Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Standards and Agro-Food Exports from Developing Countries: Rebalancing the Debate

The proliferation and increased stringency of food safety and agricultural health standards is a source of concern among many developing countries. These standards are perceived as a barrier to the continued success of their exports of high-value agro-food products (including fish, horticultural, and other products), either because these countries lack the technical and administrative capacities needed for compliance or because these standards can be applied in a discriminatory or protectionist manner. The authors draw on available literature and work in progress to examine the underlying evidence related to the changing standards environment and its impact on existing and potential developing country exporters of high-value agricultural and food products. The evidence the authors present, while only partial, suggests that the picture for developing countries as a whole is not necessarily problematic and certainly less pessimistic than the mainstream"standards-as-barriers"perspective. Indeed, rising standards serve to accentuate underlying supply chain strengths and weaknesses and thus impact differently on the competitive position of individual countries and distinct market participants. Some countries and industries are even using high quality and safety standards to successfully (re-)position themselves in competitive global markets. This emphasizes the importance of considering the effects of food safety and agricultural health measures within the context of wider capacity constraints and underlying supply chain trends and drivers. The key question for developing countries is how to exploit their strengths and overcome their weaknesses such that they are gainers rather than losers in the emerging commercial and regulatory context.
Driving automation & changed driver's task - effect of driver-interfaces on intervention

Driving automation leads to a changed role for drivers, i.e. supervision, including now and then intervention - a role that humans are not particularly good at. New driver-vehicle interfaces can support drivers in their changed role. We tested three interface-concepts incorporating different type of stimuli to steer attention and evoke response. This study examined specifically the effects on driver-intervention to avoid collision after automation was terminated. Neither the audio-tactile interface combined with illumination, nor the audio-visual interface, revealed to provide additional intervention-support compared to a base-line audio interface. The results contribute to a better understanding of applying multimodality for developing adequate support and suggest that richer stimuli might negatively influence performance due to startle-responses and/or distraction. Richer stimuli feedback might however be beneficial within the broader spectrum of the changed driver's role (e.g. supervision) - for which further research is planned.
The Impact of Work Group Diversity on Performance: Large Sample Evidence from the Mutual Fund Industry

This paper investigates the impact of work group diversity on performance. Analyzing a uniquely large sample of management teams from the U.S. mutual fund industry we find that the influence of diversity on performance depends on the dimension of diversity that is analyzed. Informational diversity has a positive impact on performance, which is driven by tenure diversity as well as educational diversity. Social category diversity has a negative impact on performance, which is mainly driven by gender diversity while age diversity has no strong impact. Our results have important implications for the optimal composition of work groups and for investment strategies of fund investors.
Hadley Cell Dynamics in a Primitive Equation Model. Part II: Nonaxisymmetric Flow

Abstract A strategy is adopted that applies the mean meridional circulation (MMC) equation to two different steady states of a primitive equation model. This allows for the investigation of the mechanisms behind the sensitivity of the Hadley cell structure to individual source terms in an axisymmetric circulation. Specifically, the strategy allows the MMC response to the individual source terms to be partitioned into direct and indirect components. The model's Hadley cell strengthens and broadens as the viscosity of the model is increased. It is found that a substantial portion of this sensitivity is attributable to diabatic heating and surface friction changes, which are ultimately induced by changes in viscosity. Similar behavior is found as the meridional gradient of the radiative–convective equilibrium temperature is increased, except that in this case the indirect response arises through the viscosity and surface friction change. In both cases, the changes in the static stability change are found to .
Metaphorical framing in political discourse through words vs. concepts: a meta-analysis

abstract Conceptual metaphor theory and other important theories in metaphor research are often experimentally tested by studying the effects of metaphorical frames on individuals’ reasoning. Metaphorical frames can be identified by at least two levels of analysis: words vs. concepts. Previous overviews of metaphorical-framing effects have mostly focused on metaphorical framing through words (metaphorical-words frames) rather than through concepts (metaphorical-concepts frames). This means that these overviews included only experimental studies that looked at variations in individual words instead of at the broader logic of messages. For this reason, we conducted a meta-analysis (k = 91, N = 34,783) to compare the persuasive impact of both types of metaphorical frames. Given that patterns of metaphor usage differ across discourse domains, and that effects may differ across modalities and discourse domains, we focused on one mode of presentation and one discourse domain only: verbal metaphorical framing in political discourse. Results showed that, compared to non-metaphorical frames, both metaphorical-words and metaphorical-concepts frames positively influenced beliefs and attitudes. Yet, these effects were larger for metaphorical-concepts frames. We therefore argue that future research should more explicitly describe and justify which level of analysis is chosen to examine the nature and effects of metaphorical framing.
Lack of Adjustment Latitude at Work as a Trigger of Taking Sick Leave—A Swedish Case-Crossover Study

