Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Aging and Repetition Priming for Targets and Distracters in a Working Memory Task

ABSTRACT A combined working memory/repetition priming task was administered to 13 young (mean age 23) and 13 elderly (mean age 69) adults. Each participant memorized a sample target face at the beginning of a trial and then determined whether each of 13 serially presented test faces matched the sample target. In each trial, both the target and one particular distracter face were repeated during the test phase. Within-trial repetition priming effects indicated the contribution of implicit memory to task performance. Response times decreased as items were tested repeatedly within a trial, but this decrement was greater for distracters than for targets. Young and older participants were equally accurate at identifying targets, but elderly were slightly less accurate for distracters. Elderly participants showed repetition priming effects for both targets and distracters, while the young showed such effects only for distracters. The results suggest that active maintenance in working memory, but not inhibition or rejection of distracters, may suppress implicit memory systems.
Monetary Policy in a Developing Country: Loan Applications and Real Effects

Recent studies of monetary policy in developing countries document a weak bank lending channel based on aggregate data. In this paper, we bring new evidence using Uganda's supervisory credit register, with microdata on loan applications, volumes and rates, coupled with unanticipated variation in monetary policy. We show that a monetary contraction reduces bank credit supply—increasing loan application rejections and tightening loan volume and rates—especially for banks with more leverage and sovereign debt exposure. There are associated spillovers on inflation and economic activity—including construction permits and trade—and even social unrest.
Increased Susceptibility of C1q-Deficient Mice to Salmonella enterica Serovar Typhimurium Infection

ABSTRACT The role of the complement system in host defense against Salmonella infection is poorly defined. Bacterial cell wall O-antigen polysaccharide can activate the alternative pathway in vitro. No studies, however, have elucidated the role of the classical pathway in immunity to Salmonella spp. in vivo. C1q-deficient mice (C1qa−/−) on a 129/Sv genetic background and strain-matched controls were infected intraperitoneally and intravenously with Salmonella enterica serovar Typhimurium and monitored over a 14-day period. After inoculation by either route, the C1qa−/− mice were found to be significantly more susceptible to Salmonella infection. Hepatic and splenic bacterial counts, performed at various time points, showed increased numbers of colonies in complement-deficient mice compared to controls. Analysis of blood clearance showed no difference between the two experimental groups during the first 15 min. However, after 20 min and until 6 h postinfection, numbers of circulating bacteria were significantly higher in complement-deficient mice. In vitro experiments using either resident or thioglycolate-elicited peritoneal macrophages showed a significant increase in the number of bacteria inside C1q-deficient macrophages compared to controls irrespective of the serum used for opsonizing the bacteria. These findings could not be explained either by an increased bacterial uptake, analyzed in vitro and in vivo using green fluorescent protein-tagged salmonellae, or by a defect in the respiratory burst or in NO production. The data presented here suggest the possibility of novel pathways by which C1q may modulate the pathogenesis of infectious diseases caused by intracellular pathogens.
Close Association of Azospirillum and Diazotrophic Rods with Different Root Zones of Kallar Grass

The populations of diazotrophic and nondiazotrophic bacteria were estimated in the endorhizosphere and on the rhizoplane of Kallar grass (Leptochloa fusca) and in nonrhizosphere soil. Microaerophilic diazotrophs were counted by the most-probable-number method, using two semisolid malate media, one of them adapted to the saline-sodic Kallar grass soil. Plate counts of aerobic heterotrophic bacteria were done on nutrient agar. The dominating N2-fixing bacteria were differentiated by morphological, serological, and physiological criteria. Isolates, which could not be assigned to a known species, were shown to fix nitrogen unequivocally by 15N2 incorporation. On the rhizoplane we found 2.0 × 107 diazotrophs per g (dry weight) of root, which consisted in equal numbers of Azospirillum lipoferum and Azospirillum-like bacteria showing characteristics different from those of known Azospirillum species. Surface sterilization by NaOCI treatment effectively reduced the rhizoplane population, so that bacteria released by homogenization of roots could be regarded as endorhizosphere bacteria. Azospirillum spp. were not detected in the endorhizosphere, but diazotrophic, motile, straight rods producing a yellow pigment occurred with 7.3 × 107 cells per g (dry weight) of root in the root interior. In nonrhizosphere soil we found 3.1 × 104 nitrogen-fixing bacteria per g. Diazotrophs were preferentially enriched in the Kallar grass rhizosphere. In nonrhizosphere soil they made up 0.2% of the total aerobic heterotrophic microflora, on the rhizoplane they made up 7.1%, and in the endorhizosphere they made up 85%. Owing to high numbers in and on roots and their preferential enrichment, we concluded that diazotrophs are in close association with Kallar grass. They formed entirely different populations on the rhizoplane and in the endorhizosphere.
Governing Major Event Legacy: Case of the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games

