Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Preseason Shoulder Strength Measurements in Professional Baseball Pitchers

Background: The ability to identify pitchers at risk for injury could be valuable to a professional baseball organization. To our knowledge, there have been no prior studies examining the predictive value of preseason strength measurements. Hypothesis: Preseason weakness of shoulder external rotators is associated with increased risk of in-season throwing-related injury in professional baseball pitchers. Study Design: Cohort study (prognosis); Level of evidence, 2. Methods: Preseason shoulder strength was measured for all pitchers in a professional baseball organization over a 5-year period (2001-2005). Prone internal rotation (IR), prone external rotation (PER), seated external rotation (SER), and supraspinatus (SS) strength were tested during spring training before each season. The players were then prospectively followed throughout the season for incidence of throwing-related injury. Injuries were categorized on an ordinal scale, with no injury, injury treated conservatively, and injury resulting in surgery delineated 0, 1, and 2, respectively. Subset analyses of shoulder injuries and of players with prior surgery were also performed. The association between strength measurements and injury was analyzed using Spearman rank correlation. Results: A statistically significant association was observed for PER strength (P = .003), SER strength (P = .048), and SS strength (P = .006) with throwing-related injury requiring surgical intervention. Supraspinatus strength was also significantly associated with incidence of any shoulder injury (P = .031). There was an association between the ratio of PER/IR strength and incidence of shoulder injury (P = .037) and some evidence for an association with overall incidence of throwing-related injury (P = .051). No associations were noted in the subgroup of players with prior surgery. Conclusion: Preseason weakness of external rotation and SS strength is associated with in-season throwing-related injury resulting in surgical intervention in professional baseball pitchers. Thus, preseason strength data may help identify players at risk for injury and formulate strengthening plans for prevention.
Population-based incidence and mortality cancer trends (1986–1997) from the network of Italian cancer registries

The objective of this study was to analyse incidence and mortality cancer trends in the Italian Network of Cancer Registries (about 8 000 000 inhabitants) during the period 1986–1997. Included were 525 645 newly diagnosed cancers and 269 902 cancer deaths (subjects >14 years). Joinpoints (points in time where trend significantly changes from linearity) were found and estimated annual percentage changes (EAPC) used to summarize tendencies. Overall cancer incidence increased in both sexes and cancer mortality significantly decreased (since 1991 among men). Lung cancer showed significantly decreasing incidence (EAPC=−1.4%) and mortality (EAPC=−1.6%) among men and increasing trends among women. In women, breast cancer incidence significantly increased (EAPC=+1.7%) and mortality decreased since 1989 (EAPC=−2.0%). Stomach cancer incidence and mortality decreased in both sexes. Prostate incidence sharply increased since 1991 and mortality decreased. Colon cancer incidence increased and rectum mortality decreased significantly in both sexes. Significant increases in incidence were also found for kidney (up to 1991 among men), urinary bladder, skin epithelioma, melanoma, liver (up to 1993 among men), pancreas, mesothelioma, Kaposi's sarcoma (up to 1995 among men), testis, thyroid, non-Hodgkin's lymphomas and multiple myeloma. Mortality significantly decreased for cancers of the oral cavity and pharynx, oesophagus, liver (women), larynx (men), bone, cervix (since 1990), central nervous system, urinary bladder, thyroid, Hodgkin's lymphomas and leukaemias (men). Non-Hodgkin's lymphoma mortality increased in both sexes. In conclusion, most of the changes seen can be explained as the effect of changes in smoking habits and of the extension of secondary prevention activities. The Italian health care system will also have to cope with growing cancer diagnostic and therapeutic needs due to population ageing.
The role of NIMBY in opposing the siting of wind farms: evidence from Greece

This paper aims to assess the relative importance of a NIMBY (‘Not-In-My-Back-Yard’) stance on an individual's opposition to the siting of a wind farm vis-à-vis other predictors, such as perceived effects (costs, risks and benefits associated with the project), perceived fairness of the siting decision and societal trust. Data originate from two case studies, a small wind farm of just two wind turbines in southern Greece and a mega-project of 153 turbines on the Greek island of Lesvos (aggregate N = 334). We use structural equation modelling (SEM) for testing the theoretically-suggested relations between the various constructs. We find that NIMBY is not the most important predictor of opposition while it is strongly correlated with other predictors, such as the perceived unfairness of the siting decision as well as the risks and costs associated with the wind farm. These latter findings undermine the common-sense idea that wishing a wind farm out of one's vicinity (‘Not-In-My-Back-Yard’) is an example of mere ‘free-riding’. Since the fit of the SEM models was found to be moderate, we discuss the limitations of our study and the implications of our findings as well as suggesting pathways for future research.
Decomposing Executive Stock Option Exercises: Relative Information and Incentives to Manage Earnings

