Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Power Law Behavior of Queue Size: Maximum Entropy Principle with Shifted Geometric Mean Constraint

A theoretical framework based on the maximum Shannon entropy principle with the specification of geometric mean or shifted geometric mean is proposed to generate the power law behavior of the system size in broadband communication networks. It is shown that the equilibrium distribution of an M/M/1 queue is obtained as a limiting case when the shifted geometric mean is specified. The various quality-of-service parameters, such as the probability of exceeding buffer size, exhibit the power law behavior. It is noted that the results based on the Shannon entropy with shifted geometric mean are found to be similar to the results when the Tsallis entropy subject to expected number of jobs in the system is prescribed. This brings out a deeper issue of the relevance of shifted geometric mean within Shannon entropy framework when the input traffic has broadband characteristics. The proposed approach gives closed-form expressions for a queuing distribution in a much simpler way and thus establishes the efficacy of Shannon entropy in communication networks exhibiting power law.
R&D Team's Competencies, Innovation, and Growth With Knowledge Information Flow

This paper analyzes the interaction among the step-by-step innovation, the product market competition (PMC), and the knowledge information flow in the growth process. Patents protect their holders from being imitated or copied but do not protect them against the possibility that less-efficient competitors master the diffused knowledge. The degree to which diffused knowledge should be exploited by less-efficient firms is determined by both their knowledge assimilating capacities and Research and Development (R&D) teams' competence type and level. The individual skill distribution in R&D team may lead to different innovative behaviors: replicating the knowledge or creation of novel knowledge. Here, we first find that replicating the knowledge and creation of novel knowledge are both growth enhancing; second, the more the flexibility on individual creativity in R&D team is, the faster is the growth; third, the knowledge information flow has a polarization effect on firms' innovative performance.
The value of business managers' ‘Information Technology’ competence

This study analyses the role of general managers and their competence in information technologies (ITs) in the integration of these technologies in knowledge-intensive businesses. From a resource-based view, it assesses the effect of managers' IT knowledge and vision on information management in their organizations. It focuses on two knowledge industries: telecommunication and biotechnology, with a final sample of 122 firms. Structural equations are used to assess the data. The findings show that the role of managers goes further than supporting and championing ITs. They are direct key actors in the IT–business integration. For this reason, managers should understand IT potential and information system management in order to combine this knowledge with their unique strategic vision of the business, foreseeing opportunities and needs.
The Politics of Dissents and Concurrences on the U.S. Supreme Court

Why do justices author or join separate opinions? Most attempts to address the dynamics of concurrence and dissent focus on aggregate patterns across time or courts. In contrast, we explain why an individual justice chooses to author or join a separate opinion. We argue that separate opinions result from justices' pursuit of their policy preferences within both strategic and institutional constraints. Using data from the Burger Court (1969 to 1985 terms), we estimate a multinomial logit model to test the influence of these factors on justices' decisions to join or author a regular concurrence, a special concurrence, or a dissent, as opposed to joining the majority opinion. Our results show that this choice reflects the justices' conditional pursuit of their policy preferences. We also disentangle the decision to join or author separate opinions, and we find that the latter decision is also influenced by the time remaining in the Court's term.
Giving, Prompting, Making: Aligning Technology and Pedagogy Within TPACK for Social Studies Instruction

Technological pedagogical content knowledge (now known as technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge, or TPACK) has become a widely referenced conceptual framework within teacher education. It provides a common language to discuss the integration of technology into instruction (Koehler & Mishra, 2008) and builds upon the concepts of pedagogical content knowledge (Shulman, 1987) and teacher as curricular “gatekeeper” (Thornton, 2001a, 2001b). This paper describes a three-part pedagogical model—giving-prompting-making—to explicate the relationship between pedagogy and technology within the social studies classroom. This model is intended to enhance the TPACK framework by providing a clear and intuitive comparison between social studies teachers’ pedagogical aims and their choices with technology. The giving-prompting-making model can be used to guide social studies teacher education students to make the most appropriate use of technology.
A role for adhesion molecules in contact‐dependent T help for B cells

