Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Competitor identification, perceived environmental uncertainty, and firm performance

To create a competitive advantage and generate superior performance, firms must first identify rivals. However, there is little understanding of how perceived environmental uncertainty affects competitor identification, why some firms are better at identifying domestic versus foreign rivals, or how competitor identification is related to firm performance. In this paper we theorize that perceived environmental uncertainty is an important antecedent of competitor identification; it influences how many competitors a firm identifies. Our theory also suggests that different firm characteristics influence domestic/foreign competitor identification and that there is an inverted-U shaped relationship between under/overidentification of competitors and firm performance. Based on a large sample of Taiwanese firms, we find support for each of these ideas. Our study helps reinforce the importance of competitor identification for firm success. Copyright © 2015 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Resume Pour se creer un avantage concurrentiel et realiser une performance superieure, les firmes doivent d'abord identifier leurs concurrents. Cependant, la maniere dont l'incertitude environnementale percue influence l'identification des concurrents, les raisons pour lesquelles certaines firmes excellent dans l'identification des concurrents nationaux par opposition aux concurrents etrangers et la relation entre l'identification des concurrents et la performance de la firme restent peu connues. Dans cet article, nous soutenons la these que l'incertitude environnementale percue est un facteur important dans l'identification des concurrents parce qu'elle influence le nombre de concurrents identifie. L'article montre egalement que plusieurs caracteristiques d'entreprises influencent l'identification des concurrents nationaux/etrangers et qu'il existe une relation en forme de U inverse entre la sous-identification/sur-identification des concurrents et la performance. Chacune de ces idees s'appuie sur l'analyse d'un vaste echantillon d'entreprises taiwanaises. L'etude renforce la these selon laquelle l'identification des concurrents est un facteur important dans le succes d'une entreprise.
Zeta function of the . . . a class of finite fields, for odd primes l

Zeta function of the projective curve aY 2 l = bX 2 l + cZ 2 l aY 2 l = bX 2 l + cZ 2 l aY 2 l = bX 2 l + cZ 2 l over a class of finite fields, for odd primes l l l Abstract. Let p and l be rational primes such that l is odd and the order of p mod-ulo l is even. For such primes p and l, and for e = l, 2l, we consider the non-singular projective curves aY e = bX e + cZ e (abc = 0) defined over finite fields F q such that q = p α ≡ 1(mod e). We see that the Fermat curves correspond precisely to those curves among each class (for e = l, 2l), that are maximal or minimal over F q. We observe that each Fermat prime gives rise to explicit maximal and minimal curves over finite fields of characteristic 2. For e = 2l, we explicitly determine the ζ-function(s) for this class of curves, over F q , as rational functions in the variable t, for distinct cases of a, b, and c, in F * q. The ζ-function in each case is seen to satisfy the Weil conjectures (now theorems) for this concrete class of curves. For e = l, 2l, we determine the class numbers for the function fields associated to each class of curves over F q. As a consequence, when the field of definition of the curve(s) is fixed, this provides concrete information on the growth of class numbers for constant field extensions of the function field(s) of the curve(s).
Focus on: Structural and Functional Brain Abnormalities in Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders

Children exposed to alcohol prenatally can experience significant deficits in cognitive and psychosocial functioning as well as alterations in brain structure and function related to alcohol’s teratogenic effects. These impairments are present both in children with fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) and in children with heavy in utero alcohol exposure who do not have facial dysmorphology required for the FAS diagnosis. Neuropsychological and behavioral studies have revealed deficits in most cognitive domains measured, including overall intellectual functioning, attention/working memory, executive skills, speed of processing, and academic skills in children and adolescents across the range of fetal alcohol spectrum disorders (FASD). As with neuropsychological studies, brain-imaging studies have detected differences in brain structure related to alcohol exposure in multiple brain systems and abnormalities in the white matter that connects these brain regions. Several studies have found relationships between these morphological differences and cognitive function, suggesting some clinical significance to the structural brain abnormalities. Concentrations of neurotransmitter metabolites within the brains of prenatally exposed children also appear to be altered, and functional imaging studies have identified significant differences in brain activation related to working memory, learning, and inhibitory control in children and adolescents with FASD.
Normal cyclotomic schemes over a finite commutative ring

