Essays on Macroeconomics and Forecasting

This dissertation consists of three essays on macroeconomics and forecasting. Central banks have recently engaged in unconventional monetary policies at the zero lower bound, where their forecasts play a crucial role in signaling the future path of monetary policy. The work presented herein investigates the effect of monetary policy announcements at the zero lower bound in Japan, and evaluates the efficiency of forecasts that are explicitly tied to monetary policy decisions in the United States. The first chapter investigates the effects of monetary policy announcements at the zero lower bound using Japanese data from 1998 to 2013. I find that the effect of expansionary monetary policy shocks is directly passed on to corporate bond yields, notably for high-grade corporate bond yields. However, the magnitude of estimated pass-through to stock prices and the exchange rate is substantially smaller than in the U.S., and not statistically significant in most cases. Such differences may reflect a higher degree of market segmentation or smaller scope to achieve further accommodation in Japan. The second chapter evaluates the efficiency of the FOMC's new economic projections. Since 2007, FOMC policymakers have been publishing detailed numerical projections of macroeconomic series over the next three years. By testing whether the revisions to these projections are unpredictable, I find that FOMC's efficiency is generally accepted for inflation, but often rejected for real economic variables, notably for the unemployment rate. The rejection is due to the strong autocorrelation of revisions, which may reflect information rigidity of FOMC's unemployment projections. The joint efficiency of the entire projection is accepted in most cases. The third chapter evaluates the efficiency of Fed's Greenbook forecast and uses this evaluation to improve the accuracy of the Greenbook forecast. Recently, Patton and Timmermann (2012) proposed a more powerful kind of forecast efficiency regression at multiple horizons, and showed that it provides evidence against the efficiency of the Fed's Greenbook forecasts. I use their forecast efficiency evaluation to propose a method for adjusting the Greenbook forecasts. Using this method in a real-time out-of-sample forecasting exercise, I find that it gives modest improvements in the accuracy of the forecasts for GDP deflator and CPI, but not for other variables. The improvements are statistically significant in some cases, the magnitude of which can be as high as an 18 percent reduction in the root mean square prediction error

Introductory Economics: Gender, Majors, and Future Performance

By investigating the exam scores of introductory economics classes in the business school at National Chengchi University in Taiwan between 2008 and 2019, we find three sets of results: First, we find no significant difference between genders in the exam scores. Second, students’ majors are significantly associated with their exam scores, which likely reflects their academic ability measured at college admission. Third, the exam scores are strong predictors of students’ future academic performance

The inhibitory effects of a RANKL-binding peptide on articular and periarticular bone loss in a murine model of collagen-induced arthritis: a bone histomorphometric study

Showing the effects of OP3-4 on the proliferation and differentiation of cartilage cell line ATDC5. A Results of proliferation assay on day 1 with the noninduction medium. B Alcian blue-positive area ratio in the cartilage induction medium on day 10. **p <0.01 vs. vehicle control, #p <0.05 vs. 100 ÎźM OP3-4. (JPEG 384 kb

Independent ventilation of graft rejection

Background : We herein report the use of independent lung ventilation (ILV) for managing acute allograft rejection after single-lung transplantation (SLT) for end-stage emphysema. Case presentation : A 54-year-old woman was transferred to our hospital with severe hypoxemia and respiratory distress due to unilateral lung disease with diffuse alveolar damage in the right donor lung associated with acute allograft rejection and with hyperinflation of the left native lung due to emphysema. She was unresponsive to immunosuppressive medications and conventional ventilation strategies, so different ventilator settings for each lung were required. A double-lumen endotracheal tube (DLT) was inserted, and ILV was initiated. The right lung was ventilated with high positive end-expiratory pressure (PEEP), intended for lung recruitment, and the left lung was ventilated with lung protective strategies using a low tidal volume and low levels of PEEP to avoid hyperinflation. Two days later, her lung function was dramatically improved, and the DLT was replaced with a single-lumen endotracheal tube. Gas exchange was maintained, and she was successfully weaned from mechanical ventilation on intensive-care unit day 15. Conclusions : ILV appears to be effective and safe for managing acute allograft rejection after SLT for emphysema

High-Efficiency Sky Blue-To-Green Fluorescent Emitters Based on 3-Pyridinecarbonitrile Derivatives

The pyridinecarbonitrile derivative is well known as an acceptor unit in fluorescent materials. However, its use in thermally activated delayed fluorescent (TADF) emitters is very limited compared with its benzenecarbonitrile counterparts. Very recently, we developed a series of 4-pyridinecarbonitrile, so-called isonicotinonitrile derivatives, as a highly efficient sky blue-to-green TADF emitters realizing low-drive-voltage organic light-emitting devices (OLEDs). In this work, we contributed new design and development for three 3-pyridinecarbonitrile-based TADF emitters named 2AcNN, 2PXZNN, and 5PXZNN. Among these emitters, a sky blue emitter, 2AcNN, showed a maximum external quantum efficiency (ηext,max) of 12% with CIE (0.19, 0.36). While green emitters, 5PXZNN and 2PXZNN, realized highly efficient TADF OLEDs with a ηext,max of 16–20%. Introduction of electron-donor moiety into the 2-position of 3-pyridinecarbonitrile contributes a larger overlapping of frontier molecular orbitals (FMOs) and stronger intramolecular charge transfer (ICT) interaction generating efficient TADF emitters

致死的低酸素血症をきたした神経芽細胞腫Stage4Sの一乳児症例

Background : Neuroblastoma is the most common extracranial solid tumor of childhood. Although the prognosis of neuroblastoma is relatively good, newborns less than two months of age with stage 4S neuroblastoma may present with aggressive hypoxia and restrictive respiratory impairment due to abdominal compartment syndrome. Case presentation : Two-month-old girl, height of 63 cm and body weight of 10 kg. She was diagnosed as neuroblastoma with Stage 4S. Because she was suffered from refractory hypoxemia and restrictive respiratory impairment due to abdominal compartment syndrome induced by multiple liver metastasis and massive ascites, she was transferred to our ICU. Her trachea was intubated and ventilated with assist/controlled mode, driving pressure 22 cmH2O, positive end-expiratory pressure（PEEP）8 cmH2O, fraction of inspiratory oxygen（FIO2）1.0, but tidal volume was obtained only 3.2 mL/kg and PaO2/FIO2 ratio of 55 mmHg. Therefore, we insert esophageal sensor and monitored esophageal pressure to performed transpulmonary pressure guided PEEP titration. When we changed PEEP from 8 to 15 cmH2O so that the end-expiratory transpulmonary pressure achieving 0 to 5 cmH2O, her oxygenation（PaO2/FIO2 ratio : 55 to 178 mmHg）and respiratory compliance（1.4 to 3.0 mL/cmH2O）were dramatically improved. Her respiratory condition was further stabilized by ascites puncture and radiotherapy, and the patient was extubated successfully on the 25th ICU day. Conclusions : Although pediatric neuroblastoma with stage 4S may induce severe respiratory efficiency, the responsiveness of treatment for neuroblastoma is promising. Multimodal treatments including optimal ventilator management such as transpulmonary pressure -guided PEEP titration contributes to improved patient’s prognosis