Short-chain fatty acid (SCFA) transport across the colon may occur by nonionic diffusion and/or via apical membrane SCFA−/[Formula: see text]exchange. To examine the relative importance of these processes, stripped segments of rat ( Ratus ratus) proximal and distal colon were studied in Ussing chambers, and the unidirectional fluxes of radiolabeled SCFA butyrate, propionate, or weakly metabolized isobutyrate were measured. In N-2-hydroxyethylpiperazine- N′-2-ethanesulfonic acid (HEPES) or 1 or 5 mM [Formula: see text] Ringer, decreases in mucosal pH stimulated mucosal-to-serosal flux ( J m→s) of all SCFA, decreases in serosal pH stimulated serosal-to-mucosal flux ( J s→m), and bilateral pH decreases stimulated both fluxes equally. These effects were observed whether the SCFA was present on one or both sides of the tissue, in both proximal and distal colon, in the absence of luminal Na+, and in the presence of either luminal or serosal ouabain. Changes in intracellular pH or intracellular [[Formula: see text]] did not account for the effects of extracellular pH. Luminal Cl− removal, to evaluate the role of apical membrane Cl−/SCFA−exchange, had no effect on J m→s but decreased J s→m 32% at pH 6.5 and 22% at 7.2. Increasing SCFA concentration from 1 to 100 mM, at pH 6.4 or 7.4, caused a linear increase in J m→s. We conclude that SCFA are mainly transported across the rat colon by nonionic diffusion.

Summary Digital transformation as integration of digital technology into business results in fundamental changes of way world does business, communicate and develops on national and international level. There is increase of high-tech public spending which is connected with increase of need for high-tech as well as importance and benefits that it brings to development of economy. This so called digital or high-tech sector is one of the strategic sectors in the leading world economies, starting from the US and the European Union. EU recognized it in strategic document “Europe 2020” which sees this sector as key factor in smart growth based on tech knowledge and innovation. Europe, especially western and northern Europe, is trying to keep its competitiveness in global tech arena with USA and fast developing countries such as China and India as well as Asian tech giants such are Japan, South Korea and Singapore. There is increase of European countries investment in digital transformation through private and public ICT sector development which usually has positive impact on economic growth as well as key indicators such are GDP, productivity and employment. This paper provides basic review of digital transformation and high-tech sector in Europe as well as comparison between EU and Western Balkan countries. Additionally, there is analysis of influence of ICT spending on GDP growth. Paper could serve as basic for further research in area of influence of tech investment on key macroeconomics indicators.

COVID-19 had undoubtedly speeded up adoption of digital technologies. Most of the theoreticians agree that changes that happened in the pandemic period would not happen in the next several years or even decades. There is almost no business operation that has not been affected by the pandemic, from customer relation and sales to supply chain. It influenced different business sectors leaving permanent change and making a significant proportion of organizations working in at least hybrid mode: combining digital and traditional pre-pandemic ways of working. COVID-19 had significantly changed the workplace and way of working. Workplace has shifted to digital or at least hybrid and employees and companies have adopted new ways of working, including usage of digital technologies but also accepting more agile and flexible procedures and rules. The research community has followed this phenomenon and tried to provide best possible recommendation to it accordance to recognized research methods. The paper provides a systematic literature review of the most significant scientific and industry publication in the years after the pandemic start. It is based on Kitchenham methodology of the systematic review with selected publication from recognized bibliographic databases. First part provides general effects of the pandemic to digital transformation of businesses all over the globe, mostly connected to analysis of the employees’ workplace preference. The second part is focused on digital workplace transformation and presents key theoretical and professional findings in the post-pandemic workplace. This part is consisted of the preview of benefits of the digital workplace transformation, identification of critical success factors and the most significant challenges of the process.

There have been a significant number of publications about digital workplace transformation. This is due to technological developments in the last decades as well as the COVID-19 pandemic. However, there is no adequate overall definition of the term. This leads to misunderstandings and confused interpretation of the digital workplace, sometimes even narrowing it down to a set of tools or a platform. Given the complexity of digital workplace transformation, there is a need to have an integrated prospective and analyze it not just from a technological perspective, but from an organizational and processes point of view as well. Therefore, this paper is an attempt to review the concept and offer a comprehensive definition of the digital workplace. This includes all the important aspects of the transformation including tools and platforms as well as personal issues, organization, processes and management. The paper provides a systematic literature review of the publications in leading bibliographic and citation bases, starting from Web of Science and Scopus to SpringerLink, IEEE Xplore and Association for Information Systems eLibrary. The review includes not only journal papers, but also leading proceedings, books and other referent publications. It addresses the authors' approaches, perspectives, terminologies, focusses and understanding of workplace transformation over the last decade by a comprehensive review of the state of art of the literature in the field of digital workplace. Finally, a set of recommendations are made to further research in increasingly important subject of digital workplace transformation.

BackgroundTobacco tax policy in Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H) assumes a gradual annual increase in specific excise taxes on cigarettes. However, it is insufficient to reduce significantly consumption. This paper examines effects of the increase in cigarette prices and disposable income on cigarette demand in B&H by different income consumer groups.MethodsBased on the Household Budget Surveys and microdata from 2007, 2011 and 2015, we employed logit model to estimate prevalence and Deaton’s model to estimate intensity elasticity of cigarette demand for the sample of 21 424 households (9953 are smoking households) by different income groups. We used obtained elasticities and estimated the impact of tax increase on cigarette consumption and government revenue in three tax increase scenarios.ResultsTen per cent price increase would reduce the consumption of low-income households by 14%, as opposed to 9.9% for middle-income and 7% for high-income households. Low-income households would significantly increase the demand for cigarettes compared with high-income households if income increased. Increase in the specific excise tax by 25% would reduce cigarette consumption and increase government revenue, while the low-income group would experience a reduction in tax burden.ConclusionsChanges in prices have different impacts on tobacco prevalence and consumption of low-income compared with middle-income and high-income socioeconomic groups. Low-income households are most responsive to changes in prices and income. Thus, the poor in B&H would benefit from an increase in tobacco excise taxes and price.