The expanding blue economy, marked by its focus on sustainable use of ocean resources, offers enormous opportunity for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs). However, for SMEs to properly integrate and succeed in this economy, they must first have a thorough awareness of the sector’s challenges and prospects. This research used a scoping review and a qualitative study to identify the challenges and opportunities facing SMEs operating in the blue economy. The study discovered recurring themes and gaps in the existing literature by conducting an extensive examination of scholarly publications. The key challenges identified include complicated regulatory frameworks, restricted access to funding, infrastructure restrictions, talent deficiencies, government support, and market outreach. In-depth interviews with Malaysian SME leaders, industry stakeholders, and policymakers were conducted to decipher these findings. The results of interviews confirmed the relevance of the regulatory framework, infrastructure restrictions, talent deficit, and market access challenges in the Malaysian context. In particular, the study revealed emerging opportunities for Malaysian blue SMEs in sectors such as renewable energy, sustainable fisheries, marine biotechnology, and ecotourism. The study emphasizes the importance of an encouraging policy framework, knowledge-sharing platforms, and capacity building activities. It finishes by underlining the ability of SMEs to drive a sustainable and thriving blue economy, if challenges are systematically handled, and opportunities are appropriately capitalized.

The provided material presents a priority article on the scientific discovery titled “The phenomenon of simultaneous destruction of water-oil and oil-water emulsions”. The authors propose the corresponding formula: the previously unknown phenomenon of simultaneous destruction of water-oil and oil-water emulsions occurs when polynanostructured surfactant demulsifiers with characteristics akin to crystalline liquids, intramolecular interblock activity, and enduring intramolecular nanomotors (such as block copolymers of ethylene and propylene oxides, which act as sources of oligomer homologues of oxyethylene ethers) are added to crude oil during primary oil processing. This phenomenon is attributed to the redistribution of oligomer homologues, with the most hydrophobic oxyethylene ethers being dispersed in water-oil emulsions and the most hydrophilic ones in oil-water emulsions, resulting in robust nanodispersed phases with crystalline liquid properties.

Objective: To evaluate the radiographic characteristics of dentigerous cysts (DC) diagnosed at the School of Stomatology of the Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia (UPCH) during the period of 2010–2017. Material and methods: Retrospective, descriptive, observational and cross-sectional study, where the panoramic radiographs of 37 cases of DC were selected. Results: The total number of diagnosed cases of dentigerous cysts was 233, which after inclusion and exclusion criteria, 37 cases were obtained, of which 45.9% of cysts were found in the second decade of life with a higher frequency of 51.4 percent for women, and a jaw predilection of 59.5% in all cases. In addition, it was found that 97.3% of the cases were radiolucent, defined limits were found in 67.6%, corticalized edges in 54.1% and unilocular in 94.6%. All dentigerous cysts were associated with a tooth, of which closed apex (48.6%) and tooth displacement (59.5%) were observed. The adjacent tooth was not affected in 56.8% of cases, but its hard lamina was affected (59.5%). The 68.2% of cases did not affect the basal mandibular cortex, but did displace the inferior dental canal (54.5%) and 46.7% of cases displaced the floor of the maxillary sinus. Conclusions: Most of the results obtained on the characteristics in the Peruvian population support previous studies reported in America, Europe and Asia. Radiographically the dentigerous cyst showed characteristics that support its clearly benign behavior.

This paper proposes a floating-interest-rate infrastructure bond, where the interest of a government bond is paid to investors during the period of construction and the early period of operation. Unlike the usual government bond, which provides a fixed interest rate, the proposed floating-interest-rate infrastructure bond pays a floating interest, the rate of which depends on spillover tax revenues. Effective infrastructure projects have a positive effect on the economic growth of a region, known as the spillover effect. When user charges and the return from spillover tax revenues are below the fixed rate of the government bond, the interest rate will equal to the fixed rate of the government bond. In this case, investors in the infrastructure will receive interest on the government bond at the minimum rate. As the spillover effect of the infrastructure increases, the rate of return for infrastructure investment will become greater than the fixed rate of the government bond. The success of the floating-interest-rate infrastructure bond depends on the spillover effect and on transparency and accountability. Policy recommendations are provided in this paper on how to increase the spillover effect and improve transparency and accountability. 

In many cases, the expected efficiency advantages of public-private partnership (PPP) projects as a specific form of infrastructure provision did not materialize ex post. From a Public Choice perspective, one simple explanation for many of the problems surrounded by the governance of PPPs is that the public decision-makers being involved in the process of initiating and implementing PPP projects (namely, politicians and public bureaucrats) in many situations make low- cost decisions in the sense of Kirchgässner (1948–2017). That is, their decisions may have a high impact on the wealth of the jurisdiction in which the PPP is located (most notably, on the welfare of citizen-taxpayers in this jurisdiction) but, at the same time, these decisions often only have a low impact on the private welfare of the individual decision-makers in politics and bureaucracy. The latter, for example, in many settings often have a low economic incentive to monitor/control what the private-sector partners are doing (or not doing) within a PPP arrangement. The purpose of this paper is to draw greater attention to the problems created by low-cost decisions for the governance of PPPs. Moreover, the paper discusses potential remedies arising from the viewpoint of Public Choice and Constitutional Political Economy.