Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
An Empirical Study Of The Effects Of Service Quality And Organisational Performance In Malaysian Local Authorities

The main purpose of this study is to identify the Quality management practices that impacted the organisation performance from the perspective of public sector. The results of this study highlighted the close association between the service quality and the organisation performance which confirmed that investments in quality should indeed result in better performance. The service quality variables that were found to be the strongest predictors of organisation performance were customer productivity, followed by management commitment, internal customer satisfaction, system, policy and procedure, human resource and infrastructure.
A study of invariant properties and variation patterns in the converter/distributor model for emotional speech

Invariant properties of vocal organ controls at an abstract level are crucial for better understanding and modeling of the speech production mechanism. Despite the large variability of articulatory movements at the execution level, the Converter/Distributor (C/D) model provides a systematic and comprehensive framework for the prosodic organization of speech production, based on the invariant properties of articulatory movements with the concept of “iceberg” region. The goal of this paper is two-fold: (i) to examine the invariant properties in the C/D model in emotional speech, and (ii) to understand emotion-dependent variation patterns of important parameters in the C/D model framework. Experimental results support the validity of strong linear relationship between the speed and excursion of critical articulatorsat the iceberg points for emotional speech. Also, emotion-dependent variation patterns of the C/D model parameters, (e.g., relatively smaller “shadow” angle and greater syllable magnitude for happiness) are reported. Finally, the emotion-dependent relationships between the abstract-level C/D model parameters and the surface-level parameters of the invariant articulatory behaviors are reported. Index Terms: emotional variation, temporal organization of speech, C/D model, invariant property
Better Exploiting OS-CNNs for Better Event Recognition in Images

Event recognition from still images is one of the most important problems for image understanding. However, compared with object recognition and scene recognition, event recognition has received much less research attention in computer vision community. This paper addresses the problem of cultural event recognition in still images and focuses on applying deep learning methods on this problem. In particular, we utilize the successful architecture of Object-Scene Convolutional Neural Networks (OS-CNNs) to perform event recognition. OS-CNNs are composed of object nets and scene nets, which transfer the learned representations from the pre-trained models on large-scale object and scene recognition datasets, respectively. We propose four types of scenarios to explore OS-CNNs for event recognition by treating them as either "end-to-end event predictors" or "generic feature extractors". Our experimental results demonstrate that the global and local representations of OS-CNNs are complementary to each other. Finally, based on our investigation of OS-CNNs, we come up with a solution for the cultural event recognition track at the ICCV ChaLearn Looking at People (LAP) challenge 2015. Our team secures the third place at this challenge and our result is very close to the best performance.
On Demographic and Democratic Transitions

this essay considers the implications of the demographic transition for the emergence of modern democracy. although the idea of representative democracy was present in europe and north america in the late eighteenth century, here i am concerned with its realization—and this occurs much later. i argue that consideration of the demographic transition in western countries sheds light on what is sometimes called the “democratic transition. ” indeed, i believe that few aspects of socioeconomic development were more closely associated with the appearance of democracy than was progress with respect to the demographic transition. the relationship between the demographic and democratic transitions has been largely overlooked. one recalls Paul demeny’s still highly apposite observation—made in a paper now almost half a century old—regarding the extraordinary degree of neglect, shown by historians and other social scientists, of the consequences of the demographic transition. also germane are his remark that study of history can provide valuable insight into forces that are still at work, and his reflection on the non-autochthonous character of many of the development processes that are affecting developing countries (see demeny 1968: 502–504). after providing background on previous research, the essay 1) discusses why a population’s progress through the demographic transition might be expected to promote a movement to democratic politics; 2) considers issues of measurement in relation to both the demographic transition and democracy; 3) examines the emergence of democracy with particular reference to europe; and 4) appraises the potential relevance of my argument to contemporary international conditions.
A Qualitative assessment of the impact of handedness among left-handed surgeons in Saudi Arabia

ABSTRACT Among Muslims, the use of the left hand in daily activities is discouraged; many people believe that left-handed physicians lack the competency for surgery. The study aim was to document the experience of left-handed surgeons in Saudi Arabia and the impact of handedness on their training, job performance, collegial relationships, and career progression. This qualitative study included 9 left-handed physicians in various surgical specialties from 4 major hospitals in Al-Qassim, Saudi Arabia. Face-to-face interviews using a semi-structured questionnaire were conducted. Interview transcripts were analysed with Qualitative Content Analysis Method. Of the participants, 78% were male and the mean age was 40 years. Twenty-two per cent were consultants, 67% were specialists, and 11% were resident physicians. Participants reported the following: (a) a lack of training programmes specific to handedness in undergraduate and postgraduate medical training, (b) inconvenience while being assisted by a right-handed colleague, (c) stress, fatigue, and physical pain due to the use of right-handed instruments, and (d) training of the right hand being the most common adaptation technique for a left-handed surgeon. It was concluded that left-handed surgeons experience difficulty with right-handed instruments and right-handed colleagues during surgery. It is recommended that clinical curriculum incorporate hand-specific training in surgery.
SoRank: incorporating social information into learning to rank models for recommendation

