PROVINCIAL VENTURE CAPITAL CORPORATIONS: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
ABSTRACT Addressing a growing need, Provincial Venture Capital Corporations (PVCCs) constitute a dynamic, distinctive and significant segment of the Canadian venture-capital industry. All provinces are now offering their respective programs to encourage the formation of PVCCs, so this article reviews the purpose and evolution of these programs and compares their various structures and regulations. Their overall performance and outlook are analyzed, and recommendations seeking to encourage the further development of PVCCs are presented.
Les différences de perception et d'attitude entre les gestionnaires de firmes exportatrices et non exportatrices au Québec
Resume 
 
La decision d'exporter ou de ne pas exporter dans la petite entreprise est profondement influencee par le gestionnaire. Plusieurs etudes, en particulier aux Etats-Unis, tendent a demontrer que le gestionnaire de la firme exportatrice se differencie sous plusieurs aspects du gestionnaire de la firme non exportatrice. Cette etude, d'apres une enquete aupres d'un echantillon de 205 gestionnaires de P.M.E. quebecoises, presente une analyse detaillee de leurs perceptions et de leurs caracteristiques. 
 
 
 
Abstract 
 
The decision to export or not in a small business firm is greatly influenced by the manager. Several studies, especially in United States, have shown that there are significant differences between managers of exporting and non-exporting firms. This study, based on a sample of 205 managers of small businesses in Quebec, underscores the differences in their personal characteristics and in their perceptions.
A quantitative measure of nitrifying bacterial growth.
Nitrifying bacteria convert ammonia (NH3) to nitrate (NO3-) in a nitrification reaction. Methods to quantitatively separate the growth rate of these important bacterial populations from that of the dominant heterotrophic bacteria are important to our understanding of the nitrification process. The changing concentration of ammonia is often used as an indirect measure of nitrification but ammonification processes generate ammonia and confound this approach while heterotrophs remove nitrate via denitrification. Molecular probe methods can tell us what proportion of the microbial community is nitrifying bacteria but not their growth rate. The technique proposed here was able to quantify the growth rate of the nitrifying bacterial populations amidst complex ecological processes. The method incubates [methyl-3H] thymidine with water samples in the presence and absence of an inhibitor of nitrification-thiourea. The radioactively labeled DNA in the growing bacteria was extracted. The rate of incorporation of the label into the dividing bacterial DNA was used to determine bacterial growth rate. Total bacterial community growth rates in full-scale and pilot-scale fixed-film nitrifying reactors and an activated sludge reactor were 2.1 x 10(8), 4.1 x 10(8) and 0.4 x 10(8)cell ml(-1)d(-1), respectively; the growth rate of autotrophic-nitrifying bacteria was 0.7 x 10(8), 2.6 x 10(8) and 0.01 x 10(8)cell ml(-1)d(-1), respectively. Autotrophic-nitrifying bacteria contributed 30% and 60% of the total bacterial community growth rate in the nitrifying reactors whereas only 2% was observed in the activated sludge reactor that was not designed to nitrify. The rates of ammonia loss from the nitrifying reactors corresponded to the rate of growth of the nitrifying bacteria. This method has the potential to more often identify factors that enhance or limit nitrifying processes in both engineered and natural aquatic environments.