Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Financial Structure and Monetary Transmission in Europe: A Cross-Country Study

Financial structure - theories and stylized facts for six EU countries credit and asymmetric effects of monetary policy in six EU countries - an overview off-balance-sheet activities in Europe - evidence from bank-level panel data banks and monetary transmission in Europe - empirical evidence credit channels in Europe - a cross-country investigation consumption and external finance premium in Europe - an empirical analysis summary and conclusion.
Substance Abuse and Dependency Risk: The Role of Peer Perceptions, Marijuana Involvement, and Attitudes toward Substance Use among College Students

Many college students are using substances at levels consistent with Substance Abuse or Dependence, yet little explanation for this phenomenon exits. The aim of this study was to explore a risk factor profile that best separates those with low and high potential for having a Substance Use Disorder (SUD). A discriminant function analysis revealed that participants with a high probability of having a SUD misperceive others' alcohol and marijuana use to a greater extent than those with a low probability of having a SUD. Implications for educators and counselors on college campuses are discussed.
Neonatal Calf Diarrhea. Electron Microscopy of Intestines Infected with a Reovirus-Like Agent

Neonatal calf diarrhea induced by a reovirus-like agent was studied by electron microscopy. Gnotobiotie calves were inoculated with virulent and cell-cultureadapted isolates of viruses, and similar results were obtained with both isolates. The virus infected mature villous epithelial cells of the small intestine and replicated predominantly within cisternac of the endoplasmic reticulum. Macrophages within small intestinal villi also contained viral particles. Shedding of virus into the feces apparently resulted from desquamation of infected epithelial cells. Replacement epithelium did not contain the rcovirus-like agent, was of cuboidal or squamous type, and ultrastructurally resembled immature epithelium normally found in the crypts. Escherichia coli was nonpathogenic when inoculated alone and did not adhere to the epithelium when inoculated with the virus. The reovirus-like agent was a primary pathogen since it caused diarrhea and lesions when inoculated alone or with E. coli.
Long Term Tolerability and Safety of Enfuvirtide for Human Immunodeficiency Virus 1-Infected Children

Background: Enfuvirtide, a peptide inhibitor of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-1-host cell membrane fusion, is the first of a new class of antiretroviral agents, the entry inhibitors. The safety and antiretroviral activity of enfuvirtide treatment of 24 weeks in HIV-1-infected children has been previously documented. Here we present the long term tolerability and safety of enfuvirtide. Methods: Fourteen children, 4 to 12 years of age, with incompletely suppressed HIV-1 infection were evaluated. Enfuvirtide was administered twice daily by subcutaneous injection. After the first 24 weeks of enfuvirtide dosing, subjects were evaluated every 8 weeks up to 96 weeks of therapy. At each visit, each subject had a physical examination and an assessment for adverse events with particular attention to evaluation of injection site reactions. Laboratory studies obtained at each visit included hematology and blood chemistry values, plasma HIV-1 RNA concentrations and CD4+ T cell counts. Results: Of 14 subjects, 6 completed at least 96 weeks of treatment. One child discontinued enfuvirtide after 22 days of treatment because of an aversion to injections, and 1 child electively discontinued after week 24 because of surgical complications unrelated to study drug. Four subjects discontinued study because of virologic failure, defined as an increase or persistence of plasma HIV-1 RNA 1.0 copies/mL above baseline, which occurred between ≥log10 weeks 40 and 63. Two children experienced grade 3 adverse events resulting in discontinuation of the study drug; 1 subject developed grade 3 thrombocytopenia and 1 developed grade 3 edema at weeks 65 and 77, respectively. Eleven of 14 children had local injection site reactions during the first 24 weeks of treatment, 4 of the 12 subjects who continued treatment beyond week 24 reported local reactions. Generally, these local reactions were 1- to 3-cm tender nodules that developed after the injections and lasted for 1–2 days. Twelve children developed new diagnoses during treatment with enfuvirtide. None was judged to be definitively related to the study drug. Thirty-six percent of children starting enfuvirtide had HIV-1 RNA levels > 1 log10 copies/mL below baseline levels at week 96. Children remaining on enfuvirtide for the entire 96 weeks had a median of 65 cells/mm3 and 9% increase in CD4+ T cells. Conclusions: Enfuvirtide was generally safe and, except for a high rate of injection site reactions, well-tolerated in HIV-1-infected children for as long as 96 weeks.
Genome-Wide RNAi Screen Identifies Genes Involved in Intestinal Pathogenic Bacterial Infection

