Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Patho-morphological effects in broiler birds induced with sub-acute chlorpyrifos toxicity and its amelioration with vitamin E and selenium

Day old broiler chicks (60) procured from a commercial hatchery were divided in to 3 equal groups consisting of 20 each (T1, T2 and C) for the present study. About 1/10 of acute LD50 i.e., 2 mg/ kg body weight of chlorpyrifos was dissolved in 0.2 ml of coconut oil and fed orally with the help of a specially prepared syringe to each birds of treatment groups (T1 &T2) daily starting from day-old to 6 weeks or until death. Birds of T2 group were also provided with selenium and vitamin E (E-care Se) @ 5gm/50broiler birds though drinking water from day-old to 6 weeks or until death. Twenty birds of other group (C) received only the standard feed and plane water, serving as control. Birds of all the groups were sacrificed by cervical dislocation at the end of 6 weeks and gross pathological lesions were recorded immediately after slaughter. Tissue pieces of liver, kidney, lungs, spleen, intestine and bursa of Fabricious were preserved in 10% formalin solution immediately after necropsy and processed for paraffin sectioning (3-5 μ thick). Sections were stained with Mayer’s haematoxylin and eosin for histopathological examinations. Sub acute chlorpyrifos toxicity was observed to induce hyperemia and haemorrhages in most of the organs. Cytopathologically, there were toxic hepatitis and nephrosis, tubular nephritis, necrotic enteritis, myocarditis, pneumonic conditions and lymphocytolysis in spleen and bursa of Fabricious of chlorpyrifos induced birds (T1). Lymphocytolysis in the lymphoid organs clearly indicated that chlorpyrifos had cytotoxic effect leading to immunosuppression. The intensity of cytotoxic changes in the parenchymatous organs of chlorpyrifos + selenium and vitamin E treated birds (T2) were mild in nature indicating partial protective effect of selenium and vitamin E in chlorpyrifos intoxication.
The Relationships Between Short-Term Memory, Word Decoding Skills and Language Competencies in Norwegian Fourth-Graders

84 Norwegian 9-10 year old children were tested in word decoding skills, short-term memory and language competence (semantics and grammar). Previous studies show mostly strong relationships between each of the skills, and among the language competencies. The aim was to discover if this also could be found in Norwegian children. The results indicated that language competence is related to word decoding skills and short-term memory, in support of previous studies. However, only a weak relation was found between word decoding skills and short-term memory, in spite of previous research findings of an association between short-term memory and reading skills. This suggests that short-term memory is less important for decoding skills than for other aspects of reading. In addition, morphological awareness showed weak connections to discourse oriented syntactic skills and to word decoding skills, but this may be due to the nature of the tasks.
Economic Consequences of Announcing Strategic Alternatives

This paper documents the consequences of publicly announcing “strategic alternatives,” whereby the company reveals its decision to explore a potential sale or merger. The inherent uncertainty in ex-post transactional outcomes (i.e., whether the firm is sold, liquidated, or remains independent) allows me to identify positive and negative consequences differentially accruing to these subsamples. The public announcement of strategic alternatives is associated with excess takeover-related gains for firms that are subsequently acquired but abnormally negative returns for firms that are not subsequently sold. Tests of potential mechanisms are consistent with the public announcement generating greater investor attention and leading to a more informed M&A sale process that maximizes value for successful targets’ shareholders, while also being a costly admission of business problems that alienates company stakeholders and wears on operations. These consequences that are ultimately related to firm value underscore the varied costs and benefits managers should weigh when making this disruptive disclosure decision.
Board of Directors Independence and Firm Value: Empirical Evidence Based on the Bucharest Stock Exchange Listed Companies

