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Our work is motivated by the empirical finding that Benefit corporations (B corps) that pursue certification experience a short-term slowdown in financial performance. To shed light on this finding...

Introduction Inherited mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) variants may influence Alzheimer's disease (AD) risk. Methods We sequenced mtDNA from 146 AD and 265 cognitively normal (CN) subjects from the University of Kansas AD Center (KUADC) and assigned haplogroups. We further considered 244 AD and 242 CN AD Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) subjects with equivalent data. Results Without applying multiple comparisons corrections, KUADC haplogroup J AD and CN frequencies were 16.4% versus 7.6% (P = .007), and haplogroup K AD and CN frequencies were 4.8% versus 10.2% (P = .063). ADNI haplogroup J AD and CN frequencies were 10.7% versus 7.0% (P = .20), and haplogroup K frequencies were 4.9% versus 8.7% (P = .11). For the combined 390 AD and 507 CN cases haplogroup J frequencies were 12.8% versus 7.3% (P = .006), odds ratio (OR) = 1.87, and haplogroup K frequencies were 4.9% versus 9.5% (P = .010), OR = 0.49. Associations remained significant after adjusting for apolipoprotein E, age, and sex. Conclusion This exploratory analysis suggests inherited mtDNA variants influence AD risk.

This paper investigates the outcomes of a policy experiment, the NSF SBIR/IUCRC Membership Supplement, designed to promote the success of small high-tech entrepreneurial ventures by providing subsidized memberships in university-based cooperative research centers (IUCRCs). Data collected via semi-structured interviews with representatives of 61 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) firms indicated that SBIR firms who used the supplement to join an IUCRC reported multiple R&D benefits including research cost avoidance, research savings, and access to expensive equipment. A vast majority of SBIR firms also reported realizing or anticipated realizing commercial benefits (e.g., new investors, new products, and improvements to existing products). As suggested by social capital theory, SBIR firms reported that the policy mix experiment helped them make new connections with faculty and industry. Following our qualitative results, a structural equation model was applied to test the effect of social capital as an antecedent of SBIR firm R&D and commercialization outcomes. Results suggested that the SBIR firms who developed more social capital through interactions with faculty and industry members realized significantly more R&D and commercialization benefits. Further, commercialization benefits mediated the relationship between social capital and the SBIR firm’s perceived return on investment. Overall, this study demonstrates the feasibility of subjecting mixed policy interventions to evaluative scrutiny and provides evidence that such instruments can have substantive and positive effects on small high-tech entrepreneurial ventures. We discuss implications for social capital theory, policy mix initiatives and entrepreneurship policy.

Overview: Digital transformation is reshaping entire segments and industries: communications, retail, and, increasingly, health care, medicine, agriculture, and manufacturing. While a few companies...

Hintergrund Das mobile (m) Health-Telemonitoring beschreibt eine Form der Telemedizin, bei der Smartphones, entsprechende mobile Apps und Sensoren zur Fernüberwachung von PatientInnen genutzt werden. Diese Technologie könnte besonders bei BewohnerInnen von Alters- und Pflegeeinrichtungen vorteilhaft sein. Aufgrund von Alter, Grunderkrankungen und eingeschränkter Mobilität sind diese BewohnerInnen gegenüber pulmonalen Infekten, inkl. COVID-19, besonders empfindlich. Ziel Entwicklung eines Konzepts zur Implementierung von mHealth Telemonitoring des kardiopulmonalen Systems bei BewohnerInnen von Alters- und Pflegeeinrichtungen. Studie Bei den BewohnerInnen werden über einen Zeitraum von 2 bis 12 Wochen mit den zur Verfügung gestellten digitalen Sensoren (Pulsoxymeter, Blutdruckmessgerät, Spirometer, Aktivitätstracker) tägliche Messungen durchgeführt. Aufgrund der erwarteten geringen digitalen Kenntnis der BewohnerInnen, wird das Pflegepersonal in die Messungen mit involviert und geschult. Bei Bedarf werden den BewohnerInnen Smartphones auf Leihbasis (eingelegt über Scheinaccounts) zur Verfügung gestellt. Die Akzeptanz des mHealth-Telemonitorings wird bei BewohnerInnen, Pflegepersonal und zuständigen Allgemein- bzw Fachärzten über eine Mixed-Methods Studie evaluiert, angelehnt an das Technologieakzeptanzmodell. Erwartete Ergebnisse und Schlussfolgerung Aufgrund der mangelnden digitalen Kenntnisse können ProbandInnen Probleme im Umgang mit den digitalen Sensoren haben. Der geistige bzw. körperliche Gesundheitszustand kann eine Herausforderung darstellen. Die Pflegekräfte könnten aufgrund Arbeitsbelastung nicht in der Lage sein, eine ausreichende Unterstützung zu leisten. Das betreuende Medizinpersonal könnte es schwierig finden, die Telemedizin mit ihrer üblichen Versorgung zu verbinden, nicht zuletzt wegen eines aktuell unklaren Kostenerstattungsmodells. Durch Beobachtung und Lösung der Hürden, sowie durch die Mixed-Methods Untersuchung, wird ein Konzept zur Implementierung vom mHealth Telemonitoring des kardiopulmonalen Systems in Alters- und Pflegeeinrichtungen vorangebracht.

