Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Clinical Characteristics, Spontaneous Clearance and Treatment Outcome of Acute Hepatitis C: A Single Tertiary Center Experience

Background and Aims: Acute hepatitis C is rarely diagnosed due to its predominantly asymptomatic course. However, early treatment results in viral eradication in a high number of patients thus, preventing chronicity. The aim of our study was to describe our experience with patients with acute hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection who presented and followed-up in our liver unit, pointing on treatment strategy, and outcome. Patients and Methods: Retrospective, descriptive study of 30 patients with acute HCV infection (26 males and 4 females) with a mean age of 32 years. Results: The source of infection was mainly injection drug use in 17/30 (56.7) and medical procedures 6/30 (20%). Twenty patients (66.6%) were symptomatic. HCV-ribonucleic acid (RNA) was detectable at presentation in 26 (86.7%) patients. The genotype distribution was: 13/26 (50%) genotype 1, 3/26 (11.5%) genotype 2, 8/26 (30.8%) genotype 3 and 2/26 (7.7%) genotype 4. Totally, 9 patients (30%) experienced spontaneous viral eradication. No significant differences could be documented between patients who spontaneously cleared the virus and those who had viral persistence. Thirteen patients (44%) were treated with peginterferon-based regimen. All patients (100%) achieved non-detectable HCV-RNA and had normal serum alanine aminotransferase levels at the end of the treatment. Eleven patients achieved sustained virologic response (SVR), one relapsed and one was lost to follow-up. The overall SVR rate was 84.6%. None of the patients required dose reduction or stopped the treatment due to side effects. Conclusion: In conclusion, early initiation of anti-viral treatment in patients with acute hepatitis C results in high-SVR rates (independently of genotype) and is well-tolerated.
Optimal portfolios with a positive lower bound on final wealth

We consider the determination of optimal portfolios under a lower bound on the final wealth. Possible applications range from capital guarantee strategies over life insurance investment where part of the benefit is a guaranteed return on capital to continuous-time mean-variance problems with a strictly positive lower bound. Our solution method consists of transforming the original problem into a portfolio problem without a positive lower bound but a transformed utility function and a modified initial wealth.
An empirical examination of the determinants of trust in Ghana

Purpose – How trust affects political, social, and economic phenomena have been studied by scholars for many years. However, not many studies have examined what factors determine trust among people and trust in public institutions. There is particularly a dearth of research on trust in Ghana. The paper aims to discuss this issue. Design/methodology/approach – The authors use data from the 2012 Afrobarometer Surveys to mimic four sets of variables that Alesina and La Ferrara (2002) find as significant determinants of trust – recent traumatic experiences, having been historically discriminated against, being economically unsuccessful, and living in a mixed community. The authors apply these variables to the Ghanaian context to explore how they affect generalized trust, trust in relatives, neighbors, and other people the respondent knows, as well as trust in six public institutions (i.e. The President, Parliament, Electoral Commission, Police, Army, and the Courts of Law). Findings – The authors find that tr.
Clients’ views on strategic capabilities which lead to management consulting success

This article summarises the findings of a study which canvassed clients’ views of strategic capabilities which lead to management consulting success. The survey was undertaken among 171 executives in the top 500 companies in Australia. The major elements that were investigated were the reasons for hiring the consultants and the strategic capabilities related to successful performance indicators as identified by clients. The findings show that the main reasons consultants are hired are insufficient in‐house expertise, independent/objective advice, gaining additional help/resources, insufficient manpower in‐house and quick resolution of issues. The top five strategic capabilities which clients identified as important to success, in order, were ability to listen to and comprehend the client, quality of service, client‐consultant communication, integrity and honesty and technical knowledge. All the strategic capabilities were related to one or more performance indicators. The top five performance indicators were achieving objectives agreed upon, customer/client satisfaction, timeliness of service delivery, recommendations actually implemented and achieving measurable results. Therefore the contemporary management consultant needs to be multi‐skilled and technically competent and, should have excellent people skills. Consultants also need to note that their view on what constitutes successful performance is not quite the same as that of their clients.
Coronal Decompensation Produced by Cotrel—Dubousset “Derotation” Maneuver for Idiopathic Right Thoracic Scoliosis

From 1985 to 1987,82 patients with idiopathic scoliosis followed 12 to 44 months underwent selective fusion and correction of their right thoracic curves by Cotrel—Dubousset instrumentation using the “derotation” maneuver. Preoperative, postoperative, and follow-up standing anteroposterior roentgenograms of the spine were analyzed. For curves in which there was deviation from the midline (plumb line) and rotation of the lumbar segments, an increased incidence of decompensation was produced after surgery, when posterior Cotrel—Dubousset instrumentation and fusion were carried to the “stable” vertebra with one rod bend and hook alignment on the left sided derotation rod. Previous guidelines established for selective fusion with conventional posterior instrumentation (Harrington or Luque rods) may not be applicable to derotation with Cotrel—Dubousset instrumentation.
Catching-up from way behind: lessons for India

