Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Spatio-Temporal Variation and Impact Factors for Vegetation Carbon Sequestration and Oxygen Production Based on Rocky Desertification Control in the Karst Region of Southwest China

The Grain to Green Program (GTGP) and eco-environmental emigration have been employed to alleviate poverty and control rocky desertification in the Southwest China Karst region. Carbon sequestration and oxygen production (CSOP) is used to indicate major ecological changes, because they involve complex processes of material circulation and energy flow. Using remote sensing images and weather records, the spatiotemporal variation of CSOP was analyzed in a typical karst region of northwest Guangxi, China, during 2000–2010 to determine the effects of the Chinese government’s ecological rehabilitation initiatives implemented in 1999. An increase with substantial annual change and a significant increase (20.94%, p < 0.05) in variation were found from 2000 to 2010. CSOP had a highly clustered distribution in 2010 and was correlated with precipitation and temperature (9.18% and 8.96%, respectively, p < 0.05). CSOP was significantly suppressed by human activities (p < 0.01, r = −0.102) but was consistent with the intensity of GTGP (43.80% positive). The power spectrum of CSOP was consistent with that of the gross domestic product. These results indicate that ecological services were improved by rocky desertification control in a typical karst region. The results may provide information to evaluate the efficiency of ecological reconstruction projects.
The Economics of World War I: The economics of World War I: an overview

Introduction: economic factors in the war This book deals with two issues in the economics of twentieth-century warfare. First is the contribution of economics to victory and defeat of the great powers in World War II. Second is the impact of the war upon long-run economic trends and postwar institutions in the economies of the great powers. What was the contribution of economics to the outcome of the war? As far as this first question is concerned, the authors share a broad understanding of ‘economies’, which comprises the national requirements of the war, the quantity and quality of resources, their availability and mobilization, and the institutions and policies which mobilized them for wartime purposes. As for resources, we understand them to include not only physical resources such as minerals, materials, and fixed capital assets, and financial stocks and flows, but also the human resources represented by the working population, its health and literacy, its degree of skill, training, and education, as well as assets represented by scientific knowledge and technological know-how. How important were these economic factors in deciding who won the war, and who lost? In answering this question it has always made sense to distinguish two periods of the conflict. In the first period, economic considerations were less important than purely military factors. This was the phase of greatest success for the powers of the Axis, and it lasted roughly until the end of 1941 or into 1942 (the exact turning point differed by a few months among the different regional theatres).
Adaptive neural activation functions in multiresolution learning

The author extends original work on multiresolution learning (Y. Liang and E.W. Page, 1997; Y. Liang, 1997), and presents a new concept and method of adaptive neural activation functions in multiresolution learning, to maximize the learning efficacy of multiresolution learning paradigm for neural networks. Real-world sunspot series (yearly sunspot data from 1700 to 1999) prediction has been used to evaluate the method. The article demonstrates that multiresolution learning with adaptive activation can further significantly improve the constructed neural network's generalization ability and robustness. Therefore, the work demonstrates the synergy effect on network learning efficacy through multiresolution learning with neural adaptive activation functions.
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin Morling Et Al. / Emphasis of Cultural Practices Cultural Practices Emphasize Influence in the United States and Adjustment in Japan

People have the capacity both to influence their environment and to adjust to it, but the United States and Japan are said to emphasize these processes differently. The authors suggest that Americans and Japanese develop distinct psychological characteristics , which are attuned to social practices that emphasize influence (in the United States) and adjustment (in Japan). American participants could remember more, and more recent, situations that involve influence, and Japanese respondents could remember more, and more recent, situations that involve adjustment. Second, American-made influence situations evoked stronger feelings of efficacy, whereas Japanese-made adjustment situations evoked stronger feelings of relatedness. Third, Ameri-cans reported more efficacy than Japanese, especially when responding to influence situations. Japanese felt more interper-sonally close than Americans, especially when responding to adjustment situations. Surprisingly, U.S. influence situations also made people feel close to others, perhaps because they involved influencing other people. Several psychological writers have noted a potential tension between a pair of human motives: to effica-ciously act on the world and to adjust oneself to others. Erich Fromm (1941), for example, argued that as people achieve autonomy and personal freedom, they are potentially faced with feelings of alienation from a broader culture and lack of meaning. Psychoanalyst Otto Rank (1932) wrote that when people feel autonomous and in control, they risk feeling isolated from others, whereas when they accommodate themselves to a family or community, they fear the " death " of the individual self. Freud famously said that the healthy person is able " to love and to work " (Gay, 1989). According to these views, people want both to influence the events and people around them and to adjust to fit in with people or communities. In one line of contemporary psychology (Rothbaum, Weisz, & Snyder, 1982), these two motives have been investigated as the concepts of " primary control " (acting on the environment in order to influence it) and " secondary control " (adjusting oneself to one's circumstances). These two important motives may be manifest both in situated action, such as controlling some event or adjusting to some set of circumstances, and in psychological responses, such as efficacy or trust. Furthermore, they are closely associated with cross-culturally divergent construals of self. Thus, whereas acts of influence enhance the independence and autonomy of the self, acts of adjustment highlight the interdependence and con-nectedness of the self with others (Kitayama & Markus, 2000). Research on …
Does School Quality Matter? Returns to Education and the Characteristics of Public Schools in the United States

