Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Border Carbon Ajustment in Europe and Trade Retaliation: What would be the Cost for European Union?

Unilateral climate policy, such as carbon pricing, represents an additional cost to the economy, especially to energy-intensive industrial sectors, as well as those exposed to international competition. A border carbon adjustment (BCA) is often presented as an attractive policy option for countries that wish to go ahead without waiting for a global climate agreement. We used the computable general equilibrium model MIRAGE to simulate the impact of the introduction of a BCA on imports of energy-intensive products in EU and EFTA countries and to evaluate the exports their main trade partners would lose. Given that a BCA is a trade measure, it might cause disputes at the World Trade Organization (WTO). If the BCA is considered illegal, the losses suffered by some partners may justify trade retaliations. At that point, it would be likely that prohibitive retaliatory tariffs target sensitive products in the EU, which are often related to the European agricultural sector. These trade measures would limit the drop in production in the energy-intensive and trade-exposed (EITE) sectors, but at the expense of the other sectors. Nevertheless, neither the BCA nor retaliation would have sizeable impacts on real income or GDP in the EU or on the retaliators, while leading to a small decrease in global emissions.
Red blood cell (RBC) aggregation and its influence on non-Newtonian nature of blood in microvasculature

Abstract A robust computational model is proposed to investigate the non-Newtonian nature of blood flow due to rouleaux formation in microvasculature. The model consists of appropriate forces responsible for red blood cell (RBC) aggregation in the microvasculature, tracking of RBCs, and coupling between plasma flow and RBCs. The RBC aggregation results have been compared against the available data. The importance of different hydrodynamic forces on red blood cell aggregation has been delineated by comparing the time dependent path of the RBCs. The rheological changes to the blood flow have been investigated under different shear rates and hematocrit values and quantified with and without RBC aggregation. The results obtained in terms of wall shear stress (WSS) and blood viscosity indicate a significant difference between Newtonian and powerlaw fluid assumptions.
Interactive comment on “ The implementation of a MiXed Layer model ( MXL , v 1 . 0 ) for the dynamics of the atmospheric boundary layer in the Modular Earth Submodel System ( MESSy ) ” by R .

General comment The manuscript clearly describes the MXL model implemented in MESSy. The manuscript is well written and the objectives are clearly included in the subjects treated by GMD. In spite the title of the manuscript, the paper is mainly devoted to explain not the implementation of MXL in MESSy but the structure of the mixed–layer model, which is not a new model at all. Most of the manuscript is devoted to explain
Individual Factors and Knowledge Sharing

Problem statement: Knowledge management has been acknowledged as an important element for businesses today. While individuals within the organizations might recognize the importance of knowledge management for the success of their day to day business functions, previous literatures have shown that individuals are still reluctant to participate in knowledge management efforts especially knowledge sharing. As the behavior people show in different situations depends highly on their personal intentions as well as the social forces, the degree of the reluctance or willingness towards sharing their knowledge might also fit in the same case. Based on previous studies we develop a conceptual framework to suggest a relationship between knowledge sharing and four of the individual factors namely altruism, self efficacy, mutual reciprocity and trust. Questionnaire is proposed to collect data and multiple regressions as the statistical technique to analyze the data. Conclusion/Recommendations: This study makes an attempt to discuss some of the individual factors that can affect knowledge sharing.
Discussion Papers 562

Our study shows that the technological development of a firm can be subject to an endogenous acceleration mechanism. The more advanced a firm is in using a particular set of technologies, the more likely will it adopt additional, related technologies. This acceleration mechanism implies that marginal differences in early adoption decisions lead to substantial differences in technology endowment later. This hypothesis is tested in a dataset that records the adoption times of various e-business technologies in a sample of 7,302 firms from 10 different industry sectors and 25 European countries. Estimation is carried out with a semi-parametric hazard rate model that controls for unobserved heterogeneity. The results show that the probability to adopt strictly increases with the number of previously adopted e-business technologies. Evidence for a growing digital divide among the companies in the sample is demonstrated for the period from 1994-2002. The endogenous acceleration mechanism is a possible source of early mover advantages, if technological uncertainty and technological improvements over time are not very large and if the price of the new technologies remains roughly constant.
The impact of thermal cycling in humid environments on power electronic modules

