LLukas22/scidocs huggingface dataset:
Wal-Mart and the Geography of Grocery Retailing

This paper empirically examines the impact of entry by Wal-Mart on competition in the supermarket industry. Using a detailed panel dataset spanning 1994 to 2006, we estimate the impact of Wal-Mart on firm outcomes and market structure, controlling for persistent local trends and systematic differences across markets by exploiting the detailed spatial structure of our store-level census. We find that Wal-Mart’s impact is highly localized, affecting firms only within a tight, two-mile radius of its location. Within this radius, the bulk of the impact falls on declining firms and mostly on the intensive margin. Entry of new firms is essentially unaffected. Moreover, the stores most damaged by Wal-Mart’s entry are the outlets of larger chains. This suggests that Wal-Mart’s expansion into groceries is quite distinct from its earlier experience in the discount industry, where the primary casualties were small chains and sole proprietorships that were forced to exit the market. This contrast sheds light on the role density economies play in shaping both equilibrium market structure and economic geography. In the case of grocery competition, high travel costs and the perishable nature of groceries appear to impart horizontal differentiation between firms. This differentiation in demand appears to reduce impact of scale economies advantages that Wal-Mart exploited to the detriment of far-flung competitors in the discount store industry.
Increased morbidity, mortality and length of in-hospital stay for patients with acute coronary syndrome with pre-morbid psychiatric diagnoses.

BACKGROUND
Psychiatric and cardiac comorbidities form the top two budget categories for health systems in high-income countries with evidence that psychiatric pre-morbidities lead to worse outcomes in patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS). There are no studies examining this relationship in a national multicentre population level study in the UK, and no studies examining their impact on length of in-hospital stay (LoS) in ACS. Recognizing at-risk populations and reducing LoS in ACS is an essential part of improving patient care and cost-effectiveness.


METHODS
We investigated the impact of psychiatric diagnoses on morbidity, all-cause mortality and LoS amongst 57,668 ACS patients between Jan-2004 and Dec-2014 using the Secure-Anonymized-Information-Linkage (SAIL) databank. Demographics, admissions, cardiac and psychiatric comorbidities were identified using coded data.


RESULTS
There were a total of 3857 out of 57,668 patients who had a pre-morbid psychiatric diagnosis. The mean LoS in patients without psychiatric comorbidities was 9.78days (95% CI: 9.66-9.91). This was higher (p<0.01) in the presence of any psychiatric diagnosis (14.72), dementia (20.87), schizophrenia (15.67), and mood disorders (13.41). Patients with psychiatric comorbidities had worse net adverse cardiac events (HR 1.18, 95% CI: 1.16-1.21) and mortality rates (HR 1.26, 95% CI: 1.23-1.30).


CONCLUSIONS
Our results demonstrate that psychiatric comorbidities have a significant and clinically important impact on morbidity, mortality and LoS in ACS patients in Wales, UK. Clinicians' awareness and active management of psychiatric conditions amongst ACS patients is needed to reduce poor outcomes and LoS and ultimately the risk for patients and financial burden for the health-service.
Rivaroxaban compared with standard thromboprophylaxis after major orthopaedic surgery: co‐medication interactions

AIM
The aim of the present study was to analyse concomitant drug use and its association with outcome in patients (N = 17 701) receiving rivaroxaban or standard of care (SOC) for the prevention of venous thromboembolism after major orthopaedic surgery in the non-interventional, phase IV XAMOS (Xarelto® in the prophylaxis of post-surgical venous thromboembolism after elective major orthopaedic surgery of hip or knee) study.


METHODS
Concomitant drug use was at the discretion of the treating physician. Prespecified co-medications of interest were cytochrome P450 (CYP) 3A4/P-glycoprotein inhibitors/inducers, platelet aggregation inhibitors (PAIs) and nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs). Crude event incidences were compared between rivaroxaban and SOC groups.