This paper examines the information content of stock option exercises versus regular insider share trades by corporate executives. We argue that the asymmetric payoff structure of options makes managerial wealth – compared to holdings of shares – relatively more sensitive to stock price changes and more likely induces opportunistic behaviour. Consistent with our predictions, we find option exercises followed by share liquidations are associated with disappointing future earnings news, while sales of previously held shares are not. In addition, liquidation exercises of deep in-the-money options are associated with larger income-increasing abnormal accruals, signalling lower quality earnings. On the buy side, we find that regular insider share purchases are associated with positive future earnings news while purchases through option conversions are not. This research has implications for investors, compensation committees, and future research on corporate insider trades.
Positional rigidity: low performance and resource acquisition in large and small firms

Past research has given contradictory answers to the question of how strategic change is linked to firm size and performance. This paper resolves the contradictory predictions of performance feedback theory and threat rigidity theory by positing that small and large firms have distinct responses to performance because of differences in risk aversion and internal rigidity. To examine these differences, it is necessary to distinguish risk taking from rigidity in the strategic position, which is accomplished by separate analysis of the amount of resource acquisition and the difference of acquired and existing resources. Analysis of data from the shipping industry supports the predicted interactions of firm size and performance. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Transnational family networks and ethnic minority business development

Purpose – This paper seeks to understand the role played by transnational family networks in ethnic minority business development.Design/methodology/approach – The Vietnamese nail‐care sector is taken as a case study. The research involved interviews with ten owner‐managers and four key informants involved in this industry in London. The analysis draws on concepts of “strong” and “weak” network ties and “mixed embeddedness” to explain why the Vietnamese continue to enter such a competitive sector.Findings – The results highlight the importance of transnational family networks within all aspects of the business and suggest that these links can sometimes provide a fertile source of new business ideas, but can equally limit innovation. The presence of innovative and well‐educated members within the entrepreneurs' “strong‐tie” network appeared to encourage more successful business development and diversification.Research limitations/implications – The research challenges the traditional “strong/weak” ties the.
The UK Recession in Context — What Do Three Centuries of Data Tell Us?

The Quarterly Bulletin has a long tradition of using historical data to help analyse the latest developments in the UK economy. To mark the Bulletin’s 50th anniversary, this article places the recent UK recession in a long-run historical context. It draws on the extensive literature on UK economic history and analyses a wide range of macroeconomic and financial data going back to the 18th century. The UK economy has undergone major structural change over this period but such historical comparisons can provide lessons for the current economic situation.
PPPs: Nature, Development And Unanswered Questions

Public-private partnerships (PPPs) are the newest and latest “new public management” development for the public services. PPPs are becoming a worldwide development, although the origins can be traced to the United Kingdom's private finance initiative (PFI), which remains the most advanced and developed form of PPP. This paper explores the development of PPPs, concentrating first on the PFI and then tracing the increasing presence of PPPs in Europe, the Americas and Australasia.
Decoding the Market's Reaction to Settlement Announcements

This study examines defendant stock price returns on the day preceding, the day of, and the day following announcements of settlements in various types of litigation from 2009 through 2014. I hypothesized that defendant returns would be significantly positive on the day of and the day following the announcement, regardless of the settlement amount, due to the market’s perception of a decrease in cost and uncertainty associated with litigation. I further hypothesized that defendant returns would not be significantly positive on the day preceding the announcement, because the market presumably should not have had a reason to react. The results of my analysis support my first hypothesis; however, they also show a significant positive market reaction on the day preceding the announcement. This effect is likely due to the leakage of the settlement announcement and suggests future research should consider a larger event window.
Brain perfusion imaging during preoperative temporary balloon occlusion of the internal carotid artery.

UNLABELLED The main objective of this study was to assess whether 99mTc-HMPAO brain SPECT imaging can identify patients at high risk of developing an infarct following permanent carotid occlusion in the course of brain surgery. METHODS Test balloon occlusion of the internal carotid artery was performed in 44 patients with a variety of head and neck tumors or aneurysms. Technetium-99m-HMPAO was injected intravenously while the balloon was initiated and a SPECT study was obtained 30 min later. Follow-up CT scans were obtained routinely for all patients at 2 wk and 1 mo following surgery, or earlier when necessary. Thirty patients and five normal volunteers had semiquantitative analysis of cerebral perfusion. RESULTS Twenty-six patients demonstrated ipsilateral perfusion abnormalities during trial occlusion. Eight patients in this group underwent bypass grafting prior to sacrifice of the artery: two resulting in infarcts. Eighteen patients had symmetric cerebral perfusion during occlusion and four of these patients underwent permanent therapeutic carotid occlusion; three patients had subsequent infarcts and the fourth patient had an impending stroke. CONCLUSION Patients with symmetric cerebral perfusion measured by 99mTc-HMPAO SPECT may still have a high long-term complication rate following carotid sacrifice. The scan findings in these patients were not predictive of the outcome. Patients with asymmetric cerebral perfusion had alternative therapeutic approach to carotid sacrifice and most of them had good surgical outcomes.
From Balkan Conflict to Global Conflict: The Spread of the First World War, 1914–1918