We study cyclotomic association schemes over a finite commutative ring R with identity. The main interest for us is to identify the normal cyclotomic schemes C, i.e. those for which Aut(C) ≤ AL 1(R). The problem is reduced to the case when the ring R is local in which a necessary condition of normality in terms of the subgroup of R × defining C, is given. This condition is proved to be sufficient for a classof local rings including the Galois rings of odd characteristic.
An Analysis of George Galloway's Oratorical and Rhetorical Impact

This article analyses George Galloway's methods of communicating with the electorate through the anti-political establishment party ‘Respect’. The article evaluates Galloway's use of emotive rhetoric and performance-based oratory, arguing that these are likely to appeal to a particular segment of the electorate, specifically those disaffected with the mainstream parties. To do this, the article evaluates a selection of indicative speeches that highlight his style of communicating. The article concludes that Galloway's impact can be attributed to his emotive style of rhetoric, and performance style of oratory.
Ants and Bits

Ants have always been helping people to solve various problems. Everybody remembers how they sorted seeds for Cinderella. For the IT community, ants have helped to show that Information Theory is not only an excellent mathematical theory but that many of its results can be considered laws of Nature. Reciprocally, we helped ants to be distinguished among other “intellectuals” such as counting primates, crows and parrots as one of the smartest species [1, 2]. Our long-term experimental study on ant “language” and intelligence were fully based on fundamental ideas of Information Theory, such as the Shannon entropy, the Kolmogorov complexity, and the Shannon’s equation connecting the length of a message l and its frequency of occurrence p, i.e., l = − log p. This approach enabled us to discover a developed symbolic “language” in highly social ant species based on their ability to transfer the abstract information about remote events and to estimate the rate of information transmission. We also succeeded to reveal important properties of ants’ intelligence. These insects appeared to be able to grasp regularities and to use them for “compression” of data they communicate to each other. They can also transfer to each other the information about the number of objects and can even add and subtract small numbers in order to optimize their messages.
Above the Roof, Beneath the Law: Perceived Justice Behind Disruptive Tactics of Migrant Wage Claimants in China

The way in which citizens in developing countries conceptualize legality is a critical but understudied question for legal consciousness and legal mobilization studies. Drawing on participatory observations and extensive interviews from western China, this article explores the subjective interpretations of migrant wage claimants on law and justice behind their disruptive actions. Their perception of justice differs starkly from what the law stipulates as target, evidence and proper procedures. Who shall be held responsible? What constitutes evidence? When shall they be paid? How much? Their perceptions also differ from the attitude “against the law” found among members from disadvantaged social groups in the United States. The Chinese case of legal perception is shaped by the moral precepts ingrained in the culture, and more importantly, by the lopsided relationship between migrant workers and the political and business elite. It thus points to the daunting barriers in channeling the ever-growing number of social conflicts into court.
Mirror in the Forest: the Dorobo hunter-gatherers as an image of the other