The role of cell contact in T‐dependent B cell activation was examined. Small resting B cells from C57BL/6 mice were cultured with CBA‐derived, non‐alloreactive cloned T helper cells in anti‐T cell receptor Vβ8‐coated microwells. This induced polyclonal B cell activation to enter cell cycle (as measured by thymidine incorporation at 2 days) and to secrete immunoglobulin (as measured by an enzyme‐linked immunoassay detecting high‐rate Ig secretion at 5 days). The inclusion of monoclonal antibodies against LFA‐1, ICAM‐1 and CD4 in these cultures strongly inhibited antibody responses, although proliferative responses were only inhibited to about 50%. Inhibitory monoclonal antibodies did not significantly affect lipopolysaccharide‐induced responses, T cell activation to interleukin (IL) 3 secretion, nor did they inhibit the formation of multicellular clusters containing T and B cells. There was no correlation between the level of expression of adhesion molecules by T cells and their ability to induce B cell responses. Anti‐LFA‐1 abrogated T‐dependent responses to IL 2 which were inducible after 2 days in culture, but did not inhibit the induction of this IL 2 responsiveness. These results suggest that continued cell contact involving adhesion/accessory molecules induces B cells to proliferate and to respond to T cell lymphokines. A signaling role for cell interaction molecules on B cells is proposed, similar to the role of these and analogous molecules on T cells.
A comparison of the roles and responsibilities of manufacturing engineers in Japan and the United States

The manufacturing engineering work in nine Japanese firms is structured by a horizontal division of labor between manufacturing design engineers and production process engineers, in contrast to a vertical division of labor between manufacturing engineers and technicians in three American firms. The production process engineers in the Japanese firms link manufacturing engineering processes closely with production processes, whereas less coordination between the two processes occurs in the American firms. Regarding product design, manufacturing engineering, and production processes in the Japanese firms, employees engaged in downstream processes are more heavily involved with work concerned with upstream processes than in the American firms.
Die makroökonomischen Wirkungen diskretionärer Fiskalpolitik in Deutschland - Was wissen wir empirisch?

This article surveys the empirical literature on the effects of discretionary fiscal policy on the German macroeconomy. Although the qualitative and quantitative effects of fiscal policy are often discussed among politicians and in the public, economists only recently renewed their interest in this topic and have produced only few empirical studies for Germany so far. While older macroeconometric models generally predict positive effects of expansionary policies on output in the short run, newer SVAR studies disagree on the direction of the expected effects. There is, however, some agreement that the effects are likely to be small. Copyright 2007 die Autoren Journal compilation 2007, Verein fur Socialpolitik und Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
Public Pension Reform in Europe: Policies, Prospects and Evaluation

This paper describes the demographic and economic factors underlying the reform of public pension programmes in Europe. It examines the policy response, both at the Europe-wide level and within individual European countries. Several programme reform strategies that have been implemented are evaluated. These strategies are the greater pre-funding of public pensions and expanded second-tier private pension components, 'parametric' reforms to existing programmes, and the development of formula-driven 'actuarially fair' public programmes. Efforts to provide greater incentives for individuals to postpone retirement are also discussed. Copyright Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2003.
Does Public Service Motivation Affect the Behavior of Professionals?

