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To study gender differences in candidate emergence, we conduct a laboratory experiment in which we control the incentives potential candidates face, manipulate features of the electoral environment, and measure beliefs and preferences. We find that men and women are equally likely to volunteer when the representative is chosen randomly, but that women are less likely to become candidates when the representative is chosen by an election. This difference does not arise from disparities in abilities, risk aversion, or beliefs, but rather from the specific competitive and strategic context of campaigns and elections. Thus, we find evidence that women are election averse, whereas men are not. Election aversion persists with variations in the electoral environment, disappearing only when campaigns are both costless and completely truthful.

This paper presents a comprehensive review of the detection of aflatoxin compounds using carbon allotrope-based sensors. Although aflatoxin M1 and its derivative aflatoxin B1 compounds have been primarily found in milk and other food products, their presence above a threshold concentration causes disastrous health-related anomalies in human beings, such as growth impairment, underweight and even carcinogenic and immunosuppressive effects. Among the many sensors developed to detect the presence of these compounds, the employment of certain carbon allotropes, such as carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and graphene, has been highly preferred due to their enhanced electromechanical properties. These conductive nanomaterials have shown excellent quantitative performance in terms of sensitivity and selectivity for the chosen aflatoxin compounds. This paper elucidates some of the significant examples of the CNTs and graphene-based sensors measuring Aflatoxin M1 (ATM1) and Aflatoxin B1 (AFB1) compounds at low concentrations. The fabrication technique and performance of each of the sensors are shown here, as well as some of the challenges existing with the current sensors.

Temperature is known as one of the abiotic factors that can affect mold growth. Many mold growth prediction models consider temperature as one of the parameters that can significantly impact mold growth indoors, and hence temperature has been targeted by different indoor mold prevention strategies on different premises. For example, European guidelines for libraries suggest a temperature of 19 °C to preserve books. However, running low temperature air-conditioning (AC) costs substantially more energy, and thus a higher temperature (e.g., 25.5 °C) has been regularly proposed as the recommended indoor temperature for general indoor environments in Hong Kong. It is, therefore, needed to understand whether or not the reduction of indoor temperature would lead to better effectiveness of mold prevention. Using Cladosporium cladosporioides (C. cladosporioides) as the model, its germinating spores were challenged in C. cladosporioides to wet-dry cycles with different combinations of relative humidity (RH, 40%, 60% and 80%) and temperature (19 °C and 28 °C) levels. The survival, lipid peroxidation and catalase (CAT) activity of the treated spores were monitored and compared. C. cladosporioides spores showed similar levels of viability, lipid peroxidation and CAT activity when they were exposed to 19 °C and 28 °C at the same RH, but substantially lower survival and higher oxidative stress were observed under the wet-dry cycles with 40% RH dry periods compared with 60% and 80% RH at both temperatures, suggesting that indoor temperature does not tend to affect the resistance of C. cladosporioides to wet-dry cycles as significantly as the RH level of the dry period. Collectively, this study suggests a more important role for moisture over temperature in indoor mold prevention. The outcome of this study may facilitate the sustainable management of indoor mold problems in buildings.

Biotechnological production of vanillin is gaining momentum as the natural synthesis of vanillin that is very expensive. Ferulic acid (FA), a costly compound, is used as the substrate to produce vanillin biotechnologically and the making process is still expensive. Therefore, this study investigated the practical use of an agrobiomass waste, rice bran, and provides the first evidence of a cost-effective production of vanillin within 24 h of incubation using recombinant Pediococcus acidilactici BD16 ( fcs + / ech + ). Introduction of two genes encoding feruloyl CoA synthetase and enoyl CoA hydratase into the native strain increased vanillin yield to 4.01 g L −1 . Bioconversion was monitored through the transformation of phenolic compounds. A hypothetical metabolic pathway of rice bran during the vanillin bioconversion was proposed with the inserted pathway from ferulic acid to vanillin and compared with that of other metabolic engineered strains. These results could be a gateway of using recombinant lactic acid bacteria for industrial production of vanillin from agricultural waste.

