Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
The Determinants of Mortgage Interest Rates: An Empirical Analysis of the Euro Area Countries

Using the harmonised statistics of the Eurosystem, this paper focuses on the determinants of the fixed and variable mortgage interest rates applied to new transactions concluded by households resident in euro area countries in the period between 2003 and 2009. The econometric analyses show that of the various explanatory factors considered, the cost of deposits, the level of guarantees given, the intensity of the bank-customer relationship and the efficiency of the civil justice system appear to have the most influence on mortgage interest rates. Bank competitiveness does not appear to affect interest rates. There is no evidence that the financial crisis has generally led to the application of more stringent economic conditions to mortgages by the European banking industry. What does emerge is each country’s very different reaction to the crisis.
Immunofluorescence staining for the detection of immunoglobulins and complement (C3) in dogs with renal disease

Renal cortical biopsies from 74 dogs with different degrees of renal failure were studied by immunofluorescence to assess the frequency and extent of the deposition of immunoglobulins G, M and A (IgG, IgM, IgA) and complement C3. The dogs were divided into two groups on the basis of their clinical signs, and standard histological and electron microscopical examinations, according to whether their disease was an immune-mediated nephropathy (imn) or a non-immune-mediated nephropathy (nimn). In the dogs with an imn there was strong immunofluorescence due to IgG in the mesangium and the glomerular basement membrane and to IgM in the mesangium. The mechanism of immune complex trapping in the glomerulus also resulted in positive reactions to IgM in the dogs with an nimn.
Enhancing Students Higher Order Thinking Skill through Instagram based Flipped Classroom Learning Model

This study aims to describe the use of Instagrambased flipped classroom models in enhancing higher order thinking skills in buffer solution materials. Data were collected and analyzed using the pre-experiment technique while observation sheets were the instruments used. The research was made up of 38 Chemistry Education Study students. The results showed that on average student’s activities at home is in the excellent category, while their class activities are tagged good. The results of the posttest value analysis were higher than the pretest in the medium category. This means that there is an increase in higher order thinking skills after the implementation of an Instagram-based flipped classroom learning model. Keywords—higher order thinking skills; buffer solution; instagram-based flipped classroom model
Effect of Amino Acid Infusion on Central Thermoregulatory Control in Humans

BackgroundAdministration of protein or amino acids enhances thermogenesis, presumably by stimulating oxidative metabolism. However, hyperthermia results even when thermoregulatory responses are intact, suggesting that amino acids also alter central thermoregulatory control. Therefore, the authors tested the hypothesis that amino acid infusion increases the thermoregulatory set point. MethodsNine male volunteers each participated on 4 study days in randomized order: (1) intravenous amino acids infused at 4 kJ · kg−1 · h−1 for 2.5 h combined with skin-surface warming, (2) amino acid infusion combined with cutaneous cooling, (3) saline infusion combined with skin-surface warming, and (4) saline infusion combined with cutaneous cooling. ResultsAmino acid infusion increased resting core temperature by 0.3 ± 0.1°C (mean ± SD) and oxygen consumption by 18 ± 12%. Furthermore, amino acid infusion increased the calculated core temperature threshold (triggering core temperature at a designated mean skin temperature of 34°C) for active cutaneous vasodilation by 0.3 ± 0.3°C, for sweating by 0.2 ± 0.2°C, for thermoregulatory vasoconstriction by 0.3 ± 0.3°C, and for thermogenesis by 0.4 ± 0.5°C. Amino acid infusion did not alter the incremental response intensity (i.e., gain) of thermoregulatory defenses. ConclusionsAmino acid infusion increased the metabolic rate and the resting core temperature. However, amino acids also produced a synchronous increase in all major autonomic thermoregulatory defense thresholds; the increase in core temperature was identical to the set point increase, even in a cold environment with amble potential to dissipate heat. In subjects with intact thermoregulatory defenses, amino acid–induced hyperthermia seems to result from an increased set point rather than increased metabolic rate per se.
Development of toxicity values and exposure estimates for tetrabromobisphenol A: application in a margin of exposure assessment

