Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Impact of the 2007 Liquidity Shock on Bank Jumbo Mortgage Lending

This paper explores the consequences of the collapse of the private-label residential mortgage-backed securities market in 2007 on banks’ originations of jumbo mortgages. We show that jumbo lending declined by more at banks that were more dependent on this market and were less well capitalized. In contrast, banks that had little dependence on this market and were well capitalized increased jumbo originations. These findings highlight how dependence on the secondary market may cause amplification of financial shocks, and the potential value of capital requirements that are higher during periods of economic growth in mitigating the amplification effects.
R&D, Investment and Industry Dynamics

We present a model of industry evolution where the dynamics are driven by a process of endogenous innovations, followed by subsequent embodiments in physical capital. Traditionally, the only distinction between RD both stocks affect output in a symmetric fashion. We argue that the story is not that simple, and there is more to it than differences in the object of accumulation. Our model stresses the causal relationship between past R&D expenditures and current investments in machinery and equipment. This causality pattern, which is supported by the data, also explains the observed higher volatility of physical investment (relative to R&D expenditures).
A quantitative investigation of the role of information and communication technologies in the implementation of a product-service system

This paper reports evidence from a survey, aimed at testing whether and how Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), which enable the adoption of product-service systems, can contribute to value creation. This analysis builds on previous contributions, according to which companies that are enriching their product offering through value-added services (the so-called servitisation strategy) often report lower levels of profitability, owing to the poor performance of their operating process. A wide stream of research claims that companies that invest in ICTs can enjoy valuable outcomes, since the adoption of such technologies results in processes that are more efficient and more responsive. Our hypothesis concerns the possibility of leveraging ICTs at operating process level so as to pursue a servitisation strategy. The in-field analysis presented in this paper concerns a sample of 109 companies located in Italy; data collected through the survey have been analysed using the structural equation modelling approach. The evidence presented demonstrates that ICTs can have a relevant impact on value creation because they lead to superior responsiveness of operating processes and to sound improvements in the product offering. In particular, companies that are able to embed such superior responsiveness into their product offering can further boost value creation.
Overconfidence, CEO Selection, and Corporate Governance

We develop a model that shows that an overconfident manager, who sometimes makes value-destroying investments, has a higher likelihood than a rational manager of being deliberately promoted to CEO under "value-maximizing" corporate governance. Moreover, a risk-averse CEO's overconfidence enhances firm value up to a point, but the effect is "nonmonotonic" and differs from that of lower risk aversion. Overconfident CEOs also underinvest in information production. The board fires both excessively diffident and excessively overconfident CEOs. Finally, Sarbanes-Oxley is predicted to improve the precision of information provided to investors, but to reduce project investment. Copyright (c) 2008 The American Finance Association.
Extremely high aspect ratio GaAs and GaAs/AlGaAs nanowaveguides fabricated using chlorine ICP etching with N2-promoted passivation

Semiconductor nanowaveguides are the key structure for light-guiding nanophotonics applications. Efficient guiding and confinement of single-mode light in these waveguides require high aspect ratio geometries. In these conditions, sidewall verticality becomes crucial. We fabricated such structures using a top-down process combining electron beam lithography and inductively coupled plasma (ICP) etching of hard masks and GaAs/AlGaAs semiconductors with Al concentrations varying from 0 to 100%. The GaAs/AlGaAs plasma etching was a single-step process using a Cl2/BCl3/Ar gas mixture with various fractions of N2. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) observations showed that the presence of nitrogen generated the deposition of a passivation layer, which had a significant effect on sidewall slope. Near-ideal vertical sidewalls were obtained over a very narrow range of N2, allowing the production of extremely high aspect ratios (>32) for 80 nm wide nanowaveguides.
Myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein‐35–55 peptide induces severe chronic experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis in HLA‐DR2‐transgenic mice

The use of HLA class II‐transgenic (Tg) mice has facilitated identification of antigenic T cell epitopes that may contribute to inflammation in T cell‐mediated diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis (MS). In this study, we compared the encephalitogenic activity of three DR2‐restricted myelin determinants [mouse (m) myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG)‐35–55, human (h)MOG‐35–55 and myelin basic protein (MBP)‐87–99] in Tg mice expressing the MS‐associated DR2 allele, DRB1*1501. We found that mMOG‐35–55 peptide was strongly immunogenic and induced moderatelysevere chronic experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) with white matter lesions after a single injection in Freund's complete adjuvant followed by pertussis toxin. hMOG‐35–55 peptide,which differs from mMOG‐35–55 peptide by a proline for serine substitution at position 42, was also immunogenic, but not encephalitogenic, and was only partially cross‐reactive with mMOG‐35–55. In contrast, MBP‐87–99, which can induce EAE in double‐Tg mice expressing both HLA‐DR2 and a human MBP‐specific TCR, was completely non‐encephalitogenic in HLA‐DR2‐Tg mice lacking the human TCR transgene. These findings demonstrate potent encephalitogenic activity of the mMOG‐35–55 peptide in association with HLA‐DR2, thus providing a strong rationale for further study of hMOG‐35–55 peptide as a potential pathogenic determinant in humans.
Rational under‐pricing in bidding strategy: a real options model

