Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Earnings Growth and Value Premium: The Indian Experience

Executive Summary This article addresses two main questions: Does a value premium exist in emerging market like India? If so, how pervasive is it in different market conditions? Value premium is assumed to be the difference in stock returns of undervalued and overvalued firms with a unique industry profile. The sample for the study consisted of 32 companies from the Information Technology (IT) sector, the stocks of which had traded continuously in the National Stock Exchange (NSE) during the period 2000–2010. Prowess and Capitaline constitute the sources for the firm-level financial data, and NSE web sources provide data related to share prices and market capitalization. The study involved a two-step empirical procedure: an exploratory factor analysis and a regression modelling under Ordinary Least Square (OLS) method. Exploratory factor analysis identified earnings growth and Earnings Price (E/P) rate as the prime determinants of stock returns. Expected earnings growth significantly explained E/P rate under OLS regression framework. The study then estimated normal E/P rate for the individual stock and compared the same with the actual E/P. If the actual E/P for a particular stock was greater than its estimated E/P, it was inferred that the stock was undervalued, the reverse being the case for overvaluation. The findings of this research provide empirical validity of use of E/P rate in identifying mispriced stocks in the Indian context. Undervalued stocks can produce better returns compared to overvalued stocks, and their success has been both persistent and impressive. E/P rate or P/E ratio is a valuable analytic device when properly interpreted. The publicly available E/P rate seems to possess information content and warrants an investor’s attention at the time of his portfolio formation or revision. The search process involving E/P rate suggests that the best buy would be the stock whose reported earnings per share is expected to grow most rapidly.
Follow Me! Global Marketers’ Twitter Use

ABSTRACT Social media have grown into a powerful marketing communications tool in the global economy. Marketers dedicate their time and resources to build trust and rapport with consumers through social media, yet a dearth of academic research addresses their use of Twitter. The present research undertakes an exploratory content analysis, focusing on 44 global brands’ Twitter use. The results indicate that marketers try to imbue human personality into their brands by using human representatives, personal pronouns, and verbs in the imperative form. In addition, information such as brand names and redirecting cues is frequent in brands’ tweets. Overall, marketers tend to exhibit their brand presence and personalities in their Twitter accounts, thereby building relationships with current and potential consumers. This article concludes with some social media marketing implications and future research directions.
Maternal iron and Vitamin A supplementation and the nutritional status of children in the 2010-11 Zimbabwe Demographic and Health Survey

Background: Child stunting is a public health problem in developing countries. Studies have shown that maternal nutrition is an important determinant of fetal and postnatal growth. However, the diets of women in developing countries are often deficient in energy, protein and vital micronutrients. Improving the health and nutrition of mothers and mothers-to-be is important in addressing many underlying causes of child malnutrition. Hence strategies to improve children’s nutritional status and growth should include interventions to improve nutrition of pregnant and lactating women. The World Health Organization (WHO) advises that, to improve children’s growth, pregnant women in developing countries should take iron supplements, and lactating mothers should take Vitamin A supplements. Despite the implementation of these interventions, there is little information on how antenatal and postnatal maternal micronutrient supplements influence child growth in developing countries. Objective: Evaluate the role of maternal Vitamin A and iron supplements on children’s nutritional status and growth. We compare the differences in stunting between children whose mothers received one or both of these two micronutrient supplements during pregnancy and after delivery and children whose mothers did not receive either of the micronutrients. Methods: We use cross-sectional survey data from the Zimbabwe Demographic and Health Survey of 2010-11 (ZDHS 2010-11). A stratified, two-stage cluster design was used for the survey. For our analysis we use data from 2,007 children under age 3 whose anthropometric measurements were recorded during the survey. Logistic regression analysis was used to identify determinants of child nutritional status, defined as height-for-age (stunting). Results: Forty percent of the mothers received postpartum Vitamin A supplements, while 53% received iron supplements during pregnancy. Results show that maternal iron supplements reduced child stunting (aOR = 0.73; 95% CI = (0.58, 0.91); p = 0.006). However, Vitamin A supplementation did not have an effect on child stunting (aOR = 1.09; 95% CI = (0.86, 1.37); p = 0 . 474). Conclusion: The results of this study indicate that maternal iron supplementation during pregnancy reduces early childhood malnutrition, especially stunting. Postpartum Vitamin A supplementation, however, does not appear to have an effect on the nutritional status of children. The effects of Vitamin A supplements on child nutrition may be indirect, and may not necessarily be on child growth but rather on other children’s health and developmental issues.
Determinants of Professional Golf Tournament Earnings

