Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Effects on Children’s Anxiety and Quality of Life of a Psychoeducational Program for Families Living With Parental Cancer and Their Network: A Randomized Controlled Trial Study

Background: Families living with parental cancer report lack of social support. The Cancer PEPSONE Program (CPP) was developed to bridge the gap between the families and their network. Objective: The aims of this study were to study the effect of the CPP on children’s anxiety and quality of life (QOL) and examine the association between the CPP’s effect on their well parents’ received social support, QOL, and psychological distress and the children’s anxiety and QOL. Methods: The CPP, a psychoeducational program for the families and their social network, was evaluated using a randomized controlled trial design. The children and their well parents completed questionnaires measuring QOL, psychological distress, and social support at baseline and after 3 and 6 months. Results: Thirty-five families were enrolled (18 intervention, 17 controls). The CPP stabilized the children’s family function, although the family function largely (d = 0.86) decreased in the control group (P = .018). No significant effects were found on anxiety, overall QOL, or QOL subdimensions. Significant correlations were documented between the children’s levels of anxiety and the well parents’ received social support (r = −0.196, P < .001), QOL (r = −0.138, P < .05), and psychological distress (r = 0.166, P < .05). Conclusions: The CPP seems to stabilize the children's perceived family function but did not target the other outcomes. Further studies with larger samples are needed. Implications for Clinical Practice: Optimizing social network for families living with parental cancer may support the family’s function. Actions should be initiated to increase the well parents’ social support, QOL, and psychological distress, which may also benefit the children.
COLORECTAL CANCER IN THE ELDERLY. IS THERE A ROLE FOR SAFE AND CURATIVE SURGERY?

Background: Recent reports place colorectal cancer (CRC) as the third most common cancer for both sexes. Elderly patients are often viewed as high‐risk surgical candidates with high rates of emergency presentations and perioperative mortality. The aim of our study was to examine the characteristics and perioperative morbidity and mortality rates of elderly patients presented to CRC surgery.
Sensitive and Rapid Quantitative Detection of Anthrax Spores Isolated from Soil Samples by Real‐Time PCR

Quantitative analysis of anthrax spores from environmental samples is essential for accurate detection and risk assessment since Bacillus anthracis spores have been shown to be one of the most effective biological weapons. Using TaqMan real‐time PCR, specific primers and probes were designed for the identification of pathogenic B. anthracis strains from pag gene and cap gene on two plasmids, pXO1 and pXO2, as well as a sap gene encoded on the S‐layer. To select the appropriate lysis method of anthrax spore from environmental samples, several heat treatments and germination methods were evaluated with multiplex‐PCR. Among them, heat treatment of samples suspended with sucrose plus non‐ionic detergent was considered an effective spore disruption method because it detected up to 105 spores/g soil by multiplex‐PCR. Serial dilutions of B. anthracis DNA and spore were detected up to a level of 0.1 ng/μl and 10 spores/ml, respectively, at the correlation coefficient of 0.99 by real‐time PCR. Quantitative analysis of anthrax spore could be obtained from the comparison between CT value and serial dilutions of soil sample at the correlation coefficient of 0.99. Additionally, spores added to soil samples were detected up to 104 spores/g soil within 3 hr by real‐time PCR. As a consequence, we established a rapid and accurate detection system for environmental anthrax spores using real‐time PCR, avoiding time and labor‐consuming preparation steps such as enrichment culturing and DNA preparation.
Literacy Development in A Multilingual Context : Cross-cultural Perspectives

