Bankruptcy Treatment of Intellectual Property Assets: An Economic Analysis

With the rise of intellectual property in the modern economy, bankruptcy treatment of intellectual property assets has taken on ever greater importance. The law in this area must balance different approaches to asset management. Viewing the world from an ex ante perspective, intellectual property laws seek to foster investment in research and development. Freedom of contract plays a central role in maximizing the potential value of intellectual property by encouraging a robust licensing market to exploit the value of intellectual creativity. By contrast, the bankruptcy system generally views asset management from an ex post standpoint, focusing narrowly on how to maximize the value of a failing or failed enterprise. Thus, bankruptcy law affords trustees and debtors substantial leeway to rescind contracts and reorder the affairs of the failed entity. This article examines the rather complex rules governing the treatment of intellectual property assets in bankruptcy and suggests various reforms that could better promote economic efficiency

On non-gaussianities in single-field inflation

We study the impact of higher dimension operators in the inflaton Lagrangian on the non-gaussianity of the scalar spectrum. These terms can strongly enhance the effect without spoiling slow-roll, though it is difficult to exceed f_NL ~ 1, because the scale which suppresses the operators cannot be too low, if we want the effective field theory description to make sense. In particular we explicitly calculate the 3-point function given by an higher derivative interaction of the form (\nabla\phi)^4, which is expected to give the most important contribution. The angular dependence of the result turns out to be quite different from the minimal case without higher dimension operators.Comment: 10 page

Evaluation of prognostic risk models for postoperative pulmonary complications in adult patients undergoing major abdominal surgery: a systematic review and international external validation cohort study

Background Stratifying risk of postoperative pulmonary complications after major abdominal surgery allows clinicians to modify risk through targeted interventions and enhanced monitoring. In this study, we aimed to identify and validate prognostic models against a new consensus definition of postoperative pulmonary complications. Methods We did a systematic review and international external validation cohort study. The systematic review was done in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines. We searched MEDLINE and Embase on March 1, 2020, for articles published in English that reported on risk prediction models for postoperative pulmonary complications following abdominal surgery. External validation of existing models was done within a prospective international cohort study of adult patients (≥18 years) undergoing major abdominal surgery. Data were collected between Jan 1, 2019, and April 30, 2019, in the UK, Ireland, and Australia. Discriminative ability and prognostic accuracy summary statistics were compared between models for the 30-day postoperative pulmonary complication rate as defined by the Standardised Endpoints in Perioperative Medicine Core Outcome Measures in Perioperative and Anaesthetic Care (StEP-COMPAC). Model performance was compared using the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROCC). Findings In total, we identified 2903 records from our literature search; of which, 2514 (86·6%) unique records were screened, 121 (4·8%) of 2514 full texts were assessed for eligibility, and 29 unique prognostic models were identified. Nine (31·0%) of 29 models had score development reported only, 19 (65·5%) had undergone internal validation, and only four (13·8%) had been externally validated. Data to validate six eligible models were collected in the international external validation cohort study. Data from 11 591 patients were available, with an overall postoperative pulmonary complication rate of 7·8% (n=903). None of the six models showed good discrimination (defined as AUROCC ≥0·70) for identifying postoperative pulmonary complications, with the Assess Respiratory Risk in Surgical Patients in Catalonia score showing the best discrimination (AUROCC 0·700 [95% CI 0·683–0·717]). Interpretation In the pre-COVID-19 pandemic data, variability in the risk of pulmonary complications (StEP-COMPAC definition) following major abdominal surgery was poorly described by existing prognostication tools. To improve surgical safety during the COVID-19 pandemic recovery and beyond, novel risk stratification tools are required. Funding British Journal of Surgery Society