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Notes: Helicobacter pylori is the main cause of peptic ulceration, distal gastric adenocarcinoma, and gastric lymphoma. Only 15% of those colonized develop disease, and pathogenesis depends upon strain virulence, host genetic susceptibility, and environmental cofactors. Virulence factors include the cag pathogenicity island, which induces proinflammatory, pro-proliferative epithelial cell signaling; the cytotoxin VacA, which causes epithelial damage; and an adhesin, BabA. Host genetic polymorphisms that lead to high-level pro-inflammatory cytokine release in response to infection increase cancer risk. Pathogenesis is dependent upon inflammation, a Th-1 acquired immune response and hormonal changes including hypergastrinaemia. Antral-predominant inflammation leads to increased acid production from the uninflamed corpus and predisposes to duodenal ulceration; corpus-predominant gastritis leads to hypochlorhydria and predisposes to gastric ulceration and adenocarcinoma. Falling prevalence of H. pylori in developed countries has led to a falling incidence of associated diseases. However, whether there are disadvantages of an H. pylori-free stomach, for example increased risk of esosphageal adenocarcinoma, remains unclear.

Notes: Sarcomas form a highly diverse group of rare tumors that are derived from connective tissue. More than 100 different malignant and benign soft tissue neoplasms can be recognized by histologic examination. Few diagnostic markers exist, and the cell of origin for many soft tissue tumors is unknown. The accurate diagnosis of many of these tumors therefore remains a challenge. The study of sarcomas has yielded many insights that can be applied to other neoplasms such as carcinoma. For example, the success of the treatment of gastrointestinal stromal tumor with Imatinib has led to an increased effort to find targeted therapies for other malignancies. Here we describe the known molecular changes in a number of sarcomas and focus on novel scientific approaches that can be expected to lead to improved diagnosis, prognostication, and therapy of sarcoma.

Notes: The gas-lift technique comprises the injection of gas bubbles in vertical oil wells to increase production. It is based on a reduction of the tubing gravitational pressure gradient. Several fluid-flow phenomena influencing such vertical gas-liquid flows are discussed. These effects include the radial distribution of void fraction and of gas and liquid velocity, flow regime changes, and system stability problems. Associated consequences for gas-lift performance and related optimization approaches are also discussed.

Notes: What mechanisms of flow control do animals use to enhance hydrodynamic performance? Animals are capable of manipulating flow around the body and appendages both passively and actively. Passive mechanisms rely on structural and morphological components of the body (i.e., humpback whale tubercles, riblets). Active flow control mechanisms use appendage or body musculature to directly generate wake flow structures or stiffen fins against external hydrodynamic loads. Fish can actively control fin curvature, displacement, and area. The vortex wake shed by the tail differs between eel-like fishes and fishes with a discrete narrowing of the body in front of the tail, and three-dimensional effects may play a major role in determining wake structure in most fishes.

Notes: Over the past four decades, the combination of in situ and remote sensing observations has demonstrated that long nonlinear internal solitary-like waves are ubiquitous features of coastal oceans. The following provides an overview of the properties of steady internal solitary waves and the transient processes of wave generation and evolution, primarily from the point of view of weakly nonlinear theory, of which the Korteweg-de Vries equation is the most frequently used example. However, the oceanographically important processes of wave instability and breaking, generally inaccessible with these models, are also discussed. Furthermore, observations often show strongly nonlinear waves whose properties can only be explained with fully nonlinear models.

Notes: Electrophoretic separation of a mixture of chemical species is a fundamental technique of great usefulness in biology, health care, and forensics. In capillary electrophoresis (which has evolved from its predecessor, slab-gel electrophoresis), the sample migrates through a single microcapillary instead of through the network of pores in a gel. A fundamental design problem is to minimize dispersion in the separation direction. Molecular diffusion is inevitable and sets a theoretical limit on the best separation that can be achieved. But in practice, there are a number of effects arising out of the interplay between fluid flow, chemistry, thermal effects, and electric fields that result in enhanced dispersion. This paper reviews the subject of fluid flow in such capillary microchannels and examines the various causes of enhanced dispersion that limit the efficiency of separation.

Notes: Race car performance depends on elements such as the engine, tires, suspension, road, aerodynamics, and of course the driver. In recent years, however, vehicle aerodynamics gained increased attention, mainly due to the utilization of the negative lift (downforce) principle, yielding several important performance improvements. This review briefly explains the significance of the aerodynamic downforce and how it improves race car performance. After this short introduction various methods to generate downforce such as inverted wings, diffusers, and vortex generators are discussed. Due to the complex geometry of these vehicles, the aerodynamic interaction between the various body components is significant, resulting in vortex flows and lifting surface shapes unlike traditional airplane wings. Typical design tools such as wind tunnel testing, computational fluid dynamics, and track testing, and their relevance to race car development, are discussed as well. In spite of the tremendous progress of these design tools (due to better instrumentation, communication, and computational power), the fluid dynamic phenomenon is still highly nonlinear, and predicting the effect of a particular modification is not always trouble free. Several examples covering a wide range of vehicle shapes (e.g., from stock cars to open-wheel race cars) are presented to demonstrate this nonlinear nature of the flow field.

Notes: Large-eddy simulation (LES) of turbulent combustion is a relatively new research field. Much research has been carried out over the past years, but to realize the full predictive potential of combustion LES, many fundamental questions still have to be addressed, and common practices of LES of nonreacting flows revisited. The focus of the present review is to highlight the fundamental differences between Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) and LES combustion models for nonpremixed and premixed turbulent combustion, to identify some of the open questions and modeling issues for LES, and to provide future perspectives.

Notes: Mammalian fertilization requires the coordinated activity of motile spermatozoa, muscular contractions of the uterus and oviduct, as well as ciliary beating. These elastic structures generate forces that drive fluid motion, but their configurations are, in turn, determined by the fluid dynamics. We review the basic fluid mechanical aspects of reproduction, including flagellar/ciliary beating and peristalsis. We report on recent biological studies that have shed light on the relative importance of the mechanical ingredients of reproduction. In particular, we examine sperm motility in the reproductive tract, ovum pickup and transport in the oviduct, as well as sperm-egg interactions. We review recent advances in understanding the internal mechanics of cilia and flagella, flagellar surface interaction, sperm motility in complex fluids, and the role of fluid dynamics in embryo transfer. We outline promising computational fluid dynamics frameworks that may be used to investigate these complex, fluid-structure interactions.

Notes: This article provides a critical review of computational techniques for flow-noise prediction and the underlying theories. Hybrid approaches, in which the turbulent noise source field is computed and/or modeled separately from the far-field calculation, are afforded particular attention. Numerical methods and modern flow simulation techniques are discussed in terms of their suitability and accuracy for flow-noise calculations. Other topics highlighted include some important formulation and computational issues in the application of aeroacoustic theories, generalized acoustic analogies with better accounts of flow-sound interaction, and recent computational investigations of noise-control strategies. The review ends with an analysis of major challenges and key areas for improvement in order to advance the state of the art of computational aeroacoustics.

