Pulp volume quantification methods in cone-beam computed tomography for age estimation: A critical review and meta-analysis

The secondary dentin deposition that occurs after the tooth formation process results in a decrease in pulp cavity volume in adolescents and adults. The purpose of this critical review was to correlate pulpal and/or dental volume on cone-beam computed tomography (CBCT) with chronological age approximation. A subobjective was to investigate which methodology and CBCT technical parameters would be most appropriate to evaluate this correlation. This critical review followed the PRISMA guidelines, and it was conducted by a search through PubMed, Embase, SciELO, Scopus, Web of Science, Cochrane Library databases, as well as gray literature. Primary studies that used pulp volume, or pulp chamber to tooth volume ratio measured using CBCT were included. Seven hundred and eight indexed and 31 non-indexed records were identified. A qualitative analysis was performed including 25 selected studies with a total of 5100 individuals, age ranging from 8 to 87 years without sex predilection. The most used method was pulp volume/tooth volume. CBCT voxel size ranged between 0.09 and 0.5. Manual segmentation associated with threshold algorithms was used in most of the studies. Correlation between the pulp volume/tooth volume ratio was moderate: −0.66 for the upper central incisors, −0.59 for upper canines and −0.56 for lower canines. High heterogeneity was observed among the studies. It is concluded that pulp volume should be used with caution in age estimation. Evidence supports the preferable use of upper incisors with pulp volume/tooth volume ratio for age estimation. There is not enough evidence that voxel size interferes in age estimation by pulp volume.     

Choosing the scope of trade secret law when secrets complement patents

We present a model where an incumbent firm has a proprietary product whose technology consists of at least two components, one of which is patented while the other is kept secret. At the patent expiration date, an entrant firm will enter the market on the same technological footing as the incumbent if it is successful in duplicating, at certain costs, the secret component of the incumbent's technology. Otherwise, it will enter the market with a production cost disadvantage. We show that under some conditions a broad scope of trade secret law is socially beneficial.     

Making Land Rights Accessible: Social Movements and Political-Legal Innovation in the Rural Philippines

In recent years, rule of law and legal reform has grown to be a major concern of national governments, international financial institutions, development agencies and donor organisations. Part of this concern has focused on expanding access to justice for the poor. However, little effort has gone into understanding the role of justice sector institutions in shaping the opportunities and limits of redistributive justice. Little attention has been paid to the actual workings of obstacles entrenched within the justice sector to land reform, for example. Instead, pro-market scholars cite difficult legal problems as a reason to turn away from state-led land reform and toward market-oriented land policies. Yet as this paper shows, a closer look at the details of dynamics around land reform in the Philippines suggests that political-legal problems associated with implementation of the agrarian reform law can be overcome under certain conditions. It is argued that for rural poor claimants it is important to have access to a support structure for political-legal mobilisation, particularly an alternative ‘rights-advocacy’ outreach network, and also to adopt an integrated political-legal strategy. An integrated political-legal strategy is one that is capable of activating state agrarian reform law, exploiting independent state actors' pro-reform initiatives, and resisting the legal and extra-legal manoeuvres of anti-reform elites. However, such a strategy appears to have limits as well.     

Struggles for land and livelihood

Abstract

Scholars, policy practitioners, and political activists alike have had difficulty grappling with the complex dynamics that have unfolded over the past decade and a half in Philippine banana plantations in the context of the 1988 agrarian reform law. While some focus their attention exclusively on land redistribution issues, others concentrate on the modalities of contract farming and still others emphasize trade union issues — all to the neglect of underlying agrarian dynamics. Relatively few have attempted a more integrated examination of developments in this sector of the Philippine economy. The still-limited availability of studies of land-reform-related experiences in agribusiness plantations outside the Philippines further constrains our understanding of the issues arising in Philippine plantations. This article tries to build on and deepen previous attempts at understanding the complex and confusing dynamics involving the banana elite, the state, and various segments of organized farmworkers and to fill in an important gap in the literature, using an integrated, rights-based, and process-oriented historical-institutional approach. It cites two reasons for an unexpectedly contingent land reform process in commercial banana farms in the Philippines: (1) the surprisingly unsettled character of the prevailing political-legal institutional environment within which land and livelihood struggles are playing out, and (2) the diverse perceptions among farmworkers of the meaning and purpose of, and opportunity for, land reform.     

Domestic credit and the balance of payments in Ghana

This model strives to assess the relationship between domestic credit and the balance of payments in Ghana during the 1961—75 period in an effort to guide policymakers in generating credit policies aimed at reaching a particular balance of payments objective. An equation is derived and estimated which specifies the relationship between domestic credit, exports, capital flows, and net foreign assets within a constraint imposing balance of payments equilibrium. The general conclusions of the analysis are that excessive increases in domestic credit were the principal cause for the balance of payments deficits incurred by Ghana during the period considered.