Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Do positive interactions increase with abiotic stress? A test from a semi-arid steppe

Theoretical models predict that the relative importance of facilitation and competition may vary inversely across gradients of abiotic stress. However, these predictions have not been thoroughly tested in the field, especially in semi–arid environments. In this study, we evaluated how the net effect of the tussock grass Stipa tenacissima on the shrub Pistacia lentiscus varied across a gradient of abiotic stress in semi–arid Mediterranean steppes. We fitted the relationship between accumulated rainfall and the relative neighbour index (our measures of abiotic stress and of the net effect of S. tenacissima on P. lentiscus, respectively), which varied across this gradient, to a quadratic model. Competitive interactions dominated at both extremes of the gradient. Our results do not support established theory. Instead, they suggest that a shift from facilitation to competition under high abiotic stress conditions is likely to occur when the levels of the most limiting resource are so low that the benefits provided by the facilitator cannot overcome its own resource uptake.
The Relationship Between Respiratory Viral Loads and Diagnosis in Children Presenting to a Pediatric Hospital Emergency Department

Background: Respiratory viral infections account for a considerable proportion of pediatric emergency room visits. Illnesses range in severity from mild upper respiratory tract infections to serious lower respiratory tract infections (LRTI). The relationship between viral load and specific viruses to clinical diagnosis made by physicians in this setting is poorly understood. Methods: We applied a real-time, quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) panel for 13 common respiratory viruses to 195 frozen, archival nasopharyngeal aspirate specimens obtained from symptomatic children ≤24 months of age presenting to the emergency room. Mean total viral load and number of viruses per archival nasopharyngeal aspirate specimen were compared between LRTI (n = 70) and non-LRTI (1 or more of upper respiratory tract infection, fever, or cough) (n = 125), as were yield and concordance of qPCR results to viral culture/direct fluorescence assay (DFA). Results: Children with LRTI had significantly increased total viral load and harbored more viruses than the non-LRTI group. Respiratory syncytial virus-A and -B were significantly associated with LRTI, and parainfluenza virus-1 with non-LRTI. Individual loads of parainfluenza virus-2 and human rhinovirus were increased in LRTI versus non-LRTI. Quantitative PCR yielded more viruses (including coinfections, where a “dominant virus” was typically identified) than viral culture/DFA and documented nucleic acid from pathogens not tested by culture/DFA including human rhinovirus; coronaviruses -OC43, -229E, and -NL63; and metapneumovirus. Conclusions: In symptomatic children presenting to the emergency room, total viral load is related to clinical diagnosis; specific viruses are associated with particular clinical diagnoses, and qPCR has a higher yield than other viral diagnostic methods.
A time-series analysis of the impact of heavy drinking on homicide and suicide mortality in Russia, 1956-2002.

AIM Assess the impact of heavy drinking on homicide and suicide mortality in Russia between 1956 and 2002. MEASURES AND DESIGN: Alcohol-related mortality was used as a proxy for heavy drinking. We used autoregressive integrated moving average techniques to model total and sex-specific alcohol-homicide and alcohol-suicide relationships at the population level. FINDINGS We found a positive and significant contemporaneous association between alcohol and homicide and between alcohol and suicide. We found no evidence of lagged relationships. These results held for overall and sex-specific associations. CONCLUSION Our results lend convergent validity to the alcohol-suicide link in Russia found by Nemtsov and to the alcohol-homicide associations found in cross-sectional analyses of Russia. Levels of alcohol consumption, homicide and suicide in Russia are among the highest in the world, and the mounting evidence of the damaging effects of consumption on the social fabric of the country reveals the need for intervention at multiple levels.
The Value of Research