Notes: The challenges in understanding hypersonic flight are discussed and critical hypersonic aerothermodynamics issues are reviewed. The ability of current analytical methods, numerical methods, ground testing capabilities, and flight testing approaches to predict hypersonic flow are evaluated. The areas where aerothermodynamic shortcomings restrict our ability to design and analyze hypersonic vehicles are discussed, and prospects for future capabilities are reviewed. Considerable work still needs to be done before our understanding of hypersonic flow will allow for the accurate prediction of vehicle flight characteristics throughout the flight envelope from launch to orbital insertion.

Notes: We review mathematical models of confined bubbles, emphasizing physical mechanisms as expressed in simple geometries. Molecular interactions between liquid, gas, and the confining solid are all important and are described through the disjoining pressure concept. Methods for finding static shapes are considered. The static solution is a springboard for discussing pressure-driven and surface-tension-driven flows, both of which involve viscous effects and macroscopic films entrained near apparent contact lines. We next discuss vapor bubbles produced by thermal effects. Vaporization localized near contact lines and condensation distributed in colder parts of the interface lead to steady vapor bubbles. Their size is determined through global constraints. Unsteady vapor bubbles are discussed and we end with thoughts on open problems.

Notes: The review deals with drop impacts on thin liquid layers and dry surfaces. The impacts resulting in crown formation are referred to as splashing. Crowns and their propagation are discussed in detail, as well as some additional kindred, albeit nonsplashing, phenomena like drop spreading and deposition, receding (recoil), jetting, fingering, and rebound. The review begins with an explanation of various practical motivations feeding the interest in the fascinating phenomena of drop impact, and the above-mentioned topics are then considered in their experimental, theoretical, and computational aspects.

Notes: Loss of Ca2+ homeostasis, often in the form of cytoplasmic increases, leads to cell injury. Depending upon cell type and the intensity of Ca2+ toxicity, the ensuing pathology can be reversible or irreversible. Although multiple destructive processes are activated by Ca2+, lethal outcomes are determined largely by Ca2+-induced mitochondrial permeability transition. This form of damage is primarily dependent upon mitochondrial Ca2+ accumulation, which is regulated by the mitochondrial membrane potential. Retention of the mitochondrial membrane potential during Ca2+ increases favors mitochondrial Ca2+ uptake and overload, resulting in mitochondrial permeability transition and cell death. In contrast, dissipation of mitochondrial membrane potential reduces mitochondrial Ca2+ uptake, retards mitochondrial permeability transition, and delays death, even in cells with large Ca2+ increases. The rates of mitochondrial membrane potential dissipation and mitochondrial Ca2+ uptake may determine cellular sensitivity to Ca2+ toxicity under pathological conditions, including ischemic injury.

Notes: Atherosclerosis, the cause of myocardial infarction, stroke, and ischemic gangrene, is an inflammatory disease. The atherosclerotic process is initiated when cholesterol-containing low-density lipoproteins accumulate in the intima and activate the endothelium. Leukocyte adhesion molecules and chemokines promote recruitment of monocytes and T cells. Monocytes differentiate into macrophages and upregulate pattern recognition receptors, including scavenger receptors and toll-like receptors. Scavenger receptors mediate lipoprotein internalization, which leads to foam-cell formation. Toll-like receptors transmit activating signals that lead to the release of cytokines, proteases, and vasoactive molecules. T cells in lesions recognize local antigens and mount T helper-1 responses with secretion of pro-inflammatory cytokines that contribute to local inflammation and growth of the plaque. Intensified inflammatory activation may lead to local proteolysis, plaque rupture, and thrombus formation, which causes ischemia and infarction. Inflammatory markers are already used to monitor the disease process and anti-inflammatory therapy may be useful to control disease activity.

Notes: In the past 25 years, a majority of cancer studies have focused on examining functional consequences of activating and/or inactivating mutations in critical genes implicated in cell cycle control. These studies have taught us a great deal about the functions of oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes and the signaling pathways regulating cell proliferation and/or cell death. However, such studies have largely ignored the fact that cancers are heterogeneous cellular entities whose growth is dependent upon reciprocal interactions between genetically altered "initiated" cells and the dynamic microenvironment in which they live. This review highlights the aspects of cancer development that, like organogenesis during embryonic development and tissue repair in adult mammals, are regulated by interactions between epithelial cells, activated stromal cells, and soluble and insoluble components of the extracellular matrix.

Notes: Prostate cancer displays considerable clinical, morphological, and biological heterogeneity. Classical genetic techniques have provided only limited information about the pathogenesis of prostate cancer progression. Nevertheless, several candidate genes and pathways have been implicated in prostate cancer development. High-throughput techniques have exponentially expanded the number of candidate genes, including some whose role in prostate cancer pathogenesis has been studied. However, the techniques used to study the prostate cancer genome, transcriptome, and proteome generate massive amounts of data that have yet to be integrated and explored. To move beyond candidate gene identification and develop a comprehensive understanding of cancer pathogenesis, integrative approaches need to analyze this data on a global level. This review addresses candidate genes involved in prostate cancer pathogenesis in a biological and clinical context and demonstrates how integrated analysis of high-throughput data augments our understanding of prostate cancer.

Notes: Nonimmune glomerulopathies are an area of significant research. This review discusses the development of focal segmental glomerulosclerosis, with particular attention to the role of the podocyte in the initiation of glomerulosclerosis and the contribution to glomerulosclerosis from capillary hypertension and soluble factors such as transforming growth factor beta, platelet-derived growth factor, vascular endothelial growth factor, and angiotensin. The effects of these factors on endothelial and mesangial cells are also discussed. In addition, we review our current understanding of the slit diaphragm (a specialized cell junction found in the kidney), slit diaphragmĐ??associated proteins (including nephrin, podocin, ʼ̛-actinin-4, CD2-associated protein, and transient receptor potential channel 6), and the role of these proteins in glomerular disease. We also discuss the most recent research on the pathogenesis of collapsing glomerulosclerosis, human immunodeficiency virus associated nephropathy, Denys-Drash, diabetic nephropathy, Alport syndrome, and other diseases related to the interaction between the podocyte and the glomerular basement membrane.

Notes: Malignant gliomas, the most common type of primary brain tumor, are a spectrum of tumors of varying differentiation and malignancy grades. These tumors may arise from neural stem cells and appear to contain tumor stem cells. Early genetic events differ between astrocytic and oligodendroglial tumors, but all tumors have an initially invasive phenotype, which complicates therapy. Progression-associated genetic alterations are common to different tumor types, targeting growth-promoting and cell cycle control pathways and resulting in focal hypoxia, necrosis, and angiogenesis. Knowledge of malignant glioma genetics has already impacted clinical management of these tumors, and researchers hope that further knowledge of the molecular pathology of malignant gliomas will result in novel therapies.

