Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Electromechanical Response of High-Performance Fiber-Reinforced Cementitious Composites Containing Milled Glass Fibers under Tension

The self-damage sensing capacity of high-performance fiber-reinforced cementitious composites (HPFRCCs) that blended long- (1 vol %) and medium-length (1 vol %) smooth steel fibers was considerably improved by adding milled glass fibers (MGFs) with a low electrical conductivity to a mortar matrix. The addition of MGFs (5 wt %) significantly increased the electrical resistivity of the mortar matrix from 45.9 to 110.3 kΩ·cm (140%) and consequently improved the self-damage sensing capacity (i.e., the reduction in the electrical resistivity during the tensile strain-hardening response) from 17.27 to 25.56 kΩ·cm (48%). Furthermore, the addition of MGFs improved the equivalent bond strength of the steel fibers on the basis of the higher pullout energy owing to the accumulated cementitious material particles attached to the surfaces of steel fibers.
Institutionalized Online Access to Corporate Information and Cost of Equity Capital: A Cross-Country Analysis

ABSTRACT: The demand for online information in stock markets around the world has led to many stock exchanges requiring the disclosure of information on listed corporations through the stock exchange website. We examine the impact of online access to corporate information on stock exchange websites on market transparency. We posit that institutionalized online information dissemination is likely to reduce the level of information asymmetry in stock markets. To increase the spread in the types of markets and market features in our sample, we expand the sample size of 40 or fewer countries commonly used in recent cross-country studies to 110 countries. Our proxy for the level of information asymmetry in stock markets is the cost of equity capital (COE). We examine the online availability of corporate information on the websites of the stock exchanges (AVAILABILITY) of the 110 countries, and find that there is a negative association between COE and AVAILABILITY. Further analysis shows that this association i.
Physiological and Phylogenetic Characterization of Rhodotorula diobovata DSBCA06, a Nitrophilous Yeast

Agriculture and intensive farming methods are the greatest cause of nitrogen pollution. In particular, nitrification (the conversion of ammonia to nitrate) plays a role in global climate changes, affecting the bio-availability of nitrogen in soil and contributing to eutrophication. In this paper, the Rhodotorula diobovata DSBCA06 was investigated for growth kinetics on nitrite, nitrate, or ammonia as the sole nitrogen sources (10 mM). Complete nitrite removal was observed in 48 h up to 10 mM initial nitrite. Nitrogen was almost completely assimilated as organic matter (up to 90% using higher nitrite concentrations). The strain tolerates and efficiently assimilates nitrite at concentrations (up to 20 mM) higher than those previously reported in literature for other yeasts. The best growth conditions (50 mM buffer potassium phosphate pH 7, 20 g/L glucose as the sole carbon source, and 10 mM nitrite) were determined. In the perspective of applications in inorganic nitrogen removal, other metabolic features relevant for process optimization were also evaluated, including renewable sources and heavy metal tolerance. Molasses, corn, and soybean oils were good substrates, and cadmium and lead were well tolerated. Scale-up tests also revealed promising features for large-scale applications. Overall, presented results suggest applicability of nitrogen assimilation by Rhodotorula diobovata DSBCA06 as an innovative tool for bioremediation and treatment of wastewater effluents.
Effects of oral administration of different dosages of carvacrol essential oils on intestinal barrier function in broilers

Essential oils are widely used in the pharmaceutical, food and cosmetic industries, and many plant essential oils have shown that they have positive effects on broilers nutrition. This experiment was conducted to study the effects of orally administered different dosages of carvacrol essential oils on intestinal barrier function in broiler chickens. A total of eighty 28-day-old (1.28 ± 0.15 kg) ROSS 308 broilers were randomly allocated to four groups of 20 replicates each, with one chicken per replicate per cage, and all were fed with the same diet. Four experimental groups were orally administered 0, 200, 300 or 400 μl carvacrol essential oils at 18:00 hr every day during the 2-week experimental period. As a result of which, the gene expression of the occludin, claudin-1, claudin-5, ZO-1 and ZO-2 in intestinal mucosa of small intestine (p < 0.05) and the goblet cell content in small intestine epithelium (p < 0.05) were significantly increased; test subjects with 300 or 400 μl carvacrol essential oils reduced the microbial counts of Salmonella spp. and Escherichia coli in the intestines (p < 0.05); Essential oils administration also significantly increased activity of the sucrase (p < 0.05) and lactase (p < 0.05) in intestinal mucosa. In conclusion, the carvacrol essential oils have positive effects on growth performance and intestinal barriers function of broilers; those effects may be related to the dosage, as administration of 300 or 400 μl was more effective than that of 200 μl.
The Use of Technology-Structured Management Controls: Changes in Senior Management's Decision-Making Behaviours