This article explores the emerging importance of planning and governance surrounding the concept of event legacy by focusing on an in-depth case study of the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games. Given the long-term nature of the concept of legacy, the need for planned and thorough pre-, during, and post-Games management is essential if legacy outcomes are to be monitored effectively. Research method employed for this study consist of in-depth interviews (n = 14) with policy makers, organizers, and local community associations who were involved with legacy planning and implementation for the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games. The findings present Glasgow's legacy approach as an advancement in the understanding of legacy governance and planning in relation to critical event management. By designing and implementing legacy governance structures at an early stage, each stakeholder role is established and can be monitored while allowing for some flexibility within the legacy management partnerships. In addition, the notion of a partnership legacy can be seen to have grown from innovative legacy governance structures, such as collaborative working and network creation, put in place by Glasgow in the early stages of legacy planning, which can act as a model of best practice for other major event host destinations.
Essays in quantitative investments

This thesis studies the characteristics of Chinese futures markets and the quantitative investment strategies. The main objective of this thesis is to provide a comprehensive analysis on the performance of quantitative investment strategies in the Chinese market. Furthermore, with an econometric analysis, the stylised facts of the Chinese futures markets are documented. Extensive backtesting results on the performance of momentum, reversal and pairs trading type strategies are provided. In the case of pairs trading type strategies, risk and return relationship is characterised by the length of the maximum holding periods, and thus re ected in the maximum drawdown risk. In line with the increasing holding periods, the pro tability of pairs trading increases over longer holding periods. Therefore, the abnormal returns from pairs trading in the Chinese futures market do not necessarily re ect market ine ciency. Momentum and reversal strategies are compared by employing both high- and low-frequency time series with precise estimation of transaction costs. The comparison of momentum and reversal investment strategies at the intra- and inter-day scales displays that the portfolio rebalancing frequency signi cantly impacts the pro tability of such strategies. Complementarily, the excess returns of inter-day momentum trading with the inclusion of precise estimates of transaction costs re ect that quantitative investment strategies consistently produce abnormal pro ts in the Chinese commodity futures markets. However, from a risk-adjusted view, the returns are obtained only by bearing additional drawdown risks. Finally, this thesis suggests that investor should choose quantitative trading strategies according to the investment horizon, tolerance for maximum drawdown and portfolio rebalancing costs.
Weather prediction with multiclass support vector machines in the fault detection of photovoltaic system

Since the efficiency of photovoltaic U+0028 PV U+0029 power is closely related to the weather, many PV enterprises install weather instruments to monitor the working state of the PV power system. With the development of the soft measurement technology, the instrumental method seems obsolete and involves high cost. This paper proposes a novel method for predicting the types of weather based on the PV power data and partial meteorological data. By this method, the weather types are deduced by data analysis, instead of weather instrument. A better fault detection is obtained by using the support vector machines U+0028 SVM U+0029 and comparing the predicted and the actual weather. The model of the weather prediction is established by a direct SVM for training multiclass predictors. Although SVM is suitable for classification, the classified results depend on the type of the kernel, the parameters of the kernel, and the soft margin coefficient, which are difficult to choose. In this paper, these parameters are optimized by particle swarm optimization U+0028 PSO U+0029 algorithm in anticipation of good prediction results can be achieved. Prediction results show that this method is feasible and effective.
Effect of Angiotensin-Converting Enzyme Inhibition on Renal Function and Albuminuria in Normotensive Type I Diabetic Patients