Notes: Modern techniques of cell and molecular biology have rapidly uncovered the mechanisms underlying inflammatory injury of the lung. This expanding knowledge (which includes an understanding of complement, cell surface receptors, cytokines and chemokines, transcription factors, oxidants, proteinases, and endogenous inhibitors, as well as the role of leukocyte adhesion-promoting molecules) has provided new insights into the inflammatory system in general, as well as in the context of lung injury. In this review, we summarize recent progress in understanding the regulation of lung inflammation by using immunoglobulin G (IgG) immune complexĐ??induced lung injury as a model. These studies have provided information on the role of various inflammatory mediators and their sequence of engagement. Insights into potential interventional approaches for the suppression of inflammatory processes in humans have emerged from those studies.

Notes: The association between Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) and a large number of benign and malignant diseases is unique among DNA viruses. Within infected tissues, proteins that are expressed during the normal lytic and latent viral life cycle lead to cellular alterations that contribute to these EBV-associated diseases. Although the early events of EBV infection are poorly understood, increasing knowledge of the viral processes that govern viral latency has shed light upon the potential mechanisms by which EBV infection can lead to cellular transformation. Our current understanding of the role of EBV in the development of Burkitt lymphoma, Hodgkin lymphoma, nasopharyngeal carcinoma, and other EBV-associated diseases is discussed.

Notes: The endothelial cells lining vascular and lymphatic vessels are targets of several infectious agents, including viruses and bacteria, that lead to dramatic changes in their functions. Understanding the pathophysiological mechanisms that cause the clinical manifestations of those infections has been advanced through the use of animal models and in vitro systems; however, there are also abundant studies that explore the consequences of endothelial infection in vitro without supporting evidence that endothelial cells are actual in vivo targets of infection in human diseases. This article defines criteria for considering an infection as truly endothelium-targeted and reviews the literature that offers insights into the pathogenesis of human endothelial-target infections.

Notes: Neurodegenerative diseases as diverse as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease share a common pathogenetic mechanism involving aggregation and deposition of misfolded proteins, which leads to progressive central nervous system disease. Although the type of aggregated protein and the regional and cellular distribution of deposition vary from disease to disease, these disorders may all be linked by similar pathways of protein aggregation with fibril formation and amyloid deposition. This perspective on pathogenesis suggests that a wide variety of neurodegenerative diseases can be grouped mechanistically as brain amyloidoses, an outlook that yields novel insights into potential therapeutic approaches that may be applicable across the broad spectrum of neurodegenerative disease.

Notes: Although Gram-negative bacteria have often been implicated in the pathogenesis of severe sepsis and septic shock, how they trigger these often lethal syndromes is uncertain. In particular, the role played by blood-borne bacteria is controversial. This review considers two alternatives. In the first, circulating Gram-negative bacteria induce toxic reactions directly within the vasculature; in the second, the major inflammatory stimulus occurs in local extravascular sites of infection and circulating bacteria contribute little to inducing toxic responses. Evidence for each alternative is found in the literature. Bacteremia and severe sepsis are not so closely linked that the most striking cases can be a model for the rest. Intravascular and extravascular triggers may warrant different approaches to prevention and therapy.

Notes: I am honored to write the prefatory chapter for the inaugural volume of the Annual Review of Pathology: Mechanisms of Disease. This publishing venture signals that pathology takes its rightful place alongside the other biomedical sciences. I thought it may be of interest to some to delineate how a circuitous path led me into a career in experimental pathology and to give some of the flavor of a past era in experimental approaches. Thus, my title.

Notes: From histological and biological perspectives, lung cancer is a complex neoplasm. Although the sequential preneoplastic changes have been defined for centrally arising squamous carcinomas of the lung, they have been poorly documented for the other major forms of lung cancers, including small cell lung carcinoma and adenocarcinomas. There are three main morphologic forms of preneoplastic lesions recognized in the lung: squamous dysplasias, atypical adenomatous hyperplasia, and diffuse idiopathic pulmonary neuroendocrine cell hyperplasia. However, these lesions account for the development of only a subset of lung cancers. Several studies have provided information regarding the molecular characterization of lung preneoplastic changes, especially for squamous cell carcinoma. These molecular changes have been detected in the histologically normal and abnormal respiratory epithelium of smokers. Two different molecular pathways have been detected in lung adenocarcinoma pathogenesis: smoking-associated activation of RAS signaling, and nonsmoking-associated activation of EGFR signaling; the latter is detected in histologically normal respiratory epithelium.

Notes: Parasitic diseases represent major global health problems of immense proportion. Schistosomiasis, malaria, leishmaniasis, Chagas disease, and African sleeping sickness affect hundreds of millions of people worldwide, cause millions of deaths annually, and present an immense social and economic burden. Recent advances in genomic analysis of several of the major global parasites have revealed key factors involved in the pathogenesis of parasite diseases. Among the major virulence factors identified are parasite-derived proteases. This review focuses on the direct role of proteases in disease pathogenesis. Well-characterized examples of the roles proteases play in pathogenesis include their involvement in invasion of the host by parasite migration through tissue barriers, degradation of hemoglobin and other blood proteins, immune evasion, and activation of inflammation.

Notes: Kaposi's sarcoma (KS) has long been suspected of having an infectious etiology on the basis of its unusual epidemiology, histopathology, and natural history. Nearly a decade ago, a novel herpesviral genome was discovered in KS biopsies, and since that time strong epidemiologic evidence has accumulated correlating infection with this KS-associated herpesvirus (KSHV, also known as human herpesvirus 8) with the development of the disease. Here we review the evidence linking KSHV infection to KS risk and discuss current notions of how KSHV gene expression promotes the development of this remarkable neoplasm. These studies show that both latent and lytic viral replicative cycles contribute significantlyĐ??but differentlyĐ??to KS development. The studies also highlight mechanistic differences between oncogenesis caused by KSHV and that caused by its distant relative Epstein-Barr virus.

Notes: We review recent advances in understanding, modeling, and controlling oscillations in the flow past a cavity. The fundamental mechanisms underlying cavity flow oscillations have been known for at least 40 years, but suppressing these oscillations in a reliable and robust way is still a challenge today. Interest in controlling the flow past a cavity is motivated by aerospace applications, but in addition, cavity flows provide an attractive canonical problem for exploring general flow control techniques. The focus is on recent advances in modeling these flows, and in controlling them, using both open-loop and closed-loop techniques. A relatively new perspective is that cavity oscillations may not always be self-sustained, but under some flow conditions may be lightly damped resonances, sustained by external disturbances such as boundary layer turbulence. Areas in which our understanding is incomplete, and which deserve further study, are discussed, in particular the effects of high-frequency open-loop forcing, fundamental limitations of feedback control for a given configuration of sensors and actuators, and the development of a feedback design methodology that respects the limited range of validity of the available dynamical models.

