Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Contribution of polycythaemia to pulmonary hypertension in simulated high altitude in rats.

A rat model was used to assess the viscosity factor in pulmonary hypertension of high altitude. Rats exposed to 10% O2 for three weeks developed increased pulmonary vascular resistance (p.v.r.) and polycythaemia; the haematocrit (Hct) was 50‐60%, values similar to those in normal men at high altitudes. The contribution of high Hct to the increased p.v. r. was assessed in isolated perfused lungs of chronically hypoxic rats perfused with their own high Hct blood, or normal Hct blood from control rats. Pressure/flow relationships were measured over a wide range and the slope (P/Q) of this relationship and its extrapolated intercept on the pressure axis were increased by high Hct blood. A return to low Hct blood did not restore initial conditions although a second perfusion with high Hct blood again increased p.v. r. and intercept. Lack of reversibility was attributed to changes with time in blood or lung. In a second experiment designed to eliminate time changes, chronically hypoxic or litter‐mate control rats were each perfused with only one blood, their own or each other's and P/Q relations were rapidly measured. The P/Q slope and pressure intercept increased progressively in the following groups: control rats perfused with their own blood (Hct 34%), control rats perfused with chronically hypoxic blood (Hct 56%), chronically hypoxic rats perfused with control blood (Hct 35%) and chronically hypoxic rats perfused with chronically hypoxic blood (Hct 53%). To exclude factors in chronically hypoxic blood other than high Hct which might increase p.v. r. , control rats were perfused with blood of different Hct obtained by centrifugation. High Hct again increased p.v. r. There was a significant relationship in all rats between pulmonary artery pressure (Ppa), which takes into account both P/Q slope, intercept and Hct. There was substantial batch variation which may reflect sensitivity to hypoxia. In chronically hypoxic rats with high Hct blood, Ppa varied from 29‐47 mmHg; with low Hct blood the range was 26‐38 mmHg. Comparable values for control rats were 21‐29 and 17‐20 mmHg. We conclude that the polycythaemic blood of chronic hypoxia contributes substantially to pulmonary hypertension. Where it is excessive, it may prejudice tissue blood flow.
A prospective study of cognitive impairment in ALS

Objective: To characterize prospectively the cognitive profile in ALS. Methods: Clinically definite ALS patients (11 men, 2 women), age 39.9 to 74.0 years (mean age, 54.2 ± 9.6 years; mean disease duration, 21.1 ± 10.5 months) underwent neuropsychologic, language, and speech testing followed by MR 1H spectroscopy (4 T). Five spousal control subjects completed an identical protocol. Eight ALS patients participated in follow-up studies at a 6-month interval. Results: Relative to control subjects, ALS patients showed mild impairment in word generation, recognition memory (faces), and motor-free visual perception. Bulbar-onset patients showed greater impairment in a number of measures (working memory, problem solving/cognitive flexibility, visual perception, and recognition memory for words and faces), and cognitive impairment appeared more progressive over time. ALS patients demonstrated anomia on a confrontation naming test, with no significant problems following commands or repeating. Speech motor performance scores and intelligibility scores were not significantly different. No significant declines in forced vital capacity, forced expiratory volume, or peak expiratory flow rates were observed. Although normal at initial testing (T1), MR 1H spectroscopy demonstrated a reduction of the N-acetylaspartate/creatine (NAA/Cr) ratio in the nondominant precentral motor strip across the two testing intervals. In contrast, the NAA/Cr ratio obtained from the anterior cingulate gyrus at T1 was already reduced in bulbar-onset patients (p < 0.001), whereas no deficits were observed in limb-onset individuals in the same region. Conclusions: Bulbar-onset ALS patients with cognitive impairments and neuronal loss in the anterior cingulate gyrus subsequently developed more profound neuropsychological dysfunction whereas both language and speech capabilities remained relatively preserved. Of note, the absence of bulbar signs did not predict an absence of cognitive decline.
Experimental Study of NaCl Aqueous Solutions by Raman Spectroscopy: Towards a New Optical Sensor

