Market Demand for Civic Affairs News

This paper uses time series methods to test the relationship between civic affairs content and audience share for the ABC, CBS, and NBC evening news in the mid-1990s. Because these programs competed in the same market, but varied the amount of their civic affairs coverage, they present an excellent opportunity to analyze this relationship. The study uses hand-coded news abstracts and O.J. Simpson murder trial coverage as separate measures of news content. The study finds that lower levels of civic affairs content and higher levels of O.J. news are associated with greater audience share.     

Electoral registration and the control of votes: The case of Chile

We investigate how the employment relationship may lead employers to control the voting behavior and to induce the electoral registration of their workers. Forced registration and the control of votes become feasible when voting behavior is observable, as in open ballot elections. Workers whose vote is controlled are more likely to be registered as compared to other eligible voters, increasing their impact on electoral outcomes. Increasing the secrecy of the vote (for instance with the adoption of a secret ballot) significantly reduces the control of votes. Electoral registration, however, remains biased as long as the probability of voting behavior disclosure induces less ideologically motivated voters to comply with the political preference of the employer. We provide empirical support for the predictions of the model examining the effects of the introduction of the secret ballot in Chile in 1958.     

Teacher Skill Development: Evidence from Performance Ratings by Principals

We examine the dynamic nature of teacher skill development using panel data on principals’ subjective performance ratings of teachers. Past research on teacher productivity improvement has focused primarily on one important but narrow measure of performance: teachers’ value-added to student achievement on standardized tests. Unlike value-added, subjective performance ratings provide detailed information about specific skill dimensions and are available for teachers in non-tested grades and subjects. Using a within-teacher returns-to-experience framework, we find, on average, large and rapid improvements in teachers’ instructional practices throughout their first 10 years on the job as well as substantial differences in improvement rates across individual teachers. We also document that subjective performance ratings contain important information about teacher effectiveness. In the district we study, principals appear to differentiate teacher performance throughout the full distribution instead of just in the tails. Furthermore, prior performance ratings and gains in these ratings provide additional information about teachers’ ability to improve test scores that is not captured by prior value-added scores. Taken together, our study provides new insights on teacher performance improvement and variation in teacher development across instructional skills and individual teachers.     

J亚群禽白血病病毒的LTR体外启动活性分析

为分析J亚群禽白血病病毒LTR基因的体外启动活性,将其克隆至含有萤光素酶报告基因的pGL3栽体中,构建了LTR重组质粒及其缺失不同区段的重组质粒,转染DF-1细胞测定萤光素酶的表达情况.结果显示,缺失U3时萤光素酶的表达量明显降低,缺失U5时萤光素酶的表达反而上升,这表明U3区可能具有强启动子功能,而U5区可能具有负调...     

Voices of the Commonwealth: An Oral History of the Modern Commonwealth 1965–2012

This article describes a major exercise undertaken by the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, London, to put together an oral history of the modern Commonwealth. The project was set in the context of a wider research agenda aimed at investigating whether the Commonwealth has made any difference globally in policy terms. As part of the exercise, the author, who was the lead researcher on the project, interviewed senior figures within the Commonwealth who played key roles in shaping the destiny of the organization and in influencing policy. The article is a personal account of the exercise.     

The liberal character of ethological governance

This paper examines the liberal government of ‘character’ from the perspective offered by those practices, strategies and techniques I term ‘ethological governance’. Ethological governance is neither an ideology nor a tradition of thought, but denotes an orientation to human conduct that is organized by an explicit concern with character and its formation. The paper argues that ethological governance, especially in its Anglo-American strain, subscribes to a developmental notion of human conduct (i.e. character) and serves as a standard for liberal government by judging the responsible exercise of freedom. To this end, the paper examines how ethological governance establishes a context of government that harnesses character as a tool for social and political transformation in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by (1) explaining how character establishes a normative scale against which the capacity for individuals to practise their freedom is measured and (2) offering a symptomatic reading of those aspects of John Stuart Mill's work that deal with ethology in order to show how character indexes the judicious limits of government and serves as a basic test of citizenly competence.     

人工感染血管瘤病变型ALV-J对鸡免疫器官的影响

为探讨血管瘤病变型J亚群禽白血病病毒(ALV-J)HN06克隆株的致病情况,通过人工接种7日龄SPF雏鸡ALV-J HN06株,检测HN06株对鸡体的影响。结果发现,感染鸡生长较慢,体重比对照组低。HN06株对胸腺抑制显著,对法氏囊影响不明显,外周免疫器官的脾指数比对照组大。PCR检测病毒在免疫器官中的分布结果显示,骨髓和脾在攻毒后第7天可检测到病毒整合到基因组中,法氏囊和胸腺则分别在攻毒后第14天和第21天才能检测到。通过ELISA和细胞培养技术检测病毒血症、抗体产生和排毒情况,发现HN06感染鸡血浆中第7天即出现病毒(7/21),第28天出现抗体(2/21),第21天泄殖腔出现排毒(2/21)。随着产生抗体鸡的比例升高,排毒鸡逐渐减少,42d后无排毒现象。由此可见,试验鸡后天感染HN06株出现病毒血症,HN06不但抑制机体生长,还影响免疫器官的发育;HN06首先感染免疫器官中的骨髓和脾,再感染法氏囊和胸腺;抗体的产生能抑制排毒,但病毒血症仍然存在。     

蛋鸡J亚群禽白血病病毒分离株SD1009株感染性克隆的构建与病毒拯救

为探究蛋鸡J亚群禽白血病病毒(ALV-J)的致病机理,从山东省某鸡场送检的蛋鸡病料中分离鉴定出1株ALV-J,命名为SD1009株,采用PCR方法分3段扩增出SD1009株的前病毒cDNA,PCR产物经克隆酶切后顺次连接,获得1个含有完整ALV-J前病毒cDNA的重组质粒,命名为pBW-SD1009。全长测序及序列比对分析发现,近年来分离的ALV-J都存在缺失部分rTM和DR区的序列,缺失长度为205bp。通过外源基因嵌合的方式,将205bp嵌合进入,又获得了1个前病毒cDNA的重组质粒,命名为pBW-SD1009A205,将pBW-SD1009和pBW-SD1009A205分别转染DF1细胞,通过间接免疫荧光试验,禽白血病抗原试剂盒检测,反转录酶试剂盒检验,表明拯救出了2株病毒,分别命名为rSD1009和rSD1009A205。本研究成功构建了蛋鸡ALV-J的感染性克隆,并在序列分析的基础上,又构建了第2株补全缺失序列的感染性克隆,结果表明缺失部分rTM和DR区的序列,对病毒的拯救以及病毒的复制动力学无显著影响。     

On Joining the Constitution

A new independent crossbench peer takes stock of the institution he has just joined, examines the arguments for reform and ponders what might await.