Contents: L. Verhoeven, A.Y. Durgunoglu, Introduction: Perspectives on Literacy Development in Multilingual Contexts. Part I:Anthropological Perspective: The Individual and Society. S.M. Pugh, Minority L1 Literacy in Sweden and Karelia: Challenges and Strategies. V.J. Baker, Literacy in Developing Societies: Native Language Versus National Language Literacy. M. Martin-Jones, A. Bhatt, Literacies in the Lives of Young Gujarati-Speakers in Leicester. J. Hardman, Literacy and Bilingualism in a Cambodian Community in the USA. Part II:Psychological Perspective: The Development of the Individual. E. Geva, L. Wade-Woolley, Component Processes in Becoming English-Hebrew Biliterate. L. Verhoeven, R. Aarts, Attaining Functional Biliteracy in the Netherlands. A.Y. Durgunoglu.Acquiring Literacy in English and Spanish in the United States. A. Hvenekilde, Literacy Training for Linguistic Minorities in Norway. Part III:Educational Perspective: The Individual and Schooling. D.A. Wagner, Putting Second Language First: Language and Literacy Learning in Morocco. J.N. Jorgensen, B.S. Kristjansdottir, Acquisition of Literacy in Multilingual Contexts in Danish Schools. S. Boyd, G. Arvidsson, The Acquisition of Literacy by Immigrant Children in Sweden. I. Taylor, Learning to Read in Chinese, Korean, and Japanese. I. Farah, Sabaq: Context of Learning Literacy for Girls in Rural Pakistan. L. Tolchinsky, Early Writing Acquisition in Catalan and Israeli Communities. A.Y. Durgunoglu, L. Verhoeven, Epilogue: Multilingualism and Literacy Development Across Different Cultures.
Polypyrimidine Tract Binding Protein Homologs from Arabidopsis Are Key Regulators of Alternative Splicing with Implications in Fundamental Developmental Processes[W]

Alternative precursor mRNA splicing massively expands the transcriptome diversity in higher eukaryotes. In this report, we describe Arabidopsis Polypyrimidine tract binding protein homologs as critical components of the plant splicing code and provide links between regulated alternative splicing events and seed germination as well as flowering time control. Alternative splicing (AS) generates transcript variants by variable exon/intron definition and massively expands transcriptome diversity. Changes in AS patterns have been found to be linked to manifold biological processes, yet fundamental aspects, such as the regulation of AS and its functional implications, largely remain to be addressed. In this work, widespread AS regulation by Arabidopsis thaliana Polypyrimidine tract binding protein homologs (PTBs) was revealed. In total, 452 AS events derived from 307 distinct genes were found to be responsive to the levels of the splicing factors PTB1 and PTB2, which predominantly triggered splicing of regulated introns, inclusion of cassette exons, and usage of upstream 5′ splice sites. By contrast, no major AS regulatory function of the distantly related PTB3 was found. Dependent on their position within the mRNA, PTB-regulated events can both modify the untranslated regions and give rise to alternative protein products. We find that PTB-mediated AS events are connected to diverse biological processes, and the functional implications of selected instances were further elucidated. Specifically, PTB misexpression changes AS of PHYTOCHROME INTERACTING FACTOR6, coinciding with altered rates of abscisic acid–dependent seed germination. Furthermore, AS patterns as well as the expression of key flowering regulators were massively changed in a PTB1/2 level-dependent manner.
Protective role of luteolin in 1,2‐dimethylhydrazine induced experimental colon carcinogenesis

The aim of the present study was to unravel the chemopreventive effect of luteolin on bacterial enzymes such as β‐glucuronidase and mucinase in a colon carcinogenesis model induced by 1, 2–dimethyl hydrazine (DMH). Twenty mg/kg body weight of DMH were administered subcutaneously once a week for the first 15 weeks and then discontinued. Luteolin (0.1, 0.2, or 0.3 mg/kg body weight/everyday (p.o.) was administered in a dose dependent manner at the initiation and also at the post‐initiation stages of carcinogenesis to DMH treated rats. The animals were sacrificed at the end of 30 weeks. Colon cancer incidence and the activities of bacterial enzymes β‐glucuronidase (in the proximal colon, distal colon, intestines, liver and colon contents) and mucinase (colon and fecal contents) were significantly increased in DMH ‐treated rats compared to the control rats. On luteolin administration, colon cancer incidence, number of tumors per rat and the activities of β‐glucuronidase and mucinase, were significantly decreased both in the initiation and post‐initiation stages of colon carcinogenesis dependent on the three different doses given. The increase in β‐glucuronidase activity may augment the hydrolysis of glucuronide conjugates, liberating toxins, while the increase in the mucinase activity may enhance the hydrolysis of the protective mucins in the colon. Thus our results demonstrate for the first time that luteolin, a dietary flavonoid, exerts chemopreventive and anticarcinogenic effects against DMH induced colon cancer. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Global Measures of Information Service Quality: A Cross‐National Study

