Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Regulation of Vascular Smooth Muscle Cell Turnover by Endothelial Cell–Secreted MicroRNA-126: Role of Shear Stress

Rationale: Endothelial microRNA-126 (miR-126) modulates vascular development and angiogenesis. However, its role in the regulation of smooth muscle cell (SMC) function is unknown. Objective: To elucidate the role of miR-126 secreted by endothelial cells (ECs) in regulating SMC turnover in vitro and in vivo, as well as the effects of shear stress on the regulation. Methods and Results: Coculture of SMCs with ECs or treatment of SMCs with conditioned media from static EC monoculture (EC-CM) increased SMC miR-126 level and SMC turnover; these effects were abolished by inhibition of endothelial miR-126 and by the application of laminar shear stress to ECs. SMC miR-126 did not increase when treated with EC-CM from ECs subjected to inhibition of miR biogenesis, or with CM from sheared ECs. Depletion of extracellular/secreted vesicles in EC-CM did not affect the increase of SMC miR-126 by EC-CM. Biotinylated miR-126 or FLAG (DYKDDDDK epitope)-tagged Argonaute2 transfected into ECs was detected in the cocultured or EC-CM–treated SMCs, indicating a direct EC-to-SMC transmission of miR-126 and Argonaute2. Endothelial miR-126 represses forkhead box O3, B-cell lymphoma 2, and insulin receptor substrate 1 mRNAs in the cocultured SMCs, suggesting the functional roles of the transmitted miR-126. Systemic depletion of miR-126 in mice inhibited neointimal lesion formation of carotid arteries induced by cessation of blood flow. Administration of EC-CM or miR-126 mitigated the inhibitory effect. Conclusions: Endothelial miR-126 acts as a key intercellular mediator to increase SMC turnover, and its release is reduced by atheroprotective laminar shear stress.
Immunohistochemical Expression of p27 and p21 in Canine Cutaneous Mast Cell Tumors and Histiocytomas

The objective of this study was to evaluate by immunohistochemical means the nuclear expression of p27 and p21 proteins in cutaneous mast cell tumors and histiocytomas of dogs. In mast cell tumors, nine of the 13 grade I tumors, 13 of the 19 grade II tumors, and 10 of the 15 grade III tumors showed no detectable or mild p27 immunoreactivity. In contrast, one of the 13 grade I tumors, 12 of the 19 grade II tumors, and 11 of the 15 grade III tumors showed moderate or marked p21 immunoreactivity. Nineteen of the 28 histiocytomas showed no detectable or mild p27 immunoreactivity, and 24 cases showed moderate or marked p21 immunoreactivity. These findings indicate that a loss or absence of p27 expression is an early pathogenic event in mast cell and histiocyte tumorigenesis and that p21 expression may be a marker of mast cell tumor progression and histiocytoma cell proliferation.
Satisfaction With Work-Life Benefits and Organizational Commitment/Job Involvement

Given that an employee’s personal responsibilities can have an effect on their work, one method increasingly used by government agencies to improve performance has been to offer programs that assist workers in balancing work and personal obligations. Employee demand for such work-life programs is also increasing due to the growing amount of women in the workplace, two-career families, and workers wanting a greater ability to manage work and life. Yet despite the increase in supply and demand for work-life programs, empirical examinations regarding the benefits of these programs in government agencies are scarce. As a result, this article examines the association between employee satisfaction with work-life programs and two important factors that drive work motivation: organizational commitment and job involvement. Data was obtained from the 2010 Federal Employee Viewpoint survey, and the results from the analysis extended previous literature in several important ways. First, work motivation was not consistently affected by employee levels of satisfaction with work-life benefits in federal agencies. More specifically, employee satisfaction with most work-life benefits (i.e., telework, health and wellness programs, child care, and older adult care) were positively associated to organizational commitment, and none were associated to job involvement. Next, organizational commitment was influenced more by family-friendly programs and health and wellness programs than by flexible working arrangements. The implications of these findings are detailed in the study.
The Effect of Insurance Knowledge on the Insurance Demand: the case study of Auto Insurance

Although there have been some studies about the effect of education on the insurance demand, however, the literature suffers from a lack of study about the effect of insurance knowledge on the insurance demand. Hence, for the first time this research investigates about the effect of insurance knowledge (individuals who have knowledge of insurance either their education or their occupation is related to insurance), as a substantial factor, on the insurance demand. Our main hypothesis is that the insurance knowledge has positive effect on the insurance demand. In order to test this hypothesis, we consider auto insurance. In the first step, we test the effect of risk aversion along with other individual's cha such as sex, age, marital status, occupation, education, usage, engine size, number of accidents, driving experience and age of the car on the demand for auto insurance. Then in the second step, for investigating about the effect of insurance knowledge, we divide the population of interest into two groups, one with insurance knowledge and other one without insurance knowledge and compare risk aversion level of these two groups. From 497 questionnaires that gathered from stratified random sampling and applying logistic regression model, the results indicate that risk aversion has a positive relationship with auto insurance demand. In addition, risk aversion level is higher in group with insurance knowledge. Accordingly, insurance
Public Enterprise in the Modern Western World: An Historical Analysis