Raman spectroscopy was used to study the NaCl aqueous solutions around the solid-liquid phase transition. Special attention was devoted to the modification induced by the salt on the OH stretching band of water. Investigations were carried out in the temperature range between-21 and 10 °C, for concentrations from 0 to 200 g/L. We demonstrated that micro-Raman spectroscopy can be used as a marker, allowing the determination of the salt concentration of an aqueous solution with an error close to ±5%.
Pulmonary embolism in patients with CKD and ESRD.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES CKD and ESRD are growing burdens. It is unclear whether these conditions affect pulmonary embolism (PE) risk, given that they affect both procoagulant and anticoagulant factors. This study examined the frequency and associated outcomes of PE in CKD and ESRD. DESIGN, SETTING, PARTICIPANTS, & MEASUREMENTS The Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project's Nationwide Inpatient Sample was used to estimate the frequency and outcomes of PE in adults with CKD and ESRD. Hospitalizations for the principal diagnosis of PE and presence of CKD or ESRD were identified using International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision codes. Data from the annual US Census and US Renal Data System reports were used to calculate the number of adults with CKD, ESRD, and normal kidney function (NKF) as well as the annual incidence of PE in each group. Logistic regression modeling was used to compare in-hospital mortality among persons admitted for PE who had ESRD or CKD to those without these conditions. RESULTS The annual frequency of PE was 527 per 100,000, 204 per 100,000, and 66 per 100,000 persons with ESRD, CKD, and NKF, respectively. In-hospital mortality was higher for persons with ESRD and CKD (P<0.001) compared with persons with NKF. Median length of stay was longer by 1 day in CKD and 2 days in ESRD than among those with NKF. CONCLUSIONS Persons with CKD and ESRD are more likely to have PE than persons with NKF. Once they have PE, they are more likely to die in the hospital.
Toward an Economic Theory of Liability

RECENTLY there have appeared a number of important articles by both lawyers and economists analyzing the economic effects of liability rules. This paper formalizes the analysis of these effects. When two parties, the injurer and the victim, can both take measures to reduce the likelihood of accidents, and the measures are costly for both, the standard theory of production with two inputs and one output yields the conditions for the socially optimal amount of each accident avoidance measure. The effects of decentralizing the problem and using only liability rules to solve it can then be analyzed in terms of a two-person noncooperative game. I first show that there is a complete symmetry within each of the following pairs of liability rules: no liability and strict liability; the negligence rule and strict liability with contributory negligence; and the negligence rule with contributory negligence and strict liability with what I call dual contributory negligence. An analysis of the legal standards for negligence follows. I show that there is an important ambiguity in the so-called "Learned Hand Rule" for determining the level of avoidance effort below which a party is adjudged negligent. Two of the formulations of the rule lead to inefficient results.
Peace Between Participatory Polities: A Cross-Cultural Test of the “Democracies Rarely Fight Each Other” Hypothesis

Evidence is accumulating that, in the modern international system, democracies rarely fight each other. But the reasons for the phenomenon are not well understood. This article explores a similar phenomenon in other societies, using cross-cultural ethnographic evidence. It finds that polities organized according to more participatory (“democratic”) principles fight each other less often than do polities organized according to hierarchical principles. Stable participatory institutions seem to promote peaceful relations, especially if people perceive that others also have some control over politics.
Call for developing indigenous organisational theories in India: setting agenda for future

If we accept Virmani's (2005) argument that management in the organisations in India is somehow effected, by implication, we also agree that we have not understood how organisations in India are managed effectively. It calls for developing indigenous concepts in the organisational domain, which requires moving away from unimaginative replicative studies using quantitative methods towards carrying out contextually relevant studies using appropriate methods. On the basis of meta-review of organisational research (particularly in the area of organisational behaviour) in the past several decades, this paper analyses the reason why theory-building researches are not thriving in India to a desired extent and suggests some ways out of it. Academic scholars, academic institutions and corporate world can play significant and meaningful roles in creating a new breed of researchers focusing on exploring the indigenous understanding of organisations in India and management thereof. We have delineated their roles from that perspective. This paper also discusses about the possibilities of upgrading the quality of research in India, and the theoretical, methodological and situational challenges that researchers in India face while conducting organisationally relevant indigenous researches.
Do the Benefits of College Still Outweigh the Costs?