Objectives Research has shown that individuals reporting a low level of adjustment latitude, defined as having few possibilities to temporarily adjust work demands to illness, have a higher risk of sick leave. To what extent lack of adjustment latitude influences the individual when making the decision to take sick leave is unknown. We hypothesize that ill individuals are more likely to take sick leave on days when they experience a lack of adjustment latitude at work than on days with access to adjustment latitude. Methods A case-crossover design was applied to 546 sick-leave spells, extracted from a cohort of 1 430 employees at six Swedish workplaces, with a 3–12 month follow-up of all new sick-leave spells. Exposure to lack of adjustment latitude on the first sick-leave day was compared with exposure during several types of control periods sampled from the previous two months for the same individual. Results Only 35% of the respondents reported variations in access to adjustment latitude, and 19% reported a constant lack of adjustment latitude during the two weeks prior to the sick-leave spell. Among those that did report variation, the risk of sick leave was lower on days with lack of adjustment latitude, than on days with access (Odds Ratio 0.36, 95% Confidence Interval 0.25–0.52). Conclusions This is the first study to show the influence of adjustment latitude on the decision to take sick leave. Among those with variations in exposure, lack of adjustment latitude was a deterrent of sick leave, which is contrary to the à priori hypothesis. These results indicate that adjustment latitude may not only capture long-lasting effects of a flexible working environment, but also temporary possibilities to adjust work to being absent. Further studies are needed to disentangle the causal mechanisms of adjustment latitude on sick-leave.
Protein Interactions Extrapolated from Feline Protein Complexes.

The determination of protein-protein interaction networks is a difficult and important problem in biology. Present day approaches to this problem are usually based on two hybrid experimental measurements coupled with refinement and extrapolation using computational techniques. Here we consider a computational method for similar refinement and extrapolation using experimental data from which protein interactions can not be directly inferred. Our dataset was derived from an experiment designed to examine cell growth, tumorigenesis, and differentiation in a highly malignant cat melanoma cell line using 2-D gel electrophoresis and MALDI-TOF mass spectrometry. Instead of direct information about protein-protein interactions, this experiment yields protein complexes. We analyze and interpret these complexes to provide predictions of protein-protein interactions. We find that we are able to predict when a protein pair belongs to a complex with ~96% accuracy, suggesting that these protein pairs interact. We extrapolate the experimentally identified interaction pairs to the entire cat proteome in order to obtain a cat protein interaction network. This network has a scale free degree distribution, in agreement with previous observations about protein interaction networks.
Assessment and Support for Software Capstone Projects at the Undergraduate Level: A Survey and Rubrics

Software engineering and computer science students conduct a capstone project during the final year of their degree programs. These projects are essential in validating that students have gained required knowledge and they can synthesize and use that knowledge to solve real world problems. However, the external requirements on educational programs often do not provide detailed guidelines for how to conduct or support these capstone projects, which may lead to variations among universities. This paper presents the results from a survey conducted at 19 different Pakistani universities of the current management practices and assessment criteria used for the capstone project courses at Undergraduate level. Based upon the results of this survey and similar work on Master Thesis capstone projects in Sweden, we present assessment rubrics for software-related undergraduate capstone projects. We also present recommendations for the continuous improvement of capstone projects.
The Fluxed MSSM

Recent developments in string compactiﬁcations in the presence of antisymmetric ﬁeld backgrounds suggest a new simple and predictive structure for soft terms in the MSSM depending only on two parameters. They give rise to a positive deﬁnite scalar potential, a solution to the µ -problem, ﬂavor universality and absence of a SUSY-CP problem.
Student Teaching and Internship Programs in Business Teacher Education.

0.4 tok4 A study was conducted to (1) identify, compare, and report the various c:, patterns of organization and characteristics of student teaching programs in business in the National Association of Business Teacher Education in4 stitutions within the North Central area of the National Business Education Association, and (2) identify and report the various patterns of organization, F.7? characteristics, and distinct features of each existing internship program in LAJ business teacher education in the geographic area named above. Questionnaires were sent to department chairmen of sixty-six institutions. Findings were based upon an item analysis of each question listed on the questionnaire and the results of testing eighteen hypotheses. An interview outline was developed and completed by individuals in institutions where internships were offered. Findings for this portion of the study were based upon the results of the interviews. Probably at no time in this century have traditional procedures for preparing teachers been under such severe scrutiny. Performance outcomes . arc becoming increasingly important criteria in the evaluation of teacher effectiveness. Consequently, the preservice education of prospective teachers should be designed so that performance criteria will be utilized to determine the extent of the student's ability to function effectively as a teacher. The student teaching experience, which is an important segment of the preparation of business teachers, has continued to be under critical attack. In addition, several societal forces have increased the complexity of the problem. Furthermore,. much has been said about the necessity for individual. izing student teaching; the traditional prograMs have not always lent themselves
Save Watts in Your Grid: Green Strategies for Energy-Aware Framework in Large Scale Distributed Systems

