Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A turning point for planning theory? Overcoming dividing discourses

After communicative planning theory emerged in the 1980s, challenging assumptions and prevailing theories of planning, debates ensued among planning theorists that led to apparently opposing groups with little space for mutual learning. The most difficult obstacle is that critiques of communicative planning theory framed several dichotomies making different perspectives appear incompatible. This article seeks to advance the dialogue of planning theory perspectives by acknowledging the key tensions embedded in this framing, but arguing that they can be viewed as reflecting contradictions to be embraced as an opportunity for a more robust planning theory. Drawing on Manuel Castells’ theory of communication power, the article explores four of these contradictions and shows how in each case embracing the contradictions as aspects of our complex world can lead to insights and a richer planning theory. The article concludes with suggestions for improved dialogue among theorists and identifies research that can advance our understanding of communication power.
Making history relevant to students by connecting past, present and future: a framework for research

Abstract History teaching usually focuses on understanding the past as an aim in itself. Research shows that many students don’t see the point of this and perceive history as not very useful. Yet history plays a major role in the orientation on present and future. If students fail to see this, the question arises whether this is due to a lack of explicit attention in history classes on the application of knowledge about the past to the present and the future. This article explores two questions: (1) If history is to be more relevant to students, what kind of objectives should play a central role in history teaching? (2) What kinds of teaching strategies align with these objectives in history teaching? The first question is answered by means of historical and educational theory. The second is answered by exploring a number of teaching strategies that have been described in the literature, as well as a small-scale experiment conducted by the authors. This article aims at providing a basis for developing meaningful history curricula as well as for research into educational strategies which can be deployed to teach students how to make connections between past, present and future.
The importance of product development cycle time and cost in the development of product families

In today's technologically driven world, the importance of innovation and product development is growing. Firms must develop innovative products faster and more efficiently. This has increased the importance of being able to quantify product development performance. This work attempts to quantify development effort and lead-time based on product and project characteristics through the use of a generative cost model. The model developed in this work projects development cost using direct engineering effort along with indirect cost. These costs are then compared with fabrication and assembly costs. The effects of product platforming on development lead-time and cost are analysed. Two case studies are examined: two instrument panel (IP) beam families and an automotive body-in-white (BIW) family. Results indicate that development costs, while generally a small percentage of total costs, can have significant effects on technology choice and lead to substantial cost savings in product families. Part size and complexity are shown to have the most significant influence over development effort.
Assessing the Economic Understanding of U.S. High School Students

Economics instruction in U.S. high schools is basically delivered in two ways. About half of high-school students take a required or elective course in economics, according to transcript data. The great majority of these students (about 95 percent) enroll in a regular course that focuses on basic economic concepts with applications. The remaining small percentage of students take a college-oriented course that is often called “honors” or Advanced Placement (AP) economics. Economics instruction for the other half of high-school students, if it is provided at all, is typically delivered in the context of other courses in the high-school curriculum in what is sometimes called the “infusion” or “integrative” approach. These courses would most likely be required courses taught in the social studies, such as U.S. history or American government, or in elective courses taught in business education. This study investigates what high-school students know about basic economics given the different types of economics instruction. The primary focus is on the achievement of students who complete a basic course in highschool economics. These results are important because they supply insights into what highschool students who have received direct instruction in economics know about the subject. For comparison purposes, the achievement of students who have not taken a formal course in economics will be investigated to identify what they know about economics. The comparison of those students with and without instruction in a separate course in economics gives the best estimate of the importance of direct instruction in economics to the economic understanding of most high-school graduates. In addition, similar comparisons between those students with and without direct instruction in economics will be made for two groups of higher-ability students: those who enroll in honors or AP courses in economics and those who enroll in such courses for other social-studies subjects.
Platelet and not erythrocyte microparticles are procoagulant in transfused thalassaemia major patients

The level of circulating platelet‐, erythrocyte‐, leucocyte‐ and endothelial‐derived microparticles detected by high‐sensitivity flow cytometry was investigated in 37 β‐thalassaemia major patients receiving a regular transfusion regimen. The phospholipid procoagulant potential of the circulating microparticles and the microparticle‐dependent tissue factor activity were evaluated. A high level of circulating erythrocyte‐ and platelet‐microparticles was found. In contrast, the number of endothelial microparticles was within the normal range. Platelet microparticles were significantly higher in splenectomized than in non‐splenectomized patients, independent of platelet count (P < 0·001). Multivariate analysis indicated that phospholipid‐dependent procoagulant activity was influenced by both splenectomy (P = 0·001) and platelet microparticle level (P < 0·001). Erythrocyte microparticles were not related to splenectomy, appear to be devoid of proper procoagulant activity and no relationship between their production and haemolysis, dyserythropoiesis or oxidative stress markers could be established. Intra‐microparticle labelling with anti‐HbF antibodies showed that they originate only partially (median of 28%) from thalassaemic erythropoiesis. In conclusion, when β‐thalassaemia major patients are intensively transfused, the procoagulant activity associated with thalassaemic erythrocyte microparticles is probably diluted by transfusions. In contrast, platelet microparticles, being both more elevated and more procoagulant, especially after splenectomy, may contribute to the residual thrombotic risk reported in splenectomized multi‐transfused β‐thalassaemia major patients.
Changes in mitochondrial phosphorylative activity and adenylate energy charge of regenerating rabbit liver.