Maintaining consistently high quality information services (IS) is a powerful means of increasing the overall efficiency and effectiveness of a global enterprise. This study introduces a global Information Services Function (ISF) Quality Framework that outlines the importance of both behavioral and procedural dimensions in planning, implementing and evaluating global IS quality. Based on this framework, the study investigates the cross-national psychometric properties of a behavioral measure of service quality in the IS context. Using a cross-national survey of IS customers from Korea, Hong Kong, the United States and the Netherlands, perceived ISF service quality was measured using a service quality measure (SERVQUAL) to determine cultural affects. Based on confirmatory factor analysis, support was found for four of the original five SERVQUAL quality dimensions in the U.S.A. and the Netherlands. However, the same four-dimensional measurement model did not fit the Hong Kong and Korean samples. Further factor analysis showed that the Hong Kong and Korean samples shared a somewhat similar factor structure that differs from the shared U.S.A. and Netherlands structure. These findings support previous research that has found an “Asian factor'’with differing definitions of IS Service quality. These findings suggest that the feasibility of standardized global ISF measurement depends heavily on the relative magnitude of cultural effects. Rather than merely applying the U.S.A. ISF/SERVQUAL measure, a localized version of the instrument may need to be developed that captures the unique nature of ISF service perceptions in internationally based subsidiaries or companies.
Complexity of Restricted Variants of Skolem and Related Problems

Given a linear recurrence sequence (LRS), the Skolem problem, asks whether it ever becomes zero. The decidability of this problem has been open for several decades. Currently decidability is known only for LRS of order upto 4. For arbitrary orders (i.e., number of terms the n-th depends on), the only known complexity result is NP-hardness by a result of Blondel and Portier from 2002. In this paper, we give a different proof of this hardness result, which is arguably simpler and pinpoints the source of hardness. To demonstrate this, we identify a subclass of LRS for which the Skolem problem is in fact NP-complete. We show the generic nature of our lower-bound technique by adapting it to show stronger lower bounds of a related problem that encompasses many known decision problems on linear recurrent sequences.
Partner Choice and Women's Paid Work in Sweden - The Role of Earnings

Recent observations of higher labour -market activity among women with a high-earning spouse and widened household inequality have spurred research interest in earnings homogamy and in effects of own and spouse’s earnings on female labour supply. This article studies trends in earnings homogamy among married and cohabiting parents and in effects of own and spouse’s earnings on mothers’ time in employment and non-employment in Sweden. We analyse, first, correlations between spouses’ earnings and, second, effects of time -varying own and spouse’s earnings on mothers’ transitions between part-time and full-time work, on their exits from and re-entries into employment and on their exits from parental leave over the years 1968-92. We use individual life histories from the 1992 Swedish Family Survey combined with longitudinal information on earnings from the national taxation register. A unique aspect of this data set is that it has very accurate longitudinal earnings information for both married and cohabiting spouses, including former spouses. We find that mothers’ own earnings have a larger and more significant impact on their labour -market transitions than spouse’s earnings and that the impact of the latter has even declined over time.
Physical-Layer Security in Wireless Communication Systems

