Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Journal of Agricultural & Food Industrial Organization Market Segmentation Analysis of Preferences for GM Derived Animal Foods in the UK

This paper undertakes a detailed market segmentation analysis of the demand for GM derived animal foods in the UK with the aim of illustrating how this analysis can provide distinct information that can assists in evaluating the welfare impacts of proposed changes to the EU's GM labelling policy. The specific modelling approach employed was the latent segment (LS) model which allows for the simultaneous determination and explanation of both segment membership and product choice. Based on psychometric and demographic variables as well as choice data, the LS model was able to identify three distinct and behaviourally consistent consumer segments. Further, the LS model was found to outperform alternative econometric approaches for accounting for preference heterogeneity. Finally, our analysis shows how it can yield distinct information over the segmented nature of the food market that can uniquely assist both European policy makers in designing GM labelling regimes and public awareness campaigns as well as the agricultural and food industry in developing pricing, marketing and new product development strategies.
Intersectoral Spillovers, Relative Prices and Development Traps

Why is the economic growth rate so low in poor countries? This paper offers an explanation by using a simple two‐sector AK growth model with intersectoral linkages and high relative prices of intermediate goods. Intersectoral linkages lead to two balanced growth paths (BGPs). The high‐growth BGP is a source. The low‐growth BGP is a sink because it has a small final goods sector, small intersectoral spillovers from the final goods sector to the intermediate goods sector, and small marginal products in the intermediate goods sector, yielding high relative prices of intermediate goods. The low‐growth BGP is an attractor and thus development trap. To produce a big push effect, this paper analyzes the first‐best policy and finds that a subsidy to own consumption and a provision of public goods to the final goods sector can internalize the external effect and render the low‐growth BGP infeasible. As a result, there is only the high‐growth BGP.
Empirical Determinants of Emerging Market Economies' Sovereign Bond Spreads

In this paper the empirical determinants of emerging market sovereign bond spreads are estimated, using a ragged-edge panel of JP Morgan EMBI and EMBI Global secondary market spreads and a set of common macro-prudential indicators. The panel is estimated using the pooled mean group technique of Pesaran, Shin and Smith. This is essentially a dynamic error correction model where cross-sectional coefficients are allowed to vary in the short run but are required to be homogeneous in the long run. It allows a separation of short-run dynamics and adjustment towards the equilibrium. The model is used to benchmark market spreads and assess whether sovereign risk was overpriced or underpriced during different periods over the past decade. The results suggest that a debtor country's fundamentals and external liquidity conditions are important determinants of market spreads. However, the diagnostic statistics also indicate that the market assessment of a country's creditworthiness is more broad based than that provided by the set of fundamentals included in the model. It is found that the generalised fall in sovereign spreads seen between 1995 and 1997 cannot be entirely explained in terms of improved fundamentals.
Modelling effectiveness-equity trade-offs in public service delivery systems

Distributional equity is a particularly salient objective in public sector decision making, in general, and decision making concerning the delivery of public services such as education, libraries, sanitation, and public safety, in particular. In this paper two related bicriteria mathematical programming models are developed for identifying the trade-offs between overall output effectiveness and equity that result from alternative allocations of service resources among different service delivery sites branches. The models developed here incorporate equity in a more satisfactory manner than have previous efforts. An illustrative application of the models to the allocation of new books among the branches of a public library system is presented.
Can sustainable development be achieved if geology is ignored

“Sustainable development” implies that a stable relationship between human activities and the natural world is possible such that the prospects of future generations do not diminish. Can this really be achieved in our urban centres where social and economic issues are often the driving force behind development? Geoscience information has traditionally been under-utilised in planning and development, because all too often its relevance and significance is misunderstood or underappreciated. However, this is starting to change. Using case studies from London and the Thames Gateway Development Zone, this paper discusses how technological developments, such as improvements in GIS technologies and 3D modelling software, are driving this turnaround. The paper also considers the impact of organisations not sharing ground investigation geodata and know-ledge about anomalous ground conditions across London, the huge benefits that data sharing can offer and how lessons learned in this study can be applied to other urban centres. The paper will show that within the environmental ecosystem, if one component part is misunderstood, then developing sustainably without compromising future needs will be difficult, if not impossible, to achieve. In London, difficult ground conditions cost developer's time and money through project overruns and expensive engineering solutions. A more sustainable solution is in improving our understanding of the relationship between the geology (lithology) and its properties (physical, chemical or hydrological characteristics). We will show that for the urban underground to be fully utilised throughout Europe, the lack of development policies for the subsurface needs to be addressed. For a subsurface development policy to be written, stakeholders will need to regard the urban underground as environmentally sensitive, just as it does for the surface.
Effect of cleidocranial dysplasia‐related novel mutation of RUNX2 on characteristics of dental pulp cells and tooth development