Most existing learning to rank based recommendation methods only use user-item preferences to rank items, while neglecting social relations among users. In this paper, we propose a novel, effective and efficient model, SoRank, by integrating social information among users into listwise ranking model to improve quality of ranked list of items. In addition, with linear complexity to the number of observed ratings, SoRank is able to scale to very large dataset. Experimental results on publicly available dataset demonstrate the effectiveness of SoRank.
Public Views on Sentencing Juvenile Murderers

Concerns about juvenile murderers were raised by increases in juvenile homicide rates between the mid-1980s and mid-1990s. Little is known, however, about what level of punishment the public desires for such youths. Using a randomly selected sample of Florida citizens and a factorial vignette survey approach, the present study assesses the impact of characteristics of the offender, aspects of the offense, and perceptions of a youth’s maturity on public preferences for the punishment of juvenile murderers. Our findings show that the public favors short sentences of incarceration or less punitive responses in most cases and that the most salient determinant of punitiveness is the type of murder committed. These results are discussed in light of prior research and current policy directions.
Abortive Infection of Snakehead Fish Vesiculovirus in ZF4 Cells Was Associated with the RLRs Pathway Activation by Viral Replicative Intermediates

Snakehead fish vesiculovirus (SHVV) is a negative strand RNA virus which can cause great economic losses in fish culture. To facilitate the study of SHVV-host interactions, the susceptibility of zebrafish embryonic fibroblast cell line (ZF4) to the SHVV was investigated in this report. The results showed that high amount of viral mRNAs and cRNAs were detected at the 3 h post-infection. However, the expressions of the viral mRNAs and cRNA were decreased dramatically after 6 h post-infection. In addition, the expressions of interferon (IFN) and interferon-induced GTP-binding protein Mx were all up regulated significantly at the late stage of the infection. Meanwhile, the expressions of Retinoic acid-inducible gene I (RIG-I) and Melanoma differentiation-associated gene 5 (MDA5) were also all up-regulated significantly during the infection. Two isoforms of DrLGP2 from zebrafish were also cloned and analyzed. Interestingly, the expression of DrLGP2a but not DrLGP2b was significantly up-regulated at both mRNA and protein levels, indicating that the two DrLGP2 isoforms might play different roles during the SHVV infection. Transfection experiment showed that viral replicative intermediates were required for the activation of IFN-α expression. Taken together, the abortive infection of SHVV in ZF4 cells was associated with the activation of RLRs pathway, which was activated by viral replicative intermediates.
Complex Patterns of Gene Fission in the Eukaryotic Folate Biosynthesis Pathway

Shared derived genomic characters can be useful for polarizing phylogenetic relationships, for example, gene fusions have been used to identify deep-branching relationships in the eukaryotes. Here, we report the evolutionary analysis of a three-gene fusion of folB, folK, and folP, which encode enzymes that catalyze consecutive steps in de novo folate biosynthesis. The folK-folP fusion was found across the eukaryotes and a sparse collection of prokaryotes. This suggests an ancient derivation with a number of gene losses in the eukaryotes potentially as a consequence of adaptation to heterotrophic lifestyles. In contrast, the folB-folK-folP gene is specific to a mosaic collection of Amorphea taxa (a group encompassing: Amoebozoa, Apusomonadida, Breviatea, and Opisthokonta). Next, we investigated the stability of this character. We identified numerous gene losses and a total of nine gene fission events, either by break up of an open reading frame (four events identified) or loss of a component domain (five events identified). This indicates that this three gene fusion is highly labile. These data are consistent with a growing body of data indicating gene fission events occur at high relative rates. Accounting for these sources of homoplasy, our data suggest that the folB-folK-folP gene fusion was present in the last common ancestor of Amoebozoa and Opisthokonta but absent in the Metazoa including the human genome. Comparative genomic data of these genes provides an important resource for designing therapeutic strategies targeting the de novo folate biosynthesis pathway of a variety of eukaryotic pathogens such as Acanthamoeba castellanii.
microRNA 223 Is Upregulated in the Multistep Progression of Barrett's Esophagus and Modulates Sensitivity to Chemotherapy by Targeting PARP1