The use of wireless networks has grown significantly in contemporary times, and continues to develop further. The broadcast nature of wireless communications, however, makes them particularly vulnerable to eavesdropping. Unlike traditional solutions, which usually handle security at the application layer, the primary concern of this dissertation is to analyze and develop solutions based on coding techniques at the physical-layer. First, in chapter 2, we consider a scenario where a source node wishes to broadcast two confidential messages to two receivers, while a wire-tapper also receives the transmitted signal. This model is motivated by wireless communications, where individual secure messages are broadcast over open media and can be received by any illegitimate receiver. The secrecy level is measured by the equivocation rate at the eavesdropper. We first study the general (non-degraded) broadcast channel with an eavesdropper, and present an inner bound on the secrecy capacity region for this model. This inner bound is based on a combination of random binning, and the Gelfand-Pinsker binning. We further study the situation in which the channels are degraded. For the degraded broadcast channel with an eavesdropper, we present the secrecy capacity region. Our achievable coding scheme is based on Cover’s superposition scheme and random binning. We refer to this scheme as the Secret Superposition Scheme. Our converse proof is based on a combination of the converse proof of the conventional degraded broadcast channel and Csiszar Lemma. We then assume that the channels are Additive White Gaussian Noise and show that the Secret Superposition Scheme with Gaussian codebook is optimal. The converse proof is based on Costa’s entropy power inequality. Finally, we use a broadcast strategy for the slowly fading wire-tap channel when only the eavesdropper’s channel is fixed and known at the transmitter. We derive the optimum power allocation for the coding layers, which maximizes the total average rate. Second, in chapter 3 , we consider the Multiple-Input-Multiple-Output (MIMO) scenario of a broadcast channel where a wiretapper also receives the transmitted signal via another MIMO channel. First, we assume that the channels are degraded and the wiretapper has the worst channel. We establish the capacity region of this scenario. Our achievability scheme is the Secret Superposition Coding. For the outerbound, we use notion of the enhanced
Interrelationship among institutional infrastructure, technological innovation and growth. An empirical evidence

This paper uses a multi-equation model to achieve an overall study of two key factors which explain growth, technology and institutions. The paper focuses on the process of the accumulation of these factors and the interrelationship arising among them. A theoretical model is given, together with empirical evidence for the joint impact of these factors on economic growth in a wide-ranging sample of countries between 1985 and 1997. This paper also contributes certain novel aspects in the variables employed. Thus, an indicator of human capital and an index reflecting institutional infrastructure have been used. The human capital indicator considers health, formal education, informal education and accumulated experience. It embraces a wider range of factors than the variables conventionally used in empirical studies. As to the institutional infrastructure index, it has been constructed on the basis of six institutional sub-indices, comprising voice and accountability, political stability, government effectiveness, regulatory quality, rule of law and control of corruption. Thus, the index constructed captures a greater wealth of the items commonly covered by the concept of institutions.
Intestinal effects of long‐lasting spermine ingestion by suckling rats

Spermine ingestion induces the precocious maturation of the small intestine in suckling rats. Previous observations suggest that spermine‐induced intestinal maturation is a two‐step phenomenon. The first step is the elimination of immature enterocytes (4–10 h post spermine ingestion) and the second step is the replacement of previous immature cells by adult‐type enterocytes (2–3 days post initial spermine administration). The spermine‐induced maturation is reversible when spermine administration is stopped. This work was undertaken in order to check whether the extension of polyamine administration (for 3–7 days) after the appearance of spermine‐induced maturation can retain the mature state of the small intestine. Our results indicate that extension of spermine administration does not prevent some parameters (sucrase and maltase specific activities) reverting to a typical ‘immature’ value while others remain at a typical ‘mature’ level (mucosal weight and lactase specific activity). Our results show that there are at least two different mechanisms in required for the control of spermine‐induced maturation of the small intestine.
Sea-floor characterization related to object-detection performance of sonar systems: A case study

In this study, we use lacunarity maps in order to predict the influence of seafloor characteristics in the object-detection performance of high resolution imagery sonar systems. Three different synthetic aperture sonar (SAS) systems have been used to collect acoustic data. They will be referred as SAS1, SAS2 and SAS3 to avoid drawing a comparison. A test area on the Belgian Continental Shelf, between the Thorton bank and the Goote Bank, is selected based on the long term stability of its physical characteristics. Different objects (exercise-mines and friendly-objects) have been deployed in this area and acoustic data are collected during object-detection trails. Results demonstrate a relation between the difficulty of detecting a target and the environmental parameters, in accordance with other analysis presented in the literature.
Mediterranean Conference on Information Systems ( MCIS ) 9-2010 FROM IT ASSETS TO BUSINESS AND ECONOMIC VALUE