Tetrabromobisphenol A (TBBPA) is used in a diverse array of products to improve fire safety. The National Toxicology Program (NTP) recently completed a 2‐year bioassay for TBBPA. The objective of the present study was to develop a cancer‐based and a non‐cancer based toxicity value and to compare such to appropriate estimates of human exposure. Data from the NTP 2‐year and 13‐week studies were selected to develop candidate toxicity values. Benchmark dose modeling and subsequent evaluation of candidate values resulted in selection of an oral reference dose (RfD) of 0.6 mg kg−1 day−1 based on uterine hyperplasia in rats and an oral cancer slope factor (OSF) of 0.00315 per mg kg−1 day−1 based on an increased incidence of uterine tumors in rats. Lifetime average daily dose (LADD) estimates ranged from 2.2 E−7 to 3.9 E−6 mg kg−1 day−1 based on age‐adjusted exposures to TBBPA via breast milk consumption, dietary intake, soil/dust ingestion and drinking water ingestion in infants, young children, older children and adults. Average daily dose (ADD) estimates ranged from 3.2 E −7 to 8.4 E−5 mg kg−1 day−1. Resulting margin of exposure (MOE) values were > 800 000 for non‐cancer endpoints and > 32 000 000 for cancer‐based endpoints. These data collectively indicate a low level of health concern associated with exposures to TBBPA based on current data. It is anticipated that the exposure estimates, along with the toxicity values described within, should be informative for understanding human health hazards associated with TBBPA. Copyright © 2015. The Authors. Journal of Applied Toxicology Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
Out and about:a sensory ethnographic study of therapeutic landscape experiences of people living with dementia in the wider community

Whilst ageing in place is considered important for a healthier and a better quality of life for older people, there is yet a dearth of evidence on how older people with dementia negotiate and experience the wider community. The aim of the present study is therefore to explore experiences of social and spatial engagement in the wider community for people living with dementia in order to advance understandings of how their interactions in and with community settings impact on their health and wellbeing. Drawing on the theoretical framework of therapeutic landscapes and a sensory ethnographic methodology, I provide social, embodied and symbolic accounts of people’s everyday experiences and pursuits of health and wellbeing within their neighbourhood and beyond. An in-depth examination of socio-spatial interactions of nine people with dementia, seven of whom participated with family carers, is conducted by use of innovative interview methods (including photo-elicitation and walking interviews), participant observations and participant ‘diaries’ (kept for a period of four weeks). The thesis presents three broad themes relating to participants’ interactions with and experiences of places beyond the home- the diverse and changing nature of people’s personal circumstances and conceptions of health and wellbeing; the interrelationship between people’s changing health needs, lifestyle choices and geographical area of activities and finally the social, physical and symbolic processes through which people maintain a sense of normality and stay connected. Together these themes illustrate the significance of a variety of places to the lives of people with dementia. The ‘shrinking world’ analogy associated with experiences of dementia is thereby considered through a more focused discussion on the active role people with dementia play in shaping their life worlds and their everyday interactions to meet their health and wellbeing needs. Further, by applying the concept of therapeutic landscape to experiences of people with dementia in the wider community, this thesis makes an important contribution to dementia research whilst also suggesting new directions for the therapeutic landscape scholarship.
Pain and fatigue in community-dwelling adults.

