Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
VH Gene Analysis of Primary Cutaneous B-Cell Lymphomas : Evidence for Ongoing Somatic Hypermutation and Isotype Switching

Primary cutaneous B-cell lymphomas are B-cell non-Hodgkin’s lymphomas that arise in the skin. The major subtypes discerned are follicle center cell lymphomas, immunocytomas (marginal zone B-cell lymphomas), and large B-cell lymphomas of the leg. In this study, we analyzed the variable heavy chain (VH) genes of 7 of these lymphomas, ie, 4 follicle center cell lymphomas (diffuse large-cell lymphomas) and 3 immunocytomas. We show that all these lymphomas carry heavily mutated VH genes, with no obvious bias in VH gene usage. The low ratios of replacement versus silent mutations observed in the framework regions of 5 of the 7 lymphomas suggest that the structure of the B-cell antigen receptor was preserved, as in normal B cells that are selected for antibody expression. Moreover, evidence for ongoing mutation was obtained in 3 immunocytomas and in one lymphoma of large-cell type. In addition, in 1 immunocytoma, both IgGand IgA-expressing clones were found, indicative of isotype switching. Our data provide insight into the biology of primary cutaneous B-cell lymphomas and may be of significance for their classification. r 1998 by The American Society of Hematology.
Does the Religious Nature of Organizations Affect Performance Measurement? A Case of GCC Banks

Management accounting performance measurement (PM) practices in manufacturing industry are well reported, but little is known about PM practices in financial services industry (FSI) and almost nothing is reported regarding Islamic FSI. This research attempts to study the multdimensional PM practices in Islamic FSI. Several Islamic financial institutions have been studied in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries in order to explore the effect of the nature of organization in PM practices. Special emphasis is given on non-financial PM practices that conform the principles of Shariah in different type and size of Islamic FSI in different macroenvironment in GCC countries. As it is known that the objective of Islamic FSI is not only to maximize profit, but also to improve the socio economic condition of the community in order to conform the principles of Shariah, which actively advocates non-profit activites thay make a positive contribution toward the needy and poor, and promote welfare programs thay may or may not be financially viable. This study reveals that management accounting plays a moderate role in measuring both financial and non-financial performances in the Islamic FSI in GCC countries. However, research results indicate that the nature and characteristics of organization (Islamic FSI) do not have great impact on PM practices though it is generally held belief that Islamic FSI should conform the principles of Shariah. According to research findings, some research directions are given at the end of this chapter.
Team Resilience: Scale Development and Validation

Resilience is of great importance for teams working in complex and unstable environments. Team resilience is the ability of the teams/groups to bounce back and sustain in the facade of adverse conditions. Research reveals that resilient teams are more likely to be productive, agile and innovative during the turbulent times. However, despite the growing importance of the concept, there is lack of reliable and valid scale to measure team resilience in the literature. Keeping this gap in mind the study aims to design and develop a reliable and valid measure to assess the resilience capacity of the teams. Findings of the study reveal that team resilience is a hierarchical and multidimensional scale comprising of four primary dimensions along with 10 sub-dimensions. Psychometric evaluation and validation has been done using 160 responses from 12 IT companies located in India. The instrument may be used as a diagnostic tool for identifying team resilience capacity and thereby acts as a starting point for increasing team resilience. Moreover, identifying teams with lower resilience scores may assist organizations in tailoring strategies that might improve the teams’ effectiveness.
The relationships among perceived quality, perceived risk and perceived product value

Perceived value is an extremely important concept in marketing and many authors have dealt with it in recent years. In Slovenia perceived value of product is a rather neglected aspect of the research. Moreover, nobody has empirically researched the impact of individual factors on perceived value of a product. The researched target group was students – the fastest growing segment among the users of mobile phones in Slovenia. In their research the authors focused on two of the perceived value impact factors: perceived product quality and perceived risk. Based on literature and our own findings, their main researched objective was to design the model of relationships among perceived value, perceived quality and perceived risk. After the model had been tested with the method of structural equation modeling (LISREL 8.0), the authors found that statistically significant relationships (positive and negative, direct and indirect) among the concepts researched exist.
Effects of Etravirine Alone and with Ritonavir-Boosted Protease Inhibitors on the Pharmacokinetics of Dolutegravir