Opening Paragraph The term ‘Dorobo’ denotes an ethnic category embracing small hunting-and-gathering groups residing on the fringes of various agricultural and pastoral peoples in East Africa. The essence of the Dorobo's position is that they engage in economically symbiotic activities with regard to local farmers and herders, while retaining their social marginality as people of the bush. Much is known of them through the constructs of their neighbours, who assign them attributes commensurate with their marginal social position; the Dorobo are amalgamated with wild amoral creatures, and their ancestors are thought to have been in attendance at the birth of the present world-order. Their marginality therefore has economic, spatial, and temporal dimensions. Résumé Le miroir dans la forêt: les chasseurs-cueilleurs Dorobo ou l'image d'autrui On examine dans le présent article un ensemble d'idées qui ont cours chez certains des peuples agricoles et pastoraux d'Afrique Orientale et qui ont trait à la nature et aux modes sociaux de leurs voisins chasseurs-cueilleurs, connus génériquement sous l'appellation de ‘Dorobo’. On passe tout d'abord en revue les facteurs économiques et écologiques qui soustendent l'existence d'une adaptation independante à la chasse et à la cueillette: on montre ensuite comment cette adaptation ou ‘mode de production’ entraîne l'apparition d'un ensemble distinct de représentations liees à ceux qui la pratiquent. Les Dorobo sont isolés socialement de ceux qui entretiennent ces croyances à leur égard et qui peuvent done, sans restriction, concevoir les Dorobo comme les représentants typiques de l'état de désordre, impression renforcée par l'association intime de ces derniers à la brousse et à ses créatures. Ainsi, on attribue aux Dorobo des tendances animates reliées dialectiquement à certains traits que les cultivateurs et les pasteurs estiment être caractéristiques d'eux-mêmes. Si l'individu normal et pondéré fait preuve de respect vis à vis des conventions sociales, le Dorobo, à ses yenx, ne manifeste de respect envers rien. Il apparait donc comme un être incestueux, qui s'adonne à la sorcellerie, à la boisson et aux pitreries. Mais ces stéréotypes ethniques renferment une ambiguité essentielle: en effet, une autre croyance trés répandue est que les Dorobo ont été les premiers occupants du territoire et qu'ils ont donc des rapports intimes et fructueux avec les forces naturelles et avec Dieu. Les pasteurs et agriculteurs utilisent done l'être “Dorobo” comme médiateur avec ces mêmes forces ou créent symboliquement, au sein de leur propre société, des chefs rituels que l'on croit doués des mêmes capacités. Le présent essai s'attache done à faire ressortir l'idéologie concomittante d'un mode de production dans lequel un processus de symbiose établit des rapports réciproques entre les chasseurs et leurs voisins.
kette and blown fuse interact genetically during the second fusion step of myogenesis in Drosophila

Drosophila myoblast fusion proceeds in two steps. The first one gives rise to small syncytia, the muscle precursor cells, which then recruit further fusion competent myoblasts to reach the final muscle size. We have identified Kette as an essential component for myoblast fusion. In kette mutants, founder cells and fusion-competent myoblasts are determined correctly and overcome the very first fusion. But then, at the precursor cell stage, fusion is interrupted. At the ultrastructural level, fusion is characterised by cell-cell recognition, alignment, formation of prefusion complexes, electron dense plaques and membrane breakdown. In kette mutants, electron dense plaques of aberrant length accumulate and fusion is interrupted owing to a complete failure of membrane breakdown. Furthermore, we show that kette interacts genetically with blown fuse (blow) which is known to be required to proceed from prefusion complexes to the formation of the electron dense plaques. Interestingly, a surplus of Kette can replace Blow function during myogenesis. We propose a model in which Dumbfounded/Sticks and stones-dependent cell adhesion is mediated over Rolling Pebbles, Myoblast city, Crk, Blown fuse and Kette, and thus induces membrane fusion.
Religious Involvement and Educational Outcomes: The Role of Social Capital and Extracurricular Participation

Previous research has observed that religious participation is positively related to a wide variety of adolescent outcomes, including academic achievement, but relatively little is known about why this is the case. We focus on a group of related potential explanations for why religious involvement improves educational outcomes. We examine whether religious participation enhances academic outcomes among teens by the way in which it shapes their social ties, or social capital, focusing on both intergenerational relationships and on relationships with peers. We also examine the potential intervening role of extracurricular participation. Using structural equation models to analyze data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (Add Health), we examine the potential role of social capital and extracurricular participation in mediating the relationship between religious participation and academic achievement, dropping out of high school, and attachment to school. We find that religious attendance promotes higher intergenerational closure, friendship networks with higher educational resources and norms, and extracurricular participation. These intervening variables account for a small part of the influence of adolescent religious participation on the educational outcomes in this study.
Dual-energy computed tomography compared with ultrasound in the diagnosis of gout.

