Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Public Relative Performance Feedback in Complex Service Systems: Improving Productivity Through the Adoption of Best Practices

Managers of service organizations seek to improve productivity without eroding service quality. We explore whether privately versus publicly disclosing relative performance feedback (RPF) about individual workers' processing times can help achieve this goal. Using three years of patient encounter data from two emergency departments, one of which changed from privately to publicly disclosing RPF to physicians, we find an 8.6% improvement in productivity and no significant reduction in quality associated with implementing public RPF. This benefit is greater when workers are carrying out understandardized, rather than standardized, tasks. We conduct further analyses that suggest the benefit of public RPF may primarily stem from the identification and diffusion of best practices around workflow, rather than from the motivation to be top-ranked or the shame of being bottom-ranked. Thus, our results suggest public RPF can foster the sharing and adoption of strategies for improving the management of workflow.
Contribution of Human α-Defensin 1, 2, and 3 to the Anti-HIV-1 Activity of CD8 Antiviral Factor

It has been known since 1986 that CD8 T lymphocytes from certain HIV-1–infected individuals who are immunologically stable secrete a soluble factor, termed CAF, that suppresses HIV-1 replication. However, the identity of CAF remained elusive despite an extensive search. By means of a protein-chip technology, we identified a cluster of proteins that were secreted when CD8 T cells from long-term nonprogressors with HIV-1 infection were stimulated. These proteins were identified as α-defensin 1, 2, and 3 on the basis of specific antibody recognition and amino acid sequencing. CAF activity was eliminated or neutralized by an antibody specific for human α-defensins. Synthetic and purified preparations of α-defensins also inhibited the replication of HIV-1 isolates in vitro. Taken together, our results indicate that α-defensin 1, 2, and 3 collectively account for much of the anti–HIV-1 activity of CAF that is not attributable to β-chemokines.
Immunohistochemical Distribution of NGF, BDNF, NT-3, and NT-4 in Adult Rhesus Monkey Brains

Immunohistochemical distribution and cellular localization of neurotrophins was investigated in adult monkey brains using antisera against nerve growth factor (NGF), brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), neurotrophin-3 (NT-3), and neurotrophin-4 (NT-4). Western blot analysis showed that each antibody specifically recognized appropriate bands of ∼14.7 kDa, 14.2 kDa, 13.6 kDa, and 14.5 kDa, for NGF, BDNF, NT-3, and NT-4, respectively. These positions coincided with the molecular masses of the neurotrophins studied. Furthermore, sections exposed to primary antiserum preadsorbed with full-length NGF, BDNF, NT-3, and NT-4 exhibited no detectable immunoreactivity, demonstrating specificities of the antibodies against the tissues prepared from rhesus monkeys. The study provided a systematic report on the distribution of NGF, BDNF, NT-3, and NT-4 in the monkey brain. Varying intensity of immunostaining was observed in the somata and processes of a wide variety of neurons and glial cells in the cerebrum, cerebellum, hippocampus, and other regions of the brain. Neurons in some regions such as the cerebral cortex and the hippocampus, which stained for neurotrophins, also expressed neurotrophic factor mRNA. In some other brain regions, there was discrepancy of protein distribution and mRNA expression reported previously, indicating a retrograde or anterograde action mode of neurotrophins. Results of this study provide a morphological basis for the elucidation of the roles of NGF, BDNF, NT-3, and NT-4 in adult primate brains.
Global modeling of secondary organic aerosol formation from aromatic hydrocarbons: high- vs. low-yield pathways

