ATHENS (Reuters) ? Greece and its private bondholders drew closer on Friday to a bond swap deal that would prevent the country from sinking into a chaotic default and ease the euro zone's debilitating debt crisis.
Cash-strapped Greece is fast running out of time as it pushes to wrap up an agreement by Monday paving the way for a fresh injection of aid before 14.5 billion euros ($18.5 billion)of bond repayments fall due in March.
Bankers and government officials close to the talks say an agreement to cut Greece's debt is in sight and that the two sides may be able to present a joint proposal at a meeting of euro zone finance ministers on Monday.
"We are very close to wrapping it up," one source close to the negotiations told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
After a breakdown in talks last week over the coupon, or interest payment, that Greece must offer on its new bonds raised fears of a disastrous bankruptcy, the two sides resumed negotiations on Thursday.
Greek Prime Minister Lucas Papademos, Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos and Charles Dallara, the head of the Institute of International Finance (IIF) representing bondholders, started a new meeting on Friday morning.
According to one Greek banker, senior euro zone finance officials have scheduled a conference call for Friday afternoon.
HIGH STAKES
The stakes could not be higher. Greece needs to have a deal in the bag before funds are doled out from a 130 billion euro rescue plan that the country's official lenders, the European Union and the International Monetary Fund, drew up in October.
The paperwork involved alone is expected to take weeks, meaning failure to secure a deal soon could put Athens at risk of a chaotic default in March, which in turn could jolt the financial system and tip the global economy into recession.
A large chunk of the bond swap must be agreed by noon on Friday and formalized before Monday's meeting of euro zone finance ministers, Venizelos has said.
"The deal must be completed. There is no more time left," said a Greek government official who requested anonymity.
Adding to the pressure, officials from the "troika" of foreign lenders have begun meetings with the Greek government on Friday to discuss reforms and plans to finalize that bailout package.
Progress has been hard to come by in the latest round of negotiations, with bankers worried about suffering losses far higher than the 50 percent writedown they were expected to take on the nominal value of their bonds.
Actual losses for investors are expected to be much higher depending on the terms, such as the coupon, being negotiated.
A source close to the talks earlier said Athens and its foreign lenders had initially offered a coupon of just over 3.5 percent, but bondholders rejected that as too low. They were seeking a coupon of at least 4 percent, the source said.
VARIABLE COUPON
One of the options being considered is a coupon that rises after staying stable for the first 10 years, another source close to the talks has said.
According to Greek press reports not identifying their sources, the two sides may agree a coupon ranging between 3 and 5 percent, depending on the new bonds' maturities, resulting in a loss for investors of between 65 and 70 percent in terms of net present value.
Investors have also bridled at Greece's threat to enforce losses if not enough bondholders sign up to the deal.
The swap is aimed at cutting 100 billion euros off Greece's over 350 billion euro debt load. The second bailout - drawn up on condition Greece pushes through painful cuts and structural reforms - is expected to reduce Greece's debt to a more manageable 120 percent of gross domestic product in 2020 from about 160 percent now.
Greece is stumbling through its worst economic crisis since World War Two, with unemployment at record highs and near-daily protests and strikes against austerity measures that have deepened an already brutal recession.
Nearly one out of two youths is unemployed and anger against waves of tax hikes and pay cuts is running high.
(Additional reporting by Athens bureau and Stephen Brown in Berlin; Writing by Harry Papachristou; Editing by Ruth Pitchford)
There's no superhero origin story that begins with a bite (or a lick?) from a gecko. Plain 'ol wall climbing powers are, it seems, just not as sexy as wearing skintight suits, slinging webs and crawling up buildings. But if a few bright minds at the University of Southampton have anything to say about it, we could soon find ourselves walking like real-life lizard people (V, anyone?) and suctioning onto various surfaces using the managed properties of light. Lead researcher John Zhang and his UK team have predicted the existence of a force more powerful than gravity and the short-range pull of the Casimir effect, whereby plasmons (electromagnetic waves) captured on a metamaterial and the electrons on a metal resonate and form a bond of attraction. The resultant particle field is supposedly strong enough to "overcome the Earth's gravitational pull" and could even be used to alter the reflectivity of a material. Obvious military and aerospace applications aside, this invisible adhesive could also make its way into our everyday lives -- they just need to need to prove that it, y'know, actually exists first.
Non-invasive measurements of tricuspid valve anatomy can predict severity of valve leakagePublic release date: 18-Jan-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Abby Robinson abby@innovate.gatech.edu 404-385-3364 Georgia Institute of Technology Research News
An estimated 1.6 million Americans suffer moderate to severe leakage through their tricuspid valves, which are complex structures that allow blood to flow from the heart's upper right chamber to the ventricle. If left untreated, severe leakage can affect an individual's quality of life and can even lead to death.
