Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
SOCS-3 Induces Myoblast Differentiation*

Myoblast differentiation is characterized by a sequence of events that includes an increase in insulin-like growth factor (IGF)-I and contractile gene expression. The increase in IGF-I expression activates cell signaling mechanisms that participate in the differentiation process. One potential contributor is the SOCS-3 (suppressor of cytokine signaling-3) gene, which regulates signaling mechanisms and may be sensitive to changes in IGF-I concentrations. For the first time, the role of SOCS-3 is investigated in myoblast differentiation. SOCS-3 mRNA levels and SOCS-3 transcriptional activity increase during myoblast differentiation. SOCS-3 gene expression is induced, at least in part, by activation of the IGF-I receptor during myoblast differentiation. Overexpression of SOCS-3 cDNA significantly increased transcriptional activation of the 2.0-kb skeletal α-actin promoter in differentiating C2C12 myoblasts. In addition, overexpression of SOCS-3 specifically increased serum response factor-driven transcriptional activity but had no effect on nuclear-factor of activated T cell-driven transcriptional activity. SOCS-3 overexpression induced skeletal α-actin transcription in a myoblast cell line that cannot respond to endogenous IGF-I, indicating that SOCS-3 can contribute to the myoblast differentiation process in the absence of IGF-I. These data suggest that IGF-I induces myoblast differentiation, in part, by increasing SOCS-3 expression.
Consumer use of nutrition labels

Increasing consumer interest in nutrition has led to an increased interest in nutrition labelling. Finds that over half (58 per cent) of the sample surveyed read nutrition labels. Nutrition labelling was found to have an impact on consumer purchase decisions. Of those consumers who read nutritional labels, 81 per cent use them in their evaluation of food products. Consumers have to deduce information from nutrition labels in their current format. Survey findings reinforce previous work carried out in this area, particularly in the context of consumer categorization of food products as “good” or “bad”. For example, consumer avoidance of “negative” nutrients is apparent throughout the survey. The majority of respondents, who read labels, indicated that they search out information on nutrients they wish to avoid. In general, since time allocated to shopping for food products is limited, the format of nutritional labelling needs further consideration and improvement. The concept of nutrition should be incorporated into food companies’ marketing strategy.
Serum Level of Thyroid Hormones in Patients with Chronic Hepatitis C Virus Infection

Objective: There are clinical and laboratory associations between thyroid and liver diseases. Hepatitis C virus (HCV) is known to be responsible for both hepatic and extrahepatic diseases. The most frequent and clinically important endocrine extrahepatic diseases are thyroid disorders and type 2 diabetes mellitus. We aim to study the relationship between the serum level of thyroid hormones (THs) and the severity of liver disease in patients with chronic hepatitis C virus (CHC) infection. Methods: 60 patients with CHC infection were selected for the study. They were divided into two groups: with or without liver cirrhosis. Those with liver cirrhosis were further subdivided according to the Child-Turcotte-Pugh scoring system. Serum levels of free T3 (FT3), free T4 (FT4) and TSH were measured to all patients. Results: There was decrease in the FT3 and FT4 levels and increase in the TSH levels in patients with CHC with cirrhosis when compared to patients with CHC without cirrhosis. Conclusion: Thyroid profile abnormalities were seen in cirrhotic HCV patients when compared to non-cirrhotic patients. The abnormalities in the serum level of THs (decreased FT3, FT4, and increased TSH) are strongly associated with the severity of liver damage and advancing of the child score.
Internal Marketing: Scale Development and Validation

Internal marketing has been an area of interest for the past few decades, and the rapid growth on internal marketing literature has evolved the concept further. However, this theoretical advancement has not been able to empirically strengthen the concept, and there exists disagreement on the key components of internal marketing. Thus, this article endeavours to identify the dimensions of internal marketing by probing in the extant literature. In addition, the aim of the article was to develop a robust and valid instrument for measuring internal marketing. Data were collected from qualitative study and from 154 employees of financial service sector. Analyses revealed 11 significant dimensions of internal marketing, namely, senior leadership and vision, inter-functional coordination, internal communications, organization structure and changes, staffing, training and development, incentive systems, physical environment, strategic rewards and empowerment. Construct validity and reliability were empirically ascertained along with the determination of the good fit for the proposed model. The study highlighted the difference between strategic rewards and incentive systems as perceived by the employees. In addition, organization structure and change factors were tested to be significant, providing empirical evidence of their vital role in developing and implementing internal marketing practices in service firms. The article concludes by discussing the possible implications and future research avenues.
Recent rise in poverty and its implications for poor households in Pakistan.