Innate Immunity in the Fly Gut Drosophila melanogaster is an important model system to study innate immunity, being both easy to manipulate and lacking an adaptive immune system. In order to identify genes that regulate innate immunity, Cronin et al. (p. 340; published online 11 June) performed an RNA interference screen on flies infected with the oral bacterial pathogen, Serratia marcescens. Genes involved in intestinal immunity and regulation of hemocytes, macrophage-like cells critical for phagocytosis and killing of the bacteria, were identified. Several hundred genes conferred either enhanced susceptibility or resistance to bacterial infection. Furthermore, the JAK/STAT signaling pathway was activated in intestinal stem cells after bacterial infection, resulting in enhanced susceptibility to infection, most likely through regulation of intestinal stem cell homeostasis. In vivo RNA interference screen reveals regulators of innate immunity in Drosophila. Innate immunity represents the first line of defense in animals. We report a genome-wide in vivo Drosophila RNA interference screen to uncover genes involved in susceptibility or resistance to intestinal infection with the bacterium Serratia marcescens. We first employed whole-organism gene suppression, followed by tissue-specific silencing in gut epithelium or hemocytes to identify several hundred genes involved in intestinal antibacterial immunity. Among the pathways identified, we showed that the JAK-STAT signaling pathway controls host defense in the gut by regulating stem cell proliferation and thus epithelial cell homeostasis. Therefore, we revealed multiple genes involved in antibacterial defense and the regulation of innate immunity.
Evolution of Men Who Have Sex With Men Community and Experienced Stigma Among Men Who Have Sex With Men in Chengdu, China

Objectives:To understand the stigma and discrimination experienced by men who have sex with men (MSM) in Chengdu, and to evaluate their impact on effective HIV prevention. Methods:Focus group discussions and individual in-depth interviews were conducted from June to September 2006. Results:Stigma and social pressure for MSM were reported to mainly arise from their families to get married and have children to protect family reputation and lineage. Few participants reported experiencing stigma and discrimination from friends, colleagues, or general society. Nevertheless, fear of being ostracized because of their sexual orientation was frequently expressed, and was a major barrier for participating in HIV/AIDS prevention programs. Fear of stigma and discrimination related to HIV infection from inside the MSM community was also identified as a major reason for MSM reluctance to seek HIV testing and treatment. Conclusions:Stigma and discrimination related to homosexual activities and HIV/sexually transmitted disease infection have been major barriers for MSM seeking health services. HIV/AIDS programs must be sensitive to issues of stigma both from outside and inside the MSM community.
The cellular immune response to primary sarcomata in rats II. Abnormal responses of nodes draining the tumour