Formation of SOA from the aromatic species toluene, xylene, and, for the first time, benzene, is added to a global chemical transport model. A simple mechanism is presented that accounts for competition between low and high-yield pathways of SOA formation, wherein secondary gas-phase products react further with either nitric oxide (NO) or hydroperoxy radical (HO_2) to yield semi- or non-volatile products, respectively. Aromatic species yield more SOA when they react with OH in regions where the [NO]/[HO_2] ratios are lower. The SOA yield thus depends upon the distribution of aromatic emissions, with biomass burning emissions being in areas with lower [NO]/[HO_2] ratios, and the reactivity of the aromatic with respect to OH, as a lower initial reactivity allows transport away from industrial source regions, where [NO]/[HO_2] ratios are higher, to more remote regions, where this ratio is lower and, hence, the ultimate yield of SOA is higher. As a result, benzene is estimated to be the most important aromatic species with regards to global formation of SOA, with a total production nearly equal that of toluene and xylene combined. Global production of SOA from aromatic sources via the mechanisms identified here is estimated at 3.5 Tg/yr, resulting in a global burden of 0.08 Tg, twice as large as previous estimates. The contribution of these largely anthropogenic sources to global SOA is still small relative to biogenic sources, which are estimated to comprise 90% of the global SOA burden, about half of which comes from isoprene. Uncertainty in these estimates owing to factors ranging from the atmospheric relevance of chamber conditions to model deficiencies result in an estimated range of SOA production from aromatics of 2–12 Tg/yr. Though this uncertainty range affords a significant anthropogenic contribution to global SOA, it is evident from comparisons to recent observations that additional pathways for production of anthropogenic SOA still exist beyond those accounted for here. Nevertheless, owing to differences in spatial distributions of sources and seasons of peak production, regions exist in which aromatic SOA produced via the mechanisms identified here are predicted to contribute substantially to, and even dominate, the local SOA concentrations, such as outflow regions from North America and South East Asia during the wintertime, though total modeled SOA concentrations there are small (~0.1 μg/m^3).
A temporal basis for Weber's law in value perception

Weber's law—the observation that the ability to perceive changes in magnitudes of stimuli is proportional to the magnitude—is a widely observed psychophysical phenomenon. It is also believed to underlie the perception of reward magnitudes and the passage of time. Since many ecological theories state that animals attempt to maximize reward rates, errors in the perception of reward magnitudes and delays must affect decision-making. Using an ecological theory of decision-making (TIMERR), we analyze the effect of multiple sources of noise (sensory noise, time estimation noise, and integration noise) on reward magnitude and subjective value perception. We show that the precision of reward magnitude perception is correlated with the precision of time perception and that Weber's law in time estimation can lead to Weber's law in value perception. The strength of this correlation is predicted to depend on the reward history of the animal. Subsequently, we show that sensory integration noise (either alone or in combination with time estimation noise) also leads to Weber's law in reward magnitude perception in an accumulator model, if it has balanced Poisson feedback. We then demonstrate that the noise in subjective value of a delayed reward, due to the combined effect of noise in both the perception of reward magnitude and delay, also abides by Weber's law. Thus, in our theory we prove analytically that the perception of reward magnitude, time, and subjective value change all approximately obey Weber's law.
Exploring TOPSIS Based Algorithm for Non- Homogeneous Alternatives in Group Decision Making

The purpose of this work is to explore an algorithm based on Technique for Order Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) for non-homogeneous alternatives in group decision making. In this particular case of evaluating a set of decision alternatives, an individual expert expresses hedonic judgments for a subset of decision alternatives depending on his/her knowledge about the alternatives. The structure of the decision making problem generates a local matrix of judgmental responses for each decision alternative. Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) determines the ratio of relevant information to irrelevant information in the local response matrices. The SNR vectors of all decision alternatives are aggregated into a global decision matrix and passed as argument to the TOPSIS algorithm to rank the alternatives. The attractiveness of this algorithm is that we do not have to modify the existing TOPSIS. The algorithm was used to rank 10 different sports that were evaluated by 34 respondents in a survey and the result is practically appealing. This type of non-homogeneous group decision making is particularly useful in selecting an optimal decision alternative among a large set of alternatives where opinions of a large group of stakeholders count. This is for instance in opinion polls, comparison of market products/services and Delphi process where an expert does not necessarily have to possess full knowledge about all decision alternatives or be jack of all trades.
Original article: Psychometric properties of the Tampa Scale for kinesiophobia and the fear-avoidance beliefs questionnaire in acute low back pain