RESULTS
CYP3A4/P-glycoprotein inhibitor/inducer use was infrequent, in contrast to PAI (~7%) and NSAID (~52%) use. Rivaroxaban was associated with a lower incidence of overall symptomatic thromboembolic events compared with SOC, regardless of co-medication use. In both treatment groups, PAI users, with higher age and prevalence of cardiovascular co-morbidities, had similar higher (>7-fold) incidences of symptomatic arterial but not venous thromboembolic events compared with non-users. NSAID use had no influence on thromboembolic events. However, odds ratios (ORs) for major bleeding events (European Medicines Agency definition) were higher in NSAID users compared with non-users in rivaroxaban [OR = 1.50; 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.06, 2.13] and SOC (OR = 1.70; CI 1.16, 2.49) groups. In PAI users, ORs for major bleeding events were no different from those of non-users in both the rivaroxaban (OR = 1.49; CI 0.84, 2.65) and SOC (OR = 1.46; CI 0.82, 2.62) groups.


CONCLUSIONS
Use of NSAIDs in XAMOS was frequent and associated with a higher frequency of bleeding events in patients receiving rivaroxaban or SOC, although the benefit-risk profile of rivaroxaban compared with SOC was maintained.
Bilberry juice modulates plasma concentration of NF-kappaB related inflammatory markers in subjects at increased risk of CVD.

PURPOSE
Bilberries are abundant in polyphenols. Dietary polyphenols have been associated with strategies for prevention and treatment of chronic inflammatory diseases. We investigated the effect of bilberry juice on serum and plasma biomarkers of inflammation and antioxidant status in subjects with elevated levels of at least one risk factor for cardiovascular disease (CVD).


METHODS
In a randomized controlled trial, participants consumed either bilberry juice (n = 31) or water (n = 31) for 4 weeks.


RESULTS
Supplementation with bilberry juice resulted in significant decreases in plasma concentrations of C-reactive protein (CRP), interleukin (IL)-6, IL-15, and monokine induced by INF-gamma (MIG). Unexpectedly, an increase in the plasma concentration of tumor nuclear factor-alpha (TNF-alpha) was observed in the bilberry group. CRP, IL-6, IL15, MIG, and TNF-alpha are all target genes of nuclear factor- kappa B (NF-kappaB), -a transcription factor that is crucial in orchestrating inflammatory responses. Plasma quercetin and p-coumaric acid increased in the bilberry group, otherwise no differences were observed for clinical parameters, oxidative stress or antioxidant status. Furthermore, we studied the effect of polyphenols from bilberries on lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced NF-kappaB activation in a monocytic cell line. We observed that quercetin, epicatechin, and resveratrol inhibited NF-kappaB activation.


CONCLUSIONS
These findings suggest that supplementation with bilberry polyphenols may modulate the inflammation processes. Further testing of bilberry supplementation as a potential strategy in prevention and treatment of chronic inflammatory diseases is warranted.
SeX-Box: Exposure to Sexist Video Games Predicts Benevolent Sexism

We examined the association between playing sexist video games and sexist attitudes. Undergraduate students (61 men and 114 women) indicated the level of perceived sexism present in their most frequently played video games. Students also completed the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (Glick & Fiske, 1996), which measures both hostile and benevolent sexism. As predicted, men who played video games perceived to be high in sexism showed higher levels of benevolent sexism, compared with men who did not play such games. This relationship was not evident for women. Importantly, our study provides the first known evidence of a link between long-term exposure to sexist video games and sexist attitudes. Although correlational, these data are consistent with the notion that sexist video games encourage and reinforce sexist attitudes. Our findings have important real-world implications for video game researchers, parents, and game players themselves.
The Impact of Rewards on Job Satisfaction and Employee Retention