Normotensive patients with insulin-dependent (type l) diabetes mellitus (n = 18) were given 25 mg captopril (b.i.d.) and placebo for 3 mo in a randomized double-blind crossover study. Patients had normal renal function, and none had retinopathy. Albuminuria was <20 μg/min in 12 patients and between 20 and 200 μg/min in the other 6. Patients were examined at the end of the placebo and captopril phases. Captopril caused little reduction in blood pressure obtainedby 24-h ambulatory monitoring (systolic 126.0 ± 2.7 to 123.9 ± 2.4 mmHg, P< 0.08; diastolic 74.2 ± 1.9 to 72.1 ± 1.9 mmHg, P < 0.09). Captopril lowered glomerular filtration rate from 99.5 ± 7.7 to 71.0 ± 5.5 ml · min−1 · 1.73 m−2(P < 0.01), whereas renal plasma flow (443.9 ± 15.2 ml.min−1. 1.73 m−2) remained unchanged. Filtration fraction was reduced from 22.4 ± 1.4 to 17.4 ± 1.4% (P < 0.01). Urinary albumin excretion was reduced from 59.1 ± 0.15 to 27.7 ± 13.9 μg/min (P < 0.1). Reduction was relatedto the extent of initial albuminuria (r = 0.997, P < 0.001), a relationship that remained significant after logarithmic transformation (r = 0.540, P < 0.02). Dextran clearance was used to determine glomerular capillary function. Angiotensin inhibition caused reduction in effective glomerular pore size and also reduced flow via the nondiscriminatory shunt. Angiotensin inhibition in normotensive patients with type I diabetes was well tolerated. Reduction in albuminuria is mediated by a combination of hemodynamic changes and alterations in glomerular capillary function.
Systematic review and validation of prognostic models in liver transplantation

A model that can accurately predict post–liver transplant mortality would be useful for clinical decision making, would help to provide patients with prognostic information, and would facilitate fair comparisons of surgical performance between transplant units. A systematic review of the literature was carried out to assess the quality of the studies that developed and validated prognostic models for mortality after liver transplantation and to validate existing models in a large data set of patients transplanted in the United Kingdom (UK) and Ireland between March 1994 and September 2003. Five prognostic model papers were identified. The quality of the development and validation of all prognostic models was suboptimal according to an explicit assessment tool of the internal, external, and statistical validity, model evaluation, and practicality. The discriminatory ability of the identified models in the UK and Ireland data set was poor (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve always smaller than 0.7 for adult populations). Due to the poor quality of the reporting, the methodology used for the development of the model could not always be determined. In conclusion, these findings demonstrate that currently available prognostic models of mortality after liver transplantation can have only a limited role in clinical practice, audit, and research. (Liver Transpl 2005;11:814–825.)
Does Money Buy Congressional Love? Individual Donors and Legislative Voting

Abstract Despite the popular belief that campaign contributions affect policymaking, study after study has suggested that legislative voting is unaffected. We reexamine this question by focusing on the increased dominance of individual contributors. Using data on roll calls associated with the Congressional Cooperative Election Study, we test for senators’ responsiveness to their parties’ national donor class. Several findings emerge. First, responsiveness to national donor opinion is significant, even controlling for the effects of in-state constituents, affluent citizens, activists, senator ideology, and a senator’s personal donors. Moreover, the results hold in specifications that account for the endogeneity of national donor opinion to legislative votes. Second, and consistent with scholarship that argues fundraising is increasingly important for party leadership positions, the relationship depends on the ideological favorability of a state to a senator’s reelection. Also consistent with this perspective, responsiveness to donors is unrelated to a senator’s wealth, time to reelection, or seniority.
One mutation, two distinct disease variants: unravelling the impact of transthyretin amyloid fibril composition

