Highlights of the 2013 PPI User Survey

From December 2012 to May 2013, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) Producer Price Index (PPI) program conducted a user survey of its stakeholders in order to learn more about the program’s data users and how they utilize PPI data. The survey was sent by email to more than 42,000 PPI contacts who had a preexisting relationship with the PPI, as either a survey respondent, a subscriber to a data product, or a user who had contacted the PPI program for technical information. To increase awareness, BLS highlighted the survey on the PPI website and announced it in the U.S. Federal Register. The survey resulted in a total of 3,790 responses

Producer Inflation in 2014: Energy Prices Drop but Prices for Services Advance

The Producer Price Index (PPI) measures the average change over time in the selling prices received by domestic producers for their output. The PPI provides measures of final demand (price changes for goods, services, and construction sold to consumers, capital investment buyers, government, and export) and intermediate demand (price changes for goods, services, and construction sold to businesses, excluding capital investment goods, as inputs to production). This issue of Beyond the Numbers describes price changes in PPIs throughout 2014. Falling energy prices and rising services prices were some of the top movers in 2014

Improvements to the Producer Price Index measure: The Final-Demand-Intermediate-Demand System

[Excerpt] The release of January 2014 Producer Price Index (PPI) data marks the transition from the Stage of Processing (SOP) aggregation system to the Final Demand–Intermediate Demand (FD–ID) aggregation system. The transition to the FD– ID system is the culmination of a longstanding PPI objective to improve upon the SOP aggregation system by incorporating price data for services, construction, government purchases, and exports. In comparison to the SOP system, the FD-ID system more than doubles PPI coverage of the U.S. economy to over 75 percent of in-scope domestic production. This issue of Beyond the Numbers presents 2013 PPI data based on the new FD–ID system. The PPI estimates shown with this system represent the beginning of wider coverage by the index, to be continued in subsequent issues

Effects of ozone-vegetation coupling on surface ozone air quality via biogeochemical and meteorological feedbacks

Tropospheric ozone is one of the most hazardous air pollutants as it harms both human health and plant productivity. Foliage uptake of ozone via dry deposition damages photosynthesis and causes stomatal closure. These foliage changes could lead to a cascade of biogeochemical and biogeophysical effects that not only modulate the carbon cycle, regional hydrometeorology and climate, but also cause feedbacks onto surface ozone concentration itself. In this study, we implement a semi-empirical parameterization of ozone damage on vegetation in the Community Earth System Model to enable online ozone-vegetation coupling, so that for the first time ecosystem structure and ozone concentration can coevolve in fully coupled land-Atmosphere simulations. With ozone-vegetation coupling, present-day surface ozone is simulated to be higher by up to 4-6ĝ€ppbv over Europe, North America and China. Reduced dry deposition velocity following ozone damage contributes to ĝ1/4 40-100ĝ€% of those increases, constituting a significant positive biogeochemical feedback on ozone air quality. Enhanced biogenic isoprene emission is found to contribute to most of the remaining increases, and is driven mainly by higher vegetation temperature that results from lower transpiration rate. This isoprene-driven pathway represents an indirect, positive meteorological feedback. The reduction in both dry deposition and transpiration is mostly associated with reduced stomatal conductance following ozone damage, whereas the modification of photosynthesis and further changes in ecosystem productivity are found to play a smaller role in contributing to the ozone-vegetation feedbacks. Our results highlight the need to consider two-way ozone-vegetation coupling in Earth system models to derive a more complete understanding and yield more reliable future predictions of ozone air quality

Why a basic income alone will not be a panacea to social insecurity

At the start of this year, Finland began a trial of a 'universal basic income' system, under which 2,000 individuals who were receiving welfare were selected to receive a guaranteed monthly income of 560 euros over the next two years. But can basic income systems really address problems of social insecurity? Neil Warner, Frederick Harry Pitts, and Lorena Lombardozzi explain why a successful implementation of a basic income will require a wider and more radical intervention in the economy

