Use of laser-scanning confocal microscopy in the detection of diagenesis in bone

This research demonstrates the value of laser scanning confocal microscopy (LSCM) as a research tool in osteological studies, and diagenetic studies in particular. LSCM combines properties of light and scanning electron microscopy using laser light to excite fluorophores throughout the z-axis, developing a 3-D image. Using differential staining and selecting for specific wavelengths of light, one can image targeted materials. This research is divided into two parts: visualizing bone structures such as proteins and their decompositional products and visualizing diagenesis. Part one of this study utilized pig bones as a means of testing the overall ability of LSCM to fluoresce bone. Twenty-three samples were imaged, including 13 samples from a decompositional study conducted 5 years previous, and 10 “fresh” samples collected from a commercial butcher. This part of the study determined that protein and organic components of the bone could be fluoresced and diagenetic alteration could be imaged. The second part of the study used human samples as a means of imaging and mapping diagenetic alterations. The second part of the study used 13 samples, including 4 clinical, 7 ancient, and 2 modern controls. The pig study used Basic Fuchsin and SlowFade Gold stains, while the human study used toluidine blue. Images were also taken with unstained elements. The results of the non-human study found that a fresh bone fluoresced differently than that of a 5-year subset, while the results of the human study confirmed these findings and determined that the bone diagenesis can be mapped using LSCM.     

Institutions,interests, and policy support: Experimental evidence from China

Policy support matters for the success of public policies. It is still unclear how governments can garner support for policies with high costs. Using a conjoint experiment in China, we demonstrate that governments can encourage policy support by offering institutional services and material interests to policy targets. In particular, citizens become more willing to support policies when governments timely disclose policy information and respond to and incorporate their voices in the policy design. Government subsidies in both the short and long runs also increase citizens' policy support. In addition, government transparency and long-run subsidies are complementary to enhancing policy support; the role of institutions is strengthened when citizens are exposed to severe policy problems.     

促进共同富裕视角下完善工资分配政策研究 ——以坚持劳动力要素按贡献参与分配为前提

劳动力要素按贡献参与分配是初次分配中的重要内容。本研究在梳理分析我国工资分配制度政 策的现状及积极成效的基础上，探讨了当前工资分配领域仍待解决的 4 个突出问题，包括劳动报酬的比重在一 段时期出现下降，农村居民的工资性收入与城镇居民的相比依然不高，农村居民的工资性收入区域差距还比较大， 行业间工资收入差距需要进一步缩小。研究认为，完善劳动力要素按贡献参与分配制度机制，要坚持改革与发 展相结合，“做大蛋糕”与“分好蛋糕”并重。研究建议：推动经济增长与居民收入增长同步，实现劳动生产 率与劳动报酬同步提高；深化工资分配制度改革，健全工资决定和合理调整机制。     

A higher bar: Institutional impediments to hate crime prosecution

Why are hate crime cases so rarely prosecuted? Most states and the federal government have hate crime laws on their books, yet available data indicate few prosecutions in most jurisdictions. Drawing on case files and interviews with police and prosecutors in one jurisdiction, three institutional impediments to hate crime prosecution are identified: evidentiary inflation, by which law enforcement uses a higher burden of proof than what is required by statute; loose coupling between police departments and prosecutors' offices; and cultural distance between law enforcement and victims. Findings also reveal that advocacy groups and media can successfully increase the visibility of cases and draw the attention of prosecutors. The findings align with aspects of legal endogeneity theory and enhance our understanding of the role of organizations in constructing the meaning of law. The results also help explain why some laws are rarely enforced, even when they have support from key personnel in an organization.     

Harming America: Corporate Crime in a Context of Deregulation

ABSTRACT

Like many Republican presidential candidates before him, Donald J. Trump campaigned on a pro-business, anti-regulation platform, and since his election in November 2016, he has directed his administration to move forward with deregulation in many arenas, including consumer financial protections, environmental controls, and workplace safety among others. Past efforts to roll back regulations governing certain industries, such as the savings and loan and the mortgage industries, have had harmful consequences for the general public or for specific interest groups. In this study, we review what the Trump administration has accomplished with regard to deregulation to date. Then, based on past deregulatory fiascos, we theorize the harmful collateral consequences that may result from this most recent swing of the regulatory-deregulatory pendulum.     

Youth Adversities Amplify the Association between Adult Stressors and Chronic Inflammation in a Domain Specific Manner: Nuancing the Early Life Sensitivity Model

There is strong evidence that chronic, systemic inflammation hastens onset of the diseases of old age that ultimately lead to death. Importantly, several studies suggest that childhood adversity predicts chronic inflammation. Unfortunately, this research has been plagued by retrospective reports of childhood adversity, an absence of controls for adult stressors, and a failure to investigate various competing models of the link between childhood adversity and chronic inflammation. The present study was designed to address these limitations. Using 18 years of data collected from 413 African Americans (58% female) included in the Family and Community Health Study, hierarchical regression analyses provided support for a nuanced early life sensitivity explanation for the link between early adversity and adult chronic inflammation. Controlling for health risk behaviors and adult SES, late childhood (ages 10–12) adversity amplified the association between adult adversity (age 29) and chronic inflammation. This interaction operated in a domain-specific fashion. Harsh parenting amplified the relation between intimate partner hostility and inflammation, whereas early discrimination amplified the relation between adult discrimination and inflammation. These findings suggest that individuals may be primed to respond physiologically to adverse adult circumstances that resemble those experienced earlier in life.

     

Cause Lawyering and Movement Tactics: Disability Rights Movements in South Korea and Japan

We investigate cause lawyers’ roles in movements for the domestic adoption of international human rights norms. Social movements scholarship often assumes that lawyers will divert activism toward institutional tactics, while the sociolegal studies literature emphasizes that lawyers are active in diverse ways across venues. A paired comparison of antidiscrimination movements in South Korea and Japan reveals how critical junctures in regime history shape the tactical repertoires that cause lawyers bring to their interactions with movement actors, and thus also movement tactics. This research advances scholarship on professionals in social movements, cause lawyers as norm entrepreneurs, and legal mobilization in East Asia.     

寻找商业目标与公司合规之间的最大公约数

作为现代城市治理的题中应有之义,商业合规变得日益重要。除了外在讨论商业合规的传统视角,从公司内部视角讨论"在什么条件下"商业合规更容易、更可能实现的内在驱动机制,是一个十分关键的问题。两个研究小组围绕商业合规进行了全面分析,同时结合国内外商业合规研究的最新动向,探讨了如何建立商业合规的"高效认知界面",提出了一种公司更愿意合规的认知行为界面偏好的方法,改变以往强调商业合规的"硬干预"、"强干预"的窠臼,走向更为符合商业合规选择偏好的"软干预"、"弱干预"的范式。在此基础上,寻找到让赢利与合规目标之间达成最大公约数的具体实现方案。