This essay reassesses the process whereby between August 1914 and the end of 1917, all the most powerful countries of the day became belligerents in the First World War. It examines the three waves of decisions to intervene and offers generalizations about the process, comparing the early twentieth century with more recent periods.
CaffePresso

Auto-tuning and parametric implementation of deep learning kernels allow off-the-shelf accelerator-based embedded platforms to deliver high-performance and energy-efficient mappings of the inference phase of lightweight neural networks. Low-complexity classifiers are characterized by operations on small image maps with two to three deep layers and few class labels. For these use cases, we consider a range of embedded systems with 20W power budgets such as the Xilinx ZC706 (FPGA), NVIDIA Jetson TX1 (GPU), TI Keystone II (DSP), and Adapteva Parallella (RISC+NoC). In CaffePresso, we combine auto-tuning of the implementation parameters, and platform-specific constraints deliver optimized solutions for each input ConvNet specification.
Behind the lines–actions of bacterial type III effector proteins in plant cells

Pathogenicity of most Gram-negative plant-pathogenic bacteria depends on the type III secretion (T3S) system, which translocates bacterial effector proteins into plant cells. Type III effectors modulate plant cellular pathways to the benefit of the pathogen and promote bacterial multiplication. One major virulence function of type III effectors is the suppression of plant innate immunity, which is triggered upon recognition of pathogen-derived molecular patterns by plant receptor proteins. Type III effectors also interfere with additional plant cellular processes including proteasome-dependent protein degradation, phytohormone signaling, the formation of the cytoskeleton, vesicle transport and gene expression. This review summarizes our current knowledge on the molecular functions of type III effector proteins with known plant target molecules. Furthermore, plant defense strategies for the detection of effector protein activities or effector-triggered alterations in plant targets are discussed.
Systemic innovation in a distributed network: the case of Danish wind turbines, 1972—2007

What motivates firms to engage in shared innovation activities in complex technologies, where appropriation of value is interdependent on others? Transaction cost economics prescribes that innovations that are complex and systemic in nature should not be distributed among several actors. Here the firm is clearly the locus of innovation. Opposed to this, the network-based view suggests that a distributed organization may be the most efficient way to organize innovative processes under uncertain and rapidly changing conditions and that, because the locus of innovation is the collaborative network, firms are forced to join in order to stay informed. However, these two contrasting views both overlook the complexities of real-life activities. Understanding that firms' motives and propensity to collaborate are contingent on and evolve as industries evolve is the key to understanding their attitude towards sharing and co-developing knowledge.
Municipal Government Performance Appraisal System Practices: Is the Whole Less Than the Sum of its Parts?

This article presents the results of a national survey of municipal government performance appraisal system practices based upon the responses of 240 personnel professionals. The survey focuses on appraisal system structure, the link between performance and personnel decision making, perceived user acceptance, and observations on the effectiveness of the appraisal system. The results indicate that most performance appraisal systems are designed in accordance with the literature. However, the administration of these systems is more problematic. Most systems are perceived to be somewhat effective in terms of the process of appraisal and the affects on motivation and productivity.
Hemolytic transfusion reactions in oncology patients: experience in a large cancer center.

At The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Hospital and Tumor Institute at Houston, the incidence of hemolytic transfusion reactions over an eight-year period (1974-1981) was analyzed. Only four hemolytic transfusion reactions were reported out of 142,957 transfusions of blood (a frequency of one reaction in 35,739.25 transfusions). This could be due to the following factors: (1) Impairment of immune status related to the malignant process or temporary immunosuppression caused by intensive chemotherapy could enable patients to tolerate incompatible transfusions. (2) The reactions are overlooked or masked by the severity of disease in cancer patients in spite of an elaborate education for nurses, residents/fellows, and staff physicians about the dangers of hemolytic reactions. The figures herein reported are lower than those reported from non-oncology hospital settings.
On the Core of an Economic System with Externalities