ABSTRACT Dolutegravir (DTG) is an unboosted, once-daily integrase inhibitor currently in phase 3 trials. Two studies evaluated the effects of etravirine (ETR) alone and in combination with ritonavir (RTV)-boosted protease inhibitors (PIs) on DTG pharmacokinetics (PK) in healthy subjects. DTG 50 mg every 24 h (q24h) was administered alone for 5 days in period 1, followed by combination with ETR at 200 mg q12h for 14 days in period 2 (study 1) or with ETR/lopinavir (LPV)/RTV at 200/400/100 mg q12h or ETR/darunavir (DRV)/RTV at 200/600/100 mg q12h for 14 days in period 2 (study 2). PK samples were collected on day 5 in period 1 and day 14 in period 2. All of the treatments were well tolerated. ETR significantly decreased exposures of DTG, with geometric mean ratios of 0.294 (90% confidence intervals, 0.257 to 0.337) for the area under the curve from time zero until the end of the dosage interval (AUC0-τ), 0.484 (0.433 to 0.542) for the observed maximum plasma concentration (Cmax), and 0.121 (0.093 to 0.157) for the plasma concentration at the end of the dosage interval (Cτ). ETR combined with an RTV-boosted PI affected the exposure of DTG to a lesser degree: ETR/LPV/RTV treatment had no effect on the DTG plasma AUC0-τ and Cmax, whereas the Cτ increased by 28%. ETR/DRV/RTV modestly decreased the plasma DTG AUC0-τ, Cmax, and Cτ by 25, 12, and 37%, respectively. Such effects of ETR/LPV/RTV and ETR/DRV/RTV are not considered clinically relevant. The combination of DTG and ETR alone should be avoided; however, DTG may be coadministered with ETR without a dosage adjustment if LPV/RTV or DRV/RTV is concurrently administered.
TITLE Improved Survival after Unrelated Donor Bone Marrow Transplant in Children with Primary Immunodeficiency using a Reduced Intensity Conditioning Regimen

The optimal approach to stem cell transplantation in children with immunodeficiency who lack a matched family donor is controversial. Unrelated donor stem cell transplant gives equivalent outcome to mismatched family donor stem cell transplant in Severe combined immunodeficiency whereas unrelated donors may be preferable in nonSevere combined immunodeficiency children. However, unrelated donor stem cell transplant with conventional conditioning regimens has been associated with significant treatment related toxicity, particularly in non-severe combined immunodeficiency patients with pre-existing organ dysfunction. We report the outcome of a series of 33 consecutive unrelated donor transplants performed at our centre in children with primary immunodeficiency using a reduced intensity conditioning regimen between 1998 and 2001. We have compared these outcomes with a retrospective control cohort of 19 patients transplanted with myeloablative conditioning between 1994 and 1998. All children in both groups had primary engraftment. There was no statistical difference in the speed of immune reconstitution or incidence of graft versus host disease between the 2 groups. Overall survival was significantly better in the reduced intensity conditioning group-31/33 (94%) compared with 10/19 (53%) in the myeloablative conditioning group (p = 0.014). We conclude that the reduced intensity conditioning regimen results in improved survival and reduced transplant related mortality compared to myeloablative conditioning in high risk patients undergoing unrelated donor transplant. For personal use only. on August 30, 2017. by guest www.bloodjournal. org From
MarkeTrak VII: Customer satisfaction with hearing instruments in the digital age

INTRODUCTION Digital hearing instruments as a percent of fittings have grown from 5% in 1998 to nearly 90% in 2005.1 In terms of active hearing instruments in consumers’ ears over the last 5 years, nearly half of consumers (48%) are using hearing instruments with digital signal processing (DSP). A study of customer satisfaction with hearing instruments is especially relevant at this time when there are nearly 5 million digital hearing instrument fittings in the marketplace. With a binaural rate of 74%, this equates to 2.9 million users of DSP instruments. It is generally agreed that digital hearing instruments offer significant advantages to the hearing-impaired that 10 years ago were not available with analog hearing instruments:2-7 These include: v Superior signal processing (DSP) capabilities, increasing the chances that noise sources will be removed and that the instrument will capture and understand more of the speech signal, or that some sounds will be enhanced to aid speech intelligibility. v Active noise reduction and cancellation and therefore greater user comfort in noisy situations. vGreater flexibility in fitting the instrument to the unique hearing loss characteristics of the consumer. v Better ability to reduce internal noise in the hearing instrument through suppression of acoustic and mechanical feedback. v Superior optimization of microphones in directional hearing instruments. v Better overall shaping of the frequency response. vThe ability, through datalogging, to use DSP to better monitor hearing instrument use, which will aid the fine-tuning process for some consumers. vOverall cleaner sound delivered to the consumer’s ears. In a survey of hearing instrument specialists and audiologists, most reported greater patient satisfaction with digital hearing instruments.8 Dispensers reported that their patients were either “somewhat” or “much more satisfied” with DSP in comparison with older technology as follows: overall satisfaction (78% believe DSP is better for their patients), sound quality (89%), listening comfort (82%), understanding speech in noise (77%), understanding speech in quiet (62%), feedback suppression (70%). In a double-blinded comparison of three levels of hearing instrument technology, 74% of consumers preferred the second-generation digital over a single-channel analog programmable and a first-generation, two-channel DSP.9 The advanced digital was rated significantly higher on word recognition, need fulfillment as measured by the Client Oriented Scale of Improvement (COSI), numerous listening situations, situational preference (i.e., speech in noise), and overall preference. This article is the second installment of a series of publications that will cover significant issues and trends in the hearing instrument market. Its purpose is to explore in detail the customer satisfaction ratings of hearing instruments, with an emphasis on fittings over the past 5 years.
A study on pre-processing methods for copy-move forgery detection based on SIFT

