Search Results (381)

This paper analyzes how two major economic downturns—a recession and a stagflation—affected convergence in the European Union (EU). Absolute and conditional convergence rates are estimated using ordinary least squares (OLS) semilog regressions based on cross-sectional data from 2004 to 2022. The study tests two hypotheses: there was no absolute convergence in the EU during either the recession or the stagflation period, and conditional convergence occurred during the recession but not during stagflation. The regression results indicate that neither hypothesis can be rejected. External variables—economic openness, inflation, and investment—were more influential during stable periods, whereas internal variables—debt, unemployment, and the control of corruption—had a greater impact during crises. These findings suggest that the EU was more institutionally prepared for the stagflation due to mechanisms developed after the financial crisis, but these tools proved less effective in addressing supply-side shocks. Full article

Spinal muscular atrophy (SMA) is a severe autosomal recessive neuromuscular disorder and a leading genetic cause of infant mortality. Advances in disease-modifying therapies have significantly improved outcomes when treatment is initiated early, underscoring the importance of timely diagnosis. With the growing availability of prenatal genetic screening and high-resolution molecular diagnostics, opportunities for early detection, and potentially in utero intervention, are rapidly expanding. This narrative review synthesizes current evidence on the prenatal management of SMA, focusing on diagnostic strategies, the clinical application of fetal genetic testing, and the emerging potential of fetal therapy. We explore both invasive and non-invasive diagnostic approaches and evaluate experimental prenatal treatment modalities, while critically addressing the associated ethical, regulatory, and economic considerations. As the field progresses, integrating in utero strategies into clinical care may reshape perinatal medicine and offer transformative potential for genetic neurodegenerative disorders diagnosed before birth. The convergence of early diagnosis, fetal intervention, and personalized genetic counseling will be central to optimizing care pathways and outcomes in the era of precision medicine. Although significant challenges remain, the translation of fetal therapy into routine clinical practice is approaching feasibility. Future clinical trials, anchored in definitive prenatal diagnosis, will be essential, with benefits potentially outweighing the inherent procedural risks. Full article

Consanguinity is the marriage of two related persons. This type of marriage is one of the main pillars when it comes to recessive hereditary diseases, birth defects, infertility, miscarriages, abortion, and infant deaths. Intermarriage continues to be a common practice in various communities in North Africa, the Middle East, and West and South Asia, as well as among migrants from Europe and North America, even though in more and more countries it has become illegal. Even if security and stability are some of the motivations for consanguineous marriage, studies show that women often suffer physical and verbal abuse from their husbands. However, because of the blood bond, tolerance for these habits is much higher. In addition, it seems that the divorce rate is much lower because separation would affect the entire state of the family. The choice of partner is significantly influenced by variables such as limited access to education and financial resources. Illiterate people coming from poor rural areas are much more likely to choose consanguineous marriage to maintain wealth in the family. The lack of medical knowledge about the negative effects of consanguinity leads to an increased rate of abortions, infant deaths, and births of children with congenital birth defects. Today, because of the process of urbanization and increased levels of knowledge, the younger generation is becoming increasingly less receptive to this particular form of marriage. In addition, as education has become more accessible to women, they have become more independent and eager to fulfill their own goals and not the wishes of the family. In conclusion, contrary to the many apparent advantages of consanguineous marriage, partners should put genetic risks first, as medical problems bring with them increased costs in the medical system and also within the family, leading to even lower economic status and consequently perpetuation of this type of marriage. Full article