Cleidocranial dysplasia (CCD) is an autosomal‐dominant disorder caused by a lack of function of one or more alleles of the RUNX2 gene. Mutations of the RUNX2 gene were analyzed in a family with CCD, and a novel nonsense mutation was identified, c. 1096G > T, p.E366X, which was predicted to cause a number of potential dysfunctions. Western blot analysis showed that the novel mutation created a shortened protein product, which lost 155 aa in the C‐terminal domain. The mutant protein was detected to be localized mostly in the cytoplasm, not in the nucleus, which demonstrated that transport of the RUNX2 protein into the nucleus was disturbed by the p.E366X mutation. For the first time, RUNX2+/m dental pulp cells (DPCs) were isolated from two permanent incisors of the CCD patient. Compared to RUNX2+/+ controls, RUNX2+/m DPCs presented an impeded progression from the G1 to the S phase in the cell cycle, a lower rate of proliferation, weaker ability of calcification, and distinct ultrastructure. More interestingly, the ultrastructural analysis and energy dispersive X‐ray spectrometry (EDS) analysis showed that the CCD tooth exhibited insufficient mineralization of enamel and dentin. This study suggests that the truncated RUNX2 mutant protein may be responsible for the alterations of RUNX2+/m DPCs, and RUNX2 gene may be involved in dental development by affecting the cell growth and differentiation, which provides new insights into understanding of dental abnormalities in CCD patients. J. Cell. Biochem. 111: 1473–1481, 2010. © 2010 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Rapid diagnosis of tuberculosis in various biopsy and body fluid specimens by the AMPLICOR Mycobacterium tuberculosis polymerase chain reaction test.

STUDY OBJECTIVES This study was undertaken to determine the usefulness of the AMPLICOR Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test (Roche Diagnostic Systems, Inc; Branchburg, NJ) in diagnosing TB in tissue and body fluid specimens other than respiratory secretions. DESIGN AND SETTING Prospective analysis of clinical and laboratory data in patients with suspected TB at the four divisional hospitals of Catholic Medical Center, located in New York. PATIENTS AND MEASUREMENTS A total of 1,090 tissue and body fluid specimens from 1,032 patients with suspected TB were subjected to acid-fast bacillus (AFB) smear, culture, and the AMPLICOR MTB PCR test. RESULTS Of the 1,090 specimens, 32 grew M tuberculosis complex and 8 specimens grew isolates belonging to the Mycobacterium avium complex (MAC). The AMPLICOR MTB PCR test was positive for 24 of the 32 specimens that grew M tuberculosis. It was also positive for four additional specimens that were culture-negative for M tuberculosis or MAC. Two of these specimens were from patients with a previously recorded positive sputum culture for M tuberculosis. The AMPLICOR test was negative for all eight specimens that yielded MAC only. When AMPLICOR MTB PCR test results were compared with the confirmed clinical diagnosis of TB, the sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, and negative predictive value for the AMPLICOR MTB PCR test were 76.4%, 99.8%, 92.8%, and 99.2%, respectively. PCR results were available within 6.5 hours, compared with an average of 3 weeks for culture of M tuberculosis. CONCLUSIONS These data establish the utility of the AMPLICOR MTB PCR test for the rapid detection of M tuberculosis in tissue and body fluid specimens other than respiratory secretions.
Modeling the Impact of Diversity Management

Public management research on diversity suffers from a lack of coherence and little theory building. There have been few attempts to establish a comprehensive theoretical framework through which streams of research can unite and better inform public managers—rather, issues of recruitment, management, and cultural values are pursued as wholly separate areas of inquiry. This article critically evaluates the current ways in which public management research addresses the diversity issue and proposes a new comprehensive model for research. The model is based on three functions of diversity management: recruiting and outreach, building cultural awareness, and promoting pragmatic management policy. These functions are linked to organizational performance through a series of intermediate steps, and the resulting model for quantitative analysis is specified.
Fertility, the Demographic Dividend, and Economic Growth 1

We exploit differential timing of abortion legalization across countries between 1960 and 2005 to estimate the effect of changes in fertility on income, finding that reducing fertility by one child per women increases income per capita by about 20%. We estimate that most of the income gain is due to an increase in the number of workers per capita, because of a lower youth dependency ratio, and higher female labor force participation. We also find that reductions in fertility lead to increased investment in education and slower population growth, but little evidence of higher physical capital intensity or worker productivity.
Complete Markets, Informed Trading and Equity Option Introductions

