Photodynamic therapy vs radiofrequency ablation for Barrett's dysplasia: Efficacy,safety and cost-comparison

AIM:To compare effectiveness,safety,and cost of photodynamic therapy(PDT)and radiofrequency ablation(RFA)in treatment of Barrett’s dysplasia(BD).METHODS:Consecutive case series of patients undergoing either PDT or RFA treatment at single center by a single investigator were compared.Thirty-three patients with high-grade dysplasia(HGD)had treatment with porfimer sodium photosensitzer and 630 nm laser(130 J/cm),with maximum of 3 treatment sessions.Fifty-three patients with BD(47 with low-grade dysplasia-LGD,6 with HGD)had step-wise circumferential and focal ablation using the HALO system with maximum of 4 treatment sessions.Both groups received proton pump inhibitors twice daily.Endoscopic biopsies were acquired at 2 and 12 mo after enrollment,with 4-quadrant biopsies every 1 cm of the original BE extent.A complete histological resolution response of BD(CR-D)was defined as all biopsies at the last endoscopy session negative for BD.Fisher’s exact test was used to assess differences between the two study groups for primary outcomes.For all outcomes,a two-sided P value of less than 0.05 was considered to indicate statistical significance.RESULTS:Thirty(91%)PDT patients and 39(74%)RFA were men(P=0.05).The mean age was 70.7±12.2 and 65.4±12.7(P=0.10)year and mean length of BE was 5.4±3.2 cm and 5.7±3.2 cm(P=0.53)for PDT and RFA patients,respectively.The CR-D was(18/33)54.5%with PDT vs(47/53)88.7%with RFA(P=0.001).One patient with PDT had an esophageal perforation and was managed with non-surgical measures and no perforation was seen with RFA.PDT was five times more costly than RFA at our institution.The two groups were not randomized and had different BD grading are the limitations of the study.CONCLUSION:In our experience,RFA had higher rate of CR-D without any serious adverse events and was less costly than PDT for endoscopic treatment of BD.

Cost-effectiveness of Crohn's disease post-operative care

AIM: To define the cost-effectiveness of strategies, including endoscopy and immunosuppression, to prevent endoscopic recurrence of Crohn's disease following intestinal resection.METHODS: In the "POCER" study patients undergoing intestinal resection were treated with post-operative drug therapy. Two thirds were randomized to active care(6 mo colonoscopy and drug intensification for endoscopic recurrence) and one third to drug therapy without early endoscopy. Colonoscopy at 18 mo and faecal calprotectin(FC) measurement were used to assess disease recurrence. Administrative data, chart review and patient questionnaires were collected prospectively over 18 mo.RESULTS: Sixty patients(active care n = 43, standardcare n = 17) were included from one health service. Median total health care cost was $6440 per patient. Active care cost $4824 more than standard care over 18 mo. Medication accounted for 78% of total cost, of which 90% was for adalimumab. Median health care cost was higher for those with endoscopic recurrence compared to those inremission [ $ 26347( IQR 25045-27485) vs $2729(IQR 1182-5215), P < 0.001]. FC to select patients for colonoscopy could reduce cost by $1010 per patient over 18 mo. Active care was associated with 18% decreased endoscopic recurrence, costing $861 for each recurrence prevented. CONCLUSION: Post-operative management strategies are associated with high cost, primarily medication related. Calprotectin use reduces costs. The long term cost-benefit of these strategies remains to be evaluated.

The impacts of U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Agreement on the carbon emission space and mitigation cost of China, EU, and Japan under the constraints of the global carbon emission space

Based on the Computable General Equilibrium (CGE) model and scenario analysis, the impacts of the U.S. withdrawal from the Paris Agreement on the carbon emission space and mitigation cost in China, European Union (EU), and Japan are assessed under Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and 2
C scenarios due to the changed emission pathway of the U.S. The results show that, under the condition of constant global cumulative carbon emissions and a fixed burden-sharing scheme among countries, the failure of the U.S. to honor its NDC commitment to different degrees will increase the U.S. carbon emission space and decrease its mitigation cost. However, the carbon emission space of other parties, including China, EU, and Japan, will be reduced and their mitigation costs will be increased. In 2030, under the 2
C target, the carbon price will increase by 4.4e14.6 US$ t1 in China, by 9.7e35.4 US$ t1 in the EU, and by 16.0e53.5 US$ t1 in Japan. In addition, China, EU, and Japan will incur additional Gross Domestic Production (GDP) loss. Under the 2
C target, the GDP loss of China would increase by US$22.0e71.1 billion (equivalent to 16.4e53.1 US$ per capita), the EU's GDP loss would increase by US$9.4e32.1 billion (equivalent to 20.7e71.1 US$ per capita), and Japan's GDP loss will increase by US$4.1e13.5 billion (equivalent to 34.3e111.6 US$ per capita).