This study conceptually develops a Business Value if IT (BVIT) model, conjointly and innovatively using four theoretical frameworks, the Resource-Based View(RBV) of the firm, Knowledge-Based View (KBV), Contingency theory, and the Strategic Alignment Model. The developed model proposes that IT-enabled knowledge and communication capabilities, which actually create IT-enabled economic value (EVIT), can be driven by organizational strategy and resources via their impact on IT strategy and resources. The study contributes to the extant body of knowledge by developing three new IT-driven business value constructs: Know-Tech, Com-Tech, and EVIT along with theoretical grounding and implications about empirical measurements. It is thus suggested that IT-enabled knowledge and communication capabilities mediate the effects of organizational and IT strategies and resources on EVIT, thereby illustrating the paths that lead from IT components to IT-embedded capabilities and to EVIT. The model implies that IT matters in modern knowledge-based turbulent and dynamic competitive environments by contributing to the acquisition of organizational IT-Embedded knowledge and communication capabilities that can drive sustainable economic value. The proposed model also shows the paths by which IT contributes to eventual organizational economic gains albeit indirectly through deeply embedded, inimitable, dynamic and valuable organizational knowledge and communication capabilities. This research paves the way to an empirical investigation of 'ITEmbeddedness' as recently called for by scholars.
Families in Europe

Analysing data from the European Social Survey, in this article we try to capture the main features of European families. Accounting for the changing trends of the past 40 years in family arrangements, practices and values, we also discuss some theoretical and methodological issues raised by the exercise of comparing countries. General configurations like family size, composition of the household, living arrangements and marital status are identified and analysed by clustering European countries. The insertion of men and women in the labour market, fertility rates and hours of work of parents are another central focus of discussion. Our results tend to contradict some stereotypes. The majority of Europeans are formally married or living together, conjugal disruption is transitory for the divorced and the separated tend to return to conjugality. With modern ideals, family is, for all European countries and with very similar averages, the most valued dimension of personal life.
When Do Accounting Earnings Matter More than Economic Earnings? Evidence from Hedge Accounting Restatements

This study examines behavior following a change in accounting treatment for derivative hedges due to the misapplication of hedge accounting. I examine firms faced with the following choice; one, maintain stability in economic earnings but increase the volatility of accounting earnings or two, maintain stability in accounting earnings but increase the volatility in economic earnings. I find that firms historic abilities to meet earnings targets are positively associated with the likelihood that firms will focus on accounting earnings rather than economic earnings. Results provide evidence of a change in management behavior following a change in accounting method.
Psychosocial and physical risk factors for musculoskeletal disorders of the neck, shoulders, and lower back in salespeople.

OBJECTIVES: To analyse the association between symptoms from the musculoskeletal system and many psychosocial and other physical stressors in the job demand-control-support model. Also to analyse the influence of personality characteristics. METHODS: 1306 salespeople answered a self administered questionnaire on job characteristics, exposures, personality characteristics, social network, smoking and drinking habits, and symptoms of the neck, shoulders, and low back. RESULTS: In multivariate analyses, high job demands were related to neck and shoulder symptoms (ORs 1.43-1.47 in the highest exposure groups compared with the lowest), and tendency to become overworked and lack of social support from colleagues were related to back pain (OR 1.81-2.04 in the highest exposure groups compared with the lowest). Lack of variation in the job, low control over time, and high competition were related to neck symptoms, but there was an interaction so that both low control over time and high competition had to be present to increase the OR. Also, driving long distances and sedentary work were related to neck and low back pain, and time spent in the car to shoulder pain (ORs 1.64-2.80 in the three highest groups v the lowest exposure groups). CONCLUSION: Both psychosocial and physical factors were associated with musculoskeletal symptoms. Many dimensions of the demand-control-support model were associated with symptoms. Only one personality characteristic, tendency to feel overworked, significantly influenced the prevalence of musculoskeletal symptoms.