We estimate the value added by sell-side equity research analysts and explore the links between analyst research, informational efficiency, and asset prices. We identify the value of research from exogenous changes in analyst coverage. On announcement that a stock has lost all coverage, share prices fall by around 110 basis points or $8.4 million on average. The share price reaction is attenuated the more analysts continue to cover the stock, suggesting that there are diminishing returns to coverage at the margin. The adverse effect of coverage terminations is proportional to the analyst's reputation and experience and to the size of the broker's retail sales force. Exogenous reductions in coverage are followed by: less efficient pricing and lower liquidity; greater earnings surprises and more volatile trading around subsequent earnings announcements; increases in required returns; and reduced return volatility. Simulations suggest investors can trade profitably on the volatility changes. Finally, retail investors sell and large institutional investors buy around coverage terminations, suggesting that different investor clienteles have different demands for analyst research.
Eight years of clinical findings and biopsy results of nasopharyngeal pathologies in 1647 adult patients: a retrospective study.

OBJECTIVES We performed an 8-year retrospective study to evaluate the presentation, clinical findings and nasopharyngeal biopsy results of adult nasopharyngeal pathologies. METHODOLOGY This study included 1647 patients (801 males and 846 females) admitted to outpatient clinics. All patients underwent a nasopharyngeal biopsy for a nasopharyngeal mass. In addition, a blind biopsy was taken if there was suspicion of nasopharyngeal carcinoma, even in the absence of a mass lesion. The pathological diagnoses were analysed on the basis of the age, sex and clinical presentation of the patients. RESULTS Patient age ranged between 18 and 85 years; the mean was 36 years. Patient age differed significantly between those with benign and malignant disease (p=0.000); the risk of malignancy increased with age. Benign disease was found in 97.4% of the patients. Reactive lymphoid hyperplasia was the most common condition; it was found in 92.71% of benign cases. Undifferentiated nasopharyngeal cancer was the most common malignant disease, being found in 82.95% of all nasopharyngeal malignancies and in 4.43% of all nasopharyngeal disease. The most common symptom was nasal obstruction. The other main symptoms were hearing loss and neck mass. Neck mass was associated with malignancy. CONCLUSIONS Benign disease of the nasopharynx is more common than malignant pathology in patients with a nasopharyngeal mass. Although adenoidal tissue undergoes regression in the adolescent period, this tissue may present as the chief cause of nasal obstruction in adults. Age and symptoms may predict malignant disease.
The influence of resource dependency on collaboration in the construction supply chain

In the construction industry, supply chains consist of clients, project managers, builders, consultants and suppliers, resulting in a diverse group of trades that extend down to a single labourer. The construction supply chain is often seen as a highly volatile and inefficient mechanism that falls well short of expectations due to its project focus rather than its supply chain management prowess. With relationships in the construction industry being viewed as short term and project based, the development of enduring relationships becomes difficult. It is well documented that the construction supply chain suffers from significant deficiencies in production. Hence it is wasteful and lacks cohesion with relationships being fragmented and at arm’s length. In order to improve cohesion and productivity, the relationships among the supply chain actors needs to be improved. However, in order to do so, there is a need to understand what drives the relationship and what key factors determine why actors will enter into a work or project relationship and why the arm’s length approach is a constant in the industry. This thesis extends the research into the influence of resource dependency on collaboration in the construction supply chain, specifically explores the relationship between supply chain actors and at various stages of the procurement process all the way to the project realisation stage. Particularly, the research aims to investigate and identify “what influence does resource dependency have on collaboration in the construction supply chain? ”
The impact of trade agreements on livestock producers

Growth in per capita supply of livestock products in developing countries during the last decade is associated with even faster growth of imports, particularly those of pig and poultry meat. Some developing countries are net exporters of livestock products. The theory of comparative advantage emphasises the global benefits of trade liberalisation and the damage caused by tariffs and other trade barriers. High tariffs remain in the EU, USA and Japan despite the negotiations of the WTO aimed at reducing trade barriers. However, it is estimated that even if all such barriers were removed, the impact on developing countries, as a group, would be relatively small. The SPS Agreement of the WTO is aimed at international harmonisation of health and sanitary standards and the resolution of associated trade disputes. Developing countries face resource constraints in meeting the standards demanded by industrialised country importers. Similarly standards for environmental protection, animal welfare and other non-market attributes of agricultural products may require harmonisation within the WTO. PPLPI Research Report 2 1. Consumption of Livestock Products and Trade in the Developing Countries
Effect of Educational Program Regarding Therapeutic Exercises on Women's Pain, Fatigue and Shoulder Function Undergoing Mastectomy