Japan and South Korea have shown that it is possible to catch-up with the developed country; and also in a short time span of a decade. Technological innovation is the core of catch-up. Both the countries have followed economic policies around the core of a technological policy that aimed at developing competitiveness in the international market. The present article reviews the achievement of both Japan and South Korea in the light of their respective technology-related policies. When compared with India, it is found that India had more or less similar policies but derived different results. The article evaluates the match and mis-match of the policies to draw lessons for India.
Principled Tolerance and the American Mass Public

Americans appear to be more tolerant of deviant opinions and life-styles now than they were a generation ago. Recent research by Sullivan and his colleagues suggests, however, that this apparent change is largely illusory – a product not of an increase in principled support for tolerance, but rather of shifts in public dislike for, and hence intolerance of, particular political groups. An alternative account of tolerance is proposed which shows that citizen attitudes on issues of tolerance are remarkably consistent – far more so than has been commonly appreciated. In particular, the empirical analysis distinguishes two kinds of consistency – ‘principled’ and ‘situational’. Using log-linear techniques, it demonstrates that substantial numbers of the general public now support a variety of forms of tolerance consistently; and do so, not for reasons peculiar to each, but rather on principle. The broader implications of the results for the study of public opinion and democratic theory are noted.
Day-of-week effects in tests of forward foreign exchange rate unbiasedness

The day of the week on which the forward rate is quoted and the day of the week on which the corresponding one-period ahead spot rate matched to the delivery date of the forward contract is quoted may play a systematic role in the empirical estimates of the coefficient on the forward premium in tests of forward foreign exchange rate unbiasedness. These "day-of-week" effects are motivated from an inventory carrying cost argument as in Bessembinder (1994) and introduced into a simple model for forward foreign exchange market efficiency. Empirical results show that the point estimates are generally consistent with the hypotheses; however, large standard errors make discriminatory power weak and conclusions regarding the role of inventory carrying costs in the magnitude of the forward premium bias debatable. Copyright @ 1999 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. All rights reserved.
Ipilimumab Combined with Nivolumab: A Standard of Care for the Treatment of Advanced Melanoma?

Ipilimumab, an inhibitor of CTLA-4 on T cells, was the first drug to improve overall survival in patients with advanced melanoma. Subsequently, inhibitors of PD-1, including nivolumab and pembrolizumab, were shown to be superior to ipilimumab with a more favorable safety profile. The combination of ipilimumab and nivolumab is associated with a further improvement in response rate and progression-free survival; however, the combination is associated with an increased rate of immune-related toxicities. In 2015, the FDA approved the combination for the treatment of BRAF wild-type advanced melanoma. This review examines the preclinical rationale for the combination of ipilimumab and nivolumab as well as the efficacy and toxicity data from clinical trials in patients with advanced melanoma. Finally, alternative treatment options are discussed with a focus on patient selection. Clin Cancer Res; 22(16); 3992–8. ©2016 AACR.
Molecular identification of two species of myiasis‐causing Cuterebra by multiplex PCR and RFLP

Abstract. The myiasis‐causing flies Cuterebra grisea (Coquillet) and Cuterebra fontinella (Clark) (Diptera: Oestridae) are normally parasites of mice, predominantly of the genus Peromyscus. The morphological similarities of these species and the existence of intermediate morphotypes bearing characters of both species make the identification of adults problematic; furthermore the identification of larvae is apparently not possible. This study presents two molecular approaches to discriminate between these species using specific band patterns: (i) species‐specific primers designed in the cytochrome oxidase II (COII) region used in multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and (ii) restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) on amplified segments of cytochrome oxidase I (COI) gene. Both methods were tested on Cuterebra larvae and on adult museum specimens. The two techniques showed a clear difference between C. grisea and C. fontinella, although species‐specific primers were more successful than RFLP for degraded DNA. No intraspecific variation in RFLP and species‐specific amplifications were detected for the two species of Cuterebra. The results exhibit discrepancies between molecular and morphological identification, suggesting that some of the adults were misidentified.
99 09 22 7 v 1 1 4 Se p 19 99 Calibration of the MACHO Photometry Database

