Florida: Round 1 - State-Level Field Network Study of the Implementation of the Affordable Care Act

This report is part of a series of 21 state and regional studies examining the rollout of the ACA. The national network -- with 36 states and 61 researchers -- is led by the Rockefeller Institute of Government, the public policy research arm of the State University of New York, the Brookings Institution, and the Fels Institute of Government at the University of Pennsylvania.Florida's governor and legislative leadership declined to participate in setting up an Affordable Care Act (ACA) exchange and, indeed, refused or returned federal grants awarded to facilitate exchange planning. Instead, the state provided funding for an existing state-funded exchange for small business and individuals unrelated to the ACA that opened with limited services in spring 2014. Florida led the way in opposition to the ACA. Its then attorney general, Republican Bill McCollum, filed suit against the Obama administration aiming to have the law blocked as unconstitutional in both its individual mandate and its requirement for Medicaid expansion

The Monterey event in the Mediterranean: A record from shelf sediments of Malta

Oligo-Miocene carbonate platform and shelf sediments outcropping on the Maltese Islands provide an excellent archive of the paleoceanography of the central Mediterranean. A sequence of shallow water limestones, than shelf limestones, and marls, followed again by shallow water limestones, reflects drowning of a carbonate platform, the establishment of a shelf environment and, in the late Miocene, renewed progradation and aggradation of shallow water carbonates. The sequence recording the deepening of the Maltese platform contains several phosphorite hardgrounds and phosphorite pebble beds. These phosphorites were dated with strontium isotopes. Major episodes of phosphogenesis occurred between 25 and 16 Ma, and they are coeval with those phosphorite events reported from Florida and North Carolina. A Miocene carbon isotope and oxygen isotope stratigraphy was established on planktic and benthic foraminifera and on bulk samples. A major carbon isotope excursion with an amplitude of up to +l‰ between 18 and 12.5 Ma can be correlated with the globally recognized Monterey carbon isotope excursion. This is the first record of this event both in shallow water sediments and in the Mediterranean. The carbon isotope excursion precedes an oxygen isotope excursion which also was recognized in deep-sea records. Major episodes of phosphogenesis and platform drowning preceded the carbon isotope excursion by up to millions of years

Internationales Product Management 2011 : Einsatz und Trends – Ergebnisse Schweiz

StudieIm Bereich Product Management führen wir 2011 erstmalig eine umfassende Studie zum Status Quo und den aktuellen Trends des Product Managements durch. Befragt werden Product Management-Entscheidungsträger aus der Schweiz sowie aus dem Ausland

Exogenous schwann cells migrate, remyelinate and promote clinical recovery in experimental auto-immune encephalomyelitis

Schwann cell (SC) transplantation is currently being discussed as a strategy that may promote functional recovery in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) and other inflammatory demyelinating diseases of the central nervous system (CNS). However this assumes they will not only survive but also remyelinate demyelinated axons in the chronically inflamed CNS. To address this question we investigated the fate of transplanted SCs in myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG)-induced experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) in the Dark Agouti rat; an animal model that reproduces the complex inflammatory demyelinating immunopathology of MS. We now report that SCs expressing green fluorescent protein (GFP-SCs) allografted after disease onset not only survive but also migrate to remyelinate lesions in the inflamed CNS. GFP-SCs were detected more frequently in the parenchyma after direct injection into the spinal cord, than via intra-thecal delivery into the cerebrospinal fluid. In both cases the transplanted cells intermingled with astrocytes in demyelinated lesions, aligned with axons and by twenty one days post transplantation had formed Pzero protein immunoreactive internodes. Strikingly, GFP-SCs transplantation was associated with marked decrease in clinical disease severity in terms of mortality; all GFP-SCs transplanted animals survived whilst 80% of controls died within 40 days of disease

Swiss Corporate Sustainability Survey 2012 : Nachhaltigkeit in Schweizer Unternehmen

StudieDas Thema Nachhaltigkeit ist viel diskutiert und immer wieder Gegenstand von Untersuchungen. Der Erkenntnisgewinn der bereits existierenden Studien liegt grösstenteils in der Bedeutung von Nachhaltigkeit für Konsumenten, deren Kaufverhalten oder deren Verständnis des Begriffs Nachhaltigkeit. Wo aber steht der Werkplatz Schweiz bezüglich Nachhaltigkeit? Welche Herausforderungen sehen Unternehmen und wie wird Nachhaltigkeit in der Praxis umgesetzt? Die Studie "Swiss Corporate Sustainability Survey 2012" gibt Antwort auf diese und andere Fragen

Distribution of authigenic albites in a limestone succession of the Helvetic Domain, eastern Switzerland

A new occurrence of authigenic albite was found in a Jurassic sedimentary succession of the Glarus Nappe near Walenstadt (eastern Switzerland). The euhedral shape and the chemical purity of these albites are evidence for their authigenic origin. The crystals are irregularly distributed in the sediment, highlighting the importance of the host rock composition for albite authigenesis. The crystals occur exclusively in limestones with a carbonate content higher than 80 wt-%. A diagenetic or hydrothermal origin of albite authigenesis is discussed for the studied region. Clay mineral transformation appears to be an important source of ions for albite formatio

Altered carbon cycling and trace-metal enrichment during the late Valanginian and early Hauterivian

Abstract.: Carbonates of Valanginian age deposited in the Tethys and Atlantic Oceans show a distinct positive δ13C excursion (Δ δ13C = 1.5‰-2‰) in sections of the neritic, hemipelagic, and pelagic environment. This excursion records a major climate-induced perturbation of the global carbon system. The δ13C excursion is accompanied by enrichments in manganese (Mn) and iron (Fe). The correlation of the δ13C excursion with trends in Mn and Fe contents reflects changes in Valanginian paleoceanography and climate. Fe enrichment occurs mainly in terrestrial, platform, and shelf regions. In a basinal direction the Fe content decreases, whereas the Mn/Fe ratio increases. An increase in sedimentary Mn and Fe concentrations is related to elevated continental weathering rates and to widespread dys- or anoxia that favored metal deposition in Valanginian sediments. Various oceanographic changes (e.g., expansion of oxygen-minimum zones) resulting from increased continental runoff led to a strong remobilization and focused reprecipitation of metals in the oceans of the Valanginian stag