This paper examines the influence and causal relationship between board of directors independence, CEO duality, and firm value. By estimating multivariate regression models for panel data, unbalanced, for a sample of companies listed on the Bucharest Stock Exchange, there resulted a positive influence of the percentage of independent directors on firm value, but down to a threshold of their representation of 47.23 percent, whereupon their influence becomes negative. When we employed fixed-effects models, the relationship previously mentioned was not statistically validated. However, the results provide support for a lack of statistically significant relationship between the percentage of non-executive directors and firm value. Besides, by estimating fixed-effects models we found a positive influence of CEO duality on industry-adjusted Tobin’s Q ratio, but not statistically significant when estimating models without cross-sectional effects. The causal relationships between board independence and firm value identified based on Granger causality are not robust.
GVCs, Jobs And Routine Content Of Occupations

This work addresses the role of global value chains (GVCs), workforce skills, ICT, innovation and industry structure in explaining employment levels of routine and non-routine occupations. The analysis encompasses 28 OECD countries over the period 2000-2011. It relies on a new country-specific measure of routine intensity built using individual-level information from the OECD Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) survey, as well as on new industry-level Trade in Value Added (TiVA) indicators of offshoring and domestic outsourcing. The results suggest that employment in all types of occupations positively relate to innovation. With respect to offshoring patterns, a positive correlation is observed between the offshoring of inputs and domestic outsourcing with more routine-intensive jobs. Taken together, the results point to the existence of complex interactions between the routine content of occupations, skills, technology and trade, which do not allow for a neat identification of “winners” and “losers” in a GVC context.
Hydrological risk analysis of the solimões river using extreme value theory

The Brazilian hydrography is made by naturally navigable rivers that, in most cases, are the only transport means between many villages located by their margins. It occurs in particular in Amazonas (Brazil), where large distances and adverse natural conditions, make difficult the use of other transportation types, whose implantation and use are too onerous. Rivers are crucial not only for transporting large cargoes through large distances, they are also important to the local and international commerce, making viable the offer of products with competitive prices. This work presents the study with extreme low levels of rivers at Amazon region. In this study, we consider specially Solimões River levels, because Solimões is very important in communicating regular lines of cargo and people fluvial transport between local villages. The use of the Extreme Value Theory to model these extreme low levels of the Solimões river is due to its adequacy and accuracy in estimating probabilities of occurring rare events.
Organisms as Persisters

This paper addresses the question of what organisms are and therefore what kinds of biological entities qualify as organisms. For some time now, the concept of organismality has been eclipsed by the notion of individuality. Biological individuals are those systems that are units of selection. I develop a conception of organismality that does not rely on evolutionary considerations, but instead draws on development and ecology. On this account, organismality and individuality can come apart. Organisms, in my view, are as Godfrey-Smith puts it “essentially persisters. ” I argue that persistence is underpinned by differentiation, integration, development, and the constitutive embeddedness of organisms in their worlds. I examine two marginal cases, the Portuguese Man O’ War and the honey bee colony, and show that both count as organisms in light of my analysis. Next, I examine the case of holobionts, hosts plus their microsymbionts, and argue that they can be counted as organisms even though they may not be biological individuals. Finally, I consider the question of whether other, less tightly integrated biological systems might also be treated as organisms.
Preparation, Characterization, and Antitumor Evaluation of Electrospun Resveratrol Loaded Nanofibers

Resveratrol has been reported as a potential antitumor agent for several years. The possible application was greatly hampered by its poor solubility. The current study reported the construction of electrospun Resveratrol loaded nanofibers with methoxypolyethylene glycol-poly(caprolactone) (mPEG-PCL) block copolymers as drug carriers. Characterization studies showed the successful encapsulation of Rsv in the nanofibers with an in vitro sustained release pattern. In vitro XTT assay suggested the superior cytotoxicity of Rsv-NFs with more apoptosis induction on cancer cells. Cells that exposed to Rsv-NFs showed less clonogenic ability when compared to the equivalent dose of free Rsv. In addition, the migration and invasion ability of cells were also significantly lower when treated with Rsv-NFs. In the in vivo study, local implantation of Rsv-NFs greatly increased the growth inhibitory effect compared to free Rsv. Therefore, results from the current study demonstrated a promising way to improve the antitumor effect of Rsv by nanofiber delivery.
Are the regional variations in Central American arc lavas due to differing basaltic versus peridotitic slab sources of fluids

