Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Digital technology diffusion

Insufficient diffusion of new technologies has been quoted as one possible reason for weak productivity performance over the past two decades (Andrews et al., 2016). This paper uses a novel data set of digital technology usage covering 25 industries in 25 European countries over the 2010-16 period to explore the drivers of digital adoption across two broad sets of digital technologies by firms, cloud computing and back or front office integration. The focus is on structural and policy factors affecting firms’ capabilities and incentives to adopt -- including the availability of enabling infrastructures (such as high-speed broadband internet), managerial quality and workers skills, and product, labour and financial market settings. We identify the effects of structural and policy factors based on the difference-in-difference approach pioneered by Rajan and Zingales (1998) and show that a number of these factors are statistically and economically significant for technology adoption. Specifically, we find strong support for the hypothesis that low managerial quality, lack of ICT skills and poor matching of workers to jobs curb digital technology adoption and hence the rate of diffusion. Similarly our evidence suggests that policies affecting market incentives are important for adoption, especially those relevant for market access, competition and efficient reallocation of labour and capital. Finally, we show that there are important complementarities between the two sets of factors, with market incentives reinforcing the positive effects of enhancements in firm capabilities on adoption of digital technologies
Seasonal sedimentation of organic matter and contaminants in the Gulf of Finland

The levels of organic contaminants were analyzed in the accumulating material of the Gulf of Finland from April to October in 1996. Settling particles were collected at two locations: GF2 (open sea), and Schepelev (Neva Bay). The contaminants included in the study were: PCBs (7 congeners), DDT and its metabolites, HCHs, chlordanes, transnonachlor, and HCB. Sedimentation of total oil and total organic halogens (EOX) was also quantified. The average fluxes of the chemicals were calculated, and the total sedimentation to the whole Gulf of Finland accumulation areas were extrapolated from the flux values obtained for one open sea station. The sedimentation of total particulate carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus was also measured. The contribution of phytoplankton carbon (PPC) and other biogenic material to the total settled carbon was estimated. The sedimentation of the compounds was most intense during the times of increased dry matter accumulation. During the spring, diatoms were dominant in the settled material and phytoplankton comprised about 78% of total settled carbon. During the autumn, the effect of resuspension seemed important. The results from the trap at Schepelev indicated smaller fluxes of PCBs and DDTs than in the open Gulf, but the PCB concentration was high. With the exception of DDTs (90%), the Gulf of Finland was calculated to receive 1-9% of the reported total input of different contaminants to the Baltic Sea.
Financial Harmonization and Industrial Growth: Evidence from Europe

This paper analyzes the growth effects of the Financial Services Action Plan (FSAP) of the European Commission, a set of measures and directives that aim to harmonize European financial markets. Using a panel of 25 countries and 30 industries, we find that the standard specification predicts harmonization to lower growth, though the negative effect is mitigated for industries that depend more on external finance. We then show that this seemingly surprising result is due to omitted variable bias. We would expect early adopters to bear more of the costs and experience less of the benefits of harmonization. Once we control for the relative timing of adoption, harmonization is shown to have a positive effect on growth. This finding is robust to including further controls, splitting up the sample into different groups of countries, and extending the model to a dynamic setting.
CROSS CULTURAL ANALYSIS OF THE INFLUENCE OF HUMOR ON ORGANIZATIONAL DISSENT IN THE US, KOREA, JAPAN, AND CHINA Master’s Thesis

Surveys were used to explore the extent to which organizational dissent and humor differed between the United States, Japan, China, and Korea, and the influence of humor on organizational dissent in those nations. Results revealed nationality has significant differences effects on articulated dissent, latent dissent, and humor. Humor is positively correlated with latent dissent (r =.20, p < .01) among the entire sample, but not significantly correlated with articulated dissent (r = .02). Humor was positively correlated with both articulated dissent, and latent dissent in the Korea, the Japanese sample and the US sample. In the Chinese sample, humor was nonsignificantly correlated with articulated dissent and latent dissent.
Growth and gas exchanges of papaya tree seedlings grown on alternative substrates Crescimento e trocas gasosas de mudas de mamoeiro cultivadas em substratos alternativos

This study aimed at evaluating the morphophysiological development of papaya tree cultivars under different substrates, produced from mixtures of soil material with sources of organic matter. The experiment was conducted under greenhouse conditions. The experimental design was a randomized block, using a factorial 5 x 2 design with three replications, being five substrates with different sources of organic matter (S1 = 3 parts of soil and 1 of sand - without organic matter (control); S2 = 2 parts of soil, 1 of sand and 1 of cattle manure; S3 = 2 parts of soil, 1 of sand and 1 of sheep manure; S4 = 2 parts of soil, 1 of sand and 1 of chicken manure; S5 = 2 parts of soil, ½ of sand, ½ of cattle manure, ½ of sheep manure and ½ of chicken manure) and two cultivars of papaya tree (Sunrise Solo and Tainung-01). The addition of organic matter, regardless of the source, favored the growth, the dry matter accumulation and the gas exchange of the papaya tree seedlings. The best growth is obtained when using the substrate '3', particularly when it relates to the dry mass of shoot and to the Dickson Quality Index.
Curcumin: from exotic spice to modern anticancer drug.