Notes: When the free surfaces of most solids approach their bulk melting temperatures from below, the molecular structure of the material gives way to a disordered structure with some attributes of both the solid and liquid phases. When the temperature is sufficiently close to that of bulk transition, the surface melts and literally flows as a viscous fluid. This phenomenon, called interfacial premelting, lies at the heart of the microscopic theory of melting of solid matter, and captures the interest of condensed matter physicists and physical chemists alike. The process is ubiquitous and responsible for a wide range of consequences in materials with biological, geophysical, and technological significance. Because such systems are often exposed to spatial or temporal variations in thermodynamic forcing, there are a host of fluid mechanical phenomena that result from this underlying melting behavior. The fluid dynamics of unfrozen surfaces holds clues for understanding the bulk behavior of polycrystalline materials, from Earth's mantle to the stratosphere and beyond. In this review we focus on the fluid dynamical consequences of the premelting of solids.

Notes: We consider the hydrodynamics of creatures capable of sustaining themselves on the water surface by means other than flotation. Particular attention is given to classifying water walkers according to their principal means of weight support and lateral propulsion. The various propulsion mechanisms are rationalized through consideration of energetics, hydrodynamic forces applied, or momentum transferred by the driving stroke. We review previous research in this area and suggest directions for future work. Special attention is given to introductory discussions of problems not previously treated in the fluid mechanics literature, with hopes of attracting physicists, applied mathematicians, and engineers to this relatively unexplored area of fluid mechanics.

Notes: There has been a recent government-wide effort to examine the nation's language needs for both the purposes of security and to increase general cultural awareness. Recent surveys of government agencies have shown that more than 80 agencies require some sort of foreign language capability to complete their missions. These surveys were, however, completed before the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) stood up, and while there may be great need for foreign language capabilities in DHS, such as in their border patrol or customs duties, that need has not been fully documented. An assessment of DHS language needs would provide information about current and future needs and would allow the department to properly implement procedures to alleviate any problems. Potential language needs are discussed and several recommendations are made to DHS so that they could work to maintain their language capabilities, rather than fall behind.

Notes: Terrorism casualties in the U.S. have been caused primarily by attacks on facilities. In earthquake, hurricane, infectious disease outbreaks, hazmat releases, and other disasters, peoples' safety often depends on the facilities they occupy. Yet strategic homeland security documents issued by the White House and the US Department of Homeland Security focus on the protection of "infrastructures," understood to consist mainly of utility systems, and rarely on facilities per se. For other than federal office buildings and infrastructure nodes, federal plans barely acknowledge the urgent task of protecting civilian facilities. This article gives evidence for the importance of facilities to homeland security. Are facilities so varied and numerous that it would be cost-prohibitive to implement a national protection strategy? The article argues that it would not be. Economies of scope in multi-hazard protection, existing legal and accreditation frameworks, new possibilities for integrating information systems, and the nation's many facility-safety professionals are all valuable resources on which to build. The U.S. should identify facility protection as a distinctive field of homeland security policy and proceed by supporting decentralized initiatives.

Notes: Terrorist attacks may involve large-scale systems with multiple points of vulnerability and intervention. For example, chemical and biological terrorist attacks can be targeted at large-scale distribution system, such as those associated with agriculture, meat products, or water. These supply-chain systems can be thought of as having three distinct points of potential contamination: at the source, during processing, or at delivery. Prevention and mitigation strategies can be applied at any of these points. The effectiveness of a risk management program involves the ability to evaluate the trade-offs associated with allocating available resources to mitigation strategies that could be implemented at various points along the supply chain.The paper presents a conceptual model for evaluation the cost-effectiveness of these strategies. Structured as an event tree representing potential contamination entry points at various places in the supply chain, decisions related to where and how resources should be allocated to deterrence, detection and response can be evaluated. This approach focuses on the likelihood of the success of the homeland's actions, rather than on the probability of the terrorists' actions, which can be more difficult to quantify.

Notes: A Legal Guide to Homeland Security and Emergency Management for State and Local Governments is a compendium of articles by attorneys experienced in what is a rapidly expanding new field of law. These articles range from a personal account of the 2004 Florida hurricane outbreak to mutual aid considerations.

Notes: In the United States, preparation for a potential influenza pandemic is receiving heightened media coverage and scrutiny. Scientific attention is focused on the potential for the current Southeastern Asian avian flu virus, influenza A (H5N1), to become a pandemic threat through genetic mutation and viral reassortment. It is imperative that we act now, as we face an evolving and advancing disease state with insufficient national preparation. Existing preparedness plans address laboratory and disease surveillance, community containment and border protection, and mass dispensing and vaccination strategies. However, little attention has been directed to identifying and managing psychological and social factors likely to influence human behavior during a pandemic. All of our health and medical strategies require people to behave in prescribed ways to avoid exposure, prevent infection, or halt disease transmission. This article provides timely expert panel recommendations for pandemic influenza response and recovery by addressing human behavior and adaptation.

Notes: A well respected author has created an excellent overview of the threat of bioterrorism - yesterday, today and in the not so distant future. The text not only provides a succinct analysis of the threat but also presents issues of concern such as the imbalance between funding for bioterrorism and funding for all-hazard public health readiness. He includes several Appendices that are useful to planners and researchers alike. He leaves the reader with several prioritized agendas for action and the feeling that dark times are coming upon the world either from bioterrorists, unregulated research, or natural causes initiated by accidents. Overall the book serves as a good augmentation reference for university courses in natural and technological hazards.

Notes: Testimony submitted by Professors Herman B. Leonard and Arnold M. Howitt of the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, regarding ways to improve federal and state/local disaster preparedness and response. Presented on March 8, 2006 to the U.S. Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

Notes: Events such as the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and the 2004 terrorist attack on the school in Beslan, Russia demonstrate that terrorists are willing and able to attack large numbers of children. Moreover, pediatric casualties are likely when terrorist incidents occur in urban areas even if children are not the primary target. Very little research has been conducted on the management and outcomes of children during and after disasters. This paper discusses the known risks that terrorism brings to children, vulnerabilities in this population, basic principles of pediatric disaster response and current gaps in response capabilities.

Notes: Two upcoming conferences that may be of interest to JHSEM readers.

Notes: Counterterrorism (e.g., military forces) and antiterrorism (e.g., theological dialogues) programs are the most common strategies in the prevention and potential elimination of terrorism. Professor Fathali M. Moghaddam's From the Terrorists' Point of View represents a shift in current thinking because it competes with the today's counterterrorism-antiterrorism paradigm. The core message the author sends to the national and international intelligence community is this: If you all want to end terrorism, you all should first ``see the world from the terrorists' point of view." In the terrorists' world, their terrorist acts are morally justified and rational; and although they engage in terrorism, they also deeply care for the welfare of Islamic communities. From the Terrorists' Point of View also suggests an alternative explanation for the origin of terrorism across all cultures that is based on the author's ``staircase to terrorism" metaphor. Using this metaphor, an individual moves from the ground floor to subsequent floors until he/she realizes at the top floor (fifth) of the staircase the only option is terrorism to end the injustices of the social system that individual has experienced for many years. This review suggests that, although political and Islamic fundamentalist terrorists might share the same feeling of injustices on the ground floor and on subsequent floors, this metaphor appears to be more applicable to the development of political terrorism, relative to the origin of Islamic fundamentalist terrorism. It also suggests that the cultural identity crisis in Islamic communities (also discussed by the author) appears to be a more convincing approach to explain the development of this form of terrorism. The controversial nature of the author's thesis is what will make From the Terrorists' Point of View an interesting book.