*Centre for Quality of Care Research, University Medical Centre St Radboud, Nijmegen, The Netherlands, Practice of Physical Therapy and Manual Therapy, Eindhoven, The Netherlands, zFaculty of Medicine and Pharmacology, Free University Brussels, Postgraduate Education Manual Therapy, Brussels, Belgium, University Medical Centre St Radboud, Nijmegen, The Netherlands, Department of Medical, Clinical and Experimental Psychology, University of Maastricht, Maastricht, The Netherlands, Dutch Institute of Allied Health Professions, Amersfoort, The Netherlands
The effect of perceived eco-support and need for uniqueness on eco-destination image and eco-destination identification

The present study attempts to bring up eco-destination which is until now still under-researched. Especially, it puts interest in the relationship between image and identification, which is absent in tourism literature. Combined together and tailored to its purpose, it develops new constructs, that is eco-destination image and eco-destination identification. In order to represent the real nature of Wakatobi as eco-destination, it also develops another two constructs as the antecedents of eco-destination image and eco-destination identification, that is perceived eco-support and need for uniqueness. By doing so, it puts together interactively some theories that previously stand mutually-exclusive, especially those of image, uniqueness, subjective norm, and social identity theories. This mixture becomes its conspicuous novelty. The population covers domestic and international tourists over 25 years old. It applies convenience sampling for questionnaire distribution. It applies SPSS for data analysis. The results would be that perceived eco-support has significant effects on destination image and eco-destination identification, while destination image has a significant direct effect on eco-destination identification, which makes destination image only serve as a partial mediator in the relationship between perceived eco-support and eco-destination identification. Need for uniqueness should have an insignificant effect on eco-destination identification, but significant effect on destination image. It means that destination image serves as a full mediator in the relationship between need for uniqueness and eco-destination identification.
Identities and Politics

Critics of identity politics often wax polemically as they charge contemporary social movements with narrowly and naively engaging in essentialist politics based on perceived differences from the majority. Such essentialism, critics charge, inhibits coalition building (e.g., Phelan 1993; Kimmel 1993), cannot produce meaningful social change, and reinforces hegemonic and restrictive social categories (Seidman 1997). It is even responsible for the decline of the Left (Gitlin 1994, 1995). Social movement scholars similarly view “identity movements” as cultural rather than political movements whose goals, strategies, and forms of mobilization can be explained better by a reliance on static notions of identity than by other factors.
The COOH terminus of the c-Abl tyrosine kinase contains distinct F- and G-actin binding domains with bundling activity [published erratum appears in J Cell Biol 1994 Mar;124(5):865]

The myristoylated form of c-Abl protein, as well as the P210bcr/abl protein, have been shown by indirect immunofluorescence to associate with F-actin stress fibers in fibroblasts. Analysis of deletion mutants of c-Abl stably expressed in fibroblasts maps the domain responsible for this interaction to the extreme COOH-terminus of Abl. This domain mediates the association of a heterologous protein with F-actin filaments after microinjection into NIH 3T3 cells, and directly binds to F-actin in a cosedimentation assay. Microinjection and cosedimentation assays localize the actin-binding domain to a 58 amino acid region, including a charged motif at the extreme COOH-terminus that is important for efficient binding. F-actin binding by Abl is calcium independent, and Abl competes with gelsolin for binding to F- actin. In addition to the F-actin binding domain, the COOH-terminus of Abl contains a proline-rich region that mediates binding and sequestration of G-actin, and the Abl F- and G-actin binding domains cooperate to bundle F-actin filaments in vitro. The COOH terminus of Abl thus confers several novel localizing functions upon the protein, including actin binding, nuclear localization, and DNA binding. Abl may modify and receive signals from the F-actin cytoskeleton in vivo, and is an ideal candidate to mediate signal transduction from the cell surface and cytoskeleton to the nucleus.
Death, loved ones and relationality: continuities and discontinuities

