Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Viscoelastic properties of soft gels: comparison of magnetic resonance elastography and dynamic shear testing in the shear wave regime

Magnetic resonance elastography (MRE) is used to quantify the viscoelastic shear modulus, G*, of human and animal tissues. Previously, values of G* determined by MRE have been compared to values from mechanical tests performed at lower frequencies. In this study, a novel dynamic shear test (DST) was used to measure G* of a tissue-mimicking material at higher frequencies for direct comparison to MRE. A closed-form solution, including inertial effects, was used to extract G* values from DST data obtained between 20 and 200 Hz. MRE was performed using cylindrical ‘phantoms’ of the same material in an overlapping frequency range of 100–400 Hz. Axial vibrations of a central rod caused radially propagating shear waves in the phantom. Displacement fields were fit to a viscoelastic form of Navier's equation using a total least-squares approach to obtain local estimates of G*. DST estimates of the storage G′ (Re[G*]) and loss modulus G″ (Im[G*]) for the tissue-mimicking material increased with frequency from 0.86 to 0.97 kPa (20–200 Hz, n = 16), while MRE estimates of G′ increased from 1.06 to 1.15 kPa (100–400 Hz, n = 6). The loss factor (Im[G*]/Re[G*]) also increased with frequency for both test methods: 0.06–0.14 (20–200 Hz, DST) and 0.11–0.23 (100–400 Hz, MRE). Close agreement between MRE and DST results at overlapping frequencies indicates that G* can be locally estimated with MRE over a wide frequency range. Low signal-to-noise ratio, long shear wavelengths and boundary effects were found to increase residual fitting error, reinforcing the use of an error metric to assess confidence in local parameter estimates obtained by MRE.
Strategic Orientations and Innovation in Resource-constrained SMEs of an Emerging Economy

While previous research has explored the linkages of strategic orientations and innovation for large businesses of developed economies, relatively little is known about these linkages for SMEs of emerging economies. To study these linkages, data were collected from owners or senior executives of 162 manufacturing SMEs in the Punjab region of India. Our results show that while customer orientation has been found to enable innovation for large firms, it does not directly facilitate innovation for Indian SMEs. The customer-oriented SMEs create successful innovation through better utilisation of their dynamic resources. Therefore, creation of dynamic resources by SMEs is more critical than that of unique resources for successful innovation. Implications of our findings are discussed for theory as well as practice.
Restoring Fiscal Sustainability in Spain

Spain’s government has introduced ambitious consolidation measures, which should yield a sizeable improvement in discretionary fiscal efforts. Should budgetary outcomes fall short of targets, the government should stand ready to introduce further measures, as announced. Such measures could include subjecting more goods and services to the standard value added tax rate. They could also be used to fund a reduction in some social security contributions paid by employers. Once sufficient progress towards fiscal consolidation has been achieved, a further reform of the tax system towards more growth-friendly taxes should be contemplated. Spain also faces a dramatic increase in ageing-related public spending, mostly on account of pensions. The pension reform plan is welcome, but further reforms in the pension system will be necessary to contain expenditure growth. Rules on the budget balances for each level of government should be reviewed so as to induce regional governments to run larger budget surpluses when activity exceeds potential. Retablir la viabilite budgetaire en Espagne Le gouvernement espagnol a introduit des mesures d’assainissement budgetaire ambitieuses qui devraient produire une amelioration importante des efforts budgetaires discretionnaires. Dans le cas ou les objectifs budgetaires ne seraient pas atteints, les autorites devront se tenir pretes, comme annonce, a prendre des mesures supplementaires, qui pourraient consister a assujettir davantage de produits et de services au taux ordinaire de la taxe sur la valeur ajoutee. Ces mesures pourraient aussi servir a financer la reduction d’une partie des cotisations patronales de securite sociale. Une fois la consolidation budgetaire suffisamment avancee, une nouvelle reforme du systeme fiscal devra etre envisagee en vue de mettre davantage l’accent sur les impots qui favorisent la croissance. L’Espagne se trouve aussi confrontee a une augmentation spectaculaire des depenses publiques liees au vieillissement, due pour l’essentiel aux retraites. Le plan de reforme des retraites va dans le bon sens mais des reformes plus poussees du systeme de retraite seront necessaires pour contenir l’accroissement des depenses. Il conviendrait de revoir les regles relatives aux soldes budgetaires des differents niveaux d’administration afin d’inciter les autorites regionales a degager des excedents budgetaires plus importants lorsque l’activite economique est superieure au potentiel.
DEVELOPMENT OF ANGIOTENSIN CONVERTING ENZYME IN FETAL LUNG AND PLACENTA OF THE RAT AND HUMAN

1. Angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) activity in fetal lung and placenta was determined by the method of Cushman and Cheung (1971) during the second trimester of human pregnancy and throughout the rat gestation. The enzyme activity in the neonatal rat lung was also determined during the first 19 days of life.
Tolerance of Silene vulgaris to copper: Population‐related comparison of selected physiological parameters

Tolerance of three Slovak populations of Silene vulgaris [from the localities “Harmanec” (total soil Cu 34.1 mg kg−1), “Lubietová”; (total soil Cu 831.6 mg kg−1) and “Špania dolina” (total soil Cu 1368.7 mg kg−1) referred as SV1, SV2, and SV3, respectively] and Silene dioica (SD; from the locality “Špania dolina”) exposed to 60 μM Cu for 7 days has been studied. Respective controls with 0.21 μM Cu were also cultured. SV3 and SD contained higher total shoot Cu than SV1. Methanol‐soluble shoot Cu represented 60, 59, 59, and 55% from total shoot Cu and roots contained 16.7‐, 20.4‐, 9.9‐ and 28.9‐fold more Cu than shoots in SV1, SV2, SV3, and SD, respectively. Soluble proteins were the least affected in SV3 and SD when Cu‐exposed and control plants were compared. Root hydrogen peroxide and superoxide showed similar trend and were correlated with enhancement of ascorbate‐ and guaiacol‐peroxidase activities. Malondialdehyde accumulation increased in SV1 and SV2. Phenylalanine ammonia‐lyase activity and total soluble phenols were higher in SV3 Cu‐exposed plants compared to SV1 and SV2. Shikimate dehydrogenase activity was enhanced in all Cu‐exposed populations. Cinnamyl alcohol dehydrogenase activity and root lignin content were not affected and polyphenol oxidase activity was not detected. Within 14 detected free amino acids, majority of them decreased preferentially in the roots. Only serine increased in shoots and decreased in roots of all populations. Potassium content was not affected in SV3. Na, Ca, and Fe increased in roots of Cu‐exposed plants of all populations, while Mg was the least affected and Zn increased in SV2 and SV3 shoots and roots. This study revealed the highest tolerance in population from the locality with the highest soil Cu content. Present findings as complex metabolic responses to Cu stress with special emphasis on phenolic metabolism are discussed. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Environ Toxicol 25: 581–592, 2010.
Who needs to know? Knowledge LOF risk and the subsidiary staffing decision

This paper analyses knowledge-related liability of foreignness ('KLOF') risk in the context of foreign subsidiary staffing decisions, to explore how the latter affects the former. KLOF risk related to a lack of complete knowledge of the host country is centred at the critical link between specific home country and host country individuals. Assessment of KLOF risk must begin with the question: 'Who needs to know? ' Subsidiary staffing decisions shift the location of KLOF risk, changing the answer. To enhance the depth of KLOF analysis, the next step involves assessing knowledge due diligence affecting those with the greatest need for host country information. The central contributions of this KLOF work include identification of the critical link or location of risk affected by staffing decisions, and exploration of knowledge due diligence as the concept that may foster increased understanding of KLOF risk to suggest future measurement and mitigation approaches.
Spend More Today: Using Behavioural Economics to Improve Retirement Expenditure Decisions