When competition is tough and resources are scarce, management may seek ways to systematise their decision-making process so as to better control their operations and resource allocations. Yet little is known about how decision technology is used in practice during the new product development process as a means to exercise, administer and accomplish managerial control. This research investigates how an organisation used a decision technology to exercise management control in order to manage the work activities of their employees in a group decision-making setting. It assesses the impact decision technologies have at the firm level focusing on the transformation of the decision process, the individuals involved and the decision outcomes to the firm. Data was collected through a case study which included passive observations in board meetings and functional team meetings as well as interviews and document analysis on those generated from the decision technology. The decision technology was found not only to have changed the way management exercised management control vertically across different hierarchal levels but also horizontally over their fellow peers. Interestingly, even though the chief executive officer had relinquished his immediate control of the decision process, he was nevertheless able to exercise management control from a distance in a subtle manner through the use of the decision technology. Moreover, the decision technology gave management the confidence to make the necessary decisions and consider innovative and challenging projects which they previously avoided due to fear of project failure. The increase in innovative performance is believed to have resulted from management becoming more accountable for the decision process rather than on the final project outcome, regardless of new product launch success or failure. This change was due to individuals’ willingness to believe and abide to the decision process that disciplined and enforced them through the decision technology. Thus, decision technology can be seen as an enabler of management control that delivers increased innovation performance and provides action control as well as hierarchal and lateral controls.
Improving Sequential Recommendation with Knowledge-Enhanced Memory Networks

With the revival of neural networks, many studies try to adapt powerful sequential neural models, ıe Recurrent Neural Networks (RNN), to sequential recommendation. RNN-based networks encode historical interaction records into a hidden state vector. Although the state vector is able to encode sequential dependency, it still has limited representation power in capturing complicated user preference. It is difficult to capture fine-grained user preference from the interaction sequence. Furthermore, the latent vector representation is usually hard to understand and explain. To address these issues, in this paper, we propose a novel knowledge enhanced sequential recommender. Our model integrates the RNN-based networks with Key-Value Memory Network (KV-MN). We further incorporate knowledge base (KB) information to enhance the semantic representation of KV-MN. RNN-based models are good at capturing sequential user preference, while knowledge-enhanced KV-MNs are good at capturing attribute-level user preference. By using a hybrid of RNNs and KV-MNs, it is expected to be endowed with both benefits from these two components. The sequential preference representation together with the attribute-level preference representation are combined as the final representation of user preference. With the incorporation of KB information, our model is also highly interpretable. To our knowledge, it is the first time that sequential recommender is integrated with external memories by leveraging large-scale KB information.
Clicking, Assessing, Immersing, and Sharing: An Empirical Model of User Engagement with Interactive Media

This article explicates the concept of user engagement by synthesizing a disparate body of scholarship, and suggests a measurement and a structural model for empirically capturing the meaning and process of user engagement, specifically in the context of interactive media. A second-order confirmatory factor analysis of data from two experiments (N = 263) shows that four attributes—physical interaction, interface assessment, absorption, and digital outreach—together constitute a valid and reliable operationalization of the concept of user engagement. A structural equation model reveals that greater amount of physical interaction with the interface and a more positive assessment of the interface predict cognitive absorption with the content, which in turn is associated with greater behavioral intention to manage and socially distribute the content. In addition, predictive validity tests show that the four subscales are predictors of attitudinal and learning outcomes.
Development of a toolkit to enhance care processes for people with a long-term neurological condition: a qualitative descriptive study

Objective To (A) explore perspectives of people with a long-term neurological condition, and of their family, clinicians and other stakeholders on three key processes: two-way communication, self-management and coordination of long-term care; and (B) use these data to develop a ‘Living Well Toolkit’, a structural support aiming to enhance the quality of these care processes. Design This qualitative descriptive study drew on the principles of participatory research. Data from interviews and focus groups with participants (n=25) recruited from five hospital, rehabilitation and community settings in New Zealand were analysed using conventional content analysis. Consultation with a knowledge-user group (n=4) and an implementation champion group (n=4) provided additional operational knowledge important to toolkit development and its integration into clinical practice. Results Four main, and one overarching, themes were constructed: (1) tailoring care:referring to getting to know the person and their individual circumstances; (2) involving others: representing the importance of negotiating the involvement of others in the person’s long-term management process; (3) exchanging knowledge: referring to acknowledging patient expertise; and (4) enabling: highlighting the importance of empowering relationships and processes. The overarching theme was: assume nothing. These themes informed the development of a toolkit comprising of two parts: one to support the person with the long-term neurological condition, and one targeted at clinicians to guide interaction and support their engagement with patients. Conclusion Perspectives of healthcare users, clinicians and other stakeholders were fundamental to the development of the Living Well Toolkit. The findings were used to frame toolkit specifications and highlighted potential operational issues that could prove key to its success. Further research to evaluate its use is now underway.
Cultural responses towards the aftermath of suicide among the Acholi in Northern Uganda

