Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
Biological Transmutation in Germination of Seeds

Laws under which biological reactions are taking place seem to be different from physical laws and these laws do not apply to laws of biological reactions. In the biological system nuclear reactions are taking place at low temperature as equal to room temperature withstanding by biological system to form required elements from the available elements within biological system. Green grams seeds and bengal gram seeds were germinated in the room temperature and at its atmosphere. Elemental analysis was done for control and germinated seeds with wet method by using optical emission spectrometry. Results shown that Na increased by 417%, Al by 125%, Cr by 400%, Mn by 71.43%, Fe by 28.89% and Zn increased by 13% where was among decreased elements in germinated seeds with respect to control seeds Mg decreased by 14.60%, P by 4.57%, K by 10.16%, Ca by 24.59% and Cu decreased by 17.65% in green gram germinated seeds and while in bengal gram germinated seeds P increased by 8.48%, K by 22.40% and Zn increased by 10%. Among decreased elements in the germinated seeds with respect to control seeds Na decreased by 13.03%, Mg by 42.57%, Al by 36.35%, Ca by 6.13%, Mn by 40%, Fe by 22.22% and Cu by 12.5%. Results among total of increasing and decreasing elements, 147% increased and 10% decreased in green gram germinated seeds and in bengal gram germinated seeds total of 20.48% (1692 ppm) increased and 23.23% (324 ppm) decreased.
Social Presence in the PhotoShare Tele-Application

Summative evaluations usually concentrate on efficiency and effectiveness. For tele-applications aiming at an informal, home environment however, social presence and satisfaction appear to be more appropriate criteria. We applied these concepts to the evaluation of the PhotoShare tele-application, an application that was developed at IPO for viewing photos (e.g. family or holiday snapshots) together while the presenter and the viewer are at different, remote locations.
Disinvestment, Lending Relationships and Executive Compensation

The analysis employs data on federal government-owned public enterprises (PSEs) since 1980s that encompasses the partial privatization programme to examine the likelihood of privatization. The results indicate that employment-intensive, high-paying but less profitable firms are more likely to be privatized. In terms of lending relationships, the analysis indicates that private banks are the main bank for small firms, and foreign banks are the main bank for large, established firms. State-owned banks are more likely to be associated with leveraged PSEs as compared to other bank groups. In terms of compensation policies in PSEs, the evidence testifies that bigger, established and leveraged PSE firms pay higher salaries.
A simulation study of thermospheric neutral winds over the MU radar

[1] The climatological thermospheric winds observed by the Shigaraki middle and upper atmosphere (MU) radar in East Asia are compared for the first time with simulation results from the National Center for Atmospheric Research Thermosphere-Ionosphere-Electrodynamics General Circulation Model (NCAR-TIEGCM). The comparisons show that the predicted meridional winds are in excellent agreement with the observations; their differences generally fall within 20 m/s except for the summer nighttime at high solar activity. A harmonic analysis of the observed and model meridional winds is carried out to extract the mean winds and the amplitudes and phases of diurnal, semidiurnal, and terdiurnal components. The model tidal waves are also in good agreement with the observed values except for the summer diurnal amplitude at high solar activity. Comparisons of the model electron densities with the radar observations suggest that the solar activity variation of the meridional winds can be mainly explained by the role of ion drag. Interestingly, the numerical simulations predict a feature not previously interpreted well: the diurnal amplitude and the mean wind depend nonlinearly on solar activity because the electron density saturates at high solar activity levels. It is further shown that both the observed and predicted diurnal phases remain almost stable at different solar activity levels, regardless of season.
On the development of a new nonhydrostatic atmospheric model in South Africa

With the advent of ever faster computers, the operational use of nonhydrostatic atmospheric models at resolutions beyond the hydrostatic limit has become a reality. A renewed global research effort is being made to formulate and improve nonhydrostatic models. In this paper, the status of numerical atmospheric model- ling research in South Africa is briefly reviewed. We then report on the development of a new, nonhydrostatic atmospheric model at the University of Pretoria. The dynamic kernel of the model is based on a novel, split semi-Lagrangian formulation of a set of quasi- elastic equations in a terrain-following vertical coordinate based on the full pressure field. The main features of the model dynamics and numerics are discussed, and it is noted that the governing equation set presented here has not been applied in atmospheric modelling before. The model may be used to perform state-of-the-art research in numerical model development, for instance, for the derivation of new equation sets, numerical techniques and vertical coordinate systems. The model's ability to simulate highly nonlinear and nonhydrostatic flow is illustrated by means of a convective bubble experiment, where an updraft interacts with vertical shear of the horizontal wind. This experiment illustrates the potential of the new model to be used in the study of thunderstorm dynamics.
Restoration of Biodiversity and Ecosystem

