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This article introduces a new dataset of official financing from China to 138 developing countries between 2000 and 2014. It investigates whether Chinese development finance affects economic growth in recipient countries. The results demonstrate that Chinese development finance boosts short-term economic growth. An additional project increases growth by between 0.41 and 1.49 percentage points 2 years after commitment, on average. While this study does not find that significant financial support from China impairs the overall effectiveness of aid from Western donors, aid from the United States tends to be more effective in countries that receive no substantial support from China.

Subclinical leaflet thrombosis of bioprosthetic aortic valves after transcatheter valve replacement (TAVR) and surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR) has been found with CT imaging. The objective of this study was to report the prevalence of subclinical leaflet thrombosis in surgical and transcatheter aortic valves and the effect of novel oral anticoagulants (NOACs) on the subclinical leaflet thrombosis and subsequent valve haemodynamics and clinical outcomes on the basis of two registries of patients who had CT imaging done after TAVR or SAVR. Patients enrolled between Dec 22, 2014, and Jan 18, 2017, in the RESOLVE registry, and between June 2, 2014, and Sept 28, 2016, in the SAVORY registry, had CT imaging done with a dedicated four-dimensional volume-rendered imaging protocol at varying intervals after TAVR and SAVR. We defined subclinical leaflet thrombosis as the presence of reduced leaflet motion, along with corresponding hypoattenuating lesions shown with CT. We collected data for baseline demographics, antithrombotic therapy, and clinical outcomes. We analysed all CT scans, echocardiograms, and neurological events in a masked fashion. Of the 931 patients who had CT imaging done (657 [71%] in the RESOLVE registry and 274 [29%] in the SAVORY registry), 890 [96%] had interpretable CT scans (626 [70%] in the RESOLVE registry and 264 [30%] in the SAVORY registry). 106 (12%) of 890 patients had subclinical leaflet thrombosis, including five (4%) of 138 with thrombosis of surgical valves versus 101 (13%) of 752 with thrombosis of transcatheter valves (p=0·001). The median time from aortic valve replacement to CT for the entire cohort was 83 days (IQR 33–281). Subclinical leaflet thrombosis was less frequent among patients receiving anticoagulants (eight [4%] of 224) than among those receiving dual antiplatelet therapy (31 [15%] of 208; p<0·0001); NOACs were equally as effective as warfarin (three [3%] of 107 vs five [4%] of 117; p=0·72). Subclinical leaflet thrombosis resolved in 36 (100%) of 36 patients (warfarin 24 [67%]; NOACs 12 [33%]) receiving anticoagulants, whereas it persisted in 20 (91%) of 22 patients not receiving anticoagulants (p<0·0001). A greater proportion of patients with subclinical leaflet thrombosis had aortic valve gradients of more than 20 mm Hg and increases in aortic valve gradients of more than 10 mm Hg (12 [14%] of 88) than did those with normal leaflet motion (seven [1%] of 632; p<0·0001). Although stroke rates were not different between those with (4·12 strokes per 100 person-years) or without (1·92 strokes per 100 person-years) reduced leaflet motion (p=0·10), subclinical leaflet thrombosis was associated with increased rates of transient ischaemic attacks (TIAs; 4·18 TIAs per 100 person-years vs 0·60 TIAs per 100 person-years; p=0·0005) and all strokes or TIAs (7·85 vs 2·36 per 100 person-years; p=0·001). Subclinical leaflet thrombosis occurred frequently in bioprosthetic aortic valves, more commonly in transcatheter than in surgical valves. Anticoagulation (both NOACs and warfarin), but not dual antiplatelet therapy, was effective in prevention or treatment of subclinical leaflet thrombosis. Subclinical leaflet thrombosis was associated with increased rates of TIAs and strokes or TIAs. Despite excellent outcomes after TAVR with the new-generation valves, prevention and treatment of subclinical leaflet thrombosis might offer a potential opportunity for further improvement in valve haemodynamics and clinical outcomes. RESOLVE (Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute) and SAVORY (Rigshospitalet).

Entanglement is a fundamental aspect of quantum physics, both conceptually and for its many applications. Classifying an arbitrary multipartite state as entangled or separable—a task referred to as the separability problem—poses a significant challenge, since a state can be entangled with respect to many different of its partitions. We develop a certification pipeline that feeds the statistics of random local measurements into a non-linear dimensionality reduction algorithm, to determine with respect to which partitions a given quantum state is entangled. After training a model on randomly generated quantum states, entangled in different partitions and of varying purity, we verify the accuracy of its predictions on simulated test data, and finally apply it to states prepared on IBM quantum computing hardware.

Can governments still use trade to reward and punish partner countries? While World Trade Organization (WTO) rules and the pressures of globalization restrict states’ capacity to manipulate trade policies, politicization of trade is likely to occur where governments intervene in markets. We examine state ownership of firms as one tool of government control. Taking China and India as examples, we use new data on bilateral trade disaggregated by firm ownership type as well as measures of political relations based on bilateral events and United Nations voting data to estimate the effect of political relations on import flows since the early 1990s. Our results support the hypothesis that imports controlled by state-owned enterprises are more responsive to political relations than imports controlled by private enterprises. This finding suggests that politicized import decisions will increase as countries with partially state-controlled economies gain strength in the global economy. Extending our analysis to exports for comparison, we find a similar pattern for Indian but not for Chinese exports and offer potential explanations for these differential findings.

