Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Quid pro quo

This paper aims to assess the effects of explicit partner brand mentions (as opposed to a mere partnership mention) in communications by brand allies on consumers’ purchase intention and willingness to pay for an innovation, as mediated by the perceived relational embeddedness of the allies and their respective perceived corporate credibility. In Study 1, the authors investigate the effects of (reciprocal) explicit brand mentions by both allies (as opposed to by a single ally) and further test whether explicit brand mentions moderate spillover effects from the ally. In Study 2, the authors investigate the effect of reciprocity of explicit brand mentions and whether this is moderated by a company’s experience. The authors conduct two online experiments. Study 1 (N = 216) is a four-level between-subjects experiment (single communication by Partner A with explicit brand mention, single communication by Partner B with explicit brand mention, explicit brand mentions by both allies and mere partnership mention by both allies) where participants judge a social alliance related to a new tablet. Study 2 (N = 376) builds upon these findings in a 4 (explicit brand mentions by both allies; mere partnership mention by both allies; explicit brand mention by Partner A, mere partnership mention by Partner B; explicit brand mention by partner B, mere partnership mention by Partner A) × 2 (Partner A experience: established vs startup) between-subjects experimental design for a co-created battery. Spillover effects from one ally to the other are stronger with explicit brand mentions than with a mere partnership mention. There is no added value of two allies communicating over one, provided that both partners explicitly mention their partner brand. However, when allies do communicate separately, it is crucial that an explicit brand mention is reciprocated. This effect is explained by an increase in the perceived relational embeddedness of the partners, which in turn positively influences their corporate credibility. This effect does not differ depending on a company’s experience. This research is one of the first to study effects of how a brand alliance is communicated and extends previous studies on the effects of communication about brand and co-creation alliances by demonstrating that communications moderate spillover effects, that brand mention reciprocity is crucial, and by introducing the concept of perceived relational embeddedness.
Featured Article: Female mice with loss-of-function ITCH display an altered reproductive phenotype

Major progress in deciphering the role of the E3 ligase, ITCH, in animal physiology has come from the generation and identification of Itch loss-of-function mutant mice (itchy). Mutant mice display an autoimmune-like phenotype characterized by chronic dermatitis, which has been attributed to increased levels of ITCH target proteins (e.g. transcription factors JUNB and CJUN) in T cells. Autoimmune disorders also exist in humans with Itch frameshift mutations resulting in loss of functional ITCH protein. Recent phenotypic analysis of male itchy mice revealed reduced sperm production, although cross breeding experiments showed no difference in litter size when male itchy mice were bred to wild type females. However, a reduction in litter sizes did occur when itchy females were bred to wild type males. Based on these results, characterization of female reproductive function in itchy mice was performed. Developmental analysis of fetuses at gestational day 18.5, cytological evaluation of estrous cyclicity, histopathological analysis of ovaries, and protein analysis were used to investigate the itchy reproductive phenotype. Gross skeletal and soft tissue analysis of gestational day 18.5 itchy fetuses indicated no gross developmental deformities. Itchy females had reduced implantation sites, decreased corpora lutea, and increased estrous cycle length due to increased number of days in estrus compared to controls. Alterations in the expression of prototypical ITCH targets in the ovaries were not indicated, suggesting that an alteration in an as yet defined ovary-specific ITCH substrate or interaction with the altered immune system likely accounts for the disruption of female reproduction. This report indicates the importance of the E3 ligase, ITCH, in female reproduction.
Activation of the Arp2/3 Complex by the Listeria ActA Protein

ActA is a bacterially encoded protein that enables Listeria monocytogenes to hijack the host cell actin cytoskeleton. It promotes Arp2/3-dependent actin nucleation, but its interactions with cellular components of the nucleation machinery are not well understood. Here we show that two domains of ActA (residues 85–104 and 121–138) with sequence similarity to WASP homology 2 domains bind two actin monomers with submicromolar affinity. ActA binds Arp2/3 with a K d of 0.6 μm and competes for binding with the WASP family proteins N-WASP and Scar1. By chemical cross-linking, ActA, N-WASP, and Scar1 contact the same three subunits of the Arp2/3 complex, p40, Arp2, and Arp3. Interestingly, profilin competes with ActA for binding of Arp2/3, but actophorin (cofilin) does not. The minimal Arp2/3-binding site of ActA (residues 144–170) is C-terminal to both actin-binding sites and shares sequence homology with Arp2/3-binding regions of WASP family proteins. The maximal activity at saturating concentrations of ActA is identical to the most active domains of the WASP family proteins. We propose that ActA and endogenous WASP family proteins promote Arp2/3-dependent nucleation by similar mechanisms and require simultaneous binding of Arp2 and Arp3.
Widely Tunable Watt-Level Single-Frequency Tm-Doped Fiber Ring Laser as Pump for Mid-IR Frequency Generation