Under‐pricing in construction tenders is a common phenomenon and is commonly explained by the need of cash flows and penetration strategy. However, these explanations involve profit cutting and therefore are not plausible in explaining a long‐term persistent phenomenon of under‐pricing. A real options model is proposed and using the binomial lattice method a real‐life construction project tender was analysed to examine how management flexibility and uncertainty provide real options value. When uncertainties of cost items in a tender exist and choices are available to defer and switch modes of construction, then a valuable option is available to the bidders. It amounts to about 4% of the lump sum tendered in our case. The under‐priced portion is the options value which the bidder is willing to pay for the flexibility and the uncertainty. These findings enable contractors to be more competitive and to estimate construction costs more accurately in devising their bid strategies.
Screening for eating disorders and high-risk behavior: caution.

OBJECTIVE The current study reviews the state of eating disorder screens. METHODS Screens were classified by their purported screening function: identification of cases with (a) anorexia nervosa only; (b) bulimia nervosa only; (c) eating disorders in general; (d) partial syndrome, eating disorder not otherwise specified (EDNOS), or subclinical; (e) not a-d but at high risk. Information is presented on development, psychometric properties, and external validation (e.g., sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive values, and negative predictive values). RESULTS Screens differ widely with regard to objective, psychometric properties and the validation methodology used. Most screens that identify cases are not appropriate for the identification of at-risk behaviors. Little data on the external validity of screens are available. DISCUSSION Screens should be used with caution. A sequential procedure, in which subjects identified as being at risk during the first stage is followed by more specific diagnostic tests during the second stage, might overcome some of the limitations of the one-stage screening approach.
The T Allele of the 677C>T Polymorphism of Methylenetetrahydrofolate Reductase Gene is Associated With an Increased Risk of Ischemic Stroke in Polish Children

Ischemic stroke is a very rare and multifactorial disease in children. The aim of the study was to analyze the relationship between the methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR) 677C>T polymorphism and stroke in Polish children and to observe whether there is any significant transmission of MTHFR alleles from heterozygous parents to their affected offspring. We analyzed 64 patients with stroke, 122 parents, and 59 healthy children. The MTHFR polymorphism was genotyped using polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-restriction fragment length polymorphism. The T allele was more frequent in the stroke group (38%) than in controls (25%, P = .029, odds ratio = 1.84). We also found higher frequency of T allele in male patients compared to male controls (46% vs. 25%, P = .009, odds ratio = 2.53). The number of T allele carriers was again more prevalent in boys with stroke (71%) than in healthy boys (45%, P = .023, odds ratio = 3.09). The T allele was significantly transmitted in male patients (P < .019). We conclude that the MTHFR 677C>T polymorphism may be considered as a genetic risk factor of childhood stroke, especially in boys.
Domestic Demand and Ability to Export

Recent contributions to international trade theory have attempted to introduce new and more concrete elements into traditional explanations of comparative advantage. Thus Linder (1961) has presented the hypothesis that the volume of trade between two countries is larger the closer they are in terms of per capita income; this fact being due, according to him, to the export potentiality developed in the two markets by the similar national demand patterns that accompany similar levels of income. Dreze (1960), inquiring into the export-import performance of Belgium, advanced the hypothesis that small countries have a comparative advantage in products that are internationally standardized and subject to economies of scale. In fact, only large markets would allow exploitation of economies of scale; thus, when production entails economies of scale, only large countries are able to produce efficiently products having national characteristics that differentiate them from foreign products. On the other hand, the market for internationally standardized products is worldwide, and small countries are on the same footing in it as large ones. This would give them a comparative advantage to specializing their production onto the latter products, exporting them and importing the former products. Other recent contributions resort to factors like product innovation, technological gap (as reflected in R & D expenditures), and relative age of industries, to explain trade in manufactured products.1 Implicit or explicit in these new explanations of trade flows is the assumption that domestic demand is a prerequisite to developing an export industry, when the products of this industry have to overcome
Agency problems and debt financing: leadership structure effects