This paper estimates the effects of school quality--measured by the pupil/teacher ratio, average term length, and relative teacher pay--on the rate of return to education for men born between 1920 and 1949. Using earnings data from the 1980 census, we find that men who were educated in states with higher-quality schools have a higher return to additional years of schooling. Rates of return are also higher for individuals from states with better-educated teachers and with a higher fraction of female teachers. Holding constant school quality measures, however, we find no evidence that parental income or education affects average state-level rates of return.
Nutch: A Flexible and Scalable Open-Source Web Search Engine

is an open-source Web search engine that can be used at global, local, and even personal scale. Its initial design goal was to enable a transparent alternative for global Web search in the public interest — one of its signature features is the ability to "explain" its result rankings. Recent work has emphasized how it can also be used for intranets; by local communities with richer data models, such as the Creative Commons metadata-enabled search for licensed content; on a personal scale to index a user's files, email, and web-surfing history; and we also report on several other research projects built on Nutch. In this paper, we present how the architecture of the Nutch system enables it to be more flexible and scalable than other comparable systems today.
Promises And Successful Practice In IT Governance: A Survey Of Australian Senior IT Managers

In a global, digital economy, companies increasingly depend on IT for timely information sharing, effective operational control, rapid innovation, speed to market, and customer satisfaction. On the other hand, recent global financial crisis and economic recessions encourage trends for increased managerial scrutiny to reduce IT spending and to increase business value of IT. Globally, concepts of IT governance (ITG) have proliferated as a solution for improving IT management under business uncertainty and rapid technological change. However, empirical research on organisational ITG practice still is lacking and urgently required. This paper, therefore, presents survey results on ITG practice from a perspective of senior IT managers in Australian private-sector organisations. The survey examines ITG practices, IT/business strategic alignment, ITG maturity level, IT organisation, and the relationship between IT organisation and business. Archival analysis of company documents is also performed to verify survey responses and gain additional insights. Despite different ITG frameworks being implemented across the companies, the results show the central importance of shared clear understanding of the strategic role of ITG by all levels of employees across the enterprise. The paper also discusses research limitations and future research directions.
Liver Function Tests in Chronic Congestive Heart Failure

It has been difficult for the clinician to evaluate quantitatively and qualitatively the degree of damage to the liver in the presence of congestive heart failure. This paper gives a statistical analysis of the results of various liver function tests on a group of patients with congestive heart failure. The analysis includes comparisons based on etiology, type of rhythm, duration of heart failure, and nutrition.
Functional domains of the Xenopus replication licensing factor Cdt1

During late mitosis and early G1, replication origins are licensed for subsequent replication by loading heterohexamers of the mini-chromosome maintenance proteins (Mcm2-7). To prevent re-replication of DNA, the licensing system is down-regulated at other cell cycle stages. A small protein called geminin plays an important role in this down-regulation by binding and inhibiting the Cdt1 component of the licensing system. We examine here the organization of Xenopus Cdt1, delimiting regions of Cdt1 required for licensing and regions required for geminin interaction. The C-terminal 377 residues of Cdt1 are required for licensing and the extreme C-terminus contains a domain that interacts with an Mcm(2,4,6,7) complex. Two regions of Cdt1 interact with geminin: one at the N-terminus, and one in the centre of the protein. Only the central region binds geminin tightly enough to successfully compete with full-length Cdt1 for geminin binding. This interaction requires a predicted coiled-coil domain that is conserved amongst metazoan Cdt1 homologues. Geminin forms a homodimer, with each dimer binding one molecule of Cdt1. Separation of the domains necessary for licensing activity from domains required for a strong interaction with geminin generated a construct, whose licensing activity was partially insensitive to geminin inhibition.
Circulating Rheumatoid and Antinuclear Factors in Asbestos Workers