The MACHO Project is a microlensing survey that monitors the brightnesses of ∼60 million stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), Small Magellanic Cloud, and Galactic bulge. Our database presently contains about 80 billion photometric measurements, a significant fraction of all astronomical photometry. We describe the calibration of MACHO two-color photometry and transformation to the standard Kron-Cousins V and R system. Calibrated MACHO photometry may be properly compared with all other observations on the Kron-Cousins standard system, enhancing the astrophysical value of these data. For ∼9 million stars in the LMC bar, independent photometric measurements of ∼20,000 stars with V < ∼ 18 mag in field-overlap regions demonstrate an internal precision σV = 0.021, σR = 0.019, σV−R = 0.028 mag. The accuracy of the zero-point in this calibration is estimated to be ±0.035 mag for stars with colors in the range −0.1 < (V − R) < 1.2 mag. A comparison of calibrated MACHO photometry with published photometric sequences and new Hubble Space Telescope observations shows agreement. The current calibration zero-point uncertainty for the remainder of the MACHO photometry database is estimated to be ±0.10 mag in V or R and ±0.04 mag in (V − R). We describe the first application of calibrated MACHO photometry data: the construction of a color-magnitude diagram used to calculate our experimental sensitivity to detect microlensing in the LMC. Subject headings: astronomical databases: surveys – astronomical methods: data analysis – astronomical techniques: photometric
Heteroskedasticity in Stock Returns

We use predictions of aggregate stock return variances from daily data to estimate time varying monthly variances for size-ranked portfolios. We propose and estimate a single factor model of heteroskedasticity for portfolio returns. This model implies time-varying betas. Implications of heteroskedasticity and time-varying betas for tests of the capital asset pricing model (CAPM) are then documented. Accounting for heteroskedasticity increases the evidence that risk-adjusted returns are related to firm size. We also estimate a constant correlation model. Portfolio volatilities predicted by this model are similar to those predicted by more complex multivariate generalized-autoregressive- conditional- heteroskedasticity (GARCH) procedures.
Do the rich really save more? Evidence from lifetime earnings and consumption data in the United Kingdom

Whether higher lifetime income households do save a larger share of their income is one of the longstanding empirical question in economics that has been surprisingly dicult to answer. We use both consumption data and a new dataset containing both individual survey data on wealth holdings and administrative data on earnings histories from the UK to examine this question. Using each of these sources of data, we nd evidence of a positive relationship between saving rates (and wealth accumulation) and levels of permanent income. Our ndings are consistent with earlier results from Dynan, Skinner & Zeldes (2004) using consumption data from the US, but somewhat at odds with evidence from the US which has examined retirement wealth and lifetime earnings in the Health and Retirement Study, HRS (Gustman & Steinmeier 1999, Venti & Wise 1998). We present new evidence using more recent HRS data, applying exactly the same methodology as we have used on the UK data, and nd broadly the same results as these earlier papers. This suggests that the dierences are not solely driven by dierences in
Employment performance in times of crisis: A multilevel analysis of economic resilience in the German biotechnology industry

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to elucidate the determinants of economic resilience at various levels of analysis. While the economic benefits of regional clustering are well-documented, the impact of external shocks on regional clusters has only recently gained attention. This study explores the antecedents of economic resilience, defined as sustained employment growth, prior to and during the global financial crisis within the German biotechnology industry. Design/methodology/approach – This study combines multilevel linear regression analysis with egocentric network analysis. This allows us to distinguish micro- and context-level effects in the analysis of economic resilience. Findings – The findings of this study indicate that while specialization at the network and context-level is conducive to firm growth prior to the crisis, these configurations seem to be particularly susceptible to external shocks. Conversely, diversity (diversified regional agglomerations and diverse networks) seems to b.
Property and Possession: Hunting Tourism and the Morality of Landownership in Rural Norway

As forest areas have become increasingly relevant to the public as recreational landscapes, and outdoor recreation is increasingly diverse and specialized, we explore how notions of property and issues of public access are made relevant in controversies over hunting rights in Norway. Focusing on responses of local hunters to landowners’ recent promotion of hunting tourism, one central finding is that the hunters tend to engage with the hunting grounds as part of landscapes they identify strongly with. While recognizing the principle of private ownership to hunting rights, local hunters raise moral and political objections to how the ownership is performed. We conclude that taking the contextual nature of property relations into account is important when considering controversies over access to land and resources, not least in connection with development of nature-based tourism.
And Yet It Moves

This article analyzes the effect of parties’ election statements on voter perceptions of party policy positions. It reveals robust evidence that campaign policy announcements do influence party images: As a result of the campaign, party policy brands shift in the direction of the platform. Hence, it challenges the conclusion in Adams, Ezrow, and Somer-Topcu that voters do not adjust their perception of parties’ positions to campaign statements. This article makes a key contribution to our understanding of elections, as it provides empirical evidence that election campaigns are useful for voters to identify changes in parties’ policy preferences. It also opens avenues for further research that the results in Adams et al. had discouraged from, such as analyses of the factors that explain variation in the relevance of campaign statements.
Switching patients with migraine from sumatriptan to other triptans increases primary care costs