This study explored the impact of rewards on job satisfaction and employee retention among nurses. The objectives of this study were to determine the impact of rewards on employee retention, to establish whether there is a relationship between rewards and job satisfaction, to establish the relationship between job satisfaction and employee retention and to make recommendations to the policy makers in the organization on possible ways/strategies to improve employee retention based on the research findings. The study utilized a quantitative research design and 180 nurses were randomly selected as research participants. Self-administered questionnaires were administered to participants/respondents. The data was analysed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS), version 20.0. Hypotheses were formulated to test the relationships between the independent variable and the dependent variable. The study revealed that employee rewards lead to employee retention but however, they do not result in job satisfaction.
Learning on finite metric spaces

In M. Anthony and J. Ratsaby. Maximal width learning of binary functions. Theoretical Computer Science, 411:138–147, 2010, the notion of sample width for binary classifiers mapping from the real line was introduced, and it was shown that the performance of such classifiers could be quantified in terms of this quantity. This paper considers how to generalize the notion of sample width so that we can apply it where the classifiers map from some finite metric space. By relating the learning problem to one involving the domination numbers of certain graphs, we obtain generalization error bounds that depend on the sample width and on certain measures of ‘density’ of the underlying metric space. We also discuss how to employ a greedy set-covering heuristic to bound generalization error.
AcENoCs: A Configurable HW/SW Platform for FPGA Accelerated NoC Emulation

he heterogeneous nature of the modern day applications has resulted in widespread use of Multicore SoC architectures. The emerging Network-On-Chip (NoC) interconnect architecture provides an energy-efficient and scalable communication solution for multiple cores, serving as a powerful replacement for traditional bus architectures. The key to the successful realization of such architectures is a flexible, fast and robust emulation platform. This paper presents the design, implementation and evaluation of AcENoCs, a flexible and cycle-accurate FPGA emulation platform for validating synchronous and GALS-based NoC architectures. The emulation platform is built around a HWSW framework consisting of reconfigurable network components, traffic generators and ejectors, statistics collection and analysis modules. We also address the unique features of our platform in terms of reconfigurability and co-design of the hardware and software components, and assess the performance improvements and tradeoffs over existing PGA emulators and software simulators. Our experimental analysis indicate speedup improvements in the order of 10000-12000X over HDL simulators and 14-47X over software simulators, without sacrificing cycle accuracy.
Implementation and stability analysis of prioritized whole-body compliant controllers on a wheeled humanoid robot in uneven terrains

In this work, we implement the floating base prioritized whole-body compliant control framework described in Sentis et al. (IEEE Transactions on Robotics 26(3):483– 501, 2010) on a wheeled humanoid robot maneuvering in sloped terrains. We then test it for a variety of compliant whole-body behaviors including balance and kinesthetic mobility on irregular terrain, and Cartesian hand position tracking using the co-actuated (i.e. two joints are simultaneously actuated with one motor) robot’s upper body. The implementation serves as a hardware proof for a variety of whole-body control concepts that had previously been developed and tested in simulation. First, behaviors of two and three priority tasks are implemented and successfully executed on the humanoid hardware. In particular, first and second priority tasks are linearized in the task space through model feedback and then controlled through task accelerations. Postures, on the other hand, are shown to be asymptotically stable when using prioritized whole-body control structures and then successfully tested in the real hardware. To cope with irregular terrains, the base is modeled as a six degree of freedom floating system and the wheels are characterized through contact and rolling constraints. Finally, center of mass balance capabilities using whole-body compliElectronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s10514-013-9358-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. L. Sentis (B) · J. Petersen The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA e-mail: lsentis@austin.utexas.edu J. Petersen e-mail: joshpetersen1231@gmail.com R. Philippsen Halmstad University, Halmstad, Sweden e-mail: roland.philippsen@gmx.net ant control and kinesthetic mobility are implemented and tested in the humanoid hardware to climb terrains with various slopes.
Clinical and histological comparison of polyglycolic acid suture with black silk suture after minor oral surgical procedure.