The aim of this paper is to explain the pattern of public enterprise in Western Europe, Japan and USA in the late 20th century, just before the onset of privatisation. It is argued that this requires an understanding of the origins which date from the early 19th century. The task then becomes one of explaining differences over time and across countries. The focus is on those enterprises levying prices and required to break even financially. A common misconception is that the establishment of such public enterprises at both the state and municipal level was a device for overcoming problems of natural monopoly and/or a socialist instrument for mitigating worker exploitation. It is argued that the former was mainly dealt with by arms’ length regulation and that socialist forces were limited. The key questions that have to be answered and around which the paper is organised are: why was public enterprise common in grid networks; why were state owned enterprises in manufacturing more common in Germany, Spain, Italy; why were USA and UK (up to 1939) different; was municipal and state socialism important; what does the privatisation experience tell us about public enterprise; what do performance studies reveal? The answer is that public enterprise was often an instrument for promoting social and political unification, securing national defence and related strategic considerations, increasingly in the 20th century for promoting economic growth, with regulatory failures and socialist pressures playing a more subsidiary and/or occasional role.
Do border measures affect carbon leakage

In this paper we quantify the effects of the pledged commitments that have been made after the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference in December 2009 making use of the CGE-model WorldScan. We analyze the impacts of climate policy variants up to the year 2020, in particular on economic welfare and carbon leakage. We consider two main policy cases: ambitious and modest pledges. In the first case Annex I countries ambitiously adopt relatively low caps on GHG-emissions and allow free permit trade amongst each other. In this scenario China and India impose relative targets for CO2 emission-intensities of 45% and 25% below 2005 intensities. In the second case Annex I countries impose modest emission ceilings without permit trade and without the use of CDM. In this scenario China and India impose more modest relative targets too. Only in the EU permit trade occurs, separately within the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) and within the sectors outside ETS. In addition, we consider various variants for the case of modest pledges. The most important of these are: allowing Annex I countries to use CDM up to one third of the reduction effort and allowing industrialized countries to apply border measures (BM) for the ETS-sectors. In the BM case we assume that Annex I countries simultaneously adopt carbon import levies and carbon export refunds on all trade with non-Annex I. The level of these border measures is based upon the average prevailing direct and indirect carbon costs in domestic production of the ETS-sectors. In all policy cases carbon leakage is considerable. Production leakage in absolute terms is rather modest though. Our simulations suggest that border measures are rather ineffective in reducing leakage. With additional simulations we show that the fossil fuel price channel is the most important cause of carbon leakage. Because border measures do not address this channel, they hardly affect carbon leakage.
Web Aesthetics Effects on User Decisions: Impact of Exposure Length on Website Quality Perceptions and Buying Intentions

This study examines the impact of three types of aesthetics (classical, expressive, and design aesthetics) on users' quality perceptions about websites based on very short exposure (one second) to websites. It also examines the consistency of website quality perceptions based on very short exposure with the quality perceptions based on a long exposure and the impact of the quality perception based on a very short exposure on users' buying intentions. An experimental design was developed on participants exposed to different web shops for different exposure times. The findings indicate that quality perceptions and buying intentions are not affected by the first impression of a website if this is based on one second exposure. Longer exposure to a website is an important determinant of buying behavior, while all three types of aesthetics are important determinants of the customer's quality perception about the site and the customer's intention to buy a product.
Limited value of sonohysterography for endometrial screening in asymptomatic, postmenopausal patients treated with tamoxifen.

OBJECTIVES Sonohysterography (SHG) has been proposed as a useful tool for the surveillance of the endometrium in patients receiving tamoxifen. This study aimed to assess the value of SHG in asymptomatic patients who would have been biopsy candidates because of abnormal transvaginal ultrasound (TVUS) results. METHODS The study population included postmenopausal breast cancer patients receiving adjuvant tamoxifen who had asymptomatic abnormalities at TVUS (endometrial thickness >/=8 mm or endometrial echo not adequately visualized). SHG was performed with an Aloka SSD 680 system using a 5-MHz vaginal probe, with sterile saline solution as contrast medium. RESULTS Forty-one patients entered the study. A regular endometrial echo was identified by SHG in 9 patients (21.9%). Histology was obtained in the remaining 32 patients with positive (n = 27, 65.8%) or unsuccessful (n = 5, 12.2%) SHG. Benign polyps (n = 15, 36.6%) and endometrial atrophy (n = 14, 34.1%) were the most common findings; 3 patients (7.3%) had simple hyperplasia. CONCLUSIONS Breast cancer patients with asymptomatic, tamoxifen-associated TVUS abnormalities have little additional benefit from SHG. More than 23 remain candidates for biopsy, which usually yields benign or insignificant findings.
Functional nicotinic ACh receptors on interneurones in the rat hippocampus