BACKGROUND Pain and fatigue are common debilitating symptoms reported by both patient and community-dwelling populations. However, population-based studies typically focus on psychosocial variables as correlates of fatigue, with little effort toward assessing pain as a risk factor. This study examines the specific relationship between pain and fatigue and the importance of mood and sleep as covariates of fatigue in a community-dwelling sample of adults. We also assessed the prevalence of mild, moderate, and severe fatigue for this sample. METHODS Data were collected using self-administered questionnaires assessing demographic characteristics and symptoms, including pain, fatigue, mood, and sleep disturbance, in a sample (N=274) of community-dwelling adults. RESULTS Regression analyses showed pain, mood, and sleep as significantly associated with fatigue, with pain being the most highly correlated. However, while pain accounted for the largest proportion of the variability in fatigue, mood modified the relationship between pain and fatigue. We also found that 9% of the sample reported no fatigue, 41% reported mild fatigue, 42% reported moderate fatigue, and 8% reported severe fatigue. CONCLUSIONS Our findings provide empirical support of the importance of assessing pain as an important risk factor of fatigue and examining mood as a covariate in population-based studies of fatigue.
Momentum Effect in Indian Stock Market: A Sectoral Study

Jegadeesh and Titman (1993) found that when stocks are ranked on the basis of their past returns, then past winners outperform the past loser in the medium-term period. They suggested a zero-investment trading strategy termed momentum trading strategy, consisting of taking long position in the winner portfolio and short position in the loser portfolio, to generate abnormal profit. In this article, we demonstrated that the momentum trading strategy is robust in Indian stock market over the period of 2000–2013. We evaluated a range of trading strategies over alternative backward-looking ranking periods and forward-looking holding horizons in some prominent industries in India and found strong presence of momentum returns in various industries. The same conclusion we have drawn about the market as a whole that provides evidence against weak form of market efficiency.
Poverty in India in the 1990s

This note corrects an inadvertent but key error in the authors' estimates of poverty for 1993-94 on the mixed reference period and presents the impact of the correction on the conclusions stated in their earlier papers. At the all-India level, except in respect of the number of urban poor, all the earlier results on the direction of change, namely, a clear and unambiguous decline in poverty in India in the 1990s, continue to hold good. However, the size of the decline in poverty between 1993-94 and 1999-2000, in terms of percentage change over the 1993-94 levels, is reduced by between 7 and 10 percentage points depending on the indicator and the population segment considered. Despite this, the average annual reduction in poverty was higher in the last six years of the 1990s than that recorded during the ten-and-a-half years preceding 1993-94.
Optical Detection of Partial Discharges on Insulator Strings of High-Voltage Transmission Lines

Leakage current detection is a promising method for measuring pollution levels on insulators of overhead transmission lines. This paper describes the development of a leakage current sensor based on a fiber-coupled light-emitting diode, as well as the development of a processing module that detects, stores, and classifies leakage current peaks that are directly related to partial discharges on the surface of the high-voltage insulators. The relative humidity is also detected and stored for further analysis. The processing module uses a PIC 16F877A microcontroller and can register the rate of partial discharges for two months on three different levels.
Novel optical system for in vitro quantification of full surface strain fields in small arteries: I. Theory and design

Recent advances in vascular biology and pathophysiology have revealed the need to understand better the genetic basis of arterial stiffness, disease progression and responses to clinical intervention. Towards this end, in vitro experiments on arteries from genetically modified mice promise to provide significantly increased insight into both health and disease. The need to test small arteries, often of complex shape, necessitates new methods for experimental arterial mechanics, however, ones that can provide information on local changes in geometry and strain. In this paper, we present a theoretical framework for a new panoramic digital image correlation-based method sufficient to collect such information and we demonstrate the utility of this approach via validation studies on phantoms having dimensions on the order of 500–1000 μm, similar to those of large mouse arteries. In particular, we show that placing the specimen within a conical mirror and imaging the specimen via a gimbal-mounted mirror using a single camera yields stereo information sufficient to quantify the size, shape and deformation along the full length and around the entire circumference of small arteries. In a companion paper, we show further that this approach can be implemented effectively while testing arteries within a physiological solution that maintains native biomechanical properties.
Monocyte‐Induced Endothelial Calcium Signaling Mediates Early Xenogeneic Endothelial Activation

