The following are highlights from the new series, Circulation: Cardiovascular Interventions Topic Review. This series will summarize the most important manuscripts, as selected by the editors, that have published in the Circulation portfolio. The objective of this new series is to provide a concise review of significant papers that are relevant to interventional cardiology. The studies included...

BACKGROUND Biosurfactants are surface-active compounds produced by some microorganisms. OBJECTIVES In this study, we collected surface skin samples from breast of poultry (chicken, turkey, and, quail) and screened for biosurfactant-producing bacteria. We also determined the genera of cultured strains. MATERIALS AND METHODS 33 hemolytic bacterial strains (15, 11, and 7 isolates from chicken,...

East German manufacturers’ revenue productivity is substantially below West levels, even three decades after unification. Using firm-product-level data with product quantities and prices, we analyze the role of specialization show that prominent “extended work bench hypothesis” cannot explain these sustained differences. Eastern firms specialize in simpler varieties generating less consumer val...

This paper quantifies the contribution of technology gaps to international income inequality. I develop an endogenous growth model where cross-country differences in R&D efficiency and cross-industry innovation adoption opportunities together determine equilibrium gaps, trade patterns, Countries with higher are richer have comparative advantage more innovation-dependent industries. calibrat...

This paper provides new evidence that estimates obtained from aggregated data may not provide reliable estimates of average firm-level parameters, if the composition of producers with different levels of productivity changes over the business cycle. I examine plant-level data and show that, due to the countercyclical reallocation of output among heterogenous plants, productivity measures based ...

The paper surveys the literature on the growth performance of the East Asian economies, evaluates the sustainability of that performance, and provides a preliminary assessment of their long-term growth prospects in the aftermath of the current crisis. It highlights special features of East Asian growth, including unusually high factor accumulation and a favorable demographic transition, but arg...

This paper simultaneously explores the determinants of the developing countries’ production frontier and their ‘efficiency’ in using the available resources and technology. In doing so it allows for the transfer of (industrial country) technology in determining the frontier and for international trade to influence absorptive capacity and national efficiency levels. Stochastic frontier analysis ...

We analyze recent contributions to growth theory based on the model of expanding variety of Romer (1990). In the first part, we present different versions of the benchmark linear model with imperfect competition. These include the “labequipment” model, “labor-for-intermediates” and “directed technical change”. We review applications of the expanding variety framework to the analysis of internat...