Background: Suicide is a public health problem in Uganda among indigenous societies, and different societies manage its aftermath differently. Aim: To explore how the Acholi in Northern Uganda manage the aftermath of suicide. Methods: We conducted a qualitative study in Gulu district, a post-conflict area in Northern Uganda. We conducted a total of four focus group discussions (FGDs) and 12 key informant (KI) interviews. KI interviews were conducted with community leaders, while the FGDs were conducted with members of the general population. We analysed the data by means of Grounded Theory. Results: Our findings indicate that rituals form a large part in managing suicide among the Acholi. Study communities practised distancing (symbolically and physically) as a way of dealing with the threat of suicide. Conclusion: Distancing was organized into two broad themes: affect regulation and securing future generations. It is recommended that public health interventions should utilize cultural institutions in the prevention of suicide.
Frequent Adverse Drug Reactions, and Medication Groups under Suspicion.

BACKGROUND The adverse drug reaction database of the German Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices (Bundesinstitut für Arzneimittel und Medizinprodukte, BfArM) contains reports of suspected adverse drug reactions (ADRs) that are spon- taneously submitted by physicians, pharmacists, or patients. The aim of the present study was a descriptive analysis of all of these spontaneous reports. METHODS 345 662 spontaneously submitted reports were analyzed with respect to the number of reports per year, the sources of the reports, demographic variables, the most commonly reported ADRs, and the drug classes most commonly suspected. RESULTS The number of reports submitted spontaneously each year has grown steadily since 1978. At the least detailed level of analysis, "drugs for the treatment of nervous system disorders" were the most common class of drugs under suspicion of causing the reported adverse drug reactions (23.1%). In a more detailed analysis by therapeutic subgroup, the three subgroups most commonly reported as suspected of causing side effects were antithrombotic agents, systemic antibiotics, and psycholeptics-causing thrombocytopenia, diarrhea, and drug dependency as the most frequently reported ADRs, respectively. The order of drug classes most commonly causing ADRs differed markedly between the physicians' reports (diazepines, fluoroquinolones, heparins) and the patients' reports (interferons, anti- thrombotic drugs, selective immunosuppressant drugs). Patients more commonly reported subjectively perceived ADRs, while physicians more commonly reported findings or diagnoses that require medical expertise. CONCLUSION The increasing number of spontaneous reports is mainly due to reports forwarded from pharmaceutical companies to the BfArM. This, in turn, is probably a result of increasingly strict legal reporting requirements in Germany. The detected differences between physicians' and patients' ADR reports can be taken to indicate that patients should be more specifically informed and questioned about potential ADRs. By reporting adverse drug reactions, physicians may improve drug safety.
Invasive Candida Infections in the ICU: Diagnosis and Therapy

Abstract Invasive fungal infections have become a serious problem in the critically ill. One of the main reasons is the development of an immunocompromised condition. The most frequently found pathogens are Candida species. In order to provide adequate treatment, understanding this potentially life-threatening infection is mandatory. The aim of this summary is to view Candida infections from a different perspective and to give an overview on epidemiology, the range of pathophysiology from colonization to the invasive infections, and its impact on mortality. New therapeutic options will also be discussed and how these relate to current guidelines. Finally, the key issue of the choice of antifungal agents will be evaluated.
Consistency and Variation in Kernel Neural Ranking Model

This paper studies the consistency of the kernel-based neural ranking model K-NRM, a recent state-of-the-art neural IR model, which is important for reproducible research and deployment in the industry. We find that K-NRM has low variance on relevance-based metrics across experimental trials. In spite of this low variance in overall performance, different trials produce different document rankings for individual queries. The main source of variance in our experiments was found to be different latent matching patterns captured by K-NRM. In the IR-customized word embeddings learned by K-NRM, the query-document word pairs follow two different matching patterns that are equally effective, but align word pairs differently in the embedding space. The different latent matching patterns enable a simple yet effective approach to construct ensemble rankers, which improve K-NRM's effectiveness and generalization abilities.
Research on IT Governance, Risk, and Value: Challenges and Opportunities