Copy-move forgery detection is one of the most popular type of forgery in multimedia forensics. The attacks copy and paste desired area in the same images. In this paper, we aim to reduce the false matches of detected area of forgery by using the pre-processing methods, such as histogram equalization, smoothing filter with median and Gaussian filter and sharpening filter, combined with the SIFT algorithm. We presented the results of each of the pre-processing methods for total SIFT keypoints detected, total number of matches and total number of false matches. From 30 tampered images that fell into 3 groups, the SIFT method could be combined with pre-processing methods to reduce false matches and the best pre-processing method that gave the lowest false matches results was dependable on the types of images in the database.
Innovation in Dynamic Service Industries

Innovation is at the heart of economic growth and development. It is through innovation that new products are brought to market, new production processes developed and organizational change realized. Given existing cross-industry variations in structure, competitiveness and maturity, it is reasonable to expect that firms in different industries will innovate for different reasons, in different ways and with different results. This report focuses on how the innovation activities of firms in three dynamic service industries are conditioned by their different environments. Through an understanding of what competitive pressures come into play and how these pressures affect the type of innovation that is performed, Innovation in dynamic service industries goes some way in illustrating how innovation regimes differ substantially, and quite logically, from one industry to another. This is the fifth in the series of publications on innovation and technological change in Canada. One of the earlier studies investigated the type of innovation taking place in the manufacturing sector (Baldwin and Da Pont, Innovation in Canadian manufacturing enterprises , Catalogue No. 88-513-XPB). Two others focused on advanced manufacturing technologies. The first (Baldwin and Sabourin, Technology adoption in Canadian manufacturing , Catalogue No. 88-512-XPB) outlined the intensity of use of these technologies. The second (Baldwin, Sabourin, and Rafiquzzaman, Benefits and problems associated with technology adoption , Catalogue No. 88-514-XPE) investigated the determinants of adoption. Another study (Baldwin, Innovation and intellectual property , Catalogue No. 88-515-XPE) examined how innovative firms protect their intellectual property after they have innovated.
Personal selling and sales management: A relationship marketing perspective

The authors examine how the practice of personal selling and sales management is changing as a result of the increased attention on long-term, buyer-seller relationships and identify some implications of these changes. Changes in the traditional personal selling and sales management activities are needed to support the emergence of the part-nering role for salespeople. For salespeople in the part-nering role, the personal selling shifts from a focus on influencing buyer behavior to managing the conflict inherent in buyer-seller relationships. The emphasis on building relationships rather than making short-term sales and the use of sales teams dictates changes in the way firms select, train, evaluate, and compensate salespeople and members of sales teams. In this article, the authors have suggested some issues concerning the emerging partnering role for salespeople that deserve the attention of scholars interested in personal selling and sales management research.
Overview on Supply Chain Resilience

In the last few years, supply chains are integrating a more and more tightly connected global economy where traditional management practices are challenged by external disturbances and turbulent changes. Indeed, along any supply chain, a multitude of more or less critical incidents may prevent a company from obtaining the expected level of logistical performance. According to Supply Chain Risk Management specialists, one way to deal with supply chain risk is to confer to the supply chain the ability to be resilient.
A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF CONSUMERS' INTENTION TO USE MOBILE INTERNET IN USA, RUSSIA AND CHINA

As the mobile Internet has been used explosively worldwide, the effects of cultural factors on mobile Internet usage have been an interesting issue. Cross-cultural studies on the mobile phone internet may improve our understanding of individuals' attitude toward mobile phone internet in different countries and provide advantages for marketing of mobile internet services in different cultural contexts. This paper uses an extension model of Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) to provide the theoretical foundation for this study. The data was collected through a survey study of over 3000 consumer in 3 countries of USA, Russia and China. The findings present several insights into the position of mobile phone internet usage in the different market. Such insights allow mobile service providers and mobile markers to create more customized strategies to launch new internet based services or mobile marketing campaigns. This paper ends with both theoretical and practical implications and limitations of the study results.
Determinants of the Dividend Policy in Emerging Stock Exchanges: The Case of GCC Countries

