Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Trials and Terminations: Learning from Competitors' R&D Failures

I analyze project continuation decisions where firms may resolve uncertainty through news about competitors’ research and development (R&D) failures, as well as through their own results. I examine the tradeoffs and interactions between product-market competition and technological learning from parallel R&D projects. Leveraging the biopharmaceutical industry’s unique characteristics to overcome barriers to measuring project-level responses, I use a difference-in-differences strategy to evaluate how competitor exit news alters a firm’s own project discontinuation decisions. The findings reveal that technological learning dominates competition effects. Firms are most sensitive to competitor failure news from within the same market and same technology area—more than doubling their propensity to terminate drug development projects in the wake of this type of information. Finally, I explore how levels of competition, uncertainty, and opportunities to learn moderate the response to competitor failure news. This paper was accepted by Joshua Gans, business strategy.
Effects of filler size on the mechanical properties of polymer-filled dental composites: A review of recent developments

Resin composites are widely used in esthetic restorative dentistry. Since their introduction in the mid-1960s, these composites made steady gains in popularity. Their increased use is attributed to their excellent biocompatibility, absence of taste, odour, tissue irritation and toxicity, insolubility in body fluids, easy operation, excellent aesthetic properties, stable colures, optical properties, easy pigmentation, low cost and repairability. The composite resins in current use still suffer from several shortcomings such as poor mechanical properties. In order to improve these properties, microparticles have been used as fillers for a long time. However, the inadequate mechanical properties of resin composites remain problematic. Recently, researchers have utilised nanoparticles as dental composite fillers. This article reviews the relevant literature on the mechanical properties of polymer dental composites filled with microand nano-scale particles. The effects of particle size on fracture toughness, flexural strength, and hardness were examined with emphasis on other important factors for improvement. The second section focused on the toughening mechanisms of particulate-polymer composites.
Nudge to nobesity I: Minor changes in accessibility decrease food intake

Very small but cumulated decreases in food intake may be sufficient to erase obesity over a period of years. We examine the effect of slight changes in the accessibility of different foods in a pay-by-weight-of-food salad bar in a cafeteria serving adults for the lunch period. Making a food slightly more difficult to reach (by varying its proximity by about 10 inches) or changing the serving utensil (spoon or tongs) modestly but reliably reduces intake, in the range of 8–16%. Given this effect, it is possible that making calorie-dense foods less accessible and low-calorie foods more accessible over an extended period of time would result in significant weight loss.
Identification of neural connectivity signatures of autism using machine learning

Alterations in interregional neural connectivity have been suggested as a signature of the pathobiology of autism. There have been many reports of functional and anatomical connectivity being altered while individuals with autism are engaged in complex cognitive and social tasks. Although disrupted instantaneous correlation between cortical regions observed from functional MRI is considered to be an explanatory model for autism, the causal influence of a brain area on another (effective connectivity) is a vital link missing in these studies. The current study focuses on addressing this in an fMRI study of Theory-of-Mind (ToM) in 15 high-functioning adolescents and adults with autism and 15 typically developing control participants. Participants viewed a series of comic strip vignettes in the MRI scanner and were asked to choose the most logical end to the story from three alternatives, separately for trials involving physical and intentional causality. The mean time series, extracted from 18 activated regions of interest, were processed using a multivariate autoregressive model (MVAR) to obtain the causality matrices for each of the 30 participants. These causal connectivity weights, along with assessment scores, functional connectivity values, and fractional anisotropy obtained from DTI data for each participant, were submitted to a recursive cluster elimination based support vector machine classifier to determine the accuracy with which the classifier can predict a novel participant's group membership (autism or control). We found a maximum classification accuracy of 95.9% with 19 features which had the highest discriminative ability between the groups. All of the 19 features were effective connectivity paths, indicating that causal information may be critical in discriminating between autism and control groups. These effective connectivity paths were also found to be significantly greater in controls as compared to ASD participants and consisted predominantly of outputs from the fusiform face area and middle temporal gyrus indicating impaired connectivity in ASD participants, particularly in the social brain areas. These findings collectively point toward the fact that alterations in causal connectivity in the brain in ASD could serve as a potential non-invasive neuroimaging signature for autism.
Epigenome Editing of Potato by Grafting Using Transgenic Tobacco as siRNA Donor

In plants, it is possible to induce heritable transcriptional gene silencing (TGS) via RNA-directed DNA methylation (RdDM) using artificially synthesized small RNA (siRNA) homologous to the 5'-flanking region of the target gene. As the siRNA signal with a specific RNA determinant moves through plasmodesmata and sieve elements, we attempted to induce TGS of a transgene and an endogenous gene of potato (Solanum tuberosum) rootstock by grafting using siRNA produced in a tobacco (Nicotiana benthamiana) scion. Our results provide evidence that this system can induce TGS of target genes in tubers formed on potato rootstock. The TGS is maintained in the progeny tubers lacking the transported siRNAs. Our findings reveal that epigenome editing using mobile RNA has the potential to allow breeding of artificial sport cultivars in vegetative propagation crops.
The Diagnosis and Treatment of Functional Dyspepsia.