Supplier Evaluation Model Based on Fuzzy Measures and Choquet Integral

To identify interactions among evaluation criteria and describe their importance,a new identification method making use of a fuzzy measure is presented.The relative weight and interaction degree of every evaluation criteria pair are obtained by using the diamond pairwise comparison method.Based on comparison results,the maximum eigenvector method of analytic hierarchy process （AHP）,the hierarchical clustering method,and the phi（s） transformation are utilized to generate values of the fuzzy measure for each subset of the evaluation criterion set.Overall evaluation on each supplier is aggregated by Choquet integral with respect to the fuzzy measure.Finally,an illustrative example demonstrates the practical feasibility and validity of the proposed method.

Guaranteed cost control for T-S fuzzy systems with time-varying delays

This paper deals with the problem of guaranteed cost control for nonlinear systems with time-varying delays which is represented by Takagi-Sugeno （T-S） fuzzy models with time-varying delays.The derivatives of time-varying delay are not necessary to be bounded.Based on the free weighting matrix method,sufficient conditions for the existence of fuzzy guaranteed cost controller via state feedback are given in terms of linear matrix inequalities （LMIs）.A minimizing method is also proposed to search the suboptimal upper bound of the guaranteed cost function.The results are delay-dependent but contain delay-independent criteria as a special case.A numerical example is presented to demonstrate the effectiveness and less conservativeness of our work.

Power cost minimization in data centers Via Lyapunov optimization

With the advent of big data,the demand for computing has been increasing in a very large scale for the past decade,so geographically distributed data centers are erected in the direction of cloud computing development. A Lyapunov optimization approach is considered for the problem of minimizing energy cost for distributed Internet data centers( IDCs). By capturing the power cost of servers and cooling systems,the Lyapunov optimization technique is formulated to design a decisive strategy that offers provable power cost minimization and Qo S guarantees. The algorithm performance and effectiveness are validated via simulations driven by real world traces.

Guaranteed Cost Control for Uncertain Nonlinear Time-Delay Neutral Systems Based on T-S Fuzzy Model

The problem of guaranteed cost fuzzy controller is studied for a class of nonlinear time-delay neutral sys-tems with norm-bounded uncertainty based on T-S model. The sufficient conditions are first derived for the existenceof guaranteed cost fuzzy controllers. These sufficient conditions are equivalent to a kind of linear matrix inequalities.Furthermore, a convex optimization problem with LMI constraints is formulated to design the optimal guaranteedcost controller.

China's Seawater Desalination Plants Produce Megatons Freshwater For Low Cost

China, as many other parts of the world, has a serious shortage of water resources. In China, there is a total amount of 2.8×10^12 m3 of freshwater, but that is only 2000 m3 per capita, which is about one quarter of the world average. Thereforc, seawater desalination engineering is of great significance to the nation.

Optimization of Supplier Switching with Asymmetric Information

The buyer-supplier relationship plays a great role in most economic systems. The buying firm usually tries to find a new supplier who provides products with satisfying quality and lower price. A broad branch of literature deals with the development of buyer-supplier relationships, but limited research is on the circumstances under which a buyer should terminate such a relationship and switch to a new supplier. In this paper, the incentive compatibility constraint (IC) which induces the entrant supplier to report his true cost is considered, and the participation constraint (PC) which ensures the entrant supplier to get at least reservation profit is taken into account. Then the supplier switching model is set up to minimize the buying firm's total procurement cost which includes the transfer payment to the incumbent supplier, the payment to the entrant supplier and the switching cost, and the buying firm's switching cost is considered as a function of the switching quantity. With the theoretical analysis of IC, PC and the proposed model, the optimal supplier switching strategy can be obtained. Finally, a numerical example is given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed model and the switching strategy.