A new study finds that the anatomy of the heart's tricuspid valve can be used to predict the severity of leakage in the valve, which is a condition called tricuspid regurgitation. The study, conducted by researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory University, found that pulmonary arterial pressure, the size of the valve opening and papillary muscle position measurements could be used to predict the severity of an individual's tricuspid regurgitation.
"By being able to identify and measure an individual's particular tricuspid valve anatomical features that we have shown are correlated with increased leakage, clinicians should be able to better target their repair efforts and create more durable repairs," said Ajit Yoganathan, Regents' professor in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech and Emory University.
The study was published in the January issue of the journal Circulation: Cardiovascular Imaging. Funding for this work was provided by the American Heart Association and a donation from Tom and Shirley Gurley.
Yoganathan and recent Coulter Department doctoral graduate Erin Spinner teamed with Stamatios Lerakis, a professor of medicine (cardiology), radiology and imaging sciences at Emory University, to non-invasively collect 3-D echocardiograms from 64 individuals who exhibited assorted grades of tricuspid leakage. Subjects included 20 individuals with "trace," 13 with "mild," 17 with "moderate" and 14 with "severe" tricuspid regurgitation. The subjects with "mild" to "severe" leakage exhibited a mix of isolated right, isolated left, and both right and left ventricle dilation.
From the 3-D echocardiography images of the heart they collected, the researchers measured (1) the area of the annulus, which is the fibrous ring that surrounds the tricuspid valve opening; (2) the distance between the annulus and the three right ventricle papillary muscles, which keep the valve shut when the ventricle contracts; and (3) the position of the papillary muscles with respect to the center of the annulus. The clinicians also measured pulmonary arterial pressure using standard clinical methods and assessed the grade of tricuspid regurgitation from "trace" to "severe" with color Doppler imaging.
In collaboration with Emir Veledar, an assistant professor and statistician in the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University, the researchers found statistical differences between individuals with ventricular dilation and the control subjects in the parameters of pulmonary arterial pressure, annulus area and papillary muscle displacement. They also found that all three factors were correlated with the grade of tricuspid regurgitation.
"This study's use of advanced cardiovascular imaging, and more specifically 3-D echocardiography, provided new insight into the pathophysiology of tricuspid regurgitation and a good understanding as to why current surgical treatments for tricuspid regurgitation are not good enough," explained Lerakis. "I believe this study will change the focus and direction of future surgical therapies for tricuspid regurgitation only to make them better and more durable."
Based on the findings of this study, said Lerakis, future surgical therapies should not only be focused on the tricuspid annulus, but on the entire tricuspid valve apparatus, including the tricuspid valve papillary muscles and their three-dimensional location within the apparatus.
Individuals in the study with left ventricle dilation exhibited significant displacement of one of the papillary muscles and patients with both ventricles dilated had significant displacement of two papillary muscles. Subjects with right ventricle dilation showed significant displacement of all three papillary muscles.
The researchers also found that patients with a dilated right ventricle were more likely to have a dilated annulus and exhibited the highest pulmonary arterial pressures and highest levels of tricuspid regurgitation. However, not all patients with a dilated right ventricle had significant increases in annulus area, providing evidence that the right ventricle may become dilated without the annulus being affected.
"We think an increase in pulmonary arterial pressure caused geometric changes in the ventricle, which resulted in alterations to the annulus and papillary muscles," explained Yoganathan. "The combination of displacement of all three papillary muscles and annular dilatation may account for the patients with isolated right ventricle dilatation having the largest percentage of severe tricuspid regurgitation."
Knowing which parameters are responsible for significant tricuspid regurgitation and having a non-invasive imaging technique to measure these parameters should help clinicians target repairs to the specific cause of an individual's tricuspid leakage, according to Yoganathan.
In future studies, the researchers plan to study papillary muscle displacements in individuals with specific diseases to see if different disease manifestations exhibit different characteristics.
"Although it has long been accepted that pulmonary hypertension may result in tricuspid regurgitation, this study is one of the first to provide a clinical correlation between the two," said Yoganathan, who is also the Wallace H. Coulter Distinguished Faculty Chair in Biomedical Engineering. "We want to know whether treating an individual's pulmonary hypertension, and thus decreasing one's pulmonary arterial pressure, can reverse the geometric changes that are causing tricuspid regurgitation and return the annulus and papillary muscles to their original positions."
###
Emory University sonographers Jason Higginson, Maria Pernetz and Sharon Howell also contributed to the study.
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
Non-invasive measurements of tricuspid valve anatomy can predict severity of valve leakagePublic release date: 18-Jan-2012 [ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Abby Robinson abby@innovate.gatech.edu 404-385-3364 Georgia Institute of Technology Research News
An estimated 1.6 million Americans suffer moderate to severe leakage through their tricuspid valves, which are complex structures that allow blood to flow from the heart's upper right chamber to the ventricle. If left untreated, severe leakage can affect an individual's quality of life and can even lead to death.