BACKGROUND Functional dyspepsia (FD) is one of the more common functional disorders, with a prevalence of 10-20%. It affectsthe gastrointestinal tract. METHODS This article is based on publications retrieved by a selective search of PubMed, with special attention to controlled trials, guidelines, and reviews. RESULTS Typical dyspeptic symptoms in functional dyspepsia include epigastric pain, sensations of pressure and fullness, nausea, and early subjective satiety. The etiology of the disorder is heterogeneous and multifactorial. Contributory causes include motility disturbances, visceral hypersensitivity, elevated mucosal permeability, and disturbances of the autonomic and enteric nervous system. There is as yet no causally directed treatment for functional dyspepsia. Its treatment should begin with intensive patient education regarding the benign nature of the disorder and with the establishment of a therapeutic pact for long-term care. Given the absence of a causally directed treatment, drugs to treat functional dyspepsia should be given for no more than 8-12 weeks. Proton-pump inhibitors, phytotherapeutic drugs, and Helicobacter pylori eradication are evidence-based interventions. For intractable cases, tricyclic antidepressants and psychotherapy are further effective treatment options. CONCLUSION The impaired quality of life of patients with functional dyspepsia implies the need for definitive establishment of the diagnosis, followed by symptom-oriented treatment for the duration of the symptomatic interval.
Developmental Differences in the Control of Action Selection by Social Information

Our everyday actions are often performed in the context of a social interaction. We previously showed that, in adults, selecting an action on the basis of either social or symbolic cues was associated with activations in the fronto-parietal cognitive control network, whereas the presence and use of social versus symbolic cues was in addition associated with activations in the temporal and medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) social brain network. Here we investigated developmental changes in these two networks. Fourteen adults (21–30 years of age) and 14 adolescents (11–16 years) followed instructions to move objects in a set of shelves. Interpretation of the instructions was conditional on the point of view of a visible “director” or the meaning of a symbolic cue (Director Present vs. Director Absent) and the number of potential referent objects in the shelves (3-object vs. 1-object). 3-object trials elicited increased fronto-parietal and temporal activations, with greater left lateral prefrontal cortex and parietal activations in adults than adolescents. Social versus symbolic information led to activations in superior dorsal MPFC, precuneus, and along the superior/middle temporal sulci. Both dorsal MPFC and left temporal clusters exhibited a Director × Object interaction, with greater activation when participants needed to consider the directors' viewpoints. This effect differed with age in dorsal MPFC. Adolescents showed greater activation whenever social information was present, whereas adults showed greater activation only when the directors' viewpoints were relevant to task performance. This study thus shows developmental differences in domain-general and domain-specific PFC activations associated with action selection in a social interaction context.
Evidence-based occupational hearing screening II: validation of a screening methodology using measures of functional hearing ability

Abstract Objective: Validate use of the Extended Speech Intelligibility Index (ESII) for prediction of speech intelligibility in non-stationary real-world noise environments. Define a means of using these predictions for objective occupational hearing screening for hearing-critical public safety and law enforcement jobs. Design: Analyses of predicted and measured speech intelligibility in recordings of real-world noise environments were performed in two studies using speech recognition thresholds (SRTs) and intelligibility measures. ESII analyses of the recordings were used to predict intelligibility. Noise recordings were made in prison environments and at US Army facilities for training ground and airborne forces. Speech materials included full bandwidth sentences and bandpass filtered sentences that simulated radio transmissions. Study sample: A total of 22 adults with normal hearing (NH) and 15 with mild–moderate hearing impairment (HI) participated in the two studies. Results: Average intelligibility predictions for individual NH and HI subjects were accurate in both studies (r2 ≥ 0.94). Pooled predictions were slightly less accurate (0.78 ≤ r2 ≤ 0.92). Conclusions: An individual’s SRT and audiogram can accurately predict the likelihood of effective speech communication in noise environments with known ESII characteristics, where essential hearing-critical tasks are performed. These predictions provide an objective means of occupational hearing screening.
Percutaneous re‐revalvulation of the tricuspid valve

We report a successful percutaneous revalvulation of a dysfunctional tricuspid bioprothesis in an 8‐year‐old child. Five years after implanting a 25‐mm Carpentier‐Edwards valve in the tricuspid position, the prosthesis showed significant dysfunction with clinical right heart failure. A 26‐mm Edwards‐Sapien XT inverted aortic valve was successfully implanted through a 19F sheath using a jugular approach. Such procedure can significantly postpone the need for surgical replacement of a biological valve. © 2011 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Abdominal Visceral Adipose Tissue is Associated with Myocardial Infarction in Patients with COPD.

