We prove Okounkov’s conjecture, a conjecture of Fomin-FultonLi-Poon, and a special case of Lascoux-Leclerc-Thibon’s conjecture on Schur positivity and give several more general statements using a recent result of Rhoades and Skandera. We include an alternative derivation of this result directly from Haiman’s work on Schur positive immanants. Our results imply an intriguing log-concavity propert...

Pharyngocutaneous fistula (PCF) is the most feared complication postlaryngectomy with a reported incidence varying from 3% to 65%. Some of the factors such as prior radiotherapy, poor nutritional status, and preoperative tracheostomy significantly increase the risk of developing a PCF. The development of a PCF leads to prolongation of hospital stay, increases financial burden, and delays the co...

IN DECEMBER 2004, the new Barroso Commission brought the saga of the French and German infringements of the Stability and Growth Pact to a close by lifting the “excessive deficit” procedure launched in 2003. That same month, the Commission launched infringement proceedings against Greece that has been providing inaccurate public deficit statistics since the creation of the Pact in 1997. The new...

Obesity is a multifactorial disease caused by the interaction between genotype and environment, and it is considered to be a type of addictive alteration. The A1 allele of the DRD2/ANKK1-TaqIA gene has been associated with addictive disorders, with obesity and with the performance in executive functions. The 7 repeat allele of the DRD4 gene has likewise been associated with the performance in e...

Four experiments addressed the different forms and functions of in-group bias in different contexts. The authors proposed 2 functions: an identity-expressive function and an instrumental function (or promotion of positive social change). The authors manipulated status differentials, the stability of these differences, and the communication context (intra- vs. intergroup) and measured in-group b...

background: breast milk is important for the overall well-being of infants. although lactation is relatively robust in the face of poor nutrition, the implication of poor nutrition on non-nutritive factors in breast milk is inconclusive. objective: this study was designed to find associations between nutritional and immune factors in maternal blood and breast milk with the aim to improve the ne...

Health-status classification systems that use preference-based approaches, including multi-attribute utility functions, are critically examined in this chapter. Five major issues are considered: an underlying conceptual framework; the definition of health status; choice of domains; relationships among the domains; and obtaining data on the quality of population health. (Related issues are discu...

Introduction The effects of homelessness on homeless people are large. Elderly in a particularly difficult situation. Being rejected from professional, social and cultural life, seniors may develop depression cognitive dysfunction. Aim aim the study was to assess socio-demographic variables intensity symptoms functions older different life environments. Material methods Forty aged 65 over Opols...

We study dynamic committee bargaining over an infinite horizon with discounting. In each period a committee proposal is generated by a random recognition rule, the committee chooses between the proposal and a status quo by majority rule, and the voting outcome in period t becomes the status quo in period t+1. We study symmetric Markov equilibria of the resulting game and conduct an experiment t...

The present study explores the role of cognitive reserve, executive functions, and working memory (WM) span, as factors that might explain training outcomes in cognitive status. Eighty-one older adults voluntarily participated in the study, classified either as older adults with subjective cognitive decline or cognitively intact. Each participant underwent a neuropsychological assessment that w...