Inhibition of defined molecular steps of tumourigenesis by natural non-toxic compounds may be an efficient means to tackle the population cancer burden. Extensive research has addressed the chemotherapeutic potential of curcumin (diferuloylmethane), a relatively nontoxic plant derived polyphenol. Curcumin is used for centuries in cuisine and indigenous medicine against several major human diseases. Cancer is the second leading cause of death worldwide. Disruption of a proper regulation of cell proliferation can ultimately cause cancer. Most human malignancies are driven by chromosomal translocations or other genetic alterations that directly affect the function of critical cell cycle proteins such as cyclins as well as tumor suppressors, e.g., p53. In this regard, curcumin, the yellow pigment of the spice turmeric, has been reported to have immense potentialility for being used in cancer chemotherapy because of its control over the cell growth regulatory mechanisms and for its anti-inflammatory, anti-toxic and anti-oxidative properties. Increasingly reports are showing that curcumin can induce apoptosis in a wide variety of cancer cells. The mechanisms implicated in the inhibition of tumorigenesis by curcumin are diverse and seem to involve a combination of cell signalling pathways at multiple levels. When curcumin is combined with some cytotoxic drugs or certain other diet-derived polyphenols, synergistic effects have been demonstrated. Taken together, this review seeks to summarise the unique properties of curcumin that may be exploited for successful clinical cancer prevention.
A protocol for rapid identification of Brenneria nigrifluens among bacteria isolated from bark cankers in Persian walnut plants.

A protocol based on API 20E, REP-PCR or Biolog analyses is described for rapid and reliable identification of Brenneria nigrifluens among the bacteria isolated from bark cankers in walnut plants. Bacteria that are soluble in 3% KOH solution (Gram negative), oxidase negative and with oxidative (O) and fermentative (F) metabolism are subjected to API 20E, REP-PCR or Biolog analyses. Isolates that generate a 7-digit code = 0005773 in the API 20E system, a REP-PCR fingerprint or Biolog profile very similar (87-100%) to those of the B. nigrifluens reference strains are assigned to this bacterial species. Using the protocol, we identified 4 isolates of B. nigrifluens among the 28 gram negative isolates (14 with O/F and 14 with O metabolism) obtained from bark cankers in walnut plantations on 10 farms in Central Italy. Among the other ten O/F isolates, only 2, assigned to Pectobacterium chrysanthemi, were identified with reliability by Biolog analysis. This analysis also permits identification of isolates with O metabolism. A pathogenicity test performed on walnut plants revealed that only the 4 B. nigrifluens isolates provoked bark canker symptoms 3 months after the inoculation. We also found that one isolate of four and the type strain (LMG 2694T) of B. nigrifluens are urease negative, when determined in Dye’s medium. Since our data are in contrast with those previously reported, this phenotypic character needs further verification for B. nigrifluens identification.
Physical Modeling of Microtubules Network

Microtubules (MT) are highly dynamic tubulin polymers that are involved in many cellular processes such as mitosis, intracellular cell organization and vesicular transport. Nevertheless, the modeling of cytoskeleton and MT dynamics based on physical properties is difficult to achieve. Using the Euler-Bernoulli beam theory, we propose to model the rigidity of microtubules on a physical basis using forces, mass and acceleration. In addition, we link microtubules growth and shrinkage to the presence of molecules (e.g. GTP-tubulin) in the cytosol. The overall model enables linking cytosol to microtubules dynamics in a constant state space thus allowing usage of data assimilation techniques.
Skyrme density functional description of the double magic 
Ni78
 nucleus

We calculate the single particle spectrum of the double magic nucleus $^{78}$Ni in a Hartree-Fock approach using the Skyrme density-dependent effective interaction containing central, spin-orbit and tensor parts. We show that the tensor part has an important effect on the spin-orbit splitting of the proton $1f$ orbit which may explain the survival of magicity so far from the stability valley. We confirm the inversion of the $1f5/2$ and $2p3/2$ levels at the neutron number 48 in the Ni isotopic chain expected from previous Monte Carlo shell model calculations and supported by experimental observation.
Capital Structure and Profitability of Nigerian Quoted Firms: The Agency Cost Theory Perspective