Specific pathogen free rats bearing primary sarcomata induced by subcutaneous implantation of a pellet of 3,4-benzpyrene were studied. No evidence could be found that the pellet of 3,4-benzpyrene exerted any immunosuppressive action even with weak antigens. Yet there appeared to be a nimmunological defect in these animals since the number of immunoblasts (i.e. large basophilic lymphocytes) in the thoracic duct lymph was not raised above the normal in spite of the fact that these tumours contained specific antigens which on trans plantation evoke a typical immunoblast response in syngeneic animals. With in 24 h of surgical excision of these primary tumours, the number of the immunoblasts in the lymph increases sharply. The histological appearance of the nodes draining such tumours was consistent with a vigorous immunological reaction. Characteristically, such nodes contained many plasma cells, which disappeared very quickly after surgical removal of the tumour. The tumour-draining nodes respond extremely well in terms of release of immunoblasts, antibody formation and graft rejection to antigens other than those present in the tumour. The immunological abnormality in these nodes would appear to be specific for the antigen coming from the tumour and it is suggested that continual bombardment of a node by antigen interferes with the normal release of immunoblasts into the efferent lymph and thus prevents their appearance in the thoracicduct lymph. This must affect seriously the reaction of the host against the tumour since this reaction is probably mediated by the immunoblasts. These observations may explain why an auto graft from the primary tumour is not rejected so long as part of the tumour remains in situ but fails to grow once the primary tumour has been to tally excised. The failure of nodes to release immunoblasts in response to the tumour antigen is limited to the node draining the tumour, since implantation of an auto graft to adistant site causes the appearance of immunoblasts in the lymph. These observations may explain why immunization with irradiated tumour auto graft sometimes exerts a growth inhibitory effect on a primary tumour.
Real-time data dissemination for slowly-varying mobile sinks in wireless sensor networks

In wireless sensor networks, the existing real-time routing protocols for stationary sinks exploit a spatiotemporal approach, utilizing the delivery speed based on the end-to-end distance to fulfill the desired time deadline. This approach cannot be directly applied to a mobile sink since the distance can be varied depending on its movement. That is, the delivery speed cannot be determined without knowing the intermediate sensors to know the current location update of the mobile sink and control their transmission speeds. We focus on the real-time protocol for slowly varying mobile sink compared to transmission speed, which may be the most common case. By the slowly varying constraint, the movable area of a sink can be determined by the two factors: its moving distance and initial location. The movable area could provide the maximum transmission distance between a source and a mobile sink. This letter proposes a real-time data dissemination protocol for mobile sinks utilizing the movable area concept. Simulation results show the proposed protocol provides high success ratio of real-time requirement.
What Happens to Happiness When People Get Older? Socio-Economic Determinants of Life Satisfaction in Later Life

The world population is ageing and this demographic trend has become the subject of numerous research projects and discussions. In Russia, this process has also become a topic for many studies examining socio-economic characteristics and health status of elderly, their retirement behaviours. That said, research on the life satisfaction of Russian seniors and its determinants is still rather scarce. At the same time, revealing the factors of life satisfaction in old age could help develop a sound state policy towards the elderly thus enhancing the well-being of society as a whole. This paper explores the determinants of elderly life satisfaction using micro-data from the Russian Longitudinal Monitoring Survey. Our research show that for all Russian seniors aged 55+ the strongest and most common predictors of life satisfaction are: health status, personal income, type of settlement, and social status. We found significant gender differences in factors of life satisfaction: an inverse U-relation of age and happiness is characteristic for the oldest old females only; holding a job enhances life satisfaction for women but not for men; and the education level of seniors has almost no correlation with life satisfaction, while having children decreases an individual’s happiness.
JAC, a direct target of oncogenic transcription factor Jun, is involved in cell transformation and tumorigenesis

Using subtractive hybridization techniques, we have isolated a gene termed JAC that is strongly and specifically activated in avian fibroblasts transformed by the v-jun oncogene of avian sarcoma virus 17 (ASV17), but not in cells transformed by other oncogenic agents. Furthermore, JAC is highly expressed in cell lines derived from jun-induced avian fibrosarcomas. Kinetic analysis using a doxycycline-controlled conditional cell transformation system showed that expression of the 0.8-kb JAC mRNA is induced rapidly upon activation of the oncogenic v-jun allele. Nucleotide sequence analysis and transcriptional mapping revealed that the JAC gene contains two exons, with the longest ORF confined to exon 2. The deduced 68-amino acid chicken JAC protein is rich in cysteine residues and displays 37% sequence identity to mammalian high-sulfur keratin-associated proteins. The promoter region of JAC contains a consensus (5′-TGACTCA-3′) and a nonconsensus (5′-TGAGTAA-3′) AP-1 binding site in tandem, which are both specifically bound by the Gag-Jun hybrid protein encoded by ASV17. Mutational analysis revealed that the two AP-1 sites confer strong transcriptional activation by Gag-Jun in a synergistic manner. Ectopic expression of JAC in avian fibroblasts leads to anchorage-independent growth, strongly suggesting that deregulation of JAC is an essential event in jun-induced cell transformation and tumorigenesis.
THE INFLUENCE OF MARKETING COMMUNICATION ON SALES IMPROVEMENT OF PT. GARUDA INDONESIA AIRWAYS