There is sample evidence that poverty which declined rapidly in Pakistan in the 1970s and 1980s has increased in the 1990s.1 This rise in poverty is likely to have adversely affected the ability of poor households to enrol their young children in schools. The cost of schooling even when it is free is usually the most pressing obstacles for poor people to send their children in school. Similarly, health correlates strongly with poverty. This does not mean that poverty is itself a direct cause of diseases, but it lies behind other causes of disease such as in-sanitary living conditions, lack of adequate nutrition, poor access to safe drinking water, and sanitation and bad working conditions [World Bank (1993)]. Because of these factors, the poor are more affected by communicable diseases than are the rich. They have also less access to modern health facilities. This paper examines recent trends in poverty and their impact on primary school enrolment, health status and housing conditions in Pakistan.
The Effects of Intellectual Capital on Performance in Australian Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs)

There are limited studies in the literature that investigate the relationship between intellectual capital and SME Performance, and test the mediating effects of organizational innovation. This study examined 2,154 SMEs of various industries from 2009-2011 by using Business Longitudinal Database (BLD) from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). Our research findings show that human, structural, and relational capital has a positive and significant effect on SME performance when mediated by organizational innovation. The implication of our findings is that managers should simultaneously develop their human capital through training, improve their networking and collaboration, and increase their investment in information technology in order to improve SME performance through innovation.
New configurations in supply chains: the case of a condominium in Brazil's automotive industry

Purpose – The paper seeks to ascertain some of the implications of the supply chain configuration for important elements of the chain's management at an automaker using the industrial condominium configuration.Design/methodology/approach – In an attempt to identify the main motivating factors for the adoption of an industrial condominium configuration, a basic case study framework was built to guide and define the key content of the research. The framework considers simplification, cost reduction, process integration, and shared infrastructure as the four main interdependent factors that impel and drive an automaker's implementation of a condominium. It also considers product and process management, logistics management, performance assessment and relationship management as business processes significantly affected by implementation of the condominium. Using an intentional sampling approach, a case study was made of an automaker that uses the industrial condominium configuration, and of four of its repres.
Widespread Long Noncoding RNAs as Endogenous Target Mimics for MicroRNAs in Plants1[W]

A computational method systematically identifies intergenic or noncoding gene-originated target mimics (eTMs) for 20 conserved microRNAs in Arabidopsis and rice and validates the biological functions of some eTMs. Target mimicry is a recently identified regulatory mechanism for microRNA (miRNA) functions in plants in which the decoy RNAs bind to miRNAs via complementary sequences and therefore block the interaction between miRNAs and their authentic targets. Both endogenous decoy RNAs (miRNA target mimics) and engineered artificial RNAs can induce target mimicry effects. Yet until now, only the Induced by Phosphate Starvation1 RNA has been proven to be a functional endogenous microRNA target mimic (eTM). In this work, we developed a computational method and systematically identified intergenic or noncoding gene-originated eTMs for 20 conserved miRNAs in Arabidopsis (Arabidopsis thaliana) and rice (Oryza sativa). The predicted miRNA binding sites were well conserved among eTMs of the same miRNA, whereas sequences outside of the binding sites varied a lot. We proved that the eTMs of miR160 and miR166 are functional target mimics and identified their roles in the regulation of plant development. The effectiveness of eTMs for three other miRNAs was also confirmed by transient agroinfiltration assay.
Impact of Financial Structure on Firm’s Performance: A Study of Pakistan’s Chemical Sector

Firms have choices to raise their capital by various means including internally generated fund, new equity issue or various types of debt. The decision to select sources of finance is referred to as financial structure decision. Financial structure decision is very critical decision with great implications for the firm's performance. Theories proposed by the researchers to explain the financing decisions have always been subject of considerable debate. This study imperially explores the impact of debt financing on the profitability of the firms in Chemical Sector of Pakistan. The rationale behind the industry specific analysis is the fact that exogenous variables appear to force firms in the same industry in similar fashion. Therefore firms within same industry construct same type of capital structure. OLS has been applied to test the hypothesized relationship. Different perspectives have evolved over the period of time to explore the critical but very complex issue of financial structure decisions. Financial structure decisions base on many psychological and situational factors especially in developing countries like Pakistan. Financial Environment has great impact on financing decisions, the role of financial institutions is critical for capital restructuring decisions. In developing countries like Pakistan Financial Markets are incomplete and are unable to meet the financing requirements of the industry. Therefore, major source of debt financing for Pakistani companies is various types of loans with different maturities. Our results are not similar to the other studies conducted on capital structure. In oppose to literature our results reveal significant negative relationship between long term Debt and firms' performance and significant positive relationship between short term debt and the profitability.
Semi-automated vertebral segmentation of human spine in MRI images