We report on the findings from an in-class experiment that represents a learning innovation which can enable classroom-based conversations about bias in the domain of entrepreneurship. More specifically, the present learning innovation explores gender bias in venture funding with regard to entrepreneurship. In an introduction to entrepreneurship class, we randomly assigned students to one of the three experimental conditions—students evaluated an executive summary for a venture either written by a woman, or a man, or one in which the gender was neutral (i.e., the control group). Students acted as if they were considering an investment and reported whether, for example, the executive summary was well written as well as how much equity they would want in the venture as a potential investor. Overall, these results provide evidence consistent with the inference that the students sampled in this study did not use gender as a decision-making heuristic when evaluating entrepreneurial opportunities. We discuss the results of our experiment and describe (a) how to replicate this activity, (b) how to discuss this in the classroom, and (c) how to adapt this activity to explore other types of bias (e.g., race, ethnicity, weight-based, etc.).

The act of being resourceful is a commonly displayed behavior in the process of entrepreneurship. For example, entrepreneurs are known to share resources with competitors, utilize their social networks to attract capital, exchange favors for resources, engage in resource bootstrapping behaviors, repurpose and/or recombine existing resources for new purposes (i.e., bricolage), and sometimes pivot from one opportunity to another following available resource options given current situational constraints (i.e., effectuation). Currently, research on the topic of resourcefulness in the entrepreneurship literature assumes these aforementioned resourceful behaviors are attributed to a limited resource environment rather than also originating from within the entrepreneur. Frugality is a new concept in the field of entrepreneurship that suggests entrepreneurs will also enact resourceful behaviors because of their own self-regulatory processes; that is, entrepreneurs will engage in resourcefulness behaviors as a preference rather than as a forced reaction to their external resource environment. Thus, frugality represents an individual-level antecedent of resourcefulness behaviors that is not bound to the conditions of necessity-based entrepreneurship. This is important as frugality opens the door for numerous future research directions in the context of both necessity-based and opportunity-based entrepreneurship. Frugality is defined as one’s general preference to (a) conserve resources and (b) apply an economic rationale in the acquisition of resources (i.e., assessing the opportunity cost of newly acquired resources). Research in the consumer behavior literature highlights that frugality is a culturally driven trait preference, whereby one is willing to sacrifice in the short term to achieve longer-term, idiosyncratic goals. Despite a large amount of research on frugal consumer behavior, there has yet to be a systematic inquiry into how frugality more broadly influences the process of new venture creation and organizations. Empirical research highlights that frugal entrepreneurs tend to engage in higher amounts of bricolage and effectuation, thus representing a promising new topic for better understanding the process of entrepreneurship. Although it is expected that future inquiry regarding frugality in entrepreneurship will naturally orient toward the topic of resourcefulness, it is also expected that frugality will relate to numerous other important topics such as entrepreneurial well-being, opportunity recognition, opportunity exploitation, and new venture growth. Considering the novelty of frugality in entrepreneurship, and management literature generally, it would benefit future research to systematically explore both the upsides and downsides to being frugal as it relates to value creation activities.

What should researchers say when recruiting entrepreneurs to participate in their study? Using a sample of entrepreneurs (N = 1,450) who were being asked to participate in an academic research project, we conducted an experiment to determine recruitment message efficacy. Drawing on best practices from the behavioral insights literature, we developed different email message recruitment statements that were randomly assigned across four phases of our experiment. Results indicate that a message grounded in the “descriptive norms” (i.e., social norms) approach resulted in the highest percentage of participants who clicked on the link to participate in our online survey. We discuss the theoretical as well as practical implications of our work.