The present study addresses the topic of European companies, including Latvian companies, sustainably entering African markets. The actuality of this topic relates to the recession and the decrease in demand in the classical export markets (such as Scandinavia and Western Europe) with which Latvian firms used to trade; this is why the re-orientation of companies to African countries was carried out. Academic research worldwide has conducted many investigations on the specifics of exporting to Africa. The lack of knowledge relating to local African business practices is considered one of the significant barriers. The aim of this study was to mitigate this barrier by exploring real-world situations in African economic sectors. Interviews with relevant African experts were conducted for this purpose. The results showed that East European entrepreneurs, including Latvian entrepreneurs, should first focus on West African French-speaking countries with big seaports (e.g., Senegal, Guinea, Ivory Coast, Benin, Togo, and Cameroon), where Latvian knowledge, professional skills, and products relating to port and transportation infrastructures are in significant demand. A case study was conducted in Cameroon as an example of a good business match with Latvian service providers. The case study also highlighted the nature of Cameroon’s sociocultural dynamics, which are distinguished by the presence of several sociocultural zones, each with its own specific characteristics that need to be taken into account. Full article

Under the international globalized environment, the impact of the financial crisis of 2008 and the recent financial effect of the COVID-19 economic recession have generated a new role for the state aimed at reducing vulnerability to a new financial shock. Cost analysis is currently an issue among public authorities, inhibiting enhanced productivity and the effectiveness and utility of public services and goods. This article aims to showcase that the basic priorities of a high degree of transparency and accountability of public spending are becoming more and more essential. The need for cost allocation is essential for states to be resilient under the current ‘spin’ of crises. Full article

Introduction: Fraser syndrome (FS) is a rare autosomal recessive disorder. However, the clinical presentation remains variable. Diagnosis is based on a series of major and minor clinical criteria that can be supported by genetic tests. Prenatal diagnosis remains challenging. Methods: Herein, we reported a case of Fraser syndrome that was missed by ultrasound and diagnosed late at birth. The newborn presented with cryptophthalmos–syndactyly syndrome and absence of the right kidney. Based on a literature review of articles from the past 20 years, the authors found 40 cases, including indexed cases on PUBMED, Scopus, Web of Science, and Scholar using keywords related to “Fraser syndrome”. Through this report, we discuss the polymalformative syndrome, the clinical and paraclinical aspects of this syndrome, its clinical management, and highlight the importance of prenatal diagnosis in the light of research. Results: Our study found that consanguine parents (41.0%) were increasing risk factors for FS and poor socio-economic status delayed the early detection of FS. Among the 40 cases, 27 cases were detected postnatally. More than half of the cases resulted in poor perinatal outcomes. The common findings were cryptophthalmos (87.5%), syndactyly (87.5%), renal abnormalities (55.5%), and genital abnormalities (42.5%). Conclusions: A prenatal diagnosis of Fraser syndrome is still difficult. Thus, a counseled ultrasound scan at a specialized center should be recommended in suspected cases with indirect signs and risk factors of consanguinity. Full article

This article examines the resilience and volatility of academic publishing at the University of Maribor (UM) from 2004 to 2023, a period marked by significant economic and policy shifts in Slovenia. Using employment data from UM’s internal records and publication data from OpenAlex, we analyze the relationship between employed researchers and publishing authors. Despite a significant drop in researcher employment during the economic recession (2009–2013), the number of unique authors publishing under the UM affiliation surprisingly increased. Analysis of author turnover reveals a striking pattern: high short-term volatility (annual churn ~40–50%) contrasted with significant mid-term stability (5-year churn ~8–10%). Survival analysis confirms this pattern, revealing high initial attrition among publishing authors followed by long-term persistence for a core group of researchers. Network analysis of co-authorship patterns shows increasing resilience to the targeted removal of influential authors over time. Most significantly, we identify a fundamental shift in network structure around 2016, when the co-authorship network transitioned from dissassortative to assortative mixing patterns, coinciding with recovery in employment growth. This shift suggests a profound change in collaboration dynamics, from a system where highly connected researchers primarily collaborated with less-connected ones to one where highly connected researchers increasingly collaborate with each other. We discuss the implications for research policy and university management, emphasizing the need to balance short-term performance metrics with long-term stability and resilience. Full article