Image segmentation is an important task in medical image processing to assist physicians or radiologists in making faster and effective diagnosis and treatment. However, there is still lack of effective segmentation methods to extract human spine in Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) images. In this study, we propose a segmentation method using 12-anatomical point representation (12-APR) method for human spine vertebra. The proposed method is a semi-automatic segmentation in which 12-points will be manually annotated on the region of interest (ROI) before the ROI can be extracted automatically. The performance of this segmentation is evaluated using six performance metrics and the results show that the proposed method gives the highest accuracy (99.87%), specificity (99.89%), Dice similarity coefficient (94.04%), Jaccard similarity coefficient (88.81%) and Cosine similarity coefficient (94.14%).
Longitudinal changes in mental and physical health among elderly, recently widowed men

Mental and physical health, morale and social functioning were assessed in a sample of elderly men widowed during the course of a longitudinal study. Measures were taken before these men were widowed, and then re-measured four years later, after they had been widowed. They were compared with a sample of age-matched still-married controls. There were no significant differences as a result of either marital status or time for mental health, morale or social functioning. However, there were significant interactions between time and marital status for these variables. Those men who had recently become widowed showed declines in mental health, morale and social functioning. Physical health showed a significant difference for time alone, with both the widowed and still-married men showing declines in physical health over the four year period. The results confirm earlier findings which indicate that men's mental health and morale is affected by widowhood. They also show that men reduce their participation in soc.
DNA damaging properties of single walled carbon nanotubes in human colon carcinoma cells

Abstract Single walled carbon nanotubes were studied with respect to cytotoxic and genotoxic properties in cells of the gastrointestinal tract as exemplified for the human colon carcinoma cell line HT29. No effect on cell growth in the sulphorhodamine B assay was observed after 24 h of incubation, whereas growth inhibitory properties were found after 48 and 72 h. After 24 h incubation a decrease of mitochondrial activity (WST-1) was measured (≥0.1 μg/ml), whereas membrane integrity (lactate dehydrogenase) was not affected. In cytotoxic concentrations, the formation of reactive oxygen species and a slight increase of total glutathione and nuclear Nrf2 were observed. However, already in subcytotoxic concentrations substantial DNA damaging effects were found in the alkaline comet assay, which were not associated with enhanced formation of formamidopyrimidine-DNA-glycosylase-sensitive sites. In addition, an increase of kinetochore-negative micronuclei (V79) and phosphorylation of the tumour suppressor protein p53 (HT29) underlined the genotoxic potential of these nanostructures.
Adenolipoma of the thyroid gland: Report of a case with diagnosis by fine‐needle aspiration cytology

Adenolipomas are rare benign neoplasms composed of mature adipose tissue and thyroid follicles. The preoperative fine‐needle aspiration cytology of such lesion has rarely been cited. Approximately 12 cases have been reported in the literature worldwide, diagnosed solely on histopathology. A 65‐year‐old woman presented with a 4‐month history of a thyroid nodule. A FNA cytology specimen showed a few benign follicular cells with adipose tissue. Right lobectomy was performed and the specimen revealed a solid yellowish mass measuring 3 × 2.5 cm. Microscopic findings showed a solid tumor predominantly composed of mature adipose tissue intermixed with thyroid follicles. The pathological diagnosis was adenolipoma of the thyroid gland. The presence of adipose tissue is a common finding within the cytologic specimen, especially in obese individuals or with inadequate sampling. But suspicion may be possible if excess amounts of adipose tissue are present in the submitted sample. Diagn. Cytopathol. 2008;36:253–256. © 2008 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Multi-Level Entrepreneurship in the Creative Industries New Zealand's Screen Production Industry

This paper situates the context for entrepreneurship in the creative industries sector in New Zealand. Setting promotion of the creative industries against an overarching national context of the government's Growth and Innovation Framework, the focus of the paper is the screen production industry, mainly the film industry. Buoyed by The Lord of the Rings –The Return of the King's Oscar success and other acclaim, the industry appears to be surfing high waves, making it an interesting case to examine. Commencing with delineation of the nature of entrepreneurship in the creative sector, the discussion continues within an integrative multi-level entrepreneurship framework.
Working Wives and Convenience Consumption