Strategies for Prioritizing Ecological Construction with Consideration of Agricultural Industry Development in Northern China’s Agro- pastoral Ecotone : A Perspective of Opportunity Cost

In northern China’s agro-pastoral ecotone,there are conflicts between agricultural industry and ecological construction resource competition,and also problems urgently to be solved for economic growth and sustainable ecological improvement.Taking the development concept of"lucid waters and lush mountains being mountains of gold and silver"as the guiding principle of prioritizing ecological and green development,this paper studied the strategies for prioritizing ecological construction with consideration of economic development of agricultural industry from the perspective of opportunity cost.Through the analysis of opportunity cost,externality,and Pareto optimal theory,and using the calculation method of the unit equivalent factor value of terrestrial ecological service function,this paper calculated the ecological service value of forest,grassland,and farmland.It found that the ecological value of forest and grassland per unit area was greater than the ecological value of agricultural industry.This indicates that the opportunity cost of farmland for ecological construction was less than that of agricultural industry.Based on the theoretical and quantitative analysis,it came up with recommendations for establishing a comprehensive system for prioritizing ecological construction with consideration of agricultural industry development and establishing and improving the incentive mechanism of ecological construction.

Test Cost Optimization Using Tabu Search

In order to deliver a complete reliable software product, testing is performed. As testing phase carries on, cost of testing process increases and it directly affects the overall project cost. Many a times it happens that the actual cost becomes more than the estimated cost. Cost is considered as the most important parameter with respect to software testing, in software industry. In recent year’s researchers have done a variety of work in the area of Cost optimization by using various concepts like Genetic Algorithm, simulated annealing and Automation in generation of test data etc. This paper proposes an efficient cost effective approach for optimizing the cost of testing using Tabu Search (TS), which will provide maximum code coverage along with the concepts of Dijkstra’s Algorithm which will be implemented in Aspiration criteria of Tabu Search in order to optimize the cost and generate a minimum cost path with maximum coverage.

Location Optimization of a Coal Power Plant to Balance Costs against Plant’s Emission Exposure

The goal of the research is to develop a methodology to minimize the public’s exposure to harmful emissions from coal power plants while maintaining minimal operational costs related to electric distribution losses and coal logistics. The objective is achieved by combining EPA Screen3, ISC3 and Japanese METI-LIS model equations with minimum spanning tree (MST) algorithm. Prim’s MST algorithm is used to simulate an electric distribution system and coal transportation pathways. The model can detect emission interaction with another source and estimate the ground level concentrations of emissions up to distances of 25 kilometers. During a grid search, the algorithm helps determine a candidate location, for a new coal power plant, that would minimize the operational cost while ensuring emission exposure is below the EPA/NIOSH thresholds. The proposed methodology has been coded in form of a location analysis simulation. An exhaustive search strategy delivers a final candidate location for a new coal power plant to ensure minimum operational costs as compared to the random or greedy search strategy. The simulation provides a tool to industrial zone planners, environmental engineers, and stakeholders in coal-based power generation. Using operational and emissions perspectives, the tool helps ascertain a list of compromise locations for a new coal power plant facility.

“COST OF GROWTH”:REGIONAL PUBLIC GOODS AND CHINA'S NEIGHBORHOOD DIPLOMACY

China is a growing power.It is an important integral part for realizing the Two Centenary Goals and the Chinese Dream to be upgraded from a regional power to a world power. To this end,the neighborhood is of primary importance and the neighborhood diplomacy consists of an impor-

An Analysis of the Influence of Equipment Reliability on M&S Cost in Multi-theater Deployments

This paper theoretically analyzes the influence of weapon reltability on maintenance and support cost （ M＆S cost） in multi-theater deployments. Based on the M＆S data of typical on-board equipment, it analyzes in depth the M＆S cost in a three-theater deployment scenario with PRICE software and the influence of reliability on M＆S cost. The result shows that under the same hardware parameter index, the M＆S cost in multi-theater deployments is much higher than that in one-theater deployments and that the cost of equipment Mean Time Between Failures （ MTBF） is also more sensitive than that in one-theater deployments, particularly when the MTBF is relatively low. As a result, the requirement for equipment reliability is higher in multi-theater deployments.