In previous research, Friend and Hasbrouck theorized that managerial insiders (officers and directors) have a personal incentive to cause the firm to use less than the optimal amount of debt in its capital structure. They suggested this occurs because officers and directors have a large proportion of their personal wealth invested in the firm in the form of common stock holdings and firm‐specific human capital. This makes managerial insiders reluctant to use the optimal amount of debt financing for the firm because of the additional bankruptcy risk higher levels of debt engender. I test FH’s theory and find evidence that supports it. Specifically, the amount of debt in our sample firms’ capital structures declines as the percentage of the firm’s common stock held by the CEO and other officers and directors increases. A direct relationship is found between blockholder share ownership and our sample firms’ debt/equity ratio. This suggests that monitoring by blockholders is effective in controlling the subop.
Labour in Global Value Chains: Work Conditions in Football Manufacturing in China, India and Pakistan

A critical challenge facing developing country producers is to meet international labour standards and codes of conduct in order to engage in global value chains. Evidence of gains for workers from compliance with such standardsandcodesremainslimitedandpatchy.Thisarticlefocusesontheglobal football industry, a sector dominated by leading global brands that manage dispersed global value chains. It assesses the working conditions for football stitchers engaged in different forms of work organization, factories, stitching centres and home-based settings in Pakistan, India and China. It draws on detailed qualitative primary field research with football-stitching workers and producers in these three countries. The article explains how and why work conditions of football stitchers differ across these locations through an analytical framework that interweaves both global and local production contexts that influence work conditions. In doing so, it argues that current debates on the role of labour in global value chains have to go beyond a narrow focus on labour standards and corporate social responsibility compliance and engage with economic, technological and social upgrading as factors that could generate sustained improvements in real wages and workers’ conditions.
Attitudes, Educational, and Career Choices of Food and Agricultural Sciences Institute Participants.

Ethnic minority students traditionally pursue degrees and careers in the food and agricultural sciences at rates lower than their non-minority counterparts. To help improve upon this situation, the Food and Agricultural Sciences Institute (FASI) was created to expose academically talented high school students to opportunities within the food and agricultural sciences. FASI provided a week of laboratory experiments, classroom discussions, hands-on activities and demonstrations, and tours of departments in a college of agricultural sciences. Building upon prior research that had assessed the immediate and short term benefits of FASI, this study examined long-term contributions to the attitudes, educational, and career choices of the 1994-2001 FASI participants. Participants from these years were studied because they would have now graduated from high school given that they were high school sophomores and juniors when they participated in FASI. Fifty-seven individuals responded to a survey instrument. The major finding was that the respondents had positive attitudes toward the food and agricultural sciences, but few had pursued degrees or careers in the food and agricultural sciences. Personal factors, parents, and family members most influenced their educational and career choices.
Fuzzy Measures For Students` Mathematical Modelling Skills

This paper reports on an experimental study on mathematical modelling (MM) with subjects postgraduate students of the Faculty of Computer and Information Sciences of the Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt. The Voskoglou’s fuzzy methods for the process of modelling developed in earlier papers were applied in this experiment. The results obtained are compared with corresponding results of students’ of the Graduate Technological Educational Institute of Patras, Greece reported in earlier works of Vokoglou and some new useful conclusions are stated.
The Evolution of Alliance Portfolios: The Case of Unisys

How do alliance portfolios evolve? We develop grounded theory based on Unisys' case, which reveals how exogenous technological changes at the industry level and shifts in a firm's strategy shape the composition of partners and the nature of alliance relationships. We identify four evolutionary processes: responding to external stimuli, breaking off inertial pressures, enabling coevolution, and restructuring and realigning the alliance portfolio. We shift attention from alliance formation decisions to changes in the nature of alliances and partner characteristics throughout the duration of the alliance portfolio. We suggest that the evolution of alliance portfolios cannot be fully explained by path dependence, life-cycle patterns, or proactive design. Instead, alliance portfolios are shaped by environmental stimuli and conflicting organizational processes. Copyright 2012 The Author 2011. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Associazione ICC. All rights reserved. , Oxford University Press.
THE REBRANDING OF CITY PLACES: AN INTERNATIONAL COMPARATIVE INVESTIGATION

An urban regeneration program that changes fundamentally the character of a district typically involves the rebranding of the area concerned. This may be highly controversial because the redevelopment might result in the importation of financially well off residents, business infrastructures, and cultural and leisure facilities more suited to better off people than to poorer pre-existing inhabitants (who might be driven out by rising property prices and rents). This article presents the results of an investigation into the place rebranding processes of nine urban regeneration units in three countries: Britain, Denmark and the USA. The study examined, inter alia, the organization of rebranding activities, how basic decisions regarding a place’s new brand identity were taken, whether integrated marketing communications were employed, consultation procedures, and the major problems that arose. A remarkable degree of consistency across the nine units' vis-a-vis the approaches towards and methods used for place rebranding was observed. Common problems seemingly invoked similar responses.
Methionine-supplemented diet affects the expression of cardiovascular disease-related genes and increases inflammatory cytokines in mice heart and liver

