Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Clinical utility of pleural fluid NT-pro brain natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) in patients with pleural effusions.

BACKGROUND Pleural effusion is not a pathognomonic sign and distinguishing between transudates and exudates often presents a diagnostic dilemma. OBJECTIVE To examine whether the NT pro-brain natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) in pleural fluid is a diagnostic tool for determining the cardiac etiology of pleural effusions. METHODS We measured pleural fluid and serum NT-proBNP levels in a consecutive series of 98 patients with heart failure and in 142 patients with other causes. RESULTS The median pleural fluid NT-proBNP levels among the heart failure patients were significantly higher (3,310 pg/mL) than hepatic hydrothorax (16 patients, 531 pg/mL), malignant pleural effusion (38 patients, 733 pg/mL), parapneumonic pleural effusion (40 patients, 294 pg/mL), and tuberculous pleural effusion (64 patients, 214 pg/mL) (p<0.001). At a cut-off point of > or = 1,714 pg/mL, the test had a sensitivity of 99%, a specificity of 99 % for the diagnosis of heart failure. There were 28 patients with pleural effusion due to heart failure misclassified as exudates by Light's criteria. Ten cases of misclassified heart failure (36% of 28 patients) showed serum-effusion protein gradient less than 3.1 g/dL; 26 of them exhibited pleural fluid NT-proBNP levels of > or = 1,714 pg/mL. The 26 patients of misclassified heart failure received diuretics before thoracentesis. Pleural fluid NT-proBNP levels were correlated with serum NT-proBNP levels (R(2)=0.928, p<0.001). CONCLUSION Pleural fluid NT-proBNP may be useful in the diagnosis of pleural effusion resulting from heart failure. The test may be especially useful in heart failure patients with exudates who have been treated with diuretics.
Cytokinin signaling promotes differential stability of type-B ARRs

ABSTRACT Cytokinins control key aspects of plant growth, including shoot and root meristem development and the timing of senescence of leaves and stems. Cytokinin perception triggers a 2-component signaling mechanism that ultimately leads to phosphorylation-dependent activation of a class of transcriptional regulators called type-B ARRs (RRBs). We have recently shown that the stability of the RRB family member ARR1 is increased in response to elevated cytokinin concentrations. In contrast, cytokinin decreases the stability of the closely related RRB member ARR2. The molecular mechanism governing the differential stability regulation of these 2 closely related RRBs remains unknown.
Loss of the TOR Kinase Tor2 Mimics Nitrogen Starvation and Activates the Sexual Development Pathway in Fission Yeast

ABSTRACT Fission yeast has two TOR (target of rapamycin) kinases, namely Tor1 and Tor2. Tor1 is required for survival under stressed conditions, proper G1 arrest, and sexual development. In contrast, Tor2 is essential for growth. To analyze the functions of Tor2, we constructed two temperature-sensitive tor2 mutants. Interestingly, at the restrictive temperature, these mutants mimicked nitrogen starvation by arresting the cell cycle in G1 phase and initiating sexual development. Microarray analysis indicated that expression of nitrogen starvation-responsive genes was induced extensively when Tor2 function was suppressed, suggesting that Tor2 normally mediates a signal from the nitrogen source. As with mammalian and budding yeast TOR, we find that fission yeast TOR also forms multiprotein complexes analogous to TORC1 and TORC2. The raptor homologue, Mip1, likely forms a complex predominantly with Tor2, producing TORC1. The rictor/Avo3 homologue, Ste20, and the Avo1 homologue, Sin1, appear to form TORC2 mainly with Tor1 but may also bind Tor2. The Lst8 homologue, Wat1, binds to both Tor1 and Tor2. Our analysis shows, with respect to promotion of G1 arrest and sexual development, that the loss of Tor1 (TORC2) and the loss of Tor2 (TORC1) exhibit opposite effects. This highlights an intriguing functional relationship among TOR kinase complexes in the fission yeast Schizosaccharomyces pombe.
High Serum PCSK9 Is Associated With Increased Risk of New-Onset Diabetes After Transplantation in Renal Transplant Recipients