UNLABELLED
Any suture material, absorbable or nonabsorbable, elicits a kind of inflammatory reaction within the tissue. Nonabsorbable black silk suture and absorbable polyglycolic acid suture were compared clinically and histologically on various parameters.


MATERIALS AND METHODS
This study consisted of 50 patients requiring minor surgical procedure, who were referred to the Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery. Patients were selected randomly and sutures were placed in the oral cavity 7 days preoperatively. Polyglycolic acid was placed on one side and black silk suture material on the other. Seven days later, prior to surgical procedure the sutures will be assessed. After the surgical procedure the sutures will be placed postoperatively in the same way for 7 days, after which the sutures will be assessed clinically and histologically.


RESULTS
The results of this study showed that all the sutures were retained in case of polyglycolic acid suture whereas four cases were not retained in case of black silk suture. As far as polyglycolic acid suture is concerned 25 cases were mild, 18 cases moderate and seven cases were severe. Black silk showed 20 mild cases, 21 moderate cases and six severe cases. The histological results showed that 33 cases showed mild, 14 cases moderate and three cases severe in case of polyglycolic acid suture. Whereas in case of black silk suture 41 cases were mild. Seven cases were moderate and two cases were severe. Black silk showed milder response than polyglycolic acid suture histologically.


CONCLUSION
The polyglycolic acid suture was more superior because in all 50 patients the suture was retained. It had less tissue reaction, better handling characteristics and knotting capacity.
An Improved RF Loopback for Test Time Reduction

In this work a method to improve the loopback test used in RF analog circuits is described. The approach is targeted to the SoC environment, being able to reuse system resources in order to minimize the test overhead. An RF sampler is used to observe spectral characteristics of the RF signal path during loopback operation. While able to improve the observability of the signal path, the method also allows faster diagnosis than conventional loopback tests, as the number of transmitted symbols can be greatly reduced. Practical results for a prototyped RF link at 860MHz are presented in order to demonstrate the relevance of the method
Investigating distributed generation systems performance using Monte Carlo simulation

A novel algorithm to evaluate the performance of electric distribution systems, including distributed generation (DG) is proposed. This algorithm addresses the deterministic and the stochastic natures of these electrical systems. Monte Carlo simulation is employed to solve the system operation randomness problem, taking into consideration the system operation constraints. The uncertainties in the locations, exported penetration level, and the states (on or off) of the DG units constitute the random parameters of the studied systems. The introduced algorithm incorporates these parameters with the traditional Newton-Raphson solution of the power flow equations. Monte Carlo simulation is implemented to perform the analysis of all the possible operation scenarios of the system under study and thus ensure the validity of the results. The proposed algorithm is employed to obtain the hourly power flow solution for a typical DG connected system. The system loading follows several typical load curves based on load bus types. Furthermore, new hourly steady-state operating system parameters are evaluated to describe the system behavior under the DG random operation. The results obtained are presented and discussed.
adaQAC: Adaptive Query Auto-Completion via Implicit Negative Feedback

Query auto-completion (QAC) facilitates user query composition by suggesting queries given query prefix inputs. In 2014, global users of Yahoo! Search saved more than 50% keystrokes when submitting English queries by selecting suggestions of QAC. Users' preference of queries can be inferred during user-QAC interactions, such as dwelling on suggestion lists for a long time without selecting query suggestions ranked at the top. However, the wealth of such implicit negative feedback has not been exploited for designing QAC models. Most existing QAC models rank suggested queries for given prefixes based on certain relevance scores.
 We take the initiative towards studying implicit negative feed- back during user-QAC interactions. This motivates re-designing QAC in the more general "(static) relevance"(adaptive) implicit negative feedback? framework. We propose a novel adaptive model adaQAC that adapts query auto-completion to users' implicit negative feedback towards unselected query suggestions. We collect user-QAC interaction data and perform large-scale experiments. Empirical results show that implicit negative feedback significantly and consistently boosts the accuracy of the investigated static QAC models that only rely on relevance scores. Our work compellingly makes a key point: QAC should be designed in a more general framework for adapting to implicit negative feedback.
Implementing a Dynamic Scaling of Web Applications in a Virtualized Cloud Computing Environment