Succession is one of the most studied processes in ecology and succession theory provides strong predictability. However, few attempts have been made to influence the course of succession thereby testing the hypothesis that the passage of one stage is essential to enter a next one. At each stage of succession ecosystem processes may be affected by the diversity of species present, but there is little empirical evidence showing that plant species diversity may affect succession. The main objective in the present study is to test if there is any effect of plant species diversity on the functioning of artificially-created grassland communities. We were mostly interested in how successful is the sowing of meadow species into newly abandoned land and how long do the effect of initial sowing persist, how is affected the set of natural colonizers, which includes both the weed species and also the later successional species arriving naturally into the zone. One of the main questions concerning succession is to which extent the trajectory may be predictable or not. What will be the consequence of the different succession pathways for ecosystem processes, such as productivity and resource utilization, as well as species composition of both above and belowground communities? What will be the subsequent effects of feed back to vegetation development through initial manipulation of vegetation after land abandonment? And, finally, how general may results be when obtained in specific conditions? Our hypothesis is that an increase in the initial plant species diversity at the start of secondary succession enhances the amount of biomass produced and consequently stimulates the soil microbial biomass and the abundance of soil invertebrates. It has been suggested that changes in plant species diversity affect several ecosystem processes, such as primary productivity, nutrient retention and vegetation dynamics. A positive impact of species diversity on plant productivity has been explained by the complementarity of resource use among plant species or their functional groups.
The 28-day mortality prediction in sepsis patients using static lactate concentration and early lactate clearance: an observational study.

Sepsis causes high mortality and morbidity. Static lactate concentration and early lactate clearance are cited to be a predictor for sepsis survival. This study examined the clinical utility of static lactate concentration and early lactate clearance within the first six hours of admission in Emergency Department (ED) to predict 28-day mortality rate in sepsis patients. Patients who presented with sepsis, severe sepsis or septic shock and admitted to ED of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Medical Centre were recruited. Blood lactate concentrations were measured upon admission (H0), at 1st hour (H1) and 6th hour (H6), respectively. Either standard treatment of sepsis or early goal directed therapy was initiated according to sepsis severity. A follow-up report was conducted at 28 days via telephone call, e-mail or case notes. Patients were later classified into survivor and non-survivor as final outcome. Static lactate concentration appeared to be significantly higher for non-survivor as compared to the survival group at H0, H1 and H6 (p<0.05). The lactate clearance trend reflects no relationship between early lactate clearance and 28-day mortality. Static lactate concentration showed a superior predictor for sepsis over early lactate clearance. Although early lactate clearance was unable to prove its ability to predict 28-day mortality, our findings suggest it can be a useful tool to gauge the resuscitation outcome.
Exploring the affordances of WeChat for facilitating teaching, social and cognitive presence in semi-synchronous language exchange

This research is an exploratory study that evaluates the affordances of WeChat for the development of a community of inquiry (CoI) in semi-synchronous language exchange supported by WeChat.WeChat is an instant messenger that facilitates a multimodal environment in which interaction can happen synchronously, semi-synchronously and asynchronously through text, audio, video conferencing and a variety of pedagogically facilitating affordances. Differing from most existing studies in CoI, this research investigates all three presences in the CoI framework, that is, teaching, social, and cognitive presence, as they emerged in the language exchange between students of Mandarin Chinese and students of English. The findings from this research confirm the establishment of the three presences in CoI, but with features specific to WeChat-supported semi-synchronous language exchange. Recommendations for future research into CoI facilitated by WeChat are also put forward.
Prediction of internal egg quality characteristics and variable selection using regularization methods: ridge, LASSO and elastic net

Abstract. This study was conducted to determine the inner quality characteristics of eggs using external egg quality characteristics. The variables were selected in order to obtain the simplest model using ridge, LASSO and elastic net regularization methods. For this purpose, measurements of the internal and external characteristics of 117 Japanese quail eggs were made. Internal quality characteristics were egg yolk weight and albumen weight; external quality characteristics were egg width, egg length, egg weight, shape index and shell weight. An ordinary least square method was applied to the data. Ridge, LASSO and elastic net regularization methods were performed to remove the multicollinearity of the data. The regression estimating equations of the internal egg quality were significant for all methods (P<0.01). The goodness of fit of the regression estimating equations for egg yolk weight was 58.34, 59.17 and 59.11 % for the ridge, LASSO and elastic net methods, respectively. For egg albumen weight the goodness of fit of the regression estimating equations was 75.60 %, 75.94 % and 75.81 % for the respective ridge, LASSO and elastic net methods. It was revealed that LASSO, including two predictors for both egg yolk weight and egg albumen weight, was the best model with regard to high predictive accuracy.
The association between brand strength and the riskiness of a company