This paper examines role overload as a possible explanation for the lack of direct links between working-wife families and convenience consumption. Role overload is combined with factors from past research in a structural-equation model. Parameters are estimated using LISREL IV on data provided by an area cluster sample of 186 households from the Milwaukee SMSA. The resultant model is generally supportive of the proposed theory.
Long‐Term Allograft Tolerance Is Characterized by the Accumulation of B Cells Exhibiting an Inhibited Profile

Numerous reports have highlighted the central role of regulatory T cells in long‐term allograft tolerance, but few studies have investigated the B‐cell aspect. We analyzed the B‐cell response in a rat model of long‐term cardiac allograft tolerance induced by a short‐term immunosuppression. We observed that tolerated allografts are infiltrated by numerous B cells organized in germinal centers that are strongly regulated in their IgG alloantibody response. Moreover, alloantibodies from tolerant recipients exhibit a deviation toward a Th2 isotype and do not activate in vitro donor‐type endothelial cells in a pro‐inflammatory way but maintained expression of cytoprotective molecules. Interestingly, this inhibition of the B‐cell response is characterized by the progressive accumulation in the graft and in the blood of B cells blocked at the IgM to IgG switch recombination process and overexpressing BANK‐1 and the inhibitory receptor Fcgr2b. Importantly, B cells from tolerant recipients are able to transfer allograft tolerance. Taken together, these results demonstrate a strong regulation of the alloantibody response in tolerant recipients and the accumulation of B cells exhibiting an inhibited and regulatory profile. These mechanisms of regulation of the B‐cell response could be instrumental to develop new strategies to promote tolerance.
Estimation of Phytochemical Content and Antioxidant Activity of Some Selected Traditional Indian Medicinal Plants

The powder samples and methanol extract of 11 medicinal plants were subjected to analysis of proximate composition and measurement of antioxidant activity. Different parameters studied include phenolic contents, moisture, ash, crude fiber, fats and waxes. The assays employed were ferric reducing antioxidant power, trolox equivalent antioxidant capacity and scavenging effect on the 1,1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl free radical. Results obtained indicate that the antioxidant potential varied significantly from plant to plant. The total phenolic contents were determined spectrophotometrically using Folin-Ciocalteu reagent. Significant correlation is observed between ferric reducing antioxidant power and phenolic contents (R2 = 0.96). These findings show that the polyphenolic constituents in the extracts are responsible for free radical scavenging capacity.
The University of Bradford Institutional Repository

It is becoming increasingly popular to expose government and citywide sensor data as linked data. Linked data appears to offer a great potential for exploratory search in supporting smart city goals of helping users to learn and make sense of complex and heterogeneous data. However, there are no systematic user studies to provide an insight of how browsing through linked data can support exploratory search. This paper presents a user study that draws on methodological and empirical underpinning from relevant exploratory search studies. The authors have developed a linked data browser that provides an interface for user browsing through several datasets linked via domain ontologies. In a systematic study that is qualitative and exploratory in nature, they have been able to get an insight on central issues related to exploratory search and browsing through linked data. The study identifies obstacles and challenges related to exploratory search using linked data and draws heuristics for future improvements. The authors also report main problems experienced by users while conducting exploratory search tasks, based on which requirements for algorithmic support to address the observed issues are elicited. The approach and lessons learnt can facilitate future work in browsing of linked data, and points at further issues that have to be addressed.
The Key Drivers of Online Consumers’ Intention to Purchase in an Online Auction: A Reference from Southeast Emerging Market

The increase in the number of online sales, such as shopping website and online auction is due to the explosion of the World Wide Web in the last decades. In very short time, the Web has changed the way of people communicate each other, search for, store, send information and materials, buy our groceries and books, and even monitor our finance and build personal relationship. The public auctions, as one of the results of those changes, on the internet are characterized by a successful implementation that requires a high volume of buyers and sellers at its website. As the number of participants involved in this selling and buying media is increasing, it is important to understand the influencing factors of online consumers’ intention to purchase, especially to determine the level of this media attractiveness towards the purchasing of good and products with on online auction and shopping website. This study examined the influencing factors of online consumers’ intention, i.e. online information system quality, online auction price, and online service quality toward online auction and shopping website in Thailand. The data was collected from 397 online consumers of Sanook.com. This study used Pearson’s correlation coefficient analysis and multivariate regressions to test the hypotheses. The results reveal that online information system quality, online auction price, and online service quality have a significant and positive relationship with online consumers’ intention to purchase. This study also found that the perception of online consumer on online information system quality, auction price, and service quality are almost equally important in influencing their interest to purchase. Moreover, among the three factors, online auction price is the most significant factor toward online consumers’ intention to purchase.