Breast cancer is the most common form of cancer in females worldwide and the most prevalent cancer among Egyptian women. Breast cancer and its treatment result in physical and psychological problems; pain, fatigue and dysfunction. It is the responsibility of the nurse to identify the breast cancer patient's needs, make appropriate nursing diagnosis and initiate plans for care. Aim of the study: to assess the impact of an educational program regarding therapeutic exercises for women’s pain, fatigue and shoulder function that are undergoing mastectomy. This study was hypothesized that there would be an improvement of patients’ information, pain, fatigue and shoulder function by using the therapeutic exercises. Quasi experimental design was utilized in this study. It was conducted at Oncology Center Mansoura University. Purposive sample included (80) patients with preliminary diagnosis of breast cancer, were admitted to female surgical units, scheduled for Modified radical mastectomy and were divided random equally into study and control groups; (40) patients in each group. Tools: used for data collection included an interviewing questionnaire sheet, Numerical Rating scale, Fatigue Severity scale and Shoulder Pain and Disability Index, performance observational checklists, and follow up sheet. Results: The mean age of the studied women 45.25 and 46.06. The majority of the women in both groups were married; housewives and 45% were illiterate. There was a highly significant difference in patients' level of information, pain intensity, fatigue severity, and shoulder dysfunction of the study group as compared to the control group. This means that the educational program had positive effect in reducing patients' pain, fatigue and shoulder dysfunction, post program and after one month of implementation of the educational program. Conclusion: There were a statistical significance difference between the two groups in relation to information, fatigue severity, pain intensity, shoulder pain and disability, and performance post program and follow-up after one month. Deep breathing and Progressive muscle relaxation techniques, arm and shoulder exercises, and patient's education are useful adjuvant techniques to complement medical treatment. Recommendations: Continuous educational health programs are recommended. So incorporation of such interventions in the care plan can enhance the care for surgical breast cancer patients and greatly improve their quality of life. [Magda Abdel Azeaz; Nadia Mohamed Taha, Abd Elrahman Hassan and Amal Eid Shaban. Effect of Educational Program Regarding Therapeutic Exercises on Women's Pain, Fatigue and Shoulder Function Undergoing Mastectomy. J Am Sci 2013;9(3):412-425]. (ISSN: 1545-1003). http://www.jofamericanscience. org. 66
Efficacy of Cefixime in the Treatment of Typhoid Fever

Typhoid fever is defined by fever (greater then 38.5°C for more than three days) and isolation of Salmonella typhi from blood or bone marrow culture. The causative agent Salmonella typhi is developing resistance against the various lines of antibiotics. So this is becoming more and more serious problem gradually. The aim of this study was to determine the efficacy of Cefixime in typhoid fever in different hospitals of Rupandehi and Palpa districts of Nepal. An open-labeled, non-comparative, study was conducted in 112 subjects to evaluate the efficacy and safety of Cefixime (5mg/kg or 200mg twice daily for 7 days) for the treatment of typhoid fever. Of the patients enrolled based on symptoms of typhoid fever, 106 (94.6%) completed the study. Clinical cure was seen in 98 (92.5%) subjects. The efficacy was measured as absence of symptoms in 10 th day of treatment. No serious adverse event was observed. Cefixime was found to be safe and efficacious for the treatment of typhoid fever.
Effect of intrauterine antibiotic treatment on reproductive performance of dairy cows following periparturient disease