RESEARCH OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this thesis is to study whether brand strength affects the riskiness of a company. This association is examined from both market risk and business risk aspect. In addition to this, it is studied, if this association is dependent on whether the firm operates in consumer business or business-to-business market. The study contributes to existing literature as there is not much prior research done related to the topic, and as it the first one done using Finnish data. DATA AND METHODOLOGY: Brand Finance published 100 top Finnish brands in 2008. The brand strength data is obtained from their publications. The financial statement information needed to conduct the statistical analysis is obtained from Thomson One Banker database. The research question will be measured by conducting a statistical analysis using SPSS. The research methods include descriptive statistics, correlation analysis and multiple linear regression analysis. RESULTS: The multiple linear regression analysis was conducted separately for both market risk and business risk, and the test and control variables were added into the analysis in three blocks. No statistically significant association between brand strength and the riskiness of a company was found, nor gave the results any support on the assumption that this association is dependent on whether the firm operates in consumer business or business-to-business market.
The Impact of Consumer Ethnocentrism and Antecedents in an Emerging Market

In the era of globalization, consumers are being more exposed than ever before to varieties of foreign products from other countries. This leads to a substantial competition between international marketers to expand their business around the world. However, international marketers become more concerned to understand consumer attitudes toward foreign products before they make their market strategies. International marketing literature suggests that consumer ethnocentrism is an important factor in making the consumers adversely evaluate foreign products. This study aims to develop a model that can be used to assess the impact of consumer ethnocentrism and its antecedents on consumer purchase intention toward foreign products in an emergent market. All the hypotheses were developed based on the findings in the existing literature. Measures were adopted from prior researches. A self-administrated questionnaire was used via convenient and snowball-sampling techniques.
THE EFFECT OF DRIED POTATO POWDER WITH ENZYME SUPPLEMENTATION ON PERFORMANCE OF JAPANESE QUAIL (COTURNIX JAPONICA)

ABSTARCT This study was to investigate the effects of feeding dried potato powder with or without glucanases enzyme on performance of Japanese quail. A total of 192 fifteen days old quail chicks with an average weight of 40±50g were divided into 8 treatments with 3 replicates as experimental factorial design. The treatments were divided as basal diet with no enzyme and potato powder kept as control and for others 15 % potato with (0.5g/kg) or without glucanases enzyme, 30 % potato with (0.5g/kg) or without glucanases enzyme, 15 % potato with (0.5g/kg) or without glucanases enzyme were used respectively. The live body weight gains and feed consumption of birds were measured individually feed conversion efficiency were calculated weekly. At the end of the trial for investigating the effect of using tomato powder supplementation on performance of quails, 2 birds form each replicates were slaughtered and some blood samples were taken for blood parameters determination. Data showed that using of potato powder had decreased feed intake (p<0.05) compared to control so that quails with increasing consumption rates of potato had the lowest feed intake. Also data showed that with using glucanases they had lesser feed intake totally. These data showed that the highest body weight gain was for control group. Although quails were fed by potato had lesser body weight gain but also quails were fed by glucanases enzyme lead to better body weight gain none significantly. Observation of this study indicated that using cumulative levels of potato with glucanases enzyme didn’t significant changes on feed conversion ratio. As result was relevant from this study there were no significant differences between treatments about some carcass organs. Also using potato and glucanases lead to decrease breast meat weight. There were no significant effects about wings, drumstick, intestinal and gizzard weights between treatments. In conclusion potato powder with or without glucanases enzyme may be used as ingredient instead of corn in quail’s diet without harmful effect on performance of them.
Child Care Practices and Associated Factors among Women of Childbearing Age Attending Health Facilities in Dekina, North-Central, Nigeria