In recent years, students have been paying more to attend college and earning less upon graduation? trends that have led many observers to question whether a college education remains a good investment. However, an analysis of the economic returns to college since the 1970s demonstrates that the benefits of both a bachelor? s degree and an associate? s degree still tend to outweigh the costs, with both degrees earning a return of about 15 percent over the past decade. The return has remained high in spite of rising tuition and falling earnings because the wages of those without a college degree have also been falling, keeping the college wage premium near an all-time high while reducing the opportunity cost of going to school.
Ownership and Control Structure as Determinants of Corporate Debt Maturity: A Panel Study of an Emerging Market

This study highlights the corporate governance potential of debt maturity structure for Turkish firms through investigating its association with ownership and control structure. We model leverage and debt maturity as jointly endogenous under simultaneous equations framework. Firstly, we find that both concentrated ownership structure and presence of a large shareholder is directly but moderately related to corporate debt maturity. We also document that it is important for Turkish firms to match maturity of their assets with maturity of their liabilities. Our findings lend considerable support to the prediction that as firms get financially strong or have more growth opportunities they shorten their corporate debt maturity structure. Moreover, despite having a controlling large shareholder or a concentrated ownership structure, firms with growth opportunities still prefer shorter maturities in order to solve the underinvestment problems. Finally, firm size is positively associated with long-term debt and our empirical analysis provides no evidence that taxes affect debt maturity structure.
Effectiveness of Countercyclical Fiscal Policy: Time-Series Evidence from Developing Asia

As the global crisis hit developing Asia, several countries instituted fiscal stimulus measures to create domestic demand. With the region returning to normal times, in this paper we draw lessons using historical data from 10 developing Asian countries to examine if countercyclical fiscal policy can still be used to stimulate growth. To do so, we use a sign-restrictions-based structural vector autoregression model. We find that expansionary expenditure shocks have an insignificant effect on output but contractionary revenue shocks have a negative effect. On the basis of those estimated effects, we perform and compare two policy experiments: deficit-financed tax cuts and deficit spending. The experiment results indicate that while deficit-financed tax cuts stimulate economic activity, the impact of deficit spending is ambiguous. Our overall evidence thus suggests that tax cuts may be a more effective countercyclical policy instrument than government spending. However, a number of factors suggest that Asian governments should be cautious about actively using tax cuts for countercyclical purposes, in part because a big part of the revenue shocks in developing Asia are cyclical rather than discretionary.
Familial Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis: Serial High-Resolution Computed Tomography Findings in 9 Patients

Objective: The purpose of this study was to assess the high-resolution computed tomography (CT) findings of familial idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). Methods: High-resolution CT scans obtained in 9 consecutive patients with biopsy-proven familial IPF were reviewed. The presence, distribution, and extent of various CT findings were evaluated. Results: All 9 patients had ground-glass opacities, intralobular reticular opacities, and irregular thickening of the interlobular septa; 7 (78%) had traction bronchiectasis, 7 (78%) had small foci of consolidation; and 3 (33%) had honeycombing. The abnormalities involved mainly the lower lung zones in 6 patients and the upper lung zones in 2 patients and had no zonal predominance in 1 patient. Follow-up CT showed increased extent of disease in 8 patients. Conclusions: The high-resolution CT findings of familial IPF resemble those of nonfamilial IPF. Familial IPF has a lower prevalence of honeycombing and a lower prevalence of predominant lower lung zone distribution than nonfamilial IPF, however.
Assessment of dose-intensive therapy in suboptimally debulked ovarian cancer: a Gynecologic Oncology Group study.

