Regional Specialization of Greek Prefectures for the Time Period 1981-2001

Intense regional inequalities are considered to be widespread in Greece. Indeed, Athens mainly, and Thessaloniki consist the two poles in Greece, Thessaloniki in a lower degree though. In these two cities the larger part of industrial activity, as well as, tertiary sector activities, is assembled. On the contrary, in the other Greek regions not only the economic activities but also the infrastructures have been developed in smaller degree. Moreover, as it is well known, two Greek regions (Northern Aegean, Epirus) are among the poorest in the European Union. This fact constitutes a reluctant factor to the effort of Greece to increase the standard of living of the citizens. In addition, the last two decades, a significant decrease of the contribution of primary sector to the GDP with simultaneous increase of the contribution of the tertiary sector is observed. The particular change involves significant repercussions to the national economy. The aim of this paper is the study of the specialization of Greek prefectures as well as spatial distribution of 13 sectors of economic activity using employment data and methods of regional analysis such as Gini – Hirschman coefficient, Location Quotient Coefficient (LQ), Coefficient of Location (CL), Coefficient of Specialization (CS) and analysis of variation – participation.

Discrete versus continuous domain models for disease mapping

The main goal of disease mapping is to estimate disease risk and identify high-risk areas. Such analyses are hampered by the limited geographical resolution of the available data. Typically the available data are counts per spatial unit and the common approach is the Besag--York--Molli{\'e} (BYM) model. When precise geocodes are available, it is more natural to use Log-Gaussian Cox processes (LGCPs). In a simulation study mimicking childhood leukaemia incidence using actual residential locations of all children in the canton of Z\"urich, Switzerland, we compare the ability of these models to recover risk surfaces and identify high-risk areas. We then apply both approaches to actual data on childhood leukaemia incidence in the canton of Z\"urich during 1985-2015. We found that LGCPs outperform BYM models in almost all scenarios considered. Our findings suggest that there are important gains to be made from the use of LGCPs in spatial epidemiology.Comment: 28 pages, 4 figures, 2 Table

EMPIRICAL DEMAND ANALYSIS FOR LONG - LENGTH ROUNDWOOD (SAWLOGS) IN GREECE

In Greece and internationally, the roundwood is one of the most important forest products as it is used widely in construction and building sector. In this study the process of wholesale long-length roundwood (>2m) price determination is depicted in the form of an inverse demand system. The empirical application based on five species of long-length roundwood using yearly data for auctions providing reasonable and promising results. The own-quantity flexibilities suggest that the responses of prices to own-quantity changes are inelastic while Allais coefficients suggest substitutability between the different species of log-length roundwood.Inverse Almost Ideal Demand System, demand analysis, flexibilities, long-length roundwood, wood sector, Greece

Regional Specialization of Greek Prefectures for the Time Period 1981-2001

Intense regional inequalities are considered to be widespread in Greece. Indeed, Athens mainly, and Thessaloniki consist the two poles in Greece, Thessaloniki in a lower degree though. In these two cities the larger part of industrial activity, as well as, tertiary sector activities, is assembled. On the contrary, in the other Greek regions not only the economic activities but also the infrastructures have been developed in smaller degree. Moreover, as it is well known, two Greek regions (Northern Aegean, Epirus) are among the poorest in the European Union. This fact constitutes a reluctant factor to the effort of Greece to increase the standard of living of the citizens. In addition, the last two decades, a significant decrease of the contribution of primary sector to the GDP with simultaneous increase of the contribution of the tertiary sector is observed. The particular change involves significant repercussions to the national economy. The aim of this paper is the study of the specialization of Greek prefectures as well as spatial distribution of 13 sectors of economic activity using employment data and methods of regional analysis such as Gini – Hirschman coefficient, Location Quotient Coefficient (LQ), Coefficient of Location (CL), Coefficient of Specialization (CS) and analysis of variation – participation

Cross Border Collaboration: A Network Analysis of the Bilateral Collaborative Projects in the Case of Greece and Bulgaria

Although neighboring countries and both members of the EU, Greece and Bulgaria have very different social and economic environments in which entrepreneurial activities take place. At the same time, collaborative activities and research on economic and social cohesion and development between the organizations of Greece and Bulgaria is only minimal. In this empirical paper, we study the collaborative projects initiated by the organizations of the countries in order to understand the collaborative status of the two nations, their priorities and targets. Thus, we analyse the 34 research project proposals funded by the European Territorial Cooperation Program Greece-Bulgaria 2007-2013, (Interreg IV). Interreg IV is an EU initiative which aims to stimulate interregional cooperation in the EU between the years 2007-13. It is financed under the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). This phase of the Interreg initiative is designed to strengthen economic and social cohesion throughout the EU, by fostering the balanced development of the continent through cross-border, transnational and interregional cooperation. Special emphasis has been placed on integrating remote regions and those which share external borders with the candidate countries. The eligible areas of the programme in the case of Greece and Bulgaria, contains seven Regional Units (former Prefectures) on the Greek side (Evros, Kavala, Xanthi, Rodopi, Drama, Thessaloniki and Serres) and four Districts on the Bulgarian side (Blagoevgrad, Smolyan, Kardjali, Haskovo), covering an area of 40.202 km2 and 2.812.236 inhabitants. In our work we performe a network analysis in order to examine data relevant to the project¢s priority axis, the number of the partners involved, the type of the partners and their nationality. Our analysis provides interesting results for the specific organizations, the conditions and the targets of the projects for which they choose to collaborate under the specific EU funded scheme. Furthermore, our research sheds light on the competences and the competitive advantages for the partner¢s selection process. Based on those results, our paper concludes by providing insights on the regional and organizational strategies for the internationalization and the development of bilateral collaboration between the organizations of the two countries that could contribute positively in responding to the current economic crisis in Greece