While an extensive set of research project deals with the saving power problem of electronic devices powered by electric battery, few have interest in large scale distributed systems permanently plugged in the wall socket. However, a rapid study shows that each computer, member of a distributed system platform, consume a substantial quantity of power especially when those resources are idle. Today, given the number of processing resources involved in large scale computing infrastructure, we are convinced that we can save a lot of electric power by applying what we called green policies. Those policies, introduced in this article, propose to alternatively switch On and Off computer nodes in a clever way.
Star-forming QSO host galaxies

Context. The recent finding of substantial masses of cold molecular gas as well as young stellar populations in the host galaxies of intermediate luminosity quasars is at odds with results of Hubble Space Telescope imaging studies since the latter appear to yield mature, quiescent early type hosts. Aims. The characterization as "quiescent" for the host galaxies of QSOs is being addressed. Methods. The radio and far-infrared properties of both the HST sample and a larger comparison sample of uv-excess selected radio-quiet QSOs are being analyzed. Results. Consistency is found with substantial recent or ongoing star-formation activity.
Dynamics of an HIV pathogenesis model with CTL immune response and two saturated rates

In this paper, we propose an HIV infection model with CTL immune response which includes the cure of infected cells and the effect of immune impairment caused by HIV infection. Both the infection transmission process and the proliferation of CTL immune response are modeled by two saturated functions. Moreover, the qualitative analysis of the model is investigated and numerical simulations are given to illustrate our theoretical results.
Where and When Does It Pay to Be Good? A Global Long-Term Analysis of ESG Investing

This paper explores the long-term performance of stocks with high corporate social performance (CSP), measured by so-called ESG scores depicting the environmental (E), social (S), and governance (G) dimension. We investigate the buy-and-hold abnormal returns of a long/short investment strategy including the top and low 20% stocks with respect to each of the ESG dimensions. The results of the bootstrap tests in a world-wide perspective indicate that financial markets are not capable to price different levels of CSP in the short run and in particular in the long run properly. The zero investment strategy produces significantly positive abnormal returns up to 20% in North America and Europe in a five year period. We also identify regional differences, for instance, a high social score does not pay in Japan and strong corporate governance yields significantly negative abnormal returns in Asia Pacific.
The Effectiveness of Preemptive Thoracic Epidural Analgesia in Thoracic Surgery

Background. The aim of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of preemptive thoracic epidural analgesia (TEA) comparing conventional postoperative epidural analgesia on thoracotomy. Material and Methods. Forty-four patients were randomized in to two groups (preemptive: Group P, control: Group C). Epidural catheter was inserted in all patients preoperatively. In Group P, epidural analgesic solution was administered as a bolus before the surgical incision and was continued until the end of the surgery. Postoperative patient controlled epidural analgesia infusion pumps were prepared for all patients. Respiratory rates (RR) were recorded. Patient's analgesia was evaluated with visual analog scale at rest (VASr) and coughing (VASc). Number of patient's demands from the pump, pump's delivery, and additional analgesic requirement were also recorded. Results. RR in Group C was higher than in Group P at postoperative 1st and 2nd hours. Both VASr and VASc scores in Group P were lower than in Group C at postoperative 1st, 2nd, and 4th hours. Patient's demand and pump's delivery count for bolus dose in Group P were lower than in Group C in all measurement times. Total analgesic requirements on postoperative 1st and 24th hours in Group P were lower than in Group C. Conclusion. We consider that preemptive TEA may offer better analgesia after thoracotomy.
Studying the Wikipedia Hyperlink Graph for Relatedness and Disambiguation

Hyperlinks and other relations in Wikipedia are a extraordinary resource which is still not fully understood. In this paper we study the different types of links in Wikipedia, and contrast the use of the full graph with respect to just direct links. We apply a well-known random walk algorithm on two tasks, word relatedness and named-entity disambiguation. We show that using the full graph is more effective than just direct links by a large margin, that non-reciprocal links harm performance, and that there is no benefit from categories and infoboxes, with coherent results on both tasks. We set new state-of-the-art figures for systems based on Wikipedia links, comparable to systems exploiting several information sources and/or supervised machine learning. Our approach is open source, with instruction to reproduce results, and amenable to be integrated with complementary text-based methods.
Costimulation of soil glycosidase activity and soil respiration by nitrogen addition