Notes: Since the early 1980s, suicide bombings have become the deadliest form of terrorism. Suicide bombers are not generally clinically deranged and are socially and politically motivated. Furthermore, the motives of suicide bombers can be considered separately from those of their sponsoring organizations. Security personnel are advised to watch for seven signs of terrorist activity and to be mindful of certain behavioral indicators of subjects about to attack. Terrorism must be prevented at the source, during pre-attack phases, and at the target.

Notes: The rise of the American homeland security endeavor has created demands for knowledgeable professionals to address issues of critical infrastructure assurance. James Madison University has recently developed a survey course on infrastructure performance using a complex systems approach. Course development was facilitated by the enthusiastic support and participation of a multi-disciplinary faculty team. The course is designed for a broad student audience including physical science, public administration, health, business, economics and sociology majors. The course has been successful in terms of graduate and undergraduate student enrollment and has generated positive student feedback.Drawing on recent work from the physical, engineering, and social sciences, we take an interdisciplinary approach to understanding complex system operation and failure. We begin by considering historical examples of major system failures. We then explore the components, operation, and complex interdependencies of the infrastructures most critical to society. We divide critical infrastructures into three classes - commodity, service, and information - and focus on the electric power, health services and telecommunication sectors as representative examples. Students are exposed to literatures that inform their understanding of large, complex, and risky technical systems. Course material illustrates how complex systems engender unexpected interactions of failures to occur that can result in a cascade of increasingly serious disturbances often culminating in disaster. A major component of the course is devoted to defining and measuring risk. The final instruction block is devoted to risk management strategies involving both technology and public policy. The course concludes with the presentation of student projects that may address a historical complex system failure case study, an assessment of an existing infrastructure system, or survey a specific topic on complex system operation and failure.

Notes: This is a review of the 2nd edition of Introduction to Emergency Management by George Haddow and Jane Bullock (2006). Overall the book covers the emergency management practices and issues common in the United States today. It has expanded discussion of the events and repercussions of September 11, 2001 but does not discuss Hurricane Katrina's impact in 2005. The authors' experiences are put to good use, especially in discussing the history and future of emergency management, but editorial problems hinder the book's application in an academic setting. The book contains several case studies and other resources that will be of interest to emergency management practitioners.

Notes: A well-respected author has created an overview of faith-based responses to disaster and the role of clergy in providing mental health and spiritual care to victims. The text surveys a range of issues, including the effects of traumatic events on psychological and spiritual health and the roles of disaster response agencies, both state-sponsored and faith-based organizations, and offers practical guidance in how to prepare for a disaster. He includes a reference section that directs readers to additional resources on the mental health aspects of disaster and disaster response. The author also develops a strategy to overcome barriers to the incorporation of clergy and faith communities into disaster response and strongly encourages collaboration and the building of cross-disciplinary relationships. Overall, the book serves as a good primer on disaster response for persons within faith communities who wish to provide effective disaster relief.

Notes: Review of 9/11 and the Future of Transportation Security, by R. William Johnstone.

Notes: The role of information assurance (IA) is critical for cyber-based technologies and products, and the risk of cyberterrorism to IA is omnipresent. In particular, to achieve IA, young and dynamic developing technologies and products should be using a defined lifecycle that leverages and builds (throughout the developmental lifecycle) on a rich and proven body of knowledge and practices in risk assessment and management. The lifecycle of software development must include the following (not necessarily sequentially): the needs and requirements; specifications; contractor selection; conceptual design; systems integration, demonstration, and validation; engineering manufacturing, development, and production; and maintenance and major upgrade. In addition to addressing the functionality of the lifecycle development, from the risk analysis perspective it is just as important to focus on (1) the people's perspectives--namely, the individual, the team, the management, and the stakeholder, (2) the hardware-software perspectives, especially the risks associated with the commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) products and (3) the environment within which the entire system operates. This paper follows and builds on two papers previously published in this journal on the risks of terrorism associated with supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) and other cyberdependent systems. Its thesis is that the reliability and integrity of such systems, and thus, the corresponding interdependent infrastructures served by them, are contingent on the following three principles of IA and cybersecurity. Adhering to these principles can be instrumental in achieving the desired level of IA and cybersecurity:(1) Risk of software intrusion must be assessed and managed throughout the lifecycle of software development, focusing on both the functionality of software development and on the people involved in the process, knowing that hackers will exploit every weakness in the system.(2) Achieving information assurance and cybersecurity must be placed high on the priority list of top management. (The two are intricately dependent on software quality and telecommunications fidelity). This is synonymous with performing a holistic risk assessment and management.(3) Risk management of cyberterrorism must be the domain priority of the entire development team and the organization's management. It must be achieved from the perspectives of the total system throughout the software and system development's lifecycles.Building on the multifarious sources of risk envisioned during the lifecycle of software development through Hierarchical Holographic Modeling, resilience in cybersecurity through risk management is discussed. The human role in IA and cybersecurity and the centrality of the educational dimension in risk management are also introduced.

Notes: Comments regarding the article "A Critical Evaluation of the Incident Command System and NIMS" in Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management: Vol. 3: No. 3, Article 1. Available at: http://www.bepress.com/cgi/siteview.cgi/jhsem/vol3/iss3/1.

Notes: Review of Shelter from the Storm: Repairing the National Emergency Management Systemafter Hurricane Katrina, in THE ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science; March 2006. Volume 604.

Notes: Review of Political Terrorism: An Interdisciplinary Approach by Jeffrey Ian Ross.

Notes: Some citations for recent relevant research published elsewhere. Selected by the Managing Editor of JHSEM.

Notes: Laurence Kotlikoff presents a humorous take on Lawrence Summers' alleged suggestion that economists are smarter than sociologists.

Notes: Contrary to Paul Rubin's recent testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee, we believe the fragility of their estimates and the invalidity of their instrumental variables undermine Dezhbakhsh, Rubin, and Shepherd's work as evidence that the death penalty deters murder.

Notes: Robert Hahn and Scott Wallsten argue that mandating net neutrality, like most other forms of price regulation, is poor policy; instead, the government should focus on creating competition in the broadband market by liberalizing more spectrum and reducing entry barriers created by certain local regulations.

Notes: Although rates are lower than in the past, the combination of the corporate and personal tax rates still imply high marginal tax rates on capital income. Martin Feldstein argues that such high tax rates hurt the economy even if saving rates are not sensitive to rates of return, and examines the various ways in which capital taxes distort other aspects of economic activity.

Notes: Joseph E. Stiglitz calculates that the full cost of the Iraq War may reach $2 trillion, much more than the $60 billion OMB Director Mich Daniels originally foresaw.