We demonstrate a thulium-doped fiber ring laser (TDFRL) integrated with an amplifier, which has a watt-level single-frequency output at 2 <inline-formula> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$\mu\text{m}$</tex-math></inline-formula> with a 120-nm wavelength tunability. The TDFRL is constructed based on a hybrid ring-linear resonator configuration. An unpumped TDF is incorporated as a self-constructed saturable absorption grating. A blazed grating aligned in a Littrow configuration is employed for broadband wavelength-selective feedback. The characteristics of the laser output mode are analyzed by using an all-fiber scanning ring resonator.
A Z-transform matrix formulation for a tensor FDTD method

The finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method remains one of the most widely used and versatile methods used in electromagnetic simulation. The simple structure of this method avoids complex mathematic formulations but is vulnerable to errors from the regular homogeneous cubes that make up the problem space. Recently, there has been activity to improve the accuracy without leaving the regular cubic structure of FDTD. However, a bottle-neck in the use of this approach with lossy media was the fact that a complex matrix had to be inverted. In this paper a Z-transform formulation is added to the tensor formulation to avoid the inversion of complex matrices, thereby facilitating its use in lossy media, an approach we call the tensor FDTD (TFDTD) formulation.
Primary probing for congenital nasolacrimal duct obstruction with manually curved Bowman probes

Purpose To evaluate the effect of the shape of Bowman probes on the success of primary probing for congenital nasolacrimal duct obstruction. Materials and methods Records of 42 nasolacrimal duct obstructions in 37 children who underwent probing with straight Bowman probes (group A) and 128 nasolacrimal duct obstructions in 110 children who underwent probing with Bowman probes manually bent to mimic the natural curve of the bony nasolacrimal pathway (group B) were evaluated and compared. All children were under 2 years of age. The main outcome was successful probing. Successful probing was defined as a complete resolution of signs and symptoms. Results The mean age of the patients was 16.4 ± 4.1 months (range 8–24 months) in group A and 16.8 ± 4.2 months (range 7–24 months) in group B. No canalicular or nasolacrimal sac pathologies were diagnosed during probing. The success rate was 76.2% (32/42) in group A and 91.4% (117/128) in group B. The difference was statistically significant (P < 0.01). Conclusion Manually curved probes can be used efficiently during probing and increase the success rates.
Canadian Consensus Conference on Dementia: a physician's guide to using the recommendations.

OBJECTIVE: To develop evidence based consensus statements on which to build clinical practice guidelines for primary care physicians toward the recognition, assessment and management of dementing disorders and to disseminate and evaluate the impact of these statements and guidelines built on these statements. OPTIONS: Structured approach to assessment, including recommended laboratory tests, choices for neuroimaging and referral, management of complications (especially behavioural problems and depression) and use of cognitive enhancing agents. POTENTIAL OUTCOMES: Consistent and improved clinical care of persons with dementia; cost containment by more selective use of laboratory investigations; neuroimaging and referrals; and appropriate use of cognitive enhancing agents. EVIDENCE: Authors of each background paper were entrusted to perform a literature search, discover additional relevant material, including references cited in retrieved articles, consult with other experts in the field and then synthesize information. Standard rules of evidence were applied. Based on this evidence, consensus statements were developed by a group of experts, guided by a steering committee of 8 individuals, from the areas of Neurology, Geriatric Medicine, Psychiatry, Family Medicine, Preventive Health Care and Health Care Systems. VALUES: Recommendations have been developed with particular attention to the context of primary care, and are intended to support family physicians in their ongoing assessment and care of patients with dementia. BENEFITS HARM AND COSTS: Potential for improved clinical care of people with dementia. A dissemination and evaluation strategy will attempt to measure the impact of the recommendations. RECOMMENDATIONS: Forty-eight recommendations are offered that address the following aspects of dementia care: early recognition; importance of careful history and examination in making a positive diagnosis; essential laboratory tests; rules for neuroimaging and referral; disclosure of diagnosis; importance of monitoring and providing support to caregivers; cultural aspects; detection and treatment of depression; observation and management of behavioural disturbances; detection and reporting of unsafe motor vehicle driving; genetic factors and opportunities for preventing dementia; pharmacological treatment with particular emphasis on cognitive enhancing agents. VALIDATION: Four other sets of consensus statement or guidelines have been published recently. These recommendations are generally congruent with our own consensus statements. The consensus statements have been endorsed by relevant bodies in Canada. control/*therapy
Genetic characterisation of Jaisalmeri camel using microsatellite markers