The reliable operation of power electronic modules operating at high voltage is essential. The dielectric system within the power electronic module is reasonably simple but must be worked as hard as possible to achieve the highest module power densities. It is well known that a critical location in a power electronic module in terms of high voltage performance is the edge of the substrate metallisation where high electric fields can give rise to partial discharge within power electronic modules and can lead to eventual failure. This paper focuses on two particular issues. Firstly the performance of the gap between the substrate metallisation on which the collector and emitter of the device sit is examined. Secondly, the performance of the substrate-gel interface is examined once samples have been thermally aged in a humid environment.
MOLECULAR AND BIOLOGICAL CHARACTERIZATION OF AN ISOLATE OF APPLE STEM PITTING VIRUS CAUSING PEAR VEIN YELLOWS DISEASE IN TAIWAN

SUMMARY Symptoms of vein yellows were observed on the leaves of the domestic pear cultivar, Pyrus pyrifolia var. Hengshen, in central Taiwan. A virus with filamentous particles ca 12×800 nm in size (isolate VY1) was recovered from one symptomatic leaf and established in Chenopodium quinoa. VY1 was confirmed to cause pear vein yellows by back inoculation. Sequence analysis of the cloned coat protein (CP) gene of VY1 revealed 80.5-86.7% amino acid identity with comparable genes of 19 reported Apple stem pitting virus (ASPV) isolates. A conserved region of 220 amino acids was identified at the C terminal of the CP genes of these 20 viral isolates (3'-CP region). Three German isolates, two Polish pear and apple isolates as well as 13 other ASPV isolates were divided into four groups, A, B, C and D, respectively. Isolates included in each of the groups A, B, or C shared 97.3-100% amino acid identity in the CP gene. Sequence comparisons of CP genes at the inter-group level, showed 74.8-91.2% and 79.4-93.7% nucleotide and amino acid identity, respectively. However, when the nucleotide and amino acid sequences of the 660 nt 3'-CP conserved regions were compared, sequence identity values rose to 81.1-95.5% and 91.8-99.1%, respectively. Using 3'-CP conserved regions for nucleotide and amino acid sequence identity comparison among ASPV isolates provides better demarcating criteria for the taxonomy of ASPV. This is the first report of ASPV causing pear a disease in Taiwan.
Market States and Fund Investors' Reaction to News Coverage

This study aims to investigate Taiwan’s fund investors’ reaction to the fund news. This research contributes to the literature by combining the issues of market states and the investors’ 本文之通訊作者為傅英芬,e-mail: t90002@mail.tut. edu.tw。 作者感謝兩位匿名審稿人所提供的寶貴意見。 文中若有疏漏,當屬作者之責。 管 理 與 系 統 第十九卷 第一期 民國一○一年一月 79-111 頁 Journal of Management & Systems Vol. 19, No. 1, January 2012 pp. 79-111
Residual amino acid fluxes in Kiel Bight -February to June 1980

Residual amino acid fluxes were determined at 2 d sampling intervals at 20 m water depth in Kiel Bight from February to June 1980. Three developmental stages can be distinguished a winter period, the spring bloom sedimentation, and the summer maturation period. Absolute fluxes were highest during the sedimentation of the diatom spring bloom and similarly low for winter and summer situations. The relative contributions of amino acids to the total organic carbon and nitrogen fluxes indicate that the particulate material of the spring bloom and the summer sedimentation contains high amounts of amino acids This implies that despite the low absolute flux during summer, material of high nutritional quality reaches the sea floor.
The Effects of Visual Auditory Kinesthetic Learning Style as Technique in Improving Students' Writing Ability

The objectives of this research were to investigate whether VAK learning style as a technique has significant effects in improving students’ writing ability and the students’ interest in VAK learning style as a technique in studying English writing. This research employed quasi experimental design. The population of this research was the eleventh grade students of Science Program SMA Negeri 1 Bontomarannu in academic year 2014/2015. This research used cluster random sampling. The sample consisted of 60 students that belonged to two groups: 30 students in the experimental andcontrol group. The data was collected by using writing test and questionnaire.The findings showed that there was an improvement on the students’ writing ability after the treatment. The students’ result of posttest of experimental group was more significantly improved than the students’ result of posttest of control group by the mean score 73.2 > 58.1. The difference of both scores was statistically significant based on the t-test value at significant level0.05 inwhich the P-value is lower than the significant level (0.0001 < 0.05). The mean score of the students’ interest in the experimental group was 91.63 and it was categorized as strongly interested. K e y words : VAK Learning Style, Writing, Learning Style
The Optimal Currency Basket with Input Currency and Output Currency