This paper examines the structure of the three professional golf tours and the factors that are most important in determining the earnings of professional golfers. The results show that the greater level of competition on the men's tour, relative to the senior and women's tours indicate that a solid well-rounded game is necessary for success on the men's tour. In addition, the weaker level of competition on the women's and senior's tours, coupled with the shorter, less demanding golf courses played on these tours indicates that the seniors and the women can succeed by attaining sound iron games and becoming good putters.
The Optimization for Hyperbolic Positioning of UHF Passive RFID Tags

This paper presents a fine-grained positioning method for radio frequency identification (RFID). The proposed method applies hyperbolic positioning to locate ultrahigh frequency passive RFID tags. In our design, finding the tagged object’s location is formulated as an optimization problem. Phase values, collected by the moving antenna, are exploited to achieve the optimal solution. The intuition of hyperbolic positioning lies in that the difference of distances from a target tag to two antennas can be inferred from phases. When integrating hyperbola curves together, optimization method can be performed to achieve the object’s location. Particle swarm optimization is then applied to enhance computational ability. For random phases, polynomial regression is employed to model the relationship between phase values and distances. We implement a prototype of hyperbolic positioning optimization to pinpoint the RFID tag’s location and evaluate its performance in our laboratory environment. Compared with other RFID localization methods, i.e., received signal strength indicator based and phase-based approaches, our design shows greater tolerance to tag diversity and tag orientation.Note to Practitioners—Radio frequency identification (RFID), as a crucial component of the Internet of things, has been widely deployed in many industrial applications ranging from logistics to retail. There are increasing needs for RFID to not only detect whether the tagged object is within the radio range, but also locate the object with high accuracy. Current RFID systems addressing these problems are either expensive or complex to implement. The RFID-based localization method presented in this paper is cost-efficient and computationally inexpensive. We consider using commercial off-the-shelf RFID devices without deployment of the reference tags to locate the target object. The antenna is mounted on a mobile vehicle to emulate the antenna array. Due to the fact that the target tag lies on the hyperbolic curve with two antennas’ positions as the foci, this paper suggests constructing multiple hyperbolas to determine the target position based on the virtual antenna array. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed approach is feasible and achieves a median accuracy of 12 cm.
Perceptions of risks and risk management strategies; an analysis of Dutch livestock farmers

The risk environment of farmers is changing and new risk management strategies are being introduced. Beal (1996) stated that risk management strategies adopted by farmers will be in accordance with their personal preferences for risk. In this context it would be useful for developers and sellers of new risk management strategies to have insight into farmers' preferences for risk. This paper studies to what extent such preferences are farmer-specific or whether general relationships exist. By means of a large questionnaire survey among 2700 livestock farmers in the Netherlands we gathered data on four groups of variables, i.e. socioeconomic characteristics of the farm, farmers' attitudes towards risk, their perceptions of sources of risk, and their perceptions of risk management strategies. Various techniques of multivariate data analyses have been used to analyse the relationships between these groups of variables. Many significant relationships were found (although not to a great extent for attitudes towards risk). However, we are cautious in recommending that new risk management strategies need to be fully fine-tuned to aspects analysed in this study. Low values of the adjusted R-squared indicate that there are still other (possibly even more personal) aspects that determine the final perception of a farmer of a risk management instrument. In addition, results of this study reflect farmers' perceptions of risk management strategies, which is not necessarily the same as the extent to which they would actually use such strategies.
Investor sentiment, underwriters’ behaviour and IPO pricing: Empirical analysis from off-line institutional investors’ bids

Using detailed bid data of institutional investors from 380 Chinese IPO firms, this paper examines the roles of investor sentiment and underwriters in the IPO pricing process. The results show that the higher the investor sentiment, the higher the bids that institutional investors will offer in the inquiry stage. In addition, underwriters will further raise the issue price based on the bid price offered by the institutional investors. Although the increased issue price is not related to investor sentiment, it has a significant negative correlation with the gap between the bids of institutional investors and the intrinsic value of the companies. Finally, we also find that investor sentiment is negatively correlated with IPO underpricing (intrinsic value less the issue price) and positively correlated with IPO first-day returns. These findings add to the IPO pricing literature and have important implications for market-oriented reforms of IPO pricing.
Contribution of natural anticoagulant and fibrinolytic factors in modulating the clinical severity of haemophilia patients

The role of natural anticoagulants, fibrinolytic cascade factors and common prothrombotic gene polymorphisms in modulating disease severity were studied in 35 ‘clinically mild’ and 37 ‘clinically severe’ haemophilia patients with severe factor VIII or IX deficiency (<0·01 IU/ml). Strong association of deficiencies of proteins C and S, antithrombin III, tissue factor pathway inhibitor and tissue plasminogen activator, together with factor V Leiden and endothelial protein C receptor 23 bp insertion polymorphisms were observed in the ‘clinically milder’ group as compared with the ‘clinically severe’ group. These results indicate a synergistic modulation of bleeding tendency in haemophilia patients by factors in the anticoagulant and fibrinolytic systems.
Distinct transformation phenotypes induced by polyoma virus and simian virus 40 in rat fibroblasts and their control by an early viral gene function