ABSTRACT This article explores the bonds between the living and the dead in contemporary Finland. The research data consists of approximately 100 letters collected via a writing call asking respondents to describe their understandings, memories and lived experiences related to deceased loved ones. By using qualitative analysis, the study endeavours to investigate the kinds of relational dimensions that emerge in these continuing bonds. This article looks at the ways in which the dead continue to be embedded in the lives of the living and contribute to the sense of self; it also considers the role of lived experiences, such as encounters with the dead, in creating and maintaining a sense of ongoing connectedness. However, relationships sometimes involve complex and even damaging histories, and this may affect a person’s willingness to continue the bond beyond the grave. Due to this, some relationships are preferably buried with the person. This paper adds to existing studies on continuing bonds by investigating relationality in constructing, maintaining and severing such bonds.
Constructs and Relationships of Edutainment Applications in Marketing Classes: How Edutainment Can be Utilized to Act as a Magnet for Choosing a Course?

The purpose of this study was to investigate the constructs of edutainment applications and their relationships during marketing communication courses. A sample of 347 undergraduate students completed a 27-item questionnaire to gather research data. The confirmatory factor analysis revealed five valid constructs: Participation and interaction, perceived learning effects, drama and practice, instructor and classroom atmosphere, and story and material. These constructs were further analyzed by the structural equation modeling (SEM), which indicated that four of the constructs were found to be effective on the perception of learning. Instructor and classroom atmosphere was revealed to have a direct (mediating) impact on perceived learning, whereas other constructs had an indirect effect on perceived learning. It appears that the research findings would help tertiary institutions to develop more learnercentered approaches to learning, and will certainly help marketing individual courses at the micro level.
The Moderating Effect of A Chief Information Officer's Competence on IT Investment and Firm Performance

With the uncertainty of market environment and variety of customer requirements, an increasing number of organizations are implementing Information Systems(IS) to improve their competitive advantage, and large amounts of firms' annual revenues are invested in Information Technology (IT) resources each year. However, research findings determining the impacts of IT on firm performance reveal conflicting results, which leads to an “IT productivity paradox”. Drawing upon Resource Based View(RBV) and Knowledge Based View(KBV), this paper analyzes the important role that a Chief Information Officer (CIO) has in IS implementation and deployment, and proposes a conceptual model to examine the moderating effect of CIO’s competence on IT investment and organization performance. By analyzing the existing managerial competence framework, CIO’s competence has been reconceptualised and divided into six sub-dimensions. The moderating effect of each competence has been illustrated and six hypotheses have correspondingly been established. It is proposed that a research methodology encompassing open and closed ended question surveys will be pursued to examine the model, and their theoretical and practical implications are discussed. The main contribution of this research paper is the re conceptualization of a CIO’s competence and a theoretical conceptual model based on RBV and KBV to explain the phenomenon of “IT productivity paradox”.
Rational Design, Preparation, and Characterization of a Therapeutic Enzyme Mutant with Improved Stability and Function for Cocaine Detoxification

Cocaine esterase (CocE) is known as the most efficient natural enzyme for cocaine hydrolysis. The major obstacle to the clinical application of wild-type CocE is the thermoinstability with a half-life of only ∼12 min at 37 °C. The previously designed T172R/G173Q mutant (denoted as enzyme E172–173) with an improved in vitro half-life of ∼6 h at 37 °C is currently in clinical trial Phase II for cocaine overdose treatment. Through molecular modeling and dynamics simulation, we designed and characterized a promising new mutant of E172–173 with extra L196C/I301C mutations (denoted as enzyme E196–301) to produce cross-subunit disulfide bonds that stabilize the dimer structure. The cross-subunit disulfide bonds were confirmed by X-ray diffraction. The designed L196C/I301C mutations have not only considerably extended the in vitro half-life at 37 °C to >100 days, but also significantly improved the catalytic efficiency against cocaine by ∼150%. In addition, the thermostable E196–301 can be PEGylated to significantly prolong the residence time in mice. The PEGylated E196–301 can fully protect mice from a lethal dose of cocaine (180 mg/kg, LD100) for at least 3 days, with an average protection time of ∼94h. This is the longest in vivo protection of mice from the lethal dose of cocaine demonstrated within all studies using an exogenous enzyme reported so far. Hence, E196–301 may be developed to become a more valuable therapeutic enzyme for cocaine abuse treatment, and it demonstrates that a general design strategy and protocol to simultaneously improve both the stability and function are feasible for rational protein drug design.
Irradiance encoding in the suprachiasmatic nuclei by rod and cone photoreceptors