Background/Objectives: This study introduces the Multi Group Cost Malmquist Index ($CM{g}_m$), a novel tool for comparing and ranking the cost efficiency of multiple groups of similar decision-making units operating in different contexts. It was applied to Greek public hospitals to assess productivity change between 2009 and 2021, covering the period before the economic recession and after the second lockdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study aimed to determine the impact of these external shocks on hospital efficiency and to identify differences in cost productivity based on hospital size and regional location. Methods: Data envelopment analysis was employed to compute the Malmquist indices for productivity change and ranking. Overall, 109 Greek public hospitals were analysed using three models: as a single group, classified by bed capacity, and classified by regional health authority (RHA). Cost productivity was decomposed into its core measures. Results: During the economic crisis, hospitals improved their cost productivity by 13.2%, whereas during the pandemic, it declined by 32.1%, primarily due to cost frontier deterioration resulting from increased healthcare demand and strained resources. Medium-sized hospitals exhibited higher cost efficiency than small and large hospitals. Regional disparities were also observed, with hospitals in the 5^th and 7^th RHAs outperforming those in 1^st and 2^nd RHAs. Conclusions: The findings highlight the pandemic’s disruptive impact on hospital cost productivity compared to the efficiency gains during the economic crisis. It is encouraging, though, that hospitals are recovering again after the lifting of strict lockdown measures. The $CM{g}_m$ is a valuable tool for policymakers, offering insights into hospital performance across multiple groups. Future healthcare policies should prioritise resource optimisation and address regional disparities to enhance system-wide efficiency and resilience in times of crisis. Full article

Forecasting GDP is a highly practical task in macroeconomics, especially in the context of rapidly changing economic environments caused by both economic and non-economic factors. This study proposes a deep learning model that integrates Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) networks with a phase-adaptive attention mechanism (PAA-LSTM model) to improve forecasting accuracy. The attention mechanism is flexibly adjusted according to different phases of the economic cycle—recession, recovery, expansion, and stagnation—allowing the model to better capture temporal dynamics compared to traditional static attention approaches. The model is evaluated using GDP data from six countries representing three groups of economies: developed, emerging, and developing. The experimental results show that the proposed model achieves superior accuracy in countries with strong cyclical structures and high volatility. In more stable economies, such as the United States and Canada, PAA-LSTM remains competitive; however, its margin over simpler models is narrower, suggesting that the benefits of added complexity may vary depending on economic structure. These findings underscore the value of incorporating economic cycle phase information into deep learning models for macroeconomic forecasting and suggest a promising direction for selecting flexible forecasting architectures tailored to different country groups. Full article

This paper examines the macroeconomic implications of unrealistic optimism, a psychological bias that has been largely overlooked in economic models. While traditional models often link optimism to speculative bubbles and excessive risk taking, this study challenges that view by demonstrating that unrealistic optimism may rather accelerate recessions. Specifically, we develop a model in which consumers, under the influence of unrealistic optimism, believe that negative aggregate shocks will affect others but not themselves. This misjudgment leads to a premature fall in output prices, reducing production and triggering recessions. Additionally, we show that government intervention, when optimally timed, can mitigate the adverse effects of unrealistic optimism, offering important policy implications for stabilizing economies. By highlighting the possibility of optimism-induced downturns, this paper provides new insights into behavioral macroeconomics and offers a novel perspective on policy design. Full article

Recent years have been exceptionally turbulent due to various crises such as COVID-19, wars, and natural disasters. We conduct a systematic literature review to address the current state of the regional economic resilience literature, a topic regaining significance amid recent global crises. Considering the findings, we not only conduct the most up-to-date analysis of resilience types but also innovate previous research by collecting and processing data on the spatial and income features of regions, providing statistics about shock coverage, and sharing insights into region types. Additionally, we supplement the systematic literature analysis methodology by experimenting with large language models and defining new search strategies. The results show that most of the literature covers European countries, while that covering all other countries is far behind. Empirical coverage comes from high- and upper-middle-income countries (~97% of research), highlighting the lack of analysis on lower-middle- and low-income countries. This brings into question the applicability of regional resilience policies worldwide. The latest papers still mainly analyze the Great Recession, the most covered shock in the regional economic resilience literature. Not all authors have turned their attention to more recent crises. Finally, we believe future research should focus more on compound resilience—how regional economies cope with cascading or simultaneous shocks. Full article