This paper explores the determination of the optimal currency basket in a small open economy general equilibrium model with sticky prices. In contrast to traditional literature, we focus on an economy with vertical trade, where one currency is used as the invoicing currency of imported intermediate goods and is called the "input currency", while the other currency is used for the invoicing of exported finished goods and is called the "output currency". We find that in the optimal currency basket the weight between the input currency and the output currency depends critically on the structure of vertical trade. Moreover, we show that if a country decides to choose a single-currency peg, then the choice of pegging currency depends mainly on how other economies respond to external exchange rate fluctuations. In a sense, our paper provides a case for the Chinese RMB peg in some East Asian economies, given the importance of the RMB as an input currency.
Transmission Capacity of Spectrum Sharing Ad Hoc Networks with Multiple Antennas

Two coexisting ad hoc networks, primary and secondary, are considered, where each node of the primary network has a single antenna, while each node of the secondary network is equipped with multiple antennas. Using multiple antennas, each secondary transmitter uses some of its spatial transmit degrees of freedom (STDOF) to null its interference towards the primary receivers, while each secondary receiver employs interference cancelation using some of its spatial receive degrees of freedom (SRDOF). This paper derives the optimal STDOF for nulling and SRDOF for interference cancelation that maximize the scaling of the transmission capacity of the secondary network with respect to the number of antennas, when the secondary network operates under an outage constraint at the primary receivers. With a single receive antenna, using a fraction of the total STDOF for nulling at each secondary transmitter maximizes the transmission capacity. With multiple transmit and receive antennas and fixing all but one STDOF for nulling, using a fraction of the total SRDOF to cancel the nearest interferers maximizes the transmission capacity of the secondary network.
ReBA

Although in theory the APIs of software libraries and frameworks should be stable, they change in practice. This forces clients of the library API to change as well, making software maintenance expensive. Changing a client might not even be an option if its source code is missing or certain policies forbid its change. By giving a library both the old and the new API, clients can be shielded from API changes and can run with the new version of the library. This paper presents our solution and a tool, ReBA, that automatically generates compatibility layers between new library APIs and old clients. In the first stage, ReBA generates another version of the library, called adapted-library, that supports both the old and the new APIs. In the second stage, ReBA shrinks the adapted-library into a minimal, client-specific compatibility layer containing only classes truly required by the client. Evaluations on controlled experiments and case studies using Eclipse core libraries shows that our approach effectively adapts clients to new library versions, and is efficient.
Panel: Labor importation as the steroid for nations' ICT success: A debate

In the recent years most African countries have embarked on a series of reforms involving the decentralisation and also integration of health information systems in order to allow improved efficiency and effectiveness in the health care. However, although the discourse around these issues are reflected in global policy documents of almost twenty years ago, IS are still fragmented and weak at the lower levels of the health service. The paper takes a multivocal and multilevel institutionalist perspective to analyse the role of information technology in shaping these shortfalls between institutional accounts and enactments of reforms. Based on the case study of two divisions of the ministry of health in Kenya, it aims to better understand the change implications of information technology for the structures of a health information system in Africa. This is meant to improve the understanding of the way technology-mediated human interactions produce variance between planned organisational change envisaged in donor-driven reforms of the health care service and unplanned HIS structures emerging from the local institutionally-embedded usage of IT tools.
Reminiscence theory and its use in counseling the aged adult

Focusing on reminiscence counseling with the aged, the paper exams the theory that an older person's reminiscing about past experiences provides one way of adapting or coping to the crises of older age, i.e., decreases in physical strength and health, role changes due to retirement, the death of a spouse or friends and changes in living arrange¬ ments. A discussion of reminiscence theory is provided, including the concept, dimensions, and function of reminis¬ cence. A distinction between the terms life review (as conceptualized by Robert Butler) and reminiscence is pro¬ posed. A review of the literature categorized two approaches to reminiscence research: reminiscence as an adaptive pro¬ cess and reminiscence as a non-adaptive process. Research concluding that reminiscence was an adaptive process in factors related to aging and life adjustment was challenged by research that concluded that reminiscence was non-adaptive in factors related to aging and life adjustment. The therapeutic process involved in life review and reminiscence therapy is outlined, followed by the review of research that focuses on the use of life review and reminiscence therapy in group counseling with aged individuals. Contradictory findings concerning the effectiveness of reminiscence thera¬ py are noted. Recommendations for further research in the areas of reminiscence and reminiscence counseling are indi¬ cated .
Optimal Licensing of Agricultural Patents: Fees Versus Royalties

We develop a theoretical model of optimal licensing schemes for quality-improving innovations. We consider an oligopolistic market where two downstream firms compete in price and the upstream innovator holds a technology that may create differentiation between the products. Our results show that non-exclusive licensing performs better than exclusive licensing under both fixed fees and royalties and that the preferred contract consists of fixed fees only. We also find that the innovator’s license revenue depends on the magnitude of the innovation so there is a greater reward to the innovator’s institution if the innovation is large.
Genetic Insights into Ecological Succession from Oak- (Quercus robur L.) to Beech- (Fagus sylvatica L.) Dominated Forest Stands