OBJECTIVE New-onset diabetes after transplantation (NODAT) is a major complication in renal transplant recipients (RTRs). Cholesterol metabolism has been linked to diabetes development. Proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9 (PCSK9) is crucial in LDL receptor regulation. Its association with NODAT is unknown. We prospectively determined the association between serum PCSK9 levels and NODAT development and then with all-cause mortality, cardiovascular mortality, and renal graft failure. RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODS In a university setting, nondiabetic RTRs recruited between 2001 and 2003 with a functional graft for ≥1 year were eligible. Serum PCSK9 was measured by ELISA. Cox proportional hazards analysis was used to assess the association of PCSK9 with the development of NODAT, all-cause mortality, cardiovascular mortality, and graft failure. RESULTS In 453 RTRs (age 51 ± 12 years, 56% male; 6.1 [2.7–11.7] years after transplantation), serum PCSK9 was 107.1 ± 43.4 μg/L. During a median follow-up of 10 years, 70 RTRs developed NODAT, 123 died, and 59 developed graft failure. NODAT occurred more frequently in the upper PCSK9 tertile (23%) versus the lowest two PCSK9 tertiles (12%; P < 0.001). In crude Cox regression analyses, PCSK9 was significantly associated with development of NODAT (hazard ratio 1.34 [95% CI 1.10–1.63]) per SD change (P = 0.004). This association remained independent of adjustment for potential confounders, including statin use. PCSK9 was not associated with all-cause mortality, cardiovascular mortality, or graft failure. CONCLUSIONS Circulating PCSK9 is associated with NODAT in RTRs. The PCSK9 pathway may contribute to the pathogenesis of NODAT.
Polls and Votes

This article revises, updates, and examines the background for a highly accurate model for forecasting the national two-party popular vote in presidential elections. The model provides a vote prediction in early September based on Gallup trial-heat or presidential preference polls and the (nonannualized) rate of economic growth in the second quarter of the election year. It is estimated over the 12 presidential elections from 1948 to 1992. The mean absolute error of the model's out-of-sample postdictions is less than 1 1/3 percentage point, and its actual error in predicting the 1992 vote was about half a percentage point. The article also assesses the reasons for confidence in the model, as well as an approach to gauging uncertainty in any specific forecast. The reasons presidential elections can be forecast at or before the beginning of the general election campaign also are explored. Finally, the forecasting model is applied to the 1996 presidential campaign between Clinton and Dole.
How Does Program Composition Affect the Revenues of Nonprofit Organizations?: Investigating a Benefits Theory of Nonprofit Finance

Nonprofit organizations draw financial support from multiple sources including contributions, earned income, government support, and returns on investment, but the source of variation in income portfolios is not well understood. The authors draw on a ‘‘benefits theory of nonprofit finance’’ to illuminate the relationship between the programs and services that a nonprofit provides and the sources from which it obtains income. The authors analyze detailed revenue and expenditure data from eighty-seven Jewish Community Centers, estimating models that show significant associations between expenditures on particular types of services and the sources of an organization’s revenue. Specifically, expenditures on services of a more private goods nature are associated with greater reliance on earned income while expenditures on services of a more public goods nature are associated with greater reliance on charitable sources. Results are potentially important for nonprofit management practice because they suggest closer coordination of an organization’s resource development strategy with its programming.
The Impact of E-Commerce on Entry-Mode Strategies of Service Firms: A Conceptual Framework and Research Propositions

This article focuses on the role of e-commerce on the entry-mode choice of service firms. On the basis of recent calls for the reconceptualization of marketing theories and concepts with services as a key component, the authors focus on the interface of e-commerce, services marketing, and foreign market entry-mode choice. The authors offer an integrative conceptual framework that explicates the role of e-commerce on the entry-mode choice of service firms, and they propose that several internal and external factors moderate this relationship. The authors derive several research propositions and offer managerial implications and directions for further research in the timely and exciting domain of services marketing.
Mainstreaming evaluation: Four case studies of systematic evaluation integrated into organizational culture and practices

Following a literature review, the researcher generated a descriptive theory of evaluation mainstreaming, the integration of systematic evaluation into the culture, systems, and job responsibilities of organizations. The researcher then explored the validity and generalizability of the theory in grant-funded Advanced Technological Education Centers using mixed methods research. Four centers were chosen based on quantitative survey responses, which suggested that the organizations were likely to be mainstreaming evaluation. For each center, the researcher conducted a site visit, interviews and document review to understand (i) the processes by and extent to which evaluation became part of everyday operations; (ii) the characteristics of the leaders and culture that made the integration of evaluation possible; and (iii) the organizational capabilities, systems, structures and practices that have made evaluation sustainable, effective, and useful. In this dissertation, the researcher presents the descriptive theory, as well as the four individual case studies and cross case analysis through which the theory was explored and refined. Key findings support the existence of three streams and six developmental stages of evaluation within organizations, and the importance of (i) leaders who possess characteristics of personal vision and commitment to the truth about current reality; (ii) organizational culture in which staff and partners have shared vision and values; (iii) organizational capabilities such as prioritizing, strategic staffing, team functioning, and creating collaborative external partnerships to listen and learn; and (iv) organizational systems to acquire, analyze, disseminate and utilize evaluative information. Specific evaluation practices of each center are also presented. Future research should test the descriptive theory of mainstreaming evaluation in broader organizational contexts.
The American Political Economy: Institutional Evolution of Market and State