Unprecedented levels of nitrogen (N) have been deposited in ecosystems over the past century, which is expected to have cascading effects on microbially mediated soil respiration (SR). Extracellular enzymes play critical roles on the degradation of soil organic matter, and measurements of their activities are potentially useful indicators of SR. The links between soil extracellular enzymatic activities (EEAs) and SR under N addition, however, have not been established. We therefore conducted a meta‐analysis from 62 publications to synthesize the responses of soil EEAs and SR to elevated N. Nitrogen addition significantly increased glycosidase activity (GA) by 13.0%, α‐1,4‐glucosidase (AG) by 19.6%, β‐1,4‐glucosidase (BG) by 11.1%, β‐1,4‐xylosidase (BX) by 21.9% and β‐D‐cellobiosidase (CBH) by 12.6%. Increases in GA were more evident for long duration, high rate, organic and mixed N addition (combination of organic and inorganic N addition), as well as for studies from farmland. The response ratios (RRs) of GA were positively correlated with the SR‐RRs, even when evaluated individually for AG, BG, BX and CBH. This positive correlation between GA‐RR and SR‐RR was maintained for most types of vegetation and soil as well as for different methods of N addition. Our results provide the first evidence that GA is linked to SR under N addition over a range of ecosystems and highlight the need for further studies on the response of other soil EEAs to various global change factors and their implications for ecosystem functions.
Deep Convolution Networks for Compression Artifacts Reduction

Lossy compression introduces complex compression artifacts, particularly blocking artifacts, ringing effects and blurring. Existing algorithms either focus on removing blocking artifacts and produce blurred output, or restore sharpened images that are accompanied with ringing effects. Inspired by the success of deep convolutional networks (DCN) on superresolution, we formulate a compact and efficient network for seamless attenuation of different compression artifacts. To meet the speed requirement of real-world applications, we further accelerate the proposed baseline model by layer decomposition and joint use of large-stride convolutional and deconvolutional layers. This also leads to a more general CNN framework that has a close relationship with the conventional Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP). Finally, the modified network achieves a speed up of 7.5 times with almost no performance loss compared to the baseline model. We also demonstrate that a deeper model can be effectively trained with features learned in a shallow network. Following a similar "easy to hard" idea, we systematically investigate three practical transfer settings and show the effectiveness of transfer learning in low-level vision problems. Our method shows superior performance than the state-of-the-art methods both on benchmark datasets and a real-world use case.
Methylation Assay for the Diagnosis of Lung Cancer on Bronchial Aspirates: A Cohort Study

Purpose: Recent studies have detected aberrant promoter methylation of adenomatous polyposis coli promoter 1 A (APC), cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitor-2A (p16INK4a), retinoic acid receptor β2, and RAS association domain family protein 1 (RASSF1A) in bronchial aspirates and suggested their use as biomarkers for lung cancer diagnostics. The purpose of this study was to validate these candidate marker genes in a retrospective cohort study. Experimental Design: Bronchial aspirates collected from a cohort comprising 247 patients with suspected lung cancer were investigated retrospectively regarding aberrant promoter methylation using a quantitative methylation-specific real-time PCR (QMSP). Results: Eighty-nine patients were diagnosed with primary lung cancer, 102 had benign lung disease, and 56 showed miscellaneous other conditions. A panel consisting of APC, p16INK4a, and RASSF1A emerged as useful combination. This panel detected aberrant methylation in bronchial aspirates of 22 of 35 (63%) and 21 of 44 (44%) centrally and peripherally located primary lung cancers, respectively. Bronchial aspirates also showed aberrant methylation in 5 of 7 (71%) patients with a recurrent lung cancer and in 8 of 30 (27%) cases without tumor recurrence. In contrast, only 1 of 102 patients with benign lung disease displayed a (false) positive test result. Rarely, aberrant methylation was found in patients with other malignancies (3 of 16). The QMSP assay correctly confirmed lung cancer in 8 of 12 (67%) cases with an ambiguous cytology. Moreover, it disclosed 9 of 26 (35%) of peripheral tumors lacking simultaneous cytologic or histologic diagnosis of malignancy. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that the QMSP assay could be applied as a reflex test in cases of suspected lung cancer that defy a definite diagnosis by conventional methods. Thus, the assay could be a useful diagnostic adjunct especially regarding peripheral tumors.