Several transformed cell lines established from Fisher rat cells (FR 3T3) infected with wild-type polyoma virus or simian virus 40 or early temperature-sensitive mutants (polyoma tsa and simian virus 40 tsA30) were studied for their transformation phenotypes. The distinct patterns which were obtained for polyoma and simian virus 40 transformants led to the conclusion that these two viruses express different transforming abilities in rat cells. The results obtained with temperature-sensitive mutant-derived transformants indicate that all of the transformation characteristics studied so far may be under the control of a viral function in polyoma tsa-transformed cells.
Adult Education and Training in Ireland

This paper focuses entirely on Irish adult education and training. During the 1990s and at the start of the new millennium, several reports and policy papers on education and training were produced by the Irish Government, some of which were reflections on policy and practice. Appropriate education and training provision for adult students and those in work has featured either as the central or a lesser theme in these publications. The purpose of this paper is to review these key publications concerning adult education and training with a view to elucidating the broad direction of recent policy in the field in Ireland.
Workplace Flexibility across the Lifespan

As demographic changes impact the workplace, governments, organizations and workers are looking for ways to sustain optimal working lives at higher ages. Workplace flexibility has been introduced as a potential way workers can have more satisfying working lives until their retirement ages. This paper presents a critical review of the literature on workplace flexibility across the lifespan. It discusses how flexibility has been conceptualized across different disciplines, and postulates a definition that captures the joint roles of employer and employee in negotiating workplace flexibility that contributes to both employee and organization benefits. Moreover, it reviews how flexibility has been theorized and investigated in relation to older workers. The paper ends with a future research agenda for advancing understanding of how workplace flexibility may enhance working experiences of older workers, and in particular focuses on the critical investigation of uses of flexibility in relation to older workers.
Optimal preservation of porcine cardiac tissue prior to diffusion tensor magnetic resonance imaging

The effects of ex vivo preservation techniques on the quality of diffusion tensor magnetic resonance imaging in hearts are poorly understood, and the optimal handling procedure prior to investigation remains to be determined. Therefore, 24 porcine hearts were examined in six groups treated with different preservation techniques, including chemical fixation and freezing. Diffusion properties of each heart were assessed with diffusion tensor imaging in terms of fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), axial diffusivity (Da) and radial diffusivity (Dr). Tractography was performed to visualize the course of the cardiomyocytes, assuming greater diffusivity in the longitudinal than the transverse axis of individual cardiomyocytes. Significant differences in MD, Da and Dr were found, as well as in FA between groups (P < 0.001). Freezing of specimens resulted in the lowest mean FA of 0.21 (0.06) and highest Dr of 8.92 (1.5) mm2 s−1. The highest mean FA was found to be 0.43 (0.11) in hearts perfusion‐fixed with formalin. Calculated tractographies were indistinguishable among groups except in frozen specimens, where no fibres could be tracked. Perfusion fixation with formalin provided the best tractography, but immersion fixation yielded diffusion data most similar to fresh hearts. These findings suggest that parameters derived from diffusion tensor imaging in ex vivo hearts are sensitive to fixation and storage methods. In particular, freezing of specimens should be avoided prior to diffusion tensor imaging investigation due to significant changes in diffusion parameters and subsequent image deteriorations.
Genome Sequence of Streptomyces violaceusniger Strain SPC6, a Halotolerant Streptomycete That Exhibits Rapid Growth and Development

ABSTRACT Streptomyces violaceusniger strain SPC6 is a halotolerant streptomycete isolated from the Linze desert in China. The strain has a very high growth rate and a short life cycle for a streptomycete. For surface-grown cultures, the period from spore germination to formation of colonies with mature spore chains is only 2 days at 37°C. Additionally, the strain is remarkably resistant to osmotic, heat, and UV stress compared with other streptomycetes. Analysis of the draft genome sequence indicates that the strain has the smallest reported genome (6.4 Mb) of any streptomycete. The availability of this genome sequence allows us to investigate the genetic basis of adaptation for growth in an extremely arid environment.
Extending lean manufacturing in supply chains: a successful case in brazil