Part I: Making Sense of the Political Economy 1. Beyond the Market-State Dichotomy 2. Making Sense of Institutions and Institutional Change Part II: The Evolution of the American Political Economy 3. The Progressive Regime and the Regulatory State 4. The Rise of the New Deal Regime 5. The Postwar Consolidation of the New Deal Regime 6. The Rise and Pause of the Keynesian Welfare State 7. The Neoliberal Regime and the Return of the Market Part III: Neoliberalism and Its Discontents 8. The Two Welfare States and the Coming Entitlement Crisis 9. The Global Economy and the Persistence of the State 10. The Financial Crisis 11. Crisis, Continuity, and Change: The Great Recession in the American Political Economy
Some Imperatives of the Green Revolution: Technical Efficiency and Ownership of Inputs in Indian Agriculture

This paper attempts to ascertain the requirements (in terms of ownership of factors of production) for successful adaptation to the Green Revolution in Indian agriculture. We estimate stochastic production frontiers for wheat in two Indian states: Haryana (which has been significantly affected by the Green Revolution) and Madhya Pradesh (where the Green Revolution has had much less effect). In Haryana, but not in Madhya Pradesh, larger farm size and ownership of land and machines positively influence technical efficiency. Thus, with the Green Revolution advancing, land consolidation and vesting of clear ownership rights of land and capital with farmers becomes important.
THE IDENTIFICATION OF STRUCTURAL BREAK AT TIME SERIES DATA ON INDONESIAN ECONOMY 1990Q1-2008Q4: THE APPLICATION OF ZIVOT AND ANDREWS’ EXPERIMENT

Before the 1997/1998 economic crisis that enhanced the fluctuation of some Indonesian macroeconomic indicators, Indonesian economic indicators seemed to run quite well as to make it attractive as business destination. The economic turbulence has brought about the enhancement of its macroeconomic indicators fluctuation: the depreciation of Indonesian Rupiah’s exchange rate, the sharp contraction of GDP, the ever-increasing inflation pressure, and the interest rate hike. The objective of this paper is to identify the right timing of the major structural break on Indonesian economy through the application of Zivot and Andrew’s procedure (ZA) (Zivot and Andrews, 1992), with time series data in the period of Q1 1990-Q4 2008. The ZA model empirical test outcome shows that endogenously the significance of structural break for most macroeconomic variables necessitates at least one hypothesis of null unit root that can be rejected for most of the investigated variables. The potential structural break in series (ADF-test) also allows some originally non-stationary-unit contained variables to turn into a stationary ones. These results are statistically significant as the endogenously appropriate break (ZA-test) coexisted with the Indonesian financial-crisis shocks in 1997/1998. Keywords: structural break, unit root test, macroeconomic time series and Indonesian economy
The changing gender ratio in occurrence of deliberate self-harm across the lifecycle.

BACKGROUND Overall gender ratios are often quoted in studies of deliberate self-harm (DSH) patients, almost always with higher rates in females than males. Reporting a ratio across all ages may conceal important variations in the gender ratio across the life cycle. METHOD Analysis was done of the gender ratio by age groups in rates of DSH in a consecutive sample of DSH patients presenting to a general hospital over a 10-year period. The patients were identified through a well-established monitoring system. RESULTS The study sample included 2,189 female and 1,439 male patients. While the overall gender rate ratio was 1.5 females to each male, the ratio varied considerably by age group: 8:1 in 10-14-year-olds, 3.1:1 in 15-19-year-olds, 1.6:1 in 20-24-year-olds, approximately 1.3:1 in 25-49-year-olds, and 0.8:1 in people aged 50 years and over. CONCLUSION Statements about overall gender ratios for DSH conceal important changes in the ratio across the life cycle. These changes probably reflect differences in development and problems faced in adolescence, changes in motivation for DSH with age, and the closer resemblance of DSH to suicide in older age groups.
Diversity and citizenship in the curriculum : research review

This research brief summarises the report, commissioned by the DfES, which looks to aid the Diversity and Citizenship Curriculum Review Group, headed by Keith Ajegbo, former headteacher of Deptford Green Secondary School, by reviewing all the relevant literature on diversity within the curriculum. The research focused on the provision of a diverse curriculum in primary and secondary schools in England, and the potential for adding a fourth dimension to the citizenship education curriculum with the specific purpose of promoting an understanding of Modern British, Cultural and Social History, British identities and shared citizenship values. The research was carried out between June and December 2006.
Why is it so difficult to outperform the random walk in exchange rate forecasting?