In an unselected series of 80 patients with asbestos exposure referred to the London Pneumoconiosis Medical Panel, antinuclear and rheumatoid factors were found in 28 and 27% respectively. This probably represents at least a fourfold increase over their incidence in random populations. The presence of these autoantibodies was not related to the duration of exposure, but was related to the extent of radiographic abnormality.
Measurement of Observer Agreement Measurement of Agreement of Two Readers

1 From the Department of Radiology (H.L.K.) and MCP Hahnemann School of Public Health (M.P.), University of Pennsylvania Medical Center, 3600 Market St, Suite 370, Philadelphia, PA 19104. Received November 21, 2001; revision requested January 29, 2002; revision received March 4; accepted March 11. Supported by grant P01 CA 53141 from the National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, U.S. Public Health Service, Department of Health and Human Services. Address correspondence to H.L. K. (e-mail: kundel@rad.upenn.edu). © RSNA, 2003 Measurement of Observer Agreement
A Method for Individualizing the Prediction of Immunogenicity of Protein Vaccines and Biologic Therapeutics: Individualized T Cell Epitope Measure (iTEM)

The promise of pharmacogenomics depends on advancing predictive medicine. To address this need in the area of immunology, we developed the individualized T cell epitope measure (iTEM) tool to estimate an individual's T cell response to a protein antigen based on HLA binding predictions. In this study, we validated prospective iTEM predictions using data from in vitro and in vivo studies. We used a mathematical formula that converts DRB1* allele binding predictions generated by EpiMatrix, an epitope-mapping tool, into an allele-specific scoring system. We then demonstrated that iTEM can be used to define an HLA binding threshold above which immune response is likely and below which immune response is likely to be absent. iTEM's predictive power was strongest when the immune response is focused, such as in subunit vaccination and administration of protein therapeutics. iTEM may be a useful tool for clinical trial design and preclinical evaluation of vaccines and protein therapeutics.
Does an interferon-gamma release assay change practice in possible latent tuberculosis?

BACKGROUND AND AIMS Suspected latent tuberculosis infection (LTBI) is a common reason for referral to TB clinics. Interferon-gamma release assays (IGRAs) are more specific than tuberculin skin tests (TSTs) for diagnosing LTBI. The aim of this study is to determine if IGRA changes practice in the management of cases referred to a TB clinic for possible LTBI. DESIGN AND METHODS A prospective study was performed over 29 months. All adult patients who had TST, CXR & IGRA were included. The original decision regarding TB chemoprophylaxis was made by TB team consensus, based on clinical history and TST. Cases were then analysed with the addition of IGRA to determine if this had altered management. An independent physician subsequently reviewed the cases. RESULTS Of 204 patients studied, 68 were immunocompromised. 120 patients had positive TSTs. Of these, 36 (30%) had a positive QFT and 84 (70%) had a negative QFT. Practice changed in 78 (65%) cases with positive TST, all avoiding TB chemoprophylaxis due to QFT. Of the immunocompromised patients, 17 (25%) underwent change of practice. No cases of active TB have developed. CONCLUSION This study demonstrates a significant change of clinical practice due to IGRA use. Our findings support the NICE 2011 recommendations.
The functional integrity of northern leopard frog (Rana pipiens) and green frog (Rana clamitans) populations in orchard wetlands. II. Effects of pesticides and eutrophic conditions on early life stage development

Premetamorphic northern leopard frogs (Rana pipiens) and green frogs (Rana clamitans) were evaluated at seven wetland sites, four of which were within apple orchards, to determine if environmental conditions associated with orchard management in southern Ontario, Canada, affected frog early development. Synchronous with breeding events (May–July), embryos and tadpoles were exposed, in situ and in the laboratory, to study site pond water for 2 to 3 weeks. Six pesticides commonly applied in apple orchards (Guthion® 50WP, Imidan® 50WP, Thiodan® 50WP, Dithane® DG, Nova® 40W, and Basudin® 500EC) and technical grade diazinon were also evaluated for direct toxicity to green frogs using continuous and discontinuous toxicity tests. Embryos and larvae exhibited poor hatching success and survival at some orchard sites during in situ assays, but no specific water source produced consistently poor developmental success. Reduced tadpole growth occurred at several study sites, showing no clear distinction between reference and orchard sites. Despite the collection of substantial environmental data, only surface water temperature appeared to be correlated with growth rates. Basudin 500EC, technical grade diazinon, and Dithane DG caused mortality, deformities, or growth inhibition during early development at environmentally relevant concentrations (<0.01 mg/L), whereas Imidan 50WP, Guthion 50WP, and Nova 40W produced survival or growth effects at much higher levels (5–10 mg/L). Dithane DG (mancozeb) was acutely toxic during prolonged exposures, and sublethal growth and deformity responses occurred at nominal concentrations greater than 0.01 mg/L. Diazinon was the most toxic to green frogs, with median lethal concentrations of 2.8 to 5 μg/L and median effective concentrations of 6 to 14 μg/L for formulation and technical grades, respectively. The combined results of in situ and laboratory tests of green frog and leopard frog developmental success suggested that embryo—larval development of these two species could be accomplished at all study sites, independent of the association with apple orchards.
Do long-term unemplo ed workers benefit from active labor market programs ? Evidence from France , 198-1998