Evidence for increased immune mobilization in First Episode Psychosis compared with the prodromal stage in males

The aim of the study was to gauge both the immune and neuroendocrine function in Ultra High Risk for psychosis (UHR) subjects and compare them with a cohort presenting with First Episode Psychosis (FEP). We recruited two groups, the first group consisted of 12 UHR males and the second of 25 males with FEP. We measured serum cortisol levels at 08:00, 12:00, 18:00 with their Area Under Curve with respect to the ground (AUCg) and the increase (AUCi) and we measured serum cytokines levels, Interleukin-1a, IL-1a, IL-2, IL-4,IL-5,IL-6,IL-8, IL-10,IL-12, IL-17a, Tumor Necrosis Factor-a (TNF-a), Interferon-γ (IFN-γ). Dexamethasone Suppression Test (DST) was also performed. The results suggest higher levels of both pro-inflammatory (TNF-a, IL-2, IL-12, IFN-γ) and anti-inflammatory (IL-10) cytokines in the FEP group compared with the UHR counterparts. Regarding the HPA axis function, the prodromal subjects showed a trend for higher AUCg and AUCi change/decrease cortisol levels. On the contrary, the DST results did not differ between the groups. No significant associations were demonstrated within each group among cytokines, cortisol and psychopathology. The findings favor a hypothesis of a relatively increased mobilization of both the pro- and anti-inflammatory cytokine networks, in FEP compared with that of UHR subjects

An expert system for ranking companies and investments: wood industry case

Wood industry is a very important part of both the Greek Rural and industrial sector. The discovery of the differentiation in the level of growth and in the quality of financial management between the Greek wood companies can provide very important aid in the design of an effective rural development policy. The evaluation and ranking of Greek wood companies based on actual financial data is a very complicated task and it requires expertise knowledge and skills. On the other hand a computer expert system can perform validation and evaluation in an efficient way and can substitute human experts. An expert system was designed and developed towards this direction. It uses multicriteria analysis for each one of the wood companies based on actual financial data and it applies fundamental principles of fuzzy logic in order to calculate the expected intervals of flows for the following years.

Humor appreciation of captionless cartoons in obsessive-compulsive disorder

Background: It seems that the core neural regions and cognitive processes implicated in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) pathophysiology may overlap with those involved in humor appreciation. However, to date, there have been no studies that have explored humor appreciation in OCD. The purpose of the present work was to investigate humor appreciation in a group of patients with OCD.Methods: We examined 25 patients with OCD and 25 healthy controls, matched by age, education, and gender. We administered Penn's Humor Appreciation Test (PHAT), a computerized test comprising captionless cartoons by Mordillo. Each set of stimuli consisted of two almost identical drawings, one of which was funny due to the alteration of a detail in the cartoon, whereas the other was not funny. Severity of psychopathology was evaluated with the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale (Y-BOCS).Results: No significant effect for group, gender or group × gender interaction was found on the PHAT scores. In OCD patients, humor appreciation was not significantly associated with age of onset, duration of illness, and obsessions, but correlated significantly with compulsions.Conclusions: Humor appreciation, based on captionless cartoons in OCD, does not seem to be deficient compared to healthy subjects but may be related to illness characteristics. © 2011 Bozikas et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd

Goal modelling for strategic dependency analysis in destination management

Purpose: The paper suggests goal modelling as a method for the strategic analysis in tourism destinations. Destination management is quite complex and challenging and requires deep understanding of the intentions, the roles and the strategies of the various stakeholders. Methods: This paper identifies the challenges and major issues of destination management, evaluates the capacity of goal modelling to address them and demonstrates the use of goal modelling for stakeholder and strategic analysis. Results: The paper provides a holistic, multi-level modelling approach that begins with stakeholder analysis, continues with the analysis of strategic dependencies between stakeholders and ends with the analysis of the strategic alignment of the Destination Management Systems. Goal modelling is used for the analysis of the roles and functions of stakeholders, the analysis of the interdependencies between stakeholders in terms of goals, tasks and resources, the selection between alternative business configurations, and the business model and strategic analysis. Implications: Three important issues of destination management are addressed: stakeholder analysis, strategic dependency analysis, and strategic alignment of information systems. The formalism of goal modelling can provide rigor and visualization in the analysis of the complex relationships in destination management