We integrate social cognitive theory, and its tenets of personal and collective agency, to develop an individual-level perspective on entrepreneurs' resourcefulness behaviors that illustrates how resourcefulness behaviors can be classified as ‘self-reliant behaviors’ or ‘joint resourcefulness behaviors’. Using this novel cognitive theoretical approach, we provide and test a framework that explains how dispositional, perceptual, and behavioral factors interact in the enactment of purposeful action with regards to entrepreneurs' resourceful behaviors. Consistent with our hypotheses, results from a quantitative study of entrepreneurs (N = 178), as well as a supplemental study involving qualitative interviews with entrepreneurs (N = 15), highlight that entrepreneurs higher in frugality tend to perceive higher levels of environmental hostility. This relationship, in turn, leads to higher amounts of self-reliant resourcefulness behaviors (i.e., customer-related and internal self-financing bootstrapping behaviors) but not joint resourcefulness behaviors. Multiple theoretical and practical contributions emerge from our findings as the extant literature does not yet account for human agency as a reason why some entrepreneurs may choose to engage in certain resourceful behaviors relative to other behaviors.

We examine how innovation culture affects new product launch performance in a sample of entrepreneurial ventures (N = 334). In order to examine the relation between innovation culture and new product launch performance, we embarked on a two-step process. First, we examined the factor structure of innovation culture—results confirmed nine-dimensions. Here, a grouped confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) examined cross-cultural differences between eastern and western cultures. Second, the dimensions of innovation culture were used to determine culture profiles across these 334 entrepreneurial ventures. We found two clear subpopulations of innovation culture and we link these two clusters to new product development (NPD) performance (i.e., new product sales and profits averaged over 5 years). In particular, a Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) suggested two profiles existed with respect to innovation culture—that is, ventures that ranked ‘high’ across all innovation culture dimensions versus ventures that ranked ‘low’ across all nine dimensions. Ventures scoring higher across all innovation culture dimensions had significantly higher new product profits and sales. In a series of robustness checks, a path model revealed no significant moderation by region (i.e., eastern vs. western countries) in the innovation culture to performance relationship. Implications as well as directions for future research are discussed.

This study tests a situated metacognitive model of entrepreneurial action to highlight how action (or inaction) during the entrepreneurial process is influenced by both individual traits and one's metacognitive ability, namely one's strategic mindset. Integrating theory on resourcefulness and metacognition, we show how entrepreneurs who are more frugal tend to engage in less action in developing their new venture (i.e., enacting fewer innovative behaviors and putting forth less effort) as compared to less frugal entrepreneurs. However, we explain that this direct (negative) relationship is mediated by one's strategic mindset, such that the indirect effect of frugality on both innovative behavior and level of effort enacted towards one's new venture is positive (rather than negative). Overall, this study extends the construct of strategic mindset to the entrepreneurship literature and highlights the crucial role that metacognition can play regarding one's socio-cognitive decision-making process and subsequent entrepreneurial behaviors.

This article describes the results of a survey designed to assess how companies are implementing digital transformation, including the various strategies they employ and the actions they take to achieve large-scale transformations. While a few companies seem to reach front-runner status, the majority seem to lag behind. This phenomenon is a top concern of boardrooms worldwide and motivated the development of this study. To help these organizations, we highlight differentiated strategic principles and characteristics of the companies’ design processes digitally mature companies undertake to transform their businesses. These insights should help lagging companies understand what is involved in implementing a digital transformation and what they need to do to enforce this transformation.

The present research complements extant perspectives of resourcefulness, which assert that resourceful behaviors arise out of responses to environmental constraints, by developing a model illustrating that entrepreneurs self-impose constraints on resource acquisition and deployment for differing reasons. Specifically, we introduce a novel conceptualization of frugality and differentiate it from self-control to develop a set of hypotheses that frugality predicts resource use behaviors based on long-held preferences (e.g., effectuation and bricolage) and self-control predicts resource use behaviors based on known end states or goals (e.g., causation and pre-commitments). After accumulating evidence of reliability and validity for a new measure of frugality contextualized for entrepreneurship research, the results support our self-regulatory theoretical framework. Our study contributes to research on resourcefulness by making multiple theoretical insights, and we outline numerous future research opportunities for applying the construct of frugality to explain entrepreneurial behavior.