Abstract Chinese “aid” is a lightning rod for criticism. Policy-makers, journalists, and public intellectuals claim that Beijing uses its largesse to cement alliances with political leaders, secure access to natural resources, and create exclusive commercial opportunities for Chinese firms—all at the expense of citizens living in developing countries. We argue that much of the controversy about Chinese “aid” stems from a failure to distinguish between China's Official Development Assistance (ODA) and more commercially oriented sources and types of state financing. Using a new database on China's official financing commitments to Africa from 2000 to 2013, we find that the allocation of Chinese ODA is driven primarily by foreign policy considerations, while economic interests better explain the distribution of less concessional flows. These results highlight the need for better measures of an increasingly diverse set of non-Western financial activities.

We study the limiting behaviour of Darboux and Calapso transforms of polarized curves in the conformal n-dimensional sphere when the polarization has a pole of first or second order at some point. We prove that for a pole of first order, as the singularity is approached, all Darboux transforms converge to the original curve and all Calapso transforms converge. For a pole of second order, a generic Darboux transform converges to the original curve while a Calapso transform has a limit point or a limit circle, depending on the value of the transformation parameter. In particular, our results apply to Darboux and Calapso transforms of isothermic surfaces when a singular umbilic with index \\[\\frac{1}{2}\\] or 1 is approached along a curvature line.

Establishing gene regulatory networks during differentiation or reprogramming requires master or pioneer transcription factors (TFs) such as PU.1, a prototype master TF of hematopoietic lineage differentiation. To systematically determine molecular features that control its activity, here we analyze DNA-binding in vitro and genome-wide in vivo across different cell types with native or ectopic PU.1 expression. Although PU.1, in contrast to classical pioneer factors, is unable to access nucleosomal target sites in vitro, ectopic induction of PU.1 leads to the extensive remodeling of chromatin and redistribution of partner TFs. De novo chromatin access, stable binding, and redistribution of partner TFs both require PU.1’s N-terminal acidic activation domain and its ability to recruit SWI/SNF remodeling complexes, suggesting that the latter may collect and distribute co-associated TFs in conjunction with the non-classical pioneer TF PU.1. PU.1 is a master TF of hematopoietic lineage differentiation. Here the authors analyse properties of PU.1 DNA-binding in vitro and genome-wide in vivo across different cell types with native or ectopic PU.1 expression, and uncover the mechanisms governing the pioneering and redistribution capabilities of the non-classical pioneer PU.1.

The accuracy of radio-based positioning is heavily influenced by a dense multipath (DM) channel, leading to poor position accuracy. The DM affects both time of flight (ToF) measurements extracted from wideband (WB) signals—specifically, if the bandwidth is below 100 MHz—as well as received signal strength (RSS) measurements, due to the interference of multipath signal components onto the information-bearing line-of-sight (LoS) component. This work proposes an approach for combining these two different measurement technologies, leading to a robust position estimation in the presence of DM. We assume that a large ensemble of densely-spaced devices is to be positioned. We use RSS measurements to determine “clusters” of devices in the vicinity of each other. Joint processing of the WB measurements from all devices in a cluster efficiently suppresses the influence of the DM. We formulate an algorithmic approach for the information fusion of the two technologies and derive the corresponding Cramér-Rao lower bound (CRLB) to gain insight into the performance trade-offs at hand. We evaluate our results by simulations and validate the approach with real-world measurement data. The results show that the clustering approach can halve the root-mean-square error (RMSE) from about 2 m to below 1 m, using WB signal transmissions in the 2.4 GHz ISM band at a bandwidth of about 80 MHz.

Calcium phosphate cements, primarily brushite cements, require the addition of setting retarders to ensure adequate processing time and processability. So far, citric acid has been the primary setting retarder used in this context. Due to the poor biocompatibility, it is crucial to explore alternative options for better processing. In recent years, the setting retarder phytic acid (IP6) has been increasingly investigated. This study investigates the biological behaviour of calcium phosphate cements with varying concentrations of IP6, in addition to their physical properties. Therefore cytocompatibility in vitro testing was performed using osteoblastic (MG-63) and osteoclastic (RAW 264.7 differentiated with RANKL) cells. We could demonstrate that the physical properties like the compressive strength of specimens formed with IP6 (brushite_IP6_5 = 11.2 MPa) were improved compared to the reference (brushite = 9.8 MPa). In osteoblast and osteoclast assays, IP6 exhibited significantly better cytocompatibility in terms of cell activity and cell number for brushite cements up to 11 times compared to the brushite reference. In contrast, the calcium-deficient hydroxyapatite (CDHA) cements produced similar results for IP6 (CDHA_IP6_0.25 = 27.0 MPa) when compared to their reference (CDHA = 21.2 MPa). Interestingly, lower doses of IP6 were found to be more effective than higher doses with up to 3 times higher. Additionally, IP6 significantly increased degradation in both passive and active resorption. For these reasons, IP6 is emerging as a strong new competitor to established setting retarders such as citric acid. These cements have potential applications in bone augmentation, the stabilisation of non-load bearing fractures (craniofacial), or the cementation of metal implants. Graphical Abstract

In this article, statistical modelling approaches for tyre/road noise levels (according to the CPX method) based on continuous 3D texture measurements are presented. The main focus is to estimate if viable correlations of interpretable 3D texture parameters with frequency-dependent CPX levels can be found. Therefore, a set of descriptive 3D texture parameters is introduced. Two different modelling approaches, focussing on linearity in order to gain interpretability, are shown. First, a linear model is calculated based on the first principal components of the texture parameters, and second, a random forest regression approach is performed on the direct texture parameters. As a principal component analysis of the CPX measurement data reveals three highly correlated frequency ranges, both approaches are calculated independently for low, mid and high frequency bands. Both models show good performance in the low and mid frequency range, whereas the accuracy in the high frequency range declines. Due to the focus on linearity, both approaches result in comparable statistical benchmark parameters.