“Electability” received considerable attention during the 2020 Democratic primary campaign, with some critics claiming that the term was code for sexism. From a rational choice perspective, “electability” could affect voting in multiple ways, including via expected utility; previous scholarship suggests that many voters consider it as such. Yet this scholarship ignores the role that salience plays in decision making, and is silent on which sorts of candidate might benefit from the effects of priming electability. To address these issues, we conducted a survey experiment during the 2020 primary season, measuring Democratic primary voters’ preferences for candidates, electability estimates, and candidate rankings. Our experiment manipulated salience by randomizing the order in which preferences and electability were elicited. We show that electability salience caused a substantial increase in the probability that a respondent made decisions based only on electability.

Positions of influence over the legislative agenda provide greater opportunities for shaping policy outcomes. Do legislators take advantage of this? If they do, when the median is pivotal and legislators' goals reflect both position taking and policy seeking, greater influence over the agenda leads legislators to moderate their bills relative to legislators with lower agenda priority. Analysis of a formal game theoretic model provides rigorous justification for the proposition, and empirical analysis of House and Senate bills from the 101st to 108th Congresses using cosponsorship data to measure the ideological locations of bills largely supports it. Committee leadership and majority party status have moderating effects while the effect of committee membership is slight. The analysis also tentatively supports the pivotalness of the median over other alternatives. Contrary to the view that bill sponsorship is mere position taking, legislative organization significantly shapes early-stage legislative behavior. Specifically, greater legislative influence implies greater responsiveness to the median legislator.

How effectively do democratic institutions provide public goods? Despite the incentives an elected leader has to free ride or impose majority tyranny, our experiment demonstrates that electoral delegation results in full provision of the public good. Analysis of the experimental data suggests that the result is primarily due to electoral selection: groups elect prosocial leaders and replace those who do not implement full contribution outcomes. However, we also observe outcomes in which a minimum winning coalition exploits the contributions of the remaining players. A second experiment demonstrates that when electoral delegation must be endogenously implemented, individuals voluntarily cede authority to an elected agent only when preplay communication is permitted. Our combined results demonstrate that democratic delegation helps groups overcome the free-rider problem and generally leads to outcomes that are often both efficient and equitable.

Understanding the incentives of politicians requires understanding the nature of voting behavior. I conduct a laboratory experiment to investigate whether voters focus on the problem of electoral selection or if they instead focus on electoral sanctioning. If voters are forward-looking but uncertain about politicians' unobservable characteristics, then it is rational to focus on selection. But doing so undermines democratic accountability because selection renders sanctioning an empty threat. In contrast to rational choice predictions, the experimental results indicate a strong behavioral tendency to use a retrospective voting rule. Additional experiments support the interpretation that retrospective voting is a simple heuristic that voters use to cope with a cognitively difficult inference and decision problem and, in addition, suggest that voters have a preference for accountability. The results pose a challenge for theories of electoral selection and voter learning and suggest new interpretations of empirical studies of economic and retrospective voting.

Do primary elections cause candidates to take extreme, polarized positions? Standard equilibrium analysis predicts full convergence to the median voter’s position with complete information, but behavioral game theory predicts divergence when players are policy-motivated and have out-of-equilibrium beliefs. Theoretically, I show that primary elections can cause greater extremism or moderation, depending on the beliefs candidates and voters have about their opponents. In a controlled incentivized experiment, I find that candidates diverge substantially and that primaries have little effect on average positions. Voters employ a strategy that weeds out candidates who are either too moderate or too extreme, which enhances ideological purity without increasing divergence. The analysis highlights the importance of behavioral assumptions in understanding the effects of electoral institutions.

To evaluate the efficiency of the oil-reducing properties of kombucha cellulose, enzymolysis and microwave-assisted enzymolysis methods were developed. The water-holding capacity of the kombucha cellulose hydrolysates formed by these two methods was higher than for the intact kombucha cellulose, while the oil-holding capacity was lower. The hydrolysates of kombucha cellulose and the intact kombucha cellulose were used to make deep-fried donuts. During this process, kombucha cellulose hydrolysates were added instead of 2% flour, and from the results, the oil content of the donut decreased significantly from ~28 to 15%, and the reduction was not related to the processing of the donut. The hardness and brittleness of all samples showed no significant change, and these samples had similar internal micro-structures, confirming texture profile analysis. In vitro digestion results suggested that there would be no adverse health effects from substituting kombucha cellulose hydrolysates in the deep-fried donut formula.