Notes: John Donohue and Justin Wolfers argue that Gary Becker and Richard Posner are wrong to think that the death penalty deters murder: they find little empirical support for the claim. If anything, when one looks over the longest period possible (1934-2000) there is more evidence that the death penalty stimulates murder than that it deters murder.

Notes: Bradford Delong and Konstantin Magin remind us that a decade ago, many thought the stock market overvalued, and yet on balance the last decade has been good for investors who bought and held. What does this tell us?

Notes: The true cost of the war in Iraq must also include estimates of US expenditures after the war to defray the costs imposed upon non-combatant Iraqis.

Notes: How much of the costs of the Iraq war are really transfer payments?

Notes: Nick Wills-Johnson wonders whether social network and graph theory could help in valuing ecosystem services.

Notes: Bruno Frey argues that terrorism has been fought in the wrong way. Instead of focusing on deterrence and preemptive strikes, we should: (1) Reduce vulnerability by decentralizing society; (2) Strengthen positive incentives to leave the terrorist camp; and (3) Divert media attention from terrorist groups.

Notes: Comparing the experience of Vioxx and Celebrex leads Omri Ben-Shahar to think that stiff product liability has the perverse effect of inducing manufacturers of defective products to leave these products on the market, rather than withdraw them.

Notes: In 2011 the federal estate tax is scheduled to revert to its pre-2001 form, with a $1 million exemption and a 55% rate on large estates. Several compromise bills are now under discussion that would raise the exempt amount and lower rates. Although many arguments bear on this decision, the choice ultimately turns on the relative force of two opposing moral principles: a principle of autonomy with respect to the use of one's justly acquired property and a principle of equality with respect to unmerited advantages. We should worry much less about raising the exempt amount than lowering rates.

Notes: Robin Pope argues that Kotlikoff is right to favor shifting payroll taxes to sales taxes only Kotlikoff fails to mention all the benefits that would be obtained by the shift. One of these benefits would be aiding employment by shifting the burden of risk bearing from firms to governments that can shoulder the risk burden at a lower cost than most firms can because of their risk pooling abilities.

Notes: Joseph E. Stiglitz presents his plan for getting the United States and the Developing World to address global warming, and argues that by failing to address this problem, the United States is implicitly subsidizing energy usage and engaging in unfair trade practices.

Notes: Robert Hahn and Scott Wallsten in "The Economics of Net Neutrality" overlook the two-sided nature of the broadband market. This has important implications for market power and their proposed remedies.

Notes: J. Bradford DeLong and Konstantin Magin's July, 2006 article gave several good reasons why "informed and aggressive" investors will not necessarily push prices all of the way to their fundamental levels, but missing was the fact that there may not be enough such investors given that none will rationally choose to be too aggressive and have too undiversified a portfolio, according to Richard Serlin.

Notes: Harry Saunders argues that we owe it to the public, as well as to the economics profession, to be realistic about the level of pain required to combat global warming.

Notes: John Donohue wonders if the Disney case means that the courts of Delaware will cleverly find the facts they need to allow managers to waste corporate assets however they please.

Notes: Despite current high gasoline prices, what we need now is to increase gas taxes.

Notes: Edward Glaeser and Dwight Jaffee argue that Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae are actively pursuing great risk at taxpayer expense and private profit: the cure is a tax on their $1.5 trillion in borrowing that could yield as much as $6 billion a year.

Notes: Patrick Butler argues that Aaron Edlin's case for converting auto insurance to cents-per-odometer-mile prices would be made more compelling if he developed Vickrey's further assessment that current insurance pricing limits car ownership, particularly among the poor.

Notes: The increases in power flows and environmental constraints are forcing electricity utilities to install new equipment to enhance network operation. Some application of Flexible AC Transmission System (FACTS) technologies to existing high-voltage power systems has proved the use of FACTS technology may be a cost-effective option for power delivery system enhancements. Amongst various power electronic devices, the unified power flow controller (UPFC) device has captured the interest of researchers for its capability of regulating the power flow and minimizing the power losses simultaneously. Since for a cost-effective application of FACTS technology a proper selection of the number and placement of these devices is required, the scope of this paper is to propose a methodology, based on a genetic algorithm, able to identify the optimal number and location of UPFC devices in an assigned power system network for maximizing system capabilities, social welfare and to satisfy contractual requirements in an open market power.In order to validate the usefulness of the approach suggested herein, a case study using a IEEE 30-bus power system is presented and discussed.

Notes: The flexible AC transmission system (FACTS) in a power system improves the stability, reduces the losses, reduces the cost of generation and also improves the loadability of the system. In the proposed work, a non-traditional optimization technique, a Genetic Algorithm (GA) is conjunction with Fuzzy logic (FL) is used to optimize the various process parameters involved in introduction of FACTS devices in a power system. The various parameters taken into consideration were the location of the device, their type, and their rated value of the devices. The simulation was performed on a 30-bus power system with various types of FACTS controllers, modeled for steady state studies. The optimization results are compared to the solution given by another search method. This comparison confirms the efficiency of the proposed method which makes it promising to solve combinorial problem of FACTS device location in a power system network.

Notes: This paper introduces some field analyses of the wooden pole fire reports and online condition monitoring recorded data for line insulators of 33kV and 132kV overhead power lines of Petroleum Development Oman (PDO). From the statistical analysis of PDO pole fire reports, it was found that PDO southern directorates had higher number of pole fires during May-September 2004. Pole fires mostly occur for single poles of 33kV distribution lines close to graded roads, where the most common burning locations are at crossarm fixation and at ground foundation. Pollution monitoring systems provide very useful information which can be used to predict the pole fire events.

Notes: A novel simulation-based spectral technique for power quality and electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) design of an independent electrical power system (EPS) has been proposed. Power filter optimization problem has been formulated to provide full solution of the electric power quality and conducted EMI problems in the EPS. The spectral technique has been implemented within a CAD tool. An example of power quality and EMC design has been provided for an independent EPS where an AC power source generates a power, which is comparable to the consumed power, and an additional power filter is calculated for an electronic product including a switch-mode power supply. Current and voltage spectra calculations have been verified with a block-oriented simulation program Simulink. Numerical experiments revealed a number of important features of the proposed spectral technique.

Notes: With more emphasis being laid on clean and renewable sources of energy, engineers look for the best possible ways to harness the wind energy to the maximum extent. FACTs controllers that were earlier being used at the transmission level find their use at generation level when it comes to extracting reliable and quality power from Wind Energy Conversion Systems (WECS). This article presents a review of the important modeling techniques employed for developing FACTs controllers and examines the role of HVDC-Light transmission in exploiting the Off-shore wind energy resources.

Notes: In this paper, a proportional plus integral (PI) type sliding surface has been proposed for designing a fuzzy variable structure controller to solve load-frequency control problem in presence of load disturbances. It is shown that the proposed controller is effective and robust enough when the system suffers from mismatched condition but the model uncertainty and disturbance are assumed to be bounded. Furthermore, the proposed control strategy drives the states to the sliding surface and also maintains the sliding motion. To illustrate the approach presented has been tested on load-frequency control of power systems and the analytical claims have been justified under the uncertainty involved in the load demand of inter-connected power systems.