This paper proposes and tests a new hypothesis concerning the price impact of option introductions on the underlying asset. We argue that the leverage properties of options induce a higher level of informed trading in the aggregate market (underlying plus derivative), resulting in excess listing-day price movements in the newly optioned equity. Using an alternative dataset, our results suggest that this may be an explanation for the observed positive than negative excess listing-day returns of US optioned stocks over the past thirty years.
Regulation of Immature Dendritic Cell Migration by RhoA Guanine Nucleotide Exchange Factor Arhgef5*

There are a large number of Rho guanine nucleotide exchange factors, most of which have no known functions. Here, we carried out a short hairpin RNA-based functional screen of Rho-GEFs for their roles in leukocyte chemotaxis and identified Arhgef5 as an important factor in chemotaxis of a macrophage phage-like RAW264.7 cell line. Arhgef5 can strongly activate RhoA and RhoB and weakly RhoC and RhoG, but not Rac1, RhoQ, RhoD, or RhoV, in transfected human embryonic kidney 293 cells. In addition, Gβγ interacts with Arhgef5 and can stimulate Arhgef5-mediated activation of RhoA in an in vitro assay. In vivo roles of Arhgef5 were investigated using an Arhgef-5-null mouse line. Arhgef5 deficiency did not affect chemotaxis of mouse macrophages, T and B lymphocytes, and bone marrow-derived mature dendritic cells (DC), but it abrogated MIP1α-induced chemotaxis of immature DCs and impaired migration of DCs from the skin to lymph node. In addition, Arhgef5 deficiency attenuated allergic airway inflammation. Therefore, this study provides new insights into signaling mechanisms for DC migration regulation.
Risk, Uncertainty and China's Exports

Both theoretical and empirical models were developed in this paper to examine how exporters' response to real exchange rate volatility (RERV) and real exchange rate misalignment (RERM) varies across industries in China. The theoretical model indicates that the impact of RERV depends on exporters' attitude to risk while the effect of RERM is ambiguous. Using disaggregated industry data, Chinese exporters were found to be averse to RERV and RERM. This suggests that the negative impact on China's exports resulting from a revaluation of the RMB will be mitigated by a positive impact due to the reduction of RERM. Copyright Blackwell Publishing Ltd/University of Adelaide and Flinders University 2006.
Creativity and Schizotypal Traits Creativity Test Scores and Perceptual Aberration, Magical Ideation, and Impulsive Nonconformity

Using a nonclinical and noneminent population, this study demonstrates an overlap in creative and schizotypal traits in the areas of perceptual functioning, behavioral and personality styles, and interests. No such overlap is observed in the area of divergent thinking. A battery containing five creativity measures was administered to a group of college student subjects scoring high on either the Perceptual Aberration Scale or the Magical Ideation Scale (N=52) and to a group of control subjects (N=65). A multivariate analysis of variance indicated that subjects high on the schizotypal traits of Perceptual Aberration or Magical Ideation (Per-Mag subjects) differed significantly from control subjects on the five creativity tests. Per-Mag subjects scored significantly higher than control subjects on the Barron-Welsh Revised Art Scale, a measure of preferences for figures, and the How Do You Think, a biographical and personality measure. There was a tendency for female Per- Mag subjects to score higher than female control subjects on the Domino Creativity Scale of the Adjective Check List. Per-Mag and control subjects did not differ on the Gough Creative Personality Scale of the Adjective Check List or on the Alternate Uses test, a test of divergent thinking. Per-Mag subjects who scored above the median for their group and gender on the Impulsive Nonconformity Scale received the highest creativity scores on the Barron-Welsh Revised Art Scale and the How Do You Think, although these results only approached significance. These findings argue for the specificity of areas of similarity and difference in schizotypy and creativity.
The physiological basis of the effects of intermittent theta burst stimulation of the human motor cortex

Theta burst stimulation (TBS) is a form of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). When applied to motor cortex it leads to after‐effects on corticospinal and corticocortical excitability that may reflect LTP/LTD‐like synaptic effects. An inhibitory form of TBS (continuous, cTBS) suppresses MEPs, and spinal epidural recordings show this is due to suppression of the I1 volley evoked by TMS. Here we investigate whether the excitatory form of TBS (intermittent, iTBS) affects the same I‐wave circuitry. We recorded corticospinal volleys evoked by single pulse TMS of the motor cortex before and after iTBS in three conscious patients who had an electrode implanted in the cervical epidural space for the control of pain. As in healthy subjects, iTBS increased MEPs, and this was accompanied by a significant increase in the amplitude of later I‐waves, but not the I1 wave. In two of the patients we tested the excitability of the contralateral cortex and found a significant suppression of the late I‐waves. The extent of the changes varied between the three patients, as did their age. To investigate whether age might be a significant contributor to the variability we examined the effect of iTBS on MEPs in 18 healthy subjects. iTBS facilitated MEPs evoked by TMS of the conditioned hemisphere and suppressed MEPs evoked by stimulation of the contralateral hemisphere. There was a slight but non‐significant decline in MEP facilitation with age, suggesting that interindividual variability was more important than age in explaining our data. In a subgroup of 10 subjects we found that iTBS had no effect on the duration of the ipsilateral silent period suggesting that the reduction in contralateral MEPs was not due to an increase in ongoing transcallosal inhibition. In conclusion, iTBS affects the excitability of excitatory synaptic inputs to pyramidal tract neurones that are recruited by a TMS pulse, both in the stimulated hemisphere and in the contralateral hemisphere. However the circuits affected differ from those influenced by the inhibitory, cTBS, protocol. The implication is that cTBS and iTBS may have different therapeutic targets.
Desigualdade no Brasil: um estudo sobre convergência de renda