PURPOSE We report a prospective randomized trial in women with advanced ovarian cancer to evaluate the importance of chemotherapy dose-intensity on survival, progression-free survival (PFS), and response. PATIENTS AND METHODS A total of 485 patients with epithelial ovarian cancer and residual masses more than 1 cm following surgery (stage III presentation) or any stage IV presentation were randomly assigned to receive either standard therapy (cyclophosphamide 500 mg/m2 and cisplatin 50 mg/m2 intravenously every 3 weeks for eight courses) or intense therapy (cyclophosphamide 1,000 mg/m2 and cisplatin 100 mg/m2 intravenously every 3 weeks for four courses). Dose modification was rigidly controlled to maintain intensity. Clinical and pathologic responses were assessed, when appropriate, as well as PFS interval and survival. RESULTS A total of 458 patients met all eligibility criteria and were assessed for survival and PFS. The dose-intensive group received the same total dose of cyclophosphamide and cisplatin, but 1.97 times greater dose-intensity than the standard group. Clinical and pathologic response rates; response duration, and survival were similar in both groups of patients. Hematologic, gastrointestinal, febrile episodes, septic events, and renal toxicities were significantly more common and severe in the dose-intensive group. CONCLUSION A doubling of the dose-intensity in the treatment of bulky ovarian epithelial cancers led to no discernible improvement in patient outcome and was associated with more severe toxicity. This study provides no evidence to support the hypothesis that modest increases in dose-intensity without increasing total dose are associated with significant improvement in overall survival or PFS.
Differences in dynamic modulus of elasticity determined by three vibration methods and their relationship with static modulus of elasticity

Dynamic modulus of elasticity was determined in clearwood samples of eight tropical hardwood species using longitudinal vibrations, flexural vibration and ultrasonic transit-time methods. These samples were subsequently subjected to three point static bending test to determine static modulus of elasticity and modulus of rupture. Acoustic velocity and wood density were found to be independent parameters as the velocity was nearly the same in wood with distinctly different densities. Among the three dynamic measurements, modulus from the ultrasonic method was the highest followed by the longitudinal vibration and flexural vibration. Any of three vibration methods could be used to predict static modulus as they exhibited a near perfect correlation with static MoE. However, the dynamic modulus determined by different vibration methods were found to diverge with increasing static modulus. Wood density was the dominating factor influencing both modulus of elasticity and modulus of rupture.
MATLAB/Simulink Framework for Modeling Complex Coolant Flow Configurations of Advanced Automotive Thermal Management Systems

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory's (NREL's) CoolSim MATLAB/Simulink modeling framework was extended by including a newly developed coolant loop solution method aimed at reducing the simulation effort for arbitrarily complex thermal management systems. The new approach does not require the user to identify specific coolant loops and their flow. The user only needs to connect the fluid network elements in a manner consistent with the desired schematic. Using the new solution method, a model of NREL's advanced combined coolant loop system for electric vehicles was created that reflected the test system architecture. This system was built using components provided by the MAHLE Group and included both air conditioning and heat pump modes. Validation with test bench data and verification with the previous solution method were performed for 10 operating points spanning a range of ambient temperatures between -2 degrees C and 43 degrees C. The largest root mean square difference between pressure, temperature, energy and mass flow rate data and simulation results was less than 7%.
Fares, Service Levels, and Demographics: What Determines Commuter Rail Ridership in the Long Run?