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present the results of a success story involving the extending of lean manufacturing practices between a focal firm and its supplier, both located in Brazil, thereby configuring a case of excellence. Design/methodology/approach – An in-depth case study was conducted involving two companies: Company A, focal, leader in its segment, located in Brazil; and Company B, Company A's supplier, also located in Brazil. Findings – Results indicate there are several mechanisms for extending lean manufacturing practices in the supply chain, such as workshops, training, and integrated teams. These mechanisms are shown and guidelines are also introduced for companies seeking to successfully extend lean manufacturing practices. Originality/value – An original use of define, measure, analyze, improve, control for structuring the extending of lean manufacturing practices to suppliers and, consequently, the importance of the lean six-sigma relationship in this context. Furthermore, .
Beet Armyworm (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) Host Plant Preferences for Oviposition

Abstract Beet armyworm, Spodoptera exigua (Hübner), oviposition preferences were determined on five host plants: cabbage (Brassica oleracea capitata L.), cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.), bell pepper (Capsicum annuum L.), pigweed (Amaranthus retroflexus L.), and sunflower (Helianthus annuus L.) in no-choice, two-choice, and five-choice tests. Tests were conducted in the laboratory, greenhouse, and field cages. Oviposition preferences were compared on the basis of two measurements, the proportion of eggs laid on the plants to total that were deposited, and the oviposition preference index defined as [(number of eggs laid on the plant) - (number of eggs laid on the cage)] × 100/total number of eggs laid. The proportion of eggs laid on the plants to total that were deposited was highest for pigweed and lowest for cabbage in all tests. Beet armyworm females were significantly deterred from laying eggs on cabbage and sunflower, while pigweed and cotton elicited a positive oviposition preference. Pepper tended to be neutral or slightly unattractive. Apparent interactions among plant species in choice tests produced measurable shifts in oviposition preference. Most notably, female response to pepper was enhanced in the presence of cotton or pigweed. Egg masses laid on the plants contained significantly higher numbers of eggs than those laid on the surface of the cage, except in the case of cabbage leaves. Knowledge of hierarchies of host plant oviposition preference by beet armyworm females will be useful in understanding the population dynamics of this important agricultural pest, and for developing effective monitoring and management strategies.
IL-12 Provides Proliferation and Survival Signals to Murine CD4+ T Cells Through Phosphatidylinositol 3-Kinase/Akt Signaling Pathway1

IL-12 is a pleiotropic cytokine that plays an important role in innate and adaptive immunity. IL-12 induces T cell proliferation and IFN-γ secretion from activated T cells. It was also reported that IL-12 prevents apoptosis of CD4+ T cells. However, the signaling mechanism that regulates these IL-12-induced responses is poorly understood yet. In this study, we demonstrated that IL-12 activates phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase (PI3K)/Akt pathway in murine CD4+ T cells, and that this signaling pathway is required for IL-12-induced T cell proliferation and antiapoptotic function, but not for IFN-γ induction. Through PI3K/Akt pathway, IL-12 up-regulates the expression of cell cycle-related molecule such as cyclin D3, and antiapoptotic molecules such as Bcl-2 and cellular inhibitors of apoptosis proteins-2, followed by down-regulation of active caspase-3. These results suggest that PI3K/Akt pathway is critical for mediating IL-12-induced CD4+ T cell responses such as T cell proliferation and survival.
Impact of Family Ownership on Market Value of a Firm: A Comparative Analysis of Family and Non-Family Companies Listed at Karachi Stock Exchange (Pakistan)

The current study attempts to investigate the impact of family ownership structure on value of firms listed at the Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) of Pakistan. For the distinction of FOB from Non-FOB, two threshold points (25% & 50%) of ownership structure are used. A sample of 280 listed firms at KSE is collected ranging for the period 2002-13. Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) is applied on panel data to estimate the coefficients of variables. The empirical results indicate that the family firms outperform the non-family ones. The better performance of young generation of family firms over succeeding generation is also revealed but professional chief executive officer (CEO) over family member is preferred. Furthermore, this study discovers inflection points i.e. (62% & 57%) for family and non-family firms under quadratic specification respectively.
Trust in sources of information about genetically modified food risks in the UK

Perceptions of trust have been identified as an important element in the risk communication process. This research is concerned with establishing the degree of trust the general public has in various possible sources of information about the health effects associated with consuming genetically modified food. Participants were asked directly about the degree to which they would trust information about the health effects associated with consuming genetically modified food from a variety of sources, including a fictitious source included as a control. They were also asked about the degree to which they believed each source had a vested interest in misinforming the public about the possible health effects associated with such consumption, and the degree of knowledge they believed each source had about any possible health effects. The results indicate that perceptions of “vested interest” and “degree of knowledge” are important elements in determining levels of trust, although probably not exhaustive. Furthermore, that younger consumers are likely to be the most responsive audience for risk information, but general audience response to risk information is likely to be influenced by preconceptions about the source of the information, preconceptions that can be derived entirely from the name of the information source.