Central American arc volcanism shows strong regional trends in lava chemistry that result from differing slab contributions to arc melting. However, the mechanism that transfers slab-derived trace elements into the mantle wedge remains largely unknown. By using a dynamic model for mantle flow and fluid release, we model the fate of three different slab-fluid sources: sediment, ocean crust, and serpentinized mantle. In the open subarc system, sediments lose almost all their highly fluid mobile elements by ∼50 km depth, so other fluid sources are necessary to explain the slab signal in arc-lava compositions. The well-documented transition from lavas with a strong geochemical slab signature (i.e., high Ba/La ratios) found in Nicaragua to lavas with a weaker slab signature (i.e., low Ba/La ratios) erupted in Costa Rica seems easiest to produce by a higher fraction of serpentine-hosted fluids released from the deeply faulted, highly serpentinized lithosphere subducting beneath Nicaragua than from the less deeply faulted, thicker, amphibolitic oceanic-crust and oceanic-plateau lithosphere subducting beneath Costa Rica.
Migration Theories and Mental Health in Toni Morrison's Jazz

This article aims to elaborate the relationship between migration and mental health problems that are evident in migrant women in Toni Morrison's Jazz (1992). To this end, pre-migration, migration and post-migration stress factors are identified in the novel based on Danish Bhugra's theory of migration. It seems that pre-migration stress factors and traumas are associated with the push theory of migration, while post-migration stresses are associated with the pull theory of migration. Despite post-migration stresses, the main female characters who encounter pre-migration stress factors and traumas are more likely to develop mental health problems like Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Although there is extensive literary criticism of Jazz (1992), no theoretical criticism exists that simultaneously covers migration theories and the mental health problems evident in Toni Morrison's female characters. It is worth highlighting that gender is a variable that correlates positively with migration and mental health. This article attempts to fill a gap in literary criticism and contribute to the body of research on mental health problems associated with gender and migration. Keywords: Push-Pull Theory, Great Migration, Black Studies, Gender, Trauma, PTSD
Metamorphic evolution of high-pressure Quartz Schists in the Chadegan metamorphic complex, Sanandaj-Sirjan zone, Iran

The Chadegan metamorphic complex is a WNW-ESE- trending antiformal structure located in Sanandaj-Sirjan structural zone, Iran.The inner core of the structure is made of orthogneiss, containing eclogitic lenses. Schists and marbles lie structurally above theorthogneiss and crop out in the external limbs of the antiformal dome. Two main deformational episodes have been documented in theschists and marbles. The first episode (D1 phase) produced S1 foliation, whereas the second episode (D2 phase) produced a penetrativeS2 axial plane foliation, F2 folds, and a mylonitic fabric. Relicts of a high-pressure metamorphic mineral assemblage (M1) (phengite+garnet + sodic-calcic amphibole) have been documented along S1 foliation. A later amphibolite-facies metamorphism (M2) occurredduring D2 deformation phase. P-T estimates for M1 stage give an average pressure of 1.6 GPa and an average temperature of 550 °C,whereas M2 stage has been constrained at P = 0.34 – 0.48 GPa and T = 508 - 575 °C. D1 deformation phase and the associated highpressuremetamorphic assemblage (M1 stage), documented in the Chadegan complex, were formed during the subduction stage, whilethe D2 deformation phase and M2 metamorphic blastesis were recorded during the exhumation stage; probably they occurred beforethe end of Cretaceous.
Major changes in glacial and Holocene terrestrial temperatures and sources of organic carbon recorded in the Amazon fan by tetraether lipids