1 Neuronal nicotinic ACh receptors (nAChRs) were studied in the rat hippocampal slice preparation using whole‐cell patch‐clamp recording techniques. 2 Responses to ACh (100 μm) were detected on inhibitory interneurones in the CA1 field of the hippocampus proper and in the dentate gyrus, but not on principal excitatory neurones in either region. The different neuronal types were identified based on their morphology and location. 3 ACh excited interneurones in the hippocampus and dentate gyrus in current‐clamp recordings. In voltage‐clamp recordings, ACh‐activated inward currents were recorded from interneurones in the presence of blockers of synaptic transmission and the muscarinic ACh receptor antagonist atropine. The zero current potential for this response to ACh was near 0 mV. 4 The effect of ACh was mimicked by the nAChR‐selective agonists nicotine (100 μm) and 1,1‐dimethyl‐4‐phenyl‐piperazinium iodide (DMPP, 100 μm). The response to ACh was reversibly antagonized by the neuronal nAChR antagonist mecamylamine (10 μm). The nAChR α7 subunit‐selective antagonists α‐bungarotoxin (100 nm) and methyllycaconitine (10 nm) also inhibited the response to ACh. 5 These observations demonstrate the presence of functional nAChRs on inhibitory interneurones in the rat hippocampus. Thus, a novel mechanism by which ACh can regulate neuronal activity in the hippocampus is revealed.
Trend and Outcome of Korean Patients Receiving Overseas Solid Organ Transplantation between 1999 and 2005

The disparity between patients awaiting transplantation and available organs forced many patients to go overseas to receive a transplant. Few data concerning overseas transplantation in Korea are available and the Korea Society for Transplantation conducted a survey to evaluate the trend and outcome of overseas transplantation. The survey, conducted on June 2006, included 25 hospitals nationwide that followed up patients after receiving kidney transplant (KT) or liver transplant (LT) overseas. The number of KT increased from 6 in 2001 to 206 in 2005 and for LT from 1 to 261. The information about overseas transplant came mostly from other patients (57%). The mean cost for KT was $21,000 and for LT $47,000. Patients were admitted for 18.5 days for KT and 43.4 days for LT. Graft and patient survival was 96.8% and 96.5% for KT (median follow up 23.1 months). Complication occurred in 42.5% including surgical complication (5.3%), acute rejection (9.7%) and infection (21.5%). Patient survival for LT was 91.8% (median follow up 21.2 months). Complication occurred in 44.7% including 19.4% biliary complication. Overseas KT and LT increased rapidly from 2001 to 2005. Survival of patients and grafts was comparable to domestic organ transplantation, but had a high complication rate.
Exogeneity, Cointegration, and Economic Policy Analysis

This overview examines conditions for reliable economic policy analysis based on econometric models, focusing on the econometric concepts of exogeneity, cointegration, causality, and invariance. Weak, strong, and super exogeneity are discussed in general, and these concepts are then applied to the use of econometric models in policy analysis when the variables are cointegrated. Implications follow for model constancy, the Lucas critique, equation inversion, and impulse response analysis. A small money-demand model for the United Kingdom illustrates the main analytical points. This article then summarizes the other articles in this issue's special section on exogeneity, cointegration, and economic policy analysis.
Maternal Correlates of Toddler Insecure and Dependent Behavior

Abstract The present study was designed to examine the relationship between characteristics of mothers and their toddler's insecure and dependent behavior. The authors studied 254 2-year-old toddlers and their mothers via a structured questionnaire administered to the mothers in their homes. The extent to which insecure and dependent behavior is related to the domains of maternal child rearing, maternal personality traits, parental marital relations, and maternal drug use was assessed. Using Pearson correlations and hierarchical multiple regression analyses, the authors found that the maternal child-rearing and maternal personality domains have a direct effect on the toddlers' insecure and dependent behavior. The maternal child-rearing domain also served as a mediator for the domains of the maternal personality attributes, parents' marital relations, and maternal drug use. There also was evidence suggesting an indirect effect of maternal personality attributes on the toddlers' insecure and dependent behavior, which is mediated by the domain of maternal child-rearing practices. Implications for the prevention of insecure and dependent behavior in toddlers are discussed.
Congenital Anomalies among Newborns Admitted in Tertiary Hospital; Iraqi Experience