The changes in the cellular concentrations of ATP, ADP, and AMP and in oxidative phosphorylation of mitochondria were investigated in the remaining liver of partially hepatectomized rabbits. The energy charge (defined as half of the average number of anhydride-bonded phosphate groups per adenosine moiety) of the liver remnant decreased from 0.866 to 0.767 (p less than 0.01) within 24 hr after hepatectomy, and then increased to a substantially higher level than normal within 7 days. On the other hand, the mitochondrial phosphyorylative activity increased rapidly to 170 per cent of the control within 12 hr and then retruned to normal within 7 days. The mitochondrial phosphorylative activity was inversely correlated with energy charge of the liver remnant (r = -0.75, p less less than 0.01). The maximal enhancement of mitochondrial phosphorylative activity was found in mitochondria obtained from the liver remnant with the lowest level of energy charge, suggesting a response of mitochondria in vivo involving enhanced biosynthetic ATP-utilizing reactions at an early stage of the regenerating process. The enhancement of phosphorylative activity was accompanied by a rise in the respiratory control ratio, P/O ratio and state 3 respiration. The adenylate kinase [EC 2.7. 4.3] activity in the liver remnant increased to more than 160% of the control within 2 days after partial hepatectomy, while the pyruvate kinase [EC 2.7. 1.40] activity decreased remarkably. However, the changes in the two enzyme activities did not correlate with those of mitochondrial phosphorylative activity or the energy charge of the liver remnant.
Enhanced selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors as antidepressants: 2004 – 2006

Depression is a major psychiatric disorder. It affects millions of people worldwide and inflicts tremendous economic burden on societies. The advent of selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors as antidepressants has been a revolutionary advance in the treatment of depression and related disorders. However, selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors are also associated with several undesirable properties, such as delayed onset of action, low response rate and side effects. The present search for a newer generation of antidepressants is focused on overcoming these issues. The patent literature covered in this review, during 2004 – 2006, illustrates several strategies employed by the pharmaceutical industry in the development of enhanced serotonin re-uptake inhibitors. Encouraged by the success of venlafaxine and duloxetine, several companies have pursued dual-acting serotonin and noradrenaline re-uptake inhibitors as drug candidates for depression treatment. Molecules with combined serotonin re-uptake inhibitor and 5-HT autoreceptor (5-HT1A and/or 5-HT1B) antagonist properties are being developed. In particular, recent research suggests that serotonin 5-HT1B antagonists alone or combined with selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors might hold unique promise as efficacious antidepressants. Finally, efforts are underway to formulate new drug candidates with both serotonin re-uptake inhibitor and neurokinin 1 (NK1) antagonist activities. Despite mixed results from clinical trials with several NK1 antagonists, effective therapeutic agents for depression may still emerge from compounds with combined serotonin reuptake inhibitor/NK1 antagonist properties.
Delving deeper into convolutional neural networks for camera relocalization

Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs) have been applied to camera relocalization, which is to infer the pose of the camera given a single monocular image. However, there are still many open problems for camera relocalization with CNNs. We delve into the CNNs for camera relocalization. First, a variant of Euler angles named Euler6 is proposed to represent orientation. Then a data augmentation method named pose synthesis is designed to reduce spsarsity of poses in the whole pose space to cope with overfitting in training. Third, a multi-task CNN named BranchNet is proposed to deal with the complex coupling of orientation and translation. The network consists of several shared convolutional layers and splits into two branches which predict orientation and translation, respectively. Experiments on the 7Scenes dataset show that incorporating these techniques one by one into an existing model PoseNet always leads to better results. Together these techniques reduce the orientation error by 15.9% and the translation error by 38.3% compared to the state-of-the-art model Bayesian PoseNet. We implement BranchNet on an Intel NUC mobile platform and reach a speed of 43 fps, which meets the real-time requirement of many robotic applications.
The Relevance and Role of Gaming Machine Games and Game Features on the Play of Problem Gamblers

