Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Subjective and psychological well-being of students of a University of the Third Age: Benefits of continuing education for psychological adjustment in the elderly

Objectives The present study sought to characterize the degree of general satisfaction with life and degree of satisfaction on four domains: health, physical capacity, mental capacity and social involvement, and to determine the characteristics of self-reports of individuals enrolled on the program in relation to their psychological well-being focusing on the dimensions: autonomy, personal growth, control, positive relationships with others, purpose, personal acceptance and generativity, and to analyse the effect of time studying on level of well-being. Method A total of 140 elderly students of a University for the Third Age took part in the study. The Global Satisfaction With Life Scale and the Self Development Scale (with six psychological well-being subscales) were applied. Continuous variables for the two groups were compared using the Mann-Whitney test. Spearman’s correlation coefficient was used to analyze the relationship among numeric variables. Internal consistency of the instrument scales was analysed by calculating Cronbach’s alpha coefficient. Results Results showed that students who had attended the University of the Third Age for six months or longer had a higher level of satisfaction with life and greater psychological adjustment compared with new entrants to the same institution. Conclusion The study results confirmed the positive effects of continuing education on the well-being of elderly and its contribution to successful aging.
English league transfer prices: is there a racial dimension? A re-examination with new data

Reilly and Witt (1995) examined the role of race in determining English football transfer prices. The aim of this article is to update their work with new and later data on productivity of football players. Using data from the 2001–2002 English league season, a transfer price equation is estimated to establish if equally productive black players command lower transfer prices. The evidence suggests they do not.
Returns to Equity, Investment and Q: Evidence from the UK

Conventional wisdom has it that Tobin's Q cannot help explain aggregate investment. However, the standard linearized present-value asset price decomposition suggests that it should be able to predict other variables, such as stock returns. Using a new data set for the UK, we find that Q has strong predictive power for debt accumulation, stock returns and UK business investment. The correctly signed results on both returns and investment appear to be robust, and are supported by the commonly used and bootstrapped standard error corrections, as well as recently developed asymptotic corrections.
Design and Demonstration of 820-GHz Array Using Diode-Connected NMOS Transistors in 130-nm CMOS for Active Imaging

An 820-GHz 8 × 8 diode-connected NMOS transistor active imaging array with an on-chip pixel selection circuit was demonstrated in a 130-nm CMOS technology. The noise performance of this architecture is comparable to the state-of-the-art MOSFET and Schottky diode detector arrays. The imaging array consists of a row and column selector, an array of diode-connected NMOS transistor passive pixels, an analog multiplexer, and a low-noise amplifier bank. At 823 GHz, it achieves 2.56 kV/W of measured mean responsivity with a standard deviation of 18% and 36.2 pW/Hz1/2 of measured mean noise equivalent power (NEP) at 1-MHz modulation frequency with a standard deviation of 67%. The mean responsivity is greater than ~ 2 kV/W between 815 to 835 GHz. The minimum NEP of 12.6 pW/Hz1/2 is the lowest for CMOS based detectors at ~ 1 THz. The 8 × 8 imaging array occupies 2.0 × 1.7 mm2 and consumes 9.6 mW of power. Reducing device sizes to support the increase of operating frequency is expected to increase the variability and mitigation approaches will be required. The measured access time for the pixel is ~ 40 nS. The number of elements that can be connected in a row is determined by the modulation frequency and can be more than 1000 elements while supporting a frame rate greater than 1000 per second. Lastly, the expressions of responsivity and NEP including 1/f noise that can be used for the detector optimization are derived and presented .
Fast Numerical Method for Pricing of Variable Annuities with Guaranteed Minimum Withdrawal Benefit Under Optimal Withdrawal Strategy

A variable annuity contract with Guaranteed Minimum Withdrawal Benefit (GMWB) promises to return the entire initial investment through cash withdrawals during the policy life plus the remaining account balance at maturity, regardless of the portfolio performance. Under the optimal withdrawal strategy of a policyholder, the pricing of variable annuities with GMWB becomes an optimal stochastic control problem. So far in the literature these contracts have only been evaluated by solving partial differential equations (PDE) using the finite difference method. The well-known Least-Squares or similar Monte Carlo methods cannot be applied to pricing these contracts because the paths of the underlying wealth process are affected by optimal cash withdrawals (control variables) and thus cannot be simulated forward in time. In this paper we present a very efficient new algorithm for pricing these contracts in the case when transition density of the underlying asset between withdrawal dates or its moments are known. This algorithm relies on computing the expected contract value through a high order Gauss-Hermite quadrature applied on a cubic spline interpolation. Numerical results from the new algorithm for a series of GMWB contract are then presented, in comparison with results using the finite difference method solving corresponding PDE. The comparison demonstrates that the new algorithm produces results in very close agreement with those of the finite difference method, but at the same time it is significantly faster; virtually instant results on a standard desktop PC.
From Independent to Corporate: A Political Economic Analysis of Rap Billboard Toppers