One of the faster changes that happen in Indonesia at last several years is the growth rate of airline industry. The role of Marketing Communications is important to improve and maintain the company's position in the market is reflected in the company's market share. This research aims to understand and extend the knowledge about the impact of marketing communications on sales improvement of PT. Garuda Indonesia Airways. This research uses causal type of research where the research methods associative with regression analysis. The result shows that Sales Promotion, Advertising, and Personal Selling do not have significant influence, while Direct Marketing has significant influence on sales improvement of PT. Garuda Indonesia Airways. T he marketing divisions of PT. Garuda Indonesia Airways should be more focus on sales promotion, advertising and personal selling variables to get more intention of consumers. On the other hand, management of Garuda Indonesia Airways also needs to evaluate their advertising strategies so it can increase tickets purchases by consumer. Keywords: sales, promotion, advertising, personal selling, direct marketing
Evolution and Learning in Neural Networks: Dynamic Correlation, Relearning and Thresholding

This contribution revisits an earlier discovered observation that the average performance of a pop ulation of neural networks that are evolved to solve one task is improved by lifetime learning on a different task. Two extant, and very different, explanations of this phenomenon are examined- dynamic correlation, and relearning. Experimental results are presented which suggest that neither of these hypotheses can fully explain the phenomenon. A new explanation of the effect is proposed and empirically justified. This explanation is based on the fact that in these, and many other relat ed studies, real-valued neural network outputs are thresholded to provide discrete actions. The effect of such thresholding produces a particular type of fitness landscape in which lifetime learn ing can reduce the deleterious effects of mutation, and therefore increase mean population fitness.
The presence of clathrates in comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko

In situ coma measurements of 67P suggest that volatiles in the nucleus are stored as clathrates and pure condensates. Cometary nuclei are considered to most closely reflect the composition of the building blocks of our solar system. As such, comets carry important information about the prevalent conditions in the solar nebula before and after planet formation. Recent measurements of the time variation of major and minor volatile species in the coma of the Jupiter family comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (67P) by the ROSINA (Rosetta Orbiter Spectrometer for Ion and Neutral Analysis) instrument onboard Rosetta provide insight into the possible origin of this comet. The observed outgassing pattern indicates that the nucleus of 67P contains crystalline ice, clathrates, and other ices. The observed outgassing is not consistent with gas release from an amorphous ice phase with trapped volatile gases. If the building blocks of 67P were formed from crystalline ices and clathrates, then 67P would have agglomerated from ices that were condensed and altered in the protosolar nebula closer to the Sun instead of more pristine ices originating from the interstellar medium or the outskirts of the disc, where amorphous ice may dominate.
Determinants of subjective job insecurity in 5 European countries

The present study searches for subjective job insecurity predictors in five European Countries (Spain, Belgium, Finland, The Netherlands and Germany). The results find conclusions regarding demographic variables, such as age, gender, educational level; type of contract; family life variables, such as having an employed partner or children living at home; firm characteristics, such as its size or whether it is increasing or decreasing its labour force; and economic context such as living in a region characterized by favourable labour market conditions.
Banking efficiency, risk and stock performance in the European Union banking system : the effect of the world financial crisis