Treatment of migraine with triptans is highly effective, although cost considerations may prompt a change in therapy. This retrospective database analysis of 3196 patients with migraine, established on sumatriptan therapy, found that 54% of the 292 experiencing a triptan switch returned to sumatriptan within 15 months, suggesting that the alternative was less acceptable. Excluding patients with unusually high use of triptans (≥208 tablets/year), switching therapy resulted in a significant increase of £53/patient in total costs, compared with patients continuing on sumatriptan (p = 0.014). Cost savings (£17/patient over 15 months) were observed only among the 41% of patients in whom the initial switch was successful and did not result in a further switch or return to sumatriptan. Among patients who were relatively low cost initially, switching resulted in increased costs, irrespective of the outcome. This study suggests that there is no economic justification for switching from sumatriptan to another triptan.
Sustainability of public finances

A central tenet of the Maastricht Treaty is that a successful European Monetary Union requires sustainable public finances of its member states. Yet there is no clear definition of sustainability. The economist’s common use of the term builds on the concept of an intertemporal budget constraint over an infinite time horizon, which is of little practical use. In this study, we develop a concept of sustainability focusing on the controllability of public finances. In so doing, we adopt the approach of the Maastricht Treaty, to assume sustainability as long as a country does not violate the double standards of the deficit (3%) and the debt (60% of GDP) criterion. When the benign assumption does not hold, we distinguish between the symptoms of non-sustainability of public finances, which can be determined in a relatively straightforward way, and the underlying institutional causes, which are more difficult to identify. Correcting the symptoms requires a disaggregate view of the government budget. Successful consolidation requires the fiscal policy problem to be addressed ‘at the source’, i.e. the adjustment of those items of the government budget that produced the build-up of a non-sustainable deficit in the first place. Lasting consolidation also requires a correction of the institutional weaknesses that are the ultimate causes of a non-sustainable deficit. After reviewing the theoretical and empirical arguments for a disaggregate and institutions-oriented approach to correcting non-sustainable deficits, we propose a practical procedure to assess the sustainability of a country’s public finances.
Norm Retrieval and Phase Retrieval by Projections

We make a detailed study of norm retrieval. We give several classification theorems for norm retrieval and give a large number of examples to go with the theory. One consequence is a new result about Parseval frames: If a Parseval frame is divided into two subsets with spans W 1 , W 2 and W 1 ∩ W 2 = { 0 } , then W 1 ⊥ W 2 .
Corporate Governance Codes: a Comparison Between Malaysia and the UK

This paper highlights several major aspects of the proposed Malaysian Code and contrasts them with UK Corporate Governance Codes. Comparisons are made on their origins, compliance, board structure and key committees. Preliminary findings suggest that UK Codes are voluntary and largely business driven whereas the proposed Malaysian Code, is regulatory driven. It suggests a more highly regulated business environment in Malaysia to ensure effective compliance and enforcement. As many Malaysian listed companies are owned by controlling and substantial shareholders who heavily influence the appointment of chief executive officers, improvements in the corporate governance standards are essential to protect minority shareholders, restore investor confidence and conform with national socio-economic objectives.
Twisting the knife: Frontier violence in the central Amazon of Brazil

The presence or absence of high rates of violence in the Central Amazon of Brazil, one of the last great frontiers of the world, is analysed in terms of a comparative approach to the study of global frontiers. Violence is shown to be low among historical peasantries in riverine and pastoral areas of old settlement located beyond the greater frontier where less inequity and imbalance between social classes, ethnic groups, sexual groups and age sets exist. The advancing frontier of open-field agriculture presents the opposite with some of the highest rates of violence in the country and is shown to be typical of a process of polarised development in Brazil.
A Bidirectional Three-Level DC–DC Converter for the Ultracapacitor Applications

Electrochemical double-layer capacitors, which are well known as ultracapacitors, have intensively been used in power conversion applications such as controlled electric drives, active filters, power conditioners, and uninterruptible power supplies. The ultracapacitor is employed as the energy storage device that can be fully charged/discharged within a few seconds. To achieve better flexibility and efficiency, the ultracapacitor is connected to the power conversion system via an interfacing dc-dc power converter. Various topologies are used as the dc-dc power converter: nonisolated two-level single-phase or multiphase interleaved converters and many varieties of isolated soft-switched dc-dc converters. A three-level nonisolated dc-dc converter as a candidate for ultracapacitor applications is proposed and analyzed in this paper. The topology is theoretically analyzed, and design guidelines are given. The modeling and control aspects are discussed. A 5.5-kW prototype was designed, and the proposed topology was experimentally verified on a general-purpose controlled electric drive. Experimental results are presented and discussed.