Background: Congenital anomaly is any alteration present at birth of normal anatomic structure and has cosmetic, medical or surgical significanceObjective: To determine the pattern of congenital anomalies in neonates admitted to tertiary neonatal care unit and to determine the impact of some factors related to congenital anomalies with and without congenital anomalies.Patients and methods: A case control study was carried out during 6 months period (1St of January to 30th of June 2011). Neonates with and without congenital anomalies admitted to Children Welfare Teaching Hospital were included in the study as a case and control group. Demographic characteristics of both parents and neonates, Consanguinity, Parity, Gestational age, Mode of delivery and type of congenital anomaly were studied. All neonates were examined thoroughly by pediatrician; confirmation of internal defects was done by various imaging modalitiesResults: Sixty (4.8 %) of 1235 admitted neonates were diagnosed to have congenital anomalies, of whom 70% were males, 86% were term newborn, 55% were delivered by caesarian section, 73.3% were from consanguineous marriage and the mothers of 75% of them were multipara and cardiovascular anomalies was the most common . Conclusions: Surveillance and monitoring of congenital conditions is important for identifying patterns of malformations and planning to improve the outcomes.
Agency Input as a Policy-Making Tool

This study posits a theoretical framework for understanding the role and value of agency input in presidential-legislative policy making. The author asserts that by using agency input for policy development, presidents instill their proposals with a degree of bureaucratic objectivity, expertise, process transparency, and agency support, which aids their legislative passage while lowering the extent of changes made to policy substance in the process. To test his hypotheses, the author conducts binary and ordered logistic regression analyses using pooled cross-sectional data across 12 administrations from 1949 to 2010. The author finds that agency input serves as a key component for increased presidential-legislative success.
The new visible hand: An assisted linear model of science and innovation policy

Science-based innovation is realized through a triple helix of university-industry-government relations. Interaction among triple helix actors in the prototypical high-tech regions, Route 128 and Silicon Valley, led to creation of the venture capital firm, science park and technology transfer office. These organizational mechanisms constitute an ‘assisted linear model’ for translation of research results with commercial potential into use either in existing firms or start-ups. Although visible end products such as science parks attracted early attention, second-mover regions have gained a sophisticated awareness of the efficacy of linking research and transfer in embedded projects as an objective of innovation policy. Copyright , Beech Tree Publishing.
Does insurance demand or financial development promote economic growth? Evidence from Taiwan

This study examines the dynamic relationship among insurance demand, financial development and economic growth in Taiwan between 1961 and 2006. Using a three-variable Vector Autoregressive (VAR) model, the competing hypotheses of demand-following versus supply-leading are empirically tested. Extending the conceptual link among these variables proposed by Hussels et al. (2005), we find that there is an equilibrium relationship between demand, financial development and economic growth. In the short run, economic growth Granger causes insurance demand, and financial development Granger causes economic growth. In other words, financial development does promote real GDP growth, and a change in real GDP leads to deviation in real insurance demand in Taiwan. Managerial implications are proposed based on the empirical findings.
Brain activity during a motor learning task: An fMRI and skin conductance study

Measuring electrodermal activity (EDA) during fMRI is an effective means of studying the influence of task‐related arousal, inferred from autonomic nervous system activity, on brain activation patterns. The goals of this study were: (1) to measure reliable EDA from healthy individuals during fMRI involving an effortful unilateral motor task, (2) to explore how EDA recordings can be used to augment fMRI data analysis. In addition to conventional hemodynamic modeling, skin conductance time series data were used as model waveforms to generate activation images from fMRI data. Activations from the EDA model produced significantly different brain regions from those obtained with a standard hemodynamic model, primarily in the insula and cingulate cortices. Onsets of the EDA changes were synchronous with the hemodynamic model, but EDA data showed additional transient features, such as a decrease in amplitude with time, and helped to provide behavioral evidence suggesting task difficulty decreased with movement repetition. Univariate statistics also confirmed that several brain regions showed early versus late session effects. Partial least squares (PLS) multivariate analysis of EDA and fMRI data provided complimentary, additional insight on how the motor network varied over the course of a single fMRI session. Brain regions identified in this manner included the insula, cingulate gyrus, pre‐ and postcentral gyri, putamen and parietal cortices. These results suggest that recording EDA during motor fMRI experiments provides complementary information that can be used to improve the fMRI analysis, particularly when behavioral or task effects are difficult to model a priori. Hum Brain Mapp, 2007. © 2007 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.
Corporate Investments: Learning from Restatements

This study analyzes the information conveyed by the restatements of financial reports. We argue that restatements contain news about the investment projects of the restating firms' competitors. This news causes competitors to revise their beliefs about the projects' value, and to modify their subsequent investment decisions. Accordingly, we hypothesize that changes in competitors' investments after restatement announcements are related to news in the restatements. Consistent with our prediction, we find that changes in competitors' investments following restatement announcements are significantly related to various proxies for news in the restatements, such as competitors' and restating firms' abnormal returns at the restatement announcements. We conclude that restatements convey information about the investment projects of restating firms' competitors.