Genetic diversity is often considered a major determinant of long term population persistence and its potential to adapt to variable environmental conditions. The ability of populations to maintain their genetic diversity across generations seems to be a major prerequisite for their sustainability, which is particularly important for keystone forest tree species. However, little is known about genetic consequences of demographic alterations occurring during natural processes of ecological succession involving changes in the species composition. Using microsatellites, we investigated genetic diversity of adult and offspring generations in beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) and oak (Quercus robur L.) populations coexisting in a naturally established old-growth forest stand, showing some symptoms of ongoing ecological succession from oakto beechdominated forest. In general, adult generations of both species exhibited high levels of genetic diversity (0.657 for beech; 0.821 for oak), which, however, depended on the sets of selected genetic markers. Nevertheless, several symptoms such as differences in genetic diversity indices between generations, significant levels of inbreeding (up to 0.029) and low estimates of effective population size (48–80) confirmed the declining status of the oak population. On the other hand, the uniform distribution of genetic diversity indices across generations, low levels of inbreeding (0.004), low genetic differentiation among adults and offspring and, most importantly, large estimates of effective population size (119–716), all supported beech as a successive and successful tree species in the studied forest stand.
Correlation Between Adiponectin Gene rs1501299 Polymorphism and Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease Susceptibility: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Background Metabolic related nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is one of the most prevalent chronic liver diseases around the world. A single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) rs1501299 (+276G>T) in the adiponectin gene has been recently revealed to be responsible for susceptibility to NAFLD. This meta-analysis intended to assess the association risk of NAFLD and rs1501299 polymorphism. Material/Methods We conducted a literature search on PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane Library databases. All involved studies were selected based on our search criteria. Odds ratios (ORs) with 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were used to quantify the strength of the association. Subgroup analysis considered the effects of ethnicity, subject scope, and source of control. Publication bias was assessed by Begg’s tests. Results Eight qualified case-control studies with 1639 patients and 1426 controls demonstrated a significant correlation between rs1501299 polymorphism in adiponectin and NAFLD under the dominant model (OR=1.18, 95% CI=1.02–1.36), allelic contrast (OR=1.21, 95% CI=1.09–1.36), homozygote comparison (OR=1.63, 95% CI=1.26–2.01) and the recessive allele model (OR=1.58, 95% CI=1.23–2.02) with evident heterogeneity. No association was observed between the risk of NAFLD and the genotypic variants in heterozygote comparison (OR=1.11, 95% CI=0.95–1.29) without heterogeneity. Subgroup analysis suggested that the sample size could be the potential source of heterogeneity. Source of control was not the reason for between-study heterogeneity and further sensitivity analysis and publication bias revealed good consistency and symmetry in the pooling studies. Conclusions Results from our current meta-analysis gave insight into the correlation between rs1501299 polymorphism and the risk of NAFLD, indicating the variant of rs1501299 might be related to increased NAFLD susceptibility.
Ratio of height to thyromental distance as a predictor of difficult laryngoscopy: A prospective observational study

Background and Aim Various airway indices are used either singly or in combination to predict difficult laryngoscopy. Recently introduced ratio of height to thyromental distance (RHTMD) is reported to have better predictability. We aimed to assess the prediction of difficult laryngoscopy by RHTMD and compared it with other indices. Material and Methods In this prospective, single-blinded comparative observational study, 300 adult patients of either gender scheduled to receive general anesthesia were assessed. Airway indices, like RHTMD, thyromental distance, modified Mallampati test, and upper lip bite test, were assessed and correlated with Cormack and Lehane's laryngoscopic grading. The validity parameters like specificity, sensitivity, positive predictive value (PPV), negative predictive value (NPV), and accuracy were calculated for each test. Effect of combining all the indices was also analyzed. Receiver operating characteristic curves were constructed and optimal cutoff value for the quantitative indices was calculated. Results The incidence of difficult laryngoscopy in our study was 5.33%. Of the four indices, the single best test was RHTMD, with better sensitivity, high specificity, NPV, and accuracy and with good PPV. A combination of all the indices resulted in 100% sensitivity and higher specificity. Conclusions RHTMD is a single best preoperative test for predicting difficult laryngoscopy. A combination of tests has higher sensitivity and specificity with better discriminative power. Therefore indices should be used in combination in the preoperative airway assessment of adult patients.