netherlands and the Scandinavian countries, have been characterised by an effort to bridge this gap. Thus, modern theorists are trying to construct statistically testable models which will enable policy‐makers to gauge the effect of their measures with greater accuracy. National accounting and the models for analysing the interdependence of the processes of production and the connections between income, savings, consumption and investment represent attempts to fill up this gap which have, in some respects, scored a considerable success. We are by no means in sight of the end of developments in this branch of theory, especially as regards dynamic theory.The second important characteristic of the newer economic theory is the further development of market theory. Here, promising attempts are being made, through a conception of a systematic theory of economic behaviour with the aid of the theory of games, to lift economic subjects out of the state of quasi‐isolation which in traditional market theory exists, and to make it possible for morphology to be incorporated in economic theory.
SOME PROBLEMS IN THE THEORY OF GROWTH AND PLANNING POLICY
Authors: DOBB MAURICE 
Published: May 2007

SUMMARYControversy during the past decade over the theory of growth has been largely concerned with the question of choice of methods of production (or of technique). Connected therewith is the question of distribution of investment between sectors. Until quite recently it was supposed that an answer to both these questions was afforded as a direct corollary from the theory of marginal productivity: in particular, that where capital is scarce and there is surplus labour, highly labour‐intensive methods of production should be favoured and the development of light industry be preferred to that of heavy industry. Thereby has been erected a theory of stages in development.This traditional doctrine is challenged by the view that the criterion of investment policy should be to maximise the growth‐rate of the economy by maximising the increase of its investible surplus. The latter implies the choice of a higher capital‐intensity of technique than the traditional doctrine would allow, and so far as possible assigning priority in development to the capital goods sector. Although in the immediate future such a high‐growth‐rate‐policy involves a lower level of employment and consumption than the rival‐policy, the former, by maximising the growth‐rate of investment, will fairly soon maximise also the growth‐rate of both employment and consumption.An attempt is made to relate this analysis to a problem of minimising cost, as a preliminary to deciding on a rational price‐system for a planned economy. Its connection with a principle of “maximum economy of labour”, advanced by some writers, is considered, two possible variants of such a principle being distinguished; also its connection with Professor V. V. NOVOZHILOV'S category of “national‐economic cost‐price”, depending on a calculation of the “marginal effectiveness of investment”.
GLEICHGEWICHTSWACHSTUM UND OPTIMALES WACHSTUM IN DER NEOKLASSISCHEN WACHSTUMSTHEORIE
Authors: Riese Hajo 
Published: May 2007

SUMMARYAccording to the neo‐classical theory of economic growth, the rate of growth of output tends towards a value which is independent of the proportion of the national income saved. If the proportion of saving changes, the rate of economic growth reaches—after an adjustment process—its original level, which (with a constant labour force) is alone determined by technical progress and the elasticity of the output in respects to changes in the use of the factor capital. Amongst the infinity of possible proportions of investment there must be one, which leads to a maximazition of consumption. It can be shown, that consumption is maximized, if the proportion of investment equals the elasticity of the output to the factor capital.The theorem that the rate of economic growth is independent of the proportion of investment is only valid, if technical progress is autonomous. The equilibrium system postulated in this theorem is indeterminate to the extent that technical change is induced by the process of capital formation. Under these conditions saving and investment decisions again become the determining parameters of the growth rate. Now technical progress may be partly independent of capital formation, but this does not mean that it is totally autonomous. It would be more correct to say that it is a function of, for example the level of technical knowledge and expenditure on education, even if these factors do not enter the analysis explicitly as factors of production. The neo‐classical theory of equilibrium, however, is based on the assumption that technical progress is simply a function of time; thus this theory of equilibrium is based upon the choice an inappropriate underlying production function.Moreover, only the rate of economic growth is dependent upon investment activity but not the level of output. With an increasing proportion of investment the level of output increases, tending to a new equilibrium path.There exists a determinable proportion of investment which leads to a maxi‐mazition of consumption. Pearce has shown recently, that this is valid only under the condition, that several economies which are on the equilibrium path of growth, are compared. If the optimum path is left temporarily (through an increase in the proportion of investment), a (temporary) increase of consumption, which exceeds the consumption foregone, is obtained. Beyond it, it can be shown, that the optimal proportion of investment must be higher, the more technical progress is induced. If technical progress is not autonomus, the system is again open: in the long run the greater the accumulation of capital the greater the possible consumption level. It is the subsistence minimum which determines the proportion of investment.
THE MARXIAN MACRO‐ECONOMIC MODEL: EXTENSION FROM TWO DEPARTMENTS
Authors: Bronfenbrenner Martin 
Published: May 2007