TOCO total assessment tool for decision-making on IP supplier selection

According to the Total Cost of Ownership concept (TOCO), the selection criterion of international procurement suppliers can be classified into two levels, namely Macroeconomic decision-making level and Microeconomic decision-making level. In this paper, a new quantitative method is put forward to accomplish the task of total assessment on the Microeconomic level which analyses all of the quantitative and qualitative factors with regard to the supplier selection. A Microsoft Excel based new application kit named TOCO Total Assessment Tool is introduced. It can calculate the direct cost and the indirect cost conveniently and can help to evaluate the performance of candidate suppliers. To use the tool, the first module called Total Cost Analysis Module is introduced to calculate the total cost of supplier selection, and then the second module named Supplier Evaluation Module is used to evaluate the performance of each supplier. Finally, the results from these two modules are transferred to the Final Comparison Module to get the final decision-making results. In this paper, the supplier selection related factors are discussed; the method of using the tool is illustrated in detail. It is shown that scientific usage of the TOCO Total Assessment Tool can make the decision-making processes of supplier selection in international procurement transparent, easily calculated, and objective. At the end, a practical case is given to clarify the procedure of using the tool.

Organic Cotton Sales Up-But What’s the Cost?

The latest headline figures on organic cotton retail sales supplied by Organic Exchange (OE)show a healthy 35% growth to a value of US$4.

Robust Non-Fragile Guaranteed Cost Control for Nonlinear Time Delay Discrete-Time Systems Based on T-S Model

This paper concerns the robust non-fragile guaranteed cost control for nonlinear time delay discrete-time systems based on Takagi-Sugeno （T-S） model. The problem is to design a guaranteed cost state feedback controller which can tolerate uncertainties from both models and gain variation. Sufficient conditions for the existence of such controller are given based on the linear matrix inequality （LMI） approach combined with Lyapunov method and inequality technique. A numerical example is given to illustrate the feasibility and effectiveness of our result.

ESG信息披露能够促进实体企业未来主业发展吗?--基于供应商、客户集中度的探析

ESG信息披露如何基于供应商、客户集中度来为实体企业主业发展提供竞争优势的内在机理尚缺乏研究,鉴于此,以2011—2021年中国资本市场A股实体上市企业的年度数据为研究样本,检验ESG信息披露对企业未来主业业绩的影响,以及供应商和客户关系在其间的中介效应。研究结果表明:(1)ESG信息披露显著提高了未来主业业绩;(2)ESG信息披露通过降低供应商集中度和客户集中度来促进未来主业发展;(3)从企业、行业和国家层面进一步分析,ESG信息披露对未来主业发展的促进作用在企业成熟期、非污染行业以及新《环保法》出台后更为显著。研究结论对于完善ESG信息披露机制和推动实体经济健康发展具有启示作用。

不同集中度下供应商稳定性对公司债务融资成本的影响

近年来,上市公司供应商断供事件频发,对公司的经营管理产生了不可忽视的负面影响,引起了社会各界的广泛关注。基于此,从外部利益相关者债权人的视角,收集整理2008—2021年沪深A股804家上市公司2825个年度供应商稳定性数据,实证检验供应商稳定性对公司债务融资成本的影响及其机制。研究发现,供应商稳定性能够显著降低公司的债务融资成本,表明外部债权人更看好供应商关系稳定的公司。调节机制分析表明,较高的供应商集中度会削弱供应商稳定性对债务融资成本的降低效应。在采用替换变量、更换回归模型、赫克曼两步法、倾向得分匹配法进行稳健性检验后,以上结论仍然成立。从作用机制上看,供应商稳定性通过提升供应链效率降低债务融资成本。异质性分析发现,在大规模公司、行业市场竞争程度较强及地区市场化程度较高的公司样本中,供应商稳定性对债务融资成本的降低效应更显著。为更有效降低公司债务融资成本,公司应重视供应商的管理和维护,保持稳定的供应商关系,提高供应链效率;为充分发挥供应商稳定性对公司债务融资成本的降低效应,应将供应商集中度控制在合理水平;应实施差异化供应商管理策略,大规模公司、行业市场竞争较强及地区市场化程度较高的公司要高度重视供应商稳定性的促进作用,着力完善供应商关系管理,促使公司确定更合理的供应商稳定性水平。