OBJECTIVES The aim of our study was to compare dual-energy CT (DECT) with US for the diagnosis of gouty arthritis and to correlate the imaging findings with results from synovial fluid aspiration whenever possible. METHODS We recruited 21 patients (17 male and 4 female) who presented with a clinical suspicion of acute or chronic gout in 37 joints. DECT scans of the hands, wrists, feet, ankles, knees and elbows were performed. For post-processing, a colour-coding gout software protocol was used. US examinations of the same joints were performed. In addition, joint fluid aspiration was performed in a total of 14 joints. RESULTS DECT images were positive for urate crystal deposits in 25 of 37 joints. US findings were positive in 24 of 37 examined joints. In 12 of 14 joints the synovial fluid aspiration was positive. CT and US findings correlated in 32 of 37 joints (86.5%; κ = 0.698, P < 0.001). CT and synovial fluid results correlated in 12 of 14 joints (85.7%; κ = 0.417, P = 0.119). US and cytology findings correlated in 14 of 14 joints (100%; κ = 1, P < 0.001). CONCLUSION DECT and US have comparable sensitivity for the detection of gouty arthritis in a clinical setting. However, DECT results should be interpreted carefully, as there could be some false-negative findings.
Acute dengue infection in the western terai region of Nepal.

INTRODUCTION Dengue fever is an emerging mosquito borne disease in Nepal claiming substantial morbidity and mortality. The objective of the study was to find out frequency of acute dengue infection in patients from the hospitals of the western Nepal. METHODS The study was conducted between August 2007 and July 2008 in patients visiting hospitals of the western terai of Nepal with chief complains of fever. The sero-diagnosis of acute dengue infection was determined by enzyme linked immunosorbent assay among 239 patients visiting Lumbini Zonal Hospital, Butwal; Bheri Zonal Hospital, Nepalgunj; Bardiya District Hospital, Bardiya and Mahakali Zonal Hospital, Mahendranagar. RESULTS The anti-dengue IgM positivity was 29.3%. There was slight male preponderance with a male to female ratio of 1.2:1. Out of the total positive cases, the highest positive cases (75.7%) were from the age group 15 - 50 years followed by < 15 years old (15.7%). Out of four hospitals, the highest positive cases (54.3%) were in Lumbini Zonal Hospital, Butwal. The age and gender were independent predictors to dengue virus infection. The highest numbers of dengue positive cases were in October (52.6%). The association between dengue disease and the month was statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS The dengue positivity was estimated in acute patients from hospitals of western Nepal by enzyme immunoassay. Therefore, the serological marker can be used to diagnose acute patients of dengue during outbreaks.
Vismodegib for Locally Advanced Periocular and Orbital Basal Cell Carcinoma: A Review of 15 Consecutive Cases

Summary: Basal cell carcinoma (BCC) is the most common periocular skin cancer and can lead to significant morbidity. We assess the effectiveness of vismodegib, a first-in-class Hedgehog signaling pathway inhibitor, in the management of periocular and orbital BCCs based on clinical response, tolerability, and orbital content preservation. All patients with periocular or orbital BCCs who met criteria for vismodegib treatment were recruited prospectively between May 2012 and 2014 from 2 hospitals. Patients received oral vismodegib (150 mg daily) until disease progression, unacceptable toxicity, or withdrawal. All patients were followed up monthly. Patient demographics, tumor size, treatment duration including dosing regimen, adverse events, response rate, duration of response, progression-free survival, and disease-free survival were analyzed. All 15 patients had biopsy-proven BCCs with no metastatic disease at presentation. The mean age was 74 years and 10 patients (67%) had orbital involvement. The mean lesion longest dimension was 51 mm and 7 cases (47%) represented recurrence following previous surgery and/or radiotherapy. The mean treatment duration was 13 months and mean follow-up duration 36 months. Ten patients (67%) had a complete response, 3 (20%) had a partial response, and 2 had progressive disease following an initial partial response (13%). The partial response of 55% in 1 patient allowed subsequent surgical resection with clear margins. Vismodegib is effective for treating periocular and orbital BCCs with orbital salvage of patients who otherwise would have required exenteration. There is a neoadjuvant role for vismodegib but further studies are required.
Propagation of Cold Pulses and Heat Pulses in ASDEX Upgrade