This work examined capital structure and profitability of the Nigerian listed firms from the Agency Cost Theory perspective with a sample of seventy (70) out of population of two hundred and forty-five firms listed on the Nigerian change (NSE) for a period of ten (10) years: 2000 - 2009 with the aid of the NSE Fact Book covering the period under review. Panel data for the firms are generated and analyzed using fixed-effects , random-effects and Hausman Chi Square estimations. Two independent variables which served as surrogate for capital structure were used in the study: debt ratio , DR and EQT while profitability as the only dependent variable. The result show that DR is negatively related with PROF, the only dependent variable but EQT is directly related with PROF. The study by these findings, indicate consistency with prior empirical studies and provide evidence against the Agency Cost Theory.
Modelling of starch industry wastewater microfiltration parameters by neural network

Artificial neural network (ANN) simulation is used to predict the dynamic change of permeate flux during wheat starch industry wastewater microfiltration with and without static turbulence promoter. The experimental program spans range of a sedimentation times from 2 to 4 h, for feed flow rates 50 to 150 L/h, at transmembrane pressures covering the range of 1x10^5 to 3x10^5 Pa. ANN predictions of the wastewater microfiltration are compared with experimental results obtained using two different set of microfiltration experiments, with and without static turbulence promoter. The effects of the training algorithm, neural network architectures on the ANN performance are discussed. For the most of the cases considered, the ANN proved to be an adequate interpolation tool, where an excellent prediction was obtained using automated Bayesian regularization as training algorithm. The optimal ANN architecture was determined as 4-10-1 with hyperbolic tangent sigmoid transfer function transfer function for hidden and output layers. The error distributions of data revealed that experimental results are in very good agreement with computed ones with only 2% data points had absolute relative error greater than 20% for the microfiltration without static turbulence promoter whereas for the microfiltration with static turbulence promoter it was 1%. The contribution of filtration time variable to flux values provided by ANNs was determined in an important level at the range of 52-66% due to increased membrane fouling by the time. In the case of microfiltration with static turbulence promoter, relative importance of transmembrane pressure and feed flow rate increased for about 30%.
Resource-Based View and Critical Success Factors: A Study on Small and Medium Sized Contracting Enterprises (SMCEs) in Malaysia

Abstract This article reviews the resource-based view theory and factors relating to the performance of small and medium sized contracting enterprises (SMCEs) in Malaysia. The strength of this theory lies in its ability to explain the usefulness of the firm’s resources to its performance. By using multiple regression, this study proposes empirically that SMCEs should place greater emphasis on managerial capabilities in finance, project, and marketing and supplier relationships in order to enhance company performance. However, unique to this industry, the research found that owner/manager characteristics are not significant factors in explaining firm performance. The findings of the research provide evidence that the survival of the firm relies greatly on its main resources, i.e. effective and efficient managerial capabilities, to formulate strategies in order to achieve sustainable competitive advantage in the industry.
The Accounting Variables’ Ability in Explaining the Volatility of Stock's Price: The Case of Amman Stock Exchange

This study aims at identifying the ability of some accounting variables which are (dividend Payout ratio, dividend yield, market value, net income volatility, debt ratio, and the company’s assets Growth) of explaining the volatility of stock’s price of the industrial companies listed in Amman Stock Exchange during the years 2001 to 2010. To achieve the study’s objectives, the researchers reviewed the annual reports of the public companies listed in Amman Stock Exchange, and also reviewed the Amman Stock Exchange’s statistical bulletins for the years 2001-2010 to get the accounting variables and to get the stocks’ closing prices. The sample of the study consisted of (64) industrial companies. To test the hypotheses of the study, the multiple regression model was used to test the independent variables’ ability in explaining the variance in the dependent variable (Volatility in stock price). The study concluded that the accounting variables (dividend Payout ratio, dividend yield, market value, net income volatility, debt ratio, and the company’s assets Growth) explained (3.8%) of the volatility in stock price while (96.2%) of the volatility in stock price referred to other reasons. The results of the study also showed that there was an important weak correlation between ratios of dividend Payout ratio and between volatility in stock price and this relation explained (1.2%) of the changes in volatility in stock price . Finally, the results indicated lack of significant correlation between the other accounting variables and the volatility in the stock prices explaining (2.6%) of the volatility in the stock prices. Key words : accounting variables, volatility in the stock prices, industrial companies, Amman stock Exchange.
Why many children are still out of school

The main purpose of this paper was to present a causal mechanism that would explain the phenomenon behind dropout among primary students. Using a Time Series design, the study analysed a nine-year series of multivariate data using advanced methodological methods such as factorial analysis, regression analysis, anomalous detection and path analysis the study specifically tried to identify relationships among and the variables and determine which factors are directly or indirectly linked to dropout. Results of the analyses showed that child labor was the strongest determinant of dropout while indirect factors were primary completion, enrolment, employment and government expenditure. Although GDP was not found to be a strong factor it appeared to have a direct impact on the other variables that influenced dropout. This may therefore imply that low economy could be the unseen phantom behind dropout radiating to an array of other factors. Child labor may just be an outward manifestation of a serious economic problem which, if not resolved could lead more children to the periphery; joining the ranks of child labor instead of learning inside the classroom.
EU Democracy promotion : policy Change in Morocco and Tunisia after the Arab Spring