This paper examines the relationship between the time spent in unemployment before entry into an active labor market program and the effect of this program on the individual reemployment probability. More precisely, we test for possible different program effects on short-term and long-term unemployed workers. For this purpose, we develop a general framework for the evaluation problem with multiple treatments and varying dates of entry into the treatment. We estimate a competing-risks duration model to derive the propensity scores that are used to construct the matching estimates of the program effects. Our application is concerned with the youth employment programs which were set up in France during the last twenty years. The empirical analysis makes use of two nonexperimental longitudinal micro data sets collected over two different periods, 1986-1988 and 1995-1998. Results show that youth employment programs were generally less effective in the late nineties than ten years before, although the two subperiods were similar from a macroeconomic point of view. On the whole, long-term unemployed young workers benefited from at least some active labor market policies. However they benefited from different types of programs over the two subperiods. JEL Codes: C13, C14, C41, J64.
Do Restructurings Improve Operating Performance?

Controversy over the desirability of corporate restructuring typically centers on the operational effectiveness of these events. The purpose of this study is to directly address this debate by providing evidence on the effect of restructurings on operating performance. This study incorporates a full set of research design enhancements to address the methodological limitations of prior studies. Using these design enhancements, our results do not reject a null hypothesis that restructuring firms have improved operating performance due to the restructuring in post-restructuring periods. In fact, the results are generally consistent with the conclusion that restructurings have a negative effect on firm operating performance in the years subsequent to the restructuring. This conclusion is based on the following empirical evidence. First, the mean and median industry-adjusted operating margin of restructuring firms is significantly negative for all five pre-restructure years, and remains significantly negative for all five post-restructure years. Second, the mean industry-adjusted return on equity is negative for four of the five post- restructure years reported, and the median is significantly negative in years 2 and 3. Third, the mean and median operating margin forecast errors for restrucuturing firms are significantly negative in years 3 through 5, and the mean and median return on equity forecast errors are also negative, though not significant, in years 3 through 5. Most importantly, empirical tests using a metric designed to control for firm and industry performance in the absence of a restructuring indicates that operating margin for restructuring firms is significantly negative in years 3through 5.
Dimensional study of the caging order parameter at the glass transition

The glass problem is notoriously hard and controversial. Even at the mean-field level, little is agreed upon regarding why a fluid becomes sluggish while exhibiting but unremarkable structural changes. It is clear, however, that the process involves self-caging, which provides an order parameter for the transition. It is also broadly assumed that this cage should have a Gaussian shape in the mean-field limit. Here we show that this ansatz does not hold. By performing simulations as a function of spatial dimension d, we find the cage to keep a nontrivial form. Quantitative mean-field descriptions of the glass transition, such as mode-coupling theory, density functional theory, and replica theory, all miss this crucial element. Although the mean-field random first-order transition scenario of the glass transition is qualitatively supported here and non-mean-field corrections are found to remain small on decreasing d, reconsideration of its implementation is needed for it to result in a coherent description of experimental observations.
Esthetic Perception of Recurring Esthetic Dental Proportion in Different Lip Line Positions Among Lay People

1 PhD Candidate of Dental Biomaterials, Department of Dental Biomaterials, School of Dentistry, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran 2 Associate Professor, Dental Research Center, Dentistry Research Institute, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran AND Department of Restorative Dentistry, School of Dentistry, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran 3 Orthodontist, Private Practice, Tabriz, Iran 4 Assistant Professor, Department of Restorative Dentistry, School of Dentistry, Bushehr University of Medical Sciences, Bushehr, Iran