This paper investigates the determinants of dividend policies for firms listed on Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) country stock exchanges . This is a case study of emerging stock exchanges, where the determinants of dividend policy have received little attention. This study used a panel dataset of non-financial firms listed on the GCC country stock exchanges between the years of 1999 and 2003. Seven hypotheses pertaining to agency cost theory were investigated using a series of random effect Tobit models. The models considered the impact of government ownership, free cash flow, firm size, growth rate, growth opportunity, business risk, and firm profitability on dividend payout ratios. The results suggest that the main characteristics of firm dividend payout policy were that dividend payments related strongly and directly to government ownership, firm size and firm profitability, but negatively to the leverage ratio. These results, taken as a whole, indicate that firms pay dividends with the intention of reducing the agency problem and maintaining firm reputation, since the legal protection for outside shareholders was limited. In addition, and as a result of the significant agency conflicts interacting with the need to built firm reputation, a firm’s dividend policy was found to depend heavily on firm profitability. This may indicate that listed firms in GCC countries alter their dividend policy frequently and do not adopt a long-run target dividend policy.
Evaluation of SMOS L4 Sea Surface Salinity Product in the Western Iberian Coast

Salinity is one of the oldest parameters being measured in oceanography and one of the most important to study in the context of climate change. However, its quantification by satellite remote sensing has been a relatively recent achievement. Currently, after over ten years of data gathering, there are still many challenges in quantifying salinity from space, especially when it is intended for coastal environments study. That is mainly due to the spatial resolution of the available products. Recently, a new higher resolution (5 km) L4 SMOS sea surface salinity (SSS) product was developed by the Barcelona Expert Center (BEC). In this study, the quality of this product was tested along the Western Iberian Coast through its comparison with in situ observations and modelled salinity estimates (CMEMS IBI Ocean Reanalysis system). Moreover, several parameters such as the temperature and depth of in situ measurements were tested to identify the variables or processes that induced higher errors in the product or influenced its performance. Lastly, a seasonal and interannual analysis was conducted considering data between 2011 to 2019 to test the product as a potential tool for long-term studies. The results obtained in the present analysis showed a high potential of using the L4 BEC SSS SMOS product in extended temporal and spatial analyses along the Portuguese coast. A good correlation between the satellite and the in situ datasets was observed, and the satellite dataset showed lower errors in retrieving coastal salinities than the oceanic model. Overall, the distance to the coast and the closest rivers were the factors that most influenced the quality of the product. The present analysis showed that great progress has been made in deriving coastal salinity over the years and that the SMOS SSS product is a valuable contribution to worldwide climatological studies. In addition, these results reinforce the need to continue developing satellite remote sensing products as a global and cost-effective methodology for long-term studies.
[Effectiveness of prayer in reducing anxiety in cancer patients].

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the effect of prayer on anxiety in cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy. METHOD Quasi-experimental study, with pre and post-intervention. Twenty patients admitted to treatment of continuous intravenous chemotherapy were recruited. The volunteers were evaluated through interviews using a questionnaire of sociodemographic, clinical and spiritual characteristics, the Index of Religiosity Duke University and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory. Vital signs were measured and collected salivary cortisol. The intervention was applied prayer and data collection occurred in three phases: first collection (baseline), pre and post-intervention. RESULTS The data found between the pre and post-intervention samples showed different statistically significant for state anxiety (p= <0.00), blood pressure (systolic, p=0.00, diastolic, p=<0.00) and respiratory rate (p=0.04). CONCLUSION Prayer, therefore, proved to be an effective strategy in reducing the anxiety of the patient undergoing chemotherapy.
Developing a new understanding of markets: reinterpreting the 4Ps

Purpose – Arising from systematic empirical observations' aims to fulfil the need to review and refine existing market models and tools.Design/methodology/approach – The article includes a critical analysis of existing marketing models, which mainly originate from the marketing mix (the 4Ps) model, which in turn has a clear micro economic “allocation of resources” background. Today, it is argued there are important changes in how markets work and what kind of marketing problems companies meet. Marketing is much more about dealing with dynamic issues where interaction is a key mechanism and where the value of resources are not given but can be developed. The basic marketing problem in many situations is consequently more about the development of resources than the allocation of them.Findings – The 4Ps can still be a useful starting‐point in many analyses but then the model has to be reframed including how the 4Ps are conceptualized. In a first reinterpretation attempt, promotion (in terms of interaction) a.