Brazil is internationally known by its deep regional income disparity. The objective of this paper is to identify the determinants of the federative units per capita income growth and to verify if there are indications of conditional convergence of the per capita income growth rate. The analysis was based on panel data about all the federative units in the periodo of the 1995-2002, and the presence of heterogeneity was considered by using Fixed Effects Model. The results indicate evidences of the existence of conditional convergence of the per capita income growth rate. Moreover, the banking credit and the government investment are determinants of the federative unit per capital income growth.
Pricing, Dynamics, and Determinants of Illiquidity Risks: International Evidence

We estimate conditional LCAPM illiquidity risks for common stocks in emerging and developed markets. We find that illiquidity risks are determined by local factors for both markets and are more strongly priced in emerging markets. Illiquidity risks exhibit no time trend and experienced an increase during the recent financial crisis that is not completely reversed a year after. Finally, we explore the determinants of illiquidity risks and find that business cycle determinants have similar explanatory ability in both sets of markets, while the effect of monetary policy and liquidity funding is more strongly supported in developed and emerging markets, respectively.
The Effects of Internal Audit Structure on Perceived Financial Statement Fraud Prevention

This study examines whether internal audit reporting structure and internal audit sourcing arrangement affect financial statement users' perceptions of ability of the internal audit function to prevent financial statement fraud. A survey of lending officers finds that in‐house internal audit departments that report to senior management are perceived as less able to provide protection against fraudulent reporting compared to in‐house departments that report solely to the board of directors' audit committee. This finding is particularly important in light of the SEC's recent consideration of whether the audit committee should be directly responsible for oversight of the internal auditor. This study does not find a difference in users' perceptions of financial statement fraud prevention between outsourced internal audit teams and in‐house internal audit departments when both report to the audit committee. Results suggest that increases in perceived audit expertise may occur with outsourcing, but such increas.
Features of the Hidden Economy in the Netherlands

This paper presents survey results on the size and structure of the hidden labour market in The Netherlands. According to the results total income from hidden work is at least 1 percent of national income. The hidden income is shared by more than one million participants (nearly 12 percent of the corresponding population). This result is lower than various other estimates of the magnitude of the hidden economy. Some definitional and methodological issues are discussed in order to explain the difference from the other estimates. The most notable results of the survey refer to the structure of the hidden labour market. At one end of this market are people with a high wage rate, working relatively few hours. They have the characteristics which given them a favourable position in the formal labour market. At the other end are people with low hidden wages, who work more hours. They have difficulty in finding a formal job. The income from hidden labour is distributed in very much the same way as income from formal activities. There is no evidence that the hidden labour market compensates those who are worse off in the formal economy.
Exchange Rates and Prices: Sources of Sterling Real Exchange Rate Fluctuations, 1973-94

This paper attempts to identify the sources of UK exchange rate and relative consumer price fluctuations between 1973 and 1994. We follow Clarida and Gali (1994) in using the Blanchard and Quah (1989) structural VAR (SVAR) method to identify the effects of three structural shocks within a Dornbusch (1976)/Obstfeld (1995) model. We find that IS shocks underlay the majority of the variance of sterling real and nominal exchange rates. Aggregate supply (AS) shocks were the second most important source of such variations, while LM shocks played an extremely limited role. In contrast, the variance of UK relative consumer prices was primarily attributed to LM shocks. Combining those results with the estimated impulse response functions indicates that the sterling exchange rate depreciations over the floating rate period were largely associated with falls in UK relative consumer prices. But it would be inappropriate for policy-makers to base any future policy response to sterling fluctuations on that finding because: (a) the Lucas critique applies to it; and (b) it represents the average dynamic interaction over the sample period. We also find that: (i) the estimated impulse responses following each of the shocks are highly theory-consistent; and (ii) the periods in which the SVARs suggest that particular shocks were especially important can be linked to observed macroeconomic developments. both those findings indicate that the SVAR representations of the data have a high economic content.