The needs of patients with psoriatic arthritis and psoriasis in the Pan-American region

PANLAR collected feedback and recommendations from patients and expert rheumatologists on the unmet needs of those diagnosed with psoriatic disease and set them down in a position paper

Present and future relations between ENSO and winter synoptic temperature variability over the Asian-Pacific-American region simulated by CMIP5/6

In this study, the relationship between ENSO and winter synoptic temperature variability (STV) over the Asian-Pacific-American region is examined in 26 CMIP5/6 model outputs. Compared to observations, most models fail to simulate the correct ENSO-STV relationship in historical simulations. To investigate the possible bias in the ENSO-STV simulations, two possible processes for the connection between ENSO and winter STV are examined in high pattern score (HPS) models and low pattern score (LPS) models, respectively. On the one hand, both HPS and LPS models can overall reproduce a reasonable relationship between STV and the mean-flow conditions supporting extratropical eddy development. On the other hand, only HPS models can well capture the relationship between ENSO and the development of extratropical eddies, while LPS models fail to simulate this feature, indicating that the bias in the simulated ENSO-STV relationship among CMIP5/6 models can be traced back to ENSO simulation. Furthermore, the bias of the ENSO simulation is characterized by an unreasonable SST pattern bias, with an excessive westward extension of warm SST anomalies over the western Pacific and weak warm SST anomalies over the equatorial central-eastern Pacific, resulting in the underestimation of the zonal SST anomaly gradient among models. Therefore, the ENSO pattern bias induces an unrealistic circulation and temperature gradient over the Asian-Pacific-American region, affecting the simulations of the ENSO-STV connection. In addition, the ENSO-STV relationship over the Asian-Pacific-American region is still robust in future projections based on HPS models, providing implications for the selection of future climate predictors.

Do economic freedom, business experience, and firm size affect internationalization speed? Evidence from small firms in Chile, Colombia, and Peru

This paper focuses on SMEs from the Latin American region and aims to build on existing literature on the emergence of the institution-based view in combination with the resource-based view. We contribute to existing literature by extending the application of the aforementioned theories to firms in three under-researched countries in this region. Specifically, we contribute to the extant literature by providing empirical insights on how home country–specific resources and firm-specific resources can affect the internationalization speed of SMEs in Latin American region. In order to achieve our objectives, we empirically examine the role of economic freedom (EF), prior business/international experience, and firm size on speed of internationalization. We use a dataset of Latin American SMEs, employing Poisson and negative binomial (NB) regression techniques. Our data cover three main Latin American Pacific Rim economies—Chile, Colombia, and Peru—with similar economic specializations, geographical borders, and economic growth dynamics. We find that (1) some parts of Economic Freedom Index (EFI) accelerate the speed of internationalization, whereas other areas slow it down or have no effect. Specifically, the closer to full EF the home country is in terms of regulations and government, the shorter the time to internationalize. (2) More experienced management teams are more likely to translate their knowledge into faster international market entry, but this pays off only for larger sized SMEs in contrast to smaller ones due to complementarities between managerial resources and physical, financial, and organizational resources. (3) Finally, industry, firm location, and country destination can only weakly explain the speed of internationalization. The findings add to the literature on SME internationalization in emerging markets and point towards potential policies to stimulate growth by SMEs in these markets.

Evaluation of Consistency of Treatment Response Across Regions—the LEADER Trial in Relation to the ICH E17 Guideline

The US Food and Drug Administration in 2008 required new type 2 diabetes (T2D) medications to be subject to cardiovascular outcomes safety requirements. Accordingly, the global LEADER trial investigated cardiovascular outcomes of T2D treatment with liraglutide, a glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonist. LEADER (NCT01179048) was a multiregional clinical trial (MRCT) conducted from 2010 to 2016, thus completed before publication of the International Council for Harmonization (ICH) E17 guideline on MRCTs in 2017. Novo Nordisk pre-specified analysis of regional cardiovascular outcomes of LEADER participants. This paper assesses the pre-specified regional outcomes based on the ICH E17 guidelines on consistency evaluation. Regional LEADER participant numbers were broadly aligned with ICH E17 guidance and equally balanced across Europe, Asia, North America, and rest of the world. Overall primary major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE) composite outcome for the trial: hazard ratio (HR) (95% CI) 0.87 (0.78; 0.97); regional results varied, ranging from HR (95% CI) 0.62 (0.37; 1.04) (Asia) to 1.01 (0.84; 1.22) (North America). However, pre-specified Cox proportional-hazard regression analyses did not show clear evidence of interaction between regions and primary outcome (p = 0.20). Furthermore, post hoc analysis of the US population in the North American region found that adjusting for extrinsic or intrinsic factors did not account for this difference [HR (95% CI) 1.03 (0.84; 1.25)]. LEADER data evaluation demonstrated general consistency in cardiovascular safety across regions, except for US participants. Discrepancies in the North American region may relate to drug exposure or chance, but, as these were post hoc findings, the overall primary result is valid, aligned with ICH E17 guidelines.