The literature expects PSM to affect behavior and ultimately performance; but little is known about the effect of PSM on actual behavior, since empirical studies typically investigate self-reported performance data. This article, therefore, investigates how PSM (specifically commitment to the public interest) affects the actual, not self-reported, behavior of Danish physiotherapists (n = 556). The analysis is based on register data on individual behavior combined with a web-based survey of PSM. We find that PSM positively affects the proportion of disabled patients. Services to this patient type are less lucrative, but disabled patients are seen as more needy, increasing the perceived contribution to society. The results imply that PSM helps secure the interests of weak and needy groups.
Food Insecurity in Vulnerable Populations: Coping with Food Price Shocks in Afghanistan

Based on data from Afghanistan collected prior to and during the 2007-2008 food price crisis, this paper illustrates that caloric intake is an ineffectual indicator for monitoring the onset of food insecurity. Unconditional Quantile Regression estimates indicate that the most vulnerable of households, which cannot afford to make substantial cuts to calories, exhibit no decline in caloric intake in response to increasing wheat prices. In contrast, households with high-calorie diets experience large declines. The estimates also reveal declines in dietary diversity across the entire distribution of households. The most vulnerable households may be sacrificing diet quality to maintain calories, with the potential for serious and long-term health consequences.
Chlorophyll Removal From Edible Oils

The chlorophyll content of canola oil, especially when extracted from frost-damaged seed is high, and results in dull, dark brown oil unless very large quantities of bleaching clay are used. We found that treatment with phosphoric acid, under vacuum in the absence of moisture precipitates most of the chlorophyll. At 140°C 2400 mg/L phosphoric acid precipitated 98 % of the chlorophyll in canola oil after 15 minutes of gentle stirring under vacuum of ~ 30 mmHg (4kPa). Chlorophyll levels were reduced from 23.8 mg/L to less than 0.5 mg/L. This was further reduced to > 0.05 mg/L with caustic refining and bleaching. A similar reduction in chlorophyll level was obtained with 5000 mg/L sulfuric acid at room temperature. Mass spectrometric analy- sis indicates that the chlorophyll is irreversibly converted to oil insoluble pheophorbides by the treatment. A mechanism is proposed. It was shown that the precipitated pigment may be left in the crude oil, as it will be removed during caustic refining. Thus the process requires only the addition in front of the caustic refining step of a heat exchanger and a vacuum mixing vessel with 15 min. residence time. The process was demonstrated on pilot and full scales. It has been patented and commercially implemented.
Does competitive research funding encourage diversity in higher education

Based on the evolution of higher education systems in the last 50 years, this paper discusses the use of research funding mechanisms as privileged instruments to maintain and foster diversity in higher education systems. We suggest that competitive research funding supported by non-standardised evaluative processes may enable differentiation among institutions according to their resources and capabilities to develop research, while also recognising the limit to the use of such policy instruments. Copyright , Beech Tree Publishing.
Changes in natural killer cell phenotype in patients with post‐viral fatigue syndrome

We analysed peripheral blood CD56+ natural killer (NK) cell subsets in 23 carefully characterized patients with post‐viral fatigue syndrome (PFS), compared with 19 healthy controls, using fluorochrome‐conjugated, specific monoclonal antibodies and the FACScan. We found significantly increased percentages of CD56+ and especially CD56bright NK cells in PFS patients. We also found significantly increased percentages of CD56+ high affinity interleukin‐2 (IL‐2) receptor (CD25)+ and CD56+ transferrin receptor (CD71+) subsets of cells, most of which also stained brightly for CD56. Also, we found an increased percentage of CD56+ CD3+ cells, many of which stained brightly for CD56, although there was no increase in the percentage of CD56‐ CD3+ T cells in these patients. These observations, in conjunction with very low percentage of CD56‐ CD25+ cells, suggest that there is a preferential involvement of this minor subset of CD56+ CD3+ T cells in PFS. Finally, a decreased percentage of CD56+ Fc gamma receptor (CD16)+ NK cells was identified, which suggests a reduced capacity for antibody‐dependent cellular cytotoxicity in PFS patients. Subsets of CD56+ NK cells co‐expressing CD2, CD4 or CD8 did not show any significant difference between PFS patients and healthy controls. These phenotypic changes provide laboratory evidence of immunological abnormalities in this syndrome, and, we suggest, may be consistent with persistent viral infection.
Bahi‐Khata: The Pre‐Pacioli Indian Double‐entry System of Bookkeeping