This paper examines how behavioural economics can be used to improve the expenditure decisions of retirees. It identifies how accumulated assets can be used optimally throughout retirement to produce life-long income when required, to make provision for contingencies – such as unanticipated spikes in expenditure – and to optimize the size and timing of bequests. We do this using a SPEEDOMETER (or Spending Optimally Throughout Retirement) retirement expenditure plan which employs defaults within a choice architecture. At its simplest, the plan involves just four key behavioural nudges: (1) First, make a plan – ideally with, but if necessary without, an adviser; (2) automatic phasing of annuitization which is designed to tackle the aversion to large irreversible transactions and losing control of assets and so allows the greatest possible degree of flexibility in managing the run-down of retirement assets; (3) capital protection in the form of ‘money-back’ annuities which deals with loss aversion, i.e., the fear of losing your money if you die early; and (4) the slogan ‘spend more today’ which utilizes hyperbolic discounting to satisfy the human trait of wanting jam today and to reinforce the idea that ‘buying an annuity is a smart thing to do’.
Knowledge-intensive Services and Urban Innovativeness

This paper addresses three issues in the context of knowledge-intensive service (KIS) development, related to the competitive base of cities and the degree to which they possess distinctive sources of innovativeness. The first is, how may growing KIS, or consultancy, use influence client innovation? Although this is inherently difficult to demonstrate, the expertise and modes of operation of consultancies suggest that they do influence technical and organisational change amongst clients. The second issue is the segmentation of consultancy influence, especially by sector and types of firm. Finally, how far does the urban base of consultancy supply imply local, specifically urban, benefits for client innovation? Consultancy services are often delivered over wide areas from their urban bases, within national and international nexuses of corporate and public-sector service exchange. This question cannot be answered by focusing only on local exchange. Urban client-consultancy interaction needs to be set within a national and even an international context of specialist expertise exchange.
Expatriate selection: back to basics?

Expatriate assignments are becoming increasingly unattractive to potential candidates making the unwieldy myriad of proposed selection criteria of decreasing practical value to internationally assigning firms. When the issue is more to find anyone willing to do the job rather than selecting the best candidate from a large pool of applicants, maybe basic personal characteristics can better guide corporations in their search for suitable expatriate candidates. To examine this proposition, a large sample of Western business expatriates in Hong Kong responded to a mail survey about their sociocultural and psychological adjustment. The results of the hierarchical regression analysis indicated that age had a positive association with general, interaction and work adjustment of the expatriates as well as with psychological adjustment. Gender was not associated with any kind of adjustment whereas being married had a positive relation with work adjustment. The implications for international firms of these results are discussed in detail.
Laboratory Model of Adaptive Radiation: A Selection Experiment in the Bank Vole

In a laboratory colony of a wild rodent, the bank vole Myodes (=Clethrionomys) glareolus, a multiway artificial selection experiment was applied to mimic evolution toward high aerobic metabolism achieved during locomotor activity, predatory behavior, and ability to cope with herbivorous diet. Four lines for each of the selection directions and four unselected control lines have been maintained. After three generations of within‐family selection, the maximum rate of oxygen consumption achieved during swimming was 15% higher in the selected than in the control lines (least square means, adjusted for body mass: 252.0 vs. 218.6 mL O2/h, P = 0.0001). When fed a low‐quality diet made of dried grass, voles from the lines selected for ability to cope with herbivorous diet lost about 0.7 g less mass than voles from the control lines (−2.44 vs. −3.16 g/4 d, P = 0.008). In lines selected for predatory behavior toward crickets, proportion of “predatory” individuals was higher than in the control lines (43.6% vs. 24.9%; P = 0.045), but “time to capture” calculated for the successful trials did not differ between the lines. The experiment continues, and the selected lines of voles will provide a unique model for testing hypotheses concerning correlated evolution of complex traits.
Regulation of oxidative stress and lipid peroxidation in PTU induced mice, treated with Pyrroloquinoline quinone (PQQ)