As the Arab Spring changed the outlook of European Union’s neighbourhood in the Southern Mediterranean, a new basis for democracy development arose. To display how the European Union dealt with democracy promotion before and after the Arab Spring, this paper is aimed at identifying a policy shift of EU’s Democracy Promotion policies in Tunisia and Morocco. A qualitative content analysis is used to check whether there has been a change on the variable EU Democracy Promotion over time. Therefore, the study is a reconstruction of EU’s democracy promotion policies from 2005 until 2014. A categorization of policies set-out is made according to strategies of democracy promotion identified by Lavenex & Schimmelfennig (2011). The classification of policies to the strategies proposed, namely linkage, leverage and the governance model of democracy promotion displays the direction and approach used by the EU before and after the Arab Spring. As a result, a possible change from one to another strategy can be related to specific moments in time. At the end, this study displays that a change of democracy promotion occurred and monitors which strategy has been used before and after the Arab Spring.
The Determinants of Capital Structure Choice: A Survey of European Firms

We survey managers of firms in seventeen European countries on their capital structure choice and its determinants. Our main objective is to explore the link between theory and practice of capital structure. Preliminary analysis of the survey shows some interesting findings. Financial flexibility, credit rating and tax advantage of debt are the most important factors influencing the debt policy while the earnings per share dilution is the most important concern in issuing equity. Evidence also supports that the level of interest rate and the share price are important considerations in selecting the timing of the debt and equity issues respectively. Hedging consideration are the primary factors influencing the selection of the maturity of debt or when raising capital abroad. We also propose to compare the responses of European managers with those of the U.S. in Graham and Harvey (2001) as well as across countries based on the English, French, German and Scandinavian law. This analysis would be completed by March 2002.
Necrotic leaf removal, a key component of integrated management of Mycospaerella leaf spot diseases to improve the quality of banana: the case of Sigatoka disease

Introduction . Bananas are harvested at the green preclimacteric stage prior to sale. The time between harvest and the initiation of the natural ripening process is called green life. Black Leaf Streak Disease and Sigatoka Disease are the main foliar diseases affecting banana production. Sigatoka Disease (SD) is due to Mycosphaerella musicola , which frequently causes early ripening in commercial banana plantations, considered as an important source of damage. Our work aimed at determining the effectiveness of the removal of necrotic leaves, one month before harvest, on recovering banana quality arising from SD-infested plants. Materials and methods . Banana plants (totaling 80) at the flowering stage were selected in an experimental plot. These plants were divided into two groups of SD infestation levels: level 1 (Severity Index at flowering 25%). We divided each group into two treatments: a treatment with no necrotic leaf removal and a treatment with necrotic leaf removal. Fruits were harvested at the same physiological age, at 900 degree-days. Fruit quality was characterized by weight, diameter, % of ripe fruit in the field and fruit green life. Results . Our results showed that the removal of necrotic leaves causes a reduction in size parameters but leads to a strong reduction in SD effects on the fruit maturity, thereby preventing premature ripening. Banana plants whose necrotic leaves were removed produced fruit with a very long green life. Discussion . Removal of necrotic leaves allows thwarting the negative effect of SD on fruit physiology. This shows that the presence of necrosis during the last month of fruit growth is responsible for this fruit physiological modification characterized by early ripening. Conclusion . Removal of necrotic leaves one month before the date of harvest may be a technique that can limit production losses when the infestation level by SD is high.
Insights into survey errors of large scale educational achievement surveys

While educational achievement surveys revolutionised research on education cross-nationally, the surveys have been repeatedly subject of heated debate since first results were published. This paper reviews existing research examining the design and methodology of educational achievement surveys. Results are reported by allocating them to the specific survey error component of achievement estimates they address. Different error components from the design, collection, processing and analysis of survey data constitute the total survey error, which is an error difficult to quantify but important for assessing the overall accuracy of the surveysâ€™ achievement estimates. The review shows that there are many reasons to assume that the total survey error associated with countriesâ€™ educational achievement estimates is likely to be inflated by other errors besides the standard error reported by survey organisers. Given the policy relevance of the surveysâ€™ estimates, policy makers and the research community would greatly benefit from survey organisers providing more transparency on the different potential errors of educational achievement estimates. Without this information the debate about the fitness of educational achievement data for policy making is unlikely to dissolve.