Child care practices have contributed immensely to decreased child mortality especially in developing nations. Investigation of child care practices and associated factors among women is necessary to provide insight into extent of adoption of maternal, newborn and child health strategies and suggest enhancement strategies where possible. This examines child care practices and associated factors among women in Dekina LGA, Kogi State. Cross-sectional survey research design was adopted for the study. The population of the study comprised 971 women of childbearing age accessing health services at health facilities in Dekina LGA, Kogi State, North-Central Nigeria. A sample of 384 women of child bearing age was selected through multi-stage sampling procedure. Well-completed 299 copies of the researcher-designed Women’s Child Care Practices and Associated Factors Questionnaire (WCCPAFQ), which comprised sections A, B and C was used for data collection. The reliability co-efficient of the instrument was determined using Split-half method and Spearman-Brown Correction Formula. The reliability co-efficient of the instrument was 0.65. Frequency and percentage, Spearman’s p (rho) rank Correlation Coefficients and logistic regressions were employed for data analyses. A logistic regression was run to investigate the relationship between the dependent and independent variables. Results showed that women moderately practised (57.5%), 51.9% of women perceived that the outlined factors affected child care practices while there was low relationship between outlined factors and child care practices among women (maternal age r = 0.11, p < 0.05; maternal education r = 0.10, p < 0.05). Independent variables of age [OR = 1.65, 95% (C. I: 0.56 - 4.88)] and maternal education [OR = 2.45, 95% (C. I: 1.01 - 5.94)] had significant influence on child health care practices. It was recommended that government; private organizations, Non-governmental Organizations (NGOs) and other stakeholders in the health sector should implement holistic programmes that will enhance women’s capacity to effectively and efficiently adopt integrated maternal, newborn child health survival strategies for quality child care practices. The general public should also be enlightened via health education programmes on the associated health risks of poor child care practices prevalent in many rural communities.
Sources of the Great Moderation: Shocks, Frictions, or Monetary Policy?

We study the sources of the Great Moderation by estimating a variety of medium-scale dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) models that incorporate regime switches in shock variances and the inflation target. The best-fit model—the one with two regimes in shock variances—gives quantitatively different dynamics compared with the benchmark constant-parameter model. Our estimates show that three kinds of shocks accounted for most of the Great Moderation and business-cycle fluctuations: capital depreciation shocks, neutral technology shocks, and wage markup shocks. In contrast to the existing literature, we find that changes in the inflation target or shocks in the investment-specific technology played little role in macroeconomic volatility. Moreover, our estimates indicate considerably fewer nominal rigidities than the literature suggests.
The Influence of Entrepreneurial Learning in New Firms' Performance: A Study in Costa Rica.

espanolLa creacion de nuevas firmas es importante para la economia. El aprendizaje emprendedor es fundamental para el desempeno de las nuevas firmas. Este articulo contribuye al conocimiento combinando los dos temas anteriores y considerando el papel que cumplen las empresas multinacionales (EIVIN) como fuentes de aprendizaje emprendedor. Este enfoque ha sido poco abordado en la literatura. El trabajo investigo el desempeno de un grupo de empresas de reciente creacion, formadas por exempleados de EMN y su relacion con el aprendizaje emprendedor en dichas empresas. El estudio se baso en una muestra de 175 exempleados de EMN en Costa Rica, que dejaron sus puestos de trabajo y formaron sus propias empresas entre los anos 2001-2007. Se trabajo con un grupo de control de firmas formadas en los mismos sectores y lapsos pero por personas que no fueron empleadas de EIVVN. Hallamos una correlacion positiva entre el aprendizaje emprendedor posterior a la creacion de la empresa y el desempeno. No asi entre el aprendizaje emprendedor previo y el desempeno. No hallamos diferencias significativas entre emprendedores por haber tenido experiencia en EIVVN. Esto deja planteadas preguntas interesantes para futuros trabajos. EnglishThe creation of new firms is important for the economy, and entrepreneurial learning is essential for the performance of new firms. We contribute to existing knowledge by combining these two topics and considering a third one: The role of multinational companies (MNCs) as a source of learning for the entrepreneur. This approach has rarely been taken in the literature. We investigated the performance of a group of young companies created by former employees of MNCs and their relationship with entrepreneurial learning in such companies. The study was based on a sample of 175 former employees of MNCs in Costa Rica, who founded their own firm between 2001 and 2007. The control group was formed in the same sectors and over the same time period, but contained people who were not former employees of MNCs. We found a positive linear relationship between post-start-up entrepreneurial learning and performance. No relationship was found between pre-start-up entrepreneurial learning and performance. We did not find significant differences in entrepreneurs with work
Mediterranean and Atlantic deep-sea fish assemblages: differences in biomass composition and size-related structure

Data obtained over a period of twenty years from 214 bottom trawls, towed on a single warp at depths between 402 and 1993 m in the western Mediterranean (Algerian and Balearic basins) and eastern North Atlantic (Rockall Trough and Porcupine Seabight), allowed a standardised comparison of density, biomass composition and size-related structure for both the whole fish fauna and for the most common species found within the deep-sea fish assemblages. All four areas are characterised by distinctly different and well-documented oceanographic conditions, biogeographical affinities and fishing exploitation. The results showed clear differences between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean deep-sea fish fauna, not only in density, species richness and composition, but also in the structure of the biomass that constitutes these assemblages. These differences are discussed in relation to environmental conditions and fishing pattern, which have determined the adaptive responses of both individual species and the whole ecosystem.