Advances in clinical basic research: Performance, treatments, and mechanisms of Parkinson disease

Abstract An analysis of the investments intervention effect from operational programmes in the programming period 2007–2013 upon the R&D infrastructure of the Czech public universities is presented. The analysis was based upon publicly available data, universities´ annual economic reports, and evaluations and analyses. A few indicators have been selected to quantify the effect of significant extension and upgrade of the universities´ R&D infrastructure where investments from structural funds amounted to 36 % of the universities´ total R&D expenditure. The effect of the financial intervention upon the performance in basic research was evaluated firstly by making use of the increase of publications number in impacted journals in the time windows 2009–2011 and 2015–2017, i.e. before the effective launch of the interventions, and after their termination. The share of foreign public funds (structural funds excluded) in the total R&D expenditure was the second indicator used. The effect upon the applied research performance was evaluated by comparing the difference of the number of patents and by the change in the share of private sources in the R&D expenditure. The analyses show an increase of the number of publications whereas the change in the share of the foreign public funds in the total R&D expenditure did not induce any positive trend. In parallel with the number of publications, the number of patents increased, too. The change in the share of the private sources in the R&D expenditure was unequivocally associated with a positive trend, especially in the out-of-Prague technical universities. For a more robust evaluation of the effect of the interventions financed by the structural funds an analogous analysis should be carried out after a longer time than the mere three years after the termination of the interventions.

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The Effect of International Joint Research to the Research Performance: The Case of the Global Research Laboratory and the Basic Research Laboratory Programme

Science Technology and Society ◽

10.1177/0971721817723392 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 22 (3) ◽

pp. 473-489

Author(s):

Jinwon Kang

Keyword(s):

Research Laboratory ◽

Research Performance ◽

Basic Research ◽

Basic Requirement ◽

Joint Research ◽

Catching Up ◽

Factors Influencing ◽

International Joint ◽

Main Factors ◽

Research Budget

Korea has been in a transition from catching-up to post-catching-up period. In this circumstance, the strengthening of basic research is one of the important strategies. This research investigates the main factors influencing research performance through the international joint research (IJR). The literature about determinants of performance of R&D and the effect of IJR to the performance is reviewed. The research performance of IJR will be investigated in comparison with IJR programme and general R&D programme as a result of international and domestic research activities. The comparison about research performance will be performed using independent samples test on the modified impact factor of papers. The main factors influencing the performance are investigated in terms of research budget, capacity, number of researchers and international collaboration on the basis of previous researches. The main finding is that the research capacity is basic requirement to increase the modified impact factor and the main factors influencing research performance through IJR are the network size and the number of contact in this research. Its recommendations, in accordance with this finding, are as follows. The government should support researcher to have more and easier contact with foreign researchers in terms of budget and programme structure and institutional improvement, including evaluation system. The additional budget on the existing programme and easy usage of research budget in the IJR are the good ways to promote the IJR activities through renovation of basic R&D programme structure. The additional credit to the research groups with bigger research networks should be considered in the selection process and ex-post evaluation process. Long-term and sustainable support for the research is the basic requirement to improve the capacity of researchers and obtain better research performance.

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A New 1,000 kV Electron Microscope

Proceedings, annual meeting, Electron Microscopy Society of America ◽

10.1017/s0424820100061318 ◽

1967 ◽

Vol 25 ◽

pp. 260-261

Author(s):

M. Nishigaki ◽

S. Katagiri ◽

H. Kimura ◽

B. Tadano

Keyword(s):

Electron Microscope ◽

High Voltage ◽

Basic Research ◽

Chromatic Aberration ◽

High Accuracy ◽

Biological Specimen ◽

Voltage Electron ◽

High Voltage Electron Microscope ◽

High Voltage Electron

The high voltage electron microscope has many advantageous features in comparison with the ordinary electron microscope. They are a higher penetrating efficiency of the electron, low chromatic aberration, high accuracy of the selected area diffraction and so on. Thus, the high voltage electron microscope becomes an indispensable instrument for the metallurgical, polymer and biological specimen studies. The application of the instrument involves today not only basic research but routine survey in the various fields. Particularly for the latter purpose, the performance, maintenance and reliability of the microscope should be same as those of commercial ones. The authors completed a 500 kV electron microscope in 1964 and a 1,000 kV one in 1966 taking these points into consideration. The construction of our 1,000 kV electron microscope is described below.

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An emerging technology: Nuclear magnetic resonance microscopy

Proceedings, annual meeting, Electron Microscopy Society of America ◽

10.1017/s042482010010706x ◽

1988 ◽

Vol 46 ◽

pp. 1000-1001

Author(s):

M.J. Hennessy ◽

E. Kwok

Keyword(s):

Nuclear Magnetic Resonance ◽

Magnetic Resonance ◽

Relaxation Times ◽

Basic Research ◽

Local Environment ◽

Magnetic Resonance Images ◽

Nmr Microscopy ◽

Mri Scans ◽

Temperature Relaxation ◽

Nuclear Magnetic

Much progress in nuclear magnetic resonance microscope has been made in the last few years as a result of improved instrumentation and techniques being made available through basic research in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technologies for medicine. Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) was first observed in the hydrogen nucleus in water by Bloch, Purcell and Pound over 40 years ago. Today, in medicine, virtually all commercial MRI scans are made of water bound in tissue. This is also true for NMR microscopy, which has focussed mainly on biological applications. The reason water is the favored molecule for NMR is because water is,the most abundant molecule in biology. It is also the most NMR sensitive having the largest nuclear magnetic moment and having reasonable room temperature relaxation times (from 10 ms to 3 sec). The contrast seen in magnetic resonance images is due mostly to distribution of water relaxation times in sample which are extremely sensitive to the local environment.

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