Hitherto unknown effects of Pyrroloquinoline quinone (PQQ) in 6-n-propyl-2-thiouracil (PTU)- induced oxidative stress and lipid peroxidation were investigated in adult mice. Animals received either PTU (0.05% in drinking water) alone for 5 weeks or PTU + three different concentrations of PQQ, after which alterations in tissue lipid peroxidation (LPO) and in enzymatic activities of superoxide dismutase (SOD) and catalase (CAT) and in glutathione (GSH) content were evaluated in two different organs such as liver and heart. Simultaneously, concentrations of serum glucose, total cholesterol, glutamate oxaloacetate transaminase (SGOT), glutamate pyruvate transaminase (SGPT), creatinine and urea were measured in serum. PTU administration enhanced the tissue LPO, serum SGOT, SGPT, total cholesterol, creatinine and urea with a parallel decrease in serum glucose and tissue antioxidants such as SOD and CAT in both the organs. When PTU treated animals received PQQ, these adverse effects were ameliorated. Out of three different doses of PQQ (1, 5 and 10 mg/kg/d, i.p. for 6 days), 10 mg/kg body weight was found to be the most effective and antiperoxidative in nature, as it maximally reduced the LPO of liver and heart, with a parallel increase in cellular antioxidants. Findings from this study revealed for the first time, that PQQ has the potential to ameliorate PTU-induced oxidative damage in liver and heart, indicating the possible beneficial effect of the test compound in regulating hypothyroidism.
Is The Book-To-Market Ratio A Measure Of Risk?

We develop a leverage-based alternative to traditional asset pricing models to investigate whether the book-to-market ratio acts as a proxy for risk. We argue that the book-to-market ratio should act as a proxy because of the expected relations between (1) financial risk and measures of capital structure based on the market value of equity and (2) asset risk and measures of capital structure based on the book value of equity. We find no relation between average stock returns and the book-to-market ratio in all-equity firms after controlling for firm size, and an inverse relation between average stock returns and the book-to-market ratio in firms with a negative book value of equity. 2005 The Southern Finance Association and the Southwestern Finance Association.
Towards e-ECIs? European Participation by Online Pan-European Mobilization

Abstract Using data on 10 pioneer European Citizens' Initiatives (ECIs), this article puts into perspective the traditional obstacles to Euro-mobilization and the potential of e-participation (normalization versus mobilization theses) to shift and/or fade the constraints to the much expected European public sphere (EPS). Taking into account the resources and results of those pan-European ECI campaigns and acknowledging that the internet appears as an indispensable tool to be adopted in the repertoire of action of ECI organizers, the article nevertheless brings critical conclusions about the ability of the internet to significantly modify the traditional constraints met in mobilizing (new) European citizens. By making internet literacy a prerequisite to participation, e-ECIs open up new possibilities but also create new barriers to the EPS and to pan-European participation.
Stock Splits and Stock Dividends: Why, Who, and When

This study investigates empirically why firms split their stock or distribute stock dividends and why the market reacts favorably to these distributions. The findings suggest that stock splits are mainly aimed at restoring stock prices to a "normal range. " Some support can also be found for the oft-mentioned signaling motive of stock splits. Stock dividends are altogether different from stock splits and they appear to be a decreasing phenomenon. The clue to stock dividend distributions may lie in their perceived substitution for relatively low cash dividends. Copyright 1987 by American Finance Association.
Assessing Attentiveness in Older Hospital Patients: Global Assessment Versus Tests of Attention

OBJECTIVES: Impairment of attentiveness is a cardinal symptom of delirium. We examined the relationship between bedside tests of attention and a global rating of attentiveness in older hospital patients and sought to identify cut‐off points on the tests of attention that might be helpful in the diagnosis of delirium.
Educación ambiental en el nivel medio superior, desde la perspectiva de género, Tlaxcala, México

This paper is aimed at describing how students, based on their gender, innovate actions in favor of the environment, in order to recover their role in the promotion of environmental education, as well as the activities that motivate them and that they like to maintain their school. The research is conducted within a qualitative methodology framework, with a sample of 80 male and female high school students. The information is collected using direct observation, questionnaires, and students’ opinions and is later systematized and processes for analysis and interpretation using a descriptive methodology. Results show differences and preferences between genders to innovate and mitigate problems, as well as differences in the reasoning and enthusiasm to perform environmental actions. One of the conclusions is that that women like to take care of the environment more than men since they show more interest in preserving it.
Catalysing open innovation through publicly-funded R&D: A comparison of university and company-based research centres