The Amazon basin is a major component of the global carbon and hydrological cycles, a significant natural source of methane, and home to remarkable biodiversity and endemism. Reconstructing past climate changes in the Amazon basin is important for a better understanding of the effect of such changes on these critical functions of the basin. Using a novel biomarker proxy, based on the membrane lipids of soil bacteria with a new regional calibration, we present a reconstruction of changes in mean annual air temperatures for the Amazon catchment during the last 37 kyr B.P. Biomarkers were extracted from Ocean Drilling Program sediment core ODP942 recovered from the Amazon fan. The Amazon fan is a major depository for terrestrial sediments, with the advantage that the terrestrial material captured reflects a regional integration of the whole river catchment. The reconstructed tropical Amazonian temperatures were ∼5°C cooler at the Last Glacial Maximum (∼21°C) compared to modern values (∼26°C). This is in agreement with previous estimates of tropical continental temperatures in the tropical Amazon basin and tropical Africa during the Last Glacial Maximum. Moreover, we also illustrate how the soil bacterial membrane lipid record reveals major changes in basin dynamics and sediment provenance during the glacial‐Holocene transition, impacting the biomarker reconstructions from ∼11 kyr onward.
Can Public Policy Affect Private School Cream-Skimming? Occasional Paper.

Abstract We investigate how key school and community characteristics interact with the characteristics of individual students and families in determining the enrollment patterns in public and private schools. Using unique, nationally-representative, individual-level data, we find evidence that a number of factors plausibly influenced by public policy (e.g., school-district concentration, student-teacher ratios, and local violent crime rates) have powerful effects on the composition of public and private schools.
Some inequalities for Garvan's bicrank function of 2-colored partitions

In order to provide a unified combinatorial interpretation of congruences modulo $5$ for 2-colored partition functions, Garvan introduced a bicrank statistic in terms of weighted vector partitions. In this paper, we obtain some inequalities between the bicrank counts $M^{*}(r,m,n)$ for $m=2$, $3$ and $4$ via their asymptotic formulas and some $q$-series techniques. These inequalities are parallel to Andrews and Lewis' results on the rank and crank counts for ordinary partitions.
Time and Economic Well-Being: A Panel Analysis of Desired Versus Actual Working Hours

Individual well-being has its resources by income and time. Though income traditionally is on the focuses of well-being analyses, the connected time dimension is often neglected. One important dimension of individual welfare regarding time and income is the possibility to harmonize desired with actual working hours connected with the income dimension. This paper will analyze this working hour tension by a ten year panel analysis for Germany. Besides descriptive measures of the subjective tension over a decade from the mid 1980s to the mid 1990s, the panel econometric analyses will quantify personal and household influences in explaining the working hour tension as one further important economic well-being measure. Copyright 2002 by The International Association for Research in Income and Wealth.
Abstract. The findings of randomized clinical trials (RCTs) regarding the efficacy of adjuvant conventional oral systemic chemotherapy (COSC) for patients with hepatocellular carci-

The findings of randomized clinical trials (RCTs) regarding the efficacy of adjuvant conventional oral systemic chemotherapy (COSC) for patients with hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) following curative hepatic resection (HR) are contradictory. Therefore, a systematic review of RCTs is required to evaluate the clinical efficacy of adjuvant COSC. Sources such as Medline, Embase and the Cochrane Library were systematically searched and all the RCTs comparing curative HR alone to HR plus COSC for HCC were identified. The odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were calculated. No treatment‐related mortality was reported by the included RCTs and the adverse effects of COSC were generally mild. However, adjuvant COSC did not achieve a statistically significant improvement in the 1‐, 3‐ and 5‐year overall survival (OR=1.43, 95% CI: 0.58‐3.56, P=0.44; OR=1.39, 95% CI: 0.75‐2.55, P=0.29; and OR=1.20, 95% CI: 0.46‐3.16, P=0.71, respectively). In addition, adjuvant COSC did not achieve a statistically significant decrease in the incidence of 1‐, 3‐ and 5‐year tumor recurrence, with pooled ORs of 0.92 (95% CI: 0.26‐1.35, P=0.66); 0.82 (95% CI: 0.66‐1.01, P=0.06); and 0.84 (95% CI: 0.71‐1.01, P=0.06), respectively. Narrative reviews offer no evidence supporting the use of COSC. Adjuvant COSC has provided marginal benefits for HCC patients following curative HR. Considering the efficacy of sorafenib for advanced HCC and the results of this systematic review, no further trials should be performed to assess the efficacy of adjuvant COSC.
Social parasitism by honeybee workers (Apis mellifera capensis Escholtz): host finding and resistance of hybrid host colonies