ABSTRACT Some important environmental factors that influence the development of cardiovascular diseases (CVD) include tobacco, excess alcohol, and unhealthy diet. Methionine obtained from the diet participates in the synthesis of DNA, proteins, lipids and affects homocysteine levels, which is associated with the elevated risk for CVD development. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the manner in which dietary methionine might affect cellular mechanisms underlying CVD occurrence. Swiss albino mice were fed either control (0.3% DL-methionine), methionine-supplemented (2% DL-methionine), or a methionine-deprived diet (0% DL-methionine) over a 10-week period. The parameters measured included plasma homocysteine concentrations, oxidative stress by reduced glutathione (GSH)/oxidized glutathione (GSSG) ratio, levels of inflammatory cytokines IL-1ß, TNF-α, and IL-6, as well as expression of genes associated with CVD. The levels of apolipoprotein A5 (APOA5), a regulator of plasma triglycerides, were measured. The methionine-supplemented diet increased oxidative stress by lowering the GSH/GSSG ratio in heart tissues and decreased expression of the genes Apob, Ctgf, Serpinb2, Spp1, Il1b, and Sell, but elevated expression of Thbs4, Tgfb2, Ccr1, and Vegfa. Methionine-deprived diet reduced expression of Col3a1, Cdh5, Fabp3, Bax, and Hbegf and increased expression of Sell, Ccl5, Itga2, Birc3, Msr1, Bcl2a1a, Il1r2, and Selp. Methionine-deprived diet exerted pro-inflammatory consequences as evidenced by elevated levels of cytokines IL-1ß, TNF-α, and IL-6 noted in liver. Methionine-supplemented diet increased hepatic IL-6 and cardiac TNF-α. Both methionine supplementation and deprivation lowered hepatic levels of APOA5. In conclusion, data demonstrated that a methionine-supplemented diet modulated important biological processes associated with high risk of CVD development.
Evolution And Revolution: A Quantum View Of Structural Change In Organizations

There may be hidden costs in making prompt incremental and piecemeal changes to organizational structure to cope with a new strategy or environment. We shall argue that changeless stable intervals punctuated by infrequent but revolutionary periods of ‘quantum’or multifaceted structural change may sometimes be the most economical strategy. Incremental structural changes may create severe and costly disharmonies as they destroy an integral structural configuration. These costs might outweigh the benefits of adapting structure to changes in strategy and environment. Because such costs may be high it might be necessary to delay changing until they can be justified. Such delays can require subsequent revolutionary structural changes. The applicability of this view of change for different contexts will be discussed.
FOREIGN INVESTMENT POLICIES AND ENVIRONMENT

ABSTRACT. We consider a North‐South model of capital mobility in which foreign investment adversely impacts the environment in South. By focusing on the strategic aspects of environmental policies, among other things, we compare different policy regimes, i.e., different combinations of tax and quota. More specifically, we investigate the (non)equivalence of these policy regimes.
Differential Expression of PD-L1 between Primary and Metastatic Sites in Clear-Cell Renal Cell Carcinoma

Response to PD-L1 inhibition depends on its expression. Primary ccRCC tumors and their matching metastases were compared, and because PD-L1 was mostly in high nuclear-grade areas, these should be specifically selected for assessment to limit false negatives. PD-L1 expression in primary clear-cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) increases the likelihood of response to anti–PD-1 inhibition, but fails to identify all responders. We hypothesized that PD-L1 levels assessed in randomly selected areas of the primary tumors may not accurately reflect expression levels in metastatic lesions, which are the target of systemic therapy. Therefore, we compared PD-L1 expression in a series of primary ccRCC and their metastases. Tissue blocks from 53 primary ccRCCs and 76 corresponding metastases were retrieved. Areas with predominant and highest nuclear grade were selected. Slides were immunostained with a validated anti–PD-L1 antibody (405.9A11). Membranous expression in tumor cells was quantified using H-score. Expression in tumor-infiltrating mononuclear cells (TIMC) was quantified using a combined score. Discordant tumor cell PD-L1 staining between primary tumors and metastases was observed in 11 of 53 cases (20.8%). Overall, tumor cell PD-L1 levels were not different in primary tumors and metastases (P = 0.51). Tumor cell PD-L1 positivity was associated with higher T stage (P = 0.03) and higher Fuhrman nuclear grade (P < 0.01). Within individual lesions, PD-L1 positivity was heterogeneous and almost exclusively detected in high nuclear grade areas (P < 0.001). No difference was found in PD-L1 levels in TIMCs between primary tumors and metastases (P = 0.82). The heterogeneity of PD-L1 expression in ccRCC suggests that its assessment as a predictive biomarker for PD-1 blockade may require analysis of metastatic lesions. Notably, because PD-L1 expression was mostly detected in high nuclear grade areas, to avoid false-negative results, these areas should be specifically selected for assessment. Cancer Immunol Res; 3(10); 1158–64. ©2015 AACR.