A new study finds that the anatomy of the heart's tricuspid valve can be used to predict the severity of leakage in the valve, which is a condition called tricuspid regurgitation. The study, conducted by researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology and Emory University, found that pulmonary arterial pressure, the size of the valve opening and papillary muscle position measurements could be used to predict the severity of an individual's tricuspid regurgitation.
"By being able to identify and measure an individual's particular tricuspid valve anatomical features that we have shown are correlated with increased leakage, clinicians should be able to better target their repair efforts and create more durable repairs," said Ajit Yoganathan, Regents' professor in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech and Emory University.
The study was published in the January issue of the journal Circulation: Cardiovascular Imaging. Funding for this work was provided by the American Heart Association and a donation from Tom and Shirley Gurley.
Yoganathan and recent Coulter Department doctoral graduate Erin Spinner teamed with Stamatios Lerakis, a professor of medicine (cardiology), radiology and imaging sciences at Emory University, to non-invasively collect 3-D echocardiograms from 64 individuals who exhibited assorted grades of tricuspid leakage. Subjects included 20 individuals with "trace," 13 with "mild," 17 with "moderate" and 14 with "severe" tricuspid regurgitation. The subjects with "mild" to "severe" leakage exhibited a mix of isolated right, isolated left, and both right and left ventricle dilation.
From the 3-D echocardiography images of the heart they collected, the researchers measured (1) the area of the annulus, which is the fibrous ring that surrounds the tricuspid valve opening; (2) the distance between the annulus and the three right ventricle papillary muscles, which keep the valve shut when the ventricle contracts; and (3) the position of the papillary muscles with respect to the center of the annulus. The clinicians also measured pulmonary arterial pressure using standard clinical methods and assessed the grade of tricuspid regurgitation from "trace" to "severe" with color Doppler imaging.
In collaboration with Emir Veledar, an assistant professor and statistician in the Rollins School of Public Health at Emory University, the researchers found statistical differences between individuals with ventricular dilation and the control subjects in the parameters of pulmonary arterial pressure, annulus area and papillary muscle displacement. They also found that all three factors were correlated with the grade of tricuspid regurgitation.
"This study's use of advanced cardiovascular imaging, and more specifically 3-D echocardiography, provided new insight into the pathophysiology of tricuspid regurgitation and a good understanding as to why current surgical treatments for tricuspid regurgitation are not good enough," explained Lerakis. "I believe this study will change the focus and direction of future surgical therapies for tricuspid regurgitation only to make them better and more durable."
Based on the findings of this study, said Lerakis, future surgical therapies should not only be focused on the tricuspid annulus, but on the entire tricuspid valve apparatus, including the tricuspid valve papillary muscles and their three-dimensional location within the apparatus.
Individuals in the study with left ventricle dilation exhibited significant displacement of one of the papillary muscles and patients with both ventricles dilated had significant displacement of two papillary muscles. Subjects with right ventricle dilation showed significant displacement of all three papillary muscles.
The researchers also found that patients with a dilated right ventricle were more likely to have a dilated annulus and exhibited the highest pulmonary arterial pressures and highest levels of tricuspid regurgitation. However, not all patients with a dilated right ventricle had significant increases in annulus area, providing evidence that the right ventricle may become dilated without the annulus being affected.
"We think an increase in pulmonary arterial pressure caused geometric changes in the ventricle, which resulted in alterations to the annulus and papillary muscles," explained Yoganathan. "The combination of displacement of all three papillary muscles and annular dilatation may account for the patients with isolated right ventricle dilatation having the largest percentage of severe tricuspid regurgitation."
Knowing which parameters are responsible for significant tricuspid regurgitation and having a non-invasive imaging technique to measure these parameters should help clinicians target repairs to the specific cause of an individual's tricuspid leakage, according to Yoganathan.
In future studies, the researchers plan to study papillary muscle displacements in individuals with specific diseases to see if different disease manifestations exhibit different characteristics.
"Although it has long been accepted that pulmonary hypertension may result in tricuspid regurgitation, this study is one of the first to provide a clinical correlation between the two," said Yoganathan, who is also the Wallace H. Coulter Distinguished Faculty Chair in Biomedical Engineering. "We want to know whether treating an individual's pulmonary hypertension, and thus decreasing one's pulmonary arterial pressure, can reverse the geometric changes that are causing tricuspid regurgitation and return the annulus and papillary muscles to their original positions."
###
Emory University sonographers Jason Higginson, Maria Pernetz and Sharon Howell also contributed to the study.
[ | E-mail | Share ]
?
AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.
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Public release date: 18-Jan-2012
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