Experiments on electron heat transport were performed in the tokamak ASDEX Upgrade, mainly in ohmically heated plasmas, applying either edge cooling with laser blow-off impurity injection or edge heat pulses with ECRH. Repetitive pulses within one plasma discharge were made allowing Fourier transformation of the temperature perturbation, yielding a good signal to noise ratio up to high harmonics and a detailed investigation of the pulse propagation. For densities lower than 1.8 × 1019m-3, an increase of central electron temperature was found as the response to edge cooling via impurity injection similar to observations made in the TEXT, TFTR, RTP and Tore Supra tokamaks. The inversion does not appear instantaneously, but with a time delay roughly compatible with diffusion. Modelling of the propagation of the cold pulses in the framework of the IFS-PPPL model yields qualitative agreement. However, the predicted increase of ion temperature is not observed experimentally on a fast timescale. The response to ECRH heat pulses is not perfectly symmetrical to cold pulse experiments, but the similarities suggest a common underlying physical mechanism. No inversion of the heat pulse is found, instead the initial pulse from the edge is associated with a second, much slower, heat pulse in the centre. This central reaction is in fact quite similar (and not symmetrical) to that of the cold pulses. By varying the position of the ECRH deposition it could be shown that the central increase is related to the arrival of the pulse close to the inversion radius and not to the initial pulse. Modelling was performed to investigate the possible physics mechanisms and for comparison with the cold pulses.
Observing the chain stretch transition in a highly entangled polyisoprene melt using transient extensional rheometry

We measure the viscoelastic properties of a highly entangled narrow molecular weight polyisoprene melt with approximately 280 entanglements per chain in steady and transient shear and in elongational flows. The storage and loss moduli of the melt are found to be well described by the Milner and McLeish model. The relaxation modulus G(t,γ) is measured using stress relaxation after a sudden shearing displacement and we experimentally determine the Rouse time τR by observing strain-time separability G(t,γ)=G(t)h(γ) for t>τR. The transient elongational properties are measured using three distinct instruments: the Sentmanat extensional rheometer (SER) universal testing platform from Xpansion Instruments, its counterpart, the extensional viscosity fixture (EVF) from TA Instruments, and a filament stretching rheometer (FSR). The kinematics obtained in each device is sensitive to the aspect ratio of the sample and care must be taken to achieve homogeneous deformation conditions. Especially for the SER and EVF instruments, a second aspect ratio associated with the rectangular cross-section of the sample is also important. We find that the initial growth in the tensile stress follows the prediction given by the Doi–Edwards reptation model for Deborah numbers based on the Rouse time less than about DeR=0.04. For DeR=0.04, the stress difference follows more or less the Doi–Edwards prediction in the limit of infinite stretch rates and, for DeR>0.04, the measured stresses are well above those that can be predicted by the basic Doi–Edwards model. When DeR>1, the stress difference also exceeds the linear viscoelastic prediction. In conjunction with this strain-hardening response, a stabilization is obtained whereby the limiting Hencky strain before sample rupture is markedly increased. We compare our observations in the regime 0.04 1 is interpreted as a signature of chain stretching for elongational deformation rates faster than the inverse Rouse time.We measure the viscoelastic properties of a highly entangled narrow molecular weight polyisoprene melt with approximately 280 entanglements per chain in steady and transient shear and in elongational flows. The storage and loss moduli of the melt are found to be well described by the Milner and McLeish model. The relaxation modulus G(t,γ) is measured using stress relaxation after a sudden shearing displacement and we experimentally determine the Rouse time τR by observing strain-time separability G(t,γ)=G(t)h(γ) for t>τR. The transient elongational properties are measured using three distinct instruments: the Sentmanat extensional rheometer (SER) universal testing platform from Xpansion Instruments, its counterpart, the extensional viscosity fixture (EVF) from TA Instruments, and a filament stretching rheometer (FSR). The kinematics obtained in each device is sensitive to the aspect ratio of the sample and care must be taken to achieve homogeneous deformation conditions. Especially for the SER and EVF ins.