Purpose: Recent microarray and RNA-sequencing studies have uncovered aberrantly expressed microRNAs (miRNA) in Barrett's esophagus–associated esophageal adenocarcinoma. The functional significance of these miRNAs in esophageal adenocarcinoma initiation and progression is largely unknown. Experimental Design: Expression levels of miR-199a/b-3p, -199a-5p, -199b-5p, -200b, -200c, -223, and -375 were determined in microdissected tissues from cardiac mucosa, Barrett's esophagus, dysplastic Barrett's esophagus, and esophageal adenocarcinoma using quantitative real-time PCR. miR-223 expression was validated in precursors and esophageal adenocarcinomas from 95 patients with esophageal adenocarcinoma by in situ hybridization (ISH). miR-223 was transfected into two esophageal adenocarcinoma cell lines, and in vitro assays were conducted. Target genes were identified using Illumina microarray, and results were validated in cell lines and human specimens. Results: miR-199 family members and miR-223 were significantly overexpressed in esophageal adenocarcinoma, however, only miR-223 showed a stepwise increase during esophageal adenocarcinoma carcinogenesis. A similar trend was observed by ISH, which additionally showed that miR-223 is exclusively expressed by the epithelial compartment. miR-223–overexpressing cells had statistically significantly more migratory and invasive potential than scramble sequence–transfected cells. PARP1 was identified as a direct target gene of miR-223 in esophageal adenocarcinoma cells. Increased sensitivity to chemotherapy was observed in cells with enforced miR-223 expression and reduced PARP1. Conclusions: miR-223 is significantly upregulated during the Barrett's esophagus–dysplasia–esophageal adenocarcinoma sequence. Although high miR-223 levels might contribute to an aggressive phenotype, our results also suggest that patients with esophageal adenocarcinoma with high miR-223 levels might benefit from treatment with DNA-damaging agents. Clin Cancer Res; 19(15); 4067–78. ©2013 AACR.
The basolateral amygdala γ‐aminobutyric acidergic system in health and disease

The brain comprises an excitatory/inhibitory neuronal network that maintains a finely tuned balance of activity critical for normal functioning. Excitatory activity in the basolateral amygdala (BLA), a brain region that plays a central role in emotion and motivational processing, is tightly regulated by a relatively small population of γ‐aminobutyric acid (GABA) inhibitory neurons. Disruption in GABAergic inhibition in the BLA can occur when there is a loss of local GABAergic interneurons, an alteration in GABAA receptor activation, or a dysregulation of mechanisms that modulate BLA GABAergic inhibition. Disruptions in GABAergic control of the BLA emerge during development, in aging populations, or after trauma, ultimately resulting in hyperexcitability. BLA hyperexcitability manifests behaviorally as an increase in anxiety, emotional dysregulation, or development of seizure activity. This Review discusses the anatomy, development, and physiology of the GABAergic system in the BLA and circuits that modulate GABAergic inhibition, including the dopaminergic, serotonergic, noradrenergic, and cholinergic systems. We highlight how alterations in various neurotransmitter receptors, including the acid‐sensing ion channel 1a, cannabinoid receptor 1, and glutamate receptor subtypes, expressed on BLA interneurons, modulate GABAergic transmission and how defects of these systems affect inhibitory tonus within the BLA. Finally, we discuss alterations in the BLA GABAergic system in neurodevelopmental (autism/fragile X syndrome) and neurodegenerative (Alzheimer's disease) diseases and after the development of epilepsy, anxiety, and traumatic brain injury. A more complete understanding of the intrinsic excitatory/inhibitory circuit balance of the amygdala and how imbalances in inhibitory control contribute to excessive BLA excitability will guide the development of novel therapeutic approaches in neuropsychiatric diseases. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Diurnal trends in responses of blood plasma concentrations of glucose, insulin, and C-peptide following high- and low-fat meals and their relation to fat metabolism in healthy middle-aged volunteers

An experiment was conducted in twelve healthy middle-aged volunteers, six of each sex, with a mean BMI of 27kg/m2 to detect differences between morning and afternoon in postprandial blood glucose, insulin and C-peptide concentrations. These responses were measured following the consumption of isoenergetic meals that were high or low in fat content, at breakfast and at lunch. Over 4d each subject received the high-carbohydrate (L, 5·5 g mixed fat/meal) and moderately high-fat (M, 33 g mixed fat/meal) breakfasts and lunches, in three combinations (LL, MM, LM), or they fasted at breakfast time and received a moderately high-fat lunch (NM), in three Latin squares. Each evening a standard meal was given. Plasma glucose, insulin and C-peptide responses were greater following L than M meals and within both MM and LL treatments insulin and C-peptide responses were greater following breakfast than following lunch. The incremental C-peptide response to a fatty lunch following a fast at breakfast time (NM) was similar to that to a fatty breakfast, but the incremental insulin response for the same comparison was marginally lower at lunch (P=0·06). The relationship of C-peptide and insulin concentrations was assessed. Plasma glucose response to a fatty lunch was increased by a fatty breakfast. The relationships of these metabolic events with fat metabolism are discussed.
The Development and Validation of the Employee Resilience Scale (EmpRes): The Conceptualisation of a New Model