Aljebreen, Mohammed, "Implementing a dynamic scaling of web applications in a virtualized cloud computing environment" (2013). Abstract Cloud computing is becoming more essential day by day. The allure of the cloud is the significant value and benefits that people gain from it, such as reduced costs, increased storage, flexibility, and more mobility. Flexibility is one of the major benefits that cloud computing can provide in terms of scaling up and down the infrastructure of a network. Once traffic has increased on one server within the network, a load balancer instance will route incoming requests to a healthy instance, which is less busy and less burdened. When the full complement of instances cannot handle any more requests, past research has been done by Chieu et. al. that presented a scaling algorithm to address a dynamic scalability of web applications on a virtualized cloud computing environment based on relevant indicators that can increase or decrease servers, as needed. In this project, I implemented the proposed algorithm, but based on CPU Utilization threshold. In addition, two tests were run exploring the capabilities of different metrics when faced with ideal or challenging conditions. The results did find a superior metric that was able to perform successfully under both tests. 3 Dedication I lovingly dedicate this thesis to my gracious and devoted mother for her unwavering love and for always believing in me. 4 Acknowledgments This thesis would not have been possible without the support of many people. My wish is to express humble gratitude to the committee chair, Prof. Sharon Mason, who was perpetually generous in offering her invaluable assistance, support, and guidance. Deepest gratitude is also due to the members of my supervisory committee, Prof. Lawrence Hill and Prof. Jim Leone, without whose knowledge and direction this study would not have been successful. Special thanks also to Prof. Charles Border for his financial support of this thesis and priceless assistance. Profound gratitude to my mother, Moneerah, who has been there from the very beginning, for her support and endless love. I would also like to convey thanks to my wife for her patient and unending encouragement and support throughout the duration of my studies; without my wife's encouragement, I would not have completed this degree. I wish to express my gratitude to my beloved sister and brothers for their kind understanding throughout my studies. Special thanks to my friend, Mohammed Almathami, for his …
Doloplus-2, a valid tool for behavioural pain assessment?

BACKGROUND
The Doloplus-2 is used for behavioural pain assessment in cognitively impaired patients. Little data exists on the psychometric properties of the Doloplus-2. Our objectives were to test the criterion validity and inter-rater reliability of the Doloplus-2, and to explore a design for validations of behavioural pain assessment tools.


METHODS
Fifty-one nursing home patients and 22 patients admitted to a geriatric hospital ward were included. All were cognitively impaired and unable to self-report pain. Each patient was examined by an expert in pain evaluation and treatment, who rated the pain on a numerical rating scale. The ratings were based on information from the medical record, reports from nurses and patients (if possible) about pain during the past 24 hours, and a clinical examination. These ratings were used as pain criterion. The Doloplus-2 was administered by the attending nurse. Regression analyses were used to estimate the ability of the Doloplus-2 to explain the expert's ratings. The inter-rater reliability of the Doloplus-2 was evaluated in 16 patients by comparing the ratings of two nurses administrating the Doloplus-2.


RESULTS
There was no association between the Doloplus-2 and the expert's pain ratings (R2 = 0.02). There was an association (R2 = 0.54) between the expert's ratings and the Doloplus-2 scores in a subgroup of 16 patients assessed by a geriatric expert nurse (the most experienced Doloplus-2 administrator). The inter-rater reliability between the Doloplus-2 administrators assessed by the intra-class coefficient was 0.77. The pain expert's ratings were compared with ratings of two independent geriatricians in a sub sample of 15, and were found satisfactory (intra-class correlation 0.74).


CONCLUSION
It was challenging to conduct such a study in patients with cognitive impairment and the study has several limitations. The results do not support the validity of the Doloplus-2 in its present version and they indicate that it demands specific administration skills.