Although hereditary transthyretin (h‐ATTR) amyloidosis is a monogenetic disease, a large variation in its phenotype has been observed. The common hypothesis of amyloid fibril formation involves dissociation of the transthyretin (TTR) tetramer into monomers that after misfolding reassemble into amyloid fibrils. This notion is partly challenged by the finding of two distinct types of amyloid fibrils. One of these, type A, consists of C‐terminal ATTR fragments and full‐length TTR, whereas the other, type B, consists only of full‐length TTR. All organs of an individual patient contain ATTR deposits of either type A or type B fibrils, and the composition in each individual remains unchanged over time. The finding of two distinct types of ATTR fibrils suggests that there are at least two different pathways in operation for ATTR fibril formation. For the most common European mutation, TTR Val30Met, ATTR fibril composition is related to the outcome of liver transplantation, which is the first successful treatment for the disease, and the penetrance of the trait. In addition, the presence of C‐terminal ATTR fragments has an impact on the affinity for various tracers used for noninvasive imaging of amyloid depositions such as 99 m‐technetium‐diphosphono‐propanodicarboxylic acid scintigraphy and positron emission tomography utilizing Pittsburgh component B, and even for the gold standard diagnostic procedure, tissue biopsy stained by Congo red and examined under polarized light. The importance of amyloid fibril composition needs to be taken into consideration when designing clinical trials of treatment modalities, and also in the evaluation of diagnostic methods such as imaging techniques.
P2X purinoceptors mediate an endothelium‐dependent hyperpolarization in longitudinal smooth muscle of anterior mesenteric artery in young chickens

Background and purpose: The chicken anterior mesenteric artery contains an outer longitudinal smooth muscle layer, whose neural regulation remains to be elucidated. ATP evokes a depolarization in the smooth muscle through P2Y purinoceptors. However, there may be an additional inhibitory regulation because blockade of P2Y purinoceptors converts the depolarization to hyperpolarization. The objective of the present study was to examine the mechanism underlying this hyperpolarization.
Molluscicidal activity of Balanites aegyptiaca against Monacha cartusiana

Context: Balanites aegyptiaca (L.) Delile (Zygophyllaceae) is a tropical tree that has many folk uses in various countries. The bark extract is used for the control of the fresh water snails that act as intermediary host of Schistosoma. Objective: Study the molluscicidal activity and chemical constituents of seed oil and seed glycosides of B. aegyptiaca against Monacha cartusiana and determine the structure-activity relationship. Materials and methods: Two bioassay methods (residual film application and the leaf dipping technique) were used to evaluate the toxicity effect of the seed oil and glycosides, in concentrations of 1.000, 0.500, 0.250 and 0.125%. The seed oil was analysed by GC/MS. Acid hydrolysis and chromatographic separation were used to study the seed saponins. Results: The bioassay of B. aegyptiaca against the land snail, M. cartusiana, indicated the activity of the seed oil and the high activity of the seed saponins. The seed glycosides gave 30.0, 53.3, 73.0 and 73.3% mortality for concentrations of 0.125, 0.250, 0.500 and 1.00%, respectively. The LC50 values were 0.335 and 0.256%, respectively. The seed oil was analysed by GC/MS. Acid hydrolysis of the seed saponins gave a mixture of diosgenin, yamogenin and 3,5-spirostadiene. Discussion and conclusion: To study the structure-activity relationship, a triterpenoidal saponin and a triterpenoidal saponins rich extract (of Zygophyllum coccenum) were proven to be inactive. Thus, the activity is associated with the steroidal, not triterpenoidal saponins. Moreover, a spirostane aglycone without sugar moiety, was found to be inactive and attained the activity by glycosidation.
IQ and schizophrenia in a Swedish national sample: their causal relationship and the interaction of IQ with genetic risk.