SUMMARYIn its aggregative aspects, the Marxian System involves two sectors or departments. Department I produces capital goods while Department II produces consumer goods (plus capital instruments specialized to their production). Some subsequent writers, following Bortkiewicz, have added a third department producing luxuries particularly metallic money.The writer has previously shown that the two‐sector Marxian model is transformable into a balanced Walrasian general‐equilibrium one, with a few functional relations interpreted as implicit in Marx, and a number of other relations treated as technically given, after the fashion of modern ‘linear economics’. In the present essay, the argument is generalized to the case where the two departments are further subdivided into n and m sectors respectively. The main substantive change turns out to be the addition of many more structural constants, which are taken as technically given.The second part of the essay returns to the two‐department level of aggregation and develops a diagrammatic representation of Marxian dynamics. Some Marxian writers stress the falling rate of profit, others the tendency toward overproduction, as the primary force for capitalist stagnation or breakdown. This presentation is among the minority which seeks to combine the two in a ‘dilemma’ model.
CAPITAL THEORY, CORPORATE TAXATION, AND CAPACITY EXPANSION
Authors: Kurihara Kenneth K. 
Published: May 2007

SUMMARYThe author makes net investment an increasing function of the marginal efficiency of capital affected by the corporate tax and accelerated depreciation, and then lets that investment enter the growth equation as an independent variable. Thus he shows that the corporate tax rate or the length of the period of accelerated depreciation will have to be reduced if the rate of growth of productive capacity is to be increased in a capital‐scarce market economy.Further the author brings out two implications. First, considering the tax‐afforded depreciation reserves as a definite fraction of national income, the resulting ratio is added to the private saving ratio so as to increase capacity growth. This first implication is thought important to a developing economy whose personal saving is insufficient to finance the net investment required for capacity expansion. The second of the implications is brought out by making externally raised capital funds an increasing function of tax‐influenced dividend payments. Considering such capital funds as a fraction of national income on a par with the personal saving ratio, the author demonstrates the theoretical possibility of the low corporate tax favorable influencing capacity expansion. He points out that this second implication is especially important to an economy whose securities market is highly developed but whose long‐term bank financing is relatively underdeveloped. He alludes to some relevant empirical evidence as supporting his theoretical arguments.
OPTIMAL POLICY CONFIGURATIONS UNDER ALTERNATIVE COMMUNITY GROUP PREFERENCES*
Authors: CHOSSUDOVSKY MICHEL 
Published: May 2007

SUMMARYThe article focusses on a methodology for revealing policy preference functions pertaining to the subjective trade‐off between unemployment and price stability. Community group indifference maps are constructed by a method of policy pairwise comparison. An empirical application is envisaged in a Canadian context with reference to the preference functions of business and tradeunion groups. Optimal group policy configurations are derived by maximizing the preference functions subject to the relations of the ‘trade‐off zone’. The effects on unemployment and inflation are analysed in terms of parametric variations of the preference function and the Phillips curve. The underlying policy implications are discussed.
A MODEL OF MAXIMAL ECONOMIC GROWTH
Authors: Horvat Branko 
Published: May 2007

SUMMARYEven with unchanged technology and under ceteris paribus conditions, fixed capital cost per unit of output will not remain constant. Production becomes less and less costly as the rate of growth increases. This means that for a given output and in order to keep the output capacity unimpaired in a specified period of time a smaller amount of real resources has to be spent in an economy growing more rapidly. The marginal efficiency of gross investment increases. It is further increased by technological progress, which may be taken as an increasing function of gross investment.Due to the limited absorptive capacity of any economy (and quite apart from the capital saturation phenomenon, which in a relatively small open economy may be neglected) diminishing returns set in, they eventually outweigh increasing returns mentioned above and for a sufficiently high rate of growth the economy reaches the point where mei= 0. This is the point of the maximum rate of productive investment.This is also most likely the point of the optimum rate of investment, because consumption effects are such that we may reasonably expect the population to accept this policy as the most desirable.
HAS U. S. CAPITAL DIFFERENTIATED BETWEEN EEC AND EFTA?*
Authors: Bandera V. N. , Lucken J. A. 
Published: May 2007

SUMMARYThe article considers the hypothesis that the timing and distinctive provisions of the EEC and EFTA disturbed relative earning rates, P, and thus influenced the location of U. S. direct investments. Statistically significant results are obtained with Pt‐1, P, and Pt+1 for investment in both unions, suggesting that adequate levels of return were associated with the structural transatlantic relocation of capital. However, the evidence contradicts the claims that investors were motivated by profit differentials in a short‐run sense, or that relative earnings pre‐destined the investment location.An additional test finds great similarities in the time pattern of U. S. investment in the EEC and EFTA. Moreover, the outcry about the American investment invasion overlooked an actual reversal of the preferential view of Europe relative to the rest of the world around 1960.Thus, artificial trade distortions introduced by the EEC and EFTA apparently have been insignificant in global business strategies that regard Europe as a homogeneous technological‐industrial complex and a unified market.