Hallmarks of delayed xenograft rejection include monocyte infiltration, endothelial cell activation and disruption of the endothelial barrier. The monocyte is an important initiator of this type of rejection because monocytes accumulate within hours after xenografting and prior monocyte depletion suppresses the development of this type of rejection. However, the mechanisms that mediate monocyte‐induced xenograft injury are unclear at present. Here we report that human monocytes activate xenogeneic endothelial cells through calcium signals. Monocyte contact with porcine but not human endothelium leads to an endothelial calcium transient mediated via a G‐protein‐coupled receptor (GPCR) that results in up‐regulation of porcine VCAM‐1 and E‐selectin. Although human monocyte adhesion was greater to porcine than to human endothelium, especially when studied under laminar flow, blockade of the xeno‐specific endothelial calcium signals did not reduce adhesion of human monocytes to porcine endothelium. Human monocyte contact to porcine endothelium also resulted in reorganization of the F‐actin cytoskeleton with a concomitant increase in endothelial monolayer permeability. In contrast to the effect on adhesion, these changes appear to be regulated through endothelial calcium signals. Taken together, these data suggest that human monocytes are capable of activating xenogeneic endothelial cells through calcium transients, as well as other distinct pathways.
Between stressors and outcomes: can we simplify caregiving process variables?

Lawton, Kleban, Moss, Rovine & Glicksman's (1989) construction of caregiving appraisal is examined through a principal components analysis and varimax rotation of a data set based on in-depth quantitative interviews with 144 caregivers. Five caregiving appraisal dimensions were identified. Two dealt specifically with the provision of care: "task load caregiving" and "dysfunctional caregiving. " The remaining three were primarily concerned with social supportiveness: "intimacy and love," "social captivity," and "social distance. " "Dysfunctional caregiving" was the only type of appraisal that had significant bivariate relationships with poor mental health, low psychological well-being and subsequent institutionalization. A sixth dimension identified in this analysis, "inner strength and efficacy," represented psychological resources. Its independence from the appraisal measures supports Lawton et al.'s (1989) assumption that resources and appraisals can be measured separately. In contrast, social resources are better conceptualized as an integral part of caregiving appraisals.
Successions of phytobenthos species in a Mediterranean transitional water system: the importance of long term observations

The availability of quantitative long term datasets on the phytobenthic assemblages of the Mar Piccolo of Taranto (southern Italy, Mediterranean Sea), a lagoon like semi-enclosed coastal basin included in the Italian LTER network, enabled careful analysis of changes occurring in the structure of the community over about thirty years. The total number of taxa differed over the years. Thirteen non-indigenous species in total were found, their number varied over the years, reaching its highest value in 2017. The dominant taxa differed over the years. The number of species in each taxonomic division also varied. In addition to the centuries-old exploitation of its biotic resources, mainly molluscs, the basin has been subject for a long time to a range of anthropogenic driving forces linked to urbanisation, shipbuilding, agriculture and military activities, which have caused chemical and biological pollution, eutrophication and habitat destruction. It may therefore be assumed that these changes were closely related to human activities. Indeed, it was observed that the reduction of only one of these forces, i.e. urban sewage discharge, triggered the recovery of phytobenthos. Therefore, it may be assumed that if the anthropogenic pressure on the Mar Piccolo was eased, it could once again become the paradisiacal place it was held to be in ancient times.
Group II Introns: Structure and Catalytic Versatility of Large Natural Ribozymes