Abstract : The document covers an investigation of the social stability of joint undertakings to allocate costs or benefits of the external effects of productive economic activity. Social stability is taken to mean that all coalitions or potential coalitions of affected parties are satisfied simultaneously. This is equivalent to being in the core of the corresponding multiperson game. A number of simple pollution-type models that have a wide diversity of core behavior are examined. Tax and subsidy schemes are discussed in regard to their potential for the achievement of Pareto optimality in the face of externalities of both types. (Author)
Goats Primed with Mycobacterium bovis BCG and Boosted with a Recombinant Adenovirus Expressing Ag85A Show Enhanced Protection against Tuberculosis

ABSTRACT This is the first efficacy study using the experimental goat model, a natural host of tuberculosis (TB), to evaluate the efficacy of heterologous Mycobacterium bovis bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) prime followed by boosting with a replication-deficient adenovirus expressing the antigen Ag85A (AdAg85A). Three experimental groups of 11 goat kids each were used: BCG vaccinated, BCG vaccinated and AdAg85A boosted, and nonvaccinated. Twenty-two goat kids were vaccinated with ∼5 × 105 CFU of BCG (week 0), and 11 of them were boosted at week 8 with 109 PFU of AdAg85A. At week 14, all goats were challenged by the endobronchial route with ∼1.5 × 103 CFU of Mycobacterium caprae. The animals were euthanized at week 28. Cellular and humoral immunity induced by vaccination and M. caprae infection was measured throughout the study. After challenge BCG-AdAg85A-vaccinated animals exhibited reduced pathology compared to BCG-vaccinated animals in lungs and in pulmonary lymph nodes. There were significant reductions in bacterial load in both groups of vaccinated goats, but the reduction was more pronounced in prime-boosted animals. Antigen-specific gamma interferon (IFN-γ) and humoral responses were identified as prognostic biomarkers of vaccination outcome depending on their correlation with pathological and bacteriological results. As far as we know, this is the first report using multidetector computed tomography (MDCT) to measure vaccine efficacy against pulmonary TB in an animal model. The use in vaccine trials of animals that are natural hosts of TB may improve research into human TB vaccines.
1-recall reinforcement learning leading to an optimal equilibrium in potential games with discrete and continuous actions

Game theory serves as a powerful tool for distributed optimization in multiagent systems in different applications. In this paper we consider multiagent systems that can be modeled as a potential game whose potential function coincides with a global objective function to be maximized. This approach renders the agents the strategic decision makers and the corresponding optimization problem the problem of learning an optimal equilibruim point in the designed game. In distinction from the existing works on the topic of payoff-based learning, we deal here with the systems where agents have neither memory nor ability for communication, and they base their decision only on the currently played action and the experienced payoff. Because of these restrictions, we use the methods of reinforcement learning, stochastic approximation, and learning automata extensively reviewed and analyzed in [3], [9]. These methods allow us to set up the agent dynamics that moves the game out of inefficient Nash equilibria and leads it close to an optimal one in both cases of discrete and continuous action sets.
Foundations of the Structure-Conduct-Performance Paradigm in Banking

This paper employs an explicit model of the banking firm to derive formally, and thereby assess critically, the most commonly tested relationships implied by the structure-conduct-performance paradigm as it applies to the banking industry. These include the relationship between loan rates and market concentration, deposit rates and market concentration, and bank profitability and market concentration. The necessary assumptions and simplifications implicit in past empirical studies are outlined and suggestions for future empirical implementation of the underlying model are presented. Copyright 1991 by Ohio State University Press.
The Solow productivity paradox: what do computers do to productivity?

(1) You don't see computers 'everywhere,' in a meaningful economic sense. Computers and information processing equipment are a relatively small share of GDP and of the capital stock. (2) You only thinkyou see computers everywhere. Government hedonic price indexes for computers fall 'too fast,' according to this position, and therefore measured real computer output growth is also 'too fast. ' (3) You may not see computers everywhere, but in the industrial sectors where you most see them, output is poorly measured. Examples are finance and insurance, which are heavy users of information technology and where even the concept of output is poorly specified. (4) Whether or not you see computers everywhere, some of 'what they do is not counted in economic statistics. Examples are consumption on the job, convenience, better user-interface, and so forth. (5) You don 't see computers in the productivity statistics yet, but wait a bit and you will. This is the analogy with the diffusion of electricity; the idea that the productivity implications of a new technology are only visible witlh a long lag. (6) You see computers everywhere but in the productivity statistics because computers are not as productive as you think. Here, there are many anecdotes, such as failed computer system design projects, but there are also assertions from computer science that computer and software design has taken a wrong turn. (7) There is no paradox. some economists are counting innovations and new products on an arithmetic scale when they should count on a logarithmic scale.