A “snapshot” of the Billboard music industry charts from 1990 to 2005 was created to examine how corporate ownership influenced the content of the hip‐hop and rap genres. The analysis included a close textual reading of the charts to identify trends associated with ownership in the music industry. The findings suggest the merging of the music industry into four dominant firms aided in the creation of music genres with messages different from the grassroots messages in the tradition of hip‐hop and rap.
Optimal Growth Portfolios When Yields Are Serially Correlated

PpTO date, the bulk of portfolio theory has evolved on the basis of a single-period model. Those writers who have considered sequential portfolio models, for example Tobin [24] and Mossin [19], have invariably assumed investment yields in the various periods to be stochastically independent. The purpose of this paper is to generalize the capital growth model, apparently originated by Latane [17] and Breiman [6], [7], to the case in which investment returns in one period are not statistically independent of returns in previous periods. ' The assumptions employed in the present model are given in section II. Essentially, a distinction between risk due to broad market forces and risk due to individual asset factors, similar to that made by Sharpe [23] and King [16], is made. Furthermore, the "no-easymoney condition" is assumed to hold and the investor is required to remain solvent with probability 1. The formal model is developed in section III and section IV gives some preliminary results, including conditions for long-run growth and ultimate ruin. In section V, an optimal investment strategy is obtained on the basis of a slightly generalized and weakened version of the innocuous criterion that more is preferred to less in the very long run. The properties of the optimal strategy are discussed in section VI; it is noted that the optimal policy is myopic, that it maximizes the long-run growth rate, and that the optimal mix of assets is independent of wealth. Some concluding comments are given in section VII.
Temporal aggregation and estimated monetary policy rules

Temporal aggregation alters time-series properties of high-frequency data, thereby affecting the estimation of models based on time-aggregated low-frequency data. This paper examines the effect of temporal aggregation of interest rates on forward-looking Taylor-type monetary policy rules. Results show that using quarterly-averaged interest rates in standard forward-looking structures adds a spurious bias to parameters that measure the extent of interest rate smoothing and serial correlation of shocks. Consequently, empirical interpretations of persistence in policy interest rate changes are distorted.
The Impossibility of a Paretian Liberal

The purpose of this paper is to present an impossibility result that seems to have some disturbing consequences for principles of social choice. A common objection to the method of majority decision is that it is illiberal. The argument takes the following form: Given other things in the society, if you prefer to have pink walls rather than white, then society should permit you to have this, even if a majority of the community would like to see your walls white. Similarly, whether you should sleep on your back or on your belly is a matter in which the society should permit you absolute freedom, even if a majority of the community is nosey enough to feel that you must sleep on your back. We formalize this concept of individual liberty in an extremely weak form and examine its consequences.
“Give me your Tired, your Poor,” so I can Prosper: Immigration in Search Equilibrium

We analyze the impact of immigration on the host country within a search and matching model that allows for skill heterogeneity, endogenous skill acquisition, differential search cost between immigrants and natives, capital-skill complementarity and different degree of substitutability between unskilled natives and immigrants. Within such a framework, we find that although immigration raises the overall welfare, it may have distributional effects. Specifically, skilled workers gain in terms of both employment and wages. Unskilled workers, on the other hand, gain in terms of employment but may lose in terms of wages. Nevertheless, in one version of the model, where unskilled workers and immigrants are imperfect substitutes, we find that even the unskilled wage may rise. These results accommodate conflicting empirical findings.
Characterization of a glucose-repressed pyruvate kinase (Pyk2p) in Saccharomyces cerevisiae that is catalytically insensitive to fructose-1,6-bisphosphate

We have characterized the gene YOR347c of Saccharomyces cerevisiae and shown that it encodes a second functional pyruvate kinase isoenzyme, Pyk2p. Overexpression of the YOR347c/PYK2 gene on a multicopy vector restored growth on glucose of a yeast pyruvate kinase 1 (pyk1) mutant strain and could completely substitute for the PYK1-encoded enzymatic activity. PYK2 gene expression is subject to glucose repression. A pyk2 deletion mutant had no obvious growth phenotypes under various conditions, but the growth defects of a pyk1 pyk2 double-deletion strain were even more pronounced than those of a pyk1 single-mutation strain. Pyk2p is active without fructose-1,6-bisphosphate. However, overexpression of PYK2 during growth on ethanol did not cause any of the deleterious effects expected from a futile cycling between pyruvate and phosphoenolpyruvate. The results indicate that the PYK2-encoded pyruvate kinase may be used under conditions of very low glycolytic flux.
Further Examination of Infants referred from Newborn Hearing Screening