Guangdong, Fujian, and Zhejiang (GFZ), located on China’s southeast coast, have long been economically active and rapidly growing provinces in China. However, the rising energy consumption in these provinces poses a major challenge to their carbon emissions reduction. Due to the spatial variation in the natural environment and socio-economic activities, energy carbon emissions (ECEs) and their reduction may vary among counties. The matter of scientifically formulating localized carbon reduction paths has therefore become a critical issue. This study proposed a novel path analysis framework based on exploring spatiotemporal heterogeneity using a spatiotemporal statistic model (i.e., spatiotemporal weighted regression). The path’s learning procedure was based on linking the changes in the amount of ECEs to the shifts in dominant factors, which were detected through local significance tests on the coefficients of STWR. To verify its effectiveness, we conducted a county-level empirical study considering four drivers (i.e., population (P), impervious surfaces (I), the proportion of secondary industry (manufacturing, M), and the proportion of tertiary industry (services, S)) in GFZ from 2014 to 2021. The ECEs show two different trends that may be affected by the COVID-19 pandemic and economic recession; hence, we divided them into two periods: an active period (2014–2018) and a stable period (2018–2021). Many interpretable paths and their occurrences were derived from our results, including the following: (1) P and S showed higher sensitivity to the changes in ECEs compared with I and M. Most counties (more than 50%) were dominated by P, but the dominator P may shift to I, M, and S during the active period. Many S-dominated counties reverted to being P-dominated ones during the stable period. (2) For the active period, the two most significant paths, M⁺ → S⁻ and M⁺ → P⁺ (+/− denotes positive or negative impacts of dominated driver), reduced ECEs by about 7.747 × 10⁵ tons and 3.145 × 10⁵ tons, respectively. Meanwhile, the worst path, S⁺ → P⁺, increased ECEs by nearly 1.186 × 10⁶ tons. (3) For the stable period, the best path (S⁺ → I⁺) significantly reduced ECEs by 1.122 × 10⁶ tons, while the worst two paths, M⁻ → P⁺ and I⁺ → P⁺, increased ECEs by 1.978 × 10⁶ tons and 4.107 ×10⁵ tons, respectively. These findings verify the effectiveness of our framework and further highlight the need for tailored, region-specific policies to achieve carbon reduction goals. Full article

Against the backdrop of global economic changes and rapid technological innovation, the sharing economy model is gradually transforming the operational mechanisms of traditional industries. However, some industries have experienced stagnation and recession during this transition, leading to market development constraints. The necessity of this study lies in filling the gap in the existing literature by conducting an in-depth analysis of the critical factors contributing to industrial stagnation and recession in the sharing economy. This study aims to provide concrete countermeasures for businesses and policymakers. The novelty of this research study lies in integrating multiple key variables affecting industrial development, including green production concepts, the circular economy, large-scale production, high-quality product demand driven by industrial automation, the sharing economy, and smart production. By employing multi-criterion decision-making methods, we quantitatively assess the impact of these factors more accurately. This study employs the Multi-Attribute Decision-Making (MADM) model, integrating the Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL) and the Analytic Network Process (ANP) to form D&ANP for analytical research. Highly automated industries are selected as the research subjects. The DEMATEL technique is used to construct the Influential Network Relationship Map (INRM), while the ANP concept is incorporated to develop the D&ANP model. Through the D&ANP method, influential weights are calculated and combined with industry-specific assessments of the suitability of potential causes (or attributes) contributing to economic stagnation and recession to determine the average performance values for each industry. These values are further compared with benchmark suitability performance values to distinguish ideal and non-ideal conditions across industries facing economic stagnation and recession. The analysis results indicate that different industries are influenced by varying factors, requiring strategic adjustments based on their unique development environments. Accordingly, this study provides industry-specific recommendations to optimize business models and resource allocation, mitigate the risks of economic stagnation and recession, and promote sustainable industrial development and economic recovery. The findings of this study not only contribute to empirical research on the impact of the sharing economy on industrial development but also serve as a decision-making reference for businesses. By offering strategic insights, enterprises can better respond to market dynamics, enhance competitiveness, and ensure long-term stable growth. Full article