Six New World Camelidae microsatellite primer pairs were used to investigate the genetic polymorphism in Jaisalmeri camel. Polymerase chain reactions were carried out for 30 unrelated camels of Jaisalmeri breed. The amplification products were resolved in 6% (denaturing) urea PAGE and stained with silver nitrate. All the 6 microsatellite primer pairs were found polymorphic in Jaisalmeri camel. The number of alleles ranged from 2 to 5. The expected heterozygosity ranged from 0.32 to 0.651 and the polymorphic information content ranged from 0.268 to 0.588. The results indicated the utility of these microsatellite loci for studying genetic polymorphism in dromedary breeds.
Vertical Distribution of Pasteuria penetrans Parasitizing Meloidogyne incognita on Pittosporum tobira in Florida

Abstract Pasteuria penetrans is considered as the primary agent responsible for soil suppressiveness to root-knot nematodes widely distributed in many agricultural fields. A preliminary survey on a Pittosporum tobira field where the grower had experienced a continuous decline in productivity caused by Meloidogyne incognita showed that the nematode was infected with Pasteuria penetrans. For effective control of the nematode, the bacterium and the host must coexist in the same root zone. The vertical distribution of Pasteuria penetrans and its relationship with the nematode host in the soil was investigated to identify (i) the vertical distribution of P. penetrans endospores in an irrigated P. tobira field and (ii) the relationship among P. penetrans endospore density, M. incognita J2 population density, and host plant root distribution over time. Soil bioassays revealed that endospore density was greater in the upper 18 cm of the top soil compared with the underlying depths. A correlation analysis showed that the endospore density was positively related to the J2 population density and host plant root distribution. Thus, the vertical distribution of P. penetrans was largely dependent on its nematode host which in turn was determined by the distribution of the host plant roots. The Pasteuria was predominant mostly in the upper layers of the soil where their nematode host and the plant host roots are abundant, a factor which may be a critical consideration when using P. penetrans as a nematode biological control agent.
Differential Effects of Propofol and Enflurane on Contractions Dependent on Calcium Derived from the Sarcoplasmic Reticulum of Guinea Pig Isolated Papillary Muscles

We investigated the possibility that the effects of propofol on sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR) function may contribute to the myocardial depression induced by this anesthetic. With guinea pig isolated papillary muscles, the effects of propofol on transient alterations in contractility (termed “potentiated-state” contractions), after abrupt changes in stimulation frequency and brief periods of rest, were compared with those of enflurane and the inhibitor of SR function, ryanodine. These potentiated-state contractions are mediated by calcium derived largely from the SR. Propofol, enflurane, and ryanodine were applied at concentrations that produced approximately 50%-60% inhibition of “steady-state” contraction. Ryanodine abolished and enflurane attenuated the potentiated-state contractions, whereas propofol had no apparent effect. Although impairment of SR function may contribute to the depression of contractility induced by enflurane, propofol has no major effect on SR function.
The Proteasomal and Autophagic Pathways Converge on Lipid Droplets

Apolipoprotein B (apoB) is the primary protein of very low-density lipoproteins (VLDL). We found that apoB accumulated on the surface of cytoplasmic lipid droplets (LDs) of hepatocytes when the proteasomal or autophagic processes were suppressed. ApoB associated with LDs was poly-ubiquitinated and surrounded by autophagic vacuoles. Moreover, proteasomal subunits were concentrated around LDs. Our data suggest that apoB to be degraded remains adhered to with LDs until being processed by the proteasomal and autophagic pathways. We speculate that the LD surface serves as a platform to prevent hydrophobic apoB from forming aggregates, and that LDs may play a similar role for other aggregation-prone hydrophobic proteins.
The Phenolic Diterpene Totarol Inhibits Multidrug Efflux Pump Activity in Staphylococcus aureus