Notes: This essay presents some preliminary thoughts about the linkages between current human rights universalism and the practice of violence in the form of wars and interventions. I draw three parallels that may help us think about the current wars on terror and in Iraq. The first parallel concerns the progress of liberal universalist thought from the Enlightenment period in which a concern for rights coexisted with the justifications for imperialism. In the current era the succeeding line of universalist thought is that of human rights which similarly coexists with the overt and tacit support for violence that deprives some humans of their lives. The second parallel concerns the use of national identity. In the imperial era, the justification for rights either given or withheld was closely linked to constructions of national identity. Similarly, today there is a resurgence of nationalist discourse in which the construction of U.S. national identity is used to justify the violence that is done against Iraqi citizens. This discourse which constructs the U.S. as ontologically civilized and the Iraqis as barbarians is used to justify the violence that is done to them. Finally, the last parallel concerns violence in general. During imperialism, the scrutiny for acts of violence was borne largely by the native. Because he was constructed as a barbarian, his violence was made far more obvious as further evidence of his lesser development. In the present circumstances, a similar scrutiny is borne by the Iraqi insurgent while the violence of the coalition forces remains veiled beneath euphemisms like collateral damage. The torture scandal at Abu-Ghraib presented an opportunity to reverse the gaze but because of its interpretation as an aberration that falls squarely outside the ``normal" and the failure to widen the debate to other violence, this opportunity was largely lost. These three parallels taken together suggest that the old liberal hegemonic order of imperialism with its conflicting narratives of rights and oppression has been carried forward and sublimated into a human rights regime. And human rights is now deployed to justify violence against ``human rights abusers." Because of this continuity, there is a need to create a new universalism born organically from the struggles of subordinated peoples that eliminates old-order imperialist justifications for the oppression of Others while claiming to support human rights.

Notes: This article analyzes, digests, and critiques various facets of the current debate regarding the racial profiling of those in the United States who appear to be Arab and/or Muslim. By dispassionately addressing this debate from a variety of perspectives - historical, empirical, and legal - the article specifically examines the fine line between preserving civil rights and civil liberties, while ensuring the security of the American homeland. Following an empirical investigation into the history of racial profiling in the U.S., a legal analysis of the relevant legislation and constitutional standards, and a scientific reporting of the psychological and emotional impact of such profiling tactics, it concludes that the ineffectiveness of racial profiling strongly weighs against its usage and at the very least, discredits many of the arguments put forth in its defense. In reaching this conclusion, I attempt to justify the near-absolute and unqualified preservation of those civil rights and civil liberties that have traditionally defined the American legal system, but which have gradually been eroding in the course of the last five years. As we approach the fifth anniversary of the World Trade Center attacks, this article exposes the ongoing need to re-evaluate the policies and practices put in place in the wake of September 11, 2001.

Notes: Discourses of race, gender and religion have scripted the terms of engagement in the war on terror. As a result, Muslim feminists and activists must engage with the dual oppressions of Islamophobia that relies on re-vitalized Orientalist tropes and representations of backward, oppressed and politically immature Muslim women as well as religious extremism and puritan discourses that authorize equally limiting narratives of Islamic womanhood and compromise their human rights and liberty. The purpose of this discussion is to examine the way Muslim women have been discursively scripted from these opposing and contradictory spaces, and to explore the negotiations and contestations made by both secular and faith-centred Muslim feminists in combating these oppressive arrangements. In the first part of the discussion, I will draw on post-colonial and anti-racist feminist analyses to map out the complex interactions of race, gender, sexuality and religion in earlier imperial practices of conquest and colonization and examine how the continuing legacies of these encounters implicate the current "war on terror". In the second part of the discussion, I will examine Muslim women's feminist political engagement with and resistance to the concomitant factors of imperial and fundamentalist domination and will craft a better understanding of how these factors variously shape and are shaped by Muslim women's responses to them.

Notes: The shroud of secrecy that the American administration has wrapped around Guantanamo Bay creates a kind of Rorschach test of political views that tell us much more about those holding these views than about the prison and interrogation center itself. But for those less interested in political propaganda, a review of statements on Guantanamo in the Arab country of Yemen reveals some interesting contradictions and complexities. Yemeni statements on Guantanamo reflect contemporary tensions in people's conceptions of national sovereignty, the political interests of a weak state in global geopolitics and a developing conception of human rights in an emerging global social modernity.

Notes: The post-September 11th era has presented immense challenges and disappointing setbacks for the advancement of human rights. Yet, the era has also been marked by complexity, paradoxes and ample opportunities for introspection as events expose contemporary human rights' various weaknesses and contradictions. This article provides an overview of the interplay between the human rights concept's various instrumental appropriations and its more autonomous emancipatory capacity manifested in post-September 11th developments. Instead of an exhaustive examination, the article simply poses and juxtaposes different dimensions and layers of the formidable presence of the human rights idea in post-September 11th developments impacting the Middle East. To this end, it places a particular emphasis on human rights' capacity to simultaneously aid, transcend and confront local and international power structures. The article begins with a discussion of the ways in which American hegemony is both bolstered and challenged through human rights discourses after September 11th. It then turns to the Middle Eastern encounter with human rights amidst the American "War on Terror." It is argued that while widespread Middle Eastern consciousness of American appropriations of human rights foster cynicism about the promise and legitimacy of human rights, post-September 11th dynamics have also resulted in greater Middle Eastern engagement with the human rights concept and international human rights norms. In subsequent sections, the article presents a brief outline of the various challenges and openings presented for human rights advocacy in the last few years followed by a discussion of the renewed imperative for a genuine international human rights dialogue. Throughout the article, examples are presented of how pre-existing human rights geographies and hierarchies ascribing relativism to the East and universalism to the West have been unsettled during this period.

Notes: The paper deals with a bilateral accident situation in which victims have heterogeneous costs of care. With perfect information, efficient care by the injurer raises with the victim's cost. When the injurer cannot observe at all the victim's type, and this fact can be verified by Courts, first-best cannot be implemented with the use of a negligence rule based on the first-best levels of care. Second-best leads the injurer to intermediate care, and the two types of victims to choose the best response to it. We explore in particular detail the more interesting case of imperfect observation of the victim's type, characterizing the optimal solution and examining the different legal alternatives when Courts cannot verify the injurers' statements. Counterintuitively, we show that there is no difference at all between the use by Courts of a rule of complete trust and a rule of complete distrust towards the injurers' statements. We then relate the findings of the model to existing rules and doctrines in Common Law and Civil Law legal systems.

Notes: This article studies the optimal scope of negligence, considering which of the parties' precautionary measures should be included in the determination of negligence and which instead should be omitted. The analysis shows that the optimal scope of negligence balances the gains derived from improved accident prevention with the administrative costs of the system. This approach also provides insights concerning not only the notions of care and activity level and their respective boundaries, but also the choice between strict liability and negligence.