This thesis has three main objectives; first, it assesses and evaluates cost and profit efficiencies of the European Union banking system by employing the stochastic frontier analysis (SFA) over the period 2004-2010. It divides the EU region into four groups; the entire EU region, the old and the new EU countries as well as the GIIPS countries. Second, this study investigates the determinants of bank cost and profit inefficiencies with the focus mainly being on the role of banking risks and the world financial crisis (2007-2009) in affecting banking efficiency. Third, this thesis evaluates the impact of different variables on bank stock returns, with the emphasis on bank efficiency, risk and the world financial crisis, over the period 2004-2010. The empirical findings show that commercial banks in the EU improve their cost and profit efficiencies on average between 2004 and 2010. Also, banks in the old EU countries appear to be more cost efficient but less profit efficient compared to banks in the new EU countries. Interestingly, the empirical analysis concludes that overall insolvency, credit and liquidity risks have significant and positive effects on bank cost and profit inefficiencies during the world financial crisis, suggesting that banks that maintain less risk outperform their counterparts during crisis time. The world financial crisis appears to affect negatively both cost and profit efficiencies of EU banks; however, it has stronger negative effect on banks in the old EU member states than in the new EU countries. Finally, the results show that changes in cost and profit efficiencies along with capital and size variables appear to have a positive and significant influence on bank stock performance in the EU and that bank stock returns are significantly sensitive to market and interest rate risks.
Converging Divergences: Worldwide Changes in Employment Systems

Exploring recent changes in employment practices in seven industrialized countries (Australia, Britain, Germany, Italy, Japan, Sweden, and the United States) and in two essential industries (automobile and telecommunications), Harry C. Katz and Owen Darbishire find that traditional national systems of employment are being challenged by four cross-national patterns. The patterns, which are becoming ever more prevalent, can be categorized as low-wage, human resource management, Japanese-oriented, and joint team-based strategies. The authors go on to show that these changing employment patterns are closely related to the decline of unions and growing income inequality. Drawing upon plant-level evidence on emerging employment practices, they provide a comprehensive analysis of changes in employment systems and labor-management relations. They conclude that while the variation in employment patterns is increasing within countries, evidence suggests that there is much commonality across countries in the nature of that variation and also similarity in the processes through which variation is appearing. Hence the term "converging divergences. "
Riding motorcycles: is it a lower limb hazard?

UNLABELLED The morbidity and mortality among motorcyclists involved in road traffic accidents (RTA) in Singapore is high. Due to their relatively small size, they represent a vulnerable group of road-users. Many reports from studies performed overseas have shown that both lower limb and head injuries appear to be common among motorcyclists. OBJECTIVES To study the characteristics of lower limb injuries among motorcyclists involved in RTA, who present to the Department of Emergency Medicine of an urban, tertiary, teaching hospital for treatment. METHODS The study was conducted prospectively from 1 July 2000 to 30 June 2001. Demographic data was collected together with details of the type of injuries, mechanism involved, management and disposition. SPSS (Chicago, Inc.) was utilised for data management and statistical analysis. RESULTS Of the 1,809 motorcyclists studied, 1,056 (58.3%) sustained lower limb injuries, 328 (18.1%) had head injuries and 256 (14.2%), sustained facial injuries. The mean age was 26.4 +/- 7.2 years and males made up the majority of the patients (1,733, 95.8%). Helmet usage was 100%. The commonest type of lower limb injury was fractures (531, 50.3%). The most common type of fracture was that of the shaft of the tibia and fibula (231, 43.5%), followed by fractures around the ankle (186, 35.0%). For those with more than one body region injured, head injury was noted to be not commonly associated with lower limb injuries. The commonest mechanism of injury was collision with another vehicle, while approaching a turn (769, 42.5%). There were 96 motorcyclists (5.3%) who had clinical evidence of alcohol consumption on their breath at presentation. There were 533 (29.5%) patients who were admitted for in-patient management and the mean duration of stay was 4.8 +/- 4.5 days. Amongst those with lower limb injuries, the admission rate was 30.5% (322 of 1,056) and the mean duration of hospitalisation was 5.3 +/- 3.9 days. CONCLUSION Lower limb injuries represent the commonest form of injury among motorcyclists involved in RTA. Improved training via motorcycle rider education, better design of future motorcycles and protective footwear may help to reduce this problem.