We studied possible host finding and resistance mechanisms of host colonies in the context of social parasitism by Cape honeybee (Apis mellifera capensis) workers. Workers often join neighboring colonies by drifting, but long-range drifting (dispersal) to colonies far away from the maternal nests also rarely occurs. We tested the impact of queenstate and taxon of mother and host colonies on drifting and dispersing of workers and on the hosting of these workers in A. m. capensis, A. m. scutellata, and their natural hybrids. Workers were paint-marked according to colony and reintroduced into their queenright or queenless mother colonies. After 10 days, 579 out of 12,034 labeled workers were recaptured in foreign colonies. We found that drifting and dispersing represent different behaviors, which were differently affected by taxon and queenstate of both mother and host colonies. Hybrid workers drifted more often than A. m. capensis and A. m. scutellata. However, A. m. capensis workers dispersed more often than A. m. scutellata and the hybrids combined, and A. m. scutellata workers also dispersed more frequently than the hybrids. Dispersers from queenright A. m. capensis colonies were more often found in queenless host colonies and vice versa, indicating active host searching and/or a queenstate-discriminating guarding mechanism. Our data show that A. m. capensis workers disperse significantly more often than other races of A. mellifera, suggesting that dispersing represents a host finding mechanism. The lack of dispersal in hybrids and different hosting mechanisms of foreign workers by hybrid colonies may also be responsible for the stability of the natural hybrid zone between A. m. capensis and A. m. scutellata. Key words: Apis mellifera capensis, Apis mellifera scutellata, honeybee, host finding, hybrids, social parasitism. [Behav Ecol 12:419–428 (2001)]
A TALE OF INCOME AND ENERGY IN RURAL AREAS: WHAT CONTRIBUTES TO PEOPLE’S HAPPINESS? EVIDENCE FROM EASTERN INDONESIA

Cash transfers and energy subsidies are two striking programs of the Indonesian government to improve the welfare of poor people. These programs have been in effect for years and altered over time. However, it is unclear that the alterations end up having utility at least at the same level as pre-alteration level. Without a good knowledge on the relative importance of the programs, one may find difficulties in assessing the utility level before and after the alteration. To my knowledge this is the first study to describe the relative importance of income and energy spending where the change may be affected by cash transfers and energy subsidies. The relative importance is anchored at the individual’s happiness level as the proxy of the utility level. This study relies on a survey covering 345 respondents residing in rural areas of North Sulawesi Province, Indonesia and cross-section regression models. The findings suggest that every rupiah spent on energy has bigger impacts on happiness improvement than every rupiah received as income. Programs that increase energy consumption may be more important than programs that boost income of people living in rural areas where most poor people are located. Therefore, alteration in one program that can create loss in utility must be compensated by another program that can create gain in utility at least at equal amount, otherwise the alteration is not a pro-poor.
Somatic embryogenesis and plant regeneration of recalcitrant cottons ( Gossypium hirsutum )

Many restrictive factors still remain in cotton tissue culture such as long duration, unpredictability and a high degree of genotype dependence. The main objective of this study was to develop a protocol allowing consistent somatic embryogenesis and plant regeneration from five recalcitrant cotton cultivars. Our results showed that the best medium for calli induction is MSB (MS medium + vitamine B5) supplemented with indolebutyric acid (IBA, 0.1 mg.l-1), kinetin (KIN, 0.1 mg.l-1) and 2,4- dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D, 0.1 mg.l-1). Embryogenic calli of all the five genotypes used were successfully from MSB medium supplemented with IBA (0.3 mg.l-1) and KIN (0.05 mg.l-1). Somatic embryos and transformation of somatic embryos into plants were successfully induced on MSB medium supplemented with ½×NH4NO3 (825 mg.l-1), 2×KNO3 (3800 mg.l-1), glutamine (2.0 g/l) and asparagines (0.5 g/l). The protocol developed in this study for cotton plant regeneration could be shortened to 4 - 5 months. Furthermore, the firstly-obtained regenerated plants of above five cultivars will broaden the range of genotypes for in vitro manipulation for cotton improvement.