Abstract AIMS: To quantify the effect of treating lactating dairy cows that had histories of periparturient disorders or disease with a single intrauterine infusion of 0.5 g cephapirin, 3–6 weeks prior to the start of the seasonal breeding period. METHODS: Cows (n=690) from spring-calving dairy herds (n=22) were enrolled in a prospective case-control study if they had a history of dystocia, a dead calf at calving or within 24 h of calving, retained foetal membranes (RFM), metabolic disease, twins or a vulval discharge >13 days postpartum. Cows were blocked by age, periparturient condition and calving date, and randomly assigned to be either treated with 0.5 g of cephapirin by intrauterine infusion, or left as untreated controls. Treatment occurred 24–42 days before the planned start of mating (PSM) within each herd. In addition, the reproductive tracts of 91 cows from 4 herds were examined using a vaginal speculum and rectal palpation and cervical-os discharge was scored on a scale from 0 (nil) to 3 (purulent). RESULTS: Overall, more treated cows were retained in the trial herds until pregnancy testing than control cows (p<0.05). Average 28-day submission rate was higher (93.1% vs 87.1%; p<0.05) and PSM-to-first-service interval was shorter (9 ± 1 vs 11 ± 1 days; p<0.05) in treated than control cows. The percentage of cows not pregnant at the end of the mating period was not affected by treatment overall. However, amongst cows diagnosed with RFM, a dead calf, or vulval discharge, pregnancy rates 28 and 56 days after PSM were higher for treated than control cows (p<0.05). Cows with a purulent cervical-os discharge had lower 28-day submission rates (p<0.01), lower 28-day pregnancy rates (p<0.05) and higher non-pregnant rates at the end of mating than cows with nil or mucoid cervical-os discharges. CONCLUSIONS: Intrauterine treatment with 0.5 g cephapirin improved reproductive performance of dairy cattle, especially those that had a history of RFM, a calf dead at calving or within 24 h of calving, or a vulval discharge.
Fluorescein angiography and adverse drug reactions revisited: the Lions Eye experience

Background: The last major survey of adverse reactions to intravenous fluorescein angiography was performed more than 20 years ago. There have been two recent fatalities involving intravenous fluorescein in Australia. It is important to review the current incidence of adverse reactions and latest literature on the pathogenesis, prophylaxis and alternatives to intravenous fluorescein angiography.
Morphology of in-vitro matured oocytes: impact on fertility potential and embryo quality.

BACKGROUND The purpose of the present study was to investigate the morphology of in-vitro matured metaphase II (MII) oocytes and to observe if there was a difference in the morphology between polycystic and normal ovaries. Furthermore, the morphology of in-vitro matured MII oocytes was related to their subsequent fertilization and cleavage rates and to embryo quality. METHODS This retrospective study included 264 MII oocytes obtained in 100 consecutive cycles. Oocyte retrieval was performed transvaginally and cumulus enclosed oocytes were matured for 28--30 h before evaluation. Prior to ICSI, all MII oocytes were graded into three groups according to the number of anomalies: grade I: oocytes without any anomaly (n = 144, 54%), grade II: oocytes with one anomaly (n = 87, 33%) and grade III: oocytes with at least two anomalies (n = 33, 12.5%). RESULTS Oocyte grades did not differ between women with polycystic ovaries [grades I, II and III respectively: 58/94 (61.7%), 29/94 (30.9%) and 7/94 (7.4%)] and women with normal ovaries [grades I, II and III respectively: 86/170 (50.6%); 58/170 (34%); 26/170 (15.3%)]. Morphology was not related to fertilization rates. The cleavage rate was, however, affected by morphological anomalies (grade I [77/144 (53.5%) versus grade II 33/87 (37.9%) (P = 0.03)], although no significant decrease in cleavage rate could be demonstrated when all grade II and III oocytes were compared with normal oocytes. Significantly more embryos of good quality developed after grade I oocytes [54/144 (37.5%)] compared with those from grade II and grade III oocytes (22/120; P = 0.001). The presence of cytoplasmic abnormalities significantly decreased the cleavage rate (P = 0.04) and also the number of good quality embryos (P < 0.001). CONCLUSION The in-vitro maturation of oocytes without anomalies yields higher quality embryos, with higher cleavage rates, than those with anomalies.
The effects of market orientation on trust and commitment