Objectives Universal newborn hearing screening (UNHS) is considered beneficial and is accepted worldwide. However, some problems remain, and administrative systematization has yet to be established in many countries. This study assessed the hearing screening of referred newborn infants and discusses the problems that remain. Materials and methods Over the two years from July 2001 to June 2003, 98 ears of 49 infants were judged as a “referral” from a newborn hearing screening program, and were subsequently referred to our hospital for further examination using conventional ABR and other audiological tests. The methodology used for hearing screening varied between practitioners and hospitals that utilized both different recording apparatus for AABR and/or automated DPOAEs and independent protocols. Results Conventional ABR identified 21 infants with bilateral normal hearing, 12 with unilateral hearing loss, and 16 with bilateral hearing loss, and a total correspondence rate of 40.8% (20 out of 49 infants). In a comparative analysis, 26 ears out of 98 (26.5%) were determined as false-positive, seven out of 98 as false-negative (7.1%), and there was a total correspondence rate of 66.3% (65 out of 98 ears). Five of the seven false-negative cases who were referred with unilateral hearing loss exhibited moderate to profound bilateral hearing loss (moderate; one infant, severe to profound; four infants). Of the 16 infants with bilateral hearing loss, nine with more than moderate loss had hearing aids fitted at our hospital or related educational institution before most were six months old. Conclusions Our results suggest the accuracy of newborn hearing screening remains an issue, but may be improved by an experienced examiner and better protocols including a two-stage process and altered timing of screening. Other ongoing health care programs need to monitor for signs of hearing loss even in the “passed” infants because of possible false-negatives and delayed-onset hearing loss. Improvement is needed in both the intervention systems and diagnostic follow-up of hospitals. Early public support is also required for infants with either severe to profound or moderate hearing loss. From the viewpoint of test conditions and puerperal parental psychological problems, it is considered that the timing of screening needs further discussion. Here it is suggested that screening should be performed within the first three months of infant's life but not be limited to before hospital discharge, and incorporated into the routine health care program for one-month-old infants without reducing efficiency.
Latin American Party Systems

Political parties provide a crucial link between voters and politicians. This link takes a variety of forms in democratic regimes, from the organization of political machines built around clientelistic networks to the establishment of sophisticated programmatic parties. Latin American Party Systems provides a novel theoretical argument to account for differences in the degree to which political party systems in the region were programmatically structured at the end of the twentieth century. Based on a diverse array of indicators and surveys of party legislators and public opinion, the book argues that learning and adaptation through fundamental policy innovations are the main mechanisms by which politicians build programmatic parties. Marshalling extensive evidence, the book�s analysis shows the limits of alternative explanations and substantiates a sanguine view of programmatic competition, nevertheless recognizing that this form of party system organization is far from ubiquitous and enduring in Latin America.
The Re-focusing of Small Business Services in Enterprise Agencies: the Influence of TECs and LECs

PROFESSOR ROBERTJ. BENNETT IS WITH THE Department of Geography, London School of Economics and Political Science, England. This paper assesses the change in focus of a form of British support services for small firms, enterprise agencies, as a result of their increased contracting arrangements with the government-backed Training and Enterprise Councils and Local Enterprise Companies. It is based chiefly on a representative matched postal survey of a sample of agencies which are compared in 1988 and 1992. The paper assesses the changing form of activities, services, client focus, finance and staff. It finds a substantial shift in services, finance and client focus to reflect TEC/LEC priorities both with the unemployed through business start-ups for self-employment, and with larger established businesses. The paper also demonstrates that changes stimulated by TECs towards a stronger output focus follow similar stimuli from private sector sponsors as evidenced particularly by the targetting of resources through secondments. The result has been a more concentrated, more highly focused structure of enterprise agencies and their resources which, under financial pressures, is likely to lead to concentration into a smaller number of agencies in the future, a process being accelerated by the development of another government initiative, Business Links.
Distal irregularities of the femur simulating malignancy.