Hybrid entrepreneurship—where an individual simultaneously engages in startup activities as well as wage-based employment—is an increasingly common career transition path. Yet, relatively little research has explored entrepreneurial characteristics during these unique career transitions. We provide exploratory insight into the longitudinal relationship between self-efficacy and persistence for hybrid entrepreneurs’ (N = 29) across a twenty-week period during which aspiring entrepreneurs engaged in activities related to venture startup while maintaining wage employment. As such, we propose that entrepreneurial self-efficacy (ESE) and entrepreneurial persistence are malleable concepts that change over time. Using our longitudinal sample, we find evidence that ESE predicts entrepreneurial persistence change over time. Perhaps more importantly, we model how changes in ESE over time affect changes in entrepreneurial persistence for hybrid entrepreneurs. In sum, our work provides a foundation from which future research can examine the longitudinal transition of nascent entrepreneurs moving from an occupational setting as an employee to launching their own venture.

Isolation of synaptic nerve terminals or synaptosomes provides an opportunity to study the process of neurotransmission at many levels and with a variety of approaches. For example, structural features of the synaptic terminals and the organelles within them, such as synaptic vesicles and mitochondria, have been elucidated with electron microscopy. The postsynaptic membranes are joined to the presynaptic "active zone" of transmitter release through cell adhesion molecules and remain attached throughout the isolation of synaptosomes. These "post synaptic densities" or "PSDs" contain the receptors for the transmitters released from the nerve terminals and can easily be seen with electron microscopy. Biochemical and cell biological studies with synaptosomes have revealed which proteins and lipids are most actively involved in synaptic release of neurotransmitters. The functional properties of the nerve terminals, such as responses to depolarization and the uptake or release of signaling molecules, have also been characterized through the use of fluorescent dyes, tagged transmitters, and transporter substrates. In addition, isolated synaptosomes can serve as the starting material for the isolation of relatively pure synaptic plasma membranes (SPMs) that are devoid of organelles from the internal environment of the nerve terminal, such as mitochondria and synaptic vesicles. The isolated SPMs can reseal and form vesicular structures in which transport of ions such as sodium and calcium, as well as solutes such as neurotransmitters can be studied. The PSDs also remain associated with the presynaptic membranes during isolation of SPM fractions, making it possible to isolate the synaptic junctional complexes (SJCs) devoid of the rest of the plasma membranes of the nerve terminals and postsynaptic membrane components. Isolated SJCs can be used to identify the proteins that constitute this highly specialized region of neurons. In this chapter, we describe the steps involved in isolating synaptosomes, SPMs, and SJCs from brain so that these preparations can be used with new technological advances to address many as yet unanswered questions about the synapse and its remarkable activities in neuronal cell communication.

Isolation of synaptic nerve terminals or synaptosomes provides an opportunity to study the process of neurotransmission at many levels and with a variety of approaches. For example, structural features of the synaptic terminals and the organelles within them, such as synaptic vesicles and mitochondria, have been elucidated with electron microscopy. The postsynaptic membranes are joined to the presynaptic "active zone" of transmitter release through cell adhesion molecules and remain attached throughout the isolation of synaptosomes. These "post synaptic densities" or "PSDs" contain the receptors for the transmitters released from the nerve terminals and can easily be seen with electron microscopy. Biochemical and cell biological studies with synaptosomes have revealed which proteins and lipids are most actively involved in synaptic release of neurotransmitters. The functional properties of the nerve terminals, such as responses to depolarization and the uptake or release of signaling molecules, have also been characterized through the use of fluorescent dyes, tagged transmitters, and transporter substrates. In addition, isolated synaptosomes can serve as the starting material for the isolation of relatively pure synaptic plasma membranes (SPMs) that are devoid of organelles from the internal environment of the nerve terminal, such as mitochondria and synaptic vesicles. The isolated SPMs can reseal and form vesicular structures in which transport of ions such as sodium and calcium, as well as solutes such as neurotransmitters can be studied. The PSDs also remain associated with the presynaptic membranes during isolation of SPM fractions, making it possible to isolate the synaptic junctional complexes (SJCs) devoid of the rest of the plasma membranes of the nerve terminals and postsynaptic membrane components. Isolated SJCs can be used to identify the proteins that constitute this highly specialized region of neurons. In this chapter, we describe the steps involved in isolating synaptosomes, SPMs, and SJCs from brain so that these preparations can be used with new technological advances to address many as yet unanswered questions about the synapse and its remarkable activities in neuronal cell communication.