Group II introns are large, natural catalytic RNAs or ribozymes that were discovered in organelles of certain protists, fungi, algae, and plants and more recently also in prokaryotic organisms. In vitro, some members were found to self-splice from their pre-RNAs by two consecutive transesterification reactions joining the flanking exons and releasing the intron in a typical lariat form. Apart from self-splicing, a variety of other in vitro activities have been detected for group II introns demonstrating their amazing catalytic versatility. Group II introns fold into a conserved secondary structure consisting of six domains radiating from a central wheel that brings the 5′ and 3′ splice junction into close proximity. Domain 1 is the largest domain that is assumed to deliver the molecular scaffold assembling the intron in its active structure, while domain 5 is the phylogenetically most conserved part that represents the active site of the ribozyme. In vivo, the splicing reaction of many, if not all group II introns is assisted by proteins either encoded by the introns themselves (maturases), or encoded by other genes of the host organisms. The host proteins known to date have additional cellular functions and seem to have been adapted for splicing during evolution. Some of the protein-encoding group II introns were also shown to act as mobile genetic elements. They can integrate efficiently into intronless alleles of the same gene (homing) and at much lower frequencies into ectopic sites (transposition). The mobility process depends on intron encoded protein functions (endonuclease and reverse transcriptase) and on the intron RNA. This review provides a comprehensive survey of the structure/function relationships and the reaction potential of group II introns, the structurally most complicated, but also most fascinating ribozymes when looking at their catalytic repertoire in vitro and in vivo.
Star excursion balance training: effects on ankle functional stability after ankle sprain.

OBJECTIVES To study the effects of Star Excursion Balance training on functional stability of athletes with ankle sprain. MATERIAL AND METHOD Thirty-two male athletes with grade 2 ankle sprain, aged 15-22 years old were enrolled. They were random sampling into training group (n=15) and control group (n=17). All received conventional physical therapy program for 4 weeks. The training group also underwent the Star Excursion Balance training 3 days per week for 4 weeks. Single leg stance time (SLST) was assessed at pre- and post-training. Re-injuries were recorded during 3 months follow-up. RESULTS After the program, subjects from both groups demonstrated significant improvement in SLST The training group gained SLST of the injured sides 2 times more than the control group (p = 0.002 tested with eyes closed, p = 0. 007 tested with eyes open), and also improved the SLST during eyes closed of the normal sides (p = 0.015). Re-injuries were found in 1/15 of the training group and 2/17 of the control group. CONCLUSION Star Excursion Balance training is more effective than the conventional therapy program in improving functional stability of the sprained ankle.
Enteroinsular axis.

A physiological role for GIP as an insulinotropic hormone involved in the enteroinsular axis has been established and ingestion of glucose, fatty acids and certain amino acids will produce an increase in circulating IR-GIP levels. The insulinotropic action of GIP is glucose concentration dependent in normal animals. A role for GIP in NIDDM is equivocal although several studies have demonstrated elevated serum levels. Animal models have indicated a disturbance of GIP receptor function associated with hyperinsulinaemia, i.e. lowering of the minimum glucose concentration at which GIP is insulinotropic.
Liver T2-weighted MR imaging: comparison of fast and conventional half-Fourier single-shot turbo spin-echo, breath-hold turbo spin-echo, and respiratory-triggered turbo spin-echo sequences.

PURPOSE T2-weighted spin-echo (SE) magnetic resonance imaging in the liver was compared with four sequences: fast and conventional half-Fourier single-shot turbo SE (HASTE) and breath-hold and respiratory-triggered turbo SE. MATERIALS AND METHODS In 58 patients with focal liver lesions, imaging was performed with a 1.5-T magnet and a phased-array coil. Images obtained with fast HASTE conventional HASTE, breath-hold turbo SE, and respiratory-triggered turbo SE were compared. Results of quantitative, qualitative, and receiver operating characteristic analyses were compared. RESULTS Lesion-to-liver contrast for solid tumors was significantly higher with the fast HASTE and respiratory-triggered turbo SE sequences than with the conventional HASTE and breath-hold turbo SE sequences (P < .01) and for cystic lesions was significantly higher with the conventional and fast HASTE sequences than with the breath-hold or respiratory-triggered turbo SE sequences (P < .01). Artifacts were negligible on all fast and conventional HASTE images. In receiver operating characteristic analyses, diagnostic performance was significantly higher with the fast HASTE and respiratory-triggered turbo SE sequences than with the conventional HASTE and breath-hold turbo SE sequences (P < .01). CONCLUSION Images obtained with the fast HASTE sequence were free from motion artifacts, and observer diagnostic performance was similar to that with the respiratory-triggered turbo SE sequence.