Chinese cabbage (Brassica rapa L. ssp. pekinensis), an important traditional vegetable indigenous to China, is a typical cross-pollinated Brassica crop exhibiting pronounced heterosis. However, its small flower organs make artificial pollination for hybrid seed production highly challenging. The use of male-sterile lines has emerged as a crucial approach in hybrid seed production. Therefore, understanding the genetic and molecular mechanisms underlying male sterility in Chinese cabbage holds profound theoretical and economic importance and is pivotal for advancing Chinese cabbage crossbreeding. Here, cytological comparative analysis of anthers from sterile line 366-2S and fertile line 366-2F revealed abnormalities in 366-2S during the late tetrad stage, including delayed tapetum degradation and the aggregation of tetrad microspores without separation, which prevented pollen production and caused male sterility. Construction of the F₂ segregating population, with 366-2S as the female parent and genetically diverse fertile material Y636-9 as the male parent, indicated that male sterility in 366-2S is controlled by a single recessive gene. Using bulked segregant analysis sequencing and kompetitive allele-specific polymerase chain reaction (KASP) technology, the sterile gene was mapped to 65 kb between the PA11 and PA13 markers, with 11 genes in the candidate region. Functional annotation, expression, and sequence variation analyses identified BraA09g012710.3C, encoding acyl-CoA synthetase 5, as a candidate gene for 366-2S male sterility. Quantitative real-time polymerase chain reaction analysis revealed minimal expression of BraA09g012710.3C in 366-2S but high expression in the flower buds of 366-2F. Further analysis of candidate gene DNA sequences identified a large deletion encompassing BraA09g012710.3C, BraA09g012720.3C, BraA09g012730.3C, and BraA09g012740.3C in sterile line 366-2S (A09: 7452347–7479709). Cloning and verification of the other three deleted genes in the F₂ population via agarose gel electrophoresis confirmed their presence in F₂ sterile individuals, indicating that their deletion was not associated with male sterility, underscoring BraA09g012710.3C as the key gene driving male sterility in 366-2S. Full article

Mainstream strategies for protecting wealth from inflation involve diversification into traditional assets like common stocks, gold, fixed-income securities, and real estate. However, a significant contributor to inflation has been the rising energy prices, which have been the main underlying cause of several past recessions and high inflation periods. Investments in distributed generation with solar photovoltaics (PV) present a promising opportunity to hedge against inflation, considering non-taxed profits from PV energy generation. To investigate that potential, this study quantifies the return on investment (ROI), internal rate of return (IRR), payback period, net present cost, and levelized cost of energy of PV by running Solar Alone Multi-Objective Advisor (SAMA) simulations on grid-connected PV systems across different regions with varying inflation scenarios. The case studies are San Diego, California; Boston, Massachusetts; Santiago, Chile; and Buenos Aires, Argentina. Historical inflation data are also imposed on San Diego to assess PV system potential in dynamic inflammatory conditions, while Boston and Santiago additionally analyze hybrid PV-battery systems to understand battery impacts under increasing inflation rates. Net metering credits vary by location. The results showed that PV could be used as an effective inflation hedge in any region where PV started economically and provided increasingly attractive returns as inflation increased, particularly when taxes were considered. The varying values of the ROI and IRR underscore the importance of region-specific financial planning and the need to consider inflation when evaluating the long-term viability of PV systems. Finally, more capital-intensive PV systems with battery storage can become profitable in an inflationary economy. Full article