Abstract Using panel data covering a 13-year period, this paper examines the roles of transportation policy and demographic changes in determining rail ridership. The paper presents a model which allows identification of long-run responses of ridership to changes in prices and service independently of exogenous shocks to ridership caused by demographic factors. Long-run price and service elasticities are estimated to be almost twice as large as short-run elasticities. After controlling for transportation prices and service levels, demographic variables contribute little to explaining residual differences in ridership. To the extent that demographic changes are driven by transportation variables, these effects are captured in the estimated long-run elasticities.
Paying for Progress in China Public Finance, Human Welfare and Changing Patterns of Inequality

Contents Introduction Is China Moving to a More Equitable Development Strategy? Vivienne Shue and Christine Wong Chapter 1 Can the Retreat from Equality Be Reversed? An Assessment of Redistributive Fiscal Policies from Deng Xiaoping to Wen Jiabao Christine Wong Chapter 2 Has China Reached the Top of the Kuznets Curve? Carl Riskin Chapter 3 Local Governance, Health Financing, and Changing Patterns of Inequality in Access to Health Care Jane Duckett Chapter 4 Paying for Education in Rural China Rachel Murphy Chapter 5 Social Security in Transition Athar Hussain Chapter 6 Investing in Rural China: Tracking China's Commitment to Modernization Zhang Linxiu, Luo Renfu, Liu Chengfang and Scott Rozelle Chapter 7 Who Receives Subsidies? A Look at the County Level in Two Time Periods Victor Shih and Zhang Qi Chapter 8 Local Governance, Policy Mandates and Fiscal Reform in China Liu Mingxing and Tao Ran Index
Radiotracer measurements of protein mass transfer: Kinetics in ion exchange media

We describe a method to measure protein mass transfer kinetics in ion exchange adsorbents for preparative chromatography based on the use of radioactively labeled protein. The method was developed and evaluated using lysozyme as a test protein with the three commercial strong‐acid cation exchangers SP‐Sepharose‐FF, SP‐Sepharose‐XL, and S‐HyperD. Iodination with 125I was used to label the protein, which was added in trace amounts (∼ 0.1%) to an unlabeled protein solution. The solution was recirculated through a shallow bed of the adsorbent particles and the radioactivity accumulated in the bed measured with a gamma‐counter as a function of time. Radiotracer‐based kinetics measurements were found to be in good agreement with results obtained with a conventional shallow‐bed technique, provided that freshly labeled protein solutions were used. The method has advantages in terms of simplicity, ability to deal with adsorption from complex mixtures, and the potential for measurements under tracer diffusion conditions. Kinetics results obtained for the three different stationary phases were generally consistent with previous studies. Protein mass transfer can be described by a pore diffusion model with a nearly salt‐independent pore diffusivity for SP‐Sepharose‐FF and by a homogeneous diffusion model with a saltindependent adsorbed phase diffusivity for S‐HyperD. However, it appears that a more complex model, accounting for parallel pore and surface diffusion, is needed to describe protein mass transfer in SP‐Sepharose‐XL. The modeling results were found to be correlated with the apparent pore sizes determined by inverse SEC.
Clinical and microbiologic effects of local tetracycline irrigation on periodontitis.

This investigation was conducted on seven individuals referred for treatment of moderate adult periodontitis. Twenty-eight sites with an average probing depth of 5.6 +/- 0.9 mm were evaluated. One tooth per jaw quadrant was randomly assigned to receive one of the following treatments: (I) no treatment, i.e., control; (II) saline irrigation; (III) tetracycline irrigation and (IV) scaling and root planing (SC/RP). A plaque control program was instituted one week prior to the experimental period and reinforced throughout the eight-week study. Irrigation was performed every 48 hours during the first two weeks of the experiment for Groups II and III, and the single treatment of SC/RP was carried out immediately following the baseline examination for Group IV. Clinical and microbiologic changes were monitored every two weeks using plaque and gingival indices, gingival fluid flow, probing depths, bleeding on probing and dark-field microscopic examination of the subgingival microbial flora. The tetracycline and SC/RP treatment modalities resulted in statistically significant clinical and microbiological improvements when compared with the control. Tetracycline irrigation alone and SC/RP alone had a similar effect in changing the subgingival microflora from one associated with disease to one associated with health. Thus, these treatment modalities are effective methods of producing statistically significant alterations in the subgingival microflora. The property of substantivity may contribute to the sustained duration of the effect of locally delivered tetracycline.