Tacrolimus in pediatric renal transplantation

Tacrolimus was used as the primary immunosuppressive agent in 69 pediatric renal transplantations between December 17, 1989, and June 30, 1995. Children undergoing concomitant or prior liver and/or intestinal transplantation were excluded from analysis. The mean recipient age was 10.3±5.0 years (range, 0.7-17.5 years). Seventeen (24.6%) children were undergoing retransplantation, and six (8.7%) had a panel reactive antibody level of 40% or higher. Thirty-nine (57%) cases were with cadaveric kidneys, and 30 (43%) were with living donors. The mean donor age was 28.0±14.7 years (range, 1.0-50.0 years), and the mean cold ischemia time for the cadaveric kidneys was 27.0±9.4 hr. The antigen match was 2.7±1.2, and the mismatch was 3.1±1.2. All patients received tacrolimus and steroids, without antibody induction, and 26% received azathioprine as well. The mean follow-up was 32±20 months. One- and 4-year actuarial patient survival rates were 100% and 95%. One- and 4-year actuarial graft survival rates were 99% and 85%. The mean serum creatinine level was 1.2±0.8 mg/dl, and the calculated creatinine clearance was 82±26 ml/min/1.73 m2. The mean tacrolimus dose was 0.22±0.14 mg/kg/day, and the level was 9.5±4.8 ng/ml. The mean prednisone dose was 2.1±4.9 mg/day (0.07±0.17 mg/kg/day), and 73% of successfully transplanted children were off prednisone. Seventy-nine percent were not taking any antihypertensive medications. The mean serum cholesterol level was 158±54 mg/dl. The incidence of delayed graft function was 4.3%. The incidence of rejection was 49%, and the incidence of steroid-resistant rejection was 6%. The incidence of rejection decreased to 27% in the most recent 26 cases (January 1994 through June 1995). The incidence of new-onset diabetes was 10.1%; six of the seven affected children were able to be weaned off insulin. The incidence of cytomegalovirus disease was 13%, and that of posttransplant lymphoproliferative disorder was 10%; the incidence of posttransplant lymphoproliferative disorder in the last 40 transplants was 5% (two cases). All of the children who developed posttransplant lymphoproliferative disorder are alive and have functioning allografts. Based on this data, we believe that tacrolimus is a superior immunosuppressive agent in pediatric renal transplant patients, with excellent short- and medium-term patient and graft survival, an ability to withdraw steroids in the majority of patients, and, with more experience, a decreasing rate of rejection and vital complications

Immune status of recipients following bone marrow - Augmented solid organ transplantation

It has been postulated that the resident “passenger” leukocytes of hematolymphoid origin that migrate from whole organ grafts and subsequently establish systemic chimerism are essential for graft acceptance and the induction of donor-specific nonreactivity. This phenomenon was augmented by infusing 3 × 108 unmodified donor bone-marrow cells into 40 patients at the time of organ transplantation. Fifteen of the first 18 analyzable patients had sequential immunological evaluation over postoperative intervals of 5 to 17 months, (which included 7 kidney (two with islets), 7 liver (one with islets), and one heart recipient). The evolution of changes was compared with that in 16 kidney and liver nonmarrow controls followed for 4 to5 months. The generic immune reactivity of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMC) was determined by their proliferative responses to mitogens (PHA, ConA). Alloreactivity was measured by the recipient mixed lymphocyte reaction (MLR) to donor and HLA-mis-matched third-party panel cells. Based on all 3 tests,the recipients were classified as donor-specific hyporeactive, intermediate, and responsive; patients who were globally suppressed made up a fourth category. Eight (53%) of the 15 marrow-treated recipients exhibited progressive modulation of donor-specific reactivity (3 hyporeactive and 5 intermediate) while 7 remained antidonor-responsive. In the nonmarrow controls, 2 (12.5%) of the 16 patients showed donor-specific hyporeactivity, 10 (62.5%) were reactive, and 4 (25%) studied during a CMV infection had global suppression of responsiveness to all stimuli. © 1995 by Williams and Wilkins

Programming Macrophage Inflammation Resolution: The Role of Omega-3 Polyunsaturated Fatty Acids

It was previously thought that resolution of inflammation was a passive process, but recent emerging research has identified that resolution is an active process and that dual acting lipid mediators derived from essential omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) have both anti-inflammatory (reducing neutrophil access to the inflamed tissue) and pro-resolving (removal of apoptotic cells by macrophages in the inflamed site) actions. The objective of our study was to determine the role of omega-3 PUFAs in programming phenotypic changes in treated macrophages. The polarization of macrophages during inflammatory responses to functionally distinct phenotypes may play a role in both inflammation and resolution of inflammation following treatment with omega-3 PUFAs for chronic inflammatory diseases