Light information is transmitted to the central clock of the suprachiasmatic nuclei (SCN) for daily synchronization to the external solar cycle. Essential for synchronization is the capacity of SCN neurons to respond in a sustained and irradiance‐dependent manner to light. Melanopsin has been considered to mediate this photosensory task of irradiance detection. By contrast, the contribution of the classical photoreceptors in irradiance encoding is less clear. Here we investigate the role of classical photoreceptors by in vivo electrophysiological responses in freely moving animals to specific wavelengths of light (UV, λmax 365 nm; blue, λmax 467 nm; and green, λmax 505 nm) in both melanopsin‐deficient (Opn4–/–) mice and mice lacking rods and cones (rd/rd cl). Short‐ and long‐wavelength light induced sustained irradiance‐dependent responses in congenic wild‐type mice (+19.6%). Unexpectedly, sustained responses to light persisted in Opn4–/– mice (+18.4%). These results provide unambiguous evidence that classical photoreceptors can transmit irradiance information to the SCN. In addition, at light intensities that would stimulate rod and cone photoreceptors, the SCN of rd/rd cl mice showed greatly reduced sustained responses to light (+7.8%). Collectively, our data demonstrate a role for classical photoreceptors in illuminance detection by the SCN. —van Diepen, H. C. , Ramkisoensing, A. , Peirson, S. N. , Foster, R. G. , Meijer, J. H. , Irradiance encoding in the suprachiasmatic nuclei by rod and cone photoreceptors. FASEB J. 27, 4204–4212 (2013). www.fasebj. org
Fairness Analysis among Modern TCP Congestion Avoidance Algorithms Using Actual TCP Implementation and Actual Network Equipments

Over modern long fat networks, enough throughput is not obtained using TCP Reno, which is the classical standard TCP congestion avoidance algorithm. For this reason, many high performance TCPs have been proposed, such as CUBIC TCP and Compound TCP (CTCP). Then, these proposals caused a new issue, which is fairness among these modern TCPs. For the issue, several fairness evaluations and some proposals for improving fairness have been published. However, most evaluations are executed using network simulator, so fairness in actual network elements and actual TCP implementations has not been discussed enough yet. In this paper, we present fairness evaluation among modern TCPs with actual network elements and actual TCP implementations. Our evaluations demonstrated that fairness among modern TCPs is very poor, especially in case of using CUBIC. Furthermore, we evaluated existing fairness improving method. The results show that the methods can improve fairness.
Normal Autophagic Activity in Macrophages from Mice Lacking Gαi3, AGS3, or RGS19

In macrophages autophagy assists antigen presentation, affects cytokine release, and promotes intracellular pathogen elimination. In some cells autophagy is modulated by a signaling pathway that employs Gαi3, Activator of G-protein Signaling-3 (AGS3/GPSM1), and Regulator of G-protein Signaling 19 (RGS19). As macrophages express each of these proteins, we tested their importance in regulating macrophage autophagy. We assessed LC3 processing and the formation of LC3 puncta in bone marrow derived macrophages prepared from wild type, Gnai3-/-, Gpsm1-/-, or Rgs19-/- mice following amino acid starvation or Nigericin treatment. In addition, we evaluated rapamycin-induced autophagic proteolysis rates by long-lived protein degradation assays and anti-autophagic action after rapamycin induction in wild type, Gnai3-/-, and Gpsm1-/- macrophages. In similar assays we compared macrophages treated or not with pertussis toxin, an inhibitor of GPCR (G-protein couple receptor) triggered Gαi nucleotide exchange. Despite previous findings, the level of basal autophagy, autophagic induction, autophagic flux, autophagic degradation and the anti-autophagic action in macrophages that lacked Gαi3, AGS3, or RGS19; or had been treated with pertussis toxin, were similar to controls. These results indicate that while Gαi signaling may impact autophagy in some cell types it does not in macrophages.