There is little empirical research that examines the effects of marketing orientation on the two most important relationship marketing concepts, namely trust and commitment. In this paper, the sponsorship relationship is the focus of an empirical investigation aimed at uncovering the potential effect of market orientation, exhibited by both parties of the sponsorship dyad, upon trust and commitment. By selecting the leading sponsorship property in Australia, the Australian Football League, the majority of key Australian sponsors were included in this study, allowing the authors to draw managerial implications of direct relevance to other sponsors and properties aiming to secure long lasting sponsorship relationships.
Linking textual resources to support information discovery

A vast amount of information is today stored in the form of textual documents, many of which are available online. These documents come from different sources and are of different types. They include newspaper articles, books, corporate reports, encyclopedia entries and research papers. At a semantic level, these documents contain knowledge, which was created by explicitly connecting information and expressing it in the form of a natural language. However, a significant amount of knowledge is not explicitly stated in a single document, yet can be derived or discovered by researching, i.e. accessing, comparing, contrasting and analysing, information from multiple documents. Carrying out this work using traditional search interfaces is tedious due to information overload and the difficulty of formulating queries that would help us to discover information we are not aware of. In order to support this exploratory process, we need to be able to effectively navigate between related pieces of information across documents. While information can be connected using manually curated cross-document links, this approach not only does not scale, but cannot systematically assist us in the discovery of sometimes non-obvious (hidden) relationships. Consequently, there is a need for automatic approaches to link discovery. This work studies how people link content, investigates the properties of different link types, presents new methods for automatic link discovery and designs a system in which link discovery is applied on a collection of millions of documents to improve access to public knowledge.
Measuring service quality in retail loyalty programmes (LPSQual): Implications for retailers' retention strategies

Purpose – This research aims to empirically develop a reliable and valid scale for measuring the service quality of retail loyalty programmes (loyalty programme service quality (LPSQual)) in the context of department stores and superstores in Malaysia.Design/methodology/approach – By adapting the process proposed by Churchill for developing measures of marketing constructs, an instrument to assess LPSQual in Malaysia is formulated. The methodology consists of developing the scale based on a literature review and qualitative method. The proposed scale is then purified and validated through exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis.Findings – The proposed instrument (LPSQual) contains 26 attributes in seven dimensions: reward, tangibility, policy, information usefulness, courteousness/helpfulness, personalization and communication.Research limitations/implications – Further testing of the scales across multiple contexts is necessary for validity enhancement.Practical implications – Retail.
House Purchase Versus Rental in Spain

One of the most salient feature of the Spanish housing market, compared to other European economies, is its relatively low rental share. This may be partly attributed to the existence of fiscal distortions in Spain favoring ownership. In this paper, we simulate the potential efects of different policy measures aimed at homogenizing the fiscal treatment of ownership and renting and improving the efficiency of the rental market. We do so in the context of a DSGE model featuring a market for owner-occupied and rented housing, as well as collateral constraints in loan markets. We find that eliminating the existing subsidy to house purchases, introducing a comparable subsidy to rental payments or increasing the efficiency in the production of housing rental services raise the rental share by a similar amount. However, their implications in terms of the construction sector differ.
Busted! Now What? Effects of Cartel Enforcement on Firm Value and Corporate Policies

In a cross-country study we look at the staggered passage of national leniency laws over 1990-2012. We show that these laws lead to more convictions of cartels, and generally increase the costs of collusion by reducing the average gross margins of the affected firms. We further examine how changing costs of collusion shape firm boundaries and show that firms reorganize their activities by engaging in more horizontal acquisitions, both in the roles as the acquirer and the target. These acquisitions tend to be associated with higher announcement returns. We find little evidence of the increase in strategic alliances or greenfield investments.