Context: Individual patient prognostication for advanced thyroid cancer (TC) is challenging. Circulating tumor cells (CTCs) have been shown to be a valuable prognostic marker for other solid cancers. Objective: We hypothesized that CTCs are present in the blood of patients with advanced TC and their number can predict overall survival (OS). Setting: This is a prospective study at a tertiary cancer hospital. Patients, Interventions, and Main Outcome Measures: Initial studies were performed with TC cell lines to determine the feasibility of detection using the Veridex CellSearch. CTC enumeration was performed in blood samples from 18 patients with distantly metastatic medullary TC (metMTC), 14 with distantly metastatic differentiated TC (metDTC), and 10 controls with a history of TC but no evidence of disease. The prognostic value of CTC levels to predict OS in metMTC patients was assessed. Results: CellSearch detected cells from MTC and DTC but not anaplastic TC cell lines. Six metMTC patients but no metDTC or control patients had more than or equal to 5 CTCs detected by the CellSearch assay. Median survival in metMTC patients with more than or equal to 5 CTCs was 13 months vs 51.5 months for those with less than 5 CTCs (P = .0116). The hazard ratio for mortality of patients with more than or equal to 5 CTCs compared with those with less than 5 CTCs was 3.95 (1.20–13.0, P = .0245). Conclusions: The presence of more than or equal to 5 CTCs in patients with metMTC is associated with worse OS. Larger cohorts are required to validate the prognostic value of CTC enumeration.

We tested how the addition of oxaloacetate (OAA) to SH-SY5Y cells affected bioenergetic fluxes and infrastructure, and compared the effects of OAA to malate, pyruvate, and glucose deprivation. OAA displayed pro-glycolysis and pro-respiration effects. OAA pro-glycolysis effects were not a consequence of decarboxylation to pyruvate because unlike OAA, pyruvate lowered the glycolysis flux. Malate did not alter glycolysis flux and reduced mitochondrial respiration. Glucose deprivation essentially eliminated glycolysis and increased mitochondrial respiration. OAA increased, while malate decreased, the cell NAD+/NADH ratio. Cytosolic malate dehydrogenase 1 protein increased with OAA treatment, but not with malate or glucose deprivation. Glucose deprivation increased protein levels of ATP citrate lyase, an enzyme which produces cytosolic OAA, whereas OAA altered neither ATP citrate lyase mRNA nor protein levels. OAA, but not glucose deprivation, increased cytochrome oxidase subunit 2, PGC1α, PGC1β, and PGC1 related co-activator protein levels. OAA increased total and phosphorylated SIRT1 protein. We conclude that adding OAA to SH-SY5Y cells can support or enhance both glycolysis and respiration fluxes. These effects appear to depend, at least partly, on OAA causing a shift in the cell redox balance to a more oxidized state, that it is not a glycolysis pathway intermediate, and possibly its ability to act in an anaplerotic fashion. We examined how oxaloacetate (OAA) affects bioenergetic fluxes. To advance the understanding of how OAA mediates these changes, we compared the effects of OAA to malate, pyruvate, and glucose deprivation. We further examined how OAA affects levels of enzymes that facilitate its cytosolic metabolism, and found OAA increased the expression of malate dehydrogenase 1 (MDH1-cytosolic). We propose the following: OAA supports both glycolysis and respiration fluxes, shifts the cell redox balance toward a more oxidized state, and acts in an anaplerotic fashion. Abbreviations not defined in the text: MDH2, malate dehydrogenase 2 (mitochondrial).

This paper creates and validates a new construct to measure attitudes toward resource use during the venture creation process, which is labeled entrepreneurial frugality. A definition of the constr...

This investigation evaluated whether moderate‐intensity cycle ergometer training affects satellite cell and molecular responses to acute maximal concentric/eccentric resistance exercise in middle‐aged women. Baseline and 72 h postresistance exercise vastus lateralis biopsies were obtained from seven healthy middle‐aged women (56 ± 5 years, BMI 26 ± 1, VO 2max 27 ± 4) before and after 12 weeks of cycle training. Myosin heavy chain (MyHC) I‐ and II‐associated satellite cell density and cross‐sectional area was determined via immunohistochemistry. Expression of 93 genes representative of the muscle‐remodeling environment was also measured via NanoString. Overall fiber size increased ~20% with cycle training (P = 0.052). MyHC I satellite cell density increased 29% in response to acute resistance exercise before endurance training and 50% with endurance training (P

This study extends current theory on organizational culture and innovation in two ways. First, innovation culture was operationalized with respect to the most current frameworks and definitions of ...