Interdecadal shift of the relationship between ENSO and winter synoptic temperature variability over the Asian–Pacific–American region in the 1980s

In this study, the interdecadal variability of the relationship between ENSO and winter synoptic temperature variability (STV) over the Asian-Pacific-American region is investigated based on observational data from 1951 to 2018. An interdecadal shift in the ENSO-STV relationship occurred in the 1980s over Eastern China, changing from significant in Period 1 (P1, 1951-1987) to insignificant in Period 2 (P2, 1988-2018). But the ENSO-STV relationship is significantly stable over North America for the whole period. In addition, a possible reason for this interdecadal shift in the ENSO-STV relationship over Eastern China is also investigated. During P1, the ENSO pattern is significantly correlated to the temperature gradient over Northeast Asia, which is the key region influencing the intensification of extratropical eddies. The intensification of extratropical eddies over Northeast Asia is directly associated with the magnitude of STV over Eastern China. But in P2, the ENSO pattern is not related to the temperature over Northeast Asia. Therefore, the change in the ENSO pattern from P1 to P2 contributes to the interdecadal shift in the ENSO-STV relationship in the 1980s over Eastern China by influencing the temperature gradient over Northeast Asia, while ENSO can influence the temperature gradient over North America for the whole period. Furthermore, the possible role of the ENSO patterns in P1 and P2 is also examined by using an atmospheric general circulation model, highlighting that the pattern of SST variation is a determining factor in regulating STV in different regions.

Collaborative Production Model of Educational Resources for Human-Computer Interaction Community in Latino America

Today, human-computer interaction (HCI) shows great activity, dynamism, and academic presence throughout the world, having special relevance in the Latin American region. The region is not only vast for its geographical space but also diverse and multicultural, where researchers and academics from this area or community have proposed and made known the benefits of the HCI that they can bring to today’s society. However, some problems arise and need to be addressed in the HCI area in the Latin American region, such as the lack of training strategies and the availability of content and educational resources in Spanish. In order to mitigate this problem, the current work proposes a collaborative production model of educative resources for human-computer interaction developed in Latin America. The model preconizes a series of strategies and technological services to support the collaborative production and access of HCI educative resources such as videos, slides, handouts, textbooks, user experience analysis, and usability tests. The proposed model is tested throughout two real case studies conducted by teachers and researchers from different Latin American universities in order to produce and use the HCI educative resources for under- and postgraduate courses.

The Problems and Prospects of e-Commerce Market Development in the Countries of the Latin American Region

In the current conditions of rapid digitalization of the worldwide space, taking into account global factors, which are being forced, including such «black swans» as the COVID-19 pandemic, the issues of e-commerce development in the context of certain regions are being activated. The article is aimed at studying and identifying the features and trends of e-commerce development in the Latin American region, a detailed analysis of Brazil, Mexico and Argentina as the largest markets in the region. To achieve this aim, the methods of scientific abstraction, analysis and synthesis, statistical analysis, comparison, structural and logical generalization were used. The article determines that, given the large population of the region with a significant stratification of society, the region has seen a sharp increase in the e-commerce market, including by means of the mass digitalization of the end user to meet the need for remote work and training during the pandemic. Most researchers distinguish the markets of Brazil, Mexico and Argentina as the largest in the region. There is a significant increase in the presence of regional and global platforms, with an emphasis on the problem of disproportionately large volume of Asian products sold by global platforms. The increase in the volume of trading platforms can have a beneficial impact on the improvement of logistics infrastructure in the region, which is currently one of the key problems. Among the existing problems, experts also indicate a low level of penetration of banking services and a high degree of cash circulation. Due to the specifics of the banking sector, not all local cards are valid on international trading platforms, which is one of the deterrent factors for the development of e-commerce. Based on statistical analysis, it is determined that in the current realities of the Latin American region, the process of digitalization of all e-commerce market participants is experienced while maintaining trends in the steady growth of key indicators of Internet commerce. This characterizes the region as promising in terms of increasing market volumes, the number of Internet consumers, the level of Internet penetration, the modernization of the banking sector and changes in legislation. At the same time, it is identified that in the presence of problems of the shadow economy, a low degree of public confidence in the banking sector, the preservation of a significant disparity in the incomes of categories of the population, there is a need to revalue the prospects and conditions for the further development of the e-commerce market in the post-pandemic period.