OBJECTIVE The authors sought to clarify the relationship between IQ and subsequent risk for schizophrenia. METHOD IQ was assessed at ages 18-20 in 1,204,983 Swedish males born between 1951 and 1975. Schizophrenia was assessed by hospital diagnosis through 2010. Cox proportional hazards models were used to investigate future risk for schizophrenia in individuals as a function of their IQ score, and then stratified models using pairs of relatives were used to adjust for familial cluster. Finally, regression models were used to examine the interaction between IQ and genetic liability on risk for schizophrenia. RESULTS IQ had a monotonic relationship with schizophrenia risk across the IQ range, with a mean increase in risk of 3.8% per 1-point decrease in IQ; this association was stronger in the lower than the higher IQ range. Co-relative control analyses showed a similar association between IQ and schizophrenia in the general population and in cousin, half-sibling, and full-sibling pairs. A robust interaction was seen between genetic liability to schizophrenia and IQ in predicting schizophrenia risk. Genetic susceptibility for schizophrenia had a much stronger impact on risk of illness for those with low than high intelligence. The IQ-genetic liability interaction arose largely from IQ differences between close relatives. CONCLUSIONS IQ assessed in late adolescence is a robust risk factor for subsequent onset of schizophrenia. This association is not the result of a declining IQ associated with insidious onset. In this large, representative sample, we found no evidence for a link between genius and schizophrenia. Co-relative control analyses showed that the association between lower IQ and schizophrenia is not the result of shared familial risk factors and may be causal. The strongest effect was seen with IQ differences within families. High intelligence substantially attenuates the impact of genetic liability on the risk for schizophrenia.
Effects of ractopamine supplementation and postmortem aging on longissimus muscle palatability of beef steers differing in biological type.

Effects of ractopamine hydrochloride (RAC) supplementation and postmortem aging on palatability of beef from steers differing in biological type were evaluated using LM samples from British, Continental crossbred, and Brahman crossbred calf-fed steers (n = 98/type). Equal numbers of steers within each type were assigned to treatments of 0 or 200 mg.steer(-1). d(-1) of RAC fed during the final 28 d of the finishing period. Warner-Bratzler shear force (WBSF) was measured at 3, 7, 14, and 21 d postmortem, and trained sensory panel (TP) evaluation was conducted using LM samples aged for 14 d postmortem. A RAC x type interaction (P = 0.006) was detected for WBSF. Within each type, steers fed RAC produced steaks with greater (P < 0.05) WBSF values than steaks from control steers; however, the magnitude of the effect of RAC on WBSF was more pronounced among Brahman cross-breds (5.53 vs. 4.96 +/- 0.10 kg) than among Continental crossbred (4.16 vs. 3.96 +/- 0.10 kg) and British steers (4.10 vs. 3.75 +/- 0.10 kg). The effect of RAC on WBSF, though diminished slightly by aging (mean WBSF difference: 3 d = 0.49 kg; 21 d = 0.24 kg), was not completely mitigated by 21 d of postmortem storage (P(RAC x AGE) = 0.16). Steers fed RAC produced steaks that received lower (P < 0.05) TP ratings for tenderness (8.09 vs. 8.95 +/- 0.18) and juiciness (7.41 vs. 8.07 +/- 0.16 kg), along with slightly lower (P = 0.06) ratings for beef flavor (6.67 vs. 6.93 +/- 0.10 kg), compared with steaks from unsupplemented steers, regardless of biological type. Among the 3 biological types, Brahman crossbred cattle produced steaks with the greatest (P < 0.05) WBSF values at each aging period; WBSF values for steaks from British and Continental type steers did not differ (P > 0.05) at any aging time. Sensory panel ratings of tenderness, juiciness, and beef flavor were greatest (P < 0.05) for steaks from British steers, and least (P < 0.05) for steaks produced by Brahman-type steers. Results from this study suggest that RAC supplementation slightly decreases LM tenderness (WBSF and TP) of British, Continental crossbred, and Brahman cross-bred steers, and that the effect of RAC on WBSF may be more pronounced in steaks from Brahman crossbred cattle than among stenks from Continental type or British steers.
The Civil War in France

Written by Karl Marx as an address to the General Council of the International, with the aim of distributing to workers of all countries a clear understanding of the character and worldwide significance of the heroic struggle of the Communards and their historical experience to learn from. The book was widely circulated by 1872 it was translated into several languages and published throughout Europe and the United States.