This theme issue of the Journal of Information Systems sees the publication of seven papers that cover a variety of facets of research on the governance of information technology. IT governance (ITG) is the process by which organizations seek to ensure that their investment in information technology facilitates strategic and tactical goals. IT governance is a subset of broader corporate governance, focusing on the role played by information technology within the organization. There are several important dimensions of ITG. Arguably the most important element of ITG is the design of decision rights and organizational structures. What role do governing bodies, such as the Board of Directors, play in the oversight and direction of IT? What roles and responsibilities for IT does the governing body assume and what is delegated to senior and operational management? How is IT to be structured within the organization? Is the provision of IT to be centrally organized within a single, functional IT organizational unit? Or, perhaps, is provision of IT to be largely distributed to operational or administrative units within the organization? Other dimensions of ITG, as noted by Wilkin and Chenhall (2010), include strategic alignment between organizational goals and needs and IT outcomes; management of risk; value delivery; and measurement of performance. ITG has become more important within organizations as the important role that IT plays in adding organizational value has become increasingly clear (Brynjolfsson and Saunders 2010; Masli et al. 2011; Tambe and Hitt 2012). Investment in IT is a significant proportion of current and capital spending in most industries, giving additional impetus to ITG. IT is also subject to high levels of environmental instability. How are organizations to respond to the insourcing/outsourcing nexus, cloud computing, virtualization, and mobile computing among other environmental challenges? Equally, the compliance requirements arising from overall (e.g., SOX) and industry (e.g., HIPAA, Basel II, PCI) regulatory regimes have given an added impetus to ITG efforts. Given that IT both mitigates risk (e.g., by supporting internal control processes) and creates risk (e.g., by exposure of corporate IT systems to external threats), there is an increased understanding that IT is an important component of enterprise risk management (Parent and Reich 2009; Wilkin and Chenhall 2010). While these challenges are compelling for many organizations and particularly for governing bodies, they are shared by a wide variety of organizations. While there may be entity, industry, or national differences, all entities must address questions such as ‘‘how is IT to be organized? ’’ or ‘‘how much of the provision of IT should we move to cloud providers? ’’ There are also many aspects of IT provision (e.g., security, enterprise architecture, user management, software
Facilitators and barriers to the effective implementation of the individual maternal near-miss case reviews in low/middle-income countries: a systematic review of qualitative studies

Background The maternal near-miss cases review (NMCR), a type of clinical audit, proved to be effective in improving quality of care and decreasing maternal mortality in low/middle-income countries (LMICs). However, challenges in its implementation have been described. Objectives Synthesising the evidence on facilitators and barriers to the effective implementation of NMCR in LMICs. Design Systematic review of qualitative studies. Data sources MEDLINE, LILACS, Global Health Library, SCI-EXPANDED, SSCI, Cochrane library and Embase were searched in December 2017. Eligibility criteria for selecting studies Qualitative studies exploring facilitators and/or barriers of implementing NMCR in LMIC were included. Data extraction and synthesis Two independent reviewers extracted data, performed thematic analysis and assessed risk of bias. Results Out of 25 361 papers retrieved, 9 studies from Benin, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Cote D’Ivoire, Ghana, Malawi, Morocco, Tanzania, Uganda could be included in the review. The most frequently reported barriers to NMCR implementation were the following: absence of national guidelines and local protocols; insufficient training on how to perform the audit; lack of leadership, coordination, monitoring and supervision; lack of resources and work overload; fear of blame and punishment; poor knowledge of evidenced-based medicine; hierarchical differences among staff and poor understating of the benefits of the NMCR. Major facilitators to NMCR implementation included: good leadership and coordination; training of all key staff; a good cultural environment; clear staff’s perception on the benefits of conducting audit; patient empowerment and the availability of external support. Conclusions In planning the NMCR implementation in LMICs, policy-makers should consider actions to prevent and mitigate common challenges to successful NMCR implementation. Future studies should aim at documenting facilitators and barriers to NMCR outside the African Region.
Rates of cannabis use in patients with cancer.

Background A comprehensive assessment of cannabis use by patients with cancer has not previously been reported. In this study, we aimed to characterize patient perspectives about cannabis and its use. Methods An anonymous survey about cannabis use was offered to patients 18 years of age and older attending 2 comprehensive and 2 community cancer centres, comprising an entire provincial health care jurisdiction in Canada (ethics id: hreba-17011). Results Of 3138 surveys distributed, 2040 surveys were returned (65%), with 1987 being sufficiently complete for analysis (response rate: 63%). Of the respondents, 812 (41%) were less than 60 years of age; 45% identified as male, and 55% as female; and 44% had completed college or higher education.Of respondents overall, 43% reported any lifetime cannabis use. That finding was independent of age, sex, education level, and cancer histology. Cannabis was acquired through friends (80%), regulated medical dispensaries (10%), and other means (6%). Of patients with any use, 81% had used dried leaves.Of the 356 patients who reported cannabis use within the 6 months preceding the survey (18% of respondents with sufficiently complete surveys), 36% were new users. Their reasons for use included cancer-related pain (46%), nausea (34%), other cancer symptoms (31%), and non-cancer-related reasons (56%). Conclusions The survey demonstrated that prior cannabis use was widespread among patients with cancer (43%). One in eight respondents identified at least 1 cancer-related symptom for which they were using cannabis.