The earliest treatise on accounting is generally thought to be Pacioli's Summar of 1494. The Bahi-khata is a double-entry system of bookkeeping that predates the ‘Italian’ method by many centuries. Its existence in India prior to the Greek and Roman empires suggests that Indian traders took it with them to Italy, and from there the double-entry system spread through Europe. The Bahi-khata is described and its double-entry principles explained.
Mortality, marriage, and growth in pre-industrial populations

Abstract It has been widely assumed that in pre-industrial European populations postponement of marriage was a major check on fertility, and that marriage was contingent upon access to a livelihood in the form of a homestead or a craft. Death made room for new families, and the age at inheritance might therefore be an index of the age at marriage. High mortality should then mean early marriage and high fertility. When the effect of a uniform increase in the force of mortality on the “natural rate of growth” is estimated quantitatively, it is found that fertility response is of the same magnitude as the change in mortality so that within a wide range mortality differentials alone would not suffice to account for persistent differentials in growth rates. The assumption of a reasonably effective control through the prudential check is thus strengthened.
Dependent indefinites: the view from sign language

In many languages, an indefinite determiner or numeral may be inflected to indicate that the value of the indefinite DP depends on another DP in the sentence or in context. Most semantic analyses of dependent indefinites formalize a similar insight: dependent indefinites contribute a variation condition: the value of the variable introduced by the indefinite must vary with respect to the value of another variable in the sentence or in context. The specific implementation of this insight varies in significant ways, notably on the following two fundamental architectural questions: 1. Are dependent indefinites anaphoric to their licensor? 2. Are dependent indefinites themselves quantificational? In this paper, I argue the following: 1) dependent indefinites have an anaphoric component; 2) they are themselves quantificational. I argue that new data involving spatial agreement in American Sign Language gives insight into these questions, but that the answers have theoretical and empirical ramifications beyond sign language. An analysis is presented within the framework of Plural Compositional DRT (Brasoveanu 2006, i.a.).
Variation in Diagnostic Testing in ICUs: A Comparison of Teaching and Nonteaching Hospitals in a Regional System*

Objectives:To explore variation in the use of diagnostic testing in ICUs, with emphasis on differences between teaching and nonteaching ICUs. Design:Retrospective review of a prospective clinical ICU database. Setting:Five teaching and four nonteaching ICUs in Winnipeg, Canada, during 2006–2010. Patients:All adults admitted to the nine ICUs during the study period were eligible. After excluding subgroups restricted to teaching ICUs, inter-ICU transfers, prior ICU admission within 90 days, ICU length of stay less than 12 hours, and missing death dates, 10,262 patients were evaluated. Interventions:None. Measurements and Main Results:Our primary outcome variable (TotalTesting) was the cumulative number of nine common laboratory tests, three radiologic tests, and electrocardiograms performed in each ICU. We used multivariable median regression to identify factors associated with TotalTesting, including length of stay, demographics, admission details, type and severity of acute illness, and specific medical interventions. We estimated the predictive power of variables as the decline in pseudo-R2 (a goodness-of-fit measure for median regression) when omitting those variables from the model. Median (interquartile range) TotalTesting was 27 (18–49) in teaching ICUs and 20 (13–36) in nonteaching units. With multivariable adjustment, median TotalTesting was 7.1 higher (95% CI, 6.6–7.7) in teaching ICUs. The most influential variable was length of stay, accounting for almost half of the variation. ICU teaching status was the second most important factor, greater than the degree of physiologic derangement and details of medical management. Conclusions:After adjustment for confounding variables, patients in teaching ICUs had slightly but significantly more diagnostic tests done than those in nonteaching ICUs. In addition to increasing costs, prior studies have shown that excessive testing can cause harm in various ways and does not improve outcomes. Interventions to reduce testing should be directed to all caregivers with responsibility for ordering diagnostic tests, in both teaching and nonteaching institutions.
The Determinants of Occupational Success in Britain