BACKGROUND Cardiovascular diseases are frequent and a major cause of death in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). In the general population, various fat depots including abdominal visceral adipose tissue (VAT), subcutaneous adipose tissue (SAT), and liver fat have been linked to increased risk of cardiovascular diseases. We hypothesize that these adipose tissue compartments are associated with myocardial infarction (MI) in patients with COPD. METHODS We collected measures of VAT and SAT areas and liver attenuation on the computed tomography scan of the chest from 1267 patients with COPD. MI was a self-reported physician-diagnosed outcome. The association between fat depots and self-reported history of MI was assessed by logistic regression analysis in which the patients within the 2 lowest tertiles of VAT and SAT areas were the reference group. RESULTS Eighty three patients (6.6%) reported a history of MI at the time of enrollment. Compared to patients who did not have an MI episode, those who had a prior MI had a higher VAT area (mean ± SD, 303.4 ± 208.5 vs. 226.8 ± 172.6 cm2; P=0.002) with no differences in SAT area and liver fat. After adjustment for age, gender, obesity, pack years of smoking, hypertension, high cholesterol, and diabetes, patients within the upper tertile (vs. those in the lower tertiles) of VAT area had increased odds of MI (odds ratio [OR] 1.86, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.02 - 3.41). CONCLUSION Increased abdominal visceral fat is independently associated with a history of MI in individuals with COPD.
Entrepreneurial impact sourcing: a conceptual framework of social and commercial institutional logics

This article answers calls for better characterizations of impact sourcing given its potential to create social impacts in conjunction with global sourcing. It introduces a conceptual framework consisting of four dimensions drawn from entrepreneurship literature: primary mission, success criteria, resource mobilization and innovation approach – that characterize entrepreneurial impact sourcing service providers. These four dimensions are anchored across ideal types of social and commercial institutional logics to explicitly account for and capture the dual social and commercial value orientations of impact sourcing service providers as acknowledged in the literature. We evaluate the utility of this framework by using it to assess a US‐based business process outsourcing social enterprise that focuses on the underserved workforce of military veterans and spouses of military personnel. We found that this firm used social logic for both the firm's primary mission and the firm's resource mobilization; it used commercial logic for its success criteria, and it used both logics for its innovation. Our analysis of the case substantiates the applicability of the framework for capturing variation in how impact sourcing providers may selectively draw upon different logics across the four dimensions. © 2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
Permanently online and permanently procrastinating? The mediating role of Internet use for the effects of trait procrastination on psychological health and well-being

A growing number of studies suggest that Internet users frequently utilize online media as “tools for procrastination. ” This study thus investigated the relationship between trait procrastination, Internet use, and psychological well-being in a representative sample of N = 1,577 German Internet users. The results revealed that trait procrastination was associated with an increased use of leisure-related online content and impaired control over Internet use. As a result, Internet users high in trait procrastination showed a higher risk of experiencing negative consequence of Internet use in other life domains. These negative repercussions of insufficiently self-regulated Internet use partially accounted for the correlation between trait procrastination and impaired well-being (i.e. stress, anxiety, and depression). These findings underline the role of online media as an instrument for dysfunctional task delay among Internet users. Implications of the results are discussed with regard to media use and self-control in general and procrastinatory media use in specific.
Females Choose Multiple Mates in the Lekking Greater Prairie-Chicken (Tympanuchus cupido)

ABSTRACT. In lek mating systems, females visit aggregations of displaying males and appear to have unrestricted opportunity to choose and mate with any male. Behavioral observations of lekking birds indicate that females generally mate once and that only a small percentage of males gain a majority of copulations. However, genetic analyses of paternity have revealed that multiple males sometimes sire young within one brood. We analyzed paternity of 25 broods of Greater Prairie-Chickens (Tympanuchus cupido pinnatus) breeding in an isolated population in central Wisconsin. We found multiple paternity in 44% of broods (1–4 sires brood-1) and a positive relationship between the number of sires and female home-range size prior to nesting. Multiple paternity was apparently not influenced by local breeding experience: native Wisconsin and translocated females from Minnesota did not differ in the likelihood of multiple mating. The high incidence of multiple paternity may reduce the variance in male reproductive success and increase the effective population size, which may be important for the maintenance of genetic diversity in small, isolated populations.
Dietary vitamin E (α-tocopheryl acetate) and organic selenium supplementation: performance and antioxidant status of broilers fed n-3 PUFA-enriched feeds