ABSTRACT The phenolic diterpene totarol had good antimicrobial activity against effluxing strains of Staphylococcus aureus. Subinhibitory concentrations reduced the MICs of selected antibiotics, suggesting that it may also be an efflux pump inhibitor (EPI). A totarol-resistant mutant that overexpressed norA was created to separate antimicrobial from efflux inhibitory activity. Totarol reduced ethidium efflux from this strain by 50% at 15 μM (1/4× MIC), and combination studies revealed marked reductions in ethidium MICs. These data suggest that totarol is a NorA EPI as well as an antistaphylococcal antimicrobial agent.
Lifetime of Double Occupancies in the Fermi-Hubbard Model

We investigate the decay of artificially created double occupancies in a repulsive Fermi-Hubbard system in the strongly interacting limit using diagrammatic many-body theory and experiments with ultracold fermions in optical lattices. The lifetime of the doublons is found to scale exponentially with the ratio of the on-site repulsion to the bandwidth. We show that the dominant decay process in presence of background holes is the excitation of a large number of particle-hole pairs to absorb the energy of the doublon. We also show that the strongly interacting nature of the background state is crucial in obtaining the correct estimate of the doublon lifetime in these systems. The theoretical estimates and the experimental data are in agreement.
ASXL1 mutations in primary and secondary myelofibrosis

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Influences of Entrepreneurial Competencies on Product Development Decision: Longan Processing Enterprises in Thailand

This research aims to evaluate the entrepreneurial competencies of longan processing entrepreneurs and analyze the impacts of entrepreneurial competencies on new product development decision. The 165 samples of longan processing entrepreneurs are selected by a purposive sampling method. The results of entrepreneurial competencies show that risk taking orientation and competitiveness orientation are the two lowest score competencies in which the longan processing entrepreneurs should be interested in. Moreover, the age of the entrepreneur and pro-activeness orientation of the entrepreneur have some negative impacts on the decision making probability of the new product development. The entrepreneurial competencies on risk taking, innovativeness and competitiveness have positive influences on new product development decision. The findings lead to a discussion about whether the longan processing entrepreneurs are ready to develop the new product, or not.
Evaluating Urban Forms for Comparison Studies in the Massing Design Stage

We introduce five performance indicators to facilitate the comparison of urban massing design in the early design stages. The five simple indicators are based on existing studies and cover three main performance areas that are sensitive to urban form changes: solar, ventilation, and connectivity potentials. The first three indicators—the non-solar heated facade to floor area index, daylight facade to floor area index, and photovoltaics envelope to floor area index—measure the solar potential. The frontal area index measures the ventilation potential and the route-directness index measures the connectivity potential. The indicators are simple to use, as they only require urban geometry data for their calculation. We demonstrate the indicators in two case studies; variations in the values of these indicators show that they are sensitive to urban form changes and can be used in comparative studies to identify better performing urban forms among massing designs. We implement the indicators as an open-source Python library, Pyliburo, that designers and researchers can readily access and integrate into their existing design workflows.
Blind image quality assessment

Blind image quality assessment refers to the problem of evaluating the visual quality of an image without any reference. It addresses a fundamental distinction between fidelity and quality, i.e. human vision system usually does not need any reference to determine the subjective quality of a target image. In this paper, we propose to appraise the image quality by three objective measures: edge sharpness level, random noise level and structural noise level. They jointly provide a heuristic approach of characterizing the most important aspects of visual quality. We investigate various mathematical tools (analytical, statistical and PDE-based) for accurately and robustly estimating those three levels. Extensive experiment results are used to justify the validity of our approach.
Climate Change and Technical Progress: Impact of Informational Constraints

In this paper we analyse a growth model that includes environmental and economic variables as well as technological progress under different informational constraints on the behavior of economic agents. To simulate the informationally constrained economy, we make use of the non-linear model predictive control technique. We compare models with exogenous and endogenous technical change as well as directed and undirected endogenous technical change under different informational structures. We show that endogenous technical change yields lower environmental damages than exogenous technical change with fully informed agents. At the same time, welfare may rise or decline depending on the efficiency of the technology in use. In the case of directed technical change, a green growth scenario generates a smaller temperature increase that, however, goes along with less output and lower welfare. This holds both for informationally constrained and unconstrained behaviour of agents. We find that the effects of informational constraints, with respect to the climate system, increase with the degree of endogeneity of technology in the model.