A simulation exercise is used to demonstrate the difficulty to outperform the random walk in exchange rate forecasting if forecasting accuracy is judged by the Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) or similar criteria that depend on the magnitude of the forecasting error. It is shown that, as the exchange rate volatility rises, the RMSE of the model rises faster than that of the random walk. While the literature considers this finding to be a puzzle that casts a big shadow of doubt on the soundness of international monetary economics, the results show that failure to outperform the random walk, in both in-sample and out-of-sample forecasting, should be the rule rather than the exception. However, the results do not imply that the random walk is unbeatable, because it can be easily outperformed if forecasting accuracy is judged according to criteria such as direction accuracy and profitability.
Coordination in market entry games with symmetric players

Abstract We report the results of two experiments designed to study tacit coordination in a class of market entry games with linear payoff functions, binary decisions, and zero entry costs, in which each of n = 20 players must decide on each trial whether or not to enter a market whose capacity is public knowledge. The results show that although the subjects differ considerably from one another in their decision policies, tacit coordination emerges quickly on the aggregate level and is accounted for most successfully by the Nash equilibrium solution for noncooperative n -person games.
Price Discrimination by U.S. and German Exporters

The insensitivity of the U.S. trade balance to the sharp depreciation of the dollar in the past three years has revived interest in the relationship between exchange rates and the trade balance. A central issue in most analyses of the relation between the current account and the exchange rate concerns the price adjustment process. ' The simple integrated, competitive market model predicts that local currency prices should change in proportion to the nominal exchange rate for a country too small to influence world prices. The relationship between local currency import prices and exchange rates has been referred to as the "pass-through" relationship in the empirical literature in international economics. If the proportional relationship between import prices and exchange rates holds, pass-through is said to be complete. Accounts of recent U.S. experience cite the failure of dollar prices of imported goods to rise in proportion to exchange rates (i.e., incomplete pass-through) as an important factor in explaining the persistence of the trade deficit. Unfortunately, observations on pass-through alone provide limited insight into the behavior of markets, since incomplete pass-through is consistent with at least two fundamentally different paradigms. One is the standard competitive model of trade in which the law of one price holds, but exchange rate fluctuations are associated with large changes in import demand due to other factors. For example, if dollar appreciation is correlated with increases in world demand and industry marginal cost is increasing, then pass-through will be less than complete. The other is an imperfectly competitive model in which exporters are capable of price discriminating across destination markets, a phenomenon. Paul Krugman (1987) has labeled "pricing to market. " In this model incomplete pass-through is typically associated with fluctuations in the markup of price over marginal cost on exports.2 These fluctuations in markups are believed to be countryspecific; they do not reflect the behavior of prices to other export destinations. Both models are plausible explanations of recent U.S. experience. Unfortunately, it is impossible to distinguish between these competing models using only information on import prices and exchange rates for a single country. In order to distinguish between the competing models, an empirical analysis of goods prices and exchange rates must be capable of measuring either marginal cost or the markup over marginal cost. Either of these tasks poses formidable empirical problems. Much of the empirical literature in industrial organization has been concerned with precisely these issues, since markups are an important measure of the competitiveness of industries.
Out of the Frying Pan into the Fire: Behavioral Reactions to Terrorist Attacks

A low‐probability, high‐damage event in which many people are killed at one point of time is called a dread risk. Dread risks can cause direct damage and, in addition, indirect damage mediated though the minds of citizens. I analyze the behavioral reactions of Americans to the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, and provide evidence for the dread hypothesis: (i) Americans reduced their air travel after the attack; (ii) for a period of one year following the attacks, interstate highway travel increased, suggesting that a proportion of those who did not fly instead drove to their destination; and (iii) for the same period, in each month the number of fatal highway crashes exceeded the base line of the previous years. An estimated 1,500 Americans died on the road in the attempt to avoid the fate of the passengers who were killed in the four fatal flights.
Lodgserv: A Service Quality Index for the Lodging Industry

LODGSERV is a 26-item index (alpha = .92) designed to measure consumers' expectations for service quality in the hotel experience. The index confirms the five generic dimensions of service quality hypothesized by Parsuraman, Zeithaml and Berry (1986): Tangibility, Reliability, Responsiveness, Assurance, and Empathy. This paper describes the development of the index and discusses its use as a management tool.
A Flexible Parametric Garch Model With An Application To Exchange Rates

Many asset prices, including exchange rates, exhibit periods of stability punctuated by infrequent, substantial, often one-sided adjustments. Statistically, this generates empirical distributions of exchange rate changes that exhibit high peaks, long tails, and skewness. This paper introduces a GARCH model, with a flexible parametric error distribution based on the exponential generalized beta (EGB) family of distributions. Applied to daily US dollar exchange rate data for six major currencies, evidence based on a comparison of actual and predicted higher-order moments and goodness-of-fit tests favours the GARCH-EGB2 model over more conventional GARCH-t and EGARCH-t model alternatives, particularly for exchange rate data characterized by skewness. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)