The experiment was conducted to study the effects of organic selenium (Se-enriched yeast) and vitamin E (α-tocopheryl acetate) supplementation, alone or together, on the performance and antioxidant status of broilers fed diets enriched in n-3 PUFAs using fish oil. Day-old Hubbard-JV strain broiler chicks allocated to one of the following treatments: (1) a commercial basal diet containing 0.15 mg inorganic Se /kg as sodium selenite and 50 mg α-tocopheryl acetate (α-TA)/kg feed acted as the control; (2) VE200: Control diet supplemented with 200 mg α-TA/kg feed; (3) OrgSe0.15: Control with inorganic Se replaced with 0.15 mg organic Se/kg; (4) OrgSe0.30: Control with inorganic Se replaced with 0.30 mg organic Se/kg feed; (5) VE200+OrgSe0.15, (6) VE200+OrgSe0.30. Body weight (BW) and body weight gain (BWG) to 42 d were significantly improved with vitamin E or organic Se at 0.30 mg/kg (but not at 0.15 mg/kg) when supplemented individually, but not in combination, except that VE200+OrgSe0.15 improved 28 and 35-d body weights significantly compared with the control. Feed intake (FI), feed conversion ratio (FCR), mortality, carcass characteristics and relative organ weights, except for the spleen, were unaffected by any of the supplementation treatments. The significant positive effect of VE200 on BWG was observed after 21 d. Relative spleen weight was significantly higher in broilers fed VE200 compared to the other treatments. The antioxidative effects of organic Se and vitamin E, alone or together, were not evident in diets enriched in n-3 PUFAs using 1.5% fish oil. Keywords : Fish oil, n-3 PUFAs, broiler, vitamin E, organic selenium, antioxidant
Genome Instability in Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG

ABSTRACT We describe here a comparative genome analysis of three dairy product isolates of Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG (LGG) and the ATCC 53103 reference strain to the published genome sequence of L. rhamnosus GG. The analysis showed that in two of three isolates, major DNA segments were missing from the genomic islands LGGISL1,2. The deleted DNA segments consist of 34 genes in one isolate and 84 genes in the other and are flanked by identical insertion elements. Among the missing genes are the spaCBA genes, which encode pilin subunits involved in adhesion to mucus and persistence of the strains in the human intestinal tract. Subsequent quantitative PCR analyses of six commercial probiotic products confirmed that two more products contain a heterogeneous population of L. rhamnosus GG variants, including genotypes with or without spaC. These results underline the relevance for quality assurance and control measures targeting genome stability in probiotic strains and justify research assessing the effect of genetic rearrangements in probiotics on the outcome of in vitro and in vivo efficacy studies.
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Nanoelectromechanical (NEM) switches have the potential to complement or replace traditional CMOS transistors in the area of ultra-low-power digital electronics. This paper reports the demonstration of prototype circuits including the first 3-stage ring oscillator built using cell-level digital logic elements based on curved NEM switches. The ring oscillator core occupies an area of 30 μm × 10 μm using 6 NEM switches. Each NEM switch device has a footprint of 5 μm × 3 μm, an air gap of 60 nm and is coated with amorphous carbon (a-C) for reliable operation. The ring oscillator operates at a frequency of 6.7 MHz, and confirms the simulated inverter propagation delay of 25 ns. The successful fabrication and measurement of this demonstrator are a key milestone on the way towards an optimized, scaled technology with sub-nanosecond switching times, lower operating voltages and VLSI implementation.
Acquired vorinostat resistance shows partial cross-resistance to ‘second-generation’ HDAC inhibitors and correlates with loss of histone acetylation and apoptosis but not with altered HDAC and HAT activities

Histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitors such as vorinostat (suberoylanilide hydroxamic acid), valproic acid, romidepsin (FK-228), and LBH589 comprise a relatively new class of potent anticancer agents. This study provides evidence for the potential of vorinostat to cause acquisition of multidrug resistance protein-independent resistance in HCT116 colon tumor cells. This acquired resistance is moderate (two-fold to three-fold), is nonreversible, and correlates with the loss of responses typically seen with HDAC inhibitors, that is the loss of acetylation of the histones H2A, H2B, H3, and H4, the loss of the G2/M checkpoint activation, and the loss of caspase 3-dependent and caspase 7-dependent apoptosis. This acquired resistance also associates with cross-resistance to the hydroxamate-class (LBH589 and JNJ26481585) and to the aliphatic acid-class (valproic acid) HDAC inhibitors but not to the benzamide-class (MGCD0103) and the cyclic peptide-class (romidepsin) HDAC inhibitors. The acquired HDAC inhibitor resistance described hereis not a result of altered HDAC and histone acetyltransferase activities and differs from that previously reported for romidepsin.