This paper is concerned with measuring the true impact of certain human capital variables on an individual's occupational position. The particular variables which are analysed are training, qualifications and spells of sickness and unemployment. The longitudinal nature of the data enables us to control for all relevant individual attributes which remain fixed over the period of the sample. This is vitally important because these attributes are strongly correlated with the variables of interest and would seriously corrupt estimates derived from a single cross-section. A method of generating consistent estimates (as N → ∞, T fixed) for a dynamic model with fixed effects is also illustrated.
Guest Editor's Introduction: The Nonprofit Mission and its Financing

Excerpt from introduction: The idea of commercialism in the nonprofit sector sounds to some people like a paradox: Nonprofits are supposed to be essentially different from private firms for whom commercialism is their very lifeblood. To others, though, the uniqueness of nonprofit organizations is by no means self-evident; perhaps they are really not different from private firms, being just as influenced by business motives and opportunities for self-aggrandizement. Does it matter? Yes, it matters a great deal. At root is whether nonprofit organizations-which are growing rapidly-deserve the encouragement and subsidization they receive. The debate over the proper role, if any, for nonprofit organizations in a modem economy continues, periodically grabbing public attention: Private firms claim that they are victims of "unfair competition" from subsidized, tax-exempt nonprofits, and then pressure lawmakers to restrict nonprofits' commercial activities; the federal government revises the personal income tax in ways that, intentionally or not, affect incentives to donate to charitable nonprofits; and local governments introduce the latest device for extracting money from supposedly tax-exempt nonprofits.
Habits, Rationality and Myopia in the Life Cycle Consumption Function

This paper considers the effect both on solved out forward looking consumption functions and on Euler equations of two alternative hypotheses about habits: rational habits assume that consumers are aware of the effect of their current consumption decisions on their future marginal rates of substitution; under myopic habits, they are not aware. Demand systems evidence suggests there are important habits effects for most consumption goods, but time series models of aggregate consumption have found only a low degree of habit persistence, a result confirmed here by an analysis of quarterly U.S. data based on Euler equations. Taken together the evidence appears to favour the hypothesis of myopic habits.
Human organic anion transporter 1 mediates cellular uptake of cysteine-S conjugates of inorganic mercury.

BACKGROUND The epithelial cells lining the renal proximal tubule have been shown to be the primary cellular targets where mercuric ions gain entry, accumulate, and induce pathologic effects in vivo. Recent data have implicated at least one of the organic anion transport systems in the basolateral uptake of inorganic mercury (Hg(2+)). METHODS Using a line of Madin-Darby canine kidney (MDCK) II cells transfected stably with the human organic anion transporter 1 (hOAT1), and oocytes from Xenopus laevis microinjected with cRNA for hOAT1, we tested the hypothesis that hOAT1 can transport biologically relevant mercuric conjugates of cysteine (Cys). RESULTS Indeed, MDCK II cells expressing a functional form of hOAT1 gained the ability to transport the mercuric conjugate 2-Amino-3-(2-amino-2-carboxy-ethylsulfanyl-mercuricsulfanyl)-propionic acid (Cys-S-Hg-S-Cys), but not the corresponding di-glutathione S-conjugate of Hg(2+) (G-S-Hg-S-G). Moreover, p-aminohippurate (PAH), adipate, and glutarate (but not succinate or malonate) inhibited individually the uptake of Cys-S-Hg-S-Cys in a dose-dependent manner. Uptake of Cys-S-Hg-S-Cys, but not G-S-Hg-S-G, was also documented in Xenopus oocytes expressing hOAT1. CONCLUSION These data represent ostensibly the most direct line of evidence implicating a specific membrane protein (i.e., hOAT1) in the transport of a biologically relevant molecular species of Hg(2+) in a mammalian cell. Moreover, these data indicate that the organic anion transporter(s) likely play a prominent role in the basolateral transport of mercuric ions by proximal tubular cells and in the nephropathy induced by Hg(2+).