Prepared for the Independent Gambling Authority in South Australia, this report examines aspects of the relationship between gaming machine technology and problem gambling. It looks at: • whether particular gaming machine games feature more commonly in the play of problem gamblers as compared to recreational gamblers; • whether there are particular characteristics of those games that distinguish them from other games; • whether those differences are the characteristics that attract problem gamblers and feature in problem gambling play; • to what extent those characteristics affect the play of recreational gamblers; and • to what extent those characteristics feature in a gamblers’ transition from recreational to problem gambler.
General image retrieval using shape and combined features

Content-based image retrieval (CBIR) is an important multimedia application. In recently emerged MPEG-7 standard, image content is described by perceptual features such as color, texture and shape. Many shapebased image retrieval techniques have been proposed in literature. However, almost all of these techniques assume isolated objects and use only shape feature for retrieval. General image retrieval or retrieval based on segmented objects are little addressed. In this paper, a general image retrieval technique is presented to address image retrieval based on segmented objects. The objects in the image are extracted through a semi-automatic segmentation tool, and are indexed using both individual features and combined image features. A Java-based client-server retrieval framework has been developed to conduct the online retrieval experiment. Results show that general image retrieval using shape features performs well for images with rigid objects, and image retrieval using combined features outperforms retrieval using individual features.
Gender Aspects of Pharmacokinetics of New and Old AEDs: Pregnancy and Breast-Feeding

Alterations in drug disposition in pregnancy and drug transfer into breast milk during lactation are the most important gender-related aspects of the pharmacokinetics of antiepileptic drugs (AEDs). The effect of pregnancy on drug disposition has been fairly well characterized for the old AEDs. Total and unbound plasma concentrations of phenobarbital decline up to 50%. Total phenytoin levels may drop to approximately 40% of prepregnancy concentrations, but unbound concentrations considerably less. Unbound valproate levels remain unchanged despite a fairly marked decrease in total concentrations, and changes in unbound and total plasma concentrations of carbamazepine are minor. In contrast, pregnancy has a pronounced effect on lamotrigine, with a 300% increase in apparent clearance in the third trimester. Much less is known about the kinetics of other new AEDs during pregnancy. Umbilical cord/maternal plasma concentration ratios close to unity suggest free transplacental passage of most AEDs, whereas higher ratios indicate fetal accumulation of valproate and gabapentin. Milk/maternal plasma concentration ratios close to 1 demonstrate extensive transfer to breast milk of many AEDs including ethosuximide, gabapentin, lamotrigine, levetiracetam, oxcarbazepine, topiramate, and zonisamide. Plasma levels are, however, in general low in the nursed infant, although pharmacological concentrations have been reported occasionally for carbamazepine, ethosuximide, lamotrigine, and phenobarbital. For most of the new-generation AEDs, there is an urgent need for further kinetic data from pregnancy and breast-feeding.
Life After Business Failure

Where there is uncertainty, there is bound to be failure. It is not surprising, therefore, that many new ventures fail. What happens to entrepreneurs when their business fails? People hear of highly successful entrepreneurs extolling the virtues of failure as a valuable teacher. Yet the aftermath of failure is often fraught with psychological, social, and financial turmoil. The purpose of this article is to review research on life after business failure for entrepreneurs, from the immediate aftermath through to recovery and re-emergence. First, the authors examine the financial, social, and psychological costs of failure, highlighting factors that may influence the magnitude of these costs (including individual responses to managing these costs). Second, they review research that explains how entrepreneurs make sense of and learn from failure. Finally, the authors present research on the outcomes of business failure, including recovery as well as cognitive and behavioral outcomes. They develop a schema to organize extant work and use this as a platform for developing an agenda for future research.
The Personal/Group Discrimination Discrepancy: The Role of Informational Complexity

The personal/group discrimination discrepancy (PGDD) refers to the tendency of disadvantaged group members to report higher levels of discrimination against their group in general than against themselves personally as members of that group. In two studies, the authors examined the cognitive mechanisms that underlie the PGDD. In Experiment 1, the authors demonstrated that the PGDD emerges from a divergence in the comparison standards on which personal and group judgments are made and that specifying that the same standards be used for both types of judgments eliminates or reduces the PGDD. In Experiment 2, the authors demonstrated that the magnitude of the PGDD was a function of the degree of informational complexity in the comparison targets. Implications for conceptualizations of the PGDD are discussed.
Increased acid sphingomyelinase activity in peripheral blood cells of acutely intoxicated patients with alcohol dependence.