The need for an employee-specific measure of resilience has directed the development of the Employee Resilience Scale (EmpRes). The conceptualisation of employee resilience in the present study describes an employee capacity that organisations can help develop through the provision of enabling factors. The EmpRes Scale was developed and tested in three samples, and was found to have adequate measurement properties. Findings from two organisational samples also revealed that employee resilience is significantly associated with learning culture, empowering leadership, job engagement, job satisfaction and intentions to turnover, and unrelated to employee participation and corporate communication. The research indicated that employee resilience has a mediating effect on the relationships between learning culture and job engagement and job satisfaction, and empowering leadership and job engagement, job satisfaction and intentions to turnover. The findings suggest that organisations enable their employees to be more resilient by creating a learning oriented culture and building empowering leadership, which in turn leads to better organisational outcomes. Although future research is required, the present study shows preliminary support for the psychometric properties of the scale as well as the conceptual model.
Clinical and Laboratory Investigations Age-related changes in skin wrinkles assessed by a novel three-dimensional morphometric analysis

Background A system has been developed whereby the morphology of the skin surface can be evaluated directly in three dimensions. This system employs a non-invasive device that utilizes white light of halogen origin, and which allows the computation of wrinkle depth and width, and other parameters of skin surface morphology. Using innovative engineering, an optical system has been devised so that light is transmitted via a slit and can be used to measure not only replicas of the skin but also the skin surface directly. The measurement area is 6Æ4 · 6Æ4 mm, and the theoretical resolution with a · 50 magnification lens is within 12Æ5 lm. Objectives To use this system to study age-related changes in the morphology of wrinkles at the eye corner areas of women of varying ages. Methods One hundred and one healthy women (age range 20–80 years) residing in the Tokyo area were the subjects used in this study. Results Wrinkles demonstrated a rapid increase in depth in women aged 40 years or older, and plateaued at the age of 60 years. Surface morphology parameters yielded results similar to those of age-related changes in wrinkles. Conclusions This new analytical system provides a rapid and convenient non-invasive method to evaluate skin surface morphology in three dimensions, especially with respect to wrinkle formation. The results obtained using this system provide a deeper insight into the mechanistic relationship between wrinkles and skin elasticity.
Isolation and characterization of plasma membranes from human leukemic lymphocytes.

Summary A method for the isolation of lymphocyte plasma membranes from patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia is described. Lymphocytes were disrupted in a hypotonic bicarbonate medium using a Dounce homogenizer. The plasma membranes fraction was finally collected from a continuous sucrose gradient at density 1.115 (g/ml). Electron micrographs of this material showed membranes and small dense vesicles of unidentified origin. The enrichment of this fraction in adenosine 5′-monophosphatase, Mg2+:Na+:K+:adenosine triphosphatase, and uridine diphosphatase, considered as plasma membrane markers, was, respectively, 43-, 23-, and 42-fold. The only noticeable contamination of plasma membranes was lysosomal material as attested by a 4.7-fold increase in β-glucuronidase specific activity. It was calculated, however, that lysosomes accounted for less than 10% in the plasma membrane fraction. The concentration of cholesterol and total phospholipids per mg of plasma membrane protein was, respectively, 185 and 965 µg, thus 10- and 6-fold higher than in the whole homogenate. The molar ratio of cholesterol to phospholipids was 0.38.
How important and how treatable is vascular stiffness as a cardiovascular risk factor in renal failure?

It is possible, with the increasing recognition and repetition of epidemiological data that provide compelling evidence for the appalling toll that cardiovascular (CV) pathology exerts on patients with advanced renal failure, to become both blasé and nihilistic. Dialysis patients aged 20–30 years have the same cardiovascular mortality (CVM) as non-diabetic non-uraemic subjects aged 70–80! Despite the known high prevalence of coronary artery disease in dialysis patients w1x, assessment of CV risk relying exclusively on ‘conventional’ CV risk factors incompletely explains these patents’ greatly increased mortality rates. Where Framingham CVM risk scores and actual CV events have been compared (in a renal transplant population) it appears that age, diabetes and smoking seem even more Correspondence and offprint requests to: Dr David J. A. Goldsmith, Consultant Nephrologist, Renal Unit, Guy’s Hospital, London SE1 9RT, UK. Email: david.goldsmith@kcl.ac. uk 965 Nephrol Dial Transplant (2002) 17: Editorial Comments