Roentgenograms of the knees, externally rotated, in 100 children were reviewed in evaluation of the irregularity seen on the posteromedial aspect of the distal femurs. Dissection studies of the soft tissue and osseous structures were carried out in order to determine the etiology of this irregularity. It is more commonly seen in boys and on the left side and may be mistaken for malignancy.This apparent break in the cortex, with irregularity and occasional diminutive spicule formation, is a normal finding and due to the medial supracondylar ridge. An aponeurotic sheath from the extensor tendon of the adductor magnus muscle attaches along the medial supracondylar ridge, and with muscle stress and growth causes the development of this ridge. The development of the adductor tubercle is due to the attachment of the extensor tendon of the adductor magnus.The medial supracondylar ridge is not usually seen in the preschool age and is most commonly identified in oblique or lateral projections of the knee in the 10.
Research excellence and patented innovation

Highly cited American papers are selectively cited by American patents. A US paper among the top 1% most highly cited papers is nine times more likely to be cited by a US patent than a randomly chosen US paper. Governments hoping that the research they fund will foster innovation should therefore emphasize research excellence because agencies supporting the best research will support the research most likely to contribute to innovation. When mediocre research is supported, for whatever reason, neither science nor innovation is likely to gain much direct benefit. Copyright , Beech Tree Publishing.
Across-Sample Incomparability of R2s and Additional Evidence on Value Relevance Changes Over Time

Given the increasing popularity of across-sample R2 comparisons in accounting research, this paper illustrates why the regression R2s are incomparable across samples and the general nature of this problem. The regression residual dispersion with proper control for scale is proposed as the alternative measure of explanatory power for across-sample comparisons. In market-on-accounting variable regressions, this measure can be conveniently interpreted as the degree of accounting-based pricing errors and be used as a measure of value relevance of accounting information. As an application, the issue of over-time value relevance changes is re-visited. In contrast to prior mixed findings based on the R2 measure, a decline of value relevance since the early 1970's is robustly detected using the alternative measure.
The potential of employee involvement in the SE to foster the Europeanization of labour relations

This article looks at recent developments with regard to employee involvement in the European Company (SE) and in this light analyses the SE’s impact on European industrial relations. The article argues that the SE has indeed brought some innovation and new impetus at both national and European level. Thus, the SE might be better than its poor ‘reputation’ might suggest. This is all the more true with regard to the limited (new) rights granted by the SE legislation and the background of its introduction: the SE was never meant primarily as a social policy instrument, but rather to foster the cross-border mobility of companies in the EU internal market. Cet article examine les évolutions récentes relatives à l’implication des travailleurs dans la société européenne (SE) et analyse dans cette perspective l’impact de la SE sur les relations industrielles européennes. L’article indique que la SE a effectivement apporté certaines innovations et un nouvel élan à la fois au niveau national et européen. La SE pourrait donc être supérieure à ce que pourrait laisser supposer sa réputation médiocre. C’est d’autant plus vrai si l’on tient compte des droits limités (nouveaux) octroyés par la législation sur la SE et du contexte de son introduction: la SE n’avait jamais été conçue d’abord comme un instrument de politique sociale, mais comme un moyen de favoriser la mobilité transfrontalière des entreprises à l’intérieur du marché intérieur de l’UE. Dieser Beitrag befasst sich mit den jüngsten Entwicklungen der Arbeitnehmerbeteiligung in Europäischen Aktiengesellschaften (SE) und untersucht, wie sich die SE in diesem Kontext auf die europäischen Arbeitsbeziehungen auswirken. Aus unserer Sicht hat die Europäische Aktiengesellschaft tatsächlich einige Neuerungen herbeigeführt und sowohl auf nationaler als auch europäischer Ebene neue Impulse gegeben. Die SE dürfte somit besser sein als ihr Ruf, umso mehr wenn man den beschränkten Umfang der neuen, durch die SE-Rechtsvorschriften gewährten Rechte betrachtet und bedenkt, vor welchem Hintergrund diese Vorschriften eingeführt wurden: Bei der SE stand niemals im Vordergrund, ein sozialpolitisches Instrument zu schaffen, sondern die grenzüberschreitende Mobilität der Unternehmen im europäischen Binnenmarkt zu fördern.
Kinetic behaviour of DPPH radical scavenging activity of tomato waste extracts

The kinetic behaviour of tomato waste extracts (obtained from six genotypes) and standard antioxidant compounds (ascorbic and caffeic acid) were investigated using 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl radical test. Based on the time needed for the reaction to reach steady state, the investigated extracts show very slow (steady state ≥ 180 min) antiradical behaviour, ascorbic acid act as rapid antioxidant (steady state < 5min) while caffeic acid is rapidintermediate antioxidant (5 min < steady state < 20 min). The efficient concentrations at different kinetic times EC50,t were determined for all extracts, ascorbic and caffeic acid. EC50,t was used as a parameter to screen and compare antiradical activities of food extracts with slow kinetic action. Irrespective of the time considered, the comparison of the EC50,t for extracts showed that the DPPH radicals scavenging activity of extracts decreased in the order of O2 > Knjaz > Backa > Saint Pierre > Rutgers > Novosadski niski. Tomato waste extracts showed very slow kinetic action, which is probably result of the different kinetic bevaviour of phenolic compounds, present in tomato waste, as well as other antioxidants (vitamins, carotenoids etc).