Notes: Professors Goldberg vigorously attacks the merits of the "Three Tenors" decision while emphasizing the issue of whether the challenged restraint resides within the boundaries of the firm. Professor Muris responds that the Commission's analysis is correct as a matter of law and fact, and that Professor Goldberg's call for a market power screen for all horizontal restraints ignores the legal costs of rulemaking. I take a third view of the debate. While conceding that per se rule is properly applied to "naked restraints," I show that the Commission's analysis relies on an inappropriately narrow view of the ancillary restraints doctrine in order to justify application of the per se rule. In particular, the Commission's emphasis on the timing of the restraint as well as its hostility towards PolyGram's free rider defense are not supported as a matter of law. In any event, the facts of the Three Tenors do not support the Commission's conclusion that the moratorium agreement was not ancillary to the joint venture.

Notes: World governance today is characterized by international organizations lacking democratic legitimacy and control by the citizens they claim to represent. They are also criticized for being inefficient. This leads to violent protests and to NGOs having great influence. To address these problems, we propose international governance based on the democratic idea of citizen participation: All citizens of the member countries of international organizations have the potential right to participate in the decision-making of international organizations via initiatives, referendums and recalls. In order to reduce transaction costs, a representative group of citizens is randomly selected who can actually exercise their participation rights.

Notes: Antitrust authorities often consider parallel pricing and market share stability to be clues of illegal collusion. To analyze whether this inference is correct, I develop a model of price competition with differentiated products in which demand and costs vary over time. In many cases parallel pricing does not distinguish between a competitive and a collusive outcome. However, in some cases perfect parallel pricing is compatible only with a competitive equilibrium, and therefore provides some evidence that firms did not collude. I also show that the competitive equilibrium is characterized by a higher market share stability than a collusive equilibrium.

Notes: Monetary sanctions are less effective when agents cannot afford to pay them in full. We present a simple model of a society with two types of risk averse agents, differing in terms of productivity in the legal labor market. We consider transfers from the most productive to the least productive agents, and discuss the conditions under which redistribution can reduce crime.

Notes: Buying market share occurs when firms price below the profit-maximizing price in order to gain market share, even though recoupment of lost profit is impossible. Although perceived by rivals as predatory pricing, buying-market-share pricing does not generally damage competition even when it forces efficient rivals to exit, and current predatory pricing policy yields desirable antitrust enforcement outcomes. However, buying market share can harm competition when share-based entry barriers exist and product differentiation is sufficiently weak. With weak product differentiation and share-based entry barriers, even prices set above average costs can have anticompetitive consequences.

Notes: This paper extends the law enforcement model to include court congestion. Society suffers harm from court congestion since delay affects the credibility and the reliability of the criminal justice system. The core result of the paper is that the probability of apprehension and the probability of conviction should be considered separately by the enforcement authority. Because the level of congestion is affected by the probability of apprehension only, the use of fines and conviction should be exhausted before resorting to the costlier (in terms of court congestion costs) instrument of apprehension.

Notes: We demonstrate that contingent attorney fees can play a strategic role in a model of nuisance suits. Specifically, the use of contingency fees makes the plaintiff's threat to go to trial credible. In contrast to previous economic analyses, we show that contingency fees do encourage nuisance suits.

Notes: Merger analysis is a field in which economic theory is systematically applied, day-in, day-out. Economics structures the definition of the relevant market, and then economics drives the evaluation of the likely competitive effect of the merger. Exactly which models are used by Federal Trade Commission staff would be of great interest to the stake-holder community, as would any details on how the models are applied. This paper provides those details with an in-depth study of the FTC merger review process focused on single market horizontal mergers evaluated between 1993 and 2003. Five different market models are identified with a homogeneous goods analysis (two choices) useful in about one-third of the cases and a differentiated goods analysis (three choices) relevant for the others. Unilateral effects analysis was used in slightly more than half of the cases and coordinated interaction theories in just less than half. Evidence contained in hot documents, validated customer concerns and event analyses appears to play an important role in confirming the implications of Guidelines-based theoretical models of a merger's competitive effect.

Notes: This paper discusses specific cases in financial regulation, competition law and legal rules in procurement, in light of the economic concept of the efficiency of mixed bundling as derived in our theoretical models. We assess the appropriateness of the existing rules, and also discuss whether there is a need to reform specific legal or regulatory rules in light of the efficiency discussion. We examine the U.S. legal and regulatory framework in government procurement, the offsets case, and finally we look into financial regulation in the case of bundled brokerage and soft commission arrangements on both sides of the Atlantic. The novelty of our models is that we analyze transactions mixed bundling in the cases of monopoly, monopsony and exchange. Additionally, for the cases of monopsony and exchange we consider goods of varying degrees of quality certainty. The common result is the local optimality of the bundling of transactions in terms of expected profits for the price-setting firm, and an overall increase in the level of trade in the goods bundled. In the real-life cases examined, we found that in most instances the authorities have decided that if the practice of pure bundling is present, to replace it with mixed bundling, rather than ban bundling altogether. This practice is correct, as according to our models mixed bundling is efficiency-enhancing (both in profits and in trade volumes). On the other hand, the policy implications derived from our models based on the presence of quality uncertainty suggest that allowing the bundling of dissimilar tasks is beneficial rather than damaging to trade, especially if the goods bundled are of diverse degrees of quality certainty. This is at odds with the current legal and regulation approach to bundling practices.

Notes: The judicial review of legislation can be configured in any of a number of ways. In particular this task may be concentrated in a constitutional court, or diffused among ordinary judges. Recent studies have shown that the design of judicial institutions can have important legal, social, and economic consequences for a given polity. Scholars have dwelled on the reasons that lead political actors to the choice of one model of judicial review over another, but there has been little empirical study on this choice. Here, several hypotheses as to the circumstances that lead to the establishment of constitutional courts are tested on the basis of a data set of 128 democratic constitutions. I find that the degree of political uncertainty facing politicians is an important predictor of whether or not a constitutional court will be established.

Notes: The Trojan Horse enforcement mechanism turns law-breakers into law-enforcers by entrusting them with the right to file a private suit and to collect a fine from their accomplices. Unlike leniency or state witness programs, the Trojan Horse mechanism is not dependent on an effective public enforcement agency operating in the background. It positions conspirators in a prisoner dilemma at the very first stage of their conspiracy, long before public enforcers are on their tails, thus enabling the state to decriminalize certain conspiracies. As shown in this paper, the Trojan Horse mechanism has a (comparative) advantage in asymmetric settings, such as in the employment of illegal immigrants. Whereas fines and other criminal sanctions hardly deter empty-pocket lawbreakers such as illegal immigrants, the carrot this mechanism waves might lure illegal immigrants into suing their employers and leaving the country with a prize in their pockets. Thus, it provides a more humane enforcement mechanism than the prevailing ones, and creates a strong deterrent effect on employers who consider hiring illegal immigrants.