Public funding of university and company-based R&D centres of excellence is widespread both in core and more peripheral regions. What is less well-known is whether these R&D centres can catalyse multi-directional, multi-actor and iterative innovation. Based on data from a real-time monitoring study, this article explores the development of 18 R&D centres’ external connections. University-based R&D centres establish more new connections than company-based centres and are more likely to be interacting with small or micro-firms. However, there is a general bias towards links with larger firms; micro, small and medium-sized enterprises also are less likely to be involved in collaborative R&D with research centres than other types of relationships. The results suggest the potential for R&D centres to act as a catalyst for open innovation but emphasise the need to ensure that the focus of the R&D being conducted is relevant to the needs of smaller firms.
Law and Finance: Common Law and Civil Law Countries Compared an Empirical Critique

The ‘theory of law and finance’ argues that the common law system provides a better framework for financial development and economic growth than the civil law tradition. This paper identifies a number of problems that cast doubt on the soundness of the empirical basis of this literature. However, this analysis supports the idea that the legal tradition is a major factor in shaping corporate law. In particular, while there is not much evidence that common law countries protect financial investors better than civil law countries I find support for the assumption that financial investors are treated differently across legal families.
Seasonal changes in body composition of the arctic ground squirrel, Citellus undulatus.

The depletion or accumulation of body reserves is followed in terms of the weight and proportion of lipid, protein, water, and minerals in arctic ground squirrels during the entry, deep, and emergent phases of the hibernation season and after the reproductive phase of the active season. Average weight increased slowly through the summer, from a minimum of 346 g, until mid-August when 190 g accumulated in 3 weeks to be used subsequently during the 220-day hibernation season beginning in mid-September. During hibernation, the 325-g loss in weight represents 62% lipid, 26% water, 9% protein, and 2% mineral. Fat in lipid provides most of the energy but insufficient amounts of carbon for glucose synthesis during hibernation. However, protein provides an adequate gluconeogenic reserve. Significant loss of mineral indicates that skeletal reserves of calcium are important during hibernation. After hibernation, continued loss of weight by females indicates further utilization of reserves during gestation and nursing.
Out-of-Sample Predictability in International Equity Markets: A Model Selection Approach

For 13 major international stock markets, there is much evidence of out-of-sample predictability for growth stocks especially when evaluated with economic criteria, and to a noticeably lesser extent for general stock markets and value stocks. Our results shed light on the recent debate about stock return predictability, using different assets (growth-style indexes), forecasting variables (past returns), forecasting models (nonlinear models), and alternative forecasting evaluation criteria (economic criteria). Our analysis suggests that (growth) stock returns might be predictable.
Membrane Traffic in Skeletal Muscle

Skeletal muscle tissue is made up of highly organized multinuclear cells. The internal organization of the muscle cell is dictated by the necessary regular arrangement of repeated units within the protein myofibrils that mediate muscle contraction. Skeletal muscle cells have the usual membrane traffic pathways for partitioning newly synthesized proteins, internalizing cell surface receptors for hormones and nutrients, and mediating membrane repair. However, in muscle, these pathways must be further specialized to deal with targeting to and organizing muscle‐specific membrane structures, satisfying the unique metabolic requirements of muscle and meeting the high demand for membrane repair in a tissue that is constantly under mechanical stress. Specialized membrane traffic pathways in muscle also play a role in the formation of muscle through fusion of myoblast membranes and the development of internal muscle‐specific membrane structures during myogenesis and regeneration. It has recently become apparent that muscle‐specific isoforms of proteins that are known to mediate ubiquitous membrane traffic pathways, as well as novel muscle‐specific proteins, are involved in tissue‐specific aspects of muscle membrane traffic. Here we describe the specialized membrane structures of skeletal muscle, how these are developed, maintained and repaired by specialized and generic membrane traffic pathways, and how defects in these pathways result in muscle disease.