BACKGROUND Acid sphingomyelinase (ASM; EC 3.1.4.12) hydrolyses membrane sphingomyelin into the bioactive lipid ceramide and is thus involved in different cellular processes such as differentiation, immunity, or cell death. Activation of ASM has been reported in particular in conjunction with the cellular stress response to several external stimuli, and increased ASM activity was observed in a variety of human diseases. Ethanol-induced activation of ASM has been observed in different cell culture systems, thus raising the question about the effect of alcohol intoxication in human subjects on ASM activity in vivo. METHODS We determined ASM activity in peripheral blood mononucleated cells of 27 patients suffering from alcohol dependence. Patients were classified according to their blood alcohol concentration at admission, and ASM activity was determined repeatedly from all patients during alcohol withdrawal. RESULTS Acutely intoxicated patients displayed significantly higher ASM activity than patients in early abstinence (Mann-Whitney U test: Z = - 2.6, p = 0.009). ASM activity declined in acutely intoxicated patients to normal values with the transition from the intoxicated state to early abstinence (Wilcoxon test: Z = -2.7, p = 0.007). At the end of withdrawal, ASM activity was significantly increased again compared to the early phase of abstinence in both patient groups (Wilcoxon test: Z = -2.691, p = 0.007 and Z = -2.275, p = 0.023, respectively). CONCLUSIONS Alcohol-induced activation of ASM occurs in human subjects and might be responsible for deleterious effects of ethanol intoxication. Chronic alcohol abuse may induce deregulation of sphingomyelin metabolism in general, and this impairment may cause side effects during withdrawal from alcohol.
Adaptive Sliding-Mode Position Control for Piezo-Actuated Stage

The piezo-actuated stage is composed of a piezoelectric actuator (PEA) and a positioning mechanism (PM). Due to the existence of hysteretic nonlinearity in the PEA and the friction behavior in the PM, the accurate position control of the piezo-actuated stage is a challenging task. This paper discusses the adaptive sliding mode control for the piezo-actuated stage, where the hysteresis is described by the Prandtl-Ishlinskii model. This paper tries to fuse the hysteresis model with the adaptive control techniques, where the real value of the parameters of the stage need neither be identified nor be measured. The proposed control law ensures the global stability of the controlled piezo-actuated stage, and the position error can be controlled to be as small as required by choosing the design parameters. Experimental results show the effectiveness of the proposed method.
Frequent mutations in the MITF pathway in melanoma

Microphthalmia‐associated transcription factor (MITF) is involved in melanocyte cell development, pigmentation and neoplasia. To determine whether MITF is somatically mutated in melanoma, we compared the sequence of MITF from primary and metastatic lesions to patient‐matched normal DNA. In the 50 metastatic melanoma tumor lines analysed, we discovered four samples that had genomic amplifications of MITF and four that had MITF mutations in the regions encoding the transactivation, DNA binding or basic, helix‐loop‐helix domains. Sequence analysis for SOX10, a transcription factor, which both acts upstream of MITF and synergizes with MITF, identified an additional three samples with frameshift or nonsense mutations. Microphthalmia‐associated transcription factor and SOX10 were found to be mutated in a mutually exclusive fashion, possibly suggesting disruption in a common genetic pathway. Taken together we found that over 20% of the metastatic melanoma cases had alterations in the MITF pathway. We show that the MITF pathway is also altered in primary melanomas: 2/26 demonstrated mutations in MITF and 6/55 demonstrated mutations in SOX10. Our findings suggest that altered MITF function during melanomagenesis can be achieved by MITF amplification, MITF single base substitutions or by mutation of its regulator SOX10.
TITLE : IMPROVING CUSTOMER CARE AWARENESS FOR FACILITIES STAFF WITHIN NHS TRUSTS

The paper centres on a facilitative approach to raising customer care awareness for facilities staff within NHS Trusts. It draws on the authors’ experiences of providing training under the PEAT initiative. It also draws on recent research examining customer and service provider perceptions. The paper questions the value of training and the extent to which this can translate into action that leads to improvement. It is suggested that in some contexts it can actually do more harm than good. Effective awareness raising requires a tailored approach to training that is responsive to the needs of the organisation and is sensitive to local culture. The reference group methodology used provided opportunities for staff to take ownership of the design of the training programme, a means of identifying local sensitivities, generated action for change and the means of implementing change. The authors conclude that whilst there are particular cultural sensitivities within Facilities Departments within NHS Trusts; morale is often low, there is a widespread perception that ‘managers’ are not prepared to listen to staff and that staff resent the imposition of training; it is possible to devise an approach to training which can overcome these barriers.